The Mouth of Doom: Session 28
General Summary
The Forbidden Ward: An Enemy Within
Report Date
24 Apr 2021
As the Wrenjer’s continued investigating the Forbidden ward in the Mouth of Doom, each room they discovered seemed to weigh heavily on the pink mohawked cleric of the Menders. It was even affecting his spells. His usually bright pink Guidance was dimmed and flickered as if his heart wasn’t in it. While the others were investigating the room, Zetwuzadi tried to have the Mender open up. In the storage room they found a variety of valuable items and an old donation jar that the group takes but doesn’t count. Examining the plate of armor that had animated moments ago, they find it is radiating transmutation magic. Some wonder if the protector could be repurposed or given instructions; however they learned that it didn’t respond to either the paladin or the wizard. Te’Leyuura believes that it could be given a different task but it would require research and more time than they have at the moment. The location is noted on the map and they continue their search for something that could help cure the pestilence.
Before moving down the hall, Leofric’s grief stops him and the others fall back to help their companion in whichever way they can. The cleric has been a source of joy, always ready to share a story with his friends and as he brought his tear filled goggles off his face, it was clear that discovering a Mender’s ward tainted and desecrated was taking its toll. “[...]honor what they have done…” Vadim’s words reach through the grief and they all move to the next room.
From behind the northern door, Artem and Jarvis could hear the bubbling and slorping noise almost like something cooking in a cauldron. However, upon opening the door it revealed a large concentrated pool of pestilence. The glowing green goo was spilling slowly through a large crack in the stone across from the door. Just staring at the pestilence made their eyes blur. Zetwuzadi could sense the desecration and the goo itself radiates as if it was a demon. Te’Leyuura’s Detect Magic picked up a faint conjuration aura. At the far northeastern wall they could see a door and now had to figure out who and how they would enter the goo room.
After a brief discussion, the wizard sends her familiar into the room. As Sindragosa passes through the door they can see her in distress. They call her back and keep the flying snake away from the group. The paladin has been immune to the disease, so far, and is sent in with a rope around her waist and tied to her celestial bear in case she falls unconscious. When she passes through the doorway, she can feel the infectious particles as the air is thick with them. With the paladin in the room, they test the pestilence pool against Enya’s fire and it does blacken but as the fuel of the fire dies a fresh layer bubbles up. With the pool, they all rely on Zetwuzadi to investigate the room and the door. They can see the concentration on her face as she stares at the door. She had thought she heard noises and as the group readies themselves, she opens the door
Lying in wait was another plague zombie in Mender robes and some rats. The room was an office, with a desk and chair on the southern side and a chest against the eastern wall. As the zombie and rats attack, another creature joins the battle. It appears out of thin air and casts a spell. Zetwuzadi could see the small humanoid like fly with six limbs, a long needle nose and two bulbous eyes as she slipped in the grease they placed at her feet. She is attacked on the ground and as she stands, she informs the group of the stirge-like spellcasting creature. Unfortunately the creature turns invisible and leaves the office to fly over the pestilence. Artem slays the zombie and it explodes with the pestilence while Zetwuzadi turns her face from the cloud saying a prayer for the Mender. The fire druid moves up and brings her Wildfire Spirit into the room thick with pestilence, it feels the infection but does as Enya bids and teleports Zetwuzadi away from the door as it moves into the office.
Vadim, hearing that the creature went invisible, moves up and casts a spell allowing him to see the bug-like creature. He calls out to the paladin that the creature is three steps forward and two steps west, then falls back. Leofric, with Vadim’s directions, lights the creature up with Faerie Fire. With them finally able to see it, they recognize it as a pestilence demon. Hearing this, the wizard sighs and stops her hands mid motion to change her firebolt into magic missiles. Working together, the Wrenjers quickly eliminate the combatants, just in time as the creature seemed ready to send the pestilence out the door. They don’t believe this demon was summoned by the Menders. Relying on the paladin, they wait patiently and safely at the door while she moves to the office and does a quick once over. Making her way back to the group, they place Sindragosa into Jarvis’ bag and Te’Leyuura helps investigate the room through her familiar’s eyes.
They learn nothing more about the room that Zetwuzadi hadn’t discovered before. The chest looked to have been busted in by a mallet and is packed with gems and coins. The papers look to contain nothing of interest from a quick scan; however, the paladin still shoves them into the bag when Sindragosa reenters to pass through the contaminated room. Heading through the eastern door, outside of the goo room, it leads to a small hallway or antechamber that has two more doors off of it. The room itself looked to have once contained furniture but had been dragged out long ago.
Heading to the southern door, they stop and wait for the two experts to investigate and open the door. Within they can see an impressively large rat that looked to have gorged themselves on zombie Menders as parts of them were still strewn about the room. The stench in the room was almost as bad as the refuse room. Three enter the room to investigate while the rest stayed safely away from the smell and potential trouble. After finding nothing on the remnants of zombies, Artem falls back and shuts the door while Jarvis, with Zetwuzadi’s help, moves the rat’s body with Thorn Whip. Upon moving, the body explodes with a large amount of concentrated pestilence.
Before leaving the room, they take the cleansing stone and shed some of the pestilence. They then move onto the last door in the room. After determining the door safe to open, they find that it leads to an administrators room. The bedroom had a desk, side table with what looked to have been pictures of the occupants family--faded, a bed free of blood stains and a broken, empty chest. However, in the northern stone wall they find a secret closet that contains an altar to the Master. Upon it they find an offering and four scrolls. Three of them radiate abjuration magic and are Lesser Restoration (written in Abyssal) while the last one was a letter. "Jossel, if you plan on continuing your work with the Menders, the Grand Cornu suggests you take these." Te’Leyuura and Artem were both reading the scroll and upon reading ‘Cornu’ both were taken aback. All doubt that the servants of the Master hadn’t escaped Tsar were gone. The title of Grand Cornu is reserved for the voice of the Master, the one who the inaethri would give their orders too.
Discovering this secret side room they confirmed the suspicions that some of the residents of Tsar successfully escaped and that one of the Master’s clerics had infiltrated this group of Menders. Sensing how this would affect Leofric, Vadim softly sings of the Menders but not of the heroic endings but the middle bits. "Sometimes we have to mend through the darkness to get to the glory songs at the end of the battle.” With these words they move back to the air tight door off of the northern hallway.
The heavy, sealed door led to another hallway. Off of which were two surgical rooms with one skeleton missing a left hand post mortem. Whatever demon the saboteur had them summoned required all of the Menders pay with their left hand. Past these rooms and another door, they find a larger foyer. Two other doors were off this foyer and a larger staircase that headed up to an area they hadn’t investigated. Across the way, three zombies were hovering near a smaller pool of pestilence. Jarvis calls out to keep them away and casts Shatter on the group, while Enya uses her Wildfire Spirit to get the only one immune to the disease closer. Hearing the call to keep them away, Te’Leyuura lobs a Fireball at them making sure they couldn’t resist their destruction.
With the current threat eliminated they make their way up to the northern door. They didn’t want to go up the stairs for multiple reasons, one of which they could potentially contaminate an area of the dungeon that wasn’t infected. Past two doors, they find a room that looked to be a reading room off a larger chamber. At the far side, past a large congregation of pestilence, was a bookcase and an image of a hand on the wall. Zetwuzadi once again had to be the main investigator as she was immune to the disease. As she entered the room and climbed under a table, she could see the fountain in the other room, it was pouring pestilence and she could see other streams of the glowing green goo from the main concentration. After a small discussion of taking the books or not, they determine that although they are important they can’t help their current situation.
Knowing they need more information, they leave the pestilence wellspring for now and head back to the last door off the foyer. The room was small, with three alcoves that each had a different statue. The northern alcove and the largest contained a gargoyle statue, the side alcoves had a skeleton and a unicorn. Each of them radiated transmutation magic and on the wall, written in blood was “The Healer is false and will betray you.”
