Adventure Log, Session 6 The Old Orc Temple, Part 3
General Summary
The trio (and dog) are in the guard tower. A ladder goes up to the upper levels of the tower, and one goes down, into a dark hole. They go up. This was used as an observation room. There were two small rooms, alcoves now, with the doors long gone, both filled with a millennium of debris. The cultists apparently had moved most of the debris from the perimeter of the space, so their people could keep watch over the area. They then went up the ladder to the topmost floor, which the cultists/slavers were using as an observation tower. A large beam transected the ceiling, with marks in about the center where something might have hung. Bas reliefs found later, in the temple proper, indicate that a set of large chimes or tubular bells hung here, and were rung when sacrifices were being performed.
After checking the upper floors, they looked into the hole with the ladder going down. Taid cast Continual Light on the end of a torch (failing the first time, but succeeding the second), causing the end of the torch to emit light. Holding the light in the hole, and looking around, they saw a room filled with organic debris, and covered in mushrooms. Spores floated in the air, and it smelled musty. Elitheris noted that many of the mushrooms, most oversized, were edible. They went in, mainly to harvest the mushrooms, which netted them several meals worth of mushrooms. The ceiling in here used to be a dozen feet high, but the pile of debris, a lumpy, uneven mass of old roots, branches, leaf loam, and other, more questionable things, took up anywhere from three feet to eight feet of that space. Some of the mushrooms glowed in the dark, giving just about enough light to navigate the room by.
There were two openings, one on each side of the room. One was mostly blocked by a pile of debris, leaving only the topmost two feet of the opening. Eykit squirmed into it, sliding down the slope created by the debris pouring into the room through the opening. Like the vestibule next to it, it too was a mushroom garden. But there were also three giant centipedes, each three to four feet long, and orange and black in color. They sensed that Eykit was food, and swarmed to attack.
Here is a video on centipedes. Just for fun.
Two swarm onto him as Taid and Elitheris come sliding down into the room. Eykit tries to stab one of the centipedes on him with his shortsword. It glances off of the carapace. Elitheris, under attack herself by the third centipede, tries to stab it with her knife, but again, the attack glances off of the hard shell of the squirming beastie. Taid uses his halberd hook to get one of the centipedes off of Eykit, who (with reason) was a bit uncomfortable, given that the centipedes were trying to bite his face.
The hook maneuver wasn’t successful, so Taid grabbed one and slammed it into the ground. Elitheris kicked the one on her, sending it flying back. The fight turned into a close combat melee, mostly with a lot of grabbing and smashing, with the occasional kick to keep them off. Taid killed the first one, by repeatedly slamming it into the ground, then coming down onto it with a knee drop, pinning its writhing body to the ground, and clocking it with the butt of his halberd.
The second one was attacking Eykit, who had grabbed it near the head and was trying to stab it with his shortsword. Elitheris helped, grabbing it by its tail, and pulling on it. Eykit and Elitheris each had an end, with it stretched between them, its legs going a mile a minute to no avail. Taid’s halberd blade cut it in half.
The last one came after Elitheris, who kicked it away, but then it came after Eykit. He grabbed it, and Elitheris pinned it to the floor with her knife, killing it.
During the fight, they noticed that the centipedes’ toxicognaths (the front pair of legs that had evolved into mouthparts that injected a painful paralytic poison) were unable to bite through armor. Taid had gotten bitten in the face, but his Dwarven physiology shrugged off the effects of the paralytic, leaving him with a tingling face and a few minutes of severe pain. A bit of first aid stopped the small amount of blood that was leaking out of his face.
Looking around the room, they harvested the edible mushrooms, and found an old metal chest, with a lock long rusted into a lump. In it was a mace with a silver head (although the haft crumbled to dust as soon as it was disturbed) ; a pair of rusty throwing axe heads (they need some maintenance, but will be useful when they get new hafts) ; some old coins (18 Araterre Crowns, which might turn out to be collector’s items, and some old Orcish coinage, and a stack of old Dwarven coins). Eykit estimates that the old coins, not including the Araterre Crowns, could be worth between $500-1000. He won’t know until he can talk to his sources. He hasn’t a clue about the Crowns and how much they might be worth. But they are definitely historical, as the Kingdom of Araterre was the birthplace of King Gishi Tondene, the founder of the Tondene Empire. There is also a raccoon skull in there as well, and when Taid touches it, he realizes that it’s not only magical, but a large power stone (8 points). It’s also fragile.
They move to the third room, also filled with debris. More mushrooms, the edible ones get harvested. Eykit finds an old Elven rondel dagger, with Tengwar writing on the blade. “Maica Melehtë”, or Piercing Might, is what is written on the blade. With a little love and care, the weapon can be fixed up enough to use. The sheath is rotted away, however.
"Piercing Might", the Elven script written on the blade of the dagger
The fourth, and last room in this section, was the room with the least debris in it. Around the edges of the room could be seen the remains of cabinets and bins, crates, boxes, and barrels. There were also another pair of centipedes. These two were dispatched a bit more easily than the first three; Elitheris put a couple of arrows into them, and Taid managed to chop one nearly in half. They got some good, solid hits on them, but not before Eykit got his face bit. Pain shot through his face, and the tingling and numbness of his face came soon thereafter.
This room also had a metal box in it, with a functional lock. Eykit picked it, after a little time. Inside were two 2” crystal balls, enchanted to provide light at the moonlight level (they are enchanted with Continual Light, set at the dim glow "moonlight" level). Taid kept the metal box, putting the raccoon skull, padded with twine, in it.
They then went up to the top floor of the temple itself, finding a largish room with an altar in it. The altar was coated in dark stains. The walls of the room were covered in bas reliefs, a pictorial history of the town’s worship of Kruge, the earth god, called Haethalas by the Elves, Khuz’dun by the Dwarves, Pagiili Taavirl by the Goblins, and Grome by the Humans. It details that Gijak Balorat was a town that regularly sacrificed prisoners of war to their patron deity, to stave off earthquakes, floods, and bad harvests.
To the sides of the main altar room, were two narrow rooms. One appeared to be used for administration purposes: it had desks and chairs, with writing implements and parchment scraps on them. The other had a row of hooks on the wall, with manacles and chains hanging from them. There was also a brazier, a bin of root vegetables (yams and turnips, mainly), a barrel of water, and jars of tea leaves.
There was also a stairway down into the depths of the ziggurat. The drumming could be heard, as well as screams every 10-15 minutes. Like clockwork. Eykit also noticed another sound: footsteps, coming closer then moving away. Elitheris sneaked down the steps, to see if she could get a look at who it was that was down there. Her foot slipped, and she made a loud noise. Fortunately for her (as she scrambled back up the stairs and out of sight) the guard, an armored Dwarf, didn’t seem to notice, as he was doing something with his crossbow (that’s what happens when the guard crit fails his perception roll).
When he passed by, they went down the stairs. The landing seemed to be a common lounge area, with tables and chairs. But they didn’t get a chance to really take much of a look, because they could hear noise coming from the side opposite to where the Dwarf disappeared to. They ran around the corner, trying to stay out of sight, and open the door to what turns out to be a kitchen/dining hall area.
They enter, closing the door behind them.
They hatch a plan. When the guard goes by, Eykit will open the door, and Taid will grab him, dragging him into the room. Elitheris was ready with a knife. The guard goes by, a human, wearing linothorax armor.
Taid grabs him, pulling him into the room as Eykit closes the door and Elitheris slices at his throat. She cuts his neck bad, but it isn’t enough to kill him. It’s enough to make him gurgle instead of scream, however, and Taid punches him in the face with his free hand. Elitheris tries to stick her knife in the guy’s chin, but he struggles and she misses. She tries again, grabbing the poor guy’s head before plunging her dagger up under his chin, the blade coming out of his cheek. He stops moving.
Since that plan worked so well, they decided to try it on the Dwarf guard. This time, Elitheris got her bow ready, as she was better with a bow than a knife. She took position standing on one of the dining tables to get a better angle.
The Dwarf came by, Eykit opened the door, and Taid grabbed him and manhandled him into the room, tackling him to the floor face down. The guard’s spear went skittering away, but he attempted to go for his knife.
Elitheris loosed an arrow into his leg. Eykit hacked at the Dwarf’s arm with his shortsword. Mr. Wiggles went for his arm, causing the Dwarven guard to drop the dagger he had just drawn.
The Dwarf reached out and grabbed Eykit’s ankle, pulling him off balance but not quite dropping him.
Taid slammed the hooked spike of his halberd into the guy’s back. Elitheris put a second arrow into him, this time in his other leg. Eykit struck the foe’s other arm, while Taid spiked the guy’s leg with the hook, and he finally stopped moving. They finish him off, too. It was four on one, with surprise. He didn’t really stand much of a chance.
They think they have taken care of all of the roving guards on this level, based upon the timing of the guards’ rounds. And the lack of any localized noises. The drumming is loud, as are the screams, but even Eykit, with his parabolic hearing, couldn’t detect anyone else moving on that level.
They haven’t searched the room, or looted the bodies yet (although Eykit took the human guard’s knife and Taid took the Dwarf’s ST 16 crossbow and bolts, and Elitheris got the human guard’s arrows). They got a fair amount of loot from the lower chambers, including some foodstuffs. Elitheris collected the poison glands of the five centipedes, with the hope of creating some poisons with them. They each got 3 CP (except for Mr. Wiggles, who got 1, since he couldn’t go down the ladder).
After checking the upper floors, they looked into the hole with the ladder going down. Taid cast Continual Light on the end of a torch (failing the first time, but succeeding the second), causing the end of the torch to emit light. Holding the light in the hole, and looking around, they saw a room filled with organic debris, and covered in mushrooms. Spores floated in the air, and it smelled musty. Elitheris noted that many of the mushrooms, most oversized, were edible. They went in, mainly to harvest the mushrooms, which netted them several meals worth of mushrooms. The ceiling in here used to be a dozen feet high, but the pile of debris, a lumpy, uneven mass of old roots, branches, leaf loam, and other, more questionable things, took up anywhere from three feet to eight feet of that space. Some of the mushrooms glowed in the dark, giving just about enough light to navigate the room by.
Here is a video on centipedes. Just for fun.
The hook maneuver wasn’t successful, so Taid grabbed one and slammed it into the ground. Elitheris kicked the one on her, sending it flying back. The fight turned into a close combat melee, mostly with a lot of grabbing and smashing, with the occasional kick to keep them off. Taid killed the first one, by repeatedly slamming it into the ground, then coming down onto it with a knee drop, pinning its writhing body to the ground, and clocking it with the butt of his halberd.
The second one was attacking Eykit, who had grabbed it near the head and was trying to stab it with his shortsword. Elitheris helped, grabbing it by its tail, and pulling on it. Eykit and Elitheris each had an end, with it stretched between them, its legs going a mile a minute to no avail. Taid’s halberd blade cut it in half.
The last one came after Elitheris, who kicked it away, but then it came after Eykit. He grabbed it, and Elitheris pinned it to the floor with her knife, killing it.
During the fight, they noticed that the centipedes’ toxicognaths (the front pair of legs that had evolved into mouthparts that injected a painful paralytic poison) were unable to bite through armor. Taid had gotten bitten in the face, but his Dwarven physiology shrugged off the effects of the paralytic, leaving him with a tingling face and a few minutes of severe pain. A bit of first aid stopped the small amount of blood that was leaking out of his face.
Looking around the room, they harvested the edible mushrooms, and found an old metal chest, with a lock long rusted into a lump. In it was a mace with a silver head (although the haft crumbled to dust as soon as it was disturbed) ; a pair of rusty throwing axe heads (they need some maintenance, but will be useful when they get new hafts) ; some old coins (18 Araterre Crowns, which might turn out to be collector’s items, and some old Orcish coinage, and a stack of old Dwarven coins). Eykit estimates that the old coins, not including the Araterre Crowns, could be worth between $500-1000. He won’t know until he can talk to his sources. He hasn’t a clue about the Crowns and how much they might be worth. But they are definitely historical, as the Kingdom of Araterre was the birthplace of King Gishi Tondene, the founder of the Tondene Empire. There is also a raccoon skull in there as well, and when Taid touches it, he realizes that it’s not only magical, but a large power stone (8 points). It’s also fragile.
They move to the third room, also filled with debris. More mushrooms, the edible ones get harvested. Eykit finds an old Elven rondel dagger, with Tengwar writing on the blade. “Maica Melehtë”, or Piercing Might, is what is written on the blade. With a little love and care, the weapon can be fixed up enough to use. The sheath is rotted away, however.
The fourth, and last room in this section, was the room with the least debris in it. Around the edges of the room could be seen the remains of cabinets and bins, crates, boxes, and barrels. There were also another pair of centipedes. These two were dispatched a bit more easily than the first three; Elitheris put a couple of arrows into them, and Taid managed to chop one nearly in half. They got some good, solid hits on them, but not before Eykit got his face bit. Pain shot through his face, and the tingling and numbness of his face came soon thereafter.
This room also had a metal box in it, with a functional lock. Eykit picked it, after a little time. Inside were two 2” crystal balls, enchanted to provide light at the moonlight level (they are enchanted with Continual Light, set at the dim glow "moonlight" level). Taid kept the metal box, putting the raccoon skull, padded with twine, in it.
They then went up to the top floor of the temple itself, finding a largish room with an altar in it. The altar was coated in dark stains. The walls of the room were covered in bas reliefs, a pictorial history of the town’s worship of Kruge, the earth god, called Haethalas by the Elves, Khuz’dun by the Dwarves, Pagiili Taavirl by the Goblins, and Grome by the Humans. It details that Gijak Balorat was a town that regularly sacrificed prisoners of war to their patron deity, to stave off earthquakes, floods, and bad harvests.
To the sides of the main altar room, were two narrow rooms. One appeared to be used for administration purposes: it had desks and chairs, with writing implements and parchment scraps on them. The other had a row of hooks on the wall, with manacles and chains hanging from them. There was also a brazier, a bin of root vegetables (yams and turnips, mainly), a barrel of water, and jars of tea leaves.
There was also a stairway down into the depths of the ziggurat. The drumming could be heard, as well as screams every 10-15 minutes. Like clockwork. Eykit also noticed another sound: footsteps, coming closer then moving away. Elitheris sneaked down the steps, to see if she could get a look at who it was that was down there. Her foot slipped, and she made a loud noise. Fortunately for her (as she scrambled back up the stairs and out of sight) the guard, an armored Dwarf, didn’t seem to notice, as he was doing something with his crossbow (that’s what happens when the guard crit fails his perception roll).
When he passed by, they went down the stairs. The landing seemed to be a common lounge area, with tables and chairs. But they didn’t get a chance to really take much of a look, because they could hear noise coming from the side opposite to where the Dwarf disappeared to. They ran around the corner, trying to stay out of sight, and open the door to what turns out to be a kitchen/dining hall area.
They hatch a plan. When the guard goes by, Eykit will open the door, and Taid will grab him, dragging him into the room. Elitheris was ready with a knife. The guard goes by, a human, wearing linothorax armor.
The Dwarf came by, Eykit opened the door, and Taid grabbed him and manhandled him into the room, tackling him to the floor face down. The guard’s spear went skittering away, but he attempted to go for his knife.
Elitheris loosed an arrow into his leg. Eykit hacked at the Dwarf’s arm with his shortsword. Mr. Wiggles went for his arm, causing the Dwarven guard to drop the dagger he had just drawn.
The Dwarf reached out and grabbed Eykit’s ankle, pulling him off balance but not quite dropping him.
Taid slammed the hooked spike of his halberd into the guy’s back. Elitheris put a second arrow into him, this time in his other leg. Eykit struck the foe’s other arm, while Taid spiked the guy’s leg with the hook, and he finally stopped moving. They finish him off, too. It was four on one, with surprise. He didn’t really stand much of a chance.
They think they have taken care of all of the roving guards on this level, based upon the timing of the guards’ rounds. And the lack of any localized noises. The drumming is loud, as are the screams, but even Eykit, with his parabolic hearing, couldn’t detect anyone else moving on that level.
They haven’t searched the room, or looted the bodies yet (although Eykit took the human guard’s knife and Taid took the Dwarf’s ST 16 crossbow and bolts, and Elitheris got the human guard’s arrows). They got a fair amount of loot from the lower chambers, including some foodstuffs. Elitheris collected the poison glands of the five centipedes, with the hope of creating some poisons with them. They each got 3 CP (except for Mr. Wiggles, who got 1, since he couldn’t go down the ladder).
Rewards Granted
Several meals worth of edible, oversized mushrooms.
A tarnished, silver mace head (needs a new haft).
A pair of rusty throwing axe heads (needing new handles and some care and attention).
Some old Orcish and Dwarven coins (Eykit thinks they might be worth $500-1000, but won't be certain until he can talk to his contacts).
18 Araterre Crowns (old coins that might be collector's items).
A raccoon skull that has been enchanted into an 8 point powerstone.
An enchanted Elven rondel dagger with "Piercing Might" inscribed in Tengwar on the blade.
A pair of crystal spheres, enchanted with Continual Light, so they always glow at a "Moonlight" level.
Elitheris harvested the poison glands from the giant centipedes.
Eykit took a knife off of one of the guards.
Elitheris took some arrows off of a guard.
Taid upgraded his crossbow (ST14 to ST16), and took some crossbow bolts from a guard.
They got some pocket change off of the two dead guards, although they really haven't looted the bodies yet. Or the kitchen.
They also got 3 Character Points each, except for Mr. Wiggles, who wasn't able to go down the ladder. He only got 1.
A tarnished, silver mace head (needs a new haft).
A pair of rusty throwing axe heads (needing new handles and some care and attention).
Some old Orcish and Dwarven coins (Eykit thinks they might be worth $500-1000, but won't be certain until he can talk to his contacts).
18 Araterre Crowns (old coins that might be collector's items).
A raccoon skull that has been enchanted into an 8 point powerstone.
An enchanted Elven rondel dagger with "Piercing Might" inscribed in Tengwar on the blade.
A pair of crystal spheres, enchanted with Continual Light, so they always glow at a "Moonlight" level.
Elitheris harvested the poison glands from the giant centipedes.
Eykit took a knife off of one of the guards.
Elitheris took some arrows off of a guard.
Taid upgraded his crossbow (ST14 to ST16), and took some crossbow bolts from a guard.
They got some pocket change off of the two dead guards, although they really haven't looted the bodies yet. Or the kitchen.
They also got 3 Character Points each, except for Mr. Wiggles, who wasn't able to go down the ladder. He only got 1.
Missions/Quests Completed
They checked on the rooms beneath the tower.
They took out the two guards on the second level.
They took out the two guards on the second level.
Character(s) interacted with
Some centipedes, although they didn't talk much.
A pair of guards, although they weren't given a chance to talk much.
A pair of guards, although they weren't given a chance to talk much.
So, I got the translation of "Piercing Might" incorrect. It's supposed to be Maica Melehtë. At some point I will have to update the Tengwar image, and fix the runes on the dagger image. For those that are curious, it's pronounced "Mah-ee-kah Mel-eh-tay".
Report Date
12 Dec 2021
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