Entering the Whispering Cairn Report

General Summary

Patchwall 15, 595 CY

Session: 2024-04-03

Prepared for the fight with the spiders, the younglings move forward to confront the creatures. Delilah starts off with a powerful eldritch blast, pushing the lead spider back. Tolman fires with his bow as Kaszu fire bolts the creatures. One of the spiders tries to bite Argan, but fails to penetrate his armor while Crichton charges forward and slices through another with his glaive. It was at that point they saw a much larger spider move out of their den behind the rubble. She moved part of the way to the companions, but cunningly stopped, dodging their attacks with some kind of arachnid intelligence. Malakai and Crichton tried to hit the mother spider, but she managed to avoid their attacks easily. Even Delilah's eldritch blasts were avoided. Tolman did manage to pierce the creature with an arrow, aimed to take advantage of his companions distracting her. Kaszu and Argan turned their attention to the smaller wolf spiders, which were still about the size of a wolf themselves. While Kaszu finished off the last of the wolf spiders the other companions turned back to the mother spider and finally defeated her.
Malakai and Tolman moved into the web-filled den and began searching for any treasures left over by previous victims while Delilah spent some time harvesting the mother spider's mandibles and part of a leg.
Across the main hall to the west, three steps led up to a dais and a magnificent fresco showed a massive room with seven lit lanterns arranged in alcoves around the room, showing all seven colors of the rainbow in order.
Clearing the spider webs sealing off the passage to the north, the younglings descended a wide set of stairs into a large chamber. Seven short hallways branched from the room, four holding lanterns that looked similar to the two the companions had found. The back of the green lantern was opened and something protruded from it, but it, among all the lanterns, was lit. Yet Argan could see no recent signs of passage. In the exact center of the chamber rested a large sarcophagus carved with a bas-relief of a seven-foot bald androgynous figure. The base of the sarcophagus was a large arrow whose point was at the head of the sarcophagus and pointing to the western alcove. Delilah and Tolman recognized the arrow as the arrow of law, a symbol of outer-planar lords of order. Kaszu noted that the sulfurous material sealing the coffin was traced with fire runes.

While Delilah wondered if they should open the sarcophagus, Argan stated that it was likely a lich inside. Then Argan had the idea to see if they could rotate the sarcophagus. With a mighty heave from Argan and Crichton, the entire sarcophagus, base and all, rotated clockwise to the next alcove and stopped. After a minute, they were able to rotate the structure to the lit, green alcove, at which point they heard a terrible stone-on-stone screeching before the top of a stone cylinder started rising from the floor under the lantern, stopped, and crashed down, leaving a gaping hole in the floor.
In less than a minute, a large swarm of green-carapaced beetles rushed out of the hole, followed by a creature that looked like an eyeball held up by six viciously-pointed legs. As the creature and swarm charged the party, Crichton let loose his breath weapon while Tolman and Argan fired arrows. Delilah blasted the aberration and pushed it away from the party. Kaszu fire bolted the swarm while Malakai cast a spray of poison at the beetles. The mad slashed went at Crichton, gouging him with their talons. Tolman got a carefully aimed shot onto the slasher, wounding it, while Argan and Delilah continued their attacks at range. With the mad slasher dead, Crichton finished off the beetle swarm scattering the rest with his glaive. Looking into the hole, Delilah could see that it descended about sixty-feet, with some kind of chamber below.
Lighting all of the lanterns they had, which only excluded the missing red lantern, the younglings continued to rotate the sarcophagus. Another cylinder of stone arose when they reached the indigo alcove. Delilah examined the cylinder, which had an opening facing the back wall of the alcove. The opening showed a small, 4-foot wide cylindrical chamber with a small lever on the inside wall. This one was filled with powder and the remnants of cloth at the bottom of the cylinder, which was stained a dried brownish-red color. Argan then had an idea of taking bones from the none pile in the blue alcove and placing a few of the bones inside the cylinder. Triggering the lever, the cylinder closed and descended. They heard a crushing sound, and a minute later, when the cylinder re-emerged, the bones were powdered.
While searching the room, they also discovered that the blue alcove's ceiling was much higher than the others, and that about eighty-feet up a passage led to the northeast. The bones piled up there showed signs of breaking, as if from a great fall.
Finally they turned the sarcophagus back to the yellow corridor, with the map lit, another cylinder rose out of the floor. This one had no debris at the bottom. Delilah volunteered to be first. She entered the cylinder and pulled its lever. One minute later, the cylinder re-emerged without Delilah. The companions took turns using the cylinder until they were all in another chamber, deeper underground.
The walls here are covered in bas-relief images similar to the slender figure upon the sarcophagus lid in the chamber above. Nearly a dozen androgynous. hairless humanoids stand in poses of deference. Almost as if they are paying homage to the viewer. Many extend their hands in adoration, their faces awash in adulation. Several of the statues lack hands, arms, heads, or anything else easily hacked off by long-absent tomb robbers.
About fifteen feet to the northeast, a dark passage extends from an elaborately carved arch. Only a little of this hallway is visible, however. as a large stone block obscures most of the passage. Malakai examined the stone block, and while a few of them working together could topple it, it looked to be resting on a pressure plate. Tolman took a few moments and carefully attempted to jam the pressure plate. Only one way to be sure.
The corridor continued to the northeast with three alcoves to each side, where statues of these androgynous beings stood, holding their hands out as if cradling something. The winds were definitely stronger, and louder here.
Behind the second statue to the right a thing that looked like two eyeballs connected by muscle tissue flew out. It cast one of its eyes on Argan, who fought off the fear magically induced inside him. Its other eye aimed at Kaszu, who fell asleep. Malakai cast chill touch and hurt the creature while Argan took a swing with his battleaxe, kicking Kaszu to awaken him. Kaszu awoke and fire bolted the aberration while Delilah blasted it. It tried to lash out and strangle Kaszu, but was unsuccessful, but it made good use of the cover provided by the statue as the companions' attacks went wild. It cast a wider ranged sleep spell with several members falling unconscious. Finally, the creature fell to the magic of Kaszu and Delilah.
Examining it, the arcanists in the group worked together to determine it was known as a lurking strangler. A creature first created by the beholders as pets and familiars, but also used by the cult of Vecna. What it was doing down here was anyone's guess.

Campaign

It Started in Diamond Lake

Protagonists

Tolman K’hurzz

Malakai Steelbuckle

Delilah Raincloud

Crichton Eogen

Argan Agu-Ulakanu

Chaotic Good Goliath (Outlander)
Ranger 4

36 / 36 HP

STR
18

DEX
14

CON
14

INT
10

WIS
12

CHA
8

Kaszu Billowcase

Chaotic Good Rock Gnome (Guild Artisan / Guild Merchant)
Artificer 3

24 / 24 HP

STR
8

DEX
12

CON
14

INT
17

WIS
14

CHA
10

Report Date

07 Apr 2024