Well Vol woke up hearty and healthy, it turns out his god Kord was showing him a vision. I seed to it he was alright, but while we were distracted, the Sapling must have sneaked back into the city, I turned and saw his spider crawling over the wall. We let him do his own thing, but the rest of us went to where the beam ended, at another temple not far out from town. Vol spoke that it may be best that the Sapling had left; his vision had shown us confronting Lolth, the Drow goddess of spiders. It would be best that the spider affishenado not be around for her death and divine judgement.
Oh, to mention, the little raccoon, Discharge, he found an arcane book in the library that makes him speak the common tongue as long as he holds onto it. So we can understand him now, but he still chitters an awful lot anyway. Critters will be critters.
Outside the temple grew bushes upon bushes of those berries that the physician was using for creating the fog of disintelligence. I set to it to collect just enough berries for my own concoctions, and my companions were bored enough that I had to tell stories from my childhood to keep them entertained. As the stories ended, so did my picking, and we entered the temple together, and there was a tunnel. The tunnel was long, much longer than the width of the building. I am sincerely getting annoyed with all this religious cabara-shat in every religiously affiliated place. Nothing is straight-forward, there is always trickery at play, from my experience. Nottheless, we continued onward a ways, growing impatient, then suddenly we reached a room. In the room was three doors with a slot on each, and three ornate pedestals with a metallic tile on each. On one tile was engraved a skull, on another, a spider, and on the last, a bleeding goat head. We concluded to find Vecna, we should use the skull key, but on which door was just a guess. We chose the door in the front of the room, and entered cautiously into a prison. Skeletons sulked about the room, and we took them out without much of an exertion of effort. Discharge disintegrated three of them with a most powerful explosion of electricity. We all stood in awe of the magnificent display of purple and white tendrils of shock bursting around us. Even the single skeleton that remained seemed to gaze with impression at the display of raw power flowing out of Discharge. Vol took down that skeleton while the opportunity was present.
We did look around the room, much of the walls in the cells were lined with chains and shackles, meant for holding multiple prisoners. There was a rack in one cell, and in another was a decaying corpse of a legendary Beholder. Acid was seeping from it putrified body and had eaten a shallow pool into the floor. We kept our distance, but the little raccoon seemed eager to retrieve some acid for me for fighting; I had no vial strong enough to contain it, though, so I declined the... generous offer. We rested for a bit in the center of the room, surrounded by cells, on a blood-stained floor. This wasn't my most restful reprieve, but I was able to keep my mind free of what must have happened here in days past. The liquor helped much to take my mind off things. We drank and laughed and made merry, until we were ready to go, but I was still a bit caroused.
As we readied ourselves to leave, a few stones at the top of the stairs pushed out of the wall, and a hideous figure with a mask of half-goat and half-bull, in a dark cloak walked out of the wall. I knew it was the Sapling; I was with him when he bought the masks, but Vol didn't know. He saw the masks as symbols of the dark gods, and charged up the stairs with his ax raised. Fortunately for the Sapling, he had sense enough to lift his mask off and reveal his face. I'm sure Vol wasn't too ready to put hold on his weapon, but he did the better of his actions and stopped half way up the stairs. So there was another underground passage from the town into the temple. I wonder if this one leads to near the physician. I will have to ask of this when we have time to leisure about.
We continued as a whole group through the doors at the top of the stairs, into a dim room. The first thing of note was blood pooled in the floor, a massive statue in the center of the room, with live bodies around it, writhing from chains hanging from the ceiling, suffering from spikes through their bodies. Eerie as this was, and used to death as I was from my past in wars together with Vol, I'm not fond of suffering and pain. Death is one thing, but adding cruel, prolonged torture is evil, repulsive, and the slightest bit upsetting to the stomach, especially when you're watching it from standing in a pool of blood. The Sapling approached the alter beneath the statue, when a figure stood from the altar. Sapling has a tendency to announce our presence, doesn't he. The figure declared himself an acolyte of Torog, the god of imprisonment and torture. Torog then vanished into the pool of blood and arose in front of us in a rising orb of blood. It was a terrible battle; with every attack he leeched some of our life away, but we stood victorious at the end of it. That cabaran blood blister was better off dead; and so were the tortured bodies hung around the statue. Vol climber upon the statue, and after praying for their peace, mercifully killed each victim. I consulted my god Balinor, and after learning they willingly subjected themselves to this, as devotees to Torog, I decided to scavenge their corpses for humours, organs, marrow and the like for alchemical pursuits, to spite Torog. Upon realizing that I had harvested too many organs to carry, and in the wisdom bestowed of alcohol, I began to stuffing them in my platinum pouch in return for gold, as it was less burdensome to handle.
A door behind the statue was slightly ajar. We went through, and were returned to the room with pedestals and keys. In Vol's vision, Vecna was with Lolth, the spider goddess, so we exchanged the skull key for the spider key, and used it in the same door we first went through. We could see inside the room, there was a giant spider, too big to fit in the door, and it was carrying a human head in its jaws. The door shut quickly by our own decision. We tried it on the hidden door in the back, and entered into a room, just in time to see Lolth crush Vecna's skull in.
In my haste to pen this all down, I forgot to mention that Vol convinced Sapling that we were going after Vecna, and we might have to confront Lolth because she imprisoned spiders against their will and forced them to do her bidding. As far from truth as stars and water, but we needed him to despise her, else he may join forces with her against us. And as much accuracy with a halberd as a blindey at a dartboard, but when he hits, he hits fierce, and his spider (with a more fair eye to fighting) shares his mind too, it would be better to have him on our side if things went awry.
And Vecna's skull was crushed, and we were asked straightforward what were we doing in her chambers. Sapling spoke up immediately - as he tends to drag us with him into precariously undiplomatic rallies, such as Vecna, the first time, and his arson run in Ixeer. He commanded her (by what authority he thinks he has or has not, I claim him bold, if not stupid) to free her spider prisoners. She just laughed and asked what he was talking about. I looked at Vol in a semi drunken haze. I pulled out my fire bomb, and he drew his ax, to prevent her from revealing herself as Sapling's ally. We tried to start a brawl, but she easily dodged our attacks, and left us, not before calling two large spiders to attack and maim Sapling's pet. We dispatched them after a time, and settled into a watchful rest.
No comments:
Post a Comment