Session 4 - Part 2

The Shrine of Evil Chaos

Two dark acolytes appeared out of the darknesss and were quickly dispatched.  The party did wonder why there were humans in the caves.  They decided to head back to the barred door and avoid being surprised by monsters from the rear.

Opening the door, the party found a large room filled with six sarcophagi.  Dropping their light rock (a rock with the light spell cast on it) on the sarcophagi, they heard a growling sound coming from the far south one.  The growling got louder and the top began to move a bit each time the creature inside pounded to get out.  Kilborn and Steely pried the cover off to find a wight.

This undead horror put up a good fight, and seemed resistant to most weapons.  In a secret compartment at the bottom of the sarcophagus was a tube of leather inscribed with symbols of skulls and capped by a plug of obsidian.  Inside the tube was a rolled up piece of fine vellum that smelled faintly of rot.  The party found a scroll of protection from undead.  Next to it was a bejeweled silver dagger.

At this point, the party decided to return to town for supplies.  The spent the night at the inn, and paid a visit to Finn's Shoppe.  There, they picked up the Mace of Disruption and two potions of healing.  Kilborn wielded the mace and the party headed back to the Cave.

Retracing their steps, they found that part of the cave had been repopulated by another five dark acolytes.  These too were quickly dispatched and the party headed south to the dreary prison cell.  Inside they found a medusa.  They tried in vain to get it to look into a mirror and get petrified by her own gaze, but to no avail.

In the end, they chose to let her out on the condition that she help them.  She had an ulterior motive though, and that was to complete the ritual that the dark priest of the cave was working on and gain more power for herself.  She stayed behind while the party ventured further in.  The first room they came across was a chamber for recent acolytes.  After killing three of them the other two surrendered.  Bound and tied, they were pushed along by the party as they investigated the caves to the south where they were told zombies and skeletons lived.

Steely and Kilborn stood on the front lines as wave after wave of skeletons marched in on them.  Lórien blasted them with a thunderwave and drew the fire of the skeleton's short bows.  Retreating back down the passage, he drank a healing potion and came back to the fight.  It was quickly over by that point.

Venturing further west, they found a room full of zombies.  Kilborn took the four to the north and Steely took the four in the south.  Zombies kept rising from the dead with their zombie fortitude, but in the end, they were vanquished.

From there, the party headed north and found an evil chapel.  An ominous purple glow emanated from the four ancient bronze vessels sitting on the dark alter there.  Wisely, the party decided to avoid that room and head north with the medusa at point.  They came across a door and the medusa went in.  She found four dark acolytes, but turned them to stone.  Upon exiting the room Steely caught a glimpse of her and was turned to stone.

A tense negotiation followed and Kilborn turned over his magic mace for a dose of elixir that would restore Steely.  Steely was back and they headed further down the tunnel.  Searching the room with four petrified acolytes, the party found a trove of evil books and scrolls.  Deciding that the world needed less of this evilness, they destroyed the whole collection.  The reward gained them enough XP to hit level 4.  The party got their stat bonuses and headed north.

As the medusa rounded the corner, she was mesmerized bu the west wall of the Temple of Evil Chaos and began chanting stanzas of a hymn to the gods of chaos and evil.  This chant summoned three zombies from an adjacent chamber, but they were quickly turned to stone just by looking at the medusa.

To their left, a secret door opened and dark priest stepped out into the midst of the party.  He cast inflict moderate wounds on Steely and hit him for over half of his hit points.  The party quickly killed him to find skeletons streaming out of a chamber behind the temple.  Steely and Kilborn headed to the front lines and started hacking, and Lórien blasted them to pieces with a thunderwave.  The bones of five skeletons were blasted against the far wall of the temple.  

With three skeletons still alive, the medusa broke the spell and started to attack the party.  Lórien used the wand of binding to hold her still and with a few hard hits from Steely, and she was dead, eliminating the last threat in the Shrine of Evil Chaos.

Loot:

11pp

11gp

7ep

360sp

806cp

1 Gold flagon (10gp)

9 golden cups (2gp each)

Finely wrought bracelet (20gp)

Gold ring set with a jet gem (520sp)

21 garnets and gems (10gp each)

4 large gems (garnets worth 20gp each)

Jeweled silver dagger(50gp)

Garnet eyes from an idol (25gp each)

Magic Items:

Scroll of Protection from Evil

Oil of etherealness

+1 Banded armor

+1 Mace

Staff of Striking

XP:  2960

Per person: 986  Enough to get the party to 4th level.