The party stood in a room with doors in the north and south walls and another on the northern end of the east wall, the same door we entered through. Charred ice ogre corpses lay strewn about, reeking of burnt hair and flesh. Kyril’s control temperature was still in effect, fending off the cold for those within its 10’ compass. Outside of that 10’ range it was bitterly cold. Seamus didn’t seem to mind the chill. Antifreeze and all that.

The red marble floor was filthy with long use and lack of care. A raised dias (is there another kind?) stood in the room, ringed by silver and gold runes that nobody recognized or could read. Along the east wall is a mural depicting a female wizard:

• She is shown sleeping and having a dream where she sees the world controlled by some sort of electric insect.
• Next she is shown going about various steps to create these insects.
• Finally she is shown standing in front of about 50 of them.

The south and west walls are blank, like a mural was planned for them, but never done.

As Cathal and Flint listened intently at the double doors in the north wall the party was attacked by a new bunch of cold, albino ogres.

• initiative tie
• Kyril cast faerie fire and the ogres lit up like Cathal \footnote{The last night we were in town Cathal had gone home with a dude rather than the horny, semi-drunk hostess. The party wondered if a lawful good Grand Knight of Diancecht could actually be a pickle smoocher but the question remains unanswered. Nobody volunteered to do the research.}.
• Menka cast aid on Lycovyne
• Lycovyne separated an ogre head from an ogre torso with his Sword
• two of the ogres belched forth clouds of frozen pain
• them’s wot saved took 7 points of damage - Flint, Cathal, Tim and Gonchar
• Menka failed his save and took 15 points of damage
• they missed Cathal and Lycovyne
• Gonchar missed as well
• Flint nailed one of the icy fuckers for 12 points
• Cathal hit one for 8
• initiative win
• Menka thrashed an ogre with his flail for 12 points praise Thoth!
• Lycovyne sliced one open for 10 points
• Cathal hit twice, scattering tiny ogre brains about
• breath weapon again
• Seamus did not save but still only took half damage
• Flint did not save and took 19 points of damage, Lycovyne took 11 and Seamus took 6
• Menka got hit for 10 points of damage
• initiative win
• Kyril, invisible in an improved fashion, staved an ogre for 10 pints, killing it
• Cathal and Gonchar tag-teamed an ogre and took it down
• 4 ice ogres, 30 hp
  • rough armor and clubs, no more

The party was in rough shape. The ogres’ breath weapon had laid waste among us. Cathal set to the battlefield surgery and also cured light, serious and critical wounds among us, by the mercy and the bounty of Diancecht. Menka cured Flint’s lighter wounds, while Kyril did the same for Lycovyne. Flint also used his Periapt of Healing to gain 8 more points.

Finding Lagartha#

Somewhat refreshed we returned our attention to the double doors in the north wall. We let ourselves through and entered a room filled with four large, rough ogre-sized chairs and a sack on a human-sized table in the NW corner of the room. Double doors sat in the east wall. We heard voices coming from somewhere, everywhere. Gonchar, Lycovyne and Tim understood the language - we seemed to be hearing an argument over whether to kill or ransom the girl (in ogrish?). Cathal barged through the double doors in the east wall with the party right behind him.

The party burst into the Ice Ogre King’s sleeping quarters. The Ice Ogre king, a huge, bloated-yet-powerful specimen, stood over a large bed covered with rough furs, arguing with two large, bloated, pale, consorts, awash in claws, large teeth, excessive body fat and hair, spilling out over what appeared to be flimsy skirts and halter tops.

They were having a heated discussion over a young human female, who lay bound on a bed. As the party entered, we saw the king cuff one of his consorts soundly. They seemed to be so involved that they did not see or hear the party open the doors. The King was by the north wall, by the foot of the bed facing south, both consorts were 5 feet south of him, facing him. Both were yelling at the king and gesturing towards the princess - Lagartha, she who the party seeks - lay on the bed.

• initiative win
• Cathal sliced an ogre open, doing 10 righteous points of damage
• Lycovyne and Menka accidentally walked into an active breath weapon, not noticing it, or, rather, believing it to have been on the other side of the engagement
  • Menka did not save, taking 20 points of damage
  • Lycovyne saved, taking 10 points
• Gonchar nailed an ogre bitch for 19 points
• Cathal got caught in the cloud of frozen pain as well and did not save, taking 20 points of damage
• the ogre female missed Cathal
• though she clubbed Gonchar for 10 points
• and then she did not
• initiative win
• Gonchar hit the icy ogre broad for 19 points, killing her
• Lycovyne zapped an ogre with a magic missile for 37 points!
• Menka cured (someone’s? his?) serious wounds for 16 points
• Cathal sliced the big guy wide open, killing him
• Gonchar hit the remaining ogre for 17 points
• Seamus plowed through and killed the last one with his flagon

Cathal laid on the battlefield medicine again, but the party was in rough shape. Lagartha was in even rougher shape. Menka used the Staff of Curing on her to get her back on her feet. She looked like she felt a lot better. All better, in fact.

There were two chests in the room. One in the southeast corner and a huge one in the southwest corner. Flint checked them both for traps but did not find any.

He opened the huge chest - it contained the frozen heads of 32 dwarves, 22 humans, 10 halflings, 47 ores, 13 goblins, 8 half-orcs, 5 elves, 3 hobgoblins, and at the very bottom is the head of a very mean looking ice ogre.

The chest in the southeast corner was filled with goodies!

• ice ogre loot!
  • 100 gp
  • 100 pp
  • potion
  • scroll of heal (Menka)
  • large two-handed sword

We searched around the room and Lycovyne found a secret door in the southern wall. Lagartha said this complex contained a whole tribe of ice ogres. She seemed disoriented, wasn’t sure where it was but remembers running a gauntlet through a large room of female ogres and young who scratched, hit and clawed her. Cathal and Lagartha backtracked into the room with the sack on the table to reclaim all her gear. She returned armed with a bow and seemed to be a ranger.

Lagartha is, as we knew, the daughter of Lord Harald Marksgaard and his wife Maeve. She is young, slight, blonde, yet clearly of warrior class, a ranger by trade. She says she was afield with two men-at-arms and Arndt a sergeant of the guard, and attacked and taken by a band of ice ogres who slew her men-at-arm guards and left Arndt for dead, in a block of ice.

Lolath’s Treasure Room#

We went through the secret door and foud ourselves in a treasure room of sorts. 3 chests lined the walls of the small room. Flint found a trap in the lock of the chest against the western wall. It seemed to be of a magical nature he could see the rune, and choosing to read it, set the trap off and took 22 points of damage. Ouch.

The chest contained lots of jewelry and gems!

• chest on the western wall - loot!
  • gems
  • diamond brooch
  • rings
  • necklace
  • heavy as hell

The chest along the eastern wall employed a gas trap. Flint was able to disarm the trap (click!) and his eyes gleamed as he looked at the pile of EP, GP and PP within!

• chest on the eastern wall - loot!
  • “lots of EP, GP, PP”

The dwarven thief found a sort of lock on the chest along the southern wall that only allowed a specific kind of person to open it. Tim told Flint to get out of range and cast a knock spell on the chest from outside the room. The word “KILL” was heard in a sing-song female voice, and loud concussion rang out to shake the room which fortunately, none were in. The party realized that to have been in that room when the word emitted from the chest would have been a grim thing indeed.

The chest was not large but it did contain some interesting treasure. It also concealed an iron ring beneath, attached to a secret hatch.

• chest on the southern wall - loot!
  • wand
  • book
  • scroll
  • two rings

We loaded the chests into our various bags of holding and turned our attention to the hatch in the floor. Flint found no traps on the hatch. Gonchar tried and failed to lift the hatch door. Flint then failed. So did everyone else until Cathal successfully pried the hatch open.

The knight peered downward but could only see about 5’ of stairs before inky blackness blocked his vision. The light from his sword did not penetrate this darkness. We closed the hatch.

Kyril heard Randolph Carter’s strange communication device ring and was able to communicate with him. He asked us to find him.

The party returned to the throne room and, turning our attention to the door in the south wall, entered into a corridor which proceeded south, turned east, and ended in an entry into a room, covered with webs. Kyril heard his name called from beyond the webs. The party hacked through the webs, and found what seemed to be the ogre’s meat locker. Bodies hung from hooks, humanoid and others, all headless. There was a smell of carrion, but muted as the room is essentially a frozen meat locker. There were 21 dressed bodies of various animals and humanoids hanging from meat racks. All the humanoids are headless, but 4 are dwarves, 3 are human, 1 halfling, 4 orcs, 2 gnolls, the remainder appear to be deer, horses, wolves and goats.

There seemed to be thick webs spread between the ceiling corners of the north corners of the room, and a web stretching from the doorway to the ceiling floor corners of the SW corner. There was nothing else in the room, save a door of bars on the south wall, and bars in place of a wall on the eastern half of the south wall.

Beyond the bars, 2 dessicated elvish bodies occupied the room which appeared to have been used as a prison.

The Statement Of Randolph Carter, Part II#

The floor of this cell was rocky, frozen dirt. It seemed to have been dug out with a dagger which was stuck in the dirt, next to a tin cup full of dirt, and the corners of the room have been covered with dirt, as have the corners of the ceiling.

In the room was Randolph Carter. He looked several years older than the youthful Carter the Druid last met, but much younger than the Carter the rest of the party remembered. He was sitting on a stool, speaking softly with one of the elf corpses. When the party entered, his gaze shifted to us and he looked at the Druid and said “Mr. Kyril! It has been quite some years. For me, anyway, it seems. You look nary older at all!”

Carter was clad in a ragged suit, tie, jacket, hat, worn boots. His hair was graying at the temples. He had a slight stutter and twitch as he spoke.

Much had happened since he last saw Kyril. He was very timid then, but he had seen much since that, such THINGS, and believed himself to have become stouter stuff. He stated that his nerves were “currently in a very wretched state”, and he had perhaps made some errors in his search for knowledge.

“I am glad to see you survived the honey-temple. After we parted, many of the huge giant-brutes appeared at the temple, seemingly enraged, and seemed to enter the place to search for something or someone - I feared it was you, my friend. A pair of these foul things noticed me, and I confess I lost nerve, and fled the place and returned to my home!”

He said to Kyril that, as Kyril knows, he is not from this place. “I am native to another world altogether, just as you are this one. I have returned to this one several times, and this time I have come - albeit briefly - to find you and beseech you for assistance. But I warn you, if you do not know - brutes similar to those who swarmed outside the honey-temple, but albino, and seemingly adapted to this frozen terrain, are in this place. I have seen them come into this room, and these bodies hanging from hooks are their food! I hid in this cell - I have ways - and they did not notice me.”

He knew this to be a stronghold of Lolath Dhuserra. He knew her, before this place came to be as it is. She was a powerful sorcerer, contemptuous of the laws and mores of civilized folk and other wizards, keen for knowledge and experimentation and willing to summon powerful beings to further her knowledge and power. She created beings with her experiments, testing the limits of her knowledge. She tamed and rode a great ice-dragon.

“Do you know why I am certain that this realm is not the Dreamlands in which I have so extensively traveled? The great dragons that exist here. No such things exist there, in the Dreamlands - certainly, there are smaller, carnivorous reptilian and amphibian creatures which they sometimes call dragons or drakes, but not as here. Did you know in the far north here, in the mountains miles north of Cragenheim, there is a great beast, Drogon the Flameborn, a gigantic worm who breathes flame, who is said to be able to consume a mammoth with a single bite, who is said to rule an entire mountain chain from beneath an ancient plaza in a city abandoned by a long-dead civilization? How is it that men can rule in such a place?”

“I get ahead of myself. Let me tell you why I seek you, friend Kyril. With the assistance of certain keys I have learned to travel to distant places in a certain way. I have traveled extensively in one of these places, and come to believe that this world - YOUR world - was the same place as the Dreamlands I know. Perhaps a different time? I did not - and DO not - know. But in the Dreamlands I have traveled, there are beings, quite common beings, that are nowhere to be found as far as I can tell here. Bokrugs, Men of Leng, Beings of Ib, Cats which speak like men, and other things. I believe that a handful of rare beings seen there also exist here - the Gug, Ghasts, things which crawl deep beneath the surface in both places, but this place is different. I thought perhaps this was the same place, but a different time, from the Dreamlands I have come to know.”

“So I tested this. Chalmers taught me how to make time meaningless. His hubris and lust for knowledge doomed him. But I thought I had learned from his errors. And perhaps I went too far in my quest. Too far back. It was too fascinating to travel in such a way! But something noticed me. And they have followed, oh how they have followed. I can only avoid them by moving from place to place, and quickly.”

“I know this: Lolath, who became an acquaintance of mine, was known for a library like none other in this realm, somewhere here I must think, perhaps in well-guarded catacombs deep in the earth? It is said that this dazzling library was destroyed, perhaps by one of her experiments or ill-advised dabblings with great powers, gone wrong. But she had volumes not so easily destroyed, or perhaps which were better-guarded. Some of these, like the Book of Horrors, are best destroyed, unfound, or buried away from the reach of mortals. But she also is said to have had a copy of the Cultes des Ghouls - the Ghoul-Cults - a powerful tome with many undiscovered magics, including a way for me to contact he who is known by many names, called by some the Proud Pharoah, and I believe he can grant me my desire to get these damned hounds off my trail. I beg you to locate this book, and allow me to access its pages, and find the spell by which I can contact him!”

Carter stammered then, his voice shaking, his eyes flitting about with seeming desperation.

“I cannot travel through rooms with corners, or angles. They will find me.”

“I beg you to bring this tome to the Tower of Thoth-Azuul in the far southern town of Ruatha. He is one of the Nine, who is known to Aesil, whom you know. With his help I can access this spell, and erase the scent they have of me, and be free. Thereafter, I can assist you however you deem needed, and will be in your debt.”

He now seemed startled, sniffed the air, stared frantically from side-to-side, up and down.

“Do you smell it? That acrid, burning stench? I have come to know that this foretells their coming! Did we miss a corner here?!” He said, looking around wildly.

“It matters not. It is so! If I depart now, perhaps I will forestall their arrival, spare you all and delay them longer! I will find you my friend, hopefully under more glad circumstances!!”

The party did smell an odd burning scent, albeit for just a moment. At that moment, Carter, visibly sweating despite the permeating chill, pulled a sack from one of his pockets and opened it. Within, a swirling, light pulsed. Incredibly, he stepped into the bag - and the sack - and disappeared. The distant, acrid stench dissipated.

Menka had listened to Carter’s tale with both ears wide open. Yet another set of paths, crossing!

The party exited the “meat-room” following Carter’s departure and began back towards the treasure room. Upon re-entering the throne-room on the way, we were surprised by a horde of ice ogres. Lagath drew her bow even as Cathal kept trying to keep her out of the fight.

• surprised
• the front line got hit with 2 breath weapons
  • Menka failed the first save (16 points) while Flint, Cathal and Gonchar made their saves, taking 8 points
  • Menka and Lagath saved the second time, taking 6 points, while Cathal, Flint and Gonchar did not, taking 13 points.
  • That hurt a lot - Cathal was down to 6 points, most of us were in the 20s.
• Flint whipped out his Wand of Wonder and let forth a stinking cloud
  • 3 ogres rendered helpless
  • 1 ogre saved, 1 out for 1 round
• Lycovyne zapped the back line with his Wand of Fireballs as well, nailing them all for 14 points of fire damage!
• Lagartha drilled the ogre that saved vs. the stink with an arrow
• Cathal called upon Diancecht to Heal him, so that he could continue the fight
• Gonchar hurled his hammer into the stinking cloud, nailing an ogre with an arrow already sticking out of him for 28 points, killing the beastie
• initiative win
• Menka used the Staff of Curing on Lagartha (yes?), curing her wounds from the breath weapon
• Lycovyne hurled another fireball into the back row, doling out 24 points of damage and wiping out the 4 ogres in the back
• Gonchar nailed an ice ogre up front with a natural 20, splattering teeny tiny ogre brains all over the place
• one of the ogres had the gumption to hit Cathal with another breath weapon, but the knight saved and only took 6 points of damage
• the weight of battle had pulled some of the party into the stinking cloud - Cathal made his save but Menka and Lagartha failed theirs, hitting the deck for 5 rounds
• Tim hurled a fireball into the midst of the enemy, searing the remaining ogres for 17 points
• initiative win
• one of the remaining ogres made a break for the door but Tim zapped him with a magic missile, stopping him dead in his tracks, literally
• Gonchar killed another ogre, this time up close and personal
• Kyril staved one for 6 points…
• initiative win
• …and then again for 6 more points while it prepared its breath weapon
• Gonchar brained that same ogre before he could belch forth his cloud of icy pain
• 9 ice ogres (26 hp)

18 ice ogre corpses now littered the room. Cathal set to stitching and battlefield medicine while the cleric and druid applied what was left of their healing spells. This got us back on our feet but the party was stilly sorely wounded and we decided to rest in an adjoining room to get some spells and hit points back.

While we prepared to rest we searched the room. In a second pile of skulls we found a small hoard of magic items:

• Ice ogre loot!
  • scrolls (I think?)
    • plant growth
    • wall of force
    • stone to flesh
  • books
    • Manual of Iron Golems
    • Manual of Golems

We picked spells, rested and applied more healing. Menka’s dream of the messenger of Thoth continued, this time pointing “down”. We’d spent quite a few of our healing spells but decided to press on rather than rest again.

Spurred on both by curiosity and the prompting of the ibis, we decided to descend through the secret hatch under the chest in Lolath’s treasure room. Opening the hatch and peering into inky black darkness, Cathal cautiously stepped on the first step. It clicked and two 4 foot long electric eel monsters dropped from the ceiling!

• initiative win
• Lycovyne zapped one with a magic missile but the creature resisted the attack
• Tim’s Milf’s Acid Arrow did seem to have an effect
• Seamus missed
• Flint sworded the same creature for 6 points
• Lagartha’s arrow bounced off one of the creatures (non- magical arrow)
• Flint took 7 points of electrical damage in return and, failing his save, was stunned
• initiative tie
• Seamus missed an electric eel bug
• Menka said a prayer
• the beasties missed Kyril
• Cathal got zapped but saved (and took no damage?)
• Cathal missed his foe
• Gonchar nailed an electric eel bug twice for 27 points
• initiative tie
• Seamus missed
• Cathal got hit for 4 points of damage, plus 6 points electric damage
• Cathal killed his opponent with heavenly force!
• 2 electric crawlers (25 hp)

We pulled ourselves together and returned our attention to the steps below the secret hatch. Flint had not checked the stairs for traps and therefore had not found them. A continual light item dispelled the darkness while also negating the continual light. (note - I do not recall whose item this was) Looking into the pit again the knight could see 20’ down the steps. They were of an uneven sort and seemed to have been formed by hand.

As he stepped through the hatch the continual light in effect on his shield dispelled the darkness utterly and was in turn canceled. He made a dex check stepping through the hatch and began to walk down the stairs. It got warmer as he descended.

The party, not in fact having seen the paladin get immolated or otherwise destroyed stepped through the hatch and walked down the stairs into the long darkness. The stairs ended in a large room. The continual light sources showed the room to be large, indeed. The walls and ground seemed to have been formed by hand, literally. More murals of the wizardess adorned the walls.

An iron golem marched out as Cathal stepped on the floor of the room. The metal creature spoke, thus:

The answer to this riddle was “wine”. We would hear this riddle several times in the near future. Every time we re-entered this area, as it happened.

The east door lead into a 20’ hallway which ended in a door. The western door opened into a 20’ hallway that ended in a barred gate. Gonchar and Cathal went there. The corridor widened as it approached the gate.

Through the gate they saw a very large human, seemingly made of body parts sewn together, watching them intently from a distant alcove, with at least four corridors beyond the bars off the main passage. The dwarf and paladin also observed smashed continual light globes, heard some buzzing and saw broken lights down by the flesh golem.”

Gonchar and Cathal went down the west corridor, then came running back out hot on the heels of Cathal’s evil evil evil warnings.

Kyril checked the southwestern corridor but found nothing of interest, according to him. Flint examined the eastern door. He tried to remove the trap only to experience some painful electrical discharge which required the immediate application of salve and ointment. He was damaged, but I don’t know how badly. The lock seemed unpickable. Menka pondered casting a divination but decided not to, as there were no relevant sacrificial animals present. Lycovyne knocked the wizard locked door and it opened.

Cathal and Gonchar marched down the hall. It was a 20’ wide circular room and very well lit with globes emitting continual light. The hallway opened into a reading room of sorts, perhaps a library. A comfy chair, a small writing table next to it holding 2 books, shelves underneath held something. Shelves on the northern wall held writing materials, while the southern wall held statuettes which the party has not yet examined.

Cathal, Gonchar and Menka entered the room. Menka checked out the books on the table.

• “Electricity” – I. Astbury
• “Vampirism: causes, cures, prevention, defenses and theory”, by Marius de Romanus

Cathal found a piece of paper under a statuette on the lower shelf of the small table next to the reading chair. The statuette itself was a bloated beast with the body of an ape, large claws, tiny wings and the head of a boar. The creature had hooves and the curled tail of a pig. On a scrap of vellum below it was scrawled a word, “Nalfeshnee” He gave it to Menka for safe keeping.

On the far wall, there was a chair and writing table upon which were several items:

• A half-written letter
• 4 sheets of vellum
• A writing quill and an inkpot, filled with dried, hardened ink.
• An empty wine glass, with a red spot of long-dried wine on the bottom.

Kyril then cast detect magic and sensed very strong magic emanating from the shelves on the northern wall.

All of a sudden the door to the round room behind us slammed shut, locking Cathal, Menka, Flint and Gonchar in the room. We learned that casting a knock on the door caused it to open for 10 seconds.

end