Greetings y'all and welcome to another postin' dealing with the comings and goings of those "heroic" folk in the wild and beautiful Shudder Mountains! Now I know it's been a while since I last spun a yarn, so herein are some of the previous tellings so'en you might catch up!
Now sit back whilst I tell you more about the adventures of Pinky, the halfling brewer, Hans, the mad Braar, and Darcy, the elf wanderer!
When last we left the band they had just barely survived a shadow that was stealing their life force while they were desperately trying to wake from the horrible nightmares it produced. They had finally returned to Hard Scrabble Valley, their home, after weeks of traveling through the mountains from Sour Spring Hollow, only to discover something was a miss! Tom Dankers, was a young man when they were spirited away and now he's in his sixties!
Chapter 3: The Serpents Beneath
The old man put a hand to his chest and stated, "Pinky it's me. It's Tom Dankers..."
Pinky was astonished. How could this be? They were only gone a few weeks.
"You don't look a bit older," stated Tom. "Come have a drink!"
They sat with Tom and drank and told him their tell of how at his wedding they awoke and fought evil spirits. He told them that was 40 years ago and that, "We all thought you was dead! But I reckoned you might return one day. My boys have been keeping up the brewery, though the ale is never as good as when you made it."
"What about Grandma," Pinky asked. And he found out she had past away only few years after he left. Tom's wife was in the heavens.
The next day the party decided to split up and explore what they remembered of the town, finding it quite the same as when they left. Though the old stone temple, that was used by the Shud Folk as a House of the Sovereign, was grown over and no longer in service as the old Braar had died and no one took his place. They had questioned Han's if he was to be the new town Braar, but he only gruffed something under his breath and left to see his old farm. The farm was dilapidated and the people shunned area and lands surrounding it saying there was a permanent gloom there and that no food would grow since his family had died.
 |
| Similar to this Mayan temple, though not as large. |
Eventually they decided to explore the temple as it was a center point of interest in all their dreams. Inside they found a stone door buried beneath the sand pulpit. They went to get supplies and tools to lift the stone and met Tom Dankers only daughter, Rynila, a bit boyish and willing to help the party on their new adventure. (My sister joined the game at this time. Creating a 1st level warrior.)
They succeeding in lifting the stone door the next morning and found a large pit beneath. Using a rope they descended into the pit which was round and had four doors in either direction. In the centre was a stone pedestal with a crystal embedded it in. Three columns with serpentine carvings held the ceiling up and sand covered the entire floor.
They found walking through the sand was very difficult and the doors had to be opened by pushing in the right series of blocks, otherwise acid would splash out on them. As they explored, the sun moved to the apex of the temple and shone down on the crystal pedestal which began to hum. Something stirred beneath the sand and churned the floor up. Then a large mechanical serpent with three heads rose from the sand. It's three heads each had a different coloured crystal embedded in the metal that gave it a cyclopic appearance. The heads spun at random and shot out laser beams of different varieties!
There was chaos in the chamber as both Darcy and Rynila climbed the columns in order to jump on the mechanical serpent. Hans stayed at one of the doors attempting to open it as acid burned his flesh and Pinky was stuck on the centre pedestal fearing he would be ground to bits by the metal scales that churned the sand.
A beam like the light of the sun shot out from one of the serpents crystal eyes and cut a column in half forcing Darcy to dive into the sands. Rynila jump off her column onto the serpents back and with a hand full of meat she had stored in her pack she quickly forced it into the exposed gears of the serpent forcing the head to stop swiveling. (This was a Mighty Deed my sister came up with on the spot! What a natural!)
 |
| Eh.. Something like that! |
Hans finally found the right combination to open the doors and as the meat clogged up the gears the party made for the door. Rynila was the last one through and just as the doors were shutting a beam of cosmic energy struck her from behind. Sores opened all over her body and stunk of death, but otherwise she was unharmed. (This was a laser beam from the serpent guardian that caused insta-corruption!)
Beyond the door they found winding passage ways that lead deep under ground. There they discover three more coded doorways and, using Han's staff so as to not get sprayed with acid, opened them. The first door lead into a chamber with a dried up cocoon hanging from the ceiling and a console before it with crystal levers. The levers did nothing and they soon left to explore the next chamber which was exactly the same as the previous one.
Here they found another cocoon and the console crystals were lit. Touching the crystals opened the cocoon. Out slid a white scaled humanoid to splat against the stone floor. Hans took no time in leaping over the console to attack the vile thing and tripped missing the creature and breaking his staff on the floor. The others followed his lead and smashed the thing into a slimy pulp.
They decided to search the room a little more and found a hidden alcove that contains some well preserved robes. They proceeded to leave the room and heard the slapping of wet feet down the corridor. They ran, following the sound, only to find the third room was empty. The cocoon was split open and a wet steaming pile of goo lay under it.
Following the strange footprints, of some three toed creature, they discovered a secret tunnel sloping down into to darkness. Something was loose and they were sure it was going to be bad news for the town. They decided they to follow it.
