| Session Date | February 20, 2021 |
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| Base XP Gained | Carry Over |
| Player Notes | ZZ's Notes |
The party recovered form the Battle of Durnton, seeing to the ordering of the town , the recently deserted soldiers, and the like. The three Rangers, led by Merrin, volunteered to scout west of the river during the night, in case of further trouble. This taken care of, the party spent a quiet night at the Goat and Bull Tavern, their de facto headquarters.
The next morning, they took some time to identify a number of captured magic items. Iban also tried to scry Lord Solen once again, but once again failed. He then tried one of the recently released soldiers he believed to be back at the castle. He found him indoors, in a barracks room with a number of other soldiers., They did not appear at all happy. Meanwhile, the Rangers returned. They had seen no activity between Castle Solen and Durnton throughout the night. At the castle, they had sen Bugbears on the walls but no human soldiers. There was no sign of the spider riders whatsoever. The party decided to spend the day in Durnton, and would return to the castle when it was closer to nightfall. While they waited and continued to help order the town, a troop of soldiers from Manston rode in They had been sent to see what had happened and were obviously pleased the town had not been totally destroyed. Word of the attack had spread throughout the region and local militias were all standing up. The leader was unsure if Lord Alcibard would be sending a force here, as he was waiting on him to return and report. The general feeling was that the war had begun, though the news that Solen seemed to have prompted the attack on his own initiative (and against the desires of the Giant King) perhaps complicated things. The party inquired about the news from Manston and learned that there had been several assassinations the past few days and the city was on edge. However, they were relieved to learn that Homfrith, chief cleric of Maladominus (and a city council member) had been raised from the dead -- he had been slain just before the party left town; the assassins had tried to burn his body but were driven off before they could do so. Homfrith had been the cleric that raised Mordecai, Bel, and Amadin from the dead among other things. The troop leader rode off soon after to report back, but left a few riders behind to serve as messengers should the party or town need them.
The party rode off a few hours before sunset with a couple of deserter soldiers. When about an hours walk from Castle Solen, the soldiers turned back and took the party's horses away. After Iban cast invisibility on everyone, they returned to the castle and made their way to the waterfall to the west of the castle. Sure enough, they found a slippery, muddy cave behind it sloping up steeply, at the end of which they found a secret door. Under a silence spell from Mordecai, Iban threw open the door, behind which they found a room with two Ettins. A fierce melee erupted, as the Ettins were quick to react and quite strong. They were eventually slain and no alarm raised. A moderate treasure was recovered.
Beyond, the party found themselves on what they believed to be the same level they'd been in before. There was a room beyond the Ettins with a heavy door that appeared to have been long rusted shut, though there were signs it had been forced recently. A rathole gnawed through it revealed a musty, dank corridor beyond. The party took a different route! The found a staircase going up, likely to the Keep, but decided to continue exploring the dungeon, as they believed their goal, the gem of seeing, was below and not above.
Exploring to the west, the party found a series of high, wide halls slick with moisture and some mold that eventually led them down a wide stair to a great north-south hall. To the north, they found ranked statues depicting hostile warriors armed with swords and axes. They turned south,m not liking the looks of these and were suddenly swarmed by a vast number of Ghouls. Mordecai and ZZ destroyed (and turned, respectively) a score of them but more kept coming. The party fell back in good order. Knar prepared to lightning bolt many of them, but the creatures were to fast and swarmed the party. A pile of them buried the wizard before he got his spell off, and the wizard was paralyzed (after two critical hits on him!) and unable to do anything as the creatures began to devour the helpless victim. Iban was also paralyzed, and the fight began to turn somewhat desperate, though happily the party had a wall to their back to limit the ability of the Ghouls to surround them. Despite the moment of danger, the party gained the upper hand and eventually prevailed (it was a nice, tactical fight!). They then rested and healed themselves somewhat, and considered their next actions. It was decided to clear out the Ghouls once and for all, to prevent another such scenario. Plus, as there were several passages the ghouls may have taken, it was hoped they could be destroyed in detail.
This proved the case. The first room they entered was an ossuary, stacked with great piles of bones both ancient and not so ancient (many with tooth marks). Two short stairs going yet further down led to a pair of obvious Ghoul lairs. Each had some of those that had been driven off previously. Within each group, however, were a few extremely tough Ghouls exuding a terrible reek. These proved resistant to turning but not to being cut to pieces. Sadly, the ghouls appear d to have little treasure of their own, save for a small gem found amidst the many bones and other detritus of their lairs.
The party now decided to push north through the hall of statues. Knaw first used his wand to detect magic, but found the statues to be non-magic. Iban, still invisible, opted to scout ahead of the party, and found a a total of 8 hostile warrior statues. But, as he got further north,he was faced with a huge medusa face with glowing green eyes leering at him. Fortunately, nothing bad happened. It seemed that there was another broad staircase down, below which was a giant Medusa statue in a larger room. After reporting back, he decided that he would levitate and propel himself along the ceiling above the statue and drop a cloak over its face. This he did with little trouble, and the rest of the party proceeded forward. The statue lay in a lozenge-shaped room with a floor consisting of a bewilderingly complex mosaic depicting a medusa's snaky hair (not sure if I mentioned but ZZ felt a strange draw from it). Both Bel and Amadin sensed a secret door on the back wall, but 10' above the floor. So, Iban levitated up to it and opened it, revealing a small alcove with a wraith behind the door. By good fortune, he was not struck by it and was able to get clear as the party poured magic and missile fire into it (Bel shot it dead with a few magic arrows); as it disintegrated, a golden statue of a medusa head with green eyes like the great statue fell to the ground. Beyond was a pile of treasure,including some strange boots determined later to be Boots of the Spider (allowing climbing walls and such).
The wraith slain, the party continued their next actions...