Chapter 49
Most of the companions are locked in a room, 30 feet square, with nine opaque globes hanging from an unseeable ceiling. Mond, Gustaf, and Golem Number 9 are on the other side of the secured door, outside of the room and unable to help them with the latest puzzle.
Dolor walks around the room, contemplating each of the silvery globes in turn. Bilwin joins him, but neither discerns anything of note; there are no sounds from within, nothing can be seen inside, and they do not move on their own.
Out of curiosity, Gven begins tapping each of them, attempting to generate a reaction in case something is inside. On the fifth orb, she taps it a little too hard with her dagger and the glass shatters, spilling several gems and a single key to the floor. Dolor picks up one of the gems, then another, and says, “Pretty, but fake.” Grindlefoot grabs the key and tries it in the room’s door, but it doesn’t unlock the latch.
Gven continues tapping the remaining four globes, trying to do so with a gentle touch to avoid breaking them. The last one breaks open unexpectedly and several hundred gold coins fall out, along with another key. Grindlefoot tries this key on the door, but it also fails to open the lock.
Dolor does a quick count of the gold pieces, “600 is a decent sum for our purses. It looks like we’re meant to crack them all open until we find the one with the real key, and likely a nasty surprise to go with it. Gven, do you want to do the honors?”
On the third orb, Gven breaks it open to discover a batch of jewelry and another key. Before they have a chance to try this key, a cloud-like shape emerges from the remains of the orb and takes a human form.
Seeing the shape become solid, Gven doesn’t waste time and embraces her rage. Pulling Tempest Edge from its sheath, she swings at the apparition twice, slicing through the figure’s outline. It screams in pain, a piercing sound that chills the barbarian’s skin, and lashes out with spectral tendril-like arms that don’t find their mark.
Standing close to Gven, Dolor is able to react next. Gleaming Blade arcs through the air faster than the spirit can move, slicing through its mid-section. The tiefling follows up with his non-magical shortsword in the other hand, stabbing the creature. Another shrill scream of agony fills the room.
Grindlefoot prepares to cast Haste on Gven and—fortunately, for his own health—recalls her response the last time he did. The druid decides that Dolor will be more appreciative of the doubled speed, improved defensive benefits, and extra action.
Before bludgeoning it with his hurdy-gurdy case, Bilwin quickly verifies that it’s not undead with Detect Evil and Good. The spectre visibly recoils when the instrument’s case lands against its shape.
Gven stabs it with her glowing blue sword, generating another chilling scream. Dolor follows Gven with a wide swing of Gleaming Blade. The sword’s magical energy slices through the apparition’s body and it dissipates into a puff of smoke.
With their enemy gone, they investigate the gems and discover they’re valuable, worth several thousand gold. The key doesn’t unlock the door, and they continue smashing the six remaining orbs, ready for another opponent to appear.
Grindlefoot smashes the orb closest to him, allowing a scroll and a key to drop.
Bilwin cracks the next orb, which yields a handful of lead pieces and another key. Within seconds, three dark, black shapes appear floating in the air and stare at the companions menacingly.
“Enough with the googly-eyed stares, you ugly spectres, let’s get to the fighting!” The half-orc barbarian stabs one of the enemies with Tempest Edge and smoothly follows that with a strong swipe of the greatsword across the middle of its body. She watches it dissolve into smoke after being cut in half by Tempest Edge.
Dolor moves toward another of the phantom-like creatures, skillfully wielding Gleaming Blade to slice off what could have been its head. It also turns into an acrid-smelling smoke.
With a mildly-soothing battle cry of “I love pumpkins!”, Grindlefoot jumps at the remaining creature while swinging his staff above his head. The weapon smacks against the apparition’s side, also causing it to dissipate into the air. The halfling looks at the others and grins, “I do love pumpkins. And it just popped into my head.”
They continue breaking the remaining orbs, looking for the key that unlocks the door—not to mention further treasure—while cautious of encountering further creatures. Once all of the orbs have been smashed, they sift through the items on the floor, discovering both treasures and trash.
Dolor recounts for the others, “Let’s see what we’ve got here that’s actually worth something. 600 gold coins, gems that I estimate are worth 12,600 gold, a scroll, a potion, and one silver ring.” He hands the scroll, potion, and ring to Bilwin. “Can you identify these, see if they’re useful?”
The dwarf looks at the scroll first. “Mmm, yes, this is a spell, but I’ll need more time to understand what it does.” He stuffs the paper into his backpack and then examines the potion bottle. “No markings or warnings. This one will also require some more thought,” and the bottle joins the scroll in his backpack.
“I’m particularly curious about this, though,” and he holds up the ring, turning it over in his hand looking for anything peculiar. The cleric decides to cast Identify in order to learn the ring’s properties. “Oh, this one is a paradox! This silver ring will grant you any wish you want, BUT whatever you wish for disappears as soon as you leave this room. Wish for untold wealth and you only have it while you stand here. Want to live forever, you can do so within the confines of these four walls. Need a powerful weapon, you can only battle with enemies that find you in this room, deep inside this underground temple.”
Looking around the room to see everyone’s agreement, Bilwin drops the ring to the floor, where it bounces a few times before rolling to a stop at Mond’s feet. “Nope, not gonna happen,” and the sorcerer heads to the door. “One of those damned keys must open this.”
Returning the way they came, northward in the hallway with a brief cut left and then back to the north again, the adventurers arrive at the room where the other four golems sit in silence. Grindlefoot happens to be watching Golem Number 9 when it looks at the others; the halfling thinks he notices a slight wistfulness to its gaze.
“Only one way from here.” Gven opens the northern door and they proceed down a short passage, turn right and come to the turnstile. Upon inspection, “That thing only goes one direction. If we go through it, I hope there’s a way out on the other side.”
They agree that there’s no choice but to go onward, through the turnstile. The passage goes for another 30 feet to the east, turns right towards the south, and ends after 60 feet at a closed wooden door. Dolor investigates, finds no indication of traps, and slowly pushes the unlocked door inward.
They enter a cavernous room, easily 100 feet across a deep chasm to the other side. The bottom of the chasm, nearly 50 feet below the ledge they’re standing on, is filled with boiling mud. They can’t tell how deep it is, and don’t think it’s worth investigating further—better to avoid needing to know. They can see a small ledge on the other side of the massive chamber with a door like the one they passed through to enter.
Forming a walkway of sorts to the far ledge, are nine metal discs hanging from metal chains attached to the ceiling, 50 feet above them. The chains attach to the center of each disc, allowing them to tilt in any direction. Although they’re horizontal at the moment, if someone were to attempt to stand on the suspended discs, they would have to balance to keep their position as the disc tilts.
At that moment, a geyser erupts from the crater-like boiling mud and a luminescent fungus fills the air, covering a twenty feet diameter and upwards within 5 feet of the ceiling. Looking closer, they see two geysers in the chasm, one that’s 20 feet from them and another 20 feet from the opposite side. The luminescent fungus covers most of the walls, but doesn’t seem to adhere to the hanging metal discs.
“This bears some studying,” Mond says as he sits cross-legged to ponder the puzzle in front of them.
A few minutes later, the geyser on the far side erupts, spreading the same fungus in a similar pattern. Noticing that Bilwin is about to jump on the first disc, Mond stops him. “Wait! I’m willing to bet there’s a pattern here. Give me 10 minutes to figure it out.” The group waits patiently for Mond to decipher the pattern and they discuss ways to cross.
Once the allotted time has passed, Mond confirms the pattern with the others. “The geyser closest to us, on the north side of the cavern, erupts every 5 minutes. And the geyer on the far side, to the south, erupts every 3 minutes. I don’t want to know how that fungus will hurt us, so let’s be mindful of the eruption pattern as we attempt to cross.”
“I call firsties!” Bilwin runs toward the first suspended disc and jumps as he reaches the edge. Powered by his boots of striding, the dwarf easily crosses the three feet of air to the disc, five feet to the chain holding it. Exceptionally agile for a short-statured dwarf, Bilwin grabs the chain as his feet land on either side of the disc and he’s able to maintain his balance. “Only gotta do that eight more times!”
Always helpful, Grindlefoot casts Cat’s Grace on Bilwin to improve his chances on the hazardous route ahead of him.
Dolor watches the timing, allowing Bilwin to focus on successfully jumping from one disc to the next, without getting slimed by the geysers below. The dwarf carries a length of rope that will reach across the chasm, hoping to secure the hanging discs for the others. After several minutes, Bilwin makes it to the other side and finds a protrusion in the rock to tie off the rope.
“Okay, next up!”
Dolor has been keeping track of the geysers eruptions. “Give it another 30 seconds for the geyser over here to go off, then someone can start.”
When it erupts, the slimy fungus covers everything in a 20 foot diameter, including the rope. Within seconds, they see the rope begin to smolder, growing wisps of smoke rise and it disintegrates.
The tiefling looks at the others, “Perhaps we should try crossing a different way?”
As the group discusses how to cross the boiling mud-filled gorge, Gustaf sits down and begins updating the map. Once again, Golem Number 9 takes a keen interest in the mapmaker’s cartography.
