Logbook of Jerek Stonewall - Entry Number 4
March 3rd, 907 TA
I guess we are all honorary rangers now? We survived their trials and have yet to be given their password for the gate. On the other hand, we now have at least a part of the cross used by the famed Benedict Demonbinder to help seal off the armies of darkness from our beloved realm. Now all we need to worry about are folks burning other folks on Wicker Man Night and an impending meeting with an incredibly powerful mystery buyer of the cross. Sounds simple enough…
We had just finished our battle on the stone dais with the ogres, when we noticed that in the chaos, our good friend Vance had seemingly fainted from the stress of battle. We tried to wake him but he remained stubbornly unconscious. Our new leafy ally Tallowberry took him in much like he did Lady Spring and told us that Vance would be safe until he came to. No sooner had Tallowberry absorbed Vance then the dais started slowly rotating and going down, deeper into the training grounds.
Once the spinning stopped, it revealed a stone staircase that led down for quite a ways, leading to two doors. Behind one, lay the scent of honey, and the sound of enormous bees. Behind the other, lay a room filled with cots and trees, and on one of the cots laid the body of a dead man, who had died in his sleep and was then chewed upon. After a bunch of hemming and hawing between the members that took entirely too long, We decided to go through the room with the cots.
I stayed at the far end of the room, as I didn’t trust the room to not be trapped, and so kept the door open as the others explored the room, not finding much of interest other than another door in the back. Korag opened this new door, and beyond it was a hallway and opposite our door, another door. We all moved past the cot room into the hallway, and then Neptune opened this new door. Behind it were several crates of explosive fireworks, as well as three jars full of dirt, and three large beetles whose undersides glowed in the dark. Doing what we do best, we ignored whatever trial the rangers had prepared for this room and just cut the beetles down, taking their glowing glands after we had done so. No sooner had we done that than we heard the stone dais moving again, and before we could get back there, it had returned to the top, and we were trapped below.
Knowing there was no way back, we moved forward down the hallway, which led to a large room with pillars strewn about. With a large metal tree in the center, and a man impaled by spears upon it. Neptune realized that the pillars were trapped, and that if we moved the wrong way, we too would be skewered, and he spent several minutes disabling the devices. With the traps neutralized, we entered the room to explore. We found that the tree was hollow, and inside was a staircase that led up, through the ceiling and beyond. We also found that this dead body had a note on it, The note detailed how the unfortunate persons here had been searching for pieces of a cross, under the orders of Baron Weremouth, and that they had been unable to find a way out since the dais had gone up.
With the cheery thought of being trapped down here for eternity looming in our minds, we pushed on, going through what was the mess hall and the workshop of the rangers, but otherwise of no importance. We then opened the door to what turned out to be the kitchen, and all hell broke loose, as two cockatrices attacked. The feral birds were not nearly as much of a threat as Neptune, who tried to light the birds on fire after throwing oil at them, nearly burning us alive in the process. Luckily, he was a bad thrower and missed everything entirely. We dispatched the birds, and then entered the main hall of the training facility.
Part of the roof had collapsed, leading to a large opening where above us we could here even more of the foul fowl. Our local pyromaniac Neptune decided to light a rug on fire and set it underneath that entrance to keep the birds at bay, for the time being. With the immediate threat dealt with, we looked around the hall, and found basic survival books and training guides, but nothing of importance. The room had two doorways, one that we believed would take us back down toward the bee room, and another that held a strong aura of necromancy. Us being the brave adventurers that we were, decided to open the cursed door. Behind it was an unnatural darkness, and in that darkness was a creature of pure evil, close to a lich but weakened, having been trapped down here for so long.
The creature leapt at us, going straight for Neptune, and we all rushed to fight the beast. Through our combined efforts, we brought the creature down, and breathed a sigh of relief when we found all of us were mostly unharmed. As the creature died, it released a piece of a cross. This cross was made of a most unnatural metal, and it was clear that there was a power inside, even incomplete. We searched the room it had been trapped in, finding it to be the instructor’s room. We found a map of the place, which showed us that we had pretty much explored the entirety of the facility, and notes on the last rangers who had faced the trials.
With the cross, and the knowledge of the place in hand, we decided to go up the metallic tree searching for a way out. We found that this was another trial for the rangers, about trying to get a group of goblins to accept our leadership, in the form of a moving effigy. Unfortunately, we could not complete this trial as the goblins had all turned to stone due to them fighting the cockatrices. Since this way was shut to us, we decided to go through the collapsed roof of the main hall and killed the cockatrices guarding the way. We went through the pathway up to where the stone goblins stood and after some searching found a hidden pathway leading further up.
This small passage led to a room of strange dark rock. Figuring this was some sort of teleportation room, I figured that the only way to proceed was to turn off all our light sources, and as soon as we did so, three paths were shown to us. One led back to the dais room, one led to a barn, and one led into a wine cellar. After more hemming and hawing, we decided to go into the wine cellar. Apparently, this wine cellar though was guarded by a large crocodile. I used the Mummer’s Ruff to throw my voice upwards into the bar above us, and thanks to Malika, who knew the barkeep, we were helped out of there before the crock could attack.
We ate a nice, if expensive, dinner there, and then proceeded to split up. Most of the group went back to the religious district, while Telek and I went into Simon’s Storytellers, the home of the Fellowship of Wee People. We talked to the owner of the place, and were told that we could exchange stories for information, and after talking to them for a bit were told that a girl had died near where we lived, apparently by her own doll, at a place on Portman Close. We thanked them for the information and got back together with our comrades, who hadn’t gotten much at the monastery.
We endeavored to find some information on some of the magic items we had acquired and ended up at a place called Snuffy’s. He did not know much about our personal items, but when I showed him the piece of the cross, he wept with joy. He told us the history of the cross, that it was used by Demonbinder himself, and that it was made out of metal from the demon home world. He told us that he knew of another person who was searching for the cross and who held the other piece. HE wouldn’t tell us who it was, but I believe it is the newest Baron Weremouth. Snuffy would arrange a meeting with us at his place with the other owner tomorrow evening.
With this meeting scheduled, we went to the Fretful Porpentine for drinks and a possible job, and were rewarded with both. Lt. Greyriver was there ad she gave us a mission to kill a demon that had been captured by a man called The Deacon outside of the city walls. We were to buy the monster, and then remove it. We headed to the cave where the demon was being kept, and were greeted by Deacon. He was a very cagey fellow, and showed us the demon, which was real, inside his cave. He waited for us to verify the monster before payment, when I heard a voice coming from a thicket in the back of the cave. The voice said that they were a cleric of the Hearth, and that the Deacon had kidnapped them. Deacon overheard us talking to the voice, and proceeded to let the demon loose, and then flee. The demon initially attacked us, but when he saw the demon cross in my hands, he tried to flee. I could not let this stand, and with a single, defiant charge, I struck down the beast.
With the demon dead, we chased after Deacon to save this cleric before he could be harmed,. We chased Deacon to the far side of the hill, where another cave entrance was. We saw inside this cave an effigy for the wicker man festival being built, and a horse and carriage, where Deacon and a female associate were trying to drag away a man. We are now at that entrance, and I have issued a challenge to Deacon to unhand their prisoner. It is only a matter of moments until we see whether we can avoid bloodshed or not.