In our last session, our intrepid adventurers had begun their task of searching for six specific books in the lair of the wizard Castanamir. They had been hired by Chakos of House Cadryenne, a drow elf, to accomplish this task. As there would be many spoilers even just giving a brief recap of what happened last week, I’m going to save that for after the break. This week both Muse and Theo were missing so it was just Rachel and RJ playing and thus just Morgraen, Riordan, Lavinia, and Rurik. Spoilers: There are definitely spoilers for the old AD&D module, C3: The Lost Island of Castanamir, below the break.
My GM comments, as usual, are in [italics and brackets].
So, in our last session, the party had explored a portion of Castanamir’s abode. It had become quite apparent that a lot of magic was at work here. Primary among these, of course, were the archways or portals that led from one room to another. The party had determined that these archways magically transported them from one room to another even though it seemed that one was just walking from one room to another. In their exploration, they had discovdered the entry lounge, a kitchen, a dining room overrun with rats, the “Zim Exhibit” (whatever a Zim might be), a room with some hobgoblins behind a furniture barricade, a hallway, and some sort of game room that brought opposition for those in the room to fight. They had also encountered a couple of hit-and-run humans, a berserk barbarian (that they killed), some sort of cross between a wolverine and the Tasmanian Devil (that they also killed), and a couple of ogres (that killed Vondal and from which the rest of the party escaped and ran). We pick up this session with the party having passed through an archway that they had not yet passed through before.
Not sure what to expect as they passed through, an empty and featureless room some ten-feet on each side was not it. That is what they found, however. The only archway offering an exit was the one that they had just passed through. Suspecting that there was a hidden passage or secret door, the party began to search the walls. As they started to poke and prod, they found that their hands and arms passed right through the walls. They were insubstantial!
Suspecting that the walls hide a larger room beyond and expecting to find more archways, Rurik and Riordan stepped through the walls directly across from the archway that they had come through. They found themselves in the corners of different rooms rather than being together. Rurik’s eyes were immediately drawn to the pedestal in the middle of the room which had a single book atop it. Even from his short distance away, he could see that the book was “The Angelus,” a sacred text that he had been seeking his whole life! Riordan, on the other hand, was in a room with numerous bookshelves lining the walls. If that was all, he would have been pleased but instead, there was a large bonfire in the middle of the room and northern barbarians were taking the books from the shelves and tossing them onto the fire!
Lavinia followed Rurik and Morgraen followed Riordan. As Rurik made a beeline for The Angelus, Lavinina’s eyes were drawn to all of the gold and gems piled up behind the pedestal that held Rurik’s interest. Similarly, Morgraen’s main concern was not that which appeared to be Riordan’s. As she came into the room, one of the bookshelves swung on a hinge to reveal a hidden passage…a passage from orcs and goblins came flooding forth.
Realizing that their companions were not in the room with them and speculating that the wall behind them might not be solid, Morgraen and Riordan walked through the wall and entered the same room as the other two. Riordan’s interest was immediately drawn to the bookshelves beyond the piles of treasure that held Lavinia’s rapt attention. They looked to be some extremely rare books…even some that were only rumored to exist. He headed straight for the bookshelves.
Morgraen had no interest in the books or the treasures. Her gaze was immediately drawn to a dwarf in the room. A dwarf that she had thought she had been forced to leave to his death on the battlefield. A dwarf whom had been her lover until she was forced to leave him behind…Nicolai! He immediately ran forward to greet Morgraen.
As the two dwarven lovers caught up on what had happened since that fateful day they were separated (and how Nicolai had managed to survived and come to this place), the others were enthralled by their own interests. As Lavinia was filling her pockets, pack, and any available container, she kept uncovering even more valuable treasure. First it was gold. Then platinum. Then gems and eventually a diamond as big as her head. Riordan was finding texts that he never imagined he, or anyone else for that matter, would ever see. He found one of the rumored original draconic texts on the subject of magic. Similarly, he found the first recorded treatise ever written by elvenkind on the topic of magic. He also came across all six of the tomes that Chakos had hired the adventurers to recover. Rurik was so overcome with the joy of finding the Angelus, that he simply stood there, hugging the tome.
Nicolai explained that he had thought he was dead but had woken up here instead. For the last year or so since he and Morgraen had been separated on the battlefield, he has been living in Castanamir’s home. He described the various rooms that he had explored…all of which fit the description of what the party had discovered in their own explorations. Morgraen [and Rachel] were rather skeptical of all that was going on. The skepticism was not abated by Nicolai’s attempt to convince Morgraen to stay here with him and let the others continue on with whatever quest the party was on. All that he could get Morgraen to agree to was a few moments of privacy when the others left before they would follow after.
So once Lavinia had piled every single piece of treasure in the room into a rather convenient chest she had found…a chest that was bigger on the inside than it was on the outside…and Riordan gathered up the most rare of the books and Rurik composed himself and stopped weeping with joy, the trio passed through the wall again to give the pair their privacy. Two things happened as a result. Nicolai dropped to a knee and proposed to Morgraen. Lavinia screamed in despair as the chest was no longer in her arms when they returned to the small ten-by-ten room! Riordan and Rurik were both disappointed to find that the books they had brought out were no longer in their possession either!
Heading back into the larger room, the trio arrived and found Morgraen accepting Nicolai’s proposal for marriage. Even stranger, Lavinia was carrying the chest again even as she started to explain that none of it was really. The Angelus was back on the pedestal along with another book (which turned out to be a very important annotated version with the commentary of a highly respected and renowned sage. Lavinia was adamant that the treasure had not gone out with them and Nicolai confirmed that none of the treasures could be taken from the room.
As a group, they exited through one of the side walls to see if they could find other archways, Morgraen and Nicolai embracing as they passed through. He, of course, was no longer there on the other side and neither were any of the treasures that had been re-gathered. Perhaps Morgraen had already mourned the loss of Nicolai over the past year or perhaps she was hiding her pain; regardless, she and the others pressed on despite their lost joys.
Beyond the illusory wall was a large room with three archways. There was nothing of interest in the room except for in two corners. Small shelves, some ten feet up, were in each corner. Small frosted glass glboes that had been broken sat on each shelf. There were no shards of glass, however, on the floor…leaving Rurik to speculate that at least the globes had not been broken from the inside out (perhaps hatching something).
[The rest of the session was largely dominated by the party (and players) trying to determine the pattern of the archways…successfully I should say. The determined that passing through one “direction” always led to a portal in specific “direction.” They made notes indicating which archway led to which destination. Below, I’m just going to touch the highlights of the exploration.]
While passing through the archways to determine their pattern, the party had a few encounters of note. They found a couple of hallways that they hadn’t really explored before. In one of their first passes through, they encountered the ogres that had killed Vondal in the “game room.” This is where the party established the practice of simply going right back through the arrival archway if there was immediate danger. Unfortunately for Lavinina she was the last one to come through and by the time she did, the ogres had come over to the party’s “arrival” archway. Fortunately, Lavinia is almost as hard to swat a housefly when she puts her mind to it and she was able to duck back through the archway without becoming a smear on the floor. The party quickly ran through another archway before the ogres arrived.
In future explorations, the party was able to give these hallways a better look as the ogres where no longer there when they arrived again. Both hallways had a pair of rooms that were accessed by normal wooden doors. Each of these rooms had an additional wooden door that led to another room. In one hallway, the initial wooden doors, although still upright and intact, looked like they had been broken into as the door jambs were busted. One of the hallway’s chambers held a quartet of hidden crossbows and a tripwire that launched bolts at Morgraen as she entered. The chamber behind this room held a single cot with a couple of bags of food stashed underneath it.
The opposite door led to a couple of rooms with a lot of furniture and other junk. An obvious bedroom, as indicated by the large bed within, had the skeleton of a short humanoid figure. A note was lying on the bed. It read, “Master, We kepe hows nice sins you bin gone. Kleko got sik and dide. Me burned bahdee in oven. Me sik now. Not much time. Golum in dineeg hall broke.” It was signed by someone named Monne, presumably the skeleton were his or her remains. This scene suggested that Castanamir has been gone for a rather long time…or something cleaned all the flesh from Monne’s remains.
The other hallway held a room where all of the furniture had been piled up against the other door in the room. The party cleared enough furniture to allow them to access the door. A bedroom was beyond the door as was a reptilian creature, humanoid in form. It threw a large dart and so the party quickly shut the door as it didn’t seem like there was anything in the room of interest to the party…at least not from the quick look that they got.
The party also passed through the room with the hobgoblins a number of times. Each time they did, the hobgoblins shouted out for them to drop their weapons and surrender. Apparently, the hobgoblins got tired of being ignored and as the party passed through one of the times, a group of archers took position on the hobgoblin barricade and let loose. Lavinia, the last to pass through this time, was struck and incapacitated. By the time the party returned to the room [the party had to pass through a number of archways to return to the hobgoblin chamber], their companion had been taken by the hobgoblins. The archers were still on the barricade but one hobgoblin was in the room carrying a white flag. He indicated that the hobgoblins wanted to parley with the party.
The hobgoblin offered to return their companion if the party would go and gather food for them. The halfling, as he put it, was a bit small and looked kind of stringy and tough. However, if the party refused to their demands, the hobgoblins would be happy to eat their companion and start while she was still alive and conscious. All that they wanted was two weeks of food for three dozen men. When Morgraen pointed out that there was no way that thirty-six hobgoblins could be hiding behind the barricade, they simply pointed out that it was a bit crowded and repeated their threat to eat the hobbit.
Before agreeing, Morgraen talked more to the hobgoblin and explained that Chakos had also sent them to this place. This seemed to rattle the hobgoblin a little bit. He asked to speak with his commander privately. [The hobgoblins did become something of a comic relief but don’t let that fool you…they are quite deadly.] The commander was confused as to why the hobgoblin wanted to speak with Private Leigh but said go ahead. It was then clarified that the hobgoblin wanted to have a private conversation with the commander. After they did, the hobgoblins started to refer to the themselves as the 1st Unit of the 1st Phalanx of the 1st Column of the 1st Army of the NEW Glorious Hobgoblin Empire rather than the 64th of the 3rd of the 7th of the 2nd of the Glorious Hobgoblin Empire. [This was all seemingly spurred by Morgraen’s mention of Chakos.] Eventually, the party agreed to the hobgoblin’s request and set off to fetch food from the kitchen.
To fetch as much as was demanded, they had to make numerous trips. Each trip took them through a number of archways and a number of rooms. Although they were fortunate enough not encounter the ogres or the pair of humans, they did encounter another of the northern berserkers. He charged and chased the party through one of the archways…which led to the hobgoblin lair. As the party engaged the berserker from up close, the hobgoblin archers peppered him with arrows from the relative safety of the barricade. Like his brethren (presumably), this one suffered multiple mortal wounds before finally dying (and getting his head chopped off for good measure). After the battle, Lavinia–still unconscious–was hoisted above the barricade and a falsetto voice regaled the hobgoblin archers with much praise and declared them to be her hero until the Commander shouted out that that was quite enough from Private Leigh [Like I said, they were a bit of comic relief and some very bored soldiers.]
Eventually, the party brought back enough food (noticing that neither the pantry nor the ice box ever seemed deplenished by their raids. Lavinia was returned to them, her wounds having been skillfully bandaged, no worse off having been Private Leigh’s halfling puppet for a bit. As a group, however, their explorations and combats were starting to take their toll and so they elected to find a place to hole up and catch their breath.
Returning to one of the two hallways (the one without the broken doors), they picked the room with the lone cot. Closing the door behind them, they found that the door had been crudely jury-rigged to allow it to be barred from within using a table leg. They did so and relaxed for a bit. When they exited the room, the two humans took a shot each from the opposite doorway before running off down the hall. They must have passed through one of the three archways as their was no sign of them when the party looked.
At another point during their explorations, the party came back to the dining room. The two humans who had taken a couple of shots at them in the past were in the room, standing at the opposite end of the room by the rats’ nest. One of the rats was sitting on the dining table and one of the humans was actually petting it. Morgraen had entered the room first and tried to talk with the pair but one of them shot at her instead. When Rurik came into the room, he cast Sleep. Although neither of the humans were affected, the rat on the table dropped. The humans were quite upset by this and one yelled, “I’m going to kill you,” and they started coming after Rurik. The party were successful, however, in evading the pair.
There was quite a bit more exploration and nearly ever [if not every] archway was mapped as to where it went and where it came from. Throughout these additional explorations, the party continued to avoid the ogres and other encounters until one of the last mappings. As Morgraen passed through the “south” archway in the kitchen, she came through the eastern archway of the “Zim Exhibit” and was met by the two humans, who looked as though they had just come through another archway. They looked quite happy to see Morgraen as murderous grins spread across both of their faces.
[That’s pretty much where we ended the session. The party had explored and mapped quite a bit of real estate. They had also interacted and or fought with a number of the factions/residents “residing” in Castanamir’s home. However, much to their chagrin, they had not located Castanamir’s library or the six books (assuming, of course, that the ones previously found were not actually real). Much of the night was taken up with the players puzzling out how the archways worked. In fact, at the end, Rachel exclaimed, “Phew! I’m exhausted.” But it was a good exhaustion from all the puzzling.
The players are now speculating that they’ve missed something. Perhaps a secret door or a hidden archway that leads to Castanamir’s library. I, of course, have no comment on that. But I will note that if they are going to now search around the various rooms for a secret entrance to the library, they might want to keep in mind that they are not alone. They know that there are two ogres somewhere even if they haven’t seen them in a bit, there are the hobgoblins, there are the two humans now confronting Morgraen (although their typical behavior has been to shoot and run but they do look really pissed so who knows), and there were three bedrolls in the pantry where the first encountered one of the berserkers and have since encountered another. Is it possible that a third one is somewhere about?
That’s pretty much it. I’m sure I may have gotten the order of events mixed up a bit but I think I hit the important highlights at least.
Next week should be RJ, Rachel, and Theo so Aelwulf and, perhaps, a new face will be back with the party.
I must say that the magical portals are making it very easy to have PCs come and go as the players’ attendance fluctuates. đŸ˜‰ ]
