[4E] Grandpre Academy, Group 2, Part 3 (IC)

[Leewei]

Bolerum

The paladin's eyes light up at the prospect of finding the vault. He smiles back at Antoine's jibe.

[Dekkah]

DM
When Antione spoke of the map, Tikka look with interest.
"Oh, these dwarves added some notes to the map."
The goblin translate the added names on the map.
"Did you not look for Furtimanius? His name is on map."

Spoiler: Map

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With Ashe asking the group to be cautious, the heroes doesnt take time to search the throne room right away and withdraw back the the study and bedroom to rest. Ung set up his bedding near the wall and try to get some sleep. The heroes take turn at watch and spend the rest of the day relaxing before being enough tired to actually sleep.

September 3rd, 1500 :

After some decent night sleep, Ashe and Ung feels better and good enough to travel safely again. With their strenght back, they search the corpse and throne room. On the queen corpse, they find a few items of interest which sure are magical : the crown, the full plate armor, the hammer and a ring. The crown have a neat design, made to act as some crown the the Gemviper family symbol, but is also made to be pratical and protective. Her armor and hammer also bear the family crest and of excellent craftsmanchsip. The ring is odd, made out of some clear blue metal branded with runes.

There is an otheron the corspes that have potential. Searching them all also yeild some money, gems and some belt.

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Ok, moved things forward.

Antione added some books to your book collection.... did I give you some bonus for this personnal library? (cant remember)

Loot found on the Queen :
Lifestealer Warhammer +2

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When you strike your enemy, a small measure of your foe’s life force is absorbed by this weapon and directed into you.
Lvl 9 +2 4,200 gp
Weapon: Any melee
Enhancement Bonus: Attack rolls and damage rolls
Critical: +1d12 necrotic damage per plus

PropertyWhenever you kill an enemy with this weapon, you gain temporary hit points equal to 5 + the weapon’s enhancement bonus.

Attack Power (Healing, Necrotic) Daily (No Action)Trigger: You hit an enemy with an attack using this weapon.

Effect: The target takes extra necrotic damage equal to 2 + the weapon’s enhancement bonus, and you regain a number of hit points equal to that extra damage.

Wintersnap Plate armor

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Lvl 9 +2 4,200 gp
Armor: Any
Enhancement Bonus: AC

Properties : You gain cold resistance equal to 3 + twice the armor’s enhancement bonus.

You gain a bonus to Stealth checks in snowy or icy environments equal to the armor’s enhancement bonus.

Utility Power (Aura) Daily (Minor Action)Effect: You activate an aura 1 that lasts until the end of the encounter, until you deactivate it as a minor action, or until the armor is removed. Squares in the aura are difficult terrain for creatures other than you.

Diadem of Acuity

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This metal headband enhances your insight and perception skills.
Head Slot 3,400 gp
Property : You gain a +2 item bonus to Insight checks and Perception checks.

The blue ring seem magical, but nothing you guys can easyly identify (This require an Arcana check)

On other corpses :
Magic hammer +2

Belt of Lucky Strikes

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When wearing this belt, you can hit when you need to.
Waist Slot 3,400 gp

Power Daily (Free Action)Use this power when you miss with a melee attack. Make a melee basic attack against the same target as the one you selected for the attack that missed.

213 GP
130 SP
47 CP
Gems worth 275 GP total.

What do you do?

[Leewei]

Bolerum

The paladin is fairly impressed with the items. Scratching his chin as he looks at the ring, he finally looks at Antoine and shrugs.

"It has some runes on it worked into the scrollwork. Kind of complicated."

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Arcana: (d20+2)[15]

[Gillric]

Ashe

As the others look through the gear on the bodies of the fallen, Ashe takes a closer look at the throne itself. Noting a peculiar spot and verifying the absense of traps, Ashe opens a small compartment. Hmm, a hidden compartment with only a cushion? Antoine, is there an enchantment here to protect the contents?

[Shadow_Elf]

Antoine
The sorcerer does his morning card reading while the others rouse themselves, and then helps them in the search. Bolerum hands him the ring to study, and then Ashe asks about the throne compartment. "Oo ye yi, I'm not a dowsin' rod, podnah. Gimme a few t'finish with this ring, an' I'll check out the throne." He tries his best to identify the enchantment on the ring, before heading over to the throne to look for magical signatures.

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Arcana (Ring): (1d20+12)[27]
Arcana (Throne): (1d20+12)[24]

[Dekkah]

DM
While Antione look at the ring and throne, Ung take some time to inspect the two doors, while not really touching them.
"Door have no lock. Do us look other side?"

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If you open one of the door, tell me which one (north or south)

[Leewei]

Bolerum

The paladin looks at either door, then shrugs and readies his greatsword. "When we're all of us ready, Ung."

[Shadow_Elf]

Antoine
After his inspection, Antoine puts the ring on and sticks the hand wearing it in the secret compartment, patting around the cushion as if searching for something.

[Dekkah]

DM
Antione search the compartement finding nothing. The human seer try to analyse the magic interaction and while the magic are similar, they doesnt seem to react to each other presence at all.

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I extrapolated from both you high rolls.
The ring doesnt seem to trigger anything as you expect the ring to do (sinc eit is some sort of key).

[Shadow_Elf]

Antoine
He furrows his brow. "Both the ring and the cushion in the compartment have teleportation enchantments on em', but they don't react to each other like I thought they might. I think the ring might be some sort a key, but it don't unlock the enchantment on the cushion." He takes off the ring and frowns. "Dang, I thought that was a real no-brainer. D'y'all want me to look into the cushion's past, see how the last people to deal with it used it, or should we just git a move-on?"

[Leewei]

Bolerum

Shrugging, the paladin says, "Maybe there's a command word? Or the ring's wearer needs to be dwarvish?"

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Bol clearly doesn't have a lot of patience for puzzles, and would rather proceed through a nearby door than fiddle with a throne. Smashing it to bits to see what's inside appeals to him -- but since there's teleportation magic involved, it's likely to spoil any enchantment.

[Shadow_Elf]

Antoine
The witch frowns, not liking the prospect of leaving behind an unresolved mystery. "Well, let's explore Roctook proper-like. We can come back if we find a clue, or if there's nothing else more worthwhile to use my divinations on, an' I'll suss this out then. Meantime, which way we want t'start with?

[Gillric]

Ashe

Ashe takes a moment to examine both doors as well as what surrounds them. The north door opens out from this room and looks to have been defended, it likely leads deeper into the complex. The south door opens into this room and was barred from this side, that is likely the way out.

[Dekkah]

DM
Since they are seeking the exit, the heroes heads south. With the door opened, Ashe can see a corridor that angle 90 degrees to the left after 5 feets. He spot a few elven corpse and once he goes around the corner, end up facing a caved in corridor, completly filled with fallen stone. There is even one elven skeleton stuck under the crumbled celling and from the look of it, it have been half buried alive since some dried up blood handprint is on one boulder on him.

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I should had look at the dungeon sooner lol.... didnt though it was blocked path so close lol.

TRying to move forward here would require lot of physical effort (moving rocks and stuff)

A dungeoneering skill check could be useful here if one of you inspect the blocked path.


Oh well what do you do?.

Spoiler: Map

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[Shadow_Elf]

Antoine
Antoine frowns. "Might be there's another way out. I don't really want to go to the effort of openin' up the secret exit if there's another exit elsewhere. We just gotta keep our eyes open fer traps." He moves to return towards the north exit, but keeps his regard on his companions to see if they are following him.

[Gillric]

Ashe

Ashe moves to the North door with Antoine. Proceed with all caution, there are very likely traps. It's not like we have much choice though, that cave in is from the original attack on this place and at least 25 feet of tunnel are collapsed, we would be digging for quite some time and there is no garauntee that it wouldn't collapse again.

[Dekkah]

DM
With the block path south, Antione open the north door. It leads to an short tunnel, roughly 10 feet long. In the corridor, a dwergar skeleton lay on his back in front of an open door. That door lead into a small room with many elven skeletonslaying on the floor. On the left wall, you can see 6 wooden levers, all angled down in low position. You can see that the last lever is covered with a blood handprint, while the others are all clean.

The right side of the room suffered a cave in similar to the south tunnel. Many elven skeletons seem to be stuck under the stones and from the blood splatters ont the rocks covering them, leatting you guess that these have been crushed by the falling stone long ago. As you come closer, you note part of a blue metal band that seem to have been embeded within the stone floor. It is made of the same material than the ring Ashe found on the dwarven queen. the metal band is 4 inches wide and from the look of it most of it have been buried the the fallen stone. You can see a few runes carved in the metal and a quick analysis let you know it is magical, but without seeing it all, identifying the magic and purpose would be extremly hard do to.

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Going forward with Antione post.

You can see on the map the part of the metal I mention ikn text above (between the 2 skull icon in AY54 (dark blue with a light blue dot that represent a rune )

You can try an arcana check now (this wont prevent you to do an other one if you decide to dig up to see it fully later.

Spoiler: Map

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[Gillric]

Ashe

These cave ins almost look like they were intentional to me. I wonder if these levers were used to trigger them as a last line of defense?

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Perception: (1d20+17)[29]
Dungeoneering: (1d20+7)[16]
Theivery: (1d20+7)[9]

[Dekkah]

DM
Ashe take time to search the corpse equipement on the corpse in the south tunnel and in the room, as well as what he can see of the one partially buried and find some money, two magical weapons and an armor.

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Here is some more loot!

27 GP
30 SP
143 CP

+2 Dynamic longsword
+1 magical hand crossbow
Battle harness leather armor +1

[Leewei]

Bolerum

As the party advances, the paladin looks suspiciously at the fallen, and at the doorways and other potential hiding places.

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Where there's one skeleton that can move through stone, there may well be more!

Perception: (d20+4)[5]

[Gillric]

Ashe

I can't tell if the levers have been activated or not but if we break down that wall we might get a better idea. It looks like it will be as tough to shift this cave in as the other unless that rune can be cleared and is used for teleportation or something? Any thoughts Antoine?

[Shadow_Elf]

Antoine
The witch frowns. "Je pense que these runes could be partuva teleportation inscription, but I cannot be sure. Lesse if anything happens when I cross the threshold wearin' the ring, eh?" he says, stepping over the blue line.

[Dekkah]

DM
Antione have a lot of trouble getting past the metal band since there is rubble from the flooring to top in the room over it, but he still manage to squeeze among the stones and be on the other side of the embedded metal while wearing the ring. Beside a few rock rolling down from the pile because of Antione struggling among them, nothing happens at all.

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You are sure you got past the blue metal line in the floor.

[Dekkah]

DM

The heroes start clearing the lever room, while Antione work on a ritual on the ring. They transport the stone into the throne room, with Bolerum, Ung and Rikard working on the heavyer stones. After half an hour, the heroes managed to clear enough to see the hole above the room created by the broken celling, which goes 15 feets deep into the stone.

Now that he sees that cavity, Ashe keen senses immediatly notice a tunnel a few feets above the celling, 3 1/2 feet wide. That tunnel goes toward the lever pannel and after climbing, Ashe spot a metal wire running along the tunnel and hanging into the hole. The wire tip look to have melted. Going in the tunnel would be rough for those un heavy armor, but still possible with difficulties. Even less armored heroes feel squeezed in them.

Ashe take a few moments to crawl into the tunnel, being careful not to disturb the wire and quickly reach the section hidden behind the lever pannel. There is a few pulleys and a wire that is tied to each levers. From that side, Ashe know that all the levers have been activated. An other tunnel small tunnel, runnign above the celling level, goes south, where the 5 other wire runs. Without exploring it, Ashe can see an intersection going east with two wire angling that way and supported by pulleys, while the 3 others keep going in the south tunnel.

The group still decide to clear the rubbles for now to see the full circle and so Antione can inspect it. After an other half hours,or so, when Antione finish his own ritual, the group notice that the north wall bears a blue metal circle with an hand imprint, roughly 3 feets off the ground. Intriged, they clear more rubbles and see that the small hand circle is linked to the floor circle with some band of blue metal that runs on the wall.

Spoiler: Hand imprint circle image

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It is on the north wall (I've put a small circle on the map north wall so you see where it is -on the wall section AW54/AW55).

Still wanting to be able to identify the whole circle, the group take the next hour and half or so clearing the rest of the stones, doign some good workout. They find a few more elven corpses and some money, but nothing of real interest.

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Ok, I could had stoped when you found the celling tunnel or blue hand circle, but I guess you would, at least finish to clear the blue circle to identify it.

You find more gold : 20 GP, 15 SP, 24 CP
You guys can do a lot of things now, so roleplay/action time.

Ashe, roll an dungeoneering please (for the pannel/wires).

If something isnt clear or if you have questions.

I added the above celling tunnels on the map (translucid green) and the wires (yellow lines)

Spoiler: Map

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The Green shading represent the above celling tunnel (they rune 15 feet higher than ground level into the celling (accessible only from behind the hidden pannel or at AX54
The yellow lines are the metal wire running into the hidden tunnels.

[Leewei]

Bolerum

Scratching his beard as he looks at the handprint, the paladin finally ventures, "Circles make me think of portal magic. Maybe this is activated by a hand wearing the ring?"

[Shadow_Elf]

Antoine
The Vistani awakens from his meditation after about an hour, part way through the efforts to clear the debris. "Puttin' one's hand on that blue handprint teleports ya somewhere else. I saw a treasure vault that only the wearer of the ring could access. Might be some loot worth procurin' in there, eh?" he says with a grin. With a tip of his hat, Antoine no longer stands before the party. Instead, a very much living version of the duergar queen whose soul they laid to rest the previous day stands in his place.

If the party is put on edge by this, it is dispelled in a moment when he opens his mouth to speak. "Not bad, if I may say so mahself. I seen her alive-like in three visions, plus I seen the corpse an' the ghost, so I'd say this is a pretty good likeness. Just in case there's some kind a treasure-guardin' baddie or trap or somethin' on the other side a that portal, I'd like to at least have a chance of smooth talkin' my way past. Now, unless y'all have a better idea, I'm gunna go ahead an' press that hand an' see what I can see, oui?"

[Gillric]

Ashe

Ashe emerges from the tunnels again. The levers on the wall were used to trigger these cave-ins. All but one went off, the last was triggered but failed to function properly, I have disabled the trap as much as was safely possible.

[Dekkah]

DM
Tikka take some time checking the runes and say,
"It does look like some teleportation magic. Not a destination circle for the link portal ritual, but some built in magic similar to that."
Ung and Tikka both nod to the mage about him trying it. The orc look at the circle and ask looking confused,
"Do Ung stand in circle too?"
Tikka look at the circle then add,
"Good question. This circle look big enough to contain more than one, all of us if we wish so. Should we all go in or let you go alone?"

[Leewei]

Bolerum

"If there's a statue of Kord in there, I'd love to see it!"

[Shadow_Elf]

Antoine
The disguised duergar shakes "her" head at Bolerum's exclamation. "The statue ain't here, Bole. The Roctook duergar were hired t'escort it, but it never passed through here itself. I found a map in that library that indicates a Kordite temple where it might've ended up, though. I reckon we can check that out when we're done with the Daggers."

He then addresses the notion of them going together. "Might as well. If we're accosted on the other side, at least then we ain't separated from one another. Since only the ring-wearer can use the portal, I would hate t'be stuck on the other side if somethin' attacked me. Let's all see if we can do this as a unit, eh?"