Stonehell Session 15

~ good old fashioned dungeon crawling ~

~ danse macabre ~

~ bandit juice ~

Danse Macabre, The Chambermaid and the Housekeeper, After the Danse Macabre of the Holy Innocents’ Cemetery in Paris, Guyot Marchant, 1485

previous play reports here

 

30 of Sprout

Gringle the warrior

Lyra the hunter

Breagle the outlaw

Fjord the beastmaster

Foggy

Over downtime, Soot the greengiant healer found a way to use their blood demon to cure petrification. Gringle and Ethex returned to flesh. Doc, owner of the General Store, returned from his trip to the capitol flush with goods and gold, expanding the general store. Sagging Jonas, commander of the Stonehome Militia, will return next week with builders, and the Hellseekers are eager to start commissioning buildings.

The crew set out for Stonehell Valley. Lyra, a new addition to the roster with her trusty wolf Bhole, and Fjord, now a full fledged member of the Seekers, as well as Breagle the outlaw, coming back from some time off, and Gringle freshly thawed from stone. They brought along Aethelread II the donkey and his cart, with fresh supplies for the 2 guards of their stash.

An easy 8 hour trek through the marsh brought them to the valley, where they quickly dropped off the cart and headed down. The crew decided they would explore the last quadrant of the first floor, rumored to be a massive crypt. 

Carefully making their way east, Lyra used her trail talisman to find tracks from some human bandits, also making their way east. The party decided that these were remnants of the Ghost Beggars and made to pursue.

They encountered some skeletons in a room, as well as a resonant voice that kept repeating “I do not understand your questions.” Luring them out the skeletons were dispatched, with only Lyra being knocked unconscious. They smashed the skulls to prevent reassembly and took a breather in the room.

Inside was a 10’ face, carved of stone, with a long beard. Smoke poured from the mouth, and two sapphires for eyes. The Stone Oracle greeted the party and let them know, three questions a day. Lyra detected divination magic within it, so they began asking away.

I rolled that the Oracle would give false answers for every question, but the players were clever and mostly asked questions they had partial answers to. For nearby treasure, they were told of a place they had already looted. They learned false information about “Da Dragon”. They asked about the origin of the Oracle, and got a longwinded and clearly false story. With Lyra rested they left. 

They picked a path directly towards the catacombs, and shoved open the door decorated with a danse macabre. In the entryway they heard the sounds of combat from further in, and decided to investigate. Lyra took lead, pushing forward at the edge of the torchlight, until she stepped on a bone underfoot that let out a sickening crack.

Hearing the noise, the brigands turned to pursue. Lyra set a springtrap, and retreated to the Seekers, where they immediately turned out the light. In the darkness they heard the shifting of flesh and saw the spark from Fjord’s 8 arachnid eyes peering into the darkness. Gringle took out his fire oil and nitre accelerant. 

As soon as the 6 brigands came within sight, Gringle let the fire oil loose. It crashed at their feet, igniting instantly and coating their legs in burning oil. Next flew the accelerant, which caused a huge explosion, liquifying 5 of the brigands and sending forth shockwaves. The 6th was quickly brought down with a bolt from Lyra’s crossbow. The crew gathered what gold had survived the blast, a meager 36 pieces, and fled from the dungeon. 

With only 30 minutes left in the session, they decided to carefully make their way back to town, sell off their nitre stocks to Doc, and discuss the possibility of claiming some trade routes to cut out the Capitol.