Deciding to investigate the sewers a bit more in hopes of discovering more information about the mysterious golem assassins, the group deploys the folding boat in the early morning hours and sculls upstream. They find a partially covered entrance to an overflow pipe and enter.
Though old, the sewers are in relatively good repair, except in places where they have collapsed. The group searches about and finds that upstream seems less recently traveled than the directions that lead back towards Baytown.
Eventually, the group leaves the sewer area and enters the section of the underground complex dealing with fresh water, culminating in a large underground cistern that measures hundreds of feet across. Near one end is a patch of boomshrooms sprinkled with shiny things – coins, gems, magic? The elf deploys his cloak of batwings and flaps around the cavern before returning to shore. He observes glowing fungi on the walls of the cistern and a few barrels slowly circling in the eddies formed at the center of the watery expanse.
There is a brief discussion on the banks of the cistern and the folding boat is deployed again in preparation for a trip along the subterranean canals. There is a moment where the group is distracted and it is then that the dragon surfaces and blasts them with a stunning roar, followed with a splash of caustic acid.
As the group rallies and engages the creature with spells and weapons, it becomes apparent that this is no ordinary dragon. It casts a spell that drops the paladin face down and unconscious in the water and begins biting all within reach. The scales of the dragon seem amazingly resistant to the attacks of the party members, but finally the ranger delivers a crushing blow to one of the beast’s forelegs and forces it to erect a globe of impenetrable darkness and retreat beneath the water surface. The elf passes his cloak to the mage so the spellcaster can get an aerial view of things.
This begins a game of cat and mouse that sees the dragon casting cloudkill in the party’s midst and hiding out in the middle of the cistern, safe from missile fire and the fireballs that the mage wants to use, though the airborne mage still manages to use magic missiles to annoy the beast. In the midst of all of the chaos, a trio of the pale wooden sword wielding golems burst into the room to add a little more spice to the adventure. Suddenly the shit gets very real and the demise of the party is not outside the realm of possibility. They battle grimly on, using spells and weapons in a desperate attempt to stave off a transition to dragon snacks.
Finally, after the golems are defeated,. a globe of darkness pops up on one of the giant pipes that carry water into and out of the cistern and the group surmises that the dragon has taken leave of the locale. They draw a few shaky breaths and decide what to do now.
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