After talking it over, the party decides to spend a few more resources on investigating the potential dracolitch lair. After all, who said Melkerech was humanoid? They send in Thrahw to shape a small hole in the stone sealing off the shaft (feed that kitty!). Malchor sends in the wizard eye to investigate. He scopes out an undermountain network of tunnels, staffed by a drow and some druegar, and a purple miniature mountain gorilla and maybe an imp or a quasit…who knows. It doesn’t look like a fun place to run around in – and the tip from Pearsay did explicitly mention a tower – so unless the tower is the shaft (feed that kitty!) then this is probably the wrong place. Welp – off they go into the deeper desert.
Using the powers afforded to them, they spend nights aloft looking for landmarks and days in the cool comfort of the den of rope-trickery.
Eventually they find a suitable candidate. A tall, three spired ebony tower without doors or windows situated in the middle of a small hollow, high up on the side of a mountain range overlooking the barren desert. Seems like a place to check out so off they go. Scouting reveals a pair of flesh golems roaming around the vale and a pile of dead animals and humanoids at the entrance to a long sloping mist-filled tunnel that seems to extend under the tower.
The mist is determined to be poisonous and the slipper-clad mage investigates the tunnel ceiling. More dead animals lie piled in a region that looks empty. Eventually it is determined that there is an invisible barrier there, which Malchor disintegrates. They erect a wall of stone as a dam to the poisonous mists and make their way towards the base of the tower. They break into the basement of the place and spend a few minutes marveling at all the dust. Clearly this place has been undisturbed for decades, at minimum. Onwards and upwards.
They climb stairs and investigate as they go. Things are looking pretty mundane as they ascend through the first few levels. When they enter the boudoir of the mage’s concubine, things get a bit spicy. The concubine turns out to be a demon/devil/extraplanar whatchamhooozit that likes to cultivate flowers that produce a narcotic pollen. Although most of the party is incapacited by the lotus dust, Goldpiece manages to maintain a grip long enough to blast her into another dimension using the unicorn staff. A secret trapdoor in the ceiling allows entrance to a room beyond.
The room is pyramidal and has no apparent exits aside from a trapped, locked, magical secret door set into one of the chamber walls. A bit of resting and head-scratching ensues but after a bit they suppress the magical trap and gain entrance (via teleportation portal) to another complex. They continue to investigate and fight a couple of cat statues and a flying longsword before entering a room with a pair of minotaur statues. Runes are inscribed about the base of each statue…
Leave a reply