March, Week Three

 Week three brings us further into the Crucible of Oxyus, from beautiful rooms covered in bas relief sculptures, to wood paneled studies, to strange experiments in gravity. Read on to explore and discovery what awaits!

Week Three

3/13: The Wizard’s Study

In the western range of the pillared hall there is a perpendicular corridor made of dressed gray-green basalt cobbles. Down this corridor are two smaller doors on either side, a blue door and red door. At the end of the passage there is a set of double doors with a radiant eye painted on each. This is the study of Oxyus of Fenebrahn. The study itself is 30’ long and 25’ wide and is lined with dark wood paneling. Half-empty bookshelves, a desk, and a wooden chair add to this room’s office-like air. There are two human-sized statues placed before the northern doorway. The sound of distant running water can be heard from beyond the western end of the room.

• North: The 10’ wide hallway is separated from this room by two 15’ tall arched doors made of iron with large copper bands around them. The weight of the doors is so immense an Open Doors check is necessary to heave them aside.
• West: A stout wooden door separates the room from a 5’ wide hallway that travels further west into the mountain. 30 feet down the hall a T-section branches off to the north. The sound of running water is louder behind this door.
• The Statues: The Eastern statue is made of moss-covered green basalt and is carved into the coiling serpent of darkness Aboses. The Western statue is made of black and red flecked marble and carved into the likeness of the Phoenix god of magic, Zaltus Embri.
• The Contents of the Study: The bookshelves here have been ransacked, and only moldering volumes of now-indistinguishable tomes remain. Rat droppings are scattered all around the room. There is a secret compartment in the desk. Inside is a pouch with 25 platinum coins stamped with Oxyus’ face on them and an ornate golden key with a pearl in the handle (worth 50 gp by itself).

3/14: The Bedroom

The is a well-appointed room, 30’ wide by 25’ long. In the corner, a massive canopy bed can be found. Next to that is a small side table with an ancient ceramic oil lamp resting atop it. The walls of this room have been painted to resemble some distant northern forest, showing endless pine trees and brambles with the occasional fox or buck peaking around a tree. Smelly piles of rubbish have been piled up in here. The bedding has been wadded up like a nest and large rats can be seen residing there.  Those who disturb the rats on the bed will be attacked by three rat packs consisting of five Rats each.

• South: There is a simple wooden door leading into a hallway that travels south to a T-section. The door has been splattered with old blood. The distant sound of running water can be heard from behind it.
• East: Down a 25’ long corridor to the east, a locked, blue-painted wooden door can be found. The key in the secret compartment in room 3/13 will open this lock.
• West: There is another simple wooden door on this wall that leads down a short corridor to room 3/18.

3/15: The Relief Room

This ornate double room is covered in relief sculptures and is split in the middle by an ornate floor-to-ceiling carving with two arched corridors running along the north and south side of it. The room is 50’ long by 25’ wide with 30’ tall ceilings.

• North: A 25’ long hallway leads into this room from a simple wooden door in room 2/27.
• East: In the eastern end of the room, a Secret door allows access from this room to the magic fountain in room 3/12. To reveal the door, one must push in the exposed stone heart of a demon carved to the left of the secret door.
• West: The door on this wall is made of sturdy mahogany wood and opens upon a corridor with empty torch sconces running along it.
• The Walls: The walls are covered completely in ornate bas relief sculptures of war scenes between pot-helmeted warriors with curved swords and barbed-spear-wielding demons. The demons seem to be winning.
• The Central Sculpture: This large feature is roughly 10’ wide by 15’ long and depicts the gods of the Akrakogi scrambling up a massive tree trunk, The entire Akrakogi pantheon is depicted crawling up the tree to avoid the demonic onslaught. There is Grudys the Smith, No’Shem the Wise Warrior, Vrundas the General, Mech’el the Sea, Honugas the Trickster, Lartemi the Hunting Mother, Henram the Hearth Protector, Onetri the Lantern Bearer, Menludyss the Earth Mother, Gar the Messenger, and Pemrahn the Solar Father, who is seen standing at the very top of the sculpture. This feature actually hides a secret staircase that descends to the floor below. If the sculpture of Vrundas’s scabbard is pulled up on, a door will open in the grand carving with an audible click. This will reveal the staircase inside that leads down to level 3.

3/16: The Sitting Room

This small 20’ by 30’ room is masterfully cut and polished from the living stone. Two ancient couches on either side of the room and a small moldy armchair sit, waiting for someone to sit down and enjoy them. There are two small tables in this room with ornate ceramic oil lamps atop them (50gp, weighs 10 coins). Rats skitter around the edges of the room.

• South: This wall bears a wooden door that leads to a hallway in the south.

3/17: The Drain Room

This 40’ diameter circular chamber is bridged by a corridor running east to west through the top of the chamber. The chamber bottom is located 20’ below the bridge, where a grated tunnel allows water coming through from an underground river to the south to pass through the north of the chamber and out. In ages past, this water feature ran swiftly. But because it hasn’t seen proper maintenance in centuries, the water has  slowed to a trickle here as it slowly drains out of the chamber. In the muck and piled up debris of the watery cesspit an Otyugh makes its nest, ready to ensnare those foolish enough to go looking for treasure.

• The Bridge: This 5’ wide bridge crosses through the middle of the chamber, either end then continuing into a hallway. At about the middle point of the bridge, a cleverly hidden trapdoor has been concealed. If not spotted, anyone who steps on the door must succeed at a Wands save or fall through the door to the waterlogged bottom of the chamber, taking 2d6 damage from the initial fall.
• The Otyugh’s Treasure: The Otyugh has managed to collect a small trove of loot taken from the corpses of its food. This includes 50 gold coins from a scattering of different nations, a pair of thick golden bracelets worth 200 gp each, and a small sack of 25 silver coins.

3/18: The Empty Chamber

This 20’ wide room is 35’ long and has the smell of mildew about it. The original purpose of this chamber has long since been forgotten, but the five candle nubs in the northwest corner speak to someone having spent some time here in the not-too-distant past. There is also a ratty blanket and two burnt torch ends scattered about in here. Someone has written “head over heels!” in chalk on the northern wall.

• North: A secret door in this wall can be accessed by uttering the word “silence” while standing in the room. It leads down a long tunnel further into the dungeon.
• East: A small hallway leads to a door to room 3/14.
• West: A similar hallway leads to another simple wooden door that leads to room 3/19.

3/19: The Gravity Room

This 60’ long room is 25’ wide and split down the middle by a rotating wall that turns to reveal the other side of the room. Around the north and south ends of the chamber, thick iron rings have been driven into the walls, floor, and ceiling. The rotating wall in the middle of the room conceals each half of the room from the other. Only after a careful search does the rotating mechanism hidden in a false pillar become apparent. In the northern half of the room, a person-sized plinth 4 feet in height with a wide flaring crown can be found. A polished emerald sphere sits in a depression in the center of the plinth and can rotate freely atop it. Next to the plinth a scarred, ratty-looking human fiddles with the odd statuary while his two beady-eyed bodyguards stand around bored. The scar-faced leader is Warrik, and the other two are Davrod and Knyss. Though they appear human, in actuality Warrick and his companions are acolytes of demonic forces - Wererats who have been living in this dungeon and raiding from it for decades!

• North: Many rusty iron rings have been driven into the walls, ceiling, and floor on this side of the room, ending about 15’ away from the apparent southern wall (the rotating wall). Some of the rings have links of chain attached to them.
• South: Many rusty iron rings have been driven int the walls, ceiling, and floors on this side of the room, ending about 15’ away from the apparent northern wall (the rotating wall). A small table sits against the northern wall, and chains have been attached through some of the iron rings.
• East: There is a heavy wooden door with iron banding on the northern end of the eastern wall. It leads to a corridor that connects to room 3/18. On the southern end of the eastern wall an empty doorway can be found, its door missing and its hinges pull off the doorframe.
• The Plinth: The elaborate stone sculpture is in fact a magical device used to change the orientation of gravity. At one time it worked on the entire dungeon, but it has been damaged over the centuries by neglect and now only works within room 3/19. By taking a round of time to orient the sphere atop of the device, a character can set the plane of gravity to any wall, ceiling, or floor in this room. Characters who are not anchored to something (like the metal rings) will suffer falling damage equal to 1d6 per ten feet they “fall” from their initial position to whichever surface becomes down. The jade sphere can be pulled off the plinth and sold as loot (3,000 gp, weighs 400 coins).
• Warrik and His Minions:  Warrik and his bodyguards have been experimenting with the odd stone plinth since they discovered this room. All three have attached themselves to metal rings to avoid falling while experimenting with the odd device. Warrik is especially cowardly and sly. He will try and grovel if he feels outmatched, at least until he can attempt to convert an enemy with his lycanthropic bite.
• Warrik, Wererat Leader
• AC 7 [12] Leather, HD 5** (27hp), Att 1 x bite (1d4) or 1 x Sword (1d8),
• THAC0 15 [+4], MV 90’ (30’),
• SV D10 W11 P12 B13 S14 (5),
• ML 8, AL Chaotic, XP 425
• -Surprise: on a 1-4; set ambushes,
• -Languages: can speak Common in both forms.
• -Weapons: may also uses weapons in animal form.
• -Spells: Warrik can use the spells Wraithform, Color Spray, and Invisibility once a day.
• Seeming: Warrik appears in human form as a ruddy brown-haired man in his middle years with a livid scar across his left eye. He is dressed in filthy rags and rather well-kept leather armor. When in his rat form, Warrik retains his hair color and the scar across his eye.
• Desires: To rule the dungeon as a greater master than the wizard Oxyus himself. To free Ssrazzbazzortch in room 3/6. To drive the Orcs on this level from the dungeon entirely.
• Means: Besides possessing a spell book with Color Spray, Invisibility, and Detect Illusion, Warrik leads 10 Wererats and an innumerable amount of Rats and Giant Rats. He has learned much of the layout of the first three levels of the dungeon from his conversations with his rats. This includes many of the secret passages as well.