Stonehell: Crypt of the Bloody Claw part 4/4

 Session 177 was played on 8/8

Morgana, Mage 7 (Reggie)
Lada, Thief (Robby)
Borumar, Thief 9 (Josh)
Gimble, Mage (Scott)
Biffin, Fighter 6 (NPC)

Leaving the staked corpse and the empty coffin, the party, loaded down with coin, returns to the room with the gargoyles. As soon as the gate opened, they attacked. Lady Morgana webs them in place, and the party runs for it, up the stairs, through the secret door. Morgana then casts Hold Portal on the secret door, followed by Invisibility 10’ on the whole party. They sneak out of the dungeon with their loot, and back to the barn.

As they settle down to count their look, the illusion on the coins ends, and their 10,000 gold turns out to be 10,000 copper pieces. With that disappointment, they bed down for the night.

At about midnight, Morgana is shocked to find someone grabbing her throat. Her eyes snap open to find a pair of jade green eyes looking hypnotically at her. Morgana’s will was strong, and the charm failed. The beautiful vampire drained Morgana’s strength, hoisting her up like a rag doll. Morgana somehow managed to kick herself free of the vampire’s grip, falling on her staff, which she used to summon a water elemental. The thump and rush of water woke the rest of the party who all scrambled to address the threat.

The elemental slammed the vampire repeatedly. She looked beyond shocked (and soggy) before giving up and turning into mist, fleeing the barn into the dark.

After catching their breath, the party discusses what to do. Biffin wants to chase after the vampire and stake it again. Morgana agrees, since she’s already spent the charge on the staff to summon the elemental. They slowly make their way back to the dungeon entrance, and back down to the fancy coffin.

The gargoyles were waiting, and the battle was on. As they fight, the vampire joins in. Biffin gets horribly mauled by the gargoyles. The elemental and the vampire square off against each other. Biffin downs as many healing potions as he can before going back against the gargoyles that had mostly focused on helping the vampire against the elemental. The elemental damages the vampire badly enough to make it again turn to mist and fly away. The last gargoyle finally slays the summoned creature. Morgana kills the last injured gargoyle with a dagger.

Beyond the gargoyles, the staked creature was still on the floor. Searching again, they find a small opening in the wall behind the coffin. Morgana uses her collapsable 10’ pole to poke the hole. Having no way to shrink themselves or turn to mist, they debate how to get through…

Morgana orders the elemental to start digging.

Hours later the mud was ankle deep out to almost the stairs, but the hole was expanded more than enough for the party to pass through comfortably. In a worked stone chamber little bigger than a walk-in closet was another coffin. Within was the regenerating vampire. Because the elemental had so damaged her, and the sun was now up, she wasn’t able to react before she was staked, doused in more holy water, and beheaded… Without even a last gasp, the vampire turned to dust, leaving only a pair of fangs behind. That, and 15 opals.

After collecting the treasure, destroying the coffin, and scattering the dirt that was in it, they start heading back up. The pair of wraiths they encounter didn’t stand a chance. Near the exit of the dungeon they check one more door and find a set of 3 locked cells. Within each was an unresponsive figure, one of which was the missing scion! After opening the cells, and getting the sickly figures out, they suddenly come alive, and with the same unnaturally large mouths, try to bite the people holding them. One is killed, the other two are tossed into the elemental who holds them till they can be safely knocked out and tied up. The captives are brought briefly back to the village, but the feeling of unwelcome sent them packing back to town.

Gains: 15 opals, reward  
Kills: 3 gargoyles, vampire, 2 wraiths
Losses:

Stonehell: Crypt of the Bloody Claw part 3/4

Session 176 was played on 8/1

Morgana, Mage 7 (Reggie)
Lada, Thief (Robby)
Borumar, Thief 9 (Josh)
Gimble, Mage (Scott)
Biffin, Fighter 6 (NPC)

After thoroughly searching the torture chamber and the prison, they begin to backtrack, searching as they go, thinking they may have missed something… and they had. A secret door! Behind the door? Stairs leading down. At the base of the stairs, 2 doors. They check the closer door first…

Borumar gets to work unlocking the door. Just as he finishes, the door is pulled open and a massive hand reaches out to grab him! An Ogre Ghoul! Borumar takes the brunt of the abomination’s assault, but a sustained barrage of Magic Missiles takes the thing down. The chamber it was locked in contained no treasure, just some well chewed bones.

The next door opened up into a moderately sized chamber. Against the far wall were 3 gargoyles in the “see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil” poses, though using their wings instead of their hands to mimic the poses. Also in the room was another doorway, blocked by an iron gate. A mere 10’ beyond that gate was another. Beyond that? A fancy coffin. The gargoyles, as dangerous looking as they were, remained still as they investigated the gates. Borumar unlocked the nearer one, and as he did heard a telling metallic click come from the other gate. Keeping a close eye on the gargoyles, and the coffin, the party squeezes into the space, and Borumar unlocks the second gate, causing the first to lock behind them.

The fancy coffin was propped up against the far wall. Passing around holy water, they prepared to open the lid. When they did, a horrific looking undead thing lunged out at them, fanged teeth looking for something to bite down on. Between the holy water, and Borumar and Biffin’s ready weapons, the creature was cut down screaming, and then a stake pounded into its heart.

Behind the coffin? A chest containing thousands of gold coins!

Borumar leaves a Karl coin in the coffin.

Gains: Thousands of gold coins  
Kills: Ogre Ghoul, coffin creature
Losses:
 

Stonehell: Crypt of the Bloody Claw part 2/4

Session 175 was played on 7/18

Morgana, Mage 7 (Reggie)
Lada, Thief (Robby)
Borumar, Thief 9 (Josh)
Gimbal, Mage (Scott)
Biffin, Fighter 6 (NPC)

The two werewolf guards are efficiently cut down, and then the other 4 that charge down the hall toward the party are loudly blasted with a lightning bolt that then rebounds back on the 4 of them, stopping just a few feet before reaching the party. The charmed cultist runs for it, away from the violence, down the stairs, likely toward the rest of the cultists below.

Taking the stairs down after her, they open up onto a long hall, at the end of which is a statue of a moon goddess. As they approach it, it briefly animates and throws a silvery disk toward the party. Borumar in front ducks, avoiding it, but leaving Morgana wide open for the trap. The blade sinks deep into her chest, and she drops. Potions are quickly poured down her throat and all over the wound, reviving her before she slipped away completely.

Crawling toward the statue, keeping their heads down, avoids further blades and they safely make it past the moon goddess. Following the instructions they make it to the cult’s main worship room, where a ritual was in progress, but they also seemed ready for the party. What they weren’t ready for was Morgana and Gimbal both casting sleep. Lada and Borumar follow that up with bow shots at the still standing cultists, then Biffin runs in. He gets touched by the adept, hurting him a little,. The adept doesn’t survive the encounter. The sleeping ones are killed, except for the charmed one, who is tied up and left to think about her sins. The cultists pins are all taken (clawed hand made of silver, finger tips colored with red paint).

They then find and search the dark adept’s chambers, are attacked by his giant rat friends (who are all promptly put to sleep via a sleep scroll, and killed) and then his meager treasure taken. They then find a recently used torture chamber and prison, but still no noble girl...

Gains: cult pins, small amount of coins  
Kills: werewolves and cultists
Losses:

Stonehell: Crypt of the Bloody Claw part 1/4

Session 174 was played on 7/11

Morgana, Mage 7 (Reggie)
Lada, Thief (Robby)
Borumar, Thief 9 (Josh)
Gimbal, Mage (Scott)
Biffin, Fighter 6 (NPC)

Word reaches Borumar that the scion of a wealthy noble family has gone missing, and was suspected of having been taken by whoever had taken up residence in the old crypt of the moon goddess hours out of town. Meanwhile Morgana was researching ritual magics.

Deciding to take up the quest, the party gears up and heads out. By the time they reached the village it was late afternoon. They talk to the locals, and get permission to stay in one of their barns as there wasn’t an inn. Dropping off their gear, Morgana casts invisibility on the party, and they head up into the hills where a circle of standing stones marks the crypt’s location. They find the crypt entrance guarded.

As it was getting dark, and they’d already had a long day of walking, they head back and bed down, setting the watch for the night. During Biffin’s watch, shortly before dawn, a pair of werewolves attack the party. Neither gets away, nor do they score any hits on the party with their bites.

Seeing as they were up, they make an early start of it. In the entrance hall of the crypt, currently unguarded, Borumar triggers a blade trap, but manages to avoid getting his head cut open. He disables the trap, and they move deeper, coming to a large entrance hall. As they look around, a side door opens and a young woman steps into the room, shocked to see the party. She turns to run, but Morgana’s quickly uttered Sleep spell drops her fast. They tie her up, and wake her. She bites Borumar with an unnaturally large mouth. Keeping her out of bite range, they question her, but she’s uncooperative. So Morgana Charms her.

She tells them all she knows about the crypts, about the dark adept who leads the cult, even points out the areas that she was told to stay out of, as they’re too dangerous and haven’t been cleared yet. Wanting to take advantage of the fact that they had a guide, they followed her through the crypts down a couple levels until they reached a guard post. The werewolves on guard were uninterested in the cultist’s protestations, and the party pushed her aside to meet the attack of the werewolves.

Gains: Charmed cultist guide  
Kills: 2 werewolves
Losses: