Shae jumps in...

Tahldar tries swimming to the edge...

They are both caught in a powerful undertow that pulls them under...

Everyone is flying through the circular wall like something in a pipe.  With the pressure on your lungs and the length of the trip, holding your breath may not be enough...

Kahan loses his breath...
Shae loses her breath...
Tahldar loses his breath...

They begin to take in water (3 hp dmg each), and then the pipe-like structure opens up and pours you straight down into an underground lake.

At least the water is warm and deep enough that no one is seriously hurt.  Kahan, Shae and Tahldar...all manage to catch their breaths again.

The lake stretches out to either side of the cavern walls and presses forward toward a left turn in the cavern ahead.  After your plummet, you are able to move forward about 15 feet to an area that is only about chest deep.

You take a moment to catch your breath and take in the situation.  The walls still glisten slightly with crystals, giving some small illumination.  There is a slight undertow, but not too bad, that pulls back toward the waterfall you just came down, where the water drains somewhere below.  The walls and path are as pictured below:

Borimer takes in deep breaths and counts his companions' heads to see if anyone is missing before moving towards the left turn to get a look at what lies around the corner.
This message was last edited by the player at 16:56, Thu 19 Jan 2017.

Tahldar coughs and sputters as he clears his lungs of water and waits for Borimer's report of what lay ahead.

"Well that could have been worse."  Leo tries to keep his head above the water as best he can.

<ooc - I assume Leo either has to swim a bit or jump off the bottom repeatedly to keep his breath?>

"Yes, much, much worse," Shae agrees.

Borimer goes to the T in the river.  He looks to the left and sees this:


The water ends and a slightly muddy pathway continues forward.  The rock ceiling hangs low (about 6 feet high at its highest) as the path curves to the left out of sight.  You see amber glowing crystals (as opposed to the purplish ones you saw before), which give off enough illumination to see by.

He looks to the right and sees this:


The amber light of the crystals provides sufficient light.  The water continues to the right, becoming deeper and acting as a mirror to reflect the numerous stalactites all around.  Dropping a pebble, you find that the depth goes to at least 20 feet below.

The waterway moves forward, where it splits into a Y junction where you can continue to follow it diagonally to your left or to the right.

The sounds of dripping water are constant.  To the right, from the distance another sound echoes across the water.  It sounds like something moving and pebbles falling into the water, followed by a quick outtake of breath, like a horse.  But the noise was far away and hardly distinguishable from here.

Borimer returns and tells the companions what he's seen, and heard from the waterway to the right. "I think there's something in there, but we'd have to swim to find it. Or let it find us."

"It could also be a creature that is trapped down here like us and needs help.  Probably not likely, but possible." Tahldar says as thinks.

"I could cast a fly spell on you Borimer and you can go check it out if you wish.  If it's hostile you can leave, and if it needs help then maybe you can carry it out."

OOC:  I'm not sure what the carrying capacity of fly is.  I would bet it's based on the recipients strength making Borimer the best candidate for it.

Borimer gives a wolfish grin, "I'll fly."

Just FYI, since the noise was far away and echoing through the caverns, if Borimer goes off alone, he might have to do some solo exploring before finding the source of the sound.

"We best stay together, I don't trust it in here," Borimer changes his mind. "Let's go explore the y junction to the left, unless it gets deep like the other side."

"Wait.  Stop." Tahldar says to Borimer as a thought occurs to him.

"What if we are below the dragon?  What if the sound we are hearing in the deeper water are it's legs shuffling around?"

"I'm not sure what good that does us since we still need to find these berries which will be up top, but maybe if the deeper part is investigated we might find a way to divert it's water away from the part it sits in?  I think it's worth looking into."

Leo is mostly concerned about keeping his head above the water but tries to listen in on the planning as best as he can.

The party moves to the T in the cave, then turns right.  From there, the party heads to the left side of the Y fork in the cave, staying to the far left where the water is not as deep.  You are forced to nearly straddle the left side of the wall to escape sinking into the 20 foot deep water in the center of the tunnel.

As it curves left through stalagmites and stalactites, the tunnel widens out.  You hear falling water ahead and then the cave opens to a round cavern with water pouring down a waterfall from above.



Besides where you entered, you can exit to the left.  Upon looking around and up, you realize that this water coming down must come from the river above that you were almost swept away in if you had not been sucked through the tunnel of water.

Just to your left, between where you stand waist deep in water and the watery exit to the left, there is a small 8x6 foot area of muddy earth.

Though the light from the surrounding crystals is dim, you can clearly see that there are footprints in the mud.  They seem to come up from the center of the waterfall area and then head down the tunnel to the left.  They appear to be booted footprints about the size of men.  Upon inspection, there are two different sizes, meaning two people must have been here.  And they are new enough to have been made within the last several days.

There is also a chalk marking on the wall with an arrow pointing to the tunnel on your left.


OOC: I understood from Borimer that you are skipping the mud and going to the right and then left at the Y.

Also, you may notice that I am not giving you a map, but instead landmarks.  I figure this is more realistic of having just fallen into an unfamiliar cave.

"Could those be the boot marks of those two adventurers we ran into earlier?"

[sorry, I can't remember their names offhand, they were a bit untrustworthy]

"I would bet it's them." Tahldar says in reply.  "One was named Fingas as I recall.  Which I believe means 'finger' in the old speech, which is now sadly lost forever in the destruction of our home."

Looking the cave over he adds, "Sure is pretty, but I'd like to keep moving.  Who knows what trouble these two have stirred up.  Let's follow after them."

"Yeah, most of the time staying in one place hasn't been the best idea while we have been here."  He shudders a bit remembering the little black things.

You follow the footprints of what you are assuming to be Fingas and Battrus.

OOC: For those of you who have forgotten or are new, their entry into this place can be found starting at post #28 here: link to a message in this game

The water pocket descends slowly.  You are able to climb over rocks on the left side and choose to do so for the moment because the water is becoming more and more cold.

You soon come to another turn in the bend.  Here the water is very cold, with short stalactites, many of them caked in ice.  The cave dips low on your right hand side where there might be an underwater cave if you dare swim in the icy cold water and can hold your breath long enough.

Otherwise, the cave and blue water continue to weave around to your left.

This message was last edited by the GM at 19:03, Thu 02 Feb 2017.

Shae steps up.  "I can cast a water breathing spell and split it among us.  If there are 5 of us, I can do two hours each.  We can leave the gnomes here while we check it out.  There is also a simple second level spell I can do which is endure cold.  I can cast it several times perhaps, but I can't split it like the other.  Perhaps Kahan can do the same thing.  If push comes to shove, I can also cast water walk to affect several people at the same time, but that might not help us get below the water surface."

Borimer nods, "I say we do some magic and check it out."

"Definitely cast the water breathing on us.  Can't hurt.  I would also cast the endure cold on someone if they want to explore the cave.  As for the Gnomes they're still back up top."

Vuzyl has not posted in awhile, so if he does not post, I will assume he stays outside the water area as a guard with the gnomes.

Everyone except Vuzyl is the recipient of a spell to diminish the effects of the cold and to breathe under water.

You shed yourselves of anything that would weigh you down (including armor but not including one weapon each) and dive into the water.  You swim down under the underground cave and after about 30 feet of swimming through the water tunnel, you pop your heads up in a cavern with walls of ice.  The cavern is about 50 feet in diameter.



To your left is a small area of ice that you can climb up on, but it is what is embedded in the ice of that wall that really catches your attention.  There is the body of a winged icy dragon spread out in the ice, encased except for its neck and head...or where its head used to be.  For someone has sliced off the head of the dragon, it would appear.  But there is no indication of blood.  The dragon's head was likely already frozen when it was severed from the neck.

The dragon looks something like this, but imagine it from the profile embedded in ice with its neck and head turned toward you, jutting from the ice...but now headless.


The tunnel continues straight ahead, or you can go back where you came from through the underwater tunnel.
This message was last edited by the GM at 01:19, Wed 08 Feb 2017.

Tahldar rises into the cavern, drenched to the bone.  "Interesting." he says simply at the sight of the dragon encased in ice.

He moves nearer to the beheaded creature and adds, "I wonder if I can get a scale from it..."

OOC: Taldar will try to pry a scale or two from the dragon if he can reach.  He'll use his bracers or dagger.

Borimer watches the cave while Tahldar works. "I'm not liking being in here without my armor." Curiosity wins out however and Borimer checks out what lies beyond the tunnel straight ahead.

is the whole area partially submerged, including the tunnel ahead?