While the others spoke of underground lakes and whether continuing deeper into the pyramid toward the city was the smart thing to do, Vsaati tried to reconcile the sounds they had heard before opening the door with what they had encountered.  The ogres had been smashing things around, or so it had seemed, but why?  Stepping back for a moment, she tried to put a story together that encompassed the sights in the room.  She was vaguely worried they might be missing something.

To Silverglade's disappointment, Malik seems no closer to dying now than before he put the ring on, but perhaps time will change that.

Vsaati quickly notes that some of the crates have been smashed open.  The crates contain candles, and several of the candles appear to be partially eaten.

Elboc will try to read the parchment.

Voran takes about ten of the un-eaten candles and sticks them in his backpack. "Well, are we pressing on downward, then?"

Elboc finds that the parchment is written in some sort of magical writing, and appears to be spells of some sort.

A pity Elboc doesn’t know Read Magic...

Sherborne moves to look over Elboc's shoulder to see if he can read the parchment.

Sherborne is also unable to read the parchment.

<Elboc, didn't you get all of the first level spells from the Magi of Usamigaras?>

This message was deleted by the player at 19:07, Mon 19 Mar 2018.

“Any chance we could take a rest?  I need to recover some of my powers so that I may interpret these arcane writings.”

Voran nods. "I am amenable to that. I can take first watch. Then we have but one door that I wish to investigate--that being the secret door. We should leave the other door with the jelly-creature alone."

Silverglade is happy to take first watch while the party sleeps.

Perhaps it is the dead ogres out in front of this room, or perhaps it is the fact that the room is at the end of its own run of hallway, but the rest period passes without interruption.

Albricht blinked, not even knowing he'd fallen asleep, in fact, if he didn't have the tell-tale creaking of bones and the discomfort of certain morning constitutional issues that tended to torment the elderly, he might not have believed any time had passed during that blink. Pushing himself to his feet, the first thing he did was to look for their two new recruits. The second was to pat himself down to make sure nothing was missing!

"Hrrrumph! Musta dozed off..."

"Can you read the scroll now?" Silverglade asks Elboc as he sharpens his sword.

After the rest Vsaati appeared much refreshed, and considerably more dapper than before now that she'd donned the spare clothes she'd scavenged.  Her old pile of acid-eaten rags were piled in a corner, where she must have changed at some point.Like Voran she grabbed a couple of candles and stowed them away for the future (one never knew) and then studiously practiced looking lazy while the group made ready to move down another level in the pyramid.

Sherborne appreciated the time to rest and gets himself ready to move on, probably sooner rather than later as those ogres are going to make things rather unpleasant...smelling.

Elboc memorizes Read Magic and Sleep.  Once he feels refreshed, he’ll cast Read Magic and try to read the writing.

Elboc casts his spell and looks to the scroll, the text swimming before his eyes and resolving into something readable.

The scroll reveals itself to contain the spells continual light, levitate, and read languages.


Read languages is the only 1st level spell on the scroll, with both of the others being 2nd level.  Elboc can scribe the spells into his spellbook now, but they will disappear from the scroll, each as he transfers them.

Roak has had a good long rest and rises refreshed, though not much less grumpy. Upon Elboc's revelation, Roak asks, genuinely curious for once: "So, Elboc, since you've got these fancy new spells, how long would it take you to copy them into your spellbook? If it's just hours, we could hang out here while you do that. If it's longer, we'll want to make time so you can learn this magic."

<I don't know of a game mechanic for how long this would take, and I believe that the assumption is that this is something that you do back in town, but that's not how this adventure works.  I'm OK with this only taking a couple of hours.>

Elboc waves Roak off impatiently as he busily scribbles the new spells into his book.  When he's finished, he mutters,  "That is how long it takes."
This message was last edited by the player at 21:25, Thu 22 Mar 2018.

Voran stands watch and waits as Elboc scribes his spells.  Then, when Eboc is done, Voran leads the party to the secret door, which they then open and investigate.

The door opens to reveal four humans wearing stylized rat masks and red robes trimmed with rat fur.  They leap to their feet and look at the party.  In the northeast corner of the room are a set of stairs leading down.

"Who are you?" demands one of them.

Malik and Shakur can be heard quietly giggling and clapping.

Voran bows, moving up right behind Roak, who's standing in the doorway. "We are travelers in this place. I am Voran. And you are?"