Once again, Yew leads the way, this time to the torture chamber where the axe is retrieved.
Heading back down again, the group reaches the problem door blocking their way onto level three without incident where Arek casts his prayer of silence before Sven chops through the heavy door, virtually ruining both it and the axe in the process.
Then it's just a matter of collecting up all the valuables from the explored areas and heading back up again.

OOC: I'll work out what's recovered and post it a little later today. I've estimated about an hour IC to collect, distribute and properly package for carrying out - could be less if you're not worried about breakages, minimising wasted space/weight capacity, or assessing values to ensure you're prioritising the most valuable items.

Ronalt posts a watch on the corridor while the loot is collected, distributed and properly packaged for portage out.

OOC: Do you want to take the items in the shrine? There's upwards of 1,500gp in value there according to Amathaon's expert assessment.
link to a message in this game

Luthien venerates the shrine of good as directed. Because he's a Paladin to be someday. In theory.

It's surrounded by evil, in an evil temple and evil certainly had to pass through at the very least to place the Prince and Sven in the next room.
Real shrine or set up?

...Luthien thinks better of it. Probably just a fake.

Leave the shrine items. It is one of the safe places we can rest in and the clerics to get their mojo back.

Brother Yew is in favour of leaving the shrine intact. Even if we never use it again it is still a holy place and should not be looted.

Yew had already previously left his halberd behind in the shrine and will leave his coil of rope there as well to minimise weight carried. He doesn't need the halberd anymore and the rope might come in useful on future expeditions. He can get another rope easily enough elsewhere when they are out of the temple.

Yew wants to check the laboratory area for any sign that the wizard it belongs to had visited it since we were there. (eg. if the place has been tidied up or corpses removed or extra equipment removed.) That locked (wizard locked?) door out of the stairs has made him suspect it might be the same wizard responsible.

Bodies have been removed to the 20'x20' "storeroom" to the north east of the shrine, but minimal other "disturbances" are in evidence.

The following items will probably remain in the shrine also due to lack of worth/bulk.

large haunch of smelly meat, (from giants)
2 bottles of cheap wine (barely drinkable)
a barrel of water and a huge pot with some sort of gruel of grain and vegetables
Bugbear's chain mail shirt
several empty bottles
drinking horn and axe blade (giant size)
pewter bowl and spoon (giant size)
A cask containing beer
red robe with a gold skull emblem
2 short capes of crimson cloth
Ogres club

Virtually everything else (except those items on Level 2 currently behind locked doors) can be taken with space to spare.

Yew suggests they dump the large haunch of smelly meat with the bodies in the 20'x20' storeroom, so that the smell of the meat doesn't lead anything else to the shrine.

After that let's just take our treasure (including the zombie Kalador) and get out of here. That is all we came back for.

I forgot about him and his "friend" (the fire temple commander - the one who had the flame tongue). Your load carrying capacity just shot up.

"Is this really a holy shrine? My training isn't really complete, but...wouldn't the evil ones have to come this way to bring his highness and Sven in here? That's...why I stopped praying all of the sudden. Maybe someone should check it for traps..."

"We've spen' many 'ours in 'ere so far. No traps ta be foun'."
"No ev'dence of divintee either fer tha' matter."
Arek hadn't really thought all that hard about it before, what with it supposedly being a shrine to a "foreign" god and all that, but now the issue had been raised, it didn't really seem quite..."right".

"Well...if you think about evil people, they probably have some sort of detection that goes off when people try to pray to good deities in here. Maybe an alarm? Or maybe a blast of evil blasts people who try to pray here. I don't know."

Arek mused on that for a while.
"S'possible I s'pose, but I've ne'er 'eard o' anything like i' before..."

"If only I were Knighted. Then I could see if this place radiates evil, despite what it looks like. Sadly...not yet."

"Wouldn't the Prince have detected that when he was here before and said something?"

"Lab room and then out of this place. Lets make sure the secret door shows no sign of our presence." Ronalt encouraged.

OOC: Does the lab have any small library we can loot/carry off?

"As I recall, we only sense evil when we're actively looking for it. If he didn't think to check..."

"He's a smar' man. I'm sure 'e did."
But that would have only established if the place was evil, not if it was a true shrine to Pholtus.

OOC: yes, there's quite a bit being recovered from the lab - about 150 lbs worth around 5,000 gp.
Books and other papers had been removed to the shrine earlier, and besides a few scrolls, included in the 5k.

"We don't know that he did, we just hope he did, really. Still...you're more in tune with divine energies. Can you tell if it's really a shrine to Pholtus?"

(OOC:Presumably religion proficiency?)

"If i' were tha Father of Battle, then sure."
Clerics didn't generally study the details of other religions, and for good reason. It didn't pay to risk insulting ones own all powerful, all seeing god by knowing too much about the intricacies of worshipping another.


OOC: In reply to Luthien (msg # 163):

What's this "religion" thing you speak of?
link to a message in this game
Must be from another edition...
This message was last updated by the player at 04:12, Wed 27 May 2015.

Sven was busy rolling up the wall coverings, lingering over the gold one. "Nothing good here. Never was, never will be. Just ashes and a rocky crater when we're done breaking it." He uttered with absolute conviction. He shook one out; "Can sell these though. Sure as hell better money in our pockets then decorating here."

Everything was finally gathered, packaged and shared around leaving everyone staggering a little under their loads (every character is Heavily encumbered even with the two zombies loaded up and carrying the second candelabra - (pair to the one given to Oohlgrist the troll).

With all in readiness Yew and Wonnilon led the way back up, all going smoothly (if a little slowly) until Yew rounds a corner not far from the bottom of the spiral stairs on level two and comes almost face to face with a group of about a dozen heavily armed men escorting four equally heavily loaded human prisoners!



OOC: The party has surprise, but only 1 segment until they recover. Actions please.
Current encumbrance reduces your character to half of normal movement rate, and they suffer a -1 penalty to attack rolls. Can drop packs, etc to lower to Moderate encumbrance, but that means automatic loss of initiative for that round, unless done in the initial surprise segment. [Private to Sven Arnoff: This means that unless you want to delay dropping excess weight and the penalties that implies, you won't get the first shot with the crossbow]
Those at the back have leather armour, shields, crossbows and short swords. The two black and white figures are chain, shield, long sword and spear, and the one at the front shown leaning on their sword is plate, shield, bastard sword and short bow.

[private to GM: 8 bandits
2 L1 fighters
1 L4 leader
4 prisoners, general foodstuffs, treasure totalling 400gp
Assassin, Merchant, Thief, Tradesman

Bandits (8): AC 8 (leather armour) or 7 (with shield), MV 12", Level 0, #AT 1, D 1-6 (shortsword) or 2-5 (light crossbow); AL CE-NE, XP 14 + 1/hp

Veterans (2): AC 4 (chain & shield), MV 9", Level 1 Fighter, hp 9, 6, #AT 1, D 1-8 (longsword) or 1-6 (spear); AL NE, XP 19, 16

Leader: AC 2 (plate & shield), MV 6", Level 4 Fighter, hp 37, #AT 1 or 2, D by weapon (bastard sword, shortbow, spear, etc. ); AL NE, XP]
This message was last edited by the GM at 14:05, Thu 28 May 2015.

Sven sneered at the group and notably did nothing to ease his burden. Violence was always the number one priority for the awful man and he took a welcoming shot from the crossbow that whistled past the leader's head to shatter on the wall behind him.
"Welcome" he greeted the surprised men evilly, before finally preparing to drop his gear.