The grinding of distant gears recalls for Barnabus a similar heavy noise: "the brief metallic noise, the clinking of moving chains" that they had heard emanate from somewhere to the east of the entrance. His response is physical as well has having been mental: when the door had swung open in response their activation of the vast internal mechanisms of the maze, a frisson of pleasure had suffused his body. Here was a place that the New Kids in the Tomb had yet appeared to have discovered or cared to discover. He wonders why.

OOC Let's go in, following the usual marching order.
This message was last edited by the player at 01:58, Thu 06 Jan 2022.

Dax pulls the odd glove off his hand, and leaves it on the table.

Drawing his sword, he moves up, to the door, and once the rest of the group is ready, he will follow Grugar in the newly discovered corridor.

The young knight stood his vigil near the secret door until his place in the order came up. He gestured to Lampert and then entered with his shield and sword at the ready.

Waiting for his companions to organize themselves, Grugar watches as he waits.

"May be spiders down there." he opines quietly, he was never a fan of spiders, but he didn't say that out loud of course.


OOC So Grugar is point on the marching order? Is that noted anywhere? The order I mean.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:29, Thu 06 Jan 2022.

Lampert holds his torch steady as Ishmael reaches his gloved hand toward the flame. The dwarf does not feel any heat from the burning fire through the fabric.

Through the veil of spiderwebs, the adventurers can see that another crypt waits beyond the hidden doorway. Just left of the door, centered on the northern wall, is a stone slab upon which rests a skeleton dressed in a simple green robe that has the appearance of some manner of priestly garb. The skeleton’s left hand is grasping an object which is concealed beneath dust and webbing.

Above the slab, carved in a style that borders on the primitive, is a depiction of a face entirely made up of leaves. To the south of the slab, in the center of the chamber, is a small, unadorned altar, upon which rests several sprigs of dried mistletoe.

Besides the door they entered from, the only other visible exit is a closed stone door on the tomb’s southern wall.

Ishmael pockets his glove and then snags the one that Dax left on the pedestal.  "That don't look like devil worshipers."  he says from the rear.

Barnabus, too, feels that the strange rite has led them to an unexpected place: a crypt for a high priest of the Green Man. It is a mystery unless the portal had ... originally led somewhere else? He doesn't know.

He observes Ishmael's experiment. Muzzahs had pledged 1000 gold for any item that bore "any manner of magical enchantment." He counts four items even if some might see them as just two.

Making sure that nothing is crawling about the skeleton's hand, he leans in to ascertain what it has been grasping all of these years.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:26, Fri 07 Jan 2022.

Dax uses his blade to part the spider webs as he enters the room. Looking at the face carved on the wall, above the skeleton, he glances back at Malivoire, and says, "Looks like Silvanus...perhaps that was one of his druids?"

While Barnabus examines the skeleton, the ranger moves to the altar in the centre of the room, and pushes the dried sprigs of mistletoe together, perhaps to make it look more appealing.

Malivoire had followed his own advice, stripping off the glove as soon as they had finished activating the door.  But seeing Ishmael's test conclude safely, he stuffed the glove into his sack for safekeeping.  Who knew when such properties would be useful, if not in the field then perhaps the lab?

The next tomb was indeed unexpected.  "I agree, that is a representation of Silvanus," he nodded to Dax.  "It appears this crypt has not been defiled in the way the other one was.  The Green Man may still hold sway here.  Be respectful."

While Barnabus and Dax carried out their investigations Malivoire let his eyes rove about the room, looking for any other items of interest.

Sir Dryvyk moved over near the stone door and tried not to scowl as his companions rummaged through the crypt. He had been struggling in his mind since they'd left the Spire about what posture he would take with regards to the looting and plundering of the Barrows. Artifacts, holy or corrupted, were of certain import as were familial heirlooms... but the rest he was uncertain. At least it gave him something with which he could keep his mind occupied in the gloomy depths of this dark place...

OOC: Listening and keeping guard while y'all do your thing!

Grugar moved into the room, sword in hand. The design on the wall and the alter proclaimed this a druidic temple of sorts, odd, given its location. But he out such thoughts from his mind.

He watched as the skeleton was investigated by Barnabus, and as the mistletoe was, to his mind, needlessly rearranged by Dax.

Then assuming there was nothing amiss he turned to scan the obvious doorway, and the rest of the room for other possible hidden exits.

OOC not sure if you'd prefer to roll for that LL. Not expecting any.

Brushing the collected dust and cobwebs aside, Barnabus can see that the skeleton is grasping what appears to be a neatly carved cudgel. Oddly, despite being crafted from wood, the weapon shows no sign of rot or brittleness.

Dax is able to clear the dust from the altar and places the dried mistletoe sprigs in a neat arrangement.

13:54, Today: Secret Roll: Labyrinth Lord, on behalf of Malivoire, rolled 2 using 1d6.  Detect Secret Doors.

13:55, Today: Secret Roll: Labyrinth Lord, on behalf of Grugar, rolled 5 using 1d6.  Detect Secret Doors.

As Malivoire and Grugar examine the rest of the druid’s crypt, the mage notices a carefully concealed seam in the eastern wall, near the northeast corner. Examining it more closely, Malivoire is able to discern the outline of a door. A tentative press on the stone informs him that the portal can be pushed open.

As soon as Sir Dryvyk's tsk tsking eyes look askance, Barnabus's arm uncoils like a giant toad's tongue darting across the moor to envelop a hapless adventurer within its unyielding grasp. When he retracts it, he now holds an uncannily unaged cudgel, with the paladin, he hopes, none the wiser.

He also peers at the green robe. Is it the sort of thing he or Muzzahs might want?

As if time itself did not advance in the barrow, which for most there it did not, as they themselves had stopped advancing through it, he withdraws another sheaf of parchment and sketches the face of leaves carved above the slab. This, he knows, Muzzahs will want to see.

He tsk tsks Dax, "Now, now, there will be time enough for horticulture later."

OOC Through the newly discovered no longer secret portal. Good work.
This message was last edited by the player at 00:24, Sat 08 Jan 2022.

"Sharp eyes, Malivoire!" Dax calls out to his friend.

"Ishmael, would you like to examine it before we enter?"

While he waits for the dwarf to look over the newly found door, Dax stands near the skeleton, and mumbles a little prayer under his breath, [Language unknown: Somastine le Ivearderevor po midi'iten str ta.]

"Shussh.  Shield the light." the dwarf says, stepping a few quick paces back towards the sarcophagus door.  "Somethings coming.  Marching feet. Hard ta know how many, but more than one." he whispers. Leaving the light behind, he steps into the darkness of the broken rubble, he pulls a dagger from his boot and stops at the jamb just this side of the door to the pottery room.  He listens, and once his eyes adjust, looks for any sign of light or life.

"I heard it too, quiet everyone..."

The knight moved opposite Grugar in order to defend the party more effectively.

Barnabus exercises a modicum of his vast store of prudence and decides to leave the fieldwork for later, the scritch, scritch of his quill terminating abruptly consequently.

Malivoire nodded to Dax, pleased himself that he'd noticed the concealed door.  But before he could voice his satisfaction Ishamel hushed them all and slipped back through the previous rooms.  Malivoire strained his ears to see if he too could hear the approaching sound of marching feet, but otherwise obeyed the call for silence.

Gwendolyn keeps her bow up and pointed in the direction of the approaching footsteps. She slowly steps backward and slips behind some of the more durable, melee-oriented members of their party while they wait to see who or what approaches.

Dax quietly steps into the room with the pedestals and watches through the open door to where Ishmael is standing in the zombie room.

His intent, if something barges in, is to slam the door shut, after Ishmael, and then to form a defensive line in the pedestal room. But he maintains the silence, and cannot communicate this to the others!

Finding himself now simultaneously at the vanguard and the rear of the marching order sets Grugar's teeth on edge. Part of him wants to shout out a questionb but he is wise enough to hold his tongue. /he growls under his breath but otherwise reamins silent.

He does alternate his attention between the dark corridor behind the secret door and the advancing teps from their rear however.

Their attention now focused on the sound, all of the adventurers are able to hear the steady tramp of the footfalls as they draw closer.

Peering into the gloom of the pottery room, Ishmael spies three figures beginning to cross the chamber toward the doorway where he is crouched. He sees that the trio are walking skeletons, each bearing an iron shield and a sword held at the ready. Despite being merely bone, their movements are eerily smooth, their gait indistinguishable from that of trained soldiers. The walking dead each wear leather boots and gauntlets, which look strikingly well preserved.

Each of the undead has a gem embedded in their forehead, which glows faintly. All of the stones are blue; skillfully cut sapphires from their appearance.

If the group of skeletons has spied Ishmael, they give no indication. They continue moving forward, their pace unwavering.

The dwarf glances over to where the ranger Dax is watching.  He moves his hand quickly in the darkness, gesturing once with one finger, then with two, and finally holding three fingers.  He keeps his ears open, and steps back behind the hinge side of the door.  He quietly slides his axe from his belt, and waits, hoping they had other places to go, but expecting that something they did summoned the skeletons.

Dax nods, understanding that there are three foes in the corridor. He glances about, if there is anyone in the druid's tomb that can see him, he will duplicate Ishmael's gesture to them. In addition he will try to motion them to join him.

Grugar stands beside the once secret door, torn.

In his heart he wanted to fell whatever foe appeared, but he also wanted to be sure that no enemies snuck up on them from behind.

So he remained watching, knowing all the while that there may be no enemies in the darkness ahead of him. But could he take the chance and leap into battle leaving the group exposed to attack from behind?