RPG Recap: Beyond the Temple of the Abyss, 2012-04-07

Wednesday, the 11th day of the Red Moon, 937

Walled up in the mine-top beneath the Gladwell farm, the party (Rocky, Rigby, Prudence, Delian, and Tamara) decided to escape through one of the “night doors” shown to them by Huk the Goblin. The lined up, placed hands on shoulders, and were led through the door by Delian. There was a flash of light, a pulling sensation, and then the group was somewhere altogether: a freezing cold room, about 15’ in diameter with a 10’ wide hole in the middle, spanned by a net. Along one wall was a pile of small wooden palettes. Scattered around another part of the wall was a rough pile of black glass discs. A doorway on rails could be spun around the room, and the party played for a while trying to figure out the relationship between the magic numbers hovering above it, the buttons, and the graffiti all over the walls.

One thing was for sure: a note on the wall said that 290 was “Safe Haven,” but the view through the magic doorway looked like anything but. Other views were equally forbidding: an expansive lake of fire, a featureless gray gravel plain, and so on. When the room’s lighting became red and the ceiling began to open, the group decided to hasten their exit.

Through the room’s other door – a 7” thick steel affair – the group found a stairwell heading down. They went a good hundred feet before finding a landing where a crude shrine had been set up around a large yellow silk wall hanging featuring the name HAARG. Another hole in the ground led down and Rocky decided to test its depth by tossing down one of the glass discs. He was rewarded by the sound of snarling and roaring from below, which sent the group running back to the top of the stairs.

While the group was gone, a big yellow cube had fallen from the sky. It was about three feet on a side, wrapped in yellow canvas, and attached to a huge piece of yellow silk. Everything was stamed with HAARG and a stylized image of a fist crushing a brain. Inside the container, the group found some curious instructions, and some even more curious contents. There were some wooden swords, some extremely heavy coins, a bunch of food, boxed water, glowing silver blankets, a container of medical equipment (or so it was assumed) and a bunch of other equipment of questionable purpose and value. The “speaking stone,” when activated, began to drone on and on about the horrible fates that would befall the party, their friends, their families, their souls, and their race in general. (This probably applied only to the humans, as it wouldn’t speak to Delian at all.)

With the gear evaluated and redistributed, the group headed back down to investigate the roaring. Two landings down, they found a huge sleeping green… thing. Rocky decided to sneak by, but the thing was apparently only mostly asleep, and lunged for him as he passed. Delian tried to send the thing to sleep but his spell had no effect. Making no headway in his plan to beat the creature to death, Rocky decided to instead beat on the planks where the thing was standing. The wood splintered and broke, and the monster fell out of sight.

With the threat dealt with, the group headed down to the next level… where the huge green creature stood, furious and waiting for the party. The turned tail and ran back up. From there, they rained down molotov cocktails, wooden crates, and even the big steel cage that had been in the monster’s lair. Then they tied Tamara into a harness made of the silk and goblin ropes and lowered her down so she could fire arrows into the monster from beyond its reach.

Unfortunately, Tamara had a hard time getting good shots off while dangling and spinning on the rope. Even more unfortunately, it grew more difficult once the furious monster began to pick up the dropped crates and throw them at her. Most unfortunately, he finally picked up the steel cage and threw it right at Tamara, crushing her against the wall, snapping the silk rope, and sending her crashing to the ground. The rest of the group burst in moments later and Delian responded to the monster’s suggestion of parley by throwing a few glass vials at the thing. The vials were full of juices extracted from the same seeds that cost Delian his left hand, and they burst and mixed, burning the thing horribly. Unlike its earlier wounds, these did not heal, and the horrible green monster stayed down.

Rocky chopped its head from its body and shoved it in his pack, just in case it might come in handy later.

The group finished their descent, finding a few corpses on the way and collecting the dead men’s fur-lined cloaks against the intense cold. At the ground level, they weighed their options: head out into a blinding snowstorm, in the dark, with an unconscious and half-dead cleric; or camp for the night. They camped, bundling up in their glowing blankets and a semi-self-pitching tent. The next morning, after supping on canned soup and crackers, they opened the heavy steel door and headed into the snow.

XP

Delian  : 1366 + 210 = 1636 (Level up at 4000)
Rocky   :  807 + 210 = 1017 (Level up at 2000)
Rigby   :  342 +  60 =  402 (Level up at 1200)
Tamara  :   29 +  70 =   89 (Level up at 1500)
Prudence:   29 +  91 =  120 (Level up at 2500)
Written on April 8, 2012
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