From my place of concealment I had learned much over the years, and my imprisonment was of increasingly little consequence. Now the enchantment to reveal my greatest foes was near complete. The casting would show them, who or whatever they might be, so that I could mark their progress and plot their destruction. The final casting made I focussed my mind and the vision began to come to me; I could sense that I was somewhere in the south, though the world looked strange to me. The puny humans had spread like a plague out of control, vomiting up their pale cities with no concept of design or structure. How they cried out for leadership. Men now called themselves kings or overlords when they could scarcely enforce their will a days march in any direction. Magic casters called themselves wizards when they had mastered only the basest of parlour tricks. The world had in short, decayed rather than progressed as we would have ensured, and I shook my head with the pain, the waste of all that time, all that energy. The others would surely have to pay a great price beyond that already accrued through their treachery and murder.
Now the spell took greater effect and my thoughts told me that here was the human city of Estagrad. A minor state amongst minor states, I grew attentive for here it seemed lay my nemesis. Who would it be? Had one of the others lived on like myself? Or had some nameless creature found its way into this hovel-packed blot of human filth? Suddenly with a final rush a room sharpened into tight focus. The effect was pleasing. I could smell the wood burning in the grate, taste the aroma of pipe smoke. Outside the cries of a market trader found their way into the chamber. Those in the room could not sense my presence.
They were five in number, none of them bearing any resemblance to anyone I knew. A thin bony faced man who pursed his thin lips as he traced a delicate finger over a map scrawled on a parchment. His clothing was though poor by my standards, clearly superior to those around him, rings adorned several fingers and he used a magnifying device from time to time to clarify points on the map. I judged him a merchant or some such. The other four were all younger: Two wore armour and were heavily armed, the other two wore simple robes, the woman, perhaps the oldest in the group in her early thirties, the other a skinny youth of perhaps 18 leaning casually on a spear. Which of these were my foes? All, some? Was there some error? How could this pathetic group of humans possibly pose a threat to me?
I wasn’t quite sure about the job Raalerman outlined. He claimed that he had financed an expedition to destroy this cult of Moloch and now wanted us to follow up and see what had happened. Now he didn’t go into why he was doing this and didn’t exactly look the charitable type, but no one else asked anything and money was money, and my purse was looking pretty light. If I didn’t find something soon I’d have to trail back to my master with the shame of not being able to make my own way. The others looked pretty young, so at least I could pretend greater experience than them. Gordon looked a powerful fighter, all muscle and no brain. Wouldn’t be surprised to find a bit of orc not far back in his heritage. The ranger Draegon seemed ok, the willowy young monk looked like he’d blow away in a stiff breeze, but if what Raalerman said was half true there’d be opportunity enough to test all our powers.
We set off for the village of Kyrea and arrived late the next day after overnighting at an inn. We had no problems on the road other than keeping the animals in line. There was a local patrol but nothing of concern. Tried to get to know the others a bit, Draegon seems ok, Dagnar is a bit of an oddity, but then you don’t meet many monks. Gordon is somewhat monosyllabic, presumably there’s a brain in there somewhere. It was at the village that things began to run less than smooth. We were quartering the animals so I’m not exactly sure what happened. Gordon went into the local tavern and clearly upset the village folk there somehow. They overcame him, presumably using some kind of magic as there was no sign of a struggle. Luckily Draegon turned out to be a bit of a smoothie on his part and I batted my eyelashes and looked helpless to add to the effect. We stayed on our best behaviour after that and then made our way out towards the location of the temple. We were all keeping a special eye on Gordon now as well as he showed signs of being a bit of a loose cannon. How right we were would be revealed soon. We stayed alert aware that a similar, perhaps even stronger group than ourselves had disappeared without trace.
We found a bunker with a stairwell and descended into darkness. Once the weapons came out I began to wonder if this really was what I’d wanted when I first began my studies all those years ago. I wondered even more a few minutes later when we were suddenly attacked: What I realised on later reflection was a magic mouth, demanded a password as we edged our way into the cave at the bottom of the stairs. We were taken by surprise and a salvo of crossbow bolts fired from concealed positions criss- crossed the corridor. We were all hit apart from Gordon who was watching the back. This was the kind of blooding I could well do without. Gordon spread some healing around, which was a gratifying experience; I’ve never received a curative spell before and it was a great relief. Made me consider whether perhaps I should have chosen the clerical path. Too late now. Maybe Gordon has his uses.
Scouting around we discovered a guardroom and the trap mechanism. Stable doors and horses bolting sprang to mind. The place at least seemed unguarded. Had there been guards in that guardroom they would have had the option to attack us as we lay wounded by the trap. The room itself was at the top of an easily defended flight of stairs. Anyone penetrating the dungeon would have to destroy any guards here or leave an enemy force to their rear. We then crossed a bridge, again easily defended with built in barricades for defenders on the other side, again, thankfully unguarded. Perhaps the previous party had succeeded in destroying the cult?
Now the corridors were of well worked stone, and we had our first success: An elf from the first party, chained up, near dead of thirst. I felt quite the heroine as we helped to unchain him. Perhaps this would help even the odds, though sadly he had no weapons or equipment. Moving on deeper we encountered the first defender - a zombie of some sort that fought our fighters to a standstill as they investigated a door off one of the corridors we were searching. Gordon couldn’t turn it and it seemed resistant to weapon attack. Very much losing the fight, Draegon managed to shut the door on it and it didn’t try to follow us.
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