We begin this session as a continuation of the previous session, no 1:1 time lost. The party is standing just outside of the Synthetorium of Zandruul now. They can see where the Giant Locust blew a hole out from the ground, around 50' in length or about 10' longer than its 40' length. The gaping hole now goes all the way to the bottom of the dungeon. The Giant Locust has flown off into the distance, moving as fast as a Hippogriff flies. It was going in the direction of the south west.

The surviving characters at the start of this session included:

- Keisial, Human Ranger, former retainer of the late Galador.

- Fothas, Dwarf Fighter.

- Hendricks, Dwarf Fighter / Thief, currently recovering and in need of bedrest.

- Savina LaFey, Human Illusionist, invisible.

- Randimir, Half-Elf Cleric / Magic-User.

Sapphira and Jedor were buried in the rubble, Avuin and Galador were disintegrated. However, some in the party recalled that Sapphira had a Ring of Regeneration and believe that there is still a chance that she lives…

Meanwhile, Jedor makes a saving throw to be able to utilize the Final Words ruling and makes his save! He uses his final words to mutter a prayer to his god. He is using divine intervention to selflessly save Sapphira. He gets a big bonus to the Divine Intervention chance for being on a holy quest…so there is a 35% chance that his deity will intercede on his behalf.

Sapphira remains alive beneath some of the rubble at the bottom of the room that once contained the Giant Locust. However, others in the party are not saved such as Frido.

The Giant Locust caused the rubble to land away from the main fight but it will still take the party 3 hours to dig out the rubble and reach Sapphira. Fothas using his dwarven stone cunning does not believe it is in danger of collapsing. The locust broke through the stone ceiling and “cookie cuttered” its way through the rock.

Fothas judges that this construction is only 100's of years old, relatively new and reliable so he thinks it will hold as they dig through. He thinks that Sapphira is still alive down there due to her Ring of Regeneration.

The party goes down to the bottom level of the dungeon and begins to dig her out. The whole area where the locust was is filled with rubble and the beams that were holding up the Giant Locust have collapsed. The barrier surrounding the pool has been broken and there is a huge amount of rubble. Most of the rubble is concentrated everywhere except for the east side.

Due to the time it will take to remove the rubble the party will not get back to Seleb before nightfall. But, a few hours later under continual light, Sapphira is unburied. She is alive and her ring is intact! Jedor is also still alive, miraculously! It appears as if he did not take the wounds that killed him after all and he is at 1 hp but will require bedrest.

We also must check for the survival of some magic items, including a magic longsword of Galador's and a magic longbow of Avuin, the items that were on the late Galador and Avuin. Those items need to make a saving throw to see if they survive. Avuin's magial two-handed sword is gone as well as his magic longbow. Both were disintegrated! However, Avuin's +2 Splint Mail somehow survived the disintegration attempt and it remains buried beneath some of the rubble. The party takes some time to retrieve the +2 Splint Mail.

Galador had a +2 longsword and a map indicating the location of a dubloon (from the mysterious individual found in the Graveyard of Delbo). The +2 longsword was destroyed along with the map.

Through divine providence, some of our party members survived although some, such as Frido, definitely remain dead. We find the remains of the skeleton that came into the room at the last second before the Giant Locust escaped and killed Avuin and Galador. There is a satchel on the skeletal remains containing two metal keys.

The will of Avuin states that a Ranger that joins the party shall receive his belongings thus, Keisial inherits the Splint Mail +2. Everything else that survived is taken including the keys.

- Key id 12.

- Key id 99.

The party leaves the Synthetorium and heads back to Seleb.

We arrive back in the hamlet and find that there is great panic and loud arguing everywhere. The Giant Locust was seen flying off in the distance, heading in the direction of the Isomi stone though it cannot be seen now. The people in town say that they saw the locust fly off in the distance and go below the horizon. There was a great beam of light that was fired off at the Isomi stone and with a flash which lit up the sky above the horizon, the sky in that direction suddenly lost all color.

After the great flash of light, the Giant Locust was seen falling out of the sky along the horizon. Some of the people of Seleb have a great concern because they worship the stone. Those that saw it fall out of the sky say that it happened a few hours ago. These people will go to the stone to get a vision from Scaepa but they do not have a permanent presence there. They are not the “People of the Rock”, which is a different group that worships monoliths.

Most of the people in the town have not realized what happened yet and the party has not seen the elder yet. There are 450 people living in this hamlet which is located in a remote part of the badlands. Seleb does have some classed characters that pass through or dwell in the region, but they tend to be isolated.

There are enough classed characters here that the party feels fairly safe. The party wants to rest for the night and then go to investigate the fallen locust.

Randimir heals Keisial and Hendricks both to full health however Hendricks will require to be under bedrest.

The next morning, we find the elder of Seleb. He wants to know what happened so we explain as best we can, “We tried to stop the locust but we failed. We lost many of our companions and the Giant Locust caused the building to collapse before it got away.”

The elder chooses to believe us. He looks back at us and asks, “Whats next? Who will go to the stone to see what's happened?”

We agree that we will go and the elder explains that he will try to keep Seleb in order while we are away.

Seleb is not connected to the banking network found in the cities further to the north.

The new lineup for the rest of the adventure includes the following characters:

- Sapphira, Human Paladin. On a holy quest and restored back to life through divine providence.

- Keisial, Human Ranger. Formerly a retainer of the late Galador, now promoted to a full character.

- Fothas, Dwarf Fighter.

- Randimir, Half-Elf Cleric / Magic User.

- Bron the First, Human Fighter. Manage to find his way to Seleb from Elsewater while traveling with a caravan.

- Phineas (aka Cleric #1), Human Cleric of Mote. AC 2, medium shield, MV 9“, Doors 1-2, Listen 1-2.

- Savina LaFey, Human Illusionist. Re-joins the group back in Seleb. Usually invisible.

The next day begins our journey toward the Isomi Stone. This standing stone is about 10 miles away from Seleb.

Avuin had some gold and treasure stored on his horse but we will retrieve that later.

Before we leave, the elder gives us directions to the Isomi Stone and we head to the south east on horseback After traveling for 5 miles, we see on the surface of the horizon that the blue of the sky and orange of the sun is absent. We are seeing the sky above where the Isomi Stone should be that the world is MONOCHROME!

We continue on our way, heading in the same direction and the sky stays that way. The monochrome takes up more and more of the sky with a distinct lack of color. When we arrive closer to the epicenter, the stone that is described as a tall plinth has been split in two and is shattered. All that is left is shorter stump of a rock in the distance.

All around us as we look in that direction, the sky and land has been drained of color and everything only appears as different shades of black, white and gray. We are about 5 miles out from this location but the way we need to go to get closer to the Isomi Stone has been stripped of color.

We can see that Along the horizon, over the top of the stone, is a great ovular shape above the shattered stone that is radiating energy like a cats eye. It is hovering above the ground and is streaming gray colors with wavy light. The great oval seems to be stationary and hovers directly above the split stone.

If we continue on this way, we will travel into this land with no color, beyond the edge of the normal world. We check the surrounding areas for anything that we can see that resembles the corpse of a Giant Locust but have seen nothing yet, at least from this distance.

The locust flew to the Isomi stone and fired its disintegration ray at the stone. The locust then fell out of the sky.

Previous info on the Isomi stone: Megalith to the south is called the Isomi stone. It has the ability to create visions in people who keep an all night vigil at the stone.

The Elder: is a member of the town. Julan: received a vision from the Isomi stone. The Synthetorium breached open and out from it came a gargantuan locust that destroyed the Isomi stone.

The sky, the landscape…everything surrounding the land has been turned monochrome, all color has been removed.

Looking upon the horizon, we can just barely see the cat eye / ovular shape and it is unmoving. We estimate that we are about 5 miles away from it. At the epicenter, the monochrome spreads out in the distance until it approaches our position, which is a few hundred feet. Is the colorless landscape moving this way?

Bron the First rides up to inspect the edge of the monochrome area, along with some of the others from the party. We ride up toward the edge of the colorless place and see that it is creeping out slowly. The ground and air is simply drained of color, the grasses and shrubbery, anything that once had a color is now a shade of gray. It is expanding from the origin point slowly.

We estimate that it will expand over 2 to 3 miles over the course of a week.

Phineas (Cleric #1) takes some holy water to spray into the gray monochrome. The holy water steams a bit as soon as it crosses the monochrome but it does not steam away completely. Everything else we try appears to be interacting with the colorless landscape normally.

Despite absence of color, the sky in the direction of the split Isomi Stone looks normal. We look for signs of life beyond and yes, we can some ants that appear to be moving about normally in the discolored area.

The party ponders amongst ourselves, “What do we know of Hades 3 Glooms?” We know that the 3 glooms are equal in power and is where a number of powers reside. Scaepa has control over Hades and the 3 Glooms. The glooms themselves have a population of Daemons and other weird monsters. Hordelings are also found in Tartarus and the Lower Planes. The River Styx runs through the Glooms and the Glooms are all connected to the bottom of Yggdrasil and Mount Olympus. Each of the 3 Glooms has a different leader.

We also know that if someone stays in the glooms for too long it is possible that you can never leave.

Bron checks to see if the ants leave the gloom and return to their normal color when they leave beyond its border. He lures some out using some rations and finds that the insects are able to leave the discolored area. Keisial leads their horse along the edge of the gloom and finds that it is almost like walking through a veil. The horse color returns once it exits the monochrome border.

We discuss this further and wonder if the black scroll has a way of stopping this.

Randimir wants to cast Speak with Animals on a bird and it takes him 2 turns to find one.

Randimir asks if the bird was here last night when the Giant Locust flew over the stone and furthermore, did it see a flash of light?

The bird says that it saw a flash of light and all the other birds were in panic due to the great flying thing. They saw it fall out of the sky in the direction of the stone. The bird says it was talking to another bird and this other bird was quite close to the stone. The bird said that it saw the great stone explode and in its place came the great eye thing. Every color was stripped from the area and the bird flew away with the other birds.

Continuing our questions about what it may have seen, the bird explains that it saw a hulking winged thing, like a human but much different and angrier looking. It came through the eye and attacked the big flying thing which sent it to the ground dead. The birds all flew away then.

The party believe that the eye is some kind of a portal to the 3 Glooms.

Realizing that we have learned all that we can without progressing within the monochrome, we return to Seleb. Randimir leaves to talk to the Clerics of Scaepa at their Temple. The head cleric is named Mengow and he is also the head of the Clerics that worship the Isomi stone. He asks Randimir if we saw the stone. We explain what we saw of it and the circumstances as we know them.

Mengow has to think about what to do next but he knows that they will need to evacuate the town and go north. It is not safe for regular people to be in Scaepa's retribution. Their failure to protect the Isomi Stone that is surely part of the vengeance that was sent by Scaepa. However, he knows that the people of Seleb are independently minded. If there is a portal at the site of the Isomi Stone, things could come through it, dangerous things. He also mentions that the Glooms are very big. Whatever lies beyond the portal, as long at the other end is not located near to the Iron Fortress, then maybe nothing that would be considered too bad will come through.

Overall, we are not sure of the power of the portal but surely the creatures that come through would be limited in their power. If it was opened by Scaepa directly, the power could be much greater than those created by mortal creatures of the Outer Planes. If we leave and return back in a few days, there may not be anyone left here in Seleb, especially if something bad has happened.

We ask Mengow if we should take a trip to Elsewater and he explains that by the time someone makes it to Elsewater, Seleb might have already been taken by the expanding gloom or a creature that has emerged through the portal. He says that if we think there is a chance that we can make it then so be it. Mengow also says that they will send someone else to Elsewater to relay the warning.

Our party went to the stone and back which took an entire day. Some of the people from Seleb also rode out to the stone and now there is a fear and panic inside the town as word of the gloom has already spread. Seleb benefits from its small size because, if this had occurred outside of a city like Mombafra, there would have been absolute chaos. The people of Seleb have not taken to looting or killing and things are relatively in order.

Suspicion among some of the people is had towards our party. Only the elder knew of the vision Julan had at the Isomi Stone. Only he knew that something bad was going to happen.

The party takes to our riding horses at the stable and the 7 of us start riding toward the Synthetorium of Zandruul, to complete our mission and perhaps to find a way to stop the expanding gloom. We arrive after a day.

Back at the Synthetorium of Zandruul…

Randimir has one continual light coin left since the others were destroyed by a Dispel Magic spell. We are at the top of the ramp way going down. There is a massive hole going through the place as we witnessed before, the collapsed opening made by the Giant Locust.

Bron, Fothas, and Keisial are opening doors.

We have a little trouble with the first door that we attempt but with 60' continual light coin, we can see that the passage beyond is free of exoskeletons this time. Previously, some spider exoskeletons had been placed in the hall containing some type of green fungus or slime that was potentially lethal. We had to burn it away after coming in contact.

We cross the hall and go to the door. Randimir can listen with his Weasel Familiar which has a 8 in 20 chance to listen. Beyond the doors, he does not hear anything. We open the door found on the upper right hand side of the Great Hall. Fothas manages to get the door this time.

The enemies are surprised!

We push into the room and the three door openers enter. We find a large room, much like another great hall, with an elevated area. There is a mural on the east wall above the elevated area. We can see alcoves on the west wall of the room.

Inside the room about 30' away from our group are two big 10' x 10' cubes of a sickly gray color. They are nearly perfect cubes that slide along the ground, toward the south end of the chamber. The cubes are otherwise featureless.

They are currently 3” away.

Bron is going to ready an oil flask to launch at the cubes. He manages to hit one with the burning flask dealing 8 damage, the flames spread and the cube continues burning. It does not splash onto the other cube.

Gauging the room, we can see that the mural on the elevated platform resembles a 7 pointed star encompassed by a great white circle. The 7 pointed star is decorated with gems that glisten brightly in the firelight. We can also see a second staircase that leads up to the elevated portion. We cannot see the end of the hall despite the burning cubes.

Bron will attempt to throw another flask of oil on the next round of combat. Savina puts on her Ring of Invisibility and there is 3 more burning damage on the first cube as the fire continues to burn.

The second oil flash thrown by Bron misses its target but Sapphira also throws a flask and it hits within range for splash damage which will cause 1-3 damage. The oil flask causes 2 more damage to the damaged cube. A crushing blow check confirms that the flask breaks. The gray cube continues burning and we hear a gross muffled popping and boiling sound.

Randimir throws another burning oil flask but this one misses too.

Both of the gray cubes advance toward our party. They slide steadily across the stone floor. We can see that from the shell of the face of the cube, it opens up much like a McDonald's beverage cup lid with a finger emerging through the straw hole. Suddenly, a translucent pseudopod-like appendage shoots out. The appendage is clear, not gray like the rest of the cube, but more like a translucent gel.

One of the cubes attempts to strike Sapphira and the other one is on Randimir. The pseudopod hits Sapphira with a roll of a 20 and she must save versus paralysis at +2. Luckily, Sapphira successfully rolls her save and only takes 1 damage!

She can feel that the skin around where the pseudopod hit becomes numb. The other gray cube hits Randimir with it's pseudopod and now he must also save versus paralysis at +2. Randimir fails the save and he becomes paralyzed, taking 2 damage as well. This time, the pseudopod stays attached to Randimir and it has full control over his body as it begins to pull him inside.

Bron tries to cut the pseudopod off while Phineas tries to pull Randimir away from the gray cube. Savina looks for anything that may be of assistance so she holds the door open. Sapphira tries to chop off a pseudopod as well.

Meanwhile, the gray cube that has the attached pseudopod continues to pull Randimir towards it. This reveals a translucent inside and once Randimir is pulled in, the cube begins dissolving him. Randimir takes 4 damage this round and he cannot breathe!

The other cube attacks and hits Keisial who must now save versus paralysis at +2. Luckily, her saving throw is successful and she is not paralyzed but still takes 1 damage.

Bron misses the gray cube with his sword along with everyone else. We all miss. This time Phineas attempts to attack with his mace and Bron misses once again.

Both of the gray cubes shoot out their pseudopods and both are attacking Fothas this round. While the pseudopod is extended out, Keisial strikes a blow, hitting a pseudopod which has AC 8 (no type). She does 5 damage which severs the appendage which then retracts back inside the cube. Fothas manages to block the attacks with his shield.

Randimir is still inside of the gray cube that swallowed him and he is being dissolved. He takes 7 damage.

For the next round, Bron holds his attack to wait for the pseudopod to emerge. Randimir takes another 6 damage from the acid as continues to be dissolved.

Bron rolled a 1 and misses his stike against the pseudopod but Keisial hits one for 3 damage. Phineas also strikes and does 6 damage to the pseudopod, which dismembers the appendage! Phineas manages to destroy the cube by striking into the opening, and into the translucent interior! The gray cube suddenly collapses with a splash and Randimir falls out! Although he is alive, he is still paralyzed.

Once again, Bron holds his attack for the other pseudopod. Clearly, these are the one weakness these things have besides fire.

Fothas strikes the interior of the cube for 9 damage and Phineas hits for 4, destroying the other cube!

Combat is now over!

Randimir becomes unparalyzed as the group examines the other objects that were contained inside the gray cubes. These are the objects found:

- 78 cp

- 37 sp

- 41 gp

- 40 pp

- 2 gems

Savina enters the room while inside the room, healing spells are cast on Randimir who was heavily damaged by the dissolving acids of the gray cube.

We can see once again that along the east wall is the 7 pointed star surrounded by the big white circle atop the 5' high elevated platform. There are alcoves along the west wall and the chamber meets a wall on the south end.

Phineas heals Randimir again for 8 and he should now be fully healed.

The stone of this chamber is the same kind of rock found inside the rest of the dungeon in general. Chunks of the wall have fallen off in places.

The glittering gems seen on the 7 pointed star include:

- 3 star rubies.

- 4 violet garnets.

Randimir casts Find Traps to look at the wall and the alcoves and his spell locates highlights traps on each of the gems. A hidden panel is also seen on the elevated platform which is also trapped. He confirms that each of the traps are directly behind each gem and it looks like the panel on the platform would open upwards.

We investigate the alcoves further and only find chunks of stone and rubble that have fallen off the wall but otherwise, there is nothing of value.

Now that we have thoroughly searched this room, we decide to leave the gems and pass through the north east door.

Bron charges through the door and into a group of 6 dwarf zombies. He swings his large bastard sword and does 6 damage. Phineas manages to kill one with a bow shot and now there are only 5 left.

Randimir uses his Turn Undead abilities and manages to turn all of the zombies. They immediately retreat back up the stairs. The stairs are going up in the back right corner but otherwise the room is entirely featureless, completely empty and free of debris.

The group charges after the zombies and Randimir strikes one for 5, destroying it. Sapphira also manages to strike, killing a third one after a 3 damage hit. Keisial hits another for 3 and Fothas hits one for 9, a bigger one, that manages to not get destroyed despite the heavy blow it sustained. The dwarf zombies continue to flee.

Our party continues dispatching the undead monsters and Fothas manages to finish one off while Keisial nearly kills another. Randimir hits for 3 while it tries to get away. We refuse to let it get away and re-engage the zombie we were pursuing. Bron strikes it down for 7 damage destroying the final zombie.

Combat ends…for now.

At this point, we find ourselves on a landing with the stairs continuing upwards. It looks as if the stairs go up for quite a ways.

No sooner do we take a moment to catch our breath but suddenly, we hear a terrible angry roar from up the top of the stairs, as if something is banging against metal, something big.

We can see that at the top of the stairs is a regular door, made of wood, but the roaring sound is coming through the door.

We see another room to the south, back down the stairs that is mostly empty. Meanwhile, the sound of something large is attempting to break through the door at any minute

Bron braces for a charge along with Fothas, attempting to hold off whatever might break through. Phineas is up front along with Sapphira, both in the second rank.

With a CRASH the door blasts open! Standing behind it is a big Minotaur with a double bladed axe and in the same movement, the large axe is pulled up like a maniac and the creature charges down at us!

Randimir and Keisial can fire their ranged weapons before the charge. Randimir misses as does Keisial.

We are under the effects of PROTECTION FROM EVIL due to Sapphira's aura! The minotaur attacks with its axe which is treated as a halberd as per the rules under the Monster Manual. Fothas is attacked it hits Fothas with its great double bladed axe! Fothas takes 8 points of damage but the headbutt misses.

Fothas makes retaliatory strike and hits for 4 damage while Saphhira swings her blade, dealing 5 damage to the man-beast! The Minotaur is wounded.

Phineas heals Fothas with a Cure Light Wounds spell for 3 hp.

Bron attacks the Minotaur using his bastard sword and hits for 15 damage does not score a hit.

The Minotaur does not understand the common tongue, in fact it barely knows the Minotaur language.

Attacks continue against the Minotaur. Keisial hits for 7 damage and Fothas does 4 damage. The Minotaur swings its axe once again and it rolls a 17, Phineas takes a hit and suffers 2 damage but the horns miss.

Another attack from the large beast but this time it attacks Keisial but the attack misses as does the headbutt. Fothas retaliates once again, cutting down the creature for 14 damage while Randimir hits it for 3 damage, which FELLS THE MINOTAUR! It lands to the ground with a heavy collapse.

Just as quickly as the Minotaur dies, we see a lump form on its stomach. Its large axe is lying on the ground next to it. The lump grows and bursts open. Popping out of the lump is a purplish pink grub and after it emerges, the Minotaur begins to change form, transforming into a dead dwarf, the grub lying next to it…however, the grub is still moving.

Rushing to action, Bron tries to slice it in two but the grub rears back, leaping into the air! Initiative is tied and there are simultaneous attacks.

Bron scores a hit for 4 damage while Randimir does 6 and Keisial hits for 3 damage, slicing up the creature. It still lands on Fothas who feels a sharp bite, but the grub falls off and lands on the ground. Kaisiel stomps on the grub thing.

Combat ends, the Minotaur and Dwarf Zombies annihilated.

We now realize that the big axe is gone, absorbed into the form of the dwarf. The dead dwarf looks like a normal dwarf now and not like the zombies we fought in the last room. The dwarf has a fancy looking belt on it and is wearing armor. Where the large axe previously lay is now a regular dwarven axe. The dead dwarf also has a backpack.

We gather the following items:

- A belt made of golden thread and a platinum buckle.

- A suit of dwarf sized Banded Mail.

- A sack containing 38 gp.

- A pouch with a potion vial.

- A dwarf axe (battle axe).

The belt and the backpack have no extra-dimensional pockets. Fothas takes it off and tries it on but it feels like normal banded armor. Keisial spars with the battle axe but finds that it is nothing special.

We go to open the door at the end of the stair, leading up. The door opens up into a long hall filled with columns. We can see another door on the left wall and the columns are spaced out 20' from one another. They are smaller than the ones found in the Great Hall. We can see that the hall ends at a wall to the south.

There are two doors on the east walls and the north side of the hall turns to the left. We turn to the left to open the south door.

We burst into the room, there is filth on the ground and a bunch of coins. We estimate that there is around 1,000 electrum pieces scattered about. Crawling across the refuse are 8 fire beetles milling about. The glowing glands glow with a sickly green color and the light they emit is weaker than normal. We also see that on their beetle shells are several green boils.

Bron proclaims, “I will hold them off” and starts his attacks.

We lose initiative and the beetles move in to attack us. Keisial, Fothas and Bron are up front and receive the initial bites. There are 3 beetles on Keisial, 2 on Fothas and 3 on Bron. There is no Paladin protection up front.

We fight off all of the beetle attacks this round. Some of the party try to disengage but Keisial and Fothas cannot get away as the beetles push forward. Bron is still trying to hold them off. A Sleep spell goes off, cast by Randimir.

Bron is only level 2 but he is not effected however 7 of the 8 Fire Beetles are put to sleep. Keisial is also not effected due to having 2 HD as a Ranger. Bron lights a torch to deal with the Fire Beetles and their boils. Phineas lets out a strong battlecry to increase our morale.

This time, we gain the initiative.

Fothas strikes first with a torch and he hits. These Fire Beetles have AC 4 and the torches do 1-3 damage. Fothas deals 6 damage due to his high strength. He happens to strike a boil by chance and it pops, sizzling in the torch fire.

Sapphira hits for 5 damage and also hits one of the boils. It explodes causing green stuff to spread onto everybody! This was the last of the beetles.

The green substance appears more liquidy and does not resemble the consistency as the green slime we encountered previously. Luckily, this green stuff does come off with water. Regardless, Keisial, Sapphira and Fothas all burn it off, taking 2 damage, 1 damage, and 6 damage from the torch fire respectively.

We pull all of the Fire Beetles into a single mount, light it with a torch and it goes up in flames. The smoke trail goes down the corridor, following an air current.

The door to the room is already open thanks to Savina holding it open. Following the encounters we take 2 turns to rest and recuperate. Randimir listens at the door at the north end of the hallway but does not hear anything on the other side of the door.

At first, the door does not open because it is locked, however the group manages to open the door on the second try. We stumble into a dark room which is only illuminated by a continual light coin.

Up against the west wall is a wooden table, bound with steel. Sitting upon the table is a stone chalice and a stone goblet.

The east wall has an etching of a design carved into stone. It resembles a woman wearing a beautiful dress but her back is to the viewer and she is facing a great throne. The person that is seated on the throne is concealed by her dress but they seem like a kingly man. The carving is precise, but not flashy or ornate. These etchings have proportions that are correct but there is not a lot of detailing work. It resembles a woodblock print with a number of simple lines.

On the wooden table are additional carvings.

Randimir casts Find Traps but finds that there are no traps. We decide to continue down the north hall to make use of his spell. The hall contains more small pillars that continue on for two more sections. At the very end of the hall, we can see that some of the wall has collapsed and can see into the stonework beyond the wall.

Phineas stays behind in the room with the carved mural and starts pressing things on the wall.

Meanwhile, the rest of the group found a door in the south of the empty chamber. When we open the door it opens up to the other original hallway. We just see rubble and big stones in the west chamber but there is a big stone in the corner that had broken off from the wall.

Phineas finds that the mural does not depress and finds nothing else of interest in here.

We head through the south door and try to make it to the southern hall where the smoke was billowing out. There are still no traps detected but we manage to get around the corner before the spell expires. Through this passage is a ramp leading up through an opening in the ceiling and there is sunlight streaming in. The ceiling stops and we can see brown stones. Sunlight filtering down through stones and although the stairs continue up, they are mostly collapsed.

The dwarves in our party can only detect depth and not the travel direction when underground. We could climb through the opening above if we wish, as a secondary exit.

Back in the Fire Beetle room, Randimir checks the east wall by tapping.

As we gather up the coins from the refuse, suddenly our Ranger, Keisial, and Randimir's Weasel perk up, facing toward the door. Suddenly the door pushes open, slamming back into the wall. Another big gray cube slides into the chamber!

Bron is in melee with the cube but Fothas is not. Everyone else in the party is also in melee. For the first round, Bron prepares to attack the pseudopod that expects to emerge. Sapphira attampts to strike inside the exposed translucent weak spot while Fothas moves in to engage.

The pseudopod strikes at Keisial who has an AC 1 but the attack is dodged! Hendricks does 3 damage to the cube while Sapphira scores an excellent hit and does 13 damage!

For the next round of attacks, Sapphira misses and a pseudopod attempts to strike Fothas. Bron does 11 damage as he strikes the exposed hole, and excellent hit and the gray cube creature is destroyed!

Combat is over. The usual turn passes after combat.

We go back to collecting up the coins and Randimir finds that the east wall is not hollow.

There are a total of 1,150 ep and 1 gem. Bron can carry 100 coins and Fothas grabs the gem. The room now smells like burnt Fire Beetles and cube slime.

We go back down to the room with the goblet and chalice. We find inscriptions on both, inside the rim of each is an inscription written in common.

The stone goblet inscription reads “The purity of Kaguya.”

The chalice is stained red and bears the inscription “The sacrifice of Ra.”

We know that one of the two moons is called “Kaguya” and “Ra” is the name of the Sun. Phineas, as a cleric of Mote, realizes that the red stain looks like blood. He also has more knowledge of the stars than others and finds that the geometry depicted on the table depicts orbits, positioned in such a way so that Kaguya (the stone goblet) is creating an eclipse against Ra (the chalice).

Randimir rearranges the goblets and nothing happens.

Fothas bleeds into the Ra Chalice for 3 damage worth of blood and Randimir puts holy water into the other goblet.

The chalice casts a shadow onto the wall, where the woman is not standing, as if causing an eclipse upon the carving. Suddenly, there is a white and yellow energy emitted along the wall. A grinding sound fills the small room, coming from the wall to the right. The carving of the woman pushes into the wall, opening up a secret storage area and revealing a beautiful cloak. It hangs inside of a secret panel that was concealed behind the wall.

The cloak is a dark purple-black with fine silver threads. When the goblets are done with their function and no longer emit their light, they are no longer made of plain stone but are now a goblet of silver and a chalice of gold, inset with moonstones.

Fothas tries on the cloak which feels luxurious and grand. He feels that it has power and feels internally resilient. A protection is granted to the wearer, increasing the wearers saving throws by +2 against poison and disease. Another aspect of the cloak is that it seems to fade into the surroundings, like a chameleon power. Fothas becomes only half visible to us.

Continuing onward, we find a door at the end of a staired room on the north hall.

Silver chalice with moonstones worth 2000 gp. Gold goblet with bloodstones worth 5000 gp.

We go back to the chamber of death where we found the Giant Locust. In the south east door is another room. There are 14 workbenches have been jam packed with wood, metal and stone refuse in here. Randimir finds a key in this room, underneath the rubble.

- Key id 141.

We try to open the room on the other side of the chamber of the Giant Locust and find a passage that continues down. There are two doors on the left and another one straight ahead, leading to the west.

One of the doors on the south is made of solid steel. It does have a keyhole and the door is quite cold.

The party leaves the Synthetorium for now to recover and divide treasure.

We make it back to Seleb without any incidents. Randimir casts detect magic on everything we have found and sees the following:

The cloak is magical as well as the potion we recovered.

As we get back into Seleb, night has fallen. Fothas who is wearing the cloak feels the power of the cloak increase during the nighttime hours. His saving throws against poison and disease increases by +2, whereas inside and during the day they were just a +1. He has a 90% hide chance using the chameleon-like ability of the cloak.

Potion we found has only a light amount of magic.

When discussing the growing gloom, it is determined by estimation, that it is moving outward at about 2 miles per 7 days, this equals to about 63 feet per hour.

We decide to sell the silver goblet with the moon stones and the gold chalice with blood stones.

From Jonathan's notes

— Today at 4:42 PM

To do:

• Check the crevice, and possibly mine through it by hiring workers.
• Further explore the lower level where the steel door is.
• Further explore the lower level where the intelligent skeleton fled the stairs.
• Check out the sunlight leaking through the ceiling by the collapsed stairs that appears to lead to the surface somewhere.

Rolling up for random gem values:

100 gp.

1000 gp.

10 gp.

The dwarven belt is worth 1,500 gp.

Keisial sips the potion and feels he has domain and authority, except for against dwarves.

Phineas and Fothas roll off for the cloak and Phineas rolls higher, gaining the Cloak. It has id 114.

Savina LaFey takes the magic potion, id 113.

Keisial is taking the belt to help pay for his training.

1,128 total xp.

Treasure Rewards:

Everyone gets 6 pp, 1,010 gp, 176 ep, 1,128 treasure xp.

Keisial gets 3 pp, 505 gp, 88 ep, 2,064 xp plus the dwarven belt.

1,459 xp for everyone except Keisial noted above.

Keisial gets 2064 xp.

Phineas gets 4459 xp.

Jedor gets 51 xp.

Hendricks gets 102 xp.

Savina hits Level 3 Illusionist.

Keisial hits level 2 Ranger.

Randimir hits level 5 Magic-User.

Phineas hits level 3 Cleric.