Belak's Room?

As they went deeper into the vast citadel, the noticed that the small hallway was very moist and smelled of rot and decay. Thankfully, the stairs only went down for a short time and then after even continued to go up again. They counted the stairs and noticed that they were level with the previous room with Ashdaralon's statue, but they were a bit disorientated from the ups and downs and smells, let alone all the weirdness that they had seen.


As Ropin rounded the corner, he saw a very long hallway drift into darkness. He quietly stepped forward, which was not too hard since the floor was also splattered with moss and small grasses. As he got nearer to what looked like the middle of the hallway, he noticed 2 doors at the end. He beckoned the others to come - silently.

Ropin got to the first door and tried to see if it was trapped or locked. It was not trapped, but it was locked. He looked at the other door and noticed that it was neither trapped nor locked (or so he thought - since he is not really a rogue...). As they were getting ready to open the second door, Relord and Masiry got ready.

Ropin pushed the door open and then Relord stepped inside and found himself in what looked like a mushroom garden. The smell was quite strong and he also noticed a small goblin doing what seemed like gardening in the corner. He explained this to the others as quietly as he could, but the goblin heard and turned around to see who had opened the door.

Basically, quick fight and dead goblin. But they also noticed that some of the mushrooms seemed to glow, and some of them had various kinds of powders on them and they seemed to move a little when they were near them. They would have to be careful since Relord mentioned that mushrooms could both heal and harm you if you were not carfeful....

After looking around a bit, they noticed another small wooden door to where they guessed the other door in the hallwya led and a large wooden door that was actually 2 doors together leading somewhere else. Ropin was curious about the large door while Kasas was interested in the smaller one and both tried to open them.



Ropin was first and gently pushed open one of the doors. He was shocked at what he saw (and did not see). He saw what looked like a huge cave or cavern that was covered with grass and fungus as well as weird looking trees. He could not see farther, but knew that it extended even deeper into the darkness. He also unfortuately saw some other goblins, a hobgoblin and a few tree blights working in the garden area and gently closed the door again, so as to not make a sound.

Meanwhile, Kasas was not having luck with the other door. It was also locked and he could not seem to open it. Relord offered to try to break it open with his morning star (he picked up from the bugbear when they entered the hole) but it was agreed that breaking the door in the hallway would be quieter than breaking it here, especially since Ropin just explained the situation behind the door. In fact, did they really need to see what was behind the door? Shouldn't they prepare for the eventual fight with the monsters in the next room?

But curiosity is a powerful thing and it was decided that the door had to be broken.

After 4 loud clanging blows to the door, it shattered and they were able to go inside. They saw a small room, which looked like a bed room, living room and study area all in one. They thought it might be Belak's room and that he is most likely very close now.

Kasas was very curious as to what was in the room and looked around. He immediately saw some more bookcases, an experimental table and a regular eating table in the middle, a small fountain, a clothing dresser and a small unkempt bed. He noticed that on the experimental table were two halves of an apple, but he could not determine if it was a red or white one since the skin was peeled off and there were other powders and liquids around and in it.

As Kasas was looking in the room, Ropin was looking at the mushrooms, trying to figure out which were deadly and which were ok.

He did not have too much time, since suddenly the doors opened and in came the goblins and the hobgoblin! Oh no! They had heard the noise from breaking the door and now the fight was starting!



Would they be ready?

This IS a Dragon Temple.....

They made it through the night, but not the morning.

Just as everyone was waking up, they heard some chattering in the hallway. It seems that 3 goblins were looking for their master, the bugbear and found him lying in the doorway of garden room number 2!
Since some things can not be discussed or reasoned out, the party quickly decided to deal with these goblins before they could run off and warn others. Ropin jumped up and launched over the dead bugbear and Relord, managed to climb the dead husk and was ready at the top. Kasas and Erky were still in the back, feeling a little bit nervous after their near-death moments and Masiry was just coming out of his meditaiton exercise and was ready to go.


One goblin dropped dead from a nice shot by Ropin, as he came over the dead bugbear, and Masiry actually outpaced Relord by cleanly vaulting the body to help Ropin attack the other goblins. However, one of the goblins got scared and ran off down the hall.

They debated about running after him, but decided to go a little slower and prep for anything that may come back first since they already knew this area and did not know anything further down. However, after a few minutes, nothing happened. No one came back and no other sounds were heard. They then continued down the corridor, opening the one other door to the right, and noticed that it was another garden room with grass, purple moss, some strange fungus and small trees. This place was where they were planting things to eat or use....

They continued down to the door in front of them and came to a small broken down circular room with lots of purple moss on the floor, dripping walls and some broken sections of floor and ceiling. There was another door leading out of it and it was open. Apparantly, the goblin was too scared to close the doors on his way through....

They peered into the doorway and saw a hallway painted with stunningly beautiful - and gory - frescoes of dragons flying and destroying towns, dragons eating humans, dwarves and elves and dragons in all shapes and sizes doing what dragons do best - ravaging countrysides and hoarding treasure.

They all looked at each other and remembered that this citadel was in fact dedicated to a long lost dragon cult, not only a place where kobolds, goblins and weird humans did experiments with plants and trees!

Erky volunteered to quietly go down the hallway, since she said it seemed to open up at the end.


As Erky came to the corner, she peered into the room and froze. Ropin and the others were following her as well slowly and also stopped and readied their weapons. What did she see?

Erky's eyes quickly glanced over the room and did some calculations and guesswork. When she was done, she sighed and stepped more into the room. "It is alright! I see a dragon statue, a strange circle on the floor and another door. Oh, and that goblin we saw run down here looks dead. Don't know from what yet!" She did not mention that she had thought she was looking at a real dragon for a second, since the statue was so beautifully done as to resemble a real dragon.


They came into the room and were still leery. First, as they looked closer, they saw red glowing lights in the dragons' eye sockets, the marking on the floor was in Draconic and seemed to pulse with life, and the goblin was indeed dead, but they did not see any blood or weapons around him and it was not clear how he died.

Plus, the most important finding was when Kasas looked closer at the statue and said; 'My god! This is Ashdaralon the Great! This is HER temple and citadel. It was said that she got so powerful and controled so much that a cabal of sorcerers and wizards fought with her and banished her to another realm. But not only that, they used some dark magic to pull her entire temple below ground. There is something else that I am forgetting, but that is the main part!' Kasas was excited and wanted to go check out the circle, but the others mentioned that now would not be the best since they should continue on.


To save time and perhaps come back to this area later, they decided to look to see where the door leading out of this room led.

As Erky opened the door, which was surprisiingly not locked, she looked into a dilapidated, old, crumbing small library with many books and tomes and yet another door leading out. No one was all that excited about this discovery except Kasas, who started to look through some of the books and noticed that many of the titles had to do with dragons and dragon lore.

The others were content to keep going and opened the door into a hallway that lead to a staircase going down. 'How deep is this?' Relord said, while, Ropin, who has been impatient to find the humans said as if on cue; 'Where are the humans and Belak?'

Meanwhile Kasas was thinking how to take some (or all) of these books back to the surface, when he grabbed one and as he pulled it out of the shelf, grey powder spilled out from between the cover. These books were super old and distintgrated! After a quick search, with a few more books in that sorry state, he gave up on his idea and continued with the group.

Indeed, when will this end?

The Garden Rooms, Part 2

As they were heading back to the room - just a few feet away - the door that they had not opened yet suddenly opened up and they saw a large bugbear with a giant scythe in his hands.

Oh crap! Everyone stood still in shock, not knowing what to do. However, the bugbear seemed as if not to notice them and was on his way to just get some lunch. However, he sniffed with his large nose and looked down the corridor at the open door to where the party was and squinted (it seems that bugbears have bad eyesight). He either did not like what he smelled or saw since it seemed to dawn on him that something was not right.

He hefted the scythe in his large hands and lungered down the hall at the first person he saw - Kasas.

Kasas, knowing that 1 swipe from that weapon would be fatal, made a risky decision and bolted TO the bugbear to get to the room where the 3 goblins were killed and close the door, hoping that the bugbear would then choose the other people in the party.

However, the bugbear followed him, grunting and grinning and when he came to the closed door, kicked it open and made for Kasas inside the room.

Relord, Ropin, Masiry and Erky were all running after the bugbear now as well and tried to gang up on him. Kasas was able to dodge and weave the great arcs the bugbear made with his weapon, but only barely. Relord suddenly had a thought and cast Shatter at the bugbear and his weapon, hoping to break it. After chanting the spell words, a loud sonic boom was heard in the small confines of the room and everyone in the path of the sonic blast stood motionless for a moment. Kasas and Masiry were affected slightly, but the main job was done - the bugbear's metal bladed scythe shattered into many pieces and he was left with a wooden staff.

However, the power of Relord's blast had another unexpected result: the metal hinges on the laarge wooden door also broke and the door fell to the ground with a loud thud. Now that the bugbear was without his weapon (that he liked), the bugbear decided to pick up the door and use that (since he could get at leat 2 people in one swing and he was all about efficiency...

He was surrounded, but he not only had a large shield now, but also a pretty useful battering weapon to hit multiple targets, which he used as quickly as possible. Relord and Ropin each got bonked a few times, but the most serious was Kasas. As he was trying to get through the door again to get som espace between him and the bugbear, the bugbear got an Attack of Opportunity on him (a free hit) and smacked him hard, making Kasas roll out of the doorway on his back, just barely keeping his eyes open. Meanwhile, Masiry and the others each got some good hits on the beast and were able to take him down.

After looking down the corridor where the bugbear came from and not hearing anything, they decided to jimmy the door shut (they did not have the key) and rest as they were planning. However, they still did not want to go back to the room with the Thoqqua, so they decided that the room where they killed the bugbear was good enough even if did not have a door now. After a little debate, they pushed and lugged the begbear to the door entrance, making a mound in front of the door, as a way to make it difficult for someone or something to go over.


Finally, they were able to rest a little bit and each found their own private space to zone out in. Since Erky was still recovering from the shock of almost dying (as well as Kasas), she felt hungry and looked in her burnt backpack for something edible. Previously, she had found some strange apples in the experimentation rooms; 4 of them pure white and 5 of them a very deep red - all of them shiny and fragrant.

The fire had ruined a few of them, but there were still 3 red ones left and 2 white ones, so she picked a red one and started to eat it. With each bite, she seemed to gain more strength and vivality, and even the other adventurers noticed it. 'Wow, that was a good apple!' she said and offered them to the others. 'How about you Kasas? You look beat. Do you want one?'

Before Kasas could answer, Ropin and Relord both said: 'You ate the apple?!' 'What else do you do with apples?' replied Erky. But Relord mentioned that they were a little strange and should be careful. He then asked to see one of the white ones and concentrated on it but could not determine if it was just a white apple or something else. Then, his curiousity piqued, Kasas took a white apple and cast identify on it.

Holy Cow! After casting the Identify spell on it, Kasas almost dropped the apple on the gound. His face was almost as pale as the apple and he whispered: 'This apple has powerful magic in it - a Power Word: Kill matrix that I have only read about! Do NOT eat this apple! Give me the other one!' He grapped the other one and did another spell and this time he looked closely at Erky. 'And this one' he said, holding the red one, 'is also a powerful spell, but it cures all when eaten. We need to use these sparingly!'

Erky looked shocked at what she had done and looked at her scarred hands, seeing that they were fine now. Good thing she did not eat the other apples!

So, they could get a good rest now and after packing the apples away, everyone tried to get some shut eye.

Would they make it through the night?

The Garden Rooms, Part 1

'We MUST be getting close,' Ropin lamented and prepared to open yet another door to what looked like a very large underground lair. After being careful to listen for anything behind it, Ropin opened the door and peeked inside. All was clear.

However, the smell here was very dank and musty as if there were lots of grass or leaves all around in differing stages of decay and growth. It was quite wet here too, and some of the rocky walls even were leaking water down the sides in little rivulets.


There were 3 doors, and they opted to check out the middle door, since Kasas thought he heard something there. So they opened the door and saw 2 goblins and another of those weird Hobgoblin-plant creatures tending some plants in a medium sized room that was covered with moss, grass and mushrooms.
Not waiting to ask questions, they opened up on the workers and dispatched them easily. Then Ropin and Masiry wanted to check out the room heading South quickly since there might be more goblins that heard them, but Kasas and Relord were content to stay and loot the bodies (to which they found very little).

Ropin and Masiry as well as Erky went to the other door, listened and opened it quietly with bows ready. There was no one in this one, and while it looked similar to the room they just came from, there was a strange smell - kind of burning leaves or grass - and they also noticed black lines and some pot marks in the grass, showing the rock floor underneath. Towards the back, they also noticed a mound of dirt and rocks as well as a small hole in the wall. Erky went to investigate it.

When she got there, she looked around and started to poke at the mound to see if there was anything inside or useful there, as well as to scope out the hole in the wall.


In hindsight, that was not a very good idea.....


...since something suddenly jumped out of the hole right on top of here. 'Giant Worm!' She yelled and she was only half right. Since as the 'worm' was attacking, its nose glowed bright orange and started to burn Erky's clothes! 'What the heck IS that?' Ropin cried out as he waded into the room trying to aim his bow.


Actually, no one cared at the moment and watched in horror as Erky struggled under the 'giant worm.' However, Ropin's arrows did not find their mark and Masiry looked on in disbelief wondering how he was going to be able to punch THAT! Quickly, Kasas and Relord entered the room and Kasas, after doing a bit of planing, launched off a few magic missles and what would seem to be a terrible fight, was done in a short time.


However, Erky was not moving when they pulled the giant worm off of her and all of them had to put out small fires on her clothes and backpack. They looked at her in dismay since her skin was burnt and she was nearing death.

As gently as he could, Relord put his hands on her to cure her and hoped that would do the trick. It would heal the wounds, but the skin would take longer to heal. While doing so, Ropin was curious about this creature and examined it closely. He realized that this was a Thoqqua, a monster that actually can burrow through solid rock, eating the nutirients in the rocks. He then had an idea and cut open the belly, where he found 3 small gems that must have hardened in the Thoqqua's gullet. He resolved to give them to Erky as a momento....

After a few minutes of being close to death, Erky stumbled up and coughed a 'thank you' to Relord and the others. She said she was fine, but they felt they went through enough for one day, so they decided to rest, even though it was only nearing noontime.

They decided to go to the previous room to rest since they did not want to stay in this particular room.

What in the World??....

The adventurers found themselves in a large room after they climbed down the hole and killed the bugbear.

It was not what they expected, course, they were not sure what they were expecting - mostly they thought that they would see the humans that they were supposed to find - the main reason why they were in this strange dragon citadel in the first place! But no. At least not yet.

They looked around. It was very damp and moist and had vines and algae on all the walls and most of the ceiling. The algae cast a strange purple light, so they could see a little bit, but had to let their eyes adjust to the glow.

Apart from the hole, there were 3 other ways to go. Two of them had doors and one of them lead out into what looked like a cave or something.

They were not sure where to go, but they did wonder where the goblin king and queen were who had fell down the hole. They had expected to see them, along with the other goblins, but they were not there.

Anyway, all was quiet for awhile and they decided to pack their packs full of the purple algae for some quick and easy mini-medicine (even though it tasted terrible). However, as they were gathering up some of the purple algae, they must have made too much noise deciding what to do, since one of the doors opened and a small hobgoblin peered out into the room. He made a noise (what sounded like a question and then a yell) and then he quickly closed the door and ran back to where he had come from.

Realizing their mistake, the adventurers hurried to the door to prepare for yet another fight!


They got ready and then opened the door to look inside. It seemed to open up into a hallway, but it was quite dark and the purple light did not reach too far. As they were looking, a javelin came hurtling past and hit Relord in the chest. They did not see who had thrown it, but there were indeed other sounds further down the hall.


Relord quickly cast Light on a rock and threw it down the hall to brighten things up. It helped a bit and they saw 2 hobgoblins scurrying towards one of the middle doors.


They had fought many hobgoblins before, so they knew they were pretty easy to kill, so Ropin and Masiry ran to the door they went into. As they ran down to the door, they saw two other doors in the back open up as well, but did not look at what was coming out. They were concerned with the 2 hobbies in the room and Ropin lunged in first.

However, when he was there he saw a terrible thing: it looked like a small horse or a large rat had been experimented on and had a large cut on its belly. But not only that, it looked like there was a tree growing out of the stomach! After looking quickly (and not throwing up), Ropin saw the 2 hobgoblins rush at him to try to attack. But one goblin closed the door so Masiry could not help! Ropin was on his own.

In the meantime, Relord, Kasas and Erky had come into the hall and had taken up positions against some other monsters.


Erky and Masiry were trying to get the door open to help Ropin, but Relord and Kasas headed back to where the other doors had opened and something else had come out.....they looked and were surprised that it looked like a hobgoblin but with hard tree-like skin and branches that seemed to come out of his skin.

What in the world was going on?

It seemed like this Belak character was experimenting on hobgoblins and other animals to mix the tree blights and other animals! Terrible!

The worst part was that these hobgoblins, while slower were much harder to kill and had poison in their claws!

Also, as Erky and Masiry were trying to help Ropin, another weird horse/tree creature came out of another room and tried to bite Erky. Thankfully, Erky was nimble and escaped the bites.

Finally, Ropin emerged from the room himself and looked tired. He had killed not only the 2 hobgoblins, but the horse/tree creature that the hobgoblin set loose on him. It was a weird fight and once he got out and looked at the other weird creatures, they all were left wondering what was going on.....

What was going on?

And where were the humans?

Out of the Frying Pan and Into the Fire....

After a bit of a rest to regain spells and health, the adventurers considered how to get down the hole; either by the vines or by some of the rope that they carried.

Kasas and Relord wanted to use their ropes, so they strung them up as best they could to some sturdy pieces near the hole and began to traverse down. It was not so difficult, but a little harder than they thought.

First, Kasas went down, sending his hawk first to investigate to make sure there were no monsters about. After Steropes came back with an "all clear" report, he headed down. However, when he was about halfway down, his hands slipped on the rope and he tried to hang on. He did, but he had slid a little bit and the rope caused his hands to burn, so he instinctively let go - not a smart move - and fell the remaining way, which turned out to only be about 10 feet. Still, he got a little wounded.

Next, Relord headed down and made it without incident.

Ropin, number three on th elist, was another matter. He thought it would be pretty easy and wanted to go a little faster, but he mistimed a handle and fell backwards into the hole when he was about 30 feet up! He tried hard to grab onto anything - rope, vine or wall, and fortunately he grabbed onto some vines. However, the force of his falling tore the vines off the wall and he kept falling......BLAM! He would have hit the floor very hard, but - thankfully - or not so much for Relord - he fell onto Relord. They both got injured a bit and Ropin had to tend to his sore leg that was pretty damaged in the fall, but he turned out ok.

Erky was next and was doing fine until....

....there was some noise from below. It sounded like "Hey! OW!"

Erky could not see what was going on, but it was clear that Ropin and Relord were fighting something in the eery purple lighted darkness.

2 large dire rats had sneaked up to the adventurers and took a bit out of each, so another fight ensued. Erky tried to climb down quickly.

Masiry was still up, watching to make sure nothing came at them from behind and also quickly sprang down the ropes in his casual monk style. However, when he landed, he saw something that he did not want to see: A huge bugbear creature with anterks on his head! Wait a minute - there were only rats! What was this guy doing here?

Anyway, he did not look too happy to have visitors and took out a HUGE morning star and started to aim at Kasas and Ropin.

WHOOOSH! The first swing nearly took off Ropin's head - if he had been hit, but thankfully, it just grazed his cheek and was not hurt - if the morning star DID connect, tho.....he would not want to think about that....

Quickly, the rats were taken care of, but this bugbear was ferocious and strong. Erky tried to stab him with a dagger and Masiry tried to do his monk magic on him, but all failed. Even Relord hit him quite hard, but it was only a scratch for him! Kasas, used his trusty magic missles though and hit him each time. The bugbear did not like that and went directly for Kasas. If the bugbear hit just once, Kasas would have been incapacitated for sure.

The bugbear took a huge swing and aimed it at Kasas. Kasas ducked, hoping that he missed the deadly morning star and turned back at the bugbear at the last instant. He was shocked at what he saw: The bugbear was still and not moving and had a terrible look in his eyes - and then he fell on the floor. What had happened?

Kasas looked around and wondered what he did!? Oh, Ropin was getting his 2 swords out from the bugbear's chest, wiping the blood from the blades. He looked as shocked as the bugbear since he hit the bugbear's heart directly and instantly killed the bugbear. He even was not sure that he had really killed him and struck him again, just to be sure.

Wow, what could have been a disasterous fight for the wounded adventurers ended up being an easy (and lucky) movie-esque fight scene where the hero gets the one lucky shot to kill the baddie.

Whew! They took a breather and looked around at the strange room more, now that they had more time.

The Goblin King

...What they saw when they opened the door came as a small shock to them. Small because they knew that there were goblins waiting for them and one of them must be the king, but the layout of the room was strange and....as they looked around - they did not see the humans they were supposed to find.

Instead, they found two large barricades set up and what looked like a large hole in the center of the room. Standing behind the barricades were about 5 hobgoblins, 6 regular goblins and what looked like the Goblin king and another large goblin, which was (as Kasas pointed out) probably they goblin queen.

They did not look happy.

But Ropin, being as diplomatic as ever, did not shoot first and decided to talk to them. He mentioned that they were only looking for the humans that had come this way and he did not want to fight anymore. The goblin king looked at the humans hiding in the doorway and started to talk to them, which was remarkable.

However, he was upset that the adventurers had killed most of his front soldiers, who were trying to stop the kobolds and that we must be helping the kobolds. Ropin did not say anything at that point and the King continued to say that if they wanted to see those other humans - which were down with Belak - the goblins would agree to let them go down without fighting only if they returned to the kobolds, killed the kobold queen and returned with her head.

Ropin and the others actually started talking about their options and were about to make a decision when Relord mentioned that it was probably better to deal with things now - here - and to fight the goblins. Unfortunately, he said this in a loud voice and the king overheard.....

...so a fight broke out.

Basically, it was difficult to hit the goblins over the barricades that they had prepared so for awhile, the fight consisted of arrows and javelins shooting back and forth without much progress. Then the queen seemed to cast a spell and Relord, Ropin, Kasas and Erky all felt much weaker and vuneralble. What did she do to them!? They did not know, but it seemed from that point on they were easier to hit.

However, Kasas's eagle - Steropes - flew inside the room to discharge a spell at the king but failed. However, he did see the hole in the ground and told Kasas that it was very deep with vines growing up from below. Basically, if you fell in, you were in trouble.

After a few goblins were killed and Ropin and Relord were hit a few times with arrows, they decided to go into the room to finish them off. Ropin was first and he rushed into the room to then get cover behind the door. However, as he looked in the corner, there was another of those strange walking tree blights in a pot that he had to deal with.

At this point, the goblin king wanted to jump over the barricade himself to fight head on, but somehow he slipped and fell into the hole (making him look silly). However, he luckily caught onto one of the vines and tried to climb back up. The queen also rushed over to help him but then Relord, Kasas, and Masiry all tried to push her into the pit as well, and after a big push, finally they succeeded! Now, both the king and queen were dangling in the vines in the pit and were trying to climb up.

The rest of the goblins were taken care off quickly and it was pretty easy to shoot at the king and queen as they tried to climb up. It looked like they were starting to climb down when one of the vines snapped and the king fell into the darkness. And with a few well placed shots, the queen soon followed. However, they did not know if they were really dead or not and wanted to go check.

Ropin reminded them that perhaps they should rest now and regain their spells and health so that if they 'were' still alive, it would be easier to deal with them. So they decided to rest and watch the hole for anyone coming up.

Only a little bit into their rest, Masiry heard some sounds coming from the room they had entered before the throne room and went to go see. He saw the young and elderly goblins being lead away through the long corridor. He called the others to look and they went to confront them, but the goblins were scared and did not want to cause trouble and then Ropin decided not to kill them.

They then went back to rest, but before doing so, they also looked around the room to see what kind of treasure there was. They were not disappointed since most of the hobgoblins and goblins (that had not fallen into the hole) all carried money and they found a chest near the king's chair. Relord went to open it, but Ropin immediately stood back a few feet saying "Be......"

But it was too late. "...careful!"

As Relord opened the chest, 2 tiny darts hit him in the shoulders and while it did not hurt much, he knew immediately that he was poisoned with strong poison! He was about to heal himself when Erky, who had been looking over his shoulders, noticed two bottles in the chest as well and mentioned it to Relord. Relord grabbed one and opened the cork and smelled. It did not smell like a regular potion he was used to and started to logically think: the chest has poison, goblins are not smart and may forget, these bottles may contain anti-toxin or poison remover!

He was right and drank one quickly.

Then it was time to rest before they headed down into the hole!