Tomb of The Serpent Kings Part 8

Haco was dead -slain by the giant stone skeleton. So the party blamed him for burning down the Slumbering Giant. Naturally. Problem solved.

Maul had met a shifty elf named Farcaan at the feast thrown in Haco’s honor and the two of them set off together for the Tomb of The Serpent Kings. They were joined by the apprentices of the Witch of Bebbenburg -JD (whom Maul had fought the stone skeleton with) and a young Halfling named Belladonna.

Being an apprentice to the witch Elsbeth Dupree is not an enviable post. She spends her time on the upper floors of her tower ingesting psychotropic drugs and reading the inscrutable messages written in the stars by long-dead gods. Her apprentices are restricted to the lower levels of the tower, scrubbing chamber pots and dusting moldering tombs that they are not allowed to read. Dupree barks instructions and insults at her apprentices via a series of Magic Mouth spells. They both wear mage-locked anklets that the witch assures them will fold them inside-out if they ever betray her or her secrets.

So taking a few days to possibly get killed in a snake-man dungeon sounded pretty good.

Also in tow was the young village girl Kit who had signed a one-month contract to carry the party’s torch.

[DM Note: This session saw us transition from B/X (LoTFP) to my Knave hack, GLAIVE. It took about 30 minutes to translate JD and Maul to Glaive. Effje and Sister Cletus’ players had to miss our last game of 2019 due to the flu. Ramen’s player decided to roll up a new character and her fiance joined us for her first game of D&D ever. She did great and was awesome!]

Judging by their map, the adventurers felt confident that they had explored most of the dungeon. But there were two large gaps on the second and third levels. Returning to the secret entrance located in the twisted roots of a mighty tree they returned to the dungeon via the goblin warrens. Where they encountered hostile fungiods that had either moved in after the goblins left, or grew out of the muck in the old mushroom farm. Not sure which. Either way, there were lots of teeth and whipping tentacles when they encountered in a pair of the creatures in the southeastern passage of the old warren. Retreating back to the old Goblin Guard Room, Maul threw down his caltrops in the doorway and readied his great axe. 

The first fungoid came to a painful stop as the caltrops bit into its feet, but the second was not slowed. JD and Farcaan attacked with sling and bow to no effect. Not wanting to waste her precious few spells, Bell drew cold steel and hacked at the closer fungoid. Maul finished the job, splitting the creature in two with his axe. Seeing this, the remaining creature fled in terror and the party moved on to a Domed Hall where they found the goblin crook they had used to fend off a Skeleton Jelly on a previous visit. They scooped that up in anticipation of encountering more of the creatures.

Once more the locked iron door of the Treasure Room mocked the party as they moved eastward through the old Slave Room and up into a very obvious Pit Trap. Leading the party, Maul failed to notice the suspicious loose tiles on the floor and then failed to move fast enough as they collapsed inward like sand through an hourglass, taking the dwarf with them. Maul’s pack took the brunt of the damage and for a moment his heart stopped upon seeing several skeletons impaled on the spikes all around him. Luckily they were just victims of the trap and not skeleton jellies. He looted a gold ring from one of the skeletons while the party prepared a rope to haul him out of the trap.

To the east they discovered a Yawning Chasm and wanted nothing to do with it, so edged back around the pit trap and headed into a Hallway that sloped upwards to the north where they ran into an actual jelly coated skeleton. They had the improvised skeleton crook ready and forced the skeleton jelly up into an old Ceremonial Room. There was a stone door to the east that appeared to be barred from the far side. There was also a dry fountain surrounded by stone benches and evidence that something had been pried off the top of the fountain at some point. Maul retrieved a serpent idol from his pack and slotted it into the top of the fountain. Hidden mechanisms began working inside the walls and the stone door ground open revealing, once again, the yawning chasm that no one wanted to get too close to.

[DM Note: My wife has been lugging around this goofy serpent-man idol since the second or third session, convinced it was the key to...something. So finally I let her have a win. But it’s really just a random piece of loot. The Stone Door is a replica of the Hammer Trap door from the first level of the dungeon. Except that it hammers its victims out into the chasm.]

As the party pushed the skeleton jelly through the doorway the hammer trap activated and sent it flying out into the dark void. Rightfully proud of themselves, the party headed west down into the Guarded Hall where they found two incredibly life-like snake-man statues flanking the entrance to the hall. Clearly, this was a trap!

[DM Note: It was not. But 15 minutes of elaborate scheming later . . .]

A dramatic and detailed plan of action was devised and put into action. Maul dove through the gap between the statues bracing himself for the inevitable blows. Bell prepared to cast Summon Cube to destroy the earth below the definitely living snake-men statues the moment they struck.

Just pretend the snake guys are made of stone.

Nothing happened. Maul dusted himself off and the party looked around.

Discovering a Shrine Alcove just around the corner from the statues, Maul entered with Farcaan. There was a statue mounted on a round pedestal. There were two holes in the base large enough to fit a pair of humans arms. But not being complete dummies Maul and Farcaan stuck the crook and the elf’s shovel into the holes. Rotating the statue clockwise caused dozens of large gold coins to pour out of the base, some of them rolling out of the room and into the Blade Trap Hallway.

[DM Note: They got lucky. Turning it counter-clockwise would have filled the room with poison gas.]

The ceiling of the Blade Trap Hallway is ridged like the gullet of a snake. This instantly raised the hackles of the party. No other parts of the dungeon had thus far looked like it might eat the party. So they sent Kit the lantern bearer to fetch the coins that had rolled that way. In seconds Kit was sliced into a dozen pieces. Her lantern shattered on the floor, briefly lighting the hallway with a spreading pool of burning lamp oil before plunging the party into total darkness.

[DM Note: Okay, first of all -you should always have more than one light source lit at any given time. Because if you don’t the DM is going to say, “roll a d4 -that is how many Turns it takes for you to blindly grope through your pack for flint, steel, and a torch,” and then start rolling for Wandering Monsters.

I didn’t think sending Kit down the “ribbed for no one’s pleasure” hallway was very nice. Though it was funny. What are child labor/endangerment laws in D&D anyway? I made a Morale roll to see if she would follow the obviously sketchy order and one of the players made a roll to see if she could dodge the trap. She did, and then she did not. So my Murder Hobos have killed a child now. Hurray for D&D?]

It took 30 long and terrifying minutes to get a torch lit. As the light finally caught, Farcaan saw two massive skeletal hands coated in orange jelly close over her face and gave a muffled shout as the skeleton jelly began crushing her skull. 

The party flew into action and freed Farcaan before too much damage was done and quickly got the crook around the skeleton’s neck. Seeing what the Blade Trap Hallways had done to Kit, they manhandled the skeleton in that direction. Chopping blades met indestructible skeleton jelly and in short order the party had accidentally disabled the trapped hall. But they still had a skeleton jelly to deal with.

[DM Note: I imagine the effect was similar to tossing a large rock into a clothing dryer. If you’ve never seen this you should go to YouTube right now. I will wait.]  

What followed was a smash-cut montage that would have made Edgar Wright proud. Sloping hall, fountain, idol, gears and pulleys, doors opening, skeleton shoved through doorway, hammer trap, skeleton disappearing into the murky void of the chasm, back to the Guarded Hall.

The party considered their options. No more treasure in the Shrine Alcove. Obvious danger in the Blade Trap Hallway. And a door to the unknown in the south wall. They opened the door.

The Summoning Room is a long, narrow room with a huge pile of junk stacked at the entrance.

[DM Note: I think the junk is actually supposed to be piled outside the door, in the Guarded Hall but I’m not sure, and I didn’t describe it until the party opened the door anyway, so it was inside.]

A huge pile of junk blocked the entrance and I told the players it would take 30 minutes to clear it and it would probably make a lot of noise. Instead, Bell cast summon cube which allows her to create or banish several cubic meters of earth. It's basically the Minecraft spell. A trench opened under the junk and it filled the hole, allowing the party to just step over it.

At one end of the room was a small altar containing some golden bowls and a wavy dagger with a huge emerald in its pommel. (+1 magic dagger). At the other end of the room, Bell saw a very attractive halfling in ragged travel clothing who smiled unsettlingly at her. Her ankle was chained to the floor and she seemed very nonplussed to see the party. 

Instantly suspicious the party kept their distance and began asking questions. Who was she? How did she get here? Etc. She was captured by the goblins, she thought the party was them coming back to kill her.

[DM Note: The goblins were actually terrified of her and it was they who piled the junk in the doorway, hoping to keep her in the room. She is actually a succubus summoned thousands of years ago by snake-men priests.]

Not getting the answers they sought, Maul stepped forward menacingly with his great axe in an attempt to intimidate the halfling woman. In doing so, he crossed the summoning circle that bound her and the manacles around her leg turned to dust and blew away. She thanked him then with a “POP!” she teleported into the Guarded Hall. 

JD was at the back of the party and thus closest to the demon. She morphed into a gorgeous human woman before his eyes as she charmed him, then reached out to caress his face, preparing to deliver her deadly kiss to regain her strength with his life-force. 

A great axe and a shovel crashed into her before she could. The two mighty blows did little more than amuse her. Licking a small spot of blood from her lips the demon smiled saying, “That wasn’t very nice,” as her eyes turned black and opaque. She teleported again, this time beyond the light of the party’s lantern.

A minor panic ensued and it was decided to get out of the tomb as fast as possible and by the shortest route. This would take the party through the Basilisk Hall but it was a risk they were willing to take. 

Moving as quickly as they could they passed through the Blade Trap Hallway, through a Vestibule, and into the Basilisk Hall, making for the secret door that Maul knew was in the south wall. They were almost to the door when JD felt his limbs stiffen and his mind slow as he began to turn to stone before his companion’s eyes. Not even slowing, Maul scooped the mage up and started running, extolling the rest of the party to do the same.

As they reached the door the basilisk came crashing out of the darkness, lashing out at everyone with tooth and claw. JD regained the use of his limbs just as Farcaan took a blow to the face that dropped her to the ground unconscious. Bell cast night sphere and a 40’ globe of darkness appeared that blinded everyone (though they could all see the stars of a distant galaxy twinkling on its inner surface). The party used the confusion of the blinded basilisk to make its escape back to the surface where they tended to the Farcaan.

The elf survived but she was badly mauled, (-1 Charisma, permanent). Catching their breath at the spooky taxidermy shack, the adventurers then started back to Bebbenburg Keep for a much-needed drink.