September 21st, 2008
As kobold leader fell down, party thought he was dead. Unfortunately, when they approached him, he pulled a lever above him and portcullis dropped down from a ceiling and split up the party: Elsing and Kalista stayed behind.
Irgon tried to crush the portcullis with his hammer but iron door stood solid. Vani tried to repair the lever but it was beyond repair. Before they could came up with a new plan, four kobolds entered in the passage and took Elsing and Kalista with them as they were too weak to resist the kobolds alone. They were happy to be alive. At least for now.
The rest of the party decided to go on and find some other way out. When they calmed down, they heard mumbling coming through the door beside them. Vani managed to pick a lock and sneaked inside. She saw only a few barrels, it looked like a storage room. But then she noticed the source of the mumbling: a halfling woman was sitting behind one barrel, tied up and gagged. They set her free and she told them that her name is Yoderis. She is a ranger in this woods and has came to this cave when she saw a group of kobolds acting organized like an army. Unfortunately, they were not only organized, they were cunning also and set her a trap and captured her. They were called up by some Shantarax so they just threw her behind this barrels. That was about two hours ago. They found her stuff in one of the barrels: two short swords and a studded leather armor. They all agreed they should go forth together.
The party continued down the corridor, circularly descending until they found a kobold laying on the ground. This was the one who escaped them before, it looked like he was finally dead. At least until Irgon touched him. Then he started screaming so Vani finally put him down. She found a dragon-shaped key on him and Kriv took his spear and magic orb.
The passage led into a big domed chamber where sounds of their steps echoed around them. They carefully proceeded but in the middle of the chamber, they heard a growling sounds above them. Three reptilian creatures hovered above them and suddenly dived at them. From the other side of the chamber, two swarms of green reptiles came out and attacked them. Spiretop drakes that attacked from above were hard to hit and needlefang drake swarms pulled the fighters down and bit with countless teeth. This time, however, Vani was particularly effective and dealt a few death blows. When party thought they had won, Kriv was pulled down and overwhelmed by a last drake swarm. After battle was over, he just stayed lying on the ground; he was dead. They couldn’t do anything to bring him back to life. They will need to raise him from the dead in some temple. For now, they decided to carry him but Vani first took the party money from him.
On the other side of the chamber they found many egg shells and one egg yet unhatched. Vani took the egg, curious as what she could do with it or whatever hatches from it.
Chamber ended on a cliff. Looking down, Vani saw a hole in the middle of the stone and they decided to try to reach it. They tied Kriv’s body to a rope and lowered it down. They all then managed to climb down to a horizontal ledge. Vani and Yoderis managed to balance on it and reached the hole but Irgon lost his balance. He fell down heavy and barely managed to stay alive. Girls tied the rope and lowered it down so Irgon managed to climb up.
The hole was a small corridor leading to two doors. Behind one of the doors they found small empty room with a hole on the ceiling. This wasn’t a way out. But room behind the other door was more interesting. Tied inside they found Kalista, Elsing and Incanus. They set them free and party was together again, even stronger with Yoderis and Incanus.
They climbed down and found an iron door. Dragon-shaped key they found on kobold fit in the lock. Vani sneaked inside…