Abyss Modified Session 23: Another Side Quest

Instead of continuing with the plot we had a side adventure, we had a few new players and were short on tables. One of the halflings that had been saved from Daddy Fate disappeared in a strange cave near the campsite. Godric, Dinak, Thelrum, and Tamin were joined by the arcane cleric Good Mojo, Arshan the paladin, Enrique the druid, Rolin the goliath battle master fighter, Hidani the rogue/wizard.

They found the first chamber odd, there were two frog demons flanking an illustrated map of the croissant shaped dungeon and doors on the north and south walls. The demons were easily confused and could not agree on which door had opened last. Someone suggested that one of them might only tell the truth and the other lies, but it turned out the monsters were idiots. The party tried the south door first, and encountered a rage filled naga which attacked the group. The frog demons took that chance to attack the party, thinking that they had tricked the party into trusting them. Battle was had, one demon was banished and the other fell to the party’s multiple spells and attacks. Thelrum took every chance to alarm every door, hallway, and pouch that was in his reach the entire dungeon. The map showed the party that there was a secret door in the naga’s room. The demon they killed had instructions to try to trick anyone that came in the dungeon and attack them when their backs were turned, so at least the demons could read. They also found a few skulls in the naga chamber as well.   

They found a thin wall made of paper painted to look like stone but with a crack they could see torch light through, so they pushed passed it to find a smaller chamber full of floor pillows, hidden money bags, incense, a painting on the wall of a strange skeletal man playing a stringed instrument with lightning coming out of it, and a locked but not trapped door. They opened the door after looting pillows and found a strange cistern. There was a five-foot-wide walkway around a murky green pool. A few of the party, members decided to sneak across the walkway without touching the water. Good Mojo locked eyes with something large and squid like in the water and really felt like pushing his allies into the water to feed the beast, but being a small sized cleric had difficulty pushing anyone in. The group attacked the aboleth, Rolin jumping into the water to attack it and sinking rapidly. The group drove it off and eventually the domination effect wore off of Good Mojo, they might have used a spell to do it. Godric had found the next hall had three legless skeletons crawling to a closed door with burn marks on it. They used mage hand to bypass the most likely trapped door handle and entered a store room.

Numerous shelves of odd items greeted them as well as a large gear creature that called himself Ticktock. He looked like he was made of thousands of gear and levers and told the party about his numerous collections. His skull collection was his favorite so the party told him about a few skulls they had seen a few rooms back so it reached its long gear arm and stretched it past the cistern, the pillow room, and back into the naga room and grabbed the three skulls the group had passed and pulled them back to its room. The group was uneasy, this construct was odd. They asked it about magic items so it let them take some things that to it, seemed useless. It told them about the master Geb, a very powerful musician and magician as well as his pet dragon. The party thanked him, closed his door, alarmed it, and went back to the first chamber to rest, again arcane locking and alarming every door. Their rest went uneventfully except for the dragonborn paladin wandering out of the dungeon. They double checked the dungeon map and saw x marks on the rooms they had been in, a slew of question marks on one room, what appeared to be a room full of chairs in another, and what appeared to be poop in the smallest room.

They went through the north door and found a hall made of the finest marble, so fine it was almost slick. False pillars lined the walls and an obsidian door was to the north, and the hall hooked to the west. They could hear fine musical strumming coming from “chair” room and saw a strange skeletal man strumming on his stringed lute like instrument. Godric and Enrique played along for a bit and they started talking with the skeleton. Tamin took this chance to sneak into the obsidian door room and found the bathroom. There was another door on the north western corner, which the entire corner seemed to billow as if something was snoring behind it. The skeleton asked why the group was here and they told him about the missing halfling. He described the halfling perfectly and said he had not seen him. The party knew he was lying and asked about the dragon. He told them his pet dragon took the halfling after the little man stole some of his food from the feast hall table and now has a cuddle partner, so they most likely would never get the halfling away from the dragon. They went to take a closer look at the situation, casting protective spells against frost they expected from the white dragon and fanning out to not all get caught in the breath. Someone cut through yet another paper wall revealing a large white dragon cuddling a terrified halfling. They bargained with the dragon, which had no clue what they were talking about until Thelrum offered it a bag of coins. Its greedy eyes lit up and it began counting the coins, releasing the halfling. They group fled back to the first room, waving goodbye to the skeleton, which thought the coins were a great idea.

As they made it to the entrance, they saw two oni, one with blue skin and the other with green blocking their path. The two oni scanned the party with a magic device and could tell that four of the party were there when Daddy Fate had died and had to pay a toll… a toll of Death. Thelrum Arcane locked the door behind the party, so the dragon would have to break down the door, the group protected the halfling from danger, countered the cone of cold from both oni, and beat the tar out of the oni. They made it back to their camp and reunited the halfling with his people.