Bruce (Grenville d'Tharashk) announces that today will be marked by fire and dead things. And possibly some dead things on fire. Chuck (Ashe) instantly votes himself in, claiming, "I've always been enthusiastic about death, just like an elf!" Ernest (Kurgash) shows up with his hands full of carbohydrates and sugar. He offers, "I would have brought Peco, but instead I brought enough calories to recreate him in a lab." Tim (Doc Lungpuncture) points out, "I don't care what you brought, but I'm happy to eat it. Oh, and here are some onions!" Bruce immediately obsesses: "Oooh... onions..."
Paul and Billy (Secheck) show up later, once the shrapnel has ceased to fly.
Peco (Solmar) shows up only after the dust has settled and the wounded have been slain.
Chris (Thaiphong) decides that he will avoid the whole problem by getting really sick and missing the day entirely.
Kurgash points out that there were several things that didn't make it into the last session summary, including:
Grenville d'Tharashk tries his hand at selling the various non-magical treasure recovered from the less-than-fearsome Cult of the Obsidian Eye. He only manages to get 45% of market value for the masterwork stuff, for a total of 680 gold, 8 silver and 5 copper. Lungpuncture comments, "Nice going, bard-tard."
Grenville does slightly better on the magical goods, obtaining 52% of market value, or 5200 gold. He also manages to sell the heavy warhorse for 52% of market, bringing in 208 more gold.
The jackalwere wizard's obsidian shard necklace brings 30 gold.
And there are also various other pieces of jewelry.
Each characters' share is 1039 gold, 8 silver once the money is divided six ways (counting Pip). The merchant buying the goods from Grenville is confused, "Who the hell is Pip?"
Lungpuncture asks, "Hey, Grenville! How do you feel about getting into the money lending business?"
Grenville replies, "How much do you need?"
Lungpuncture answers, "About forty-six gold. I want to sell a +1 Greatsword and buy a +1 Longsword."
Grenville scoffs, "And you think that's even worth my while to bother with? Here, just have a hundred gold and be on your way." Lungpuncture demonstrates that he has the practical nature of a war veteran: he takes the money without needing to be asked twice.
Kurgash decides that he needs to own some magical armor. He finds that he is far too fond of his own suit of spiked chainmail to give it up in favor of something pulled from the bargain bin at Forthright Ferggus' Formidable Fortificatory Fashions, so he asks for a manager and arranges for a custom enchantment job. He explains, "I've become very fond of the spikes in particular. I almost managed to annoy a chuul with them! See the one that's broken off? The business end got lodged into the thing's woopsis." The manager demonstrates his well-developed customer interaction instincts by making only the most polite, noncommittal comments.
Problems arise when the manager asks him to leave his armor behind for the artificer to work on. Kurgash gets an anxious look on his face, "Can't you do it while I wait?"
The manager gently explains, "The enchanting process takes a day."
Kurgash refuses to relent, "Can you do it while I'm in the armor?"
The manager starts to become a bit concerned, "But it'll take all day! You won't be able to move! You'll be terribly uncomfortable!"
"That's OK. I can take it."
The manager finally relents and allows Kurgash to be enchanted into his armor. Kurgash stoically endures the experience, though by the end he suspects that the artificer really didn't need to use quite so many handfuls of caustic dust.
Ashe observes the huge amounts of attention Kurgash is getting by making a project out of a relatively simple magical object transaction. He becomes quite jealous and resolves that he will also make a spectacle of himself in his quest for magical goodies. He reasons that it shouldn't be too hard. After all, he wants to purchase a +1 Spiked Chain. Even in Sharn, there can't be too many such things on the market at any given time.
He delves into the Bazaar and is almost driven to tears when the first shop he lays eyes upon is Strange Cindy's Specialty Chains. He thinks to himself, "She can't possibly have magical spiked chains. What are the odds?" Then he sees a sign next to the door reading "SPECIAL! SALE! QUALITY +1 SPIKED CHAIN! LIMITED TIME ONLY!"
As he counts out his gold to Strange Cindy, Ashe reflects that this whole experience could actually have gone so much worse than it did. And besides, now he has a story he can tell the whole family.
Grenville decides that he's going to forego buying magical objects in favor of exploring the possibility of commissioning a bridge to the characters' new tower residence. He learns that a low-grade bridge to the Excoria Tower Annex will cost 1000 gold. A nicer bridge will cost 2000 gold. Grenville announces that he can cover 1000 gold. Kurgash adds 500 gold to the pile. Ashe contributes 800 gold. Secheck contributes 600 gold. And Solmar adds another 300 gold. All told, Grenville finds that he has 3200 gold available. Grenville spends 2000 gold arranging for a good-quality bridge to the tower, and the remaining 1200 gold on stocking inventory and furnishings for the characters' tavern. The characters have already spent 1000 gold upon furnishings (on 04/17/2005), which puts the Fallen Angel into the lower level of average businesses, with polished wood floors, a varnished bar top and glass in the windows.
Solmar spends some time making a statue of a fallen angel for the antechamber. He proposes that the bar should have a goth theme. Nobody seriously objects.
Lungpuncture finds a new hobby: stripping and polishing the skulls of the hobgoblin monks the characters killed last adventure. Grenville objects just enough to make sure that the polished skulls are not placed somewhere where the customers can see them.
Lungpuncture spends the week chasing cripples around Downbelow, claiming that he is a healer. Sadly, he doesn't actually have the Profession (Healer) skill.
Martin Leaps-the-Towers is good to his word and turns over his Ring of Counterspells to the characters. The retail price of the item is 4000 gold. It is quite an interesting item. The user first casts a spell of first to sixth level into it. From that point on, the wearer is immune to that spell.
The characters decide that they'd like to sell it so they can purchase something more generally useful. Grenville goes into the marketplace to sell the ring, but he finds that he gets distracted by all of the groupies who cling to him whenever he goes out in public. He only manages to get 40% of retail for it, after getting taken by a fast-talking halfling with some silks to sell. He brings 1600 gold back to the other characters.
The money gets converted into a masterwork byeshk great axe for Kurgash, who sells his old masterwork greataxe to help cover the rest of the cost. He shows it off to the others, boasting, "Check it out! It's purple!"
Secheck comments, "Hey! And it goes with the Lacy Glovettes of Ogre Power you wear, too!"
Kurgash glowers.
Some days after it opens for business, the Lady Varania shows up at the Fallen Angel. She is dressed entirely in green silks with emerald jewelry, and has six servants with her. Lungpuncture starts hitting on her, "Hey babe! Once you go chrome, you never go home!" The Lady demonstrates her quality by refusing to acknowledge his presence.
One of her servants approaches Grenville to ask, "Would you join the Lady?" Grenville drops the story he was telling the others and heads over to her table.
Kurgash complains, "I want to hear more of the monkey story!"
Lady Varania tells Grenville that an organization called the Ministry of Winds stole a relic from her collection. She will pay if the characters can get it back. The object is a scepter, and the price is 5000 gold.
Grenville blurts out, "That sounds fair!"
Suddenly, buffing spells rush across the room to make Grenville smarter.
Lady Varania asks Grenville, "Have you heard of the Obelisk of the Winds?"
He replies, "Yes I have! I actually know quite a bit about it. It's a big monument here in Sharn. Winds blow around it constantly. When the winds die down, a door shows up at the base. The Ministry of Winds are the spellcasters who built the obelisk, but they retreated underground 200 years ago because they thought the end of the world was coming."
Lady Varania raises an eyebrow and comments, "Way to blow a natural 20 on a Bardic Knowledge roll. Why do you know all that detail? Are you some kind of obsessed obelisk freak?"
Grenville blushes and answers, "I just read a lot."
Lady Varania explains that the Ministers of Winds live under the obelisk. They are interested in ancient things and the elements, specifically air. There are always four members. Currently, the members include a human, an elf, a minotaur and a goblin. The scepter they stole is the Scepter of the Clouds. It has no magical power, but it does have great religious significance to an ancient goblinoid sect.
Grenville asks, "Do you think they stole it for some practical goal or for its historical value?
Lady Varania replies, "I don't know what practical value it might have. We cannot overlook the possibility that they might simply be insane."
Lungpuncture points out, "I'd like to advise caution! This racially-diverse group could be a rival group of player characters!"
Secheck adds, "Or maybe the guy who wrote the module only bought one box of miniatures."
Kurgash mocks the others, "If it's okay, after we retrieve this cloud scepter thingy we're gonna take it back to our rooms for a night. You know, just to let it settle. It's a service we provide to our most discriminating clients."
Ashe reminds Kurgash, "She could really be evil, you know."
Kurgash points out, "She could be evil and paying us five G's a job rather than being evil and listen to our sniveling excuses."
Unsatisfied with the information that Grenville already provided, the characters hit the streets to find more information about the Obelisk of the Winds. Grenville rather casually makes an excellent Gather Information roll and mentions in passing, "Did you know that the supernatural winds around the obelisk die down when real winds blow through? And that happens only rarely, so we'd better time our entry carefully?"
Kurgash comments, "You know, you're blowing a lot of really good rolls on worthless things like Gather Information. I'm glad I don't rely upon you to watch my back in fights, because I predict that when one comes up you're going to be sucking on a truly epic string of bad rolls."
Grenville scowls at the big orc barbarian, but not so Kurgash can see him.
The other characters learn that the Ministry of Winds are obsessed with the wind, and are known to have collected massive amounts of information about the area around their obelisk. There have always been four members of the Ministry, but the founding members were originally human.
Lungpuncture exclaims, "They've been Reincarnating all this time!"
Secheck disagrees, "No, if they'd been doing that then there would be a lot more badgers and bears in the group."
All of the members of the Ministry are spellcasters of some kind, but not all of them are wizards and sorcerers. Lungpuncture finds a pamphlet that lists some of their secret handshakes and slogans, including "The four winds will reign supreme!" The pamphlet suggests that they were originally interested in taking over the city.
The Obelisk of the Winds is 120 feet high and forty feet on a side at the base. It is made from huge blocks of mottled granite, and has no surface features. Strange, unnatural winds blow around it constantly.
The characters decide to wait a day or two to see if the wind stops. Ten hours after they start waiting, a gust of strong wind blows through the district, canceling the magical wind. A door made from the same stone as the rest of the obelisk appears.
Secheck determines that the door is locked.
Lungpuncture shouts slogans at the door. There is no effect.
Kurgash slams his shoulder into the door over and over and over. He puts a shoulder-sized dent in the door, but doesn't open it.
Then the winds come back and the door fades away. The characters walk off in disgust. They persuade Solmar to write a Knock scroll. It takes him two tries and costs Grenville 230 gold coins. When he is done, they come back to wait some more. It takes seven more hours for the door to appear again. Ashe, who now has a level of sorcerer and can actually use scrolls without making Use Magic Device rolls like Grenville and Solmar do, reads the scroll and opens the door.
The characters move in fast, into a dark chamber twenty feet across. The stone walls are covered in intricate carvings. The floor is smooth, and the ceiling quite high.
Kurgash yells, "Move up!" Lungpuncture casts Light on himself. Grenville casts Light on his longsword. Ashe mourns, "There goes the surprise."
Ashe and Grenville look at the carvings. They find they don't know anything about them. Nothing at all. Kurgash mocks Grenville, "Where's your good rolls now, silly harping lad?"
Grenville grumbles something about having just saved a lot of money on car insurance. Then he watches happily as Kurgash fails to scale the walls of the room.
Secheck finds a concealed secret hatch in the floor with a stone spiral staircase underneath it. He reasons, "Well, the legends do say that they live under the tower." He also finds a section of wall where the carvings are deep enough to climb, leading up to a small chamber high above.
Secheck and Kurgash scale the walls. Kurgash does much better now that Secheck has shown him how to do it. They come out in a small room with transparent walls, much like the observation room in the last obelisk the characters were in. A strange creature with ruby-red scales, mandibled head and four arms is sitting at a desk in the center of the room writing on parchment. Hundreds of pages of parchment covered in obsessively small script sit in stacks around him. Kurgash and Secheck can't help but notice that the creature has four shortswords sitting nearby.
The creature is totally uninterested in the characters until they enter its chamber, at which point it leaps up, blades in hand, and clatters out, "How dare you disturb me!"
Secheck and Kurgash commence a bracing round of shortsword dueling with the lizard-bug. Secheck takes a nasty scratch. He begs Kurgash, "Let me escape! I need to get out of here! I don't want to get implanted! Oh god, I don't want to get implanted!"
Kurgash ignores the kobold, as he's busy getting scratched repeatedly by the lizard-bug. He is surprised to find that all those scratches actually add up to 17 points of damage.
Far below, Grenville tries scaling the wall. He doesn't get far before he falls. Fortunately, his Feather Fall talisman saves him from serious injury.
Solmar clambers up and tries using his magic powers on the lizard-bug. He is appalled to discover that the bug-thing has Spell Resistance.
Grenville looks up at the wall then realizes, "Doh! I have a Spider Climb scroll!" Vorp! Up the wall he goes. As soon as he gets close enough, he starts singing and dancing.
Lungpuncture calls up from the ground, "Grenville! Do you have another one of those?" Grenville shrugs. Lungpuncture curses, "Aww, man! Even that chain-freak Ashe is making it up before me!"
Ashe looks down at the warforged and makes mocking gestures.
Solmar places a Protection from Evil infusion upon Kurgash.
Secheck asks, "Do we even know it's evil?"
Solmar points out, "It certainly looks evil. And I'm not the one who's fencing with it, so I'm willing to take the chance."
Kurgash decides that it is time to rage. And then the four-armed lizard-bug scribe tries to grapple him. Kurgash roars, "This is where I'm a Viking! Oooh, you know he just grappled me..." Secheck tries to save him by shooting arrows and also gets grappled.
Kurgash decides to take advantage of the situation and hugs the creature closer, doing thirteen points of damage with his armor spikes. One spike pierces a vital organ. The lizard-bug shudders and dies. Lungpuncture is amazed, "Wow. He's just managed to kill two more people than I would have expected with those armor spikes."
Kurgash smashes the creature's torso against the transparent walls, shouting "Bad bug! Bad bug!" Lungpuncture stops standing directly under the opening in the wall.
The characters look over the parchments. It looks like they all contain relentlessly detailed observations on the events of the neighborhood for the last eight months. The characters decide that the creature spent at least eighteen hours a day, seven days a week, spying on the city through the see-through walls.
Grenville suddenly yells out, "Hey! I just found the cover page for this volume! It's titled A Country Xill in the Big City, Part CXLVII! I guess that means the lizard-bug I actually a xill. Whatever that might be."
Dramatic readings of a few pages convince the characters that xill are naturally bloodthirsty and violent. This one just happened to take up voyeurism as a hobby. Ashe asks the others, "We're keeping the scrolls, right?"
Grenville answers him by reading from the last page of the log. It reads in part, "Those seven guys are still watching the tower... I hear someone downstairs... they're coming up the stairs... uh oh..." He points out that the xill scribe saw nothing wrong with spending gallons of ink describing the travails of a particular local rat as it searches for food in the rubbish tills.
Lungpuncture imagines how the first conversation between the xill and the sorcerer who summoned it must have gone:
Xill: "What do you want me to do, master?"
Sorcerer: "Chronicle everything you see from this room."
Xill: "WHAT! Frickin' wizards."
More reading from the xill's papers suggests that the xill was on duty basically 24-7. A typical entry reads: "Morning again. Soup-seller selling soup again. Twelve customers. See man picking up dead bats on the plaza... Frickin' wizards... Saw couple making out on flying carpet. Touched self. It's good to have eight arms..."
Grenville thinks about publishing A Country Xill in the Big City, but resolves to find an editor and maybe to add a Moulin Rouge-style romantic subplot. Ashe suggests that it could be used as toilet paper instead.
There's nothing else of value in the room.
The characters head downstairs. The spiral staircase ends in an empty room whose walls were once painted in sky-blue. A sturdy wooden door stands to the west. Solmar decides that trouble is brewing. He places a Toughen Construct infusion on Lungpuncture.
Ashe searches the room. He finds the stairs. Barely. Grenville agrees, "Yep, those are stairs." Lungpuncture concludes that the room is empty.
Kurgash opens the door. He sees an oddly-shaped hall filled with fluid-looking alcoves. There are unusual carvings that Grenville thinks are part of an ancient pictogram system that fused magical knowledge and philosophy. Only a few obscure sects used it. He is unable to read the mad ravings. Secheck advises, "It's best not to go insane this early in the adventure."
Kurgash moves to the next door and hears whistling rushing air. He tells the others, "There's wind on the other side of this! I told you we need protection from wind!"
Secheck offers, "I've got a cloak."
Everyone holds on to something. Secheck ducks into an alcove. Lungpuncture gets ready to use his Freedom of Movement trick. Kurgash asks Solmar to polish him up with Cat's Grace now, because he smells a Reflex save in his future. And Ashe sends his familiar Gomez away.
Kurgash opens the door. A severe wind rushes out. Everyone laughs because it would have blown out torches, but Lungpuncture and Grenville are using magical light. The hall continues on the other side of the door, complete with alcoves. Ten eight-foot undead shambling humanoids lumber out of the alcoves towards the characters. They are obviously walking through a heavy wind.
Secheck steps out into the wind and promptly gets blown over.
Solmar casts Gust of Wind to interrupt the magical wind, allowing Kurgash to attack a zombie and deliver a remarkable amount of damage. He kicks the door closed behind the first two. Ashe and Lungpuncture run up to help. And Grenville starts to sing.
On closer examination, the creatures are ogre zombies. Kurgash grouses, "I hate ogres. And for some reason there's a lot of ogres around Sharn." Kurgash chops the creature to pieces then forgoes the opportunity to do a Cleave on Lungpuncture.
Kurgash opens the door again to let another couple of zombies in. Kurgash, Lungpuncture and Ashe make short work of the next candidate. And Secheck falls. Again.
Lungpuncture casts Divine Favor as Kurgash and Solmar wait for more zombie meat to approach. Grenville notices that Kurgash is badly hurt and tries to advance to help him, but can't make headway against the wind. Kurgash whispers back, "Grab the rope!" A zombie steps up and takes an axe chop. Kurgash takes more damage, but Grenville still isn't making any headway. Kurgash repeats, "Grab the rope, moron!" The zombie goes down to Kurgash's axe strike. Lungpuncture kicks the door closed. Kurgash groans, "Woah... feeling woozy."
Lungpuncture and Grenville finally manage to provide Kurgash with a quick round of healing.
The characters let in the next zombie. It takes damage very quickly, but so does Kurgash. Grenville heals him. Ashe cuts and chops leaving the creature in bad shape. Kurgash finally ends it. And Secheck is still flying like a kite in the wind.
More zombies follow. The next one gets through the door unopposed because everyone is too busy healing Kurgash. Kurgash gets busy reducing the zombie to pieces parts with Ashe's help while Grenville stands behind him using the Wand of Cure Light Wounds. And ever so often, Secheck decorates the zombie with rather ineffectual arrows. Kurgash finally crushes the thing, but then becomes fatigued as his rage ends.
Ashe takes the next zombie on the chin. Grenville heals him as Kurgash dishes out damage. Ashe takes it out.
Secheck calls out, "Hoo-hah!" and lets off an arrow.
Ashe yells back, "What are you shooting at?"
Secheck asks, "Does it matter?"
Lungpuncture notes that he's out of spells, but has one turning attempt left. He concentrates upon the zombies and rolls. He succeeds! And then he rolls to see how many hit dice he's able to turn. Snake eyes! He makes the first one feel a bit uncomfortable. The others don't even notice.
Secheck manages to actually deliver the killing arrow to a zombie. Everyone cheers.
The last zombie steps in and hits Lungpuncture. Lungpuncture feels the pain. And then it hits him again. Lungpuncture starts to leak vital fluids. He taunts the zombie, "That all you got? A real soldier does better than that!"
Secheck points out, "That'd do for me!"
The last zombie falls onto the pile of eight-foot corpses in front of the door.
Kurgash points out to the others, "You folks realize we have another four wizards to kill? And we haven't even seen anything that looks like a living room."
The characters hear the door open on the other side of the door. Kurgash assumes the position. He notes, "I bet they're all like 'Where'd our zombies go?'"
Solmar announces, "I have good trick!" and puts a Flaming Sphere into the doorway. Then the minotaur smashes the door down and his sorcerer friend throws a Lightning Bolt down the corridor to fry Secheck, Solmar and Lungpuncture.
Kurgash thinks about rushing, but then notices, "Hmm... There's a Flaming Sphere in the way." He throws an axe at the sorcerer instead. He is just a bit unhappy to realize that the fellow has both Shield and Mage Armor up.
Solmar sends his Flaming Sphere to cook the minotaur. The smell of roast man-ox fills the corridor. Kurgash exults, "It's the nad-burner!" Solmar adds on a Hold Person to deal with the sorcerer. The sorcerer laughs at the spell. The sorcerer mocks him, "That's resisted with a Will save! Hah! Those are my speciality!"
Ashe blows an Expeditious Retreat cast.
Secheck falls over in the wind.
Kurgash notes, "We suck."
The minotaur steps out of the fire and right into the middle of the party. Kurgash begs, "Can somebody please tumble through there and kill that sorcerer?"
Ashe replies, "I'd love to, but my spell got hosed a moment ago." The minotaur decides to squash Solmar, who manages to evade. Wait! The minotaur gets two attacks! No actually, he gets three! Fortunately, he rolls really badly and Solmar survives.
Kurgash suddenly realizes, "Hey! That minotaur is using a +1 Large Great Axe! I'll be able to practice with that weapon once the fight is over, 'cause someday I'll be proficient in it!"
Grenville advises, "Don't be counting your +1 Large Great Axes before they hatch."
Lungpuncture tries to cast Spiritual Weapon, except that the sorcerer interrupts him with a Magic Missile and kills his spell. And almost kills Lungpuncture as well.
Kurgash goes berserk again and tries to intimidate the minotaur. The minotaur is unimpressed.
Solmar watches with frustration as the sorcerer sidesteps the Flaming Sphere. He is so frustrated he doesn't even manage to stab the minotaur.
Ashe elegantly tumbles past the minotaur to miss the sorcerer.
Secheck stands! Taking in mind that neither sorcerers nor minotaurs are immune to arrows, he opens fire on them. He annoys the minotaur.
The minotaur tries to pulverize Solmar, who once again avoids his attacks.
Ashe takes another Lightning Bolt from the sorcerer. Ashe throws himself to the side, suffering nothing more than a few trivial second-degree burns.
Lungpuncture notices that he's down to two measly hit points. He backs up out of the minotaur's threatened range and zaps himself with his Cure Light Wounds wand. Kurgash reassures him, "Don't worry, we'll take him out." Then, somewhat to his amazement he takes the minotaur down in one hit.
Grenville notices that his life is no longer in danger of minotaurish death, so he zaps the sorcerer with a Scorching Ray. The sorcerer takes some damage then runs for the door. Ashe rushes after him, shouting, "Come back here!" He misses. Then Ashe tries to trip him, but fails totally.
Secheck asks, "Aren't you supposed to be good at that?"
The human sorcerer runs through a side corridor and into a second large room to an meet up with a female elf in plate, a dire wolf, and a big, blue-furred wolflike humanoid creature. Kurgash runs in right after the sorcerer, takes a look at the crowd, and decides to back up. He also notices that the wind only affects the corridor.
Grenville decides that things are not going well. He casts Shield on himself. Solmar tries to advance, but is pushed back by the wind. Ashe advances to catch up with Kurgash. Kurgash mentions, "Now, I can run as fast as a wolf but I don't know about you."
Kurgash pulls back to the corridor. He yells, "Elf invisible sorcerer one freaky. Over."
Secheck responds, "You mean it's just a 719 again?" Behind him, Lungpuncture grabs Secheck and runs for it. Solmar takes up a position behind Kurgash.
Ashe reflects, "I'm not enthusiastic about double-moving and leaving Grenville to take the charge."
Grenville agrees, "I'm not enthusiastic about this either! Feel free to take the brunt for me!"
Ashe mourns, "What else can I do with a full action? Wet myself?" He decides to set for a held attack in the side corridor.
Grenville asks, "Y'all have another character idea in mind, right?" Ashe ignores him.
The dire wolf charges Ashe. Ashe slams it for seven points of damage. And then he takes the attack of opportunity and delivers a critical hit for seventeen more.
The goblin wolf-thing shows up and casts Charm Monster on Ashe. Ashe laughs off the spell.
Lungpuncture, still carrying Secheck, reverses course and storms up the corridor.
Grenville pops around the corner to throw Glitterdust at the elf cleric and the goblin wolf-thing. Both of them end up blinded. Ashe howls in delight as he tumbles past the dire wolf to attack the cleric. He announces, "Hello, elf-lady!" and cracks her upside the head with his chain. She moves forward to attack him. He responds by tripping her. She is forced to spend her round standing up.
Then the dire wolf comes up to attack Ashe from behind. Ashe feels fourteen points of his buttocks getting bitten off. He yells, "Get up here, Grenville! Tumble past the dire wolf like I've shown you!"
The goblin wolf-thing starts to blink. And the sorcerer reappears to savage Ashe with some Magic Missiles. Ashe staggers with zero hit points left.
Lungpuncture finally carries Secheck up to the corridor intersection. The situation doesn't look good: there's a lot of blood, and most of it doesn't look like it came from the bad guys. Secheck starts firing arrows at the dire wolf. The thing is looking pretty feeble, but is still up.
Kurgash runs around the corner to terminate the dire wolf. He cuts the creature literally into two pieces. With the threat of the wolf removed, Grenville runs up and heals Ashe. Ashe responds by inflicting minimum damage on the elf cleric.
Secheck notices that the human sorcerer is completely healed now. He works on that problem by sending two arrows back into him. The sorcerer decides to deal with the situation with another Lightning Bolt, hitting the elf cleric, Ashe, Grenville, Kurgash, Solmar, Secheck and Lungpuncture. Secheck curses, "Why am I being held by something that conducts electricity?"
Ashe collapses. The elf cleric is looking pretty hurt, but casts Cure Serious Wounds on herself and gets a lot better.
Lungpuncture pushes into the side corridor, allowing Secheck to move under his own power. He notices there are some doors, and pushes into what proves to be a bedroom. He tells the kobold, "Shoot from the doorway!"
Secheck replies, "But I'm tired and that bed looks so comfy!"
Kurgash moves forward past the blinded cleric to slash at the sorcerer. The fellow is still up, though he's missing a few ribs.
Solmar Spider Climbs across the ceiling to move into the side room to reconnoiter and find the scepter and the goblin-wolf-thing. He sees a long chamber decorated with tattered tapestries. There is a table with a brightly glowing lamp and four chairs at the far end. He guesses that the goblin-wolf ran right through the room and out the opposite room.
Back in the corridor, the sorcerer throws his fourth Lightning Bolt. Ashe pleads, "Attack of opportunity? Anyone? Kurgash?" The elf cleric, Ashe and Grenville all get hit. Grenville falls at -2. Ashe gets turned into a puff of ash at -22.
Lungpuncture decides that he'd better do something about the elf cleric. "Is she evil? I hope she's evil. I get a better AC if she's evil..." Turns out she's not evil.
Kurgash finally kills the human sorcerer. A bit too late to help Ashe.
Secheck delivers another four points of damage to the elf cleric with his arrows. And then it's her turn. She swings wildly at Lungpuncture. Lungpuncture swings back and smashes her to the ground.
Kurgash goes to look for Solmar, but he doesn't see anyone. He's hoping to find him before a barghest eats him. Nobody is able to find the barghest. He does manage to find a vault. The place is a cold, rough-hewn cave with lots of coins and trinkets scattered all over:
Lungpuncture hunts down all the skulls of the defeated. He pauses over Ashe's ash pile, "For the bar? Yes? No?" He faintly hears something calling out, "I will haunt you!"
Solmar reappears in time to evaluate the Scepter of Clouds. He says that it wouldn't be worth 5000 gold on the open market, and that it actually looks like it might have actually be stolen recently.
The characters take the Scepter of Clouds back to Lady Varania and collect the 5000 gold reward.
The fourth-level characters each gain 3066 experience points. The fifth-level characters each gain 2833 experience points.