The party attempts to convince Ash that there is absolutely, positively no secret doors or underground passages to be found in the darkling lair where the qwyllion’s illicit alchemical lab was violently decommissioned. Ash persists, not even believing his own eyes to the contrary, and accidentally locates a secret door concealing a hidden passage leading to a wine cellar containing one crapulous darkling.
Briar intimidatingly introduces himself to oenophile Jax. Jax stumbles into Barika’s left hook. Jax knows only that a couple of his co-workers were dispatched to abduct a dwarf, that said dwarf may or may not be taken to the boss’s lair as roughly indicated on the surface map, and that he is willing to stay here quietly with this fine vintage of wine. Ash obliges with a tight, immobilizing binding.
The party continues on through a concealed passage indicated by Jax. Sqyylarr orients the party’s underground progress to the surface location indicated by Jax to be the most direct entrance to the underground location of Eravastika.
The passage opens into a round chamber with a closed hatch in the floor. Barika, at Ander’s urging, opens the hatch and finds an abundance of raw sewage. She lets it close urgently. Briar explores rapidly north where the stonework turns to natural cavern. Giant centipedes flank the party. Ash plugs his attacker with a ready arrow, but the centipede sprays acid over him, Nicodemus, and Barika. GG’s turret destroys the centipede.
A gazing basilisk begins to turn Briar to stone. Ash, probing around to see Briar’s problem, catches the gaze as well and only has time to choose a dignified pose before he fully turns to stone. Nicodemus reaches for his restorative ointment but has none so he chops out a centipede instead. The basilisk goes for Sqyylarr next and gets a little nibble as she begins to turn to stone. Briar, resisting back to his bendy self, slays the basilisk as it attempts to flee. Nicodemus and Briar lend their righteous talents to help Sqyylarr shake off the petrification. Ash, however, does not pull through.
Professor Steele can find no way to apply his proficiency in medicine to the situation. He and Sqyylarr tend each other’s wounds while Ash’s fate is considered. Nicodemus is well connected in town and could easily arrange the services of a temple priest to restore Ash. Briar, concerned that time is a factor in rescuing Hops, wonders if there is a more immediate solution. Since a basilisk is able to consume its victims by reverting them back to meat during ingestion, GG reasons he can make a restorative solution if that particular organ is retrieved intact. He explains the process in exquisite detail, but Nicodemus botches the removal.
Nicodemus revivifies the basilisk after neutralizing its gaze. They kill it all over again, and this time Nicodemus masterfully retrieves the intact organ. GG soaks the restorative into lamp oil and coats Ash in the solution. Stone returns to meat, Nicodemus cures the meat, and Ash is back.
Once rested, the party continues in the direction indicated by Sqyylarr right into a blocking pile of rubble. Sqyylarr, Barika, and Briar exhaustingly dig out the rubble. Sqyylarr orienteers the party on to the den of a pair of fomorians who bash and curse her severely. Raging Barika inspires those around her and Briar’s holy aura helps prevent any further cursing. Professor Steele banishes one of the ugly fomorians and Nicodemus banishes the other. Nicodemus removes Sqyylarr’s evil eye curse.
No passage is found directly in the direction Sqyylarr wants to go so the party takes a hallway south looking for a way to turn east before the fomorians return. The first room they pass is a round chamber of seven sarcophagi and zero other connections. The door at the south end of the hallway opens to a very fancy sarcophagus guarded by a pair of warrior statues. All the sarcophagi already show signs of thorough looting.
GG, using an amulet-permitted firebolt, confirms that at least one of the entombed skeletons is not undead. The same cannot be said for the specter he releases which scares him into dashing to catch up to the party.
Professor Steele and Barika find a couple of loot chests. The first is full of earrings, still on the ear, and necklaces, still on the neck, and rings, still on the finger. Barika lets the lid close, and they elect to forego examination of the second chest.
The party finds an east exit and beats feet just ahead of the fomorians’ planar return.