Creep adjusts his hat of disguise and looks as charming as the day he walked into the Doomvault. He explains his insightful and cunning plan for the quick destruction of the phylactery in amazing detail, the sort of plan that will save time and lives. Unfortunately the hat of disguise does nothing for Creep’s ability to communicate; it all comes out as unintelligible moans and groans and halitosis.
Once condescending politeness for Creep’s disability has been served, Bizzle, grabbing the map away from Creep, goes for the door to the next shrine. No surprise, the sounds of shuffling zombies and boots await them. Tricksy unlocks the door and Creep shuffles into the room where a red wizard, deathlock wight, dread warrior, and four fellow zombies take no notice of him whatsoever. Tatters surveys some green mist hanging out around the shrine. No good mist is green like that. Tatters chooses conflict and tosses a firebolt at the red wizard. Tricksy concurs and adds an arrow. Creep makes some menacing jabs with his rapier and “accidentally” stabs a fellow zombie.
The red wizard prepares a cloud kill. Tatters counters it. The four zombies line up perfectly trying to protect their red wizard. Tricksy conjures a barrage on them and walks up to the ceiling out of revenge’s way. Creep’s shadow slips away to mess with the dread warrior’s own sense of dread. Creep adds his eldritch blast to the red wizard. Tatters gusts wind down the congo line of zombies, knocking the red wizard and the last zombie into the shrine’s field. They bounce off the shrine and fatally smash into the wall. The green mist does not dissipate.
The zombies strike at Tatters and Bizzle while the wight and warrior attempt to knock Tricksy off the ceiling with grave bolts and javelins. Bizzle walks through the line of injured zombies, piercing left and right to slay all three until he gets to the wight. Tricksy’s arrows and Creep’s blasts have the wight at undeath’s door, but it’s his dread warrior comrade who kills him with a botched javelin throw intended for Creep.
Tatters magic missiles the dread warrior and Bizzle’s scimitars finish the job, but undead fortitude stands him back up. Bizzle drops him again, but undead fortitude stands him back up. Tricksy buries an arrow in him, but undead fortitude stands him back up. Tricksy has a second arrow already in flight and the dread warrior’s fortitude undeadens him no more.
Creep harvests organs and brains, his pockets overflowing with offal. Tatters carefully loots what’s left of the red wizard and finds some bracers of defense [+2 AC when not wearing armor or using shield], a scroll of remove curse, a scroll of speak with undead, and a book of traps [based on robe of useful items, tear out a page for a trap or component].
Bizzle attacks the shrine and scratches out some of the runes before the green mist incapacitates him. Tatters disables the shrine by outsmarting it. The shrine releases a pockmarked orc, Bandagh, chosen of Yurtrus. Creep stabs Bandagh in the most humane way possible and then harvests him, carefully removing his head to preserve the brains.
The party takes a short rest while Tatters enjoys a salvage bar.
Bizzle loudly runs down the next hallway and into the next shrine room. This room features swaying vines on the floor, roots through the ceiling, and a wraith attended by three will-o’-wisps. Creep sends eldritch blasts flying left and right. Tatters follows with firebolts. Tricksy sends arrows with such force she breaks another bowstring. The wraith lifedrains Bizzle. Bizzle’s scimitars drain the wraith.
Creep shuffles heroically into position between the wisps and the wraith. Tatters concentrates magic missiles on the wraith and Bizzle’s scimitars dissipate him, leaving no protein for Creep. Creep blasts his own finger off when his spell backfires, but otherwise the wisps are worn down quickly. Tricksy discovers that moving nonleisurely through the vines causes them to entangle, but she also discovers that stabbing the vines with a rapier causes them to die.
The shrine holds a half-elf, and it does a good job of defending her from the uncharismatic adventurers. Tricksy eventually wins the shrine and releases Eira, chosen of Rillifane Rallathil. For once, a chosen is actually grateful and she agrees to join the adventure. She seems a little conflicted about something, but who isn’t?
Creep, feeling the momentum, bursts into the next shrine room with a massive witchbolt directed at the red wizard, Thay apprentice, and three yetis. The witchbolt goes terribly wrong and bounces straight at Tatters. Tatters counters the spell. Bizzle crosses the freezing room to scimitar up the red wizard standing next to one of two braziers providing a little warmth. Tricksy, safely on the hallway ceiling, sends the red wizard a couple of arrows. Eira takes on a yeti with her shillelagh. The other two yetis chose Creep and Bizzle.
Creep takes a beating from the yeti with a dash of scorching from the apprentice. Tatters and Bizzle finish off the red wizard before he can create much mischief so Tricksy helps Creep with his yeti. A terrible visage projects from Creep’s shield, frightening the apprentice and yetis. Then Creep drops a hunger of Hadar. Bizzle’s yeti isn’t covered by the hunger so Tatter’s slays it with a firebolt. Creep, unimpeded by the magical darkness, pulls Eira safely out before she gets slapped by any milky tentacles. The apprentice dies immediately and Creep keeps the yetis dancing with blasts into the hunger until they succumb.
The rest of the party bounces off the shrine trying to get in. Again it’s Tricksy who eventually wins the shrine releasing human Hefrun Arnsfirth, chosen of Auril. Hefrun goes right for Tricksy so the party quickly turns her into lunch meat for Creep.
The party plus Eira backtracks uneventfully to a shrine skipped earlier off the red room.
Creep bursts into the shrine room and points one of his remaining fingers at a large flesh golem, calling his next strike true. A red wizard cowers behind the golem, but there is no hiding from Tatters’s magic missiles. Tricksy repairs her bow, contemplating a lawsuit against the low bid contractor supplying R&S with defective bowstrings. Bizzle chases the wizard behind the shrine while Tatters plugs him with missile after missile. Creep’s eldritch blast makes the red wizard die tired. The golem becomes the focus of all the spells and sharp implements and dies well-rested.
Tricksy wins the very last shrine in the temples of extraction. The black gate behind her flickers significantly and darkens. It could be none more black. The shrine releases halfling Curran Corvalin. Curran claims no deity, making him the Doomvault’s first and only chosen of agnosticism. He won’t fight for his own freedom. Nor can Bizzle entice him through the black gate. Creep declines to eat him. Curran appears entirely useless.