“Safely” back in Renwick’s quarters, preparations for a much-needed long rest are interrupted by an assault on the door where the scuffle with Hellenrae broke up a short while ago. Renwick enters from the opposite direction sporting eveningwear from his paladin collection. He invites the party to withdraw to his basement safe room and magically bolsters the door. Familiar with the lich’s modus operandi of kill clouding doorways, the party avails itself of his invitation and descends some steps down to a bronze plated door, slightly ajar.
Simon enters the basement and finds himself assailed by the sight, smell, and moans of six meandering zombies. Seven sarcophagi line the walls. Sidestepping shuffling zombies he heads for a stone door at the west end of the room.
Haerelben follows Simon into the basement but his attention turns to the elaborate sarcophagus at the east end of the room. The relief of a knight with a long beard adorns the open top. The chamber, helpfully inscribed Samular Caradoon, appears unused rather than recently vacated, the preferred condition of any empty burial chamber. Party members from Summit Hall recall that a tomb for Samular Caradoon already exists there, hence the corny old riddle, “Who is buried in Samular’s tomb?”
Meega takes up position in the center of the room and prepares to slashingly respond in whichever direction crisis befalls them, as typically happens when the party splits up and begins poking at everything.
Theren dashes past expeditious Simon to the west door where they hear growling beyond. Simon pushes on the stone door and, from Theren’s perspective, his old man feet slide back across the floor. Simon, an early adopter of general relativity, observes he has managed to push the entire universe away from his stationary feet. Impressive, but the door remains shut.
Theridan inspects a zombie. What may have once been a monk is now an utterly rotted standard zombie specimen.
Allana inquires from the Opeth what she’s looking for. Stranger than that question is the answer, that sister brother sister brother is crying. Allana listens for the crying but hears only zombic shuffling so she closes the bronze door causing a thrum of magic to surge through the room.
Meega slips around the brownian zombies and, with Sehanine’s guidance, opens Simon’s stone door. Simon and Theren glide down a forty foot hallway where Theren unsurprisingly hears growling beyond the opposite locked iron plated door as well. Back in the zombie room, Theridan listens at another door and hears footfalls.
Allana, attempting to parse the Opeth’s adjuration, shoves open a sarcophagus with Haerelben’s assistance. Inside are the remains of a monk featuring a holy symbol from an ancient order of a lesser Faerûn deity and wearing an unmagical ring. Meega and Theridan examine a different sarcophagus and similarly find a monk’s remains but little else.
Down the hallway of growling, Simon and Theren decide they are ready to meet whatever growls beyond this door. Theren runs back to entreat Meega’s help while Simon waits. Waiting takes too long so Simon easily picks the lock and opens the door. The room beyond prominently features a cage along one entire side containing an aberrant insectoid monstrosity with missing eyes and metal artificial claws. A great stone column surrounded by clay pots sets in the center of a square section of red earthen floor in this room. Simon heads for stairs that lead up on his left, but as he approaches they fold into a slide and the cage door opens releasing the umber hulk. Laughter rings out from the top of the stairs, but it’s probably unrelated since there’s nothing funny about this situation.
Theren and Simon engage with the monster until Theridan, in bear form, and Meega can step in giving Theren the opportunity for one of his quality battlecries: “You’ll have to go through MEE…ga!” Meega, so completely excited to find a giant to hit with Giant Slayer, mistimes her swing and pulls her choppus maximus giving her the fighting potential of a slightly lesser fighter. Even so, she gets her licks in along with Bear Theridan and the three Watchful Knights while Simon freeze rays and Theren crossbows from a prudent distance. Theridan’s Knight gets the killing blow but he doesn’t speak so can’t brag insufferably.
Allana, closing in on the Opeth’s pleas to “Free him! Free her!” investigates the column and clay pots and discovers the column actually comprises two large stacked stones trickling liquid from the resulting seam into the clay pots that are half-full and half-empty. “She’s there!” says Opeth. Simon makes his own culinary investigation of the crystal-orange liquid slowly filling the pots. The Opeth thinks that’s pretty gross but Simon doesn’t hate it so he proceeds to quaff the sacred tears. To him, it tastes like an enormous eyeball in the wall staring at, and then attacking, him with a slight mineral aftertaste.
Allana hears, “Free me, I’m in the stone,” and requests help to separate the column pieces. Several attempts are made to topple the upper stone with might and magic. “Gasp! We’re being watched,” she hears next. Meega’s crowbar breaks so pitons and rope are brought to bear on the problem.
When Simon begins to feel ill and holds up a petrified hand, the situation turns urgent. He’s quickly petrified and loses concentration on the spell he had been using to shrink the top stone. Theren picks Rock Simon up and carries him out to the zombie room for safekeeping. Haerelben, while attempting to determine any magical properties of the column, gets the sense that the wall behind the column might be an arcane source. Identification of the wall reveals profound evil, but nothing that answers Haerelben’s warm abyssal greetings. Theren declares war on the evil wall in primordial and the giant eye emerging in the wall answers his declaration, “It’s already war.” Theren sends a couple of hip shot bolts into the eye but the bolts dissolve ineffectively. Uh oh.
With the pressure on, synergy begins to form. Haerelben guides Meega’s strong shove of the top stone while Allana pushes with eldritch blast. It tilts over just enough for Theren to reach into the seam and guide out an orange shard which promptly attacks the walleye and both are gone. Speaking of gone, the Watchful Knights dispel in the magical burst why not.
Allana conversates with the Opeth and directs the pots of tears be removed. Haerelben has no way to reverse Simon’s petrification so it seems Renwick is due for another imposition. It’s déjà vu all over again as Theren picks at the bronze door lock and Renwick answers immediately. No gas cloud this time, but Renwick does get cross at the sight of Rock Simon and softens only when Allana presents him with one pot of tears, a potentially valuable resource in his pursuit for mortality. He knows a little about the Elder Elemental Evil Eye and is not terribly surprised it would be found in his basement since that is just the sort of mischief the cultists get up to.
With Simon back to “normal”, it’s time to rest. The party agrees to camp outside in the valley mostly because of Haerelben’s desperate lobbying to get away from the lich’s undead roommates. Meega and Theren find a suitably hidden corner of the valley, Theridan covers the party’s tracks, and an uneventfully long rest is enjoyed by all. With clear heads and good health, the discussion turns to the next move. Theren suggests the Scarlet Moon Hall and Haerelben auguries weal results from Sehanine.