DM: Heading Down

After taking care of the corpses of both Lyrie and Tsuto, the party decides to head down. Orik leads them further north into what he says to be Lyrie’s workshop. Everything in the room is in disarray. Nothing interesting catches your attention though. The mercenary then lead you deeper within the shop, at the back, a set of steps that lead deeper into Thistletop.

The new steps change about a third of the way down the stone spiral staircase, being of much older, much more worn stone. The walls around you are cracked here and there, with mildew and other fungal growths lining the cracks. You must be getting close to the sea level here, although you can hear nothing through the thick stone walls.

The stairs open out into a small room that is lit by a single lantern that has been left upon the floor. The lantern casts sufficient light to make the small room quite clear. A stone door just ahead of the steps hangs slightly ajar, the detailed carvings that once covered its surface defaced by chisel marks and hammer blows to the extent that only a few remnants of images (mostly of gemstones and crowns) remain. The floor here is slanted downwards to the west at a noticeable angle.

Air quality seems to be surprisingly good, and the temperature is warmer than you would have expected for listing stone dungeon so close to the sea.

Lloyd moves forward and peers through the crack between the door and the wall. The room beyond is also lit by a solitary lantern placed on the floor. Otherwise it is empty.

Moving in you find that the chamber has two pillars to support the ceiling. In many places the floor and ceiling are caked in ancient grime and sot. Alcoves in he north and south wall contain partially damaged statues of a man in robes clutching a book and a glaive. The entire room, just like the last one, is tilted down to the west, and whatever ancient upheaval caused the complex to tilt knocked the statues from their bases so that they now lean against the southern walls of their alcoves. On the east wall is a single door.

*

Lloyd and Gryffin hears nothing at the door, except the faintest echoes of perhaps distant movement, or even the sea itself striking the deep stone walls of this strange rock. It is hard to tell, and filters through the rock like a dull thrum.

The eladrin opens the door quietly to reveal a short hallway that rises in a slope to the east. Five feet from the western door, the floor is polished and shiny, unlike the dusty floor elsewhere. A pair of stone statues depicting stern men wielding iron glaives stand in alcoves north and south of this section of the hallway. At the eastern end stand two stone doors, their faces carved with strange runes. Between the doors is a third alcove in which a partially collapsed statue sits. The top half of the statue is missing, leaving behind a ragged stump of a torso.