Life's The Pits

The party had finally defeated the Sisters of the Broken Path, the fanatical hobgoblin monks who guarded their sado-masochistic oni master. That master was now bloodied and kneeling at the feet of his new mistress, Bella. But the party had paid a price: Suishen, the ancestral sword of the Amatatsu family, had been wrest from Sawyer’s grip and hurled into the gas-filled pit they were fighting beside.

Marie rushed back into the bedroom where Bella stood guard over her prisoner. “Tell us about that pit!” she demanded. “How deep is it, and what’s in it?”

The oni didn’t answer. Instead he turned to Bella. “May I answer her, mistress?” he asked meekly.

Bella blushed. There was something disturbingly … pleasurable about his obsequiousness. But she fought to hide her arousal. “Tell her anything she wants to know,” she commanded, and blushed even more when he bowed his head to her. “Yes, mistress.”

The oni turned back to Marie. “The pit is 100 feet deep, and has a pool of acid at the bottom. The gas is poisonous. However, I am immune. If you wish, you may lower me on a rope, and I will retrieve whatever it is you have lost in the pit.”

Marie cringed at the thought of Suishen lying submerged in a pool of acid, but the oni was being far too helpful in her opinion. She didn’t trust him for a second, and wasn’t about to give him the chance to get his paws on Suishen. Ignoring his offer, she rushed back to the edge of the pit. She tied a weight to the end of a rope, and dropped it over the side, playing it out to gauge the depth of the pit. The weight disappeared into the dense green mist, but the rope went slack after only 50 feet. Unfurling her wings, Marie flew back and forth across the wide pit, dragging the weighted rope to see if the pit was deeper near the center. It seemed to be a constant 50’ deep everywhere. At one point, the rope snagged on something hidden in the mist far below, but quickly freed. When Marie pulled the rope back up, neither the rope nor the weight showed any sign of acid damage. So much for the oni’s trustworthiness.

While Marie was surveying the pit, Bella continued questioning her prisoner. “A few minutes ago, you said you’d tell us about your siblings, and your mother. Tell me about them, and yourself.”

The oni bowed again. “I am Ichirou, Spawn of Munasukaru. I have two brothers and one sister. They reside on the fourth level of the Penance, far below here. My brothers live in one chamber, and my sister lives in the one beyond it.” His voice began to break. “My mother is Munasukaru, Supreme Ruler of the House of Withered Blossoms.”

At last – someone who could tell them about the mysterious ‘Munasukaru’. Bella wanted to know more. “Tell me about your mother – what’s she like?”

Ichirou began to tremble all over. “Mother is all-powerful! She is terrible, and cruel, and I love her so much!” He was subconsciously picking at his scars. “She rules all without pity, and deals out pain and torment in generous bounty! Such glorious pain, in a never-ending demonstration of her love!” He had prostrated himself at Bella’s feet, tears and snot running down his face. “I love you, mommy!!!” he shouted to the ceiling, as if Munasukaru were listening.

Bella looked down with disgust. And she thought she had mother issues. She decided to change the subject. “And who was your father?”

Ichirou sat up and wiped the snot from his nose with the back of his hand. “Who?” he asked with a blank expression.

“Your father,” Bella prompted with exasperation. “You must have had one, right? Who was he?”

Ichirou looked confused. “I suppose there was someone, but how would I know? Mother wouldn’t have kept him alive long once he’d served his purpose.”

While Bella conducted her frustrating and embarrassing interrogation, everyone else was gathered at the lip of the pit, debating strategies for recovering Suishen. Marie had tried using Detect Magic to pinpoint the sword’s location, but with the dense fog filling the pit, the spell’s glow only narrowed it down to one quadrant of the huge pit. Most of the group was none too keen to risk prolonged exposure to the poisonous mist (although Marie wasn’t convinced the oni had been telling the truth about that any more than he had about anything else, she wasn’t willing to fly down and take a deep breath, either). However, Nicki wasn’t too concerned about poison, and decided to take it on himself to locate the sword. He cast Gaseous Form on himself and stepped off the ledge, drifting slowly down until his misty form merged with the fog and he disappeared from view.

After half a minute, he touched down at the bottom of the pit. As Marie had already figured out, there was no sign of any pool of acid, but the green fog was so thick that he couldn’t see more than five feet in any direction. He scanned the floor around him, but saw no sign of Suishen, so he began a spiraling search pattern. Sure enough he quickly found the sword, lying on the ground a few feet away. The area directly behind Suishen was dark, and Nicki thought it was just a shadow, but then the shadow moved.

Nicki froze, but whatever it was didn’t seem to have noticed him: his gaseous body was the perfect camouflage in the thick mist. He slowly floated upwards until he hoped he was higher than the shadowy figure, then floated forwards. As he got nearer, a creature materialized out of the fog below him. It looked like a bull, but with stone and metal armor plates instead of hide. It appeared to be grazing on fungus growing on the floor of the pit, and as Nicki watched, he saw puffs of greenish mist blow out of the thing’s nostrils.

So now what? Nicki’s original plan had been to locate Suishen, rematerialize, pick up the sword and Dimension Door back up to the party. But the presence of this bull, practically right on top of Suishen, changed all that. He’d be revealing himself, and leaving himself open to whatever attacks the thing might make. That didn’t seem like a good idea to Nicki, so he simply drifted back up to the surface to let the others take it from here.

When he rematerialized, everyone was anxious to know what he’d learned. “Well the good news is, I found Suishen. He’s right down there,” and pointed to the spot where he’d located the sword. “The bad news is, there’s some kind of mechanical bull right behind it.”

Everyone began to discuss options. Bella had tired of listening to the simpering oni by now, and had wandered out to listen in. When she learned there was something down there, she tied a rope to one of the dead Sisters, and began to lower her down into the pit. “Just fishing,” she grinned. “Maybe we can distract that thing away from Suishen.” Sure enough, no sooner had the rope begun to slacken than something slammed into the “bait”, almost pulling Bella off her perch at the lip of the pit. The only problem was that the blow had come from the opposite direction from where Nicki had said his mechanical bull was. Apparently there was more than one inhabitant of the pit.

Sawyer was getting frantic to get his sword back, and the group decided he should be the one to retrieve it. Marie cast Resistance on him to help him deal with the presumably poisonous fog, then Fly, and Bella gave him one of her Potions of Invisibility. Nicki went out over the center of the grid (using his Boots of Levitation), and dropped a Flaming Sphere straight down into the pit. He couldn’t hope to hit anything, but hoped that the sphere’s glow would serve as a better distraction than Bella’s dead hobgoblin. “Here goes,” Sawyer said grimly, then quaffed the potion and zoomed invisibly down towards the spot that Nicki had pointed out.

Zhustin was standing behind Bella, not wanting to get too close to the edge of the pit. No sooner had Sawyer vanished, than something slammed into the wizard from behind. Ichirou apparently wasn't as compliant as he'd pretended to be; he'd been left unattended for too long, and now he was making a break for it. The oni Bull Rushed Zhustin forward into Bella, then shoved both of them off the edge and backwards into the pit. Bella’s Ring of Feather Falling activated automatically, slowing her descent, but Zhustin vanished, screaming, into the mist. His screams ended with a sickening thud.

Sandoval drew his echoblade and whirled to attack the oni. To his surprise, Ichirou looked much healthier than the last time he’d seen him; they’d forgotten about oni’s innate regeneration ability. That wasn’t the only ability they’d forgotten. Ichirou ignored Sandoval’s stab with a sneer, then took off flying across the pit, heading off into the unexplored eastern alcove.

Marie knew they couldn’t afford to let him alert whatever was ahead of them to their coming, so she unfurled her wings and flew off in hot pursuit. But suddenly she heard a sound from behind her that had become all too familiar; the clattering of Nicki unlimbering his metamagic rod. She began flapping her wings madly, trying to reverse course, but she was too late. There was a blinding flash, and then she was engulfed in the flames of the Empowered Fireball that Nicki had cast on the fleeing oni. Her wings were scorched, and for a second threatened to fail, dropping her into the pit as well, but she recovered, and managed to flutter awkwardly to the far ledge, where Ichirou’s smoking corpse lay. Behind her, she heard Nicki clucking with disappointment. “When are you going to learn not to go chasing off after things by yourself? Maybe this will teach you a lesson.”

Down in the pit, things were happening fast. Zhustin had survived the fall, but was lying half-stunned on the floor of the pit. He wasn’t sure how badly he was hurt, and he didn’t want to wait around for whatever was living down her to make it worse. So he immediately cast Dimension Door, and reappeared back up in Ichirou’s bedroom, lying on the satin sheets of his featherbed.

Sawyer had had no difficulty locating Suishen, but no sooner had his fingers closed around its hilt than he heard Zhustin’s scream and the thump of his landing. He flew through the mist towards the sound, but found nothing. But he wasn’t the only one who’d heard Zhustin’s arrival. Out in the fog, he heard the clatter of hooves, and three bull-like creatures appeared out of the mist, charging towards the sound. Luckily, Sawyer’s Invisibility prevented them from seeing him, but they collided with him all the same, and one of their horns gored him painfully. They stood looking confused, trying to figure out what had impeded their progress. Sawyer swore to himself; these were no “mechanical bulls”, as Nicki had described. They were gorgons!

And then Bella came floating down into view, courtesy of her Ring of Feather Fall, and the gorgons’ eyes blazed as they saw something to attack. Sawyer wasted no time; he flew upwards as fast as he could, grabbing Bella by the arm as he zipped past. All three gorgons bellowed with rage, and snorted out blasts of hot vapor at the rapidly ascending rogue and her invisible partner. Bella and Sawyer felt their skin grow numb and their joints begin to stiffen, but they shook off the gorgons’ petrifying breath, and made it to the safety of the ledge high above.

Nicki was all for carpet bombing the pit with Fireballs until the gorgons were dead, but everyone else felt it wasn’t worth the expenditure of spells. As Marie doled out healing, they began to search Ichirou’s room. There were several lacquer and bamboo wardrobes, cabinets, and chests. In them, they found some jewelry, clothing, and a disturbing collection of sex toys and bondage gear. In the back of one of the cabinets, they also found a well-crafted strongbox. It was securely locked, although they found no key on Ichirou or among his belongings. The box was covered with a thin layer of rust and a thick layer of dust, and didn’t appear to have been touched in decades. Bella checked it carefully for traps, then picked the lock. To her disappointment, the contents were nothing but a pile of letters, scrolls, books, and scribbled notes, most crumbling with age. Zhustin began to look through them, and they seemed to all have to do with the politics and factions of Minkai, although it would take several hours to study them. All very interesting, and probably important, but not urgent. It was time to move on.

They explored the other two alcoves. The one to the north had been divided into spartan cells where the hobgoblin monks apparently lived. The one to the east was crammed with objects relating to combat, including wooden practice weapons, wooden dummies, breaking boards, and similar martial arts training accessories. There were also a pair of rolled up segments of bamboo flooring, which could be unrolled to create walkways across the treacherous grid over the pit. There was also a short flight of stairs leading downwards into darkness.

With illumination from the spellcasters, they descended, and found themselves in a long corridor decorated with scenes of anger, illustrating humanoid figures suffering in scenes of shockingly brutal violence. The hallway continued for over 200 feet, and at its end, a closed door was set in the north wall. Bella listened, and hearing nothing, pushed it open.

They found themselves in a smelly barracks, with fur bedrolls scattered haphazardly across the floor. A dark hole in the far corner served as latrine and midden. A short set of steps led up to an open doorway into another room set about four feet above this one. Muffled voices could be heard from that room.

Once again, the group had the luxury of being able to prepare for a battle. Sandoval cast Good Hope, and Marie added a Prayer, while Shinjiro quaffed a Potion of Barkskin and Bella one of Protection from Evil. Then they slipped quietly into the empty barracks. As they got to where they could see through the open door into the next room, they saw Withered Blossom Warriors moving around inside.

Sawyer was so glad to have Suishen back that he didn’t want to waste time on any fancy “strategies” – he simply charged up the stairs and happily hacked at the hapless hobgoblin standing in his way.

The hobgoblin warriors were taken completely by surprise, and the party took advantage. Bella fired off a round of arrows while Sandoval began singing. Shinjiro followed Sawyer into the room, charging a hobgoblin in the corner, while Nicki fired a volley of Magic Missiles. Zhustin tried casting Touch of Fatigue, but the spell fizzled; this had been one of the first spells he’d ever learned, and he’d forgotten you actually have to touch the intended target.

The confused warriors were still trying to figure out what was going on, and Sandoval clobbered three of them in the center of the room with a Sound Burst. Marie immediately followed up with a Flame Strike on the same group. Zhustin, hoping no one had noticed his previous gaffe, summoned an Earth Elemental to appear behind the one Shinjiro was punching.

There was another short set of steps in this room, leading up to yet another open doorway. Suddenly, two figures came rushing out of that room, bellowing orders. They looked like the other Withered Blossom Warriors, but more grizzled and battle-hardened. One charged at Sawyer, and bashed him with its morningstar, while his partner jumped off the steps and attacked the elemental.

Sawyer immediately switched his focus to this new enemy. Suishen flashed, blood sprayed, and the veteran suddenly found himself missing one arm. Luckily for him, it was his left arm, and he kept swinging his morningstar with his right. Bella charged up the stairs and tried to slip past his defenses with a Spring Attack, but she slipped in the growing pool of blood and missed badly. Nicki stepped up to the open doorway and fried him with a pair of Scorching Rays, but he simply roared with rage and kept fighting.

The appearance of the veterans galvanized the other warriors into action. One spun around and shattered the earth elemental with a blow from its morningstar, while the others began to swarm Bella, Sawyer, and Shinjiro. They rained blows down on their foes, jockeying for position to flank them, and the group remembered that these things were maddeningly hard to bring down. Shinjiro unleashed a Flurry of Blows, and managed to drop one and injure another, but more stepped up to fill the gap.

Sandoval took up position in the open doorway beside Nicki, and fired a pair of arrows at the veteran warrior beside the stairs. Suddenly a new figure appeared in the far door to the next room. It was an enormous ogre mage, similar to the general they’d fought upstairs, but this one had a huge bow in its hands, and an equally huge katana strapped to its waist. It let fly an arrow that slammed into the bard like a small tree trunk.

Marie saw the spray of blood, and Sandoval stagger backwards, and decided to do some preemptive healing, so she cast a Mass Cure Light Wounds. Zhustin, from his vantage point near the back of the barracks, could see the ogre mage standing in the doorway, and decided the time was right to pull out the big guns. Waving his arms in elaborate motions (not all necessary for the spell, but damn it looked good!), he cast Chain Lightning on the ogre mage. To his surprise, the spell had no effect on the oni, who barked out a hoarse laugh. But the spell still branched off to find other targets around the room. The warriors reacted with uncanny reflexes, and most dodged the crackling arcs, but when the smoke cleared two of the warriors lay dead, as did the one-armed veteran. But there were plenty more still up and fighting.

The PCs didn’t earn any new XP this week; it turns out I’d awarded you the XP for defeating Ichirou as part of last week’s total. We’ll be back at Leo’s next week, when presumably Joette and Rich will rejoin us. In two weeks, I’ll be back in person, although Roger will be gone.