4 Yarthmont - Feeling crushed

 With his cuts cleaned up, Demetrius threw open the door to the consultation room and strode up the corridor. At the junction he turned right, and then turned left at the next junction. Faced with a blank wall, he stepped on a slightly protruding flagstone in one corner of the corridor and pushed the wall ahead of him. It swung open to let him into another corridor. Right, then left and a longer walk before he turned right. The door to Darius' chambers lay ahead. Demetrius strode forwards and suddenly the walls crashed in towards him. He dodged but not quickly enough and cried out in pain (5 DAM).

The noise was huge and he felt sure that Darius must now be warned of his approach. Speed would be to his benefit now. If he were quick enough, he might reach Darius before he was fully prepared. Casting cure light wounds, he healed the damage the trap had done (Heal 6 HP), reflecting how Darius had beefed up the defences here since he had been alive.

Kicking the door in ahead of him, he was confronted with the strange sight of ten people in dark robes and masks representing nightmare creatures all standing in a circle, motionless and not reacting to Demetrius at all. Suddenly one of them screamed in terror. Demetrius jumped, but he recognised people in thrall to Zargon and knew they were harmless unless he attacked them. Darius' chambers were to his right, so he moved swiftly to the door on that side of the room and kicked that one open too.

This room too was full of people, this time all masked as animals and dressed in brightly coloured robes. They were all involved in card games and dice games. The atmosphere in the room was convivial apart from the fact that none of them acknowledged Demetrius' violent entry. Assessing the threat, Demetrius decided there was none unless he triggered it himself. He marched straight across the room to a section of the wall where he pushed a loose stone low down near the floor and the wall swung open. Here was Darius with his followers in the newly revealed room. They were armed and ready, but Demetrius was on the warpath and would brook no delays in his vengeance.

Deciding that he needed to neutralise Darius as fast as possible, Demetrius cast Hold Person at him. Darius froze.

That was close. Darius failed the save by 1 point. Lucky that Demetrius focused the spell on Darius so that he had a penalty to save. I was tempted to try to slow down more of the baddies, but chose not to.

Demetrius then swung his mace with savage and brutal intent, and slew two of the hobgoblins that were Darius' guard. That left four more hobgoblins and a dozen human guards. The remaining guards swarmed Demetrius, who retreated to the doorway to provide some measure of cover. With Darius neutralised, he had time to deal with them all safely. He blocked the attacks of those who could reaching him and counterattacked unsuccessfully. A brief exchange of blows left no one hurt, then Demetrius attaked with renewed vigour and three of the hobgoblins fell to his blows. The extra effort nearly cost him, but he just managed to block several blows and turn those blocks into attacks that cost a hobgoblin and a Cynidicean their lives.

With the hobgoblins dead, Demetrius faced lesser opponents. Three of the humans fell swiftly to his mace and he advanced into the room. In no time at all he stood panting amid the bodies of Darius' bodyguard. Only Darius remained, still paralysed by the spell.

Demetrius could see what was to come in Darius' eyes. The hatred and the fear were clearly present, even though he could not move a muscle. Demetrius swung his mace and crushed Darius' skull. The priest of Zargon fell to the floor.

4 Yarthmont - Snakes in a Pyramid

Demetrius pulled the door open to the room beyond. He now stood in his (long abandoned) kitchen and dining room. Dust covered the cupboards, chairs and tables. The door from this room stood partially ajar. Two snakes with brown and yellow scales lay coiled around the body of a person in a rabbit mask. Seeing Demetrius, they uncoiled and slithered towards him.

He called once more upon Usamigaras and words of power poured from his mouth, even as he leapt to the attack. The Snake Charm took effect and one of the snakes stopped, raised its body up and began to sway gently. As he loosed the power of his god upon the one snake, he swung his shield at the other, catching it a firm blow. The snake was stunned by the blow, and he followed up with a blow of the mace. The snake snapped at him but he was easily able to evade it. Demetrius finally crushed the snake's skull with his mace, and turn and kicked the other snake firmly in the head as it started to recover from his spell and followed it up with a blow of his shield. The snake was clearly woozy as it tried to bite him but he blocked the blow easily. However, dodging the blow put Demetrius off balance and he only caught it a glancing blow. He dodged the next attack by the snake and crushed its skull with his mace. He was clearly out of practice because these snakes should not have taken so much time to defeat.

Sadly, while possessed Broneslav will not be earning experience or these snakes would have been a very nice stash of XPs indeed.

Demetrius ignored the body and headed to the opposite door. His mission to kill Darius would not wait. He had an idea where Darius should be, so it was just a case of getting there as quickly as possible.

Through the door was Demetrius' living room. He propped the door he had entered by open with a chair from the dining room and headed straight through to the only exit from this room. This opened onto a corridor that ended in a door with his former consultation room beyond. The room was set up with a desk in the middle and a row of chairs facing the desk. The desk chair looked comfortable, the others, well, not so much.

"Oh," Demetrius thought, "Those statues are new. Who has been using my office?"

As he moved to leave the room, suddenly the statues moved. Both gargoyles attacked in a flurry of claws and rock hard teeth and both bit him hard (2 DAM). Demetrius responded by smashing one of them with his mace and shield. Black ichor started flowing from the cracks in its skin. He followed this up in similar fashion and the gargoyle crashed to the floor, it's head caved in. Demetrius then blocked and evaded the other gargoyle's attacks, turning its momentum against it and bludgeoning the creature fiercely. The gargoyle got past his defences and clawed him (1 DAM). However, it was wounded badly and struggling. Demetrius easily killed it. He paused to bandage his wounds before moving on.

4 Yarthmonth - What Lies Beneath

Broneslav dropped quickly through the trapdoor and found himself in a small empty room with stone walls and floor. There were no exits, so Broneslav immediately began to search. Soon he found a secret door that opened into a larger room beyond. This new room had clearly been inhabited and was as its owner had last left it. But it was dusty too, and looked like the owner had not returned in some time. A white hooded cloak lay cast over a wooden chair. A bed, a wooden chest and a table completed the ensemble. On the table was a wooden carving of two intertwined snakes.

It was a bit weird that the secret door would open into someone's bedroom. Broneslav could not fathom why this might be unless those in the pyramid above were denied entry to this section, or were only permitted entry by the gatekeeper in this room. He decided he could go round in circles trying to work out all the possible options and that the best approach would be just to accept that this was the way and continue his explorations.

Broneslav opened the chest. It contained clothes for a slighter man than he was. The cloak on the chair looked good though. That was the advantage of cloaks; one size pretty much fits all. Picking it up, he staggered as a psychic force hit him.