Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Death in the Dark

After killing off the Dark Angels the party discussed their options.  Lythandar pushed for going back into the tapestry room and try to find the southbound passage that seemed apparent from outside.  Mara wanted to exit back out to the west or through the secret door to the tunnels.  Other party members weren't sure which way to head, or should they just try and enter this complex again hoping to find the third "world" that Gofin and Mara had experienced earlier.  Lythandar's thought was that they should try and finish exploring the Garden of Graves before possibly entering a "world" from which no return was possible.


So the party exited to the north and found themselves back in the Feywild amongst many cairns, three obelisks and the curved wall of a building that they hadn't explored yet.  Moving north to the entry to the hall of tapestries they again entered and found no change from when they left the area.  Melisana, Alhellara and Demin tried to find an exit to the south where they had seen an outside connection.  Lythandar did an arcana check and had a brief vision of an area of rough-hewn rock passageways, where images were once painted on the walls.  Everything felt very empty, a peculiar feeling that life and magic that had once flowed through had been whisked away.

Pretis and Mara led the party out the western door to the party room and beyond that entry they found a room with twisted runes covering the curving uneven walls and even parts of the floor and ceiling.  Two walls jutted out and curved oddly ending in narrow columns, as though to continue the pattern begun by the runes.  Some of the runes glowed softly providing weak light through out the area.  Pretis moved in to a niche in the north and found a metal lever on the south wall of the niche.  Mara moved south down the curving wall and found more runes and open areas to the east and west.  The rest of the party moved cautiously into the main room.

Suddenly the room became pitch dark.  The darkness faded quickly, allowing the characters to see once again ... but things were not the same.  A perfect duplicate of each party member stood next to or close to each of them.  As soon as the light returned Demin attacked Demin and the party tried to determine friend from foe.  As the battle raged the group found that each duplicate looked identical even down to bleeding wounds.  Pretis had her double cornered in the niche but when Lythandar tried to hit Pretis' double the magic missile actually damaged the "real" Pretis.  Several "creatures" caused necrotic damage and Lythandar gave everyone a resistance which alleviated some damage.  Soon several party members were bloodied and Gofin hit the floor following a area burst.  Pretis tried to cast some healing on Gofin but managed to heal the "faux" Gofin instead.

Mara charged north into the fray leaving her double blinded and taking ongoing damage.  But soon every party member except Mara was bloodied.  Some of the "faux" party members seemed to regain strength whenever they bloodied an enemy and the group was gasping for some break in the action.  Alhellara took time to heal Gofin and then herself.   Lythandar summoned his Hell Hound and Alhellara her Guardian Angels to provide extra damage and the "enemies" started to fall.  Eventually only two Melisanas were visible but the party had no idea which was which.  Demin stepped in and finished off the final "faux hero" and the party took a quick rest.

The bodies of the creatures turned out to be Quicklings and Spriggans, which left the party at a loss since they had no knowledge that those characters were shape changers.  Searching they found nothing magical or monetary as they discussed their next move.

Scorecard:  Each party member received 500 XP for the encounter with their doubles and they now have 24383 XP, needing 1617 more to reach 11th level.

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