Altar-cations
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Last week in Bara-Kraz...
26th of Obsidian
The party consists of Elrin the Elven Monk, Olson the Shifter Bard, Guts the Half-Orc Barbarian, and Celestia the Elven Cleric. The owner of the Crowded Goose Tavern has hired them to deliver two barrels of elvish wine to the gnomes who are supposedly setting up an airstation in the southern savannah. One barrel is a gift, while the other barrel is to be sold by the gnomes to grow the owner's brand.
Elrin has agreed to take one of the strikers who escaped the chaos at the end of their last session to the airstation. The man's name is Leonard Fultone and he is hopeful that the gnomes have an airship that will take him back to his homeland, the Duchy of Smürtroog.
The party elects to go West around the Red Rocks to avoid the more dangerous area in exchange for time. They make camp as night falls on the western part of the savannah.
The second day of travel in the Savannah is uneventful until sunset. As dusk begins it's slow descent and the scorching air cools, our four companions find themselves walking through a long abandoned village. As they rummage through the huts they are able to find unfamiliar crescent motifs. They elect to camp outside of the village to avoid any potential complications.
As day breaks they tread on to the airstation. They briefly treat with the gnomes who are grateful for the gift of wine but would much prefer food to feed the skywhale they use to give their airship buoyancy. The party inquires how much food they'd need to travel to Bara-Kraz and the gnomes tell them that they never travel in these early stages without heading to the gnomish port of gWrench on the west coast. They'd need at least 7 cows worth of meat to travel to Bara-Kraz and gWrench. Leonard, hearing all this talk of needing meat to power the ship, asks how much it would take to get to his homeland. He's disappointed to hear the amount but resolves to stay with the gnomes and essentially work off his 'trip ticket'.
Meanwhile Elrin, Guts, and Celestia spend the rest of that day and the next hunting gazelle to power the ship. Olson explores a nearby cluster of momentous baobab trees that the gnomes told them no creatures go near. Olson discovers the central tree is hollowed out and inside is a pool of water with a platform rising from the center. On the platform is an altar and statue of a veiled dwarf woman holding a crescent moon aloft.
When the rest are done hunting gazelle, Olson leads them to the tree where they investigate for a while. Celestia reads the dwarvish inscribed on the altar: "I am lit in the day but burn at night". Guts scoffs and says, "the moon". In response the altar slides to the left revealing a staircase.
The party descends downward into a 10' tall room submerged in 8' of water. With only 2' of crawl space they peer into the depths and see canopic jars at the bottom of the water and a stone slab over a doorway across from them.
They retrieve 6 canopic jars and, thanks to Guts and Elrin, remove the slab. On the other side they swim down a corridor and then ascend a stairway into a room where stone coffins line the sides pierced by roots from above while a dim pink glow from a watery pit illuminates a wooden sphinx across from them. They all hear distant murmuring in the room. Guts and Elrin are about to open one of the coffins when they realize the source of the murmuring is within.
Feeling that they need to exercise caution, they depart and vow to venture here another time. Not wanting to leave empty-handed, they swipe a few canopic jars and ascend the stairs. Before they exit, they take notice that the altar has slowly started to close over the stairs. They leave a note to any other would-be adventurers: "Don't go in, it's cursed"
Back at the airstation they ask the gnomes to take them to Bara-Kraz and they oblige. When the airship arrives at the gates of the city the citizens gawk at the gnomish marvel and the party of adventurers it dispatches.
Safely returned after a long excursion the party returns the wagon and donkey to the owner of the Crowded Goose then head to a dealer of curios to appraise the canopic jars. The dwarf, a Barandit clan member, questions them on where they got these artifacts from. While the rest of the part is silent and makes to leave, Olson blabbers on about a tomb in the Savannah as his companions glower at him.
Coming up with an excuse to distance themselves from Olson, Elrin and the rest leave to open the jars in privacy. As they are renting a room for the night, Elrin notices that they are being followed though the figure, a dwaf by the looks of it, ceases once Elrin takes notice. With hopes of gold, gems, and any other riches the three open the jars to find...a few gold coins and mounds of ash.
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It was a pretty long session and one with no combat! One thing I should've done different is not have them make multiple rolls to see how many gazelle they hunted each day. What I should've done was tell them that the higher they roll the less time it'll take and just went from there. If we had done that then who knows how much more would have been able to happen?
This week my players are taking up the request of the Razaldaub clan to clear out the Red Rocks. The clan is drooling at the money to be made off of trade utilizing the gnomish airship, and they want to lay a land route through the Red Rocks to the airstation. Before this route can be established though they need to clear the area of their primary inhabitants- gnolls.
Naturally the players are enticed by the hefty gold reward offered by the Razaldaub. Yet I believe they might be too bold in assuming they'll survive to spend it.
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