Down the Lift Shaft
Previously in the journal of Costian Raduva, we had entered an old asylum in the city of Cassomir whilst searching for the friends of Count Haserton Lowls. We continue our weekly Pathfinder adventure of Strange Aeons on Roll20.
We seemed to have finished off the strange creatures that were here, when a clanking came from below and a glass jar was hurled up through the viewing gallery in the floor from the basement below and shattered in the corner of the room. A strange yellow gloop burst out of it, spilling out over the floor and forming up into a yellow, acrid bubble of ooze.
This was followed by two giant mechanical hands which grabbed at the railings and hauled up a second monstrosity – a mechanical human shaped thing about 10ft tall, with a glass brain case in place of a head. What was was, it clambered up onto the railings directly behind me.
Sheena tried to dodge past it, but it threw a bomb at her which exploded in her face and stopping her in her tracks. Catiana couldn’t get past Sheena and myself to get at the construct, and really didn’t like the look of the oozing thing to want to go and fight that, so she stayed where she was. Unfortunately for her, the oozing thing decided it liked the look of her and squelched along the floor towards her, forcing her to smash it until it stopped moving.
Gregor shot some arrows into the brain case of the construct, and it toppled off the railings and down onto the table in the room below – causing all of the bombs it was holding to explode in an explosion of fire and lightning. He was then able to finish off the ooze, making certain that it was dead.
Ray shouted something from somewhere, but he was still invisible so I wasn’t sure where he was. Taking a look at the lift, it seemed to go down, so myself, Catiana, Erasmus and Gregor crammed inside and we went down to the room below where the chemical smoke from the construct was beginning to dissipate.
The room seemed to be some form of alchemical laboratory, for the walls were covered with shelves of bottles and jars containing all sorts of admixtures. There were stained glass windows in three of the walls – odd, since this was the basement. They depicted an angelic being with their hands inside a patient, light shining out of the wound as the patient smiled up at the angel’s face.
The windows seemed to open, and had a holder behind them to set a light. Just as Catiana looked behind one, Sheena dropped down over the balcony into the room and the floor exploded in a mass of tentacles. Gregor said some words and the tentacles were dispelled before they could do much.
Behind one of the windows there seemed to be a crude ladder set into the wall, and a hole led down a considerable distance.
Player’s Notes: Ray was off exploring by himself and had discovered some nasty things upstairs, so I took a look ahead at some of Costian’s new spells which might be useful, notably Etheric Shards. As with a lot of things in Pathfinder, the description isn’t too clear and I figured a clarification now rather than in the midst of battle would be preferable. After a longer discussion that planned, it was decided every 5ft cube moved through would cause damage – so larger creatures would take more damage.
It was then noticed that there was a half-hidden switch in the lift, which could be toggled to a ‘down’ and ‘even more down’ position. By this point Ray had turned up, so we all squeezed into the lift with Catiana incorporeal so that she could fit, and we headed down and down and down.
The lift eventually came to a halt, so Catiana stepped out through the door into a large room at the end of which were a couple of giant centipedes with small blue men sitting on top of them. Exactly what a couple of Derro were doing riding centipedes (actually Cytillipedes we were later to discover) I have no idea. The rest of us opened the door and piled out as the Derro charged towards us.
I caste a Haste on the entire party (except for Ray, who I couldn’t see) and battle was joined. One centipede stopped halfway across the room and seemed to be biting at someone we couldn’t see (probably Ray), and the Derro was stabbing a short spear into him.
Catiana was bitten and felt it’s venom flowing into her, so I decided to try something new. I sent my spirit out to try and possess one of the centipedes, succeeding, yelling at the others not to hurt it just as my empty body fell to the floor. Inhabiting its mind, I bit at the one remaining Derro, biting it in two as Sheena finished off the last centipede.
Ray had managed to dispel his invisibility, allowing Erasmus to try and neutralize the venom in him. Erasmus also helped Catiana, who was trying to figure out whether she could ride me into battle.
There was one door one of the room (other than the lift), from behind which could be heard the sound of water. Investigating whilst in the body of a centipede sounds like fun, as long as I can figure out how to get all the legs to move in the right way.
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