08/03/2024 -- Operation Delve (Level 2.5)

Date: 17 Knewidi 715AR. Starring Seth (commander), Bee (marshall), Zey (quartermaster), Storm (spymaster), and Angel (lorekeeper).
Bee goes to find the papers on the divider that she gave to the Maiden, and brings them to Corania. Corania is hard at work making adjustments to the Hook, but gives a small frown when she sees the notes. She says she can make do with some of them.
- “Certainly, Raymas got himself into more than he bargained for…”
Bee says she’ll do everything she can to pick up where he left off.
Margaux wards Angel and Bee, and agrees when Angel invites her to join the mission. Zey goes to the Bitter Swill. Storm waits for the group at the entrance.
The spymaster puts 3 people on emeralds, netting us +2 emeralds.
The quartermaster puts 2 build points into the blood testing equipment, and 1 into waterproofing the tents. He also grabs the jars we made before.
The marshall gets a 4 on the delve roll, and everyone loses 5 * their power score getting down there.
Some things appear to have been tidied up in room 24, and one of the jars we took has been replaced with a new jar of dirt. Bee checks out the jar, and the dirt’s a little moist. We hear shuffling, and catch a very strong smell of rot. Seth asks the spirit to activate his powers if he senses anything dangerous, but the spirit cannot.
- “If you would give me total control over your body I would take it if I could, but my creator would not allow such a thing.”
Seth uses his power to determine if opening the door we’re looking at is good, bad, or neutral – he is told more towards neutral, a little good. As we open it, we see the figure dart around the corner, and find a more polished hall. At the end of the hall is a very sturdy sealed door. We also see an alcove a ways down the hall. There’s a light buzzing sound behind the door, and Seth smells old, dried flesh and more rot on the other side.
We head to room 20 and find a pedestal, surrounded by the corpses of cultists. The bodies haven’t been ripped into as much, and are mostly mummified now. A ruby sits on the pedestal. We also see a heavy steel door with no handle, just rivets. Angel loses 70sp to the creature, and Zey gives them 25sp.
Bee inspects the bodies, and finds that they all have something in common. Bee turns one of them onto their back, and finds they all have wing tattoos carved into their skin. Some have 3, some have 4, and one in a gold-threaded uniform has 6. Bee recognizes some similarities with how Ki’s wings used to grow. Around the corner is another corpse, this one with large scratch marks. Bee checks the body, and finds nothing of interest except for a single platinum coin with an iridescent aura.
Seth touches the ruby, and there’s a pulse of light from the door on the other side of the hallway, revealing these invisible goldenish red chains. A voice speaks in Dwarvish.
- “Hostiles close. Unable to open.”
Seth touches the ruby again, and the voice says, “Guardian escaped containment. Cannot open.”
We go to the alcove door, and Seth breaks it down after a couple tries. We see 2 dead cultists around a pedestal. Next door is an infirmary. A lot of the medicine here is old, but we find some bandages and unspoiled salves, and get +8 recovery.
Through the next door we find an area where the ceiling has collapsed in. There’s another door to the left, with a pole attached to it and golden rings hanging from the pole, almost like a ring toss game. Inside is what appears to be a lounge area of some kind. We see chests, furniture, and paintings piled together, along with remnants of old games, piles of material, and other random assortments of things.
We also find a small alcove with two things – a bell with a string that seems to go below, threaded through a path in the stone, and a second string close but unconnected to the bell that seems to come up from the bottom. It seems like a system of communication.
While looking around, Bee accidentally knocks over a chest, and finds a potion of golden liquid, with lightning crackling within – that one releases, but there are more within. She starts to look more closely, and finds 4 quick potions, a Sharp III longsword, +9 scrap, and +30 silver coins.
Zey is drained to 0sp by the creature, and gets Tired III.
Seth touches the bell twice, and it rings a third time, then twice more, repeating the pattern he made.
Sometime around here, the party splits up, because we need at least one person to stay behind to operate levers to open some of the doors. Bee, Storm, and Margaux stay behind, while Zey, Seth, and Angel go further into the dungeon (might’ve been a bit later on? But before the cage room).
At the next door we investigate, we find broken locks on the ground in front of it, the dart traps having long since run out. There’s a strong sense of Primordial magic to the south. We find another collapsed hall with claw marks, and see the corpse of a minotaur, now mostly bones, with the remnants of a white lab coat. We find a scythe trap rusted mid-swing.
We find another destroyed room – it seems like explosions led to a partial collapse. There’s a golden, triangular key, and we find couches, chest-tables, leashes, whistles, metal prods… it seems like a training area for some sort of animal.
In the middle of one of the rooms is a massive cage filled with large mounds of dirt, but no worms. To the side is a lever of some sort, more golden in color.
In one hall, we find a large ballista, pointed at the door leading into the cage room. We go down from there into room 6, where we see a root has grown through the ceiling, seemingly intentionally – there are tools for root inspection, like magnifying glasses, microscopes and slides, etc. This seems to be one of the stronger, main roots.
Seth touches it, and feels a surge that’s far too much for him. He loses 1HB and is blown backward. It seems like 90% of the power is in the roots – it’s doing something down there…
We go back to the cage room, and Zey examines the lever. It seems timed to pull itself back.
We find another mummified minotaur, a lab tech with their throat torn out. There’s a small sapphire pendant around their neck, emitting a dull blue glow, and a bunch of dead worms around the body. Seth picks up the pendant, and a few worms inch closer, no longer repelled.
We find a sealed steel door… with a triangular keyhole! Inside, we find a desk, a few filing cabinets, and a chalkboard with a drawing of the creature on it. With a combined total of 5 successes investigating, we learn the creature is a Glamis. It’s a person who, before death, had previously desecrated corpses, and was bound to the dirt of their homeland. The curse took them as they died, and forced them to remain.
The Glamis eats worms that have lived in the dirt of their homeland, and it’s in the nature of the creature to put worms in corpses to make sure they’re healthy and that their supply doesn’t run out. Eating the worms helps to ease the torture of the ethereal flesh of the creature, and is the only thing that satiates it. It seems like this was the guardian of this level, trained to attack and kill intruders. This went without issue for 100 years until it was accidentally released, then began to eat everyone here once it had broken containment. It can teleport to dirt from its homeland – wherever there’s dirt, it can go there.
The doors at some of these points had been prepared for that, and were infused with tin and ores to prevent teleportation, but the Glamis is able to scuttle through and teleport to a patch of dirt when the doors are open. The final failsafe for this level is that when you go to the door that leads further down, the door won’t open if the Glamis is within this section of the dungeon, to prevent it from infesting the lower levels.
Zey, Seth, and Angel make a plan to lure the creature into the cage, set the timer for it to close, and hightail it out of that section before the door out shuts, trapping them in. Zey sets the time for a minute, and Angel hucks their jar of worms as far into the cage as they can. The creature appears, and they all book it out of that area of the dungeon, successfully escaping.
Bee beats Margaux at mancala while this is going on.
After the mission, Angel goes to see Magion, and asks him about their dagger. He doesn’t know anything about it – it was likely created before his time. They ask if it would be alright to bind themself to it, and he says that it would be good to be cautious, but if we’re going to continue delving, it could be helpful. He offers to hold onto it, but Angel decides to keep it, and binds themself to it. Magion also agrees to administer a martial school test for them when he’s less busy, and he does indeed do that.
The quarterstaff and longsword are brought to the blacksmith, so that we get the blueprints for Sharp III and Echo Strike.
Bee takes the coin she got to Lavatera, who says it looks to be imbued with a certain amount of celestial energy – perhaps it grants good luck. It’s also potentially a useful relic. Bee pockets it.
- This is the Coin of Past Heroes. The person who has the coin gains +1 hero point at the start of each session they participate in. It’s also worth 3 relics.
Everyone gets a level-up!
Net gains/losses: +9 scrap, +8 recovery, +4 quick potions, +2 emerald, -1 intel, -1 supply.