Chapter 13: The Dwarven Monastery

February 27 continued

The group camps to eat dinner and rest. They rest for about an hour, and after that, Agnarr notices a group walking along the road, consisting of two humans, one dwarf, and an elf. The elf has a very fine and expensive-looking armor, the dwarf has an axe in one hand and Iorak’s holy symbol in the other. One of the humans has a bird as an animal companion and a bow in hand, and the other human is clearly a wizard. The whole group looks like they shouldn’t be messed with; they are probably quite powerful.

The dwarf greets the group, saying, “Ah, other adventurers, haven’t seen many of those lately.” Neiia tells them that the group is looking for mushrooms. The dwarf asks if they have seen a blue dragon around here. Kieron asks why they are looking for it, at which point the dwarf tells them that this dragon has reportedly stolen some magical item from some city-state on the southern coast. Ertak asks what they plan to do if they find it. The dwarf says that since it’s a blue dragon, they probably have to kill it, because they don’t easily give up treasures.

The group tells them about the disease, and the woman with the bird says that she knows this disease, and the only cure she knows is for their dwarf priest to cast a healing spell. When healing is mentioned, the dwarf walks to Neiia and says that this won’t hurt much. After that, he raises Iorak’s symbol up and presses the other hand on Neiia’s stomach. Next, lightning strikes the symbol, which conducts through the hands to Neiia, who visibly heals. The group talks about other things and hears, among other things, that this monastery was once a temple of some evil dwarf sect, so the basement might be extensively trapped, so if one goes there, one should be very careful.

Neiia stays to rest, and the others go to investigate a nearby stone circle. Ertak identifies it as a fairy crossing. The group rests for an hour and then heads back to the monastery. When they come to the monastery, Neiia and Kieron start flying up, and up there, Kieron goes up to sit in a tree, and Neiia throws an explosive fireball at the top of the tower. The explosion is a good one, and Neiia goes to investigate and notices that the tower’s roof has collapsed. The group goes to the tower door and tries to open it. They can’t get the door open, and Neiia makes a hole in it with a fire bolt so that she can see that there are many stones, etc., behind the door, and that’s why the door won’t open. Neiia and Kieron rise above the tower again, and Kieron tries to throw a coin with light spell cast on it down inside but misses. The coin flies out, and Kieron goes to retrieve it, but Agnarr picks it up before her. Neiia shoots a large explosive fireball inside, causing large flames to burst from the windows and the remains of the roof to fly to the winds, and a pillar of fire rises high above the tower.

Next, the group goes to look at the other collapsed tower, and nothing special is found there. After that, the group goes to the next door, and there Kieron feels that there is something wrong there, like that should be a trap, but she doesn’t find it. Neiia also doesn’t find a trap, but she notices that there is some strange magic on Kieron. Kieron can’t push the door open.

Agnarr comes to look at the door and states that Kieron is right, the trap is missing. Someone has clearly disarmed the trap from the door and taken it with them. Once upon a time, a spike would have struck out from it. Agnarr tries to open the door but can’t, not even with Ertak’s help. Next, Kieron and Neiia try to open the door so that Kieron supports her hand against the opposite wall and pushes the door with his feet so that she is completely in the air. Neiia, in turn, does a jump kick in the middle of the door, and the door breaks in half, and both halves fall down. Inside is apparently some kind of armor or weapon storage.

There are no doors going forward from the room, so Agnarr starts looking for secret doors, at which point Kieron decides that she could now get his light coin back, so he goes to Agnarr and starts tearing his belt off, but doesn’t succeed. Agnarr wonders what she is doing and pulls back correspondingly. Kieron states that she wants her light coin back, at which point Agnarr gives it back. After that, Kieron goes to the corner to examine something, or pretends that there is something interesting there, but when Neiia, who has been examining the room, has found a crossbow bolt that is in perfect condition, like it was new, it’s difficult to maintain interest in the corner. Neiia examines the bolt and states that it is a bolt containing fire magic. Since one was found, more might be found. They search the room for three minutes and find two more similar bolts.

Ertak, who is in the corridor, has noticed that there is such a spot in the wall where there could be a secret door. No one pays any attention to him until they have examined the room. Neiia notices magic at that spot but doesn’t find any secret door. Neiia and Kieron go forward while Agnarr and Ertak stay to look for the secret door. They don’t find anything and come out. Outside, they turn their gaze to the well and want to go down the well shaft. Neiia and Kieron have meanwhile opened another door and are in the next room examining it.

Neiia casts a flying spell on Ertak, and he flies into the well, though he doesn’t fit inside with his shield, so he leaves it at top. There is mold on the walls in the well, but nothing else. Ertak bumps into the walls enough to dislodge mold from the walls, and this dust is somewhat irritating.

Kieron and Neiia continue forward, and the others come along too. They pass the temple room and the library, and Kieron begins to examine the next door. The others go to examine the library.

Agnarr examines the books, but when the first one crumbles to pieces and the next one produces some cloud that causes minor problems for him. He feels weaker and sees minor hallucinations.

The group tries to push the door open but don’t succeed. Meanwhile, Ertak examines books and finds one book whose pages are intact. He doesn’t understand the language, so he asks Jaysek, who also doesn’t know the language but begins to examine the rest of the books.

Jaysek also gets dust in his eyes and feels unwell but stubornly finishes examining the books. Agnarr states that he is too tired to continue, so the group rests for half an hour. After that, they return, and when everyone pushes the door at the same time, they get it open. Once the door starts to open, it opens lightly. Everyone except Agnarr falls to the ground. In the room is a relatively well-preserved table and chair. On the table is a half-eaten piece of pie and a rusty knife that someone has sharpened. Kieron notices that the door was clearly wedged shut with a wooden wedge.

The pie is not decayed in any way, so someone has clearly been here quite recently. A door leads forward from the room, but there is a lock on the door. No traps are found on the door, so Kieron tries to open the door but can’t get it open because the door is clearly locked. Agnarr tries to pick the lock but doesn’t succeed, though he states that it likely could be opened if more time is spent on it. For the next attempt, he uses five minutes instead of one minute but doesn’t succeed. On the third attempt, he gets it open after 20 minutes. Inside is a small room with two one-meter beds. There are some items on one of the beds.

Agnarr also notices a trap on the floor. In front of the door is a string that is attached to a net above the door and an anvil. When you pull the string, the net and anvil fall down. Kieron tries to disarm the trap but states that the string probably needs to be cut to disarm the trap. Agnarr doesn’t believe it, so he examines the trap himself for eight minutes before coming to the same conclusion. Agnarr cuts the string and steps inside. At the same moment, a kobold attacks him. The kobold strikes Agnarr twice and then blocks Kieron’s blow with his short sword.

After this, the kobold trips Kieron, but Kieron jumps up while the kobold goes after Agnarr again. Agnarr recovers and steps backward, kicking a chair that’s in the way under the table and out of the way. The kobold tries to strike Kieron, but Neiia manages to cast a spell so that the kobold fumbles his strike, and his weapon turns in his hand. Kieron strikes the kobold, but the kobold jumps to safety.