Chapter 14: Finishing the Temple Exploration

February 27 continues

The group rests for another hour and then decides to go investigate the last room. The plan is for Ertak to use the fire wand and then kick the door open, and then Kieron will go in first to look. Ertak prepares a fire bolt and blasts the door off from the hinge side. Kieron sees some mummy-like corpse inside, and draws her weapon, steps inside, and strikes the mummy lying on the ground. Agnarr follows but just looks around. Ertak shoots a fire bolt at the mummy, but nothing happens. At the same moment, Agnarr notices something in the ceiling and withdraws to get a light out. When Agnarr gets the light out and comes in, a bat flees from the ceiling. As it goes out, the bat defecates on Agnarr’s head as he’s waving the light.

The text on the paper is some dwarf language or something, so no one understands it. Neiia takes the paper with her. Ertak examines the silver mace and thinks it could be Droskar’s holy symbol.

Next, the group examines the temple room and finds nothing but a larger Droskar mace. In addition, small recesses are found in the wall. Nothing else special is found in the room. Next, the group goes to tell the situation to the wolf. Neiia tells the wolf the events, and the wolf tells her to bring the spider’s body here, and then you can take that mushroom from there. Agnarr carries the spider carcass inside and notices at the same time that the wolves are clearly preparing to attack. Agnarr asks Kieron to help pick the mushrooms and warns him about the wolves too, and when Agnarr starts picking the mushrooms, the wolves attack. The big wolf goes after Neiia, and the other two wolves go after Kieron and Agnarr.

Neiia dodges the boss’s attacks and tries to talk him around, saying that we don’t want to fight now, it’s not worth it. Kieron is hit many times, and she falls to the ground each time before drawing her weapon while laying on the ground and starting to defend. Agnarr hits his creature so many times that it flees, and after that, Agnarr comes after Kieron’s enemy. After a moment, this wolf also flees, and both wolves went unconscious before they get very far. The boss wolf is still trying to attack Neiia, and Neiia lures it to another room, and when Kieron, Agnarr, and Ertak surround it, the wolf flees. The group collects the wolfs’ treasures, and Ertak skins the smaller wolves while Ertak heals Neiia. After this, the group leaves.

The group continues through the night until they end up where they stayed when they fled from the forest witch’s cottage due to the smell. On the way there, Jaysek sees something on the side, and Agnarr notices that a Keld fairy has been nailed to a tree with wooden nails. Two more are found nearby.

The group remembers that local legend says that if you kill a Keld fairy, its fresh blood can transform lead into gold. A few bloody lead ingots can be seen on the ground, so the legend apparently isn’t true. The group buries the fairies. The group continues for an hour, and after that, nuts start raining down on them. Kieron and Jaysek try to lead the horses away faster, but the others are ahead. Jaysek gets past Ertak and runs while leading the horses but stumbles to the ground.

Jaysek just barely manages to dodge the horses before they run over him. Kieron notices that Ertak finally starts running after wondering in a circle for a long time, so she starts riding quickly after him. Neiia runs past Agnarr. Ertak falls in front of Kieron’s horse, and both horses trample him; Kieron’s riding horse jumps and lands directly on Ertak’s hand, the pack horse behind just grazes Ertak’s midsection. Some kind of smoke cloud has also appeared in the middle of the group, causing problems, and next, trees and vegetation start growing from the side, blocking the road.