As Alec and
Varien plunged into the choppy waters of the cavern, a bright yellow canary
wriggled free from the eldritch knight’s pocket and flew to safety. Birdwen
flashed his tailfeathers as he swooped in a figure-eight above the cave. He noticed
that the cave’s northeast wall was in fact artificial, like the world’s most
unfortunate beaver dam. The ribs of several shattered ships were lashed
together with vines and lengths of gnarled rope, with sections of decking
hammered into an overlapping patchwork barrier that seemed to be keeping most
of the water from leaking out of the cavern into parts beyond. Alec began
to splash his way to the north face of the cave where the collapsed bridge had
come to rest, hoping to use it as a makeshift ladder. Suddenly
Alec felt a ragged claw close around his left ankle, and then a second one grip
his right leg. He was pulled beneath the waves. Varien
sighed as he treaded water; he was no stranger to watery environments, though
it had been a while since he’d gone for a swim. Suddenly
the water around him began to swirl menacingly and Varien found himself trapped
in a whirlpool. Strange , the paladin thought to himself as he struggled
to keep his head above water. A shadowy
shape appeared in the wall of water before him, and before Varien knew what was
happening, a huge hand emerged from the swirling water to grab him by the
throat. Varien’s eyes bulged as the massive hand began to strangle him. As Alec
thrashed and tried to kick his submerged assailants away, he felt a hand close
around the back of his neck and squeeze with surprising strength. Siegfried
frowned as he looked down at the agitated waters of the cavern. Then his nose
wrinkled as he smelled the awful rotting stench of waterlogged, undead
creatures behind him. Sure enough, he could hear the slap of bare flesh on
stone as a trio of growling ghasts shambled towards him. The first
one, his oversized tongue logging as water gushed out of its gaping mouth,
tried to rake him with its claws. Siegfried cast a defensive shield spell,
stopping the first attacker in his tracks. The undead creature’s two companions
clawed their way past Siegfried’s magical defenses. A claw gouged the
half-orc’s flesh – Siegfried felt a numbing cold flash through his chest before
it subsided. The third undead creature gnawed on Siegfried’s arm painfully. Varien
managed to wriggle free and unsheathed Fiendsbane, slashing at the creature
that had grabbed him. His first swing missed, but he caught the giant undead
creature on the backswing, his sword biting deep into the creature’s bloated,
rotting flesh. Fiendsbane flashed with radiant energy and Varien followed through
with a thunderous smite that boomed loudly in the rocky confines of the
cavern. The
oversized ghoul was sent thrashing backwards, his bloated body parting the
waves like the prow of a ship as he spun away, dragging Alec with him. The blast
of Varien’s smite weakened the makeshift wall to the northeast. Bits of driftwood
shifted in their tangled places and began to splash down into the waters. Siegfried
brandished Hack and Lightbringer and began to swing his weapons at the ghouls,
cutting one down to size, sending it stumbling backward across the algae-smeared
stone floor. Bob gripped
his holy symbol and cleared his throat. “Ding dong, you are on the side of
WRONG!” he prayed as he cast turn undead . There was a
chorus of howls as the undead creatures within hearing distance reacted to
Bob’s divine ability. The giant
ghoul released Alec and began to splash its way to the makeshift wall that
dammed in the northeast section of the cavern. Two of the lacedons burbled and
screeched as they dove beneath the waves, kicking and clawing at the waters –
one to the east, and one to the west. A single tear
of Evergold rolled down Bob’s cheek as he used his metamagic ability to quicken
a Toll the Dead spell. The sound
of a melancholy chime resonated in the cavern, arcing out to catch the third
lacedon who had withstood the cleric’s turning ability. The lacedon shuddered
as a wave of necrotic energy bowled him backwards into the water. Alec shook
his legs free from the writhing lacedon and drew his family sword. He felt a
red haze of rage descend over his field of vision as he tapped into a source of
primal ferocity within. Struggling to remain buoyant, he swung at the creature
and missed, but his second attack, augmented with a Greenflame blade, struck
true, separating the creature’s head from its body in a geyser of blood and
seafoam. He
confidently grabbed the first plank of the wooden bridge and hauled himself out
of the water. Birdwen
caught sight of the ghasts menacing Siegfried and homed in for a landing on a
free bit of ledge. Turning back into his Halfling form, he cast Ice Storm on
the undead creatures. In an instant, the corridor was filled with a raging
maelstrom of hail, sleet, and ice, freezing over any puddle of standing water
in the tunnel. The jagged swirl of sleet and hail ran red for a fleeting moment
as it turned the wounded ghast into chum. Siegfried
stood stock-still amid the flurry of sleet. “Wet and cold, small man? Really?” Erwen shrugged. As one of the
lacedons swam westward, Varien couldn’t help himself and gave it a savage riposte
with Fiendsbane. The slashing attack seemed to snap the undead creature out of
its cowering retreat, and it rounded on the paladin, slashing at him with its
claws. Varien
shuddered as he felt the creature’s claws find their way through his borrowed
armor. There was a creeping numbness that radiated out from the wound, and he
felt all feeling in his extremities retreat until he was unable to draw a
breath. Without a sound, he slipped beneath the waves. There was a
terrible stretching sound as the riptide ghoul began to change its shape,
flattening itself into a blue-tinted shadow of its former self, with bones and tendons
snapping loudly. It began to squeeze its considerable bulk into small spaces
between the bits of debris forming the northeasterly wall of the cavern. The
remaining ghasts, heedless of the icy blizzard around them, threw themselves at
Siegfried. The half-orc parried as best he could, taking a raking blow along
his arm that bled alarmingly, but he managed to fight off the creatures’
paralytic abilities. He popped another defensive shield spell to keep
the creatures at bay. He caught
sight of Varien going under amid a bloody cloud in the water, and quickly concluded
that he was going to have to get his very fine boots wet. “That shadowfelling
paladin!” he shouted, and dove off the edge of the ledge. His boarding school-perfect
dive form was marred slightly as his scarf snagged on an outcropping and caused
him to over-rotate, but he figured nobody would judge him so long as he
achieved his aim, which was to swim to Varien, grab the paralyzed paladin
firmly, and open a dimension door back up to the tunnel, putting him and
Varien on the opposite side of the undeads’ flank. Siegfried,
Varien, and five cubic feet of polluted seawater splashed into the tunnel, the
water immediately turning to ice in Erwen’s storm. Varien
coughed out a lungful of water as he could feel movement returning to his limbs. Bob aimed a
ray of frost at one of the lacedons, freezing it solid, and then misty
stepped his way across the cavern. Alec hauled
himself to his feet at the top of the bridge and unleashed the Sword of
Trevelyan on the first ghast he could see, knocking it off the ledge into the
choppy waters below. Erwen
dropped the ice storm spell and cast water walk on his
companions. Siegfried let
his scarf wring itself out before attacking the remaining ghast from behind
with Lightbringer, hitting it with a solid blow that crushed its vertebrae and
sent it sprawling towards the edge of the tunnel. It turned, bones cracking
through its rotten skin, and bared its teeth at the half-orc. Siegfried bared
his own teeth and brought Hack down with a vicious overhand swing that buried
the axe head deep in the ghast’s skull. Siegfried pushed the corpse forward,
arm outstretched, until it dangled off the cliff, and then he let gravity pull
the dead creature off his blade. It hit the water with a bloody splash. That left
one ghast snarling and snapping as it crawled up the cliff face. Alec peered
over the ledge, let off a fire bolt and followed it up with a shot from his
hand crossbow. Both bolts struck the creature in the head, and it stopped
squirming instantly, falling off the cliffside and bouncing off several rocks,
smearing blood on them before disappearing in the churning waters of the cavern. “Now then,”
Siegfried said as he prestidigitated the water off his clothing, “are we all breathing?
Have we all stopped bleeding? Then let’s press on.” He pointed towards the
stone door. “On it!”
Erwen chirped as he launched himself at the heavy door, pushing at it with all
the strength of a Halfling. His feet slipped on the slick stone floor, but he
put his head down and kept pressing on. “That big
boy is still out there,” Varien said. “I think he was missing a sandal on one
of his feet.” Siegfried
smiled. “If you’re a good boy, Varien, you’ll fight him again soon, but for now
we have good people to save, and evil people to avenge their deaths upon, if
necessary.” “You need
to stop talking like you’re better than us,” Varien said. Siegfried’s
smile hardened. “I’ll stop talking better when everyone else around me is
better.” Varien
sighed, walked up behind the Halfling, and put out his hand on the door. He
pushed with all his strength. There was a
slow grinding sound as the door began to move on hidden hinges, a watertight
seal making rubbery stretching sounds as it moved in its frame.
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“I did it!”
Erwen said excitedly, admiring his tiny biceps. The Halfling strolled through the
open door into the corridor beyond.