CUT SCENE "This place is bad", thought Rutgar, a Goliath from far away in the Lortmil Mountains. As he led his troops through the vast swamp, searching for the entrance to the tomb, he reflected on how much he had lost to get to this point. All of his clan who had joined him were now long dead, but Olvenking Hazendel had recognised the urgency of this task and now Rutgar, admittedly not the best suited for leadership, was nearly at his goal with an army behind him. He would find the The Tomb of Horrors and defeat the lich, Acererak, who was the cause of the fear of the Stone Giant seers and the Firbolg dreamwalkers. Suddenly corpses burst out of the brakish waters of the swamp, clawing at his troops and pulling many of them under. Swords are out and fighting is underway. As the chaos breaks out around him Rutgar falls into a rage, rushing at targets and smashing them hard. Suddenly in front of him a rift opens in the air around him and he sees his enemy through the rift, Acererak himself. "Grrraaaargh", shouts Rutgar as he rushes towards the rift, swinging his axe and chopping at Acererak. However the rift is an illusion, as he connects with its surface he finds himself falling into darkness. END OF CUT SCENE You sit in the Tomb of Papazotl and consider your next move. There are still many places in this tomb that you have not explored, both in the levels above and below you. You look through your notes and consider the warning of the plaque in the stairwell: You feel that you have found most of the spaces that this plaque indicates, but the last line grabs you. You remember the devil mouth to the north of the stairwell on this level and the darkness that was in its mouth. You decide to examine it further. You head north. The walls and floor of this fifteen-foot-square room are cracked and carved with images of terrified humanoids falling. Set into the middle of the floor is a stone bas-relief of a bearded devil face, painted green. Forlorn cries echo from the black void of its gaping maw. bÚrp grabs Yakka and shoves him in the void, then brings him back out. Seeing that Yakka is not disintegrated, bÚrp climbs into the void and decends down a cylindrical shaft before opening up in the ceiling of another room. bÚrp sticks his head out of the darkness and sees four torches illuminating stone sphinxes crouched in the corners of this fifteen-foot-high room. The torches cast flickering light across hieroglyphs carved into the tiled floor. At the center of the room, a gold-inlaid funeral barge stands atop a three-foot-tall stone dais. Resting on the deck of the barge is a small golden sarcophagus decorated with horned rabbits. A dark shaft opens in the ceiling directly above the barge, while to the south, a corridor is visible through a set of fangs carved into the wall. The skeleton of a dwarf sprawls on the floor east of the barge, clad in a tattered yellow turban and dusty chain mail, and clutching a bronze shield. b'Urp calls the all clear and a rope is lowered allowing you all to come down onto the stone dias. Grizz cast's 'detect traps' and suddenly the entire floor lights up - every tile seems to be trapped in some way. However since you are all on the dias you appear to be safe. Javelin spends some time trying to open the sarcophagus with no luck. You are obviously missing some clue. You climb back up the rope, but Trayzeal lags behind. He can hear Papazotl in his head urging him to do whatever he wants, and he suspects the skeleton might hold a clue. Grizz and bÚrp watch in horror as Trayzeal takes a step off the dias on starts walking towards the skeleton. The sphinx statues yawn and masses of locusts come pouring out, swarming around Trayzeal. Both bÚrp and Grizz find themselves badly hurt and start climbing the rope to get away, but as they leave they see the bones of Trayzeal clatter on the ground. His flesh has been totally stripped from him and he is dead. You climb up and take a moment to reflect on the horror of the scene below. But a moment is all you can take, you knew this place was deadly and Trayzeal stepped on that tile despite knowing it was a trap. You return to the central staircase and ascend a level. You find yourself back near the entrance to the tomb, and recognise the demon mouth that was the first thing to greet you in this place. You explore passages that you had not been down before. You enter a corridor to the north. Carved birds soar across the walls of this corridor. Blocking the passage near its northern end is a large adamantine propeller with five sharp blades. You step forward, but the blades begin rotating with a deep thrumming noise. You step back and they slow to a halt. bÚrp, with his sticky grung hands and feet climbs along the wall instead and flings himself between the blades, pulling himself through to the ceiling on the other side without a scratch. A deep pit opens up at the entrance to this tomb, with a stone sarcophagus resting at the bottom. A snarling monkey-like creature decorates the sarcophagus lid. Beyond the pit, three treasure chests sit on stone daises. The chest on the left is carved of black onyx, the middle chest is made of rusty iron, and the chest on the right is cast of silver and glistening with frost. bÚrp remembers some of what Orvex taught him and recognises this place as Wongo's tomb. He remembers that Wongo was known for being bloodthirsty and psychopathic so decides that this place is not worth exploring. He returns to the group. You head east instead. A giant stone skull crusted with moss juts out from the end of the passageway. A flame flickers within each of its eye sockets, and a view into a chamber beyond can be seen through its open jaws. Grizz sends his lizard through the jaws to explore and as he does so, one of the flames flickers out. "I say, chaps", says the lizard, "this is certainly an interesting place. I shall elucidate you on what I perceive. There are many skulls in the walls, but they don't look at all as if they might have anything left to eat on them. A large stone box in in the middle of the room, and on it I see a horrid snake carving. Evil, nasty things. Behind I see a clear box with a small skull on it. What? I don't know? Sorry young lady, where are you?" He seems to have started a conversation with someone in the room "Why you are in this room of course young lady. Well how would I possibly know that? Have you tried opening your eyes? What is his name, possibly he is one of these lovely chaps who are travelling with me? Grizz calls the lizard back. As it returns the other flame in the skulls eye is snuffed out. bÚrp looks carefully at the skull and finds that the jaw is hinged. He puts another shortsword between the teeth by one of the hinges and then passes through the jaws. The jaws shudder as they try to close, but this time the shortsword trick has worked and the trap is defeated. As bÚrp enters the room his mind is assailed by questions from a young girl who sounds afraid, lost and blind. Remembering the warning on the obelisk outside "Speak no truth to the doomed child" he says nothing instead. He finds it easy to open the tomb and in it he finds a bundle of cloth. The girl is getting more insistent that he reply. He opens the cloth and sees a staff carved in the shape of a staff. He suspects that this is the tomb of Moa and remembers Moa as being kind and honest. He decides to grab the staff, but before he gets an opportunity the girl screams "WHY WON'T YOU HELP ME?" The voice shrieks in horror as the skull's eye sockets flare with green flame. With a shattering crash, the crystal box explodes and the skull levitates into the air. A skittering sound can also be heard as swarms of undead spiders come out of holes in the walls and start attacking bÚrp and Besh (who is also in the room). Rutgar feels like he has been falling through the darkness for a long time. Possibly many years, but time does not seem to count in this place. Suddenly a light appears ahead and he finds himself plummeting towards and into it. He stumbles into a passageway. It is stone, but filled with vegetation and growth. He hears shouting off to his left and sees a human and a drow shouting at something further away. He pulls up his axes and runs towards them. "Are you friend or foe?" Rutgar shouts at Javelin who is looking at the battle unfold in the tomb of Moa. Javelin starts and looks at this Goliath who has come out of nowhere. "That remains to be seen", Javelin replies turning back to the battle. "I am hear to defeat Acererak" shouts Rutgar, "Where is he?". "We are hunting for him too", replies Javelin, and turns away again, turning towards the battle where bÚrp and Besh and fighting swarms of spiders and a floating skull. Grizz has also joined the battle. Javelin runs off to join the fray. Tlad suddenly finds himself facing this axe wielding giant with Javelin running away. He summons the maximum power he can and unleashes a crackling bolt of lightning at Rutgar. It misses him but Rutgar immediately falls into a rage, running up to the Drow and smashing him with the axe, almost killing him outright. Grizz sees what is happening and transforms to a giant octopus, grabbing Rutgar with one of his tentacles and holding him away from the Drow. Tlad prepares to cast another spell, but Javelin holds his hands up and yells "STOP, he is on the same mission as us". Tlad does not understand the words, but he recognises the gesture so lowers his hands. Meanwhile Rutgar has been hacking away at the Octopus tentacle. Octopus blood flies everywhere and Grizz feels himself weakening. He lets go and returns to his goat/firbolg form. Rutgar sees this Firbolg, and is confused. He knows firbolgs as guardians of nature. He turns and sees Tlad submitting and Javelin also not threatening. He ceases his attack. Meanwhile, bÚrp and Besh and managed to defeat the skulls and the spider. bÚrp grabs the staff. Green smoke billows from the staff, coiling around him like a serpent. A sibilant voice whispers in his ear: "Let me help you! I promise to be good." b''Urp allows this spirit to inhabit him, it seems a good fit. As the group meet Rutgar, bÚrp looks around the room seeing if he can discover a secret door. To his surprise, he finds one. You all decide to stop for a rest before opening the door.
