Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer Creatures
Frozen Sick
D&D Beyond Basic Rules
Basic Rules (2014)
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Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer CreaturesFrozen SickD&D Beyond Basic RulesBasic Rules (2014)Sign in to view your library & saved favorites.
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"Then lead on." Brocc says with a nod. "Let's see about finding this crystal with the runes. It is somewhere in these caverns ahead of us after all, just need to get down there and start kicking over stones until we find the thing."
He recalls that a number of Dark Elves supposedly worship Slangg but knows they have a different name for the God of Lies. He recalls also some talk of Demon Prince Myurr being worshipped by them. Myurr attempted to rule over the entire world back in 284 AC and he knows he rules from a palace on The Plane of Rust....it is unlikely anything he is involved in is good.
Down the group wended past a fortune in gold and thousands of scintillating crystals of varied hues......on occasion they would find areas where the stone had been worked but more often the mineral walls were pristine and unmarred.
After almost forty minutes they reached the floor of the cavern though still had to pick their way through thousands of crystal outcrops.
Every step echoed in the darkness, attenuated along the crystal growths to reverberate up the walls of the vast cave.
Bones began to be interspersed with the crystals and many of them were marred with dark stains.....
In the distance only barely visible in the reflected light was a great spur of crystal set in the floor of the cavern, some 30m in height and refracting light from all the other crystals within the cavern.....
Herman stops, wondering aloud at the ominous beauty in front of him
"Looks like we found it." Brocc says with a grunt of amazement. He has his spider-mount move forward so he can get a closer look at the large crystal outcropping ahead.
Zeltheris looks around curiously, "I wonder what effect a good shatter would have here."
Approaching, Brocc begins to note a number of strange runic markings engraved into the crystals surrounding the outcrop....
Brocc stops to study the strange runes... What roll do you want for that?
( No need for a roll.)
Brocc notes that they are mostly a variant form of Elvish and possibly Demonic, based on some of the darker tomes he has perused in his studies.
The Elvish portion at least seems to reflect concepts of restraint, suppression and binding........based on his arcane knowledge these symbols should be humming with arcane power...they are not.
Brocc has his spider walk the entire way around the crystal outcropping. He studies the runes to see if something has caused them to no longer function...
Investigation: 9 Guidance: 4
Once he notices something he uses his arcane knowledge to understand what he is seeing.
Arcana: 6 Guidance: 3
Garet hangs back leaving the knowledge of the arcane and eldritch to those with the aptitude and experience in those areas.
"Feels like a containment area or prison of some type and if it was to contain some spawn of Myurr, then this may explains a distinct lack of living dwarves." Garet mutters almost to himself he definitely had a bad feeling about this place.
Zeltheris stands a little back, offering what knowledge he has to help the others with their investigations.
Banzo determines that the placement of the runes was quite particular and a number of them are no longer in place or a re missing altogether. But there is definitely something still here.
( Help action from Zeltheris on Arcane- 18 )
Broccs examination of the energies here indicates that the binding is completely gone.......and yet there is a very strong source of arcane energies here....
All of those gathered note a large number of broken bones scattered around the base of the crystal.....
"Well, I'd say someone set whatever this thing was to hold free." Brocc comments as he joins the others. "Not sure if we could remake the prison, or if that is simply not possible any longer." He frowns as he nods to the bones. "I'd say whatever was held here was what caused all of the damage, but where is the thing at now?" He glances around them. "We've been here for a bit now, and nothing has attacked us, so, did it go elsewhere or is it just sleeping?"
"or it is in some way inside the crystal, look"
Herman indicates the bone at the base of the crystal (without getting near them)
Zeltheris looks over the crystal for anything that looks like an entrance, "I don't know that whatever was in here was physical in nature. Perhaps it possessed something else in the area? Either way, trapping it again could be very difficult."
As Banzo circles the outcrop there is a sudden subtle shift in the air and the outcropping suddenly, impossibly, sinks rapidly through the cavern floor without disrupting a single crystal.
A high pitched vibration begins to hum throughout the entire cavern....and then the outcropping is back, flowing up out of the ground it glares down at them from rough...a barely formed face over 30 metres high with an immense grinding maw all formed of cloudy crystal.....enormous limbs ending in rending crystal claws flowed out from the outcropping...
The roar reverberated throughout the cavern as it moved forward....
(
Oh....its Initiative time.
Feel free to make checks if you want to try and determine whats happening.
Pellucidas: Initiative- 7)
Zeltheris initiative: 7
Arcana/Religion/History all the same modifier: 15
Brocc initiative: 13
Arcana: 9
Perception/investigation: 8 (Mod is the same for either.)
Guidance: 2
Herman init 17