Above & Below

"I don't know if I can ever rid myself of my anger," Effort says to Promise, as she bends down and assists him with the runes.  "It is always there.  It's the only reason I am alive today.  Without my anger, I would be a corpse on the steps of the temple in Gorta.  After Namar attacked us, I got out, but barely.  I was bleeding out on the steps there, Promise.  I should have died.  I asked the priests for help, and they laughed at me.  Laughed, and told me not to stain their precious temple with my dirty blood," she hisses, eyes narrowing.  "If not for this power you spoke to, I would be nothing more but another body in that war.  But I came back, to that very temple, to the very priests who spit on my will to live, and I took everything I could from them, with a new face, and using my own two hands."  She stills.  "This is something I know I can do.  I can make life better for us.  For all of us.  If they can respect me so while I wear their face, then I know I am not the worthless trash they claim us to be.  I will change this world," she swears.  "Or I will die trying."

Kurama, you only find anything of value on the ghoulish corpse that was formerly Wendel. He carries with him a small pouch with 20 gold pieces in it. He also had a map of Whitehold that showed some of the other hallways - it looks incomplete, but consists of whatever these cultists knew.

After a few hours of carving, Promise chips away the final few pieces of rock to complete the rune. As he does, there's a strange pulse of arcane energy throughout the caverns. Brask, you even feel a little shiver down your spine. Effort and Kurama, you feel it more intensely. It doesn't manifest itself in any particular way - you just feel it. 

"Anyone that has any bit of ability in the arcane, feel free to lend your power here. I've tried this before and not only is it rather draining...the results are unpredictable." Promise walks to the center of the runes. "But I think now we will be able to open up a passage to one of these other worlds. Which one...I'm a bit less sure of. And what to do when we get there? Ha..."

He closes his eyes, stretching his hands toward the ground as he gently speaks some incantation. A few moments pass, and a few more, and suddenly the runes begin to glow. A pale blue at first, and then a deeper shade that gets brighter and brighter. 

Everyone, roll a pure d20 luck check. Best 2 out of 3 wins it - 1-10 is one result, 11-20 is another. 

(We're splitting loot 5 ways right?  So everyone gets 4gp)

Luck Roll (fingers crossed!): 18

Luck Roll: 1

whoops XD

Haha, it's not necessarily better or worse...although it may seem that way at first. It's all riding on Brask's roll! 

short rest die: 6

With "Brask" out sick for a few days, someone else can make his luck roll. First come, first served. Then we'll move on. And be sure to short rest if you need to (I think most people do). 

Burik short rest: 10

Last HD: 4

(And I guess I'll do the last luck roll (Closes eyes really tightly)): 9

You can feel the energy around you start to swell and spin, and before you know it, you can see it too. The room shakes and bits of stone start to fall from the ceiling. A rainbow of bright light swirls around you...and then each of the colors begins to fade. They grow paler and paler until all you can see is a whirlwind of various shades of gray. Then the room seems to erupt, sending darkness spilling out of the floor where the runes once were. Boulders and bits of the mountain crash into one another as you all lose your footing and begin to float.

An instant later, it seems like that was all a dream. You have trouble even remembering how long ago it was. As you regain your bearings, you look around you. You are in a large semicircular stone area (think amphitheater) with massive walls going up three sides. Hundreds of feet high. The fourth, open side is the base of an immense stairwell. It travels upward almost as far as you can see, but at the very top, it seems to open up into the outside. The sky above it is a pale gray, and you can see dense clouds slowly moving their way across the sky.

Pip slowly stands up and checks to be sure he still has his weapons and gear. He then looks around, and his eyes grow a bit wider. "Um...eh...where are the others?" The rest of you turn to see that Burik and Promise are nowhere to be found. It's just the four of you. 

"Fascinating!"  Kurama exclaims as the group finds solid footing after "floating" for an indeterminate amount of time.  As he reached for one of his notebook, his joy was soon dashed as he heard Pip mention those that were missing.  Looking around the area, Kurama searches for any trace of their presence.

Perception?: 26

You don't see or sense anything related to Burik or Promise. It's just the four of you now, at the bottom of this stairwell. You do get a sense, however, that this area you're in seems about as deep as you might have traveled down into the depths of Whitehold. The opening at the top of the massive stairs is probably about how deep you were into the mountain when you traveled here. 

Kurama frowns as he's unable to find any trace of Burik or Promise.  "This is troubling..." he says out loud to no one in particular.  Turning the others he says, "I'm not sure what we're supposed to do now.  Promise never told us exactly what we were meant to find here."  He then pauses as he begins to pace back and forth to look around the amphitheater-like space before continuing.  "And I'm exactly sure where here is?  Are we "Above" or "Below"?  Or something else entirely?"  While normally relatively calm, his distress at their current situation is written clearly across his face.  

"Wherever we are, we gain nothing by standing around here.  I feel like a rat in a cage," Effort says warily.  Pulling Cadmael out of his pocket dimension, she sends him towards the stairwell.  Pulling out a browncap mushroom, she munches on it while mentally giving her familiar his orders.

Browncap Hit Die: 1x 6

What do you see? she asks the owl.  Come back immediately once you have looked.

As Cadmael is searching, Effort reaches out with her sense to see if she can get a feel for the flow of energy from their surroundings.  "Aid me, my patron," she whispers as she does so.

Arcana: 15 + Guidance 3

Effort, you feel a pure arcane energy still swirling around you from the journey to this realm. It seems to be slowly waning as you stand there, perhaps just an echo of the powerful magic that sent you here. You also feel a darker magic. It's more subtle, but it seems to be everywhere, permeating this entire area.

Cadmael flies up the stairwell. Incredibly tall, he can almost reach the top before reaching his limits. Dark clouds everywhere, he thinks. Slowly rolling across the sky. It appears that we're still in the mountains...or some mountains, anyway. I can see a few tall peaks to the west.

"Well, wherever we are," Pip says nervously, "it's still cold."

"Shouldn't we wait at least a little bit though to see if they pop up before leaving" Kurama asks.  "Maybe it just took them a little longer to get her somehow..." he adds though there's not much confidence in his words.

Nope, says Brask, stomping off towards the stairs.  Nothing good comes from waiting around.  We could leave them a message though.

As he walks, Brask looks for a loose stone he could use to scratch a message into the floor:  Investigation 13

Brask easily finds a loose stone that could scratch a message into the floor. 

Letting the tendrils of energy fade around her, Effort opens her eyes.  "... I think, if we have traversed worlds, we have gone to a plane of evil.  The residual energy here is tainted... it would not be wise to stay long here, particularly if it is localized to this building."

She points at the staircase, allowing Cadmael to land on her arm as he returns.  "We are in the mountains still, hence the cold.  There are taller peaks to the west of us.  Let us go outside and see if we are in some alternate version of Whitehold."

Despite her words, she crosses her arms and waits patiently for Brask to finish his message.

Brask draws a large arrow, and scrawls the words:  This way, dumbasses. 

Happy with his work, he sets off up the stairs towards the exit.

You begin to climb the massive staircase. As you ascend, the frosty air begins to bite at any exposed skin...although admittedly the fresh air is a little bit nice after your journey through the depths of Whitehold. When you reach the top, you see the stairs were simply set in a giant, square-shaped hole that descended into the rocky structure you appeared in. 

Everyone, give me a perception check.