Pizazz's Ravenloft and Beyond

"Agree," for hart to say which time nodded Lionel, dimming the sword's light. "That room back with a young man statue can not be the gave of Strahd's mother. If she is not among those crypts around - it's further down."

"Can we send a skeleton to the stairs?"

"Meepo say check rest doors here first." Meepo says as he nods to the other doors. "No want to miss mother crypt if here..." He would help look at the rest of the inscriptions, then would agree to send a skeleton down the stairs first if nothing was found here.

"Oh, did the ghost we met upstairs tell us his name? We should look out for him in case he's down here too."

Now that someone else has suggested it, Mordekai's building curiosity has him excited to read the rest of the inscriptions. 

     “I want to say Pinwick but I’m pretty sure that’s wrong,” Ketch says with a grumble.  “But yes, quick look at each, why not? Better than having to double back... and if something else jumps out, lest it’s not behind us when it does...”

"Then may be we have to split up to cover more ground? Just do not open more doors."  Lionel stepped towards crypt 3 to read the plate there.

Ulthan continues to quietly open doors, there's bound to be some magical things we can use in here... That and fighting things one at a time seems way better than getting attacked by all 30 crypt things...

Lionel heads to the next door, #3, and reads the plate above the crypt door : "Lady Isolde Yunk (Isolde the Incredible): Purveyor of antiques and imports".  

Ketch, Mordekai, and Meepo walk over to #5 to read the plate above the door: "Artank Swilovich: Friend and member of the Barovian Wine Distillers Guild"

Ulthan walks away over to #10 and looks up at the engraving: "Sir Leonid Krushkin (Sir Lee the Crusher): Bigger than life, he loved his jewelry".  Everyone hears Ulthan pull the crypt door open.  Inside, an oversized skeleton draped in jewelry and rags lies atop an elongated marble slab in the center of the crypt. Leaning against the slab is a bloodstained maul strung with cobwebs.

Lionel continues over to #8, the next closest, and reads, "Duchess Dorfniya Dilisnya". 

While Ketch, Mordekai, and Meepo see a crypt in the east wall, with "Saint Markovia: Dead for all time" written over it. 

Do you keep walking around reading doors?  Ulthan, do you inspect in the crypt, or just go to the next nearest one?

"Oh, for gods sake, who is opening doors?!" Lionel returned to see Ulthan trying to awake the whole morgue for fun. It seemed as "at least do not touch anything" would only encourage the ranger, so he did not add it watching Ulthan's grave-robbing escapade in silence. For the first time the paladin thought of the obvious - the guy probably had a Curse of Defiance on him or something along that line. The thought was worth of investigation later.

"Ulthan, I do not think we should open every door. That way we guarantee more traps. However..."

Mordekai tries to get Lionel's attention as well. 

"... this one was a Saint. If any are worth the risk of opening, this one might be? I don't expect what we're looking for to be in here, but if there is anything like a holy relic of any kind, it can only help us? What do you say Lionel, just one more?"

He turns to Ulthan again "...and then we really should stop."

     "The one ghost we found here so far wasn't all that difficult to handle," Ketch points out.  "I'm half curious about what Dead for All Time means, myself.  And if I was trying to hide a body, putting it under the wrong name would be one way..."

     But Ketch shrugs and follows Lionel's lead.  He's not that invested one way or the other on this.

"Strahd is too confident to hide hide something like that." Lionel was not absolutely sure about that statement but one thing he knew: "we can look of course if you think it's wise, but taking something from the grave..." He did not finish the sentence - Meepo's skeleton passed by. It seemed, the group was well pass the point of dignifying death. Lionel sighed. "Let's be quick about it".

     "The dead have no claims of ownership...  Or the first person owned all of the land and everyone after is repeatedly stealing from them," Ketch responds.  "I'm not so orc-is as to say strength determines ownership, nor so crass as to want to defile a respected grave.  But survival is more important than niceties."

With everyone seemingly agreeing, they make their way a few feet over to the crypt against the east wall. There's a short ten foot hallway leading to the door, but before you can approach the door Lionel says, "What's with the holes in the wall?"  Indeed, there do appear to be small holes in the wall on the side of the hallway leading to the crypt entrance. 

     "Trap?  Perhaps we back off and get the skeletons to walk around a bit carrying something heavy?" Ketch suggests

Well the maul seems like a good weapon around here with all the undead, so Ulthan takes that with him mumbling something about bad idea.

(How heavy are the doors of the crypts? We've already found at least two set aside, I think. They're stone, right? I'm guessing stone doors to crypts are unfeasibly heavy to carry like a riot shield, even with several people helping?)

The stone doors weigh 2000 lbs.  So, if you have enough strength as a group you could carry it around, but, as a riot shield...um.....  

Ulthan grabs the large maul from the crypt.  Nothing untowards happens. He know has a blood stained Maul. 

"Meepo think bad idea." Meepo points out. "Reading no said find saint, but find mother..." He points out. "Meepo no think mother saint..." He and his skeletons do not go towards the crypt, they stay back.

     "Does not every child think their mother a saint?" Ketch asks.  

     Without going into the hallway, Ketch will get as good a look at the holes as he can.  He'll even grab one of the torches from one of the skeletons and wave it into the hallways to try to illuminate the holes.  Are they on both sides of the hall?  All at one height or various heights?  Can he guess at all if they are to release some kind of gas or to shoot some kind of projectile?  (Is there markings on opposite wall from previous ious firings, for example?). 

     We could drag one of the corpses and throw it into the hall, Ketch thinks to himself but eyes Lionel and decides the dwarf would be unlikely to allow such a thing.

     Ketch spits.  "Whatever," he says.  He's not particularly invested in this one way or another. "We can search rest of the area for "the saint" and come back here if we turn up empty..."

(By the "hallway" do we mean stairs down on the east wall? Or one of the crypt along it?)

"Or we can ignore those obviously trapped crypts and go further down?" These people here - whoever they were - did not sound all that important. Probably the young man in a special sarcophagus, but not those in the crypt. Very unlikely Strahd just stuffed his mother in "just another crypt" in here.

(If the holes are indeed on the wall along the stairs, then repeats the suggestion for one of the skeleton to walk along the wall and see what happens)