SESSION 45C: LONG REIGN OF THE SUN
October 31st, 2009
The 25th Day of Kadal in the 790th Year of the Seyrunian Dynasty
After several long minutes, the homunculi emerged from the cloud of black pollen that blotted out much of the hill. They waited the better part of half an hour for the last of the poisonous vapor to blow away.
Mounting the hill again, they easily reached its apex. Set into the ground at the center of the stone circle they found a large iron plug etched with bronze and set into the earth. The bronze etching detailed Alchestrin’s sigil. Around the perimeter of the plug was an inscription written in characters Ranthir identified as ancient Arathian. With the aid of a spell he was able to translate the passage:
Forevermore shall the sun be my foe.
From its light I pass forever.
The doors of my realm shall not open as long as its reign lasts.
“Does that mean what I think it means?” Tor asked.
“That we can’t get in unless it’s night?” Tee said. “Yeah. I think so.”
Indeed, the plug wouldn’t move. Ranthir tried bathing the area in a magical darkness and they experimented with other coverings to block the sunlight, but none of it worked. Elestra then tried to send her homunculi down into the ground, in an effort to circumvent the plug, but they weren’t able to clearly communicate with it or determine if it had found anything.
Eventually they hunted down a shovel from a gravekeeper a fair distance away. Returning to the hill they dug down around the edges of the iron plug, only to find that it was set into a smooth-faced iron shaft that also resisted their efforts to penetrate it.
Meanwhile, Ranthir was examining the magical guards laid upon the plug. Eventually he concluded that their initial suspicions had been correct: Only at night could the plug be opened. The spell was ancient, but still potent – only a powerful wish would remove the plug.
“So when we get the wish spell from Rehobath do we use it on the sealed door at the Banewarrens?” Elestra asked. “Or do we use it here?”
“I think we need to use it at the Banewarrens,” Tor said. “We know how to get through this plug. We just have to wait for dark. But there may not be any other way through the sealed door.”
“Except the key,” Tee said.
“A key that may not exist any more. Or that we may never find.”
They debated staying until nightfall and then going into the tomb. But there was trepidation about staying in the Necropolis after dark without proper preparations.
And then Tee realized that they couldn’t stay: The note they had discovered in the Temple of the Rat God describing some sort of shipment at Mahdoth’s Asylum was dated for midnight. They couldn’t afford to be trapped inside the Necropolis while that kind of known activity was happening.
“We were just deputized, after all.”
Running the Campaign: Agenda Pressure – Campaign Journal: Session 46A
In the Shadow of the Spire: Index
