From the diary of Vida Pankhurst
And I was in the darkness, so darkness I became…
Today Fillian seemed especially irate over his missing elf friends and so pulled out a scroll of finding that he had been saving. He used this and ascertained that his mistress is being held back where the water temple was. We decided to head back that way, near where we killed the Owlbear a few days ago. On the way we entered a room that had been trashed and left derelict long ago. However, we failed to see a horde of horrible bug creatures with protruding beaks by the ceiling that swarmed us and attempted to suck the blood from our warm bodies. Fillian and I both managed to knock a few out with sleep spells but they kept coming faster than even Ugg could crush them.
Retreating out of the room we found the way back up to the main chamber and we followed Fillian back to where we killed the owlbear. To make matters more complicated for the poor wizard he detected his mistress was being moved; most likely for sacrifice. As we approached the general area he sensed she was now being moved near the fire temple (which is guarded by that hyrda creature that is beyond our current abilities to defeat). Consequently, we decided to investigate a secret door we discovered on route instead. It opened to reveal a seemingly unused stairway leading down into a dark chamber infested with fungi and mushrooms of all descriptions.
Joe and Sameson exhibited their usual bravado and opted to explore down the stairs first. Of course, it was not long till the sound of trouble brewing was heard by the rest of us at the top of the stairs. I followed them down into the chaos to see Joe trying to restrain Sameson, who he was convinced had gone insane. Looking across the room I saw the true cause of any insanity. To those ungifted with the ability to see through such a deception was an old, rather harmless looking, lady. I saw a creature with the head and upper body of a woman but the lower body of a lion. A Lamia!
The creature tried her tricks on us but to no avail and Fillian hurled fire at the beast woman. Seeing that the creature was relatively unscathed by this attack I cast wrack on her. This time she failed to resist and the creature writhed and screeched in agony as the pain overwhelmed her. My companions then finished the pitiful creature before she could do any more harm to us and the spell on Joe ceased to be.
At this point my companions decided this was perhaps not the best route for us to proceed in and we backtracked a little. This most blessed and cursed temple is confusing to us, and I must confess to being thoroughly lost in what lies where. Fillian however seemed to know exactly the way to go to rescue his beloved elven mistress and so we followed him on a different route. We encountered another group of bugbears, which we routinely slaughtered. Relieving them of any useful items we proceeded on through a concealed door into to a huge ornate chamber decorated with a plethora of carvings and sculptures resembling sea creatures. In its centre stood a huge fountain. Behind the fountain stood a mighty construction... Even these fools that stagger blindly within the darkness of this mighty temple gleaned that this must be the entrance to the water temple.
Sameson decided to investigate the fountain and I accompanied him; mostly because I find it amusing to jog his memory of what happened last time this body and his stood alone together before an altar to a dark god. Within the murky depths of the fountain shiny, precious items glowed. Powerless to resist their appeal, Sameson reached into the fountain and took one of the items. Immediately the construct behind the fountain began to move and lumber towards us. This was no mere statue, but a powerful golem known as a juggernaut. We did the only logical thing to do against such an apparition and fled the chamber; Sameson promptly dropping the item back into the fountain.
Moving expediently down the corridor we put as much distance as possible between ourselves and the juggernaut. We only stopped when we were sure the golem pursued us no longer. Wondering what to do next we took a different door from the bugbear chamber and encountered an ogre in an adjacent room. The creature seemed too lazy to attack us and devoid of the usual belligerence of its race. It simply shouted at us to go away and let it sleep. My companions agreed with me that this would be an ideal subject to torture and use to gain information about the temple. Besting it in combat (although one gets the impression the ogre was so lazy that it barely even tried to win) we bound the ogre and I set about tormenting the beast.
In the room we found a teddy bear that the ogre clearly had a mawkish attachment too. I broke the ogre by making him watch me cut his beloved toy to pieces. He told us through his blubbering that the prisoners we sought were to be found nearby and we used him as a guide to show us exactly where. It led us north and up a stairwell and we found another exit ending in a corridor. The ogre continued to lead us through a pair of crossroads and into a large room in which a statue of a large bull headed humanoid sat upon a throne.
Being understandable dubious about such statues we forced the ogre to go in first. Our caution paid well because the bull-headed creature was not a statue at all but a minotaur that promptly stood and charged the ogre; it ripped the ogre’s guts out with it’s a horns and then hurled the carcass aside, like the ogre was no more than a teddy bear itself.
Ugg and Sameson charged and despite taking heavy wounds from the beast’s great axe succeeded in killing it. Whilst my companions licked their wounds I tried to make use of the creature’s soul, but it resisted and was whisked off to whatever bestial god minotaurs pay homage to.
Forced to progress without the ogre we travelled on through an assortment of strange empty rooms. One clearly an armoury of some sort, another with water trickling down its walls and finally a massive hall littered with skeletons that seemed to have hosted one off the bigger battles when the temple was torn down years ago. Finally we reached our desired destination by following the ogre’s directions. Knowing the cell to be close we debated about the best course of action. The ogre had told us, under duress, that an ogre guarded the prisoners.
Joe decided to disguise himself in water temple robes and claim that he was here to bring the elf missionary for her execution whilst the rest of us waited in the corridor. This plan worked and she was turned over to him alive, if malnourished. Joe reported that another elf prisoner was also held inside guarded by the ogre and a bugbear jailer but this one, a man, was a prisoner of the fire temple. As such they would not believe that Joe was of both temples and so I donned the fire temple robes and said I would try to free the elf. Of course they believed me and turned him over to me unconscious. I must confess at the sight of the helpless creature I was tempted to rid the world of another sanctimonious elf; however I feel my companions would have taken umbrage at this, so I stayed my hand.
We took the elves to the temple entrance and the male one, whose name was Cambient or something equally as poncy, took the feather from Samson’s hair and used it to call griffins to bear him and the other elf off to freedom, without so much as a thank you. So typical of elves to make such an ostentatious show of their powers. Anyway, as exhausted as we were we decided to journey back to Hommlet to gather supplies and so I write this on our way back and ready to undertake my usual night time struggle.
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