3.5e Batman Campaign (2.0)

[Molan]

The fireball from Oracle's wand lit up the forest in a bright flash of orange light. The angry fey woman shrieked in anger; she was quick, and managed to avoid the worst of the blast, but the wand was high powered, and the monster was still badly burned.

From across the marsh, the second "woman" appeared, her skin looking like the bark of a tree and her hair a long green, leafy mane. She rushed towards the party rapidly but was more than fifty feet away, and had to maneuver wide around the "giant" in the center of the clearing. It was plain something was off about her.

Spoiler: OOC

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Will save to pierce the second assailant's illusion. Kate's turn.

[Feathersnow]

The Armored woman activates her defensive powers, and stands ready to defend her friends from the giants.

[Molan]

As he observed, Damien saw the illusion shrouding the second woman slip away; the creature seemed to be a cross between a stunningly attractive human woman and a sleek lion. It looked human from the waist up, with the body of a lion below that. Whatever or whoever she was, she was angry, bounding toward the party in great leaps.

As she charged, Robyn rushed to Oracle's aid, stabbing the first woman. She shrieked in agony, now burned and bleeding, and began to withdraw, running in the opposite direction. She didn't look mortally wounded, but she was hurt enough that she seemed to have lost her appetite for standing pat and fighting fair.

Spoiler: OOC

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It's Damien's turn. Disguise effect still shrouds lionwoman from everyone else except Damien unless Jbe rolls against her.

[MrAbdiel]

"Hyah!" As Robyn and Kate join the melee and the tide turns, Damien animates with delight and the emergence of his now well featured glee for overwhelming an enemy. He springs into pursuit and slices viciously at the woman's back as she goes, before breaking off towards the second attacker to meet her mid-field. Arms held stiffly to either side as his legs drive him onward, he revolves the looted blade in with the flourish of one wrist, and barks out in snide challenge:

"You avoid the green elves, but you try your tricks on US? You're DEAD, lady! You and your friend are DEAD!"

A familiar pinch of flash powder, and he vanishes mid charge; with the only proof he is still in the world being the raking profile of the swordsword carving at the lion-woman's flank.

Spoiler: OOC Actions!

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Attack of Opportunity on Hag Lady: (1d20+10)[20], -2 because it's sized for a medium creature,+2 if flanking with Kate or Robyn. For up to (1d6-2)[4] minimum 1, and damage and, if it's Shock like I think, (1d6)[1].

Then the turn begins! I'm assuming Lion-Lady is close enough to charge. Then charge! Swift action to turn invisible, then the charge attack at, wisely this time, full Expertise, versus FlatFooted 'cuz I'm ninjing. (1d20+5)[15], -2 for the weapon's size, +2 for charging. (Edit: OH! And +2 because invisible!) For up to... [ROLL]1d6-2[ROLL] Minimum 1, maybe (1d6)[5] electric, and (3d6)[8] sudden strike.

Booyah!

[Molan]

Damien lashed out with the crackling, unidentified short sword as the fey woman attempted to escape, releasing a jolt of magical electricity and wounding her further. He tried to follow up a second time but his sword seemed to scrape off of her skin -- it was much tougher than he'd initially realized.

The woman turned towards him and glared, a malevolent hatred beaming from her green eyes.

Spoiler: OOC

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Spoiler, then Oracle, then the charging second woman, then Robyn then Kate.

[JbeJ275]

"Don't make us keep at this. You're not going to like where it ends up!"

As Oracle's saying this she slowly makes her way to her feet and moves behind the rest of the group, still panting with the effort of moving her body with such diminished strength. But when the charging woman first makes to close with one of her group she conjures a stinging glob of acid and hurls it at the monstrous face.

Spoiler: Rolls

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(1d20+6)[12] VS Touch AC
for (1d3)[3]+(2d6)[7] damage.

[Molan]

The acid blob hurled past the charging woman and she flew towards Kate, lashing out with a long pair of claws. The claws failed to penetrate her armor however, yielding only sparks.

Spoiler: OOC

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Kate's turn.

[Feathersnow]

Kate takes a step back and swings with her poleaxe!

Spoiler: crunch

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(1d20+11)[17] to hit
(2d6+4)[15] damage if successful

[Molan]

Kate's halberd slashed down on the new attacker and landed true, ripping a great rent into her flank. Her physical form seemed to shimmer as she shrieked in pain; she was clearly still masked by some kind of illusion.

Robyn responded in kind, hurtling in to fight at Kate's side, stabbing hard into the second woman. She howled again, clutching her wounds in apparent agony.

Spoiler: OOC

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Damn Robyn's doing work. Good first outting. Okay, Damien's up.

[MrAbdiel]

Spoiler: Attack of Opportunity on Lady2!

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(1d20+5)[13] vs Flatfooted AC of the enemy. -2 AC for them because they're charging! If it hits, (1d6-2)[-1] minimum 1, plus (1d6)[6] shock and (3d6)[9] Sudden Strike.

Damien makes a spiteful lash at the passing monstrosity, before turning back to charge her exposed flank! As he does, he fades back into view; but he does cause the team to surround the enemy.

Spoiler: Charge on Lady2!

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(1d20+7)[14] vs Flatfooted AC of the enemy. -2 AC for them because they're charging too! If it hits, (1d6-2)[3] minimum 1, plus (1d6)[6] shock. AC is 24 for the next round, and Damien is visible.

[Molan]

Damien lashes out at the fey monster, but his attacks found no purchase. Despite the illusion she was draped in, her hide was much too thick; even flanking her, he was out of his weight class.

Spoiler: OOC

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sorry guys long day. JBE's turn.

[JbeJ275]

“Leave Damn you! We have no time for your games!” Shouts Oracle, this her hands returning to the wand of fireballs and calling another eruption of fire on the one that was still fighting them.

[Molan]

The second woman howled in rage; Barbara's fireball lit up the dark forest in a nimbus of flame, washing over half of her body. The vicious fey had clearly been unprepared, and the wand Oracle was carrying was extremely high powered. She shrieked and ran off the direction she'd come, trailing smoke and embers.

Spoiler: OOC

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Dayum that was one way to end a fight, lol. Incidentally JBE are you keeping track of your remaining charges or am I? Just checking. In any case that sapped the fight out of them, they're on the run. Question becomes whether you guys want to pursue or not.

[MrAbdiel]

Damien spitefully slashes at the retreating enemy...

Spoiler: Attack of Spiteful-tunity!

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(1d20+8)[14] for (1d6-1)[1] minimum 1 and (1d6)[2] zappy zap damage.

...But after a few autonomic steps, does not pursue. These interfering fey, after all, aren't the target - and are clearly very dangerous. He retracts the Rod of Ropes, glances over his immediate companions. Watching Oracle barely able to hold up her wand, he takes a step closer as if preparing, awkwardly, to lend a steadying shoulder (which is mounted to a body a foot and a half shorter than Oracle herself).

"What happened? Poison?" He guesses, a stab in the dark informed by his own history of stabbing in the dark; but his eyes track Robyn presumably rushing back to Spoiler's side.

[JbeJ275]

Barbara initially seems to instinctually go for her crossbow to pin down the retreating attackers, but fails to even lift the stock of the contraption quickly enough to fire it. She drops it back to the floor, and staggers over to the others, readily taking Scion's offered shoulder.

"I... I don't think so. It felt like something else, like all the warmth and life leaving my body with just half dead arms left behind. If those things are scared enough of Nigma's men to set up here... I'm not sure how much of a chance we stand against them right now..."

[Feathersnow]

"That is... deeply unsettling. It occurs to me I have a powerstone that might get us through the underwater way, but, now, I'm not too sure."

[MrAbdiel]

"We didn't come all this way just to turn back and leave Verena now. And if that powerstone lets you swim in your armor, then that might work just fine. If you can go through and take a guide-line, the rest of us can follow it without much trouble - presuming there's no additional harm involved. Spoiler!"

The kid begins maneuvering the group back together, putting away his Rod, taking up Oracle's dropped crossbow, and beginning to move the party over toward the blinded blonde. "What happened? You didn't fire a shot."

[Molan]

As Damien moved over to help Spoiler, Barbara, otherwise struggling to even move, happened to notice something. A few yards out of reach of the grasping vines the hill giant illusion had once covered, she noticed a sylvan marking on a nearby tree. It looked identical to the one Spoiler had translated for them earlier.

"Hey...that tree's marked 'Peace', she commented offhandedly.

Spoiler: OOC

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Still free actions here. Someone will have to climb the tree if they want to look for goodies. Don't worry, the Nigmas drove the fey off with magic items, not with OP level power.

[MrAbdiel]

Damien offers his handy haversack to carry everything Oracle is over-burdened by; his little backpack has quite a bit more containment. But when the tree is pointed out, he's onto it; scampering up its length with the assistance of his ever present Rod of Ropes, and looking for a similar reward chest to the one they encountered before!

Spoiler: Monkey Business

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If the Rod of Ropes wasn't enough, I can take-10 climb for a 22 if that's enough!

[Molan]

Damien climbed into the tree that Barbara had pointed out. Up high he found another sack like the first ones they'd seen, made of some sort of vegetative matter. When he opened it up, he found a wand, a box containing 100 platinum pieces, an obsidian statue, and a pair of unidentified potions.

The party made their way past the grasping vine, and as they progressed further into the wood, the forest gave way to what could be charitably described as a swamp. Soon, the trees around them were dead and drowned and water rose up to almost their knees. Kate and Spoiler had to help pull Barbara along, still weak as she was. Spoiler's eyes eventually cleared -- the blinding effect the fey attacker had used on her eventually wearing off.

Not long after they'd entered the marshlands, the trees began to clear somewhat, and they (finally!) found the Temple of the Moonbow, looming high in the dark, early morning sky in all of it's shabby glory.

The temple was half sunk into the marsh; the front doors were cracked open somewhat but were clearly immersed in mucky water. Vines and moss creeped up along it's sides on every angle, and despite the excellent craftsmanship of the elven architecture, pieces of it were beginning to droop and lean to the sides, some bits even falling and collapsing into the marsh. The temple looked like a corpse, slowly decomposing over many decades in the abandoned, haunted wood.

Two things stood out about the temple as they took in the sights. The first was that the Temple had been defaced. Huge, slightly glowing neon green "?" sigils were slapped along multiple surfaces of the temple, with one particularly large and garish sigil marking the front surface at the top of the temple over the main doors, defacing the Moonbow icon there. The paint looked reminiscent of the garish, luminescent paints that had bedazzled some of the buildings back at the thorpe, but where those buildings had looked like works of art and expressions of joy and emotion, the Nigma sigils looked almost purposefully sloppy, angry and offensive. The single toned green neon paint seemed to menace, looking out over the surrounding marshlands like a challenge for someone to dare to enter.

The second was that the front door was guarded. Three elves, bedecked in armor covered in forestwarden shrounds and carrying elven thinblades guarded the entrance. They didn't show a lot of outward iconography, but the consistent green motifs on their armor and clothing identified them with House Nigma.

"Duskblades." Spoiler whispered.

"Are you sure, how do you know?" said Damien.

"One hundred percent. Sylvan nobles love to keep them as bodyguards. Just their stuck-up highborne posture'd be enough to give it away, but they also tend to carry those fancy elf weapons. They're very traditional."

"Not that traditional, apparently." Barbara growled, still sounding slightly out of breath. "They're helping Nigma desecrate an old temple to help keep a hostage. Still though, I think Spoiler's right -- they have Duskblades who train and work at the college. I'd bet she's right."

"So what does that mean for us?"

"It means they're dangerous. If we're going to go into the front, we'll have to get the jump on them, and I'll probably be using this wand again," she feebly held up the high powered wand of fireballs she'd used to beat off the unseelie fey. "Even then, it could be ugly. No telling how proficient they are, but they can stand up in a fight and they're adept with magic. Their equipment looks expensive too."

"Or, we risk swimming through the culvert." said Kate bluntly, finishing Oracle's thought.

"So..." Spoiler breathed, sounding nervous. "How lucky is everyone feeling?"

[MrAbdiel]

“One or two tugs, we’ll assume it’s an accident.” Scion, in his unilaterally appointed leadership role, explains to the commando-knight as he spools put the length from the rods, and Spoiler uses her skilled digits to make loops to hook on Batwoman’s belt.

"Three in succession and we’ll know the far end is secured and we’ll reel in. First Spoiler and Robyn; second Oracle and I. But if you encounter trouble and you need extraction, any amount of erratic tugging past three and we’ll secure our ends and haul you out."
He gives a final glance back the way they came, and briefly at the debilitated Oracle; but seems resolved they should continue. “Anything we’ve forgotten?”

[Molan]

Using the trees, poor light conditions and waist-deep marsh water to avoid observation by the duskblades guarding the entrance, Kate carefully made her way around the edges of the marsh towards where the culvert was located. With her armor secured in Damien's haversack, she was a bit more nimble; her fighting style relied on classic heavy infantry tactics, deploying a long heavy polearm and heavy platemail, but her experience as an imperial ranger served her quite well navigating quietly through the marsh. This was exactly the sort of trouble she and her old comrades used to get into. For a moment, she found herself feeling almost nostalgic.

She pushed her head under the vile water and began to swim into the temple through the culvert. This was the moment of truth; if their information had been wrong, if the culvert was too deep and long, she'd be in trouble. But the water was still and she was strong, and she worked her way through the short drainage tunnel swiftly before finding air above the waterline again. She emerged -- covered in muck but otherwise unharmed -- on the other side, looking at a loose, rusted looking grate at the end of the passageway that led into the temple itself. She emerged as far as she could out of the water without hitting her head on the slime covered top of the tunnel, and gripped the rusted metal grate with both hands, firmly but quietly pressing her strength against it. The stones and mortar sealing the damaged metal in place were loose, and she was eventually able to remove the entire grate without too much fuss. She secured the rope to a nearby stone support pillar just inside the next room, and gave it three firm tugs.

The rest of the party followed Kate's lead through the marsh, and when they felt the tugs, Robyn gave Spoiler's arm a knowing, resigned squeeze before the two of them disappeared below the brackish water. After about a minute had gone by, Scion and Oracle followed suit.

The party slowly emerged through the tunnel Kate had cleared, two at a time. As they worked their way out of the culvert, Kate had already worked ahead, quietly pressing the entrance door to the temple shut from the inside -- the outer door, which was also ajar, was separated from the inner one by an entry hall, allowing her to seal them off from the Nigma thugs without alerting them. With the door closed, Kate secured some loose debris nearby and worked to barricade the door as much as possible.

Once Damien was through the culvert, he removed Kate's armor from the haversack, and she put it back on, prepared for whatever lied ahead.

The room was incredibly dark -- Oracle had a better time determining it's contours than most, but most of the party was shrouded in almost complete darkness.

"Let's see if we can shine some light on this situation..." Robyn said idly to herself, removing an everburning torch from her pack and using it to light one of the nearby sconces.

"No! Wait!" Barbara tried to stop her, but it was too late. The orange flame from the everburning torch touched the metal sconce on the wall, which erupted in green flame of it's own. Seven identical torch sconces lit up with green fire all around the central room, illuminating it, but likely alerting whoever'd enchanted them to the party's presence in the process.

The room was long and wide -- a central worshipping / reception chamber for the temple. It was lined with a series of support pillars from which the green burning sconces hung, and most of the area was filled with random detritus and little else. However, hanging high from the ceiling in the center of the room, wrapped in a series of chains, was a massive glass or crystal ball, perhaps as much as seven feet in diameter or larger, filled with a strange, swirling green mist. The party walked from the culvert to the center of the hall. As they watched, the swirling mists in the ball parted, and a face appeared.

The face belonged to an elf -- he might have been a wood elf, it was hard to tell through the magical device. His hair was long and red and he was draped in green finery, and he carried a long golden cane, topped with a golden "?" sigil of House Nigma.

"Well well well!" the figure in the crystal ball mocked, his face cut from one end to the other in a wide, mocking grin. "What do we have here? I have to admit, when I heard that there were adventurers snooping around my affairs, I was a bit worried it would be that perpetually vexing Dark Knight or one of his miserable little cronies. But what a delight this is! Seems his meddlesome monopoly on Gotham's vigilante scene might be finally over! This will be much, much more fun for me."

"Lord Nigma." Kate said, her voice low. "Let that girl go, and we can finish this quietly."

"I'm sorry, who are you?" Nigma shot back, waiving a hand dismissively. "No offense little knight but I don't have time to trade insults with nobodies."

"Come on, Nigma." Oracle pressed. "Fox already knows you're blackmailing his ship captain. This can't possibly be of further benefit to you. Just let the girl go, we can put this behind us."

"Ah, so you are the mercenaries fox hired to save his sorry hide!" Came Nigma's retort. "I wasn't sure exactly who I should be looking to pay back for that irritating inconvenience. How serendipitous! If you bumbling idiots manage to survive the puzzles I've laid out for you in this temple, I'll have to take the time to repay the favor down the road. Understand one thing, little adventurers. No one...no one in this city stands up to the Banker Houses, understand? And anyone who crosses House Nigma will learn very quickly just how quickly this city can turn on those who violate the natural order of our business."

"There's nothing natural about what you're doing!" Robyn countered, anger flaring in her face for the first time.

"Oh, but there is," Nigma said, his image flickering and disappearing only to reappear periodically as he talked; the divination magic transmitting his image seemed sloppy, or like the connection was weak. "You'll find I'm more natural than the rain. But I wouldn't count on you pathetic inbred peasants to understand any of that. So let me make this simple for you, as I'm already getting bored with this inane conversation. Thanks to you, and your misbehavior, my use for this girl as a hostage has come to an end. I'm more than happy to let her die here in this temple, but I assume you feel differently. So here's my proposition: you solve the puzzles and challenges of my devilish dungeon, and you might just be in time to save her. Or, don't! And let her die. That's up to you. In the meantime, my merry minions and I will be preparing a thank you gift for you back in the city. So you've got some excitement to look forward to, either way."

Spoiler moved to speak, perhaps to try to talk to him and persuade the high lord to change tac, but it was too late.

"Tick tock, adventurers."

Spoiler: OOC

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Okay! You're in the dungeon! Feel free to take actions out of initiative order. You can search this room, and look for passages to the next one.

[JbeJ275]

"Just so you know." Oracle starts saying just as the room goes silent. "Describing something directly such that it very slightly rhymes is not in fact a riddle. There must be a better way to describe mercenaries surely."

The juvenile attempt to annoy their adversary into staying a few seconds more done, Oracle began stepping forward. Quickly setting about searching the room, especially the statue near the middle of the room and the barricade to her forward and right.

Spoiler: OOC

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Gonna take a 10 for 26 on this preliminary searh roll is that works.

[Molan]

Oracle scoured the room, searching it up and down, and shifting her way through the debris. Everything in this chamber was wet, though it seemed slightly elevated compared to the foyer Kate had barred, there was a damp muskiness everywhere she walked, and green slimy algae covered much of the surfaces.

Still, her search wasn't without merit. The enchanted torches, for one thing, were linked together not with any well crafted, permanently implanted ongoing spell by but a simple magical device, suggesting craftiness but an overall lower level of sheer arcane might for whoever had made it. The torches were activated by a simple crystalline switch embedded in the stone behind one of the torches, and had been added after the temple had been built -- much more recently, by all accounts.

That led her to a second "device"; a series of arcane sigils carved into one of the stones of the temple, imbedded with magic power. Their ley lines led up to the ceiling, where she discovered several smaller, less noticeable glass orbs tucked away in the cobwebs above them.

"Look at that," she said, pointing the small, smokey-looking globes out. "That's how Lord Nigma was able to see into this room. The large ball up there is one-way; it allows him to project himself. Those orbs allowed him to see. We should keep an eye out for any more of them, either in this temple, or in the future, if we are expecting more run-ins with the bastard."

"What...are they?" Spoiler asked, squinting at the ceiling.

"Based on a preliminary observation? Scrying sensors. Built into those orbs as permanent magical items. He'll have a matching orb in his manor somewhere that allows him to see through them."

"M'kay...so are we assuming Lord Nigma is a powerful mage, then?" asked Damien.

"Not necessarily," Oracle replied. "I'd never heard the Nigmas mentioned in high esteem at the College. He could be a powerful wizard, or have one in his employ. But this could just as easily be the work of an artificer or bard, or some other sort of hedge arcanist. I would have expected more magical traps or permanent spells in here if our opponent were truly proficient, though we probably shouldn't rule those out."

She continued her scan, and found two other objects of worth; a locked metal door at one end of the hall, and a mechanism built into the partially destroyed Moonbow statue nearby. She pressed the mechanism, noting that it wasn't trapped, and a stone opened up revealing a hidden compartment. Inside she found what had to be a dozen spell scrolls, all of them arcane in nature, and a pair of wands, one made with Illusion magic, the other with Abjuration.

The locked metal door had several obnoxious "?" Nigma sigils on it, painted in iridescent green. But despite the distractions, Oracle was able to determine that in addition to being locked, it was also warded.

Spoiler: OOC

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Gave you 10's for K. Arcana and Trapfinding to speed things along.

[Feathersnow]

Ah. We are dealing with a lunatic who messes with innocent minds and has willfully desecrated his own gods. He, however, doesn't actually care enough to keep his supplies out of our control. He is either supremely confident or completely insane. Possibly both.

[MrAbdiel]

Ah. We are dealing with a lunatic who messes with innocent minds and has willfully desecrated his own gods. He, however, doesn't actually care enough to keep his supplies out of our control. He is either supremely confident or completely insane. Possibly both.

"One or both, particularly to be so happy to make capable enemies." Scion responds to Batwoman, waiting off to one side as the impressively enduring Oracle and the indisputably talented Spoiler begin taking apart the trap mechanism. "...You've been to far places, Batwoman. Fought strange foes. Have you ever fought elven duskblades? If we get flanked.. do you know what we ought to expect?" The question is a shot in the dark; but worth the shot. As they converse, Damien makes his preparations; drinking another potion of Longstrider; using the enchanted ring on one hand to create a small bowl of ink black paste, which he spreads carefully on the edges of three shuriken, and once on the edge of his mundane short sword.

[Molan]

Barbara unfurled her identify scrolls, casting their magic over the wands they'd discovered and watching as the scrolls themselves slowly evaporated in smoldering blue fire until they vanished into dust.

Spoiler: Identify on Wands

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These wands are both fully charged (50 uses), one is a wand of attentive alarm, and the other is a wand of enduring scrutiny .

"I know a little bit about them," Robyn offered. "Duskblade is sort of an ancient form of professional noble warrior, kind of like a human knight, but with a much stricter style of training and combat. They are usually going to be carrying expensive, traditional elven weapons and they use exotic materials to make really sturdy light armor. But more than that, they can cast spells in combat, including casting them through their weapons. The Nigma's are not a very warlike house -- their standing guard isn't particularly large, so the ones we saw outside shouldn't have *too* many friends nearby. But they're pretty dangerous duelists. If we have to fight, we should get the drop on them, rather than getting ambushed ourselves."

While Damien and Kate talked, Spoiler and Oracle worked on the door. They were able to disarm the magical trap protecting it, and after about five to ten minutes of work, Spoiler was rewarded with a loud *clack!* Sound as the door's metal internal mechanism finally gave way. The door didn't immediately open right away, but Spoiler pressed against it, and when Oracle started to help her the old rusty metal barrier slowly slid into the side of the wall, revealing a dark, dank hallway beyond.

There was another door at the end of the hallway. It was hard to tell at this distance exactly what the door looked like, but they could see some more hints of the telltale green paint on its surface.

Spoiler: OOC

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okay, free actions up! This next door is a bit trickier...

[MrAbdiel]

Stepping through the threshold, Damien immediately looks for a similar “switch” to light up this room; but if that turns out to be fruitless search, he’s more than happy to not learn his lesson and proceed first down to check the next door!

[Molan]

Damien made his way down the hall, finding a large iron door at the end. The door had no features, except for a large message carved into it's face. The message was spelled out in 2-inch block letters. It had no handle or apparent lock.

Barbara walked up to the door, alongside Damien, her divination magic radiating outward over it.

Spoiler: Oracle

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Sixty nine separate Transmutation (electricity) effects exist here. All of them are overlapping.

The message read as follows:

Spoiler: Door Riddle

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Okay, so *IF* this worked there should be a handout on the screen for you all to read in Roll20. It's also in all of your inventories so you should be able to view it yourselves under the journal tab. Let me know if it works. All the handout should show is the message on the door.

Spoiler: OOC

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Make Intelligence, Search, and Spellcraft checks at your leisure.

[MrAbdiel]

"Another riddle..." Damien says, comfortable stating the obvious, frowning at the panel of 2 inch letters. "...This one more obscure." He drifts a hand back and forth infront of the letters, mouthing the words as he reads them rapidly, then squints.

"...Something about the 'cure' and 'curse' pairing bothers me. One doesn't usually cure a curse. They're all squares - perhaps we are meant to rearrange the letters -" He looks over the panel, and shakes his head. "But there's no blank space you'd need, if it were a sliding puzzle. Hmm."

Another pause from the child, before his head tilts a little; and he looks up towards the ceiling for more of the scrying orbs - not that he can do much about them.

"...One doesn't cure a curse. Traditionally, one breaks a curse."

Slowly, speculatively, Damien reaches forth with one closed fist, intending to knock on the faces of the letters to see if there is a hollow report from anywhere - especially over the words "a curse". But he is concious to reach slowly enough that one of his allies might stop him, if they have a superior idea, or have spotted some danger.