Funeral and Farewell

5th - 8th day of Fireseek, CY 592

Skullcrusher’s Demise
The battle against the skullcrusher ogres took a decided turn for the better. Lucas was able to blind two of them with a glitterdust. Vannay’s acid orb made a direct hit on one of them melting his head. Delvanos took one of them down with three rapid arrow strikes. Victor stunned one and proceeded to pummel him. The only one that was not under the slow was kept from moving into a flanking position by Vannay’s summoned air and earth elementals. The slowed and blinded ogre’s were not able to do anything useful. Another round of attacks brought the remaining ones down.

Victor moved towards Erwin and verified that he was indeed dead. Vannay placed his elementals as sentries on the two exits from the chamber. We did some healing and then decided to check out the trap door before we left the fane.

Chymon’s Hoard
Lucas and Thurilkosij (Vannay’s pseudodragon) went down the shaft. They found a large room with similar dimensions to the pit in the upper chamber. There were four alcoves on each side. We decided that it would be better if everyone was in the chamber before examining the objects in the alcoves. Vannay noticed that two of the alcoves had magical auras. Lucas moved towards the alcove with the open chest, but as soon as he crossed the entrance to the alcove a noxious poison gas sprayed out filling the chamber. Lucas took a full blast from it, and he fell to the ground severely weakened and nearly helpless. Victor’s strength was also severely diminished by the poison. At this point, we decided that it would be best to leave the chamber. Victor cast a bull’s strength and lesser restoration on himself. Lucas who had lost all strength was carried by Uthgar up the ladder.

We spent a day resting in Moradin’s temple. Victor received a sending from Canoness Y’dey. She said that there were two people in Hommlet interested in meeting our group. We arranged a meeting in the abandoned town of Rastor.

We returned to the trap room the next day. Lucas was able to disable two of the three remaining traps, but the last one dropped him into the floor leaving him encased in stone. Vannay used a dimension door to free him from the trap. We then collected the remainder of Chymon’s hoard.

The Funeral Pyre
We teleported to Rastor to meet the two fellows Y’dey was sending our way. Vannay had some mishap with the conjuration, which scrambled us a bit, but otherwise it wasn’t too terrible.

Victor had some knowledge of how to conduct a service for Erwin. We gathered wood and set his body on top. A blazing pyre was set, and we looked on as the smoke rose up into the night sky. We noticed some small woodland beings observing the service from the protection of the tree line, but they did not come forward. Delvanos thought they were probably fey creatures, but only Erwin could have told us what kind.

Delvanos and Lucas had been arguing privately for the better part of the day as brothers are known to do. Finally, Delvanos approached Victor about speaking with Lucas. Delvanos was very concerned about Lucas’ safety, and he knew that his brother would not listen to him. Victor took Lucas off to the side and spoke with him privately.

The next morning Lucas was gone without any goodbyes.

New Blood
Later in the morning, a cleric of Saint Cuthbert and a mage approached our encampment in Rerrid’s old church. They identified themselves as Credin Vigorian of Veluna and Safadin Gammel of Greyhawk. These were part of the group that journeyed out into the Sea of Dust to find the Air Binder. Apparently, their respective orders thought it was important to have representation in our group assaulting the fanes. They seemed like nice enough fellows, and we did need some people to fill in for our losses. After some consultation, we agreed that they could accompany us on our quest.