We searched the two rooms off of the main hall. One of them was a berthing area with six beds. Since there were five dead priests, it appeared that one of the priests was spared. The other room was a library and study. The older tomes were books on Dumathoin, and they appeared to have not been used in some time. The other books were on Abbathor. There were also a few maps with possible mining locations detailed on them. We also found a journal written by one of the priests. The relevant portions of the journal indicated that "Glorim" arrived at the temple several years earlier. He eventually joined the priesthood, and the clan began to rely on his advice more and more. When the giants began their assault, the imposter dwarf advised against joining the Khannenhelms in fighting the incursion. Glorim said that this attack would weaken the Khannenhelms, and it would give the Thangeddins leverage over their brother clan. When Ragnok Thangeddin took a group of warriors with him to the Northern Redoubt, Glorim became angry at the lack of control the priesthood was demonstrating over the tribe. Shortly after the departure of the warriors, Glorim called the priests to the temple, so he could give them his master plan. This was almost certainly the point that Glorim killed the entire priesthood.
Vannay spent some time searching the study, and he discovered a secret door behind one of the bookshelves. After magically bypassing the lock, we opened the door. To our great surprise a scream filled the room and hall. The wail of the banshee nearly killed Uthgar, but he was saved by his advanced endurance training.
Using our contact medallion, we contacted the other group warning them of Lothirlondenex. We bedded down for the night away from the temple. The discovery of what happened at the Temple of Abbathor was enlightening, but we could not help feeling like things were worse with the destruction of the holy stone. Uthgar in particular was deeply troubled. We made plans to return to the Khannenhelms in the morning to apprise them of the situation.
Devil, Swarm and Worm
Safadin, Delvanos and Victor made their way through the mountain caves to the Northern Redoubt. Along the way we heard something moving up ahead. After the ambush in the Hall of Odenkor, we were a bit wary. We began preparing for battle. A short distance ahead of us was a fiendish creature covered in barbs, which Safadin identified as a hamatula. We continued with our spell defenses, while we closed. The devil fired three rays at Victor, but his inner armor blocked all the attacks. Delvanos and Safadin finished the creature off rather quickly.
The tunnel opened into a vast chamber, which had large drop-offs leading down to a basin with a major crevice in the center. Covering almost the entire floor were swarms of centipedes. Some unknown attacker cast a spell, which evaporated large amounts our precious bodily fluids. Creden and Victor both used divination spells to attempt to locate the assailant, but they were not successful.
The centipede swarms began creeping in on us. Safadin managed to destroy the majority of them with some well placed lightning attacks. Victor and Delvanos were able to destroy the remaining vermin with their energy enhancements. At this point the enemy revealed himself to be a huge frost worm with an obviously fiendish heritage. It dealt a powerful bite attack on Victor. Safadin tried to use a prismatic ray against it, but the creature's resistance blocked it. Delvanos launched a volley of arrows, which took a good deal of fight out of the worm. Victor followed up with a flurry of holy, flaming fists. The creature was decimated, but not finished with us. It exploded in a blast of cold death throes. Delvanos avoided the damage entirely, but Victor and Safadin only avoided the majority of the blast with their quick reflexes. Now we had to decide if we should rest or continue on to the Northern Redoubt.
