Vecna: Eve of Ruin (#4) - The Mines III

The recent hot weather and football World Cup has meant that we have not been able to meet up online for several weeks. That said, we managed to get together last night, and that allowed us to finish this particular part of the current adventure.

The Mines - Day 3 (continued)

After Healing up as best we could, we decided that we should at least try to investigate and clear out the final cavern in the vicinity of the mine entrance. We had very few spells between us now, but we were almost back at full health - we just hoped that there was nothing too serious to overcome in the final cave.

Using my magical boots, I jumped to the island that separated the spit of land we were currently on from the final cavern's spur. There were lots of bodies that I could see on the opposite bank by the final cavern entrance; some even looked like they had been gnawed upon and possibly eaten.

Navda joined me on the small island and we tried to lasso some of the bodies and drag them into the water so that they could be shriven of their potential undead status. We managed to do this for about half of them, but then the rest were beyond our reach.

I then jumped across to beach opposite to see if I could push some of the bodies into the water physically, but as soon as my boots hit the gravel a massive roar emitted from the cavern followed by the sound of many metallic objects clashing and grinding together. The remaining zombies on the beach began to stir and move towards me so I jumped back to the island to bide us some time.

Dharion had unslung his bow by now and had begun shooting the zombies that he could see, felling several of them as Twerca, the dwarf warrior joined us on the island. Navda also began to loose arrows at the remaining zombies, but just as we thought we had almost got them all a few more emerged from the cavern.

Suddenly, one of the zombies was pulled into the cavern mouth at very high speed, which puzzled all who saw it happen. The remaining dwarf zombies were quickly destroyed by the archers - the beach was now clear. I jumped back across, but as soon as my boots hit the beach I was attacked by more zombies that emerged from the cavern. They beat me badly before Dharion destroyed one and the rest of the party could get across to help.

Twerca immediately charged into the cavern, but the rest of us slowed as we encountered a chest high mound of mud, debris and discarded weaponry. The clanging and grinding metal noise grew louder as we slowly entered the dark chamber, but Druss entered a berserk rage and charged in to aid the dwarf. Gladreth decided to cast Invisibility upon herself and snuck in further than the rest of us. Suddenly all was pandemonium; several more zombies emerged from the dark as another huge roar was emitted from a being deeper within the cavern. I was glad to have my magical mace as all non-magical weapons were suddenly ripped from my comrades' grasps; bows, rapiers, swords, all flew into the darkness.

The source of the roaring and the grinding metal noises emerged from the darkness - a Risen Reaver (as I was told later); an undead drow warrior much larger than any drow we had previously seen with four arms and his entire body impaled with weapons of all types, including our missing bows, rapiers and swords.

The Reaver jumped high and landed right between us all huddled just inside the entrance. Most of us fell to the ground with the impact and the Reaver proceeded to carve us up with its four sharply weaponised arms. The rest of the zombies joined the attack and we rapidly began to tot up all kinds of serious injuries. Twerca and Gladreth, whose invisibility fell from her as soon as she entered the combat, fell under the onslaught but I could not reach either of them to stabilise them. A Prayer of Healing, however, helped everyone, albeit temporarily.

The fight was rejoined in earnest by my comrades, but the Reaver kept us at bay and put Twerca down again. Finally a shot from Dharion's bow found its mark and the beast fell. Unfortunately my second Prayer of Healing could not revive Twerca in time from the horrific injuries that she had sustained in the fight.

The Final Cavern at the Entrance to the Mines

As soon as the Reaver died, the rain stopped and the sun emerged from the breaking clouds to start the process of drying the land. With the rain stopping, the water level in the channels began to recede and revealed all of the dwarfs that we had thrown in to spare them from undeath. We could now also see the entrance to the mine itself.

We explored the rest of the cavern for loot but didn't find too much other than the remains of a large number of partially eaten dwarfs. A couple of them still wore a few items of magical clothing (a cloak and a pair of boots), and there were a few magical weapons lying around that had not adhered to the Reaver which must have come from the defeated dwarf warriors.

We picked up what we thought would be valuable and buried the dead as best we could. We then returned to the village where we told the few survivors what we had found and what had happened. They were glad of the news and allowed us to rest up and Heal our weary bodies and souls.

This ended the current part of this adventure. Hopefully we will be moving onto some more intriguing parts of the scenario next time.