The Dark Goal of Greed

“The Dark Goal of Greed”
Rise of the Runelords episode
Episode no.	Episode 21
Date	2009
Game Master	Abbe
Characters	Dorothea Honeypot Nathaniel Nell Velicia
Episode chronology ← Previous Next → "Saviour in Time of Need" "The Sweetness of Victory"
Rise of the Runelords chapter list

In this chapter the heroes at last find the demon and some information about the old runelords.

The Dark Goal of Greed

We all returned out into the L-shaped room and took a rest. As we took care of our wounds Nathaniel and Dorothea started talking of the large treasure that was in the room where the monsters came from. Peeking down the tunnel the large termite had dug I could see silver and gold glitter in the water. It was really soothing sitting there looking at the precious metals and stones glittering in the water, listening to Honeypot singing. I felt a lot better and checked the illusionary gold coins in the other end. Doroythea pointed out that there were slots next to it. We pointed them out to the others, but before opening any new passages we made sure that the treasure was taken care of. The room sloped down into water, but it was clear and the floor was covered by mostly silver coins, but there were also gold and precious stones. An enormous giant sized golden helmet dominated the treasure and a little suspicious after the illusion I checked it carefully and concluded that it was actually a working, practical helmet of brass and only covered in a thin layer of gold, but it was still valuable. I just barely reached the bottom at the deepest end and dove down into it picking up valuables. I noted that Nathaniel took of his jacket and breastplate while picking up the treasure and his shirt clung nicely to his chest. Then I realized that my top did cling too. Anyway we got the treasure out and went back to the illusionary stack of huge coins.

It was pretty obvious that you should insert gold coins into the slots to get it to open. Dorothea suggested we should try the old coin on a string trick and I agreed. We knit a coin to a string each, but Velicia said that we couldn't use any trick, but should just put the coins in and started doing that. We put our coins in to and it worked as the staple lowered into the floor. When we pulled out our strings they were empty of the coins but the knots and loops were still intact. Some kind of magic had made the coins disappear.

We entered a new room that was T-shaped. In it was three double doors. The ones to the right didn't have any handles. They also seamed to be magical. We went straight ahead. It was some kind of ritual room inside with three operating tables, surgical instruments and a seven-pointed trowel with spikes and knobs on. There were also human remains. I didn't like the room at all and left. Looking at the strange doors I went back in and brought the trowel and held it up to the doors. It looked like it would fit.

Then we looked through the other ordinary double doors and that was some kind of throne room where an old illusion of some old king talked to us in that strange language again. Dorothea told us that it was an old message mentioning a name, Alaznist. Velicia told us she had heard that name before and that it was some kind of runelord, that lived forever and ever ago. She, as it was a female name and still not called a runelady, was connected to "wrath" in some way. There were also "sloth" and this place was apparently "greed" and there were some four more. I suggested that we should put a seven pointed star on a map with a point on Sandpoint and one on Thistletop and see where the other points would be, but somehow it didn't work. I don't understand it. Otherwise there was nothing of interest in the room.

Velicia told us that the last pair of doors had some magic that could hold an extremely powerful creatures trapped. Then we realized that the demon, Malfeshnekor, was probably just behind these doors and by free it meant open the doors and let it go not free it from the depths of hell. I don't know if even Nualia knew it.

Dorothea thought that we should take a peek, but I reminded the others that Nualia thought that she could use the demon to destroy all of Sandpoint and that it would probably be very powerful. We agreed to think about it and Dorothea, Velicia and Honeypot who knows about that magic stuff would think about if it would work.

That left me to doing fun stuff instead. I went back to the treasure room and sorted all the coins and gems. It was 1273 gold coins all with an old stamping and 40000 silver coins. I'm not exactly sure about that sum. It was to many coins to count twice and then you cant be certain of the result anyways. It turned out to be a total of 80 gems, of different kinds. There was 11 Amethysts, 9 Lace Agathes, 9 Obsidians, 10 Roze quartz, 9 Amber, 7 Sugilites, 8 Jaspers, 7 Turquoises and 10 Malachites.

Nathaniel said that the others were finished researching. I felt very refreshed after counting the treasure. When I asked what they had found out about if it was safe to open the door Velicia started assuring me that the magical barrier would not be broken by opening the doors, while Dorothea immediately answered yes, without any hesitation or explanation. I got a feeling she didn't really know if the demon would still be held within the room by the magic. While I hesitated at the answer she opened the door.

It was a room lit by many candles and a big burning pit in the middle of the room. There were still shadows in the corners of the room. I hid as well as I could so the demon wouldn't see me. The other went up to the protective magic, and when the demon realized that we wouldn't just walk in to the room it showed itself. I peeked around the corner and saw a very big demonic creature with four arms and two had huge claws instead of hands. I moved back as far as I could without leaving the room and held my dagger at the ready. Dorothea liked this and taunted the demon that apparently banged against the magic, but failing to penetrate it continued to throw whatever there was to throw at us. Several of the things later turned out to be quite valuable.

We decided to leave it there, perhaps to return later when we knew more about killing demons. We looked closer at the pool in the treasure room and found that in the deep end there was a tunnel leading out into the sea.

We felt quite finished with Thistletop and gathered all things and returned to Sandpoint.