Madness at Gardmore Abbey - session 10

 played Sept. 3

Altar of Glory

You enter the catacombs, a winding network of burial tunnels starting beneath the temple and extending under Dragon’s Roost hill and even deeper, perhaps below the upper tier of the village. Knights who fell in battle, whether defending the abbey or on distant campaigns, are laid to rest in stone coffins spread throughout the tunnels. Niches reminiscent of pantry shelves line the interior walls, holding the exposed bones of the less-honored dead, including other knights, priests, those who served the knights, and citizens of the village. Bones are piled in the shelves indiscriminately, making the most of the limited space available.

You move through the dark tunnels cautiously, disturbing the odd rat and spider. Its pitch black, hot and completely airless down here. Your bodies are drenched in sweat and covered with a coat of pale dust. It smells of bitter, rotten things.

After a while, you come to a larger chamber that is illuminated in dim flickering light – candles ahead probably. From somewhere ahead, you hear the barely audible sound of chanting, apparently a liturgy to Bahamut. The voices sound like monks. You stay back, out of sight, peeking ahead. A few elaborately decorated closed sarcophagi with heavy stone lids are just in front of you. One of them seems to be open. The light and chanting come from somewhere just out of sight ahead.

Four sarcophagi, one open, stand in the outer portion of this irregularly shaped room. The closed sarcophagi are decorated with elaborate carvings venerating Moradin, Pelor, Ioun, and Erathis, and bears the name of a knight. The open sarcophagus’ lid has been pried off revealing a shattered skeleton amid moldering burial garments. The skeleton's skull is missing. (though all the other bones seem to be still present) Sir Rombert, Sir Toren, and Sir Fror. These have not been disturbed. You cautiously approach the disturbed one, and looks inside. The lid has been pried off with a crowbar or similar tool, and bears the name Sir Sefgar. The disturbed corpse is leaking a corrupting influence (take 5 necrotic damage).

[Religion check]

Closing the lid back on the remains will not suffice to end this corruption; Sir Sefgar's skull must also be returned here, then the lid closed, then the sarcophagus targeted with a divine healing or radiant power. Bahamut is likely to look down kindly on such an act.

Beyond, a few armored humans kneel in worship before an ornate altar decorated with twin rearing dragons: one purpleblack and the other silverwhite.  A soft light emanates from the altar, bathing the worshipers in a halo of gold. The closest knight seems like the leader – he has a shock of red hair and his face is terribly scarred with a great gash from his ear to his jaw. None of the knights appear to have noticed you.

Further to the back of the gold-walled chambers you discover the source of the white glow: a gleaming blade set into a small alter - a sword in a stone. It seems timeless, undisturbed. Sir Oakley gasps when he sees it. ‘The Blade of the Four Crusades! I don’t believe it!’ he shakes his head, astonished. The sword gleams with gold and silver engravings of Bahamut in the form of a sinuous dragon; its pommel is a huge ruby. ‘This sword belonged to Gardrin the Hammer, founder of the abbey, when he took the paladins on the Crusade of Conquest. Later it passed to his daughter Zarel, who led the Third Crusade to the Witchlight Fens. It was always held by the Captain of the Paladins, who were also called the ‘Dragonslayers of Bahamut’. It’s last recorded owner was Havarr of Nenlast, who led the knights during the War of the Infernal Bastion. You may have heard of him as Havarr the Scar, due to the terrible scar he suffered across his face during that terrible last crusade in the south. He is said to have fallen in the last days of Gardmore, when the Abbey was overrun.' Sir Oakley is quite thrilled - you have found one of the four items needed for the ritual.

The undercroft below the temple is dark and dusty, full of cobwebbed piles of masonry, statue fragments and empty sarcophagi with broken lids. Behind a pile of crates you find a low archway that had been concealed, and it leads down into pitch blackness below Dragon's Roost. 'These must lead to the catacombs where the dead paladins were buried in days of old', suggests Sir Oakley. You notice some small flecks of red stuff on one of the archway pillars. It's bright red, like lacquer or oil pain or crystallised liquid - none of you can identify it.

[Arcana] [Nature]

You inspect the specks of red substance very carefully. The little droplets of red matter cling to the doorframe yet give slightly when prodded, little drops of red mercury glinting metallic. After staring at it for a while you’re sure you saw it move of its own accord. This substance is not of this world - its origin is from a different plane.