“We can wax philosophical over some pipeweed back at camp. For now, any way we can gather more of that mithril?”
“I’m sure there is more ahead. I can feel it in me beard.” Dur’dan says as he works at clearing the path.
Dur’dan hums this tune as he works. Minecraft - ♪ Dwarf Hole (Diggy Diggy Hole) Fan Song and Animation - YouTube
The party returns to the rubble wall and works together to clear a pathway through. They use their weapons and hands to clear debris, their progress slow but steady. Eventually they finally break through to the other side and continue along the hall, which seems to extend for an eternity featurelessly, lacking turns and doors for the entirety of its length.
Eventually they pass through another large entrance chamber. Here there is an empty gateway, its huge, foot-thick oak-and-iron doors lying broken from their hinges in a heap of splinters on the ground, a dusty dwarven corpse lying partially trapped beneath it. The party gives it a wide berth and passes through the gate without rousing it. The gate gives way to a very steep and wide stair descending nearly a hundred yards, its length littered here and there with skeletons that the party likewise manages to avoid, Kittix in particular hugging the walls as they pass them.
The stair opens into an impossibly vast cavern dimly illuminated by more ceiling-clinging fungi. The cave is hundreds of yards high, just as wide, and many times deeper. It is packed with hundreds, if not thousands, of unlit and silent stone buildings, the majority of them resembling surface tenements packed into tight rows. A maze of narrow stone streets winds between them, cutting out through the city like a spiderweb, occasionally opening into small, statue-filled courtyards that dot the city. A few of the buildings are freestanding, others are walled estates of small clusters of buildings. The city extends up along the walls of the chamber, too, like a vast, stone beehive, and a breeze moves through the city, winds carried through miles of tunnels for perhaps a hundred years before reaching this cave.
On the opposite end of the city there is a huge palace carved entirely in relief from the side of the cave itself and its towers loom tall over the city like watchful giants. In the distance there are entrances to tunnels at regular intervals along the walls of the cave leading off away from the city, which could house thousands, if not a hundred thousand individuals.
The dead of this ancient place are scattered along the streets, their corpses long-rotted, leaving naught but skeletons in varying states of decay. Many are clad in rusted armor, many are not, and there are doubtless more within the buildings themselves. There are few signs of battle: The occasional damaged building, a pile of armored corpses here and there, much less than Dur’dan expected to see in a city that had fallen to subterranean invasion.
The party stands in silent awe of what they behold, none of them having ever seen a sight so awesome and terrifying. Even the Ironbeards are moved at their cores: This city is more than three times the size of Goldhelm, even forgetting the entrance system the group was forced to traverse. This is a delve.
The party has not only discovered at last the rumored delve, but the find is more than they could have imagined. Mines have not yet been found but there is no telling what bounty such a trove may yield to them.
Experience Award
All player characters are awarded three experience points to spend.
So far five experience points have been awarded in total to everyone in the party, minus whatever individual players have spent.
[ul]
[li]Attributes - New rank x 5[/li][li]Skills - New rank x 3[/li][li]Skill Specialties - 3[/li][*]Merits - New rank x 2[/ul]PM me with details or questions on how you spend experience points that you’ve accumulated (please don’t share such information publicly).
“Holy smokes,” Hob exclaims breathlessly.
John silently mouths, “Son of a troll. THIS is a delve!”
“Imagine the treasure we’ll find in this place Kitz.” Arrow said in awe
Kittix is frozen in fear. “Lots of skeletons, Arrow.”
Dur’dan is in absolute awe of what is unfolding in front of his eyes… a delve, a safe haven, a place that many Dwarves can call home. Enough room for even surfacers to live, for a price of course.
“Aye lads… we’ve got ourselves a mighty fine find here. This is the beacon of hope we needed. That we all needed. There is too much danger for our band to take care of. We need an army. We each need to get our people here and clear this place out. We have an issue however… we need to find a way out.” Dur’dan laughs. “I say we head up to the safehold, do some sniffing around and see if we can’t find another exit. If we make it out big fella (referring to Kahn) your people will need to help my clan be rid of the undead, and then we will handle your… greenskin infestation.”
Dur’dan will begin making his way towards the palace, steering clear of the undead but keeping a keen eye on anything of value to take back to his father.
“Come on Kitz, remember the time with that Merman Spice Lord, what was his name? Gallow, that’s right! You thought he had your hide back then and we got out of it, I admit barely but at least this time we have a few competent allies to back us up.”
Dur’dan mutters something under his breath in Dwarven to Oshro.
“I don’t think we can beat skeletons by catching them in net and hauling alongside boat.” Kittix sighs, slinking after Arrow and the others.
Oshro guffaws uproariously at Dur’dan’s comment.
Karikhan responds to Dur’dan, “My people will be grateful for such allies. Clearing the horde will benefit us both, as we will soon both be calling the Scrubland home.”
As long as the group is stopped here, Khan will examine the dwarven craftmanship, being careful not to disturb any dwarven remains. Khan will stay near Dur’dan while doing so, as he recognizes the dwarf’s importance for forging the alliance. Karikhan is especially interested in finding the remains of whoever the ancient invaders were.
The party makes its way through the ancient city, winding through streets that crisscross the delve like veins. The constant green glow that billows from above makes the trek an eerie experience: Goldhelm is illuminated with a mundane system of torches and braziers known as the fireworks. This fungi is something else entirely than what Dur’dan and Oshro are used to. Khan doesn’t see the remains of any non-dwarves at all and the city itself has held up miraculously, perhaps a testament to dwarven quality.
The group enters a part of the city a bit more damaged than the rest and finds many of their paths blocked by debris. Eventually they enter a tiled plaza centered with a long-dry fountain once supplied with water from the open mouth of a dwarven statue built into one of the buildings, its drain caked with dry mud. The buildings surrounding the plaza are all tenements: This part of the city was likely once populated by the poorer of the delve. The courtyard is full of unarmored and unarmed bodies and passing through it risks disturbing the corpses, though it is the only route through this part of the city. The party can either attempt to carefully pick their way through or turn back and spend much longer circumnavigating this sector of the delve.
“Oh my, this is going to be a troubling experience going through here, but I see no other way… I’m game if you guys are.”
Dur’dan will try and get a head count of as many hostiles as possible and will also try and map out a path that will hopefully not disturb any of the corpses, axe at the ready of course.
There are around fifteen corpses in the courtyard.
“Well, we could always try to find a way around first, but hey, it’s our funeral.”
“We should not be going this way…” Kittix is reluctant to follow Dur’dan through the courtyard.
“Typical.” Oshro grunts under his breath, not willing to confront the lizardfolk directly and risk another chastising from his uncle.