Attendees:
Having secured the castle, we decide to investigage the mines. After all, we can't report back that everything is secure unless it really is. So we dungeon delve! And oh, what a busy dungeon.
Encounter 1: Shortly after entering we encounter some formerly living orcs. These skeletons are obviously guards who jump right into action when we arrive in the tunnel. One attack is made on them and then the cleric proves his worth and turns them to dust!
Encounter 1b: There's a small collapsed area of tunnel. Investigation by the sneaky types fines two skeletons who likely have trouble climbing out. We leave them for now because someone has started firing arrows into the Dwarve's tiny little legs.
Encounter 2: Some orcs are firing down the corridor from the darkness. They try to bait us into pursuit, but the dwarf senses shifting stone floors and stops before a trap that would collapse the tunnel in a spot. He props it up and we can only cross one at a time. On the other side we engage 2 Trolls and 4 Orcs. It's the typical hack and slash goodness, but ultimately we prevail. Being low levels we then have to decide what to do with the trolls that are obviously regenerating. Deciding that fire was good enough for the orc bodies upstaris, we used fire to dispose of the regenerating trolls.
Encounter 3: We find in a tunnel a bound prisoner. She is a Dark Elf whom our goody-goody elf does not seem to regard as being a problem. She offers her services for a year having been freed by us. While the men consider what her services are worth, the lone other female tries to offer her a partnership in our little endeavor, something which she neither is interested in nor are some of the others willing to outright offer. After all, Lord Ordin didn't hire her. Nonetheless we decide she's harmless enough to come with us and may even be helpful.
Encounter 4: The fog. Around a bend we find a figure pressed into the wall. He seems almost to be a relief carved into the stone. He is opposite a wall of fog. Some investigation using a Dancing Lights shows nothing more than that the fog doesn't dissipate, blow up, or attack when it comes in contact with a dancing lights. So we head inward. Visibility: 5'. A few short steps in, a stinking cloud is encountered, causing the Dwarf to violently hurl. So the monk moves to the front and we continue inward. A number of playes are knocked out for 3-4 turns while they wretch. Meanwhile we are accosted on one side by a spirit and on the other by a small horde of skeletons. The dwarf plays roadblock for a while, preventing their continuation inward and the monk puts fist to bone while the good elf does battle with the spirit. Eventually everybody is back to health, by which time a few skeletons are demolished and the ghost is slightly impaired. With a team effort all foes are eliminated.
Encounter 5: At the end of the hall is a 4-legged skeletal beast. The priest uses his turning to hold it in place while the monk chips away at it. Meanwhile a small earth elemental charges from out of nowhere and both are vanquished without too much trouble, particularly because the one was held for the entire fight.
Encounter 6: Further on we discover a pool of water and on the other side two orcs; One has a javelin and the other is dressed in priestly/shammany garb. We engage. The only minor issue here comes when an area spell also manages to catch our Dwarf for just a few points. A minor thing normally, but the orc unleashes his javelin of lightening targeting the Dwarf in the metal armor as primary. He takes the full brunt and everyone else within 100 ft of ricochet takes half (Except the monk who sidesteps it). Fortunately no one was in the water (I imagine there was an additional hurtin' for that). The dwarf is just barely taken down as a result of the cumulative damage. Fortunately our priest and the Dark Elf help heal him back to consciousness. Now this priest is no pushover. He proceeds to do some harm and he and our priest exchange spells. The group do a little bit of tripping over one another in their jockeying for flanking position, and the dwaf does an bullrush that drives the priest backward, but we continue the fight. In the end we are victorious.
Break: We loot and go back to the surface and make a trip back. After all, the priest has put a minor curse on our dwarf which will cause him to miss half of the time when he should have actually hit, so we need that removed. And we need to give back word to Lord Ordin about how things are going. Plus we need to hire some soldiers for our castle.
So we journey back without much issue, visit the sage & alchemist for various reasons and continue on to the big city. At the end we meet Lord Ordin and let him know our progress. We train (as everyone is up a level at this point from when we started the game), gather supplies, discuss trade routes, and head back.
We delve into the dungeon again. This time there are several shafts that go straight down! So we use lots of rope and lots of lower.
First Shaft: We lower the dwarf like a hunk of hairy bait on a hook, and nothing bites so we come down. At the bottom there is a door and a strong breeze coming through the cracks. On the other side is treacherous(!) and windy passage over which is built a winding set of stairs. The wind is so strong that it will take much climbing and many fortitude rolls. The group who venture into this do well, except the monk who has quite a few missteps but still makes it. At the other end is a door that we cannot pass through because it is apparently wizard-locked (or some equivalent) and no one has the appropriate means to bypass it; not even brute strength. On the scene we found some strange dwarven made object that later we realize is some kind of firearm. If we'd been more clever/knowledgeable we may have been able to blow that door open; but we are 4th & 5th level characters with no knowledge of such strange dwarven wizardry. (Not even the dwarf!) With some effort we get back and climb back up.
Second Shaft: We drop the dwarf in. We drop the Goody-Elf in. And before we can send anyone else in, something attacks! From out the darkness comes some kind of strange elementally creature (whose description I fail to recall; nonetheless, I recall the danger and the call to arms!). The dwarf struggles with it and it sucks the energy from the elf, knocking her unconscious. Meanwhile the monk repels the hard way, missing his second climb roll and plummeting a great deal; It's only a combination of monkly skill and tumbling that keep him from being KO'd. The entity (later identified as a "Salt Mummy" or somesuch) sucks the liquid from it's victims and build's it's hitpoints. As a result, the fight takes a long time as it rebuilds itself on the moisture of others. Eventually it is brought down and the group find NOTHING of use down there. We climb back out again.
Third Shaft: I believe it was said that this shaft will take quite a
while to explore, so we called it a game right there.