Session 0027 - To the Icetops

Roster

List of characters who's player was in attendance

Player characters who's player is attending the game start with 1 Hero Point, and can get more during the session.

Absent

List of characters who's player was absent

Player characters for missing players do not start the session with a hero point, and can not get any more during the session.

Session Log

After defeating the two drakes, Leodegar sees Eriana starting to skin one and he thinks that its skin (or the teeth that Sarroxtíoð is taking) are not going to be worth anything. He thinks that its eggs would be valuable if they found those. However, these are flying creatures, and if they had any eggs they would likely be in a hard to reach location - assuming they knew where they were.
The party clean up, take the corpse of the fallen warrior who came with them and head back to Lakeside town. They are given the promised reward of 20gp (the remaining solder was given separate compensation), and the town arrange to bury the fallen warrior with full honors. In addition, the group are given free food and lodging for the rest of the day.
In the morning the group head out early into the Icetops. They are told by Harbek and Leodegar that it will take four days on foot to get to the site of the crypt, high in the mountains. On the third day the route will take them through a short cave complex.
The first three days of the journey passes uneventfully until nearing dusk when they reach the site of the cave. The old road they have been following has clearly not been used very often, and as they approach the cave the ground and vegetation has a light layer of snow.
They can see a cave entrance up ahead leading into a cliff face they need to get beyond. Harbek tells them the trail continues to the north east though a narrow canyon and shortly beyond that they should see the ruins of the crypt high up to the north east.
After going through the cave entrance, the narrow crack twists downward, cutting into the mountain side and opens into a frigid cave festooned with icicles. The floor is icy but fairly rough and thankfully not slippery. Pillars of rock obscure any exit that might lie in the far side of the cave.
Ferdinand lights up his lantern and they move in to explore the caves, looking for an exit.
To the east, there is considerable mist that obscures the area. They see no other exits, so the group head through the mist looking for a passage east. Shortly after entering the mist, a stalactite falls from the ceiling right behind Ferdinand. He turns around and notices it sprout tentacles that lash out to try and hit him! It appears to be some sort of rocky creature that after trying to fall on him and lash out with tentacles it begins to levitate up off the ground.

He yells out in warning to the others, as three other similar creatures end up falling and attempting to impale party members below. All four creatures miss their target, and all four begin to levitate up after smashing to the ground. Some of them are spotted moving along the ceiling to get into position before falling.
In response, the party attack the strange creatures. They have hard rock-like bodies that are hard to penetrate. Ferdinand has difficulty connecting, but they can be hit. Leodegar manages to hit one with his hand crossbow, and he calls out that he does not recognize these things. Alicia also has some success hitting one with her arbalist, but Sarroxtíoð has similar difficulty to connect initially. The party is partly hampered by the obscuring mist in the area making it a bit difficult to find their target.
The creatures levitate up fairly slowly, but the ceiling appears to be roughly 20 feet overhead and it does not take long for them to reach the ceiling. Once there, they move around to get above the party and drop down a second time. This time their aim is much better. Ferdinand gets hit badly, but Alicia helps mitigate the damage and she hits the creature in return. Another one falls on Harbek and injures him significantly.
Before the creatures can begin the fly up a second time, the party are quick to respond. At this point it also appears that the mist is beginning to dissipate. Leodegar thinks the creatures may have been generating it.
Ferdinand leaves the lantern behind, and tumbles past the creature and stabs it with his rapier, landing a powerful blow but the creature survives. He tumbled to the east into a passage that clearly leads farther into the mountain. Sarroxtíoð quickly finishes the creature off with his sword before stepping in to try and help with the creature attacking Harbek. The dwarf curses and casts a spell that unleashes wavy black lines at it, clearly injuring it but the creature survives.
Eriana runs in to help out by grappling it, and keeping it from flying upwards again. In response, the creature sprouts tentacles and hits her and grapples her in turn!
A third creature falls and hits Sarroxtíoð, and the fourth falls and misses hitting anyone. It is not long after this that Eriana kills the one she is grappling and both Ferdinand and Sarroxtíoð kill the one on Harbek.
With only one creature remaining, the party focus on it and eliminate it shortly afterwards.
Near the end of combat and shortly thereafter, Alicia moves to bandage Ferdinand. Harbek used some magic to heal himself and asks the party if he should cure everyone, and they agree. He casts a heal spell on everyone which helps patch them up a bit. Alicia uses her lay on hands ability to cure Ferdinand a bit more so the group is in better shape.
While doing this, both Sarroxtíoð and Leodegar hear something to the east, but when they fall quiet to listen whatever they heard goes silent.
They reform into a marching order and head eastward deeper into the cave. A rough unlit tunnel leads eastward out of the icicle cave. Numerous narrow openings lead off the passage to either side.
As they pass the first narrow opening to the left, they can see what looks like animal pelts on the floor about 15 feet in. Not wanting to leave anything unexplored behind them, particularly given that they heard something, Ferdinand and Eriana cautiously move in to explore. As they walk into the narrow passage Eriana notices someone hiding up ahead and to the right in the darkness. They are unnoticed by Ferdinand.
Eriana does not wait for it to react, she moves to get a better look and spots an Orc hiding up ahead. She points it out to everyone and throws a knife at it.

Before the creature moves to attack, roars from down the tunnel are heard as several orcs emerge from other narrow tunnels to attack the party. One charges Sarroxtíoð wielding a cruel looking two-handed axe and critically hits him. Sarroxtíoð is badly injured, but in a rage and responds by hitting back savagely. Amazingly, the orc somehow remains standing though it looks like it should have fallen over. As it staggers from the blows, Alicia drills it with her arbalest and downs it.
The orc that was hiding moves out to attack Ferdinand but misses. Ferdinand easily outmanoeuvers it, stabbing it with his rapier and distracting it as he moves to flank it with Eriana.
Three other orcs enter the tunnel, one engaging in melee with Sarroxtíoð, who at this point is reeling from his wounds but still standing. The other two orcs stand back in the hall, hurling javelins at the party.
The session ends after the first round of combat with an unknown number of orc assailants down the tunnel.