[Myself and Dak are on the trail of the Black Mirror and have arrived in Waterdeep.]
DAY 565 (19th Eleint) (September) cont ...
Sometimes, when you are just sitting around drinking in the tavern, and adventure falls in your lap.
The Singing Sword is often frequented by adventurers, powerful fighters, wizards, rogues, you name it, and is a place where people go who have got a lot of trouble, but also a lot of money, to get their problems - hopefully - dealt with.
Such a man was Roge Gelnne, who we first saw going from table to table trying to recruit people to help him. Most were turning him down. One table of young fellows were about to go, but the innkeeper, a clever fellow, said to Roge;
'Not them, they are too inexperienced, it would be suicide.'
He then nodded towards me and Dak. I was in disguise, you may remember, but perhaps the innkeeper had a nose for matching up adventurers to tasks that were equal to their talents.
We heard out Roge Gelnne. He was a well-to-do merchant who was renovating his wine cellar. The builders had unearthed an ancient tomb though, or something like it, and terrible noises were heard coming from the darkness at the bottom of the stairs.
Roge had quickly sealed it off again and had informed the authorities. The authorities had bigger problems though, apparently, and poor old Roge was now taking matters into his own hands.
'I need this sorted by the 30th!' he cried. 'I've a big party planned and I can't have it ruined by monsters in my wine cellar!'
We had nothing better to do, so off we went. Roge had a nice house, but we didn't see much of it as we were ushered down into the cellars straight away.
A sledgehammer was taken to the walled off stairway, and down we went. The first room we came to had what looked like two mummy lords in it and three treasure chests. The mummies were wearing ornate armour and surrounded by grave goods.
I didn't really want to touch something, but it was obvious someone had to, so Dak bravely went and poked a chest. Needless to say the mummies came to life and attacked us. I summoned apes and salamander flame brothers to hold them off, then pinned them down with Sudden Stalagmite spells. This allowed Dak to wade in and chop them to bits.
One of them tried a Slay Living touch on Dak, but he shrugged it off. Once they were finished we took all the treasure and moved on.
The next room contained four giant zombies, and we waited at the door while they filed through. I used Sunbeam spells to harm and blind them, while Dak used his axe to finish them off.
So, by the time we met the Dread Wraiths I was feeling quite smug, quite full of myself. Look at me! Me and my pal Dak absolutely ripping through this dungeon like pros.
My hubris was soon to be my undoing! Our equipment and tactics were well suited to our foes so far, but Wraiths are dangerous and Dread Wraiths doubly so. I've never fought them before, but Fenrir has. I wish I'd paid more attention to his bragging last time we'd met!
There were four (I think) and they were not stupid. While two went for Dak, the others went for me. Whatever spells I had left were ineffective, and my armour was not good enough to throw off their touch. Quickly my constitution was drained until I could barely crawl. Dak was not close enough to rescue me.
I felt like I was about to die, and to be honest, I think the Hairy Belly of Fate saved me that day. I should have died, but by some miracle I did not, and I was able to crawl back up the stairs while Dak came charging in with his axe to kill my tormentors while their claws could do nothing against him.
Dak had invested a lot of money in all that armour and I realise now, that if I want to be the sort of fellow that the innkeeper at the Singing Sword thinks can take on Dread Wraiths then I need to make a similar investment.
In addition, although I know I have enough money for a Resurrection I have no desire to die, not least at the hands of the undead! I know I'm going to have nightmare for a month now. Should have stayed in the pub.
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