Final dungeon.
I'm pretty sure I got Room 3 of Level 3 upside down. But I went by my notes, so whatever error there is, is a double copy-error.
### 301-574
As the river wides down to the Inner Sea, it has eroded a
passage that was buried by the forces of the Titans. A vast complex from
Before, now colonised by the impact fauna of that cataclysm. Only those of
sinister intent dare enter for everyone knows awful smells and sounds emanate
from it.
### Any dimensions not stated are assumed to be 10 feet. The
ceiling is a uniform 20 feet high, excluding the vaulting the sides, which
rises from 16 feet. Unless otherwise stated, all rooms are lightless and made
of yellow brick. All doors are not stuck unless indicated.
### Whenever the pulley elevator appears, the weight limit
is Heavy Armor + Treasure or 1600-coin weight. Anymore and the basket tips over
halfway for 1d6 damage from the fall as they catch on the non-aligned level one
below.
Descriptions in the Before language/writing are labelled
BFTXT
## Level 1
### Random Encounters
1 – 1d8 Bandits
2 – 1d4 Crab Spider, replace with wild dogs (2d6 Wolves) if
Room 2 cleared
3 – 3d4 Skeletons, mixture of old and new bite marks from
mandibles
4 – 1d10 Giant Marsupials (Giant Shrews) seeking any sort of
food
5 – 1d6 Giant Geckos, reroll if Room 4 cleared
6 – 1d6 Mask-Wearers (Dwarves) on a quest for loot
1.
Filthy but empty. Leaking water and windblown
dirt have turned the yellow brick to alluvion strata.
Scored years ago is six circles overlapping in a stack, with a wavy line at the
bottom.
2.
Bones, skin and flies take up parts of this
chamber. It stinks of weeks old carcasses and fly dirt. Allowing patches of
mushrooms to flourish.
On the ceiling lurk 4 Crab Spiders camouflaged dirty-yellow. They drop onto
characters if the surprise.
3.
A pit with broken edges plumets into the
darkness. A crude pulley has been anchored into the brickwork on four sides,
with a looped rope hanging down. After 1 turn of pulling, a worn wicker basket
that can house two people appears.
4.
A lizard musk fills the room, meat and paste
dung. Six Giant Geckos lurk here and hunt each night outside. If alerted, they
are hiding on the walls and ceiling around the door.
Amid the dung is a regurgitated cloth bag with 33gp in ivory tokens.
5.
The water damage hasn’t obscured the graffiti. A
wild scrawl of crude boats, letters, clan symbols and names. Characters can see
all three main island cultures and some in the corner they do not.
They say nothing except they were once here.
6.
The floor here is strewn with dirt but it is
weak. Close inspection shows track marks on the walls and not the floor.
Stepping onto it has a 2 in 6 chance of collapsing per person. Doing 2d6 as
they fall to Level 2, Room 1.
## Level 2
### Random Encounters
1 – 1d6 Gnolls, drifting from the plain hunting grounds,
reroll if slain
2 – 1d6 Berserkers, reroll if Room 1 cleared
3 – 1d6 Robber Flies attracted by the smell of random
encounters and cults
4 – 1d4 Draco Lizards seeking an insulated nest
1.
This room smells like a winter house. Of dirty
bodies, human waste, food scrapes and no ventilation. Only the dim light of oil
maps illuminates the 12 Berserkers, making patterns of snakes and waves out of
mud on the walls. This matted band look like prates once.
They attack immediately and pursue. Travelling up and down the walls of shafts
and collapsed rooms. On death, a Red Wyrm of Rage (Giant Centipede) bursts
forth.
12cp is found among their remaining clothes.
2.
A pit with broken edges plumets into the
darkness. A crude pulley has been anchored into the brickwork on four sides,
with a looped rope hanging down. After 1 turn of pulling, a worn wicker basket
that can house two people appears.
3.
This room has puddles of cold mud from cracks in
the ceiling but on the direst south side is a ochre drawing of a circle of
crude, snakelike heads. Otherwise, it is empty.
4.
Writhing in the mud and powdery dust are 5 Red
Wyrms of Rage (Giant Centipede), they blindly strike out seeking food and
hosts. In the corner is five dismembered bodies, torso burst open.
5.
Old pictures in ochre. Hills and giant figures
above, throwing lightning. They have fierce expressions.
## Level 3
### Random Encounters
1 – 1d3 Tarantella, replace with 1d6 Wights returning to
haunt the surface world
2 – 1d6 Harpies, crawling on the roof, reroll if slain
3 – 1d6 Tiger Beetles, hunting for robber flies and whatever
else they can eat
4 – 1d4 Mediums on a pilgrimage of chaos, they attack if
characters do not respond to a Chaotic hail
1.
Three heads of the Hydra emerge from the sea to
haunt the land itself!
They flicker slightly side to side in the light. None move forward.
Daylight equivalent or approaching it reveals them to be realistic carvings.
2.
Lots of looping practise marks scored by chisels
into the brick. All centred around a green stone panel, which is heavily
scored.
It bears Before Writing
BFTEXT: “What is always coming but never arrives?”
The answer to the riddle-lock is “Tomorrow”
Inside is 1100sp and 400gp in spare wire, rods and tokens.
3.
Muttering audible through the door. Inside is a
madhouse of diagrams, bone orreries and murals in chalk and blood. All focused
on large humanoid figures and circling serpents
Nine tattooed men and women live here, having traded their minds for power
(Mediums). They attack if not spoken to in the Chaotic Alignment language.
They have short swords and consist of 8 level 1 MU and 1 level 3 MU. Their
spells are:
Level 1 MU: Protection from Law x 2, Light x 2, Darkness, Detect Magic, Read
Magic and Magic Missile
Level 3 MU: Detect Magic, Floating Disc and Read Languages
82sp between them.
4.
A pit with broken edges plumets into the
darkness. A crude pulley has been anchored into the brickwork on four sides,
with a looped rope hanging down. After 1 turn of pulling, a worn wicker basket
that can house two people appears.
5.
Empty except for the increasingly disordered
scratching on the walls. Dozens of Before words and select translations
relating to the sky, sea and control via magic.
## Level 4 (5th Level Dungeon)
### Random Encounters
1 – 1d4 Cockatrice, shaking off the dust of ages
2 – 1d2 Cave Lizards, a monster of the Before Age (Giant
Lizard Tuatara)
3 – 1d2 Ravenous Underbeasts (Cave Bears), all pale hair,
claws and maw
4 – 1d6 Blink Dogs, stopping by old pack territory and
defending it fiercely, if slain replace with 2d4 green-fire Hellhounds running
through the underground
5 – 1d4 Owlbears, if slain, replace with 1d4 Rust Monsters
following the smell of blood
6 – 1d4 Giant Marsupials (Giant Weasels)
1.
A long decline slants into the dark. If the
direction is discerned, it is going west (in-game Polar-East). Some 120 feet
along is a chimney downwards for some 10 feet with dim light and foul smells
emanating from it.
2.
A chest-high, yellow brick wall runs the length
of the cave. Rocks have grown over the bricks in the wall. Behind the wall is a
lumped mass of carbonised bone in front of clear but indistinctly shaped blast
shadow.
3.
The passage grows increasingly narrow until it
is only 3 feet wide. It terminates in a round chamber. Laughing skull motifs
are carved into the walls.
4.
A cave faceted into seven roughly equal
portions., centred on a table split on similar lines. Each seventh is decorated
with scratches and bodily fluid. Seven separate glyph codes, aesthetic styles,
elaborate heraldries and seven small cultures in all.
For here live 7 Trolls in the dark.
If surprised, they are discussing pacts to secure a sliver of an unlucky
member’s cave portion.
The table consists of 1000gp of gem shards arranged in a fanciful map of the
cave. Jewellery worn by them is worth: 600gp, 1100gp, 1200gp and 1300gp.
5.
This cave smells of dust underlaid with a bird
or reptilian musk. If surprised, two prehistoric things neither bird not beast
(Owlbears) sleep beneath a layer of dust. If alert, these dinosaurs of a
generic form attack in hunger.
6.
A brick room with the weight of the world
pushing down on the ceiling.
Walking into this empty room triggers the slide when more than 3 people enter.
The old ramp system give way, producing a steep descent to Room 8.
7.
More brick walls. Here dozens of hand shave been
stencilled on the wall in ochre and carbon. The handprints at the top and
behind are human-shaped. The top layers are stumpy and clawed.
8.
The bottom of the ramp. The ceiling beyond looks
weak. Roll 1d6 for each entrant, a roll of 1 means a large block falls from the
ceiling doing 1d10 damage to them.
9.
Steps down into the darkness.
10.
A horrible must wafts here. This is the nexus of
many small tunnels leading into the darkness. If surprised, 4 large marsupials
of a kind unknown to our palaeontology (Giant Weasels) stand startled by the
light and noise. If not, they come out of the dark like furred missiles. The
tunnels beyond are outside the scope of this adventure.
11.
Within a crack in the floor is a well of water.
It shimmers with minerals and tastes salty. Drinking from it causes a Save vs
Poison or results in death. If passed, a draft gives the benefit of a magical
potion. Roll 1d6: 1) Diminution 2) ESP 3) Gaseous Form 4) Growth 5) Healing 6)
Invisibility.
There are 4 drafts in the well and it will slowly refill over a year.
## Level 5 (6th Level Dungeon)
### Random Encounters
1 – 1d4 Disembodied Cultists (Spectre)
2 – 1d6 Giant Scorpions (Sea)
3 – 1d6 Hulking Yet Indistinct Figures, with horns and
bronze spikes protruding (Minotaurs), reroll if Rooms 7 and 8 cleared
4 – Reroll unless Room 2 is cleared, then 1d4 Weretigers
from across the strait, conducting secret rites never to be revealed or seen
under pain of death
5 – 1d4 Salt-Water Infused Wrapped Bodies, muttering praise
to the deep ocean (Mummies)
6 – 1d2 Salt-Coated Ravenous Underbeasts (Cave Bears)
1.
This room is empty and bare, the end of the
matter.
2.
All is quiet in this room dominated by a large
square pool with gold and silver cycads inlayed in the walls.
Suddenly the water bubbles and 5 heads of the Hydra emerge.
As each head is defeated, it is withdrawal into the water. The pool leads to
the sea via an airless passage some 500 feet long.
10000sp and 10000gp on the walls.
3.
Everything here is wet. Elaborate mosaics of
trees and stars lie obscured, and the pits and rubble make pools on the floor.
Six Giant Sea Scorpions lurk in the tidepools.
4.
An enormous continental map covers the wall,
picked out in shells and glass.
Those entering and standing for one turn cause the glass to glow and images of
animals and environments that were, fill the room. Then a terrible figure sems
to loom as a shadow and the illusion distorts. All present in the room must
make a Save vs Wands or attack the closest other person in melee range with an
attack.
5.
A stone circle lies peeking out of the salt like
a fairy hillock. Stepping inside teleports the user to the surface. Then it
needs 1 turn to recharge.
6.
This corridor smells of salt and the sea. If
night, the corridor is filled with 6 inches of salt water. Obscured by the salt
crystals is depictions of a large figure being encircled by serpents and then
many suns and moons.
7.
A rack housing four assemblages of statues and
an abattoir (Minotaurs). If surprised, their feet hang in a way to keep them on
a dry dais. Otherwise, they eliminate intruders, including those intrudes in
Room 6 if they fight or make loud noises, emerging 1 round later.
8.
Are brick room with what once was innumerable
stone pipes and vats. All melted in a heat. One round after entering, the Black
Pudding surges from the pipework like a tidal wave.
