Chapter 3 / Episode 82 – The Vampire Beneath Highport
Planting 7, 576 CY — Morning in Highport
Weather: Low gray sky; cool coastal wind; the stench of brine and smoke drifting through ruined streets.
Players
- Dog the Ranger
- Irving the Reluctant, with Harvey the Hare
- TerryOr the Cleric
- Dixon the Dwarf
- Silversun the Magic-user
- Slash the Bard
- Tiger Wong the Monk
Narrative Recap
Highport woke with a growl, not a whisper. The party rose at first light, Dog returning from a night of scouting, reporting nothing good and nothing reassuring. Before they could even reach the magic shop, a band of orcs blocked the street—taunting Dixon with the kind of stupidity only orcs and drunks can manage.
Slash responded the way Slash responds: Heat Metal.
Armor hissed. Orcs screamed. Weapons hit the ground.
The way forward cleared itself.
At Gargamel’s shop, Silversun attempted to ransom back his stolen dagger which he saw hanging on the wall—only to learn the asking price was fit for a king, not a wizard with scorched pockets. Silversun had to settle for the recharged wand and the story of a thief in Highport who loves to sell stolen merchandise. So they left empty-handed and turned their attention to the real task: infiltrating a temple of Gruumsh before dawn’s full light.
TerryOr proposed the plan—silence on a coin, a dash of invisibility if needed, and stealth over steel. For once, everyone agreed on subtlety. Dog and Tiger circled the outer walls searching for alternative entry points while the others prepared for a window breach and interior push.
The Infiltration
After watching an orc patrol pass, Terry shattered the wooden window cover with a quiet, decisive strike. The interior was dark, stale, wrong. Dog and Tiger remained outside with Harvey, to monitor movement while the others moved toward a locked inner door. After several failed attempts (and choice dwarven profanity), the lock surrendered—and two massive orc bodyguards waited on the other side.
No one was surprised. Dixon charged with a dwarven roar.
Cloaked by the silence spell cast on the cleric’s coin, the Orcs fell quickly and soundlessly to the floor, no match for either the Dwarf’s hatred of their foul brood, or the battle skills of the bard. They had gained entrance to the temple proper, but far greater challenges lay shrouded in its shadowy interior.
The Statue of Gruumsh
Irving the Reluctant, a paladin, was familiar with the floor plan of this temple; it had originally been dedicated to his own patron deity, Cuthbert, but had been perverted to the worship of the orcs’ deity Gruumsh. Terry Or, a cleric of St. Cuthbert was likewise at home in the darkened temple. Passing through the door from a side antechamber, they found themselves in the main gathering place for those hoping to abase themselves before the foul Gruumsh, originally the nave of St. Cuthbert’s temple. The altar area lay in front of them, but unlike the temples they knew, this altar was separated from the nave by a heavy floor-to-ceiling curtain. The item they sought to complete their quest should lie within the altar, and Terry hoped the object of the quest was near as he cautiously moved forward. His approach caused the curtain to recede revealing a towering stone idol of Gruumsh.
Enraged by the sacrilegious display, Terry rushed forward — and the air sparkled as an anti-magic field snapped into being. His boots now made heavy footfalls on the hard stone of the temple floor. He glanced downwards at them in surprise, but his attention was immediately drawn back to the hideous effigy that occupied the area where the sought-after altar should lie.
Gruumsh animated, raising his spear menacingly.
Irving and Silversun lunged forward, weapons at the ready while Slash attempted faerie fire. Dixon hurled his hammer with all the force he could draw from his dwarven heritage. Every spell fizzled. Every enchantment collapsed. Dixon’s hammer hit the floor with a sad, metallic clunk.
Disaster!
The cleric was dumbfounded as the gigantic spear descended, piercing his armor and causing a serious but not life-threatening wound.
The bard recovered his sensibilities first, yelling for a retreat. The cleric and the dwarf withdrew before the idol could finish them. It stopped moving as they left the altar area.
But still more surprises awaited this retreat.
The Ambush
The door to a second antechamber, directly opposite the one by which they had gained entry, suddenly burst open exposing a deadly ambush: a drow priestess and her half-orc
champion. Noticing the expectant gaze of the bard, Terry nodded in return. The proven effectiveness of his command spell would both amuse several members of the party and nullify this adversary in short order. The priestess, unfortunately, was far from being a novice. Her hand was moving as the door opened, and silence washed over the hall, stopping Terry’s spell before he could utter it and choking off communication, strategy, and hope in one soul-crushing gesture.
Irving fumbled his weapon in the confusion, cursing as the half-orc closed. Terry and Irving pulled back to regroup while the others tried to force the priestess’ position.
Faced with the grim possibility that they were far overmatched, the group fell back to their original antechamber entrance. Irving bravely did his best to hold the temple’s defenders at the door, while the rest of the group descended the stairwell to the lower level. “We have to find that altar or all of this will have been for nothing!” Terry yelled to the others as he descended the stairs.
The Cells Below
Terry paused at the bottom of the stairs and prayed that all traps might be revealed to him. This was not time to leave anything to chance. Dixon the dwarf, Slash the bard, and Silversun the mage entered the basement level and began the search. The darkness was thick on this level, oppressive with a sense of evil. Silversun swore he could almost feel it, like a fog or other atmospheric presence. He quickly lit torches to abolish that presence and then recoiled as his vision returned. The light revealed rows of cells and the broken forms of prisoners who barely resembled the living.
The stench was appalling and had little to do with the absence of light. The untold suffering present in these cells was aptly described by the stench of death, decay, and rot that permeated the air. The mage also noted that many had not survived this filth and disease-ridden environment as at least a dozen bodies lay on the stone floor outside of the barred enclosures. He took a half-step backwards as he fought against the need to purge his stomach of its contents.
Then the dead stood. All of them, almost in unison, slowly stood and turned towards Silversun, extending their arms as though pleading to touch him with their skeletal, rotting fingers. His stomach heaving once more, he lurched backwards, hoping to avoid their vile affections. The mage was certain it would only be a matter of time before they cornered him in this unfamiliar, darkened prison.
Suddenly, the zombies froze in place, rapidly crumbling into piles of dust. “Hey Silversun, I could use one of those torches,” Terry the cleric said, not realizing how close the mage had
come to misfortune. “Find anything?” Silversun took a deep drink from his water skin as he passed a torch to the cleric. Still somewhat overwhelmed, he just shook his head while indicating the prisoners. “We’ll get them later,” the cleric reassured him. “I found the altar, and poor Irving is facing the priestess and her henchmen all alone upstairs. Come on!”
As the cleric and mage raced by, obviously headed for the stairs once again, a stone sarcophagus caught the eye of Dixon, who then alerted the bard to its presence. Valuable loot might lie inside! Approaching slowly and cautiously Dixon and Slash investigated the stone bier. Although it radiated a sickening chill neither of them could shake, both were convinced it concealed undreamed-of treasures.
******
Grabbing the shoulder of the mage, Terry guided him back to the stairs. It was strangely quiet above. Exchanging worried looks, the two rapidly ascended.
******
As the rest of the party disappeared to a lower level to seek the altar the party needed to find, Irving squared off against a hulking, chaotic figure that was doing his best to enter the antechamber. Blows and parries from the highly skilled paladin blocked his path. The two smiled grimly at one another as both paused briefly to catch their collective breath. The two exchanged blows yet again, the sounds of forged metal meeting forged metal silenced by the spell from the priestess. Irving had suffered several wounds, but all were mere scratches. He again smiled grimly at his opponent, who answered his stubborn resistance with a glare. This was far from over.
As Irving prepared for another hammer and tongs set of blows from the brute, a noise from the far side of the room distracted the two of them. “Haaiiiiiiyaaah!” came the battle cry from Tiger Wong the monk. It was instantly followed by the resounding slap of a flying kick that knocked the priestess from her feet and sent her flying. Turning slightly at the noise the brute’s face was suddenly converted to a look of astonishment as a feathered shaft sprouted from his left shoulder, its length buried somewhere within his torso.
Meanwhile, the cleric and mage rushed into the battle from the paladin’s rear. Both had forgotten the silence spell of the priestess, and while Terry futilely attempted to heal Irving, Silversun shot forth a pair of magical missiles that fizzled as they left his fingertips. All present felt the tide had perhaps turned, but they weren’t out of this scrap yet.
The Coffin Opens
Dixon and Slash debated how to open the stone sarcophagus. Several times they tried lifting or sliding the heavy stone lid, but to no avail. Strategy, leverage, tools—none of it mattered, and none of it worked.
Then the coffin exploded open on its own.
A mangled half-orc corpse twisted upright, revealing the hateful gaze of a vampire.
Slash stumbled back. Dixon stood his ground.
The vampire struck first—cold, brutal, draining the dwarf’s life. Dixon landed a single silver dagger hit, but silver wasn’t enough. Moments later, the vampire overwhelmed him, slamming him to the stone and draining him until the world went black.
Dixon fell.
Slash retreated, torch shaking in hand, as the vampire hissed and withdrew into the shadows to reform its strength.
The Battle Above
Upstairs, the fight was no less brutal, but it finally came to an end. Tiger Wong leaped through the melee with a flying kick, slamming into the drow priestess. Silversun fired Magic Missile which fizzled because of silence. Dog shot into the chaos—one arrow hitting the orc champion for a brutal twelve-point blow. Terry tried to force a healing spell into the fray but couldn’t push it through the silence in time.
But they won.
The drow priestess fell. The half-orc brute collapsed. The upstairs chambers were secured.
Downstairs, Dixon, their stalwart companion, lay dead.
The vampire, and the fulfillment of their quest, still waited.
Next Steps
-
Party: Deal with the vampire in the lower crypt.
-
Party: Retrieve the altar—the main quest objective.
XP
Awarded when the temple’s objective is fully completed.
