The Caverns of Chaos

A Four Against Darkness Adventure

My name is Maudicor. In the past, I have delved into the mysteries of mana and learned the arcane arts. Now, I use my talents in the service of the Holy Temple.

Recently, the Preceptor of our local temple learned of a nearby dungeon that the locals called the Caverns of Chaos. Apparently, evil forces had occupied it. I was assigned, with three others, to clear it out. My companions were Aganon the warrior, Wynne the cleric, and Kyda the rehabilitated rogue.

I drew a map of the parts of the dungeon that we explored.

1. We entered the dungeon and found ourselves in an empty room. There are 3 doors leading out; we chose the middle one.
2. From there, we moved into a long corridor that emptied into a rectangular room. As we entered the room, a sudden flurry of wings swooped by us. A pack of vampire bats, startled by our appearance, flew out of the room.
3. After passing through an empty corridor,
4. we came into a long room. It seemed empty but after a thorough search we found some mysterious runes carved into the far wall. Perhaps a clue to the secrets of the dungeon? We need more information to reveal the mystery.
5. And another empty corridor, leading to
6. an irregularly shaped room. As we entered, a foul odor assaulted our senses. Bones were strewn throughout the room. Then we heard a faint growling, followed by an angry roar. The denizen of the room, a vile troll, leapt out of the darkness at me! He swung and his long claws dug into my arm. I fell back, blood oozing from my wound. My companions rushed forward. Aganon and Wynne hacked and smashed the creature. Them Kyda snuck up behind it, and thrust her blade deep into its vitals. It collapsed. We then chopped it to bits so it would not regenerate. We found 2 gold pieces strewn among the rubbish. We then retraced our steps (scaring off some rats in one of the corridors) until we reached a new room.
7. This room was occupied by 6 goblins. I blasted one with a fireball while my comrades each killed one. The remaining 2 fled.
8. We followed them into a corridor but they disappeared! There was a stone door at the end of this hall but we could not open it. Then I noticed s series of knobs labled with pictographs. A puzzle! After a few minutes, I solved it and we were able to open the door.
9. As we passed through the next corridor, we ran into a patrol of 3 hobgoblins. We immediately attacked, and after a brief fight we had vanquished the foe. On one of the hobgoblins, we found a ring of teleportation.
10. The next room was covered in webs, We started cutting and burning our way through them, but this awoke the denizen of those webs. A giant spider dropped into our midst. As it descended from the ceiling, Aganon thrust into its torso but the creature still lived. It landed on Wynne and sank its fangs into shoulder. She cried out in pain and backed away. The party attacked, but the spider deftly dodged. It then leapt at Aganon biting him and injecting him with poison. Aganon countered and slashed the spider. It bit him again; more poison coursed through his veins. He was growing weaker, but he put all his strength into the blow and split the creature in twain. Wynne then rushed to him and by praying fervently to the Maker Aganon's wounds were healed. Searching the room, we found a necklace worth at least 100 gold!
11. We backtracked through a few rooms, scaring off some more vampire bats. We burst into a new room and ran into 7 orcs. With a quick incantation, I put 3 of them to sleep. Aganon and Wynne each killed an orc, but they were injured in their fights. Aganon then slew another and Kyda's backstab eliminated the last one. We found a ring worth 120 gold.
12. As we explored the next room, we found piles of rusted junk lying around. I planned to poke around with my staff, but then I realized that it was missing from my hand. After my cry of surprise, the others discovered that their weapons were gone. Gremlins! They had stolen all our weapons, our treasure, and even my spell book. We were utterly defenseless so we decided to make a hasty exit.

As we neared the exit, we were attacked by a pack of goblin swarmlings. They bit and clawed, wounding me. But we were able to extricate ourselves and flee from the dungeon.

We have now reported our failure to the Holy Temple and we await their response.