Prologue - Death House

Taniwha catches Amalthea move to protect him but does not see the strike, everything goes black. He is surrounded by the inky black, he can hear the laughter on men, the screams of his mother!

"Dear gods what hit me?" Taniwha says as he groggily gets to his feet and withdraws pulling out a hand crossbow.

Grimly determined, Abraham attacks again hoping to fell the creature and save Amalthea.

Taniwha shakes his head clear and fires a bolt towards the monstrous head, "You’ll kill us anyway Kier!"

Distracted by the discordant voice in her head, Amalthea fails to move quickly enough to avoid going down the monster’s gullet in one gulp! She holds her breath and tries her best to escape, from one end or the other…

Taniwha refuses to show his pain to this thing calling itself Walter as he spits a glob of blood into the murky water covering the floor. Keeping his distance the Tiefling draws bearing on the hulking mass, "I have enough demons in my dreams, Walter. I won’t lose sleep on one more." Taniwha retorts in Infernal as he reloads and releases another bolt . . .

The quavering voice invades her head and she feels the others still whaling away at the creature that calls itself Walter...

Round Seven

Amalthea feels the crushing pressure of the monster's maw, but suddenly it spits her out in a mess of slime. "Farewell, mortals. You may have bested me, but you will never leave this accursed edifice alive. Finally then will I claim your souls." The thing laughs maniacally and disappears into the mulch and thorns of its lair. It seems to dissolve into the shadows and disappear.

The room is suddenly silent, and even the shadowy ghost-figures are silently watching from the ledges.

As Amalthea feels she is about to lose the fight against the monster's digestive system, she is suddenly evacuated in a puddle of slime. As she quickly tears off the ooze left on her face and takes a desperately needed gasp of air, "Walter's" voice leaves its final words and the eerie laugh fades into silence. She turns to thank her companions and sees Abraham lying unconscious. She curses herself for not saving more of her healing. She quickly runs up to the broken altar to see if there are any bandages or healing items to bring the man back to life.

Taniwha staggers as the weight of his injuries settles upon the Monk, taking him a few moments to register the form of Amalthea emerging from the waste pile. His eye then falling upon the slumped for of Abraham and he forces himself forward to assist the Dwarven warrior to revive their fallen comrade.

There are no medical supplies by the altar, but Amalthea remembers there are some in the small prison she saw. She can get them without risking running into any dangers, as it seems like the most pressing threat was the demon. By the time she returns with dusty wraps and gauze, Taniwha has stabilized the body of Abraham, lifting his soaked head above the water, his dark hair shining from the oil and algae in the water. Thanks to their aid, the man coughs up water and begins to breathe again.

The ghosts around the temple are silent, as if daring the adventurers to simply walk out of here.

Amalthea pats Abraham on the back, helping him to get the water out and relieved to see he's still alive.

"Ugh, that was a close call. Hopefully Walter is free now to join his sister..."

She uses her warhammer to prod around the refuse pile again and the broken altar to see if there is anything of importance before they leave.

"Eh, we should probably hightail it out of here now. Doubt those cultists missed hearing the explosions and fighting."

There is nothing in the refuse pile, not even a trace of the demon. Amalthea cannot even feel the nauseating aura of its evil. The broken altar is similarly bare; it's just the altar, the chains hanging above it, and the dais upon which everything sits. The specters gaze silently at you for a moment longer, then vanish. The room is eerily empty, and Narissa has inexplicably disappeared. The portcullis is raised and the way out stands open.

Taniwha move over slowly to help Amalthea carry Abraham, "We are not in a good way, shall we just get out of here as fast as we can. I am not sure we can stand up to another fight."

Going back the way they came, the party of Amalthea and Taniwha stagger through the water and up the earthen tunnels of the basement. You leap over the pit trap and hurry on. Everything is a blur, and yet no more nasty surprises leap out to meet you. At least not until you ascend the rickety stairs to the attic.

The attic is full of black, sulfurous smoke that belches from the red-hot stove and rises to the roof. As soon as you open the door to the attic from the staircase, the putrid stuff starts wafting into the staircase, leaving your faces gritty with soot. Dimly through the smoke, you can see that the window looking onto the lawn is now bricked up. The door to this room has been replaced by scythe-blades that slice back and forth. The walls of the room sag, plaster crumbling and cracking, as if the walls were made of paper and are about to melt under the weight of the roof. The sheets covering the old furniture are now all black from the smoke.

Already weakened from the fight Taniwha feels the pings of dissipation as the climb out into the thick smoke. Using his free hand he pulls his hood up around his mouth, and pour some water over it to lessen the smoke effects. He pulls Abraham dragging Amalthea towards the rooms door in to the hallway . . .

Amalthea takes up Abraham's other side and follows Taniwha's lead, lifting her shield with her other arm in case a scythe gets too close.

Round One
The party braves the smoke and tries to get through the doorway of swinging blades. The blades swing heavily in an alternating pattern, but you think you could make it if you time it right.