Session 9 - Duergar Stronghold

After smashing a section of wall out, Throt shows the party the way through the hole. They open the hatch to see a ladder to the bottom of a 20 ft Vertical tunnel leading into its horizontal counterpart that leads into the stronghold. They head through the tunnel then send Mochi ahead as she climbs the ladder and peeks out she sees two small rooms, and a corridor leading to the West. 

As Mochi peeks around she smells and then sees a hulking ogre standing in the hallway blocking a door. She feeds this info back to the party who sneak up and into the first room, as they move to position themselves Nox stumbles and the Ogre lets out a roar of anger. 

As they all turn to look at the Ogre, they notice large patches of flesh missing, and realize that this thing is undead. Layton lines up his crossbow and puts a bolt into the beasts eye. 

Mochi follows it up with a bolt of her own, then Nox throws down with some frostbite. Etch mocks the ogre commenting on its lack of life, and Throt adds an exclamation point in the form of a great axe strike.

Kurash comes in with a Shelleighed club and smacks the ogre in the face, and the party keep taking chunks away from the ogre until there is just not enough of its body to keep functioning the closing blow was from Throt who swung his great axe with two hands aiming for the neck and takes the head clean off. Kicking the severed head across the room to Kurash, where it stops rolling and the eye keeps looking around. 

Mochi steps over the bits of zombie ogre and checks the door for traps then checks out the lock, its a simple locking mechanism and Mochi opens it more or less as if it wasn't there in the first place. 

The room beyond the door is the main hall of the keep, there are three cages, one looks as if it was home to the zombie ogre, the other two contain goats. Also next to the cages against the wall is a sled.

 As Mochi starts to walk through the room she is struck in the face by an unseen force, knocking her to the ground. Throt runs in and swings his great axe at the point where the strike appeared to come from, revealing a giant Duergar holding a war pick.

The party not scared of a challenge respond to Mochi's attacker with axes, eldritch blasts, vicious mockery ad eventually the Duergar falls, shrinking back down to his normal size. 

Next they encounter two rooms separated by two doorways side by side, as Throt moves to go through steel spikes slam down from the ceiling, scratching a gash in his arm. Looking into the room beyond the spikes, Throt catches a glimpse of another Duergar who becomes visible for a fraction of a second while he runs into a room beyond closing a heavy stone door. 

Throt spots a lever in the room, and asks the party if that might open the spikes when they say likely he says "I am so smart look at me, I didn't know about doors until a few days ago"

Etch sends in his unseen servant to throw the lever and the spikes retract. Throt heads to the heavy door and finds it securely locked, he gets everyone to stand clear and throws the lever, hearing the door click and move ever so slightly, he barges in as Mochi re opens the spikes, they find a small room with a bunk and desk carved into the rock walls.  Standing in the room is a lone Duergar and they immediately attack him, making short work of him as he is beaten and bloody he drops to his knees and surrenders. Throt picks him up by the throat and slams him into the wall. They ask him many questions and determine the following

- He is here to build an outpost/stronghold to help his father in his quest. 

- He is in possession of the Lantern from the Inn, which is on his desk under a burlap sack. 

- His father has a larger stronghold in the mountains which he draws a map to

- The stronghold contains 5 spore servants, and a hidden armory which he tells them how to locate.

On his desk is a letter written in dwarvish, some shards of crystal which Kurash suspects are something of value but cant identify directly, and some pieces of colored glass. 

They ask more about the spore servants and determine they are re-animated corpses who act on their issued commands, their reanimation is achieved using a specific mushroom which the Duergar collect when the season is correct. Their instructions are to protect the stronghold and they are armed with spears. 

They check out the Armory, and find the following

2x Heavy Crossbows

2x Steel Shields

6x Javelins

4x Spears

2x Scale Mail (Sized for Dwarves)

2x Sets of Climbing gear

3x War Picks

4x Mess Kits.

The party decide to take a long rest, in the secured office of Nildar (the Duegar they found in there) and secure him for further interrogation.