Following Kord’s words, the party goes to the City of Ashes. Belflin finds grey flesh and tracks that leads to the mausoleum of the Laberness family. He forces Erland to get the key to the mausoleum. The party enters, finds a secret passage, and descends into the darkness.
At the end of the tunnel the party stumbles into a room covered in dwarven runes and full of ghouls. One particular ghoul is big and bloated. He seems to be the leader. As the party destroys ghoul after ghoul he decides to jump into the bone pit in the middle of the room, but at the last moment Corian jumps after him and strikes him down with a handful of magic missiles.
Down here amongst the bones Corian finds a letter:
The party follows the tracks of the ghouls further into the depths of the Underdark and spends a first night within a rope trick. The next day they meet the gnome Ingerstockvilli, last survivor of Glamire. Ghouls have overrun his city. And since he is a vampire, he asks the party for a donation of blood! But they deny him the blood and he turns gaseous and disappears.
Later the party happens upon a fight between drow, dwarves, derros, troglodytes, and ghouls. The party joins the fray and helps the refugees fight against the ghouls. The priests of Orcus are all slain and the party leaves the temple to the refugees. The dwarven leader Rambon tells the party about the ghoul armies, about the fall of Hammerheim, about Gnawbone and the tomb of the last emperor, about the dark stalkers of Blinderstal, and the yellow river of Fleshbrook under the rule of Corpsefinger. The refugees don’t want to join the party, but they will gladly take messages. The party sends word to Erland, Zoey, and Flax. The ghoul leader had a magic spear and a magic ring which the party take.
Again the party spends a night within a rope trick.
On the third “day” underground we see the party descending along a waterfall between huge pillars of the underdark. It’s a very long way down, but using fly, a ring of featherfall, and winged boots the party reaches the bottom in a few minutes. Several passages seem to meet down here. The party wants to work their way north towards Fleshbrook. As they are considering their options, they are attacked by ghouls!
Some of the ghouls use clockwork crossbows, and the gnomish vampire shows up in the party’s back! He must have betrayed the party to the ghoul patrol. The end result is a long and difficult fight, but in the end the party overcomes both ghouls and vampire.
A lot of masterwork armor & weapons are found. Magic stuff is taken along, the rest is buried in a little stash. The party also finds another letter:
XPs next session. [1]