Dasani was the first to greet the morning. "Well, I guess finding the cairn will be easy enough, just follow the noise!"
"Aye", responded The Legend, shaking off the leaves and dust that had blown in over the night.
"Alright all, grab your rations and let's get a move-on. Would probably be best to have as much daylight as we can get", Bobert interjected. The group nodded, hoisting their gear to their backs and moving out.
After about 20 minutes following a narrow path through the thickets and pine, the adventurers made their way to the mouth of the cairn, a wide, monolith-lined portal partially obscured by underbrush.
"I think this is it", exclaimed Dasani.
Studying the markings around the entrance, Bobert nods in agreement and adds, "Indeed, judging by the noise coming from within, I'd say we found it too."
The Legend, hopping to the front of the party, says in a haughty tone, "Then let's get moving and show anyone still inside what we're made of!"
Inside the cairn, naturally dim light illuminates the long hallway, which extends into darkness, even beyond the dark vision of the dwarf. The walls bear horizontal bands of deceptively simple geometric patterns at waist level, interspersed with glyphs of startling detail. In other parts, the walls look as if they had been hacked apart by tools or weapons; slash marks from ax or sword, along with claw marks and pieces of fur and blood caught on the edges portend danger in the dark recesses.
The Legend is unphased, as he marches confidently down the hallways, shouting, "Come out, come out, wherever you are! Fear not unless you are a foe!"
Paul and Dasani followed closely, while Bobert kept some distance.
Further in, the party passed two alcoves, which they searched. In ancient days, the alcoves held great incense braziers mounted upon marble columns. Looters have since plundered these priceless artifacts, leaving only four small anchoring holes. With the hall running North to South, in the western alcove, the party finds a moldy bedroll, likely used by the locals when they dare to spend a night in the cairn, fearful of venturing any further.
Bobert examined the alcove in further detail and noticed thin, hollow tubes in patterned bands upon the walls. These seemed to be the source of the strange whispers filling the hallway.
Shaking his head side to side, Bobert explains the system and physics of the tubes to the party, his sense of disappointment in the mundane clearly palpable, "No ghosts indeed, just a bunch of tubes carves into the cave to catch the wind, which then resonates to create the sounds we heard on the way up. Silly children are afraid of nothing more than large panpipes."
With the area thoroughly searched and nothing of further value to be discerned, the party continued north towards two larger alcoves. As the light began to yield to the dark, Dasani and Bobert channeled their mystical abilities to afford themselves a source of illumination. Dasani, with a bit of flare made his sword glow as if on fire. Bobert simply affixed the source to the ring on his finger.
As the party approached the alcove, the sounds of growls and snarls quickly filled the hall as a pack of hungry wolves startled the party, charging at them from the hallway further north!
The Legend had just enough time to square up against the wolves as they closed the gap with a feral swiftness. The first wolf all but crashing into the sturdy dwarf, narrowing missed the dwarf's leg as the wolf snapped its jaws on the attack. The other two wolves closed in on Paul, scraping and clawing, but unable to penetrate the hard, leather armor.
Bobert was able to infuse The Legend with Bull's strength in an effort to make quick work of this situation, allowing the dwarf to swing his ax with increased intensity and power.
A frenzied melee ensues, with The legend taking a swing at a wolf, but narrowly missing, Paul connects with his scimitar, leaving a huge gash in the larger of the two wolves, as another grabs a hold of his leg and trips the young slayer.
The wolf dueling with the dwarf connects, leaving a deep wound in his shin, exposing the bone underneath, the dwarf shouting in pain.
Bobert lends support to the fray with magic missiles aimed at the largest of the three, as purple barbs of force punch into the side of the beast.
Dasani begins casting a spell of healing while the battle lurches on. The dwarf connects, clobbering the wolf, which yelps from the blow. Paul, while pronated on the dusty floor of the hallway, swings at a wolf though fails to land a strike. The two wolves go in for the kill, sending the young slayer into shock as they tear into his flesh. Dasani finishes his chant as a soothing light washes over the combatants, closing their wounds.
More missiles slam into the large wolf and the revived slayer manages to connect, sending a leg flying across the hall, bringing the beast down, the other still nipping at him.
The dwarf manages to bury his ax as it bites hard into the creature, nearly severing the spine and sending it to the ground as Dasani prepares another round of healing for the beleaguered combatants.
Bobert, his magical energy exhausted, calls upon his bonded ring to fire one last volley of missiles while Paul, still prone, works to evade the wolf's jaws.
As the missiles connect to the creature's hindquarters, the dwarf is able to land an ax strike to the head simultaneously, whipsawing the beast and slamming it into the eastern wall.
As fast as it had begun, the combat was over.
Panting, out of breath, Dasani speaks in a hushed voice, "Perhaps being a bit quieter would serve us better."
Paul, dusting himself off and rubbing a bruise nods in agreement, responding with exasperation "Definitely".
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