Chapter 1: The One Who Watches From Below

It has been a couple of months since your fateful spins on the Wheel of Destiny. After leaving the cliff at the edge of the sea, you made your way to the nearest city to purchase equipment and come to terms with your new abilities. Your old lives are a thing of the path. You are now ADVENTURERS!

Many of your surviving companions went their separate ways, but five of you decided to stick together. Kip the dwarf, a former herder, brought back to life by the Wheel for a second chance. Henry, once a grave digger, now a somewhat crazed wizard. Honey, the beekepper who pledged herself as a cleric of the Lady in Blue. Hyde the sellsword, moving further along the path of the warrior. And Pyne the con artist, now a full-fledged thief.

Early on during your travels together, you inducted a sixth member into your band: Braxwen Hardwind, a wandering halfling. Hopefully, his good luck will rub off on you!

***

You journeyed for several weeks together, in search of adventure. Eventually, you found yourselves in the city of Punjar, where you heard tales of a mystical place called the Cave of Secrets. The name may be cliched, but if the stories are true, any question can be answered at the Cave, if one is willing to pay the price.

At first, you dismissed the tale as mere legend. But just this very evening, a grey-robed man with a white beard, deep in his cups, boasted too loudly of his trip to the very cave. In exchange for coin and gems, any secret can be uncovered. But what care have you for secrets? When the old man spoke, your mind began to race. Where do all the coin and gems end up?

As the doddering codger stumbled toward the door, the drunk tripped over a bench, sending mugs in all directions and angry revelers to their feet. In the commotion, you saw a scroll tube fall from the man’s pocket and roll under the bar. You claimed the tube before anybody else noticed it. The tube contained a neatly-drawn map of the countryside showing the city of Punjar and an X marked "Cave of Secrets." If this map is to be believed, it’s a mere two days travel away...

Whether there be coin or gems, I'll sniff them out. Kip declares with a smile and a thump on their chest.

Baxwen nods, probing his left nostril with his pinky. He extracts something that he rolls into a ball between pinky and thumb before he flicks it toward the floor.

"Agreed," Baxwen says. "A swift departure is good. That old fool unlikely reached old by being too great a fool."

You have time to make any purchases in the city before departing. After several days of hard trail, you finally reach the area indicated on the map. Your pulse quickens as you spot the cave. Near the opening a simple weathered sign beats in the wind. It reads, "ENTER."

The passage is dark, but with their infravision, Braxwen and Kip can see there is some sort of dim illumination further on.

Braxwen points at the sign.

"Not 'entrance', but 'enter'," the halfling says. "A command, not a welcome." He points to the passage. "There is a dim illumination down there. Not sufficient light for normal eyes, at least at first. Do we cautiously proceed? Or perhaps search this immediate area? This obvious entrance may be an inobvious trap."

Hyde notices a few faint humanoid footprints in the dust, but they seem to be a few weeks old at least. When you are ready, you make your way into the entrance passage. It gradually widens into a large cavern. A light smoke hangs in the air, diffusing the light of the scores of candles placed around the chamber. The air has a thick richness to it—tart, sickly sweet with floral undertones – and makes you feel light-headed.

Through the smoky gloom, you can see body-length niches are carved on every wall. Two figures appear to be slumbering here under threadbare blankets.

A large, obsidian obelisk stands at the room’s center beside a small altar. A large, baleful eye has been carved into one side of the obelisk. The stone altar is covered in flickering candles. A beaten copper collection bowl lies next to a plate of bags containing dried flower bulbs.

Hyde can see a smaller alcove to the north. To the east, stairs lead up to a massive metal gate. To the southeast, the cave floor slopes downward gently and widens, ending at a precipice. A railing cobbled together from discarded wooden planks is the only thing between you and the cavernous black pit.

The sellsword does not see any other people in this room besides the two under the blankets.

The pit is over 100 feet deep. Dropping the torch into the pit reveals piles of humanoid bones far below.

The first figure does not respond to Henry. Inspection reveals her to be a recently deceased elven female. Her cause of death is not immediately apparent.

The other figure is a geriatric human male. Poking him causes him to groggily awaken. "Eh? What? Who are you?" he mumbles, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

In an excited and hushed voice Kip informs the group I can smell gems over there He points in the direction that the scent originates from.

When the old man jolts awake Kip breathes in sharply "By the Stone! I thought that was a zombie." Kip immediately scans the room for any danger.

Baxwen follows along. He lags a bit at the obelisk, looking at the copper bowl and the dried flower bulbs. He looks toward the blanketed figures, and watches Hyde drop his torch into the pit.
Baxwen takes advantage of the "live one" to slip Hyde's silver piece out of the bowl into the palm of his hand. He then skips over to the geriatric human.

"We are explorers of dread reputation and uncanny skill," Baxwen says to the old man. "Who are you?"