Sessions 18-19

[Adminenkainen]

Session 18

The Heroes spent the week divided, finally convinced that there was too much to get done to keep doing everything together.

Batman spent the week studying his new spells, with Robin standing guard.

Blaze and Darklash spent it exploring the newly opened northeast region, or more precisely a narrow corridor of it along Milwaukee Ave, which led up to the Pal-Waukee Airport. They encountered strange things, and heard of still more, but also found an untapped reservoir of gasoline (an abandoned gas station) and rescued nearly 40 people from Unincorporated Wheeling, from around the airport, and convinced them to come south.

Gracie and the White Knight had planned to spend it exploring the ruined castle west of Orchard Place, but tough skeletons at the tower repelled them and they returned to the village to rest. While there, they learned some of the Baron’s mercenaries were ready to leave, but not all of them, and the two became embroiled in a sort-of family quarrel between the Baron’s widow, Faith, the sorcerer who had worked with the Baron, Percy, and Faith’s daughter, Irene, who seemed to be under Percy’s spell.

But all that was put aside on March 14, when everyone reassembled for a joint effort to pierce deeper into the Southland Hideout and plumb its secrets.

First, this meant meeting up with The Spook, still holed up in the secret cave – and The Spook had some news. For one, the missing nomes had been sighted by him and his apprentice back in the hideout. And another, they had found the remains of one of the missing ogres, dead in the giant spider lair. The Spook led them to the southeast of the two stairwells, which could be reached through a map room they had never found before. The Outsiders searched the room – which was when the south door opened and four hoodlums started to come in.

Two of them immediately bolted out of the room the way they came and down the stairs. Two of them gave the heroes a lot more trouble than they should have, but the heroes were holding back quite a lot.

Behind the south door was indeed the much sought after staircase. The Spook begged off on accompanying them, as he needed to return to his lair and wait for his apprentice.

Down below, the heroes found a maze of short, twisting passages (as opposed to the maze of long, twisting passages up above). They followed the light of the fleeing hoodlums to a small room where they encountered now a group of six hoodlums. Again, they dispatched hoodlums without much trouble. The trouble did not begin until they were questioning the hoodlums, and one of them warned them of a deadly trap to the west.

Unsure if the hoodlum was truthful or trying to lure them away from something important, they had to then check it out. Batman went first – and walked straight into a 10’ cube of hallway that filled with red light and cause searing burning pain to course through Batman.

Terrified of this terrible trap, the White Knight carefully tapped the floor with a crowbar, but failed to find any trigger to the trap. The trap was blocking and seemed to be protecting a door. Batman looped a lasso around the door handle and managed to wrench it open, but they only saw more hallway on the other side. Batman was not willing to cross the trap again and, fearful to move, clung to a corner. It was up to the others to go around and find a safe way to him.

This did not prove to be easy. When they backtracked to the last bend in the hall that went in the same direction, Darklash led the way – and she walked straight into a second trapped area and was burnt. They backtracked even further, back to the stairs, and saw Batman waiting in the far north corner from there. The White Knight tried to reach him – and went straight into a third trapped area. This time he jumped ahead straight to Batman, but then was trapped there in that corner with him.

The others worked out a plan for using Gracie’s strength, her two grenades, and Blaze’s heat generation to slag their way through the wall around the trapped area. Eventually, after much noisy demolition, they succeeded and Batman and the White Knight were able to hop out of the corner safely.

The second level had turned out to be not the cakewalk they had expected; three of them needed rest and they returned to The Spook’s lair so they could get it. But Blaze and Gracie were still fine and they went to do some exploring back on the first level while the others rested. They went out to do it with The Spook’s apprentice as their guide.

First stop was the giant spider lair – it had long dogged the heroes that the only fight they were too scared to take on was the giant spiders in this room, and Blaze was determined to put an end to that once and for all. He dropped a fireball into the room before entering and roasted everything in it. The spiders were dead – as was one of the ogres – whose remains had been encased in webs in the room. It also appeared that the ogre might have taken two of the spiders down with him, and that only one was still alive when Blaze fried it. From this room, they found a new route to Hershel’s office.

Their second stop was the oriental hall – a frequently guarded hall, and this visit was no exception. There were four guards in the hall, but they turned to run when confronted. The heroes chased them to the old ferret rooms, where they ran into four more hoodlums. But even outnumbered 8 to 2, the heroes prevailed handily. After winning that victory, Blaze questioned their prisoners and learned Mr. Gould was still in charge and had them looking for Ferret Master. Blaze asked them to lead him to Mr. Gould, and they agreed to. Blaze sent the apprentice back to tell the others of this surprising result and Batman rushed to join them.

Mr. Gould was cordial when the Heroes were shown to his room. He did not know much about how or why they came to be here, but he knew more about the hideout than they did. He knew the one-eyed horned men from the lower level were called bogeymen and that they had a map showing the hideout was four levels deep. A truce was reached, with Mr. Gould promising to keep what hoodlums were still loyal to him away from the Heroes, and they would know the loyal ones by the password “strawberry.”

After 12 hours of rest, there were still some injured Heroes, but healthy enough to make another crack at the lower level. They went northwest and found a suite of new rooms that were living quarters for more hoodlums. There was fighting, there was chasing, and there was surrendering. The hoodlums were all refugees from the upper level, but they were down here for a specific purpose -- waiting to be summoned for a major raid on Mount Prospect.

The Heroes needed some downtime to prepare for that. They had a laundry list of things to do, but first they checked in on Ferret Master at the Fisher Farm. FM was doing great, happier than ever to have so much space for his trained ferrets.

[Adminenkainen]

Session 18 1/2 (chat-based play between live sessions)
Part 1: Gracie and the White Knight


March 14, 1942. Saturday.

Gracie and the White Knight knew where the five mercenaries who had come over with him were situated how, so it was easy to find them and ask them to come back. And all five of them were; indeed, most of them seemed enthusiastic to. But they did insist on being paid, and they wanted $5 a day, each.

Since money was not tight, the heroes agreed.

March 15, 1942. Sunday.

Gracie and the White Knight, plus Sergent Ely and his men, returned to the Southland and proceeded to the Hideout. The temperature was now reaching mid-40s by midday, so the weather was much more reasonable for travel.

They were aware that a woman in a black coat over a red jacket and matching veil was watching them from behind trees en route. It was a curious encounter, but since she left them alone, they left her alone.

Once they were down in the hideout, they encountered no one the whole way from the lab down through the abandoned far east side of level 1 of the hideout.

“Easy men,” Ely said. “They’ll get us up safely,” he said, referring to Gracie and the White Knight and the amazing powers that had allowed them to navigate the access shaft going the other direction.

They were all back in the Orchard Place region in no time. “Form up around these two!” Ely shouted. They all held their rifles at their shoulders and faced the surrounding woods, but the woods remained not dangerous.

The Baron’s manorhouse was still inhabited, and the guards who had chose to remain behind did not look too happy to see Ely’s mercenaries come back.

“Had enough of traveling with these two?” Captain Elwin asked.

“We came back for you, Hubert,” Ely told him, half-serious.

Faith was glad to see Gracie and the White Knight return, but not for any reason they expected. “White Knight!” Faith said, practically rushing to his arms. “He’s taken my daughter! That foul sorcerer ran off with her! You’ve got to help find them!”

But Faith was short on clues as to where they had gone. They searched Percy’s tower, but it was mostly cleared out except for some mundane furnishings.

March 16, 1942. Monday.

After spending the night as guests at the manor, the heroes took their mercenary team back to the Ebner Woods to see if the Odd Fellows knew anything. They encountered nothing but squirrels, even when crossing Higgins Road, until they reached the Odd Fellows’ egg-shaped building. Here they met with Brother Theodore, Brother Xavier, and Sister Nadine. Xavier teased that perhaps they knew something of Percy’s whereabouts, if their guests would put all their guns by the entrance and settle in for an afternoon of shooting craps.

The Odd Fellows were inveterate gamblers and wanted bets on the table. Money was lost, money was won, but Gracie and the White Knight came out $2 ahead by the end of the afternoon. There were clearly other members of the Odd Fellows in the building, but they remained unseen on the upper split-level.

“Now, Percy Saunders…” Xavier said. “It’s true he was here, looking for allies.”

“He found none here,” Theodore said sharply.

“Indeed,” Xavier continued. “He left here empty-handed and, I believe, headed for the castle ruins.”

Now the castle ruins was definitely Gracie and the White Knight’s top priority, but they did not want to try tackling it without the other heroes. So they left their mercenaries guarding the entrance to this region and used the hideout to go back to Mount Prospect. They waited the rest of the day for Batman, Blaze, and Darklash to come back, at which time they had a conference.

They learned that the three had gone to the temple in Glenview and were exploring that all day. A magic mirror had shown them that Batman’s brother Sam was searching for him and Batman wanted more time to look for him. What they all settled on was a compromise, where they would all team up again in three more days instead of five.

But that was too long to wait to look for Faith’s daughter, Irene. Gracie and the White Knight knew they would have to go it alone for three days looking for her.

March 17, 1942. Tuesday.

Returning to the Orchard Place region, they picked up their mercenaries, still camped out north of Algonquin Road. Instead of going first to Orchard Place and then cutting through woods to get to the castle ruins, they could get there faster walking Algonquin Road to Busse Road, as Busse Road ran south right past the bald hill with the castle ruins on it.

This time, emboldened by the mercenaries, they decided to take the main gate on the east side of the castle -- or what was left of it. In the wreckage of a portcullis and an old-fashioned battering ram were six skeletons. Two of them rose up to defend the entrance. Their liveliness was shocking to the mercenaries; one of them backed off and another was frozen in place in fear, but three of them fought with the heroes, blasting the skeletons with their guns and destroying one, while seriously damaging the other. The damaged skeleton was smashed to pieces by the White Knight’s shield.

Gracie, meanwhile, had noticed that their brief battle was being watched by a one-eyed, horned man dressed in black. The “bogeyman” watched from an open pair of double doors on the other side of the courtyard, and after 3 seconds had stepped inside and out of sight.

The heroes crossed the courtyard, which seemed to have long since been gutted by fire. The ground sloped up to the double doors in the southeast corner of the main keep and the heroes rushed there, pursuing the creature. By the time they reached the doors, they had been barred from the other side and Gracie had to use her Amazonian strength to break through.

The small entry hall was deserted, as was the room after that. There were north- and west-facing doors in that room and the heroes tried the west one. This third room had chairs and benches in it, but no one. Here were north- and west-facing doors again, plus stairs going up to the north. They kept going west, or tried to. The next door was locked and Gracie’s strength was called upon again, but these were no ordinary locks and Gracie was only barely able to force it open. The room beyond was a barracks, with six beds, and an armory, with spears and bows and arrows. The only way out were stairs that went down, so the heroes headed that way.

The stairs bent at a landing and continued down. Then heard people moving down below, even though the room down below was dark, and figured to surprise them. But the figures jumped out of the shadows and engaged the heroes and mercenaries. Two of them were man-beasts like things they had fought in Carl Alsher’s basement, but two of them were larger and even more monstrous-looking. They ganged up on just two of the mercenaries, rending them with two and claw. Sgt. Ely was lightly injured, but his man Mark Archer went down in a bloody heap.

“Form up! Overwhelm them one at a time!” The White Knight ordered them. He led with his shield, bashing one of the smaller ones, and then Gracie followed up and punched the same one.

The mercenaries, though, seemed paralyzed with fear, with one of them -- Thomas Short -- decided to try and flee. The monsters ripped into him. The remaining three mercenaries worked hard to beat them off with their riffle butts, but Thomas was still torn to shreds.

Gracie ((buffed now with Multi-Attack and Get Tough)) pummeled the first one down they had been working on, while the White Knight tried to protect people with his shield. Forced to keep defending themselves, the remaining mercenaries used their guns as clubs and beat on the larger two monsters. It was not enough; Carlton Armstrong was the third mercenary they dropped.

The White Knight beat down the second of the smaller man-beasts with his shield. The larger man-beasts recognized Gracie and the White Knight now as the bigger threats and went after them. The White Knight’s shield protected him, but Gracie was raked fiercely by claws -- and went down!

The White Knight pulled a stunt and yanked Gracie out of the combat before they could do worse to her! They retreated into the staircase, where WK began to apply first aid. With a flashlight aimed at her, he could see she was actually not seriously injured at all - somehow she had lost all muscle control and was effectively paralyzed. WK kept applying first aid, hoping to somehow speed her recovery.

At first, WK could hear the combat still going on in the other room, but less than a minute into the first aid, it was already over. Long minutes of horrifying silence followed. When he was finally free to look back into the room where he had left those brave men fighting -- those men he had paid to fight beside him -- he found the two large man-beasts were feasting on Thomas and Carlton, and the others were clearly dead.

Horrified, and unwilling to go it alone, WK retreated with Gracie. He carried her while taking fantastic leaps all the way back to the church in Orchard Place -- one of the few places left in this world he felt safe.

Soon, Gracie was feeling almost as good as new. But even if she was at full health, they knew a fight against those monsters was dicey. So they returned through the hideout to Mount Prospect, to try and appeal to the other heroes once more to come with them -- now, not just to save the daughter, but to avenge Sgt. Ely and his men.

[Adminenkainen]

Session 18 1/2 (chat-based play between live sessions)
Part 2: Batman, Blaze, and Darklash

March 15, 1942. Sunday.

The temperature is hitting mid-40s by midday now, so it is a more pleasant trip into Glenview today to find the temple and, hopefully, some answers.

When they found it, sitting in a field within sight of the East Fog Wall, they knew why Becker had guessed as he had. The temple was enormous, as tall as the box elder and red maple trees around it. It was clearly no rural Shriners’ temple.

Some of the sidewalk was still lying in rubble around it, as if it had been scooped up with the building when it was brought here.

The doors were unlocked. It was quiet inside. The interior was richly decorated, with a foot path of 2’ x 2’ squares of what looked like obsidian inlaid into the floor and heading through the wide foyer in each direction. There were side passages that led to stairs and small private rooms, but most doors on all levels led into a giant auditorium room, three levels and 80’ high, that could seat over 4,000 people. And, sitting on the center of the stage, was a large rectangular block 40’ tall that looked like it was solid black marble.

It appeared to be solid marble, but since it wasn’t breaking the floorboards, it had to either be magic or hollow. The heroes searched it, but could find no means of ingress. What they did find was an unusual curtain at the back of the stage; it was decorated with silver eyes, pyramids, squares, and diamonds. The curtain concealed a back room where they found a lone throne on a small dais.

The throne must have been worth a fortune, as half its surface was covered in silver, gold, and malachite. It was Robin who discovered that the silver and gold balls mounted on the arms of the throne were detachable; there were four of each, each the size of softballs.

There was a smaller black curtain, decorated with goldfish, mounted on the wall, and this concealed a large mirror. Robin, quick as ever, was first to find the mirror and gasped when he looked into it.

“Gosh, do you see that?” he asked, pointing into the mirror. “The swirling shapes? That’s so weird…” Weirder still, no one else could see the swirling shapes he mentioned from where they were standing. Robin seemed to watch enraptured until Batman pushed him out of the way and looked into the mirror from in front of it. Then he too saw the swirling shapes and saw ((I’ll tell Megan what he sees)).

“I see my brother!” Batman said. “He’s looking for me! I’m here, Sam!” Batman yelled at the mirror.

Blaze, Darklash, and Robin had to calm him down or he would have ran off on the spot to go look for this Sam.

While moving Batman from the mirror, both Blaze and Darklash look into it and they both also see images in the swirling shapes. For Blaze, he sees himself walking up to a man he can’t see clearly and hugging him. For Darklash, she sees a more disturbing sight of herself lying on an operating table, dark figures performing surgery on her.

Robin, when pressed, insists he didn’t see anything he could make out in the mirror.

After this, the heroes backtrack and cover more of the side rooms around the main hall. In one, they find a white marble griffon statue on a black dais. The statue has a paw raised with a round indentation in it, like it could hold a ball. The heroes come up with the idea of putting one of the balls retrieved from the throne in it and try silver first. That does nothing, but when they try a gold ball, a white curtain appears in a doorway where there had only been wall before. The ball cannot be removed from the statue now.

Checking the secret room revealed by the magic griffin statue, the heroes find a room with four floor-to-ceiling paintings on the walls. One depicts a ferocious-looking mastiff in the woods. The next depicts a snowy mountaintop. The third depicts a Nordic-looking man working tools on an anvil. The fourth depicts a golden pegasus, flying. The room has no other exits.

While checking the room, the mastiff suddenly leaps out of the painting! It is an impossibly huge mastiff, larger than a great Dane. It snarls and growls and comes after Robin, snapping at his heels as he flees from it. Batman cast Charm Animal, but it had no effect on the beast. Blaze threw one of his smaller fireballs at it, hoping to keep it at bay, but the beast shrugged off the fireball. Darklash defended Robin with her sword, stabbing the beastly hound and delivering a light wound. The hound retaliated by biting Darklash. It was a grizzly bite ((6 dmg)) and left her limp in the beast’s maw!

Batman told Robin to get out of the room; he was going to drop a Sleep spell on the creature. Blaze could not target the creature now with fire for fear of hitting Darklash -- so he took a gamble on shooting the magic painting with fire instead. The painting burned, though the rest of the room was remarkably resistant to catching fire. Burning the painting served only to distract the dog and made it drop Darklash. While it resisted Batman’s second spell, Blaze scooped up Darklash and they made it out of there!

The mastiff howled in the secret room, but did not follow through the white curtain. Safe in the griffin room, they examined Darklash. She was actually only lightly injured from the bite, but some paralytic fluid in the wound had rendered her without any muscle control.

And, while they were discovering that, the griffin statue began to move. And then talk. “Who sent you? Whom do you serve?” the griffin asked.

By now, nothing magical surprised anyone, so Blaze tried answering it. “We serve whatever destiny has brought us all here,” he said, calculating that it was a safely vague answer.

“You should not be here,” the griffon said instead.

But, while Blaze was digesting that, and Darklash was still a wet noodle, Batman was getting Robin ready to back in there and kill that dog with their guns. Nor could they be persuaded from it. “We’ve got this,” Batman said grumpily. “You can stay here and listen to the talking statue.” And with that, they went back through the curtain.

There was five minutes of almost constant shooting on the other side; Blaze could hear it all from the hallway outside the griffin’s room. Then Darklash recovered enough that she could talk and walk again. Since she was disoriented, Blaze caught her up on what was happening. Darklash was concerned for Batman and Robin, but Blaze was confident they could handle a fight on their own, and he was sure this magic griffon had information they needed.

“You should not be here,” the griffon repeated when Blaze entered.

“Where is here?”

“This is, and is not, the home of Rei Po.”

“Who is Rei Po.”

“Rei Po is a great and powerful wizard. He has traveled every land and secured many fabulous treasures. I am one of their guardians.”

“This is his home?”

“You have already seen some of his treasures.”

“But it is also not his home?”

“Somehow, this is so. I both am, and am not, in the room to which I was bound.”

“What is going on behind the white curtain?”

“The other intruders have chosen to face two of Rei Po’s prisoners. Oh -- they just decided to release the third. And…now the fourth.”

A few minutes later, Batman and Robin emerged from the white curtain. Neither appeared injured, but they moved more stiffly. And they did not come out alone. Behind them was a strange man, Aryan, wearing an armored baldric, girdle, and chainmail leggings, but was otherwise bare-chested and bare-armed. He carried a big, metal hammer. But behind him, a gold-colored pegasus squeezed through the doorway, its bird-like wings held tightly to its body.

“You have released the prisoners of Rei Po,” the griffon said to Batman. “You cannot leave with them.”

“Try and stop me,” Batman said, leveling a Tommy gun at the talking statue.

[Adminenkainen]

March 16, 1942. Monday

Gracie and the White Knight were still busy in the Orchard Place region, but the others were done with the Glenview Temple for now and giving everyone a day to rest. At least, Blaze and Darklash assumed Batman needed rest, as he had nearly died, but instead Batman started going on long walks, looking for his brother. The magic mirror in the Temple had shown him his brother Sam looking for him.

March 17, 1942. Tuesday

Gracie and the White Knight came back from the castle ruins to say that it was a slaughterhouse down in the basement; they had lost all five mercenaries, and for a moment White Knight thought he had lost Gracie too. They wanted everyone’s help to go rescue Irene Rettig, the Baron’s 19-year old daughter. Percy Saunder, a sorcerer, had abducted her and taken her to the castle ruins.

However, Batman wanted three more days to look for his brother and everyone agreed to give it to him. While he was briefly back at the house, a vote was taken as to whether Robin should be allowed to keep his gun (he had accidentally almost killed Batman while shooting into a melee). A strong majority was in favor of Robin having to give up his gun for now.

March 18, 1942. Wednesday

Luckily, there were things to do in the towns to keep the Heroes busy. Olaf Otisberg, the 11th century fighting Norwegian rescued from the Temple, was sighted in Des Plaines, trying to get drunk at the bars in town. The heroes, particularly Gracie, worked to keep an eye on him. Olaf did not seem to want to interact with the heroes, though, and they gave him space since he was not causing much trouble.

Blaze checked on the rescued scientists and found they were having more trouble than they had expected replicating the healing pill and felt frustrated.

Food hoarding -- and food stealing -- was becoming a problem. White Knight wanted to confront the mayors and the rich Busse family and make them redistribute food, but the other heroes shot the idea down. Nevertheless, the heroes agreed to look into stopping this current rash of food thefts from people’s kitchens and Darklash suggested nightly patrols.

March 19, 1942. Thursday

That night, Blaze and White Knight were on patrol together when they found something trying to break into someone’s home -- it was a gorilla! The gorilla was a boss when it came to grappling and it was kicking both of their butts until Blaze had to get serious and wound up accidentally beating it to death. White Knight followed its tracks through muddy backyards and found it had come from the south, possibly from the Southland.

March 20, 1942. Friday

Blaze healed. Batman gave up on his search, for now.

March 21, 1942. Saturday

The heroes all returned to Orchard Place together. On White Knight’s suggestion, they had come to the manorhouse first to ask for more help. Faith and her mercenaries didn’t trust WK (they observed how he had left with five of their numbers already, but came back with none of them now), but she was convinced to send one (Clarence) to observe.

They took Touhy Road west across the region, detouring in the spot where a large, rocky hill had sprung up and broken up the road. To their surprise, they spotted three man-beasts like the ones that had slaughtered the mercenaries feasting on a wolf’s carcass on the hillside. Everyone seemed unsure of what to do until Darklash suggested they save their strength for the castle.

After veering off road through some thick woods of mostly dead trees, they at last approached the castle on its hill from the south. They first came across a catapult, facing the castle and, as they drew much closer, a giant skeleton rose up and throw a large rock at them. Gracie charged the skeleton and wrecked it to pieces, though.

The castle’s south wall showed signs of having been laid siege to by the catapult at some point in the distant past, and there was a hole here big enough to go through one at a time (wrecking it wider looked like it might bring the whole wall down on top of them). Blaze went through first -- and was sliced and diced by sword-wielding skeletons. But Blaze was not facing them alone long; Batman and the White Knight leaped over the curtain wall carrying Darklash and Gracie, and they quickly took out the skeletons.

A skeleton and zombie were patrolling the courtyard, but the heroes ignored them and headed up for the castle’s main entrance. Inside, they found another surprise -- besides undead, the castle was inhabited by centaurs! The centaurs either could not or would not communicate with the heroes, and although they always had their bows and arrows ready, they were never planning to take the first shot. So the heroes avoided them as best they could while navigating the castle.

Ignoring the centaurs, the heroes went straight for the barracks/armory at the top of the stairs and found it was stocked with more undead skeletons (and one zombie). There were nine of them in total, but that meant nothing because the Heroes mowed them down in one minute.

Down the stairs, the man-eating man-beasts did not last much better. Blaze blasted them with fire, destroying two of them immediately, and the third one fell to bullets. There was a good-sized treasure horde in the corner of the room; they found lots of 17th century English guineas, a small-sized suit of platemail armor (perfect for Robin, who now calls himself Sir Robin), a magic potion, and a magic shield (a spell later confirmed these two were magical).

The rest of the basement level involved methodically checking empty rooms, until they came to a den in the far corner of the basement level. While searching it, Darklash disturbed a ghost that was apparently hiding under the desk! The ghost energy drained Darklash, but Batman’s magic sword and Darklash’s magic shield meant they could hurt it and they managed to chase the ghost off. The rest had taken turns trying to exorcise the ghost by reading from a Bible in the room, but the Bible failed them.

The only other treasure they found in the basement was a storeroom full of antique furniture, and the ancient books in the den, but they left it all behind to maybe get later (half-joking about stocking their hideout/house with antiques). After making sure the basement was clear, they moved back up to the ground floor. They encountered a whole herd of centaurs and avoided combat with them. They found a larder stocked with preserved food that they badly wanted to raid, but delayed from doing so for fear that it was the centaurs’ only food.

In the middle of the castle was a room where some incense blocks were being stored next to a small iron chest, and nearby was something covered by a sheet. Under the sheet, Batman found a Gatling gun that was ready for use; it was just missing a tripod to mount it on. He also opened the chest (he knew neither was trapped because he had already cast a Find Traps spell) and found seven small gems mixed in with moth-eaten clothes (and because everyone was watching, he couldn’t just take them and had to share).

The next room, though, was occupied by a bogeyman, likely the same one Gracie and the White Knight had seen outside the castle before. It talked to them and seemed friendly, but it was a trick to lull them into dropping their defenses while it tried to immobilize them with what seemed like a Hypnotic Pattern spell. It sort of worked -- Gracie and the White Knight were hypnotized. The bogeyman tried to flee from the others, but Batman caught up to it and shot it dead in the hallway. At least they had learned a few things first from the bogeyman -- the bogeymen were allegedly from another world, were here as observers, but had some sort of undisclosed mission.

In the bogeyman’s room was a cot; while searching it, Darklash found a magic spell scroll and reluctantly gave it to Batman, who everyone had been noting was growing increasingly power-hungry. Batman, for his part, knew thanks to his spell that the chest in this room was trapped, but opened it anyway out of curiosity (and giving everyone else warning so they could get out of the room first). The chest exploded -- Batman leaped back and took light damage -- sending a shower of guinea coins around the room.

After collecting the treasure, the Outsiders moved on, figured they had seen everything on the ground floor, and moved on to the second floor. They found more centaur children (unguarded this time) and left them alone. And they found Irene in a bedroom.

However, Irene had some surprises in store for them -- she claimed to be here of her own volition. She hated her mother for marrying bullies like The Baron and she willingly partnered with Percy to look for a way to escape this place. Batman cast Detect Magic on her to see if she was enchanted (this led to a minor altercation where Irene thought she was being attacked and began a counter-spell, but Darklash tackled her and disrupted her spell) and there was no evidence she was under a spell. Further, despite her mother’s fears, she was not lovers with Percy (“He’s old, ew!”). And, lastly, Percy was in the next room and she wanted them to talk to him.

Percy Saunders, a 50-year old Brit, answered the door. The Heroes learned that he had come here the same day they did. He had thrown in with The Baron at first, but had no loyalty to his widow. He had brought Irene with to watch his back and keep him company. He had taken control of the castle ruins from a weaker magic-user named Temple (“He’s still slinking around here somewhere”) and was just now identifying potions he had found in this workshop. Batman’s Detect Magic spell told him that Percy was covered practically head to toe in magic paraphernalia, there were magic potions in the room, and the earthen statue in the room was magic.

Percy was asked if he had seen a bronze lever anywhere in the castle and he was surprised by the question - because there was one in the very next room over. They all went in and, sure enough, in an otherwise empty room was a Bronze Lever. Like The Spook, Percy had not been able to move it, but the Lever moved easily for Darklash.

Blaze made a proposal to Percy and Irene - that they would be welcome to take over the Burning Tower in Des Plaines. Percy was glad to come check the place out and just needed more time to wrap up here first.

While Percy went back to work, the Outsiders reconvened on the other side of the floor and talked about plans. Batman wanted to sell the Gatling gun, but everyone else wanted to keep it; Blaze had plans to use it to hold the north end of the Southland in case the hoodlum invasion came.