Chapter 3: The Lord's House

[Enoch]

Yes, I think our intent after barring the door was to head for the top floor--quietly.

[drpete]

Cool. I think I know what everyone is up to. I just want to hear from Hlalf before I move you guys inside.

[drpete]

Scratch that... here ya go...

Inside the House

As Raamiz and Shmehk go upstairs, Hlalf goes into the dining room to look at the stuff on the table. He is shocked to see that the room is not empty after all! There is a man pressed against the wall!

Before he can react further, the back door is burst open, and Aurs and Fiemar enter.

"HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE!"

A grim cackling sounds through the building!

"Fools!” a dry, aged voice says. “Small-minded thieves intent on plunder deserve bodies to match. Try and carry off my treasures now, mice!"

As the voice intones its words, blood-red shadows coalesce in the corners of the room before crawling across the exterior doors and windows of the house, seemingly barring passage through them.

You abruptly watch the walls grow around you, turning into cyclopean palisades that seem to rise 100’ into the air. The floorboards grow as wide as corridors and the ground becomes gritty with dust motes. The party has been transformed to rat-size!

The transformation causes a broad puddle of pinkish, gray, brown, and other-hued slime to appear around each shrunken PC.

[Wintermute]

"Piss off ghost!" Bellows Hlalf as he charges forward, his voice becoming a shrill cry as his form distorts and shrinks!

He stops, confused by the sorcery affecting him. The distance seems much farther than it did before. "Uh oh..."

[Marullus]

Checking: was it the man in the dining room who spoke and cast? If not, was that man also shrunk? Any further details of him?

[drpete]

That man was also shrunk... perhaps he can introduce... himself?

[Marullus]

Ohhhhh.... Other new PC. Cancel plan to kill 'em.

[drpete]

Some descriptions of the various spots people are in...

Dining Room
A large table rises up before you, dominating the center of this gloomy and dusty room. Whatever lies atop its broad surface can no longer be discerned from your lowly position on the floor. A single chair stands beside the table, pushed in firmly against its edge. A small, cobwebbed chandelier hangs unlit from the ceiling.

In addition to the exit leading to the back door, there is a gigantic door, looming about 70 feet tall, leading toward the front of the house. A boarded up window on the back wall of the house, 40 feet above you, is covered in blood- red shadow. The room is huge, about 250 feet long, and 250 feet wide.

Back Entrance

The back door, which stands a full 70 feet tall, now, is covered with a blood- red shadow. The stairway, which stands about 100 feet from the back door, rises up like a mountain slope, rife with wide ledges. Each riser is about 8 feet tall. This will likely make climbing the stairs challenging, but not impossible.

In addition to the stairs and the entrance to the dining room, there is a 50 foot- wide hallway leading to the front of the house, and an entrance to the study to the left.

Top of the Stairs
You are in a 100x100 foot space at the top of the now-mountainous stairway, near the front of the house. The area is rife with gigantic dust bunnies.

There is a gigantic, 70 foot tall door to your right, and a 50 foot wide hallway leading to the back of the house. The ceiling above this hallway is maybe... 200 feet high.

[Sapperzz]

Fiemar can see the man in the dining room with him is of eight-cities descent, a swarthy looking, dark-skinned, thin figure. His muscles twitch with excitement at the meeting of another in the house, and he breathes rapidly in anticipation.

"What sorcery is this? What have you done to us?" He speaks to Fiemar. "I mean you no harm! I must demand you make us normal sized again, or perhaps you have enlarged the house?"

An ornate dagger glints on his belt underneath a thin cloak, he seems poised to grasp it should anything go further awry.

[shaidar]

Shmehk looks in horror at the mountainous stairs looming below them and around at the cavernous room

"Oh, no, no, no, no, no, this isn't good. I thought we might find a corpse, not a mad wizard!" he pauses and looks at Raamiz "Unless it's both" he takes a deep breath and seems to recover himself "No, that's very unlikely. The top floor is still the best bet for the laboratory, and we're going to need the help of the others to get there, I think, who knows what creatures lurk in this place, mice and rats at the very least"

Just to confirm that I've understood your previous post...we are on the second floor landing and there are no stairs that lead up to the top floor from here, but there is a hallway leading off.

[Marullus]

Saal is in the dining room with Hlalf.
Fiemar and Aurs are at the back door.

Fiemar grouses, extricating himself from the pile of goo around him and stepping out onto clean flooring. "It seems my warning may come too late for your uncle, his doom already in progress," he says to Aurs' in Low Lankmarese.

"Still, every challenge contains opportunity. There is advantage in our miniscule height." he concentrates, palming something from his pouch into his hand, and chants, reaching down to touch the bare food of the flooring.


Summoning [1d20+5] = 4+5 = 9
one stamina spellburn before roll. One temporary and two permanent luck after roll.

A snow owl, now seemingly twenty feet tall, climbs up out of the wood flooring where he touches it! "Welcome, friend, I need your aid," he tells it in Coldspeak. "I need you to eat no small people you see - only true mice. And carry us to solve this mystery." He clambers up onto it's back and reached down for Aurs.

[drpete]

Just to confirm that I've understood your previous post...we are on the second floor landing and there are no stairs that lead up to the top floor from here, but there is a hallway leading off.

That's right. The general layout of the house has stairways going up from the back of the house to the front, with a hallway next to it, and room(s) on either side. The ceiling of the 2nd floor hallway is open to the 3rd floor, so it goes way up.

[Wintermute]

Hlalf looks in horror at the titanic walls and furniture. Wide eyed he leans over and scoops up a handful of the slime around him and watches it stream between his fingers. "Hey new people... is this me big parts?" Hlalf stands there petrified by the weight of his predicament.

Fiemar has an owl mount, awesome! Hlalf is terrified of magic due to his current geassed state. It's going to take some encouragement to get him to come along I think!

[shaidar]

Shmehk

The spellcasting gets Shmehk's attention, and he looks impressed.

"Another wizard, and one with his wits about him, that is good" he says to Raamiz.

He turns and calls down to those in the hallway, speaking in Low Lankhmarese "Hello down there! Can you hear me?"

[Sapperzz]

My Bad! Should have said hlalf!

With the stranger in front of Saal looking tranced in terror, he takes the opportunity to unplaster himself from the wall. If he can. he will take out his grappling hook from his sack, readying to to swing up on to the table or a chair to get a better vantage point.

[Enoch]

Raamiz stares in horror at the opening unreachably far above. "Well, I suppose we needn't worry about locked doors anymore--

"Perhaps it is time we ally ourselves with those others who seem intent on interrupting our score."

Raamiz joins in the cry, cupping his hands around his mouth and calling down the staircase in Northernese. "Hello down there! Is anyone else...experiencing anything strange?"

[drpete]

The owl appears, just as described in Marullus' post. Have a fleeting luck!

Saal can climb up with a DC 10 climb check. Using the grappling hook/ rope, he can make that check with a d24.

[Sapperzz]

Saal twirls the hook a few times before tossing it up to find a hold:

Climb sheer surfaces check: 9+5(class bonus + agi)= 14

Climb sheer surfaces check [1d24+5] = 9+5 = 14

[AureoBuendia]

Aurs Bonne accepts Fiemar's gesture.

"I'm open to ideas and this sorcery is more your field of expertise than mine. May I suggest we rally with those who also share our predicament?"

He also moves his massive two handed sword for better access if the need arises.

[drpete]

Saal climbs easily up to the table.

From this perspective, the collection of elaborate devices with mechanical teeth and wire nooses look extremely dangerous, like they could chomp or grab you if you were to get too close.

Also up on the table is a collection of delicate tools, probes and saws resting on an oil- stained cloth. These seem tailor made for working on delicate mechanisms like the things on the table.

From up here, you can see a pair of tiny men like yourself over by the door. They seem to be getting on to a giant, 20- foot- tall owl's back.