Conquering the Barbarian Altanis: Session 163

February 2, 2026

Adventurers

Character	Race	Class	Description
Sieghart Totschinder	Human	Fighter level 1	Soldier of fortune hailing from the City-State of the Invincible Overlord. Impoverished into desperation.
Nifft	Human	Thief level 2	A spendthrifty drifter, mutt, and vagrant. Lanky, tall, dark eyed and dark haired, with perennial little smirk matching his bent nose.
Thelaryn	Human	Magic-user level 1	Well groomed and well dressed Mage of the Order blessed with looks, charm, cleverness, agility, and fitness. And yet, people find him slightly suspicious.
Ambros	Human	Cleric level 6	Follower of Aniu, Lord of Time.
Ignaeus	Elf	Fighter level 4 / magic-user level 5	A slightly weathered looking elf with dull blonde hair and chiseled features. Seeks wealth and knowledge.
Foxglove	Human	Thief level 6	A willowy human, long hair ties in a pony tail, looks a bit dangerous and dainty at the same time.
Syd Grundy	Human	Ranger level 1	Tall, middle aged and scruffy looking man of the wilderness.
Tikatu	Human	Druid level 4	A dirty little man with dark and dirty skin, wearing loincloth with no back. “What will be, will be” is his favourite aphorism.
Kenso San	Human	Fighter level 3	An arrogant and self-assured sellsword wandering Wilderlands to prove he can best anyone.

Harvestime 8th, Airday

A party of nine adventurers and one linkboy descended down the pit atop the Midnight Goddess Hills. It was Ignaeus whom brought them here, for he made a wicked deal with Old Crus. The Wizard would teach him third level spells if the elf would bring him three living specimens from the Woelands.

Dungeon beneath the circle of shattered dolmens was the closest, as well as most familiar, to the adventurers. Hence, they returned to the spider-infested place once more. Like before, the antechamber was filled with blue, cinnamon and copper smelling mist.

Foxglove navigated the chamber and stuffed rolled bedrolls into the dragon-mouth's nostrils. Within half an hour the mist dissipated. More experienced adventurers warned juniors of three pit traps in the chamber. The party successfully navigated the chamber and exited into the long corridor.

This time they decided to head right, then turn left, then straight into the wide corridor leading to another long corridor. Kenso led the way, with big and confident strides. Ignaeus flanked him, while Ambros and linkboy Oriel were right behind them.

All four fell down hereto unknown pit trap. A nasty crack could be heard as Oriel snapped his neck. Other three adventurers were not particularly hurt—besides the bruised egos, that is. Others threw down the rope and helped them out.

The corridor before them was 120 feet long. There was an archway on the right hand side every thirty feet. Second and third archways emanated sickly pale green light.

“Careful...”

Based on their previous experience, adventurers made an educated guess that wicked spider-like monstrosity might lair in either, or both, of those chambers. Although Ambros was always able to turn them, adventurers did not have any magical weapons to actually injure the monsters.

First chamber to the right was empty.

Second chamber was filled with sickly green webs from bottom to the ceiling. Ambros uttered the holy words, resulting with webs shaking from activity. Ignaeus entered and blasted with wand of paralysation, borrowed to him by Old Crus. Webs continued to shake and jiggle.

Third chamber was mostly empty. There were few tattered webs here and there.

Seeing that the monster is not leaving the webs, and well aware of the fact they cannot injure it, the adventurers continue down the corridor. They eventually reached a dead end in a form of round, domed chamber. They passed bloated wooden doors prior to the terminus. Kenso forced them open, revealing a small chamber with spiral staircase leading further down.

Floor of the domed chamber was littered with broken masonry, statuary, and other oddments. Plaster that used to cover the walls and the ceiling had mostly peeled and flaked away. What little remained of it looked like it might have once depicted a natural vista.

Thoroughly searching the chamber revealed secret doors to the northeast. Foxglove discovered that concealed handle was trapped with a poisoned needle. He found a way to apply pressure to it without getting pricked.

Opening the secret doors revealed a curious chamber. Air was noticeably drier, staler, and colder. A thin layer of dust covered every visible surface, including a large cylinder of ice dominating the northeast corner.

The cylinder was roughly eight feet in diameter and ten feet in height. Foxglove wiped off a little bit of dust from the cylinder. Behind the thick sheet of ice was a black, oily mass. The light did not penetrate it. Upon closer inspection it became obvious that the mass was not perfectly smooth—it had bulgy and bubbly surface, encased with ice.

Unsure what to do, adventurers poured military oil over the ice, set it on fire, and then left. They backtracked to the chamber with spiral staircase and begun their descent. The steps were broad enough for two adventurers to advance side by side.

After three full turns, the stairs broke up into the ceiling of a large cavern. From then on, the stairs continued down, freestanding and without any handrails. Shining the bottom with bullseye lantern revealed two large spiders. Adventurers at the front retreated upstairs to discuss and plan.

Ignaeus led the second descent. He blasted the spiders with his wand of paralysation. Then everyone quickly descended in a single file to minimise the risks of being knocked off the stairs.

Once on the ground of the cave, the party realised these were not large spiders, but arachnid-like humanoids Ambros, Foxglove, and Ignaeus have met a year or so ago on the upper level, close to the entrance. Tikatu and Syd inspected the wounds. Clean slashes and punctures, most likely by weapons.

Large cave, some fifty by thirty feet and sixty feet at it highest point, had two exits on the east side. One leading north was dark and filled with stalactites and stalagmites. One leading south was wider, opening up into adjacent cave. There was some greenish light and music-like sound coming from the latter.

Adventurers went south, advancing slowly by carefully. They entered a junction-like cave splitting in four directions. Further south was a narrow tunnel. To the east was a vast cavern, nearly two hundred feet in diameter. The cavern was illuminated by a giant sphere of solid web, suspended in the center by strings of webs thick as towers defending the City-State of the Invincible Overlord.

The sphere was over one hundred feet in diameter, its surface dotted with hundreds of small, hexagonal openings. Upper part of the sphere was slightly less concave, and had several low structures and squat towers protruding from the webbing. Green light emanated from the towers and openings. Spiders crawling everywhere, except on top, where they walked upright.

Cavern floor beneath the sphere was littered with refuse and junk.

Adventurers turned off their light and switched to whispering.

Broad tunnel leading to the west continue for some sixty feet until it was completely plugged with thick webbing. There was a vertical slit in the plug, roughly in the center. A small ball of web emanating green light was placed by it. Two spiderpeople were visible inside the slit, vomiting on webs they were pulling out of their bottoms.

The party approached them, and then Ignaeus paralysed them with his wand. Kenso, Ambros, Sieghart, and Syd came all the way to the slit. Upon closer inspection, the creatures were almost identical to the two slain creatures they had just passed. Sieghart took the webbed ball holding gooey mass emanating light and stuck it to his shoulder.

“These will be two out of three Ignaeus needs.”

“But how do we take them out?”

As adventurers discussed, Ignaeus heard a familiar tune being whistled, coming from the north cave they came out of moments ago. It was an elven mating tune.

Attronarch's Athenaeum