SND-02: PLEASURE CRYPTS (Part 2)

The following is intended for the play-by-post delve of SND-02: Fane of the Heresiarch.

Vitals + Rumors + Crusaders + Score + Watchtower + Bleak Seminary + Confessional + Black Cathedral + Ashen Ambulatory + Pleasure Crypts + Catacomb Reliquary + Death Wyverns' Crucible + Prison of Frozen Gods + Observatory + Gauntlet of Walls + Blighted Grove + Chaos Maze + Mothers' Cloister

Azure velvet tapestries dangle from the smooth grey stone of this large chamber. Ivy and violet flowers cling to the walls. Each tapestry depicts a pair of ghostly lovers chasing one another around a trident.

Rays of smoky crimson light filter down through skylights in the vaulted ceiling high above.

A 10 ft. high tier inlaid with baroque patterns rises along the north and east walls, its golden-railed balcony overlooking a grove of dead trees in the center of the chamber from which shrunken heads grow like fruit.

Grove of Dead Trees: Shrunken humanoid heads dangle from the bare black limbs of the trees. Thou may enter a tree’s space (difficult terrain) to gain cover.

A creature adjacent to or in a tree’s space can eat one of the shrunken heads as a minor action. Doing so grants that creature 5 temporary hit points.

A tower-like structure from a 50 ft. pit in the center of the room. A glistening gold sarcophagus is visible between the crenellations that line the structure.

The air is heavy with the stink of perfume and fornication.

Two sets of heavy iron doors – one leading west and one leading north – bear spiked pull rings and are embossed with the image of a succubus embracing an armored tiefling skeleton wrapped in broken chainmail.

The doors are not locked but are very heavy, requiring a standard action to open or close.

The succubus on the door is in fact a recent modification; there is evidence that the original image depicted a medusa.

Soft footfalls echo off the chalky stone stairs. Thy cloak pulled up close to thy face, thy eyes scanning the room for prey.

Across to thy right, a radiant image. Past the 50 ft. pit, thou sees a 10 ft. tall woman's face hewn from brilliant ruby set into the northeast corner of this golden tier. Recalling your brief conversations from elsewhere in the Fane, thou recognizes that it has been carved in the likeness of Lahamu, Bride of the Heresiarch.

Further past the bend on this raised platform, thou sees a far more interesting, and frightening, sight. A lithe, young woman stands, looking in thine eyes. Perfect auburn hair cascades down to her pure alabaster shoulders. Her glittering hazel eyes are full in color and deep in passion. Ruby red lips pucker and beckon. She wears shining obsidian plate armor, clinking and clanking as she moves, two horns delicately protruding from her hair and a pair of leathery wings from her back, whipping in the air.

Wordlessly, she raises her sinister hand and beckons.

image by Jon Green

Beyond the double doors lies a charnel chamber containing eight decrepit sarcophagi. The lid of each sarcophagus in the two small crypts has been etched with two sets of four symbols. The crypts are watched over by a 10 ft. tall black marble statue of the bat-winged Sorrow Nimbus.

Wisely, the dungeoneers open the seventh sarcophagus to reveal a horde of a dozen treasures and a chain lowers in the ruby mouth!