Thoughts of Erhivor: Dwarven Citadel - Day 3

Things have been very strange since we came down into this citadel. We have discovered three magical items here and some strange mystical traps and creatures. The ring that I found not far from where we are now I still have yet to understand. Nel is carrying a magical adamantine Urgrosh, which I have yet to understand the nature of. I am wearing a magical, yet cursed, war crown. The war crown has made me feel stronger and more confident and commanding, yet it seems to be turning me into a Dwarf. It's becoming more and more difficult to remember that I am an Elf the more that I wear this crown, but I cannot take it off. I do have a lovely beard, though.

The room that we found the Urgrosh and the Crown in was inhabited by a young and malnourished White or Blue dragon. Instead of breathing fire as a weapon, it breathed ice. It was a very dangerous and vicious creature, regardless of its malnourished state, though. We managed to kill it, but it nearly killed Brom and Gideon in the process. In that room we not only found the two magical items, but an Orcish spiked shield, a cracked-open egg (from which the dragon probably came), a tooth from what was probably an adult dragon and a stone tablet with Dwarven runes engraved within it and appears to be in some form of code. At that point, I made a really stupid mistake and put the war crown on.

Getting to the room of relics was a little complicated as it was trapped with magic. The trap was in six parts, where in order to deactivate them, one must utter the name of a Dwarven hero whose sigil matched the rune engraved on the floor. The heroes and sigils matched those who had statues in the room nearby where I found the curious magic ring that I have. At the end of the hall with the six traps, just outside of the room of relics, there was a silver anvil and a golden warhammer. None of us could get a hold of the hammer, as it would magically move away from our grasp.

Another room off of the trapped hallway with the anvil and hammer contained a forge and a smith who was a lizard-like creature, yet humanoid in form, whose body seemed to emanate fire. The smith was in the process of forging weapons and it appears was walled off with a mystical barrier. It could not hear or see us from within that barrier. I happened to lose control of my thoughts and wandered past the barrier in order to irrationally communicate with the fiery lizard, which seemed to break the barrier, at which point the lizard could see us and it suddenly attacked us all. The lizard was fast and strong and it attacked with a vicious spear and its tail. After everyone except for myself getting hurt very badly by the creature, our combined efforts overpowered it and we managed to kill it.

I then found a secret door within the forge room which led to a weapons store room. Within that room we found a series of exotic, masterwork weapons and a full set of spiked scale mail armor. We then packed up the weapons and armor and, after taking a break near the lift shaft at the base of the trapped hall, we climbed up the shaft and back to where the secret door is that we originally came from the night before.

When we got to the secret door, someone had pulled the stone out of it that Gideon placed there to keep it open, so the door was shut. We had no choice but to break down the stone door, regardless of who might be on the other side. Once we broke through the door, everyone except me noticed a man hiding about thirty feet away from the door, almost directly in front of us. Gideon called out to him and asked him to come out. He came out into view and told us that we were under arrest and to submit. Gideon and I did not believe that he was a legitimate guardsman and Gideon asked him to identify himself. He refused and threatened to attack us. Then all of us started talking and arguing loudly and I started openly accusing the man of being an imposter. The man then shot me with a dart, at which point Gideon rushed forward to attack the man and I shot him back. As Gideon rushed forward, another man seemed to suddenly appear beside Gideon and stabbed him. In short, I took down the first man, who was thirty feet away with a couple of arrows and Gideon and Nel killed the second man. Then a third man appeared from the rubble about twenty feet away and ran down the adjacent corridor into the dark. Gideon ran after the third man while I watched the first man and Nel attended to him. Once Brom showed up to assist Nel, I ran after Gideon to help him out, at which point the third man, who was hiding behind a barrel that both Gideon and I missed, shot me with a poisoned dart. I was then unconscious.

I awoke to Nel and Brom standing over me and Gideon standing over the third assailant, who was rather dead. Gideon was cut up pretty bad and bleeding a lot. After Gideon bandaged himself up, we started to hear fighting behind the closed door in the room that I woke up in at the end of the corridor. Brom's curiosity got the better of him and he opened the door. Now we're all standing in the doorway staring at a room full of armored men with their weapons drawn and they're all stopped in the middle of fighting and staring at us. They don't look very friendly.