Mission: Take a Book Leave a Book

Jaymem sent a request to retrieve a book for him. Our heroes went to a lodge in the woods run by werebears. The lodge was built atop the cellar of an older mansion inhabited by and insane wight, and that mansion was built atop the even older ruins of an ancient laboratory. After killing a troll, fighting their mirror selves, and fighting many an underground menace, they finally found the book they were after. They befriended and freed a monstrosity leftover from an experiment eons ago, and made their way back to the surface.

Take a Book Leave a Book (by Rheinhart)
Capable Koristos, Righteous Ryn, Dynamo Dando, and I volunteered to retrieve a book Jaymem requested via one of his stick-man messengers. Not in a literal bear cave this time, however, it turned out to be underneath another kind of bear cave. After trekking into the woods to the west following Koristos’ lead, we came to a large nondescript lodge. Simple, rugged, and fairly well built and maintained.

We searched the area a bit and just as we decided to check inside after our knocked went unanswered, a savage bear ran up to us as if it was going to attack! However, instead of attacking, it changed form into a burly man! A were-beast! However, everything I’d read or heard about were-beasts did not fit this man’s demeanor nor was he savage nor out of control. He was downright amicable. Danke gott, it's always a pleasure to meet a potential friend and ally than yet another problem to be dealt with.

The place in the woods is named Fur Cloak Lodge and several werebears live there. Burl informed us that it was built upon the ruins of a manor house whose foundation was still very solid. It’s sealed, however and no one ventures down there. We asked to go down there to search for the book and he happily let us. The “shave-and-a-haircut” knock when we return is our code that it is us and safe to open the door.

The basement was spacious and mostly empty apart from dust and cobwebs… and this insane weight named Spence. He still thought he roamed his wine cellar and at first was going to attack us to make us leave. We befriended the blighter with the help of an empty wine bottle I had still with me from the haunted vineyard a few weeks ago. I’d been holding on to it in case we needed to sample some liquid for some reason.

Ok. I’m a packrat. But it came in handy! That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

Spence told us about the ruins HIS manor was built upon and we realized that we needed to locate a way further down if we were going to find anything. I spotted some tiny runes carved into one cellar wall and after some investigation we figured out how to open the secret door. The weight became terrified, warning us not to venture down there and ran off with my bottle. Never did manage to convince him to share his good wine (if there was still any left). The ruins below turned out to be an ancient wizard’s laboratory and many of his experiments were still down there and would be dealt with by our little troupe.

Down we went into the earth for many minutes until we came upon a troll guarding the path near some lava wearing some harness chained to the wall. While Koristos and I kept the troll busy, Dando and Ryn figured out how to release the heavy chain from the wall. With a mighty shove, we managed to throw the end of the chain into the lava which took the troll down with it. I swear it gave us a “thumbs up” just before vanishing beneath the magma.

Beyond the troll lay a room with a mirror. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary until I went up to read the inscription of the mirror as it was written in Elvish. My reflection was abnormal as it showed me in my skivvies rather than a true reflection. Dando tried it out, too and was shown the same thing. The cheeky cat-man tried to get Ryn to see her reflection, but I put a stop to that before he could disrespect her like that. Next thing I know, Dando kneed me in my codpiece and sucker punched me, dislocating my jaw! I blacked out for a moment or three. When I woke next,  Ryn had shared a bit of her life force with me as we both touched the mirror and found ourselves “inside it” along with Dando, all of us in our skivvies and trying to yell loud enough for Koristos to hear us and run inside the mirror to join us. I doubt he heard us, but he did see us frantically waving our arms from in the mirror and ran in to join us. After a few awkward moments, we realized there had been a voice in our heads telling us to speak the word as one. We didn’t know what word it was talking about, but Koristos started counting and we fell in sync, eventually giving a single number word all of our voices at once, thus opening the mirror and getting back into our gear.

The mirror had opened a path into a maze. Lots of strange things down here. Fought a “gelatinous cube” thing which had a full pewter silverware set, not a piece missing, in it! I kept that so it could be cleaned and used again. I think we ended up exploring every nook and cranny of that maze before finding the way down, yet again.

At this lowest(?) level, the path led to an obvious laboratory which contained the requested book we were looking for: Torrence the Great Arcano-Biologist’s Research Notes. One of the experiments was alive down here, it was some kind of manticore, but with all the wrong parts: head of a lion, torso of a man, body of a scorpion, rear of a man, tail of a lion. It’s name is Cantimore and it wanted us to free it of the scorpion head still attached to part of its body and was a never-ending source of trouble for him. He asked us to hack it off and try to heal him and if successful, destroy the arcane circle keeping him imprisoned down here. We obliged as it is rare to find civilized monsters.

Once we got the book, we returned to the surface, thanked Burl for his help and gave the book to the waiting stickman for our payment. I wonder how Jaymem knew about this place? Maybe he’s using magic to find these books. Yeah, that must be it.