The Hydra was killed but the entire party was tired.
Colbert: "We have to press on, unless we want to get stuck in the forest over winter."
'Damn it Colbert why the fuck did you have to pick late Autumn for this jolly venture into this damnable forest.'
Marie: "We still have plenty of time, it is best that we do not rush to our deaths."
Marie must have seen my grimace, although she could have also seen Allelu and her scarred left eye that now has a slash going from the top of her eyebrow to her cheek. Luckily it seems that her eye is only closed due to blood flowing down rather than any actual damage to the eyeball.
'This adventure has only just begun and its already such a big shit show.' Allelus helm looks like a tin can that was opened by a dagger, Sofia is just tired and resting on the floor after concentrating on her spells, Marie is the best looking of our group with a few close calls but no real damage except for looking slightly stressed. Colbert is the best off with not even a hint of exhaustion even after firing off the same amount of eldritch blasts as Sofia did with her spells, but he is down a servant and 3 slaves. 'Sure hope he won't try to feed us to the temple if push come to shove.'
As the party begins gathering our things I help with carrying the dead along with Allelu and Colbert with his two slaves, while Marie and Sofia skin the Fake Hydra in all of its pale glory and human like heads. The smooth skin is removed and folded like a blanket before Allelu puts it in her massive backpack, 'I really should also get a backpack to help in carrying my own weight for the party.'
*Ahh
'Maybe not right now with a bad right shoulder.' As I move on and carry a dead goblin I notice that one of the slave bodies is gone. 'Time to practice my Sentient common language skills now.'
Zutal: "Colbert some creature got away with the female bandit, the melted collar is still here though."
Colbert: "Forget that worthless piece of slag, just make sure that the creature won't be coming back"
Zutal: "That is kind of hard to do, as whatever it is has almost no distinct smell so apart from the Hydra and human smell there is no clue as to if it could be tracking us for more easy pickings."
Marie: "If it has no smell then we should just assume that it snatched a corpse for an easy meal, if there were more then we would have noticed them or you would have smelled them. Let us just hope that it is scared of us enough not to follow."
Dragging the Hydra back was a pain, however the cheerful hobgoblins in the village proved that it was all worth it. In the evening the returning hunting parties were greeted by a massive pile of meat from the hydra, resulting in a feast and dance late into the night for the bountiful harvest along with some of their fears being alleviated for a month or two.
Chief: "The hydra is gone, thank you plains dwellers. My village is humbled by your strength, however it is only a temporary respite before another creature fill the missing gap, still do not let such a thing sour the night atmosphere for you have greatly helped with our winter stores."
It truly felt like I was finally in a fantasy world doing adventurer things. With the party finishing at around midnight we took to our wooden cabins to sleep, the structures were minimalistic with a thatch roof and no interior decorations unless the bark and wood chipping floor counted. Colbert got a cabin with his slaves, while we got our own for just the four of us, even if Colbert had an overcrowded cabin it was now at least quite empty. Next morning we helped Colbert dig graves for the human and goblin graves next to the villages own graveyard, however the servant goblin had a lot more attention put to its corpses handling as Colbert had personally wrapped it up in bandages and put a decomposition prevention chain around it with the plan of taking it back with us to Snout Port.
After completing our morning tasks we got a visit from the village chief, who benevolently gave us gifts crafted from the fake hydras bones. Marie got thirty arrows with jagged edges to not only cut into the prey but also be harder to remove as it would cut on the way out as well. Allelu by this point got out a spare helm with a similar design to the previous one but having no engravings on it, her gift was a hackleor plume, a rather showy piece of armour accessory that is made from one of the fake hydras skulls and goes over the front visor like a mask with a carved top where large bird feathers have been place. The masquerade look the knight now had was intimidating with the skull face and brown feathers coming from the top and pointed backwards giving the tall half-demon even more height, with carvings on the skull that looked sinister if stared at for too long. Sofia and I got a bone bracer for our right arms, with a protection enchantment, with me not wearing much armour or clothing for that matter did not diminish my admiration of the craftwork on the enchant. Colbert got a bone dagger that was also enchanted, but I could not distinguish much about it.
The entire party left for the temple and arrived at the temple in the morning, a few hours before lunch time and in better shape than we left last time. My shoulder still hurt slightly but it did little to diminish my excitement for the upcoming temple run that would test my perception skills, as we slowly climbed into the hydras den we came into a room of the temple. The large space had a hole in the side from which we came and the floor was littered with bones, a pungent odour in the room caused us to quickly exit the room through a door on the wall to the immediate right and only then could I finally appreciate the architecture. The door on the right wall had led to a larger central room with four more doors, each made of wood that has been preserved with enchants in both its surface and the metal bands going around the door and its joints to the wall, the doors had to be at least 4 metres (13 foot) tall and were a dark brown in colour with beautiful wood grain on the varnished surfaces. The ceiling went as high as 6 metres (20 foot) with there being no pillars to support the large space, the walls were plain large stone bricks but the ceiling was a single surface of what looked like polished stone that was engraved with more enchantments.
Zutal: "Any clue on what the enchants on the doors or roof are for?"
Sofia: "As an expert in magic I find it difficult to understand this old runic language, however it is not too dissimilar from what we use, well much closer to our runic language than the atrocious language used by the Claret Confederacy."
Colbert: "I have had some studies on older Draconic Empire texts, these are not just simple strengthening enchants. The destroyed empire had a knack for putting stories into engravings as decoration, this could take the form of text or pictures made from the way the enchants were engraved into the work. This however is a story about the Gods and each of their beliefs."
I felt a feeling of familiarity brush across my scales, a tingle of static and a warmth in my belly, unnatural feeling drew my gaze to a particular part of the ceiling above a door to the left this time.
Colbert: "The door on the right is for Huncame, and it leads further down to the temples bottom where the riches should be held. The front is for the worship of the gods with the gods idols, most likely. The left is not something that I am sure of though, 'it says a quick passage to the underworld from the heavens through the mortal realm.' Well, lets begin by documenting the idol room to cross reference any of our findings before venturing down into the mystery door or the trapped hallways leading to the temples treasury."
Zutal: "Can we quickly check out the left door, we can just peek in to lessen the mystery and come up with a better plan of action."
Marie: "I doubt we will come across something interesting or informative in a hallway just beyond the door. Still let us go and give it a quick look as it can't be any more dangerous than the lower floors."
Colbert: "Ahh, but what about my research. I need to compare all the old texts describing the old gods with the idols in the prayer room or main entrance and then we can hopefully find scrolls talking about the gods and what they do in the lower levels of the temple."
Marie: "Your dusty papers and idols aren't going to grow legs and run away, Come lets give the mystery room a peek."
Colbert reluctantly follows the rest of the party followed by his two slaves, while holding a book in hand that most likely contains his notes on the old gods and their temples which he wanted to cross reference information with the temple.
The door is opened by me but what greets us is not a hallway. There is only a large cavern going from below to the top with a black void at both ends, with the only light being our torches.
Allelu: "Huh, is it an entry way from the outside all the way down in the form of a drop?"
Colbert: "Well, whatever it is seems like it will never be explored since we cant climb down the hole."
Sofia: "Hold on for a moment, we didn't go that far down and yet there is just a massive cave going up as far as we can see."
Colbert: "Please, these torches aren't enhanced lanterns. It is just pitch dark and the top is most likely just covered by a lid of stone or something."
Sofia: "But aren't there 10 metre (33 foot) tall trees on top of the slab then? How would it support so much weight?"
Colbert: "Silly questions, we don't even know their gods let alone the architecture of the Draconic Empire. Why would it be strange that their stone is just a regular ever day rock, it might be enchanted or a special mixture of mineral rocks."
Marie: "Whatever it is must have access from lower floors so when we explore the underground levels of the temples we will be able to see how far the hole leads."
With this everyone moves away from my point of interest, however before fully closing a gust of wind from below the tunnel flies through the temple up above and sends shivers down my spine. Whatever is down there must not be just a simple tunnel as the air did not smell stagnant which would suggest more openings or something magical in nature. I highly doubt that the gust of fresh air from the hole in the ground came from a larger underground cave system as it had no smell of other creatures in it.