Emperor of Ice - Sellswords Campaign Chapter 5

Chapter 5 - The Tower of Teuton

Gunnar trudged disconsolately at the back of the party. “I bet that’s the Tower of Teuton”, he said, pointing at a tower.
Sir Robin looked at him. “How do you know?”
“It’s the tallest.”
Christos laughed. “Well you’re right – it must be the one we are looking for. It is the one that glorifies the Lord of War, Bane of the Unnatural, the Great God Teuton. Well spotted.”
“Nah, because it’s the tallest one round here, it will have the most steps up.”
“Steps are a cultural enemy to dwarves,” whispered Sintamo to Eldarondo.


View of the table set up.

Viewed from the PC's entry point.

The three floors inside the Tower.

The heroes in their starting positions.

 But danger is waiting for them.

 Sintamo eyes up the distant skeletons, allows for the wind and takes a long shot....

....Thunk! A skeleton bites the dust!

As the rest of the horde shamble forward, Eduardo (giggling to himself) starts to gather this magical energy....

....FIREBALL!

 As the PCs move forward, a horde of bandits led by a thug, move onto the table behind them.

In the meantime Brother Christos rushes on ahead of the rest of the group and encounters a horde of skeletons, but they didn't last long!

Only to be ambushed by a giant Ice Serpent. Christos misses his attack, but just parries the snake's jaws with his shield.  His counter strike crushes the beasts skull.

The PCs hear a distant howling, a werewolf has arrived on the scene.

The bandits hang back, keeping downwind of the werewolf, which rushes towards the party.  Eddiesdrew himself up to full height, pointed at the beast....and sent forth a small shower of sparks! Intrigued, the werewolf moved closer to the pretty lights.
Sintamo called to Eldarondo, "We'll have to do this the old fashioned way!" and promptly stuck two arrows in the beast.
Gunnar stepped up to shield the bemused Eddie, who just stood by, muttering to himself.
Eldarondo added an arrow to the werewolf's collection of feather-related jewellery, before the enraged monster charged Gunnar. The dwarf was knocked backwards by a viscous swipe, but the beast's claws just scrapped off of his armour.
Gunnar promptly relied by splitting the werewolf's skull with his axe.

Emboldened by the arrival of another horde of their friends, the bandits used the distraction of the werewolf to rush closer.
Eddie suddenly looked up, wide eyed.
"I've got it!" he cried to no one in particular.
"I should have done this" he explained to his invisible audience, and promptly blasted the oncoming bandits with a large fireball!

In the distance Christos was heard to call "I've found the door".
Eldarondo yelled "Come on everyone, run for it."
As Gunnar ran past the giggling wizard he called out.
"Eddie, what's the most important rule?"
Eddie paused for a moment, pushing thoughts of fire out of his mind. "Urrr...if I'm at the back, run."
"You're at the back, laddie!"
With a startled yelp, Eddie ran after his comrades.
More bandits and more armoured skeletons now entered the table.

Turning to aim at he skeletons, Sintamo was surprised by a giant snake emerging from a nearby pile of rubble. He avoided the serpent's strike and shot it through the throat.
"I thought you'd have a better way with endangered species" Sir Robin said innocently.
Sintamo glared at him.
"I'm a ranger, not a snake charmer!"
"Scorpion charmer more like!" Robin muttered.

And now a wandering Ogre entered the table!

As the party drew together, Eldarondo called to Eddie.
"Don't look now Eddie, but you are being chased by a giant spider".
With a frightened squeal, Eddie increased pace and overtook the rest of the group.
Eldarondo shot the creature as it scuttled towards them.
"You should have checked with Sintamo, he might have wanted to keep it as a pet."
"Shut up!"
At this point the party too a brief rest, to allow Christos and Eldarondo to use their healing skills and patch up the wounds suffered so far by the party.

Now came the real challenge, every time a PC touched the tower, it would turn in a random direction. This would only happen once in each PC's turn, so the group realised that as soon as the tower stopped moving, they needed to jump onto the tower quickly, before it moved again.
Sintamo, Eddie and  Eldarondo managed to get onto the staircase leading to the door (unfortunately, so did two hungry wolves!)......

While Sir Robin and Christos elected to scale up the wall. Gunnar found himself on the far side of the tower to the rest of the party, with multiple hordes of bandits closing in, so started to climb the wall on that side. Fortunately, as soon as one of the bandits started to follow him, the tower turned, carrying him out of reach of his angry foes!

Having dispatched the wolves, Eddie, Sintamo and Eldarondo climbed the staircase. The ranger was muttered as he rummaged through his pack.
"What are you doing?" Eldarondo asked.
"I've got as set of lock picks in here somewhere, I knew they would come in handy".
The elf gently tried the handle as Sintamo triumphantly brandished his lockpicks.
The door swung open with a low creek.
"It's unlocked!" Eddie explained unnecessarily.
In the meantime, Sir Robin and Christos climbed in through the window.
"Where's Gunnar?"
Two sets of fingertips could be seen, grasping the windowsill across the chamber. With an accompanying grunt the top of a helmet came into view, only to slump back down out of sight.
A second time the helmet came into view, then dropped back out of sight.
"Perhaps it's some kind of Dwarven exercise regime." Robin mused.
"Just give me a hand you two, will you."
"And stop laughing!"

Venturing up to the second floor, Gunnar was sudden attacked by... giant frogs!
"Hop along you lot!"
"Gunnar, that's not really funny."

The dwarven axe made short work of the over-sized amphibians.
"That last one's croaked!" Gunnar chuckled.
"No, no more jokes Gunnar."
"I TOAD you it would be alright."
"Seriously, stop it now!"

The rest of the party followed Gunnar up the stairs.
"Where do you think this relic is going to be?" Eldarondo asked.
"On the top floor, of course." Christos replied.
"It would be" Gunnar mumbled.

As they climbed higher they encountered more aggressive frogs. As Eldarondo finished the last one off, Eddie paused for a moment, looking quizzical.
"I think something is coming up the stairs....."

"...Wolves!"
"What are they doing in here?" Eldarondo asked.
"Hunting frogs?" Sintamo suggested as he shot an arrow over Eddie's shoulder into the throat of one of the beasts.
"Oi, watch my ear!"

By now Sir Robin and Christos had reached the top floor and there, on a stone pedistal, was a bejeweled book with a red and green cover.
"Is that it?" Robin asked.
"I think so." Christos replied.
"Only think so, what does it say".
"I'm not sure, I can't really read it."
Robin raised an eyebrow.
"It's in a secret code know only to the most senior priests of my order, but I do recognise some of the characters."
"Just grab it and let's go."

As the rejoined the rest of the party, Sintamo was musing on the tower's ecosystem.
"I can see why the wolves would come in to hunt all these giant frogs, but what are the frogs eating?"
"Insects?" Eldarondo suggested.
"They'd need to eat bucket loads of insects to survive."
"Big insects, then?"
"GIANT SPIDERS!" Eddie screamed.
"Yes, that would work, no need to shout I'm right next to you."
"NO, GIANT SPIDERS!" Eddie repeated, pointing at the ceiling.
Looking up the party suddenly noticed the amount of cobwebs sprawling across the high, ceilings. From all four corners, a black mass of  writhing creatures scuttled forward.
"Everybody out, now!" Christos yelled and led the race for the door.

Once outside the tower, they saw that all the bandits were gathered together at the far side of the tower, so the PCs leapt of the steps and escaped into the ruins before they were sighted.