With Onyx fully restored and knowing that they now had access to an easy source of healing for the rest of their time in the crypt the party made their way back towards the chamber with the magical trap. Onyx chose to return to Delde’s backpack part way through the walk without prompting leading her to wonder if her familiar could either sense the danger they were approaching or her own growing apprehension. In any case, by the time they all reached the catacomb before the reflecting pool the groups good spirits were dulled by the recognition of the task before them now.

Delde used her cantrip to grant herself the ability to sense magic so that she could gain a better understanding of the trap before them as they stood in front of the entrance to the trapped chamber. She managed to not become overwhelmed by the shear intensity of the necromantic magics surrounding them all, but only just. It was as if she had just been walking in a meadow during a bright summer day only to take a step and be instantly taken to a mountaintop in winter, so sharp was the distinction she experienced. It took all her effort to look past the energies buffeting her and into the chamber before her, specifically at the shallow pool of stagnant, still water.

She could see it. The magical enchantment remained in place, active and ready to go off once triggered disappointingly enough. It was also far beyond her ability to overcome; this she was sure of. Delde had been entertaining the idea that she could perhaps try and disarm or otherwise disable the magical trap through some clever manipulation of arcane energies. Not quite a full dispelment, more akin to using a rock to hammer a nail when an actual hammer wasn’t available. But seeing the magics herself, feeling the raw potential that they contained, Delde felt that she could try something like that for days before finding success. And time was something that they did not have on their side. She turned back to her companions and shook her head grimly.

‘The magical defence is still there, and it’s beyond my ability to disable… We’re going to have to come up with some other way of dealing with it’.

Frustration boiled within Delde. She had wanted to present some sort of solution to their problem, not leave it for others to work out. But she had no clue as to how she could defeat it, the magnitude of the magic behind the enchantment was too great.

‘Did you learn anythin’ about the trap from lookin’ at it?’

Bayes words might have sounded accusatory to others, but Delde could tell she was just looking for more insight into the obstacle before them.

‘Such as?’.

‘I don’t know much about magical traps. But I do know a bit about normal ones. You can tell a lot about how a person sets up their traps. Are they set up for a specific animal? Are they well made? Has the person left signs to warn people that there’re traps about? Things like that. I mean, is this another of the trials we were mean to do, or was it set up by whoever summoned all these undead?’.

Delde turned back to the pool with intent in her eyes. Baye was correct, she needed to gather as much information on the magical defence that she could. She had allowed herself to become fixated on her failure to find an obvious solution to their problem to the point that she hadn’t focused on what she could do. After forcing her senses to peer beyond the oppressive necromantic magics surrounding her Delde examined the magical trap once again and made an interesting discovery.

‘Huh, that’s… strange’.

‘What is it?’

‘The magical trap, it’s… it’s very powerful, powerful enough that I didn’t notice before. Because despite the great power behind it, the actual formula, the structure binding the enchantment is quite crude. Primitive really’.

‘What do you mean?’.

‘It’s like…’ Delde tried to think up an appropriate analogy. ‘A trap that’s been set up that’s essentially a giant boulder being held up by a stick. Extremely simple. Most magical defences like this would be more akin to a mechanical bear trap. Complex and intricate. The contrast between the power and the design of the defence is bizarre’.

‘Could yie use this tae… turn off the magic trap’.

‘Hm? Oh, no… the trap… its simple but still effective. To continue using the metaphor essentially the boulder is too big for me to move’.

‘Does this tell us anything useful then, or is it just a weird thing about a really dangerous thing? Like a rabid wolf with two tails’.

‘I’m… not sure. It’s just so incongruous for there to be such a disparity between the power behind a magical defence and the actual skill behind making it’.

‘Could it have been a sorcerer? You did mention that their magic was more instinctual, could that be the reason for the difference?’.

‘No, a sorcerer’s magic is more instinctual, but they have a base understanding of what they do. They still have structure to their magic; it just comes naturally to them whereas others like me have to study for it. The way this magical trap was made is as if the creator had vast magical power but no idea how to use it at all’.

‘And does that tell you somethin’?’.

‘I had thought that whoever had done this to the crypt was some sort of powerful necromancer, but any spellcaster capable of a feat like this would have made a more… elegant magical defence. We have clear proof that the strangers’ bodies we’ve found were part of a group that came here for a purpose. I figured they were being led by a necromancer, or they were part of some cult, but if that was the case then why is this so crude?’.

Every new thing Delde learnt about what had happened in the crypt to twist it into a den of undead only appeared to lead to new questions. She put it to the back of her mind for the time being though. She had more immediate problems to contend with. It didn’t matter how or who made the magical trap before them, the question was how she was going to get everyone past it.

‘Er, Delde? I’ve got a question about this magic trap thing; how exactly does it work? Because for me, I was walking through there with everyone, then I looked at the reflections in the pool and I saw… well I saw something… disturbing in them, but I thought it was actually happening, and then I got really scared and panicked and… Well anyway, what I’m trying to get at is how is it actually triggered? Because if it just goes off every time we look at the pool then couldn’t we just walk through there avoiding looking at it? Or am I missing some magical bit of knowledge that says why that won’t work?’.

Don’t look at the pool.

Don’t look at the pool.

Don’t look at the pool.

WHY DID SHE NOT THINK OF THAT!

It was so simple, so glaringly obvious Delde couldn’t work out how she had missed such a clear solution. The enchantment was entirely bound to the pool of water within, she could see that herself, it was completely reasonable to assume that so long as nobody looked at the reflections, the trap wouldn’t be triggered.

‘Th-that could work. We’d need to be careful to not look at the reflections in the pool at all though, even a glimpse would trigger the trap again’.

‘Hey hey,what d’ you know I’ve still got it when it comes to traps and getting past them! If we absolutely can’t look at the water then we should probably just keep our eyes closed the whole time we’re in there, maybe blindfold ourselves? The room looks like it’s just a straight corridor so we should be fine, right?’.

‘Unless there’s another trap deeper in there’. Baye pointed out. ‘We’ll still need to be careful. Also, could be more monsters down at the end of the room’.

‘So, we’ll be careful and keep our ears open to hear anything coming towards us. Delde, could I borrow your staff to check for traps in our way?’.

The half elf honestly didn’t want to hand over her staff to be possibly damaged or destroyed in a trap, but she knew it was for the groups benefit as a whole that Dal was asking so she handed it over without any complaint. Delde made sure that Onyx was settled safely in her backpack chewing on some jerky to insure he wouldn’t slip out as they were walking through the magically trapped passageway. They fashioned makeshift blindfolds out of some bandages that Adriana still had and tied them over their eyes before beginning their walk through the ensorcelled chamber.

They moved at a slow pace, all huddled together to ensure that they all knew where each other were. They had considered tying themselves together with rope but decided that there would be too much risk if one of them ended up falling into a pit and dragged the rest of them along.

Clack, clack, clack.

It echoed through the narrow chamber, the sound of Dal tapping the path before them to test it for traps. Without sight Delde could now only rely on her other senses for clues as to what was happening. She had even deactivated her magic sensing cantrip just in case being too close to the trap and detecting it would trigger the enchantment. Now all she could do was focus on the smell of the stale air and mildew infested water, the sounds of her soft steps and breaths along with everyone else’s, the feel of dust and damp air on her skin.

Their progress was laughably slow through the chamber but none of them attempted to hurry along, they all waited for confirmation from Dal before they moved. Delde found the growing tension excruciating, if something was going to attack them, a trap was going to go off she wanted it to happen now rather than for it to be drawn out. At least to get things over with.

A part of her was tempted to just peek out her blindfold. Not take it off, just take a little look, see how far they were, how far they had to go. It was tempting. Delde hated being in the dark, dependant on others, knowing she could go faster than she was. Just a little look. She knew to avoid the pool and its reflections; surly she would be fine?

Delde felt her hand move to her blindfold. Just a quick peek. She just wanted to know how far they were to the exit.

The sound of someone stumbling besides her drew Delde’s attention and her rising hand darted out to the source of it. She felt herself grabbing hold of the cold, hard metal plates of splint mail. It was an armoured torso, higher than she would have expected Igmars to be meaning she was holding onto.

‘Adriana? Are you alright?’

For a split second Delde feared that the cleric had either been attacked or had fallen victim to the illusions of the pool.

‘Yes, I am fine. I am sorry for worrying you, I just tripped over a stone on the ground’.

The rest of the party were also concerned about what had happened but after a moment of explanations they resumed their steady slow trek across the chamber. Delde didn’t feel the need to peek out of her blindfold anymore, the shock she felt having reminded her of how dangerous a position she was in. She didn’t need to do anything foolish to endanger everyone just so that she could feel more comfortable.

After what felt like hours Dal stopped the group.

‘Ok, I think that we’ve reached the exit to the room now. There doesn’t seem to be any door, just like with the way we came in and I’ve been keeping a track of where the edge of the pool is with the stick- ‘

‘Staff’ Delde corrected him.

‘-With the staff and I’m pretty sure that the pool is behind us now. So do we want to take off our blindfolds here and walk into the other room, or do we walk in blindfolded just to be safe with the whole magic trap thing?’.

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‘Define “pretty sure”’ Baye requested.

‘I mean, I’ve been checking the edge of it with the staff like I said, and it ended a few meters back. I just didn’t want to jinx us just in case there was another one further on in the room, but it looks like we’re at the way out now. So, blindfolds on or off?’.

‘How aboot one o us takes oor blindfold off and checks ahead?’

‘I’ll do it’, Delde said without thinking and was already taking off her blindfold before anyone could suggest otherwise. In the dim light from the lantern, she could see the passageway that Dal was talking about, a mirror to the one they had entered through. Past it Delde could just make out another large chamber, one which also had many recesses in the walls for the bodies of the dead. Another catacomb. For a moment Delde wondered if they had somehow gone in a circle and just come to the way they had entered from. She stopped herself before she turned about to check for herself. Instead, she examined the chamber more carefully, stepping closer to get a better look.

No, this was another catacomb, but it was not as twisting as the one they had just come through. The smell of death was just as strong within it though. Delde tried to see if there were any plague zombies within it as well as there had been in the other, but she couldn’t see or hear anything to suggest that. Once again, she caught herself before she turned around to address her companions, instead stepping back and telling them what she had seen. They all decided to walk through the passageway first then remove their blindfolds, just in case something happened when they entered that would force them to turn around.

Once they were all past the doorway, they all took off their blindfolds and looked around. The catacomb was barren of any traps or monsters, undead or otherwise. The presence of large rents in the ceiling and an abundance of guano caking the floor made it clear where the bats had originated from though. Fortunately for them they appeared to have all fled from their last encounter with them. Searching the chamber revealed no other clues as to what happened in the crypt, nor any sort of treasure or useful items they could take with them. Delde noted with mild concern that all the recesses for the dead were all absent of anything other than dust, a few badly decayed bone fragments and rotted cloth. The catacomb could have easily held more than one hundred bodies, but it contained none. Just like the previous one they had come from. It didn’t bode well for what they might be facing up against soon.

The sounds of the group’s footsteps reverberating off the walls was the only noise made as they passed through the second catacomb. They all kept a tight grip on their weapons as they walked, uncertain if they were being led into a trap or lulled into a false sense of security as they went deeper into the crypt.

They found the exit to the catacomb and walked down a wide and winding passageway, the walls, ceiling and floor all covered with a latticework of cracks and fissures. While it looked structurally unsound there was no sign that the passageway was in any danger of collapsing, at least in the immediate future, there were no falling rocks, no water leaking in, no ominous rumbling sounds. The strong smell of earth mixing with the musty scent of death of the crypt was the only sign of how deep underground they were. Still, Delde was apprehensive about making any loud noises.

As the exited the passageway they found themselves in a large chamber, easily as big as the catacombs they had just come from. The once masterfully crafted vaulted ceiling of the chamber showed significant signs of damage as did the walls and floors, the same as the passageway they came from, if anything the damage here looked worse. And perhaps it was Delde’s imagination, but she felt that the stonework was darker as well. Not scorched by fire, coloured by paint, or stained by fluid. The stone appeared to be the same as what the rest of the crypt was made from, but in the light they brought with them it looked darker than the stone throughout the rest of the crypt. As if there was some cancerous force nearby corrupting it, polluting the very structure of the architecture.

In the centre of the room there was a ten-foot-wide stone bridge crossing over a deep chasm into darkness. Beyond the bridge there stood a pair of stone statues which were unlike the rest they had found in the crypt appeared to be modelled after villagers as opposed to Kassen. The pair were armed with spears and shields along with resolute expressions engraved on their faces. And beyond the guardian statues, only barely noticeably to Delde in the dim light, even with her elven eyes, was a set of grand brass double doors, ten feet tall and gleaming through the shadows.

‘Er, Delde? Could you do your whole magicy thing and see if there’s any magical traps or anything about here?’.

Dal said as he crept forward, moving slowly while investigating the path before them in great detail. Delde immediately began casting her cantrip to detect magic, she had no intention of being caught out by another magical defence again and suspected that if there was another, the bridge would be an idea position for it. But after examining it with her enchanted senses she could detect nothing other than the vast necromantic magics of the crypt, although she could tell that they were getting closer to the source of the magics. Whatever had created such an upswell of necromantic magic either originated or remained behind the brass doors before them. Delde told everyone that she couldn’t detect any magical traps nearby, and no one could see any monsters lurking in wait for them. Dal continued his slow study of the chamber though, gradually making his way across the bridge until at about one third of the way down it he stopped and turned to the rest of the group.

‘Alright so good news bad news time. Bad news there’s a trap right in the middle of the bridge, or at least the trigger for one, anyways it’s too big to get around. Good news, I spotted it before I set it off and I’m pretty sure that I can disarm it, or the trigger at least, so we can walk over’.

‘Ony idea whit the trap does?’.

‘I’m not completely sure, but I’m thinking that it has to do with those statues at the other side. My money is on them rushing down the bridge to push us back or off if we trigger the pressure pad’.

Delde looked at the statues herself. She had thought that their positioning was unusual when she first saw them but hadn’t thought much about it, thinking that it was due to some cultural inclination or odd aesthetic choice. The two statues were standing between the bridge and the brass doors, rather than besides them which Delde would have normally expected. There was still plenty of space to walk around them, so it wasn’t as though they were an obstacle to their progression. But now that Dal had mentioned it Delde suspected that the gnome was correct in his assessment. She wasn’t an expert on traps or how to position them but setting one up over a bridge above a deep chasm seemed logical to her. Prior to entering the crypt Delde would have assumed that potent magic would’ve been necessary to perform such a feat, but after having seen the other statues throughout the complex she was certain that the ones before her could be just as capable of moving as they were.

‘Is there anything that we could do to help you whilst you attempt to disarm the trap on the bridge?’

‘Yeah, don’t walk over it and don’t wander about too much, I only checked out the path we’d need to walk to cross the room so I’m not sure if there’s any more traps about. I mean Delde’s cleared us for magical traps but the more normal stuff like this could still be about, so try and stay safe… Oh, but feel free to tell everyone back home how I dived into danger and put myself in harm’s way to protect you all from the deadly death-traps… Also please tell me if the statues start to move, I want to have as much of a start to run away from them as possible if I do set them off’.

The rest of the group stood at the edge of the chasm looking at Dal as he feverishly worked at the flagstones before his lockpicking tools arrayed beside him and he went from one to the other. Delde couldn’t see exactly what he was doing from where she was standing and didn’t want to get in his way, but she could make out that he had managed to pry up the flagstones slightly and was now doing something underneath them through the narrow gap that he had. She disliked just standing around, waiting for somebody else to do the work needed for them to pass, but Delde accepted that Dal was the best, most qualified person for the task at hand. Rather than letting herself wallow in impotent frustration she chose to continue to keep watch one the rest of the chambers in case of an attack by some monster crawling up from the chasm or the guardian statues started to move.

They were close to the heart of the crypt now; she could feel it. And Adriana’s early assessment seemed to be correct, whatever fell force had kidnaped Dimira appeared to have retreated into the heart of the crypt where Kassen, founder and hero of the town that bore his name rested. Delde wondered if he himself had been raised along with all the other bodies interred within the crypt. She hadn’t mentioned that possibility to anyone else out of concern that Adriana might have taken offence to the very idea of it. She hoped that if it was the case the cleric would be able to control her emotions and fight off the undead; if she lost her nerve and ran, they would lose one of their most effective weapons against it and any other undead they might face.

THUD!

Delde was shocked back to attention and looked over to the guardian statues then to Dal, desperately trying to determine if something had gone wrong. But judging from the relaxed manner of the gnome as he collected his lockpicking equipment and carefully put it away in his pack it seemed like everything was fine.

‘Alright, so I think that I’ve disarmed the trigger for the trap, or at least I mean I’ve jammed the mechanism beneath the pressure pad so that it won’t go down. That means we should be able to walk across the bridge without any statues bull rushing us or whatever else the trigger sets off. I think’.

‘Whit dae yie mean “yie think”? Is it workin’ or no?’.

‘I mean what I said, as far as I can tell the trap won’t work now but just to be safe, I think we should cross over the bridge one at a time. That way we won’t put too much weight on the pressure pad and accidentally unjam the thing, I’ll go first if it makes you feel better’.

‘Maybie ah should go over first. Ah’m the heaviest oot o us aw, if ah can go over it the rest o us’ll be fine’.

‘Yeah, you have been packing on the pounds a bit lately, but I still think I’m the best choice; I can search for traps on the other side of the bridge as well and make sure we don’t just avoid one trap only to step right into another. You can go after me though if you want’.

With that established Dal walked gingerly across the stone bridge, which despite the cracks running through it seemed to remain sturdy. Igmar followed him, moving quickly if loudly, but failing to trigger any response from the trap. After that the rest of them all crossed the bridge after them, still going one at a time, but feeling safer in the knowledge that they were unlikely to be knocked off of it. Once they were all on the other side and their rogue had confirmed that there were no traps on that side all their attention turned to the grand brass doors before them.

‘So Delde, any magical traps on the doors?’.

‘None’. She had already checked; it was the first thing she had done when she had reached the other side.

‘And I can’t see any traps on it either so… Do we knock or just burst in? I’m getting pretty strong “heart of the crypt” vibes from those doors and as Adriana said that that’d be where Dimira and the talking undead that took her would be I say we shouldn’t touch them until we’re sure we’re good to go down in there’.

‘He’s right’ Delde nodded in agreement as she drew her recently gifted wand, stroking the filigree as she held it. ‘I can use this wand to give us all some magical armour before we enter. It won’t make you immune to attacks, think of it like another layer of armour over what you already have. Hopefully it’ll give us an edge against whatever we come across in there. And while I don’t have any other magic that’ll grant you any more protections, but I do have some spells prepared that might be able to weaken or at least slow down whatever we must fight’.

‘I can offer supplications to Sarenrae to bless myself and others for the coming battle. I regret that I will only be able to grant the blessing to others nearby me, but it should help those of us fighting in close quarters. I also have fully recovered my power to channel holy power through myself and can use it to both heal us and harm the restless undead we will no doubt face. And I have this’. She revealed her own wand to the group, made of a dusky, sand coloured wood that had no ornamentation on it. ‘I received it in the “treasure chamber” as it were. It is a wand that contains healing magics within it which will increase how much healing I can offer you all. Or I can use it against the undead if needed. It only holds around ten uses of magic however and I need to be quite close to the person I am healing, so it will not work as a long ranged weapon’.

At her side Delde heard Baye sigh in resignation as she began to rummage through her backpack, eventually pulling out two potion bottles. The ones that she had gotten as her own personal reward in the treasure room.

‘Was hopin’ to hold onto these and not need to use them. But looks like if there ever was a time for them it’s now’.

The halfling uncorked one that was bright orange in colour and drank it down in one go.

‘That one’s to help make me more dexterous’.

She said as she twirled an arrow between her fingers. Slowly at first but quickly accelerating before stopping and bringing out the other potion bottle. This one was filled with a viscus, clear liquid and Delde noticed that the bottle cap was clasped shut and wider than one would expect. Instead of drinking from it Baye instead grabbed a couple of arrows and dunked their heads in the fluid. When they came out, they appeared slightly oily, but glistened and sparkled with what could only be magic. She repeated the process with the rest of her arrows, a mix of blunted and normal ones until the potion bottle was empty. At the end of it, Baye had twenty arrows coated in the magical substance. As she did so she explained what she was doing.

‘This is an oil that enchants weapons. Only lasts for so long. An hour or so at most. Useful for when your hunting somethin’ with a thick hide or magic in its blood. Or if your goin’ to fight some undead lord or whatever is waitin’ for us through there’.

Igmar and Dal looked at each other.

‘You got onythin’ up yer sleave?’.

Dal shrugged.

‘Got this fancy magic dagger I found. You?’.

The dwarf brandished his hefty dwarven war axe.

‘This’.

‘Man, we’ve got to get more magic stuff in the future if we want to keep doing this’.

The two of them laughed and even Delde grinned as she used her want to grant all her friends some “mage armour”. She felt tense, but calm. Adrenaline slowly working its way through her system. They were going to fight a monster unlike anything they had faced before, despite all the horrors they had already encountered in the “crypt of the everflame”. There was even a chance that there could be an army waiting beyond the grand brass doors before them. All logic dictated that they retreat to Kassen and warn the town, even if that meant leaving Dimira and any other potential survivors to a cruel fate.

But Delde didn’t want to do that.

She wanted to press on, to meet any challenges behind the doors with the full force that she and her friends could muster. With all of them together, ridiculous and trite as it sounded, Delde felt that they had a chance of victory. And if they did come across an army, well at least they knew that the way out was clear so they would have a clean break to the exit.