The Revelation of Mulmo PBP - WARNING SPOILERS

[GnomeBoy]

Yoros isn't prepared to mess with the telescope controls at this time.

FWIW, he'll pick up the elf by the collar when Sufferus drags him, so that little-to-no elf scrapes along the floor the whole time we're on the move.

But for the moment, he is alert and near-by, ready to back up Fred.

[Raven_Crowking]

There are (ironically) no traps found on the trap door.

[Skyscraper]

"This trap is not trapped? Good", confirms Maledict.

He opens the trap door, ready to skewer the first thing that has a head that presents itself beyond said trap door.

If nothing springs at him to attack, he inspects the room below. If he can't see anything, he lights a torch. If there is only a staircase, he moves down. He keeps his sword unsheathed, ready to drop the torch to he floor and decapitate something. Anything.

[marshal kt]

After you.

[Raven_Crowking]

The stairs lead downward to a room cluttered with tables, both vertical and set at angles to facilitate drawing and painting.

Specimens of all sorts are scattered about this room, including a set of what appear to be artificial butterfly-like wings, the cast-off husk of a bluish-grey man-sized insect, the eye of an enormous bug floating in preserving liquid, and the dissected remains two beings laid out on tables. One is a delicate looking man with mauve skin. The other is a hideous centaur-like creature with all limbs terminating in hands, rather than hooves on its lower limbs.

On shelves and on tables are many books with wooden covers. Several of these are open, showing them to be macabre sketchbooks. Paintings and drawings of similar creatures, half-completed or complete, are littered about the tables, and hanging from the walls. In addition, there are several stools, and three comfortable-looking chairs.

The stairs continue downward.

[Raven_Crowking]

The stairs lead downward to a room cluttered with tables, both vertical and set at angles to facilitate drawing and painting.

Specimens of all sorts are scattered about this room, including a set of what appear to be artificial butterfly-like wings, the cast-off husk of a bluish-grey man-sized insect, the eye of an enormous bug floating in preserving liquid, and the dissected remains two beings laid out on tables. One is a delicate looking man with mauve skin. The other is a hideous centaur-like creature with all limbs terminating in hands, rather than hooves on its lower limbs.

On shelves and on tables are many books with wooden covers. Several of these are open, showing them to be macabre sketchbooks. Paintings and drawings of similar creatures, half-completed or complete, are littered about the tables, and hanging from the walls. In addition, there are several stools, and three comfortable-looking chairs.

The stairs continue downward.

[marshal kt]

OOC: "Not the comfy chair!"
Sorry couldn't resist.

[Skyscraper]

Maledict moves down into the room, and slowly moves around the room around warily, to see if anything hides behind one of the drawing boards.

"What in the purest water's name is this place?", he asks in disgust. He speaks softly to his sword: "Lady Blackrush, please avert your eyes, for I cannot sheathe you just yet, in case a monstrosity springs forth from the shadows."

**********

Sufferus, on the other hand, arrives in this room like a child in a candy shop. His eyes are wide open, and a twisted smile forms on his lips that have not smiled in over 12 years. The cleric of the Maimed One moves about the room, inspecting the drawings and sketches, revelling in the sight of the dessicated corpses, imagining the pain of the subjects as they were dissected. He looks about the tables and the papers. "What were you up to? Was this your work, Morgil the Moon-Sage?" He tries to find clues of who might have been the author of these works, and what the intent was.

[GnomeBoy]

Yoros enters, slack-jawed. "It's like some kind of womb of horrors down here..."

"How does this place get us closer to our goal? I've gotten a bit turned around, I think."

[Skyscraper]

Yoros enters, slack-jawed. "It's like some kind of womb of horrors down here..."

"How does this place get us closer to our goal? I've gotten a bit turned around, I think."

Brother Sufferus doesn't take his eyes off the papers he's inspecting when he replies. "We must understand this place if we are to survive in it all the way to our goal. This is a place of dark magic. Do not touch anything, lest your hands wither and fall from your arms."

[marshal kt]

Looking around at everything, "Ummm.. I'm not sure if this is a trap or not. It doesn't look safe."

[Raven_Crowking]

There are over a dozen completed paintings and maybe two dozen completed drawings here, in addition to a great number of sketchbooks, each of which weighs 10 pounds. The sketches seem to be of lunar landscapes and of strange creatures - including some that look rather like the beings you fought on the tower top, some delicate-looking manlike beings flying with artificial wings, gigantic caterpillar-like creatures, centaur-like beings with hands instead of hooves, and so on.

There are many drawings from life, but also many anatomical drawings, and drawings that are clearly from dissection.

[Skyscraper]

"It seems like this person was interested in the moon. And the strange creatures found there." Was it you, Morgil the Sage?

In what language are the books and notes written?

If he's capable of reading the language, Sufferus takes a few minutes to see if one or more books would indicate who the author is, e.g. are the notes signed, is a name found in the books' first or last pages, etc...

[Raven_Crowking]

They are written in elvish.

[Skyscraper]

"I can't read this, this is elvish."

Is "Morgil" an elvish name?

[marshal kt]

Remind me that I don't want to pose for this artist.

[GnomeBoy]

"I can get by in Common -- barely."

Yoros will peer further down the stairway... any light down there?

[Raven_Crowking]

There is no light below.

[Skyscraper]

RC:

Is "Morgil" an elvish (-sounding) name, to Sufferus' knowledge?

[Raven_Crowking]

In JRRT's elvish language, Morgil would translate to "dark star" or "black star". "Mor" is used in, for example, Mordor, and Gil in names like Gilgalad. So, yes, Morgil could be an elvish name.

[GnomeBoy]

The aged warrior carefully descends the stairs, under the light from his lantern, longsword in hand.

[Skyscraper]

Maledict readies himself to follow Yoros. Sufferus picks up Morgil's foot (he assumes that's him) and also descends.

[Raven_Crowking]

The stairs lead downward into another chamber, this one fitted as a bedroom with a carved wooden bed, several wardrobes, an ornate silver basin with a silver ewer, and a scattering of cushioned chairs and small tables. Your light reveals that the walls here are covered with wooden panels carved with representations of a strange, cratered alien landscape, over and upon which even stranger creatures move – squid-faced caterpillars the size of castle towers, savage-looking centaurs with hands instead of hooves, delicate-looking people flying with artificial wings, eight-legged humanoid insects, and a horribly flying monstrosity that is not quite a bee, and not quite a jellyfish, but has has aspects of an enormous lobster and an octopus. Some of these creatures are familiar from the room above.

The stairway continues downward.

[marshal kt]

"Wow. and someone could actually sleep with all of that on the walls?

[Skyscraper]

"Down?", asks Maledict.

"Hold", says Sufferus. "Maybe this place holds more than meets the eye. You there," he asks Fred, "do you think you might find anything in this bedchamber? Perhaps keys or important information?"

Sufferus knocks on the wooden panels to see if one might sound more hollow than the others.