Illustrious Castle: The Basement

Wandering Encounters

There are no wandering encounters on this level, as there has been no access from up or down since the summoning. Dust lies on the floors thick as down, undisturbed for decades. The air is stale and dry.

If they leave the door open, you may decide on a low (perhaps 5%) chance every six hours of an encounter with something from the first floor’s encounter table.

Mess Halls (1)

Dozens of soldiers sit, sleeping, at long wooden tables, plates and cups before them. They sit motionless, their heads bowed to the tables. Some are reduced to skeletons; some are as they died, their skin dry and faded, their hands still clutching grey legs of meat.

The destruction occurred during supper, a late meal time. Mummified guards and servants still sit at the tables.

The three sections of the mess hall are separated by archways. Officers sit at the head of the sections. The officer at the center table has a ring of seven keys and a map of the secret places (see Mess Hall Map). One of the keys opens the cells in the dungeon, one opens the coin treasure chest in the Order’s secret treasure room, and the rest open doors that no longer exist in the above-ground castle. The other two officers have a ring of six keys, the same except that they lack a treasure key. Anyone searching the 53 skeletons will find d8 silver coins of the Order, up to a total of 249 coins.

Close examination of the benches will uncover two (or three, if the animated skeleton normally here has left) spots where a mummified skeleton once was—bits and pieces of mummified flesh but no skeleton. Unless Eliazu has been alerted to their presence, one of the animated skeletons will be in the center mess hall. Eliazu is unlikely to attack, however, preferring to use it for reconnaissance. If Eliazu notices the characters, this skeleton might follow them out of the hall after they leave.

Kitchen Area (2)

A quiet whistle greets you as you walk through the hall into this wide room. (A huge pot is inset into the wall to your right as you walk into room.) Knives, pots, and pans are scattered neatly about the counters that ring the walls. There are two dark doorways on the far wall, to your right, and another on the far wall to your left.

The flue exits up in the mountains, where constant winds suck air up, keeping a flow of air from the cliff to the mountainside; however, both openings have been blocked.

The room had been cleaned and organized when the summoning went awry, as the summoning was late at night.

Servants’ Quarters (3)

Men and women, faces taut, cracked, and pale, lie in cots that line the walls. Threadbare blankets partially cover the dead.

There is no money to be had in the servants’ quarters.

The Basement: Temple (4)

Purple steps, curved in a semicircle dais at the left end of the hall, lead up to a marbled altar. Two lifelike statues flank the dais, Christ on the right holding a shepherd’s staff in his left hand, and Christ on the left reading from a book in his right hand, his left hand upraised. Wooden kneelers fill the rest of the room.

There are two chalices on the altar, a silver water chalice worth 45 shillings, and a gold wine chalice worth 180 shillings. A gold box (worth 250 shillings) on the altar still contains hosts stamped with the staff of Christ.

A square of fine ash surrounds the altar at a few inches distance. The soot dirties the undersides of the chalices and the box. Eliazu, after the summoning, has used part of his power to begin to defile the church.

The kneelers are oaken. The statues could go for as much as 200 to 400 shillings in Black Stag or Crosspoint, but are heavy—on the order of 300 pounds each.

Temple Entrance (5)

You step through the small hallway and see the stones in the walls become much more regular: squares in even rows. There are (two guards or one guard) in leather armor, slumped and dry, jumbled onto a kneeler in the left alcove. Another alcove to the right is empty but for the kneeler and the painting. Each alcove contains a wood carving in a centuries-old style. On the left, dyed green, a robed man with a large key in one hand and a scroll in the other looks sternly down upon you. Two barefoot men look pleadingly up to him. He presents the key to the one on his right, and the scroll to the one on his left. In the right alcove, dyed blue, a robed man with a walking staff and his wife look upon a young man in a discussion with elders.

The devotional painting on the left is Jesus giving heaven’s key to St. Peter and the scroll of law to St. Paul. Written on the scroll is “verum”, truth in Ancient. On the right Mary and Joseph find Jesus discussing theology with the rabbis.

This temple was not for the servants, but only for members of the Order. If the characters examine the skeletons, they may notice that one of them has had its clothing and skin deteriorate more than the other. This is because it has been walking about and pieces of its dried clothing and flesh have flaked off.

One of the two skeletons is here if the demon is not yet alerted to the party’s presence. If so, Eliazu might now be alerted because it sees through the skeletons. Eliazu prefers to use the skeletons for reconnaissance. (If so, the one here will leave; the characters should be given the opportunity to recognize that the skeleton is missing.)

This room is depicted on the cover of this book.

Library (6)

Books and folios line the walls. A long table extends through the center of the room. In the far right corner, a glass door gleams in your light. Behind the glass you can see other books.

While some of the books the Order collected were placed in the library at Biblyon, the best of their books were stored here, underground, and safe from looters. There are 1,586 books here.

The books are dry and brittle, and in the oldest ones, the pages snap if turned with any force. They might be worth money if transported to someone who buys books. The Library, of course, will want them and will lay a claim to already owning them. All told, the library could be worth from 500 to 4,000 shillings.

The library specializes in natural philosophies: divining locations, bestiaries, botany, biology, and is a mojo resource level 4 for researching divinations and a mojo resource level 2 for other magics.

Within a glass case are books that were special to the Order. There are several original and copied biblical remembrances. It contains, among other books:

The Travel West: A small journal, it is an account in Ancient by Astix Morellus, advisor of the Abbot who brought the Order across the mountains in the 558th year of the cataclysm. An Anglish translation is in the King’s Common Sitting Room (18).

The Hidden Fullness of Fragmentary Evidence: This book discusses the power of divinatory magic to learn about the history, location, and previous incarnations of objects from the objects themselves. It is a mojo resource level 2 for research regarding the divinations of objects.

Other books in this room include:

Brewing Barley and Wheet: Recipes for brewing beer, including dubious theoretical discussions.

Herbal Lore of the Celts: An anthropological study of Celtic herbal knowledge, collected from various authors.

History of the Pre-Christians: A book that attempts to reconstruct the history of Jews from biblical remembrances.

Life-Cycle of the Giant-Kin: A short, somewhat inaccurate, anthropological study of goblins, hobgoblins, ogres, and trolls. It paints a picture of cannibalism, in-fighting, and inbred hatred.

Plant Life of the Chaotic Mist: A collection of drawings and suppositions about the plants of the strange mists such as that on the path to Astronomers castle. Unfinished—there are drawings in the back with space for writing, but no writing.

Reconstructing Eden: A theoretical discussion of what Eden must have been like. Includes many sides on topics such as “Did predators eat meat or were they vegetarian?” Also discusses whether God will allow humans to rebuild an Eden, whether that is humanity’s purpose, whether suffering is humanity’s purpose, or whether humanity does not know its purpose. Alvon Peter, who later would found the heretical Community of Calling, argues in favor of rebuilding Eden in small groups.

Vestibule (7)

The walls glow an evil white. A skull lies amidst bones in the center of this small room.

The skull rises quickly upon a tail of bones. The tiny bones click as they rise. The skull glares upon you with primal hatred.

The demon has used much of his power to conjure a death’s head to guard the secret door, as he cannot touch the scrolls in the secret writing room (8), which is blessed. The death’s head will attempt to strangle the nearest opponent if it achieves surprise; otherwise, it will most likely attack to bite.

The secret door to the writing room (8) is hidden by a glowing fungus. It was not originally secret. To those with Elven sight, the glow of this room is similar to the light from a diseased phosphorescent fungus, and a closer examination will reveal that the walls are covered, head to toe and top and bottom, with a thin, pasty substance. The substance feels organic, like a cross between moss and butterfat.

Death’s head: demon 2; survival 9; move 9; bite d8 or strangle d4; defense 8; silent; paralysis; magic resistance 5.

Secret Writing Room (8)

You push back the fungus-covered door to reveal a small room. A skeletal body, mummified, sits at a wooden table, its hand still holding a long, tapered feather.

A partially burnt paper lies beneath the skeletal hand. Around the skeleton’s neck is a small copper-colored cross on which hangs an ornately carved maple Jesus.

These were the quarters for the Order’s priest, Edgar Lewar. He was one of the few higher-ranking members of the Order to be kept outside the loop on Tragos’s plans to summon Eliazu, but he suspected that something was up.

This room is blessed, and it is very difficult for Eliazu to exert influence inside it. While inside this room, characters will be free from Eliazu’s telepathy, influence, and even skeletons.

On the floor beneath the skeleton is the key to the Priest’s worldly treasures—the closet. The cross is worth 80 shillings.

See The Unsent Letter for the partially burnt letter still beneath the priest’s bony hand. It looks as though it has been heated in numerous places; the burned areas are smoothly edged.

The keyhole to the treasure closet is trapped. Anyone picking it must make an evasion roll or be pricked with a poison pin. The poison has a strength of 2, an action time of 1 round, and does d4 injury points. It is a powdered poison, still fully active.

Inside the closet are three small boxes. Two of the boxes are carved oak, a matching pair, with symbols of the Phoenix. They are worth 40 shillings each, or 100 shillings as a pair.

The first box in the matching pair contains 49 of the Order’s electrum scroll/dove coins, 120 of the Order’s silver pen/pyramid coins, and 186 shillings, 225 pennies, 269 half-pennies, 352 farthings from Crosspoint. There is a huge 500 shilling emerald.

The second box in the matched pair contains two scroll tubes. One tube, bearing the seal of the Bishop of Crosspoint, contains four scrolls, all in the Ancient tongue:

1. a letter from Robert Agwood, then Bishop of Crosspoint. The translation is provided in the props section for any characters who can read the Ancient tongue (see The Bishop’s Letter);

2. a Christian scroll of restore health at 8th level (see Restore health scroll);

3. a scroll describing the Christian ritual of exorcism (see The Exorcism of Demons);

4. a Christian scroll of protection from sorcery at 8th level that any archetype can use (see Protection from sorcery scroll);

The other scroll tube has “Beware” and “Cave” written on it. It contains a scroll (in Anglish) cursed with the curse of the unseen. See The Curse of the Unseen for more information.

The third chest is a small oakwood box, lightly stained, with no markings. Inside, it is padded with linen, and contains a golden staff head in the shape of a dove. (See The Staff of the Dove in the back for details about the staff head.)

In the back of the closet is a simple maple staff. The staff head in the first chest fits onto this staff.

Acolytes’ Living Spaces (9)

Skeletons lie upon simple cots. There are two small tables and a few chairs.

Four cots, two writing tables, and three chairs. Three skeletons, in the cots. Two wear expensive holy symbols (silver crosses, 25 shillings each), and the other wears a simple wooden cross (hand made, by himself).

Storeroom (10)

Large stone statues stand amidst chests and trunks. A large man with wings and a spear is killing a snake coiled around his legs. A woman in a robe holds a child close to her breast. A man with a knife is carving a large branch.

There are two closed chests and three open chests. Two hold old clothes and vestments; the others are empty. There are also three large stone statues of Mary, of Gabriel and the Snake, and of Joseph the carpenter. These weigh 200 pounds, 300 pounds, and 220 pounds, respectively, and could be worth as much as 400 shillings each in Black Stag, or 250 on the coast.

Meeting Room (11)

Thick white strands hang loosely and wave in the wind of your movement. Several chairs surround a circular wooden table. A huge bronze candleholder dominates the table. A bookshelf lines the wall to your left, filled haphazardly with folios and papers. Far to your right, a large blackboard hangs on the wall from floor to ceiling.

This room is filled with dried giant spider webbing, and the husks of two dead giant spiders. They wandered up from the dungeon and died hungry.

The bronze candle holder (with five candles) is worth 8 shillings. The bookshelf holds notes and diaries of wars, including their battle plans against the Astronomers over the centuries. A great place for future adventure clues!

The secret door to the secret meeting room is behind the blackboard. The latch is a stone in the wall beside it. The blackboard seems to be embedded in the wall, but will open out on wide hinges if the latch is opened.

If they study the post-war folios they will find references to an expedition to the Stigmas di Cristo (this was when they captured Wendell) to get information about a book titled “More When Doors”. The book holds important magical secrets, but they can’t decipher it. After this, they find references to an expedition deep south, looking for an ancient something at the ancient Greek ruins of Ekdulon. (Greek is not commonly recognized, except for resembling an odd form of Ancient.)

Other references show them looking for the book “More When Doors” as it is apparently an unexpurgated version of a set of papers called “No More Stars”.

One thing to remember is that this is a planning room. All of the folios describe plans, but not results, except insofar as the results of one plan might play into another.

Secret Meeting Room (12)

(The blackboard swings open or The bookshelf rotates you to the other side), revealing a medium-sized room with a small table and four chairs. Two warriors in full plate stand silently on the wall (ahead of you or to your right), their tall halberds raised at an angle.

The secret door to the stairs is hidden behind the statues. The right statue’s right arm must be pulled to open the door. The secret door to the new throne room is the bookshelf. There are three shelves, holding minor books and bric-a-brac. If the correct stone on the floor is pressed, the entire bookshelf and circular floor rotate around. The books are: three biblical remembrances, one general history of the world, and one general history of philosophical sciences. The bric-a-brac are little statuettes of soldiers, creatures, and houses.

New Throne Room (13)

You step over the thick curtain that now lies crumpled on the floor and enter a huge octagonal room. The four angled walls are covered in bright paintings of mountains and battles. On a dais against the far wall, a tall throne still has an occupant. A skeletal corpse sits slumped in the great chair. There are two doors on the right wall and a small set of bookshelves on the left wall.

The two hundred year-old paintings on the walls describe the creation of this castle—a man leading his army and priests over the mountain (right of the entrance), scenes of battles with the Druids (right of the dais), scribes by a river (left of the dais), and the building of Biblyon (left of the entrance)

The throne is wood, with iron bands. It is on a carefully carved stone dais. The secret door to the secret meeting room is a series of bookshelves so that both sides look the same—including the same books and bric-a-brac. The mechanism is the same as the other side: one of the stones on the floor will, if pressed, cause the whole thing to rotate around. One of Eliazu’s skeleton spies sits slumped in the throne.

Elite Guards’ Rooms (14)

Several dried flaking corpses lie across cots and chairs in this wide room. Armor and weapons hang from the wall to your (left or right).

These rooms housed the Illustrious Guard, who guarded the leader of the Order with zealousness—and facilitated Tragos’s rise to power following the Goblin Wars. In one room, there are eight armed mummified bodies. In the other, there are seven.

There are twenty shillings in the left room (8 skeletons), seventeen in the right (7 skeletons). The weapons (25 swords, 30 spears, 22 short swords, 7 daggers, 6 bows, 98 arrows) are reasonable quality and could be resold for a quarter to half the normal price to a merchant. The armor is leather (20) and a few suits of chain mail (4, two per room). The chain mail is resalable for a quarter to half price. The chain mail is for an average-size male.

Bathrooms for the Leader and His Consort (15)

You slide open the door to reveal a brightly-painted tower-like room. A (torch, lantern, whatever they’re carrying) shines upon you. Behind the light you see movement, and human-sized creatures.

As your eyes adjust, you see that the creatures are yourselves in a full-length mirror. There is also a water basin, a large water basin, various jugs, and brushes. Besides the large mirror, your light glints from something on a stand next to the water basin.

These bathrooms are lavishly furnished. There is a mirror in each (25 shillings), as well as a hand mirror (12 shillings; this is the source of the glint), brushes, water jugs, and old, brittle and dry, soap. These rooms were redesigned after the Goblin Wars; they originally held the leader (and possibly his wife), and his closest advisor (and possibly the advisor’s wife). They were not then so lavish. Most of the ostentatious things here were purchased after the Goblin Wars.

Private Rooms for the Leader and His Consort (16)

Ornate chairs, a table with the legs of a lion, a padded bench, and a small shelf in one corner with glasses and vases. You half expect the owner to step out of the far hallway, wearing a royal blue evening robe, and ask you what you would like to drink.

These are private sitting and game rooms. Each has a small table and chairs, a sofa, and a small bar.

Bedrooms for the Leader and His Consort (17)

The leader and his advisor traditionally domiciled in these rooms, but following the Goblin Wars, Tragos d’Illus instituted a more kingly fashion in which he and his consort shared them.

Common Sitting Room (18)

A comfortable room for sitting, there is a small table flanked by two cushioned chairs. A few books lie haphazardly on the table. A tapestry hangs from the left wall, depicting something to do with a pyramid and the sun. Another tapestry hangs on the right wall, above the table and chairs. It appears to have a maze on it. In the far corner of the room, a great wheel sticks out of the wall as for a boat’s helm.

A winch in the far corner of the room is for re-raising the deadfall trap in the hallway to the Order’s treasure.

A trap door in the ceiling of the southwest corner leads to the deadfall above the secret entrance to the treasure room in the King’s bedroom. The tunnel is about three feet wide by three and a half feet tall.

The tapestry is the building of the tower of Babel. Here, the tower is envisioned as a pyramid, somewhat Egyptian in style (memory of the Egyptian style is fading), with a huge sun burning down on a crowd of people milling about the bottom. The inscription is “So the Lord scattered them abroad.”

There is a newer tapestry, created for Tragos, which is of a great maze-like city ending at a large castle. The inscription is “Nothing shall be impossible, which they imagine to do.”

The books on the table are:

More When Doors Mow Spun Gifts: See the treasure list. It appears to be a collection of nonsense.

The Travel West: A small journal, it is a translation of an account by the advisor of the Order’s Abbot who originally brought the Order across the mountains in the 248th year of the cataclysm. The original, in Ancient, is in the Library (6).

Il Bibliocolectivo (“The Collected Bible”): A collection of biblical remembrances that Vince Kellius, the founder of the Order of Illustration, believed to be exceptionally correct and relevant. He collected them in the 152nd year of the cataclysm.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland: This book by the mage Charles Dodgson appears to be heavily read. This is a first edition unexpurgated version, and a serious study of the book makes it a mojo resource level 2 for researching first level Mental spells. It is in Anglish, the language Dodgson wrote it in.

The Order’s Treasure (19)

The large rock-like wall decoration opens toward you, revealing a thin corridor perhaps three yards long and three feet wide. Beyond the corridor, in a small room, a medium-sized wooden chest beckons with mystery.

At the entrance to the hallway to this room is a wire running about three feet above the ground. The wire is a thin, strong steel. It is fairly obvious; perception rolls to see it are at a bonus of four.

A thin silver wire, sagging slightly to the ground, extends across the hallway at about three feet above the floor, coming out of the wall just about a foot beyond the entrance.

The wire turns off the trap later in the hallway. There is a moveable plate in the center of the hallway, about five feet down. The wire must be held back under pressure while anyone is walking across the plate, or a three foot wide by seven feet tall by two-foot deep stone block will drop at the entrance to the hallway (between the wire and the plate), completely blocking it. The person walking on the plate will be safe; however, anyone standing where the block drops will take 3d6 points damage. A successful evasion roll will half this. The stone will block pretty much any conversation from one side of the block to the other.

Pulling on the wire, the wire will feel under pressure until pulled back about six inches, at which point the pressure will be alleviated, much like pulling on a compound bow. The plate will appear to be under less pressure (though discovering this will involve touching the plate and pressing at least a little bit, and having done the same before the wire was pulled back).

There is a metal curb along the edges of the hallway. On the part of the hallway where the block will fall, the metal curb is actually a cushion for the block. Powerful springs hold the curb up, but someone trying it will recognize it is movable on a perception roll. The curb will not keep the block above the floor. The block is heavy enough to push the springs all the way down. The springs and curb is there to cushion the block so that it doesn’t break when it falls.

There is a winch in room 18 to pull the block back up.

There are three chests here, about two feet deep and tall, and four feet wide. All of them are trapped in some way. If the key is not used on the first two, or the pass phrase not spoken on the final one, the trap will go off.

The chest to the left will, if the key is not used, shoot four darts when the lid is lifted. They were once poisoned, but the poison has degraded. The darts will still do d3 points of damage each. Each person in the line of fire must make an evasion roll or take d3 damage from d3 of these. The chest contains the Order’s supply of their own minted electrum and silver coins. There are 1,075 electrum scroll/dove coins and 4,512 silver pen/pyramid coins.

The middle chest has sleep gas in a sealed glass beaker. If the key is not used to open the chest, the glass beaker will fall when the lid is opened. It smashes unless it makes a fortitude roll vs. 3. If it smashes, gas fills the room. It has an action time of 1 round and a strength of negative 3 (due to its age, it has weakened). The effect is that it causes the victim to sleep for at least 3d6 minutes. The chest contains a bag of 12 Crosspoint and Black Stag pound coins, a bag of 1,152 Crosspoint and Black Stag shillings, and a silk pouch containing a pure matte black powder. This is ten uses of Powder of Darkness.

The right chest is magically trapped. While the key is needed to open the chest (without breaking it or picking it, anyway), the trap will still go off even if the key is used. The trap is temporarily disabled through the use of the pass phrase “Babylon”. This disables the trap for either a minute or the next time it is opened, whichever comes first. Otherwise, a cold flame will spurt out when the chest is opened, causing 3d6 points damage to anyone in the cone from the chest through the hallway. The flame will be eighteen feet long, six inches wide at the beginning and three feet wide at the end. It does not damage nonliving objects. Victims are allowed an evasion roll for half damage. Inside are two spellbooks, labeled Volumes I, VI, and X.