[Session Report 1 - 3/10/24] '"The Cult of the Medusa"

   

    This was a duet session with my sister.  She had 6 characters in total, including 2 fighters, a cleric, a thief (party leader), a magic-user, and an elf.  Each character was 1st level and rolled up according to the Basic Rules.  The adventure started off with each character receiving rumors although due to poor rolls, some of the adventurers gained little to no information.  This didn't deter them however and they soon entered the ruined temple.  Upon entering the dungeon, the party explored a 30x30' room with a northern and eastern exit.  Each passage was illuminated by wall mounted torches to the  right of them.  The room's construction was clearly old and had seen better days, vines and moss could be seen growing from the cracks of the dungeon walls and floor.  Nature was reclaiming what once was hers.  2 statues dominated the room and were posed quite dynamically, as well as displaying expressions of terror.  The party examined the statues and tried to move them, turn them, etc to no avail.  However, they did notice that these particular statues lacked any sort of base to them.  Immediately, the party started to fear for the worst... they were in the Medusa's lair!

    Quickly regaining their composure, they decided to avert their eyes and try to walk through the dungeon mainly by looking at the floor, occasionally looking up as they journeyed through the stone passages.  The party decided to take the eastern exit and after a few winding corridors two party members suddenly fell into a pit!  The elf and cleric were unlucky enough to trigger the trap as the others walked over it.  Inside the pit were 5 Spitting Cobras and 3 corpses.  The adventurers, wanting to avoid the same fate as the poor bastards laying beside them, acted quickly and while avoiding the venomous spit from the cobras were able to climb up the 10' pit with the help of their friends and some strong rope.  Even though they were able to avoid any harm from the snakes, they still had taken damage from the fall leaving the elf critically wounded at 1 HP and the cleric hurt at 4HP.  The party, determined to not leave empty handed, pressed on into the darkness.

    The new room they had entered was empty, but a passage to the north was seen and the party kept marching.  They came across a larger room, about 40x40', that had 5 statues similar to previous 2.  This wasn't the worst part, they had stumbled upon 7 cultists wearing dark grey hooded robes that had insignias of 3 joined snakes.  Fortunately for the party, the cultists decided to simply warn the party to leave and never come back.  Heeding their warning, the party decided to double back only to be stumped by the pit they narrowly escaped earlier.  This led them to return to the cultists, hoping that they could be shown a different way out of the ruins.  Enraged at the party for not leaving, the cultists decided to attack.  They lunged at our heroes with daggers.  Then, the magic-user who had prepared a sleep spell beforehand, quickly cast it immediately dropping 5 of the 7 cultists which broke their morale.

    The cultists fled to a northern exit and shut the door.  The party quickly slit the throats of the sleeping cultists and tried to rest up before deciding to leave the dungeon.  Just as they were heading down the western hallway, they heard multiple foot steps and the hissing of many snakes.  It was the Medusa, the cultists went to alert her!  The party decided to stay and fight and used the hallway as an effective choke point.  The elf and fighter launched their spear and javelin as the enemies approached, hoping to finish an enemy off before getting into a melee.  The fighter had missed but luckily the elf landed a successful hit dealing 6 damage to the Medusa, leaving her with 4HP (Yes, I know I rolled terribly for the medusa's HP LOL.)

    Now, the enemies were upon them and the fighters and cleric were in the front rank, trying to protect the squishier party members.  Within a few moments, the cleric dropped dead!  The elf, quickly taking his place, started to defend as well.  Attacks were exchanged, first a cultist was killed, and then with the mighty thrust of his spear, the elf killed the medusa causing the last cultist to run away in terror.  They followed and eventually cornered her, killing her swiftly.  The room they followed her into also had a locked chest placed against a wall.  The thief tried to pick the lock but failed, leaving the fighter to hack away at the box until it finally broke.  Despite their losses, this adventure was worth it now because they had just found a few thousand coins and some other items of interest as well including a chainmail shirt +1 (party doesn't know it is magical yet), some potions (growth and diminution) and an interesting looking gem that resembles one they heard about in the rumors.  They gathered their belongings and were able to leave the dungeon safely and headed back to town.