I drew the 8 of swords this morning: all tangled up, unable to see clearly. Now I have to figure out what we’re tangled up in that we’re not seeing clearly. Riyou wandered off again, so we inspected the hirelings presenting themselves. We’ll need the extra help because Bancroft insisted he had a mission from his god, and he wouldn’t heal us unless we helped. I’m amazed the farmer even knew what extortion was. We hired all but one torch bearer that had a wet sack with flies buzzing around it and a dead smell following him. We saw a bunch of giant frogs in a pond on the way, but they didn’t look hungry, so we edged around them.
Bancroft suggested walking in and making our way to the main entrance to find the Nergalite he has to kill, so we went to the secret entrance (D10). As we walked, we saw a pack of rats busy eating to the east. To the west, a statue was buzzing. To the north, we heard a wolf growl. Bancroft opted for the wolf. As soon as Bancroft opened the door, someone yelled for help, then a baby cried, and there were 3 piles of rocks with coins strewn among them. All seemed like traps. The rock piles turned out to be misshapen cloaked creatures clutching rocks that ran past us out the door, dropping coins. We had the henchmen pick up the coins.
The room dead-ended in a niche to the north. We searched for secret doors. I found an emerald, but no secret doors. We headed back south and to the statue, where the buzzing turned out to be giant flies. They killed three of the henchman. One bit me. Another bit Bancroft. Seacrock put three to sleep, along with the surviving henchman. The living henchmen ran off into the dark. Ignoring my advice to leave while the rest of the flies were sleeping or busy eating, since we were wounded, the guys decided we needed to kill them all. We took care of that. There was a hallway going west that seemed promising to be headed where Bancroft said he needed to be. A room had more flies that Seacrock put to sleep. Lots of little alcoves with preserved organs that they insisted on searching despite Bancroft’s supposedly important mission that had to be done right this second this morning. It was disgusting work poking around in the organs, but we found a grey potion, gold pieces, and a ruby.
We opened the door to three zombies, two of which barged in to attack us and the flies. Apparently they have a grudge against the flying bastards too. I ran out, dragging the mage out with me so he didn’t get one-shot by anything. Bancroft ran out after us, shutting the door behind him. His god was mad at him, probably for getting distracted by everything instead of focusing on his holy murder mission, so he was unable to turn undead. We made short work of the outside zombie anyway. We decided that was enough excitement, and headed for the exit.