Down into the dungeons below Redcastle we went. Pockets went ahead, checking the doors for traps. We found none, but soon came to a large room with some very detailed “statues” of Orcs.

They looked as if they were in the process of fighting something, but had been turned to stone. Thinking this was rather ominous (having heard tales of medusa, basilisks, and other such creatures), some of us thought to proceed carefully. Pockets on the other hand, decided to knock over a bunch of the statues, making quite a racket.

Once we had him settled down, we continued examining the room. one door had protective wards on it, so we had Pockets check out the other door. He had no sooner opened it, than he too was turned to stone! We weren’t too surprised when out came a medusa!

Luckily the rest of us were able to kill her before we too were turned to stone. (in the process, we also managed to reduce her treasure horde to a pile of melted gold.) After the battle, Drusilia summoned her “angel” friend again, and gave him the sword of Pelor in exchange for returning Pockets to his former state.... so, the angel got the sword in the end, and we still didn’t get our answers! It figures.

Searching the rest of this level, we found only some more orc “statues”, and one “statue” of an elf... in a prison cell. Having no way at present to restore the elf, we left him where he was, and proceeded back to the warded door.

Opening the door, we found a set of stairs leading down to a large room which contained two large statues and several exits. It looked suspicous to me, but the rest of the party proceeded into the room as Aramil managed to set of the trap!

A large metal grate fell into the doorway trapping the rest of the party in the room, while I managed to duck back into the hallway. With horror I watched as the two large statues came to life!

As we began fighting them, I noticed something odd... Only one of the statues was really moving... the other was an illusion! Unfortunately for us, one statue was more than a match for our group. As the statue was immune to magic, we only had our brute force to rely on. Eventually we were forced to retreat... I disintegrated the iron gate, and we all ran back up the steps and closed the warded door. We are now resting and recovering as we attempt to think of a way to get past the stone guardian.

~=Fafnir Flamebrewer=~