The party spends another night deep below the city of Paravor in the dwarven ruins of Kharak Azul. Chet prepares a Leomund’s Tiny Hut. In the early hours, Beskar’s helmet scanners detect movement outside of the hut. A closer inspection from the inside of the hut reveals them to be drow ghosts stalking the hallways. The next morning he tells C’Nut and Chet about this, and sends a telepathic message to the Trade Town dwarves about the location of the Oathkeeper’s Foundry.
Niaelo spends the evening away from the others, summoning her greater demon within a binding circle and attempting to persuade, intimidate, and command the creature’s true name from it. She’s unsuccessful, for now.
In the morning, the group reconvenes and decides to explore more of the stone hallways remaining on this level. One door in particular reveals an enormous grand hall, complete with hostile spider automatons led by a gigantic sphere warrior automaton. Battle ensues! Fireballs, swords, and dark magic rage but the automatons are extremely resilient. Niaelo summons her demon again, which takes the pressure off but breaks free of her hold as soon as the last automaton drops. Chet makes tactical use of retreating to the rear and taking cover. Beskar takes to the air with his jetpack. C’Nut’s summoned beasts take the brunt of the demon attack, and the chaos finally ends when the demon disappears.
Through another door, the long awaited treasury is finally found. Jewels, heaps of coin, dwarven armor and weaponry, and magical items await us. Greatest of all is the Architect's Maul, foretold by Glenda the Green; a magical warhammer capable of building or annihilating huge swathes of stonework. It could raise a castle given time, or tear one down. Beskar claims the Maul, and Niaelo manages to cajole him into giving up the Darksaber in exchange.
In another room, Chet detects a hidden door with his Wand of Secrets. Inside is a dusty throne, and the ghost of Borin Oathkeeper himself! He demands to know the meaning of the intrusion, and Beskar is able to calm the situation with his knowledge of the Oathkeepers and their forge. Borin tells us that he’s been plagued for years unending by the drow ghosts that still haunt the halls, reminding him of the fateful assault that ruined Kharak Azul centuries ago. Beskar swears an oath that the drow will be destroyed.
Down a winding stone tunnel, the group is quickly able to find the drow ghosts lying in wait before their next night time raid. They’re heavily armed, just the same as the day they died centuries ago. Niaelo waves the others in the party back and enters the room to give the drow last rights. Recalling her days in the Temple, she brings Lolth’s attention to the lost souls while the ghosts look on, enraptured, and guides them into Her arms in the Abyss. The profane ritual ends, Loth’s smothering presence lifts, and ghosts are put to rest without combat. Niaelo is named a favored daughter and champion of Lolth by her Queen.
We return to Borin Oathkeeper and he gives us a Dwarven Head Medallion as a reward, which allows the wearer to see through the eyes of any of the statues in Kharak Azul, or Paravor. Could this be what Glenda the Green wanted Chet to find for her?
In the next room beyond Borin, we find an elevator descending straight down into the darkness. C’Nut works out the mechanism requires the dwarven coins we’ve been collecting and takes a short ride part way down alone while the rest of the group argues over next steps.
The group decides to descend together. Along the way, a drider appears from a cave on the side of the shaft, playing an enchanting tune on a flute. The flute’s charms convince Beskar to jump off the elevator! But he has the sense to activate his jetpack and quickly closes with the enchantress, who calls herself Hepzibah. Battle ensues. Under a hail of blows and magic, the drider is blasted off the platform and tumbles down the shaft. All that’s heard is a distant splat.
Finally at the bottom of the shaft, the group steps off the elevator and finds the corpse of Hepzibah. Niaelo uses dark powers to animate the corpse enough to interrogate. The drider says that none have used the elevator in a long time. Skullport lies in one direction on the underdark highway nearby, and drow territory the other way, including the fabled Menzoberranzan.
The group spends the night on the elevator platform, raised out of sight of the landing in the underdark. The next morning, a group of duergar and deep gnomes passes by, a band of Deepway Merchants led by Torgo Xorn, amazingly a relative of Steve Xorn from Trade Town. C’Nut agrees to paint a portrait of each of the merchants in exchange for information on the underdark; they say that chaos dwarves to the northwest have a cache of beskar, and that there are hot springs and the city of Skullport in that direction as well.
We take our first real steps in the Underdark towards Skullport, with the Deepway Merchants.