Session #46: The Vampire in the Tower, Part 2

This week, the party awoke to find that Ctenmiir would now be following their progress through the tower, and had released one of his laboratory "experiments" into the courtyard to waylay them. Now on Day 1 of the 3 days they would have before Ctenmiir attacked Falconia, they set out back through the courtyard and found that the topiaries in the topiary garden resembled their party. When they went to investigate, the topiaries attacked, along with their master - an oblivion moss mindmaster. This encounter didn't prove terribly taxing on the party, but did saddle all but one of them (Amnon being the one) with a memory loss disease which has locked out one of their encounter powers.

Continuing on, the party found the kennels - inside they found a hill giant werewolf, Varrg, the kennel master they had been searching for. He had 3 large gravehounds which sicced on the party - this battle proved challenging, but ultimately manageable, as despite Varrg's regeneration ability, the party took him down. Cyrus & Vorgym were infected with a disease from Varrg's bite. After returning to the main hall, the party had their first feast, which went off without a hitch.

With their ability to advance to the next floor secured, they opened the way and ascended to the second floor. There they found a beholder waiting for them, and were "congratulated" by Ctenmiir on defeating "a hobgoblin that wallows with spiders" and "a hill giant who runs with a pack of rotting curs". The beholder then attacked, using its eye rays to inflict a bevy of conditions on the party. Through petrification, blindness, near death and near disintegration they prevailed, and the beholder fell.

We stopped at this point, as my ping had been driven too high for us to continue and we had run up against our time limit anyhow. An update on the ping situation: it wasn't a result of the virus as I feared, but rather my sister attempting to video chat with someone. Hopefully it won't become a regular problem =) See everyone next week: the laboratory awaits!