Temple of The Unknow God Ch1

Four people walk off a well-worn path into a clearing. The dew is still on the grass, and the sun is still coming up.
“I’m telling you, this is it!” A half-orc says surveying the clearing.
The party of four look around the clearing and all they can see are a few bones, and dozens of kids. There is almost no sign of anything worth a copper piece let alone the presence of a temple.
“No, I don’t think so Ghort,” a man in shining blue pate armor says shaking his brown hair.
“I’m telling you Jerrus, this is the place,” Ghort says looks around smiling, making his red beard seem to flush.
“Hey kids!” Ghort yells out.
A tiny creature sees the kids coming and bounces on his tiny kobold feet. The fourth person looks at the kobold a little confused.
“Uh, Bartimus,” the halfling starts as the Kobold pulls out a lute and starts playing a very upbeat tune while dancing.
“Leena,” the man in armor says and shakes his head at the halfling.
“But Jerrus, he’s acting all . . .” Leena is cut off by the look on Jerrus’ face.
“Kobold so happy for little ‘un to hear music,” Bartimus says and starts singing quietly and dancing in circles around the other three.
The kids, three boys and two girls, all with brown hair stop just in front of the group.
Ghort bends down and smiles and his half-orc features seem very warm and friendly and despite the kid’s hesitation the kids smile back. They don’t even seem to be phased by the party, the kobold or the half-orc.
“Thank you so much for coming,” Ghort says wiping his bald head and then his beard in one motion. “Is there an entrance to a temple nearby?”
“Can you seriously think . . .” Leena starts but stops as all the kids nod in unison.
“Where is it?” Ghort asks politely.
Four of the kids seem preoccupied by Bartimus and join him in singing the simple song.
The oldest, a girl, looks around and then thinks better of it.
“My mom and dad said that we should bring anyone looking for the temple to the inn,” She says quietly.
“Well then,” Ghort says, “I don’t want you to get in any trouble. You should always listen to your parents,” he says jubilee and shakes a happy finger at her, “What was your name, now?”
“Kimber,” she answers and seems to feel a little more comfortable.
“What a pretty name for such a brave girl, it’s not just anyone that would come to a half-orc so quickly,” he says and reaches his hand into his bag and pulls out a silver coin.
The other children stop dancing as the silver coin glints in the sun. Bartimus keeps dancing around and it looks like the little kobold is also taking in everything around the clearing.
Ghort smiles as does Jerrus.
“Well, then, take us there quickly and,” Ghort claps his hands dramatically and the silver coin disappears, but he moves his hands away from each other in fists. Then while taking a sudden deep breath he opens his hands and there are five silver coins between his fingers. “You will each get one silver!”
The children gasp.
“This way!” the youngest says and runs up to take a silver coin.
Ghort gives each child a coin as they start walking away from the field towards a path they four party members veered off of a few minutes ago.
“Haiewe,” Ghort says.
Jerrus snickers and Leena looks around confused. Bartimus; however, lowers his head as though he expects to be scolded but he is still playing his song.
“Follow the children, we will march to town!” Ghort says and the children walk away.
Bartimus stops playing his song and then straightens up and salutes. The children look back and laugh as Bartimus starts marching and plays a marching song and sings, “March, march, march, march, march, march, march, march, march, flowing kids to town, and we march, march, march, march.”
Leena looks at Bartimus as though she has never seen the strange little kobold before. She brings up the rear as the kids and Bartimus march in cadence towards town. They enter town and quite a few heads turn to the sound of the music, and as now all the kids are singing the song along with Bartimus.
Quite a few people smile and some even snicker.
“We only have one inn in town,” Kimber says and hurries to get to the front of the line and leads the way. The inn is called The Gooses Down and looks like it only has a few rooms. The kids all stop, but Bartimus marches in place still singing his marching cadence.
“Haiewe,” Ghort says briskly, “we’re here.”
Bartimus looks up and gives a little start and then runs to hide behind Ghort’s leg, and fails miserably.
“Thank you so much Kimber everyone else,” Ghort says handing each a silver coin and then and waves them good bye and the kids runs off towards a shop. Jerrus opens the door and push his way inside, the inn only has a few people there.
“Good morning,” the innkeeper says.
“Good morning in deed,” Jerrus says waving and holding the door open. The rest of the party enters and it’s clear the innkeeper is no stranger to these kinds of groups.
“Were you heading to the temple entrance?” The innkeeper asks.
“We were, but some very nice children said we should stop by this inn first,” Ghort says nodding politely.
Leena and Bartimus enter the inn quietly and they find a table and Leena sits down and Bartimus seems to slink around to try and hide, and fails at doing so, so he can sit next to Leena.
“Kids?”
“A group, but I only got the name of one, Kimber,” Ghort says with a warm smile that finds its way into the innkeeper’s heart, “Such a polite group of children.”
“Yes, they are good enough,” the innkeeper fills up some mugs with water and approaches the table as Jerrus and Ghort sit down. “the entrance to the temple is easy to find, but we always tell those that come here not to go in.”
“Are we not allowed to enter?” Jerrus asks.
“Oh, no,” the innkeeper says putting down the drinks. “It’s just people rarely ever comes back out.”
Leena and Bartimus pick up their mugs and Bartimus’ fingers drum on the mug and Ghort looks down at Bartiums for a moment.
“There were a lot of bones in the clearing,” Ghort says still looking at Bartimus.
“Yes, the kids hunt the skeletons and zombies that come out of the temple,” the Inn keeper says casually.
Bartimus stops drumming his fingers for a moment as he looks up at the innkeeper.
“Isn’t that dangerous?” Jerrus asks.
“Not really,” the innkeeper says casually, “just a few rocks will take down most everything that comes out and we do have a few people that watch the children as they play. So, they are never really in too much danger.”
Bartimus starts drumming on the mugs again and Ghort watches for a moment.
“Yes, there were three in the trees,” Ghort says nodding.
“That sounds about right,” The innkeeper says nodding back.
Leena looks over at Jerrus.
“I didn’t see anyone,” She says softly.
“Neither did I,” Jerrus says and shrugs.
“Oh, I’m surprised any of you did,” the innkeeper says appraisingly.
Bartimus drums on his mug again and Ghort watches.
Before Ghort can ask any more questions the innkeeper smiles and nods to the drumming.
“Oh, we do have some information about the temple we keep it here in a book, and I can bring it over so you can look it over.,” the innkeeper says smiling at Bartimus.
“Breakfast would be tasty,” Bartimus says knowing he’d been caught using thieves sign.
“We don’t really have menus, we just serve simple meals is that alright?” the innkeeper says.
All four of the party members nod.
“I’ll be right back,” the innkeeper says, “and it’ll be two silvers for all four of you.”
“Will someone tell me what that was all about?” Leena asks.
The other three all look at Leena for a moment.
Bartimus finally scratches his head and sighs.
“Being a kobold, I have gotten used to being treated like some mindless creature. Not many kobolds live for very long and even fewer learn proper language skills. I stick out far too much if I talk the way I have been taught,” Bartimus explains.
“But that’s not how you are,” Leena says.
“When you first met me, what was your first impression?” Bartimus asks, “Did you truly believe that I, a kobold, would have anything worth talking about or did you expect me to talk like, Kobold happy, kobold want like dance and sing?”
“I . . . I,” Leena stammers, “I just never heard a kobold speak like you before. Then, I never heard a half-orc talk like you before either.” She says looking over to Ghort.
“Education,” Ghort says simply.
“Ah, food,” Bartimus says in a simpering voice as the innkeeper comes back.
Ghort pulls out four silver coins and puts it on them table as the innkeeper puts down a plate in front of each of the party members. The plates seem to be suited for each person’s needs. Mostly pan-fried vegetables but with a few pieces of sausage mixed in and fried eggs on top.
“I said it was only two silvers,” She says.
“I know, but we need a map we can take with us if you have one,” Ghort says, “do you believe that we might be able to get one?”
The innkeeper puts down a book in the middle of the table. Bartimus immediately picks up the book and start flipping through the pages.
“Kobold want to see pretty paintings,” Bartimus says flipping through the pages rather quickly.
“We don’t sell our maps, but there is a copy in the book,” the innkeeper says. Bartimus does flip the pages to a map.
“Then can I get some parchment?” Jerrus asks politely. He rummages through his own back. “I didn’t bring any.”
“I probably have some,” Ghort says lifting out his own bag.
“I don’t sell parchment, but we do have a mercantile in town, but some of the items they have were previously owned,” The innkeeper says.
“Does that mean someone goes into the temple from town?” Leena asks.
“Yes,” The innkeeper starts.
Ghort feels a little kick and looks over to the kobold who is flipping slowly though the last few pages of the book. The book has changed into some kind of register of names and dates.
“What is going on with the names at the end of this book?” Ghort asks.
“Well, it started as a list of people who came to conquer the temple, and then turned into a list of people who have gone into the temple with the day they went in, and if they came out,” the innkeeper says.
While Bartimus flips through the last few pages. Very few of the names have more than one date next to them. All of the dates are more than one hundred and fifty years ago even to the last name in the book.
“We actually have continued the register from that book and we have two books full of names, some years have more names than others.” The innkeeper says softly.
“But if people have been going in for more than a hundred and fifty years, how come the first floor still has undead on it?” Leena asks.
“That’s in the book, I suggest you all read it. I would also suggest you wait until tomorrow,” the innkeeper says.
“It’s still early, we should be able to go there today,” Jerrus says.
“Kobold scared, kobold say wait,” Bartimus says in a simpering voice, unlike the voice he used while the innkeeper was gone.
“Thank you for that, I think we will wait and go tomorrow,” Ghort says and pulls the book forwards, “I think we will take the time to read the book first.” He picks up a fork, “but for now, time to eat.”
The innkeeper nods and walks away.
Jerrus leans over to Bartimus.
“Are you sure we should wait?” Jerrus asks in a whisper.
“They go into the temple twice a week, they are going into the temple in four days, three days if we wait until tomorrow. The book has it outlined what they do and it looks like when the book was written the town was already used to searching the first floor of the dungeon for survivors. I did see about a half dozen people that were saved,” Bartimus says quietly.
“Are you saying we can’t survive?” Leena asks.
“No, what I am saying is I would rather err on the side of precaution. If we go in and find it is beyond us, we have less time to wait for help,” Bartimus retorts, “Actually, I think we would benefit to visit the mercantile as well.” Bartimus then looks towards the innkeeper.
“I take it you want me to do all the talking again?” Ghort asks smiling and continues to eat.
Bartimus nods and starts to eat. They all read at least part of the book before they all finish eating the food. It seems that as far as they understand, the temple seems to bring in more and more undead whenever some are killed or even escape. The book mentions that the amount that the temple brings in is not limited, and can happen as many times as ten a day or as few as two, but there will always be the same number of undead in the temple at any given time and they seem to bring in with them whatever they had when they were alive. Leena is the last one to read the book and it seems to be a little too much for her.
“So, that temple, will have treasure in it,” Leena says smiling.
“Yes, and at the same time, it will never cease having more undead than we would ever be able to defeat. The first floor seems to have the weakest undead and it is possible that once we go in,” Bartiums says softly, “that we may find ourselves in a predicament beyond ourselves. What we brought, may not be enough.”
“That map, it had a legend I didn’t understand,” Jerrus says looking at the book.
“We need to find a map,” Ghort says, “and the mercantile might have one.”
“The innkeeper said she didn’t have one,” Leena says.
“True,” Ghort says nodding, “she also said we should go to the mercantile and that it has past adventure’s items. I’m sure someone else might have been able to make a map of the first floor we can use.”
“But wouldn’t the innkeeper want to sell us anything to make money?” Leena asks.
“Look at your plate,” Ghort says. Jerrus and Leena look down at their plates.
“These plates are simple, but pure silver. The table, Leena, I think you should recognize it more than anyone else.”
Leena looks down at the table and then gasps and runs her hand along the wood.
“Half-oak,” Leena says as though she is only seeing the table for the first time. “this is a very rare tree from my home land.”
“And these mugs,” Ghort says taking a drink, “the glass is elven crystal. The handles, also silver. This entire town is blatantly lavish. They don’t need our money, they will get our money if we die in the temple.”
“The innkeeper was being kind in suggesting that we wait and telling us we should shop first,” Bartimus says smiling. “with how many people have died, I can only guess how many people they have pulled out of that temple and had to bury.”
“Or how many people they might have come looking for their loved ones,” Jerrus says softly, “just to find their name in their registry.”
“That is also a kindness,” Bartimus says softly, “even if it is a little gruesome.”
They four of them finally understand the full weight of the situation and hold a moment of silence between them.
“Well, I’m done eating,” Ghort says and gets up from the table, “let’s go shopping.”
They leave the inn and it only takes asking one person to be directed to the mercantile. The shop is very large, and seems to be bursting with items, weapon, and armor. Nearly all of the items are in exceptional condition.
“Oh, I am so sorry,” A voice calls as a jubilee man comes out from a back room, “I didn’t hear you come in.”
Everyone has spread out to different parts of the shop. Leena is looking at some lock picks and other thieving tools of extra ordinary quality. Jerrus is looking over multiple hand drawn maps of the temple. Bartimus is looking as a large collection of scrolls, with his hand clasped behind his back. Ghort, is currently holding up a jar of smelly ointment.
“Oh, I’m so glad you are here,” Ghort starts, “I was looking at these items, and I think you may have mislabeled some of these items. Most of these potions and ointments are worth nearly ten times what they are labeled.”
“You know, I have never heard someone tell me what my products are actually worth,” He smiles, “I heard about you four from my daughter Kimber.”
“She was your daughter?” Ghort says putting the jar down and walking toward the shopkeeper hand outstretched.
“Yes,” the shopkeeper is obviously happy to see such a different kind of group. They shake hands and release.
“Oh, she was such a kind and brave girl, you and your wife has done an excellent job in raising her.” Ghort praises.
“She and her friends came in to spend the money you gave them,” he chuckles.
“I hope they spent the money wisely, on something practical,” Ghort says laughing, “like enough candy to make then sick.”
The shopkeeper laughs.
“I’m John,” He says, “and they did buy more than enough candy to be sick for a few days.”
“I’m Ghort, what would you suggest we take with us into the temple?” Ghort asks.
“I would suggest you don’t go there at all,” John says.
“Well, we are persistent,” Ghort says smiling, “But are there any really good maps of the temple?”
John looks over to Jerrus who is still riffling through the collections of maps.
“I keep most of what people want to buy there, but if you are interested I do have a few others I can bring out,” John says.
Jerrus looks over towards john and Ghort.
“Yes, please,” Jerrus says and then rolls up the map he’s holding and starts putting all the maps back into their neat place. John nods.
“It’ll just be a moment,” Johns says and walk back into the back room.
“Well, how were those maps?” Ghort asks.
“Most of them are just copies of the map we saw in the book,” Jerrus says, “they even had the same legend, so they aren’t really helpful.”
Bartimus comes over with five scrolls in his arms and tries to lift them to the counter. Jerrus quickly takes the scrolls out of Bartimus’ arms and puts them on the counter.
“Don’t you think we should be getting more potions?” Leena asks still looking at the pick locks.
“No, I’m certain we have enough,” Ghort says, “I brought about two hundred.”
“What?” Leena asks looking up again.
“When I heard about this temple I tried to find out all I could, and when I heard of its mortality rate I started making potions. But, I think I forgot to make antidotes or other curatives so I might need to get some of those,” Ghort says offhandedly.
Bartimus seems to have picked up another arm full of scrolls and this time Ghort sees them first and puts them onto the counter.
“Are you going to get more?” Ghort asks.
“Kobold wants two more,” Bartimus says adoption his more childish speech pattern.
“Here we are,” John says coming out with a pile of maps.
Jerrus quickly piles the scrolls so there is room on the counter. Jerrus looks over these maps, and they all have legends that have been corrected. Some are in horrid but legible hand writing, but Jerrus finds one map that is well drawn and has a lot of notes added and a legend that gives really good detail about what is in the temple, and has part of a second floor. The map is written in Orc but does have some words written in common under important places on the map.
“This one,” Jerrus says holding up the map, “but I’ll also saw a cartographer kit I would like too.”
John takes the map from Jerrus and neatly rolls it up. The innkeeper then looks at the items that were brought over by the Kobold.
“Were these scrolls also for you or did you friends just bring them for fun?” the innkeeper asks politely.
“Oh, we are going to use them. I asked Haiewe to bring them,” Ghort says thinking quickly not to make the innkeeper think too much about it.
“Kobold do good?” Bartimus asks.
“You did very good indeed, if there is anything else you want just bring it up,” Ghort says smiling. Bartimus scurries off behind some of the shelves. Jerrus also heads off to get the cartographer kit.
“Since you are going into the temple, I would suggest that you bring with you a lot of potions, and we have a lot of bags of holdings here as well,” the innkeeper suggests.
“Oh, we have plenty of potions, but I did see you have some salve that cured poison and dieses, I want them as well,” Ghort says and the innkeeper quickly brings the two jars of salve to the counter.
“Don’t mind with thieves’ tools though unless you plan of going below the second floor,” John calls out as Leena is bringing up a bag of tools to the counter.
“From what I understand what we are looking for is most likely on the third of fourth floor,” Ghort says.
“Did you read the book?” Johns starts, “the temple has more than twelve floors that we know of.”
“Well, we are looking for a sort of library that is housing some old tomes,” Ghort says.
“Why don’t we need thieves’ tools on the first two floors?” Leena asks still bringing the tools to the counter.
“The traps on the first two floor don’t seem to do anything to people,” John says, “you’ll understand once you see it.”
Jerrus set the cartographer kit on the counter and Bartimus comes back with some odd-looking lute strings.
“Well,” Ghort says casually, “if we don’t have anything else we might need now, I think we are done.”
“Bags of holding?” John asks again.
“Oh, we all each already have a bag of holding, except me, I have two and one if nearly full of healing potions,” Ghort explains. “So, how much does this all cost us?”
John looks at Ghort appraisingly.
“you could have easily stolen anything,” Johns starts.
“If, you think we might have, I’ll be . . .” Ghort rebuttals but is cut off.
“No, that’s not what I meant, but you could have and are willingly buying everything,” John says, “we usually see one or more people try and steal, and you didn’t. You were also so nice to Kimber . . .” John looks at all the items, and calculates the prices.
“Well, the total comes to forty gold, eleven silvers, and five coppers,” Ghort supplies quickly. He already has out his money pouch and is starting to could out the gold.
“Five gold,” John says flatly.
“What?” Ghort says certain that he didn’t hear it correctly, “no, that is way too low for the quality of goods we are receiving.”
“I won’t take money from someone that my daughter sees as a nice group of people,” john says smiling warmly.
Ghort opens his mouth several times to rebuttal but is met with a severe look from John.
“Then we must take it graciously for that price,” Ghort puts down the five gold and everyone put their purchase into their bag of holding.
They leave the mercantile, still bowing their thanks before they head over to the inn again. They get the two rooms that are available and sit in the largest of the two rooms to finally try and set out what they will be doing tomorrow morning.
“What are you talking about looking for old books?” Leena asks, “I thought we were going to get treasure.”
“Well, we may certainly find treasures,” Bartimus starts, “but I want to find out what it going on in the temple and why the number of undead inside are endless.”
Jerrus eyes Bartimus for a moment.
“You knew the temple had endless undead?” Jerrus asks.
“I certainly was lead to believe so in the readings,” Bartimus nods, “I notices that in some of the older books they listed the gods, but there was always a space before all the gods were listed. I searched for years trying to find out what that was the case and most scholars just believed that it was to pay respect the gods. But then I found a passage that baffled me, and no scholar could explain. It gave a number of the gods, but the number was given in a fraction listing one god as two of one and then the rest. No name was given but what I found was that if you include that one god that is two of one it works to fill in the blank of all those ancient books. This one god, for some reason was taken out of all the books in the world. Only the slightest references are made to the one god that is two of one. It then references this temple as the one god that is two of one’s creation. It seems the god was of two minds that were opposed to each other. They could only do anything that both agreed to do, and this temple was the one thing they agree upon.”
“Wait, if they could not do anything without agreeing,” Jerrus starts, “how did they agree to make a temple that was always full of undead?”
“Well, I think it was in the cunning of each mind that they agreed on keeping evil locked up, but that was all I could find,” Bartimus says, “from what I read their reason was written down and kept inside the temple.”
“You could say finding out what is going on and why this temple exists is the real treasure,” Ghort says, “but from what I found out, hundreds of artifacts are also in the temple, and only a few have made their way to the surface.”
“Everyone has a bag of holding to just stuff everything you can find that might be of value into,” Ghort says, “I have already asked the innkeeper to make us a few dozen meals each that we can keep in our bags as well. Food will be the real problem in there.”
“Are there any more questions?” Bartimus asks.
“What’s my cut?” Leena asks.
“What?” Jerrus asks and frowns.
“No, we told her that we would give her a cut of the profits we get from this and it’s is a fair question,” Bartimus says, “Ghort and I have discussed this, and Jerrus, I know you don’t care about the money, but we will split the profit three ways equally. Ghort and I will share on third and Leena you will also get one third, and whether you want it or not, Jerrus the other third is yours.”
“I’m okay with that,” Leena says nodding.
“Oh, and while we are talking about shares,” Ghort pulls out one of his bags of holdings and motions for everyone else to so the same. “For each of you,” he puts his hands into his bag and pulls out dozens of vials, and hands the first dozen to Leena, the next dozen to Jerrus, and the third dozen to Bartimus. “I’ll just give you each a dozen right now. I hope that’s enough, but if we need more I still have plenty. But until tomorrow we have all the time we need so you are free to walk around.”
They all head off and spend the rest of the day exploring the town. Bartimus spends most of his time playing with the local kids and playing his lute, with the new strings he bought. Jerrus shadows Ghort as Ghort tries to find out more about the temple. But Leena spends her time trying to drown herself in mead. When night falls everyone goes to their room.