After a few days Dove and Gale return to the City in the evening but both remain tight-lipped about what they
have been doing. The party meet up with
Fingers in the inn and he explains that many hundreds of years ago according to
Thieves Guild records when the Guild was in its prime it dug many tunnels under the city particularly in the direction of the Nobles Quarter. As a result it was able to carry out many successful robberies to the frustration of the rich and powerful. Unbeknown to the Guild a certain Lord Elric was a master of the Dark Arts and when the Guild robbed him he unleashed an army of undead into the Guild's tunnels. A bitter war was waged under the City but eventually the Guild casualties started to mount up and the undead broke into the basements of the Guild itself.
The Guild was forced to sue for peace returning all Lord Elric's stolen property and making extensive payments in recompense.
Ever since that time only the foolish have dared to explore those tunnels for fear of what still might stalk them and their very existence has been forgotten by most people. Fingers, however, very much doubts if the Guild ever tried taking a cleric into the tunnels because 'thieves and clerics have never seen eye to eye'. Furthermore 'everybody knows that clerics have just got to say boo to a vampire and it runs away' so he thinks that Dwain will give the party the edge it needs.
He agrees to meet the party at a certain location in the sewers the next day.
At the appointed time the party reach the meeting point in the sewers and Fingers emerges from a nearby secret door. They follow him up some steps which take
them to a somewhat dusty and dingy room in the basement of the Thieves Guild with many old books on extensive shelving. Fingers says this is the old records library
of the Guild and the other thieves are afraid to come down here as they believe it is haunted. Fingers told them that the ghosts of men do not bother
Halflings so he has the run of the place.
Fingers suspects that the real undead lie on the next few levels underneath the library and he leads them to a secret door in the wall which he already has
discovered how to open. The party descend some stairs and come to a room full of old bones which come to life as soon as they enter. A brief fight with
some armed skeletons ensues after which the party loot their foes weapons, one of which turns out to be magic with properties against the undead and is
claimed by Firmon. The party
also note that Fingers is also wielding an undead-slaying sword which he appears to have obtained in mysterious circumstances.
The party gradually clear the basement levels room by room noting that the undead appear to have pre-programmed tactics and hence can
generally be put at a strategic disadvantage. The monk, Kan Ze, proves he can open secret doors when Fingers can't although with an entirely different
technique. He also reveals that his real, non-monkish, name is Medalric which may suggest his family originated in Sankhar. Rumpkin
is fascinated with the contents of the basements and frequently pockets bits and pieces whose value escapes the rest of the party. He is unhappy, however,
when Medalric claims a greenish pebble in which he detects a faint magical aura.
As well as skeletons the party meet animated suits of plate armour, zombies, spectres and wights.
Dwain, who has never fought undead before, at least remembers his clerical training and is able to brief the party on the strengths and weaknesses of
their opponents. Gale on the other hand who spent many years in
The Waste is highly sensitive to the unnatural and can sense the presence of undead.
Eventually after many tough battles the party call it a day before they have cleared out all the basement levels theorising, perhaps optimistically, that
the undead will not re-occupy them.
Returning to their task when Fingers is next available the party destroy the final two wights in the Thieves Guild basement and then find a secret door which
Fingers assures them will take them to the tunnels under the City. As they descend the stairs they found leading down from the door a forbidding spectral figure appears who informs them they they should turn back by command of Lord Elric, otherwise they will be destroyed. The undead figure is ancient and powerful and has the advantage of being able to travel through the walls. The party, however, are determined to press on and have the advantage of two weapons forged specifically
to fight the undead. Lord Elric's servant is defeated. At the bottom of the stairs the party find another secret door and open it to find they are close to a crossroads in the Underdark where an ancient battle appears to have taken place. Although the participants are now a mass of crumbling bone happily all their magical items have remained intact including some of use against the undead. Suddenly Gale detects a terrible spirit of death and vengeance approaching. The party have acquired a certain expertise in these fields themselves by now and the spirit is at least temporarily put to rest.
The party first check out a route to the sewers, surviving an encounter with a gelatinous cube along the way. They then proceed cautiously along what Fingers claims is the direction of the palace. The party travel through a natural cavern and are alerted by Gale's sixth sense that it is inhabited by 'something unnatural'. This turns out to be a roper which the party dispatch when it attacks them. A little while later the party encounter a group of jackal-like humanoids and a brief skirmish follows. The last jackal creature
surrenders and tells them he was a member of a larger party of scouts who came up from the deeps. The party then encounter a well which Rumpkin cannot resist
investigating. He is immediately attacked by a very large spider and more emerge from the well. Gale decides to stick a flamimg sphere down the well to discourage
the spiders and the party think they can see another gelatinous cube partially hidden by the, now rather singed, spider webs. Having had a tough day the party
decide to return to the tavern at that point.
Back in the city the
Geogoths are still searching for the party so in order to have a safer base the party move in with a relative of Fingers, Elwin
Sandheaver, who
just happens to have a new property he has bought for his expanding business. The exisiting tenants are still moving out so for the time being the party camp
out in two rooms in the basement. In return for this favour Elwin would like the party to help him rid the neighbourhood of the local criminal gang the
Neggers. He would like the party to ambush the members of the gang as they ask the local shopkeepers for protection money. Ordinarily he would ask his employees to
do this but the gang, having experienced a number of reverses, have hired a number a tough mercenaries. The party split up, each partnering one of Elwin's
apprentices. Of these the most useful is the half-orc Ogson who comes to the rescue of Rumpkin when he is in difficulties. The overall operation is succesful
and the Neggers are expelled from another City block.
The party return to the tunnels under the City (via the secret door in the sewers) and find the old well again. This time the gelatinous cube is defeated
and sent into the depths of the Underdark (the well is really, really deep). The party spot two passages which starts about 20 feet down the well on opposite
sides and Gale goes down to investigate. The passages are really quite narrow and don't look if they have been used recently. Gale explores about 100 feet
in either direction before returning. Back in the tunnels the party
eventually reach some imposing doors which may be below the location of the palace. The doors are guarded by two suits of armour which spring to life
and are annoyingly resistant to magic. After a tough fight the suits of armour crumble into dust but the party sustain many wounds in the battle and decide
to retreat for the time being.
Four days later the party return to the tunnels under the City. To their dismay when the party return to the imposing doors under the palace the suits of srmour (now identified as Helmed Horrors) have reformed are are guarding the doors again. The party discover several more things in short order (a) the Helmed Horrors reform really quickly if destroyed (b) the doors are trapped with fireballs - luckily Fingers has discovered magic which enables him to attempt to disarm traps and pick locks at a distance and (c) Dwain can't dispel the magic on the doors because it was put there by a really powerful wizard. The party decide instead to try the tunnels
leading from the well.
At one point the party find that the roof of the narrow tunnel from the well has partially collapse leaving a pile of rubble on the floor which they will have to crawl over. Gale senses some monstrosity in the rubble so Firmon pokes it with his greatsword only for the sword to be snatched from his hand by a tentacle. He
is not impressed so pokes it rather more severely with his spare sword. Eventually the creature dies and Firmon spots a gold ring in the rubble which immediately he feels the urge to put on. It appears to be a ring of jumping rather than some sort of cursed item and Firmon is not at all alarmed when he finds he cannot take it off at all. Later in a natural cavern the party encounter three ropers and by dint of their superior spacial skills contrive to tbe ambushed by creatures
with only one third of their own speed. Luckily the party are tough enough by now to take all the creatures on at once. Shortly after this encounter the party
find a secret door into what turns out to be an underground complex situated under the palace.