Session 66 - Mausoleum

The adventurers travel to the Rappan Athuk Mausoleum, exploring the surface area before returning to the inn.

This write-up is based on Kay’s notes from our September 17, 2025 session. Since our group is scattered around the country, we use Discord for our voice communication and Roll20 for our virtual tabletop. Thanks to Kay for the write-up and screen shots.

Continued from: On to the Coast Road

Location: John Chapel Inn, Coast Road, Eastreach Provence

Date: Saturday, June 24, 3517

6AM
We had breakfast at John Chapel Inn, a small waypoint along the Coast Road. During brekkies, Blaze asked the staff and customers if any of them knew any of the names from Helman Hairfoot’s journal. None had heard of him, but some had met some of the others at St. Rundar’s Inn about six weeks ago. They were acquaintances, and heard they were headed toward Rappan Athuk. We told them that they made it there, but never left. They responded that it was called the Dungeon of Graves for a reason.

7 AM
The party left for Rappan Athuk, taking the Coast Road south. It was overcast and in the 80’s, it was muggy and we could already feel the sweat running down our backs after walking a few hundred yards down the road.

9:30 AM
The clouds start to burn off, this was not an improvement. After travelling about 5-6 miles, there’s no trail to the left yet. 

11 AM
8 miles south from the inn, we spotted the trail. It’s 90F, and we’re all sweaty. We followed the trail east to a campsite with a fire pit, and fresh water, where we topped off our water bottles.

We took a break and had lunch.

Noon
We continued east along the well-trodden path.

2 PM

In the last hour, the terrain changed to rocky and hilly and began to climb. We followed the trail up to the top of a hill and saw a valley or pit. It’s huge, with several different graveyards. It’s a huge, cross shaped valley, over 700 feet across, oriented north – south, like a crater on top of a hill. There are graves everywhere. We figured out easily that the graves belonged to adventurers.

As we moved downhill through the graves, we passed one newly-dug open grave with a tombstone that had “Blaze Goldeneyes” on it. According to the journal and rumors, this graveyard is extremely haunted.

The area is terraced and we travelled downhill toward the dwarf statue described in Helman’s journal. Elron went up ahead of us and saw a swarm of regular-sized rats to the northeast of us, with about 13 of them sitting there, just watching us. While coming down the terraces toward the dwarf statue, we noticed the normal sounds of life were gone, there’s an ominous silence in stark contrast. All of the local birds are carrion birds, circling slowly overhead.

We arrived at the life-sized statue of a dwarf standing on a 4-ft X 4-ft block. The ground around it showed signs of being visited frequently. There were dwarven runes that Elron translates as: “Blessed is he who spares these stones and cursed is he who disturbs these bones.”

Elron looked at the base for the small compartment and found it. The compartment didn’t look trapped. He found an iron key inside and removed it.

There are three mausoleum buildings here, one to the east of the statue, one to the west, and one to the south. Helman’s journal only spoke of one; not three. To the north end of the valley was a large well. A short distance away to the northeast of us are three little depressions, with tunnels going down at an angle. They look like rat tunnels. 

On the mausoleum roof to the south, we noticed 8 gargoyles lined up on the top across the front and sides of the building. Elron readied his sling; Breena cast magic armor that gives her 8 hours of protection. The large building has carved demons in bas reliefs, and hundreds of skulls. It’s 60 ft. X 40 ft. and 20 ft tall. The gargoyles are human-sized and each has four arms. Blaze reminded the group that there’s a bounty on horns of green guardian gargoyles, and these fit the bill.

We checked out the west mausoleum; there are no gargoyles on the roof and the building isn’t as elaborate. Stairs go down to the doors, the building is in a depression. Elron, at the door, saw marks on them; they’ve been pried open and one is slightly ajar. The building is 40-ft. X 40-ft and 20 ft tall. Inside were 8 sarcophagi; the lids were pried off and the contents looted.  We looked for secret doors or floor panels, and checked inside the tombs, finding only the rare scattered bones and rotted cloth.

3:10 PM
We searched and found nothing. Going to check out the east mausoleum, saw regular-sized rats watching us and disappearing down tunnels. On the east mausoleum, the doors looked the same as the others, standing open. We spent 30 minutes searching the building. We found no traps or secret doors.  All the sarcophagi had been opened. Elron checked the key holes in the door for the iron key; it didn’t fit. 

Sinis cast detect magic and found that the gargoyles are magic, also they look like they’re made of the same green stone as the buildings, so they may not be actual gargoyles but animated stone constructs. The stone is all one block; the building itself detected as magic, but the furniture and doors are not. The east and west buildings are plain, but made of the same strange green stone. Elron looked for broken stones from the buildings, found none, and tried to knock a piece off with a rock, but failed.

Blaze, inside the east mausoleum, cast dispel magic on the green marble, and saw an effect of a glowing spiderweb, with cracks radiating out; it glows, fades, leaving smooth floors, and the cracks sealed up, leaving no damage behind at all.

We discussed how to attack the gargoyles.

Blaze reasoned that if we hit gargoyles made of stone, we may damage them too much to animate. The building is in a depression, lower than several of the adjacent terraces. Blaze can stand on the terrace at the same elevation as the roof of the building and cast her lightning bolt to hit the four gargoyles in a row on the front of the mausoleum; the rest of the group would stand ready at the door of the eastern mausoleum; and when she runs to them, with the rest of the gargoyles flying to attack, the others would use their ranged weapons to cover her.

Before we put any plan into action, we wanted to check out the well to the north of the graveyard.

4 PM
We went to the well, located on the other end of the sunken graveyard, opposite the mausoleum. The finely crafted artwork of the well is diminished only by the horrific images of demons, devils, and undead things that form the bas-relief carvings.  It was an ornately carved well, with horrific bas reliefs, with runes and scribblings adorning the empty spaces. Large grooves inside look like claw marks on the stone; below, it looks like it opens up into a larger cavern that’s flooded. The grooves look like they’re an inch across, each are a foot away from the others, and 10 feet long. Something tried to climb out and didn’t make it. The well is constructed of the same green stone as the other buildings. 

We decided to go back to the inn for the night before attempting the mausoleum; we figured we did good recon this time.

4:10 PM
We headed back to the road 5 miles away, and then a 7-mile trip back to the inn on the Coast Road.

6:40 PM

The group passed the campsite, going up the Coast Road.

7:30 PM
A half hour before sunset we ran into 7 brigands who stepped out of the underbrush with crossbows pointed at us.

 

Continued in Session 67 - Brigands & Gargoyles