After tying up some loose ends in Iadenveigh and Torch, and making a quick trip to Starfall to surreptitiously unload some treasure (and Grendal), the party, which now included a priestess of Brigh called Hala, made its way to the Scar of the Spider. At the entrance to the valley, they found the smoking ruin of a massive robot. A large crater indicated that the robot had been crippled by a major explosion, possibly caused by a planted mine. As the party examined the robot, they noticed a large net slung under it. Within contained several human bodies, most likely local barbarians. They had been killed by the explosion, but sometime later, the tops of their skulls had been surgically removed and their brains extracted. As the party examined the scene, the robot exploded, of course.
After patching themselves up, the party began following the tracks of a second large robot which had apparently also been damaged by the blast, but survived and made its way back down into the valley. On the way, they came upon a large cave full of reddish fungus. The fungus turned out to be radioactive, but flammable, The party was able to burn it away, destroy several giant spiders that occupied the cave and recover a sizeable treasure trove. Continuing on their way, they encountered a ragged man with many scars and some high-tech prosthetics. The man, who called himself Paetyr, was clearly mentally disturbed, but not hostile. Hala was able to cure the man of his insanity and he proved to be a valuable source of information. He turned out to be a druid who had been tortured by a group he called the Butchers who inhabit the valley. He was able to provide information on other denizens of the Scar of the Spider, notably a four-armed female being who used high technology. He said she was the one who destroyed the giant robot. The company was interested in making contact with this person. Paetyr said she could be found in a place he called the Machine Caves and told them how to get there.
The Machine Caves turned out to be natural caves, but parts of the interior were clad in metal with glaucite doors and robotic guards. There was no immediate sign of the four-armed creature, but the party members found themselves in the throne room/laboratory of a particularly bombastic robot called Binox. After a predictably unsuccessful effort at diplomacy, a surprisingly difficult battle ensued. Binox proved quite formidable, with integrated laser rifles, a force field and the unexpected ability to rapidly climb out of pit spells (a party mainstay). Nonetheless, the would-be robot king was defeated. They explored a little more and realized the room they were in was a fully functional military and production lab powered by a geothermal reactor, a find worth a king's ransom. As the party healed up, the four-armed female appeared. She spoke in Androffan and said her name was Isuma. She said she was of a race called the Kasathans and that she was from a distant world. She said she was brought to this world on the ship that crashed in Numeria thousands of years ago. She and several fellow Kasathans had been preserved in stasis pods until recently. They had run afoul of a group of Dominion agents and only she had been able to escape. Since then, she has been fighting a guerrilla war against the Dominion. When the party informed her that they were looking to cause some trouble for the Dominion as well, she asked to join them. She also told them of another group of aliens who lived in a place she called the Fungal Cave. She said they were also worshippers of the elder gods of the Dark Tapestry, just like the Dominion, but that the two groups were mutually hostile. She figured this other group might be a bit easier to take on and that they may have some useful technology or information to use against the Dominion. It was agreed to check out the Fungal Cave first and off the went with Isuma tagging along.
-Rognar-
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