War for the Crown Gameplay Part 1

Adelaide flinches at the sudden light, but fortunately doesn't spill anything and finishes her extract. She seals the vial, planning to use this later. "Is pushing unknown buttons a good idea?" she asks, mildly.

Josie shrugs. "You said you didn't see any traps. There's been no one trying to kill us so far. The first one did seemingly nothing, and the next one just turned on the lights. As far as pressing buttons in some unknown place goes, this seems fairly tame."

"Ah dunno about well set up," Corey shrugs sullenly. "Ah'd think ya'd want the switch fer the lights ta be in the room the light are in."

"Look, if Josie happens to drop dead from pushing a button that she didn't know the purpose of, I suppose I could deem it a cause worthy of restorative magic. Let's keep going," Momo snarks, crossing her arms and meandering towards the next door.

Adelaide had been planning to let the subject drop anyway, so she lets it fall with Momo's comment. The next room requires Sarina's light once more. Heavy wooden bookshelves line the walls of this opulent bedchamber. A posh chair sits in the northwestern corner alongside a small circular table. A massive bed and an adjoining table rest along the eastern side of the room. An open bathroom fits into the southwest, with a bathtub matching the room’s opulence, but adding an ignoble odor. Doors exit to the west and south. On the wall, like in previous rooms, there is a switch. An ornate gold key lies on top of the circular table next to the sofa chair. Puzzled and suspicious, Adelaide checks the key for traps, but finding none, she takes the key.

She does a cursory inspection of the room as well. In doing so, Adelaide notices a scroll case hanging from the railing of the bathtub. This bronzed and pitted case opens to reveal a tattered note that reads: “Fourth bed from the north. Comforter. Backup key.”

"Hm, take a look at this," she says to the others, showing them the note.

Josie shrugs. "So figure out which way is north and we'll find the key for this. Or just tear apart whatever bed is fourth from a wall."

Corey hits the switch, and the lights in the room from before turn off. "... wait, that don't make a lick of sense."

"I just thought others would like to see, not that the message was especially cryptic," Adelaide answers with a sigh. "Josie, perhaps you'd be willing to check the beds from the other room?" At Corey's comment, she shrugs. "They may need to be pressed in some sort of pattern to truly make sense. For the moment, I'm glad Sarina is able to handle lighting."

"Welcome," Sarina says with a sigh, as she refreshes the light spell once more. "Not that it's particularly draining, just a bit tedious. Perhaps we should press that switch again, though? Some light seems better than none."

Josie nods. "I have to head over there anyway to check the beds, so I'll get the button while I'm there."

While Josie goes to inspect that, Adelaide does a further check of this room. A cursory check of the bookshelves reveals that there are a wide selection of books, including a fantasy novel, a mystery, a cookbook, and a history of the fourth army of exploration. Feeling it would take too long to properly inspect all the books, she decides to check the bed and chair area further, and she's unsurprised to find nothing there. The lights suddenly turn on in this room. "I suppose that's your reprieve," she comments to Sarina, looking back to the hallway Josie went down.

Stopping briefly by the cabinet on the way back, Josie remarks, "Found a key. Looks like it went to that thing you unlocked. The lights changing is also weird."

Stacked wooden crates cover the southern wall, and more crates occupy the northwestern corner. Wooden shelves fill much of the eastern half of the room, each tier filled with dust-coated bottles, crockery, and glass jars. Like before, a switch sits on the wall of this room as well. The lights in this room are already on.

Corey sifts among the bottle and jars, and though he doesn't find anything interesting in any of them, he does find a note nestled between two bottles. "'Backup power source in favourite book,'" Corey reads. "What kinda game is this fella playin', leavin' riddles around like this insteada just sayin' it plainly."

Sarina moves over to Corey from where she had been investigating the crates, and finding clothes, condiments, pickled vegetables, preserved delicacies, salted meats, and a well-stocked toolkit scattered about in the crates all in plain sight. "The people who set this up probably knew what the favorite book was," Sarina says with a shrug. "I'd guess it'd be that history book, given the portraits."

Sure enough, when Sarina goes to check the history book, she finds a small piece of curved glass inside that  looks to be the same material as the crystal ball. "I suppose this is it? I'm not quite sure how it functions, though. Anyone else have an idea?"

Josie presses the button in this room while Sarina talks, and the other two rooms turn on their lights.

Adelaide looks at it, thinking. ”If I’m not mistaken, we could use this to scry whatever area the crystal is connected with. I think the most straightforward way to find out what area is just to try it. Anyone want to come with me to see?”

Momo shrugs, and agrees. "Yeah. I'll come along."

Adelaide doesn’t wait to hear who else will see, and goes along. The image appears of the boxes in the other room. ”It looks like those boxes are quite important, then!” Adelaide concludes with a grin. ”I guess we’d best get to moving them.”

Momo grimaces, and inspects her carefully painted nails with chagrin. Mumbling bloody murder under her breath, she again collects her dress and makes her way towards the boxes.

After the boxes are moved over the course of a few minutes, the group's efforts reveal a beautiful painted fresco with an armoured, handsome Taldan man standing on the edge of a mountain, cutting down hordes of dwarves. A brass plate identifies the fresco as “Noble Galitian Maramaxus, hero of the Fourth Army of Exploration, champion of Taldor.” Just then, Martella's voice rings from the badges again, “Out of the senate. Stavian’s soldiers still pursuing. Fighting throughout the entire senate building. Not all military are with Stavian. Assassins seem to be a collection of foreign agents. City guard is in chaos. Lion Blades and Eutropia’s allies fighting against assassins back in the senate. Wherever you are, keep your heads down!”

”Understood, trying to decipher this place,” Adelaide answers briefly. She considers the mural. ”I wonder if there’s something to decode in looking with the crystal...” She goes to check, but it looks no different. The young woman frowns. Adelaide pulls out her vial, drinks the concoction, and goes to inspect the mural itself more closely. "Ah, it moves," she announces in a moment. "I'm not certain how yet, but there are a few telltale notches, here and here. I wonder if it has to do with this key," she adds, pulling out the key as she speaks. "It could also be the lighting... though, I'm hesitant to turn out the lights and putting our visibility burden on Sarina right now. Do you all suppose it'd be worth splitting up to investigate before going that route?"

Josie chimes in, "Splitting up seems reasonable. I guess I could look for a place to put the key in somewhere around here."

"Sure," Adelaide agrees, handing Josie the key. She then goes to the bedchambers to investigate further, but upturning the chair, bed, and bookshelves find her nothing. I should probably put those books back later, she notes to herself, feeling a touch guilty about the mess.

First, Sarina decides to detect magic in every room. She notes that the small slot in the wall has a conjuration aura, and that the fresco has both transmutation and evocation auras, the crystal ball has a divination aura, and the light switches all have evocation auras. With the only same school of magic being the switches and mural, Sarina decides to start trying the switches, using her dancing lights to make sure rooms stay lit.

After a sequence of presses, eventually Sarina turns off the lights in the mural room while the light in the crystal ball room is on, and in the crystal ball, it shows a portion of the fresco is glowing, but no such glow can be seen in person.

Corey goes over to the room with the fresco while the others stay and keep an eye on the ball. He puts a hand on the spot that was glowing, and is informed by the others that the glowing spot changed. With their guidance, he presses each spot in turn, 6 times, before the fresco suddenly moves, revealing a hidden compartment behind it.

Inside the compartment is a cache of weapons and armour, specifically a longbow, a greatsword, a longsword, and a shortsword, along with a suit of studded leather, a chain shirt, a set of scale mail, and a set of chainmail, along with a light and heavy steel shield. Moreover, there's a small box containing 20 unique coins bearing the Voritas family crest.

Sarina identifies the coins as being the focus for a conjuration spell, and with the conjuration aura on the slot, she places a coin into the slot. That suddenly reveals a narrow passage leading to a short flight of stairs leading to a small landing before another flight of stairs go up, though only Sarina can see it.

"Excellent, a way out," Sarina says with a smile.