are we but ants?

We searched the bodies of the drow we had killed and searched the surrounding rooms, most of which seemed to be the private chambers of those same drow.

Most of the party was out of magic but we were still deep within the fortress. There was some talk of finding somewhere to rest but ultimately the decision was made to press on now that we’d stirred up the nest.

Going one way we opened a door and found ourselves on a bridge linking our tower to another. At the very least, it allowed us to identify that we were in the centre tower and also that we were about 60’ above the ground; both useful things to know.

On the other end of the bridge were a pair of guards who immediately proceeded to sound the alarm. As Deathspank charged across I cast a spell to silence the guards and the alarm bells they had with them. While the guards didn’t last long we discovered that within their tower were more guards with ballistae.

It was going to take a long time to infiltrate their tower, and the ballistae would do a lot of damage in the meantime. We decided that, for now at least, there wasn’t much need to get into that tower. Upon reflection I wonder whether we were correct—there were no ballistae in our tower and it might suggest that there might be something of interest within.

We withdrew and started heading to ground level. As we tried to find a way out of the tower we were blocked by rooms that we weren’t willing to enter. In one direction was a room criss-crossed with silver threads and some sort of mechanical spiders, while in another it was just filled with spider webs.

We worked our way back up the tower and found a room that was filled with chests. Ig worked his way through them, disarming traps and opening locks. By the time we’d finished we had quite a haul when combined with the items we’d “rescued” from the drow bodies, though of course it’s of little use to us trapped here in the fortress.

I fear it will not be long before our stamina starts to give out—it’s been a long day with much fighting, yet there is no sign of us finding a way out. Perhaps it was a mistake to step into that teleportation circle, because now I feel that we’re trapped in some diabolical maze.