Present: Gardan, Markku, Jani, Mika & Anne
The next morning...
The party was given healing ointments and prayers by their host's priests. While Efrael stayed behind to study the Traps and Wards book, the rest of the party went to visit the prisoner that had requested their presence. The prisoner turned out to be, unsurprisingly, the assassin that had slayed the book shop keeper. The man offered to tell more about his employers if he was let out of jail. Since the party seemed reluctant to take the offer, the man asked them to think about it. Lamya suggested Faal Balabar that he'd help the party to frame a prison escape, and Faal Balabar promised to think about it.
At night the party traveled to the center of the market place, that had been cleared of people for them. A ghastly laughter resonated from the underground. Efrael projected himself to the astral space and detected three wizards clad as rogues playing cards and laughing. The party fetched some lanterns and descended to the tunnel beneath the carpet sales booth. They traveled towards the room where they had earlier slaughtered three bandits, and heard the laughter coming through the closed door. Shamir used his magic to create a peeping hole to the door, and the party saw the three bandits playing cards with their heads on the table. Efrael admitted his error and declared the beings to be of supernatural nature.
Lamya divined that these bandits' corpses need to be blessed and laid to rest, and then their spirit would get to rest. Efrael divined that these beings have come to existence because of the rare case of triple-beheading the party conducted on them earlier. Lamya suggested that a priest should be brought in to bless the corpses. Efrael suggested that the ghosts would be brought under control. Without reaching a conclusion the party decided to explore the bandit tunnels further.
While exploring a bandits' training room (room 10) suddenly one of the bandits' head floated through the wall and passed the party without giving them a glance, and disappeared through the opposite wall. The party went on with their exploring, when suddenly in a storage room three floating heads appeared laughing. Lamya and Ali felt a chill, and the heads disappeared and their headless bodies appeared in their place. Mua'Dib fired his crossbow at one of them, but the bolt flew right through. Efrael and Lamya ran from the room while Shamir charged with his enchanted blade. The ghost dodged the attack, but Shamir swung again and this time the ghost was split in half. The laughter subsided a bit and the two remaining ghosts attacked back. Real damage was caused by the ghosts' daggers when their ethereal blades plunged first into Shamir and then to Mua'Dib. Ali tried to hit one of them with his mace in vain, swinging right through the ghost, but Mua'Dib managed to crush one of the ghosts' head that turned out to be held by the ghost in its armpit. Another hit to Shamir froze him so badly that he dropped his blade and had to back up to pick it up. Shamir gave his falchion to Ali, who used it to cut off the remaining ghost's leg, which subsequently disappeared. Mua'Dib struck off the ghost's arm which also disappeared. The other arm got struck off by Ali. Not admitting its defeat the ghost tried to kick Ali with its remaining leg. In response Ali struck the ghost in the middle of its chest and the ghost disappeared.
Meanwhile Efrael arrived to the room where the ghosts' corpses lay, and initiated the ritual required to take control of the ghosts. The ritual went on and at the same time he started to feel his life energy draining away. One ghost appeared to him, but immediately after he gained the control of it. Alas, two more ghosts appeared and charged at him and he commanded the one ghost to protect him. While the ghosts fought, Efrael slipped away and saw the rest of the party in the tunnel. He told them and only one of the ghosts is now in his control, and the party started to walk towards the exit slowly. Then Efrael felt that his ghost had stopped fighting, and he released it saying, "Run!". The party sprinted to the exit while the laughter started booming around them. They managed to escape, though, and the laughter died away.
The party returned to the palace and started healing the wounds and lost life energies, and Lamya left a note to Faal Balabar explaining that the ghost need to be exorcised by priests. Shamir healed his wounded arm with his magic. Small drops of water were formed on the skin of the arm as the arm thawed (and was healed). After the healing the party slept till noon.
The party woke up to a knock on their door. Behind the door was a young servant who delivered an invitation to Faal Balabar. Faal Balabar thanked the party formally and said that things will be handled from here on.
Continued here
