(Copied from previous site)
New friends Phil and Jerad in tow, the adventurers headed back to the Whispering Cairn. They choose to descend back down the shaft under the green lantern, now that they were prepared for the beetles that infest the room north east of the entry chamber. As they clambered down the pitted walls, several beetles scattered from the cairns the group built for their two fallen comrades. The group deliberated in the entry chamber on how to proceed. Their decision was made for them when a writhing hoard of acid beetles came around the corner and quickly closed with Stonan and Phil. Two flasks of alchemist's fire quickly dispatched the swarm. Seconds later though, the queen of the colony, a giant bombardier beetle, came around the corner. She ran up to Stonan and caught him, Phil, and Romanova in her deadly spray of acid. Miraculously, all three were unscathed. Phil lifted her great axe and quickly clove the monstrous insect in two.
Jerad and Nader entered the room with the sludge filled basin to search it. Jerad found three oblong lumps, the crusted over corpses of three humans dressed in leather armor with an eight pointed star on the left breast. One of the bodies had some potions, and one had a fabulous pearl. Nader broke apart the nest of the vile bugs, finding a mummified hand with a ring upon it. Jerad attempted to hoard all three potions and the pearl "for his god, Pelor," but Stonan would have none of that. The dwarf became enraged and nearly attacked Jerad, but was placated by one of the potions and promises to split treasure evenly.
While the others were searching the chamber, Mercurio and Romanova looked into the room with the stone slabs from the doorway. Jerad pushed past them to examine the corpse upon one of the far stone slabs, heedless of what else might be in the room. He was surprised not only by a feeling of fatigue washing over him, but by the stag of the beetle colony, another Giant Bombardier, that came stumbling out from between two of the slabs. The beetle quickly closed to Jerad, spraying him, Mercurio, and Romanova, all of them taking festering wounds from the acid. Phil burst though into the room and once again made short work of the beetle, but this time the damage had been done.
Mercurio concentrated to try and divine if any of the items that they had gathered so far were magical. The three potions, pearl, and ring from the hand in the hive glowed brightly. When Romanova was handed one of the found potions, she recognized the small writing near the seal as Ancient Seuloise. "These potions heal wounds!" she exclaimed. She took one and Jerad used his magic to heal himself and Mercurio.
Moving deeper into the cairn, the group notices what look to be pegs for storing tools or similar items set in the walls, but anything of value was taken long ago. The passage ended abruptly at stairs descending into water. Romanova prodded ahead with her staff, eventually being submerged up to her waist in the cold pool. Looking into the water she could discern the hall opened up into a large chamber that was completely inundated. There were columns in the room and a long drain in the floor that was clogged with debris. Just then the water started to swirl violently around the area in front of Romanova. Stonan came forward and brought his flail down hard into the water, seemingly with no effect, he had gone in deeper than he intended. Phil grabbed Romanova and pulled her out of the water just as a vortex swirled and picked up Stonan, pulling him under water and into the large chamber beyond.
Jerad and Nader jumped into the water and swam down to the drain, quickly trying to clear it. Mercurio told Phil to stay put while he cast one of his incantations upon her. A few seconds later, Phil was twice her normal size and swimming towards the corner where the water elemental had swept poor Stonan. Stonan was in bad shape, The elemental left its vortex form and coalesced into a living wall of water. It slammed Stonan up against one of the columns. The activity had drawn the attention of a horrible undead creature that dwelt in one of the rooms off the main chamber. It swam out and tried to take it's own chunk out of Stonan, and succeeded. Luckily, Stonan did not succumb to the paralyzing effects of the ghoul's bite.
Stonan attempted to withdraw from the enemies, but the elemental was presented an opening, and struck poor Stonan again. Phil retaliated with a powerful blow of his own against the elemental. At the entrance to the room, Mercurio joined the efforts to clear the debris from the drain. Together the three were making progress. Stonan, away from the melee, dropped his heavy shield and swam to the surface, now about a foot below the ceiling. He drank a potion to heal his wounds and prepared to reenter the fray. Phil lashed out at the ghoul, wounding it grievously, but undead it fought on. Both the elemental and the ghoul landed blows on Phil, and she struck back, ending the ghoul's unlife. The elemental struck her again, hard, and she fell unconscious and started to drown. Nader swam over and finished the elemental with a blow from his great sword, but Stonan was unable to lift Phil's head out of the water because of her enormous size.
Mercurio canceled the spell in the nick of time. Nader and Stonan were able to lift her out of the water and get her breath. Searching the room Nader found a ring on the ghoul with the same eight pointed star seen on the other corpses in the area, and a pouch full of coins. Jerad found a short sword and the missing red lantern from the chamber above. Licking their wounds and running low on spells and potions, the group once again returned to Diamond Lake and Alustan's mansion.
From Alustan they learned that the eight pointed star is the symbol of the Seeker Lodge, a group of unscrupulous archaeologists and scholars in the Free City who sent an expedition to the area many years ago. The party must have found their remains. He warned against flashing their loot around town, Khellek, the mage with the group exploring the Stirgengest Cairn, is also a Seeker and would be interested in finding out where the items came from.
Romanova sought out a place to discreetly sell their loot while the rest of the group went to the temple of Pelor. She wandered into Tidwoads, the store run by a weasely little gnome, and the best place in town to get rid of stuff you didn't want other people to know about. He was all too happy to give Romanova some gold for the ring and red leather armor.
Meeting her cohorts at the temple, they pooled their funds and bought everyone who didn't have one a healing potion and paid for Phil and Stonan to have spells cast upon them. Romanova retired to the Emporium for a hot perfumed bath and the others found a beer garden to spend some of their hard earned gold in.