In the morning we decided to head into the passage just off to the right. I went in looking to pick the locked door he had reported only to find it wasn't locked at all, it was rusted shut. Shadow responded simply by striking the handle off the door.
Inside we found what was a friendly apparition kept alive through a magical Tyr amulet. Much to our surprise, he was willing to talk with us and thanked us for opening the door that hadn't been opened in near a century. He could barely move and when he did it was like dried meat peeling off his bed and shuffling across the floor. We asked him his purpose among other questions, but when I mentioned Strahd, he seemed to flare with holy magic at the mere mention.
We told the undead paladin that we were searching for an artifact for Strahd so he could send us back to our home, being adventurers in a different dimension. When we told him it was a small orb with a dragon claw that he was searching for, he seemed confused at why it was that particular artifact he would want out of the myriad of powerful, evil artifacts in the castle's vault. All he could recall of the artifact was that it was something used to increase your powers, but not strength.
We continued our discussion about Strahd and he painted a very different picture than the Strahd we had encountered. Our Strahd wasn't a fearsome warrior, but a very tired and depressed ruler with perhaps one too many wives.
Eventually our undead paladin expressed his wish to be freed from this plane of existence. He said he'd help us retrieve that (and only that) artifact as long as we promised to release his spirit so he would finally see his rest (and not reanimate). Yuna obliged, taking the amulet of Tyr and saying his final rights. He soon vanished into dust but left us with a map to help guide us to the castle vault. He also mentioned that we should let "Liz" a kind child's specter in the castle know that he had left to return to his peace.
Following our newly acquired map we came to what the map said was a secret door. Investigating the area, I was able to ascertain that there were two bricks (one near the door, and one farther down a hallway) we needed to push simultaneously. I recruited Lefty to help, and we pressed both bricks in at the same time. When we did so, the bricks magically folded away as if under some enchantment and revealed our passageway.
Much to our surprise the passageway beyond looked absolutely spotless without a speck of dust. It seemed suspicious given the age of the castle, but we made our party's formation and proceeded down the hallway. Shadow suddenly stopped us in our tracks as he sensed something strange in front of us. I summoned my telekinesis to hover a torch up past the party, but when it reached a certain depth, it immediately extinguished. Zax handed Inrah a coin, and she cast a light spell upon it and then threw it forward where it stuck in mid-air, shimmering and suspended. That's when Zax remembered the tales of gelatinous cubes!
Lefty fired arrows that dissolved inside the cube. Shadow backed away fearing the acid inside as Inrah lit both Shadow and the encroaching cube with a colorful explosion of Faerie Fire. Surprisingly, I discovered these jelly-like creatures aren't completely mindless as my psychic daggers pierced and damaged it. Shadow, in lead, was scrambling to back away from the corrosive wall as it moved toward him as it was trying to envelope him. Zax threw fiery oil upon it in a last-ditch effort, filling the hallway with thick smoke if only for a few moments until it was extinguished. Finally, a third arrow from Lefty pierced the cube to the point where it collapsed, oozing upon the floor in front of us.
We descended further down the hallway, down a spiral staircase, down another longer hallway until we came upon a door of extraordinary workmanship. None of us had ever seen a door quite to this magnitude. If we could have looted the door and melted it down, surely it would have been worth more than what was beyond. Made of adamantine and inlaid with silver and gold, I sat dumbfounded at the sheer audacity of the door ... so much so I couldn't find a way to even open it. Luckily Inrah flew upwards and noticed a keyhole that lay between the frames in a curious position.
As we used the key the paladin had given us, suddenly a blast of electricity shocked its way through Inrah, sending her reeling backwards. I took another look at the door and this time I saw its devious nature. Trapped four different ways! 2 mechanical traps and 2 divine arcane traps!
I was able to disarm the two mechanical traps after some inspecting. One would have flooded the chamber with water. Another would have released ceiling tiles to crush whoever was underneath. As for the divine traps, Zax was able to align their righteousness to the doorway and finish turning the key without disturbing the divine energies.
The big surprise here was that there was another key, inside the key! This time I used my psychic bolstered knack to track down five more keyholes at the end of the hallway leading to the door. Again, 2 of the locks were mechanically trapped while Yuna revealed 3 of the locks contained magic. Using my psychic bolstering again I was able to disarm the mechanical traps, which would have filled the hallway with fire incidentally. Shadow cast an identify spell upon the remaining locks and we found three schools of magic therein: transmutation, evocation, and conjuration. Thinking upon the possible results of opening traps dealing with evocation (a fiery end) and conjuration (possible teleportation somewhere unpleasant), we ascertained as a group that the transmutation effect was our best bet. We turned the second key, and ... success!
The giant door retracted, and what we found behind was ... strangely tempting. We had promised our undead paladin guide to only leave with the singular artifact, but there beyond the door wasn't a museum full of powerful, and most likely cursed, magic items. As an example, we could feel anger coming from a great axe. Zax practically had to be pulled away from a holy sword.
Eventually we came upon the artifact we were seeking. Shadow quickly grabbed it and put it in his pouch, laying aside any fears of magical retribution.
Walking out of the vault, the door shut behind us, and the key collapsed, disappearing into the floor. We had won our prize!
As we made our way back out of the castle, we stumbled upon "Liz" being tormented by a ghoul. We dispatched the ghoul without as much as a scream from it. Liz saw Yuna holding her old friend's amulet of Tyr and asked if he was gone. Yuna might have made a new mischievous spirit friend, fond of tugging on Inrah's wings.
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