#baronyofthesilverwolf

She strains, the boulder shifting, but it doesn't lift.

David stands by, ready to help, though he does not offer unless asked. Out of politeness, perhaps.

"Wow, this is heavy" She admits, her pride wars a bit and she keeps going on her own to see if she can manage yet

Then she admits "Might need a bit of help. David"

David leans in, and he murmurs to the stone for a moment, and the ground around it wiggles, and softens a bit. Not to mud, but from solid rock, to more like a crumbly sandstone.

Gwen finds she can now easily lift the stone, which may weigh a good 500lbs.

"Lift with the legs, that's the secret" A smile "But thanks"

As she lifts it, sand crumbles in and pours down the hole for a moment, but it soon is just a trickle. The boulder removed reveals a narrow tunnel. A gust of cool, stale air rushes out, carrying the faint smell of earth and stone, musty and moldering things.

"Huh!" The nocker ducks down the dodgy-looking passage, quick as you please.

"I.. and thar she blows" The stone is put almost tenderly to the side, as Gwen sees if she can fit in

Gwen can fit, but it's a tight squeeze - no one else can walk alongside her, she needs to stoop over. David looms at the entryway, and then tactfully offers, "I will keep watch out here."

"Okay. I'll take rear" She hates that letting the littler ones take up the struggle, but it is for the best so she doesn't block them

Art slid in almost as fast as Thistle! Of course, he leaves sloshy wet footprints and now has a coating of dust and sand caked to his wet clothes.

It was dim outside. It is pitch black in here.

At first.

"Okay, not all of us see in the dark" She starts to say

Art can NOT see in the dark, but he had grabbed the back of Thistle's shirt, and that was good enough for him!

Citrine zips down, and her light provides a faint illumination - and almost as if in response, dim lighting appears.

The tunnel walls are covered in intricate glyphs, glowing faintly in the dim light cast by Citrine. The symbols, odd and complex, spiral down the passage in patterns that seem both beautiful and unnerving. Some are familiar to Thistle - almost, tickling the corners of her memory, echoes of Glamour, but many are foreign and unrecognizable—clearly a cipher devised by Caelan himself.

Thistle can see in the dark.

"Huh? It's fine down here."

THISTLE notices all of this before the rest, but when the glyphs start to glow, the stand out in stark contrast to her, where the others may only have the faintest illumination.

"Thanks, Citrine"

She scribbles in her sketchbook, copying everything down.

At the far end of the tunnel, they find a private workroom - "It must be Caelan's - " Art says, his voice echoing weirdly down the tunnels. "There's that symbol again, over the door.

The space is small, barely big enough for two slender wilders to stand comfortably - leaving poor Gwen to stoop awkwardly in the tunnel.

It is filled with remnants of his final project. A rough-hewn stone table stands at the center, with scattered tools and strange components—partially worked stone, shards of crystal, and several empty containers that might once have held rare alchemical substances - and a few that are half full, but covered in dust - perhaps gone inert due to age?

She stops and waits

As they step into the chamber, the air seems to hum with latent magic. Old, dormant, but still there.

A specific glyph on a wall by the entrance catches Thistle's eye. It's just a squiggle, but... no, it's not... something comes to mind, a flicker, a torch, a lamp, a spark... light, it says.

She steps closer to the mark on the wall, and reaches out to touch it.

When Thistle’s hand brushes against that glyph, the entire room responds. A soft ripple of energy spreads from that point, activating a series of ancient runes embedded throughout the chamber.

One by one, glowing lines of blue and gold light flare up along the walls, illuminating the space with a warm, ethereal glow. The ceiling lights up last, revealing a sprawling mosaic of constellations and arcane symbols. The light isn’t harsh; it feels almost alive, pulsing gently as if the chamber itself is awakening after a long slumber.

Art gasps softly, moving inward, eyes glued to the constallations... then he notices something, and turns to beckon to Gwen. "Here, Gladiola... the chamber widens over here, where the ceiling goes up... "

"Oh, that is baller...."

Scribble-scribble

It's a squeeze to get there, but then Gwen can stretch out to her full height, as both the floor starts to dip and the ceiling raise as the workshop extends back into a wider space towards the back wall.

She moves to that chamber, squezing, flaking

Art's eyes widen, and without hesitation, he grabs the closest item of interest—a worn, leather-bound notebook that was lying on a table.

Clearly Art's impulsiveness isn't meant to stymy Thistle; it's just who he is. Still, there’s no lack of things for her to explore. The room is filled with other curious items: stoneworking tools, alchemical supplies and cabinets - all clearly related to Caelan’s work.

"It's a cipher. So, I just... I could solve this with math..."

"A cipher? Huh"

Art flips through the notebook eagerly, his eyes scanning the intricate glyphs and symbols. "Yeah, it’s definitely a cipher—Caelan encoded his notes. If we can just figure out the pattern, it’s only a matter of time before we can crack it."

"Whoever wrote this was a genius."

Then he stops, and blinks. "I wonder..."

"Exactly."

"Heh. Wouldn't it be funny if, like, "I-S-O-L-D-E" was the key."

Art pauses, running a finger over the coded glyphs. "It might be cheating," he says, glancing up at Thistle and Gwen, "but I think I can read it. With a cantrip. Normally, I'd love to sit and puzzle it out, but..." His eyes flick back to the door they came through, concern knitting his brow. "We might be low on time."

"Then do it. We can't risk premature activiation"

He looks to Thistle, "It won't last." He warns, "So we WILL have to figure out the cypher eventually, if we want to read the rest of the book." He is cheered by this!

"Can you guys keep looking around while I work on this bunk? It might take a few minutes."

"Sure" She nods

"Sure! What art lets you read stuff?"

He gives her a grin. "Remember when we were dropped on that boat in the Caribbean?" Teasing a bit, not giving her the answer.

Starting at the letter A, he names a stone, and a star. "A, amethyst, Arcturus." A silly grin on his face, despite the solemnity of the situation. "B, Beryl, Betelgeuse. “C, Carnelian, Capella..."

Citrine gives a chime of outrage! Art looks sheepish, but he doesn't stop, to interrupt the flow.

"OH."

“E, Emerald, Enif. F, Feldspar, Fomalhaut.”

A pause, and he grins over to Gwen, "G! Garnet,...Gamma Cephei." Even as his eyes scan the ceiling of the chamber.

Gwen smirks as she looks about

Thistle is picking up things, turning them over, and in general being a Nebby Nellie

GWEN notices section of the wall near the far corner of the room, where the glyphs look slightly different—less worn than the others, as if they had been etched more recently or preserved deliberately. They're higher up on the wall, above Thistle's puny line of sight.

There is a faint line she can see from her higher angle, on what otherwise looks like solid stone, and a line of text, almost obscured by dust.

"Hey, those runes over there look newer or something?" She points "Dusty though, can't make it all out"

She cranes her neck, squinting.