[03] The Ziggurat

| I vote for going left |

| I agree, the torchlight is worth investigating right away. |

| I will hold off on lighting a torch now. I second that we should check out the left chamber first. |

OOC: I too wish to investigate the torchlight! I can try sneak up and spy first if people like.

Sullivus says, "Yes, let's go left, but remember that they can see our lantern light as easily as we can see their torches."

Vergas agrees, quietly: "Yes, we should go left first. Potts, if you're up for it, please scout ahead and see what you can make out. But don't go too far and hurry back with news! The rest of you, spread out a few steps and keep on the lookout. I don't like that dim passage across the hall, could be trouble. Sullivus, stay in the center for cover, and don't shine your lantern down the left passage."

| The idea is to form a rough circle around Sullivus while we wait for news from Potts. I don't want to get surprised from any side if we can help it. |

| Acceptable plan. |

| Dungeon exploration turn 3.6 |

It is agree that Master Potts should investigate the flickering light that beckons beyond the left arch while the others--still more or less at the foot of the entry way--for a defensible semi-circle around Sullivus.

| At the dungeon exploration scale Potts can carefully cover 180ft (or 60 yards) per turn, which is far enough to traverse the whole of the plaza and reach the arch in a single turn... assuming nothing goes wrong! |

Potts scampers off enthusiastically, soon leaving the pool of mixed daylight and lantern light behind him, and picking his way through an age of wet dredge scattered across the uneven floor. As he draws cautiously nearer (some 20 yards in now) to the central columns and presumed boulevard, he spies an occasional dapple of reflected light from the otherwise glassy, black surface. He soon realises it is not a paved road at all, but a sprawling arm of water that bisects, and partially floods, the plaza. The waterway looks to be haphazardly 5 to 10 yards wide. The surface is still and ominous, breached here and there by a few slimy blocks that protrude a few inches; its banks comprise only heaped swamp-muck.

Potts has an uneasy feeling about the water so, staying as clear of it as he can, our bold Halfling reaches the dimly illuminated arch (now 40 yards from his fellows and operating in near darkness) and peers silently around the corner...

Passage is too small a name for the 30ft broad avenue Potts espies, though the far two-thirds of its width are filled by the slug of dark water that reaches in from the plaza to tapper off half way in.

| Potts is a sneak thief in his element, in near darkness, so the referee assume he peers around the corner unnoticed... |

Potts immediately spots two hooded figures at the far end of the passage; bare-chested men whose muscled arms and chests seem to burn with inscrutable, luminescent symbols. The whole of the avenue is almost as long as the grand entry chamber is wide (perhaps 80-90ft), with the steady but flickering orange light coming ever more brightly from a pair of narrow stone doors that the men seem to be guarding.

It seems the run of parallel columns continue their run from the piazza and into the avenue, though here these are half sunk into the graven stone walls they scale rather than standing free. The ceiling seems dramatically lower (perhaps 10ft), and the intermittent flicker of the orange light, and movements of the two figures, casts a pantomime of long, dark shadows down the avenue.

What now?

| Since Vergas is mighty unaware of all that Potts is seeing, he just stands his ground, peering around the large plaza carefully. Here's to hoping Potts will make it back soon... |

| Sullivus is also waiting patiently for Potts to return. He'll try to shield the lantern's light with his body so it doesn't project down the way that Potts went. |