Might and Magic (Ch. 10)

Ongoing blog of Might and Magic: Secret of the Inner Sanctum

Chapter 10: Caves and Strongholds

-
-

With our recent acquisition of a King's Pass, we decided to put it to use and pay a visit to Castle Alamar itself. The guards at the gate would not let us pass, with our card or no, without a password. Fortunately for us, a nearby bard was singing it in song. It hardly seemed like the most secure kind of password to me. But who were we to complain?

Alamar...what has happened to you? What did you see in the Inner Sanctum that causes you to shut yourself away so while the land of Varn itself tears itself to anarchistic shreds?

This seemed to be our best hope to find anything solid on the Inner Sanctum. What better person to ask than the one who was fabled to have already been there?

 Even with our King's Pass, we were made to wait for hours before the guard informed us that the king would deign to see us. And only then, it seemed to be moreso because our reputation as skilled adventurers preceded us. Alamar seemed to recognize that we would not be turned away so easily without our audience.

The person on the throne was undoubtedly King Alamar. Exactly as song, legend, and artistry had depicted him. And yet, we couldn't help but feel ill at ease. He addressed us with the strange appellation 'Varnlings'. As though elevating himself to a level wholly above us. Rather than hear our questions or engage us in a dialogue, he tasked with us an immediate quest that he urged was of utmost importance. He would talk to us only after we had found the Crypt of Carmenca and returned to report. And then, we were muscled away.

There was something terribly wrong with this quest, and we all knew it. Carmenca was a children's story. A marionette who turns into a girl when she wishes upon a falling star. And although many old myths and legends have some root in reality, we were in consensus that the request was a fool's errand. Even Faulkner, who is most learned on old lore and stories--informed us that he recalled not even the slightest shred of evidence that a true Carmenca ever existed.

With the mark of Alamar's command upon us, no other lord would give us a quest so long as our fool's errand was incomplete. However, Faulkner had a spell in his clerical repertoire to remove the burden of Alamar's request from us. Thus, in the end, no lasting damage was done. And yet the message Alamar had given us was clear: He had nothing to say to us, and did not wish to see us return. So we took our leave in all haste.

We travelled next to the town of Portsmith, to begin our search for the 'Astral Brothers' that Telgoran mentioned. The town itself seemed unassuming on first glance---except it became apparently in short order that there were no menfolk about. The town seemed populated entirely by .... voluptuous young ladies. And although this was not an unwelcome sight for weary eyes, we quickly had a nasty surprise in store for us.



Sam, Finn, Faulkner, and myself were accosted by unseen forces as we made our way through the winding  corridors. Some vampiric force was at work here that took a tremendous toll on us but left Alicia and Betty June unscathed. We had to rest often as we made our way about.

Eventually, we found the elf we were seeking, who boasted proudly that he was the only male left living in the city. He did not care to expound on the condition befalling the city itself but simply left us with his half of the clue: C-15.

We resolved to get to the root of the city's affliction and explored the undercrofts. It did not take long in our exploration underneath Portsmith to stumble upon a demon's convention hall. From the other side of the door we could hear the murmuring and snickering of the evil beasts plotting new schemes to bring trouble upon Varn.

 We burst in with our weapons ready, never doubting our skill and strength. A great demon lord was in attendance, overseeing the conference. Such a beast was capable of casting a spell of Eradication, so we focused our efforts on it right away to take him out first. With the Lord out of the way, the rest could be attacked or chased away with ease.

We had won the day, but something was still amiss. The strange force that assaulted the men was still at work in the city, so we explored further.

We found a passage leading back up to the city proper, to a disused building that, from the outside looked abandoned. Inside, we found that the place was anything but. From within this office, a candied voice sang out to us for discovering her.

The city ruled by a queen Succubus. All the womenfolk in town were but her loyal subjects. Her voice was too powerful for us to resist and the four of us men in the group were paralyzed helplessly. With us unable to help, we were outmatched in this battle and Alicia used a Time Distortion spell to whisk us away to safety. Portsmith, we decided, was unsafe to linger in any longer.

There is a pool in the dungeon  under Portsmith that reverses the sex of party members. But the succubus queen is a -really- tough enemy to defeat and it isn't really necessary to beat her.

 The town of Algary was much less remarkable and had little of note. It took some time to find Zom, but we eventually tracked him down in the former dockside warehouse. Not in use anymore since the cities moved underground, obviously. His half of the clue was "1-15". Taking the clue we had received from Telgoran to heart, we combined Portsmith and Algary to determine that the astral brothers' clues were coordinates. C1-15,15. It seemed a visit to the C1 sector was in order...

In this far corner of C1, we discovered a treasure chest marked as the property of "XX!XX!". We weren't sure precisely what that meant. Was it a name? If so, how on Varn would it be pronounced? We opened the chest anyway and relieved it of it's gold and a curious ruby whistle. A note pointed to another location, at B3, 14-2. "Blow Twice to Enter".

The dense trees blocked entrance to the stronghold we found there. But, taking the note to heart, blowing the whistle twice caused another entrance to open! We readied ourselves and trudged into the stronghold in this enchanted forest, looking for all the treasure and clues we could find.

A riddle challenged us in one of the rooms here. The properties it described in its description made Alicia suggest 'Prism', but this was apparently unsatisfactory. Looking for obvious synonyms, Faulkner tried 'Crystal', and we were rewarded with treasure and a crystal key to add to our keyring.

Among the disused halls we found a tapestry depicting a ferocious gray beast with the body of a man but the features of a raging bull. A threat of what lied deeper within?

As we mapped our way upstairs to the top, our suspicions were confirmed. At the far end of this floor we were beset on all sides by the enormous gray minotaur and its lesser bretheren. The weaker minotaurae were not a deadly threat for us to cope with except for their numbers. The gray minotaur on the other hand was much stronger, capable of delivering a blow that could drive any of us unconscious instantly. Alicia focused her fireballs and thunder bolts on the larger groups of minotaur while Faulkner used his superheroism spells on us as we tackled the gray one in melee.

After a bloody battle, we were victorious! We found much gold hidden in chests through the alcoves of this room, but little in the way of tangible clues for the Sanctum. Occasionally, we would find more cryptic messages in gold and silver leaf, but without some kind of codex the messages were useless to us.

Much earlier in our journey to the Medusa's cave, we had seen a clue pointing to another stronghold not far from here in the Raven's Wood. The so called "Raven's Lair". As long as we were assaulting Strongholds, we decided to track it down and tackle this one next. Other than it's remote location, its entrance was unguarded.

In this stronghold many strong humans and demihumans assaulted us at every opportunity. Skilled swordsmen, thieves, assasssins, and ogres and giants tested our endurance with every battle. In this long hallway, giants from afar pelted us with heavy boulders and retreated further away whenever we got close. Our reward was finding more cryptic silver and gold messages.

A mighty Storm Giant blocked our progress here, directing it's lesser bretheren. But we triumphed through and pushed onward to the deepest chambers.

We pressed onward too quickly and stumbled right into a pincer attack. In this room, archers stepped forth on all sides of us with their bows ready. Directly ahead of us, an archer dressed in rich finery introduced himself as Lord Archer 'The Raven', who stole from the rich to give to the poor, and demanded all our valuables. We were not afraid and attacked.

It was a bad idea. The archer's bows and enchanted arrows were much stronger than they looked. Even with our Shield spell, they struck with such strength that I was staggered with a single arrow. We were too overtaxed from our journey here to prevail and used another Time Distortion to flee safely away...at least we had all of our gold and valuables intact.


This battle, like the succubus queen one, is -really- hard, even with a max level party. Technically though, encountering and combating this group counts as 'defeating' the stronghold though, even if you end up fleeing.

Having escaped with at least our miserable lives, we continued our journeys elsewhere in Varn, looking for more lairs and strongholds to invade. Near Portsmith in the Korin Bluffs we found a cave where the wizard Ranalou made his home. He invited us to use his portals to journey to any of the local castles, but with our own magic users' spells of flight and teleportation we had no problems journeying on our own.

In many of the dungeons we had scoured, we found curious rooms painted in black and white checkerboard patterns. Most of them held no clues, but in one particular one we discovered a black chess piece. Inscribed on it was the clue: 'The first is Female'.

In the far south of E4, near the edge of Varn, we nearly stumbled upon a city of dragons having a town meeting. We briefly considered crashing the place to see what treasures we might make off with, but decided the risk was far too great. Taking on even one or two dragons at a time was the limit of our abilities...to take on a whole town square of them would be suicide.

This spot triggers what is generally considered the most difficult encounter in the game. It -can- be beaten. But it requires so much level grinding and sheer luck that I didn't want to bother. There's no reward other than 1980s bragging rights.

 Near the city, on the other hand, we discovered none other than the Fabled Building of Gold, whispered down in legends as the lost El Dorado. How could we resist going in and plundering what we may?

There were many powerful undead and trolls wandering the halls. The building was immense, but most of the rooms were already pillaged. Climbing a large winding stair, we went all the way up to the fourth floor, which was in shambles. A construction sign warned us that the long-forgotten floor was not yet finished.

Indeed, many walls were missing entirely. Doors hung in empty frames. At first it seemed there was little of value here.

Dragons! No doubt citizens of the nearby Dragon town. A large cluster of them were gathered in this cramped hallway in the corner of the unfinished dungeon. Although extremely dangerous adversaries, we persevered and took them on in small groups, using the cramped corridor to our advantage.

The corner the dragon were huddled around? Another odd checkerboard room, this time with another prize--a white idol to go with our black one. Inscribed on it was another clue:  "The second is the most valuable". There was a third part to this puzzle. There was no associated idol to go with it, but we had seen it inscribed in another checkerboard room. "The last is the first".




There were few places on Varn we had not yet explored. A large island remained unexplored in the sea of D4, and we headed there next.

On this volcanic isle, we were beset immediately on all sides by crazed natives wielding spears. I recalled the statue in Sorpigal that described the hero Gala, who tried and failed to civilize them. They were not devastatingly powerful, but the power of the volcano was interfering with our magic. And they vastly outnumbered us and would swarm us with repeated blows. Still, we were able to drive them back and plunge further inland.

At the foot of the volcano a passageway was built into the mountain, blocked by a large slab of coral. The key we had retrieved from the hooded bridgekeeper opened it for us, and headed inside to see what secrets lie within.

The passages under the volcano were almost unbearably hot! Along the passages where the magma ran close, we could even see a faint glow from the rocks. Strange mechanisms which we did not recognize were set into some of the alcoves here. What sort of strange purpose did this place deep under Varn serve?

A young virgin, cast into the volcano by the natives above, had survived her plunge into the caldera and was held captive here. When Sam released her bounds she jumped into my arms with eager thankfulness and I gave her a sweaty kiss.

Yes, you have to kiss the virgin to get the vital clue here.

Before she left, she urged us to use the settings 1-B, 2-J. Going back to the strange machines and setting the dials in this way caused the energy pervading the underground halls to change somewhat. A new passage had opened somewhere.

A tremendous elemental bathed in a pool of magma bellowed out to us from this unlocked passage, demanding our intentions.

Requesting a clue teleports you to a checkerboard room with one of the chess clues. Requesting a challenge initiates a very difficult battle.

We announced ourselves at not hostile--that we were adventurers seeking the Inner Sanctum. The pool of magma bubbled--and the volcanic god seemed to recognize the name of the Inner Sanctum as we mentioned it. As though judging us for worthiness, he presented us with a riddle.

"Who was brave, but failed?"

The answer, as I remembered from her statue in Sorpigal, could only be Gala. The one who came to this island to civilize the natives but failed and was torn to pieces.

With a hiss, a cloth sack emerged from the pool as the volcano god seemed pleased with this answer. Protected by a silvery bubble that popped as soon as it was at our feet. Within was a simple gray card, made of a slightly malleable material that none of us recognized. Inscribed on it was a series of intricate designs--and along it a black stripe that seemed to serve some purpose, but what--we did not know. It did not look like any sort of key or tool that was made on Varn.


But before we could inquire further, the Volcano god teleported us away with a spell. From deep within the volcano, we found ourselves cast into the city of Algary, far away. We made our way back to Sorpigal to regroup.

We had scoured much of Varn and still had little information on the nature of the Inner Sanctum. Still--we had gathered many strange clues like the idols and the gray card. It felt like we were slowly but steadily gathering many small pieces that just hadn't yet fallen into place. We had little avenues of exploration still open to us. We had not yet taken Lord Kilburn's map to explore Dragadune and follow Corak's footsteps into the desert. We also had not yet finished calling upon the other local lords. Since we had passed by their castles time and time again in our journeys, we resolved to meet with the other lords first.

Soon, that is. We were exhausted from our long marches around Varn. It was time to rest. And return to the Guildmaster yet again for another year of training.