Dragon Peak: Entry Level

Entry Level Map

Under the glacier next to Dragon Peak, a twelve foot tall stone double door provides entry into the mountain. The door has images of tree trunks carved into it, realistically mimicking a dense forest with textured bark and the occasional knot. One of the knots goes a little deeper than the rest, and if a dragonborn inserts a hand into the hole, the door will quietly swing open.

A round room fifty feet in diameter lies beyond the door, its walls carved to look like an old elven forest. The ceiling twenty feet above looks like a canopy of leaves blocking out the sky above. The rotted remains of a long wooden table pile up near the similarly-sized door opposite the entry. Two smaller doors provide egress through the side walls.

Examining the carved walls reveals deep knots carved into the walls for the smaller doors, but the larger door has none. The carving itself seems like an elven design with its eye for realistic detail, but the elegant workmanship feels very dwarven. The remains of the table show evidence of a braided ivy border detail and carved writing in three languages: Draconic, Gladlam (Elven), and Steinrede (Dwarven). Sharp-eyed and lucky investigators may piece together the words five, trials, prophecy, and scale, but the wood has rotted over the past 500 years and utterly obliterated any further words.

The left door will open for a dwarf inserting a hand into the knothole, and the right door will similarly open for an elf. The left room's walls were carved in the traditional dwarven style with straight lines and geometric regularity, mostly involving equilateral triangles and diamond shapes. The right room continues the forest motif from the circular room. Both rooms contain a plain stone couch that once held cushions, a long line of stone pegs on the wall opposite the circular room for hanging cloaks, and a door with no visible means of opening.

Investigation reveals one of the pegs in each room hides a trigger mechanism which will open the door to reveal the corridor beyond. Further investigation reveals a knothole on the wall to the circular room side (a diamond shape in the dwarven room) which will trigger when a dwarven (on the left) or elven (on the right) hand is inserted into the hole. These open the doors to the final room on this level, but on the opposite sides (the dwarven trigger opens the door on the elven side, and vice versa). If both sides are triggered simultaneously (or within 1-5 minutes depending on how lenient you want to be), the large door in the circular chamber will swing open between the circular room and the final room.

The magic circles in the corridors contain words in Gladlam or Steinrede like safety, feathers, lifting, and flight. They will safely lift or lower an object or person as a permanent levitation or feather fall effect between the lower level and a mezzanine room above containing several arrow slits allowing missile fire into the circular room through carved knotholes at least 12 feet off the ground.

The final room contains two permanent torches which light a sparse room. An inlay in white onyx spells out "The Five Trials Await" in Draconic. A wide staircase leads upward, circling to the left as it climbs.

Note: There's not much here, just a puzzle that speaks of dwarves and elves working together to open the way for those with dragon blood, and a possible hint about paying attention to the prophecy. This might not jibe with what the characters know about dragon relations with elves and dwarves, but then again, this complex was built by a silver dragon patron of the arts. In my game, I started a 5-minute timer when the party triggered the elven side, and by the time they got to the dwarven side, the timer went off, so they barely saw the door to the final room close, which confused them for a while. Classic.

Part of T.W.Wombat's Lore 24 project, detailing the world around Fellport.
For all city posts, see the Fellport Index. For posts about the wider world, see the Beneterra Index.