We still need to talk to Walter—the total jerk who abuses his employees—but we don’t really think he’s involved.  We also have reason to suspect Walden, another complete jerk, who has openly pursued women with a horrible success rate.

We decide to check out the house that has been rented but empty.  When we open the front door, I get dusty, but there’s no visible dust in the house.  I also notice that the furnishings are exceptionally lavish—they’re upholstered—but there are no tables anywhere.  We go down a hallway into a bedroom at the end.  It contains a bed, a dresser, a wardrobe, and a full-length mirror.  Something’s off about the mirror.  I open it to find a ladder going straight down in the wall.  We block the opening and investigate the rest of the main house.

The next room has a brazier and a sort of front.  The west wall has a bar that is identical to the one in the main room.  In fact, it butts up to the same spot in the wall as the one in the front room.  On inspection, there doesn’t appear to be a seam between it and the wall; it may go through the wall.  I open it and look in to see some boxes and earthen jars.  We continue to the next room which appears to be a dining room with a table, chairs, and a wall of cabinets.  The next room is a kitchen with stairs at the back.  There is a locked door at the bottom of the stairs, and a curtain with a bell at the top.  I disable the bell and Ulric opens the curtain.

This area is as large as the entire downstairs, but is one large room.  Along the south wall, there is a large mural covered in soot.  There is a fine powder all over the room.  The mural appears to be a painting of a battlefield, but is actually a frescoe.  It is older than the building.  It depicts humans and elves fighting demonic creatures.  The wall with the frescoe is made of different material.  I search the wall and find a place where there is a large iron ring in the wall.  We get Korvinean to cover our tracks in the dust and head back down to the room with the hidden door.

There is a lever just below the second rung.  I disable that, and Ulric climbs in.  He makes it down to the bottom safely, and I drop his shield down to him before following.  The room is 20’ x 20’ with one door.  It smells dank and damp and has a bare earth floor.  As I open the door, dirt falls on my head and knocks me to the ground.  Ulric helps me up.  We are in a long hallway leading off to the south.  After about 200 feet, there is a gradual turn to the right.  Thirty-five feet beyond that is another door, which is not trapped or locked.  This door opens to another 20’ x 20’ room.  There are doors in the south and east walls, as well as a metal trap door in the floor right in the center of the room.

We decide to go to the door straight across from us in the south wall.  It opens to another hallway like the one we came through, which disappears into the distance.  We check the other door to find the same result, and come to the conclusion that this is some sort of nexus.    We pin all of these doors closed and attempt to open the trap door.  We have to use a rope to lift the door, then find a ladder, leading down to the middle of another 20’ x 20’ room. 

This room contains one door leading to the south.  As we realize that we are now about forty feet underground, we open the door to reveal a 25 foot long hallway which ends in another door.  Unlike all the previous doors, this one is made of solid oak.  I open the door and get hit with three darts.