Page 149 - Tomb of Annihilation

32. ROTATING CRAWLWAYS TREASURE
Sephirius wore no armor but carried a +J yklwa (see
Any character searching for traps or secret doors in this
"Buying a Special Item" in chapter 1 for more infor-
tunnel notices a narrow seam in the stonework with
mation on this weapon), a dungeoneer's pack, a pouch
a successful DC 15 Wisdom (Perception) check. This
containing 8 gp, an ivory back scratcher shaped like a
seam marks one end of a 25-foot-long section of crawl-
dinosaur claw (25 gp), a holy symbol of Bahamut (25 gp),
way (marked uTunnel A" on map 5.3) that rotates. If the
and a red crystal eyeball measuring 1 inch in diameter.
check succeeds by 5 or more, the character can deduce
Crystal Eye. The nonmagical crystal eye is one of
that the seam represents a point where two sections of
the ten keys needed to open the vault of the beholder
tunnel can detach from one another.
(area 44).
When 50 pounds or more of weight is applied to the
floor at the midpoint of tunnel A, a mechanism causes
33. CHAMBER OF OPPOSITION
the tunnel to quickly rotate 90 degrees clockwise and
sink 5 feet as it turns. Both ends of the tunnel are
immediately cut off, trapping creatures inside. At the
This chamber contains a stone font filled with a steaming
same time, a second crawlway perpendicular to the first
(marked "Tunnel B" on map 5.3) rotates 90 degrees green liquid. Beyond it, a shadowy figure stands at an
clockwise and sinks into place, positioned where tun- open door on the far side of the room. The figure's back
nel A used to be. Characters who are flying, in gaseous is toward you.
form, or otherwise effectively weightless do not trigger
the trap and can move through the tunnel safely.
The stone font ls attached to the floor and can't be
ROTATING TuNNEL tipped over. It is also impervious to damage and spells.
Read the following text to players the first time their It appears to hold 40 pints (5 gallons) of hot soup, but
characters are caught in a rotating tunnel: the liquid is illusory. Tactile exploration reveals that the
liquid has no substance and the font is dry.
The dark figure is a magical, illusory duplicate of
With a loud grinding noise, this section of crawlway be-
whichever character opened the door to the room. It
gins to rotate, instantly cutting off the exits ahead and copies the character's movements, allowing a shrewd
behind. You can feel the passage sink about five feet as player to use the duplicate to dispense with the liquid
it turns. After a few seconds, it comes to a stop and the in the font. The shadow duplicate has the statistics of
a commoner and is immune to poison damage. It per-
grinding abates.
fectly matches the motions of the character who created
it, always keeping its back to its creator as though it was
When tunnel B connects to the rest of the crawlway, a a projected image 15 feet ahead.
new passage running north to south is formed. Tunnel B If the character who created the shadow duplicate
is trapped similarly to tunnel A, except that both tunnels moves backward, the duplicate moves toward the font
ascend 5 feet as they rotate 90 degrees counterclock- lf the character then mimes drinking from the font, the
wise when the trap triggers. The only way to return tun- duplicate slurps up the "soup" at a rate of 5 pints per
nel A to its original position is to trigger the trap from round, draining the font in 8 rounds. Once the font is
tunnel B, and vice versa. drained of illusory soup, a treasure appears in the font
Characters trapped in a section of tunnel not con- that wasn't there before (see "Treasure" below). Casting
nected to the rest of the crawlway have no clear means dispel magic on the font causes the illusory soup to van-
of escape. The tunnel is airtight. A single creature ish, but the treasure does not appear. The illusory soup
consumes the available air supply in 24 hours, with reappears 1 minute later.
multiple creatures dividing that time up between them. The shadow duplicate can't exert pressure on objects
For example, four creatures trapped in the tunnel could and glides through any obstacles it encounters. Casting
survive 6 hours before they begin to suffocate. dispel magic on the figure causes it to vanish. It doesn't
react to taking damage but disappears if it drops to 0
SKELETAL REMAINS hit points or is made to leave the chamber. Closing the
Any character who can see into tunnel B notices the door to the room and reopening it creates a new dupli-
body of an unlucky adventurer. cate of whoever opened the door. There can be only one
shadow duplicate at a time.
The shadow duplicate has a terrible and deadly as-
I pect. Any creature that looks upon its face sees a hor-
As a new tunnel rotates into place, you see a skele-
tal corpse lying on the floor of that tunnel, about ten
rific visage locked in a silent scream and must succeed
feet away.
on a DC 15 Wisdom saving throw or drop to 0 hit points.
A creature that cannot be frightened automatically suc-
ceeds on the saving throw.
The corpse belongs to Sephirius, dragonborn paladin
of the Company of the Yellow Banner. Looting the body TREASURE
reveals several items of interest (see "Treasure" below). If a shadow duplicate drinks all the illusory soup in the
font, a 1-inch-diameter eyebalJ made of incandescent

Cl! \YTHM II fOMB OF 111£ NINll GOUS
q.8