The Sixth Floor of Avernus
Hook
Irik Zal’honan suggested that something valuable waits on the sixth floor of Castle Avernus’s main tower.
Evidence
- An invisible barrier blocks the direct ascent above the third-floor Conjuration Room.
- Carver’s attempt to mend broken runes drew transmutation energy from another room but did not open the way.
- An alternate staircase reached a fifth-floor bedchamber whose trapdoor locked the party inside.
- Ooru reopened the trapdoor before a Boom Stick was used.
- The alternate search led into the slaughterhouse rather than to the sixth floor.
- A route across the guarded inner bailey wall allowed the party to reenter the central tower above the blocked passage.
- The party reached a gilded upper treasury containing gold, gems, rare paintings, and spell scrolls.
- An elemental laboratory below the treasury produced a crystal capable of summoning a grave elemental.
- Irik appeared during the party’s long rest and endorsed using the recovered gold for the greater good.
Open questions
- Was Irik’s promised treasure the gold, the restorative scrolls, the elemental crystal, or all of them together?
- Who or what erected the invisible barrier?
- Can the damaged runes be restored safely?
Next steps
The party found and used an alternate route to the upper treasury. Further investigation of the barrier may still reveal how the castle’s damaged magic works, but it no longer blocks the treasure Irik promised.