29 KiB
The Deep Cellar — The Old Work
Everyone thinks the cellar is the bottom. It isn't. Orenn and Mags never fully retired — they just moved the work downstairs, past a door that isn't on any map, and told the world they poured drinks for a living.
Purpose (For the DM)
This level is the exploration spine of the module — the track for players who came to do things, not talk. It rewards sneaking, searching, lockpicking, and picking fights carefully. Everything here is optional. A party can solve the murder without ever finding the concealed door. But a party that goes down here finds:
- Useful things — a fiend-hunter's arsenal, alchemy, coin, and one or two items that make the Reckoning easier.
- Backstory, told by the room — the truth about who Orenn and Mags really were, discovered through what they kept, caged, and buried, without a single NPC having to explain it.
- A fight, on the party's terms — a guardian, an infestation, a haunting, and a caged thing that might not stay caged.
This does NOT relocate the endgame. The Reckoning still happens in the Upper Cellar — the thin point, Orenn's binding circle, and the ward-sigils are all up there and unchanged. The Deep Cellar is a second, lower level reached through a concealed door. Its own rift (the Old Work, below) is the same planar fault seen deeper and worse; it is a source of dread, backstory, and monsters — not the dual-plane-kill site. If in doubt, keep binding and killing Xarrul upstairs where the circle is.
Getting In
The only entrance is the concealed iron door in the Upper Cellar (see cellar.md — The Concealed Door). Finding it is the first exploration beat:
- DC 15 Investigation on the north wall behind the barrel racks — the "living rock" there is a cleverly fitted iron door faced with a shell of real stone. A cold draft and a faint drag-scuff on the earth floor give it away.
- DC 15 Perception — the same cold draft, plus the smell (copper, tallow, something animal underneath).
- Orenn's keys (on his body) include a heavy, plain black iron key that fits nothing upstairs. It fits here.
- Mags will only reveal it under the most extreme trust (see mags.md) — and even then reluctantly. Players who find it themselves rob her of the choice, which is very much the point of this track.
The door itself is locked (Arcane Lock, DC 20 to force, DC 25 Thieves' Tools; Orenn's black key or Knock bypasses it). Behind it: rough steps cut into bedrock, descending.
Read-Aloud: The Descent
Za falešnou stěnou nejsou sudy. Jsou schody. Vytesané přímo do skály, úzké, nerovné, kluzké vlhkem, které stoupá zdola jako dech. Vzduch je tu ještě chladnější než ve sklepě — a hustší, jako by měl vlastní váhu. Kovová pachuť sílí. A pod ní něco jiného: pižmo, zvířecí, a hluboko vzadu sladká hniloba.
Deset schodů. Patnáct. Ztratíte počet. Světlo shora se scvrkne na bledou skvrnu a pak zmizí úplně. Ať chcete vidět cokoliv, musíte si posvítit — a to světlo tu vypadá menší, než by mělo, jako by ho tma kolem hltala.
A pak, na hranici slyšitelnosti, něco zaškrábe. Daleko. Nebo blízko. Tady dole se to nepozná.
Layout
The Deep Cellar is a warren carved over years, not a planned dungeon. Roughly 25m across at its widest, on a single sloping level that descends toward the Old Work.
┌───────────────────────┐
│ THE OLD WORK │
│ (the rift, deepest) │
│ ▓▓ contained tear ▓▓ │
└───────────┬───────────┘
│ (warded arch)
┌──────────────┐ ┌───────┴────────┐ ┌──────────────┐
│ THE VAULT │ │ │ │ DEEP STORAGE │
│ (arcane- ├──────┤ THE JUNCTION ├──────┤ (trophy hold,│
│ locked) │ │ (hub cave) │ │ haunted) │
└──────────────┘ └──┬──────────┬──┘ └──────────────┘
│ │
┌───────────┴──┐ ┌───┴───────────┐
│ THE CELLS │ │ THE WORKROOM │
│ [1] Guest │ │ (laboratory) │
│ [2] Long Dead│ └───────────────┘
└──────────────┘
▲
steps up to
UPPER CELLAR
Light: None. Utterly dark. Bring your own — and note that the darkness here feels thick (flavor; no mechanical penalty beyond normal). Some rooms have sconces the players can light.
Sound: Carries strangely (the fault line). A footstep three rooms away can sound close; a scream close by can sound far. Use this — Perception checks to locate a sound are at disadvantage down here.
The Junction (Hub Cave)
An irregular chamber where the passages meet. This was Orenn and Mags's working floor — a scarred wooden table, two chairs, a rack of tools (mundane: shovels, a mallet, coils of rope, iron stakes), and a whitewashed wall covered in chalk.
The Chalk Wall (DC 12 Investigation to read it properly): Years of case-notes in Orenn's shorthand and Mags's blunt block letters. Most is smudged over. What survives, read together, is the backstory of the whole level, delivered by the room:
- Columns of dates and single words: "bound," "burned," "sold," "returned," "kept."
- A crude regional map with a dozen X's — jobs. Three are circled and struck through hard enough to tear the whitewash.
- A newer hand (last few weeks), hurried: "wards thinning again. Faster than '09. G. felt it too — won't say what it saw. Watch the Order. If it comes through, seal below and burn." — This is Orenn's, and it matches the letter Mags carries and the hidden fifth rule upstairs. It confirms Orenn knew something was coming.
- DC 15 Investigation: One struck-through X on the map is annotated "Lambent — Vyre?" — Orenn had been circling the cult for months. (Threads the exploration back into the murder mystery. See Lambent Order.)
Encounter — The Infestation (rats): The Junction and passages are infested. This is the low-stakes "you are not alone down here" beat.
- 1 Swarm of Rats (CR 1/4) per passage the party lingers in noisily; up to 3 total. They boil out of cracks, drawn by warmth. They're a nuisance, not a threat — but they can force a retreat from a room, knock over a lantern (darkness!), or gnaw a dropped item.
- Flavor near the Old Work: rats down there are wrong — some flicker, half-there, ethereal-touched. They pass through a closed door once and vanish. (Pure atmosphere; treat as normal rats mechanically, or reskin one swarm as taking only force/radiant/magical damage if you want the rift's influence to bite.)
- Stealth option: A party moving quietly (group DC 12 Stealth) crosses the Junction without waking the swarms. Rewarding caution is the point.
The barred inner door (to the Old Work): A heavy door reinforced with the same runed iron nails from upstairs, barred from this side. Cold radiates from it. See The Old Work.
The Vault (Treasure Room)
"You told me we were poor," Mags said once, "so I'd stop worrying." Orenn just smiled. They were never poor. They were careful.
A low chamber sealed by a banded door under a permanent Arcane Lock (Orenn's black key, Knock, or Dispel Magic vs. DC 17; brute force is DC 25 Strength, and the door is designed to scream — a shriek-ward alerts the phase spider and anyone in the Junction). This is where twenty years of "expensive, reliable, discreet" went.
Read-Aloud: The Vault
Dveře se otevřou s dechem suchého, starého vzduchu. Uvnitř se vaše světlo odrazí od zlata. Ne hromady jako v dračích pohádkách — spíš pořádek. Truhly srovnané u zdi. Police. Zbraně na hácích, naolejované a čekající. A všechno pokryté tenkou vrstvou prachu, kterou léta nikdo nezvedl.
Je to poklad člověka, který nikdy neutrácel — protože nikdy nevěřil, že válka opravdu skončila.
Wealth
- 1,400 gp in mixed coin across three locked chests (DC 13 Thieves' Tools each, or the black key).
- A velvet roll of cut gemstones worth 900 gp total (six stones, 150 gp each — easy to split, easy to steal a couple unnoticed: a Personal-Goal hook, see character-secrets).
- A deed-box: two more deeds (a warehouse on Popelová Alley, a shuttered chandlery) and letters of credit with a moneylender — proof the "just a barkeep" story was always a story.
DM note — preserve the upstairs beat. The modest lockbox in Orenn & Mags's bedroom (150 gp, the deed, the two silver rings, "It's just a life") still stands. The contrast is the character work: the sentimental front upstairs, the buried fortune down here. Don't collapse one into the other. Mags never spent the vault. It was for a war she never stopped expecting.
The Cleaner's Arsenal (the useful stuff)
Rewards for going deep — none of it breaks the Reckoning, most of it helps it:
- Fiendbane Salt (4 doses). A pinch thrown at a fiend within 10 ft. forces a DC 14 Charisma save; on a failure the fiend is anchored to its current plane (can't use Ethereal Jaunt / Slip Between) until the end of its next turn. This is the exploration reward that makes pinning Xarrul possible without buying Tallow's manacles — cheaper in gold, dearer in danger.
- A quiver of 10 silvered crossbow bolts and a matched silvered hand crossbow (well-kept, +0 but silvered).
- 2 vials of Holy Water, 1 more vial of Silversheen, and a jar of warding chalk (2 uses) — stacks with the storage-room supplies for a party that hunts both caches.
- A Potion of Heroism and a Potion of Greater Healing (×2) — the couple's "before the bad jobs" stash.
- A Ring of the Ram (3 charges) OR a +1 dagger etched with a fiend-binding sigil (DM's choice, tuned to the party's gaps) — one modest permanent item as the deep-exploration prize.
The Trophies (backstory)
On a shelf, labeled in Mags's block letters — souvenirs kept the way soldiers keep them:
- A shattered summoning horn, scorched. Label: "the sewer thing, '01. never again."
- A child's shoe, clean, kept apart from everything else. No label. (Say nothing. Let it sit. Insight tells a player this is the one thing in the room that hurt them.)
- A row of small glass jars, each holding a pinch of grey ash and a slip of paper with a name and a date. Fiends they burned. The most recent jar is empty, waiting, labeled only with a question mark — Orenn expected one more.
- DC 14 Investigation: one trophy — a guild-style garrote with a jade bead — matches the House of Scales; another, a bronze pin, is a Lambent Order eye-in-flame (like the one in the private room). The couple's "problems we solved" included people from both factions currently sitting upstairs. If that ever comes out, the lockdown gets much more dangerous.
The Cells
Two cells cut side by side, iron-barred, fitted with the runed nails and a warded lock (DC 15 Thieves' Tools; the warding adds a jolt — 1d4 force to a failed pick). This is the ugliest truth of the level: Orenn and Mags didn't just kill things. Sometimes they kept them.
Cell One — The Guest
Occupied. A changeling the couple has held for years and used as an off-book asset. Full write-up, stat block, leverage, and dialogue in npc/the-guest.md.
Short version for the DM: the Guest is the beating heart of "they still have something going on." It's alive, lucid, a fluent liar, and it knows more about Orenn, Mags, and the Lambent Order than anyone the players have met — because Orenn used it to spy on the cult. Freeing it, using it, or leaving it is a genuine moral choice, and it can end in a fight (doppelganger, CR 3) or a very memorable escape. Read its file before running this room.
Read-Aloud: Cell One
V cele někdo je. Sedí na kavalci, zády ke zdi, ruce položené na kolenou, docela klidně — jako host, který čeká, až ho konečně někdo přijde obsloužit. Když se do cely opře vaše světlo, ten člověk se usměje. Je to příjemný úsměv. Vřelý. A vy si na zlomek vteřiny nejste jistí, jestli jste ten obličej už někde neviděli — jestli to není někdo, koho znáte.
"No konečně," řekne. "Začínal jsem mít strach, že na mě zapomněli."
Cell Two — The Long Dead
Empty of the living. On the floor at the back, a desiccated corpse — humanoid-shaped, but wrong: the bones too long, the jaw unhinged, the skin drawn to grey parchment over a frame that doesn't sit right. It has been dead for years. The manacles are still locked around wrists that shrank out of them.
- DC 12 Medicine/Investigation: it starved, or was left to. No violence killed it. Someone stopped bringing food.
- DC 15 Investigation: the bone structure is a shapeshifter's — a changeling or doppelganger, caught mid-collapse when it died, unable to hold a face. This is the Guest's predecessor. (If players have met the Guest, this lands like a stone. If they see it first, meeting the Guest afterward is dread.)
- Around its neck, a corroded token — a guild bead or a Lambent eye-pin (match to whichever faction subplot your table has leaned into). Whatever this thing once impersonated, it was placed among a faction the players are dealing with tonight. It knew things. Then it stopped being useful.
- The scratch-marks: the inside of the cell door, low down, is covered in tally-scratches — years of them — and one phrase gouged over and over in a dozen borrowed handwritings: "I was real."
This room explains, without a word, exactly what the Guest is afraid of, and exactly what kind of people ran this tavern.
The Workroom (Laboratory)
A long, low chamber that smells of vinegar, sulphur, crushed herbs, and cold ash. A stone bench runs the length of one wall: alembics, a small athanor (cold), racks of labeled vials, a mortar, a ledger, and dried plants hung from the ceiling in careful bundles. Mags's herb rack upstairs is the kitchen branch of this.
Read-Aloud: The Workroom
Dílna. Jinak se to nazvat nedá. Podél zdi kamenný stůl, na něm sklo — baňky, křivule, chladič — všechno pečlivě umyté a srovnané. Ze stropu visí svazky sušených bylin. Ve vzduchu se drží ostrý pach octa a síry a pod ním něco sladkého, co vám z nějakého důvodu naskočí husí kůži. Na stěně visí police plná lahviček, každá popsaná úhledným písmem. A uprostřed toho všeho leží otevřená kniha, do které někdo psal ještě nedávno.
What They Made (and still make)
This is the other half of "still something going on." The couple never stopped brewing:
- Fiend-hunting alchemicals — the source of the holy water, silversheen, alchemist's fire, and warding chalk found throughout the tavern. They supplied themselves.
- Veil Dust research. A locked drawer (DC 14) holds 3 doses of Veil Dust plus a notebook studying it — not as a drug but as a tool for watching the thin point. This connects to the ethereal-trip subplot: Orenn and Mags used Veil Dust to monitor the fault for years. It does not contradict Tallow's supplier being Mother Vyre — the couple brewed their own small batch for work; they were never in the trade. (If a player is hunting the source of Vetch's addiction, this is a red herring that feels hot and cools on inspection — DC 13 Investigation on the ledger shows they never sold a gram.)
- The Ledger (DC 12 to read): entries for materia, ward maintenance, and — chillingly — line items for "the Guest": "fed," "used — Order, 3 nights," "compliant," "trim dose" (a suppressant they keep the Guest on; see the-guest.md). If the players read this before meeting the Guest, they'll know it's been drugged into cooperation for years.
Loot & Craft
- 2 flasks of Alchemist's Fire, 1 vial of Basic Poison (×3 applications), Antitoxin (×2).
- A partially-finished batch of warding chalk (1 use) and enough materia for a proficient character (Herbalism Kit / Alchemist's Supplies / Poisoner's Kit) to brew one more dose of any of the above during the lockdown (1 hour, DC 13 with the right tools). Rewards a crafter PC with something to do.
- Silvervein root (the ward-herb, ×4 sprigs) — matters for weakening Skein and helping Bren. A direct bridge from the exploration track into the possession subplot.
- Trap: the drawer of finished poisons is needle-trapped (DC 13 Investigation to spot, DC 12 Thieves' Tools to disarm; 1d6 poison + DC 12 CON or poisoned 1 hour). Orenn and Mags didn't want their own stock lifted.
Deep Storage (The Trophy Hold)
The largest room down here, and the worst-kept — because things in it don't like being tidied. Shelves and crates of confiscated, dangerous, or simply strange items from twenty years of jobs: things too risky to sell, too valuable to destroy, so they were shelved and warded and left.
Read-Aloud: Deep Storage
Velká místnost, plná regálů, a na regálech… věci. Maska, která sleduje, jak procházíte kolem. Zrcadlo zabalené v plátně, převázané provazem. Klec, ve které není nic — a přesto se hýbe. Loutka bez nití. Zbraně, které by neměly být tak staré a přitom bez jediného škrábance. Nic tu není v pořádku a všechno je pečlivě popsáno a odloženo, jako důkazy ve skladu, na který se má radši zapomenout.
A vzduch je tu studenější. Ne fyzicky. Jinak.
The Haunting — Encounter
The room is haunted by a Poltergeist (specter variant, CR 2) — the untethered remnant of a job the couple could contain but never fully cleanse (say so on the chalk wall in the Junction: a struck-through X labeled "the Vresk house — never left"). It's bound to the room by the wards, furious, and territorial.
- It hides among the trophies and strikes when the party disturbs the shelves or lingers >2 rounds. Invisible (DC understood: needs See Invisibility / Veil Dust / a lucky Perception vs its Stealth to pin down); it hurls objects (Telekinetic Thrust) and drops the lights.
- Non-combat outs: it calms if the party leaves the shelves alone and simply passes through, or if someone re-lights the room's warding sconces (DC 13 Arcana to relight the ward-candles bolted to the walls — doing so pins the poltergeist and lets the party loot in peace). A cleric can turn or lay it to rest (backstory: it just wants the room quiet again).
- Scaling: for 5 PCs, add 2 Shadows (CR 1/2) that peel off the walls where the ward-light has failed — a bridge to the rift's influence.
Loot (weird, useful, cursed-adjacent)
Let players earn these by braving the haunting. Suggested shelf (pick to taste):
- A Cloak of Billowing or Hat of Disguise (mundane-ish utility, great for the social/stealth players) — tag: "Guest's spare — do not issue." (Ties to the changeling operation.)
- A Bag of Holding (smaller sibling to Tallow's) — practical for hauling the vault's coin.
- 3 runed iron nails (as upstairs — anti-fiend wards) and a Driftglobe (portable light for the dark warren; a small mercy).
- A sealed lead casket, warded, labeled "DO NOT OPEN — '06". Inside (if a player insists): a Vial of dark ichor — a bound fiendish essence. Opening it is a bad idea (DM's discretion: a minor fiend or a curse) but it can be used as a component to bait/lure Xarrul. A high-risk, high-reward exploration payoff for a bold party. The wards on the casket (DC 15 Arcana) spell out plainly: whatever is in here wants you to open it.
The Old Work (The Rift)
The deepest chamber, behind the barred and runed door off the Junction. This is why Orenn and Mags really live here — and the thing the hidden fifth rule means when it says burn below and seal the door.
Read-Aloud: The Old Work
Za dveřmi je zima, která nemá co dělat s teplotou. Místnost je malá a kulatá a uprostřed podlahy je… trhlina. Ne ve skále. Ve vzduchu. Ve světě. Svislá jizva dlouhá jako člověk, po okrajích roztřepená, a skrze ni prosvítá šeď — plochá, nekonečná, špatná šeď éterické roviny. Kolem trhliny je do podlahy vyryt kruh znaků, stříbrem a solí, a ten kruh svítí slabě a unaveně, jako někdo, kdo drží dveře zavřené už příliš dlouho.
Něco se na druhé straně pohne. A pak ještě něco. Trhlina je čím dál větší — a poprvé za patnáct let ji nikdo nehlídá.
What It Is
The planar fault beneath the tavern surfaces as the thin point upstairs; down here, at the lowest point, it has torn into an actual rift — a hand-thin tear the couple contained decades ago with a silver-and-salt containment circle (distinct from Orenn's binding circle upstairs). The circle is failing in step with the ward-sigils Xarrul has been cracking. This is the source of the ethereal bleed everyone's been feeling.
- DC 14 Arcana: the containment circle is the same craft as the upstairs work but older, and it's being eroded from the ethereal side — the same claw-marks that cracked the wards.
- DC 16 Arcana: the rift and the upstairs thin point are one fault. Widening or "using" this rift would be catastrophically less controllable than the upstairs thin point. This is not where you do the dual-plane kill. (Explicit, so a clever party doesn't try to run the Reckoning down here and derail it.)
The Conversion (Optional — a lone explorer)
If a single PC lingers here alone, this is where Xarrul can reach them — a ward-snare pins them, or an Ethereal Pull drags them partway into the grey, and the fiend simply talks. They rejoin the party changed: genuinely convinced Xarrul should go free, and carrying a shard of its nature. This is not a charm — it's a conversation that worked, and it's one of the best engines for Scenario F at a large table. Full scene, the player's note, the boon (the Grey Step), and the counterplay: handouts/the-conversion.md.
Encounter — Creatures from the Rift
This is where "Xarrul can have some creatures from there" pays off. Xarrul doesn't lair in the rift — it lairs in the ethereal cellar (upstairs overlay, per canon) — but it has learned to loose the scavengers that gather at the tear, herding them at intruders like dogs.
Deploy as a scaled encounter (tune to party size / how hurt they are):
- Baseline: 3 Shadows (CR 1/2) that pour out of the tear where the circle's light has thinned, plus 1 Ethereal Filcher (CR 1) that darts in to steal a valuable item off a PC (DC 13 vs. Sleight-of-Hand-style grab) and flee back through the rift — a fantastic reason to chase, and a way to make loss of the vault's prize sting.
- Harder: add a Specter (CR 1) or upgrade to a lone ethereal-touched horror of the DM's making. If Xarrul is actively present on the ethereal side (late game), it can spend a turn "opening the gate" as a lair-flavored action, adding 1 Shadow per round until the circle is restored.
Encounter — The Guardian (the pet)
Roaming the whole Deep Cellar — but denning near the rift, because it can hunt across the boundary — is the couple's pet, a bound Phase Spider the players may meet anywhere down here. Full tactical block below. It's the "fight a bit" the party will remember.
Read-Aloud: The Guardian
Slyšíte to dřív, než to uvidíte — suché klepání, jako když někdo poklepává kostěnými prsty na kámen. Pak zmizí. A pak, z místa, kde před vteřinou nic nebylo, se to vynoří: pavouk velký jako lovecký pes, tělo lesklé a temné, a nohy, které se dotýkají země jen napůl — jako by si nebyl úplně jistý, na které straně světa vlastně je.
Phase Spider "Přástka" — Large monstrosity, unaligned · CR 3 (700 XP) AC 13 · HP 32 (5d10+5) · Speed 30 ft., climb 30 ft.
| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15 (+2) | 15 (+2) | 12 (+1) | 7 (-2) | 10 (+0) | 6 (-2) |
Skills Stealth +6 Senses darkvision 60 ft., passive Perception 10 Ethereal Jaunt. As a bonus action, the spider can shift from the Material Plane to the Ethereal Plane, or vice versa. (This is why it can guard a household on a thin point — no wall, and no plane, keeps it out.) Spider Climb / Web Walker. Climbs difficult surfaces, including upside down, and ignores webbing movement restrictions.
Actions Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +4 to hit, reach 5 ft., one creature. Hit: 7 (1d10+2) piercing damage, and the target must make a DC 11 Constitution save, taking 18 (4d8) poison damage on a fail, half on a success. If the poison reduces the target to 0 HP, it's stable but poisoned and paralyzed for 1 hour.
Running it well:
- It's a guard dog, not a monster. It was raised by Orenn and Mags. It will not attack a creature that (a) carries Orenn's scent — anyone who handled his keys/body/clothes — or (b) speaks the household command word Mags knows, or (c) simply doesn't threaten the Vault or the Cells. A quiet, respectful party can pass it entirely (great stealth payoff). Present this: it tracks them, clicks, phases, watches — and holds fire until provoked.
- Provoke it (force the Vault, harm the Guest, attack it) and it fights like an ambush predator: bite, phase out (safe on the Ethereal Plane where non-ethereal weapons can't reach), reposition, phase back for another strike. Players need force damage, ethereal reach (Veil Dust!), or to catch it on the Material Plane to pin it.
- After Orenn's death it's agitated and grieving in its animal way — more skittish, more likely to lash out from fear. A druid/beast-handler (DC 14 Animal Handling) can calm it; killing it upsets Mags deeply if she learns of it.
- Scaling: for 5 PCs or a combat-hungry table, add 2 Giant Spiders (CR 1, its brood) nesting in the passages. For a lighter table, run Přástka purely as an avoidable stealth obstacle.
DM Cheat-Sheet — Running the Deep Cellar
Pacing: This is a 30–60 minute side-track, or the spine of the whole night for an exploration-hungry group. It runs parallel to the lockdown upstairs — while some PCs interrogate patrons, others can be down here. Cut between the two.
The three payoffs, guaranteed:
- Loot — the Vault + Workroom + Deep Storage give gear that makes the Reckoning easier (Fiendbane Salt, silvered weapons, alchemy, silvervein root for Bren).
- Backstory — the chalk wall, the trophies, the child's shoe, Cell Two, the Guest, and the ledger tell the whole truth about Orenn and Mags with almost no exposition.
- A fight on their terms — rats (trivial), the poltergeist (medium), the phase spider (avoidable or hard), rift creatures (scalable), and optionally the Guest (CR 3).
Threads back into the main game — surface at least one:
- The chalk wall / Guest / trophies reveal Orenn was investigating the Lambent Order → feeds the murder mystery and the Reckoning.
- The Workroom's silvervein root and Veil Dust → the Possession and ethereal-trip subplots.
- The Fiendbane Salt and silvered gear → the means to pin Xarrul without paying Tallow.
- The vault trophies implicating both factions → a lit fuse if it ever reaches the main hall.
If the party burns it (the fifth rule): Orenn's contingency — "burn the cellar stores and seal the door" — is a real option. Torching the Workroom and Deep Storage and collapsing the door denies the loot but also cuts off the rift's bleed into the tavern (the fire consumes the failing containment and the stores that feed the fault's attraction), giving a partial ward-restoration effect equivalent to repairing the sigils. It's a scorched-earth ending Mags respects. The Guest, if still caged, dies in the fire unless freed first — make the players sit with that.