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[Iituem]

6

You take a moment to carefully feel around your location.  Thinking about it, the rocks you've fallen on aren't loose for the most part, more like a formation.  Although some parts are pretty rounded and smooth for a natural rock formation... you think this might have been carved in some fashion.  Feeling around the shape, you think you might be on some sort of sculpture of a broadly humanoid figure; two arms, two legs, one head, in repose.  There's a sharp drop off the edge of the sculpture, but only down a few feet.  You take an experimental step off and find some loose rocks, although they don't clatter right.  Hrm.  Wait, that's not rock either.  That's bone.

Feeling around the bones, you find the scattered remnants of what was probably a humanoid creature based off the skull, strewn with what feels like rags of clothing.  There is some sort of long, rough metal object nearby, and miraculously there is even what at first you assume to be some sort of sleeping creature but which turns out to be a leather bag.  It takes a little work to get it open, as it seems stuck in some way, but inside you find small cakes of what appears to be some sort of ancient preserved grain substance (cram, your instincts provide with a strange echo of distaste - it certainly doesn't smell good) some sort of stoppered bottle of a smooth, unyielding non-metallic substance (glass), a few sheets of some sort of crackly tough substance and three long wooden rods wrapped at the end in layers of fabric.  There is a small metal box you can easily pry open, containing what smells like shavings of dry wood, a strip of metal and a tiny rod of metal as well.  But best of all, there is a small pouch containing several discs of a metal that tastes glorious, almost as good as gold!  (40 silver pieces)

A) Take the bag with you and go exploring.
B) Forget the bag, just take the silver pouch and go exploring.
C) Rest on the silver to sleep more easily and heal up for a while.
D) Suggest a course of action.

[Blood_Librarian]

D
Is the bottle closed with some sort of lid? if yes, open it, smell inside.

[crazyabe]

C.

[Criptfeind]

A

Better not wait around in the open like this. Who knows what might come around.

[Puppyguard]

A
Yeah, I'd rather not we get eaten by whatever else is down here.

[Harry Baldman]

A, keep shuffling through the dark.

[Detoxicated]

A though being a good speaker be awesome

[Iituem]

The bag's pretty big, but it has a strap so you struggle into the strap, tighten it around you with a loose knot and drag the bag after you.

6

You shuffle along the surprisingly flat stone floor, mucky in places with fallen water, wondering why this whole place hasn't been flooded by now, if things can fall down into this cavern network via sinkholes.  It is most peculiar.  You hit a few more large rectangular stone objects before you reach a wall of what appears to be cut stone and, following it, find what you think is a corridor.  You follow along it (noting that it actually slopes downward) until something finally breaches the stifling darkness; a faint yellow glimmer.

At the end of the corridor, you can just make out where faint yellow light illuminates square-cut flagstones on the floor and the heavy blocks of the corridor's walls.  As you approach, you can make out a large chamber beyond, similarly constructed of cut stone and with a vaulting ceiling supported by massive stone block pillars.  The whole arrangement is easily the size of a small manor house, perhaps 50 feet by 60 feet with 40 feet from the floor to the highest point of the ceiling.  There are open stone passageways leading out of this chamber to the left and right sides of the room.  More stone coffers are arranged around the edges of this room, each bearing sculpted images of humanoids in repose.  At the far end of the chamber is a large pyramidal platform (with the top cut off to create a level space) upon which rests another box of veined white marble (not local to the area) and covered with a similar sculpture of a figure in repose, save that elements of this one have been highlighted in gold leaf.  In the middle of the room, beneath the apex of the ceiling and in front of the pyramid, a 5 foot high pillar holds a massive gleaming bronze dish which is currently burning with a low orange flame, casting light and flickering shadows around the room.

A) Gold, did you say?  That box up on the pyramid definitely bears investigating!
B) This is a little weird.  Skirt around the edges of the room and investigate one of the passages out.
C) That big shiny box looks a little suspect, but maybe one of the lesser ones would be worth looking into?
D) Make a suggestion.

[Kashyyk]

D Eat scran,  then sleep in the bag on the pile of coins.

Wrong turn. Let's go with A

[Criptfeind]

G-g-g-goooold?

A

[Puppyguard]

A

[Iituem]

You clamber up the pyramid and onto the sarcophagus atop it - from a closer position you can see that the sculpture atop the boxes forms part of a lid.  The gilded marble sculpture is that of a figure akin to and yet clearly different from that of the kobold you saw before; although it has two muscular arms and a rounded, triangular reptilian head, its body tapers off at the waist into a coiled serpent's tail.  The whole sculpture is banded in gold and brilliant blue lapis lazuli, and a pair of rounded garnets are set as the figure's eyes.  There is writing around the edge of the sarcophagus in an unfamiliar script.  Fortunately as a dragon you speak the tongue of the Sun and so can understand (and read) all mortal languages.  It reads:  Here lies Narsis, Prince of Ophidia and master of the lowlands, protector of his people and destroyer of the Okesh.  It then goes into elaborate and somewhat painstakingly dull detail about Narsis' accomplishments, mostly relating to the genocide of the aforementioned Okesh and various achievements in legal and agricultural reforms for his people.

The sarcophagus lid itself is beautiful, displays astounding craftsmanship and is entirely too heavy and unwieldy for you to drag out of wherever this place is, but if you could it would have a value of {5000 silver coins}.  The gold would take a long while to strip and you would actually devalue it in doing so by damaging the artwork.  However, the twin garnets {250 silver coins each} could easily be pried out with your claws and taken with you.

A) Try removing the lid anyway, we can take a look at this Narsis chap.
B) Just take the garnets for now, we can come back for the rest.
C) Maybe leave this one be, but possibly open one of the other caskets in case they have anything good in them.
D) Yeah, maybe not.  Just leave the chamber through one of the passages.
E) Something else?

[Puppyguard]

E Take the twin garnets and check the other caskets for any easy collectables.

[Criptfeind]

Hum, too big to steal... Maybe we can make this our lair later.

B

[NRDL]

B