Despite coming together on level 3 to fight the armor, we ended up spread out again.  Luckily the house was relatively small so we could rally if needed.  Brian had us roll initiative again so that we could take turns doing things out of combat.  Arlo searched the library, starting with the desk.  He found some useful things like a flint and steel and an iron key.  Next, he grabbed the empty footlockers from next door and began filling them with books that he thought were interesting or valuable.  He found one that he had to read.  (Missed a Will save.)  Evidently, it was so offensive, he was compelled to burn it in the fireplace.  Lord Q joined him in there at some point.  Loki, Kaladin, and Ambrus searched the music room and examined the dog.  They were convinced the dog was real but didn’t find anything else of note in there.  The dog seemed to not like one particular cold corner but we could not find a reason.  Kharn went back up to the 3^rd floor and searched the room the ghost was in.  The ghost did not reappear but he did notice a secret door behind a mirror.  It was the stairs up to the attic that we were looking for although it was filled with spider webs.  He grabbed a torch and headed up.  Loki joined him, feeling the music room was a dead end and having no interest in the library.  At this point, we were in two groups.  Level 2 and level 4.

Down in the library, Lord Q found a secret door behind a bookshelf.  In there were a couple of bookshelves with magical type tombs including, I think, some rituals.  I don’t think we’ve found any magical inks though.  There were also the skeletal remains of what we figure was an adventurer type.  Evidently, he had opened a chest and gotten spikes in his head for his trouble.  He did have thieves’ tools on him and some other gear that Ambrus took. He used an abundance of caution and searched.  The thief had a letter in his hand we figured he had grabbed from the chest.  It was from Lord Straud himself basically telling the head of this house that his adulterous ways had brought the curse on to him and his household.  He would be getting no aid and will reap what he sowed.  In the chest were 3 blank spells books, 3 cleric scrolls that for some reason our delusional wizard Zolton could read, the deed to the house and a windmill and a will leaving everything to Rose and Thorn.  Their searching was then interrupted by combat upstairs.

On level four, the first room had a padlock in it.  We could hear the eerie sounds of children playing but the iron key and Rogue were downstairs so Loki moved onto the next room.  It was a guest room full of webs and spiders.  Since they were small, he got the torch from Kharn and reopened the door.  However, the spiders formed into 2 spider swarms and attacked.  They did 4d4 of damage and had their usual resistances.  3 of us took significant damage (good thing we got those extra hit points).  Those below came up to help but the fight was over before they could do much.  The locked room was opened with the iron key.  It was a room for the kids.  The window was bricked shut.  When we started looking at stuff, their ghosts appeared.  One merged with Arlo and one with, I think, Lord Q.  They wanted to be put to rest i.e. their skeletal remains buried outside the house.  There was also a dollhouse of this house.  It was detailed enough to see that there was a spiral staircase from the 4^th floor down to the basement.  Since they were affecting two players, we decided to take care of that asap.  Their bones were put into their toy box and we headed down.  With a bunch of debate about whether to do other stuff along the way, we ended up at the front door.  However, that evil mist had engulfed the whole house and we decided we needed to deal with the basement before going out of the house.

We then spent a bunch of time looking into everything we’d left behind.  The first-floor den was searched.  The stuff wolves moved to watch us but never attacked.  We found two pistols and supplies that went to Loki, a shotgun over the fireplace that, with much debate, went to Kharn, and a deck of cards.  The kitchen was searched more thoroughly and any edible food was taken.  The books from the library were taken and carried somehow.  The hanging corpse was searched but no one made a decent roll so if there was anything worth finding, we didn’t find it.  The body was taken down and wrapped in a sheet for future burial.  I don’t remember if anything else was done or found.  The rest of the 4^th floor was searched.  If anything of note was found, I can’t recall. 

So, then we were finally left with the stairs down.  It was more of a dungeon than a basement and certainly larger than the house footprint.  There were multiple corridors heading in various directions.  Kharn and Loki attempted to sneak ahead a bit.  (Ambrus was still poisoned and had disadvantage on all rolls so he hung back.)  In one room, we were attacked by 3 ghouls, emerging from alcoves with rotting sleeping mats.  They had a claw that did paralysis or a bite.  Both did 10+ damage which is significant at 1^st level.  Kharn raged and was crit like 3 rounds in a row.  Luckily it was half damage and he managed to save.  Loki blasted away with his pistols so further sneaking was out.  Arlo was compelled to hide by Thorn although he was out of 1^st level spells anyway.  The next room had a well and some more alcoves.  A big ghoul emerged from it and managed to shove Kharn into the well.  Good thing he saved or that could have been dicey.  It did more damage but again, no one missed that save.  It was dropped and Kharn was pulled out.

At that point, it was approaching 1 AM.  No one was out but most everyone was below half.  We agreed to a long rest but where? We still couldn’t leave the house.  We decided to hold up in Rose and Thorn’s room which had one door and no windows.  I think we locked the door from the inside with the padlock.  We set watches but weird things kept happening right when we started to sleep.  We got the long rest and Ambrus finally recovered from the poison but everyone had to make a CON save or take 1 level of exhaustion (disad on all skill rolls).  Ironically Ambrus, after suffering through the poison all night, was the only one that saved.  However, Arlo used an inspiration die and saved on that reroll.  Ambrus gave his inspiration die to someone else (Kharn or Kaladin?) and that person also saved.  Zolton will have to save next time.  Luckily the skill-heavy house search is over and it’ll mostly be combat from here on out so maybe the exhaustion won’t be too bad? We did make it to 2^nd level.  Next game is scheduled for 3 weeks.