Lair of the Lamb session two: Shellfishness

The party stumbles into the Landing, the biggest room they've been in so far. A thick steel door of dominates the room's north wall, lit by a torch on a stand (and Gwyn's burning bowl). The flickering firelight reveals tiled flooring and rough-hewn walls curving up to an arched ceiling ten feet above. On the door's other flank is a sturdy wooden table bearing a sturdier wooden chest banded in iron. Behind them to the west, temporarily cowed by firelight, is the Lamb; south and east, corridors into the dark. The east one stinks horribly.

They've lost Kurt Hammer and Kes somewhere along the way, stumbling through the Dark. They're probably fine. The dagger (presently the most valuable member of the party) ended up in Gwyn's hands through some sort of Confusion alchemy.

This leaves the present party:

Gwyn puts out the fire in her (slightly charred) wooden bowl and Alec grabs the torch.
He has constructed a mental ordering of each party-member's usefulness towards their (his) survival. He is at the top; so is Kurt Dagger.
He is steering, with what might he has, for - in definite order of priority -

1. His own survival.
2. The survival of as many allies as he can get out with him.
   

After some walking, they spy a wooden door in the corridor's eastern wall. Carefully, they open it up, revealing... the BROOM CUPBOARD. It contains a broom. It also contains a gong and a hammer. The hammer (d6 bludgeoning) is eagerly grabbed, and the gong is pondered.
If rung, would it summon the lamb here? Or to its dinner-room? Lennie decides to put down the chest in favour of the broom. Alec, questioning the wisdom of lugging the chest along, downgrades Lenny's Ranking. (He is now slightly below the goat).

Onwards, southwards. A dead end, a statue of a man-sized fish with human hands (with matching engravings on the walls), raising them above its upturned gaping mouth as if to hold something, a dish, a bowl, something. Inspection reveals a tiny puddle of milky liquid in a divot on the floor. Closer inspection, with Lennie's finger, reveals that it is acidic. Further inspection reveals nozzles in the roof, ready to douse the room.

Meanwhile, Alec & Gwyn appreciate art:

Engraved on the wall is an exceptionally designed image of a fish and humans. The humans are supplicating the fish. The humans have their hands outstretched. The fish has its hands outstretched. The humans are suffering. The humans are in the foetal position.

Invigorating.
They also notice that the fish statue is on grooves, and could be slid to the side, though it is presently locked in place by some mechanism. Once the fish's throat becomes evident, they quickly make the leap to water/liquid, and debate cutting the goat for blood ("just a little bit of blood!" "it'll have a lot of blood in it, even though it's dehydrated!"), but Battie's not having it. Alec downgrades Battie's Ranking. While he and Gwyn discuss the mechanism, Battie and Lennie, in order:

1. Try and stuff the broom down the Fish's throat.
2. Try and stuff a handful of hay down the Fish's throat.
3. Try and stuff a handful of hay down the Fish's throat, then try and ram that down the using the broom.

Alec and Gwyn vacate the room just before they finish step 3. Immediately once they do, acid sprays down from the ceiling. (Alec readjusts his Rankings). Battie, Lennie, and the goat feel the burn, but though their pelts will have diminished market value, they are left standing and manage to run out of the room. Seeing that the statue is still stuck in place, the party decides to return later.

They return to the LANDING and march east. The Underclock reaches the teens, the shadows breathe, and our party reach the PIT. Four corridors find a hole forty feet down and forty feet foul. There's space enough to skirt it; the party starts to. Alec peers down the pit and sees, in the muck at the bottom, a pile of rags. The rags raise its head to him and speaks. It is AKINA, a old woman. "You don't look like priests", she says.

Exposition. They are all under the WHITE TEMPLE; the peasants were brought here as sacrifices for the LAMB, which sleeps in the pit. (Alec's hopes of trapping said LAMB in said PIT are dashed). Akina cleans the Lamb of lice and such, and it leaves her alive in return. ("How do you eat and drink?" "You don't want to know.") There will be more peasants; at least a dozen are brought in every week, she's heard the priests say. But she's never heard them get carted past this pit, which means they must be back in the area our heroes have come from.
If they can get her out, she has a very fancy ruby ring for them. It glints like a tiny flame in the firelight.
They cannot at present get her out. (They have about 12 feet of rope between them).

They tell her they'll be back, and head north. At this point, Kurt Hammer stumbles out of the Dark and takes his namesake for himself. Just as a whispered explanation of events so far is relayed to him, the party notices that the room ahead a) contains a huge pool of water and b) contains the Lamb having a drink. They're able to avoid its notice and slink off.

Using a combination of the gong, the Underclock ticking up, Alec, Kurt and Lennie hiding in the Broom closet, and sacrificing the goat (which lets out one final terrified betrayed bleat as the lamb chases it into the dark), they're able to lure the lamb away. They go and drink. It's glorious.

Gwyn is disturbed, while drinking, by vision-sensations of drowning. They convey this to Alec through sign language; The team peer into the pool and see an armored skeleton at the bottom; they take its rusty breastplate for themselves and use some of their rope to attach it to Gwyn. Filling their bowl, they slowly and carefully carry it back to the fish statue. Luckily, they get there without trouble, and pour the water in. With a grinding noise, the statue moves aside, revealing a secret room.

It contains a great throne made of unfired clay and sheep bones. Near it lies a golden helm with eye-and-ear covers: a sensory deprivation helmet. Kurt hammer picks it up; he can tell it's a masterpiece. It's worth more money than he's made in his life.

They wonder. Maybe the lamb is stupid enough to think that if you can't see it, it can't see you? Maybe the throne controls the lamb? Maybe the helm controls the lamb?

Either way, it's a safe bet that something will happen if someone sits on the Throne.

Alec resolves himself. "Be ready to put that helmet on my head as soon as I sit down", he tells Hammer, thinking that it might guard against some danger.
In trickery, confidence is vital; a man with fancy clothes and an official-looking sheaf of papers could walk right into a great many installations and be as unremarkable and impervious as their walls. And so he takes his seat as an emperor might, on the obscene throne, one hand gripping one armrest, the other gripping the torch like a scepter.

The instant he is seated, he feels IT. A presence sees him, envelops him, pours into him, Judges him. Is he suitable? Is he worthy? Is his mind so shaped that it can hold the understanding, the twisting corrosive knowledge, and observe how it changes him quickly enough to change in reaction and still stay himself? Or will it burn a hole in him, right through him, and come dripping out sizzling?

In some worlds, Alec suffers the wrath of divinity. In this one, he gathers his wits about himself, gathers his self about himself, and makes his will save. The knowledge seeps into him and stabilizes. He is blessed. He feels strength flow through his bones, bolstering him. The world becomes transparent, save for a ghostly building directly above him. A light shines from its peak, the only solid thing. It beckons him, calls him close.
Upon his brow, he feels white-hot burning, and there a gleaming eye opens. He sees out of it, and feels that he could spend this new organ to - once ever - See something far away instead.

And his right forearm, with sensations that ought to be much more painful than they are, cracks and morphs and shifts and calcifies and carcinizes into a giant lobster claw.

That fish statue is awfully heavy, and awfully difficult to move when locked back into place. An idea dawns, as the Underclock ticks over and the Lamb approaches once more with bile and hatred: lure it into the throne room, and trap it.

Lennie lights his broom on Alec's torch. He has, for the moment, a flaming staff. A symbol of the dawn.
Gwyn has a breastplate, a knife, and a torch.
Kurt Hammer has a hammer, a very fancy helmet, and 4 dex.
Alec has a Lobster claw, a fragment of Skill empowered by his recent experience, and a strange burgeoning sense of camaraderie.
Battie has the memory of a goat that is no more, its bloodstains still painting the floor of the fish room.

And the Lamb has a body and souls made of parts too overgrown and sharp to fit together into any coherent whole. It enters the room, despite the light, and lunges. It grazes Alec, but in the chaos he barely manages to avoid any serious damage. Blows rain down on the Lamb, dagger and hammer and claw, but its thick hide absorbs it all with but a few grunts and screeches. Everyone save Alec and Gwyn leave the room and prepare; Kurt gets in position, ready to push the statue-door closed in one fell swoop.

The moment comes. Alec and Gwyn make a break for it; Lennie javelin-throws his broom through the doorway above their heads, distracting the lamb; and -

It doesn't work. Gwyn stumbles, Kurt barely manages to stop the door from closing and trapping all three on the inside, and then they're through and the Lamb has pushed its way out of the room. The party tries to flee, but Kurt is slow and undextrous, and the Lamb follows behind, biting and barging. Kurt decides, then, and turns, wielding the Helm of sensory deprivation, and jams it over the Beast's snout.
The Lamb is strong. The lamb is cunning. The lamb is not accustomed to problems that are worsened, rather than bettered, by continuing to charge forward. It rams its snout into the helm's hollow, and it sticks there, holding its mouth shut. It screams in muffled rage.

But its teeth are not its only weapon. Its very bulk is deadly enough. And it has decided on Gwyn, is charging at Gwyn -
When Battie throws herself into the way. She's flung aside like a sack of potatoes, and her body slams into the wall and slumps down. She is not dead yet, but she approaches death.

Lennie drops all else he has and hefts Battie in his arms. He turns to run, and -

And there, time ran out, and the session ended.