H6 - Lower Laboratory
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H6 — Lower Laboratory
The Point Where the House Stops Pretending
The stair descends past finished stone into older brickwork.
At the bottom, the domestic details disappear. The corridor beyond is broad enough for equipment carts. Brass ventilation pipes run overhead. A reinforced door stands open beside a rack of waxed aprons, gloves, face wraps, and eye protection.
Two people in plain dark coats look up from a small table.
H6 is the hideout's primary combat encounter. The lower laboratory handles restricted materials and provides a security buffer between the residence and H7.
Creatures: Two hired guards using Guard 1 statistics or equivalent level 1 humanoids.
If the party fought loudly upstairs, the guards are standing, armed, and positioned behind the stone benches. Otherwise, one is seated and the other is checking a shipment manifest.
They carry whistles but know that sounding a city alarm may expose what Corven is storing below. Their first objective is to stop intruders and close the H7 security door.
They surrender if one guard is dropped and the other is clearly trapped or outmatched. They know Corven as a wealthy alchemist with questionable clients; they do not know the full Golden Hand plan.
Laboratory Terrain
- Stone benches provide cover.
- Rolling specimen carts can be Shoved and create difficult terrain if overturned.
- Eye-wash cistern: a creature adjacent to it can spend an Interact action to gain a +1 circumstance bonus to the next save it attempts against an inhaled or contact irritant before the end of its next turn.
- Vent controls: Crafting or Thievery DC 16 can open the basement exhaust vents, useful if H7's defense activates.
Unlike the upper laboratory, several crates here bear stripped shipping labels and small hand-and-coin authorization marks. The basement was receiving material Corven did not want entered into his legitimate business records.
After the Fight
The Restricted Door
A thick laboratory door separates H6 from H7. It has no obvious keyhole on the outer face. Instead, three narrow glass indicators sit beside a brass handwheel.
The indicators represent pressure, ventilation, and reagent-feed status. Corven's staff were expected to stabilize all three systems before opening the comparative laboratory.
Challenge: Open the Laboratory Safely
Success opens H7 without arming its archive defense. Failure still opens the door, but H7 begins armed. A critical failure immediately activates the first stage of the Archive Purge.