Sheepstrangler used a gem of elemental summoning and sent the elemental after the minotaurs. It defeated them. He wandered the maze aimlessly and finally (accidentally?) arrived at a room that let him climb up to rejoin the others on the second level.
While he was running for his life, the rest of the party took care of the important matter - they climbed down and looted the minotaur room, finding a suit of plate armour that was clean and polished. It held the smashed and broken skeleton of the last wearer. Did the armour do the smashing?
Once the party reformed, they continued exploring the second level. They found a couple of kitchens, several bunkrooms, and three more observation rooms looking down into the maze. Those three rooms appeared to have traps. One had a giant X carved in the floor, another had a chest displaying gems, the third had a swinging axe tied back with rope. The party did not explore those rooms.
They found a garden room, filled with greenery and unnatural sunlight. This room had four bowls, each containing fruits. The party attempted to claim some, but the fruits grew little wings and flew up in panic. A couple of people did manage to catch a fruit before they flew out of reach. They tasted of the sweetest, most delicious fruit imaginable. Eating the fruit gave a bonus to an attribute - STR for one person, CON for another. The party chose not to try and catch any of the fruit flies, but did (if I remember right), kill one with a spell.
During their exploration they defeated a large number of ghouls and ghasts in an ambush room and a wraith in another room. The undead all seemed to be speaking, "Curse Munafik, curse him for doing thos to us!" Who was Munafik? Some writings on a wall, and the book stolen from the Thune, suggested he was the high priest of this temple many centuries ago and that he had dabbled in the black arts to extend his life. Was Munafika now a lich? Was he the figure Niavarra encountered?
The party rested for the night. They now had less than half of their time remaining to find the Thune party.
During the night, a couple of ghasts attacked and were quickly dealt with.
Grim prepared Remove Curse and finally got rid of Baleon's mummy rot. Everyone's nose was grateful.
The party continued exploring.
In the middle of the complex they came to a room with a waterfall and palm trees. This is where Naivarra met the skeletal figure that she couldn't hurt. However, there was no sign of the figure.
The palm trees appeared to be growing pineapples, which is weird because pineapples normally grow on the ground. Zaiden thought there was something strange about the fruit, so he threw on at another party member. It broke, leaving strange smelling pulp and juice. A little experimentation found the pinepple juice to be quite flammable. The party did not (if I remember right) collect any of the flammable pineaples.
This room also had a couple of altar-like stone blocks with handprints and carved runes. After some experimentation, the party discovered that the runes were command words to change the gravity in this room. Much hilarity ensued as the party members tied themselves to trees and swung upside down, in an (eventually successful) attempt to use the reverse gravity to get to a higher level of the tomb.
At the top of the waterfall room, there was a large passage leading south and a loose boulder covering a passage leading east. Behind the boulder was a small gnome with a spoon.
The gnome introduced himself as Prit. It seemed he had been in this tomb for a long time. He had carved some tunnels for himself. With what? With a spoon. Well, with lots of spoons. He had them stuffed in his pockets and tied to his clothing. He knew a lot about spoons and about the unsung history of spoons in architecture. He didn't, unfortunately, know anything else.
Zaiden touched Prit's mind with his mental communication and tried to do something. Perhaps his patron, a creature of madness, might be interested in a small mad gnome? He's not sure what happened, or if anything happened at all, but if it did, it certainly won't be good for the gnome.
The party headed east through Prit's tunnel. They came to a rocky room containing a large stone golem protecting something shiny. The party guessed this was the phylactery of the skeletal figure, and engaged the golem. The first thing the golem did was pile rocks in front of the shiny item, to protect it from missile fire. The second thing it did was engage the party, either smashing someone with its fists (doing massive damage) or throwing rocks (doing fair damage). The battle was short. One golem, no matter how tough, cannot handle the combined melee and ranged attacks of an entire party.
The shiny thing turned out to be a glass bell jar containing a beating heart. Attempting to move the jar shattered the glass and stopped the heart. A scream echoed throughout the tomb. What did this mean for the skeletal figure? Was it a lich, now without its phylactery?
The stone golem room had a passage south, so the party headed back west to the antigravity dome room. They headed south from there.
They came into a large room, with stairs and platforms leading upward, with extremely fast water flowing in channels beside the stairs. From the angle of the room, this water was what caused the waterfall in the antigravity room.
On the first landing, the party encountered some emaciated figures who seemed to come out of the walls. These figures attempted, but failed, to knock characters into the water. The characters fought back, only to discover that when they killed a creature, it reformed as two creatures. The party faced four of them, then five, then six, then seven…
Eventually, someone got the idea of shoving the creatures into the water and the combat ended in a flurry of positioning and shoving.
On the second landing, the party encountered a wall of flame. At least, it seemed like a wall of flame. Those below the wall saw their comrades crisping and burning and screaming, but those who walked into the wall were saying "no, no, it's an illusion, trust me." What was real, what was illusion?
On the third landing, the party met the classic mirror trap. Doubles of each character appeared and attacked. Strangely, the doubles did not speak and did not cast any spells, only attacking in melee.
On the fourth landing, the party found a giant bronze fist, 15ft high, and a dead skeletal figure. Was this
Munafik? They looted the corpse and moved on.
South of the gauntlet room was a semi-circular room with a massive column of water descending from a hole in the ceiling and passages leading east and west.
Standing next to the column of water, Baleon heard it speak.
"What is your name?"
Baleon.
"What is your quest?"
Remove two items from the tomb to free Amun-Re.
"On whose hallowed ground stand ye?"
Amun-Re.
"Correct. Put thy hand in mine!"
An impression of a hand appeared in the column of water. Baleon put his hand in it and the column pulsed with light and began to flow upwards.
The party of course stepped into the column and were carried upward.
I guess there was nothing interesting in the rooms to the east and west.
The pillar of water took them to a small tomb with two rooms.
One room contained a straw boat and a mirror, with the mirror not actually reflecting the boat - just the PCs. The prow of the boat contained a wooded stand that looked like it should hold something. It was shaped like a setting on a ring designed to hold a gem. It wasn't, however, holding anything.
Some searching showed that the mirror was hooked to the wall. There were hooks on two other rooms, so of course the PCs didn't move the mirror to those walls. Instead, they put the mirror on the floor, in a shallow depression the same dimensions of the mirror. This caused the mirror to grow foggy and then show a straw boat, floating in mid-air fifty feet below. In the boat's prow, a wooded stand clasping a gemstone.
Some careful rope work and someone was lowered and able to retrieve the gem. The air was cold and thin. Wherever they were, it was quite high.
The second room contained a sarcophagus. Lying across the sarcophagus was a very ornate staff. Inside the sarcophagus… a mummy!
The second room had a statue of Amun-Re holding the staff and gem in crossed arms. This statue moved, to reveal a small room behind it. After some trial and error, the PCs discovered that the room was a teleporter and the key was for one person to hold both the staff and the gem in crossed arms.
The teleporter took them to another small room behind a secret door in a temple complex. After a couple of rooms, the party realised they were in the outer temple of the pyramid, where they were captured by the Thune two days ago. They kept exploring the place and encountered the Iaseda. He was not happy to see them, espeically since they had not found the missing Thune. He was especially not happy to see sacred artefacts looted from the tomb, held by what appeared to be Amun-Re (Zaiden in disguise).
The party tried the "this is Amun-Re, your pharaoh, risen from the dead, obey him" ruse. It didn't work. First of all, the Thune were never Amun-Re's people. His reign ended almost a thousand years before their civilisation rose. Second, the Thune are the guardians of the lost places. Their sacred tenets are that what is beneath the sands stays beneath the sands, whether it be an item or a figure. By all the teachings of their religion, Amun-Re was an abomination, to be destroyed at all costs.
A furious battle developed, raging throughout the complex. Eventually the PCs escaped out the front door, without their horses or retainers or guide or most of their gear. What would the Thune do to their hostages?