Tolð 22, 653 DR: Wherein the group follows beckoning Yrūn apparition deeper into the organic island tunnels. After falling through the floor and then into the maw of a giant maggot, the group decides to turn back. Before abandoning Edahyla to her fate, Dammon explores the lower reaches of the labyrinth and discovers two anthropoids, talking in Zultayan.

Continued from Ūlaryalok, Part 1.

Roydor, 22 Tolð 653

The dark, blood-wet, and skin-tattered walls of the island’s tunnels pressed tightly around them. The sweet and rotting smell of decay filled their mouths and nostrils, making those that could taste it gag with each breath. Before following the apparition deeper into the bowels of this place, Zildara wove a small healing upon Dammon’s dry and chalky skin. Even in this damp, dark, and humid labyrinth, the sorcerer gleamed unnaturally white. As she stepped back from Dammon, who was trying to converse with the apparition, she noticed with some dread that his skin matched the hue of the ghost that was leading them. Zildara returned to her place in line, burdened with dark thoughts. Tressta held high the light source the Zalan priestess had conjured and the group pressed deeper into the tunnels.

The tunnel soon widened into another chamber that extended past the glowing torch’s range. The spell seemed to be all that kept the darkness and the ghost at bay; a hazy globe of safety. In this new chamber the walls and ceilings seemed ‘injured’. Ichor flowed and oozed from the walls and ceiling settling in wide dark puddles on the floor. Each footstep sank into the ‘ground’ and caused the ichor to rise and pool around their shoes. Attempting to circumvent a large flow of the island’s ‘blood’ Jak stepped away from the apparition’s chosen path. The room erupted with a terrible tearing sound and a cloud of noxious gas exploded from the floor. Jak fell into the cloud and out of sight. Tressta breathed in too much of the gas and immediately grew ill, clutching her stomach and feeling her last meal burning up her throat to the back of her mouth. Zildara and Zêla jumped backward until the cloud settled to reveal Jak suspended in the air by the rod on his belt, in the middle of a gaping dark hole. Dammon cast a spell on himself and rose above the ichor pools, which now drained into the hole around Jak.

Dammon cast a second spell on Jak’s spear, allowing him to rise from the hole and ferry the others across the room using both the spear and the strange magic rod. The party successfully crossed the chamber and Dammon released the spear from his arcane controls. Reestablishing the marching order they continued behind the beckoning ghost.

As they moved from the bleeding chamber, the walls became more solid; the floors ceased their threats to suck the shoes from their feet. Tressta, holding the light in one hand and her sickened stomach with her other, watched the floor and sloping walls as they made their way deeper into the isle. Turning another corner she noticed ripples across the wet floor like those seen before the worms had attacked. Tressta yelled out alarm and Jak, trying to determine the direction of the newest threat, stabbed his spear deep into the floor. In response, the floor yawned open beneath the group. Zildara and Tressta jumped free of the giant maw, but Jak with both hands on his spear, plummeted into its dark throat beyond the reach of Tressta’s light. Regaining her footing, Tressta pulled her rapier as a barbed tongue lashed from the massive maw, wrapping itself around her leg and ripping at her flesh. Dammon stepped into the chamber as five more of the tendril-like barbed tongues rose from the monster’s throat. Arcane bolts flashed into the worm’s mouth which responded with one tongue lashing out at the sorcerer, whose mystic armor shone defiantly against the slashing barbs. Zêla somehow found both her voice and song despite the horror that had swallowed her master, and began to sing encouragement. Zildara, wide-eyed and thinking twice about the fortune that brought her from a Boronon dungeon to this terrible place wove a quick invisibility and vanished from sight. Meanwhile, the tongue wrapped and twisting around Tressta’s leg continued to shred her pants and slice through her leg. A second tongue lashed out at Zêla, coiling up leg and torso and seeking to flense the bard. A third tongue of the sightless monster struck toward the invisible Zildara, missing but shattering all her illusions of safety. From the rear wall, Dammon summoned a storm of ice shards that rained upon the opened maw, cutting into its tongues and body. In response, somewhere from inside the giant worm, they heard Jak’s yelling.

Jak had fallen a good distance into the giant throat, and thrust his spear deep into his side to arrest his descent. Now he hung from the spear’s wooden shaft, pushing and twisting the weapon into the wall of the worm’s throat. Around him the throat undulated and convulsed in protest. Above him he could still see Zildara’s summoned light and the whipping shapes of the tongues above, but the monster did not seem able to contend with the warrior in its throat. He hung on and twisted the spear deeper into its side.

In the chamber above, Zildara and Tressta were soon able to sever the tongues and then stab at the mouth of the monster that had risen from the floor. Dammon continued to punish the creature with arcane missiles. Inside, Jak soon noticed that the throat had stopped moving. It wasn’t flexing or responding to his twisting of his spear. Activating the magic rod on his belt, he pulled the length of his spear from the worm’s side with a long sucking sound. Assessing the best way to climb from the monster he heard a new shrill sound coming from beneath him as the throat was filled with smaller worms rushing past him toward the mouth. Jak the Red huddled the best he could against the throat wall and let the monsters pass, hoping his friends could contend with what was coming up. He shuddered as their wet lengths pressed past him, eclipsing the light above. Dammon heard the squeals of the giant worms and unleashed an icy storm into the monster’s open throat as more than a half dozen of them emerged from the dying parent, their tendrils lashing out at the wounded and fatigued party gathered atop. Zêla retreated into the hallway, pulling icy splinters from her arms. Zildara rushed forward and killed one of the younger worm creatures with her sword. A couple of the emerged worms began crawling from the room but were stopped by another storm of icy shards. With the last of the ice splinters fading from the bloodied floor, Jak climbed wearily from the monster’s maw. Resting around the yawning hole and bodies of the perforated worms, discussion turned to leaving rather than continuing forward.

At the edge of the light, the Yrūn apparition endlessly beckoned them forward, oblivious to the beating and dangers they had suffered. What could be so important that they should risk their lives to go forward? How could Edahyla have survived this place? Was she even alive? Dammon metamorphosed into a bat and explored down the passage the ghost beckoned them toward. He soon discovered that the corridor descended deeper into the island. There, many side corridors and chambers opened up to either side. In one place the wall seemed of a different consistency, but as a bat he could not examine it further. At the end of his exploring he found two anthropoids slowly roaming the corridors below, speaking softly in the tongue of the Zultayan. Finding his way back to his comrades he told them of his findings and there was much shaking of heads and sounds of despair. At that time, more than one person noticed a change in the room and all turned toward Tressta to see the light spell starting to fade.

Continued in Escape from Ūlaryalok.

Characters

• Dammon Shroudson = 0 CPs
• Jak of Cænden = 0 CPs
• Tressta Drynsval = 0 CPs
• Zildara = 0 CPs
• Balàdâsha (Cook) = 0 CPs
• Dorkun = 0 CPs
• Ērēus of Amra = 0 CPs
• Familiar = Unkn.
• Graiç of Mazzam = 0 CPs
• Paldòr Batrūlan (Ship Captain) = 0 CPs
• Zêla ma Ler = 0 CPs

Played: 10 Jul 2004