[While Fenrir was getting into a bar fight in Westgate, I was still pouring loads of summoned critters into the caves of the mind-flayers]
DAY 493 (9th Flamerule) (July) cont ...
More beasts were summoned, two more apes, one fiendish wolf, then packs of regular wolves until we had all run out of spells.
Again we advanced into the cleared areas, finding two dead ogres, a dead doppleganger and more dead mindflayers.
We also found treasure, gold and other coins, gems, scrolls and potions.
The caves opened up into a huge cavern, the size of a cathedral, and we could see massive crystals everywhere, in lumps as big as houses and growths as big as tree trunks. Jiggle was sent forward, from the entrance to take a look, while we others stepped back into the tunnel.
On her return she reported that she saw a bunch of mindflayers gathered around one of the massive crystals, doing something arcane to it.
We had no magic left for another assault though, so we left them to it for today and went back outside to rest.
DAY 494 (10th Flamerule) (July)
In the morning we snuck back to the huge cave without being blocked or attacked. This far in, our magic barely functioned at all, but summoning was still the safest form of attack against enemies like mindflayers.
Wolves were sent in, a Yeth hound and several apes. Sylvia kept watch and listened to the fighting. Spell after spell failed, nullified by the anti-magic effect of the caves. A mindflayer was killed, then an ogre.
More spells failed and another ogre approached. More dopplegangers lurked further back. It looked dicey for a moment and I considered teleporting out and just going back to Waterdeep, admitting defeat and getting the Temple of Mystra to finish this off.
But I realised we had finally come to the point where we were relying too much on magic and I ordered everyone to start using their bows and crossbows.
This, combined with a lucky Celestial Bison that Sylvia summoned, did the trick. The Bison trampled the ogre and the arrows dealt with the dopplegangers.
I also managed to summon a Flaming Sphere, that together with the bison finally slew the last ogre.
Now Jiggles, armed with the magical bow I had loaned her, came into her own, and one by one she sniped the remaining mindflayers with deadly shots aimed from the shadows.
There were four, she killed one, then another, then the last two rushed at us. Sylvia summoned a Celestial bomb beetle and I summoned three hippogriffs. These only delayed them, but it was enough to give Jiggles time to stick arrows in them too.
The battle was over, so we went over the crystal that they had been so intent on. There was a nether-brain inside it, and judging by the cracks in the glass the mindflayers had been trying to release it.
Out of nowhere a giant black shadowy being - easily 30 feet tall - suddenly appeared and using some mysterious means began to repair the crystal.
After that he turned his attention to the cave and we watched in awe as all the crystal growths receded until only the 'crystal coffins' were left.
The shadow giant was not threatening, so while he attended to his business we wandered the cavern. We could see that there were creatures inside the 'coffins', all sorts of nasty things. Some of them we could tell that - somehow - they were observing us as we passed, which made us very uneasy.
I could feel them probing at my mind, a crushing pressure, and hear them cursing in dead languages and unknown tongues.
After about ten minutes the shadow giant seemed to have finished his tidy-up. It turned and looked at us. I gave it a friendly wave.
It raised a hand and we were frozen to the spot.
'Thank you, protectors,' is said inside our heads. 'Now you must choose a warden from your company.' We asked some questions and gathered that this was a sort of prison and that there must always be a warden.
'What if none of us want this job?' I squeaked.
'For this world and all worlds to remain,' it intoned. 'A warden must be present.'
I could hardly volunteer anyone else, so I mentally stepped forward. There was a surge of power in my head and it was suddenly full of knowledge that I scarcely wanted about this dreadful place and I passed out.
When I awoke I felt great. I felt aware of the entire island, like I was there looking at every part of it at once. Without being told I also knew that there were 66 'floors' below this cavern and from each floor led out six tunnels, each with more of the coffins and more of the prisoners within them. The further down you went, the nastier the prisoners. Up top was bad enough with nether-brains and what-have-you, but at the bottom there were nasties so nasty that they ate demogorgons for breakfast.
The knowledge I had of Mid Point Island came from a blessing called 'Intellcus.' Other blessings included a near doubling of my Druidic power, but the Shadow told me that this only happened while I was on the island.
I could summon the shadow whenever I wanted, on the island, so I called him Alfred, as he had to be called something. He told me that this place had been created for the worst and most evil of creatures in all of existence, many years ago, a sort of 'dark well of the weave' full of fell power. I barely understood what he meant.
Jiggles had discovered a side tunnel and shouted at us to take a look. There was a chamber at the end of the tunnel with floor tiles and pillars that made it look like a teleportation chamber.
Alfred explained: This chamber can be use to teleport to anywhere in Faerune. It is one way though.
He went on to say that the Island was protected with an 'Anti Teleportation Shield'.
He was forth-coming with information, though it was sometimes delivered in an odd sort of stilted way.
From my questioning of him I gathered the following information:
- The Dopplegangers and Mindflayers were indeed trying to free the Nether-brain
- My main duty as 'Warden' was to protect the island
- The 'Blue Phage' had been an unfortunate by-product of the mind-flayers interfering with the crystals that contain the prisoners
- The 'Blue Phage' could now be expected to be receding from all infections sites across Faerune
- There is a sort of aura or something that makes people feel ill-at-ease on the island unless I give them something that I am now calling the 'Mark of Welcome'. All I need do is will it.
We talked (if you could call it that) for much longer, Alfred and I, and some of it was so stomach-churningly terrifying that I am not fain to record it here in ink.
Perhaps one day.
Now I must rest. I has been a long day, with an end to it that I did not expect.
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