Journal 21: Caught in the loop

General Summary

Into the fire (4)

After melting in a fiery storm of fire, ye olde band of heroes wake up again to a familiar sight. We try to device a plan this time, but don't get far. A boy happily walks up to us with a pamphlet for the circus. Before even listening to the boy, Maze promptly blasts, and kills, him with an Eldritch Blast. The rest of the team is very surprised. What the fuck? Maze explains his actions: since we keep 'resetting', his hideous action doesn't matter at all. The rest doesn't agree with this reasoning and we argue a little.

A small blue light appears in front of us, and gets steadily bigger. Maze stuffs the corpse of the boy in a bale of hay. The blue light reveals a tiefling guard, whom asks Maze what he did. Maze resists compulsion, and counters with Friends. Maze tells the tiefling that we're all going to die, and that the innocent, little boy was in fact a doppelganger and evaporated when slain. While this happens, the rest of the team slowly moves away with the aid of Pass without Trace. The tiefling teleports together with Maze into the city, to warn the leaders. The rest goes to the druids.

Maze looks for the shady guy he saw in a previous life. He hides under a market stall and casts Invisibility. He overhears a drow talk to an elf with long brown hair and a sick complexion. He follows the drow and tries to extract a password. This fails, and Maze runs towards the tower and tries to get in. He tells te guard he is a traitor and needs to talk to the great wizard. The guard doesn't buy this story, but lets Maze into the hallway to allow him to explain. Maze talks to the guard a little, then gets mind controlled.

Meanwile, the rest of the team talks to the druids. They tell us Elavel is taking care of some plantlife in the area where the firestorm seems to come from. Borae, another druid, joins the conversation and asks us why we are so inquisitive. He tells us that werewolfs also wanted to cure the spellplague. Their temple is at the south side of town and is called the Crescent Temple. The druids are the circle of the veil. We learn that Elavel is done waiting, and was talking to an entity from the shadows, from another plain. It whispers from beyond and is obviously Bad News(tm). Then, the fiery death is once more upon us.

Into the fire (5)

We wake up, and find out the boy Maze blasted is alive again. Maze gives all his gold to the boy, and asks him about Diviath. He then blasts the boy again.

Rael, Nate and Nero go to the west end of the grove. Plants stop growing there, and we can see the glowing dome. There is no life around us, not even bugs. We find a cave (by wolf Rael's scent ability) where Elavel might be. We go in, and get lost in the darkness. Nate uses Light but it flickers out almost instantly. This seems to be a non-natural cave! Rael calls out to Elavel, but only hears whispers. Smokey shadowy tentacles caress our legs. Rael uses Flaming Sphere, and for a brief moment it shows something big. We also see a corpse (Elavel). Nero shouts, and the giant thing wakes up and kills us! Everyone dies! Shynt and Maze don't remember what happened.

Into the fire (6)

We exchange stories. Rael summons horses for transport. We move to the west side of the town, toward a show named Singe & Tide. We are looking for scrolls (of Comprehend Languages), but they don't sell them. They tell us the library might have them. Maze provokes a fight, and Nate gets stabbed. Everyone dies.

Into the fire (7)

Rael summons horses. We mount them and go toward the library. Maze makes snide remarks. Rael dismisses his horse. Maze falls. Haha.

The library is guarded by two snake-people. They carry lanterns. To prove ourselves, we must use magic to snuff out the light in the lanterns. We do so without much trouble and wonder what this actually proves. We enter the library, and are greeted by a Sphynx. It asks us a riddle, which we fail, then get teleported to the outside of the library. The snake-people won't let us in again.

Rael goes into spider mode and crawls into the library unseen. He gets discovered by the sphynx, and they fight. Rael loses in the end, and gets teleported into water. A lot of water. He uses his Ring of Drowning to survive as long as possible.

Meanwhile, the rest goes back into town. Shynt talks to the clocktower guards; they ask him to join them. Maze demands to be let in. He uses magic on the clocktower doors and shatters them, then slaughters the guards. He uses Disguise Self to appear to be a guard. At this time the little 'rebelion' arrives, and Maze gets hit by an arrow and dies.

Into the fire (8)

We go to the library, and get in. We forget the riddle as soon as the sphynx asks us.

Into the fire (9, 10, 11)

We enter the library, and fail the riddle.

Into the fire (12)

We decide to go into teams (Maze & Nate and Nero & Rael). Team Maze fails, but team Nero succeeds! They get teleported somewhere else.

They get welcomed into the Erudite Oasis. Rael asks for a scroll of Comprehend Languages. They banter a little with the librarians, whom seem unconcerned with the regular goings on of the world, or as one might put it, 'disconnected'.

The sphynx tells us another riddle. It tells us the city is broken, and it knows we can fix it. If we get this riddle, it will give us what we need to figure everything out.

We use a Comprehend Languages scroll when the firestorm appears, but learn nothing of value (except that the thing is from the shadow realm).

Into the fire (13)

Dire wolf Rael, Maze riding on his back, are followed by the rest to the shadow cave. We find out the giant thing is a Shadow Dragon. Spooky! Elavel is still alive, and murmers something about being unable to stop it. Also, the Shadow Dragon's name is Nocdrahir. She thinks Morbelgion is a monster and he must be stopped! She performed a ritual in the cave that she learned about in the oasis. Rael and Maze fight the dragon, because it saves us the trip back.

Into the fire (14)

A man looks at us from behind a building. It turns out it is an entity that is not physically there. It seems to know everything, and enjoys our struggles. It tells us we need to figure out the 5 things that cause the loop (see riddle). He wants to be entertained.

From here on out, this entity sometimes appears as different characters (Note: just refer to him as Annoying Andy, or alternatively Irritating Ian The Entity From Beyond). He sometimes messes with us, our magic, our items, our mind, and other aspects of our life.

We get into the library, fail the riddle, and decide to go to the Crescent Temple. There is a giant metal man inside an iced block at the center. Maze blasts it, and dies when giant ice shards pierce his fleshy, fragile body.

Into the fire (15)

We get into the library and succeed the riddle! We ask for help with the shadow dragon. We learn that The keepers are a group that build the city, and lurk below it. We learn where the entrance to their domain is. Meanwhile, Maze is up to his usual tricks. Then, everything resets.

Into the fire (16)

We go to the keepers' lair. The ground has the purple/red stone stuff that we have seen before. We find the body of a dwarf. He has a used up runestone in his posession. Well, had. Hehe. There is a giant ice block covering the way, with an 'I' shaped symbol on it. Rael uses Dispel Magic to get rid of it, and the door melts away. A metal rod sticks in the ground, in the purpleishsortared stone. We move on. It gets hotter. Felicity is sent forward by Maze. She sees lava ahead! In the lava sticks another rod. Another path reveals another dwarven corpse, this one has an empty stone and an 'S' rune. The dwarf also had silverish chalk. We also find a letter from Frederick on the body. It tells us he wants to use the power of the redpurplerocks to create a new rune.

The Entity From Beyond then appears, and tells us we found the rods! Then two walls of power impact on our location, one is green (acid) and one is red (fire). We die a horrible death.