BB's Diary #35

Mellsday, 7th of Dusk 212 EoL

Dear Diary,

the predictions I made in my last entry were accurate, sadly, but again I'm getting ahead of myself.
After our father hadn't shown up at around 10 a.m. we decided to continue walking to not raise any suspicion among Czyrkal and his gang. Shortly after our departure, we met Mordek, the dwarf that father ordered to kill me and my brother. Father had sent him again and he was giving us crucial information about the island.
Before we went to the mansion to discuss our plans, we all noticed that Shirel was not himself. He was always behind us, not paying attention, not listening, or communicating... he probably only thinks about his child. I hope he can put himself together once we need him. Oh, and Yelena now has an animal companion as well, Ari a griffin.
Once Mordek told us that the city on Akruzeth was built on old Joghat ruins and that the Joghat used to have a sewer system our plans shifted. We decided to go through the sewers to the palace, thus avoiding the inhabitants as much as possible.
We then teleported onto the island, the buildings were old, decayed, and musty. Trip and I found buildings built on Joghat stones so we all flew over the river to enter one of those buildings. Lucky's thieving skills came in handy here. I made a passage through the stone on the ground into the sewers where it smelled even worse than in the houses. It was just disgusting. All over the walls was some kind of slime... Somehow Yelena thought it would be a good idea to taste it. She almost threw up, hallucinated, and was, like Shirel, very confused.
Not long after her mishap, we found the source of the slime: a beholder was living in the sewers. He was not very cooperative in letting us pass. He wanted our magic items to add to his treasure. We were not so fond of that idea and a fight was inevitable. Shirel was turned into stone. I positioned myself on a small jetty right in the middle of his room, ready to jump in and swim behind him to surprise me. Before I was able to execute my plan, the beholder destroyed the jetty, and I fell into the water and was stuck. I couldn't move, I couldn't swim. Neither my muscle nor my magical power were able to get me out of there. Once Lucky killed the creature, I was able to get out of the water. We looted his treasure before getting out of that room and exploring the sewers some more.
We found lots of runes, mostly Joghat once, some were from the beholder. Mordek guided us further through the sewers and found where they exit the palace. Unfortunately, a stone wall blocked the passage. We decided to rest in the mansion for one more night before entering the palace.

Ansday, 8th of Dusk 212 EoL

Early the next morning we continued our journey after Lucky had finished his book. I made a passage through the stone wall and we found ourselves in the middle of a well. We flew out of it and ended up in the empty yard of Czyrkal's palace. We immediately found Czyrkals's throne room. After a hallway, there were two circular levels. On the first one, the three remaining apprentices were keeping up some magical cylinder around them where souls flew all around it. On the second level, Czyrkal was waiting for us.
A big fight was about to start... with Czyrkal putting an invisible magical cage around us. Not being aware of it, Ken transformed himself into a T-Rex, smashing us all into the walls of that cage. Shirel was crashed the worst and fell unconscious. Trip had the good idea to cast a anti-magic field on himself, granting us passage out of the cave, except for Shirel and Ken, who couldn't get out on their own.
Now the real fight began. Lucky found out the hard way that it wasn't smart to run through that soul wall, as he touched it he collapsed to the ground and it seemed like his soul was absorbed into the wall. Yelena then had the brilliant idea of teleporting past the soul wall next to Czyrkal and struck him with her sword, which the latter didn't like as he simply told Yelena to die. I could feel the power in that word, and didn't see Yelena afterwards. I shot a few arrows at Czyrkal. He threw two green magical beams at me. I was hurt badly, and as I was falling down, I saw my hands and arms disintegrate and that is the last thing I remember of that day.
Apparently, the others fought bravely and we were lucky to have Mordek with us. In the end, they won the fight.

Aersday, 9th of Dusk 212 EoL

I woke up the next day in my room in the mansion. It was clear that Mordek had brought me back to life. I humbly thanked him. Lucky was standing next to him, and seemed very relieved and happy to see me alive. In the corner of my eye, I saw a mattress on the floor next to my bed. Lucky had spent the night... Maybe there is hope left to get back together? I don't know...
I felt terrible. Being dead for a day is really not something I'd recommend to anybody. As happy as Lucky seemed to have me back, it was quite clear that something else was bothering him. He warned me that Trip was not feeling well at all and that Yelena had lost an arm. I was quite confused but did not get any more information at that point.
I decided to pay a visit to my brother. He opened the door and fell around me, taking me into his arms. He was devastated. For a long time, we just sat in his room before Trip told me part of what happened. After the fight was over, he messed up and Yelena and Shirel risked their lives to save him. Trip was crushed after I died and didn't pay attention. He opened a door without taking precautions and triggered a trap. Another grren beam shot out of the door and disintegrated him as well. Shirel, who witnessed what had happened, grabbed the shard, that Trip had and which was still intact, and tried to bring Trip's body back. Yelena came to his help. Together, they managed what seemed impossible. The shard and Yelena's arm are gone, they somehow transformed into Trip... Now we know: to bring somebody back to life who was disintegrated costs an arm and a leg. Fortunately, we got a 50 % discount this time.
Trip lost all his belongings, he ended up with nothing but the stuff he gave Ken (who btw also died in that whole process). Now he knows how I felt back in Sigil, when he burned all my stuff. I'll never tell him this, that would be inappropriate.
We met the others at breakfast. Yelena's arm was really gone, like the whole thing. She tried to cheer Trip up. I was then informed, that Shirel found out, from the dead apprentices, that his child and former girlfriend are in Hispalis. This means there is another stop on our journey.
We then went out of the mansion to search Czyrkal's palace and met Strahd, who apparently already searched Czyrkal's workroom. To not get further into trouble, we let him go. If necessary we can still deal with him at a later moment in time.
We went through the door that nearly cost Trip his life and found a huge library with millions of books and at the end of it was his workroom. Of course, we stayed in that library for an eternity. Mostly due to the magic globe that stood in the middle of the library. The guys were looking at all the books and through every corner of the workroom. It was soooooooo very long and annoying. The only good thing that happened was when I walked past Lucky, I whispered into his ear, reminding him about the first time we were together in a library. The time we shared our first kiss. I'm pretty sure he looked at my ass afterward.
Yelena and I played some cards while waiting for the others to finish up. They got a lot of new magic items, which is why we're now in the mansion again. We won't stay long here, we'll leave soon, trying to get the shard and leave this island asap.

I'm so glad that I'm alive. That my brother is alive. That my friends are alive. There's still something bothering me though... How did they bring me back to life? I'm pretty sure that Mordek does not know how to do that, once the body is gone. I need to find that out.
Hoping we'll survive this second part of our adventure on Akruzeth,

Love, BB <3