Test Of Sacrifice

After some soul searching, Chul chooses to jump into the plasma. The rest of the group watches as Chul's body begins to disintegrate before their eyes...but, as if time is slowing, the pieces of Chul's body slowly stop spreading apart and then draw back together, leaving an alive and breathing Chul on the floor before it. Chul experiences a series of long vision in a few split seconds. The only physical changes to Chul are to his left eye, which now is a small candle-sized flame with small wisps of smoke rolling off. When Chul is fully awake and back with it, he knows that divine intervention has saved him from annihilation, such a boon is not to be granted again.

Chul can feel something has changed, a reservoir of power that he isnt sure how to get at. With some experimenting he finds he can see things if he concentrates, such as Snake in a desert travelling with what appears to be a caravan to some fantastical city, Maavu in Cauldron rebuilding his wrecked warehouse, Kristof having an argument with a Wee Jas acolyte, and Jenya being disciplined by a superior. Chul tries to view several other people, but fails...unsure if its his lack of knowledge on how to use his new-found power, or a limitation to it outside of his control.

Chul concentrates on the desert and city they saw Snake at, attempting to "teleport" the group their, but nothing happens. Chul concentrates on Cauldron, the picture of the Church of St. Cuthbert in his mind. Like sinking into a deep lake of water, Chul can feel a power wash over him as he loses control and the group feels a sickening sensation as things go hazy and they all find themselves in the church standing in front of Jenya.

Jenya is shocked, to say the least, and overjoyed to see the group has returned safely along with Alek. She thanks them for Alek's safe return. She explains Skellerang's death and says she attempted to speak with his corpse, but he did not want to speak to her and she was unable to force him to do so. On the side, she speaks to Chul about concerns with the growing rift between Wee Jas and Pelor. Kristof's claims are not totally unfounded she explains, the Wee Jas clerics have become less and less approachable, turtling up inside their citadel. Why, Jenya doesnt know. But she tells Chul that if Kristof needs any help to let her know...Kristof has a bad habit of not asking for help when he needs it.

The group visits Maavu next. He informs them he is forming a loose alliance of like-minded invidivials in regards to the current city government. This loose network of people consists of many people whom the Crimson Tear's would call allies. Maavu tells the group the information he was able to gather from the stolen ledgers. They document much of the taxes diverted toward the half-orc mercs, and to Vhalantru, ear-marked for the Church of Wee Jas in return for services they were to provide, such things as labor and magical resources. The ledger doesnt go into details, its just line items. Almost all the money gathered by the higher taxes since around the Flood Festival have gone to various projects under Vhalantru's name, he also finds Rhiavadi's name besides Vhalantru's in many cases. There are a few exceptions, including the founding of the MTA, which appears to be Navalant's project.

With this information, Maavu has informed the Striders, who are now monitoring Vhalantru and Rhiavadi's house, and the Church of Wee Jas. Tyro has a contact in the Church of Wee Jas in Sasserine he trusts whom he has queried about the local church's behavior.

Returning to the Drunken Morkoth, Morgan offers the hired hands a more permanent employment opportunity. Only Kreed accepts, the others take their pay and return to their respective lives for the time being.

Chul visits Kristof at the Tower of Pelor and finds Baleson (one of the missing miners) waiting for him. Baleson claims to have seen a vision of Chul talking to the sun god. The sun god promised Baleson that Chul could cure him of his sickness. Chul can see sitting in the gut of Baleson, a dark curled up creature. As Chul approaches, the blackness unfolds and grows becoming a full sized jaguar. Chul can clearly see the creature latched onto Baleson, as Baleson screams and writhes in agony, his body transforming into some half human and half jaguar hybrid. The creature that now is Baleson jumps at Chul, clawing and biting. Chul grapples the black creature he sees and rips it off of Baleson. The blackness erupts into flames and roars and thrashes about in Chul's arms. The flaming creature turns and latches on to Chul. The flames subside and Chul finds he now has the creature curled up inside of him, but instead of blackness its a bright flaming ball.

Unsure of what make of it all, he helps Kristof attend to an unconscious Baleson. Chul decides to take his leave, and as he leaves the temple he runs into the group of orphans who now live as altar boys at the church. One of the boys has a curled up ball of blackness in the rough shape of a bear sitting in his gut. Chul decides to leave it alone for now, and queries Kristof to see if he has seen anything odd with the child. Kristof says no besides an enormous appetite. Chul tells him to keep a close eye on the child, and takes his leave.

The group faces a few days of rest and relaxation...

The Black Flame

Shortly after settling down to have a long rest, those on watch hear the low distant sounds of sceaming and wailing issuing forth from the walls around them. While a little unnerving, the watch continues, and on the second watch of Chul and Snake, the sounds get louder and louder as if getting nearer and nearer. As Chul and Snake intently watch the stairs, which seems to be the direction the sounds are coming from, Snake spots out of the corner of his eye a featureless human-shaped creature pulling itself up out of the earth and reaching for Chul. Miniature ghostly apparitions float over its body, the source of the screaming and wailing.

Snake attacks the creature, and cries out an alarm to wake the rest of the party. Salla, as he wakes up, has another one of the creatures attempting to slam its balled fists into him. The creature attacking Chul successfully connects and Chul staggers about as one of the ghostly apparitions floating about the faceless creature, flies into Chul. A white ghostly face imposes itself over Chul's as it screams and wails. Chul is able to recover, but the experience is hideous, leaving behind awful memories of death and pain from someone else.

The group fights these featureless creatures, slaying one and routing the second. As the group recovers from the battle, a chilling voice, with no discernible source, fills the room. The voice says little of sense, babbling about the "surprise" its pets had found.

It is decided to attempt to finish resting, which happens with no more interruptions, other then the constant and unnerving wailing that can still be heard. The group begins to prepare for what they believe will be a fight just up the stairs. During this time, they realize Kara'fen is gone.

Leading the charge is Salla, who runs up the stairs and into a 60' by 30' cave, in the middle a large black flame envelops a plate-clad black skeletal creature. Between the skeletal creature and the stairs is a moving pile of rocks in a roughly humanoid shape. Salla and Snake move in, with Snake leaping into melee with the skeletal creature (a silence spell cast on his person). When Morgan moves into the chamber, the rocks charge at him. The rest of the group piles into the cavern.

Two manticores appear from nowhere in the middle of the cave, and from smaller tunnels leading off the side of the larger chamber, several malformed (demonic in appearance) apes and boars charge out surrounding the group.

While the party whittles through the fodder, Kara'fen makes an appearance throwing a bolt of lightning that bounces through the party. Chul, suffering major burns from a shield of fire that wraps up Kara'fen, manages to stun him and then uses Alakast to take him down and pulp his head.

Meanwhile, Snake and the skeletal creature dance about, and once the creature gets out of the "bulls-eye spell", I mean the silence spell, it chants a foul curse and Snake disappears. Unfortunately, it cant stand up to Morgan hacking at it with his giant sword and is cut down.

After Salla puts on his thinking hat, the best he comes up with is that Snake was dismissed from Occipitus back to their "home" plane...somewhere.

At the other end of the chamber with the black flame they find another set of stairs leading up. These lead them to what can only be the eye socket of the giant white skull. A geyser of plasma spouts out the red burning material that makes up the sky of Occipitus. Nearby stands another wrapped corpse in decorative full plate. It welcomes the group to the final test, the Test of Sacrifice, and tells them they must sacrifice an ally to the geyser to become the new ruler of Occipitus.

Whom shall be sacrificed to claim the final prize?

Plain Of Ulcers

After resting for a few days in the small clearing, the party begins to follow the lantern once more. Leaving the small bone forest, they find themselves on the other side of Occipitus from where they were before. The lantern points straight at the ominous giant skull in the middle of Occipitus.

A day worth of travel later, small pothole-sized pools of acidic liquid, that smells and looks like blood, begin to dot the landscape. As the party draws closer to the skull, the "ulcer" pools grow larger and deeper, some even act like geysers, spraying the liquid about.

The next day leads to more of the same, even larger "ulcers". These pools of liquid are very deep, roughly 50 feet in most cases, with several underwater tunnels connecting them. The solid land to walk on becomes more like several land bridges that cross the plain of "ulcers" about the skull.

As the day nears an end, and the group nears the skull, Snake picks out a black slithering shape move along a far-off pool. He can pick out the black scales, giving him a guess the creature might be some sort of snake or lizard. Snake verbally warns the rest of the group to be on their toes, which pays off when a large black shape comes hurtling out of one of the underwater tunnels in a ulcer pool. The shape unfolds its great black wings and unleashes a wave of acid from its giant maw...a black dragon is looking for its next meal!

Some of the group attempts to get out of the way, some move up into swinging range, and others stay back at a range to pepper it from a safe distance. The dragon backs up into the pool, seemingly immune to the acidic effect, and sinks back down into the blood-like fluid, swimming back through the tunnel it came from.

Snake, Chul, and Tiluk, the colorful winged serpent they rescued, move quick enough to keep up with the dragon as it swims from pool to pool through the network of tunnels that interconnects them. Modisto flies overhead, faster than the others, he is able to position himself ahead of the dragon and fling a volley of magic missiles into it.

The dragon reacts and shoots up out of the pool, pushing out its wings to gain flight and meet Modisto as it breathes another wave of acid. A burned Modisto cringes as claws and teeth reach him, but luckily his mirror image takes the brutal bite as the claws rip up the real Modisto. Snake reaches the pool where Modisto is quickly becoming a tasty snack, and shoots an arrow through the dragon's head. The dying dragon falls out of the air and splashes back into the pool below it.

Through some careful searching, the party finds what they believe to be the dragon's hoard, recovering a couple thousand pieces of gold, some large gems, and a magical mace. Deciding thats enough for one day, they take a long rest and continue traveling the last few hours to the base of the skull.

The beam of light from the lantern shifts to point into a pool at the front of the skull...directly at a tunnel under the pool that appears to lead under the skull. Next to the pool a raven-winged man lies on the ground, flat on its back. It struggles weakly against several iron spears that have pinned its wings to the ground, then lies still.

The man is nearly 8-foot-tall with a lithe frame. His long, feathery wings are jet black. Tattered robes cover very little of his body, but a mass of scars, welts, and rough black spiral tattoos cover almost every inch of skin. The wounds on his wings are streaming blood that seemingly has flecks of gold in it.

Salla and Tercival administer some healing to the creature, and the iron spears are removed from his wings. Helping him up, he thanks the party and introduces himself as Saureya. Saureya answers several questions...

Q: Who did this to you?
A: A rakshasa and his bodyguard - a giant. They're on their way inside the skull. Presumably they're trying to pass the Test, too.

Q: What's with the tattoos?
A: Admiarchus found it amusing to keep me around as a prisoner. He thought it would be amusing to torture me repeatedly and put these blasphemous sigils on my flesh.

Q: You know Kara'fen?
A: We met years ago at the Cathedral of Feathers. He was wondering why he couldn't enter the antechamber, much less get to one of the doors. So I told him: Adimarchus wanted to keep anyone born of the Lower Planes from becoming the next ruler of Occipitus. Adimarchus was always hopeful that this successor would be another fallen angel or someone formerly of the light.

Q: What do you know about the Test of the Smoking Eye?
A: I helped Adimarchus create it. He confided in me throughout its constructions; after all, I was exactly the kind of successor he wanted. I was able to introduce a flaw into the test...I always dreamed of rescue. The first two parts simply point you to the final part, the one that really matters. I suspect the rakshasa is exploiting that flaw.

Q: Why are you here?
A: I was waiting for you. After all these years, I had a mild curiosity about the people who were going to pass the Test of the Smoking Eye. Now that curiosity is satisfied.

Q: What's the third test?
A: I'm not telling. The rakshasa tried to force the same information from me. He failed. I'll say this - knowing in advance what the test is won't help you prepare in any meaningful way. You could succeed. You could fail. You could turn your back on the whole idea. I'm not going to meddle in your fate. My own fate is trouble enough.

Q: What happens if we pass the test?
A: The very fabric of Occipitus's reality is yours to command - you do know how to control an entire layer of the Abyss, don't you? No? Well, I'd humbly suggest a line of academic inquiry, then. Like every other part of the Abyss, Occipitus responds to power, and the more powerful you are, the more Occipitus will bend to your will.

Q: Any advice?
A: I'd catch that rakshasa, unless you want to grow whiskers when he recreates Occipitus in his image.

Tiluk talks with Saureya, and decides to join with him, leaving the party, but not before thanking them for their aid. Saureya leaves with Tiluk, leaving the party to swim through the submerged tunnel and the acidic waters.

The swim is short, and the tunnel leads upwards and out of the fluid. The large circular tunnel continues, heading upwards and switching back on itself to the right every 100 feet or so.

Jonl leads the way, and after several switch backs he hears voices around the upcoming turn. Sneaking up to the corner, he peers around to see a humanoid tiger leaning against the wall of the tunnel having a discussion with a giant. The tiger man carries a metal lamp that emits a beam of light up the tunnel. The giant has red hair and black skin, is covered in blackened plate and wields a gigantic sword.

The rest of the party hears Jonl's report and a plan of attack is agreed upon. Modisto leads the attack by trying out his new ability to summon a storm of ice...which proves quite effective, layering the tunnel in a slippery sheet of ice. Jonl shoots a silence arrow into the rakshasa. Chul leads the charge with a stunning attack against the giant, that actually works!

The raksasha pulls the arrow out of himself and snaps it into two, throwing both pieces down the tunnel. Snake manages to bat the silenced piece of arrow back at the creature, and a game of keep the raksasha in the silence begins..meanwhile Chul continues to pull off stunning attacks against a giant...

The first of several waves begins to makes it way up the tunnel. Like a constricting throat, the tunnel tightens up its length, creating a wave effect on the floor, and causing several of the party to fall. Morgan and Salla end up having the worst trouble with this, finding themselves being swept past the battle as they ride wave after wave down the tunnel.

While the giant remains stunned from Chul's attack, the rest of the party attacks it with everything they have, finally bringing the giant down after it gets one swing of its sword off on Chul. The rakshasa, out of the silence now that the arrow has been carried down the tunnel by the waves, turns invisible and begins to move back down the tunnel. It doesn't make it very far before it is knocked down by a wave, and Snake feels it tumble up against him. The concentrated firepower of the group quickly finishes it.

Continuing to move along the now constantly flailing tunnel, it leads to a throne room, where an ape-like creature made of clay wanders about smashing its fists into the walls and floors. A quick melee is had with a magically enhanced Snake drawing the rage of the creature.

Thoughts of rest are had...

Plain Of Cysts

The single illuminated door at the other end of the web-filled chamber is opened, and the group enters a smaller chamber decorated with small tin bird cages hanging from chains of various heights throughout the room. At the other end of the chamber, next to a door, is a bird-like humanoid standing up inside a circle of silver dust.

The creature begs the party to release it from its prison, the ring of silver dust. It explains it fell to the Abyss with the chunk of Celestia. It was placed in this room ages ago by Ardimachus shortly after the fall, for what purpose it does not know. The party decides to sleep on the decision and leaves the creature trapped in the small circle of dust. After a long rest, they attempt to test if the creature can read the books they found in the library above, and are satisfied enough with the result to push aside a small amount of dust setting the creature free. With mixed emotions of shock, fear, and glee, the creature flees from the party and its prison.

Continuing on, the party enters a chamber split by a raised platform on one half where a iron lantern sits. Splitting the room in half are floating red sigils. Employing a "mage hand", Modisto grabs the lantern from the other end of the room, and brings it to himself. After a bit of experimenting, Morgan picks up the lantern by the metal rod attached to it with a chain, and a beam of light leaps out and points to the door out of the chamber. Following it, they party is led back out to the guardian of the test who claims they have passed the Test of Judgment and the lantern will take them to the next test.

Up the stairs and out of the cathedral they find that the beam of light points past the cathedral and through more of the celestial rubble. A discussion is had in regards to discarding Kara'fen, much to his annoyance, but in the end he stays and the group finds themselves leaning on him as their guide on the journey again. They party rests in the cathedral before departing and while they remain unmolested, Salla and Chul share a cryptic vision during their sleep.

Travelling once again, Kara'fen leads the party through the landscape, avoiding several obstacles and making good travel time. They travel for five days, and on the fifth day they arrive at the Plain of Cysts. The plain is covered with hundreds of large (man-sized and bigger) cyst-like protrusions from the ground itself. Kara'fen explains that a large host of Celestia fell here and died. Occipitus wants to absorb their dead bodies, and each cyst is home to a dead Celestian, a grave of sorts while Occipitus attempts to deal with the foreign food it wants to consume.

The lantern begins to point in odd directions, the beam of light turning a full 90 degrees in seemingly random directions as they follow it through the plain. Stopping at a cyst that Modisto has detected magical auras inside of, the lamp flashes brightly and half the party finds themselves back outside of the plain. The transported half catches up with the other and they continue through the plain, this time intent on not stopping and not disturbing the cysts.

As they slowly twist and turn their way through the plain following the noncommittal light, they wander too close to a pack of large winged drakes with unfortunate venomous stingers. The drakes flock to the party, and while Morgan continues moving with the lamp, the rest deal with the drakes. In the end, the only complication is a paralyzed Snake, which Chul picks up and carries with him as the group continues to follow Morgan and the lamp.

More disorderly traversing leads them past a cyst where they can see a brightly colored snake inside, and, by chance, a twitch of life! Salla and Tercival check it out while everyone else follows their beaming guide. They easily cut open the cyst, its film-like exterior parted with a stroke of a blade, and find buried inside the jelly-like goo, a large snake with rainbow feathered wings. Several cuts and bruises cover its body, and as they wipe the goo away the wounds begin to seep blood. Salla and Tercival ply their trades as best they can, dumping all of their various prayers of healing upon the creature. It awakens with a sudden reaction of confusion and hostility. They manage to soothe the creature's concerns and after explaining to it where it is and how it got there, the creature follows them while discussing the questions of its new home.

While Salla keeps busy talking with the serpent's voice in his head, Jonl hears a woman giving orders several cysts away from the moving group. Modisto and himself investigate, to find a woman and three men having just torn open a cyst, ripping the head off of its occupant, a dead angelic creature. As they watch the grave robbers, the lamp turns direction again and begins leading the rest of the group directly toward the desecrated site. Jonl decides to start things off with a bang and tosses the rest of the golden orbs on the necklace they found at the woman and men, engulfing them in fire. The burned men each drink a vial, disappearing from sight, while the woman begins to make prayers to her god, which Modisto recognizes as prayers to Wee Jas.

Snake is given the ability to see invisible objects, but it doesnt help Chul who gets ambushed by two invisible assailants. While Snake takes care of the third, the rest of the group quickly takes down the two on Chul, the intense burning they suffered has left them severely weakened. Meanwhile, Jonl attempts to attack the woman from behind, but she turns the tables and uses magic to hold Jonl in place. A flying Modisto shoots missiles of arcane energy at her, and she retaliates by attempting to dispel the spell keeping him aloft, luckily she fails and Modisto avoids a gory fall. By this time, Snake has made his way to the priestess and his swords quickly determine her fate.

Quickly looting the bodies, and picking up the corpse of the woman, they continue following the lamp. Without any warning, the lamp flashes again and the entire group finds themselves in a clearing in the middle of a thick forest of bone. Standing on the edge of the clearing is another armored and wrapped walking corpse which congratulates the party on passing the Test of Resolve and directs them to follow the lamp to the next test.

Cathedral Of Feathers

Kara'fen makes his way through the crowded forest of chalk-white "bones" jutting from the ground. Sight is restricted, and Kara'fen makes several stops to regain his bearings. Jonl is able to easily climb up the bone protrusions and view the surrounding forest.

After spending a night in the woods, the group approaches the edge of the Demon Fields and the beginning of the celestial rubble they must cross to the Cathedral of Feathers. A roaring scream of pain is heard through the woods, in the direction of the celestial rubble. Jonl climbs up to witness a scene taking place a short distance away, at the edge of the celestial rubble ahead.

A muscular humanoid with the features of a lion is being tortured by a squat humanoid creature whose skin drapes over it like it were melting off the bone. Overseeing the torture is a large toadish creature with clawed hands and a gaping maw of razor-sharp teeth. Several more of the smaller creatures with draping skin are in the vicinity. Obvious signs of a recent fight are visible, especially long red claw marks on the giant toad creature. Jonl knows from the group's talks with Kara'fen that the smaller creatures are called Dretch, and the larger toadish creature is a Hezrou.

After Jonl reports his findings, the group decides to charge into the fray while the creatures are wounded. Snake leads the charge, brightening the battlefield with his shield and blinding several of the dretch. As the skirmish begins, the dretch begin to unleash vile smelling gas that incapacitates those unfortunate enough to breathe in a lungful of the nasty substance. Jonl unties the lion-man and witnesses the terrible wounds of his torture, several fingers and toes have been cut off, a sort of "de-clawing" they interrupted.

The battle is over relatively quickly as the wounded creatures fall. The lion-man introduces himself as Leoness and thanks the group for saving him from further torture. He leads the party to his lair inside the celestial rubble where they can safely rest and tend to their wounds. On the way, Leoness answers several questions about his origins, his current situation in Occipitus, and his knowledge of the test of the smoking eye.

After spending a peaceful night in the dark (in comparison to attempting to sleep in the bright red light above), the group departs from Leoness. He offers them a parting gift, a cold iron spear from Celestia, a weapon to aid them on the test and their travels.

Picking their way through the mounds of rubble, the group arrives at the ruins of a once mighty cathedral. Only the first floor of the cathedral remains intact, the upper floors having long ago crumbled and fallen. Jonl scouts it out, climbing up on the roof to look through large gaping holes in the ceiling.

Jonl finds that the cathedral floor is broken up into an entry hall, a large main sanctuary, and two smaller side chambers. In the entry hall he finds two creatures with the body of a giant spider and the upper torso of an elf, and a large open-faced pit in front of the stone doors to the outside. One of the side rooms contains massive amounts of debris. Jonl can hear a feminine giggle from the sanctuary, but chooses not to risk taking a look.

After Jonl returns, Morgan decides to go knock on the stone doors, but no one answers. Disappointed that the Abyss isn't as homely and welcoming as he imagined, Snake and Morgan force open the doors. The room appears empty, except for some rubble, with no pit or strange creatures in sight. Prodding about the room, they discover that their is indeed a pit in the room, covered by some sort of illusion to appear as part of the floor.

A second set of stone doors separates the entry chamber from the main sanctuary, which are opened to reveal the rubble-filled sanctuary. At the far end is a statue depicting an obscenely fat biped with the head of a ram. Sitting on the statue's shoulder is a scantily clad, seductive lady with large leathery wings on her back.

As the group enters the room, a streak of lightning crackles across the entry chamber from the fingertips of one of the elf-spider abominations, its body slowly becoming visible, floating eerily in the air with no obvious support. The spider creature follows up with a wall of webs that Salla gets stuck in.

As the portion of the party in the entry chamber comes under attack, the few members of the group in the sanctuary are charged by a large creature with the lower torso of a snake and a more human-like torso. The creature is covered in bright fiery red scales wielding a long fiery spear. The winged seductress emits a giggle and flies along behind the large snake creature. As it approaches it points its flaming spear at the doorway and a wall of fire erupts between the rooms splitting the party in two. Snake charges at the creature, while Morgan unloads frozen bolts into it.

In the entry chamber, the second elven spider has made its appearance with a lightning bolt and web. A few more minor spells are slung as the group flees from the heat generating wall of flame, followed quickly by the elven spider's deaths.

Jonl ends up hiding on the rooftop from the winged seductress as she attempts to lull him out into her waiting arms.

Salla gets brave, and leaps through the wall of fire, wishing the pain would stop as he lands on the other side. The large snake creature puts up a decent fight, but falls from the concentrated attacks of Snake and Morgan. The winged seducer, tired of Jonl's games, approaches Salla. Morgan steps in behind her, and with a single swing of Alakast he drives the staff through the back and out the chest of the demon, killing her instantly.

Kara'fen recommends the group rest up in the cathedral. As the days pass, the group finds things to do, like mess with the second side room, which is some sort of old celestial library. But the books have taken a life of their own and assault any intruder. The group gathers some samples of the books to take. During their time resting they also experience the cathedral's namesake. On occasion, for a short burst of time, the cathedral is whole once again, feathers float in the air, heavenly music plays, and the windows show a green, blissful scene of the wild.

After a few days of rest, the group descends the stairs in the back of the sanctuary, minus Kara'fen who is unable to physically proceed to the test. At the bottom of the stairs they find a square room with a single door to the side. Sitting at an oak desk in the center of the room is a withered, desecrated corpse covered in a strange mix of funeral wrappings and golden filigree armor. The corpse lifts both hands showing their empty, then speaks: "Adimarchus, Most Potent Ruler of Occipitus bids you welcome to the Test of the Smoking Eye. If you are here, then Occipitus lies fallow, without a strong hand to guide its development. Know then that you are a pretender to Adimarchus's throne. If you are worthy, step forward and undertake the Test of Judgment." One withered hand points to the door. "Go through the door, slay the occupant behind it."

The door leads to a chamber containing a series of wooden platforms that form a network of bridges, seemingly connected by fine webbing. A door is at the far end of he chamber. The ceiling is thirty feet above, and the a spike-covered floor is thirty feet below.

An invisible Modisto flies to the other end of the chamber and back to check things out, and manages to not get eaten. Still not desiring to fight something on the wooden platforms, Salla beings to detect evil around the room, pinpointed a single aura in the dark. Snake begins to fire flaming arrows in the direction that Salla directs, and they catch glimpses of some giant spider creature skittering about the ceiling. Jonl beings to fire arrows in the platforms with light spells upon them, to illuminate the area in a more persistent fashion. This seems to cause a reaction as Salla's next detect shows the evil aura directly in front of the group. From under the platforms a giant hideous spider with razor-sharp claws on its legs lurches upward and at the group.

A front line is formed and melee is had. For many members of the group, their weapons prove useless, unable to penetrate the supernatural carapace. With a tight formation those who can hurt the creature slowly bring it down.

Herald Of The Smoking Eye

All that remains of the creature they slew is a pile of a hot ashes. After letting them cool down for a bit, amidst the ashes a large amulet on a black iron chain is discovered. The amulet's face is a large flat disk with an etching outlining a gnoll wielding a triple-headed flail.

The floating ball of gas that is Tercival collects back up into his unconscious self a few minutes after the end of the fight. Shortly thereafter he comes to, a quick look of sorrow passes over his face, and he thanks the party for saving his life. Alek has no idea who or what the creature is, but upon seeing it he felt a holy wrath fill him, nothing like he has ever felt before. He remembers charging at the creature as if seeing it from a third-person perspective, barely in control of his own actions. As the group goes about their post-battle business, Tercival is happy to help with whatever tasks at hand, offering healing wherever it is needed. But he doesnt say much, or offer much in the way of taking the reigns, he seems to be distracted by his thoughts.

Shortly after the battle, as the group begins to question where they are and what they are going to do, a figure is seen making its way over the flats in your direction. Snake can pick out that the figure is about Salla's height, dressed in green robes and wielding some sort of staff with a white flag tied to it, which it waves every so often as it continues walking in towards them. As it gets closer Snake can pick out that it carries several curious knick-knacks secured in various spots that mostly consist of bones, feathers, and rocks. Stitched in black on the front of its robes is a circle split in half. One half is empty, the other half contains a skull with a smoking eye.

The humanoid approaches the entrance. Its skin appears thick and leathery with black blotches dotting it. A hood is drawn over his face revealing little. The creature raises its hands to show it carries no weapons and says "My name is Kara'fen. I will be your guide through the test of the Smoking Eye." "Welcome to Occipitus", he motions around him indicating the harsh red land behind him.

Immediate reactions are to throw detect spells, Salla detecting Kara'fen as an evil presence and several magical auras about his body. Tercival seems to have realized the same thing, stepping back and shouting at Kara'fen, "What are your intentions evil demon?" He draws his glowing white sword.

Kara'fen steps back as well, raising his hands to show he means no aggression, and says "I cannot control my unfortunate heritage, fiendish blood flows through my veins. I swear that I have come here with no harmful intentions...I only wish to see you pass the test, just as much as you wish to return to your city I am sure."

Anglor, seemingly oblivious to the brewing hostility, blurts out "Occipitus...a holy man once told me an epic of an angel fallen from Celestia into the Abyss. The layer he fell on was called Occipitus I believe. The epic ends with the fallen angel the unholy ruler of Occipitus, left to his own bitterness and regret. Not the most warming of epics...more I suppose a fable to teach against betrayal."

Kara'fen nods as Anglor speaks and follows up, "Yes, part of Occipitus was once Celestia but is now corrupted and consumed by the evil of the Abyss. The fallen angel you refer to is the demon lord Adimarchus, the ruler of Occipitus until he vanished fifty years ago. Now Occipitus desires a new master, it is not just simple rock, Occipitus is a living thing. Adimarchus left behind a test, whomever passes this test shall be the new rightful ruler of Occipitus."

"I was told that I would find ten travelers here, with the power to pass the test, and the motive. As the ruler of Occipitus, it would grant you certain boons, including the ability to shift between planes....to send you back to your city....you come from an area called Cauldron, yes? I know of your home. I met another traveler here at this same spot many years ago. My experiences with him were...unpleasant. He called himself Dyr'ryd, a cruel and psychotic demodand native to Carceri. He forced me to lead him to the first part of the test, but he failed before he could even start the test." A brief smile passes over Kara'fen's face as he mentions this. "He spoke of Cauldron often. He seemed to be fascinated with the city."

More talk of returning home is called for.

"It will require all of your efforts to pass the test." He looks at Tercival and Morgan. "I was not told to seek any individual, but a group of ten, and here you are."

"Will you be coming with me then, or will you hide in this cave until you die from starvation or by the claws of the slaad that inhabit these mountains?"

Salla attempts to target Kara'fen with a hold person but the spell fails. Kara'fen returns the favor, charming Salla.

More questions are asked, and a few interesting bits are discovered. Most notably that Dyr'ryd belonged to an organization called the Cagewrights, and that he was very interested in the setting of Cauldron claiming its unique geography and positioning make it an excellent spot to carry out certain planar rituals.

After a couple days of resting, and encountering one of the Slaad creatures that Kara'fen spoke of, the group begins the 100-mile trek to the Cathedral of Feathers.

The first night in the flats is a harsh one as a creature resembling a demonic lion attempts to drag Salla off in the middle of the night. Salla is saved before the creature can run off with him.

Into the second day, they enter deeper into the flats passing herds of creatures resembling bison. One herd begins to stampeded toward the group. Kara'fen urges everyone to run, and wisely everyone pays heed to his words, running out of the path of the stampede. Two giant hippo-like creatures are charging behind the herd...the cause of the stampede. Kara'fen calls them "thunder beasts" and recommends they are best avoided, while the group is tiny compared to the creatures, the creatures would consider the group "edible".

Later in the day Kara'fen finds a "furrow", a small cliff that runs through the flats. Kara'fen takes the party down into the furrow, explaining that they will avoid the majority of hunters this way.

A night is spent in the furrow, and on the third day of travel a second stampede flings itself into the furrow. Kara'fen continues to advise everyone to leave hastily, which is done. Glimpses of a "vrock" are had, pushing the stampede along. The creature is a gastly humanoid shaped vulture. The group seems to not be noticed, and they continue along the furrow.

The furrow finally comes to an end, and Modisto flies up to find another one nearby. The group climbs out the first furrow and into the second, continuing the journey.

At the end of the second furrow, Modisto flies up again to check out the situation. He just happens to make out some movement in the hair-like "plants" that are growing up around the edges of the end of the furrow. Six demons that Kara'fen had described previously as "babalu" are hiding in the growth, apparently aware of the group below and waiting in ambush.

Modisto reports what he finds and a plan is formulated, involving fireballs, flashes of blinding light from Snake's shield, and Alakast's devastating attacks. The fight is long, but no one is hurt too badly. The creatures are covered in an acidic slime that leaves behind a few scars on Morgan's blade.

Nearby is the "Demon Fields", a forest of bone-like structures. Kara'fen leads the party around the edge of the forest and decides to camp there, before leading the party into the Demon Fields.

We Aren't In Cauldron Anymore

With a long break under their belts, the group returns to the mirror but finds that Tercival is no longer in the room. Looking closer at the mirror they can see a small image of Tercival slumped in despair in a small square chamber.

Morgan begins walking along the carved lines in the floor, from colored circle to colored circle. As he nears the mirror, an out-of-breath Tercival comes leaping out of the mirror. Tercival and Morgan do a double-take at each other, and Tercival says "They are coming, defend yourselves!" Backing away from the mirror, with his sword at the ready, two Morgan-sized human-shaped creatures step through the mirror. They appear to be walking mirrors, their skin smooth, reflective, and featureless. In each hand they wield a large jagged splinter of glass. Tercival yells not to look directly at them, so Modisto drops a darkness spell into the room. About this time, Salla uses a detection spell to discover that Tercival is giving off evil vibes.

Melee in the dark ensues, with Morgan smashing a couple of the creatures into bits who step through the mirror and into reach of his sword. However, he gets stabbed multiple times in the back with what feels like a sharp dagger. Jonl, Chul, and Snake finish off one or two more (they are not sure with the darkness) before they get to smashing apart Morgan's backstabbing buddy.

Cut and bleeding the group decides to rest again before messing any more with the mirror.

When they return to the room, they notice the mirror is actually more like a liquid pool then a solid surface. Morgan steps into the mirror and finds himself alone in a small-pentagon shaped room with a violet ambient light, each wall holds another colored mirror. He discovers that he can talk with the rest of the group, even though their voices sound distant and muffled to each other.

After some trial and error, Morgan manages to step through enough various colored mirrors to finally step out into a small stone chamber where Tercival sits slumped against a metal door. Tercival doesn't even register Morgan's arrival, his tear-stained face slumped down and his torn, bloody hands at his side.

Morgan dishes out some of his special medicine (boot camp instructor shouting) to get Tercival to at least talk to him. He finds out that Tercival was shown the mirror by the "silver-skinned archons" after he had drank from their chalice to gain their favor and strength. He first met the archons several months ago, before the Demonskar Ball. Visions of disaster in the horizon for Cauldron, led him to Vaprak's Voice where he encountered them for the first time. The vision told him that he must undertake the "Test of the Smoking Eye" to save Cauldron from the disaster.

During these talks, the rest of the group makes their way through the mirror and into the chamber with Tercival. It appears as if the mirror is a one way trip, so the group tackles the metal door. Morgan's great strength aided by a magical mace make quick work of bashing through the door.

Through the door is a larger chamber, in the middle stand four metal columns, and on the opposite wall an archway leading to what appears to be the outdoors, except that the outdoors glow a hellish red. Watching the metal columns, a small spark of electricity jumps around every couple of minutes.

One by one, the party crosses the room to the other side, timing their movement through the larger chamber in between sparks of electricity. On the other side of the room they are greeted to a sky made of flame, bathing everything in a reddish glow. Off in the distance looms a massive skull: a white monolith the size of a small mountain. Clouds of flame stream from the skull's eye socket and up into the sky. About a half-mile ahead stands a cluster of gently curving white pillars, almost as if giant rib bones had been stuck in the ground. Off to the sides, and surrounding the entire scene are steep mountains, whose tops seem to touch the fiery sky. It stretches around the entire horizon - as if standing inside a vast bowl with a fiery lid. The ground is spongy and wrinkled. It's more like skin than dirt.

As Tercival begins to cross the room there is a huge surge of electricity between the pillars followed by a loud crack and flash of lightning. Standing between the pillars is a creature as tall as a giant. Two of its four arms end with clawed hands, the other two with powerful pincers. Its doglike head is topped with horns, and its violet eyes are cold and dark. A loud barking voice fills the mind of everyone in the room, "Tercival must die! Peace is at an end!"

Like a man possessed, Tercival charges the monstrosity. Tercival's white shining sword carves into the creature, while its massive claws crush his steel-encased body. Tercival is soon tested to his limits and falls limp in the creature's claws. Snake jumps up and knocks Tercival loose from his claws, sending him and Tercival hurtling across the room.

Salla runs over and forces a potion of gaseous form down Alek's throat. The monster raises its claw in the air and draws out a glowing rune, barking out a sinister chant to match. Chul, Snake, Kreed, and Krylscar find themselves befuddled and confused as to where they are and what they are doing. Salla throws a silence spell on Morgan, which unfortunately for Morgan makes him the new target for the beast. Salla follows this up with a dispel magic on Snake, which dispels the magical confusion effect on his mind.

Morgan finally manages to get his hands on Alakast, and swings it down on the monster delivery a thundering blow that echoes through the chamber as chunks of flesh are blown off with the magically enhanced hit. But that is all the hits Morgan gets in as the creature traps him in its claws and crushes the consciousness out of him. He throws the limp body across the room near Modisto. Morgan's broken body stains the stone floor with blood as he is quickly fed a healing potion to keep him from dying to his injuries.

Salla casts a second silence spell, this time on Snake. Snake manages to move around the creature and grab Alakast from where Morgan fell. Snake gets two mighty blows in with the staff before the creature tears through him as well. Chul scoops up the staff, swinging it at the monster's knee. With Pelor smiling upon him, he drives the staff through the knee, exploding it out of the creature's leg.

The heavily wounded monster stumbles over to the gaseous form of Tercival. As he turns his back to the party, Morgan charges in pushing his sword through the monster's body, its tip bursting out of its stomach. The monster crashes to the ground, its body quickly catches flame and begins immolating itself.

The exhausted group relishes in their victory, high fives and shouts of joy are shared...