Cave of the Seven Suns, Passage of History; HfU: T-12
The Passage of History
This second passage, which turns left from the entrance passage way, is made in much the same way as the entrance hallway - a seamless, shiny and buffed red and brown rock that now shifts to a white and pink rock as you move towards the middle half. The air is stale, but only annoyingly so, and your lantern is the only light available here. You find no signs of wear, or potential traps or secret doors as you go. The the rock is seamless, unmarred and beautiful to behold.
Upon approaching the the middle half of this passageway you see that both sides of the passage depict with amazingly detailed pictures of what you think to be a historical account of the fall of the Elders. To accompany the pictures are words in an elder dialect of celestial (similar to the one found at the entrance) along the bottom of the pictures.
Historical Account
The pictures and words of this hallway seem to cover the ancient times when the mortals of this plane worshiped the elders. The Elder, Zharan, turned the mortals against the pantheon of Elders in a successful attempt to claim all of their power for himself. His spawn are the dragons and their half-bred bastards. They are imbued with a portion of his divine essence and they alone are meant to be worshiped.
Zharan's mortal followers worked for many, many years to foment unrest and rebellion within the ranks of faithful of the other Elders. The fateful day came when the the spawn of Zharan attacked and destroyed as much of the temples dedicated to the followers of the other Elders as they could, as well as the most devout of their faithful and imposed their draconic will upon them. His half-dragon spawn lead his militaries into the civilized worlds to impose their Zharan's will by destroying all that they could of the memory of the Elders. They bribed the peoples who were cooperative and memory wiped those that were not. They did everything within their power to erase the memory of the other Elders from history and the reckoning of the mortals.
They destroyed the other Elders' followers and broke their loyalty with fear and torture. The unrest and rebellion wrought from the works of the subversive followers of Zharan worked to his favor as his silver-tongued evangelists worked the mobs to assist their new draconic overlords in their efforts to over thrown the supposed tyranny of the Elders, much to their lament later on. Their new draconic overlords were ruthless tyrants forcing sacrifices and enforcing martial law and essentially slavery upon their subjects.
A few of elves and dwarves, who are referred to as the Remembered, saw what was coming and prior to the overthrow moved as much of the Elders' lore to different safe places in the world so that the knowledge of the Elders would not be lost to time. The Calarat of Fire, the Tomb of Tsephyr, Ascalon's Citadel, Martyrs Peak, Vale of the Wilds, the Spire of the Shade, and the Heart of Oblivion are the places to which the Remembered sequestered the collective knowledges of the Elders.
As time moved on some of the Dragon Lords became less tyrannical and more just and kind causing a rift to form between the progeny of Zharan and a weakening of his hold on the mortal realms. As this happened the Remembered forged a similar coup as progeny of Zharan had done millenia before. The Remembered started an underground movement to resist the mostly tyrannical rule of their draconic overlords and fomented rebellion and spread the word of the Elders.
There is a golden symbol of a eight pointed star at the top of this 'historical account'.
More
As you stare at the what is said and written here Elvar has padded off and returned. You are not sure how much time has transpired as you read, decipher, and absorb the collective knowledge present here. The celestial and draconic form of writing is becoming a little bit easier for you to work with as you get more practice and see its usage.
The elf returns ever so quietly and says quietly "We are not alone Derin." He smiles that familiar smiles that says he is ready for combat (or avoid it) and continues "There are quite a few creatures towards the back of the next chamber, which is huge. I did not see them clearly at all; mostly heard them make noises of sorts. I did not want to bring down a swarm of creatures without you being prepared. There is a huge statue or something in what I think is the center of the chamber, as well as something lightly glowing to the back of the chamber.".
Knowledge Notes
You have done well with your knowledge checks - you needed a 20 for most of these and a 15+ for one and you got two out of seven. Yea!!
Your research and booklore has you remembering reading about the Calarat of Fire and Ascalon's Citadel. The Calarat of Fire was as holy place dedicated to one of the Elders and was said to be found in a desert somewhere. Ascalon's Citadel was said to be the citadel of an elven wizard of great might that was to be found deep in a great forest somewhere down south.
