As the companions continued to trudge on down the shoreline, perhaps the fact that the smell was SOMEHOW getting worse was a thought that was drowned out by the echoes of the sobbing boy. A last cry of "Dann-neeeeee" filled the ears of the party before the sobbing was swallowed up by the squelching sounds of the filth river along with the occasional sound of scraping or buckling metal. The almost cave-like interior began to narrow and shrink as the shoreline did too, but soon, the party again did find the familiar sandstone walls and a large archway representing the architecture of Is'Merith once again. Mina had heard about the Per'at department of waste management... Apparrently designed to give the disabled and the mentally ill new purpose and to get them working for a greater cause. YES it was council run.
There were even SOME disabled waste management employees in the noble ring who were likely the lucky ones. Representatives for the cause, seen to plant trees and tend the gardens, sculpt murals out of old junk from the recycling 'centres'. This place was the reality of what the department was and more and more Mina wondered just how small the evils her brother had committed compared to the bigger picture. It seemed that very little about Is'Merith was true. That everything GOOD about it was hollow, like the honeycombes of mines surrounding it. Was this why there was a lack of druids in the land? What would happen if one of the party learnt such ways? Would they attract unwanted attention? Disappear?
In fact, the more that Mina thought about it, the more it concerned her. She knew and DINED with wizards of such power that they could cast spells as potent as WISH! Wizards who, for entertainment would summon and taunt powerful DEMONS in front of people, allowing children to throw food at them or forcing said creature to juggle. Those dinner parties always freaked her out, but then, those same wizards would then ve seen curing the sick or building a new community service facility of some kind.
Mina remembers the story of the desert, that Ismerith has always been a mining city afflicted with war, that when the free armies came though, they cast blight spells in the thousands, killing everything as they went. Sickeningly, she now finds herself questioning what is more evil, a man or woman who has a choice to be good or evil and chooses evil, or a demon that was simply created so?...
The looming archway overhead appears to be 80ft wide, the very top must be about 60ft from water level, the lowest part on either side must be about 20 foot lower, 40 above water level. 10 foot wide walkways run along each end making the total width of the filthy river itself about 60ft.
As the party begins to move along the walkway, they begin to notice overflow drainage tunnels 10ft by 10 ft and what appear to be stairways on each side that run parralel to each other, slight variation in the brickwork on the archway overhead indicating that these are probably service tunnels for moving from one side to another.
After about 15 minutes, The party is also able to establish that for the filth to continue to flow downward, it must be descending deeper into the ground, though probably only at a very small rate not noticable to the naked eye.
The party stops at this point as Shen has not been able to find any tracks neither human nor "giant rat" in the area. The feeling of dread attached to this dreadful place is only exagerrated too by the lack of any lead to follow. Perhaps some of the side tunnels could be explored more, or the party could go further in OR they could also ask around Peer'At to see if they can find out further where the red death victims run off to. The party should try and work out what to do next....
At this point, Isaac turns his eyes to the filth and notices a bloated corpse laying face-down in the water. What disturbs him isn't so much the corpse itself, but the fact that it appears to be moving, like it's struggling to stand up. He also notes it does not appear to need to breathe, it just... Keeps... Slowly floundering...
