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Menexenus's Age of Worms Campaign Journal
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<blockquote data-quote="Menexenus" data-source="post: 4422664" data-attributes="member: 8951"><p><strong>Sessions 65 & 66: Ma'kar, The Harbinger of Worms</strong></p><p></p><p><em>4th of Coldeven</em>. The party moved to explore the large cavern near the bottom of the shaft. The cavern was enormous - about 90 feet high, 70 feet long, and 120 feet wide. The ceiling was covered with stalagmites and a number of large stalactites poked up out of the water. Along the cavern walls were a few small disconnected landings of flat stone above the water line. Across from the cavern's entrance was a short worked stone hallway leading to stone double doors. There was also one worked stone passageway leading away on each side of the cavern. As they approached the partially submerged cave, Killick noticed that the water in the room was filled with green worms, like the ones in the fountain. </p><p></p><p> While the rest of the party considered how best to proceed, Katawan flew out over the water, landed in the hallway on the far side, and approached the double doors. Just then, two more undead clerics of Kyuss airwalked down from the ceiling, out from behind stalagmites, in Katawan's direction. One of them cast a spell at Katawan while the other one lifted its arms and called out in a foreign language. In response, an enormous green worm rose up from out of the wormy water. It moved towards Katawan, blocking the passageway and his line of retreat. However, Katawan was unphased. He used his ability to slip through the cracks of time and space to transport himself directly back to the rest of the party on the far side of the cavern.</p><p></p><p> Having a clear target, Alexander let loose with his artillery spells. The Overworm absorbed the damage that Alexander dealt, approached the landing, and tried to knock Tarric into the water, just barely missing him. Eventually the party withdrew out of reach of the giant worm. Realizing that it could not get at the party, it submerged itself back under water. The Wormcaller clerics continued attacking the party with ranged spells. Dispel Magic seemed to be one of their favorites. However, when the party concentrated their ranged attacks on just one of the Wormcallers, it was quickly destroyed. The remaining Wormcaller decided to take a cue from the Overworm and withdraw behind a stalactite out of sight of the party. With the party in hot pursuit using their flight powers, the Wormcaller once again summoned the Overworm to emerge from the sea of worms below. It was clear that the Overworm had healed a portion of its damage for the brief time it had been submerged. Again, it tried in vain to strike Tarric, missing him by the closest of margins.</p><p></p><p> In a matter of seconds, the Overworm was destroyed without having ever successfully struck any of the party members. The party breathed a sigh of relief, as some of them still had horrific memories of what it was like to die in the gullet of an enormous worm. With the main threat neutralized, the party ganged up on the remaining Wormcaller and dispatched it quickly. With the battle over, the party investigated one of the side passages and found a small suite connected to three small, spartan living quarters. Alees did her best to find treasure or secret passages but came up empty.</p><p></p><p> Next the party decided to check out the stone double doors that Katawan had originally intended to investigate. Alexander and Norvell waited around the corner while Alees checked the doors for traps. Finding none, the party opened the doors. Inside the 20 by 20 foot room beyond was a six-armed undead spellcaster, the same one that the party members had seen in their visions aiding the mortal Kyuss. Two of its hands were holding rods while the other 4 hands were free for spell-casting. One of the rods began to glow as it shot a Cone of Cold at the party, but all of the party members standing in the hallway were highly Evasive. At the same time, with another hand, it cast Magic Missiles at Tarric. Katawan ran into the room, but as he did, a sword slashed down at him from the corner of the room. There was another undead fighter in the room, like the one that the party had fought before in the temple up above. Tarric came forward to give assistance and found himself face to face with the fighter, whose sundering abilities he feared so much. He quickly withdrew, hoping to preserve his magical swords. </p><p></p><p> The opponents had clearly had time to cast many buff spells and the party members in the hallway were making little headway against them. They called out for Alexander's help. He cast Improved Invisibility on himself and reluctantly flew forward. He noticed that the 6-armed spellcaster was able to see him. It was clear that the combat was going poorly for the party: Grimlock IV was dead, Killick was unconscious and bleeding, Alees was held immobile by some magical effect, Katawan's actions had been slowed, and Tarric was avoiding the sundering fighter at all costs. Alexander called for a retreat. Tarric picked up Alees and flew her to the far side of the large cavern. Katawan took great risk to pick up Killick's body and exit the room, facing many slashes of the fighter's sword in the process. Once the party was out of the room, invisible flying Alexander created a Wall of Force across the passageway to separate the combatants. The party began to exit at top speed. However, when Alexander looked back over his shoulder, he saw that the spellcaster and the fighter had somehow escaped the Wall of Force. The spellcaster continued to shoot ranged spells at the party as they exited, but once they were in the shaft rising towards the surface, there seemed to be no further pursuit.</p><p></p><p> When the party was all together again, Alexander teleported them all to Saltmarsh hundreds of miles away, where they could lick their wounds, re-supply, and strategize.</p><p> </p><p> <em>5th of Coldeven.</em> The party continues recuperation, casting all of Norvell's healing spells.</p><p> </p><p> <em>6th of Coldeven</em>. The party teleported directly to the fountain room in the basement level of the temple of Kyuss. Katawan immediately went exploring some of the rooms that the party had missed the first time, finding large rooms containing stacked corpses. In the first room, the corpses were undecomposed while in the second room the corpses had all rotted to skeletons. But in both rooms the corpses were laid out in a very organized manner, as if stored for later use. After running through these rooms, Katawan found himself at the side entrance to the large cavern. Meanwhile, Killick and Alees flew to the stone double doors which were closed once more. They listened at them and heard nothing. Killick cast a spell that allowed him to reshape the doors. He created a hole in the middle large enough for a man to walk through, but the room was empty. Killick donned his Hand of Glory and attempted to see if the enemies were invisible, but he found nothing. Killick communicated his findings to the rest of the party. Tarric activated Branwhite's ability to see invisible creatures and searched for the enemies in the other rooms near the cavern entrance. Having seen nothing invisible in the cavern, Killick listened carefully. He thought he heard spellcasting coming from the suite of living quarters on the left-hand side of the cavern. He moved up to the doorway, cast a preparatory spell that turned his skin to stone. Then he stone shaped the door in the same way he had done the last one and stepped through. Killick saw the six-armed spellcaster and the fighter was, but his Hand of Glory also allowed him to see an invisible worm naga.</p><p></p><p> Killick yelled out to the party that he had found the enemies. The spellcaster tried to hold him in place with powerful magic, but Killick's Ring of Free Action prevented the effect from taking hold. The undead swordsman charged forward at Killick, missing him. Katawan, Alees, and Alexander all tumbled into the room to support Killick while Norvell and Tarric waited in the hallway. Appearing to receive a mental command from the six-armed creature who had no mouth, the sundering fighter withdrew to a corner of the room. Then the spellcaster stepped forward and cast a Prismatic Spray. Katawan and Alees were hit by the purple streams. Katawan resisted the colorful stream's effect but Alees did not, and she suddenly disappeared. Killick was hit by a green and a blue stream; he was immune to the first and resisted the second. In order to allow Tarric to join the fight, Alexander fired his most potent spells at the undead fighter. The first most potent spell expended the fighter's magical fire protection. With all party members focused on the fighter and with its fire protection gone, it was quickly dispatched by Alexander's fiery barrage. Seeing the damage that Alexander could do, the 6-armed creature cast a spell on Alexander that caused him to disappear from the battlefield as well. A brief hush came over the party now that two of their number had disappeared under suspicious circumstances. Where were they? Would they be able to return? </p><p></p><p> With the sundering fighter gone, Tarric was able to commit more fully to the battle. The 6-armed spellcaster and the still invisible worm naga were holed up in one of the small dormitory style rooms, and Tarric strode forward to block them from leaving. The naga moved to the doorway and tried unsuccessfully to deliver a touch spell on Tarric. This caused it to become visible again for all to see. With his blindfighting abilities, Tarric was the best person to fight the naga because he could literally close his eyes and still have a good chance of hitting. As he sliced into the naga with his blade, it recoiled back into the room, opening the way for other party members to enter. The other party members averted their gazes from the naga completely and focused on the spellcaster, leaving the naga to Tarric. Killick summoned small air elementals and instructed them to attack the spellcaster to help eliminate its mirror images. Meanwhile, Killick himself flew into the room, attached himself to the ceiling using his Slippers of Spider Climb, and attacked the spellcaster from above. The spellcaster was able to quickly eliminate the elementals, but this just allowed room for Katawan to move forward and begin pummeling it with his magically enhanced fists. </p><p></p><p> At this point, Alexander suddenly returned from wherever he had been. This lifted the party's spirits and reinforced the feeling that the tide was turning in their favor. The spellcaster's face betrayed a look indicating that it was annoyed with the naga. It seemed to expect the naga to be doing something that it wasn't. The spellcaster was clearly seriously wounded and began casting a spell. Up above, Killick had been waiting and struck the lich just as it began to cast. This caused it to lose the spell it was casting. In addition, the force of Killick's blow was enough to cause it to crumple to the floor in a pile of dust. Suddenly all the members of the party experienced a vision in which they saw many of the prophecies of the Age of Worms coming to pass in the last decade. Only 2 more prophecies remained to be fulfilled - a tripartite spirit becoming one and a fighter of the pit gifting a city to the dead. As the party's perception returned to the here and now, they heard a thunderous crack followed by an enormous crash that nearly knocked them all off their feet.</p><p></p><p> Luckily, the remaining naga was no longer interested in fighting. It quickly and nervously began begging for its life in Common (which none of the other worm nagas had ever spoken). It assured the party that it had served the six-armed lich against its will and had, over the centuries, uncovered secrets that the party would surely want to know. In return it asked to be left alive and granted its freedom. Alexander agreed to these terms. The first question Alexander asked was where they could find the lich's phylactery. The naga explained that the lich's phylactery had been destroyed in the battle that had been fought centuries ago when the denizens of the temple had been trapped behind the obsidian wall. Alexander didn't trust this answer at first, but when the naga insisted it was true, and when more details about the battle were supplied, his incredulousness abated. Next the party asked the naga where Alees was. The naga explained that the purple stream of the Prismatic Spray would have sent her to another plane. The party asked the naga which one. It said that it did not know for sure, but that it suspected the lich would send her to a plane whose environment was very inhospitable, like the negative energy plane or the elemental planes of fire or water. The party guessed that she had been sent to the Elemental Plane of Fire. They pooled their resources and discovered that only Killick had a means of getting there by using his Ebon Steed. He activated the figurine, hopped on the steed, and disappeared.</p><p></p><p> While the party waited hopefully for Killick to find Alees, they continued questioning their prisoner. The naga explained that the six-armed spellcaster, whose name was Ma'kar, had tricked the mortal Kyuss at the behest of some elder god. It had given Kyuss faulty instructions about how to ascend to godhood, so that when the process was finally utilized, Kyuss became trapped in the very stone monolith that had been used as a focus for the ritual. The ritual had indeed transformed him into a god as promised, but it had also left him trapped and unable to work his will on Oerth. In additoin, the Spire of Long Shadows which Kyuss had been led to believe was an important part of the ritual was in fact a conduit that helped to siphon off the devotional energy that would normally have gone to Kyuss, diverting it to this elder deity instead. The naga said that he hoped that the loud crash that they had heard earlier was the spire collapsing of its own weight now that Ma'kar was no longer around to support it with his magic. Alexander asked what would happen now that the spire was destroyed. The naga responded that it believed that Kyuss's devotional energy would now flow to him unimpeded. Alexander asked if this energy might help Kyuss escape imprisonment. The naga thought so, but not on his own - Kyuss would still need assistance from his worshippers here on Oerth. The naga added he couldn't be sure but he believed he knew the identity of the elder god whom Ma'kar had served - Tharizdun.</p><p></p><p> The party asked the naga where they could find treasure in the temple. The naga replied that it would be happy to show the party all the treasure in the temple in exchange for its freedom. It showed the party the lich's treasure (mostly jewelry and artwork), his own treasure (mostly books including a Manual of Clear Thought and a Tome of Bodily Exercise), and the other nagas' treasure (mostly gold and magic items that required arms to function). As the party moved around the complex, they observed that all the green worms in the cavern and in the fountain had disappeared. At long last, the party emerged from the ziggurat and saw that indeed the spire had collapsed and crashed through the obsidian ring, opening a hole in it. The naga cheered that it was finally free of this prison after all these centuries. It thanked the party once again for liberating him and for keeping its word. Then it airwalked away through the newly formed gap in the obsidian wall and disappeared into the jungle. Katawan expressed reservations about letting the creature go, but Alexander reminded him of the promise they had made. Katawan responded that it was only Alexander who had promised and griped sarcastically that he couldn't remember when the party had voted him party leader. </p><p></p><p> It was nearly dusk when Killick and the Ebon Steed flew back to the ziggurat bearing Alees's charred corpse. He had been gone for nearly 12 hours. He explained that he had had to summon many fire creatures on the plane of fire to help him locate Alees. But apparently she had been unable to withstand the plane's intense heat for long. The party was saddened by the news of Alees's death, but relieved that her body had been recovered so that she could be raised. After resting a bit, Killick observed that the slow worms inhabiting the soil of Kuluth-Mar were now slowly leaving through the gap in the wall. Alexander suggested fireballing them, but Killick restrained him saying that that would only kill the ones near the surface. Most of the worms were deeper in the soil and would get through anyway. However, Killick was determined to find a local druid population and warn them about the threat posed by the Spawn of Kyuss.</p><p> </p><p> <em>7th of Coldeven</em>. The party collected their belongings and their dead and teleported directly back to Magepoint with mixed feelings. They had destroyed many minions of Kyuss, but they had also freed some. They had learned a great deal about Kyuss's origins, but they had strengthened him by destroying the apparatus that prevented him from receiving the devotion of his worshippers. They had all been touched by powerful divine energies that had bestowed upon them them limited control over their own fates, but the cost had been the grisly death of their friend Alees. Truly, the victory was bittersweet.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Menexenus, post: 4422664, member: 8951"] [b]Sessions 65 & 66: Ma'kar, The Harbinger of Worms[/b] [I]4th of Coldeven[/I]. The party moved to explore the large cavern near the bottom of the shaft. The cavern was enormous - about 90 feet high, 70 feet long, and 120 feet wide. The ceiling was covered with stalagmites and a number of large stalactites poked up out of the water. Along the cavern walls were a few small disconnected landings of flat stone above the water line. Across from the cavern's entrance was a short worked stone hallway leading to stone double doors. There was also one worked stone passageway leading away on each side of the cavern. As they approached the partially submerged cave, Killick noticed that the water in the room was filled with green worms, like the ones in the fountain. While the rest of the party considered how best to proceed, Katawan flew out over the water, landed in the hallway on the far side, and approached the double doors. Just then, two more undead clerics of Kyuss airwalked down from the ceiling, out from behind stalagmites, in Katawan's direction. One of them cast a spell at Katawan while the other one lifted its arms and called out in a foreign language. In response, an enormous green worm rose up from out of the wormy water. It moved towards Katawan, blocking the passageway and his line of retreat. However, Katawan was unphased. He used his ability to slip through the cracks of time and space to transport himself directly back to the rest of the party on the far side of the cavern. Having a clear target, Alexander let loose with his artillery spells. The Overworm absorbed the damage that Alexander dealt, approached the landing, and tried to knock Tarric into the water, just barely missing him. Eventually the party withdrew out of reach of the giant worm. Realizing that it could not get at the party, it submerged itself back under water. The Wormcaller clerics continued attacking the party with ranged spells. Dispel Magic seemed to be one of their favorites. However, when the party concentrated their ranged attacks on just one of the Wormcallers, it was quickly destroyed. The remaining Wormcaller decided to take a cue from the Overworm and withdraw behind a stalactite out of sight of the party. With the party in hot pursuit using their flight powers, the Wormcaller once again summoned the Overworm to emerge from the sea of worms below. It was clear that the Overworm had healed a portion of its damage for the brief time it had been submerged. Again, it tried in vain to strike Tarric, missing him by the closest of margins. In a matter of seconds, the Overworm was destroyed without having ever successfully struck any of the party members. The party breathed a sigh of relief, as some of them still had horrific memories of what it was like to die in the gullet of an enormous worm. With the main threat neutralized, the party ganged up on the remaining Wormcaller and dispatched it quickly. With the battle over, the party investigated one of the side passages and found a small suite connected to three small, spartan living quarters. Alees did her best to find treasure or secret passages but came up empty. Next the party decided to check out the stone double doors that Katawan had originally intended to investigate. Alexander and Norvell waited around the corner while Alees checked the doors for traps. Finding none, the party opened the doors. Inside the 20 by 20 foot room beyond was a six-armed undead spellcaster, the same one that the party members had seen in their visions aiding the mortal Kyuss. Two of its hands were holding rods while the other 4 hands were free for spell-casting. One of the rods began to glow as it shot a Cone of Cold at the party, but all of the party members standing in the hallway were highly Evasive. At the same time, with another hand, it cast Magic Missiles at Tarric. Katawan ran into the room, but as he did, a sword slashed down at him from the corner of the room. There was another undead fighter in the room, like the one that the party had fought before in the temple up above. Tarric came forward to give assistance and found himself face to face with the fighter, whose sundering abilities he feared so much. He quickly withdrew, hoping to preserve his magical swords. The opponents had clearly had time to cast many buff spells and the party members in the hallway were making little headway against them. They called out for Alexander's help. He cast Improved Invisibility on himself and reluctantly flew forward. He noticed that the 6-armed spellcaster was able to see him. It was clear that the combat was going poorly for the party: Grimlock IV was dead, Killick was unconscious and bleeding, Alees was held immobile by some magical effect, Katawan's actions had been slowed, and Tarric was avoiding the sundering fighter at all costs. Alexander called for a retreat. Tarric picked up Alees and flew her to the far side of the large cavern. Katawan took great risk to pick up Killick's body and exit the room, facing many slashes of the fighter's sword in the process. Once the party was out of the room, invisible flying Alexander created a Wall of Force across the passageway to separate the combatants. The party began to exit at top speed. However, when Alexander looked back over his shoulder, he saw that the spellcaster and the fighter had somehow escaped the Wall of Force. The spellcaster continued to shoot ranged spells at the party as they exited, but once they were in the shaft rising towards the surface, there seemed to be no further pursuit. When the party was all together again, Alexander teleported them all to Saltmarsh hundreds of miles away, where they could lick their wounds, re-supply, and strategize. [I]5th of Coldeven.[/I] The party continues recuperation, casting all of Norvell's healing spells. [I]6th of Coldeven[/I]. The party teleported directly to the fountain room in the basement level of the temple of Kyuss. Katawan immediately went exploring some of the rooms that the party had missed the first time, finding large rooms containing stacked corpses. In the first room, the corpses were undecomposed while in the second room the corpses had all rotted to skeletons. But in both rooms the corpses were laid out in a very organized manner, as if stored for later use. After running through these rooms, Katawan found himself at the side entrance to the large cavern. Meanwhile, Killick and Alees flew to the stone double doors which were closed once more. They listened at them and heard nothing. Killick cast a spell that allowed him to reshape the doors. He created a hole in the middle large enough for a man to walk through, but the room was empty. Killick donned his Hand of Glory and attempted to see if the enemies were invisible, but he found nothing. Killick communicated his findings to the rest of the party. Tarric activated Branwhite's ability to see invisible creatures and searched for the enemies in the other rooms near the cavern entrance. Having seen nothing invisible in the cavern, Killick listened carefully. He thought he heard spellcasting coming from the suite of living quarters on the left-hand side of the cavern. He moved up to the doorway, cast a preparatory spell that turned his skin to stone. Then he stone shaped the door in the same way he had done the last one and stepped through. Killick saw the six-armed spellcaster and the fighter was, but his Hand of Glory also allowed him to see an invisible worm naga. Killick yelled out to the party that he had found the enemies. The spellcaster tried to hold him in place with powerful magic, but Killick's Ring of Free Action prevented the effect from taking hold. The undead swordsman charged forward at Killick, missing him. Katawan, Alees, and Alexander all tumbled into the room to support Killick while Norvell and Tarric waited in the hallway. Appearing to receive a mental command from the six-armed creature who had no mouth, the sundering fighter withdrew to a corner of the room. Then the spellcaster stepped forward and cast a Prismatic Spray. Katawan and Alees were hit by the purple streams. Katawan resisted the colorful stream's effect but Alees did not, and she suddenly disappeared. Killick was hit by a green and a blue stream; he was immune to the first and resisted the second. In order to allow Tarric to join the fight, Alexander fired his most potent spells at the undead fighter. The first most potent spell expended the fighter's magical fire protection. With all party members focused on the fighter and with its fire protection gone, it was quickly dispatched by Alexander's fiery barrage. Seeing the damage that Alexander could do, the 6-armed creature cast a spell on Alexander that caused him to disappear from the battlefield as well. A brief hush came over the party now that two of their number had disappeared under suspicious circumstances. Where were they? Would they be able to return? With the sundering fighter gone, Tarric was able to commit more fully to the battle. The 6-armed spellcaster and the still invisible worm naga were holed up in one of the small dormitory style rooms, and Tarric strode forward to block them from leaving. The naga moved to the doorway and tried unsuccessfully to deliver a touch spell on Tarric. This caused it to become visible again for all to see. With his blindfighting abilities, Tarric was the best person to fight the naga because he could literally close his eyes and still have a good chance of hitting. As he sliced into the naga with his blade, it recoiled back into the room, opening the way for other party members to enter. The other party members averted their gazes from the naga completely and focused on the spellcaster, leaving the naga to Tarric. Killick summoned small air elementals and instructed them to attack the spellcaster to help eliminate its mirror images. Meanwhile, Killick himself flew into the room, attached himself to the ceiling using his Slippers of Spider Climb, and attacked the spellcaster from above. The spellcaster was able to quickly eliminate the elementals, but this just allowed room for Katawan to move forward and begin pummeling it with his magically enhanced fists. At this point, Alexander suddenly returned from wherever he had been. This lifted the party's spirits and reinforced the feeling that the tide was turning in their favor. The spellcaster's face betrayed a look indicating that it was annoyed with the naga. It seemed to expect the naga to be doing something that it wasn't. The spellcaster was clearly seriously wounded and began casting a spell. Up above, Killick had been waiting and struck the lich just as it began to cast. This caused it to lose the spell it was casting. In addition, the force of Killick's blow was enough to cause it to crumple to the floor in a pile of dust. Suddenly all the members of the party experienced a vision in which they saw many of the prophecies of the Age of Worms coming to pass in the last decade. Only 2 more prophecies remained to be fulfilled - a tripartite spirit becoming one and a fighter of the pit gifting a city to the dead. As the party's perception returned to the here and now, they heard a thunderous crack followed by an enormous crash that nearly knocked them all off their feet. Luckily, the remaining naga was no longer interested in fighting. It quickly and nervously began begging for its life in Common (which none of the other worm nagas had ever spoken). It assured the party that it had served the six-armed lich against its will and had, over the centuries, uncovered secrets that the party would surely want to know. In return it asked to be left alive and granted its freedom. Alexander agreed to these terms. The first question Alexander asked was where they could find the lich's phylactery. The naga explained that the lich's phylactery had been destroyed in the battle that had been fought centuries ago when the denizens of the temple had been trapped behind the obsidian wall. Alexander didn't trust this answer at first, but when the naga insisted it was true, and when more details about the battle were supplied, his incredulousness abated. Next the party asked the naga where Alees was. The naga explained that the purple stream of the Prismatic Spray would have sent her to another plane. The party asked the naga which one. It said that it did not know for sure, but that it suspected the lich would send her to a plane whose environment was very inhospitable, like the negative energy plane or the elemental planes of fire or water. The party guessed that she had been sent to the Elemental Plane of Fire. They pooled their resources and discovered that only Killick had a means of getting there by using his Ebon Steed. He activated the figurine, hopped on the steed, and disappeared. While the party waited hopefully for Killick to find Alees, they continued questioning their prisoner. The naga explained that the six-armed spellcaster, whose name was Ma'kar, had tricked the mortal Kyuss at the behest of some elder god. It had given Kyuss faulty instructions about how to ascend to godhood, so that when the process was finally utilized, Kyuss became trapped in the very stone monolith that had been used as a focus for the ritual. The ritual had indeed transformed him into a god as promised, but it had also left him trapped and unable to work his will on Oerth. In additoin, the Spire of Long Shadows which Kyuss had been led to believe was an important part of the ritual was in fact a conduit that helped to siphon off the devotional energy that would normally have gone to Kyuss, diverting it to this elder deity instead. The naga said that he hoped that the loud crash that they had heard earlier was the spire collapsing of its own weight now that Ma'kar was no longer around to support it with his magic. Alexander asked what would happen now that the spire was destroyed. The naga responded that it believed that Kyuss's devotional energy would now flow to him unimpeded. Alexander asked if this energy might help Kyuss escape imprisonment. The naga thought so, but not on his own - Kyuss would still need assistance from his worshippers here on Oerth. The naga added he couldn't be sure but he believed he knew the identity of the elder god whom Ma'kar had served - Tharizdun. The party asked the naga where they could find treasure in the temple. The naga replied that it would be happy to show the party all the treasure in the temple in exchange for its freedom. It showed the party the lich's treasure (mostly jewelry and artwork), his own treasure (mostly books including a Manual of Clear Thought and a Tome of Bodily Exercise), and the other nagas' treasure (mostly gold and magic items that required arms to function). As the party moved around the complex, they observed that all the green worms in the cavern and in the fountain had disappeared. At long last, the party emerged from the ziggurat and saw that indeed the spire had collapsed and crashed through the obsidian ring, opening a hole in it. The naga cheered that it was finally free of this prison after all these centuries. It thanked the party once again for liberating him and for keeping its word. Then it airwalked away through the newly formed gap in the obsidian wall and disappeared into the jungle. Katawan expressed reservations about letting the creature go, but Alexander reminded him of the promise they had made. Katawan responded that it was only Alexander who had promised and griped sarcastically that he couldn't remember when the party had voted him party leader. It was nearly dusk when Killick and the Ebon Steed flew back to the ziggurat bearing Alees's charred corpse. He had been gone for nearly 12 hours. He explained that he had had to summon many fire creatures on the plane of fire to help him locate Alees. But apparently she had been unable to withstand the plane's intense heat for long. The party was saddened by the news of Alees's death, but relieved that her body had been recovered so that she could be raised. After resting a bit, Killick observed that the slow worms inhabiting the soil of Kuluth-Mar were now slowly leaving through the gap in the wall. Alexander suggested fireballing them, but Killick restrained him saying that that would only kill the ones near the surface. Most of the worms were deeper in the soil and would get through anyway. However, Killick was determined to find a local druid population and warn them about the threat posed by the Spawn of Kyuss. [I]7th of Coldeven[/I]. The party collected their belongings and their dead and teleported directly back to Magepoint with mixed feelings. They had destroyed many minions of Kyuss, but they had also freed some. They had learned a great deal about Kyuss's origins, but they had strengthened him by destroying the apparatus that prevented him from receiving the devotion of his worshippers. They had all been touched by powerful divine energies that had bestowed upon them them limited control over their own fates, but the cost had been the grisly death of their friend Alees. Truly, the victory was bittersweet. [/QUOTE]
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