Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="kinem" data-source="post: 4266672" data-attributes="member: 24234">Aram continues to spin stories for a long time, but finally it is time to 'sleep'.The night is tense as you take turns on watch.  In the human camp, several soldiers patrol with torches.  On the other side of the river, orcs and bugbears patrol in darkness.A sudden attack by your hosts is not far from you minds, but in the end the night proves uneventful.In the morning you are reunited in the human's camp.Captain Warren tells Aram "I can tell you want to meet the Master.  I myself have not.  Your best course is to continue past the swamp in your boat.  If you keep heading west you will of course reach the western mountains beyond the Plain of Fire.  Beyond Great Pass, is the land of Hule where the Master rules from.  I will write a note vouching for you but in truth it will mean little.  Just tell your story, and tell the commanders you meet all that you know of the cursed Darokins."-------------------------------------------------------------------The party gets underway again, heading upriver.  The rest of the day proves uneventful.  You set your usual watches for the night, but the night proves uneventful.The next day you continue on.  The shallow river grows wider and slower, and you soon find yourself in the swamp itself.There are some areas of large muddy flats, encrusted with salt, where nothing grows. The rest of the swamp is covered with thick reeds that grow up to 8’ in height. These reeds are very dry and brittle and clatter constantly in the wind. There are no trails through this swamp; travel through it clearly must be by boat.  The boat is your island now.  The movement of the raft through the reeds sounds like the wind.You are forced to spend the night on the raft.  You use the poles to try to anchor the raft in place for the night, but it's not very secure.  Girgal can tell that the water is foul here, and you depend on the food and water you have brought with you.[sblock=Walking Dad]Girgal has disturbing dreams that night. He does not have a clear memory of their details, but in the morning he feels that he had very clear and very evil dreams. He remembers a few incidents in his past as part of the dreams, such as the days before he converted to the service of Ka, when he committed some evil acts he now regrets.  He remembers also the battle against the wyvern and its rider and the trolls, in which he was nearly killed.  In his dream these scenes somehow felt “wrong,” as if things happened differently in the dreams than they did in life.  There also seemed to be someone watching, feeding, guiding, laughing at him.[/sblock]In the morning you resume the journey across the swamp.As you move slowly through a reedy section of the swamp, only the sounds of normal wildlife reach you above the snapping and cracking of the reeds. The air is hazy with heat and the work of poling the raft is tiring and sweaty. Slowly the surroundings begin to change. The reeds become thicker. Large tumors grow on some of the stalks. Large patches of green-brown algae spread before you. Fish, doughy white and gray, swim just below the surface. Slowly the sun sets under a gray sky.As you travel, the landscape becomes more and more blighted. The reeds become twisted with strange growths, algae cling to the raft, and you spot fish with strange deformities.The swamp grows quieter. In the evening, you notice a small hut, raised on stilts just above the level of the swamp. It looks to be an old building, worn and stained.</blockquote>

Verification