“Let the feast bepin!”
The crowd of Kuo-toa cheered and raised bladders of beer in salute. A crew of horrible-sounding musicians began to play. A gurgling kind of off-key singing began to be chanted by the band members.
“Argh,” groaned Garrison, “Clearly there is no such thing as a Kuo-toa bard.”
“Not so!” exclaimed Verdi with a laugh. “You only wish there wasn’t!”
The feast was taking place in the central open area of the Wet Village. The party members were using air plant to participate, but no one could really eat with the plant in their mouth. Well. Natasha could. She choked a lot, but managed to swallow large bites of Lev-Neck steak nonetheless. She kept forgetting she needed to breathe and got a wild look in her eyes, then a party member would pry out the food and shove more air plant into her mouth. Natasha seemed upset and annoyed each time, looking at the discarded meat mournfully.
The centerpiece for the feast was the chief’s ornate trident. It was jammed into the ground, with the three tines pointing upwards. On each spike one of the sea hags heads was affixed – a gruesome display, which only disturbed folks appetites if they looked at their hideous faces for too long. Ozzy refused to even glance at them. Mostly, the Kuo-toa cheered and thanked the party instead. Exclamations of: “Our heroes!”, “We love you bost of all!”, “Be not know there were three Bitresses… and so ubly!”, “Not bad for non-Kuo-toa. Not bad at all!”, “This party is all for you! Hooray!”, and “I bust name by next child after you!” are commonly heard over the music, talking, and grating songs.
There are huge banners floating above the central area, above the feasting and celebrating fish-people. The largest ones read: “Hooray for freedom!”, “Our heroes!”, “Down with the Mistress!”, and “Kuo-toa life forever!”
Of course, this kind of talk, the banners, and the party itself, is somewhat lessened in impact by the easily seen hastily hidden banners reading: “We love the Mistress!”, “Down with dry-landers!”, “We worship only the Mistress!”, “Long live the Mistress!” and “The only good dry-lander is a dead slave dry-lander!”. These posters were rolled up hastily and stuffed under seaweed plants once it became clear that the Mistress had been defeated, but they keep floating out where they can be read quite often due to the turbulence created by the party, to much Kuo-toa embarrassment and eye-rolling of party members.
The paralyzed Ettin was also a popular entertainment option. Kuo-toa lined up to kick the sole surviving minion of the tyrannical Sea Hags. The chiefs guards are brutal in their attention to the creature, since the party tossed the Ettin out of the sinkhole depths first to make them think that the party had been defeated and the Mistress the victor of their contest. It was a good joke, and one well-earned due to the fish-folks cowardice, but the chiefs bodyguards who reported the wrong winners to everyone were not amused at being made to look like fools. They dared not take it out on the party, so the Ettin was the target of their ire.
The party members collect large baskets and bladders of Kuo-toa food and beverages to take with them when the water-breathers see that they can’t eat underwater. Before the party leaves, Chief Boop swims above the crowd and spreads his arms expansively.
“Oh, no. Is he doing what I think he’s doing? A speech?” groans Noxen.
“Now is the time for all Kuo-toa to cobe topether! The leadership of tribe has chanped and the direction of all people has shifted with the currents! Old treaties, prudpes, and apreebents are null and void and we bust rethink how we wish thinps to work now!”
Ozzy broke out of his trauma-induced stupor at this statement. “What?” he yelped with indignation.
Zafirah narrowed her eyes. “You are not talking about going back on our treaty are you?”
Garrison growled. “Your agreement with us is not null and void,” he said matter-of-factly. He gestured to the Sea Hag heads. “Do you see those three heads? That didn’t take us very much effort.”
The party members all frowned and nodded in solidarity. Some rested their hands on weapons. A worried mummer ran through the group of Kuo-toa.
“Notice,” Verdi said gleefully, “We are all alive while all of the Mistresses minions are dead. I wonder what that means? It might mean that we are quite strong, but if you feel like you can take us on mentally – go for it!”
Chief Boop swallowed, mumbled something, and then put on a wide grin. “Erp! Of course. I bean, of course not. Er… Duh… Erp, have some bore Lev-Neck everybody! Yum-yum!”
Ozzy rubbed his sensitive ears. “That fat fish just said ‘it was worth a try’ under his breath!” he grumbled.
Cheif Boop carried on with his speech as if there had been no interruptions. “Yes, we bust work topether and not allow our superior Kuo-toa culture to be tainted by those who are dry-landers. We will banish our life-debt slaves to the surface and rebuild our plorious palace!” There was some grumbling about this idea, but a few seconds of looking at the grumpy heroes and the grisly proof of their valor was enough to stop that.
Reporting to Tundor
Tundor and Bianca are deep in conversation about the carvings that adorn the Exhalation Vent when the dripping party arrives. Natasha is enjoying the food sent by the Kuo-toa, but it smells awful to everyone else. The drinks are not popular either. Only Ozzy seems to like it.
“This is beer?” Uruk said with disgust. “It is foul!”
“Where?” said Neamen, looking about with some excitement.
“Yes, mushroom beer,” said Ozzy.
“Fermented fungal juice? Disgusting!”
“Hic! Mmmm!”
Tundor finally noticed them. “Ah, good. You are back. Did you find the Temple, then? The Temple doors I should say.”
“Yup,” Zarek said.
“Excellent. And no trouble with the locals?”
“Uh, well–” Garrison started.
“Excellent,” Tundor interrupted, while packing up his waterproof notebook hurriedly.
“About time, too,” Bianca added, rolling some sketches into a waxed tube.
“Well, there might be some trouble down the line getting the Kuo-toa to stick to their agreements,” Alba said.
“Then we will not worry about it. It is a clearly problem for another day for you to deal with,” Tundor said distractedly.
Natasha stopped chewing Lev-Neck steaks to ask, “So you know what is inside the windy Temple?”
“I do,” he answered while sorting through his bag. He looked up suddenly and stared into the distance. “Well, in a general sort of way.” He shook off his thoughts with a shrug. “I know what is at the center of it.”
“Which is?” Garrison asked patiently.
Tundor seemed to jump a bit at the question and narrowed his eyes. “Oh, I do not think I need share such things with you. When the time is right and it is required for you to know more, I will tell you. When we begin our study of the temple, we will, of course, send you in first, to deal with traps, guardians, things like that. This should be what you focus your attention on – not matters of scholarly import.”
Bianca spoke up. “For the love of all that’s holy, do not damage any of the carvings in there.”
Tundor nodded sagely. “Quite right. And there is one particular item within the Temple that I require. Loose treasures and things are yours to keep.”
Bianca glared at Tundor, “Unless they have archaeological value!”
Tundor half-nodded, half-shrugged. “The item I require is more important. I care nothing for trinkets.”
Ozzy looked worried. “What is this item? It doesn’t look anything like a Sea Hag head does it?”
“Oh, no,” Tundor blinked at the strange question. “You will know it when you see it. A glowing orb, filled with swirling mists inside it.”
“I’ve heard of this kind of thing,” Uruk said knowingly. “When you remove the orb, it will cause the Temple to collapse.”
Tundor held up both hands to fend off such speculation. “I don’t know about that. Sounds like a potential trap for you people to cope with. If you are too afraid to touch it, that’s fine.”
“Afraid?” Ozzy said angrily.
Zafirah put a soothing hand on the man-bat’s shoulder. “It would be a shame if the prize was damaged because we didn’t know what was coming and you did.”
Tundor chewed his bottom lip for a while and looked to Bianca who nodded. He looked back to the party and sighed. “Well, unfortunately, that is all I know about the contents of the Temple. I know how to open the doors and that the prize I seek is within.”
“How on Aio do you know how to get in? You haven’t even seen the place or the doors yet!” Noxen asked.
“That’s true,” mused Tundor. “But I have done such interesting research! You’d be amazed!”
“Share with us, then,” Zafirah said.
“No, I think not. My research and methods are secrets, you see. Besides, the orb is not nearly as important as you seem to think it is. It is merely a tool that will guide us to the real treasure...” He paused and a look of scholarly ecstasy blanketed his face. “The library of Krill’thak!”
“Nerd,” whispered Verdi.
“How well known is this library?” Garrison asked.
“I doubt there are more than a handful that have heard of it,” Tundor said airily.
“I know I haven’t,” Garrison said, scratching behind one ear. Other party members shrugged and frowned.
“This is not natural. At all. Neither the temple or the library have anything to do with birds or the stars,” Nemean said sagely, as if this was a huge insight that would help everyone understand things better.
Bianca stared at the jaguar-man sadly. “We need to get this fellow back to his goose. He is struggling.” She turned to Tundor. “And this conversation is pointless at the moment. We need to get the entire team down here. We need some people here at this vent, but we need most of them down by the Temple doors. That’s a long way down, through multiple sections of submerged cave. It’s going to take a while to ferry everyone and all our equipment down here. Days of work before we can even think of being ready to open up the Temple of Krill’thak. That needs to be our focus.”
Tundor nodded. “Bianca is quite right. Let’s get back up to the Windscreamer and get things moving. We can discuss these trivial issues later.”
“Fine,” said Zafirah. “We have work to do with the locals to ensure that they give us no trouble and follow their agreements with us.”
Preparations
The logistics involved in the underwater expedition were far more complex and time-consuming that even Bianca assumed. It took more than a week.
During this time of moving equipment and people, the party was quite busy. The revelation to Captain Tranio that 81 more people were due to arrive soon on his ship was not a welcome one. He bellowed loud and long about the impertinence of the party in assuming he would take these people on board. To say nothing of land-lubbers who didn’t understand how things works at sea: there was just no room for them, as the ship was filled to capacity already!
Noxen volunteers to solve this problem. He worked for a year as a younger man in the shipyards of Umberto and knew something of how to build ships. Using ‘lumber’ in the form of the sturdy and tree-like stems of the giant mushroom forests below, he and Rushan, Alba, Zarek, and Uruk spent the week building a large, square, flat-bottomed raft. The craft looked quite ugly, but was surprisingly sea-worthy. Once it was complete, Captain Tranio had to grumblingly admit that the craft could be towed behind the Windscreamer without any trouble at all.
Silas the Quartermaster said it was still impossible. They did not have the food for twice their number and that was that.
Once Zafirah, Garrison, Natasha, and Verdi heard about that complaint, they laughed it off. More than 60 of the ex-slaves had been professional fishermen. They would catch a massive amount of fish each day – more than they needed to feed themselves. Not only was Silas satisfied, but Old Mother Griggs and the crew were excited at the prospect of more fresh food, too.
Zafiah, Garrison, Natasha, and Verdi knew about this, because they spent most of the week with the Kuo-toa and the slaves the party had freed through their treaty. The Kuo-toa attempted to wriggle out of the deal in lots of little ways. Once Uruk had to come down to lend some intimidation to the ‘discussions’. The fish-folk tried to hide the number of slaves, create loopholes for themselves, and generally were rather difficult to work with.
The slaves were simply over-joyed and flooded the party members with gratitude. Some of them were from the mainland – 21 of them to be exact. 18 from Umberto, 2 from Monte Laguna, and a half-orc from Sanbar. The party is amazed to discover that the remaining 60 are actually not Vinci at all, but are humans! Humans from a chain of islands they call A’tooa. Nobody has heard of these islands before, but Tundor got all excited and began to question and interview them one at a time after he heard of it. Meanwhile, the party member working with the ex-slaves learned about their stories and how to help them. Zafirah also studied with the reinstated head cleric of Biblioobloop, Nastra Forkfin, to learn more about air-plants and other Kuo-toa herbs that could be used in alchemy. Captian Tranio tried to get her to share these secrets with him, but she quickly realized the man wanted to commercialize the useful plant and restrict the supply to keep prices of a new trade good high. She gave him the cold shoulder after that. The captain grumpily had his crew collect as much of the stuff as they could.
Ozzy, Min, and Nemean spent the week resting from their wounds, both physical and mental. They helped the others where they could, but Ozzy in particular needed a lot of rest to get his strength back. He woke every night, screaming. Clearly, the Sea Hags had made a permanent impression upon his mind. The whole party agreed that he needed the attentions of a powerful cleric to help with his mental health once they returned to civilization. Nemean was often inspired by the wise words of his goose and resolved to not leave Cassiopeia’s side again.
“HONK! HONK!”
“Oh, I agree. What a profound insight, my dear bird!”
Exploring the Temple of Krill’thak
Once the expedition members were finally in place at the camp put together by Bianca, the party was told to gather at the closed doors. It had taken some time to get the last few scientists down in the diving bell, since there were three who were actually afraid of being underwater. Rushan could not believe it.
Dr. Whisperwind had created a magically dead-zone in order to counteract the wild winds and noise of the Lung of Krill’thak. The blast of fresh air from the glowing portals was magically piped directly to the holes in the cavern roof. The party was quite amazed at the difference it made in the place.
Ozzy was the most relieved at the change. “I can hear myself think,” he sighed happily.
Tundor stood at the closed doors of the temple with an aggrieved look on his face. “Are you ready? I think we have delayed far too long as it is. We have a few more tasks to do here at the camp to prepare ourselves, but there is no reason for you not to begin your clearing of the complex.”
The party all nod. Some readied their weapons and gear. Alba and Zarek glanced at one another as if to say ‘weren’t we waiting on them?’ with raised eyebrows and subtle sniffs.
“Very well,” Tundor said. ‘I will use the password, unless you’d like to try to open the doors yourselves?” The question must have rhetorical, since he walked closer to the door and raised his arms dramatically. He then cups his hands together and leans close to the door in order to whisper and not be overheard. Ozzy grinned and his ears twitched as he listened closely to overhear the password anyway.
“Misil Krill’thak pi-va-sang too.”
Ozzy pouted a bit. That was less than helpful.
Noxen saw that the magic of the doors flared into activation of more than just protective magics in response to whatever Tundor did or said. The magical power flared to something quite strong and the doors began to move.
Nemean grunted in surprise. “Whispers? I was sure that licking it would work, but it didn’t open no matter how much I licked.” Bianca gave him a concerned side-eye and shook her head sadly.
When the door swings open, a blast of air blows into everyone faces, causing dust and grit of hundreds of years to pepper them. Then the wind reverses direction and the opening seems to breathing deeply with a sigh of the winds of the Lung of Krill’thak. The movement of air calms almost at once – replaced with gentle, sweet breeze after the initial deep breath.
The passageway within is well lit with continual flames which glow with a yellow light. The floor is polished to a high shine and inlaid with coral and obsidian in strange, curving patterns. The walls are decorated with bas-relief carvings of people who are being blessed with glowing magic, Timonium crystals, and wind. There are carvings on every single wall. Most of them are in excellent condition, however in a few places they have been damaged.
“This looks like it was done on purpose,” Verdi said, pointing at one of the faces that had been hacked at and chipped away.
Tundor steps away from the open doors and motions the party inside. “Please, take care of business inside while we ready the scholars for their work. No traps or guardians should disturb my team, understood? And if you find the orb I need, let me know at once. You may collect it yourself or come and tell me of it’s location – whichever you wish.”
“We understand our role,” Uruk said in a grave voice. “If we fail, then those weaker than ourselves will come to harm, which would be unacceptable.”
Tundor raised an eyebrow and pursed his lips. “Yes.”
“There are webs of magic everywhere,” Noxen said with awe, his eyes glowing slightly. “I do not understand what most of their purposes are, either. They are old, but still strong.”
The party cautiously entered.
“Nifty! A map!” Verdi exclaimed. And sure enough there was a map carved into the walls on either side of the now open double doors.
“We are in the Hall of Welcome,” Min said. “This central room that it leads to is called the Chamber of Winds. Here we have the Hall of Whispers which opens into the Chamber of Curving and over here we’ve got the Hall of Echoes that goes to the Chamber of Learning – maybe that library is closer than Tundor thinks, eh?”
“And this sealed hallway?” Zafirah asked as she pointed to it.
“Hmmm. Says it’s the Hall of Purification. I don’t like the sound of that. It opens into the… huh, how odd. Look, part of the name has been chipped away and another name scratched in under it. Looks like it used to say Chamber of Worship, but it’s been vandalized to read Chamber of Betrayal.”
“Trouble in the Temple?” joked Ozzy.
“Smells like it,” Natasha snorted to clear her nose. “The air here is old and kind of bad-smelling, too. Bad in a way I haven’t smelled before.”
Min studied a long list carved into the wall. The ones at the top were obviously older - some of them faded into utter illegibility - but there were deeper and clearer carvings near eye-level as well as a blank section of stone below the rows of text. He chirped excitedly.
“This is list of all of the high priests who have been in charge of this temple since it was founded. No dates to give us an idea of when it was founded, but look at this! The last name!”
Everyone crowded around to look.
“The most recent name has been changed,” Min explained. “It used to read ‘High Priest Norarbin’, but the middle word was chipped away and replaced with the scratched-in word ‘of Heretic’. See?”
“Interesting,” Garrison said softly. "High Heretic Norarbin."
Noxen felt the edges of the carvings and the marks of the scratched in words. “The names here have been carved over a long span of time. Thousands of years, I would guess.”
Verdi flitted about, looking at the carvings and trying to figure them out. “How come this one fellow has his face scratched out everywhere?”
Min studied a few of the scenes that Verdi identified. “Looks like every representation of Krill’thak and the name has been vandalized. There is no way to tell what the guy originally was meant to look like.”
“All of them?” Alba asked.
Min nodded with his hands on his hips. “Every single one.”
“Meticulous,” Zarek said quietly.
“Um, guys?” Ozzy said. “I can hear us breathing and talking. I can even hear everyone outside the temple through the open door behind us, but at the end of this hallway? Sound just stops. Not even echoes are coming back to me.”
Many of the party members looked at each other worriedly at this news.
Alba pulled out a small glass bead. “I can use this magic to be able to read and understand all of these writings.” She sang a high, pure note and the glass bead shattered into sparkling dust and vanished. Alba then began pointing at writings and telling the group what they said.
“These are stories of Krill’thak’s followers using air magic to breathe underwater and explore the depths. They eventually found this natural cave and modified it to be a place of gathering, power, and learning. Apparently, Krill’thak himself created the Lung – you can see a representation of the 5-sided half-pillar with the open portals there.”
She turned to another section of the wall. “Here it speaks in glowing terms about Krill’thak. Songs of praise and things of that nature. Hmmm, yes. Lots of that. Not very helpful, really. General platitudes - no details.”
Alba looked on the opposite wall. “Ah. This speaks of how Krill’thak taught his followers how to collect and use Timonium to preform feats of magic. He raised them from barbaric tribes of feral humans to become an enlightened and civilized folk. Prior to Krill’thak none of their people knew how to use Timonium in any way. Interesting hints of the kinds of magic they used. Lots of elemental magic – especially air.”
She found another section to read before the magic faded. “And here is a welcome to acolytes and those who wish to expand their knowledge of the glories and mysteries of Krill’thak. It says that we should use the basic magics and prayers taught by Krill’thak to his people in order to proceed in the Temple.” She blinked. “That’s all. The translation magic is spent.”
By this time, the party had explored and walked along the hallway fairly close to the next open room, the one identified by Min as the Chamber of Winds. Ozzy was still quite nervous to hear nothing. Despite the silence, the ancient temple was quite well lit, the magic torches burning bright and sure.
“Let’s press on then,” Uruk grunted. He stepped into the next room.
He immediately was thrown back into the hallway and slid several feet on his backside.
As Rushan helped him to his feet, Uruk grunted in surprise. “It’s like a hurricane in there! The winds are furious and the noise of it is fantastic!”
Several other party members tested this report themselves. Rushan and Natasha both tried to enter the room and were tossed back into the hallway. Nemean tried to charge through the winds on Cassiopeia’s back, but both were buffeted by the winds and dumped back into the hallway floor unceremoniously.
“HONK!”
“I agree, Cass,” Nemean said as he stood up again. “We need to find some way to calm these winds.”
“That’s a problem,” Verdi said. “I must have skipped 'basic magic and prayers of Krill’thak day' at fey school as a lad.”
“Well, it’s well-lit. You can easily see the other two hallways and the door straight across from us,” offered Nemean.
“We should get Tundor in here and see if his secret knowledge is of any help,” Ozzy suggested.
“Yeah,” Verdi agreed, “There are no traps or monsters here.”
The party looked for a moment at the open hallways, the door (which looked like a smaller version of the outer doors Tundor had opened, but with odd curved lines on them), and the writings carved into the walls of the chamber.
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