Sol Povos: The Desecrated Shrine

There are a couple of corpses here in the glade, but they are very, very dead right now. We had back into the tunnel of snakes and engage in a very great deal of healing before setting watches and going to sleep.

Marshall take advantage of this opportunity to speak to the snakes, hoping to recruit a couple of more them as companions. A tiny purple snake named Whorra joins him and Sqirmbob.

In the distance, the Nightwing screeches and curses and eventually seems to wander off... or at least settle down.

Eventually, we emerge into the hidden clearing again. Where the other statues were obsidian, these are larger and probably made of enameled bronze. There are two bodies between the snake statues, and an entrance beyond it. The corpses are only recently dead; and they were definitely Bakinawa.

We enter the shrine. It's underground, and there's some rubble and an area that looks to have been the camp where the two dead priests were staying. Alexej finds some dried sausages in their packs, and immediately confiscates them.

Marshall announces that he thinks something's in here with us. We prepare for battle. Marshall has also managed to pray for Dispel Evil, and manages to restore Alexej's floating shield. We continue forward.

Tavros and Alexej hear the faint echo of a tearing sound, like someone squeezing out a very large rag. Marshall casts Divine Favor on himself. Tavros move behind Alexej, putting him closer to the front row.

Marshall adds another spell to increase his strength.

"Fools, you are too late. The shrine has been defiled."

There's a large, horrible shadow-figure with claws up ahead; it has murdered a coautl, and is now chanting something. The thing drops the remains of the couatl and discorporates.

A mental voice says, "Summon the Nightwing."

Tavros tries to detect evil, but the thing seems to have gone completely immaterial and left through the wall. The coautl's blood has been poured into the fountain, desecrating this sacred shrine of Artem-hiss.

Marshall gets this expression on his face, like "Oh know you didn't..."

So the first thing he does is resurrect the couatl with Raise Dead. The couatl flies around and introduces itself as Zuriel. It flies over to the fountain and hovers over it sadly.

Marshall: "Might I ask a boon, great and holy couatl-creature? I believe you were just dead, and used for a sacrifice. Can you tell me about the asshole that killed you?"

"He was a Nightwalker, the most powerful of the followers of Urgroth. They come from another plane of existence. He has desecrated this temple, and I do not have the power to undo it. Normally, a tiny bit of poison flows into the water from the statue. Now, to drink it would be death."

Zuriel flies off and returns with a stone tablet, which it says it cannot read. Leira, still invisible, looks at it. She, of course, can read it; she can read almost anything.

 And lo the forces of darkness made the sacred waters profane
 And the Creator’s followers desponded and wept
 But from a far away land did come the chosen
 Who communed with the Creator
 And drank the waters
 And praised the Creator’s very form

So we think Marshall needs to commune with Artem-hiss and then drink the waters anyway.

Zuriel and Marshall pray together, and Marshall casts Commune.
-Am I the chosen one? In this world, yes.
-Can we stop the darkness? Yes.
-If I drink the waters now will I be able to fulfill the prophecy? No.
-Can you restore the waters? No.
-Can we? Yes.
-Must we kill that asshole the deathwalker? No.
-Is everything that I need to finish my task here in this shrine? No.
 Marshall considers. Maybe he needs to be in the form of a snake in order to drink the water?
-Can turn me into a snake? Yes.
-Will you? YES.

He turns into a snake drinks, and the vision comes upon him.

It starts with Artem-hiss in the form of a great serpent, swirling through the sky. Below is Phanaxia, but it is not an island; the land extends to the horizon. In the middle of the land is a tower, and there's a deep, darkness inside; it becomes a great blankness, a nothingness, that comes between Artem and his followers. Now he can see only a few of his followers. Marshall has this vision of himself drinking up the ocean... while out here in the real world, we watch snake-marshall drain the entire pool.

The bad news is that Marshall has permanently lost two points of constitution; the good news is that he can now turn into a snake daily. A really, really big snake.

The shrine is restored.

Marshall considers this an entirely fair trade. He looks over the stone tablet again and decides that its far too large and heavy to bring with us.

We start to leave, and naturally there's something between us and the exit.

Leira turns invisible again. Alexej and Tavros move up. "It's probably a Nightwing."

Horrible Voice In Our Heads: "It *is* a Nightwing!"

The Nightwing has wormed its way into the front of the temple, and it hits us with a cone of cold. Tavros just laughs; his father was a silver dragon, and he is utterly immune to cold. Leira responds with Scorching Ray.

Tavros charges and hits the Nightwing with his silver ghost-touch scimitar. Marshall tries to dismiss it, but fails to get past its spell resistance. The Nightwing then attacks Tavros' blade, and suppresses part of the enchantment on it. Leira attempts to Hold Monster, but again fails to get through his spell resistance.

We attack it some more but mostly miss; it tries Finger of Death, but we're all Death Warded and that does nothing. Tavros hits him again; then Marshall casts Dismissal and gets it past his spell resistance; unfortunately, the Nightwing shakes it off. It tries to Hold Person on Alexej, but fails.

Leira tries to hold the thing again,  but fails; Tavros attacks and misses, and the Nightwing summons a Dread Wraith. It attacks Marshall, dmaging him slightly.

Leira drops a fireball on the Dread Wraith, but it strikes at her as she tries to move away. She take a little damage, but not nearly as much as the wraith does.

Alexej has now smeared silver oil on  his guisarme, but misses; Marshall attempts to heal the Dread Wraith, and sears the ever-loving hell out of it with the holy healing energy. Leira finishes it off.

The Nightwing casts Hold Person on Alexej, and Tavros hits it again.

Marshall turns into a giant snake, and moves up to try to grapple the Nightwing.

The Nightwing bites Marshall-the-snake, twice, doing quite a bit of damage. Alexej shakes off his paralysis. Leira moves her way forward until she can see, then hits it with Scorching Ray; two of them hit and one actually does some damage.

Tavros reaches down and lays hands on Marshall, restoring him to function. Alexej hits, staggering the monster; Marshall rears up and bites at it.

Silenced, damaged, and low on resources, the Nightwing bites Marshall and then Tavros, taking Marshall back down and injuring Tavros.

Leira tries Scorching Ray again, but fails to do any damage. Tavros hits him and does some damage; Alexej misses him completely. The thing tries to bite Tavros, but fails. Tavros finishes it.

We search the Nightwing's corpse, but find nothing.

Marshall heals us, and we rest. When we wake up, an earthquake has shaken the shrine. We rush outside, and there's a horrible cyclone in the sky, and a few other Nightwing are flying around but sort of staggering in the sky as if they've somehow been injured. Something has gone horribly wrong with the world. It takes a while but eventually it passes.

Marshall attempts to restore Tavros' weapon, but fails.

We head back to the Bakinawa. They're all sort of bowing and praying and crying. Lotan runs over to us and grabs Marshall. "Did you see it? The anger in the sky?"

Marshall: "Sort of. But good news, I walked the path of the serpent! And look!" He turns into a snake.

...The whole village turns to worship him. They definitely think he's the chosen one, and that the thundering in the sky had something to do with this.

After a while Marshall returns to human form. "Hey, don't worry about me. Keep the worship on Artem-hiss."

Tavros: "I think the centaurs need some help."

Marshall: "But first, I need a drink."

A few hours later, when he wakes up from the drink that the Bakinawa use, Lotan asks: "Chosen One! You had more wishes?"

Marshall: "Let's talk about this alliance with the centaurs. Y'all need to ally with them, and help them shut down the evil centaur-murdering Baron."

Lotan: "Of course! But how does this help Artem-hiss?"

Marshall: "It's all part of dispelling the darkness."

Lotan: "Yes! We'll sack Kuldas Keep with the centaurs, and convert them all to the worship of Artem-hiss."

Marshall looks at the rest of us: "Now, what else did we come here for?"

Well, we were supposed to get information on Vecna and his minions: Krony, Kaz, and the Dark One himself. And once we do that, we should be able to cross into the mountains and go back through the portal.

Leira woke up feeling like some sort of... connection to herself had been lost. Like maybe the connection between us and our bodies back in the real world has been severed. She tells the rest of us.

Alexej: "We should ask snake-people and horse-people about this."

They don't know much of anything, but Marshall has been here before and remembers that the Black Acre contained graves for General Kaz, Traitor; Krony, servant of the dark one, co-conspirator; and a modest grave: "Here lies Vecna, my friend."

We head south to cement the alliance. The centaurs and the crazy snake priests ally and start getting ready to organize their uprising. The centaurs immediately ask us about the turmoil in the sky, but nobody seems to know much about what actually happened.

We head east in search of more information, and detour to seek the portal; the portal is indeed gone.