Isle of the Magi, Part III

3 Suns after Last Claim's Day

A day of great tragedy...

The wounded and drained party, against better judgement, decided to press on and face the mighty ettin.  Before the battle, Alvar "Wheezer" Herrickson, unable to continue due to his weak health, was unceremoniously stuffed in the bag of holding.  Coon and Raven steathily crept upon the fell giant and attacked, rousing the twice-crowned creature from his slumbers.  The brave group pressed on, with Coon's augmented strength and Sir Nagrom‘s valiant blows doing much damage.  Until, guided by Thria the Gloryseeker the group discovered the illusory nature of the titanic, sword-wielding menace.  The ettin illusion was a facade for a sentient majick construct called Kee and Loc, two massive iron door knockers with hideous faces set on a large oak and iron wrought double door.   Through the clever manipulations of Coon, Gump and Raven, as well as a little luck and some battle prowess the group breached the "gates" of Mazkorick's Tower and Loc lost his tongue.

The wizard Gump, one of the earliest arrivals, attempted to investigate a poor, demented child beating his brains upon the wall.  The very nature of Mazkorick's lair would do this to any mortal, as the featureless, black matte room fluxed in various irregular trapzoidal shapes.  As Gump crossed the room's floor he fell victim to a green slime,  lying in wait at the bottom of a cleverly hidden trap door.  He died a horrid, burning death from the magical slime.  Sir Nagrom tried to save his compatriot but it was, sadly, to late.  The group, mourning their loss, recovered the amulet of the undead.  They then sought to question the demented child, beating his head upon the wall.  The young lad seemed to be in a charmed state, but was also suffering from shock.  He was trying to accomplish something, but his nervous state limited his performance.

The only exits, were down in the pit or up on floating steps to an invisible platform.  As the hearty band of four, along with the charmed and shell-shocked lad mounted the stairs, a sudden dimensional warping of the room snapped up the lad and Sir Nagrom the Just!  The brave three (Coon, Raven and Thria) pressed on, hoping that the rest of the children, as well as their comrade in arms waited for them in the interior.  The group also discovered dusty footprints wandering up the stairs and across the platform into a 20' long mirror-tiled hallway.  The footprints ended about 15' into the hall on a plush red carpet.  The floor underneath was a shiny, infinitely black and un-identifiable metal.  Magic candles, floating near the walls gave a brilliant illumination.

Coon, carefully searching the hall found a trap door right under the last two footprints.  As he opened up the trap, a broken and twisted apparition of a warrior flew from the floor and moaned, "my bones hurt".  Finally, understanding the ghostwarrior's meaning, Coon descended the shaft and recovered the bones of a dead warrior, outfitted like the twisted apparition in the hall.  He also found a mysterious scroll and map written in blood.  Upon returning to the hall, the apparition had transformed into a homely warrior. 

He addressed Coon, "I am Snayrn, a servant of the King of Nornask, what is the year?"  Upon Coon's reply of the third day after Last Claim's Day, nineteenth year in the reign of King Nuurs Nornask'an, Snayrn's spirit cried in utter and undeathly anguish and evaporated through the ceiling, not yet to be seen again.

The diminished, yet valiant party left through the hall of mirrors other set of ebony doors and entered a skylighted, square room with long, trough like fountains obscuring exiting doors on the east and west side.  Messenger pigeons roosted under a purple, night sky watched over by three (not the expected two) gibbous moons.  Clearly, Mazkorick's Tower stretched not across physical but dimensional space.  Coon, while examining the fountains was beset upon by a child of the Oceandrinker, a long thick watery serpent.  The party attempted to fight it's way around the water weirds but first Coon, then Thria fell to the lethal, watery clutches of this fell planar creature.  Raven was able to dispatch the left fountain-fiend and recovered some treasure from the fountain and the bodies of his dead friends.  He entered the left door to be witness a strange ghostly dinner party, in a sumptuous but decaying grand dining room.  Unable to face more death and madness, Raven fled back to the hall of mirrors and collapsed in fitful slumber.

Coon the crafty thief,

the wizard Gump,

and 

the Warlady of Fortuna, Thria the Gloryseeker 

will all be missed.  

We raise drink to you in the halls of the Great Mother!