Everyone hears a female voice coming from the walls, the ceiling, and the floor, saying "Welcome, adventurers! Forward move, so that we may see, if you will find what you seek, in Andakami."
Listening to the voice beckoning him forward, Khayal obliges.
He takes a few steps forward trying to get into the shifting light.
Hajar and Rayhan move forward. Rayhan thinks about the name Andakami. Is it something he's heard before?
All Rayhan can discern about "Andakami" is that the language of two extraplanar creatures have similar-sounding words. One is literally "Isles of Not", while the other, older definition would be "realm of godlings/not of living [ordinary]".
The group moves into the cavern-like corridors, nothing but their own lights lighting the way. The passageways twist and turn around, not going in a single direction.
You notice that along the cavelike walls are circular plugs of shifing mist that, at frst glance, look more like strange protuberances on the walls. You pass by two such areas as Khayal moves forward deeper into the caves.
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The group finally sees a larger cavern up ahead of them in the blue passageway. The walls, ceiling, and floor of this large chamber are studded with strange cysts and buds. Most of the floor is covered by a wide pool of faintly glowing green liquid but for a narrow pathway leading around it to an opening on the far side. Standing near the entrance to the chamber is an unfamiliar, pale-skinned elven man dressed in fine leathers
and armed with a curved blade. Across the shallow pond lies a sumptuous divan, a canopied bed, and a table surrounded with chairs. To the East, darkness shows another cave tunnel.
A figure is seated on the divan across the room - another elf, this one female and strikingly beautiful. A second guard stands to her right side.
The woman called out in a melodious voice "Greetings, heroes from the outside! I am a spirit of creation, and I called you hear to abide with me, so that we may discuss many things, from the Archwizard who sent you here, and how to get back to the land that you hold dear. I trust the Golden Ram did not vex you, but it was a convenient way to test you! Do not mind my liege-men that you see, they will not move without a word from me. Come, take a seat at my table, and I will spin you a tale such that your ears will tingle."
To your trained ear you realize the elf woman is speaking with meter and rhyme, almost singing a song, although she is going to great pains to appear to be speaking normally. Normal for a human or elf, that is. Concentrating, you realize she is really saying
"Greetings, heroes from the outside!
I am a spirit of creation, and I called you hear to abide
with me,
so that we may discuss many things,
from the Archwizard who sent you here,
and how to get back to the land that you hold dear.
I trust the Golden Ram did not vex you,
but it was a convenient way to test you!
Do not mind my liege-men that you see,
they will not move without a word from me.
Come, take a seat at my table,
and I will spin you a tale such that your ears will tingle."
You don't know why, but both of these guards look like their either holding their breath until they turn blue, or they have a fortnight's worth of constipation. They're not hostile, but like they're both holding something in with great effort. They have locked knees, too.
The woman looks like another rival to normal human female sensuousness. Better keep her away from Hajar.
Hajar bows low and speaks to the "elf"
Most beautiful and gracious Mistress, we have journeyed far to these Isles of Not. We welcome your invitation and seek to parley with you regarding the future of Kakishon.
Khayal stands in silence, though he does nod his head at Hajar's words.
You can't recall much, just that some gnomes rhyme when spellcasting.
But you do remember the gnolls here calling the Proteans "singing shapeshifters", fighters that fought them viciously across the Kakishon islands. You are supposed to be in the Proteans' domain right now. So all is not as it is seen in these caves.
Unconcerned that the adventurers move no closer to her divan, the woman says in her light voice "I am called Lahapraset, oldest of those imprisoned here. Yes, in regret imprisoned by him called Nex on this tier, many ages ago."
"We are spirits of creation, but the Imprisoner has abandoned us, left to stagnation of our talents, deemed superfluous. So imagine our surprise when the genies of fire and earth arrived, and only after killing the one who opened the way for them did we contrive to speak with them ourselves, but were rebuffed to our very selves."
"Time flowed on, and we saw your arrival, and hope sprang anew. We need your help, your aid to subdue" the elven woman begs, "the warriors, and return this land to its' origins - oh, gloria!"
"No doubt you have seen the damage, the unweaving of the skies. Soon it will spread to the seas and the lands, unless we become allies. We can return you to the Prime Material Plane here - the path is arduous, but you will arrive in your sphere. All you must pledge is to gather those not born on this plane, and release our compatriot whom the earth-genies enchained."
Out of the corner of your eyes you notice the decorations on the walls changing minutely. One fake flower becomes a dried starfish, then changes colors from red to gold. Another symbol changes into a blue caterpillar, dropping off of the wall - and disappearing into the floor, which gives off a wisp of green smoke. Lahapraset's guard's longspear changes the point from a knife-edge to a thinner point. Small lights come off of Lahapraset's raven-black hair, some disappearing, but you could swear one of the flickering lights turns into a lightning bug.
Wind whispers through the chamber, smelling like a bakery one minute, and the salty ocean air the next.
[dice=Sense motive]1d20+3
Narir takes it all in, utterly confused at the disparity between what her reasoning tells her and what she is seeing.
So confused was Nasir, that she forgot how to spell her own name! :-P
"I regret that we were in no shape to do so at the time, as well, Mistress Yazi. Great Lahapraset, we may not yet possess the strength necessary to do what you ask. Do you have aid you can provide to us in this quest?"
Lahapraset frowns, but says "Know, then, that the earth-genies have turned their courtyard into a fortress. To attack them unprepared would be senseless. If you do not have the magical repertoire, then we must increase your reservoir." She turns and motions at the West wall, and it expands in a small bubble that flows from the wall to the floor, moving closer to the elven woman. The bubble opens like a flower, changing color from dark blue to emerald green, and Lahapraset takes several items. She hands them to the guard next to her, closing the flower, which becomes a raised bubble again, crawling back around the pond to rest up in the wall it originally came from. A cascade of rainbow colors finally settles on the blue of the walls for the bubble.
Lahapraset motions at the man next to her. The guard goose-steps towards the party, moving East around the pond in the chamber, stiffly moving as if each step takes visible effort from the man. When he reaches Yazi (the first person in the group on that side), he jerkily hands her a collection of bottles and sticks. "GgIIFFtTsssS!" the man rasps, his voice sounding like he hasn't drunk water for weeks.
Bartan looks at the items with detect magic to try to determine what we were given.
Khayal eyes the man warily. But he is unlikely to complain anlboit help offered. Especially in the current situation. When Bartan begins to discern the various properties, Khayal watches with interest. The vagaries of magical auras may be beyond him, but the usefulness of the items is not.
Bartan looks at the items with detect magic to try to determine what we were given.
2 vials of stone salve
2 vials of oil of soften earth and stone
3 vials of fly
wand of stone shape (32 charges)
wand of dimension door (19 charges)
Seeing some powerful auras emanating from the items, Bartan pulls out his wand of identify and does his search using that.
Got it.
Bartan identifies the properties of the items, and relays them to her allies.
"If our comrade you can see," Lahapraset says from across the chamber, "then make haste to use the salves or oil to set them free. Do not be alarmed by Magiyawalla's visage - once freed from her prison we will travel to you, and assist you."
The dark-haired elven woman pauses. "Even if Magiyawalla is freed, your task is yet incomplete until all who are foreign-born together meet."
So. We must do battle with the Shaitan. I feared it might come to this. But...what happens to Kakishon once these Protean get what they want? Hajar asks
The elven guard marches back to his position next to Lahapraset, who says "Your ship has been repaired, and it will take you back to where you began your journey. Do not delay, nor bend your knee to any other here in this Prison. We await the good news that our companion's freedom has arisen."
Khayal nods his head, and then looks to his companions. Catching their eyes, he makes a small facial gesture indicating his readiness to depart.
With a wordless sendoff from the dark-haired woman, the adventurers take their leave of the mind-affecting caverns. Walking back out of the caves to the shore, all of you see that the Nexian galley has been repaired from its' fall down the edge of the world.
And it is green!
Not an emerald green, or a forest green, but an "I'm about to be sick" kind of pea-soup green. As the mist becomes waves that lap on the Isles of Not shoreline, a slow ripple of yellowish color moves through the outer hull of the galley, but the color returns after the undulation is complete.
Going on board, you see that the formerly golden boatman with a ram's head is also as green as tainted copper. When everyone is onboard, the ship moves with a lurch away from the beach, the oars rotating to push the vessel away. Only the boatman's head turns, rotating on top of his shoulders until he is looking into the mist behind the galley. The ship begins moving backwards - and does not stop! Rather than guide to the port or starboard, the Nexian galley is picking up speed as it retreats into the mist.
And you hear the sound of rushing water from aft of the ship.
This time Bartan takes a few moments to lash himself to the mast or some other very strongly-attached item on the deck.
Khayal goes below. No need to even be on a weatherdeck for this. Once below he lashes himself to one of the stronger looking bulkheads.
Hajar does the same as his brother, he doesn't want a repeat of the fall.
Rayhan for his own measure, wants to be on deck to see how this all works. Of course, he's gonna tie himself down too
Everyone on board feels a heavy force suddenly forcing them down across the decking! The galley lurches towards the bow, and everything not lashed down tight goes rolling to the front of the deck! The wooden ship starts flying backwards up the bottomless waterfall, the water turning from mist into water droplets. As much as the Nexian galley fell off of the edge of the world, now it is flying up to the edge above!
Here we go again...but this time, some mysterious force keeps slamming you against the wooden deck.
You take points of damage as you are buffeted about.
You take points of damage as you are buffeted about.
You take points of damage as you are buffeted about.
You take points of damage as you are buffeted about.
You take points of damage as you are buffeted about.
You take points of damage as you are buffeted about.
If you fail two checks in a row, you take points of nonlethal damage as a magical (extradimensional?) force slams you to the deck repeatedly like a ball on a string.
With a heart-in-throat movement, the ship gets over the edge of the world, slamming -BOOM!- back onto the water. The roar of the infinite waterfall of Kakishon dwindles as the Nexian galley keeps rowing backwards, back to the islands' shores. The boatman's head is still backwards on his shoulders.
At least the sun is moving in the right direction, sunrise peeking past the clouds.
You see another sign just sticking out of the ocean waters as the ship, still rowing backwards, continues on.
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"Whheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!" Yazi let's out as the ship begins its ascent
"Hi Rose!" Yazi lets out as she is bounced past the dancer.
"Bye Rose!" she says as she is bounced back.
"This is fun!" she continues as she's bounced around the ship.
"Ow." she lets out as she doesnt quite nail that last landing.
"Wheeeeeeeeeeeee!" she starts again.
"That was fun." she giddily says, still slightly bouncing on her legs.
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Khayal watches the ten ladies with a bit of bemusement. It would have been a fun way to ride back up the waterfall, but sometimes prudence is best.
Bartan blows only a few chunks from the rough ride, and looks green and drenched, lashed to the ship's deck.
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Khayal watches the ten ladies with a bit of bemusement.
The adventurers find out that their Nexian galley is going backwards, retracting the path it took through the waters. It takes the oars rowing backwards most of the day to reach the small string of islands next to the main island of Kakishon in the center of the demiplane.
The ship retains its' sickly-green color, and the boatman is still copper-green with a reverse-facing head, but the taint is slowly fading away from the lumber, starting at the bow. The symbol of Nex is still covered up, however, and the pillows onboard the ship have a disturbing habit of turning into fish, butterfiles, or seashells if you take your eyes off of them too long.
yep
ouch
The skies are calm, and the sun is low on the horizon as you pass the small islands that you've never explored.
You see a pile of rocks off the port (East) side coming straight at the ship. They're going at a good clip, too, even making a wake!
You get to act in the Surprise Round.