Powerful weapons fire from Rayraj, Jaqweh and Ki converges on the solar wisp all at the same time, blowing its remaining plasma out into the void of space. Saryn and Ganondwarf drop out of the dissipating mass and are left to pat out the burning patches on their armor. You look out to the landscape ahead and no other solar wisps or other dangers seem to be rising. Seems like you'll be safe for now!
Combat Over!
Once you've recovered from your clash with the solar wisps, you're able to reorient yourselves and return to the path towards the temple. You cross over a rocky rise and notice a smooth flat patch that winds between rockier sections up ahead - the flat patch appears to be the remains of an ancient path.
The winding path leads down along the asteroid’s surface, curving back into a wide depression. A vast temple of stone like that of the asteroid rises from the depression. The center of the tall building sports an enormous crystalline dome atop its stone construction. Rubble covers several areas outside of the complex, though a side stairway is visible along the building’s southern edge. A primary staircase admits entrance along the structure’s western edge, beginning right at the end of the path.
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Breathing a sigh of relief as the Plasma creature dissipates under extreme violence, Ki follows Saryn towards the monastery, bouncing across the moon's service. Stopping dead as the beauty of the Monastery comes into view their eyes widen.
"Soooo Pretty! I can see why Master 'Nura came here!" They exclaim, "Ki is ready!"
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Ray helps those recently released to their feet. Feeling like he had a quick dip in a hot tub, he bounces up ahead while the others rest.
Arriving at the temple, he pauses to absorb the sight he's beholding. Stopping for a moment to wonder why one would ever want to destroy something so beautiful, he get lost for a moment in his history.
Snapping to when the others arrive, "Right mates, welcome to the temple entrance, here we got..."
"Rock and dust. You know, what you would see on a barren asteroid."
Saryn ascends up the 15ft wide stone stairs. Silver doors lie partly ajar to the northern and southern sides of the wide entryway. A second set of stairs ascends further to the east, ending at a thick stone wall with a single golden doorway bedecked in astrological symbols. A dull blue, uncut crystal, roughly the size of a human child floats in the center of the entryway. A dim light pulses from this bizarre gem.
The door heading eastward has a strange golden lock at its center.
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Admiring the intricate and beautiful Gem and Inscriptions, but none the wiser to their deeper meaning, Ki shrugs and continues up the steps to their allies'. Seeing Saryn moving to the right hand door, Ki readies their cannon and joins Jaq on the opposite side of the doorway.
"Got yer back Jack" they comm over to Saryn.
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Ganon's floating camera pointed towards the door and the gem before spitting out some basic info to him. "Church of Ibra... Ibra... Sounds familiar, but I'm not remembering anything at the moment." He polished his armor as well as he could under the circumstances. "Just a tad distracted to think clearly."
The southern and northern side chambers off the entry-way are both bare and empty, with breaches in sections of their outer walls that look like they may have been caused by strikes from stellar debris. Both of the side-chambers sport a single silver enameled door leading east, deeper into the temple.
Saryn and Jaqweh don't spot anything unusual in the side chamber.
While most of the party is appreciating the Ibran symbols or inspecting the side rooms, Rayraj has been taking a look at the central gem hovering in the entryway. He can't quite work out what the gem was used for, or what its current purpose might be. However...
He's suddenly accosted by a psychic wail that emits from the gem directly into his mind! The screams are incoherent and agonized, overlapping noise that sinks in and rattles the psyche. But Rayraj stays strong against the psychic wailing until it ebbs.
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"Something..." Ray comms, "is in pain, I need to help."
Ray threw away his legacy to help the people of Neverwinter. Though they never accepted the red skinned, horned half-human, he never turned his back on them.
"I'm going to try again...this may be a bad idea but watch my back, mates."
He steps up to the gem and lays a hand on it:
[ooce]Maybe[/ooc]
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About to follow into the chamber, Ki spota Ray and Jaw fiddling with the odd blue crystal. ”Ooh! Me help!” they exclaim as they rush to the two, using their four empty arms to help re-balance the crystal on its pedestal. Unfortunately their usual brand of ‘helping’ is not enough to actually aid in their efforts.
Rayraj, Jaqweh and Ki all start to work with the gem, either trying to intuitively discover flaws in the crystal's surface or providing advice from nearby. Both Ki and Rayraj find that sections of the crystals surface are somewhat yielding... as if the crystal itself is rotting. They attempt to remove the bizarre corrupted sections, but their manipulations are not quite deft enough and they touch an inner facet of the gem.
The crystal flares with a nightmarish inner light and a psychic blast crashes out into the minds of everyone nearby.
As the psychic backlash fades, you see that the gem is dimly pulsing with light. It seems your efforts haven't succeeded in freeing the tormented minds within.
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Ray is overwhelmed and drops to on knee as the full force of the damage washes over him.
He regains his composure, still gripping his horned brow. Through clenched teeth, "Sorry everyone. The dice weren't with me on this one. Anyone else care to try? I don't think I have the stamina to attempt another myself."
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The blast tears through Jaqweh's mind, overwhelming the mental defenses he'd been trained to maintain since childhood. He grasps onto the last shreds of those buffers inimical to every lashunta, and begins to reestablish his personal sense of order.
I am Jaqweh Navar, brother of Marak. I am a Steward Officer and a Starfinder.
His focus and sheer force of personality allow him to deflect the worst of the blast.
"I don't think trying again would be a good idea, Ray. At least not right now. Maybe there's something - or someone - inside that can give us a better idea of what we're facing here."
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Ki winces as the nightmarish horrors assault their mind, causing them stagger back from the crystal clutching their head in agony. Tears leaking from their eyes at the distress within the crystal they turn to Ray and Jaq.
"We can't help? Oh..." they say dejectedly still panting heavily. "Crystal too clumsy, maybe Nura Master can help."
Given time, the SKittermander will pop themselves down on the floor away from the crystal and try to get their breath back.
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Ray walks off down the steps and folds his legs under himself to practice the meditation he saw the master use. This lasts for only a second when he pops up to stretch and run in place. This may need further study.
When he feels his strength return he'll head to the southern door to hopefully not fail at life there.
The southern silver door opens to a long hallway with doors along the southern and northern sides of the hall. You open the first door to reveal a 10x10 foot chamber with a low stone bench. Based on the similar spacing between each doorway, you suspect that the other doors likely lead to similar small meditation rooms. Mid way down the long hall, a branching passage leads north to another silver door . Rubble blocks the opposite passage to the south and further travel eastward.
While most of the rooms are bare, the two marked on the map with Xs contain the desiccated corpses of shirren dressed in simple but tattered robes. The ancient corpses are kneeling as if in supplication, their hands outstretched, palms up. Each has a unique jewel studded holy symbol in their palm.
While the doors themselves look to be safe, when you open them you hear a barely audible echo from each room - the sound of pounding of claws on doors and the sound of a shirren's telepathic terror. There's something not quite right about the rooms, as if there's some psychic imprint of whatever happened here. You suspect that while you can view them safely from the corridor, going inside them could be dangerous.
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Stretching out, he looked between the selections out front. "Either try the front door for the respectful thing or check for a back entrance for the tactical thing."
Jaqweh also takes a quick break, sitting on the steps and recovering his composure. At Ganon's suggestion, he heads around the southern side of the building to the back entrance. He cautiously checks to see if it's locked and listens for anything moving on the other side.
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Moving into the Corridor, Ki examines the various chambers from the Hallway, pushing them open with their empty hands whilst keeping their cannon ready in case of nasty surprises. Seeing the desiccated Shirren they call out on the comms.
"Dead Shirren! All signs of scary sounds and scratching - not sure it is good to go in there! Something scary is here..."
Ki doesn't hear the same faint pounding noises that Rayraj does, but the rooms are unnerving nonetheless.
Meanwhile at the exterior of the building, Jaqweh and Ganon approach the stairs leading up to the south facing door. The set of stairs are a little unusual - each of the vertical risers is etched with runes similar in appearance to those around the main western entrance to the building. For a moment, both Jaqweh and Ganon think they see a shadowy, four armed figure standing at the top of the stairs and watching them, but when they double-take, there's nothing there.
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"Did you see.... Huh, I'd've sworn I saw someone up there."
Then when Ganon places his hand on Jaqweh's shoulder, he nearly jumps out of his skin. Hearing the meanings of the runes, he agrees that it is all a bit too creepy.
"Sounds like Ki went off on his own, too. Probably best not to scoobie the team too much. Let's join him and see if he's found anything less unsettling."
Jaqweh then heads back to where Ki is, to see if there's a better, and perhaps less strange, way in.
To the north, Rayraj opens up another hallway that appears to be a mirror image of the one to the south. All along the hall are small meditation rooms just like the ones opposite. And just like the meditation rooms to the south, Rayraj hears the sound of agonized shirren and pounding on the doors.
The north side hallway has one silver door to the south, and is otherwise blocked off by more rubble.
----
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Ray flicks a dagger out but doesn't light it yet and calls out to the group in response to Jaqweh, "Don't worry, mate. I'm sure I have been in worst hells. Just stay with Ki. But, just to add to the creepiness, while you're seeing things, I'm hearing things. You'll hear me if I run into a spot."
He does stop for a moment and says, "Though, if you feel like your well there, Saryn, you could join me..."
He pushes open the door and steps into the hallway as quiet as possible, hoping to get another good feel for the place. Then he stops, distracted by the shiny, and reaches out for the dagger.
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"Ooh this place is super creepy!" Ki notes as the little Skittermander shivers from the overall spookiness. "Apart from Dead Shirren, which I don't want to touch - seems clear here. How are you doing in the north? There is a door here that might lead into the main chamber." Ki messages Saryn and Ray.
When Rayraj steps into the meditation chamber with the dead shirren holding the dagger, he feels the back of his neck prickle. He picks up the dagger and recognizes it as a called tactical knife. However, as he turns to leave... he sees the room's doorway shrinking and fading away!
From the outside, all that Saryn can see is Rayraj momentarily freeze in place.
In his mind, Rayraj rushes for the shrinking entrance, but it vanishes into nothing before he gets to it. From his perspective, the room he's in seems to vibrate as its furniture and features turn a bland grey. There's no way out. Panic turns to determination, turns back to panic.
After what seems like only a few moments, a haggard looking Rayraj stumbles out of the meditation room, dagger in hand.
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From Saryn's view, Ray may have been standing still for a few moments but Ray had a cast away adventure and, when Saryn sees him move again, Ray steps out of the room and walks up to Saryn with a look of craze in his eye,
"Hey, Saryn. Long time no see. I made a new friend..." and he holds up the dagger by the blade and the amulet is affixed to it with an odd looking face, "This is Gerber, he's a good friend and a great listener and this douche bag thinks I'm sane but we all know that I'm cray-cray-...loopy. Hehehehehe..."
He steps back to look at Gerber then, after looking like he is more collecting himself than anything else, when he suddenly snaps off the amulet from the knife and holds it up, through Saryn's bewilderment, "Since you decided to make me nut-so, GM, mind telling me what I went crazy for?"