The Iobane members offer Issi an enchanted maul to use.
The Throat-of-Nothingness cult built the Cathedral of Nothingness in centuries past, and it stands out from the other ruins in the plaza like a lone tombstone. The cathedral consists of a large central structure flanked by two pairs of domes to the north and south. A huge double door allows access to the interior, but no other exits are available. The domes flanking the cathedral are 30 feet high, and the central cathedral is 60 feet high. A tower rises from the back part of the cathedral to a height of 90 feet, while four spires at the cathedral’s four corners reach a height of 120 feet.
The whole complex is surrounded by a 20-foot-high stone wall, but the courtyards within are barren and empty. A ring of six crimson monoliths, not quite stone yet not quite crystal, rise from the plaza stones here as if they formed naturally in ages past. Each stone emits a faint red glow. While weeds grow profusely through paving stone cracks elsewhere in the ruins, within the ring itself, the stones are barren. Only a light dusting of red sand lies atop these ruined blocks. This is the eponymous Doorway to the Red Star, though the magical portal is currently inactive.
Beyond the Doorway, a twenty-foot-wide entry hall narrows into ten-foot-wide alcoves to the north and south, where archways open into the two eastern spires. In each of the two alcoves sits a gem-encrusted skull. One of the skulls has sapphires that emit a cold blue in its eye sockets. The other skull’s eye sockets contain rubies that burn with a fierce crimson gleam.
The skulls float up into the air as you draw near. "Halt," the first one says. "Before you may enter the cathedral, you must pass the test of the faithful."
"Yes, the test! The test!" the other says cheerily. "Oh, it's a lovely test. I think you'll like it!"
"Hmph," the first skull grumbles. "Let's get on with it. Answer our questions. First: what do you desire?"
"Yes! Good answer," the second demilich cheers. "Destruction leads to a very rough road, but it also breeds creation!"
The first demilich grunts. "Right. Next question: who is the priest that rules these lands?"
"Aw, come on. That one was too easy!" the second demilich whines.
"It's still part of the test!" the first one insists. "Quiet, now!" It turns back to Issi. "What sacrifice do you bring to show your worth?"
"Hee hee! Look at the fiery hair fall!" the second demilich chortles as Issi shears her locks. Sadiki winces in sympathy and gives her sister a regretful look as Issi sacrifices her namesake hair.
"That is acceptable," the first demilich proclaims. "Now, tell us: What is strongest?"
"Yes, yes! She gets it!" the second demilich crows.
"Indeed," the first one says. "Now, the final question. What do you need?"
The demiliches grow silent, a bit baffled that finally someone they don’t know has answered their questions properly. A few moments later, they wordlessly retreat to their alcoves.
This fifty-five-foot-high chamber contains banks of ancient benches that stretch to the north and south, leaving a clear walkway between the large stone doors to the east and west. Glimmering braziers and glowing runes fill the room, and eerie shadows dance and weave across the walls. A human corpse clad in red and black lies slumped by the wall just north of the doors to the west, clutching a bone staff wrapped in colorful ribbons.
Heavy beams in the chamber cast dark and distorted shadows against the ceiling of this room. Other, more ominous shadows lurk amid the benches and alcoves. As you step into the choir, the eerie sound of discordant singing coming from the benches starts to manifest.
A ghost rises up from the corpse by the doors. "Hold fast, lest you join me in this torment!" he calls out. He resembles a handsome man clad in red and black robes. Yet as he moves, it becomes obvious that his bones have been broken in dozens of places, and his limbs, neck, and torso bend in unsettling and gruesome ways.
"I am Tollvych. Only a few months ago, I met my demise here," the man says. "I first became intrigued by the Doorway to the Red Star after I came into the possession of an ancient magical staff called Wyrm Drinker. I had determined that Wyrm Drinker’s powers had gone inert, but that if I could return it to the site of its greatest triumph, the powerful device would reactivate. After determining this site to be the Doorway to the Red Star, I made the journey. I opted for stealth
and trickery to sneak past the Iobane and the demiliches in the entry chamber, but my luck ran out in this haunted room. A choir of entropy shattered my body and snuffed out my life force!"
The ghost sighs, broken bones bending. "All I desire is to move onto the afterlife, that I may find the great reward Lord Asmodeus promises his faithful! But this place is infused with overwhelming ennui, and I cannot leave. I never got the chance to explore deeper into this cathedral, but I can sense the general direction of this place's tedium, a pulsing drone of unlife above. Destroy it, and I may finally be able to muster the will to move on to the afterlife!"
"All I did was try to cross this room," Tollvych says sadly. "The eerie call of the choir sapped my will before the destructive chorus shattered my body."
When asked about Wyrm Drinker, the ghost looks to his broken body. His hands still clutch a staff made from the femur of a gold dragon wrapped in the multicolored scales of every type of chromatic and metallic dragon. "No! It is still mine! You cannot have it," he insists fiercely.
"Long ago, it was wielded by one of the Ten Magic Warriors," Tollvych says. "It is supposed to be able to grant the wielder the power of dragons, but its magic had been suppressed. That's why I brought it here, to try to unlock its powers!"
"We let an evil dragon take the hits!" Sadiki says cheerfully. With a wicked gleam in her eye, she casts a powerful version of her summon dragon spell. A large black dragon appears in the center of the room.
The dragon's presence triggers the haunt. A choir of ghostly shadows fill the benches in the room, chanting a haunting and unearthly melody. Issi and Sadiki stay a safe distance away as the dragon is battered by their sonic attacks! The dragon roars and rampages through the shadows, blasting them with its acidic breath! It becomes badly wounded in the process, but it succeeds at disrupting the haunt and causing the spirits to dissipate. The dragon gives Sadiki a dirty look before it disappears.
Sadiki giggles. "Shall we?"
This high chamber contains several stone sarcophagi in various stages of disrepair. Candles flicker atop stone altars in circular chambers to the northwest and southwest, while a flight of stairs winds up along a stone pillar to the south.
Several mohrg spawn lurk in this chamber, clawed tongues and viscera writhing in their skeletal bodies. They prove a fine target to take out your frustrations on, and you destroy them without too much trouble. Beside the stairs up, doors to the north and south lead to the cathedral's side wings.
This pair of large domed chambers is connected by a twenty-foot wide hallway. Several workbenches, bookshelves, and desks line the walls of both chambers, while at the center of each stands a long table surrounded by chairs. Books and notes are scattered haphazardly about the room.
A bizarre creature stands among the books here. This three-armed, three-legged monster has no discernible eyes, nose, ears, or mouth or no visible means of ingesting food. Its limbs are distributed so evenly across its body that it is all but impossible to tell which way the creature is oriented at any given time.
You can hear its telepathic voice in your minds. "Ah, blood and breath. An opportunity for new exploration. The transition from life to undeath. But first, death."
The creature concentrates, sending a wave of despair to crush your hopes!
Sadiki resists the despair as well. She repeats her summoning spell, this time conjuring a gold dragon to flank with her sister.
The monster reels from the dragon's attacks and Issi's powerful maul strike. It claws rapidly at Issi, hitting her thrice despite Sadiki's efforts to protect her.
The dragon scores two more hits on the monster, then Issi delivers a critical hit that slays the bizarre aberration!
Searching the documents here confirms that the experiments conducted here were principally focused on the theoretical idea of “undeath beyond undeath.” The theory suggests that if an undead creature were starved of the needs and urges that keeps it bound to this world long enough, it might transform into something even more removed from the cycle of life. None of the research done in this workshop made much progress toward this concept. In fact, the research strongly suggests that all that lies beyond undeath is nothingness, as the soul itself is finally freed to move to the Boneyard.
With nothing else of interest on the lower level, you ascend the central stairs. A squat, plain stone altar is against the far wall of the room opposite the stairs, and the shattered remains of several benches lie scattered across the floor. A stout stone door, covered with complex runes, blocks the stairs leading further up.
A mohrg stands guard here, his long, clawed tongue writhing. He raises a blade of adamantine that seems to absorb light from the air around it, giving the impression the wielder is standing in the shadow of a much larger creature.
The mohrg rushes forward, attacking both of you with his tongue from 10 feet away.
Issi lands a solid strike as Sadiki fires a beam of disintegration. The mohrg slashes his sword through the beam, absorbing some of its magic and protecting it somewhat from the power, though the beam still damages the undead.
The creature snarls and claws at Issi.
Issi lands another devastating blow on the mohrg. The undead creature scowls as he steps back and raises his free hand. "Enough! I do not wish to meet my doom here. I've no love for Dwandek or his cultists. Spare me, and I will tell you all I know about him. I will even give you this enchanted blade. It once belonged to the Ten Magic Warriors, so I am told."
The mohrg hands over the legendary blade. It is Spellcutter, once wielded by Kaldalir, one of the Ten Magic Warriors and founder of the Iobane. This magic sword can’t harm living creatures, but it cuts
through constructs and undead with remarkable ease.
"I am Taon," the undead says. "In life, I fought against the Iobane. They slew me in battle, and my body happened to fall within reach of the cultists of the Throat-of-Nothingness. They turned me into this undead creature and promised to allow me to continue to unleash my wrath upon the Iobane, but it has been decades and they continue to keep me on a tight leash. I've given up on taking my vengeance. Now I just want to make my own way in the world.
"Dwandek's arcanum is past that door, on the highest level of the tower. He is a formidable necromancer and not easily defeated. But if you do destroy his physical form, you will have to destroy his grimoire as well. He keeps his soul within one of its pages!"
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Issi hefts the blade appreciatively, although she's a little disappointed that it doesn't have more heft, and listens carefully to the morgh. "Thank you for the information." There's no harm in being polite after-all. "As far as we're concerned you are free to leave, assuming you can pass the demiliches at the door."
She doesn't go so far to offer the creature good luck, but any fight she doesn't have to have is better than one she does.
Sharing a glance with her sister she motions forwards.
The mohrg scurries off. Sadiki lays hands on Issi to heal her injuries, then after a few minutes to refocus, you proceed up the stairs.
Bookshelves stretch from floor to ceiling around this expansive room, but the chamber’s only other furnishings are worktables cluttered with parchments, books, and tools for magical research.
The lich Dwandek is here, ready to face you! He raises his wand and prepares to fight without preamble!
Dwandek acts first, casting a spell in an attempt to dominate Issi!
Sadiki uses the last of her most powerful spells to conjure a gold dragon to flank with Issi! The dragon roars and slashes the lich with its claw.
Gritting his teeth, Dwandek casts another spell, attempting to conjure a duplicate of Issi to fight by his side!
Sadiki strikes Dwandek with a violet ray of energy, slowing the lich. The dragon scores a hit with its claws, then Issi delivers a powerful shock to the lich's system!
Dwandek howls with fury, using his magic to try to suck the moisture out of your bodies!
With a mighty strike and a huge blast of lightning, Dwandek goes down! His body quickly crumbles to dust, leaving behind his gear: a didaem of intellect and a wand of inexhaustible cynicism.
A search of the chamber uncovers a variety of other magical treasures: two +2 weapon potency runes and two greater striking runes prepared to adorn the armaments of new undead minions, and an orange prism aeon stone that Dwandek has been studying. There are also 8,500 gp worth of rare spell components and minor magical knickknacks scattered about the room.
Of greatest interest is the tome on the table: the Grimoire of Unknown Necessities. A single page near the end has been cleverly added. This page, which bears what appears to be nothing more than a detailed illustration of a nameless graveyard, is in fact Dwandek’s soul cage. Destroying it will ensure that the lich will not rejuvenate.
With Dwandek's defeat, you will have proven yourselves to the Iobane and earned the right to pass through the Doorway to the Red Star!
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Issi takes what might be described as a little too much pleasure in tearing out the final page and incinerating it with sparks of magic. She passes the bright orange stone to her sister with a smile before flicking through the Grimoire and feeling a strange tickling on the edge of her mind. She makes a note to revisit it the next day and then tucks it away in her bag.
"Right, so we need to leave without getting into any trouble and let the Iobane know." She says. "Let's check on that ghost before we go."
As you return to the chapel, Tollvych's ghost rises one last time from his remains. He sighs contentedly before fading away, the destruction of Dwandek allowing the man to pass on into the afterlife. You can now claim his gear, including his greater clandestine cloak and the staff Wyrm Drinker, its power now awakened.
Warder-Chief Mpondo and the rest of the Iobane are grateful that you have broken the Throat-of-Nothingness. In time, the Iobane intend to reclaim the cathedral, but for now, all attention swiftly becomes focused on the you and your plan to open the Doorway to the Red Star.
The actual Doorway to the Red Star consists of a ring of crimson stone menhirs that stand not far from the entrance to the cathedral. Mpondo and the Iobane know the ritual required to activate the Doorway, and they guide you through the necessary attunement process. This requires you to spend a day within 100 feet of the Doorway itself. This time need not be spent in meditation (or in any other specific activity), but stepping further away even for a few seconds disrupts the attunement. Once attuned, you can use the Doorway to the Red Star at any time during that period of activity—in this case, within the next month.
If there's anything you want to do before departing, now is the time to do it!
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Sadiki gets to keep the staff, especially given her new predisposition towards summoning them!
The prospect of spending a day hanging around the doorway doesn't bore Issi exactly, but it doesn't excite her either. Fortunately Lesedi is willing to bring as much of her research as she can and the couple spends much of the day discussing the elf's latest project and speculating about what they might find beyond the doorway.
Sadiki is invited to join the discussions if she wants.
Once you are attuned and ready to open the portal, Mpondo instructs you to stand within the ring of stones. "Now, be careful. The portal has remained closed for a long time, so there's a possibility something might be lurking in the 'in between'—be it a potentially deadly outflow of trapped magical energy or even some sort of dangerous monster. Ready?"
You begin the ritual known as the rite of the Red Star, invoking the latent power within the Doorway to the Red Star through repetitive chanting and ritual movements in an attempt to open a portal to the planet Akiton. The plaza hums with magical energy that vibrates bones, causes hair to rise as if in a static field and graces the tongue with flavors both unbearably sweet and terribly foul. The crimson pillars of the Doorway itself begin to smoke, then shimmer with red light, while the air within the ring shifts and ripples as if in the throes of intense heat. A moment later, a portal opens at the center of the standing stones. This portal is vertical and semi-circular, with a radius of 30 feet, and is filled with shimmering red energy.
Sadiki takes one of Issi's hands, while Lesedi takes the other. Together, the trio steps through the portal--
--and emerge on the other side. As the magical light fades and the sensation of sublime disorientation from the powerful teleportation recedes, a large room comes into view. This broad, octagonal chamber is shaped from red stone, the walls of which betray no joints or seams save for on the floor in the center of the room, where a complex ring of runes glows with soft red radiance. Large, overstuffed cushions are arranged neatly alongside small tables. The walls are lined with shelves and bookcases, including some that have been shaped directly into the stone, and each seems to contain a veritable treasure trove of ancient scrolls and texts.
Several creatures float in this room, taken by surprise by your sudden appearance. The strange beings are mostly pulsating brain-sac, with the body beneath it somewhere between that of an insect and a human fetus. Most of them quickly adopt nonthreatening stances as one floats closer to you, speaking to you via telepathy. "Greetings, strangers. We apologize for not being able to extend you proper hospitality. You have come to the Hall of Reason at a rather inconvenient time. I am called Fourteen Curiosities. May I ask the purpose of your visit here?"