Anachronism
Chapter 30 - A Little Light of Hope
Xej and Queen discuss...
Queen : We're south of the town by about 5 miles, we can see it in the distance. Aside from a still smoking crater from that small meteor, it seems calm. There are no Chitin horrors running around anyway. I wouldn't be surprised if they left some sort of watcher behind, maybe a Gyshin or two. I think that Jesus and I are alive, because I have a spell on me that prevents scrying or detection anywhere near me. So, what now, we're down to four. This is not looking good. After I teleported randomly away, I was struck unconscious, and Jesus and I had a dream together. We both dreamt that we were standing on the white bridge in the ruins there. Then we jumped off into the water, and it shattered, and we were standing amongst the shards of the glass, in a dark place, and looking into the shards I saw different places, one of them was an image of a cavern, and I saw a snake wrapped around it and it was saying, "here, here...."
Xej to Queen :"If there is a guard/sentry he is probably at the bridge, which seems to be of considerable interest because of the shared dream we've all had. Perhaps it is a message from the Gods."
Queen: Sure, go back to the bridge, I agree, what other choice do we have.
Jesus : Let's slay some Gyshin ass!!!
Gorvagio : Hunh?
Queen : So, what's our approach? I can make us all invisible, and I have a bunch of other nasty spells....I can also cast True Sight so that I can see what's around, but it doesn't last for very long.
Jesus : Let's slay some Gyshin ass!!!
Gorvagio : Hunh?
Xej: Lets slay some Gyshin ass! Is their any way to protect from there mind control? If not we will have to slay them quickly. If things get ugly and we must retreat we will meet back here. I have diamond dust for a stoneskin. If anybody is protected from their mind powers they should get it as well any other useful spells, they may end up fighting the Gyshin on their own. If nobody is then I'll use it myself. Are you guys ready to go?
Queen : I can make two people's mind impenetrable for most of the day. Myself, and one other. (she looks at the paladin, and the troll...) Um, that would be you Xej. If I Gyshin tried to take over the paladin, they'd only get confused. And well, as for the troll....*she sighs* So, if we get into a fight with the Gyshin, we want to kill him before jumping into the water? Is that right? And if we're losing, retreat, don't jump into the water? Are we just going to walk up invisible and hope no one sees us, or did you have a better plan?
The four invisible people creep through the ruins of city, darting from ruin to ruin on their approach to the bridge. From the hill you're on (still covered in ruins, you can see the city slant downwards slightly, maybe a total of 50 foot drop over the next 500 feet, and you see the small channel of water cutting through the city. The town is criss crossed by many such channels of water that intersect. They are almost an addition to the roads, being water roads. At any rate, looking down, your heads peaking over a ruined wall, you see the white gleaming bridge. You see it unmanned and empty. You creep closer, and closer, Queen muttering the words of her True Sight. She points down to the bridge. "There is a Gyshin sitting in the center of the bridge. His eyes are closed, he seems to be meditating."
Gorvagio looks about. "I want my shield." And then, he starts running. By the looks of things, he is steering way clear of the bridge and Gyshin. Queen puts her hand on yours, and says, "I'll look after him. We'll be back soon." And jogs after him. Some time later, the two return from the ruins, ducking and dodging. Gorvagio holds a two handed sword in one hand, and his shield is on the other. A large hammer is tied to his side, and you see Queen is carrying a pure black dagger. She is also wearing a suite of scale male. "I can cast spells in this." she says...."it's Marrienne's...though I can't go ethereal or make it look like normal clothing like she did."
"Me chop things!" says Gorvagio, swinging the humming two handed sword about.
"Ok, let's go...." says Queen.
You move back a bit, and summon a fire elemental, and an earth elemental. You order them to circle around, and attack the invisible being on the bridge. They begin moving away. You move back to your spying place, and cast stone swim on Jesus and Gorvagio. You managed to coax Jesus out of his armor for this plan, even though he was confused as to how he was going to kick some Gyshin Ass without his armor. You pointed out, his armor probably wouldn't help against a Gyshin, and he conceded. At any rate, the two dip under the ground out of your site. At that point, the air and fire elementals strike. As the two of you watch, Queen's hand wrapped around your wrist (she said she could safely teleport you both onto the bridge), Queen says, "He disappeared, completely.....Nyurgsuk Torsoola!" (the two of you appear on the bridge)
A few moments later the paladin and Gorvagio come crawling out of the ground onto the bridge, and run to the center. Gorvagio looks confused, and looks up to the hill where he left the two of you. "How you get here?" He narrows his eyes in a suspicious glare. "You evil Gyshin?" "No," says the Queen with a sigh and takes a last look around, nods her head, and the four of you jump.
As you near the surface of the water, things seem to slow down. You look about and Queen's hair is trailing slow motion above her head as she falls, and the Gorvagio's mouth is open in mid yell as he slowly descends. Then you hit the water.
The world around you shatters, and the shards of it float about you, strange images reflecting back in them all. Behind them is pure and utter blackness, which you seem to be hovering in. As you look about, you see the others also looking about stunned. "Um, hello?" says Queen, and looks at you.
You are all floating in a sea of blackness. Forming a rough 20' diameter about you in the shape of a rough sphere, floating lazily about, occasionally banging into each other, are about 100 shards of various sizes. Within these shards, you can see many different scenes. Queen and Jesus, "This seems familiar."
Looking about, she points out one, "This one, here..."
Looking in it, you see a rough cavern room, about 40' diameter. On one wall, there is a round smooth tunnel stretching away at a roughly 30 degree downward angle. Looking, you see one Gyshin, not invisible, or masked as a black human, but an actual Gyshin, sitting cross legged in mid air, eyes closed. He seems to be guarding access to the tunnel.
"Let's kick some Gyshin Ass!" says Jesus.
"Meat!" says Gorvagio, drooling at a herd of animals through another shard.
"No, over here my man!" says Jesus, directing the troll towards the Gyshin.
"Meat!" says Gorvagio, drooling at the Gyshin.
"Well?" says Queen.
Xej: What do you think is in there? More Gyshin? If its only one we should be alright if not... Nowhere else to go I guess. Let's just follow our dreams!
Xej enlarges Gorvagio. Casts protection from evil on each of us. And detect magic and detect invisibility on myself.
Xej: Lets send one of us through to see if there is any debilitating effects going through if there are none, the rest of us will follow through and dispatch the Gyshin as quickly as possible. Unless someone thinks we can do this more subtly of course. The room is very small, I think the Gyshin will detect us no matter what precautions we take. I think Gorvagio would be the best to send through first. Does everyone agree?
Queen : "Agreed."
Jesus : "Awww....ok...." (mumble mumble, I never get to go first)
Gorvagio : "Hunh?"
Queen : "Touch the shard Gorvagio, then kill the Gyshin."
Gorvagio : "Meat!" He touches the shard and you all watch as he appears in the room.
The huge hulking slobbering two-handed sword-wielding troll appears, and immediately closes on the Gyshin. His shield drops to his side and 7 shields begin whizzing about him. The Gyshin's eyes open in shock and then relax. He almost seems to dismiss the huge troll as the sword whistles towards him.
And the sword hits, and keeps going, the Gyshin body is flung hard into the wall, blood spraying and covering the rock. The last look the Gyshin gave, was a look of pure shock and horror to replace his small smile. The body lays crumpled in the corner, it's fingers still twitching, apparently still alive, but Gorvagio closes in for the kill. He swings the huge sword down again, and with a horrible splat the thing is cleaved nearly in two.
Then Jesus touches the shard and appears in the room. Gorvagio steps away from the dead thing, and a wispy form begins rising from it, Jesus steps forward, and cleaves. With a horrible shriek the thing is cut in two and vanishes.
Queen touches the shard and Xej follows.
The four of you stand in the room, it being quite crowded due to Gorvagio's huge size. A single tunnel leads away at a downward angle. The stone is all porous, and has millions of tiny holes in every surface. Jesus and Gorvagio are visible. Gorvagio is covered in blood.
He sniffs down at the dead lifeless body, then drops to his knees and begins consuming it.
Jesus chokes and you can hear Queen's wince.
"Um....I guess we're going down the tunnel...." says Queen tentatively.
Gorvagio looks back, his maw covered in blood and little bits of flesh. He nods, picks up his sword and shield, and takes rips a leg off of the dead body. He continues eating off of it as he follows you guys down the tunnel. (right now order is you and Queen, Jesus, and then Gorvagio)
As you creep down the tunnel some time later (maybe 1000 feet), you see it enters a huge cavern. It's about 100 feet high and 200 feet long. This tunnel comes out of an end wall, about 40 feet off the ground. You see 5 other tunnels, one leading off straight from the far wall, two off the left wall, one going up, one going down, one in the right wall, heading downwards, and one in the floor that heads straight down. The room is filled with lush plants, and the floor is covered in loose earth. 4 orbs in the walls give off light. The room otherwise seems quite empty.
Gorvagio : "I'm hearin thins! Shut up stupid!" Jesus : "Olla just spoke in my head, he asked if I am captured, I said no.....what should I say?"
(You are basically filled in, as to the prisoner issue, see web site for details. Basically everyone is now in this prison place, except Growly, Zaaj, Wolanin, and Crane. Olla explains all to you guys, but quickly. He explains that he doesn't know his way around, but there are quite a few Gyshin, though he knows that they are not as powerful as others he has encountered. You also heard me talking to Dan last night, so you get all that info. Most important, he explains that the crystal glowing balls in the center of the rooms control the fields, if you can destroy them, then people can get free. There is a veritable army of being here that could help. Olla is forced to talk through Jesus and Gorvagio because he can't reach you or the Queen.)
Chapter 31 - Dancing the Fine Line
Summary : Xej, Queen, Jesus, and Gorvagio broke everyone out of the jail. The whole memory of the jailbreak however is sketchy at best. Olla explained that it was a horrible fight, and finally he was able to drag the party (only) out of the hellish place, and bring them through the crystal tree to a random world. At that point he was forced to use a powerful psionic to blast everyone's minds, to clear out the Gyshin mind affects from the prisoners. This affected everyone, and they all remember little of the whole jailbreak. Olla brought two more people, both from Toril, one who was at the battle against Fate, to them, apparently who were escaped slaves at this point. They had been on this particular world for some time. Olla explained he had the "teleport key" for this Gyshin world, but it had required a wish to gain it. Following Olla's suggestion, the party went to a place in this world, and captured a Gyshin. Well, more like had a horrible battle (Jesus' soul was sucked into Xej's Old staff at one point, after Xej turned on the party), and they finally sunk him into the ground. Olla used his mind powers to question him, then they fled. Olla discovered the true form of Fate.
Fate is made up of 85 Gyshin (5 who the PC's have killed, one whom they sunk in the ground), and they focus their power at a place called Rhuktukar, a castle in a pocket dimension on the Prime Material. Each Gyshin that makes up Fate has his own pocket dimension world where they rule.
Gyshin are spirit forms that can give up their spirit forms to gain vast power by attaching themselves to the prime material.
The only real threat the Gyshin have ever faced were the Illithid. Apparently they ended up defeating the Illithid by inciting and supporting a rebellion within the Illithid slaves. The Gyshin never conquered the Illithid worlds, and left most of them to simply crumble. (they decided the Illithid were too dangerous to mess with directly, and figured that, left alone, the Illithid would slip into the darkness all by themselves. This issue is still debated among the Gyshin.)
At any rate, Olla informed the PC's that he knew of a crashed Illithid "vessel" on Toril if they wanted to look into the ancient Illithid for help battling the Gyshin. But for now, the PC's are left with a choice. Olla can now bring them essentially anywhere, except other locked Gyshin worlds, (though they can use the Crystal Tree of White Bridge to travel to them). The suggestion of going around killing the Fate Gyshin one by one was suggested, but Olla said, they had killed only 5, before everyone was crushed. It would not take long for them to use Fate's power to crush the PC's. It did not take long last time. Therefore, the PC's are somewhat at a place where they can try anything. But what will work?
Chapter 32 - The Nautiloid
Led by Olla, the PC's have decided that their best bet is to investigate the Illithid option. Olla explains to them that the Illithids were an ultra powerful race. Much like the Gyshin, their true power was difficult to imagine. They did things that even gods watched with amazement. Much about them lost in their downfall, but they are not to be taken lightly. They are crafty, and quite evil. An old Sharn saying, "Anyone with a brain doesn't mess with an Illithid." (he laughs for some time. Realizing no one is laughing with him, he explains that Illithids feed off the brains of other creatures...)
At any rate, they arrived in a canyon in the Anarauch and Olla melted a whole canyon wall, revealing a ship immersed in the rock. They crept inside, and some power source righted the ship and made interior light appear. Then Acerack appeared out of nowhere and there was a brief battle resulting in him fleeing. (woohoo) Confused at why Acerack appeared here, the PC's continued to search the ship. After some time they found that some important part, called a 'brainmate' was apparently missing. Olla did not know what this was. Again Acerack appeared, but fled when Olla approached him. The party decided that maybe Acerack had this 'brainmate', so Olla took them to his lair, and inside, where there was a huge laboratory, they found something that look like it would fit. (A brain like thing floating in liquid, encased by glass and silver metal). Xej also found his ring, and cloak stolen by Acerack. Before they left, Xej also found a small thin dwarf, with blue hair and blonde eyes, that called himself Dwarf Vader. Dwarf Vader (or Vader for short) seems to be full of stories and tends to talk a lot.
Chapter 33 - Journey to Penumbra
The PC's returned to the ship, plugged in the brainmate, and the ship took off. They don't know the final destination, but it's supposed to take 19 'sleep periods'. So, Olla agreed to take that time to teach them some mental defense. 5 days into the trip, they left their crystal sphere, and entered the pholigston. During this time, some wispy creatures attacked the ship, but the PC's defeated them. 8 days later they left the Pholigston and entered another crystal sphere. 4 days in their travels here, some Voor pods were discovered and disposed of (except one that Rouge squirreled away). 2 days later Rouge's egg hatched, and out came a baby Voor. It caused quite a bit of damage, but was finally thoroughly disposed of with a couple disintegrates by Olla.
Finally, another 2 days later, they reached Penumbra. The huge disk world, surrounding a sun. The ship landed down several hours later, and they found themselves on a dark land. Because of a giant wall at the center of the disk, that blocks the suns direct light, it is constantly twilight here. The grass is black, and so are most of the plants (since they need to absorb as much light as possible). With hills to the east, forest to the west, and grassland north and south. (the center of the disk which, from here looks like a squat tower in the distance, with a cap of golden light, is being considered north.) The party decided to head west, towards the forest...