Told by ElrikaSyf and I awaken in a strange place. Dry, dark. A red-orange brilliant glow approaches. We struggle to stand on a sandy hill, I attempt to measure the distance to the glow, which is on top of the hill. It's cold and sand is in all of my clothes. Slowly the light shifts from orange to bluish and glows more brightly. Suddenly its green, and bright. I see Syf for the first time. We are on a steep sand dune. I go to the bottom of the dune, and by then the light is purplish. We wait, and the light changes to silver, then red, then yellow. I go back up the hill. Syf is sneaking up the dune, thought flight is somewhat difficult. She gets to the top of the dune and looks at a brightly burning fire.
The sand is more like a fine dust. I begin to weave a weather cloak, and step closer to the fire, which sighs and ripples but makes no further sound. I get down and see that it is a tower of flame. Moving closer to the flame, as my boots begin to scorch from the heat of the sand, I commune with it and a watcher, who waits to burn unprotected flesh. I gasp and move back quickly to a safe distance, and speak to it, asking what it is. Within the flame Gairten screams. Syf sees the astral pattern of an elf in the center of the fire. Malevolent laughter echoes everywhere without a source. I tackle Gairten and we roll down the dune past the center of the fire, which is has now turned the immediate sand into molten glass. Much of our stuff is destroyed. Syf joins us, and we try to figure out what has happened. Our lights are warped by the same color shifting we saw in the fire. We rest, and recover, and Gairten prepares his throne of air as I bring water from the dust and recover somewhat. Kiyaa is gone. I sit with Gairten on his throne of air and we float in the direction of the wind for about two ours until the sun begins to rise in the direction of our travel. The ride is quite turbulent for some reason unknown to Gairten, but we continue on our eastward travel.
We pass over great salt flats, like thick frosting on a cake. When the sun rises we land on a high dune. Gairten, as an experiment, tries to light a fire with his firestarter. It creates a huge jet of flame, and I knock it from his hand as it burns itself out. I realize that the path of his discipline is not the same path as it once was, and this is a great part of his difficulty. It is unclear if this is the result of some malevolence or becuase we are in such a strange land. Syf's karma ritual is normal. Gairten's is imbalanced. Mine is somewhat strange as well. Syf sees that the elements that are integral to Gairten's pattern are different colors.
We fly for several more hours, as the sun becomes hotter. My weather cloak and Gairten's air armor protect us from the worst of the heat, which would soon kill us if we were directly exposed to its full intensity. Eventually we see a cloud in the distance and circle out of its path come around behind the direction of its travel. As the temperature drops and the dust begins to swirl we head straight more to get out of its path. We stop, and we are safe. I begin to commune with the storm, but I realize that it isn't natural. We head north as evenly as possible, and soon arrive at a rocky outcropping surrounding a trench of salt. There are a few scattered plants, and when I speak with one, it speaks of the deficit of water, and that it is dying now. We follow the riverbed north, and pass through a valley, instead of just sandy terrain. We pass through a ruined sand-damaged village. As the sun goes down, the air cools, and we settle into a rocky place, catching a few mice and insects. We decide to sleep. I am almost fully recovered from my burns.
While Gairten and I sleep, a storm starts. Syf awakens us and we run for the ravine. Soon it doesn't help, and we struggle against huge gusts of wind carrying stinging sand while we stumble, looking for any shelter. As the sandstorm begins to flay us alive, we realize that we cannot stay put. I see something in the distance through silted eyes, and during a brief lull in the storm we run for it.
The object we come upon is a tremendous statue. Syf notices that it has some sort of writing on it, and it offers some protection from the storm. Syf then realizes that it's smiling, as do the rest of us. We stay with it as it smiles, and then we realize too late that it's falling into a sinkhole. We decide to try and jump off as sand spills everywhere, and then something gives underneath and we freefall into darkness. Blade, whoosh, red, hot in my lungs. Coughing...
I awaken. Gairten has escaped injury by his throne of air and has brought me to. The statue is pinning me down, and Syf is nowhere in sight. I dig my way out and Gairten finds Syf. With my dagger and Gairten's torch, we can see that we're in a large domed vault. The domed roof is painted with images in a bizarre style. There are bits of strange balconies and other floors. Forty feet above, a stream of sand continuously pours through a hole in the ceiling. As is fills up, we look ahead and see arches in the chamber walls that lead off. The walls with unrecognizable writing. We move on.
We come upon an immense mural depicting seventeen scenes in 2-dimensional form. It tells the story of a dream a man with dark eyes had of a broken staff, an eight-pointed star, and a horrific face. The man with dark eyes speaks with many people: T'skrang, a small Windling, a few Elves, some Orks, and people. The man with bright eyes seems angry. The man with dark eyes gets on a boat and sails away across the sea. Lightning strikes the boat, the boat sinks, and people fall into the water. The man with dark eyes raises his head to the sky, eyes appear and in the water, a pattern appears, and they all walk on it. The travelers are now in a red-blue land. Everyone is drawn starving. Every is then dead and the man with dark eyes cries, eyes are in the sky, rain falls and the river comes. Everything is then plentiful, peasants, farmers, and people are happy and there is rain. A ship flies through the air with an eight-pointed star on its sails. There is an Elf on the ship along with orks and what appear to be slaves. They land on the river. The Elf talks to someone dressed like the man with dark eyes. War. People fighting. A massive dragon. The dragon is dead. Many people are being led by Therans and are in chains. A Dwarf and an Obsidiman stand by the Therans against the man who appears to be the ruler. The ruler raises his eyes to the sky and slashes himself, saying some words. Elves whip people. A scene of tranquility, except the river is white and people are drawn as skeletons. Theran frays. The sky is black, the horrific face looms over everything. The people are in tears and are bleeding. A man wears a circlet of five stars (red, blue, green, brown, and white). Threads run from his hands, and ensnare the horrific face. There is a scene of "plenty" again. The pyramid is replaced by a castle. Everyone is dressed differently. The river isn't flowing. End.
Syf looks into the astral plane, the doors shine brightly. They seem to be enchanted. The doors have two pictures: on is a strangely-dressed guy, the other is of golden eyes in a circle. The door is closed, but I push it open and Gairten walks through.
We enter a red gem room which has a pentagonal dais with a pentagonal stand and a cage with what appears to be a giant red gem in the middle. Everything is precisely aligned. Syf's astral sight tells her that a powerful spells was once cast here, but is showing signs of age. Syf can't find any exits and I can still hear the sound of sand pouring steadily in. We finally find a door back in the dome room, but it's underground. Syf grabs the gem, a light flares in it, and then begins to slowly extinguish itself. The gem is now dark and Gairten takes it as the gem becomes black. Everything else begins to dim, even all the other lights. Gairten's light quartz flares and burns out in a brilliant flash. Everything is getting darker.
I don't have enough information to weave a thread to the gem. Blood magic makes it worse and I get a horrible sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. Syf begins to glow, and extends a luminescent circle around us which wards off the squirmy, nasty dark things I can feel crawly over my body but cannot otherwise sense. Bugs. The gem begins to shake uncontrollably with ever-increasing strength. I try to help him hold it but I can feel it straining to be free. Gairten concentrates as he attempts to reatune to stick together. He fails. The gem escapes, and flees outside Syf's circle as Gairten explodes in a molten pillar of flame and gives an insane laugh. Syf screams in horror. I hear a rushing sound and a compressed sigh escapes my lips as I am crushed by rocks. Finis
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