Orhan 3 Day 68 TE 6063

We find several lugraki recruiting areas and a sign leading to The Forbidden Gate. To the forbidden gate we go! It's an abandoned corridor that leads to a giant brass gate. Oathar identifies it as one of the six prison gates of Gathena. Back in the first era, in the time of the great war between Kadaena and Utha, there arose spirits of evil. Maybe made by Kadaena, maybe they just rose as a side effect. They were animate beings directly connected to the conduction of evil, or something. It was said that they were not exactly servants of Kadaena, but were manifestations of evil. Personifications suited Kadaena just fine. After Kadaena vanished the evils were imprisoned down here by the remaining lords of essence. Haeraan says there's been traffic through the gate according to tracking.

We camp a bit for Alynna to reset.

Orhan 3 Day 69 TE 6063

Alynna transforms into a death monk. Whoa.

We put th eket into the gate, we hear the multiple kachunk sounds. The gate glows with eerie light, getting brighter as it swings slowly forward and a wind picks up from behind us. The wind starts to blow us towards the opening gate. We get swept in and blown down the tunnel. We get spit out onto a pile of sand after being flung through space-time apparently. We look up to find ourselves in a desert.

Above us is a yellowish light. If we look around we're in an immense cavern, miles wide. We ponder where we might be, and eventually decide it is Gethaena. To the north are hills, to the south are forest. No one's come through here for years. But there are animal tracks. Mostly scorpions. There are settlements to the northwest and southeast. We head to the southeast. As we approach, we encounter a group of lion riders approaching us. Sadly, they don't speak any language we do, so we can get only get our emergency two ranks from a Speech II spell.

They come up to us and laugh when we say we come in peace. They say something or other about death and then say "Come!" and try to lead us to a palace like structure. We start following then and thinking as we go. Oathar recalls a Loremaster, named Jaezel Arbaleth who came to this place many an age ago in an attempt to reform the inhabitants. After a while, he was instructed to leave by the council and refused. He was stripeed of his poisition and vanished never to return. Huh. As we head towards this place, Imre consults his Destiny Sense. If we want to gain more information before encountering the Dyar ex-loremaster, should we follow these guys or head somewhere else? It doesn't matter.

As we get to the castle, we see a lot of these horned muscular army guys, and a few scattered servants. On the steps leading in though, is an actual High Man. He's wearing a green tunic and sash with green legging. He speaks yet another language. We try every language we know, but can't talk to him either. He leads us into an inner courtward. There's a pale skinned guy with black hair wearing a mint green dragon scale jerkin, with a copper belt and green boots, and is practicing archery. At his feet lounges a huge black wolf with green eyes. He casts a spell and then we can talk. Some sort of high level speech spell. The wolf sniffs us. The wolf even has green breath. The guy finds this all very interesting.

"Forgive me, I am Sachiel." We introduce ourselves, as explorers. He finds that interesting. We say that we are searching for two things in particular, but have no care for the rest. "Perhaps, but he doubts that will be true soon." "No one ever comes down here and remains unchanged, except perhaps us." Oh dear. He offers us drinks and we sit around to chat.

In general, visitors who make their way down here tend to either die, or annoy one of them and get killed, or get killed by pets, you know, things like that. Some are just tortured to death randomly. He doesn't even understand the term "make it out".

When Imre asks what there is to do here, Sachiel asks us to follow as he will show us. He has some lions brought out for us to ride. We mount up. We go! We ride out into the desert following him. We get to a stone walled town near a lake. There are people on the walls and a few in the forested area. The people flee for their lives from our approach.

A guy runs out of the gates and bows to Sachiel and asks if there's anything he requires. He says he's just having a visit. We ride into the town with him. They don't actually stop us though. They look like they wat to, but no one does. He goes in to the town. Yup, it's a human town slightly reminicent of Haalkitaine. Yup, there's a little town here. Sachiel just wanders around town freaking people out, enjoying himself by terrifying the populace. We ride along with him being displayed to the populace. This town is Kanglen. There's Stonetipin, Tangeval, and Stedron. There are also of course, six keeps. No one controls the gates. Or perhaps everyone. The six all have representatives there.

We ride back to his palace, and have a nice lunch. They only speak Haessig, as it is the only language sufficient for them. The lesser servants can only speak Varnaise, as they shouldn't speak the exalted tounge. the lesser mortals in the cities speak Aegron.

We are given run of the palace before dinner. Haessig is a pictogram language. Lots of forbidden stamps all over the place. He's got a trophy room. He seems to mostly hunt animals and the occasional petrified tree, etc. Some odd crystals. We get shown to bedrooms. Haeraan looks behind to previous guests who stayed here. Haeraan sees a Dyar in a white cotton tunic, and cloak. All in white. He just hung around for a while and nothing disaterous happened to him. This was decades ago. No other visitors since then.

Oathar looks around. Teh gates appear to be to the far southwest. There's another palace to the northwest.

We rejoin him for dinner, and it's quite yummy. Up to our usual standards. A servant whispers in his ear, and we'll take care of it tomorrow. He says we definitely *must* stay, but we ask who he might suggest who we visit next. Perhaps Gadrel, who he mentioned was better at story telling. Gadrel lives to the far northwest. Thngs in the desert include glimmer tigers, jewel stings, sand lions, jadebacks, glimpsenu (very deadly snakes). We ask how people change. "Only we Ishru are truly immortal. Everything else over time fades and decays. Even these elves are not truly immortal. When their shell goes, they to move on. We have found here that under the grind stone all are truly rent down for what they are." They can't die under any circumstances. "He's perished time an dtime immortal again, and yet he is still here." He says there is no world beyond the gates. Nothing else is of any importance. Their toys come and go, but they shall remain forever.

We have a good night and he will see us all tomorrow.

Orhan 3 Day 70 TE 6063

"Good good, you can join me this morning in helping me take care of a little problem."

We ride out to the northwest. There's a section of desert that appears to be a trail. We get to a set of hills. There's also a volcano rising up to the northeast. From the center of one of the volcanoes, a beam of light goes straight up to the light course on the sky. Power perception inidcates that this is powering the light source. We pass by and the road continues west. We come to another palace. Nokorgamesh is the name of the place. Satarchian rules here. We ride up with him to the palace in the southwestish area. An Ishru comes out with a large lion. The lion and wolf growl at each other. Sachiel admonishes him that he will tolerate no more interference in his land. Sachiel just turns away when this happens. Satarchian is very angry, but we leave.

"That went well! Well, that should get him stirred up a bit!" He's track us down, kill us and eat us if he sees us again. He might turn us over to his lion though. He tells us where Gadrals place is, and Stonepin is another possibility. "It's been grand, enjoy your stay! Do come by any time!"