As Sedridor entered The Mirror, he was faced with a great expanse that seemed to stretch on forever. An impressive sight considering this place seemed to be completely underground. In front of himself, he saw a pyramid. Behind, he saw an identical pyramid. Sedridor walked towards the pyramid in front of him, only to discover it grew further from him with every step. Sedridor determined that he could not reach the pyramid that way, so he decided to walk backwards instead. While the pyramid in front of him did not grow closer, the one behind him did. Sedridor decided to keep walking backwards to go to that pyramid instead. He walked backwards for a couple hours before he ran into a strange object. As he hit it, Sedridor heard the clinking of glass vials as he heard Murdoch say “Ouch!” Sedridor asked Murdoch how long it had taken him to follow into the mirror. Murdoch told Sedridor that it had only taken him a few seconds to follow Sedridor into the mirror. Caravir on the other hand seemed intent on staying put until Murdoch and Sedridor returned with Lenna. It then hit Murdoch, there was no sign of Lenna. Sedridor explained that he had looked for her, but found no trace of her. The two decided that it was best to keep going in the manner Sedridor had been for hours now. They walked backwards as they talked forwards for the next couple of hours as they went to the pyramid.
Upon arriving at the pyramid, Murdoch and Sedridor were greeted by an odd pair of men. They looked completely identical aside from the fact that one wore a green vest and the other wore a red vest. The one in the green vest greeted them saying that the place had many names. The other one promptly interjected, stamping his foot and shouting that it was only known by one name. Already, Sedridor and Murdoch saw the conversation ahead taking a long time. The two men said that there was one way into the pyramid, but one of the two of them was a liar and would mislead them. They told Sedridor and Murdoch to choose wisely. As the two thought of a way to determine which was the liar, Caravir popped out of nowhere and fell to the ground before the two. Unfazed by what had just happened, Sedridor asked the man in the red vest a question that revealed to Sedridor who the liar was. He guessed correctly and the heroes were instructed to take 11 steps back and close their eyes to enter the pyramid. Caravir got up and brushed herself off, confused at what had just happened and why her party had disappeared. After attempting to make small talk, she decided to follow the other two.
The heroes found themselves falling for a long time before landing in a substance that was neither water nor air, but seemed to have qualities of both. It was thicker than air, but the heroes could walk and breathe freely in it. Below them, they noticed a large vortex, so they decided to walk down into it. Some distance down, the party found a set of symbols that told them clues about three men, three swords, and three seals. The party was tasked with determining which man and which sword matched up with which seal. After the thinking was done, Murdoch went to give the answers to the seals. The first one glowed white. The second one glowed red, so Murdoch ran away from it quickly. The third one also glowed red before striking Murdoch with black lightning, severely injuring him and leaving him with some amnesia. The party worked again to figure out what they had done wrong before they guessed again, that time correctly. The party was then able to proceed onwards towards the end of the vortex. Eventually, the road split into three directions. The party decided to split up.
Caravir chose to take the earth seal path. She eventually came upon a room with a single tree inside it. Inside the tree, she noticed several acorns. Caravir decided to climb up the tree to get one. She then felt sleepy and decided to rest a little. After she woke up, she saw the grass had grown since she had been there and she decided to get down. As she did, a lithe dryad emerged from the bark began to speak to her. It asked her many questions about magic and nature, testing her knowledge. After answering the questions, the bark determined she was worthy of passage onwards.
Sedridor chose to take the heaven seal path. He eventually wound up in a bright room where the floor seemed to match the ceiling, if there was one. In the middle of the room, he saw a lone tree. Behind it, he noticed a barred door. After trying to take the bars off the door, Sedridor determined he would be unable to do it. Just then, a mysterious voice addressed him from behind. Sedridor turned to find a mysterious figure behind him. The figure took off his hood, revealing himself to be dark Sedridor. The two fought (well Sedridor did most of the fighting at least) for a while before the dark Sedridor cackled with laughter and told Sedridor that he would not be rid of the enemy so easily. As Sedridor attacked more, he began to feel more pain. The evil Sedridor used the distraction of pain to his advantage and struck Sedridor hard, knocking him unconscious. He awoke slowly shortly afterwards, seeing his doppleganger trying to open the door. Sedridor slowly got up and and approached his enemy from behind. As he grew closer, the doppelganger turned around just in time to see Sedridor’s blade slice him right between his eyes. Sedridor then proceeded to leave the room.
Murdoch chose to take the night seal path. He kept going down the hall as it got darker and darker until he was in a room lit only by the faintly growing potions hanging from a tree in front of him. A deep voice told him to take one of the potions to pass on, the other three were poisonous. Murdoch was given three clues to the potions, but he was left curious about the nature of the fourth color. He used his alchemical knowledge to determine it was just colored water. He was allowed to pass. In the next area, he saw the remaining three colors. He chose the next color because it was “not what he would expect it to be” and he found that he had chosen correctly once again. In the next area, the two remaining colors lay before him. He chose correctly again and was allowed into the final area. In that room, there were three new colors. Murdoch decided that he needed to mix all the colors of the correct potions together. As he stood in that _Black Night _room, the _Child in Time _drank the Deep Purple potion. Not feeling a Burn or seeing Smoke on the Water, it seemed like he had chosen correctly. After a Hush, the voice revealed the path out of the room for him. Murdoch took the path…..Highway Star.
The three heroes met up on the other end of their respective staircases before moving on. Each found that he or she had received a small coin bearing the seal of their respective tests. They soon came upon a large spire. The three quickly climbed to the top of the spire where they saw three large statues identical to the ones they had seen in the hall of mazes. As the heroes looked on, the air shimmered and a gigantic robed figure appeared before him. The figure revealed himself as Il-Kuriarth and the heroes realized that he looked exactly like one of the statues encountered in the Hall of Mazes. He told the three heroes that they must rescue Lenna who had entered the mirror and gone the wrong way, heading into the pyramid that Sedridor had been unable to reach. With a wave of his hand, Il’Kuriarth sent the heroes into the pyramid. Inside was a huge chasm with a tiny catwalk above it. Within the cavern was a giant mass of darkness, pulsing with energy and crackling with black lightning. With nowhere else to go, the heroes jumped down into the chasm and into the darkness beyond.
They found themselves on solid ground (a marsh actually but not air at least), but surrounded by darkness. In the distance, they thought they saw a dark spire rising up from the ground. The party yelled out for Lenna, but no answer came. Instead, they were attacked by a mob of evil creatures that came from the darkness. The creatures did terrible terrible damage to the party, though much of the damage came from Murdoch being paralyzed with lit bombs in his hand. Caravir and Sedridor were able to pick up the slack and were able to dispatch the monsters. The party quickly healed before another wave came. The second wave went down just as the first did.
From there, the party decided to head towards the spire. They got to a safe distance before they decided to see what was going on outside. Murdoch used the time to brew a mutagen while Caravir and Sedridor looked around and saw that the guards came in vision of the great gate every five minutes and that there were four sentry groups on the wall surrounding the spire. The party decided that Sedridor and Murdoch would run up to the gate, levitate up the wall, run across, then levitate down. If they were spotted, Caravir would unleash fireballs upon the sentries. As Murdoch and Sedridor got to the wall, they were attacked. Caravir began firing fireballs at the sentry groups, killing two and injuring a third group. Murdoch and Sedridor got to the top of the wall, but were engaged by the remaining sentry groups. Caravir was unable to help due to the splash radius of her fireball spells, but she was able to keep other sentry groups from joining the fight. Sedridor and Murdoch were able to kill the enemies on the wall and they jumped off the other side, safely levitating down to the ground. The party then came to a heavy door. It was too much for Sedridor, so Murdoch used his suddenly abnormally high strength to help open the door, then to close it.
Inside, the party found a spiral staircase before them. They decided to head up it. Hearing voices above and below them, Murdoch and Sedridor decided to levitate to the ceiling to hide. They crawled up the stairs past the enemies that approached while Caravir was not so stealthy. She managed to get off a wall of fire, preventing the guards from following her however and the party made it up to the fourth floor, where they noticed Lenna’s sword covered by blood and guts. They noticed the bloodstains dragged off into the next room, so they went in and locked the door. The party then found themselves in a torture chamber. Suddenly, a gigantic hooded creature emerged from the shadows, but Sedridor quickly slew it with his sword. In the corner, they found a very nice candlestick that had been taken from Telvenier’s house by Lenna. Murdoch was running out of bombs and Caravir was running out of spells, but the party could not idly sit by and let Lenna suffer. They bravely entered the next room.
In the room, they encountered a very frightening skeletal enemy that proceeded to attack them with his skeleton minions and a possessed Lenna. She knocked down Caravir and Sedridor while Murdoch threw bombs at the leader. When he was out of bombs, Murdoch began throwing his other possessions including his dagger and his sickle, the former of which stuck into a skeleton and the latter of which sunk into Lenna. Caravir was blinded by Lenna, but was able to blind Lenna in return. Sedridor, having no need for ammunition, took great pleasure in destroying most of the enemies in the room. A couple times he was knocked over, but Murdoch was able to give him water to revive him. Eventually, the leader of the group was slain and only one skeleton remained. Sedridor was about to bleed to death and Murdoch was about to get knocked unconscious and thus unable to save Sedridor. A skeleton lay on the floor next to Murdoch, but Caravir blindly cast a spell, killing the skeleton before he could harm Sedridor or Murdoch. The skeleton’s body had been blasted into ash. Sedridor hefted the leader’s gigantic sword, pleased with its power. As the party recovered, Lenna became her old self, realizing she had just been controlled by another being. She healed the party and then the four decided they should rest before they made their daring escape.
Scribed by Runninginsquares