Plenty of Fish in the Desert

We left the human and Tortle settlers behind, as they had met their journey's end and we still have a long way to go. We made our way to the city Najarma, a quaint little trading post in the middle of the desert. This was only to be a midway stopping point before conquering the final stretch through the desert towards Shidon, but of course, we ran into a few complications.
 
First, we couldn't even find safe passage through the desert, as our fine friend Gary made an appearance and bought out the entire pack of sand surfing Guard Drakes. We definitely couldn't have bargained him out of that, but Gax did manage to raise the stakes so the little entitled prick would have less money to spend. So once again we were out of luck and our only option was to ask for the help of these sketchy merchants to take us through the desert.
 
Now, under normal circumstances, I'm sure these dudes wouldn't have fluffed my feathers, but why did they have to go and tell us not to look in the box? What's in the box?!
 
But, in end, it doesn't even matter. We had to cancel that trip anyway, because Misht or Otomne or whatever ran into a familiar face in the tavern. Some guy Taleb that Misht may have a past with. Something about a "false prophet" worshiper. It was interesting to see Misht forced into a situation where he had to tell us more about this town that he was banished from. Croesus, is its name; a religious town full of acolytes for a Kuatoa god?
 
Kuatoa, like the gross fish-frog things. Interesting.
 
Anyway, Taleb was apparently looking for one of these "false prophets", a guy by the name Rinth, who had come looking for some sacred text to replace the ones that Misht had blown up. Damn. Despite Misht's clear discomfort with the situation, he agreed to help. And off we went into the desert. In search of a fish god's temple. Makes sense right? Makes as much sense as the temple itself, which was full of abandoned treasures and artifacts, and not too well guarded by the green jelly cubes either. Ignore the fact that Gax did almost die from it. Just... don't think about it.
 
And when we reached the final room, the one with a few monoliths, buttons, and a curious looking book in a curious looking water filled box on the ceiling, we found Rinth. Dead on the floor, as if he had fallen from a great height. Well now, clearly this room was some sort of puzzle, but luckily for the viewers at home, I have wings. One skip hop and a flap flap to the ceiling and it was no biggie freeing that tome from its watery prison. Now the next issue is bringing a dead body back to Taleb and figuring out how that fidgety fellow is going to handle it.