Tumbling Towers - Temporus Timbers

General Summary

The Wardens finding themselves scaling the Equinot tower in Vlypeum to find the Voice of Creation to gain additional access to the sinking base last left off in Level 4 the Ooze Generator. As the group completed short rest the consoles in the ooze chamber lit up and began flashing "Warning Environmental Seal broken. Water ingress from unknown contact. Habitat Failure Immanent"

Level 5-6

Upon hearing the warning Myra suggests that maybe the group follow through a little quicker this time as apparently the tower is breaking before stepping through the teleporter. Everyone else quickly follows entering into a large observation deck room with a large tree protruding from a wall and reaching up through the chamber. a quick glance reveals no teleportation on this level and as the glass and floor begin to shake Myra yells for everyone to get onto the tree tapping Gwen and granting her enhance ability on strength. 
Everyone manages to grab onto the tree though the ability to climb varies throughout the group. Myra yells to Kanna asking her to change forms and take people up. Kanna shifts to a giant ape and gestures asking who she should take first Myra yells to take Gwen asking her to return if she has time. The others begin to make their way up the tree as Hagen and Tintreach start to fall behind. Kanna returns and Myra yells to grab Tintreach and Trenchcoat as the rest of us progress towards the top of the tree. Myra uses her vine arm as a grappling hook to propel herself upwards making it to the level as Raijun uses step of the wind to double his jump and land safely. Raijun finds a door and kicks it in as Adama misty steps the last 30 ft and Hagren completes an impressive jump out of the tree. The group rushes through the doors Raijun identified running into the teleporter hoping the next level will be more stable. 

Level 7

Appearing in a heap on the other side of the teleporter the group take stock of if everyone is ok. While some members seem a little shaken by the experience everyone seems to be ok. Taking stock of their surroundings the group sees that they are back to a similar arrangement of hallways with two doors but unlike some of the lower levels it seems that this level has been more recently disturbed. 
As Myra reaches level seven she notices that the vines on her arm appear to be dried and decaying in spots which she quickly hides with her sleeve. 

Computer "Help"

The group tackles the left room first as it seems to have been more recently disturbed. inside they find an old body as well as the remains of a campsite with a tent and goods that seem to be trimmed black and lined with gold. Adama comments that the group that was here appear to have been from Slekul and specifically Skull Hill Keep before stalking from the room saying he doesn't want anything to do with them but is curious to know what they were doing here. 
Myra puts up detect magic and gets two pings, one from the tent which she asks Hagren to investigate, and another from a desk drawer. She also asks Gwen if she would be willing to inspect the body while her and Hagren toss the rest of the room. Myra opens the desk and finds a small fist sized cannister radiating transmutation magic. Hagren investigates the tent with the help of Trenchcoat and discovers that the tent was set up more methodically and nicely than some of the other rushed campsites they had seen. in the back Hagren finds a small footlocker made of dark wood with gold trim and symbols. Hagren correctly deduces that this is probably what Myra sensed and pockets the footlocker to further investigate later. 
Gwen and Tintreach look at the body in the corner and discover that it was placed with almost ceremonial reverence. Gwen also notes that, weirdly, all the teeth are missing from the individual. Gwen also learns that the body is either very old or potentially has gone through some kind of accelerated aging process mentioning that something doesn't feel right about it. The group wonders if the wackiness of the seasons could relate to time dilation and if time here has been accelerated. Some think that we would notice if we were aging rapidly but Myra mentions that if we were all aging at the same rate it might not look so weird at least initially. To really understand whether or not we were in some kind of time dilation we would need to contact someone outside the field and ask them how long it has been. Kanna suggests just sending a message the way we did before but Gwen comments that she no longer has that ability for today. Kanna suggests maybe it's about time to bed down after they clear the floor and starts gathering some leaves to sleep on. Myra decides to sit in the hall with Kanna and identify the object she found while the group clears the rest of the floor.
Raijun and Adama enter the right hand room and find a map of the area and some monitors with another computer pedestal. As Hagren follows them in, he immediately sees the map and finds that a course was charted between the current location and Skull Hill Keep. It seems like the map or the course may have been plotted by those who were staying in the other room.  
As Raijun touches the pedestal and the center screen lights up and says "Access to undesignated privileges' revoked. New admin detected."  Raijun asks the computer for a status report and the computer reports that there was a "Habitat failure breach and damage to the environmental shift engine. Experiments compromised," followed by a long string of experiment numbers. "Backup storage data vivarium storage contact Vitae Vigaelia for processing." When Raijun asks about the status of this floor the computer indicates that only the habitat seems to be damaged this floor seems to be stable. Raijun asks about ascension again and the computer tells him that he doesn't have proper clearance and to contact the voice of animation and life. Raijun asks when the voice of animation and life was last contacted and the computer says a date that was thousands of years ago. Raijun asks for the last known location and the computer says "temporous timbers apex observatory." Raijun asks the computer if it knows anything about potential time dilation which the computer answers no time anomalies detected. Raijun also inquires who previously accessed the console to see if we could figure out who from Slekul had accessed the machine but got a very long list of names in response. 
As the group finishes questioning the computer Myra finishes identifying the cannister and learns that is a bread sprayer. There are two modes one where it can create small amounts of bread that hardens when it is sprayed and the other where it can explode destroying the cannister restraining those caught in the bread and doing some fire damage. AS the group starts to settle down to rest Raijun remarks that he calls dibs on the sleek black tent in the other room. Adama argues that no one should sleep in the tent and before Raijun can object more lights the tent on fire. This immediately causes the floor to begin to fill with smoke as Myra groans that maybe we should continue up to the next level. Someone suggest asking the computer to vent the floor and before anyone can suggest otherwise Raijun requests the computer vent the floor.
The computer indicates that it detects the smoke and will clear out the floor as it seals the windows and a hissing noise emanates from the walls as the oxygen is sucked out of the floor removing the smoke. Most of the group manages to realize what is going on and holds their breath but Raijun, distracted by what the computer was saying, fails to take a breath and begins to suffocate. The group pantomimes trying to figure out what to do as Raijun starts clutching at his throat. Finally, Myra determined not to let Raijun die walks over and kisses Raijun  blowing half of her air supply into his lungs. Raijun, shocked, manages to keep the air down as moments later the oxygen rushes back into the room. The rest of the group starts laughing hysterically as Myra turns beet red and quickly walks over to the left hand room and closes the door slumping behind it without saying a word. 
From the hall Myra can hear Adama cast the dome and loudly announce that the password is K-I-S-S-I-N-G causing Myra to turn even redder behind the door. As others set up in the dome Hagren approaches Myra's door and asks to come in. She lets him in the blush starting to fade as Hagren comes in and makes a comment about the kiss causing Myra to blush again. Myra asks what he wants and Hagren pulls out the box he found earlier and asks Myra if she can identify it mentioning that we should probably not bring it up to Adama as he would most likely attempt to smash it. Myra agrees to identify the box and finds that the spell Circle of Deathwould be cast if the box was opened improperly. Myra and Hagren look at the box and find there's no immediate lock to pick either instead finding a row of 1/2 inch to 1/4 inch slots along the front. Myra suggests she keep the box in the bag of holding as it is probably better that Adama not try to smash the thing setting off the spell. As she is concluding with Hagren she hears the others outside still mocking her and Raijun with Gwen commenting, "You make a great damsel in distress Raijun." Resulting Myra turning red again and demanding that Hagren leave the room as she shuts the door behind him. 

Nightmares

Settling in for bed Raijun spends some more time with the scroll and writes Myra a note saying thank you and slipping it under the door. Myra attempts to remove the vines she integrated with her arm, succeeding but leaving twisting gashes where the vines used to be drawing blood as they are removed. She pulls down her sleeves as she stays outside the dome sleeping propped against the door unwilling to face the group or maybe say Adama's password. 
The rest fall asleep in the dome at the end of the hallway finding sleep more easily. 
As Gwen sleeps she finds herself standing in a garden with a small girl standing opposite her. The little girl waves and Gwen, confused, asks who she is and where they are. The girl giggles and runs into the hedge maze behind her disappearing from sight. Gwen follows the girl into the maze choosing to go left and picking a flower and putting it in her pocket. As she follows she hears a voice "You followed my path and I gave you the power to protect your loved ones." As Gwen follows she turns left again and hears the laughter of the little girl ahead. "You spurned my gift. I came to you when you sought aid and you betrayed me." As Gwen goes deeper in she hears the voice again "I can forgive you as your journey is not yet complete and the fate of innocents lie in your hands." Gwen calls out asking what innocents but no one responds. 
As she turns left again the moon soaked canopy turns dark and red. The voice changes to become harsher, " You spurned me and I saved the ones you loved. You can return the favor if you can even the scales. Poison purity." As Gwen rushes away from the voice she exits the maze and finds the girl sitting at the head of a long table. In front of the girl are three vials. As Gwen approaches the table the girl grabs the golden vial in the middle. As Gwen gets closer she notices the little girl is changed, while half of her still looks like the little girl from before the other half looks older, sickly, and twisted. 
"Would you care to have tea with me? What kind of tea would you like?" The little girl asks her voice twisting as she gestures to the vials in front of her. One vial is a clear moonlit silver while the other is twisting and changing. 
"What kind of tea do you have?" Gwen asks.
"That's the gift," the girl responds.
"What happens if I drink tea with you?"
"We can all be friends," her voice twists.
"What happened to my friends?" 
"They're out playing with my friends."
As Gwen looks at the table she notices that there are only two seats one to the left nd one to the right of the girl. On the left is the silvery potion so that is where Gwen chooses to sit. 
"You came here to play right?" the little girl asks as she stretches out a white clawed hand and digs it into Gwen's arm. As she digs Gwen feels a kind of draining sensation as she watches a silver light leaving her and entering the girl. "This is gonna be fun. We can play together," the child laughs. 
Gwen cries out asking what the child is doing but the girl only responds "Feed me. Open it" indicating the container in front of Gwen. Gwen says she thought this was the little girl's tea party shouldn't she pour? The girl says that guests get to decide, they have to pour. As Gwen hears a voice in her head say, "You have to decide her fate." As the dream fades to black and Gwen wakes up panting in the dome. 
Gwen looks around frantically noticing that everyone still seems to be sleeping fine as though nothing had happened. Gwen, slips out of the dome and down the hall to the door where Myra is knocking waking Myra up. As Myra groggily wakes up Gwen apologizes for earlier and says that if anything it shows how far Myra is willing to go for her friends. Confused why she is saying this in the middle of the night Myra asks Gwen what happened and what's wrong. Gwen tells Myra about the dream and the little girl and Myra suggests that maybe the gods have gotten impatient with Gwen and are finally forcing her to choose. Gwen admits that she doesn't think that she could ever truly follow Talona as she couldn't be responsible for hurting innocent people. Myra suggests tat maybe she has to make the official instead of just paying lip service to it noting that even in the dream Gwen was unwilling to drink the more Selune like potion. Myra asks Gwen if she still has her abilities and Gwen looks to the moon brooch, as a flash of guilt washes over Myra. Myra apologizes for being harsh, telling Gwen that it's probably just the early hour and asking Gwen if she has tried contacting Selune directly as maybe she as the goddess of knowledge would have some ideas. Gwen says she hadn't but thanked Myra and turned to go. Myra stopped her before she left the room reminder her that they would get through whatever she had to do together and that she would be standing beside Gwen regardless of her choice. Gwen hugged Myra and returned to the dome to complete the rest, noticing as she went that she still had the flower from her dream in her pocket and scratch marks on her arm. 

Level 8

Waking up the next morning Myra suggests that we should keep moving as if there is a time problem we are unaware of it's best to move quickly, plus the tower could still be not fully stable. Raijun shows the group that he can now duplicate himself prompting Myra to say "Oh good this is just what I need" and another round of teasing from some members of the group leading Myra to once again go first through the teleporter. Raijun also mentions to the rest of the group he can speak with the dead and goes back to grab the head of the person from Slekul before they all come through the portal with Raijun's clone in tow. 
Upstairs they find a room with shattered glass and a blue forcefield door preventing them from entering. Unlike the last airlock there seems to be no control panel from this side with a sign that says, "Warning containment to upper levels. Status Unknown. Containment sealed." Raijun notices a crack in the wall and shadow steps through with his clone in tow. On the other side the room is dark with large spider webs and Raijun freezes as two statues turn to face him. in the center he can see another glowing console and the door to the room with a pile of ash in front of it. As Raijun moves the statuses appear to follow as he approaches the console. Myra messages Raijun trying to figure out what's going on and if he is okay. Raijun reports that he's fine but the statues worry Myra enough to try to pull apart the wall. Unfortunately the wall is made of a stone Myra isn't familiar with and so she is unable, as Raijun manages to touch the console and deactivate the statues. Once the statues are deactivated he deactivates the forcefield opening the door letting the group through. As they make their way into the room beyond they see a different style of teleporter, crates, and bodies in spider silk. 
Myra wonders aloud if this is where the spiders from level 2 came from as she cuts open one of the husks to reveal just goo inside. Hagren checks the boxes with Trenchcoat but doesn't find anything useful. Myra suggest Gwen not think too much about the room and run through into the teleporter so she can avoid the indications of large spiders. Gwen does as Myra suggests and the group follows closely behind. 

Level 9

Level nine has only one door that initially is locked. Hagren and Trenchcoat quickly solve that allowing us to peer into a larger room with a globe like hologram in the center with what looks like Temporous Timbers shown. Surrounding the globe are four monitors which Raijun says that when he looks at them they just say "Environmental conditions ... environmental conditions summer.. summer" and then transition through other seasons as if out of control. Trenchocat discovers some additional dead displays in the corner while Raijun attempts to get past the error. As Raijun messes with the monitor the computer says "Temporous Timbers requires permissions contact voice of life and animation or for access. Tempourous Timbers survival initiatives subjects conditions survive in quickly changing environment." Raijun prompts about ascension again and the computer responds "Ascension Protocol initiated by director voice of animation and life." Tenchcoat also notices that there is dried blood scattered on the floor and that the rest of the room looks ransacked. 
As the rest of the group heads out toward the teleporter Gwen notices one of monitors blinking with a similar prompt to the one Raijun originally answered. Gwen goes over, answers the computer's questions, gets stuck by the needle and can now understand Vlypeum. 

Level 10 

As the group emerges above, Gwen brags to Raijun that he is no longer the only chosen one. Above we see a single room with walls that retract and where they have retracted large vines are growing in. In the room in front of them stand many teleporters some with robots in front of them. Two of the robots seem familiar to those we saw on the ship when we were attacked but the other two seem like a new kind. We attempted to go through one of the portals but nothing happened and the robots didn't react. Gwen, Raijun, and Myra went up closer to the robots but they didn't react even with Gwen or Myra right next to them. 
Kanna looking at the vines coming in from the walls, laughs, and says that these are the first real things she's seen on this island. Myra looks at the teleporters and then Kanna and asks if Kanna thinks she could get us up the last leg. Kanna winks and falls back out of the window before in a small sand storm, she reappears as a giant desert vulture. Myra thanks her and circles her for a second before chucking a potion at Tintreach, and going off a little ways from the the others and starts her own transformation. Myra's doesn't look as pleasant as Kanna's with the sounds of bones shifting as she also turns into a giant vulture. Raijun and Gwen climb on Myra while Hagren, Adama, and Trenchcoat climb into Kanna's talons. Tintreach drinks the potion Myra gave him and gets his own ability to fly and everyone jumps out one of the two windows and starts to ascend. 
As everyone ascends to the top level there's the thunderous sound and a streak of lighting as we crest the lip. On the top there appears to be the Anzu being hassled by some smaller flying creatures who appear to have been eating some of the robots. Those who had consumed a robot appear to now have lightning fizzling at the mouth as the Anzu turns toward us sizing us up as new enemies. the group hears a tone as Gwen and Raijun hear "Purge Sequence Activated" the group also sees a flash of green light from under the Anzu as Gwen and Raijun hear, "Please send Assistance Admin in distress."

Report Date

31 May 2021