Kuluth-Mar Visions

The party travelled to Kuluth-Mar to learn more about Kyuss, his connection to the Ebon Triad, and any possible weaknesses that could aid our heroes in their fight against those who would return him to the world.
The ruins themselves seemed happy to help them on their recon mission, as memories of Kyuss' legacy linger in the very air.

Vision 1: King Kyuss

Triggered when entering the viscinity of the ruins

The ruins of Kuluth-Mar seem to be suffused with a strange taint that hovers just beyond the edges of reality. Like an oily stain spreading over a pool, a vision wavers in the air.

Within this tainted energy is a man seated on a great throne of green stone. He wears ornate plate armour, and a black circlet rests on his brow. Both the circlet and armor are adorned with silver symbols - an overlapping skull and scythe.

The vision expands, widening its scope to reveal the throne is located at the apex of the large ziggurat, in the shadow fo the spire. The spire itself gleams with flashes of white light, and at its peak is balanced af ifteen-foot-tall black stone monument shaped like a trapezoid.

Around the ziggurat spreads a thriving city, its streets paved in whtie stone, its buildings painted and whole. Thousands of figures have gathered in the large open plaza that surrounds the ziggurat, all facing the seated figure.

Their cries are a rhythmic chant, surging like waves on the monolith's shore; "Kyuss! Kyuss! The Wormgod!" As these cries rise in volume, threatening to shake the jungle apart, the vision fades, replaced by the ruined city of today.

Takeaways:

• Kyuss was once human
• The iconography on his robes and crown are the religious symbol of Nerull.
• The zigurrat once had a black monolith where the broken peak of the spire now stands
• He apparently had a huge following of fanatics.

Vision 2: The Sundering

Triggered when Sigvurd Flew to the top of the spire to investigate an odd shimmer around the broken peak.

The strange dark stain in the air wavers and then grows solid. The peak of the Spire is restored, and affixed to this peak is a fifteen-foot-tall, three-foot-thick, trapezoid-shaped pinnacle of black rock, ten feet wide at its base and five at its peak.

The monolith of stone shimmers and vibrates with waves of energy, and something strange and horrible writhes inside its nearly-opaque interior.

Suddenly, a brilliant red wall fills the view, and there's a terrible sound of crumbling stone. In an instant, an enormous red dagon is winging away to the north, the spire's broken-off peak clutched in its talons.

As it shrinks in the distance, the vision fades, and the dragon and its prize are gone.

Takeaways

• The red dragon must have been Dragotha, Kyuss' right-hand ally of ancient times.
• The black monument at the peak of the spire was moved somewhere else, not broken from a fall or eroded by time.

Vision 3: The Gift

When the party explored the room from which the twisted sword-angel and his lieutenants had emerged, they beheld this vision.

The ruins of the room wither and fade, replaced by a well-equipped torture chamber. Wailing victims strapped to horrific devices hang from chains.

In the centre of the room stand two figures. One is a handsome man dressed in flowing robes. Facing him is a strange, six-armed creature that looks as much insect as humanoid. The insect-creature's eyes are hollow sockets containing a pinpoint of light deep within. Its flesh is rotting and festering, and the green robes it wears are moth-eaten.

The creature wields a long green crystal rod in one hand, a cruel hooked rod in the other. In two other hands it holds a jeweled, golden box, which it presents to the man.

The man sets the box upon a table and opens it. Using a pair of long iron tongs, he withdraws a writhing green worm. As he beholds it, the man's expression changes to one of exultation.

Takeaways

• Kyuss was apparently not the creator of the worms, though he definitely seemed friendly with it
• The six-armed creature is a Spellweaver, a near-mythical creature said to have travelled to Oerth from a strange other realm, legendary for their superhuman magical abilities.

Vision 4: Kyuss the Student

Upon revealing and entering the southern chamber of the Ziggurat's upper level, the party beheld this vision.

The chamber wavers and shimmers, and suddenly a human man appears at one of the desks nearby. A strange gray-skinned humanoid creature with six arms stands at his shoulder.

The man studies a collection of worn and pitted bronze disks arrayed on the desk before him. Faint etchings adorn the plates, and it seems as if the alien figures and symbols writhe together at the behest of some sinister will.

The gray creature points to one of the plates, and a look of sudden comprehension blooms upon the man's face. The man, the creature, and the plates fade away, and are gone.

Takeaways:

• The spellweaver apparently served as some kind of tutor or advisor to Kyuss
• The disks survived the fireball, but most are warped and illegible - there will be time to translate them later.

Vision 5: Apotheosis

When the party was suggested to drink from the fountain of worms, they beheld this vision.

The immediate surroundings waver and fade, replaced by a birds-eye view of the city of Kuluth-Mar at its apex. The streets are empty, as the thousands of citizens have gathered in a chanting mass at the central plaza surrounding the Spire and its Zigurrat.

Suddenly, a foul energy wells from the spire's peak, sweeping outward and felling the living as it passes. For each creature that falls, you feel a silent but potent sense of wrongness, as some undescribable part of the creature, perhaps its soul, is drawn into the spire to be absorbed by the black monolith of stone balanced on its peak.

As the energy builds around this black monolith, a shimmering image forms around it: a colossal humanoid, its body composed of a million writhing worms, its arms raised in triumph. Yet, in another moment, that triumphant posture changes to one of rage, and a soul-wrenching cry of fury tears from the undulant face as the figure shrinks, pulled inside the monolith which then implodes in a horrific wet burst.

The shockwave sweeps across the city, and as it fades, the first stirrings of unlife begin among the thousands of corpses.

Takeaways:

• Something went wrong with Kyuss' apotheosois; he got absorbed into the obsidian monolith
• The same monolith that Dragotha broke off the spire and took away to the north
• Even with him sealed, he seems to have the capacity to affect unlife and his worms.