Subterranean Book

This is a series of interconnected chambers shaped as Chud' runes (also runes in the ancient language of the Volkhvy. It is located about two hours west of the village of Yarozersk, just below a cave that was recently occupied by a giant.
The complex seems to have been thoroughly explored by the Yokels. As far as they can figure, it consists of five lines of connected text that reads the following:

Before hammer of the creator about/against celestial vault strike
And fiery/hot flesh/matter in/into spirit/breath/air and fire to have a relationship with/combine
Then/therefore prophetic/magical Svarog in smithy his elemental
Poured/poured into on/onto anvil stone that/that one white hot/flammable (The Alatyr Stone)
Essence that/which in/into daughters and sons stars and winds creator.

Some of the rooms contained puzzles, items and guardians that were necessary to circumvent or master in order to progress further in the complex. These included:

• A hammer - necessary to open some doors, though also possessing the power to generate thunder against enemies;
• A pair of gryphons, guarding a stone door (one wore a gold and malachite charm
• A giantess asleep on a bed in a magical skirt that allows the wearer to resist fire (relationship to the giant in the cave above unclear
• A fire pit shaped like an eight-spoked wheel with two ducts filled with iron leading to the third line of text;
• Two fire serpents that emerged if wood from the giant's cave was burned in the pit; the serpents breathed fire, which also had the effect of casting a Geas on targets, which made them desire the Alatyr stone;
• A smithy connected to the fire pit room by ducts; the bellows had attached stone vessels inhabited to two Winds, who could attack, or help passers by to forge a key allowing access to the next line of text;
• A copper helmet or crown, with two horns removed, on a high ledge; this allowed the wearer to command most of the denizens of the complex;
• A giant stone throne, on which the crown could be activated;
• A small keyhole, which could be opened with a key forged in the smithy, that allowed access to the fourth line of text;
• A giant three-legged menhir table with a flat surface that radiated evocation magic;
• A white-amber colored stone projecting from a wall; it may be the Alatyr Stone, and seems to have been struck by something on several prior occasions;
• A stone guardian that guarded a stone door allowing access to the fifth line of text; set into its head was a piece of stone, likely from the Alatyr.
• A stone enclosure or tub, bloodstained, containing a small skeleton (suspected of being the missing boy from Yarozersk performing another blood sacrifice there opened a portal leading to a shaft going deeper underground;
• An apple tree containing Apples of Paradise. This was the main reason the Yokels came into the complex to begin with; to pluck an apple, a blood sacrifice had to be performed in the enclosure; picking an apple without having done so transformed the apple into a deadly prophetic bird (two are still guarding the tree
• The shaft from the bloody enclosure led to a passage, which in turn led to a shaft going up; at the bottom of that shaft is a talking chest named Sunduk Sundukovich.

Type

Dungeon

Characters in Location

• Sunduk Sundukovich

Related Report (Primary Locations)

• Chapter 41 - Firing the Forge
• Chapter 42 - The Smithy and Beyond
• Chapter 43 - The Wind Servants, the Stone Guardian, and Tsar Drazhan
• Chapter 44 - The Forbidden Fruit
• Chapter 45 - The Apple of Paradise
• Chapter 46 - Treasure Finder's Revenge

Related Report (Secondary Locations)

• Chapter 40 - The Subterranean Book
• Chapter 47 - Debts Repaid