We pull up onto the eastern shore of the river, which is 100 yards wide. The black stream continues up river, and is as strong as we’ve seen it. Alders, spruce, pine, hemlock forest. We’re coming down from the mountains. We take some cold weather gear from the boatsWe hide the boats.
We follow the river. We see animal tracks and not much else.
Silas (W) and Cricket (B) play chess. Silas wins. The White knight (the bleached one, not the yellow one) faces several pawns on black side, and has to keep moving from outpost to outpost, before finally cornering the Black King.
We sleep. Krambler hears a gurgling noise down by the river and wakes up Cricket to go check it out. He does, and sees figures made of water (not unlike the fire beings we fought previously). WE FIGHT. Storr finds that because of her sparring practice, she’s able to sense that the bronze katana will allow her to avoid opportunity attacks.
We eventually reduce the beings to puddles. We find an item in one of the puddles with similar markings that we found in the remains of the fire beings. Cricket perceives that one of the puddles is bottomless. Mannix immediately agrees to jump in. He removed his armor and we tie a rope around him. He jumps in, disappears, and the rope snaps. Everyone follows.
We travel through a watery tunnel that goes down, turns, and comes back up. We emerge; it is still night and there is a humongous ancient looking derwen tree in front of us, maybe thirty feet away. In front of the tree is a chest with a keyhole. Cricket picks the lock and inside we find a parchment with writing on it.
Mannix touches the tree and leaves the call again. Silas attempts to commune with nature, targeting the tree, and in doing so touches the tree as well. The rest of the party also touches the tree. Upon touching the tree, each of us individually experiences a vision of sorts, to be further discussed next week about what the visions were and what it may mean for us as characters (and our backstories) and as a party.
All of us return back to the tree and recover our consciousness, except Krambler, who is still touching the tree and conscious, but unresponsive. The ground begins to shake. As we discuss what to do next, Krambler seems to be struggling, and he begins to shake uncontrollably. The party grabs him and pulls him away from the tree. He’s okay, and says something about having kept his mind in tact.
At this point, we’ve found five pieces of paper with writing/inscriptions. Two others exist which we have not found as of yet, but are needed for next week, so Nathaniel has given us access to them. The fire paper is charred, but in a way that makes sense for what it is, the water ones are wet and pliable. They contain a language that we don’t necessarily immediately recognize.
The key and messages are here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1n5rsJGgKAKeRGUQGaKH6ZgfVAmKFvthQ