Session Five

 After very little tinkering, the puzzle on the door is quickly solved. The DM learned a lesson about dispensing info.

When the puzzle is solved, the door swings open. The walls are still dark crystal, but the crystal can be seen to be fading to gray perhaps fifteen feet down the passageway. Beyond that, there's an intense light, like bright sun on a midsummer day.

The ground is curiously flat. There's a layer of dust perhaps an inch thick, but the surface under that is completely flat like a stage. There's a sense of unreality to the surroundings and even to yourselves. There's a nervous tension in the air, like backstage on opening night of a play.

The gray crystal walls fade further into white crystal, and then transluscent. By the time the passageway opens into a room, the transluscent crystal has got opague and reflective. There's no source to the light, but the mirror-like walls reflect the brightness so much that you have to squint.

This room is empty. It's just a room, roughly circular, perhaps forty feet across. The only thing of note in this room is the ring of powdered gold.

There's a ritual circle in the exact center of the room. It's fifteen feet across, just big enough for all of you to stand in it. The circle is made up of powdered gold, the way you'd make a circle of salt. There are fist sized gemstones at what [[Kaupu]] recognizes as the cardinal points. Diamond (purpose, initiation) at the north, Peridot (creation) to the east, Ruby (life force and passion) to the south, and Alexandrite (creativity and imagination) in the west. The intercardinal directions are two Onyx's (nw and ne, for oppositional pairings and balance of same) and impressions for something round (sw and se. [[Ardour]] identifies them as pearls, apparently stolen. [[Lorrin]] and [[Camillune]] attempt to put a value on the gems so as to know how big of a pearl is needed. Each of the gems is worth 100k gold. The diamond is worth 1 million gold. Even those of you who are not magic users can feel the magic coming from this circle like heat from an open oven. There's not a doubt in your mind that if you touch the gold or the stones you would die.

On entering the circle, [[Y'so]] appears. The presence of a diety causes everyone to lose 10% of their remaining hit points. This is technically a con save to resist, but at level 3 no one can hit the save.

In this appearance she doesn't have a form. She looks like a beam of light passing through rainbow colored smoke

She directs them to try to assist in any way they can. She suggests they attempt to prevent orcs from eradicating dragons. She says the dwarves are having unspecified issues. There's a nearby place of antimagic that needs to be investigated. Monstrosities, devils, and demons need to be challenged as they have all sided against Y'so. The pearls need to be found.

They decide to help the dragons and investigate the antimagic on the way.