Tumbadoo
03-30-2008, 06:00 PM
Can anyone tell me what this is?
A dull black iron coil overlaid with a webwork of thin crimson lines.
It has the following loresong.
You sing:
Shadows flicker at the edges of your vision and creep inward. Cries assault you, shrieks of pain and despair mingled with roars of rage and rampant bloodlust. The thud of marching feet joins them, then breaks, scattering into a mad arrhythmic stamping and shuffling.
Ringing metal joins the cacophony, and a single horn blares. Voices are raised in commanding shouts but fall in wet gurgles and are silenced. Wind whistles past your ears and snaps with the sound of heavy cloth.
Abruptly, the chaos falls away, muffled by a heavy, almost tangible silence. Your sight is completely obscured by darkness now, though it is a darkness characterized not by emptiness but by malign presence. Some great pressure fills your mind and presses insistently, painfully, at your skull.
The darkness shreds, and light stabs through your eyes and into your brain. You can see nothing but the glare, shining brighter than can be comprehended as a color. Pure agony travels in its wake.
Just as you feel your every nerve will sear to ash, the light winks out and takes the pain with it. Your vision takes several moments to clear.
You sing:
Your sight dims and darkness once again encroaches. Silence wraps about you like a heavy blanket.
Weak light flickers into being before you, illuminating a narrow tunnel with walls of piled stone. Shadows cling to the crevices between rocks and fill the niches set deep in the walls. Your vision fixes upon one of these niches, and the shadows withdraw, revealing the body of an armored soldier lying in state. His plate mail is polished, and cut flowers are heaped about his form, along with jewelry in an array of precious metals.
Your sight flows along the dim tunnel, alighting on other niches and other bodies, all similarly arrayed. Some are shrouded in layers of heavy silk that hide them entirely, while others lie draped in flowing robes and are clutching crystal-encrusted staves to their chests. All are surrounded by riches ranging from bolts of fine silk and brocade to bejeweled goblets and ornate weaponry.
Your angle of vision shifts and speeds across the floor of the tunnel as it branches again and again. White stones set in rectangular patterns on the packed earth wink at you in the flickering light. Each rectangle of stones is roughly a man-length, and they stretch away across the floor of the tunnels for as far as you can see.
A faint buzzing sounds in your ears and the tunnel before you warps abruptly, melting to one side before snapping back into focus. The air you breathe grows solid and lodges in your throat. Cracks appear in the floor, small at first but growing larger as you watch. From them, tiny, threadlike streamers of colored light creep outward at a snail's pace and wind toward the walls.
The tunnel warps again and shears in half, scattering into brightly colored sparks and dispersing into nothing.
You sing:
Multicolored sparks dance before you, weaving a luminous web that pulses brightly even as your vision dims around it. The web of light retreats from you, flattening against rough stone walls that were not there a moment ago.
The colorful lines have a sickly allure, rippling as they crawl slowly across the uneven rock that encloses the vast chamber. The ceiling above is lost in a thick, palpable darkness. Heavy smoke redolent of sulfur drifts up to join it from the low fire burning in a pit in the center of the floor.
Five robed figures circle the fire pit, their arms and voices raised in a forceful chant. One figure casts a handful of amber-colored pellets into the flames, causing them to leap upward and belch sulfurous smoke. The darkness above roils in response.
Tendrils of color creep along the floor and spiral inward toward the spellcasters. As another figure crumbles dark, dried flowers into the flames, the tendrils pause, shrinking back for but a moment before pushing onward. The chant falters, then resumes, but now it carries with it an undercurrent of panic.
The vision wavers and fades with an unnatural abruptness.
You sing:
Your questing song pushes against a wall of resistance. The coil's reticence to give up its secrets wavers, then crumbles, dropping you back among the traceries of luminous color and eye-watering smoke that characterize the underground chamber of your most recent vision. The frantic chanting of raised voices assaults your ears as the images re-imprint themselves on your eyes.
The dancing shadows cast behind each of the robed figures standing around the fire condense, retreating toward their sources as the tendrils of color flow ever closer. Soon they are little but inky puddles, and those that cast them also appear to shrink. They cringe, no longer circling the odoriferous fire but standing in place. Their chant is shrill and thready, then cuts off abruptly with a fivefold shriek of agony.
The colorful tendrils spiraling inward from the walls stab into the shadows at the feet of each mage. The robes of each figure billow out and upward, lighting brilliantly from within before boiling away into nothing. The cries of the mages ricochet around the chamber, crossing each other and spawning further echoes until the stone vibrates with the cacophony of their death.
With a breathy inhalation, the sound and the darkness both are absorbed into the pulsing web of lines that mark the walls and floor of the underground room. Nothing is left of the five figures but their dying fire and their shadows, which still roil upon the floor, restless and abandoned.
Those shadows shred before your eyes, taking the vision with them.
You sing:
A heavy weight presses against your mind from all sides. Colors flash at the corners of your eyes, brilliant violet warring with scarlet, azure with a dark and pulsing viridian hue.
Images caper across your inner vision, none keeping still enough for careful examination. A child sneaks through a darkened tunnel, then cowers back with a thin cry of fear. Colorful threads fountain around him and his small form is reduced to nothing, leaving only a cringing shadow on the wall to mark that he ever existed.
Lurching, skeletal forms shuffle along twisting passages, lit by flickering torchlight and the crawling pulse of multicolored webs. White fire blooms to life in the sockets of a broken skull, then dies again.
Panicked cries and strident shouts are punctuated by the clank of tools and the rasp of stone on stone. A wall careens by, formed of freshly chiseled blocks and new mortar. Beyond it, voices are raised in fervent incantation.
The air ripples with chaotic magic, visibly eddying despite the muffling of earth and rock. The pressure on your mind builds and builds before it is suddenly released, not inward but outward, away from you. Still, the stone shudders and earth sifts down around you. Somewhere, something cracks.
Dust rides the air, drifting heavy on the floor and in the quiescent niches that line the underground corridor. The age of the place is tangible. Tiny scraping sounds along a half-crumbled gap in one wall herald the appearance of a pale rat streaked with dirt and rotten mortar. It twitches its discolored nose, sneezes once, then scurries off into the darkness.
The images trail off, growing grey and grainy as the initial pressure settles. Wan torchlight flickers to life as they fade, answered by a single spark of violet, and then there is nothing.
A dull black iron coil overlaid with a webwork of thin crimson lines.
It has the following loresong.
You sing:
Shadows flicker at the edges of your vision and creep inward. Cries assault you, shrieks of pain and despair mingled with roars of rage and rampant bloodlust. The thud of marching feet joins them, then breaks, scattering into a mad arrhythmic stamping and shuffling.
Ringing metal joins the cacophony, and a single horn blares. Voices are raised in commanding shouts but fall in wet gurgles and are silenced. Wind whistles past your ears and snaps with the sound of heavy cloth.
Abruptly, the chaos falls away, muffled by a heavy, almost tangible silence. Your sight is completely obscured by darkness now, though it is a darkness characterized not by emptiness but by malign presence. Some great pressure fills your mind and presses insistently, painfully, at your skull.
The darkness shreds, and light stabs through your eyes and into your brain. You can see nothing but the glare, shining brighter than can be comprehended as a color. Pure agony travels in its wake.
Just as you feel your every nerve will sear to ash, the light winks out and takes the pain with it. Your vision takes several moments to clear.
You sing:
Your sight dims and darkness once again encroaches. Silence wraps about you like a heavy blanket.
Weak light flickers into being before you, illuminating a narrow tunnel with walls of piled stone. Shadows cling to the crevices between rocks and fill the niches set deep in the walls. Your vision fixes upon one of these niches, and the shadows withdraw, revealing the body of an armored soldier lying in state. His plate mail is polished, and cut flowers are heaped about his form, along with jewelry in an array of precious metals.
Your sight flows along the dim tunnel, alighting on other niches and other bodies, all similarly arrayed. Some are shrouded in layers of heavy silk that hide them entirely, while others lie draped in flowing robes and are clutching crystal-encrusted staves to their chests. All are surrounded by riches ranging from bolts of fine silk and brocade to bejeweled goblets and ornate weaponry.
Your angle of vision shifts and speeds across the floor of the tunnel as it branches again and again. White stones set in rectangular patterns on the packed earth wink at you in the flickering light. Each rectangle of stones is roughly a man-length, and they stretch away across the floor of the tunnels for as far as you can see.
A faint buzzing sounds in your ears and the tunnel before you warps abruptly, melting to one side before snapping back into focus. The air you breathe grows solid and lodges in your throat. Cracks appear in the floor, small at first but growing larger as you watch. From them, tiny, threadlike streamers of colored light creep outward at a snail's pace and wind toward the walls.
The tunnel warps again and shears in half, scattering into brightly colored sparks and dispersing into nothing.
You sing:
Multicolored sparks dance before you, weaving a luminous web that pulses brightly even as your vision dims around it. The web of light retreats from you, flattening against rough stone walls that were not there a moment ago.
The colorful lines have a sickly allure, rippling as they crawl slowly across the uneven rock that encloses the vast chamber. The ceiling above is lost in a thick, palpable darkness. Heavy smoke redolent of sulfur drifts up to join it from the low fire burning in a pit in the center of the floor.
Five robed figures circle the fire pit, their arms and voices raised in a forceful chant. One figure casts a handful of amber-colored pellets into the flames, causing them to leap upward and belch sulfurous smoke. The darkness above roils in response.
Tendrils of color creep along the floor and spiral inward toward the spellcasters. As another figure crumbles dark, dried flowers into the flames, the tendrils pause, shrinking back for but a moment before pushing onward. The chant falters, then resumes, but now it carries with it an undercurrent of panic.
The vision wavers and fades with an unnatural abruptness.
You sing:
Your questing song pushes against a wall of resistance. The coil's reticence to give up its secrets wavers, then crumbles, dropping you back among the traceries of luminous color and eye-watering smoke that characterize the underground chamber of your most recent vision. The frantic chanting of raised voices assaults your ears as the images re-imprint themselves on your eyes.
The dancing shadows cast behind each of the robed figures standing around the fire condense, retreating toward their sources as the tendrils of color flow ever closer. Soon they are little but inky puddles, and those that cast them also appear to shrink. They cringe, no longer circling the odoriferous fire but standing in place. Their chant is shrill and thready, then cuts off abruptly with a fivefold shriek of agony.
The colorful tendrils spiraling inward from the walls stab into the shadows at the feet of each mage. The robes of each figure billow out and upward, lighting brilliantly from within before boiling away into nothing. The cries of the mages ricochet around the chamber, crossing each other and spawning further echoes until the stone vibrates with the cacophony of their death.
With a breathy inhalation, the sound and the darkness both are absorbed into the pulsing web of lines that mark the walls and floor of the underground room. Nothing is left of the five figures but their dying fire and their shadows, which still roil upon the floor, restless and abandoned.
Those shadows shred before your eyes, taking the vision with them.
You sing:
A heavy weight presses against your mind from all sides. Colors flash at the corners of your eyes, brilliant violet warring with scarlet, azure with a dark and pulsing viridian hue.
Images caper across your inner vision, none keeping still enough for careful examination. A child sneaks through a darkened tunnel, then cowers back with a thin cry of fear. Colorful threads fountain around him and his small form is reduced to nothing, leaving only a cringing shadow on the wall to mark that he ever existed.
Lurching, skeletal forms shuffle along twisting passages, lit by flickering torchlight and the crawling pulse of multicolored webs. White fire blooms to life in the sockets of a broken skull, then dies again.
Panicked cries and strident shouts are punctuated by the clank of tools and the rasp of stone on stone. A wall careens by, formed of freshly chiseled blocks and new mortar. Beyond it, voices are raised in fervent incantation.
The air ripples with chaotic magic, visibly eddying despite the muffling of earth and rock. The pressure on your mind builds and builds before it is suddenly released, not inward but outward, away from you. Still, the stone shudders and earth sifts down around you. Somewhere, something cracks.
Dust rides the air, drifting heavy on the floor and in the quiescent niches that line the underground corridor. The age of the place is tangible. Tiny scraping sounds along a half-crumbled gap in one wall herald the appearance of a pale rat streaked with dirt and rotten mortar. It twitches its discolored nose, sneezes once, then scurries off into the darkness.
The images trail off, growing grey and grainy as the initial pressure settles. Wan torchlight flickers to life as they fade, answered by a single spark of violet, and then there is nothing.