Alloria Mialeth is waiting for the party after they enter the walled area of palisades. After successfully completing the second trial they have a few moments to gather themselves, heal up, and move to the next door down a series of stairs. Alloria explains that the Unknowns the party have just faced are a source of great shame for her. In her past she was responsible for keeping several of the creatures locked away for the trials, and away from elven agriculture. But one fateful night, a number of Rotbeasts broke from their enclosure and caused devastation to Anlyth farms, orchards, and shrines. For this, Alloria was exiled for her failure of duty, and her name as a beast master was tarnished. It was only after a daunting experience in the Emerald Peaks that she made it back alive to the Shimmer Isles and slowly regained her status.
As the party arrive at the door on the ground floor, a figure in a deep blue cloak emerges from the shadow. A female voice speaks from the darkened hood, a message from The Tide to the party, she holds out a wax sealed scroll. "Should you succeed, a shard of knowledge will take you ever further". With this cryptic message, the figure makes her way to one of the adjoining doors that leads out of the arena. Before disappearing she turns back, apologizes to Alloria for interrupting, then adds; "It pertains to your discovery, Alloria. I'm sure you understand".
The voice of Ulahice rings out once more as she introduces the final challenge. The party have used two minutes of time, but through recovering four hourglasses have unlocked a further two in which to complete the final challenge. The Ulahice warns that they will need careful cooperation and teamwork, to survive the challenge ahead. The door before the party bursts open, light pouring in to the dark room, "BEGIN!".
In the arena ahead is a lush landscape of jungle flora, a multitude of colours and textures painted across a steeply rising cliff as the valley comes to its end. The party rush in and look around for clues as to what is needed for the challenge. They see no immediate adversaries but notice two stone obelisks, one by the door where they enter and one in the furthest reach of the walled off arena, up the cliff face. Crom sprints toward the more gently ascending route, getting eyes on the arena. Mornington takes the more direct route towards the far obelisk, but one that has to contend with more climbing. As he approaches the cliff, he takes cover in some bushes in an area of freshly turned soil, colourful flowers growing all around.
A strange clicking or gurgling can be heard from one side of the arena near Crom, strange shapes emerge from a cluster of large brightly coloured mushrooms. Two humanoid shaped creatures stumble, then sprint, shrieking towards Crom. They have large mushroom cap heads but no eyes, malformed limbs make them look roughly human shaped but they have grotesque, bright green pustules, growing to enormous size in several locations, mostly at the ends of their arms, Unknowns. They flail at Crom as the others enter the arena, Amarion quickly rushes in to flank, summons the divine energy of the ancients as he strikes one with a thunderous smite. Edward positions himself to strike the same foe as Amarion and unleashes two agonising blasts upon it, but it still stands firm. The ground rumbles next to Mornington, he sees a lump in the soil rise before an explosion of dirt is thrown into the air, a large carnivorous plant with a thick stem, red leaves, and a barbed mouth lunges toward him. It takes a sizeable chunk out of Morningtons thigh as he draws his Coral Scimitar, hacking away at the Unknown to defend himself.
Crom steps away from his adversaries, as he does they try to attack, but both miss. He runs a route toward the sheer cliff Mornington originally aimed for, looking to figure out this trial quickly before they are overwhelmed by the enemies. One of the Myconids makes chase, and to Croms horror, strikes him at a great distance. A stringy vine bursts from one of the creatures arm pustules, harpooning Crom as mycelial adhesive roots him to the creature. The creature tries to reel in its catch, but Crom is too strong to allow such a thing. Edward, still under the effects of his climbing potion, goes to scale the cliff. He makes great progress until something grabs at his leg. The Unknown launched two vine like appendages from the soil, one grappling the young warlock and pulling him from the cliff, the other becomes wedged within a crevice. Edward hits the ground hard, close to Mornington, who continues to duel with the creatures leafy maw.
Amarion and Crom team up to bring down one of the Unknowns, utilising strategic positions. Crom faces the one remaining while Amarion goes to aid Mornington. Edward climbs the Tripwire's vine, still stuck in the cliff, making light work of it, and gaining a vantage point on the battlefield. Mornington continues to fend off the Unknown before Amarion joins to flank the creature. Amarion casts moon beam to rain down radiant damage upon it as it cracks and pops, flailing.
Edward, now upon the high cliff, inspects the far obelisk. It has glyph like carvings that denote it a magic, and features hand prints on each of its four sides. He figures they must all be present to activate it, to complete the challenge, as there is no door to exit. He runs back to the cliff edge, shouts his findings, then bombards the battlefield with eldritch blasts. In another strike of bad luck, one backfires, flashing in front of Edward as the black stains upon his fingers grow to consume his entire hand. Crom faces off against the remaining Myconid, it sprays clouds of spores in the surrounding area that get into Croms eyes and ears, poisoning him and slowing his movements. The plant creature bites, misses by a large margin, exposing its stem. Both Amarion and Mornington do all they can to bring it down, severing the creatures head from its stem, defeating it. Crom hacks and slashes as he splits the last enemy in two as it's fungus flesh collapses to the floor.
Have they won? As the sound of the crowd fades from their achievements, Edward hears the same gurgled clicking from another Myconid. Cresting the hill, gaining on his position, a mycelial harpoon is launched, strikes Edward as acid burns his flesh. All goes dark as he loses consciousness. Elven rangers are seen around the arenas walls peering over ready to act, as a death is imminent. Ulahice loudly exclaims "Let it be" to the shock of some of the crowd. She wishes for fate to decide whether the devil worshiper lives or dies. The rangers back off, concealed once again behind the wall.
The party see Edward fall, but lose line of sight as his body is dragged toward the Myconid. They all run as fast as they can, Crom taking the less steep approach while Amarion and Mornington start scaling the cliff by their position. A voice calls out to Edwards mind, the familiar voice that haunts him, offering its help. Edward exclaims he does not need help anymore, he doesn't need him. We'll see, replies the voice. Before long the myconid is surrounded, a one sided, but intense conflict follows. Crom is shoved from the cliff, but luckily does not fall far. After the bard, barbarian and paladin bring down the final grotesque fungus being, they successfully revive Edward as his eyes flicker open.
The party inspect the obelisk, the water timer for the challenge still pouring. Edward can not read any of the glyphs on the stone, his Rune Keeper Eyes failing him. Amarion places his hands into the imprints and disappears in a flash of blue light. The others quickly follow, and are soon disappointed when one-by-one they each appear, teleported to the obelisk next to the start door. Luckily they have enough time and with their enemies defeated get back to the obelisk and all place hands at the same time.
The sound of the crowd, of the arena, of the jungle, fade. Silence. Bright light consumes all.
As sound slowly returns, its that of a calm jungle, gentle wind, birds chirp, insects buzz. As their vision returns, the party try to orient themselves. They are in a small clearing in a dense jungle, beneath them is a large stone slab, carved with runes and covered in vine and shed leaves. Overhead, fast moving clouds can be seen and as they part to reveal the sky, a great mountain peak can be seen, deep green with vegetation. The party look at each other and try to figure out what has happened. Have they been exiled to the Emerald Peaks? But they beat the challenges, that makes no sense. Edward sends his Familiar Artax up into the sky, and witnesses they are indeed in a jungle covered mountain range, the sparking of the distant sea far in the distance. They recall the stranger they met before the final trial, "Should you succeed, a shard of knowledge will take you ever further". They open the sealed scroll to find it has no writing on it at all. The party try to unpick what was said, they think through their recent interactions with The Tide, as they know the scroll came from them. They realise that Amarion's new sword is called Dawn Shard, and emits light. They draw the blade and bring it over to the scroll, and under its light, a message appears.
I apologise I could not tell you this in person, if you are reading this you have claimed victory over the Trials of Halamar. The first master of the hunt looks down on you with sharp eyes, but a sharper smile. I scarcely had time to modify the teleportation spell, and I have in fact exiled you, despite your success this day. I hope you can forgive me, for there is still more you must do. Climb the emerald peak you find yourself upon. Look for a yawning chasm of terrible stature and venture down. I do hope you were telling the truth about your Amulet of the Planes, failing that, return to this teleportation circle. I will be able to sense your presence and bring you back. I may have a lot to answer for in the coming days, therefore I wait in hope of your swift return. Wishing you the best of luck, and my full confidence.
Shocked at this turn of events the party feel they have little choice but to follow the instruction. Surly he is leading them to something of great importance. The party hack through dense jungle keeping a keen eye, and a keener ear for potential danger. Crom uses his instinctual senses to see if there are beasts close by. He senses there are many in these wild jungles but none are about to tread on their toes. After climbing the mountain for several hours Crom climbs a tree to observe the surrounding area, he spots a large section in the jungle with no trees, a sunken part of the mountain. Once drawn to this location the party find a huge sinkhole, maybe 200ft across with more vegetation growing at its base, as far below as the chasm stretches across.
The adventurers are wary that they need to rest, but know that the jungle is far from safe. They quickly search, and Edward scouts with his owl Artax, for anything close by that could keep them from harm's reach. They find nothing of particular use, but realise there are stone shelves on the sides of the sinkhole leading down, some of them large enough to host a bedroll or two. They collectively decide to descend into the chasm, and camp where they can on the walls, out of reach of beastial predators that will stalk the night. They fix together two lengths of rope, enough to reach half way down this imposing natural structure. They take turns making their way down, but to keep the rope for the next half of the journey Amarion uses a potion of climbing and descends without the use of rope.
After some athletic climbing, rope swinging, and careful management of the rope, they find enough footing to rest. Crom and Amarion each have their own shelf, while Mornington and Edward are sharing one. They are only slightly split up, but nonetheless find themselves in a very precarious sleeping arrangement.
The dark of night creeps in, as they hope, or even pray, for a safe night.
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