Back at camp again, the party dug through the spoils of their battles in the eastern caverns under the oasis. The weapons that Pythas and Serpentis had been wielding both turned out to be rather prominent magical items, and an errant branch of Verdan the Everliving that had been retrieved as well looked promising as a magical focus.
The next morning after, Nalpak and Muyoh volunteered themselves as the conduits that would join together with the party and seek to awaken the dreamer. Ebru was in no shape to fight still, injured as she was, and nobody seemed to willing to trust neither Jarlax nor Elhalan to return to where the Nightmare could potentially seize them again.
The party ventured into the caverns, together with the two druids, the place now eerily quiet in the absence of the Fanglords' rituals.
Even when they reached the way down into the chambers where Naralex lay sleeping, the vines that had previously blocked the path were now withered away. Beyond them was a small chamber that had been partly flooded; the whole place scattered with torches and candles, still all alight, Naralex himself lay sleeping atop a stone slab in the middle of the room.
Nalpak and Muyoh did not waste time to set up and perform the ritual that would awaken their Archdruid, though they asked for the party to keep their eyes peeled in case of trouble -- they could tell that what-ever had grabbed hold of Naralex would not be so willing to let go.
And indeed, as the ritual to awaken Naralex was commenced, dark and twisted serpents began crawling their way out of the murky waters. Then after them, more of the same viscous blobs the party had encountered earlier. And out of the walls, seeped up from the ground, more twisted tendrils of coalescing darkness.
The party did their best to keep the monsters at bay, away from the druids performing their ritual. All seemed to go well, until a sudden splash in the murky waters washed like a wave up over them!
Up from where the splash had originated, a towering behemoth of a creature emerged. It looked twisted and mangled, its skin a glossy black and its limbs all gnarled. It stared the party down with white, lidless eyes. Truly a manifestation of nightmares, and one that now leapt at the party to fend them all off.
Again, the party managed to land a decisive victory, and one the monster had been slain there was nothing more to keep Nalpak and Muyoh from finishing their ritual. Once they did, Naralex soon awoke; an old man broken out of a restless nightmare. He could tell them all that he was well, though still unnerved from a far too unsettling dream. He asked of the two tauren where the rest of his disciples were, and the story of what had befallen touched the old druid dearly.
Upon closer examination of the monstrosity that had emerged, the party found more of the same dark crystals that Zachariah Hallowhold had previously poured into Jarlax's ritual site.
This was an ill-boding sight to be sure, though exactly what it meant was not so clear at the moment. Naralex asked if he could perhaps have a portion of them, later, so that he and his fellow druids could more closely examine them and perhaps understand what had happened. If a bit reluctant, the party agreed.
Now all that remained was for them to get out of this place, and then from there off to The Crossroads so they could plot out their next steps.