Dreams of the Yellow King – Part 23
The Yellow King
There was a brief lull in the fighting which we used to catch our breath. Ray was the first to take a look upstairs, where he spotted the second Moonbeast Ahrkh-Nar. He immediately ran back down to us, and we heard the sound of spell casting followed by a billowing cloud of greenish mist that enveloped the top of the stairs.
Believing it to be a Cloudkill, Erasmus tried to dispel it, but failed. He did however realise that it was some form of shadow conjuration, rather than a real Cloudkill, but for most of us it turned out to be just as effective as the real thing.
Ray and Catiana ran up to the top floor, trying to get through the mist but were choked by it. Ray found Orsephellius in her dragon form, and tried to electrocute her, but the lightning went straight through her as if she wasn’t there. Another illusion.
Stumbling out of the far side of the mist, Catiana ran straight into Ahrkh-Nar, who cursed her with a Flesh Worm Infestation. Despite this, she laid into the beast, and was soon supported by Ray and Gregor. As is turning out to be usual, Gregor’s deadly arrows were what finally took the beast down.
Most of us were in a bad state after that, so a rest was what we desperately needed. Searching around the rest of the western end of the Prison we managed to find the Yellow King, who was both grateful to see us and also most desperate to leave both the prison and the Moon. He, like all the other prisoners here, had been badly tortured and abused by his gaolers.
In order to keep our currently friendly Shantak friendly, we removed the howdah from its back and let it into the Prison so that it could feast on the Moonbeasts. In return it was willing to carry us back down to the Dreamlands proper, along with those we had rescued from the Prison.
A final scour of the Prison obtained us some strange musical instruments not designed for human hands – hopefully they will be worth something in the cities below. We need some way to fund this expedition after all.
As I write this we are ready to leave the Moon, and are discussing plans on how we might turn the items we have obtained in the Dreamlands into real things. Whenever we start dreaming, we find ourselves here with all the things that we had here last time we dreamt, but when we wake up, those items are gone.
With help from Winter, it may be possible to Plane Shift here from Golarion, meaning we would not be dream figments here but real people. Then we may be able to take the items from our dream selves, and return with them to the Prime Material plane as real things. It’s something we need to try at any rate.
Before then though, we need to use the Yellow King’s help to find the Mad Poet and determine what it is that Count Haserton Lowls has done with our memories. But that is a story for another time.
Here ends Dreams of the Yellow King, the third chapter of Strange Aeons. There will be a break before we begin chapter four, The Whisper Out of Time.
