The Company rested and attended each member attended to his or her own personal business. They also began outfitting themselves with supplies in preparation to find enter the mystical portal.
The 12th of Darkel
In the morning, the Company prepared to return to Heth�s Chapel. A group of local Verundhyans, dressed in the garb of �tonist priests approached Jeremi and explained that they had been sent to him by Priestess Maara Pachalia to act as his staff. Jeremi is taken aback by this turn of events, apparently unaware that Maara senses in him the ability to lead others. Recovering from his shock, Jeremi orders his new followers to clean and restore the defiled Chapel back to service of �ton.
The Company later went to the Chapel and walked upstairs, passed Jeremi�s new charges. After reaching the bell tower at the top of the Chapel, there was a short discussion and then Cirend entered the arcane portal and disappeared from view. The other members of the Company followed shortly thereafter, meeting Cirend in a very strange place.
The portal has led them to what appears to be a miserable and cold swamp, stretching as far as the eye can see in every direction. There are pools of stagnant, water dotting the landscape, and dark black moss covers the trees, pools, and ground alike. More disturbingly, bright and unidentifiable violet tendrils sprout up from the muck. Whether they are plant-life or animal-life is unknown. The air itself is choked with a gauzy curtain of a faded gray mist. The stench of death and decay hangs in the stale air and emanates from the stagnant pools of water, and the ground appears alive with insects, worms, spiders, and small reptiles. The cold dampness of the swamp has an immediate effect on the mood of the Company. They are clearly in an alien place the likes of which none of them has seen before.
Orongorg sets about trying to determine the path of the large snake creature, the name of which they have learned is �naga�. Cirend has a strong urge to travel in an easterly direction but cannot explain why other than to say, �There�s something important there.� The Company eventually travels to the East, roughly following the tracks of the fearsome naga.
As they make their way through the swamp, the members of the Company encounter boiling pools of mud, somewhat like quicksand, and several members nearly drown before they are pulled out of the searing hot muck.
Continuing along the path of naga, the Company encounters a group of slave laborers who seem to have been brought to this strange place by the Pactlords in order to mine a precious mineral found in the swamp. The slaves tell them that at night they sleep in quarters near a place they refer to as the �Black Manor�, which they believe serves as the headquarters for their captors. With no means at their disposal to help the slaves return back to Samoth, the Company decides to leave the slaves to their fate and continue on.
They come to a large lake and spy an island in the distance. Cirend is strongly compelled to head to the island and the Company wade through waist deep mud, muck, and dirty water to get to it. Upon the island, they discover a tall stone sculpture made of onyx and gold, at least 20 feet in diameter and 40 feet tall. The sculpture conveys a very menacing aura with many sharp edges, points, and hooks. It rises from the middle of a round, stone-rimmed pool. As the Company are investigating the sculpture they hear and see three humanoid creatures, two trolls and an ogre, approaching them. This is a fairly short battle but the Company emerge victorious, slaughtering the three Pactlords efficiently and quickly.
Another battle is fought against two worm-like monsters with segmented tentacles growing
