Chapter 1 - The First Night
The day dragged on a bit with both Ryth-Shan and Shadowheart speaking very little to one another. The fish Kaedyn meant to purify were thoroughly rotten, and so Ryth-Shan took them back to the shore and dumped them. He and his companions had gathered a few less perishable food items from the fallen in just the short time they'd been on the beach, and so he shared what he had with Shadowheart to make at least a meal out of it. Kaedyn and Vexir were both like corpses, so neither ate. At one point, Ryth-Shan closed their eyes, for it unnerved them that they were staring as if dead.
They tidied up the campsite area and sprawled out tents and bedrolls and the like. In one open area, they built a campfire. Together, they also gathered several crates from the beach to use as their own personal storage. Then they spent some time going through the junk they'd picked up so that they could leave in their storage a reasonable amount of stuff they planned to sell, maybe, eventually, if they ever found a merchant. They considered just lugging it all around in their magic pockets, but what they soon discovered was that they still had to share the weight of all of that potentially useless junk. Therefore, leaving it at camp made the most sense.
At one point, Ryth-Shan discovered a strange, rather large, rune etched into the stone near the entrance to the ruins Shadowheart had been trying to bust into. She came to examine it as well. Both made Arcana rolls. Shadowheart rolled a 2 and Ryth-Shan rolled a 17. He succeeded and explained it was a Netherese portal rune. "There are likely more around the area. We could use these to transport ourselves from one place to another instantly."
"So you understand it?" asked Shadowheart.
"Indeed," said Ryth-Shan. He then taught her how to use it. "Convenient that it is near our campsite," he said with a smile.
Shadowheart rolled her eyes and just walked away. Her Relationship Score with him dropped another point to 46. He was trying to make friends with her, but she was not having it.
Finally, evening came, and they had lit a fire. Ryth-Shan spent some time fishing with some poles he found from the fishermen on the shore. There were also a few nets that were still intact. And so, he managed to catch them some fresh fish for the night with a successful 20 Survival check. This, at least, made things more tolerable that night, and his Relationship Score with Shadowheart increased back to 47 because he had proven useful to her.
The DM then called for a Nature roll of 15 or higher. Ryth-Shan rolled a 15 and succeeded. As they sat around the fire, eating, he looked upon Vexir and Kaedyn, lost in his own thoughts. Shadowheart noticed, and she was curious enough to ask, "What is it? You seem troubled."
Ryth-Shan looked at her and sighed. He replied, "None of this makes any sense. The Ghaik... er... Mind Flayers, I mean, and the nature of the intellect devourers... it's all wrong. The way everything happened. Something's not right."
Shadowheart seemed even more intrigued. She was sitting there with a guarded look and making it clear she still didn't trust him, but she seemed intensely interested. Their Relationship Score increased by 1 to 48. "What do you mean? What's all wrong exactly?"
Ryth-Shan's eyes roamed back to Vexir and Kaedyn who were laying between him and Shadowheart. Both appeared to be in a deep sleep. "Everything," he said. "For starters, the Ghaik were not normal. Did you notice their eyes?"
"What about their eyes?" asked Shadowheart.
"Their eyes are supposed to be pale and devoid of pupils. These Ghaik had fiery eyes, it seemed. It was as if there was something burning within their souls. It was... unnerving."
"That's it? You are upset about their eyes?" she asked.
Ryth-Shan looked at her again and chuckled. "I wish. No. Like I said. It was everything. One of the most disturbing parts was actually the intellect devourers. They used devour intellect to disable both Vexir and Kaedyn, but they didn't use body thief. That is their most deadly ability, and they didn't use it. They acted like they were going to, but then they didn't."
"Maybe it's because they have tadpoles in their heads," suggested Shadowheart. "Maybe they didn't want to harm someone they knew would soon be one of their masters."
Ryth-Shan's expression was unusually hard, and it unnerved Shadowheart. He said, "Then why did they attack us to begin with? Yes, I killed a newborn, an Ustilagor, but that shouldn't have turned them against us. Ghaik consider Ustilagor to be a delicacy. They eat them all the time. So if we are infected and we killed one, why would they attack us? The fact that we have Ghaik parasites in us should have meant that the intellect devourers shouldn't have even attacked us at all. It was as if... as if they were... disorganized."
"It was pretty chaotic up there," said Shadowheart. "Maybe they..."
Ryth-Shan cut her off. "I don't know. Maybe I didn't learn enough in my creche. I was pretty young when everyone I knew was killed. Still, my creche was rigid and strict. Ghaik lore was taught to us at a very young age. They are the sworn enemies of my people. Therefore, we learn a great deal about them almost as soon as we can learn how to talk."
"The Ghaik are individuals who believe that they are agents of "Order". They are forces of law who are driven to tame chaos. They detest disorder. They think they are the caretakers of the multiverse. They view mind control as the best way to remove freedom from others which in turn removes crime and lawlessness and disorder. For them to be so chaotic... it just doesn't make any sense."
Shadowheart said nothing to this. She was also now quite disturbed by what he was saying. Since she was silent, he continued. "They have a shared, collective mind. Knowledge equals power, and they would share vast amounts of information freely amongst one another. So if we're infected, and we are, we should have been viewed by all as ally, not enemy. Certainly, the intellect devourers shouldn't have even tried to devour intellect at all. They have the ability to sense and detect the presence and location of any creature within three hundred feet of them. I don't know. It was almost as if they were having a civil war amongst themselves. It was as if the collective mind was fragmenting into factions."
"And then, what's more," Ryth-Shan said after only a brief pause, "my people were pursuing that vessel even into the Hells! A Ghaik vessel is one of our most prized catches, but to pursue it into the hells, that is something unusual to say the least. There were so many thralls, the demons were SO bent on seizing the ship, my people were also so intent on it... no. There is something VERY strange about all this."
"On top of it all, as if all that isn't enough, the entire ceremorphosis process was done differently than normal," he concluded.
"How so?" she asked.
"It was sped up," he told her. "And yet, it is completely stalled. Normally, the Ghaik would secure the suitable host by rendering them docile with a mind blast. Then they would take a mature tadpole that was selected from the elder brain's brine pool after it had spent a decade there. Then, after a few hours of crawling around inside the host's cranium, the parasite would attach itself to their brain stem and replace their brain with its own tissue. Essentially, it would completely replace a host's personality with its own while still keeping the body alive for the second stage of the transformation."
"So, if what you're saying is true, we should not even be having this conversation right now," said Shadowheart.
"Exactly," he told her. "It is only possible to interrupt ceremorphosis to save a host before this initial stage is completed. That means we should have had to have been cleansed within a few hours in order to be saved. We shouldn't even be ourselves right now. We should be the tadpoles living through our bodies."
An uneasy silence followed. After a few moments, Shadowheart asked, "Do you know how to remove these things from our heads?"
He shrugged as he now played with the campfire. "I remember the horror stories as a child. The most effective method was to incinerate or crush the host's head."
Shadowheart's eyes bugged out. "Are you serious? The BEST way was to kill the person?"
Ryth-Shan's expression was solemn. "Yes. Utterly crush and destroy the head, parasite and all. Then the purifier would use resurrection spells to bring the person back to life. Finally, they would use restoration magic and heal spells to reconstruct the person's personality and so forth. But again, this would only be if the damage was not complete. After the initial stage, after just a few hours, the original creature would be utterly lost and beyond any hope of salvation. Only a miracle could bring them back."
"I can see, now, why you're upset," she said sarcastically. "Sounds like a truly exciting experience. I feel like I've been robbed of the pleasure."
Ryth-Shan gave her a chuckle. Their Relationship Score increased again by 1, back to 49. "I suppose I should be thankful. For whatever reason, the parasites are dormant or defective in some way."
"I'm also quite happy to know that even if we start to turn, we'll be basically dead before all the viciously awful stuff starts to happen. Right?" said Shadowheart.
Ryth-Shan nodded. "True. It is a small mercy. We'll cease to be us within hours long before our internal organs are reshaped and our faces split open to make room for the tentacles, and so forth."
She was silent again as she stared into the fire. "And they're just sleeping away now," she remarked after a bit as she gestured at their two comatose companions.
"Right," said the Gith. "They should be dead. Either via the parasites or the intellect devourers, their brains should have been consumed. We all should be dead. I just..."
She then met his gaze, her expression hard. "Let's get some rest. In the morning, let's make finding a healer our number one priority. Agreed? Forget the ruins here and all. We need to find someone who can fix us and them."
Ryth-Shan could not argue with that. "I agree wholeheartedly."
That night, Kaedyn and Vexir both had the strangest dream. Or was it real? They couldn't be certain. Either way, it was as if someone or something was calling to them. The voice sounded warm and inviting. "Where are you?" it asked. For Kaedyn, it was a woman's voice; sweet and sultry. For Vexir, it was a man's; strong and powerful. They each had the same reaction. They were on their feet in moments and running around the beach where they had landed after they'd escaped the nautiloid. The voice was calling to them from the horizon, but no matter what they did, they couldn't reach it.
They both awoke with a start at the same time. As a result, they woke Shadowheart. She was the only one who had been asleep. She had taken first watch and Ryth-Shan had taken second. Therefore, he was awake when they jerked upright. He was so startled that he jumped to his feet with bow ready. This movement woke Shadowheart who also jumped up with weapons drawn.
"What?" Vexir snapped, immediately furious that they were drawing their weapons. She searched for her own but didn't find them. She did NOT like that even more. "Calm down!" she barked. "Put your weapons down at once." She made an Intimidation roll at a disadvantage, for at that moment she was not that intimidating. She rolled a 7 and 13, so the 7 was taken because of disadvantage. 7+4=11. The DM then had Shadowheart and Ryth-Shan roll an Insight check to see if they could successfully see through her intimidation and determine if she was acting on her own or as a Mind Flayer tadpole. Ryth-Shan rolled an 8+2=10. Failure. He kept his weapons up. Her intimidation tactic worked in reverse of what she intended. He was afraid of her, and so he kept his bow up and ready.
Shadowheart, however, rolled a 13+4=17 and succeeded. She lowered her weapons. "It's okay," she told Ryth-Shan. "I think she's just lashing out in fear. It's her. It's not the tadpole." Ryth-Shan had a choice. Did he believe her and lower his weapon, or did he continue to not trust them.
He chose to trust Shadowheart. His Relationship Score with her went up by 1 to 50. He lowered his bow.
"What is going on?" asked Kaedyn. "What happened? Where are we?"
"You were rendered unconscious by intellect devourers," Ryth-Shan explained. "We dragged you both to this spot and made camp for the night." Then he shook his head and put his hand to his forehead. "Gods! You shouldn't even be awake right now. You had your intellects devoured. We should have needed to find a healer to use Greater Restoration to restore you. None of this makes any sense!"
Shadowheart ignored him. She smiled warmly. "He seems always upset about something. He never looks on the bright side. You're awake. This is good. All this is good. According to him, we should all be completely dead by now; taken over by the mind flayer tadpoles."
"What?" asked Vexir. "What do you mean? Explain."
"Well, last night, the Gith said..." Then Shadowheart told them all about what Ryth-Shan had said to her the previous night. As they sat around the camp and ate Ryth-Shan's latest catch of fish, she concluded, "So, none of us should be alive, but here we are. Our plan is to seek out a healer, though, and fast. Who knows when these things will decide to start consuming us."
"Agreed," said Vexir. She looked truly unwell. The sun was wearing on her already, and it had barely been an hour since they'd awakened. It was rather early, and the sun had barely been in the sky. Fortunately, a few clouds gave her some shelter from the harsh rays. "So we're skipping the ruins?"
"Unless you really think it's a good idea to search them," Ryth-Shan replied. "Seems rather unimportant right now. Our top priority is to get these things out of us."
"Well," said Kaedyn as he finished his last piece of fish and tossed the bones in the fire. He brushed himself off as he stood. "Then I say, 'Let's not delay.' Let's get an early start. We have a full day ahead of us."
"I still can't believe you're both standing right now and looking, well, good," said Ryth-Shan. "It's like you decided to just take a nice nap in a comfortable bed in an inn somewhere instead of having your minds sucked dry by intellect devourers."
"Again, small mercies," said Shadowheart with a pleasant smile. "Let's not sit here and dwell on it too long, shall we? I agree with... I'm sorry. What was your name again?"
"Kaedyn," he replied.
"Kaedyn. Right," she said. "I won't forget again." She then winked at him and set out. Kaedyn was surprised and didn't know how to respond to that. Vexir and Ryth-Shan both exchanged looks. Neither knew exactly what to think of that little exchange.
"Well," said Vexir after a moment. She searched her magic pocket and pulled out her greataxe, thankful that it was there. "Let's not dawdle. We wouldn't want to keep her waiting, now would we?" She shot Kaedyn a sneer. Still not knowing how to respond to this, he just gave her a blank stare in return as she turned her back on him and followed Shadowheart.
Ryth-Shan smirked and patted him on the shoulder. He then whispered, "Lady Killer," to him and kicked out the dying embers of the fire. After that, he followed the ladies out of the camp.
Kaedyn just stood there, dumbfounded, for a moment. Then, as he saw them all disappear around the bend at the far end of the camp, he shook his head and began to follow. With a sigh, he muttered to himself, "Please, Tyr. Give me strength." And with that, the party began their second day.
