South and west of Annan’s Port are two shrines, a temple, and one of the world’s most powerful artifacts.  Only the goblin tribes that still roam the mountains know of the shrines and the temple, and even they have forgotten why they are supposed to defend them.

Click this link to read the description of the Shrines of Moon and Sun, and the Temple of the Earth Mother.

Time, the son of the Moon, was murdered here in his mother’s shrine, his body left on her altar.  A cruel thing to do, in and of itself, and a deliberate act.  When she found her murdered son her cry of anguish filled the world, disturbing any and all who follow her.  Some were called to this place, including an NPC that my players had grown fond of.  They chose to follow him, in his almost mindless need to answer the call and attend the goddess in her shrine.  They didn’t have to do that – it was all their idea.  So I ran with it.  When they finally reached the mountain, Kenny was pulled from his sleep to attend the goddess.  The party found him in the shrine, his body possessed by the essence of the Moon.  Mortal bodies are not meant to handle such things, and her presence effectively killed him. (The look of shock on their faces was priceless. And heartbreaking.  I felt bad. Sorta.)  When she understood what she had done, the Moon told the party about the Well of Souls below, and that if they returned with water quickly enough they could save their friend.  Thus began a mad dash through a maze of crumbling rooms and kobold-occupied caves and tunnels.  The tension from the time-limit was palpable.  All in all, a memorable and enjoyable session.

Kenny had to stay behind, a new cleric to the goddess, imbued with her essence.  When they meet him again he is going to be one powerful dude.

This work by Jean Headley is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.