Lundar's Library

Day 76, Year 545 of the Ascendancy

The fiery zodiac maze of the pyromaniac Umbrion has often been visited
by explorers and adventurers, but no one has yet to create an accurate
map of the place. Sensing the need for such a map, a small party headed
off to Umbrion’s Keep today, to set about creating a map of Umbrion’s
maze. I learned about the party shortly after I stepped out of the
library, when I was asked to dispell the illusions around the Keep to
let in healer reinforcements. I agreed, and headed to Kizmia’s Island
with the healers.

Inside Umbrion’s Keep, I met up with the party,
and headed into the zodiac maze. It was the first time I had been in
Umbrion’s maze, and I must say that I was overwhelmed. The maze was
unlike anything I had ever seen before. In a nutshell, the maze is a
series of interconnected and identical rooms, which have walls that are
made of fire. Inside those walls prowl deadly creatures of fire, such
as Fire Vermine and Pumaces. The real danger, though, are the Lava
Walkers, which can hurl deadly fire balls at you from almost anywhere
in the maze. The only way to traverse the maze is by walking through
the walls of fire. However, not all walls are passable, and some walls
teleport you to different parts of the maze. Combine all this together,
and you have one heck of a confusing maze.

The first time we entered the maze, we nearly got
wiped out. As we tried to clear the rooms of monsters, fireballs
continuously burst forth from the fiery walls, slowly weakening our
party until only a few of us were left standing. A retreat was called,
and we were chained out back into Umbrion’s Keep. After a short debate
on a new strategy, we decided that we would send in Yor, Callus, and
Sor first, to clear out all of the Lava Walkers and other monsters, and
the rest of the party would follow. As it turned out, this plan worked
rather nicely, and our second forray into the zodiac maze went much
more smoothly.

Inside the maze, our party was led by Entil’Zha,
who was the main cartographer for the expedition. Due to the quirky
nature of the maze, our party got split up a couple times, and there
were a few fearful momments when I became separated from the party and
lost, but all in all the expedition went smoothly, and we got a lot of
mapping done. Afterwards, we met up with Yor, Sor, and Callus, and
prepared to go home.

Our ticket out of the zodiac maze and off the
island was Entil’Zha’s Ethereal Portal Stone. Instead of taking the
long way off the island, Entil’Zha simply created a portal to the
Ethereal in the middle of Umbrion’s Zodiac maze. Our party headed
through the portal to the Ethereal plane, where we met up with another
party which came through Cimmbrion’s Keep. However, as we prepared to
leave the Ethereal plane, we were beset by the hordes of powerful
undine, and not even our combined might was enough to fend them off.
So, the expedition ended in a dreadful mass depart, which further
damaged the vital plane of Purgatory. Hopefully the next expedition
will be more successful, and we will be able to fully map the zodiac
maze of Umbrion.