Expedition 59: Kraken the Case of the Mysterious Island

### Summary

We set to explore the Shattered Isles, but are sidetracked when a Kraken tells us to investigate a floating island. We do so, finding that the island is a "museum of the planes," controlled by a Morkoth who we defeat, freeing the employees.

### Detailed Writeup

A cool mist rolled across Port Vrall as the Grandaughter of Tempus docked at the jetty awaiting the coming of its crew of explorers. The anticipated crew to serve for the duration of the voyage insofar as they were to be needed, more for combat than regular ship-maintenance, read a roster of four. Nexrin, Torr, Clarity, and the newly renamed Kar (FKA Silvert see previous accts.) were to accompany Captain Stormfriend on the expedition south to explore the shattered Isles. Due to a last-minute commitment, Kar was called away on an urgent duty and was forced to forgo the quest. To assist and rebuff this loss, the roster brought on the two greenest members of the compact, Gonerton (for navigation and spellcasting) and Bea (for muscle). Accounting for this urgent roster change, the ship logs were hurriedly updated and the mainsail raised as the ship pointed its prow towards the south and cut at 40˚ off the point of sail.

*Excerpt from log*:

-0602 Smooth waves, light fog, departing at 0600 at 10 knots to the southwest, exiting the port of Vrall. The crew have set our goal to chart at least one new undiscovered island and document two local dangers.

-0640: smooth sailing, nothing of note. Crewmate Torr has contented himself by spitting over the side. He seems to have made a game of trying to hit passing seagulls as they investigate our ship. Current speed, 13 knots

-0720: still no attack, although the weather has turned foul. Spitting rain, grey skies, higher waves. The wind has accelerated our speed to 15 knots, although we have had to lower the jib to avoid capsizing. We can see the Uflophan burial mound to the east, and it serves as a reliable marker of our position. We see islands to the south.

-0746: Danger! The wind has ceased, although the waves do not. Torr has stated that he “didn’t have a good feeling about this” shortly before Clarity’s keen eyes spotted something massive on our leeward side. Closer examination shows that the creature is larger than the ship, with barbed red and white tentacles. It may even have the ability to dull our perceptions to get so close unnoticed. When we readied for battle, the creature responded with a telepathic message. I document some of what it said (abridged). “what is this? An unfamiliar ship on my sea? Six crew is but a snack, aren’t you tasty. What are you doing here” The creature introduced itself as Tunskoka, a powerful kraken with a following cult that inhabits these islands (mem. BEWARE). We offered to do a favor in exchange for mercy, and it obliged. It reports a giant lizard-like creature to the west which it does not wish to bother with (mem. This creature seems lazy. Perhaps this can be exploited?). The lizard was deemed to dangerous for us, so we accepted a separate mission to investigate a floating island that has seemingly swallowed up a party a kraken cultists. We have tacked and set the ship towards the north in search of this mysterious lost island. We have a new objective. Speed 12 knots northwest.

-0840: the island is in sight. It appears to be roughly octagonal, with entrances on each side. A pool in the middle seems to have a room beneath it, and an unknown bird-like beast with long claws was living on the island. We scouted above with Sorin and below with Bea’s fish, revealing that the island is approx. 500ft diameter and 150ft deep before it rounds off. Questioned seagull confirms reports of another party. Dropping anchor presently.

*Excerpt from land team report, given by Bea Whitehill, as dictated*:

“we landed on the island after a few hours of sailing. The sun had fully risen by then so is had to have been a little while. Anyway, the group of us anchored the boat to a tree on the island so the island wouldn’t float away with us on it without the boat. Captain Yezra is so good at knots! Anyway, we anchored the boat and started exploring around. The beaches were really nice, like, vacation nice, and there was a jungle in the middle. It was so pretty that I thought for a moment that this was a hotel! Anyway, we decided to have a ritual party on the beach with Torr, Gon, and I in order to cast our ritual spells. Captain Yezra and Nexrin seemed scared, and kept saying they were seeing things moving in the corner of their eyes, but saw nothing. After the rituals finished, we walked around the island and looked at the doors, which were covered in some sort of writing. Clarity and Gonerton told me that one said “welcome to the abyss” “free admission,” and the others all said similar things with other places like the 9 hells or Elysium. Each had a barrier over the entrance that didn’t let crabs through, only people. Torr put his hand through and pulled it out. There was also Mechanus, Mt Celestia, Arborium, Limbo, and Hades. We went up to the pool, which was actually a skylight with a force field at the bottom that looked down into a room. It was about 15ft deep. Torr dived in and noticed pearly vents.” “we finally went around to one of the entrances, the one for arboria. It was not a portal like we thought, but actually a life-sized diorama of the plane. Torr said the grass tasted like paint. Then, we walked through some illusion boulders where we found a diorama of the plane of water, which had a magic gem in a display case. Torr noted pearly strips that seem to permeate the museum. I was creeped out by the fake water, but then we heard someone coming. It was a little golden robot guy, like those things in the shriekcliffs that Calliope mentioned, and it was a tour guide. It said some nonsense about this being the “museum of the planes” and how it collects specimens from everywhere. We wanted to see the museum’s curate, so the modron let us to the centermost part of the museum. It was strangely evasive when we asked what happened to the kraken cultists. We only got in one fight on the way there; while we were going through the plane of fire exhibit. A captured fire mephit king demands that we free it, and when we refused it targeted clarity with a spell that made her puke fire. Immediately its lackeys targeted the party with heat metal, which prompted a shatter to break their concentration. In frustration, I hurled my superheated shield at the barrier which was probably weak to fire. I’m not very smart, but I think putting the fire creatures behind a barrier that is weak to fire is a bad idea; they probably could have escaped on their own. Anyway they kept attacking with fire and hit me and Clarity mostly. Torr was wasting his time being a useless bear in the back while I was getting burned. Clarity brought down the lava hurler with a blight spell, and the battle seemed to turn in our favor as I decapitated the mephit king in the most awesome combo ever! Then we discovered that they explode when they die, and I was in the middle of all of them as Nexrin and Yezra picked off more around me. I nearly died but finished off the last one.” “Then we went through a grey place and into the middle with a map of Tark. There was a kenku painting in the corner with magic paints. She’s Scratch, you should meet her, she’s really talented. There were also a lot of dangerous creatures in cages, and Mar’yanning the curator was there too. Anyway, they were geased, so all we could get out of Scratch was the words “we’re trapped, all trapped.” Torr and I misinterpreted this as an indication that Mar’yanning had geased her and was planning to trap us too, so Torr walked over to confront the shaman about this. Meanwhile, Clarity was telling Mar’yanning about the kraken, and Mar’yanning offered her a sending stone which connected to Caquoselgyr. She was describing the downstairs aquarium when Torr arrived and gave me a signal, but forgot to give it to anyone else. He then asked Mar’yanning, “do you have beasts? Like this?” and turned into a giant wolf and attacked. I must admit my memory of what came next was a bit hazy. I remember the remorhaz breaking loose, and Mar’yanning teleporting away in a bang. The next thing I knew Clarity had turned her into a goldfish and Gonerton had incapacitated the remorhaz with magic. This is when things got bad. Scratch told us to run as Caquoselgyr emerged and charmed Nexrin and Yezra. Torr’s wolf form grappled the squid thing and we tried to get the remorhaz to eat it. I felt the urge to move towards it, but then there was a big flash of lightning and I remember Yezra reviving me. It was doing pretty bad then, so I grabbed a magic trident-this one- off of its back and stabbed it. Nexrin got the killing blow with an arrow through its eye. We finished the remorhaz soon after.” “The Uflophans couldn’t willingly leave, so we tied them up and dragged them away. I also stole the air elemental gem and we looted the squid! I tried a bite of it, but it was too rubbery for me. There was a ton of loot, this was more profitable than kazreme!”

*Excerpt from ship’s log:*

Mission successful, smooth sailing all the way home with spoils of: +1 magic trident of fish command (200) (taken by Bea) Magic shield (animated) (150) (taken by Clarity) Studded leather mariners (sold to torr) (300) 300gp diamond 100gp ruby Gem of elemental (lesser air) (taken by Bea) Sending stones (100gp) 662gp