Gorlen Blackhammer – Journal Entry #368, in the Year of -647
-
Gorlen Blackhammer - Journal Entry #368
Sigh, well I thought I was hot on the trail of a Nethertome having pieced several clues together from different manaethereal research, my time spent at the Giant Necropolis, and the historical records found at the Abandoned Library it has lead me to a Mind Flayer Citadel called The Thresruloll Citadel. This Citadel lies below the Burning Sands about 120 miles Northeast of Saevara Empire at a depth of approximately 46 miles. After weeks of carefully probing the defenses of the city, I have managed to work up a plan to breach the magical defenses of the city so that I may explore it undetected, and maybe gain access to its Library. I did find the library, and can gain access to it, unfortunately I need to speak with Dregnoth, as this city uses jellied eyeballs as currency. This brand of mind flayer can extract knowledge from a creature’s eyeballs, based upon residual psionic or magical imprint left in the eye. Which makes them of great value in this city. I’ve managed to gain a workable mind flayer contact that can gain me access to the library. I believe the next clue to finding the Nethertome is in this library that is heavily guarded, however there is a catch I will need 50 jellied beholder eyeballs, and 10 jellied dragon eyeballs to gain access. I don’t know what this is going to cost me, but I definitely don’t want to be owing Dregnoth or any alchemist any favors. The alternative is to trade slaves to become thralls for their standing army, or to be herded for food. The city has little use for gold and platinum, will trade in gems in small quantities to keep their crafters busy.
I originally found it odd, this city was significantly more powerful in its combined use of psionics and magic, passive and active scans are amplified and continuously operating within 30-mile radius of the city, spanning 10 miles above and below. The Elder Brain is remarkably powerful, even as it reaches out across the city to give its instructions, I could sense a hint of divinity in its power. It was a surprise to me when I discovered in the undervaults overlapping seals of combined magic and psionic glyphs that cover much of the city as an invisible fortification that acted as a mythal.
The city mind flayer guards, I noted have a variant form of psionic circuitry (almost technical in nature) that has emerged and can be powered by multiple forms of power sources. This form of crafting is embedded in their exoskeleton armor, tentacle extensions, their weaponry, armor, and power batteries.
As best as I have been able to determine it looks like the city has three major sections, the Upper Level which is where the Slave Pens, and the Thralls reside, the next level are the Mind Caverns this is where you will find the Mind Flayer Inns/Taverns, Fest Halls, Shops and Bazaars, Temples (main deity Illsenine), Guildhalls, and other Pools, Amphitheaters, etc… and on the Bottom level is where the pool that houses the elder brain Qhargizall. It was here that gave me pause, I have seen weak spots were the veil between the manaethereal and prime material planes were weak, but have never have seen more than one manaethereal weakspot pour into a single location, in this case the pool of the Elder Brain, and the encephalic fluid that feeds it from the thought basins. The encephalic fluid combined with the leak from the manaethereal plane and the integration of a semi-divine Elder Brain generates a pool of miscible magical liquid, the tadpole offspring of the mind flayers swim thru these pools until fed to an unsuspecting being to undergo their transformation. Which explains their amplified mastery of combining psionics and magic together, to create, greater than 9th level magics, in a way that hasn’t been seen other than on Dark Sun, or in some respects Nethril. Unfortunately, it will require a great deal more planning and the right conditions before I will be able to collect some of that liquid for further analysis.
While getting the laydown of the city, I did learn of the Duergar Kingdom of Bankir the Mind Flayers had destroyed, and thralled. But interestingly enough they have made several attempts at conquering a nearby small city of Dwarves, their fortifications and crafting abilities are said to be exceptional. The mind flayers feel it’s a matter of time though before the city falls, it has been in a slow decent since they first started laying siege to it. The name of the small dwarf city was called Thon Garum, the Mind Flayers referred to it as the City of Mithril. While I wait for my order of Jellied Eyeballs, maybe I’ll head that way next to see what this City of Mithril is about. I did hear mentions of a Drow Outpost, not entirely sure if they plan to attack it or were it is, hacking a mind flayer communication is a bit tricky and they talk really fast to boot. I think the Drow Outpost is really a handful of Drows that have been turned to Thrall’s and are used as a proxy lookout for the Mind Flayer Citadel.
Located in the Mind Caverns, a block or two past the Tavern called “Grey Matter”, there is a Hall of Thought (more of a cave), were several mind flayers keep tabs on various political and business matters across the surface, normally I wouldn’t have paid much mind to that but I noticed they do keep tabs on the various coming and going of creatures about V’Ral. They periodically try to scry V’Ral, but the obelisk continues to divert the scry connection to Dregnoth’s laboratory, typically resulting in the mind flayers seeing all manner of unholy alchemicaly fueled hedonism occurring that makes them want to pull their eyes out of their skulls immediately. Naturally the scry connection, quickly drops.
In the center of the second level, is the ‘Meat Market’, on the left they sell prisoners for dinner, and on the right is an auction for slaves. Sometimes interesting things come up, as I was passing thru a few silver dragon eggs came up for sale, unfortunately I didn’t have any jellied eyeballs as that is all they would take in trade.
I did find out some basic history behind the Citadel, Thresruloll Citadel, is really old and has had several missteps over the millennia nearly being wiped out a couple of times. The city is approximately 38,000 years old; it was founded by mind flayers that while traveling the far realm, inexplicably were dumped into the manaethereal plane. They had explored the manaethereal plane for centuries before finding their way into the prime material plane and the Manaverse.
One last thing of note, while I was trying to make sure I wiggled my tentacles correctly, I do believe I saw an Arcane come out of one of the guild house’s, I found that odd but before I had time to investigate it he was gone. Need to remember to keep an eye out for that.
Alright, that’s all for now, I’m going to need to find that alchemist.
-
** Dregs quirks an eyebrow **
“Jellied ?? Seriously ??? Pickled are far better tasting and keep longer, but hey - its your salad, pal ! You wanting fresh-grown unfired ones, reconstituted, live harvested or still wriggling on the stalk ??”
-
@dwarf sadly still wriggling on the stalk, fresher that way.
