Journal of Cassian Octious
Expedition I — The Veiled Aegis
I slept perhaps three hours.
Some time after midnight I woke with the uncomfortable certainty that I had overlooked something. The temple was quiet, the sort of silence that encourages observation, so I gathered my chalk and lantern and began mapping the halls. Not merely their shape, but their intention. Doorways. Hinges. Stone seams. Rooms that should have existed but did not. Empty spaces between walls where architecture suggested there ought to have been chambers. Whether forgotten rooms or concealed passages, I cannot yet say.
Every entrance received a small notation.
At some point I apparently fell asleep on the floor beside my own diagrams. I awoke at dawn to discover Latch curled up and butt in my face, having claimed my discarded coat as a pillow.
Lucian joined our company, along with the captain who would command the ship carrying the Veiled Aegis. During the briefing we learned that the strange mist surrounding the nearby island had begun to recede. Others adventuring parties were drawn to the island pillaging for treasure and unknown relics/items. Our task was to travel to a specific island and recover a relic before someone else found it.
The voyage began quietly on a rainy cloudy day.
Without warning, medium-sized insect-like creatures erupted from the water and descended upon the ship. Above them drifted a grotesque jellyfish-like horror, its translucent flesh hanging in ribbons as tendrils reached across the deck.
The battle was quick and chaotic.
Dareya was ensnared by the creature’s tendrils, dragged nearly from her feet, while the captain fought desperately simply to remain standing. For a moment I believed we might lose him.
together, we killed the creatures.
The beach was disturbing.
Bones covered nearly the entire shoreline.
Not scattered.
Accumulated.
As though the sea itself had spent years returning its dead.
Among them protruded a single arm.
It twitched.
None of us liked that.
Before anyone could investigate, the arm began dragging itself through the sand, leaving behind a winding trail and a growing mound beneath the surface. Whatever moved there was not crawling atop the beach...it was swimming beneath it.
The creature burst upward and attacked trying to draw us under the ground.
Another reminder that islands forgotten by civilization are rarely forgotten by monstrosities.
Beyond the beach we entered a cavern.
Waiting inside stood a a stone statue of an unnaturally thin man with a pointed goatee, calm enough that the previous horrors almost seemed incidental.
He looked upon us without surprise.
Then asked a single question.
“What is the password?”
Silence.
Then Ira, our centaur sailor, answered with remarkable confidence:
“…Oh shit.”
The stranger considered the response.
Then simply replied,
“Wrong.”
That was where our story, for the moment, ended.
