“You reach a small lake and see outlines of reed grass through heavy fog. The water flows languidly over a few black rocks before tumbling into the shaft you just climbed. Birds call out to each other.”
Theme: Fog, bog, an alien palace
It is practically impossible to climb up to this swamp from the Bubbling Stench. This area is a possible starting area for a party arriving via planar travel. As this place is far enough from the Fortress Dam of Ix in order to allow planar travel, this is also where you can use magic to leave this place and where high level clerical spells work.
- building a boat with the reed available is possible
- a giant crane is standing still and suddenly comes down to swallow a giant leech that has been following the boat
- out of the mist rises a white, filigree sponge pyramid, a fractal construction without a clear separation of rooms or corridors, no furniture, no tools, no people
- at the bottom, in the very center, lies a circular silent harbor, ebony light falls on amazing swan ships (a lever throws hundreds of yards of animated silk up into the air, like fluttering wings this will break a fall and allow the boat to sail over waterfalls)
- at the top, above the mist, there is a closed red flower as big as a house (a disturbance will let it unfold and leads to an encounter with Bilapudee)
Bilapudee is a demon frog and the Lord of the Sulfur Kingdom—except that there is no sulfur apparent in the swamps, and the air up above the mist is clear and bright and clean (HD 17; AC 4; Atk 1 two handed chaos spear (2d6 + mutation); MV 9; jumping charge deals double damage); roll 1d6 for mutations during the night after being hit at least once by the chaos spear: 1. useless arm, 2. useless leg, 3. inimical face on your belly, 4. unnatural skin color, 5. budding psi powers (telepathy), 6. disturbing aura at will; chaos storm once per day to deal 12d6 damage due to spatial deformation, save vs. spells for half; psi confusion at will, anybody within 60 ft. must save vs. spells or attack an ally the next round; 80% chance to summon another demon frog; aeronautic dream is a ritual involving the inhalation of sweet chrysantheme incense fumes and the subsequent levitation of the ship the dreamer is on for as long as the dreamer does not wake
Things to learn:
- the waterfall provides access to a hell hole; Bilapudee rarely goes there; he might give the party a swan ship to be rid of them; he is not interested in teaching them the aeronautic dream to come back
- the hell below Bilapudee’s swamp is preventing planar travel and teleportation (he doesn’t know about the limited access to high level clerical spells)
- it is possible to reach the Prison of Dis via the river Styx
during the day
- in the swamp, a group of 2d6 giant leeches attack; half of them attach themselves to the boat if there is one while the others try to reach for warm bodies (HD 6; AC 8; Atk 1 bite (2d6); MV 15 swim)—leeches attacking the boat do automatic damage; if your boat has no hit-points, assume 50
- it is possible to follow the giant crane mentioned above to its nest (HD 8; AC 7; Atk 1 beak (2d6); MV 6 on foot; MV 21 fly); within the nest are three man-sized jade urns containing ashes, bones, and various gems for a total of 30 000 gold; each of the urns is worth an additional 2 000 gold
during the night
- a sulfur fog rises and oozes bubble up from the water (see River Travel for a list of random slimes and oozes)
- a long chain gang of morlokhs walking through the fog and searching for something using poles (HD 1; AC 9; Atk 1 pole (1d6); MV 1 chained) guarded by a toad slaver (HD 3; AC 4; Atk 1 two handed trident (1d6); MV 9; jumping charge for double damage)
It turns out that during the night, the servants of Bilapudee search for moon silver in this swamp. Bilapudee will occasionally buy more slaves on other planes and bring them here. Sometimes he will bring more of his frog demon friends and they’ll raid the world below. If your players want to investigate this some more, you’ll have expand this yourself. I just used it as a starting point.