The Rise of R'lyeh

''The City of R'lyeh'' You stand at the entrance to the city of the Great Old Ones, a loyal priest to the ancient masters. The stars have aligned for this short while to raise the drowned city from millennia of rest, ready for loyal servant to restore them to power that they might again overtake the Earth. Beyond the perilous expanse of non- Euclidean structures lies the Citadel where Dread Cthulhu slumbers. Under the guidance of the Necronomicon you venture through over the course of days, preserved only by the eldritch teachings of nameless blasphemes and your duty to ancient masters. Upon arriving at the citadel, hideous domed monstrosity you are faced with choosing where you will begin your search for the keys to Cthulhu's crypt and the crypt itself. The Necronomicon will guide you but beware, each use risks inducing madness and drawing the vermin of the city down upon you. There is a tall narrow passage unobstructed and leading up into the citadel. [[Choose|chamber]] this route and explore the secrets of the Old Ones. Enter through the main gate, [[collssal doors|main]] of stone with the image of a writhing mass configured as something like a face. [[Take the odd hole in the ground|waterway]], large and lined with smooth, uneven steps leading down into what sound like water, strange blue-green light emenating from deep within. Keys:(print: $keys)

Traveling down perilous slippery steps you find yourself in a large stone tunnel, the half-cylinder flooded with glowing water and walls inlaid with hideous carving of fell beast and heathen rites. At the other end of the tunnel are two paths, gaping maws of grey stone leading into darkness. [[Take the left mouth|cathedral]] [[Take the right mouth|crypt]] Keys:(print: $keys)

The path through the mouth gives way to a wider path, with many others connecting to it as well. You follow the larger path on, vast grey stones paving the floor and the walls made of some material similar to black marble. As you walk it feels as though other creatures are walking with you. You are brought at last to a pair of doors, larger than any you have seen. You place your hands on them and they gives way, the organic stone permitting you entrance. You enter into what seems like a great cathedral. Row after row of stones encircles a large dais and podium, seemingly seats for gatherings. Above you hangs a large skeleton in the shape of something vaguely like a cephalopod, this made not of bones but of pure cartilage. To the front of the room a large plate is hung facing the pews, affixed with a large stone whose color was impossible to place. The Necronomicon had never mentioned anything of the like, suggesting that this was a particularly sacred place. You walk to the podium and scale it, using the uneven ridges along it to gain footholds. At the very top you find what you suspected, a single black sheet with white writing. A key. (set: $keys to it + 1) [[Return|beasts]] Keys:(print: $keys)

You are forced to wrap your cloak about your face, so terrible is the smell. Beyond the mouth lay a vast necropolis, giant tombs in countless rows spread out to your left and right. Fortunately the other side of the room is only a few hundred yards away, the breadth of three tombs. As you begin your march across the room you notice the impossible shapes etched into the tombs. They depict the forms of your masters' ancestors, dead for eons now and entombed here when they arrived. Now, half way to the enormous doors of metal at the other end, you begin to hear unearthly jittering, like giant insects stirring inside of the mausoleums you see in the distance. Use the Necronomicon to cloak your presence before [[going|crypt1]] [[Proceed|monster]] onwards and ignore the sounds. Keys:(print: $keys)

(if: $keys > 4)[Scrawled into the door is the language of the Great Old Ones. Complex patterns no mortal eye could comprehend interweave across it to for the seal keeping the Dread Cthulhu asleep. With the keys to unlocking the door, you begin the ritual. In the low guttural language of R'lyeh you begin your chanting. Dull light traces the designs, brightening as you go and a loud hum fills the air. One by one the keys burn away the sealing script his master had placed to preserve himself and thus the city. Now at last he will be free again! [[See what you have wrought|end]]] (else:)[You have made your way to the doors, but your collection of keys is incomplete. Your chants will not avail you until you have found them all. [[Return to the flooded path|waterway]] [[Return to the beginning and look again|begin]]] Keys:(print: $keys)

The room is not so large compared to many here, but still grand, and devoted to only one thing. Gru'ghal'laam, Father of Flies, inspirations for Beelzebub, and master of sacrifices in R'lyeh. His progeny had filled the world thousands of years ago and continued to gather blood to sustain him. His statue, towering at forty feet, was life-size, he being one of the smallest of his ilk. The great proboscis draws the eye upward to the many eyes with thousands of facets each, his head surrounded in a mane of tendrils not unlike those of a sea anemone. The body is like that of a giant fly with large sharp bristles covering him, too many legs for a normal fly, and worst of all were the tumors, sporadically occurring where new forms of progeny grew in his flesh. They protruded grotesquely and then one burst open. //It's no a statue!!// As flies fill the room you began to bat the away trying to cover your flesh with your cloak to no avail. These flies are larger than an you've previously seen, with proboscis like knives. As your blood is ripped from your body you start to scream, only for more of them to plug you mouth and nose to feast. ''DEAD'' (set: $keys to 0) Keys:(print: $keys) [[Resurrectection|begin]]

A winding mass of stair leads you on endlessly. As you go the walls seem to hum, genuinely hum, some strange and nameless tune that they remembered down the eons. After hours of climbing you emerge into a massive chamber, domed like the citadel. Looking up you see that the ceiling is glass and beyond it lays a cosmos, a strange interpretation of the night sky. To your left stands a statue, tentacled mound holding aloft two bowls, and directly across the room lies a heavily enameled door. Directly in front of you though is a passage, inlaid with something like luminous gold. You approach the bowls but hidden forces repel you. In trying to discover a weak spot in the barrier you notice an opening in the wall behind the Statue, an entrance that would allow someone to go around the barrier. Now you must find the entrance. [[Try the new passage.|bad]] [[Return the way you came.|begin]] (link-goto: "Consult the Necronomicon", (either: "hinte", "Insanity", "hinte", "hinte", "hinte")) Keys:(print: $keys)

Where your hand enters the pool marked for eternity it is stained dark purple and begins to feel numb. Withdrawing it you discover that it has begun to warp, the bones beginning to move like fluid even as small yellow nodes like tumors above the skin sprout. The discoloration spreads across your arm and with it the horrific warping. You are fortunate to pass out here. All that is left is a dark purple sack of flesh covered in deformed yellow polyps. ''DEAD'' (set: $keys to 0) Keys:(print: $keys) [[Resurrectection|begin]]

(set: $keys to it + 1) You withdraw your hand holding the first key, a black sheet of paper in white ink, made of some material closer to plastic. It describes the first of the spells to open the tomb of Cthulhu. Return to the [[previous passage|chamber]] Return to the [[begining|begin]] and search for others. Keys:(print: $keys)

The doors open of their own accord, the city beginning to wake even as you embark but it will not fully waken until your task is done. You enter into the great hall of the citadel, lit by luminescent crystal in sconces along the wall. From what looks like a chandelier, smoke, dark purple and noxious spew lightly into the room. The vapor seems to writhe of its own volition, tendrils wafting down to wind around mammoth pillars, the throne, and even you. You press on and as you examine the room you become aware of various passages to lead you further in. To your right is an [[undecorated doorway|kitchen]], tall and wide but otherwise unremarkable. To your left is a [[similar passage|servants quarters]] and further on a [[smaller path|lounge]], lined with something vaguely like gold but sickly-toned. Exploration of the throne, non-Euclidean planes and clutching patterns affixed with fleshy nodes, the equivalent of jewels to the Great Old Ones. Behind it lays the [[smallest pass|heart]], only nine feet in height and requiring a servant to enter it as none of your masters are sufficiently diminutive in stature. Keys:(print: $keys)

You have entered into an even larger chamber, the walls lined with giant indentions in which large tubes are suspended and beneath them are mounds of some decayed substance, looking half burned. Other parts of the room host large shelves and strange plates which I realized where the coverings of cupboards. There is little of real interest in this room, but perhaps something is hidden here. (link-goto: "Read the Necronomicon to reveal hidden objects", (either: "hintb", "Insanity", "hintb", "hintb", "hintb")) [[Return|main]] the way you came. Keys:(print: $keys)

The hall is almost as large as the great hall, lied at first with obvious entrances that have been barred to you with the growth of organic stone, an ancient method for sealing old rooms. A sharp turn however reveals a change. The hall is now line with open holes, evenly distributed and perfectly ovular. As you walk down them, you begin to hear faint slithering, clicking, breathing sounds. The noise is quickly becoming overwhelming as you try to return the way you came. Too late you realize what has happened. The vermin of the city have begun to stir. Before you can flee the tunnel they have crawled out from the holes in the wall, hundred pouring out and all headed towards you. Your flesh peels and bones snap, your screams unheard in the cacophony. ''DEAD'' (set: $keys to 0) Keys:(print: $keys) [[Resurrectection|begin]]

The winding passage leads to an expansive, comparatively low-ceilinged room, glowing crystals suspended like chandeliers from the ceiling. On the ground large mounds of bulbous fleshy substance rise, with large indents like something had been pressed into them for a while. These surrounded a warped globe of mercury that hung suspended in the air by some invisible force. This must be a watcher, an ancient device for observing distant things. The sudden realization that a key is housed within the sphere grips you. Is your devotion great enough to test this belief and reach in to find it despite the poisonous metal.(link-goto: "reach in to find it", (either: "hintc", "mercury", "hintc", "hintc", "hintc")) Abandon the room in doubt. [[Find another way|main]] Keys:(print: $keys)

Beyond the small opening hidden beneath the throne lies a narrow path. You seem to walk it forever until you reach an odd room, the path resuming beyond it. The floor of the room has a thin layer of slime coating it and the ceiling is a mosaic depicting the birth of hundreds of the Old Ones. The slime coating the floor is likely to be an Egb'nigh’ruck, a viscous creature of something like blood plasma. The Necronomicon prescribes methods of dispatching such a creature and allowing safe passage.(link-goto: "Consult the Necronomicon", (either: "hintd", "Insanity", "hintd", "hintd", "hintd")) Long centuries may well have killed this creature, low as it is in the pecking order or at least sapped its strength [[Journey on and ignore it.|heartache]] Keys:(print: $keys)

The Old Ones are eternal. Their slumber is not [[Return to bussiness|scart]] Keys:(print: $keys)

The Necronomicon has driven you to madness. Darkness fills the room as Nyarlathotep descend on you. There is no description in any language for what he does. He is of the outer reaches, beyond physics and nature. Death is kinder. (set: $keys to 0) Keys:(print: $keys) [[Resurrectection|begin]]

The spell of revealing finds nothing of interest. You have gambled with your sanity and won nothing [[Return|kitchen]] Keys:(print: $keys)

You have found the key at great personal cost. Even now you can feel the mercury beginning to force its way into your skin thanks to the fore suspending the sphere. You will need Cthulhu to show mercy if you are to survive now. (set: $keys to it + 1) Return to the [[previous passage|lounge]] Return to the [[begining|begin]] and search for others. Keys:(print: $keys)

Your reaching arm disrupts the force suspending the sphere too greatly. The sphere collapses around you, bathing you in the thick metal but it is quick to right itself. Dragging you along. The sphere restores itself and you are caught in the pressure. The last thing you see before you drown in toxic metal is a brief flash of the black paper on which the key is inscribed. ''DEAD'' (set: $keys to 0) Keys:(print: $keys) [[Resurrectection|begin]]

Going on you enter into a chamber that only something of human stature could have made it to. The room is empty of anything but for a heart, mammoth in size and glowing deep maroon. Blood vessels reach from it and embed into the walls and the dais it is suspended on. This is the heart of the city, the life-force that operates the whole realm of your masters. You begin to approach it, careful to be silent but your actions are in vain. Before you can get ear the dais you hear slurping, squelching noises behind you. Your steps disturbed the creature, not dead or weak, and now it fills the doorway. Lengths of the ooze shoot out at you and wrap themselves around your body, dragging you into the mass. Some chemical in the slime must be corrosive because everywhere it had touched your clothes has dissolved and now begins to work on your skin, small bubbles of gas filling the slime as it breaks down your still living body. ''DEAD'' (set: $keys to 0) Keys:(print: $keys) [[Resurrectection|begin]]

This child of Azathoth is vulnerable to iron and curses. You pull a small bag of iron fillings from your belt, a standard defense against minor eldritch creatures and begin to chant a curse taught by Shub-Niggurath. As you empty the bag into the goo it rears up horrifically, issues a hellish scream despite the lack of a mouth. Fortunately, even as it rushes to kill you the curse begins to kill it, yellow muck turning putrid and green then falling to the floor. The puddle quivers as you walk through it but can do no more harm. [[Proceed safely|heartening]] Keys:(print: $keys)

You come at long last into the resting chamber of your dark master. The room is entirely blue-grey marble sprawling out forever and held by pillars. At the very center is a throne, round and dwarfing you. Upon it sits the dread Cthulhu with his massive scaled body, bat-like wings, cephalopod head, and gangly limbs. With the opening of the door he already begins to stir. His eyes open, the details of which you can't quite comprehend. His limbs stretch out and twist in peculiar manners. Then at last his attention turns to you. Burnt, scarred, infected, poisoned, exhausted, pushed to the very breaking point of human endurance and well beyond you will die without his aid. Your master rises from his throne, walks towards you, bends down for a moment to pick you up, and continues walking into his city as he swallows you whole. What did you expect? They live to destroy your kind. ''DEAD''

As you descend the stone podium you discover that some vermin of the old city has stirred at your entrance, vicious, blue-scaled creatures like hounds pouring out of a jagged hole in the wall across the room. Moving quickly. You drop the rest of the way and run to the furthest wall, realizing you couldn’t outrun them to your original entrance. You are overwhelmed with relief to discover that there are holes along this wall with steep passages. You quickly run through them though movement becomes more awkward as it continues its downward slope. Oddly, the beasts have not followed. Then, to your horror, the ground gives in to it natural inclination and slopes so that you begin to roll headfirst. On an on and on... [[See what is left of you|pit]] Keys:(print: $keys)

When your pain from the tumble has diminished enough to allow you to stand you do so and look around. The hole you came from is hundreds of feet above you and the pit stretches seemingly forever, with great pillars rising up to support the city above its, some of them lines with holes like you had come from. Even as you take all of this in you are tearing pieces from your cloak to shove into your nostrils so terrible is the smell. Strewn all around you are colossal bones and slow-decaying flesh. Hideous half rotted carcasses of many Great Old Ones. It is impossible to imagine what could have done this. [[Search|sign]] among the dead for something of use. Try to find a way [[out|consumed]]. Keys:(print: $keys)

Passing through the luminous door you find yourself in a double-mouthed hallway leading to two separate rooms. [[To the left|clean]] is dark but for a faint dark-blue glow [[To the right|cleaner]] has dancing aquatic lights. [[Perhaps another time|chamber]] Keys:(print: $keys)

This attempt at revealing the hidden passage proves successful. An urn along the wall light up then begins to shake violently, and with its dispersal some mechanism is triggered, opening a passage along the same wall as the statue but not caught in the barrier. [[Go on|hidden]] Keys:(print: $keys)

You go along the new way, feeling with your hands as there is not source of light left to you. Eventually you see a faint light and discover that in the darkness is an altar along the left side of the wall. A great circular area of the wall is indented by several feet and a mural depicts a mass of tentacles, robed in what appears to be skins and holding aloft a series of spheres that hover above his hands. What makes the altar so strange beyond its location is the manner in which it was illuminated. Thick black candles with blue flames were lined up below it, burning without smoke for thousands of years it would seem. But the Great Old Ones rarely use something so human and fleeting as candles for anything. Why here? [[Examine the mural more closely|strange]] [[Continue on|scart]] Keys:(print: $keys)

You examine the mural still more closely and realize that there is something wet near the bottom. You bend down and by the light of the candles you can just barely make out that it is red and fresh. The metallic tang hits your nose and you realize what is actually going on. The Old Ones do not bleed red, but instead a cold silver-grey fluid. The candles have not been burning for years. There are other humans here, some of which are making offerings at this altar. Most likely they are cursed thralls who are used to supply the Old Ones with eternal prayer here in the city, free from the possibility of extinction and preserved through the most macabre spells described in the Necronomicon. Your fellow humans are hidden, but they are doubtlessly here. You don't know what to do with this information so you simply press on and resume your pursuit of the bowls. [[Continue On|scart]] Keys:(print: $keys)

You emerge again from the tunnel, this time in the statue room and behind the barrier. You can now approach the bowls. You approach the bowls, filled with dark ichor. Likely a place of worship and a perfect place to hide the keys. One bowl will hold the key and the other will likely poison you or burn off your hand as you reach in. [[One|poison]] is marked with the sign for eternal, [[the other|key1]] is marked with the sign for temporary (link-goto: "Consult the Necronomicon", (either: "hinta", "Insanity", "hinta", "hinta", "hinta")) Keys:(print: $keys)

You find yourself in a great stone room lined on the left and right with what seem like stone tables. At the far end of the room is a basin of what appears to be water held by a statue. to it sides were long rods and from them hung rags. Likely a place to prepare others for ceremonies, but there is nothing interesting to be seen. [[Return|bad]] Keys:(print: $keys)

You enter into a circular room, a bench running all across the wall. The rest of the room is overtaken by a huge glowing pool, of wavering blue-green light. At the very center a black page with white writing floats. One of the keys. You quickly leap into the water to go after it. You can feel the strange properties of the water sapping your strength but you persevere and collect the key. (set: $keys to it + 1) You return as quickly as you can to the solid ground, your strength nearly depleted. You are fortunate enough to have survived the collection of yet another key. [[Return|bad]] Keys:(print: $keys)

At first there is seemingly nothing of use. Only more rancid filth that you are careful not to let touch you. Bu then you notice something else. Amidst the carnage is an empty place. Walking over to it you discover at the center a sigil, hastily carved by some great talon, around which nothing seems to have died. Just a few dozen paces to your left you notice a set of dusty talons on a half-decayed flying monstrosity, so it is safe to assume that the sign ultimately did it little good. Still, you had found a weakness of whatever did this that you could exploit. [[Continue|beast]] Keys:(print: $keys)

You continue on in pursuit of an exit for days. Your only warning is flickering growths of natural crystal and sudden cold. Darkness surrounds you and crushes you even as you begin to freeze in the beast's chilly presence. ''DEAD'' (set: $keys to 0) Keys:(print: $keys) [[Resurrectection|begin]]

Having found just about all that you possibly could amongst the remains you continue you journey. For days without end you march, sustained only by meditation and prayer. The last of your reserves are nearly depleted when the monotony grind to a halt. There is no sound to accompany the beasts arrival, nor is there scent. The only things to warn of his presence was a sudden bitter cold. Then, in a flickering of the glowing crystals that grew naturally in this pit, the beast is upon you. He stretches up nearly to the top of the pit and his body is seemingly composed of pure darkness stretching on as endlessly as the pit itself. The only distinguishable feature on the beast is a vast gaping mouth the row after row of surprisingly pristine teeth. A smoky tendril of darkness shoots out towards you only to recoil suddenly as you tear open your shirt. Your flesh reveals the infected wound were you carved the sigil into your very body. The beast leans down toward you and roars. Then he speaks. [[Continue|conversation]] Keys:(print: $keys)

''Little creature, how is it you come to be in my domain and brandish the sign of my imprisonment?'' "I am a humble servant of the Dread Cthulhu come to wake him from his long years of slumber. I wish only to return to my task." A deafening, low chuckle from the beast ''Your masters needing one such as you is a pitiful thing. They are as fleeting as you and not half so dreadful as I. But I am hungry. Come here ant'' Startled you begin to run only for a great tendril of shadow to bar your path. ''Do not run from me creature. There is nothing to you that would sate my hunger. It is your masters I desire. For my power raising the city when the stars align, they draw lots and feed me some unlucky member of their own. I have not eaten in ages and grow hungry. I will help free you from this pit to raise your masters so that I may eat again.'' You have no time to deny him as a tendril lunges for you and wraps around your body with deathly cold. The sigil o your chest begins to burn, literally, dark fire gushing from the wounds and searing even the darkness of the beast. Between pain and fear you pass out, even as you hurtle towards one of the many holes along a pillar. [[Stir|clean]] Keys:(print: $keys)