Part 6

Suspicious posted:

You forgot to read the books on the shelf in the library.

Quite right, my apologies. Here are the books that you can read on the shelf (transcribed for your reading convenience):

Westland
Areas not mentioned in this book are still not known to neither man nor elf. The chief borders are the torlin Forest to the south, the Westland Sea to the west, swamp lands to the north, and the Darken Range to the East.

"not mentioned are not known to neither man nor elf". Pretty sure that's right, but it takes some parsing.

Castle Shadowgate
The Castle Shadowgate is not the largest castle on Tarkus but is the most powerful. The castle is surrounded by an impenetrable mountain known as Gatekeeper. Only members of the now lost Circle of Twelve can enter it. It is said that the walls of Shadowgate themselves are quite alive.

Blue Dragon
And then there shall come a day when things will be lost and people won't know where. And brothers will run away for absolutely no reason at all and things will happen in the sky. And people will marvel at friends who have new names and birds will be different!!

Gods
And when these days appear, the people will call upon their gods and there will be no answer. Nay, only he who carries the sword shall truly be given the scales to judge them by.

Circle of Twelve
The Circle of Twelve was formed before most things began to be. Their names are... Framas, Garolin, Talotin, Ronlin, Talimar, Magnas, Wontave, Butwik, Tenmark, Sharnir, Lakmir, and Turgor. The circle was broken when Talimar took a new name: The Warlock Lord!!

Dun dun dunnnnn!

The History of the War
And when The Warlock Lord had finally gained power, he went up against the great kings!! The evil one would have succeeded if it were not for the Circle of Twelve. If he ever returns to power, Tarkus will not live to see the rising sun...

Ok, got to stop Talimar, a.k.a. the Warlock Lord. Got it. One last thing of note in the library:



Funny, it doesn't look Druish.

Anyway, back to our story. When we last left Castle Shadowgate, we had stabbed an unarmed woman with an arrow as she lay chained to a wall. Fortunately she turned out to be a werewolf or something.


We got to take the blade thing behind her. It's very important as we'll find out shortly.


Back to the main hallway. Let's try the upper left room.


Sorry, we have a couple tasks before we can do anything here. Let's try the last door from that hallway.


Heading left...


There's constant lightning in the background here. So let's stick our rod in this hole here and see what happens.


If had a nickel for every time I've said that...






Makes sense.


I'll take that.




With that done, let's see what's to the west.


Looks like a ledge with a bag on the left and some gold thing on the right.


Ah, sweet! Yoink!









Or not. Maybe just the bag then.


It has a "big coin" and three "gold coins". I'll take the big one.


And we should only need one of the gold coins.


No, we can't take the crown, or the halberd, or really anything in here.




There isn't, actually. Not that I can tell. There is something missing from his hand, though.




That made the panel on the right slide down and there's a hole there. But we're all out of gems, what can we use?


Oh.


To no one's surprise, the ring goes in the ring-shaped hole.


Umm, so now he's just suspended over the hole, I guess?


Torch jackpot! Wait, what's that passage to the west?






Can't imagine how this castle got past OSHA, but whatever.


Yes, very sad. Let's not go that way again.


Well, they look pleasant enough. Of course their stone so they couldn't possibly harm me.


Yep, all stone. No chance at all of them coming to life. I'll just poke them to make sure...


Sure feels like stone. I'll just walk on through...









Let's try the right door.


Another ugly statue. This one is a statue of a demon.


No, not so much. Wait, didn't we have a spell that said something about a demon and a bridge?


The light grows faint, the path winds round, where life is lost, wisdom is found. The seed of the dream, fore the evil is free, where the sword is hung, he must place the key. A bridge to from, amidst burning death. A demon to guard. Motari Riseth


Good enough for me.




Here's a GIF of the spell being cast:


Now we can go on to the room beyond.


This room is dominated by three features:






Yes, I know. What's in the pit?


I really have no idea what that thing is supposed to be. Most of these monsters have at least some link to mythology or something. This looks like a cross between a bat, a goat, a Hostess Snowball, and Bea Arthur.


Guess I'm the Snowball.


Reload...


Anyone who hasn't played want to venture a guess on how to do the switches?