Keep on the Borderlands
Following in the direction that you saw the birds take flight, the party re-enters the forest and skirts the clearing until turning away from it and moving northeast. The forest gets more dense, tangled, and gloomier than before. The thick, twisted tree trunks, unnaturally misshapen limbs, writhing roots, clutching and grasping thorns and briars all seem to warn, as the party traverses a heavily wooded and sloping terrain, one that gets steeper the farther North you go, naturally pulling the party more to the east. After almost two hours of carefully moving through this forested area the wood suddenly ends - you have stepped out of the thicket into a ravine-like area. The walls rise rather steeply, and the party came down on the left side slope.
To either side to a height of about 100’ or so - dark, streaked rock mingled with earth. Clumps of trees grow here and there, both on the floor of the ravine and up the sloping walls of the canyon. The opening you stand in is about 200’ wide. The ravine runs at least 400’ west to where the western end rises in a steep slope. Here and there, at varying heights on all sides of the ravine, you can see the black mouths of cave-like openings in the rock walls. The sunlight is dim, the air dank, there is an oppressive feeling here - as if something evil is watching and waiting to pounce upon you. There are bare, dead trees here and there, and upon one a vulture perches and gazes hungrily at you. A flock of ravens rise croaking from the ground, the beat of their wings and their cries magnified by the terrain to sound loud and horrible, a repetition of what you saw this morning only much closer. Amongst the litter of rubble, boulders, and dead wood scattered about on the ravine floor, you can see bits of gleaming ivory and white - closer inspection reveals that these are bones and skulls of men, animals, and other things,. . .
You know that you have certainly discovered the Caves Of Chaos.
This message was last edited by the GM at 20:32, Mon 01 Nov 2021.