Recovery of the 1021 Almanac, Part IV

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Throwing open the door, Jolly was sucked through the room towards a spiraling vortex of clouds and color. So great was the power of the vortex that Rue, Quadrone 843, and myself were swept towards it as well. As I flew airborne into the vortex, I saw Daros catch himself in a doorway, wince, then voluntarily allow himself to be taken up so as not to be separated from the party. Praise and admiration to brave Daros!

The four of us and Quadrone 843 found ourselves arriving in a most bizarre realm, for we landed on the floor of an open-sky tower lined with archways. Beyond the archways lay blue sky in all directions, left, right, up, and even down.

Jolly noticed a rope bridge leading to a floating island hosting a second tower much higher and mightier than the remnant we stood in. Carefully, one-by-one, we all crossed the rope bridge. As I crossed, I noticed the sky contained no sun, and looking beneath me was the same as looking above me, for no landscape was visible in any direction, and were it not for my head above my feet, I would not have known which direction was up or down. I found this most bewildering, and I stared a little too long into the cloud-filled void, for just as I reached the other side, my balance betrayed me, and I would have tumbled into infinity were it not for the safety rope Daros had shot across the interspace with his bow for just such an emergency.

In the second tower, we met a race of fearless, beautiful, peaceful creatures called aarakokra, bipedal humanoid birds who spoke dozens of languages, maybe thousands, for I've no way of knowing definitively. Rue found dialogue with their leader, Kaawnick, through the use of Common, and he told Rue we had traveled through an interplanar vortex to a region called Shasherah in the Elemental Plane of Air.

To our absolute amazement, we discovered that these magnificent creatures had somehow come into possession of the 1021 Almanac, which they accorded to Rue for no coin or ransom whatsoever! Kaawnick sent his associate, Vooosh, to fetch another person by the name of Baron, whose duty it would be to return us to the world of Toril in the Prime Material Plane.

When Baron arrived, we discovered this was no person at all but a giant eagle large enough to perch atop the tower as if the tower were but the branch of an oak. Our entire party, including Quadrone 843, crawled upon the back of Baron.

The great eagle made one flap of its colossal wings and we became airborne. The floating island holding the tower fell away at a fantastic speed, instantly becoming but a grain of sand against the deep blue color of the directionless sky.

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Photo: https://www.deviantart.com/art/aarakokra-monk-719763052

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