Chapter 5: Blingdenstone

Dustin, you are a sight for these dead eyes. Truly. Cemos, please do not fret. We all have our time to pass along, and mine is now. How can I be angry when I will be with the gods soon? I would resist any attempt to resurrect me, I know that now. You've failed no one. I had no way of telling you while I drew breath, but something down here is rotten. It touched my mind in a way that only the most powerful magics could have hoped to cleanse. Dying has freed me from that grip, and I'm thankful for it. I'm sorry I couldn't be around longer to study more with you, Master Paladin. As I said, I don't have much time left in this form, where I can truly speak with you. I have only three requests of you all. Please, cleanse this world of what ails it, for something is truly horrid here. Secondly, escape this dark place, make it to the surface and bask in the sun for me. Finally, please take my shield and hammer to Gauntlgrym. They are my family's and they deserve to know that I died in combat. It will make them proud. Please, heroes, please do this for me? she asks, slowly fading away as she speaks.

As she fully fades from view, Eldreth smiles at Cemos. Burn me here with full rites. That will be enough. With her piece said, her spectral form fades fully and you are left alone in the room again with the lifeless husks of the spiders and Eldreth's form.

As the flames surrounding Eldreth's prepared body, tears fall openly down several cheeks. The former paladin's shield and warhammer sit near her funerary pyre, only held out in accordance with her wishes. As Cemos finishes his prayers and invocations, a moment of silence falls over the room.

From behind you, in the same room where the spiders started, you hear a dry forced cough break free. As you turn to look, you see a ghostly deep gnome, clad in what appears to be formal armor of some variety. He's holding a hand to his face and coughing, all while his unblinking, pale, glowing eyes stare straight at all of you.

I am Burrow Warden Jadger. My cause is simple: you are interlopers in svirfneblin sacred land and I must determine if you are here to help my people or to hurt them. That is all. The ghost says, in a voice far deeper than you would have expected from the diminutive spirit.

It is good you are here to help us. Truly. I will strike you a bargain, if you perform services for this community, namely laying to rest spirits of the departed that have yet to move on and returning what you can of them to me here, I will answer questions about the Underdark for you. One question per spirit laid to rest. As for the spiders, they are a recent threat in this space. I was working on a means of clearing them out when you showed up. I am eternally grateful to you all for facing that threat. If I had a heart to break, it would be shattered that one of yours lost their life in this place. he bows his head for a moment before continuing.

There are two chief threats I've not been able to properly deal with from my position here in the catacombs. Near to here, by the Singing Stones, there is a deep gnome spirit named Vazuk. He's haunting his old home but is a threat to the other residents of the city because of his grief-ridden madness. He needs to be put to rest. Second is that an old friend of mine, Udhask, ventured into the Rockblight, in the northeast of the city. He perished there, but his spirit wanders since his body is not yet laid to rest. If you can help with those, I will surely owe you a boon.