23

The passage eventually opens on to the Mountains of Morn. It is night and a full moon shines brightly in the sky. Below is the barren expanse of Desolation Valley: a vast wasteland of melted rock and craters. The plain is covered with pot-holes, and, as the wind blows across them, they sigh like a tortured soul moaning at the mountains. ‘How long has the full moon shone?’ you ask Urik.

‘I know not,’ he says, ‘but Shadow Gate very near. Down below ground.’ Without hesitation, you begin to sprint across the plain and Urik follows. Gone is all your weariness and fatigue now that you are near your goal. The pot-holes lead downwards but there are hundreds of them; which way should you go?

Suddenly, a gruesome sight slithers from one of these holes. Its long, snaking body is bone white and skeletal; but its pale eyes, without pupils, reveal a deadly malice, a blind evil. It is a Scree Wyrm and it is slithering towards you.

If you wish to fight the Scree Wyrm, turn to 273.

If you wish to evade combat, turn to 243.