Knowing Rither wouldn’t spend the night with a demon whispering in his mind simplified matters, and I slept with the assurance that he wouldn’t make off with the remaining outrigger.

  When I climbed from the Dark Room the following morning, the settlement named Kirthos no longer appeared on my interface map. Nor did anyone touch the strange watercraft—my only means of reaching the correct coordinates.

  Lizardfolk ambled to and from their dam like any other workday. Disassembling the spillway to direct waters to the southern swamps might take effort, but a nearby witch motivated them.

  Leaving them to their labor, I approached the outrigger. The lizardfolk had been kind enough to provide a paddle of sorts, but it didn’t look like it would be useful, amounting to little more than an eight-foot pole. They had never used paddles, so I couldn’t hold it against them for not knowing how they worked.

  I spent the morning finishing my nautical needs. Using a falchion taken from kobold workers, I chopped at the side of a tree in downward strokes, shaving off wider and wider slivers of wood until I split off a piece wide enough for a blade. Lashing it to the end of a pole with twine formed a much better paddle.

  Beaker occupied himself by exploring and hunting, visiting every few minutes to ensure I hadn’t left without him.

  I found a rock big enough for an anchor and bore a hole through it with Mineral Mutation. Tying off a rope to it gave me a proper anchor line. The catamaran wasn’t concave like a canoe, so it had no convenient spot to place the anchor. I stowed it in my inventory.

  By midday, I readied myself for the lake.

  Picking up the vessel wasn’t easy. When the lizardfolk saw me struggling with the canoe, one worker grabbed the front crossbar and indicated I should pick up the rear. Together, we lifted and portaged it to the water’s edge. I managed it with difficulty, watching where I stepped, for the lizard’s tail in front of me swished from side to side. Its weight didn’t bother my companion. Despite my 25 strength, my shoulders ached by the time we reached the lake. Even with thin arms, this lizardfolk seemed far more robust than I estimated. I’m glad I didn’t have to fight them.

  After we thanked each other with bows and waves, we went our separate ways—he went back to the forest, and I shoved myself into the lake.

  Straddling between the crossbars felt uncomfortable. Removing my boots once more, I sat on the back with my feet on the front. The back crossbar obstructed my ability to make full strokes with my paddle. I improved my propulsion by climbing to a pontoon. I rode it like a saddle, and paddling on either side gave me the semblance of steering.

  Beaker much preferred the lizardfolk outrigger to my canoe. The crossbars offered natural perching options, and between his four legs, he could move about without tipping or rocking it.

  My toes felt good, dangling in the water. They increased the vessel’s drag, but pulling them up made my thighs ache, so I prepared myself for an inefficient journey.

  My 10-mile trip to the relic passed without incident, aside from stretching and position-shifting to stave off soreness. I zoomed into my map interface to see the coordinates tick by as I paddled. With every passing hour, I focused on my progress rather than the distance yet to cover.

  Occasionally, a patch of seaweed drifted by, and I reminded myself that vegetation meant a healthy lake bottom. I tried not to think about undead lizardfolk reaching from the depths to pull me under. Beaker kept the seagulls away and snapped at passing dragonflies buzzing across the water.

  I had no trouble finding the coordinates in the lake. As I drew near the relic’s coordinates, a flotilla of empty canoes, rafts, and logs marked my destination. Their occupants had tied them together.

  Multiple anchor lines twisted and entangled with one another as they disappeared into the deep. They held the wooden graveyard in place, though it spun and shifted on the surface.

  While foreboding, the scene wasn’t without its silver linings. The visible anchor lines showed that the lake bore no resemblance to the muddy clouds beneath Hawkhurst Rock. Aside from the verdant tinge of algae, the water looked clear.

  Where the pontoon’s shadow blocked the sky’s glare on the surface, I saw a temple looming below. Its masonry opened at an oculus that seemingly stretched to reach the surface as if the relic commanded the architecture to escape. Clinging barnacles, shells, and oysters obscured much of the masonry’s form.

  “At least the visibility is good.”

  Beaker cocked his head at my voice as if to question my sanity for paddling out to this remote location.

  Over a dozen canoes made the makeshift raft. I counted them to prepare myself for what awaited below. After tying off to one, I climbed from boat to boat, balancing across pontoons and crossbars until the temple’s oculus aligned beneath me. I pulled out a glow stone and dropped it into the water, aiming for the oculus. Refraction from the lake’s surface caused me to miss. It bounced off the temple’s exterior, falling until it bottomed on the lake’s floor.

  Though dim, seeing a glow on the lakebed reassured me this dive wasn’t the claustrophobic, disorienting experience by the Orga River. My new ring would keep me warm. Correcting my aim for refraction, I tossed the second glow stone and watched it drop through the oculus. The water’s surface and the temple’s roof prevented me from seeing where it landed, but at least no monsters poked their heads out to investigate.

  My catamaran was the nineteenth vessel to tie off at the surface. It meant at least as many lizardfolk corpses, in varying stages of decay, awaited below.

  My unsupervised griffon wouldn’t cause any trouble to the raft of tied-up vessels. Without me here, my Familiar wouldn’t bring freshly killed fish to eat on the raft. He’d explore the swamps until I returned. Besides, there were so many outriggers that I couldn’t see him destroying them all.

  After resolving to leave my pet around, I mentally fortified myself to face underwater zombies. Undead monsters fought at half the level of the original creatures. Though monsters with levels in the single digits wouldn’t present a challenge, underwater combat compromised my powers. I couldn’t cast Slipstream, Compression Sphere, or Scorch, leaving a meager sundry of offensive options. Shocking Reach would do as much damage to me as my opponent, but I hadn’t tested Moonburn. My bread and butter would be Thrust and piercing attacks since water slowed slashing and bludgeoning swings.

  I looked at a list of potential spells that I might use underwater.

  The only two direct damage spells that might work underwater were Arcane Missile and Ice Bolt, but neither promised to be game changers. Purify Water made no sense in a freshwater lake. I couldn’t foresee myself spending a power point on anything here.

  My available abilities offered options like Stunning Blow, Concussive Strike, and Whack, which sounded attractive, but they required slashing and bludgeoning attacks.

  Without further debate, I equipped my trident, cast Heavenly Favor, Presence, and splashed into the water.

  The lake possessed no chill whatsoever while carrying my heat-regulating ring, Circle of Temperance. This dive wasn’t nearly as bad as my previous dives up north.

  Because I didn’t have to swim to move with Amphibious, I drifted toward my first glow stone while gripping the trident with both hands. I remained king of the sea only as long as I held it and took extra care to avoid snagging it on drifting seaweed.

  No sea creatures sought to feed on the strange glowing human drifting effortlessly through the water. Instead, the fish avoided me altogether. The water heightened my hearing, and I found the experience pleasant. The lake’s muddy bottom stood still, leaving the water clear enough to see around sixty feet.

  Unlike underwater photographs, the scenery wasn’t subdued in blues or greens and showed more color than expected. I estimated the depth to be only fifty feet. Patches of seaweed sprouted near the temple’s perimeter, but no kelp grew nearby. The lakebed’s sparse, mud-covered bottom somewhat disappointed me. Aside from mollusks and barnacles encrusting the temple or the stones and boulders around it, the bottom of Otter Lake made for a gloomy yet dull scene.

  The temple’s dimensions mirrored the pyramidal shape of its predecessors, though the lake bed buried much of the structure. The architecture jutting from the mud looked more structurally intact than the one weathered by jungle roots. A film of slippery green slime covered the bricks, though a sharp stratum of encrusted barnacles and other formations coated them.

  I happened across a giant freshwater clam. The level 10 creature spanned the size of a compact car. Fixed onto an outcropping of rock, I didn’t expect the placid creature to present a danger. Its maw opened toward the surface, and I maneuvered close to peer inside.

  A purple pearl the size of a ping-pong ball rested within pink folds of flesh in the clamshell.

  Gems fell under the item category of valuable, so it made sense that pearls followed suit. But no matter a gem’s worth, I’d never seen a masterwork rarity in them or any nonmagical object. This purple pearl struck me as a rare and valuable object. I didn’t see how I might use it as a weapon, but I still wanted it.

  The pearl’s monetary worth wasn’t reason enough to stick my arm inside or kill the creature, so I cast Move Object and lifted it from its living cradle.

  The clam obliged me by keeping its shells open, closing it only after I’d retrieved the irritant from its innards. A brief jet stream of water pushed me away as its oversized shells collapsed.

  It boded well that I hadn’t entered the dungeon but was already collecting loot. Taking it as a sign that this would be a profitable adventure, I stowed the purple sphere in my inventory with a smirk and gently glided upward toward the temple’s opening. After retrieving my lost glow stone, I ascended along the barnacle-encrusted side and peered into the oculus.

  The view gave me a better impression of the temple’s interior. The star chamber’s mud-covered floor looked bare, aside from a thin layer of silt covering its surface. A school of fish floated around one of the four corridors opening into the space. Hiding from Presence, they stayed beneath the shadow of the doorways. All stood silent, aside from the burble of bubbles and clicking noise that always seemed to accompany underwater travel.

  Drifting through the oculus, I cast Mineral Communion but wasn’t surprised that the algae, clams, and critters attaching to the temple’s sides blinded the stones to recent events. Mollusks and barnacles encrusted the temple’s corners. I would have guessed it to be a round room if I didn’t know any better.

  Using the end of my trident, I chipped away and knocked off the buildup to expose the temple’s bricks. Using my spell, I focused on the stone’s afterimages. Flickers of antediluvian memories appeared in my mind’s eye. Robe-clad lizardfolk used the room for stargazing. They channeled starlight and moonlight through crystals to project images onto a floor. They painted zodiacs over them.

  I dismissed the visions because the layers of buildup blinded stones to recent events. Focusing on ancient memories would do me no good if I was caught off guard by present dangers. The familiar architecture already told me about this room’s function.

  My ears popped as I descended deeper into the star chamber.

  While the star chamber mirrored its sibling temples, the rest of the temple followed a unique layout. As I drifted downward, I noticed the four hallways connected to locations different from the previous temples. The fish-filled hallway spanned wider than the one we’d fought Winterbyte’s first chimera.

  The shimmering cloud of hand-sized fish blocked whatever lay past them, but they scattered when I drifted toward them. My light agitated them into a train of fleeing critters. I drifted to the side of the corridor, letting them follow one another out. Inside the tunnel’s blackness, I didn’t want my vision compromised by shadows of panicking fish. Their skins flashed reflections as they swam up the star chamber’s oculus and out of the temple. God-rays of sunlight silhouetted them as they escaped.

  Rounding the corner revealed over a dozen dead lizardfolk pulling and pushing on a grate in the floor. They used great wooden pikes, trying to pry open the bars at the hallway’s end.

  After predicting undead lizardfolk, the spectacle shouldn’t surprise me, but the creature’s title seemed rather bland. Was Urazmith a wight, zombie, or ghoul? The monster’s high level puzzled me, for an undead version ought to be half the level of the original creature. Nearly all these reanimated corpses reached the high teens or low twenties.

  Fish bites covered some zombies, and their health pools reflected significant losses. Wounds from hundreds of fish bites covered the undead—exposing skeletal features in some cases, while only minor pockmarks covered others. I anticipated the fish drifting around them would scatter at my light’s intrusion, but they held their ground. These fish weren’t just pecking at the lizardfolks’ swollen pink flesh—they attached themselves to the zombies with their teeth.

  Other fish drifted without moving or swam sideways as if concussed or unhealthy. One fish nibbled on another attached to a lizard’s shoulder, but the victim made no effort to shake off the cannibals feeding on them.

  In this dark tunnel, the star chamber’s glow provided a beacon for escape if I ever lost Presence. The light radiating from my body made hard shadows whenever fish swam by, but the bleached scales on the undead fish didn’t reflect my light.

  The lizardfolk trying to pry open the barrier had scraped off barnacles and clams from the bars. Stone hammers rested beside the grate, and heavy planks floated on the ceiling. Despite their efforts, the barrier held firm, filling me with much relief. The crypt’s contents remained intact.

  Wooden planks bobbed along the ceiling, floating beneath the reflective surface of an air pocket. The lizards trying to open the grate expelled enough air from their lungs to amass in sizable air bubbles trapped by the ceiling. Their collective last breaths reminded me to maintain a grip on my trident.