Crocodiles! And the Intentions of the 100

We now had the Mantle of Ores and the Seed of Contradiction. But as we stood in the Ores' chamber, we heard a loud crashing noise from the front of the cottage. A number of large crocodiles broke down the door and smashed their way through the house.

Kale quickly used the Exodus Knife to cut a hole in what he called "extradimensional space". We quickly hopped in and watched as the crocodiles destroyed the cottage. Apparently, the creatures could not see us or reach us, but we could see them. Kale explained that this was expected.

Carlagnios glared at Ryn. "Why did you have to complain that we would get attacked by crocodiles?"

"I didn't know!" Ryn replied. "It just seemed as improbable as having a Kraken attack us in a room."

Carlagnios huffed. "At least we didn't get attacked by a squid --"

"Don't," interrupted Kale, "just don't."

After half an hour, the crocodiles departed. At that point, Ryn noticed that the Mantle of Ores kept fading out and fading back in. "Let me take a look at that," requested Kale.

Kale spent some time examining the mantle but could not determine what was happening. Ryn and Tiny also looked at it, but neither could explain the odd behavior.

We decided to leave the extradimensional space. The area surrounding the cottage was covered with crocodile tracks. "I could tell you where they came from, if we wanted to follow them," offered Tiny.

"No," replied Kale, "we should go back to The Keeper to get the instructions on how to use the Mantle and the Seed."

We returned to the portal, which transported us back to the room with the sunken circle. From there, we made our way back to the East door and met The Keeper.

"Are you ready to agree to my offer?" The Keeper asked.

"How exactly will this work?" Kale asked. "Some of the members of our party are ... hesitant ... to take your life."

"When you release my magical essence under the prison, I won't die right away. It just starts the process."

"OK," relied Ryn, "It's no skin off our nose." He turned to Tiny and whispered, "Is it possible that The Keeper is lying?"

Tiny frowned. "It would be very hard to tell."

Kale turned to The Keeper and asked, "What exactly happened between the 100 and the Lover of the Raven Queen?"

The Keeper let out a long sigh. "The Lover promised the 100 that they would live forever -- that they would be Gods upon this earth. And they were ... for a while."

"The Lover had tricked them," continued The Keeper, "and set about destroying life in this world. He blotted out the skies. He killed living things."

"Wait, so what do the 100 hope to do?" interrupted Kale.

"Escape, of course."

"Well, they certainly achieved that," quipped Ryn. "They escaped to our world."

"This world is a lost cause," The Keeper explained. "The 100 needed to find a place to hide from the Lover."

"Um, they're not exactly being inconspicuous," Ryn pointed out. "They're conquering territories back home, starting wars, ..."

"Being inconspicuous doesn't matter," noted The Keeper. "If the Lover is in your world, he will see the 100 no matter what they do."

"So you say," replied Ryn, "but we have no reason to trust you."