Once back in Althofen and healed to the point of being conscious, the party goes to the Temple of Hysor straightaway. The tell their story to Eberulf and Franklin and Starkad tells his. They decide to include Starkad in their efforts. They leave the black bible, Cursed Book of Travel, and list of names from the Lemegeton with Septicant Franklin to be copied. They intend to get back the originals to keep while copies are kept by trusted individuals so the information will not be lost. Franklin estimates that it will take his scribes a week. The party goes to recover from the recent battles. At the Ferret's Den Inn, they run into Conrad Flugenhall, an old battle companion of Starkad. He asks to join up with Starkad once again.
They decide that they should visit Arhus so more direct reports can be made to Colonel Nemelus. They offer to take packages and letters up with them from Franklin and Eberulf. John uses his teleport spell again, but something goes horribly wrong and they appear over the middle of the ocean. They plummet and almost drown, but John saves them with another quick casting of magic. On the beach, they decide to use the safer phantom steed spell to travel. They discover that they were very far off target from Arhus. They are in Huysum, home of the School of Evocation. They decide to take advantage of this mistake and visit the school. The wizards seem arrogant, but they are finally directed to Master Falun to whom they request that important messages get to Duke Ulrich. The master leaves and comes back later with none other than Duke Ulrich.
Apparently the Duke deemed the messages from the party important enough for him to travel up and meet with them in person. They tell him the story about the Temple of Tuoo in the Black Forest and he seems quite concerned. The bible is mentioned also and Ulrich requests a copy. The party asks whether the Duke learned anything about the third gate in the mountains and Ulrich tells them that it appears that the High Temple of Mefis is built exactly on top of the gate, so that they shouldn't consider going there. They talk about looking for the gate in Darkwood Deep, but don't make up their minds. Finally, they take leave of the Duke and use their steeds to quickly arrive in Arhus. There they deliver their messages and eat at the Golden Lion (which has become very touristy because of Ulrich's past association with it).
That night they decide they need to revisit the High Temple of Epolde and teleport to it under the cover of darkness. This causes some excitement at the temple since they weren't expected. John is directed back to Building B where the sorcerer questioning happens. The rest ask new questions but are reminded about the previous divinations that the temple did for them. Depressed and directionless, the party isn't sure what to do.
Then a priest hurries into the room the party is at and tells them that they have a visitor. They are surprised. Who knew they would teleport to the High Temple? How were they found. The visitor is escorted in with great respect by the priests of Epolde. He is a simple man, dressed in nothing but multicolored robes and his head shaved bald. He carries no equipment. He is obviously a priest of some divine agent, but no one can tell of which. He tells the party this: Certain agencies are not permitted by the rules to answer clearly on certain matters. His master, who is unnamed, is interested in helping them and has sent Aethelwulf, to answer one qustion each, to the limit of his master's knowledge.
The party decides to take a day to think about their questions and Aethelwulf agrees to return the following day. They take the whole day discussing what their questions should be. When the appointed time comes, they are ready, as are the priests of Epolde who wish to document this moment. Starkad goes first:
"Who is your master and why does he seek to help us?"
"My master is the child of Arawn and Taeddon, a mortal and an aspect. The child seeks to become an agent of Hope."
John goes next, "How and why have sorcerers come into this world?"
"A consequence. A plan. A tool."
Croom asks, "What are the specific directions to the third piece of the dragon amulet?"
"In 26 days, your friend Hans will need you. But do not interfere before then."
Osric asks, "What are the specific directions to find Crystalia?"
"You need merely to go home."
Eldrin goes last and asks, "What is the most important thing they need to know about getting into Crystalia, on the order of enemies that cannot be defeated."
"The one in charge of the Crystalia Project, as your enemies call it, is Euronymous, Prince of Death, Grand Cross of the Order of the Fly. He who found the Lemegeton and delivered it to his Master."
With the last question answered, Aethelwulf leaves. The party sits around in the High Temple of Epolde and discusses the answers and their course of action. They decide that they should lay low for 26 days and be ready to help Hans when he needs it. They deduce that Crystalia must be under Althofen and that they should wait before trying to explore it. They don't want to be in the middle of something there when Hans needs them.
They return back to Althofen and the Ferret's Den only to walk in on Conrad having lunch with Lady Pine. Suspecting what they do about her, they have a hard time acting nonchalant and civil. The charade is getting thin. Their reticence to talk about what they are doing only leads them to tell her that they are now on a secret mission. After lunch, they go upstairs and give Conrad his first assignment. See if he can find rumors about underground tunnels. They want to go below Althofen but not via the well-guarded entrance that they know is in Lord Natas' hands. Croom also goes to work the government records to see if he too can find a way below. A week later Conrad reports that he has learned that the sewer system is extensive and old. There are rumors that there are places where underground caverns have been found. He goes to learn more.
Meanwhile, a week later a priest comes to get them from Franklin. He tells them that an attempt has been made on the Cursed Book. The locked cabinet has clearly been disturbed and the books are on the wrong shelf. John insists that they finish the copying today and that the books are returned. Franklin agrees to put more scribes on it, and they finally return the documents to the party.
More time passes and Croom makes it through the Krewaldian red tape and discovers that the mansion of Count Ebron is built on an old temple site of Dunay that was razed about 200 years ago. There is some thought that there were caverns underneath. Conrad also reports that the guy he talked to who found caverns in the sewers was very close to the site of Count Ebron's house. The party happily discovers that the house is still for sale. They work out with the Temple of Hysor and Eberulf's paladins to jointly buy the property. The next morning they take possession with Septicant Franklin. It also happens to be 26 days since their visit with Aethelwulf.
They head to the Temple of Baldrin so Croom can scry Hans. He succeeds and finds Hans bleeding and near death alone in a gully. They immediately succeed in teleporting in and Croom heals Hans. Hans wakes up and tells them that they found the third linnorm and he still lives. In fact, the dragon has just killed all of his adventuring party but him. The party immediately prepares themselves to go kill the dragon. As they approach, the linnorm speaks and tells them that he sense that they are carrying shards of the amulet. He thanks them for bringing them to him. The dragon uses the mountainside ledge to fly off and cast spells from a distance. Osric fortunately resists destruction but later his horse is slain by slay living. Fortunately, the dragon had used a good portion of his most powerful spells destroying Hans' party. The turning point in the battle came when Eldrin managed a critical hit while smiting the evil dragon. Ultimately the party wins. As it is dying the dragon tells them this,
"Banished we were, me and the two others. I send you to be our revenge! And a fitting one it shall be. Kill and plunder the dragonkind there and our revenge will be fulfilled. You shall have my piece. It is in the cave. But you will need the fourth piece. The piece that neither one of us trusted the others with. Together we hid it in a secret place until the time is right. And I shall tell you where it is. Far to the north is an island and on the northern shore is a waterfall. The entrance to the dungeon is under the water...a cave.."
The dragon died and the party loots the hoard. John finds a nifty ring of fire resistance. Hans meanwhile studies the freshly killed linnorm while the party talks about their course of action. They decide that they will go look for the final piece before going to Crystalia. They will bring the bodies of the other adventuring party back to Althofen in the hopes they will be raised. Hans tells them that he really wants to join them when they go look for the final dragon amulet piece. They find the third piece easily and its inscription reads: Draconia, dragon home, Rest under earth.
They prepare themselves and succeed in raising most of Hans' companions. But none elect to travel with them and they part to go their separate ways. They learn that the cave where they fought the linnorm is on the other island. So they will use it as a launching point to find the dungeon where the final piece is. They also decide that they will visit Osric's mother on the way. When they arrive at the Blukhorel estate, she gives Osric a good dressing down for not writing or visiting. The party enjoys watching the paladin get his.
The next morning they use the phantom steeds to travel at breakneck pace across the island, skirting Brynmawr carefully. It takes them a week of searching and various uses of magic to finally discover the underwater cave entrance. They enter carefully when they are finally ready. Of course, they are attacked by monsters as soon as they enter the cave. Dragon eels and aboleth mages are defeated as they enter the natural cavern where they hope the final piece will be. They find dragon claw marks and guess that they have found the right place. The cave system is hardly empty and the party spends much time battling the residents. There are a series of unfortunate events. Conrad is killed by beetles and then raised from the dead, and Starkad's prized two bladed sword is destroyed by a black pudding.
Once the place is cleared, the party has clearly not found what they are looking for. They spend days searching until at last they must use a series of locate object spells to triangulate on it. It appears to be down underneath them, but the only way down is a chasm that has no openings. Finally, they find that the entrance is masked with illusion to look like the rest of the chasm wall. They at least enter, but are immediately attacked by animating golems in dragon form and a symbol of weakness also fires in the area, making the fight much harder. The serpent golems are destroyed but the party must rest before pushing into the dungeon. The symbol of weakness remains however, and the only way past it is to use antimagic field to suppress it while they pass through. This turns out to be a great boon to the party as this allows them to bypass a series of other magical symbols and runes guarding the passage. Unfortunately, the next pair of guardians tears the party to pieces without their magical protections. John is killed again and it appears he only reluctantly returns to life with the resurrect spell once the golems are defeated.
Beyond the doors at the end of this tunnel is a donut shaped room. As soon as the party enters more guardians awake, but their programming is flawed. They spend rounds buffing up instead of fighting while the party attacks them. They are defeated and at last the party can try to figure out the dungeon. The donut-shaped room they are in has seven doors out of it, and beyond each is a puzzle and a trap. They have to figure out these puzzles in order to progress through the dungeon. There appears to be nothing else to do. Each trap consists of some sort of dragon-themed golem. The puzzles themselves also end up testing the party's knowledge of dragons. The worst time they have is when one golem manages to maze Croom and he has to fight it alone. He spends most of the time fleeing, trying to figure out the maze until by a stroke of luck he manages to get out.
Perhaps that isn't the worst time. Later, they fight an emerald golem that uses an ability to teleport around the battlefield through emerald gates. They notice as it leaves on of the gates that its feet are covered in lava. Just as the golem is defeated, it grapples Starkad and pulls him through the emerald gate. Starkad finds himself in the caldera of a living volcano. Eldrin and Osric get fire resist buffs and chase after it. They kill it on the other side, but that causes the gate to disappear with Starkad back to the dungeon. Unfortunately that leaves the two of them on the wrong side of the gate in the volcano with their fire resistance. It only protects them for a short while, but fortunately, Eldrin has a fly spell in the ring of spell storing and he uses it to carry Osric away. They discover that they are across the world on a tropical island in the middle of a clear blue sea. They see a haze of fog way off in the distance across the sea. They see the tops of several other islands with mountain peaks and possibly another volcano. Their mountainside has some vegetation so they fly down to it. They get down there just in time. Eldrin to sent his hawk to scout and it returned quickly to tell them that a red dragon is flying around up there.
Meanwhile the rest of the party uses teleport to rush to Althofen to use the Temple of Baldrin and then the Temple of Lugh in an effort to find a priest who has scrying prepared that can succeed in finding Osric and Eldrin. They finally see that they are relatively safe and thus will have to spend the night before retrieving them. Osric and Eldrin are not happy that they are sharing a very small island with a red dragon but they have little choice. Fortunately, they remain undiscovered. The next day John teleports over to join them but he immediately feels a compulsion to see the volcano. He is invisible, so Osric and Eldrin don't know what's going on. Unfortunately, his invisibility expires halfway up. The dragon isn't around though but sharp-eyed Eldrin and his hawk notice and try to get his attention with the hawk. But John ignores it until after he reaches the volcano. There, he discovers that his nifty ring is much more than a ring of element resistance. He snaps out of his compulsion and finishes his mission rescuing Osric and Eldrin.
Eventually they return to the dungeon. It takes them much time, but they eventually discover the secret of all six puzzles and they feel the whole donut-shaped room turn. Now, the seventh tunnel, which had been a dead-end, leads somewhere. Unfortunately, something is there waiting for jus that: a dragonflesh golem. However, they defeat it with no problem and enter the last room and face the last guardian. This time another dragon golem that breathes petrification gas. Osric and Eldrin are turned to stone before the rest have to retreat back to Althofen with their stoned companions. It takes several attempts to return the fighters back to flesh. They take some time in Althofen preparing to defeat the final guardian.
During this time, John Frie runs into Lady Pine. He releases a number of verbal barbs that in hindsight make it quite clear that the party suspects she isn't what she seems. Other than that, nothing keeps them from resting and preparing to battle the golem. They return buffed to high heaven and defeat it. They now find a pedestal with the last piece of the amulet on it. They also see indentations for the other 3 pieces. They worry that as soon as they put the pieces on the pedestal they will be teleported away to the land of Dragons: Draconia. However, some more study reveals that the amulet is command word activated. They feel safe in putting the pieces down. When the last piece is placed, the amulet becomes whole and can be removed in one piece. The last piece says this: Draconia, speak beautiful name. The whole poem makes the command word obvious: Draconia. John casts identify on the amulet and learns that it will teleport 8 people to Draconia.