On leaving, they are stalked and ambushed by some chaotic forest residents: an insane mutated woodsman, his wife, daughter and sons. They are cannibals, an untainted meat is hard to come by so the adventurers are (to them, anyway) a walking pantry.

Locating Atrush requires fending off the attentions of a multitude of beggars, pickpockets and thieves. Atrush prepares the paste from the fungus (Forest of Troos) in exchange for a favor -- she wants a rival beggar-wife (Seldunn) killed. The two beggar-wives argued over Atrush's lover, a legless aged drooling cripple who remains silently in the room with Atrush the whole time. His name is Resk.

Atrush doesn't know how to prepare healing preparations: she only knows how to prepare the paste, however she has the resources available for any character who does know how.

If the characters do kill the rival beggar-wife, Atrush will be overcome with sudden remorse, albeit too late now, and will turn against the characters, calling for help as she does. A mob of beggars will quickly turn up and attack the characters with sticks and stones, too many for the characters to defeat. They will be forced to flee Nadsokor. Hopefully, someone remembers to retrieve the paste.

The second encounter is with an Ilmioran patrol. They are hunting a murderer who killed a noble in Ilmar. The characters are asked to produce papers and a verbal interrogation ensues. Assuming all goes well, the characters are free to continue.

Arriving at the hills takes some time, and Luck or Track rolls to find the correct trail. The trail is treacherous and requires Climb rolls to negotiate at several points. Luck rolls are also needed to avoid a sudden slip, failure in which pitches the character(s) down the cliff.

Eventually the trail leads to a cave entrance, flanked by old pillars of stone carved with the eight-rayed symbol of Chaos.

The tunnel descends further before narrowing to a single person wide (sliding sideways, that is) gap. No normal metal armor can be worn to get past this point. A short distance in, the walls become gooey with a fluorescent purple-green luminous substance. This will corrode like an acid unless the characters have been liberally smothered with the paste made from the Troos fungus. There is enough paste for only two applications for each character.

At the end of the tunnel, it widens into a chamber beyond which is an octagonal archway, from which light flickers (like lamplight). A Demon guards this chamber (quilled, carapaced and ward-pacted against swords). It can distend to cover the archway, preventing access until defeated. It warns openly of its ward-pact, after all, it's only polite to tell it's intended victims.

The old man is a conduit for Xiombarg on this plane, but that isn't obvious to the characters. He is quite frail and openly senile. He has no idea who he is or why he is here, let alone how long he's been emprisoned. He mumbles a lot and drools from toothless gums.

Unless a character has perished at the Demons hands, It is unfortunate that there is no paste for use on the old man. So perhaps someone will have to go without? Or find some way to dampen the effects of the acid. Unless all of the bones have been destroyed, the skeletons will need to be defeated again. The return trail will also prove difficult to negotiate.

A short distance out from Ilmar the characters are met by Saraten. He asks if the characters met a dark-haired woman (who fits the description of Alondra). If the characters reply in the affirmative, then he suggests that if they meet her again, they would be doing him and his lord a great service if they killed her. He thanks and pays the characters, then takes possession of the old man, before bidding them farewell and riding south in the direction of Bakshaan.