014 - Room: The Temple of the River Goddess - Library

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The library is populated by the ghostly temple librarian, Bordia Flowkeeper, kept in the mortal realm by a combination of the High Priestess’s magic and her own unfinished business. It’s in large part thanks to Bordia that High Priestess Elle learned of the oncoming disaster with enough time to prepare for it. Sadly, Bordia did not heed the Priestess's instructions to vacate the temple, and thus was caught and killed in the collapsing building.

As a half-elf, Bordia has had many long years to become familiar with the library’s contents, and a large amount of other information besides. She’s willing to help the party, to the extent of her somewhat limited abilities. The only way that Bordia can physically interact with the world around her is through the handling of books, she can lift them, move them, open them and flip through the pages, and even use them to strike foes (for damage roughly equivalent to a physically weak character’s unarmed attack.) Bordia is also a cleric of the River Goddess, of a power level just a little higher than the party. She can cast healing and possibly protective spells, but cannot use her magic offensively (even against the undead).

Bordia has been frustrated by her inability to communicate directly with High Priestess Elle, but has had a couple weeks to think about the problem, and has come to believe that she is waiting for someone to come. Knowing that the High Priestess can’t possibly sustain much more of her current effort, she’s willing to give the party the benefit of the doubt that they might be the ones.

Bordia’s unfinished business is that she has left no successor to take over her duties as librarian to the temple. When the temple falls, her business will remain unresolved until a successor is found, but she will not be able to travel beyond the grounds of the temple, even after its collapse. Alas, this will be a tough challenge, for all the books in the library were destroyed with the temple, and will vanish as soon as the High Priestess’s spell ends.

Knowledge Bordia Can Provide

Bordia had skills involving knowledge of magic, knowledge of history, and knowledge of religion. She knows the layout of the temple and the location of things within it. She does not know what the High Priestess wants achieved.

Specific Knowledge

• Bordia knows about the coins in the courtyard fountains (See “The Coins of Many Times” below) and will definitely bring them up if the foreknowledge of the temple’s destruction comes up.
• She does not recognize the behemoth, or know from whence it came, but she can correctly note that it appears to share some traits with creatures that come from beyond the bounds of reality. She worries that means the creature may be a herald of worse to come. After all, if there’s a breach in the walls of reality big enough to let that through, what else might soon come?
• She knows that there is a secret vault in the basement (though she won’t bring it up unprompted), but doesn’t know where it is, or what’s in it.
• She has heard noises coming up from the basement, and investigating, has learned that the bodies awaiting last rites have arisen as zombies. She’ll warn the players unless not given an opportunity to do so.
• She knows that the High Priestess has a key to the storeroom door.
• She knows that the nexus is nearly 200 years old, and was an incredible work of a mad genius wizard named Hardazo Graylock. Hardazo did all the design and theorizing, but needed the help of several powerful wizards and clerics to bring his vision to fruition.
• She does not truly understand the operating principles of the Nexus, but knows they involved the deliberate twisting of space, time, and magic. She knows that the River Goddess’s church was involved in its creation in some way.
• She knows that the Nexus is traveled merely by walking. About three days of descent to reach the Hub, a day to navigate the Hub, and about three days to ascend to one of the other terminuses. The six terminuses are spread pretty equally around the globe, and are located here, at Tyrandel, at Sacred Betha, a theocracy on the far side of the globe, at jungle-bound Gorez, at the undersea city of Pelea, at the frozen city of Alevunda, and finally at the lost desert terminus of faded Vin’kana.

The Coins of Many Times

The librarians of the temple have long kept a log of every coin found within the fountains in the courtyard, because due to the blessings of the River Goddess, coins tossed into the pool are brought forward or backward in time. The log contains descriptions of coins of hundreds of mintages, the time they were found, and the suspected time they were from based on their markings. Coins that seem particularly important were physically kept and attached to the relevant page. (worth 7 gold altogether, mostly in coppers). When the fountains were built, the first coin found within them came from a distant future, but Bordia recently identified it as being from around the current time period and warned the priestess. It had been long theorized that that was the “last coin” – meaning the last coin that would ever be thrown in the fountain.

The founders of the temple also made a record of the “first coin” that was thrown in, and it was the sudden reappearance of this coin a few weeks ago, combined with the fact that no coin from the future had arrived in some time, that made Bordia concerned that perhaps the temple’s final days were near – a suspicion that she promptly reported to the High Priestess.

If any of the party members threw a coin into the fountain, the coin thrown in last is attached to the first page of the log as this “last coin”, aged more than a hundred years since the character threw it in the fountain. Bordia will be overjoyed, and immediately return it to the character that threw it in – but its unique journey has imbued it with temporal energies that give it a strange power.

Lucky Coin of Time - Once per day, the character that owns this coin can toss it in the air with a spin, where it glints and vanishes completely – putting the owner every so slightly out of time phase. At any point later, the character can retrieve the coin instead of taking a normal turn, which causes them to snap back into phase, which to others involves them vanishing for a full turn and then suddenly reappearing at the beginning of their next turn, as they are absent from the timeline for the several seconds it takes them to sync back up. During this period, they are completely absent, and no spell or attack can affect them. At the end of this period, they reappear in the exact same spot they left if it is physically unoccupied. If it is not, they will remain in temporal suspension until the exact instant the space is clear, and then reappear.

Bordia’s Successor

The party might take on finding a successor for Bordia, or one of the players themselves might attempt to serve in the role. This is a tough challenge, as it involves accumulating materials for a new library. Books worth 200 gold, at least a half of which must deal with religion, and at least a quarter of which must deal with the River Goddess herself. Beyond that, at least one book must detail the secret lore of the goddess’s time aspect, a very hard to find item. Their commitment to the River Goddess and the job must be genuine, not feigned, and the candidate must convert to the religion if not already a member. Upon success, Bordia will depart for the afterlife, and her replacement will gain access to a few time-based abilities (and spells if they are a spellcaster).