One of the people in Moonshade mentions that Pothos bears an uncanny resemblance to Erstam which turns out to be the trigger for him to confess that he is infact his son next time I talk to him.

He now gives me the blood moss quest which I’ve already done.

I hand it over and in return he gives me a set of instructions to get to Erstams island which involve heading for some docks at the north end of the island, ringing a bell, and riding a giant turtle.

I’m about to do just that but as soon as I step outside Shamino is teleported away.

The Lord of Moonshade is one of the few people up at this time of night. He asks me who I think  might have kidnapped Shamino and I get the option of Batlin or the mage who was hurling fireballs at me during the banquet. She seems the most likely so I accuse her (even though I don’t have any evidence) and he tells me to go and search her house.

When I enter her house, her automatons take immediate offense and I’m forced to fight them. I don’t find much in here, there is a locked chest with a key + a couple of scrolls showing that the lord and her used to be lovers but he broke it off. I’m expecting to find a secret passage or something but I admit defeat and head back to the lord.

He seems quite keen to admit the affair and tells me that he had a love-palace built in the middle of the lake for her some time back and tells me to search there next. He also gives me permission to use his barge.

In the palace, I catch her in the act of trying to torture the information out of Shamino.

Just like everyone else who I’ve caught out in this game she immediately attacks me. She puts up more resistance than most, conjuring up a few gremlins but shes no match for the 3 of us.

She curses me with her dying breath but nothing seems to come of it so I grab the key off her body and release Shamino.

After this distraction, I head out to try to get to Erstams island again. I end up going the wrong way to start with and end up exploring the area north of Moonshade. There are a lot of strange little buildings including this odd contraption that seems to be missing a part but I’ve no idea what that is or what it would do anyway.

It turns out I needed to follow the East coast to reach the docks. I follow the instructions and an island sized turtle swims up.

It drops us off at another dock. I know I must be in the right place by the wriggling limbs lying around.

Erstam lives here with his hunchback assistant. He is less mad than I was possibly expecting and is attempting to find the secret of immortality. To discover the secrets of life and death, he has decided to go the opposite way and attempt to create life, Frankenstein style. These experiments are dangerous, especially to his assistants who’s limbs are the ones that decorate the house.

He tells me that our missing dagger is around here somewhere and I find it behind the steps.

He also identifies the blue egg I’m carrying and tells me to look through his telescope. When I do so I see our missing sword in the middle of a load of ice. It must be in the north of the main island which I will need to cross the swamp to get to.

Erstams current assistant is not the best at keeping secrets and tells me that his master knows all about teleportation and uses some sort of jawbone to do it.

Erstam won’t tell me more unless I help him out first. He wants a Phoenix egg from a northern island. I agree to fetch it and he teleports me there.

I emerge into a small cave with some sort of tropical garden outside.

Just inside a further cave is a dead bird lying in the middle of some lava. I pull the inviting looking lever on the wall and the flames spread in from the north.

The bird sets alight and the phoenix is reborn. I was expecting a big dungeon crawl here but there was hardly anything to do in the end. The phoenix is also from Britannia and came through the gates and is attempting to restore balance in its own way.

Just to the south past a cyclops I find a teleporter which takes me back to Erstams. He now wants me to build him a creature from the body parts + egg which I throw into his contraption in the middle of the lab.

As soon as I do this the creature springs to life. True to his word Erstam hands over a key to allow me to get his magic serpents jawbone. He doesn’t tell me how to use it but I notice there are slots for the two teeth I have to fit into (and room for many more).

His monster wants to join us in the quest and I can’t see a reason why not despite a few of my companions objecting so I accept.

I now need to figure out how to use the jawbone. I try using the conviently placed serpents gate and sure enough this teleports me to a new area. This is basically a teleport hub similar to that in Savage Empire as far as I can tell. There are a lot of possible exits with doors barring the way, but a couple of doors open for me so I assume which teeth I own controls which ones open. I take the first exit I find and teleport back to Moonshade.

I’m not certain what to do next but there must be more I need to do before heading back to the main island. Since I have 2 serpents teeth I’m thinking I may have an alternative exit from the serpents gate (although this may just take me back to Erstam). I’ll try that first and failing that talk to everyone in town again and see if I haven’t missed something.