The Temple of Lost Prayers: A 4th-Level 5E Adventure (Patreon)

The Temple of Lost Prayers is the fifth adventure I wrote for the Swords & Sorceries line for 5E. The first three are available: The Sea Demon's Gold, The Song of the Sun Queens, and The Tomb of Fire. Finishing others in the line will probably need a Kickstarter fundraiser to cover the substantial costs of editing, art, and layout. Try this one for yourself in the meantime and tell me how it goes!

INTRODUCTION

The adventurers have come to Sindusa, the Land of Light, an ancient kingdom amid impenetrable jungles. In the fortress-village of Jarathapura, they learn that the prince is caught by an evil curse in an ancient temple, and his sister the princess is desperate for his safe return. In the temple, the adventurers may find the riches of a forgotten goddess—and by rescuing the prince, they might expect greater rewards still.

"The Temple of Lost Prayers" is optimized for five 4th-level adventurers. Some encounters recommend ways to make things challenging for a substantially stronger party or easier for a substantially weaker party.

HOW TO GET HERE

In all likelihood, Sindusa is isolated from the adventurers’ homelands by enormous distances, vast mountains and rivers, and a dangerous sea. Why have they come so far? Choose one of these motivations for them or invent one:

• They have traveled as guards of a merchant caravan across countless lands.
• They followed tales of the Jewel of Hatamata, said to be the largest, most valuable ruby in the world. 
• They seek the famously wise sages of Sindusa, whose scrolls look back on thousands of years of history and who regard their land as the birthplace of the gods. 
• They heard a prophecy that in Sindusa they shall shape the fate of a great land. 
• They heard that in Sindusa armies go to war with huge, strange beasts trained for battle, and hope to bring those beasts and their use home.

If the adventurers undertook a great journey to come to Sindusa, then it may have been substantial time since their last adventure—a year, maybe two, of living, undertaking small jobs and minor adventures along the way, and wandering. Each adventurer must spend enough gold for 12 months of upkeep. During that time, you may wish to allow each adventurer to undertake downtime activities that amount to 100 downtime days. 

GENERAL FEATURES

Sindusa has the following general features:

Terrain: Sprawling, tumbling, dusty, ancient villages and castles surrounded by deep jungles and huge rivers. Tall mountains loom far in the distance.

Weather: Sweltering and humid. Any clothing at all feels stifling to wear. Sindusan warriors don armor only when battle is sure.

Sights: Buildings of stone and hard-packed clay. Shrines open to all visitors, often maintained by priests who offer their best wisdom and survive on gifts. Village streets reinforced with stones to make the mud of heavy rains less miserable. Roads between towns remain muddy year round. The sun and moon shine brilliant overhead, except when sudden staggering storms turn the world gray. In the forest, the brilliance of the sun is a deep, lush green and the gleaming moon is a dizzying pattern of chiaroscuro shadows.

Sounds: A hundred or a thousand unique songs of prayer or celebration at sunrise, the beginning of work, the day’s meal, work’s end, sunset, and deep night. Merchants calling out to strangers, begging them to see and buy the wonders of this great and ancient land. Chittering monkeys. The rumbling growl and coughing roar of a tiger held in captivity. The whisper of a snake gliding into leaves and out of sight.

Languages: Sindusan. The language known to the adventurers as Common is exotic. Only a handful of well-traveled merchants or unusually well educated nobles speak it. However, Common and Sindusan share strange, forgotten origins. An adventurer who knows Common and either Celestial or Primordial can make a simple idea, request, or instruction—one or two words—known in Sindusan with a DC 15 Intelligence (Religion) test.

Appearance: Growing accustomed to the brilliant sun since time immemorial, the people of Sindusa have dark brown skin, almost universally black hair, and dark brown or black eyes. Most clothing, even the humblest loincloth, is brighly colored, and tunics and robes are woven with lovely patterns. Guards on duty wear scalemail shirts and carry long spears. 

Female Names (roll 1d10): Adrika, Aditri, Antara, Charvi, Daksha, Gatha, Kavia, Nalini, Sukanya, Talika.

Male Names (roll 1d10): Athrit, Asav, Bavish, Danush, Harit, Jagrav, Naman, Nilay, Satvik, Sashwat.

CONTINUED...

Download the attachments for the full text, maps, reference art, and pregens.