Spire of the Ancients

You pursue the hooded figure into the mountains towards the impenetrable Spire of the Ancients. You among few know of the maddening rites contained within the stolen book you now race to retrieve.

You recall the sounds of splintering wood as the secured oak doors of your library's occult section were smashed off their hinges, and the footfalls of the escaping thief as your blood ran cold when you realized what had happened. With non time to procure so much as a butter knofe with which to defend yourself you give chase. With that book and a suitable place to perform the ritual it would be possible to open a doorway for L'Qxlmn's tenacular form so that the world binder may pull our very existence back into the aether from which we came.

You return to the moment when ahead you see the figure has abandoned its horse and is now stepping through the trees, carefully examining each one as if searching for something. The dense foliage forces you to continue the chase on foot, but when you close in your quarry simply disappears behind one of many similar trees. You finally reach the tree that masked the thief's escape when you notice a weakness in the ground under your feet, and rooting through the dirt and leaves you find the handle to a trap door...