The Lake of Rot has been the most unpleasant place Shaw has visited so far. It’s just not a fun place to be in. One has to wonder what the designers were thinking. Why not a lake of puppies and kittens? Thankfully the area was mercifully short. You may be wondering why Shaw is covered in fungal growths.
First off, Shaw returned Seethewater Cave, a slightly less unpleasant area that is covered in poison bog water instead of liquid scarlet rot. A cave in which she would have found the mushroom armour set, when she first cleared the cave, if she had explored more carefully while being constantly poisoned. This set was supposed to reduce the rate at which Shaw would become afflicted by scarlet rot, but if difference there was, it must have been infinitesimal, for she did not notice it.
Once the lake was cleared(ish), Shaw made her way down into the Grand Cloister, where she fought a bunch of nasty centipede dudes, and died multiple times to a root snake dragon monster thing, seemingly composed of scarlet rot. Eventually she gave up fighting the thing, grew frustrated, and started needlessly dying to the centipede dudes. Then she fell of an edge right after re-spawning and lost all her runes. The evening was going well.
As she always does, Shaw was able to compose herself one last time, and cleared the area, resisting the impulse to fight the monster again. This led her to another rideable coffin.
A coffin floating in a river of scarlet rot, why not rest in it? What could possibly go wrong?
Despite the sarcasm, Shaw always looks kind of well-rested after these thanatological jaunts in a sarcophagus.
Once she got out of the coffin, she was inside a cave, with a sallow mistwall ominously looming at the far end. Beyond the mist, Shaw fought Astel, Naturalborn of the Void. A fairly pretentious name for something that was defeated with much more ease than the unnamed monster in the previous area.
Sadly, Shaw did not have long to celebrate this victory, as a sealed magic wall barred her from progressing any further. She needed something called an oath ring. Finally, lest William call her a liar, Shaw presents here her current stats for all to see.
