I am running a large part (the middle third of so) of Vermis III as a flux & 2 dungeons—everything between the Sunken Citadel heading and the Hanging Town label. Obviously I can't publish someone else's stuff verbatim as a ttrpg so I am just putting it here for any other Vermis fans who might appreciate the conversion. I recommend reading through that part of Vermis if you want to peruse this, I didn't bother really explaining stuff that is already explained in Vermis, I just reference it. I am running it as a subterranean petrified forest beneath Ptolus, but obviously drop it wherever. This is designed for Universal Flux Rules.
Foes are in red. Treasure is in bold. Anything I totally made up (not from Vermis) is in italics.
Petrified Forest
Subterranean | Horror | Fantasy
Overview
Its a hike just to get there. It is farther inland than many other parts of the spaces below Ptolus. A strange subterranean forest of stone and moss in a vast cavern which seems to go on forever.
Special rule: At the entrance to this flux is a statue with an apple in its hand. You cannot enter the flux without carrying this apple. Each flux turn, starting with a d6, roll the die. On 1, the apple’s condition deteriorates and the die shrinks one size. If a 1 is rolled on a d2, the apple is destroyed, and the way out closes.
Special Rule: Omens. When an omen is rolled. Roll a d10 instead of a d8. On a roll of 9 or 10, subtract 2 from the result.
Focus: The Focus of this flux is Omens.
General Features
Its held up by columns that have the exact appearance of tremendous petrified trees—bark and all.
The ceiling is so high up even a firebolt fired into the air is unlikely to illuminate its stalactites.
The ground is cold stone and thick moss. The moss appears to be home to yellow, brightly shining moths that illuminate the ground.
Large pools of water give this place the appearance of a strange wetlands.
Encounters
Ashen Scavenger. An impossibly old man crawling on all fours. He has books tied to his back with ribbons. The knowledge within has been carefully burned away, leaving ashen black stripes on all lines. He knows of Hyra, the punished king. If they force his attention, he will point at a random one of them and declare that this place hates them—that hate might doom them. Encounters in this flux will unfairly target them.
Slumbering Eye. While looking at you you must fight sleep. If wounded it closes its eye and just sits.
Witch fingers rush headfirst out of the darkness. They do not attack, but attempt to grasp and drag characters to the Brown Lake. If cut down, their ratty sheet and blanket like attire falls away to reveal various enthralled humanoids (dwarves, drow, humans).
Soft-crabs with fly-traps on their backs. The plants have taken them over.
A herd of deer(?) flee your approach. If you get close enough to one, you will see they have faces like gnomes. There is no intelligence behind their eyes.
Hag Owl. “Bhoon bhoon bhoon.” The sound of an owl, almost. Its face if feathered, and structured like a normal owl, but it has strange thin feathers like wispy hair. And its eyes are white instead of gold. “Grant me a Bhoon.” It says, in a low non-whisper. “Grant me a Bhoon. Bhoon. Please.” If no bhoon is granted to it, it will fly and tell the mud witch they are here.
Wyvern flies above. It shoots paralytic darts from its tail.
Rider of the headless horse. Hostile if not possessing Hyra's Crown.
Hazards
Apple tree. Its apples are poisonous meats. The tree is a creature that hunts by getting you to eat a part of it and die. Weak, like getting attacked by a car wash brush.
Some of the moss gives way to a sucking pit. No drowning but water trickles over victim. Very deep (10’ tube) accidental cave diving. 1 stress each action.
Strange rain from the ceiling. Almost an electrical charge to the rain. If no cover is taken, mark an armor slot. Mail melds together etc.
A tree with a hollow. Something shiny (secretly just scrap metal) glistens down inside. Trap: If you reach your hand in, a feral tarsier person thing grabs your hand and tries to chew it off. Crit equal lost finger. +10 on first attack. Has acorn token (mundane). Can see in dark.
Incidents
Migration of Slumbering Eyes. How will you hide from their herd?
Lost. Cannot peregrinate until you rediscover a location. (unless you marked trees, which has its own dangers)
Lost Item. A random PC realizes they left an important piece of gear 1 watch back. They decide what it was, and the party has to decide if they go back for it.
Moths decide they really like a random PC. They shine with dim light while within the flux, and ranged attacks against them have advantage.
Shallow
Four faced stone monolith. If approached it rises out of the ground, revealing a turtle-like body and more stone faces. If not harmed. It grows a new monolith with PC faces, then buries itself.
An orb on a pedestal. Behind it, a sword balances on its point with a red robe hung on it. The Orb compels your vision, and shows you instances where you could have been kinder or could have been crueler. The robe slowly takes form and lifts the sword. If you keep watching the orb, it knights you. If you don’t it can be engaged until the orb is damaged.
Shrine with a pig eating worms. If the pig is killed the worms inside attack. There is a box in the shrine, which if opened, released worms in the form of a man. It will ask: What is my virtue? (A: gluttony). Either way it will break apart into regular worms. The right answer reveals a Worm Token, which can cleanse someone of weak curses if swallowed.
Brown lake. No moss, no mud. Just brown and expansive, but only a few inches deep. There is an owl-sized birdhouse in the middle obviously filled with little bones and a few trinkets (Hag Owl. Chance Eater Chaositech. Beastblood Talisman). If they touch the water or annoy the owl. The mud witch rises from the lake and summons 2d4 witch fingers from the darkness.
Staircase to a giant bronze face. You realize there is a normal sized corpse (mummified) below it as if the mask were its own head. It is being worshiped and cared for by various humanoids in various golden garbs. No flesh can be seen to identify their race. Only the hands of Dorvus will be any threat.
Wyvern’s Nest. Only evidence from the ground is dooky and a dead wyvern baby (pushed from the nest). It can be climbed. There is one adolescent wyvern in the nest. Dog size. Can’t lift its head.
Contains gauntlet with unbreakable grip. Morningstar with 1-in-6 chance of poisoning targets.
Deep
Fountain (Woman’s Mouth) Shrine. Wetstone Golems. Shoot boiling water. Inside the tongue is like a stone vessel that pours infinite water (slow) but can’t be stoppered without cracking it. At the end of the hall is a tiny version set in the wall.
Hyra’s Palace.
Singing Palace.
Hyra's Palace
Rooms
A small shrine-like tower stands alone. 2-in-6 chance the rider is here and attacks intruders.
Winding stairs
Rider cannot fit down the stairs.
Communion Room
Scholar of Hyra whispers curses into goblets.
3d20 goblets each worth a handful of gold.
Sewing Room
Bolts of magical cloth. (Cursed: if turned into clothes, taking HP damage also causes stress/sanity loss)
Crystal Faucet
3 Scholars of Hyra use the water from the crystal faucet to craft paper from gray pulp.
Gray Paper. When places over writing or illustration, the gray paper immediately absorbs a copy of the image in reverse. Consumable.
Voice Organ
Like an organ with a mouthpiece.
2 scholars of Hyra whisper curses here. The curses of the scholar currently operating the organ are AoE.
Organ would be very valuable if dismantled and taken to a metropolitian area.
Royal Antechamber
The throne room. On the throne is the headless, desecrated corpse of Hyra. Hyra's Grimoir and Hyra's Crown lie in his lap.
Room is filled with the eggs of the Yellow Usurper, who is here.
Perfumed Room
Many of the perfume bottles in this room are long spoilt.
A baby-sized coffin rests on a long table. Inside: mummified dog and 6 bags of coins.
Cracked Room
A petrified tree has grown out from this room, breaching the ceiling. The floor is covered in fragile, petrified leaves.
Clearing the leaves takes time, but reveals a petrified imp. Imp will owe you 1d10 years of service if un-petrified.
Singing Palace
Random Encounters
Weeping Gobbler
Giant Locust
Pipers of Sangria
Enormous Toad
Lunatic Bones
Evil Furniture
Locusts
Levels 1-2: Nuisance
Levels 3-4: Hard to hear. Breaking Concentration.
Level 5: Totally deafening. Crawl in your gear (disadvantage on Finesse, Presence, Knowledge)
Rooms
1: Once Gardens
Low number of locusts. Always humming from next or previous room. Once gardens, but most vegetation overgrown then dead.
Skeleton Ambush.
Vassels.
2 skeletons.
Locked door to 11.
Tool shed
Candles and candelabras
Shovels, hoes, buckets, pitchforks, shears
Long dead seeds in drawers.
Vines Room.
Itching Vines conceal secret passage to 10. (Stress each watch until cured. Making a cure takes a DC 18 Instinct and 1 watch.)
Double Gargoyle. Facing outwards it cured petrification. Facing inwards it immediately petrifies. Breaking: curse, causes petrification over 2 days.
Cabinets and Chest (inwards beyond petrifying face). Contains blowgun with 2 stone darts (causes petrification up to medium creature, breaks on miss).
Wind Instrument Fountain.
Fountain. If water is stopped (stuffed in center hole) it plays shrill noise instead. 1 stress to all around, cracks open all Vassels.
Vassel Room 1
Lots of Vassels
Shrine to Murgo.
Twig Effigy. Cavity in chest with Tied Tongue (disadvantage spells and oratory, can be untied to give advantage instead, but it has a 1-in-6 chance of wearing itself to nothing every ten minutes)
If disturbed, hand pile attacks from 7.
Hand Pile Lair
Docile, curious but shrinks back. Hates those who interfere with effigy in 6.
12 bracelets, worth 12d4 handfuls total.
Vassel Room 2
Lots of Vassels.
Symbol on wall next to old campsite. (investigate: locust seem to avoid the symbol)
Columnated Room
Slimy floor. Can’t move fast or might trip.
Snail in armor. Blind unless it makes its head vulnerable. Swings flail wildly.
Loot: Three headed flail.
Tree Room
Tree. Grows through roof. Around it are tied the skeletons of a four-person party of adventurers. Tier 1 gear. 2 bags of gold. 10ft rope (magical, can be commanded to tie itself [or untie itself]. Does not recognize a master [any can command it]). (secret: they were killed by other explorers, one of which is a minotaur with one eye (replaced with a fey visage).
Door to 3. Unconcealed this side.
Prayer Statue
Statue, face is outlined (inspect to learn this) Face can be taken off for later.
Vassels.
Well Room.
LEADS TO NEXT FLOOR
No ladder.
2: Upper Level
Mask Room.
Hole in ceiling to Floor 1.
Door to 14 locked wood. No key exists, must be broken down. Lockpick.
Family(?) Mural. Wraps around walls. Four family members, each missing their face.
Praying Daughter (statue on Floor 1)
Belittled Father (mud pit on Floor 2)
Guarding Mother (Worn by armor on Floor 4)
Cherished Son (Guarded chest on Floor 3)
If all masks are replaced, hidden door opens to 17.
Narrow Face Column Room
Face Column. Faces decorate this column, each with pursed lips as if blowing. Locust crawl out from them.
Mud Pit. Separates 14 from 15. Vampire Eels within.
Hidden Belittled Father Mask within.
Stair & Door Room
Curling stairs down to (3) Middle Level
Anti-Locust Sigil near stair.
Stone Sentinel
Eye pedestal. Rotating eye statue, similar to Slumbering Eyes.
If broken open, Sentinel Core: grants bearer invisibility to Slumbering Eyes.
Paintings. 8 Paintings surround the pedestal. 6 paintings are entirely deteriorated. 2 surviving paintings depict Brown Lake and Fountain Shrine locations of the Petrified Forest.
Using the Eye Pedestal. If the pedestal’s eye is aimed at a surviving painting, all except the very largest Slumbering Eyes will migrate to the depicted locale.
Secret Room.
Hidden & Warded Door. Opened by completing Family Mural.
Loot: Gold “decapitated” head idol with a gold shed snake skin around it. Worth 1.5 Chests. 8 deteriorated Demiurge Drought potions (Agility (12) action roll under stress. Drink to gain a +1 to proficiency until the end of the scene. Deteriorated: 3-in-6 chance the potion’s effects are gone. Roll when you first make an attack against a hostile foe.)
Vessel Room
Stacks and shelves of vessels with no occupants.
3: Middle Level
Stairs Up
Stairs up to Upper Level.
Traveler’s Room
Traveler’s Chest: Trapped. Touching it causes it to expand until it fills the room, dealing 3d10 damage to those not wearing metal armor and 1d10 to those who are.
If they flee the room before it crushes itself, they won’t see the Three-pronged Key to room 24.
Well Room
Well that is only 1’ deep. No water
Putting water in the well causes a walking armor to shamble in to put it in a bucket. It is docile while porting water.
Evil Furniture
Room full of evil furniture.
Inert the first time the party enters here. When they leave, the furniture barricades them in.
Furniture does not harm them, but until totally broken apart it wil not stop pushing against them and mobbing them. Destroying this amount of furniture is a ton of work. Takes 1 watch and 2d6 stress dividing among the party as they see fit.
Never rests or leaves the room.
Pillar Room
6 Lunatic Bones Guards
Chest in alcove on north wall.
Loot: Cherished Son Mask, Two-pronged Key
Trapezoid Room
Small room blocked by an iron door with two key holes, which must be turned together. Could potentially pick (18) + 1 key.
Two pronged key is in chest in 23. Three pronged key is in exploding chest in 20.
4: Lower Level
Shallow water throughout this floor, but with a thick blanket of floating locusts. Loud, deep weeping, like a giant toddler’s, can be heard throughout this floor.
First Wet Room
2 Walking Armors.
One wears the Guarding Mother Mask
Locked door to 26. Requires 3 pronged key.
Second Wet Room
Anti-locust sigil near window.
Loud weeping behind door to 27.
Small window (open) into 28.
Door to 29 is locked by a flute protruding through door. Must play right note for Piper on other side to unbar the door, otherwise they call reinforcements (their piped alarm can be heard barely over locusts)
Gobbler’s Lair
Weeping gobbler is here unless already encountered.
Gobbler’s possessions: Child Size enchanted plate armor (all pieces scattered throughout), 2 large jars of locust honey (nutritious and tasty, but creates overwhelming tingling).
Playhouse built from locust wings.
Windowed Room
Only entrance is crawling through a small window.
Small case containing a False Mask (it worthless, a false mask that won’t fit the mural but looks like it would.)
Pipers’ Outskirts
Bandmaster listens for correct notes to open door, otherwise seeks reinforcements.
Pipers’ Village
2 Flute Brutes. Respond to Bandmaster’s call after 1 player spotlight.
Mouth Door to 33. Entering it is silent. Pipers can’t see it.
Pipers’ Fort
2 Flute Brutes. Respond to Bandmaster’s call after 4 player spotlights.
Pipers’ Vault
Dead Piper Father. His mask is the Sangria’s Favor: Locusts can’t help but follow the sound. Does not give the flutist command of them.
Face Column. Faces decorate this column, each with pursed lips as if blowing. Locust crawl out from them.
These faces are large enough to fit a person. Drops 30’ to (5) Deeps.
Resting Room
Silent in this room. No doubt Magic.
Large bed of feathers.
If party rests here:
They all fall into a deep slumber. 2d4 watches past unbeknownst to the party.
They wake with the sphinx surrounding them. It is mute and calm. Won’t speak even with telepathy, just stares kindly. It seems it would not be able to fit through the door.
When they leave, it blocks the door with a wing, and the door disappears.
5: Deeps
Daughter of Locusts
She sits atop an impossible mound of writhing locust.
She is humming louder than the locust.
Spending a few moments here focusing can teach you the song, you realize her song is the same song as the locusts. This teaches characters to speak with swarms (not individuals).
Killing her is easy. The locusts will stop singing, but don’t otherwise change behavior.
Climbing the mound is impossible, you just sink in and slide down. Locust grab at you, weighting you down like living velcro.