2 Nightal 1490

Session 4 (Feb 23, 2025) - Level 2
Sidequest
The Fearsome Five meet up with Taffy and Regi to investigate a new cave that appeared after a landslide.

Session 4 Recap

This session had Logan running Haesten and Sir Chetwynd and David running Adar and Enthir.

We started our day in the Tavern, we are served by Toblin Stonehill the Human proprietor of Stonehill Inn. He mentions that our companion Greg got up early and headed out with his things. He left us a note that said “I have stuff i need to do, see you guys later”. We find out later that he has left us with all the gold and potions he has collected since meeting us. This works out to 1 health potion from session 2 which Haesten is going to hold on to and 130 gold from session 3 which Adar is currently holding for Greg. We can divide up between the remaining party members. 32 gold and 50 copper per person (add this to your character sheet)

We ask about the miner we saw last night, his name is Linar and we are told he was gossiping about seeing Orc raiders on the east end of the Triboar trail. Toblin says the town master should know more.
We ask about the town master, his name is Harbin Westin who is a fat fancy guy that rubs people the wrong way. Although he was elected to his position. He doesn’t seem to think the Redbrands are a problem…

Suddenly, Linny Greywind who we met yesterday and remember to be the proprietor of LionShield Costers, comes rushing into the Tavern looking distressed. She looks around and sees us sitting at the table and comes right over. She mentions that earlier in the day a creek south of town suddenly turned grey. She had sent a couple of scouts to investigate and they came back with news that a huge mud slide was observed and that it appears to have exposed a cave to the underground. She offers us 25 gold each to explore the cave and report back on what we find. We accept and are then introduced to our companions for this outing. Reginald, a large black elf with cool dreadlocks held together with gold bands, he appears to be a fighter and Taffy, an albino Tiefling Paladin with paper white hair and skin and pink eyes. These two characters are run by Michaela.

We check that we have lots of rope then head out, following the muddy stream upstream until we catch sight of a large hill that looks to have one entire side scalped right off, with dirt, mud and trees collected at the base of the hill, creating a smaller adjacent hill. We climb over this smaller hill and then tie a rope off at its peak to use to rappel down the other side that is steep and full of trees, rocks and other rough terrain. We all get down easily except for Taffy who gets her foot stuck losing a boot and falling but not before Reginald can grab her and roll to the bottom of the hill and through the door saving her from taking any damage. Adar grabs her boot as he passes it and gives it back to her. We are at the entrance to the cave and find it looks peculiarly man made. The cave is dark and smells like dank, mossy wet earth. Most of us have darkvision, however Sir Chetwyn lights a torch as he does not. We check for some Indiana Jones shenanigans and find none before proceeding down what appears to be wet mossy stone steps. We descend down Into the earth and eventually come to a large stone room that has a large door at the far end and stone columns flanking the door.

This space is clearly man made. We look around and see one wall has a large mural. It seems to tell a story. It starts with a twist of branches and leaves that looks to be a physical manifestation of the face of Silvanus. Little bit of theology, Silvanus is the god that many druids align most with (including our friend Haesten). He is known as the oak father or the Forest Father and is the eternal guardian of the forest. He is the god of all wild and untamed nature throughout Faerûn. His face appears to be smiling down on a lush forest and all its creatures with the utmost care. As we move down, we see this scene again. But this time the creatures look distressed and the plants unhealthy and Silvanus seems to be pulling away, giving less of his focus. The final scene shows the same creatures dead surrounded by humanoid figures and has Silvanus completely pulled away. It seams to depict the inability of humans to live in harmony with nature and how as a result the magic Silvanus brought to the world had somehow been rejected or withheld.

Sir Chetwyn decides to look for a torch and after some looking around we find a hole in the wall that seems to contain an oily liquid which branches out away from the hole. He drives his torch in and finds that veins of light ignite throughout the cavern completely illuminating it. We notice an intricate carpet running down the center of the room towards the door but we also notice the mural has changed, now instead of a scene that gets darker as it progresses, we see that the animals just look older in the second scene and in the final we see the humanoids are hunters that appear to be living in harmony with nature. Silvanus is smiling down in all of them. Haesten gives a prayer to Silvanus recognizing the cycle of life and death and the easy found within it. The air seems to feel fresher…

We notice a smaller door off to the side and hear shuffling on the other side. Taffy knocks on it, “Hello, is anyon…” the door explodes out revealing two Ghouls. We quickly take care of one but the second deals some serious damage to Haesten. Suddenly two more come in through the main doors. 1 fucks up Adar and the other one paralyzes Regi. Haesten wild shapes into a giant frog 🐸. We eventually kill all of the ghouls with Sir Chetwynd dealing the final blow with a Nat 20 longbow shot that deals ridiculous damage. There is no loot in the room the first 2 came from or on any bodies. Haesten eats one… its gross..

We go through the doors and descend down more steps. We enter a room full of bones and the skeleton of a giant spider. Haesten eats the spider and after looking around, nothing happens and we decide to proceed to the door at the end. (Pretty sure Mack had something planned here but felt bad for us after getting our asses kicked by his initial minions).

We enter the final room and see that there is a sarcophagus in the center of the room and to the left and right, we see two coffins on each side of the room as well as many more tucked away on shelves carved into the walls. We also see two small glowing orbs, one on each side of the room, next to the coffins. At the far end of the room there is a pedestal with a large glowing orb in the center of a circle drawn in the ground. Standing over the orb is a hooded creature that is not moving.

We start looking around since it appears this creature is either not aware of us or cannot do anything if he was aware. Eventually Haesten (still in giant frog form) uses his nose to peak into one of the coffins. Suddenly a skeleton animates within each coffin and gets out to attack us. (I took less notes at this point and just played DnD).

We are up against 4 skeletons now but the figure hovering over the orb still doesn’t move. We see a stream of energy from the larger orb to each small orb and then from the orbs going towards the skeletons. Haesten Tries to eat an orb but doesn’t chew, swallowing it hole. The energy seems to be streaming out through his stomach, changing nothing. We eventually take Down a couple skeletons but at the top of each round, any down skeletons get reanimated by the orbs.

We eventually destroy an orb and notice the hooded figure starts looking around. We also notice the skeletons in that side are not being reanimated. We finally destroy the second orb but this time hooded dude (turns out to be a ghast) is free and begins to attack us. After a long and grueling battle, Enthir gets the killing blow on the Ghast using hunters mark he shoots an arrow through its neck, severing it’s spinal cord and it’s head rolls off of its shoulders onto the ground.

Suddenly the sarcophagus in the middle of the room crumbles revealing a brown bag. Haesten opens it up, it’s empty, he reaches inside and sees his arm extend out into eternity but feels nothing. He turns it upside down and some shit falls out. 68 gold and 252 copper as well as some really nice elvan boots.

• That is 17 gold and 63 copper each (sorry Mack, had to adjust to make it divisible by 4).
  Adar tries them in and finds his footsteps make no sound, he will be very good at sneaking if he wears these. They are “The boots of Elven Kind“.
  As for the bag, it turns out this is a bag of holding. It can hold a lot of shit and not get heavy. It’s inside is actually an extradimensional plane that exists to contain our crap.

We notice the large orb shrinks down to a bowling ball size and seems to have swirling clouds inside. Haesten casts a healing spell into it and it appears to simply absorb the spell doing nothing. We put it in our bag of holding and plan to ask someone we trust about what it could be.

The end!