Session 11

Welcome to the Jungle
21 (evening) Kythorn - 4 Flamerule (afternoon)

The party finishes exploring the tomb, but it turns out there’s not much left to find, just a decoy sarcophagus for Brysis of Khaem. Dawnbringer begins to introduce herself to the party, particularly Nespip. She is apparently entirely unaware of anything that has happened for the past 2500 years as she was entombed sometime during the Netherese Empire. Nespip does not tell her exactly how long it’s been.

Upon leaving the tomb the Young Adventurers find that some of the drow have caught up to them. Jorlan, the drow lieutenant from Velkynvelve, has taken Eldeth, Jimjar, Stool, and Fargas captive. The Young Adventurers refuse to surrender and attack the drow along with his small group of drow warriors and quaggoth. The fight is brief as Ralkor takes out all the mooks with a fireball, a move that is becoming all too common. As Jorlan dies he warns “She’s a high priestess, you fools, give up!”

The party regroups and discusses where they are heading next. Fargas finds out that the group doesn’t actually know the way to surface, but isn’t too mad since they know the way to Blingdenstone (or at least Jimjar does). Jimjar draws a rough map in the dirt and ultimately the party decides to take Stool home first. They’re not too sure how far away the Neverlight Grove is, but Stool says it is in a different direction from Blingdenstone.

Several days pass uneventfully as the party travels through twisting caverns of various size, occasionally lit by faerzress. Stool knows the direction of Neverlight Grove but not the route so travel often requires detours and doubling back. The group is able to forage what food they need with Sebastian able to summon water if needed. It becomes clear during this travel that Dawnbringer is not willing to extinguish her light, which Kaia is not super happy about. Eventually Dawnbringer grudgingly agrees to go dark, sometimes. Probably.

Three days into the trip to Neverlight Grove the group is beset by horrible noises--slurping sounds, gibbering voices, footsteps. The party searches the darkness to no avail, the noise seems to come from the air itself. Kaia casts rope trick and the party hides briefly, but the noises continue. In a bit of a panic the party runs into the darkness. Eventually the noises fade, but Nespip can still hear them echoing in his head and starts compulsively clawing at his ears, scratching them to the point of drawing blood. Dawnbringer, however, is able to expend some of her power to settle his mind. That night they find a cavern with abundant food and water to camp in, but also find it occupied by a creature seemingly made of mud from a hot spring which ambushes them as they explore the cave. The creature is defeated and Kaia finds the corpse of its previous victim, a duergar. Ralkor is apparently just compulsively casting detect magic now, so he discovers that the dwarf’s armour is enchanted to protect against acid. During the night some orcs and an ogre pass through. They examine Ralkor’s tiny hut, obviously finding it odd, but ultimately shrug and move on.

Six more days of travel pass uneventfully before the party runs into any more trouble. Kaia, scouting ahead, triggers a shrieking fungus which was planted to warn a group of orogs camped above the cavern. The lead orog demands a toll to pass but when the group, particularly Sebastian, is reluctant to pay the orog offers a different deal--kill Nettie the Ettin, who lives in a large cavern the group just passed through. The party decides to look for Nettie but upon backtracking they are quickly confronted with a disembodied voice. The voice claims to be Nettie, the invisible ettin, and knows that the party intends to kill her. She wants the party to attack the orogs and offers a reward. The group discusses the situation with her, ultimately deciding why not? The orogs are the ones who are actually in their way after all.

Heading back to the orogs, Sebastian attempts to bluff them with a sack containing rocks saying it is Nettie’s heads. After a natural one on the deception check, combat ensues, ultimately ending with six dead orogs. Returning to talk to Nettie they first can’t find her. As they make their way through the cavern she finally speaks and more or less refuses to give them a reward. Nespip casts command, forcing her to drop her invisibility and revealing that the source of the voice is a winged quasit. (DM note: this should not have worked, command requires that you can see your target. Oops.) The quasit, who probably isn’t actually Nettie, flies off claiming she will get the reward but just hides near the ceiling. The party presses on and Nettie finally caves, throwing a staff at the party and telling them to leave. A rock crashes against the wall nearby, perhaps thrown by the real Nettie, and the party decides that maybe they will move on. As they leave they do not think to check out the orogs’ camp (just kidding. I mean, they didn’t check, but there was nothing there).

Three more days of travel brings the party to a large cavern filled with fungus which appears to be tended. Kaia, scouting ahead, sees several quaggoth and drow gardening, each covered in mold and looking basically dead. Kaia returns to the main group and Stool informs everybody that these are probably spore servants, corpses reanimated by myconid sovereigns to assist the colony. The party then tracks down the myconids overseeing the spore servants and the leader, Porto, leads them to Neverlight Grove less than a days travel further on. Porto mentions that the party has arrived at a good time as the Day of Joy is near. Stool has no idea what he is talking about.

Finally, the party arrives at Neverlight Grove and is brought before the Sovereigns, Basidia and Phylo. Phylo acts strange, talking about the Day of Joy and the Great Seeder. Phylo invites the party to stay as long as they like. Basidia offers to escort the party around and introduce them to the circle leaders. Away from Phylo, Basidia confides in the party that they are concerned about Phylo and have no idea what the other sovereign is talking about. They ask the party to explore the Garden of Welcome on the upper plateau to see what is going on, preferably without Phylo being with them. Basidia also reveals that a group of drow visited a couple days ago and may not have left.

The first circle leader they meet is Loobamub, the leader of the Circle of Hunters. Loobamub tells the Young Adventurers that some animated pile of fungus has been causing problems on the west side of the grove and another creature they don’t know the identity of is scavenging in the area as well. Loobamub asks that the party kill the creatures and bring the corpse of the monster to Basidia to be reanimated. Loobamub knows nothing of the Day of Joy and is disquieted by Phylo’s strange behaviour like Basidia.

The party then meets Gasbide, the leader of the Circle of Builders. Gasbide acts strangely, asking about surface buildings and how they’re built. Stool and Basidia both find Gasbide’s behaviour out of character for a myconid.

We leave our party there for now in the questionable safety of Neverlight Grove.