Kay’s Journal – 3/4/2022
Gooseneck has been sleeping it off on the ship, right up until the rolled the ship up on to its side for repairs. He leaves the ship, looks around, and spots Cook roasting a pig. He also learns that the rest of us have gone off with Morgot. He sneaks a piece of the pig and follows after us. He does get spotted taking the bit of pig, but the crew who spotted him aren’t talking – so far. They do look maybe a little jealous. There might be some payback later.
In the meantime, we are faced with a five-headed hydra. Abran casts a wind spell at it and retreats to a position that’s saf – er, better for bow shots. He shoots at it, hits. Fathom waits for people to clear away from the hydra before casting her fireball. Pujol shepherds Morgot farther away and casts a wall of thorns around the hydra. That seems to hurt it as it gets blood on the vines – but CornCob notices that its blood it damaging the vines in return. Oh good. Acid blood.
CornCob moves away from it and casts a blast at it, which hurts it some. That clears the space so Fathom can cast her fireball.
The hydra pushes its way through the wall of thorns, heading after CornCob and Pujol. I duck behind some cover and shoot at the hydra.
Abran throws a fireball from his necklace at it, which hurts it some more. Gooseneck is close enough to hear the fireball go off. He rushes in and smacks it with his axe. Fathom casts another spell at it, does some more damage. Pujol keeps ushering Morgot away, and shoots the hydra with his crossbow. CornCob is right in front of the hydra and casts a bolt at it, and also summons his magic weapon.
The hydra attacks CornCob and Gooseneck – one head at each of them. It misses CornCob, but hits Gooseneck. One of its heads, which had been ‘killed’, grows into two living heads. I fire one last arrow at it, and it falls dead at CornCob and Gooseneck’s feet. CornCob, Gooseneck, and Fathom continue to beat on it until they are sure it’d dead. It doesn’t seem to be regrowing anything, so we’re feeling pretty confident that it’s dead for good.
Abran looks down the hole that the hydra came out of. It’s dark, but he sees a stairwell about 10 feet down. He jumps down the hole. Gooseneck and CornCob follow. Morgot doesn’t want to, but since we’re all going to go, his options are to go with us, or stay up here alone. He decides to go. Pujol hangs a rope down so they can climb back out. Fathom looks down, and with her dark vision sees Abran, Gooseneck, and CornCob, and the stairs. We all end up going down the hole.
This is a bad idea.
We end up 30 or 40 feet underground. Morgot thinks we’re actually under the water table. CornCob sees some moisture on some of the stones; one wall in particular is ‘extra wet’. It’s murky, and there’s some rotting vegetation and a smell of salt water. CornCob sees salt built up on one of the walls.
Abran doesn’t see any sign that the hydra was living down here; most likely it was summoned. He finds a spot where minerals have built up to create a wall across what had been an opening into another area. I look at it with the goggles. The opening and the mineral barrier don’t appear to be magic, but there’s a spot a little father down the wall that is magical. There’s also more elven writing. We do as we did before – I copy it down, and Abran reads what I’m copying.
We notice that Morgot has some glasses which are generating just enough light for him to sketch by. That’s handy!
Abran reads the elvish script – ‘your trial awaits along the path forward’. He thinks this might be some kind of proving ground. The hydra was the first trial, and more await us along the way. He thinks the rest of the trials might also summon creatures; he also thinks that at the end, there might be a family or clan weapon or other item. This is something an elf of a warrior caste would be familiar with.
Gooseneck swings at the mineral wall with his stone-breaking axe. He hits it hard, and it shatters, revealing a passage behind it. A gust of cold wind blows out from the passage.
Abran casts dark vision on Gooseneck so we can move forward without having to light a lamp. We head down the passage and come to a wall of ice blocking the path. It feels like there’s an expansive cave on the other side. I look with the goggles, and see a rune inscribed on the other side. It looks like a conjuration rune that would summon something when we go through the wall.
CornCob and Gooseneck start breaking down the ice wall. After they spend half an hour or so chipping at it, Fathom steps in to bring in some fire and hurry the process along. After a little while longer, we get through the wall and go in to the next chamber. It’s quite cold. Most of the cavern is taken up by a pool of water. There’s frost on the walls and ice around the edges of the pool of water.
We’re pretty sure we triggered the rune, but nothing appears to have showed up yet. Unless, of course, it’s in the water. I fire up the goggles and look at the pool, and sure enough I see some motion under the water. Gooseneck throws a bit of leftover roast pig into the pool. A large remorhaz surfaces. Ah, there it is.
I shoot at it, miss. Pujol pulls Morgot away from it again, and shoots at it with his crossbow. Abran backs up and shoots it. CornCob casts a blast at it, and hurts it. He casts a shield on Fathom and Gooseneck. Gooseneck rages and swings at the creature. He hits it, but gets sprayed with its fiery blood in return and is hurt himself.
Fathom knows that neither fire nor ice will hurt it, so she hits it with a bolt of magic. It tries to grab CornCob and swallow him. It is successful at the first part, grabbing CornCob in its mouth. I shoot at it but miss, and Pujol starts using his harp to heal CornCob. Abran shoots it again. CornCob banishes it – it’s gone for 60 seconds, so that’s how long we have to prepare.
We regroup, and set up to unload on it when it reappears. This works, and as soon as it reappears we all attack it. It’s not enough to take the thing down, though. CornCob summons the water elemental from the stone. We all keep attacking it. It grabs Abran in his mouth. Abran stabs it with a dagger, and that is enough. It dies, and as it falls to the ground, it disappears. All that hits the ground is a velvety, sky blue cloak.
The cavern warms up from ‘cold’ to ‘chilly’. Abran takes a look at the cloak and sees elven runes on it. It gives him a very comfy feeling, like it would warm him. He puts it on. It’s going to take a while for him to figure out what exactly it’s going, but he feels destined to wear it.
We head back up.
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