Session 19

## You Have Selected Regicide

29 Flamerule(afternoon) - 3 Eleasis (late morning)

We pickup immediately where we left off; the party just killed a behir and now finds themselves cornered by Ilvara and her crew. Sebastian is still a giant ape. Let the battle begin!

The fight begins with someone (it was Shoor) parking a darkness spell over the entrance then sending in some disposable summoned spiders and disposable real quaggoth. A yochlol (in the form of a giant black widow spider) came next and the drow followed after--four regular drow troops, Shoor, and Ilvara. The yochlol attempted dominate person on Nespip, which obviously failed. Ilvara filled the cave with an insect plague. The Young Adventurers carved up the peons but were having difficulty getting to Ilvara and the yochlol, the two most dangerous enemies, especially after the yochlol was able to web Kaia, Nespip, and Sebastian inside the insect plague. Ilvara, in fact, just straight up leaves, making it super hard to hit her or break her concentration on the insect plague.

The fight takes a turn in favour of the Young Adventurers when the insects suddenly disappear, accompanied by the sound of an explosion outside the cave. Shortly thereafter Ilvara returns to the cave and Nespip makes a great play, using his boots of speed to close the distance and dodge reaction attacks, then strikes what should be a monster blow on Ilvara, burning a second level slot on a divine smite. He then rolls an 8 on 4d8 for damage, so that sucked. Ilvara, at this point just barely alive, says through bloody gritted teeth “You belong to House Mizzrym, you will always belong to House Mizz-” when a huge rock thrown by giant ape Sebastian turns her to paste.

The rest of the fight is mop up. The yochlol lasts the longest, and lands some hefty hits with her poison blows, but ultimately the demon has no chance. After the fight the party begins to explore the cavern when Drethis’ imp appears and speaks in her voice, saying that she saved them all by attacking Ilvara with a fireball, and they should have listened to her instead of going out and getting themselves almost killed. Sebastian, for some reason, agrees that the party will go with Drethis after returning to Blingdenstone to pick up Eldeth and Fargus. Drethis is satisfied and says she will meet them near Blingdenstone.

Exploring Entemoch’s Boon doesn’t uncover much. Ilvara’s tentacle rod is the only thing of value the attackers have. There is a circle of runes drawn on the ground that Ralkor thinks improves conjuration magic in some way. Finally Ralkor finds a nest with three eggs that he assumes are Behir eggs. He and Kaia each take one and Ralkor smashes the third one (without looking inside of it).

The Young Adventurers return to Blingdenstone, starting out immediately after a short rest. The two day journey passes uneventfully. Fun fact: the second day of travel falls on the holiday of Midsummer, which I guess the gnomes of Blingdenstone don’t celebrate since I made no mention of it at the time. Back near the city the party runs into Drethis, who tries to get a firm commitment from them with no success. She warns them that the Diggermattocks will convince them to join in on this bullshit attack on the Pudding King and the party basically just shrugs and says yeah, we’re probably going to do that. Drethis angrily stomps off.

The party returns to the Diggermattocks’ Hall and reports on finding Entemoch’s Boon. Gurnik Tapfinger reports that the Stonehearth Enclave will be prepared for battle in three days time. The Young Adventurers spend the three days not doing a whole lot, just sort of chilling at the inn. They do return to the magic shop but don’t buy anything. Ralkor also discovers that what they thought were behir eggs are actually basilisk eggs, according to Eldeth. Kaia decides to smash her egg but Ralkor keeps his.

After the three day wait the Battle for Blingdenstone begins. The gnomes, along with their elemental and wererat allies, attack from the Rockblight while the Young Adventurers sneak around the back and try to fight the Pudding King alone. The plan more-or-less works; the majority of the oozes are drawn away and the party is able to find the king with only his closest followers, Princess Ebonmire and Prince Livid(both oozes, to be clear).

The party attacks, discovering that the Pudding King’s throne and dais are actually a giant gray ooze with a stone-like appearance. Several more oozes attack from nearby as well, making the fight less one sided. Fargus comes very close to being killed during the ensuing fight but the rest of the Young Adventurers ultimately defeat the king and his court. They find the bleached white bones belonging to the svirfneblin who became the Pudding King inside the ooze making up the throne. Ralkor also finds two spellbooks inside the remains of Princess Ebonmire, but nothing else of value is found in the room.

We leave our heroes here, waiting to see if the Diggermattocks will actually follow through on their promise and provide an escort to the surface.