Session 62 & 63: The Gang Beats Meat

Elsewhere, Nan concludes that the wound in Bormarech’s chest is completely sealed, though Dinoksu'um’s prayers still echo through the room. She sends her dragon to the others to report this. They leave the coyote to his business while they track back to regroup with her. In the corpse-littered encampment, Mendu collects some more badges off the tabaxi corpses. With his divine senses, Grombrin notices that one of them is undead, so Cho chops it with his glaive. The skeleton leaps to its feet and emits a necromantic blast, animating the other corpses.

Cho immediately tackles the mage while Arran stabs it with his rapier. Two undead dragonborn pummel Cho with rusted weapons while Arran wards off a third with his arcane shield. Vojta tries to heal Cho, but the mage counterspells it before teleporting away. Three tabaxi skeletons surround Grombrin and Vojta, but Grombrin smashes one to bits with his hammer, while Vojta turns into an air elemental and smashes another with his wing. A dragonborn attacks Vojta to little effect, while the other two pummel Arran and Cho. Cho is badly injured but grits through and cleaves the final tabaxi skeleton in half. Vojta batters one of the dragonborn with his beak, allowing Grombrin to smash it into pieces with a divine smite.

Mendu shoots crossbow bolts and one of the remaining dragonborn, prompting it to chase him, while Arran injures the other with his rapier, allowing Cho to chop it in half. The necromancer reappears through the doorway and shoots arcane bolts and Arran and Cho, but they narrowly avoid. In return, Arran destroys the injured mage with magic missiles. Vojta engulfs Mendu’s attacker in a whirlwind and tears its body apart, but it reassembles into a twisted form. Before it can recover, Grombrin smashes the final undead to pieces. At that moment, Nan runs in to see the aftermath. Cho is vomiting blood, so Grombrin heals him.

Mendu vouches that he was just performing death rites and didn’t think the necromancer was undead. They take his word for it and rest for a short time. There is another door here, behind which Arran hears a sound like someone moving through mud. They leave that be for now and return to Bormarech’s throne, where the mist is completely gone. The room is still filled with ambient whispers, which Vojta recognises as druidic, a chant to soothe the violent spirits. They contemplate taking the axe for themselves, but Vojta says they shouldn’t try to take it as long as the whispers remain.

The coyote arrives and asks what happened, so they explain the situation. He gives them a sending stone with three uses to contact them if they find more information. He also informs them that he will return the giant demon to its home plane if they don’t, to which they agree. The coyote leaves while the group returns to the encampment. They open the door with the mud sounds and find a room full of rancid, amorphous meat. Suspicious, he chops the meat and finds corpses hidden inside. He suggests burning it, so Grombrin breathes fire on it.

This causes an undead to leap out, screaming and clawing. Four more crawl out of the meat, including an undead elf. The elf bites Cho, injecting a mind-clouding venom, while two others pile onto him with their claws. The final undead attacks Arran but is dodged. Vojta summons a wave of water that staggers three of the undead, while Nan sends a message to the coyote, warning of this danger. Cho chops at the elf while Mendu shoots crossbow bolts at the other undead. He accidentally hits Grombrin twice due to the close quarters, but the bolts bounce off his armour. He warns to take out the elf, who is the most dangerous, so Nan blows a hole into its body with her eldritch blast.

Arran casts a quickening spell on Cho, but before he can benefit from it, one of the undead paralyses him with its venomous claws. Two others take deep bites out of him while he is defenceless. Grombrin crushes one of the undead with his hammer, but the elf promptly reanimates it. Grombrin then points at Arran’s rapier, engulfing the blade in holy fire, and Arran stabs the elf with several rapid thrusts, making it explode into flame. Nan shoots down one of the lesser undead, while Vojta bowls over the remaining three with another wave of water. Cho finally shakes off the paralysis and decapitates two of the undead, while Grombrin smashes the remaining one.

The coyote arrives and is surprised that there were undead inside the meat, since it seemed inert to him. Vojta mentions that these monsters are sometimes found in the Varian highlands as a leftover from Var’s war. They are usually created by elven necromancers to spawn ghouls, and the dwarves work to exterminate them. The coyote says that divine fire should safely cleanse what is left, so Grombrin reduces it to ash with his fire breath. Meanwhile, Arran takes a badge off the undead elf. Mendu explains that the elf was made a commander in the tabaxi army, though Mendu personally didn’t like that. He asks for the badge, but Arran says he will give it when they leave the dungeon.

Vojta heals Cho while Arran opens the next door. The hallway beyond has an undisguised beartrap, which Grombrin dismantles. The next room has Abyssal writing on the wall, which Mendu translates as “unconquered ground”, a message left by his allies. There are two more doors, one of which is a secret stone door leading back to the demonic portal. Grombrin smashes through it, which reveals a small hidden tunnel connected to it. The skeleton of an ancient dragonborn is squeezed in there, clutching a scroll that depicts a map of the dungeon, along with its hidden rooms. Nan listens at the other door and hears bipedal movement and the sound of glass.