Session 6 Recap

**Hardholme Game 6, 3/23/2018**

In attendance: Chris (as Chris lol), Lauren (Aurelae), Caspar (Aequitas), Tim (Fitz), Rick (Rael), Elaine (Fallynde), and Luther (Buckler).

**Journey to the East Temple on the Mount by the Forest**

It is the beginning of the 6th month of the 71st arrival in Hardholme.

* The entire group heads to Old World Arms…except that Rael decides to stay outside for some unexplained reason…
	+ Aequitus had a nice cowl made from a Battdusa hide.
	+ Right as things are wrapping up, Fallynde info-bombs Graeme with a very heavily loaded very-fast-spoken-piece-of-serious-information, “Oh! Hey! About the explosion: it was an attack on the Prime, they’ll probably try to do it again to the 73rd, and it was probably Dar? OKAY BYE!” Then she dashes out the door before he can say anything in reply.
	+ Graeme appears very very perplexed.
	+ The rest of the group finishes getting supplies for their journey and etc.
* Next, they all head to visit Vash at the building site for the palisades, where he is basically head foreman and overseer of the project.
	+ Rael offers Vash a vat of coffee, and in classic Vash fashion he gratefully accepts it, downs it in one go, and then tosses the vat over the wall without a second thought. Rael sighs and mumbles under his breath, “Great, that’s gonna come outta my paycheck…”
	+ Fitz takes the opportunity to cross another apology off his long list of people he may or may not have bumped into and offended during his time in Hardholme.
		- Vash replies, “WHA? YER THE SIZE O ME THUMB! WOULD NEVER NOTICE!”
	+ More Vash talk about “THOSE THUMBY BASTARDS” basically meaning Vera et al.
		- #heartVash #Vash4EVAR #Vash4President2020
		- Vash hugs practically EVERYONE present.
		- #frogbabies lol

### Day 1:

* The group strikes out East. They try to follow a similar path as they did last time they went through this way.
* It begins to rain pretty hard. The rain shows no signs of letting up.
* They make shelter underneath a large daemonwhite tree.
	+ Wngas appear during the night! Buuuuuttt Rael and Fallynde are talking and…they are TALKING and the Wngas never even appear on their radar because they run away.

### Day 2:

* They seem to be much further South than they were during the last journey East. It is much less hilly than when they were just North of here.
* Still raining, but a bit lighter.
* They make camp, Wngas appear, but remain elusive.

### Day 3:

* Great plains, green waves of grain. They march onwards steadily. Then…the ground begins to shake. The tremors increase in intensity, but seem to be localized.
* Then, just to the South of the group, a MASSIVE, gargantuan, nasty looking, green, scaly worm monster pops out of the ground!!! It flails back and forth and roars. #Quakesnake
	+ The group (mostly Aurelae) considers running away, but then Aequitus hits it with a Scorching Ray and BOOM! (A record 40 damage!)
	+ The Quakesnake dives for Fallynde and attempts to swallow her whole, but thankfully narrowly misses. It still does 32 DAMAGE. On a MISS.
	+ Buckler smites it for 30 damage! They are hitting it HARD and it is not even phased.
	+ Aurelae sees how hurt Fallynde is and throws her the bag of Goodberries she has and yells, “RUN AWAY!!!” And she and Sephra start running.
		- The others follow in suit.
		- As they run, the Quakesnake goes for Buckler, and hits him “only” once for 26 damage.
	+ They split up and RUN. They don’t get far before they feel the ground begin to shake again. The Quakesnake pops up right behind Rael.
* MORE RUNNING.
	+ After about 20-30 minutes of running, the tremors begin to subside a bit. They decide they should keep going until they reach the hills to the north, just to be safe. This takes nearly til morning, and they are exhausted (level 1).
		- They stop to take a full, long rest before going any further.

### Day 4:

* The terrain is hilly, and they can see the Golden Peaks off to the East.

### Day 5 & 6:

* Similar to Day 4. It finally stops raining. They spot Battdusa hives and Striders along the way.

### Day 7:

* They reach the point where the mountains meet the forest valley. They are a bit father east than they were last time though, so a choice comes into play: do they go slightly north west through the forest and risk dealing with the Cannitaurs, or do they avoid that super uncomfortable group of supernatural beings and risk the unknown terrain of the mountains to the East?
	+ They choose the forest, and make their way to that.
	+ The forest is a bit different than last time. Fewer daemonwhites, more firebirches. No sign of the Cannitaurs at first. Very quiet, very peaceful. But, after a little while, the Cannitaurs appear. Same as last time.
* Aurelae makes nice with them, just like last time. “We are friends,” and all that.
	+ #FitzIsGreatEchoedSixTimes
* They continue forward at Aurelae’s lead, trying their best to ignore their very creepy companions.
* They make camp in the woods. With the Cannitaurs in tow. The forest is quiet. Chillingly quiet. But all is well…

### Day 8:

* More forest. Fitz gets bored and starts a conga line. The Cannitaurs imitate him and it is hilarious.
* After a bit they can see the temple up above them. They get to the forest tree line and Aurelae thinks it is a good idea to say goodbye to the Cannitaurs, “Well, we must go now friends. It has been good to see you again…” They do their creepy imitating thing, but do not follow the group past the tree line.
* Aurelae walks up the mountain a bit, hammering in the climbing spikes and threading the line for the others. It’s a good team effort climb, Aurelae leads and Fallynde holds the end of the line and keeps it steady. It’s Rael’s first time climbing anything in \*actual\* nature, so he is pretty nervous but does fine.
* They make it to the first landing, and where there usually is a large entrance, there are just lots of large rocks caved down on where the entrance should be. They recall from the other temples that there should be another entrance higher up, and decide to just keep climbing.
* The second entrance is not caved in like the first one, but it is in clear disrepair. Aside from that, the layout is identical to the other temples. There’s a wolf-dragon statue at the back wall…but it is crumbling. There are four braziers in each corner…but all but one are falling apart, and the large round door in the center of the floor is open, but looks like it is propped open with more large rocks. Cobwebs and dust cover everything. The door and stairs look passable though, so they make their way down the stairs in the center round door.
* Again, this room is similar to the others at the other temples. The Southern part of the wall is completely crumbled in. In the North wall there is a door with a pillar next to it with a red square key already in it!
* They walk through the open red square door. Immediately they can hear a faint humming sound. Can’t tell if it is mechanical or organic at this point.
	+ Upon closer listening it sounds…like…breathing???
* There is a door at the end of the hall. Buckler opens it.
	+ Inside is a room with two tables filled with chemistry and sciency things, and above the table on the South wall are two large copper pipes coming through with levers.
	+ Fitz. Is. In. Heaven. He begins grabbing everything he can and shoving it into the Bag of Holding. Fallynde and Aurelae talk him into not grabbing everything just yet, as there are not-so-old foot prints in the dust here. They agree that he can take everything on the way out, but it might be better to not alert anyone here to their presence just yet.
* With each room they go through the ambient breathing sound grows louder. It seems to be coming from…everywhere??? Oh and also they can no longer ignore the growing stench of rotting flesh…
* Aurelae opens the Southwest door and finds stairs going down.
	+ They follow them and end up in a large round room with a very peculiar looking shallow pool of yellow liquid. Ew.
	+ Fitz immediately runs up to the pool to collect some of the yellow liquid in one of his new beakers aaaaannnddd a tentacle rises from the pool and swipes at him. #pissmonster #Slurmtentacle
	+ They attack, Fallynde chops off the tip (just the tip lol) and Buckler chops it off at the base and it falls dead.
* Fitz then dips his beaker into the pool to get some of the liquid, and as he does so his hand touches the liquid…immediately his ears quadruple in size. Fitz does not seem phased by this development, and actually seems to kinda like the change.
* Fitz spots something shiny in the middle of the pool, and he and Aequitus devise a way to fish it out without touching the liquid. They find:
	+ An amulet of Firm Shape (prevents polymorphing) – Fitz takes this
	+ 1,600g (gems worth 600 but converted to gold)
* Above the pool is a large copper tube…
* They move forward into the adjacent hallway to the North.
* The hallway opens up to a big room with two 20 feet tall terraces on the North and East walls. The terrace to the East is bigger. There are twelve pipes coming up from the floor at regular intervals. They look like they might be for venting, maybe.
* The group argues about what is the best way to climb up the tall terraces, and Aurelae simply walks up with her spider shoes (everyone seems to forget she has them lol).
	+ The East terrace has a desk with all sorts of equipment on it. This entire dungeon is Christmas morning for Fitz. She throws a rope down for Fitz so he can grab all the stuff on the desk there. There is a hallway making a T going from this terrace. Aurelae tells the others she’ll be right back and explores down the hallway. To the right, she can tell that door leads back to a room they were in earlier. To the left, there is a closed door with an eerie, faint blue glow coming from it, and she can hear a being muttering something, almost talking to itself. She listens, but cannot determine the language; she actually isn’t sure that it IS a language at all. She goes back down the hallway and checks out the North terrace.
	+ The North terrace has a hallway opening up from it with an eerie, faint blue glow coming from the door at the end of the hallway.
	+ The group decides to first go to the room to the North. Aurelae lets a rope down and they all climb up and head to the door at the end of the hallway. This room is filled with cage after cage of very WEIRD animals. Buckler points out that all the animals they’ve seen here in Hardholme have been strange and new, but this is a whole new level of messed up hybrid creatures. They are all very aggressive, making angry sounds and jumping in their cages – the ones that are alive, anyway. Many of the animals are just dead, and they all seem very neglected. Aurelae tries to talk to a few of them, but their minds are too far gone and they have no speech. It is a really sad thing. They decide to put these hybrid creatures out of their misery before going forward, thinking that is the best way to end their pain and suffering. Sad times for the 71st.
* Through the door to the Southeast is the same eerie blue glow, and they can hear muttering. Rael opens the door and they see a really fucked up operating room with four large, humanoid hybrid experimental creatures on beds, unconscious, and a 15-foot-tall purple, Quasimodo type creature that looks Shar’Gorath but more messed up. It has a snake arm, a blue hyla leg, and other disfigurements.
	+ Rael says nothing, just turns back to Aurelae with a look of pure horror on his face and she is echoing his look of horror. Without missing a beat, Rael casts Bane on the large creature and the battle begins.
	+ Aurelae doesn’t hesitate and shoots the beast. Aequitus fire blasts him for a massive 42 damage. Fitz throws his beaker of yellow liquid at the dude and he turns green. Fitz shoots his cannon for a hefty 27 damage. Rael casts vicious mockery, “Fuck you and your creepy little baby head!” Buckler and Fally get some hits in as well.
	+ After ALL of this, the big creature finally, slowly turns around and notices us. Then, all four “patients” in the beds sit up at once and begin to get to their feet, their eyes vacant and dull.
	+ The group just keeps wailing away at the big guy, ending with an epic hit of 36 damage from Fallynde and he goes down.
	+ Buckler takes one of the zombie creatures out in one hit. Aurelae shoots another square in the head and BAM! It is dead. (17 damage) #DarylTWD
	+ The other two are easily taken down as well.
	+ Fitz gets even MORE awesome equipment. There are four test tubes with red, blue, yellow, and black liquid in them. Fitz takes EVERYTHING.
	+ Rael finds some books and notes and tucks them away in his bag.
* There is one door in this room leading to the East. They enter and the ceiling, walls, floor, every single surface is completely covered in this gross living, breathing, growing fleshcreep. It has taken over the entire room and has begun distorting it. The stench and humming is louder and stronger and coming from everywhere. There are copper tubes going INTO it (whatever “it” is). In the middle of the “room” is a big black hole (also covered with fleshcreep) with stairs going into it.
* The 71st are talking about how messed up this is when they spot two figures in the back of the “room” and the taller one says, “You speak common??? Oh dear gods you speak common! Who are you? Can you get us out of here???” They are both very frightened and are so relieved to see other people who aren’t mad, vacant hybrid creatures. However, these two have clearly also been experimented on, but not to the extent to which they lost their minds. They are definitely hybrid creatures now.
* They talk to the group for a few minutes and they learn that they are Maurice and his daughter Sophia (Voidborn). They are from the 61st voyage that was marked as “lost” in the Town Hall records. They have been here for 10 years. They beg to be taken out of here, and of course the 71st agrees to take them with them. Fallynde takes the lead here and tells them all about Hardholme and how they also rescued Liblub and are helping integrate him into society as well, so they have a home and friends and can transition to a normal life.
* They all GTFO the creepy flesh covered room, and Fitz makes sure to pick up any sciency items he missed on the way here. He pulls the levers they saw in an earlier room, and one has red liquid and the other has blue. He takes two vials of each.
* Aequitus takes the Red Cube Key when they leave.
* They make their way out of the temple and down the mountain, and at the base of the mountain they grow too curious about this bag of beans they found inside the temple and plant one. A literal pyramid (like the ones in Egypt) springs up where they planted it. Ta-da! New dungeon for another campaign! They label the beans dangerous and treat them with care.