Episode 75: Can we do it?

## Plot

Sarrek takes stock of the cavern,with more Zombies forming as the battle continues while his friends surround
Ursa. Not seeing any hope in dealing with the small hoard, Sarrek focus fires on the Death Druid, dealing a significant barrage but the cold has no effect this time. Flanked by the group and looking worse for wear Ursa concentrates on Kairos sensing how close he is to death and attacks but his shield just parries the blow, and angered she fires a necrotic lance at Sarrek in response for his own attack. The Zombies nearest to Ursa attack Aya, Kairos and Enkara-saurus, biting the spell caster and causing Enkara to drop her dinosaur form. Not
giving up Enkara uses a Moon Shard on Kairos to heal him before Wild shaping once more into an Alosaurus and biting Ursa.

            Buoyed by the healing power of the moon shard Kairos continues harrying Ursa with his spear attacks, causing her to disengage and move into position to cast a spell. Black tentacles erupt from among Aya, Kairos and Enkara that injure and bind Enkara and Aya in place. With her increased strength she breaks one of the tentacles but more come to keep her restrained and prevent her from threatening Ursa. Seeing his friends in trouble and the Zombies near him slowly shambling over to him, Sarrek moves to take a shot on Ursa but the tentacles smash his arrow out the air. Free to attack Enkara, Ursa does so slashing her deeply before firing another Necrotic Lance at Sarrek, but his fast reactions save him from a direct hit. The tentacles grip on Enkara destroys her wild shape but doing so frees her from their grip. With three Zombies now around Kairos, they team up to bite him as another three go after Aya, but her entropic ward keeps them at bay. Sarrek finds himself also swarmed by the undead as Enkara now free uses her Staff of the Adder against Ursa; the poison in the weapon breaking
Ursa concentration on her spell as the tentacles vanish.

            Keeping up her momentum Enkara wild shapes, one last time and bites into Ursa who let’s out a roar that summons more zombies to the fight. Kairos freed, immediately heads toward Ursa easily parrying the bites of zombies and deals a critical strike to the death druid. However, Ursa’s next Necrotic Lance hits all of the group including some of the zombies in the way. Aya’s responds with a Hellish Rebuke and uses her shard of fury, moving ahead before throwing her Shadow Blade, drawing it back to her hand before throwing it again, gravely injuring Ursa. Disengaging with the five zombies around him, Sarrek finds another angle to attack but the arrow is caught in the aura of blood chips around her and Ursa futilely attacks Kairos and continuing her ranged exchange with Sarrek with another Necrotic Lance., his quick reactions just keeping him alive, but Enkara catches the brunt of the magic. Ursa Misty Steps into the centre of the room and repositions herself, with her zombies between her and the group.

            The zombies swarm, bringing Sarrek and Aya low and reducing Enkara back to her elf form. Surrounded she casts a Thunder Wave that to push them back from around her, but though they are injured, they resist being moved and swarm Enkara as she tries to run. Alone, Kairos takes up position equal distance among his friends and raises his banner high, channeling all its power and his own healing pool. The burst of light restores his friends to life and in fury Ursa fires a Necrotic Lance through her own zombies nearly knocking Aya down again before going after Kairos but his shield parry's her claws once again. Badly injured Aya’s twin Eldritch Blasts miss and Sarrek, bemused to be back in the fight almost kills Ursa with his next shot, but the Death druid holds on. Unable to get through Kairos’ defence she puts all her power into a necrotic lance, seeing death coming for him it’s only his reactions that keeps Sarrek alive. As the zombies swarm once more he is pushed to the edge of death, while Aya falls again under the Zombies.

Enkara fights off the Zombies around her and smashes her Staff into Ursa’s face, the poison causes the death druid’s skin to melt off of her; exposing a pulsing orb of green light within. As Ursa’s bones melt Enkara raises her staff high and cries out in victory, the Zombies melt along with their mistress and Enkara feels new power fill her at the defeat of her dark counterpart. She retrieves a Tear of Selune from the remains as the group recover from the fight and look around the cavern. With Ursa’s defeat a new part of the cavern opens, a tunnel leading down with the sound of drums coming from it. Kairos picks up the Mote of Power that had been fuelling Ursa and they retrieve the rest of the loot while Enkara revives Aya and the two enjoy their stealing victory from defeat. After letting Aya and Sarrek rest and recover they head through the tunnel that quickly goes into complete darkness. Enkara produces a flame for Aya to see, and after walking for some time the drumming sounds continue joined now with the sounds of rushing water as they come across a vast crevasse.

Kairos admits that the sound may not be drums at all as they sound nothing like he’s heard before. Aya theorizes that it may be a forge or something mechanical or automatic as it seems too precise, and repeating. They carry on through to the crevasse as it seems to go deep within the earth, its wall laden with nautilus shells. Looking up they see that the roof of the chamber is split by a massive cracked spear with glowing red runes along its length, the light from which shines into another cavern above.