Adventure Brunch #45 - 9/5/20 - Putrefied, beaten, bruised, & cursed

General Summary

Zura decided to use her Decanter of Endless Water to wash away some of the ichor on the roots of the eldergleam so Cyrus could collect sap from a clean root with the Hag's Bane knife and his herbalism skills. As Cyrus very carefully attempted to make an incision and collect the sap, his face was sprayed with a surge of more black fetid water! The roots began to recoil and shake, and a creature seemed to suddenly appear out of the tree. 
The creature was shaped vaguely like a woman but about ten feet tall, with skin made of wood, hair made of leaves. She had no mouth and no nose, and she was covered in black ichor. She pointed a finger and beckoned at Jingles; Jingles didn’t know why, but suddenly he felt like this creature was his very best friend! He knew unequivocally that he loved her and needed to defend her against his former friends attacking her! 
Jingles cocked his borrowed crossbow with a bolt (his brand new long bow from Zura was broken during the recent fight with the f-bomb) and started shooting at Cyrus, Razana, and Zura. Panthro immediately grappled his confused kitty friend, knowing the damage Jingles can do if left unchecked. Upon seeing this, the creature created a thorn wall that cut Zura and Shakax off from the rest of the party and ensuing fight. 
Next, the creature beckoned to Panthro as she had done to Jingles, and Panthro also now loved her and needed to defend her from his former friends. Having all of the kitties under her spell and attacking Cyrus and Razana, the creature melded into some of the tree roots as if she was diving into a pool and disappearing from sight. She reappeared inside the thorn wall with Zura and Shakkax, attacking them with her arms reshaped into large pointy thorns and covered in ichor.
Cyrus and Razana took many crossbow bolts to the face and genitals from Jingles, who eventually succeeded in felling Razana. Panthro made attempts to cut them up with his flails, but was unsuccessful for once. He then attempted to use his magic to cause the shadows to garrote Cyrus to death. While all this was happening Zura and Shakkax battled the wooden creature. The creature struck Zura, poisoning her poor, still-very-grotesque form. She was unable to land a blow against Shakkax, however, whose still shiny new armor deflected her blows. Shakkax was finally able to grab the creature, and reared back his head to inhale and let loose his draconic fury in her face. He set her on fire with his lighting breath, in the process also tearing her in half and leaving her a smoldering corpse on the floor--perfect for him to Captain Morgan on. 
The creature's death released Panthro and Jingles from her charms, and the party was able to revive Razana, heal each other a tiny bit, and collect the four flasks of sap--finally achieving their goal in coming to this dark and blighted place.
Two days had already passed, and they knew Vahorn would leave the cave and their exit on the third. The group was very beaten, bruised, and cursed, and lacked their usual resources. They dearly wanted to rest but felt unsafe where they were so, running out of time, they pressed on.
They made it quickly back to the fire temple but were cut off from the first stone Cyrus had read by the walls of fire--burning as intensely as the first time they encountered them. Eventually, they found another c-shaped stone and Cyrus read from it (with his armor ON this time). 
He read: “Bring the one-third through the fire, refine them as silver is refined, and test them as gold is tested. Only the pure of heart will survive the cleansing flames.” With that, Cyrus innately knew that creatures of the fire type conjured, summoned, animated, called, bound, or crafted at this stone would get a bonus to armor class, attack rolls, damage rolls, saving throws, and ability checks equal to the casters proficiency bonus. As he came to this conclusion, an explosion erupted and they fought another larger more powerful fire elemental, which immediately took out Cyrus. Luckily, Zura was able to push him away from the fire elemental with a geyser of water from her magical decanter, and Razana was able to stabilize him and bring him back from the ether. After finally dispatching the fire elemental, the group pressed on once again. By this point in their adventure, they were very, very burned.
The party continued to retrace their steps back to the cave, and entered the blighted wood. Unable to rest, they had maybe two spells left between the six of them. They were hurt, cursed, blighted, and three of them had very nearly died and had lasting injuries. With time and resources running out, they decided to send Jingles and Panthro ahead to ask Vahorn to give them more time. Cyrus gave Jingles a purse with all his meager gold and all his worldly belongings saying that “if he were to fall this should help provide for those in his employ of money”. 
Jingles and Panthro went off skulking through the dark, going unseen as only a pair of predatory cats can do across the brambles and under trees, careful not to be seen or pierced by all the thorns between them and their exit… and made it to Vahorn unscathed, not alerting any of the many denizens of the blighted woods to their prowlings. They told him that everyone was on their way and to please stay a little longer to open the cave mouth for them. They had been successful in their quest for the sap and were very close to the end of the adventure! Panthro then decided to stay with Vahorn and take a cat nap; Jingles stealthed back alone, like a hero, to help his friends.
Meanwhile, Cyrus, Razana, Shakkax, and Zura stumbled into the fight of their lives! They were attacked by violent shrubbery, vine monsters, thorn monsters, a blighted wood woman, an elven ghost, more firbolg zombies, and a unit of elven skeletons! As soon as they managed to fell one foe, new ones replaced them, offering no respite or quarter. Cyrus smashed ribs, broke arms, and cracked skulls with a badassness never before displayed; everyone would have been impressed had they not been fighting for their lives. With every hit, Cyrus thanked Bembo, the Circle of the Sun Weapons/Warcaster trainer, for all of his mandatory sparring bouts with the new weapons provided to him post his initiation into the Circle. 
The skeletons, however, slashed at everyone with short swords and were not to be felled without leaving the party something to remember them by. Razana was using her frost rays granted by her infernal legacy to keep the wooden women at bay, slowing her down to half speed and unable to catch up with her fleeing party membres. She also used her channel divinity granted to her by her god, The Baron, to turn undead on the eleven ghost attacking them, prompting it to flee and hide in the ephemeral plane. 
Poor cursed, lame Zura was moving her deformed body at half speed. She ran as fast as she could, huffing, puffing, and snuffling from her deformed face. She was determined to keep up and not force the party to stay back for her as her body at a dash was moving the same speed as her friend's walking pace. She tried a few times to help in the fight, but kept missing and slowing down, until Shakkax yelled at her to just run.
After the shrubbery which bludgeoned them, the vines and thorn monsters which strangled and pierced them, and the ghost which appeared but fled, came three large-and-in-charge firbolg zombies which Shakkax intercepted on behalf of his far squishier friends. The party pressed on, holding the incoming zombies and wooden lady at bay until they were only one hundred feet from the mouth of the cave! With the end and safety in sight, Shakkax was hit with a fatal blow and fell to the ground, lifeless...
By this point, Jingles had run out of borrowed crossbow bolts, even the ones Cyrus had been able to pull out of the carcasses on the way to the exit and bring him one at a time. Cyrus himself had been felled (though got up again with a 20 death save) and had a broken arm. Zura was still trailing behind, huffing, puffing, and snuffling. Everyone was depleted, with no spell slots, feeling the life and hope ebb away from them. They thought that this might be the end of them. They thought of what they had done and what they had left undone... 
One of the zombies managed to catch up with Zura and would have killed her had Panthro not suddenly appeared again after his cat nap to SURPRISE SNEAK ATTACK the zombie, killing it. One by one, they made it to the cave; Jingles was followed by Cyrus, then Razana, then Panthro, and, lastly, Zura killed the wooden woman with a desperate eldritch blast arrow when she finally made it to the cave. 
Vahorn came to heal Cyrus, seeing his arm was severely broken, but Cyrus--with just one point of life left--held out his unbroken arm towards the fallen Shakkax, and gave Vahorn a look that said everything: “save it for my friend.” 
The party knew they couldn't leave Shakkax, and made a last stand as the giant zombie headed towards the cave. To the horror of Vahorn, it entered the cave! Zura (on the brink of death herself) cleaved it with Dawnbreaker and Panthro attacked it with his flails from behind. Jingles, with the roar of a predatory cat, leapt on top of it, landing on its chest and using his cat claws to repeatedly slash at its throat until…. it’s head came off! 
Waiting to make sure the zombie would stay dead this time, the "healthier" party members carefully collected Shakkax, who was stabilized by Razana and healed by Vahorn. Zura snuck out to collect the heart out of the wooden woman, hoping it was a blighted dryad she could someday restore. 
At the end of it all, Vahorn sealed the cave entrance again. The party had made it--just barely, but they had made it. Some of the party members slumped to the ground falling asleep on the spot, and others contemplated on what to do next. Zura rocked in a corner and cried about how ugly she now was.
THE END!
Tl:dr Now that you've made it to the end, here is the shorter Panthro version:

Report Date

11 Sep 2020