Last time in the adventures of Nura and the Backups, our party of adventurers found themselves falling into a Seam when an earthquake struck the town of Gharob during a festival. Finding themselves in a strange land of giant mushrooms, the party saved several of their fellow survivors before engaging in a fight with slithering mouthless creatures. After the battle, the group of survivors began the trek to find a way out of the Seam.
During the journey, Davaa, Nura and Darcassian suffered from a strange throbbing sound. When they went to investigate the sound, they found a black-robed figure in the midst of slaying one of the mouthless slitherers...
The body of the mouthless slitherer dropped to the ground lifeless, a hole ripped from its chest where the mysterious figure had pulled out a sapphire-like gemstone. The figure, ignoring the party, huddled over the stone.
Kaziel Shahadra reached out to the figure, speaking to it telepathically in Pelsite. Yet, the only response he received was a loud scream. The figure twisted itself towards him, revealing that it was not quite human, but rather a strange plant-like being. The robes were in fact part of the stalk, the hood of the figure was in fact a mushroom cap. Yet, the face looked almost human, and it was the first thing with a mouth that they had seen since arriving. That mouth, however, was stretched open letting out a voiceless scream.
When Kaziel heard the scream in his head, he found himself unable to resist moving towards it. His mind still conscious and in control of all other faculties, he called out for help.
Bixi grabbed him, holding him back. Davaa then tried to call out to the creature, speaking in all the languages he knew, but the only response he heard was also the scream and he too found himself compelled to move towards the creature. When he grew close enough, the creature lashed out with vines that came out from the bottom of its stalk, pummeling him.
The party snapped into action, attacking the monster. Lighting it on fire, swinging hammers at it, and ringing the toll of death, they defeated it. Yet, as they battled, other creatures began to approach the party.
Semolina cried out in surprise when a pellet struck her, then another came flying towards the survivors. The party looked toward where the stones were flying, and discovered purple-furred mouthless monkey creatures with horns moving in. Two of them stood upon mushrooms, pelting the party with stones, while a larger bulkier one rushed toward Davaa,
Nadir and Bixi. The heroes held back however, unsure what the things intent was as it began to scratch at itself furiously. With its hands now full of spores found in its fur, it attempted to fling them at the three heroes. The three of them sprung into action and attacked, but were unable to prevent it from spreading the spores. Upon contact, they all felt their muscles begin to freeze up.
Kaziel placed a roaring bonfire beneath the brute, slaying it. Bixi and Davaa broke out of their paralysis and split, Davaa heading towards one of the slingers while Bixi headed for the other. Poor Nadir, however, was trapped in his own body, unable to break out of the paralysis.
The slingers, however, had their own spores up their furred sleeves. Bixi engaged one but found spores flung into her eyes, blinding her. Davaa, having climbed a mushroom to engage the other, also found himself blinded. As they swung chaotically at the enemies, the knight
Evsalom could hold himself back no longer, and rushed to Bixi's side. This was unfortunate for her, as Bixi almost immediately struck him in her blind rage.
Kaziel, as he moved to engage, stepped upon several mushrooms that immediately broke open spreading a poisonous spore cloud. The one Davaa had engaged moved away from him, leaving him struggling to clear his eyes. As he did so, a mushroom behind him burst, sending out thorny growths flying towards him. Even blinded, Davaa managed to dodge them. His enemy, however, targeted both Ataidas and Nadir, almost slaying
Ataidas and knocking Nadir unconscious before fleeing Davaa. Davaa, having cleared his eyes, ran towards Nadir and helped bring him out of danger, though he remained unconscious.
The creature fighting Bixi and Evsalom fled from them, rushing towards the dead plant creature where it began to scoop up shards of broken gemstones. Bixi, however, followed as it tried to flee with its prize, slaying it. The other creature then ran for the corpse of its ally, scooped up the gems and began to flee itself. Bixi and Evsalom gave chase, and killed it.
With no signs of further enemies, the party began to investigate the creatures they had fought. Davaa found slings among the smalled horned creatures, signs that these were intelligent beings not wild animals. He took four gemstones from the one that had tried to flee. Bixi, examining the plant creature, found that it had animal or human like features and skin on its hands and face while the rest was clearly plant matter. She found strange polyps growing on its vines, and chopped off a few of them. Several rotted in her hands, but she managed to collect four.
The party discussed their next steps, and decided to move forward and find a place to camp out for awhile and rest, hoping Nadir would be revived. Ataidas revealed that she had been making a map during their journey and passed it on to Davaa. Bixi picked up both Nadir and Ataidas, placing them both on her shoulders. Ataidas tried to protest, but Bixi placed one of her large fingers on her lips and shushed her.
The party was unable to find a great place for making camp, and decided to do so wherever they could find a spot. At the campsite, Bixi handed out cookies to everyone, including one for Nadir. Semolina went on a racist rant against elves, blaming Darcassian and Davaa for their bad turn of luck. When everyone reprimanded her and spoke harshly to her, she threatened to leave, and, indeed, began to leave the campsite, claiming her halfling good luck would protect her.
Kaziel was happy to see her go, yet Bixi and Davaa felt strongly that everyone needed to stay together. The two of them chased after Semolina, and a heated argument took place. Semolina admitted that her comments about elves was not appropriate, but still believed she was better off on her own. On the cusp of giving up and letting her go, Davaa mentioned that her halfling luck hadn't protected her from the slings of the enemy. Semolina acknowledged this, and began to back down, but only if the party agreed to use the right name with her and if Davaa gave her one of the gemstones. The stone was given, but no promises were truly made.
During Davaa's watch, he witnessed the sky change, shifting from a light blue to purple to eventually a pinkish red. As it did so, the land became hotter, more humid, and some of the longer taller mushrooms began to wither away, essentially melting into an inky substance that slowly plopped onto the ground.
Bixi's watch went uneventfully, as she sat there whistling hardly paying attention to her surroundings. At the end of her watch, she woke Semolina for her turn, who rudely tried to get a cookie from her. When Bixi turned her down, she made some snide comments about it being inferior gnomish cooking anyway.
It was at this point that Nadir awoke to find Darcassian looking over him. Still laying there, he began munching on the cookie Bixi had left for him as Darcassian laughed in joy and hugged him. When he asked Darcassian what was going on, the elf could not tell him, as he said he did understand the others' languages, they just seemed lost. The two spoke, Darcassian looking to Nadir for comfort and hope. Nadir had him draw a card, and it was the Dream card, a sign of hope. However, when he tried to help Darcassian sleep and experience the blessed dreams of
the Eventide, he learned that elves do not dream, and that they intentionally choose not to. Thus, Nadir saved the dream for himself, experiencing a vision.
Whilst Semolina took her position for the watch, Kaziel sent a message to her telepathically, telling her that the cookies were "so delicious" in Pelsite. Unfortunately, Semolina, already jumpy, and not a native Pelsite speaker focused on the word "delicious," and became convinced that monsters had spoken to her and were coming to eat all of them. The others tried to explain to her that it was just Kaziel, but she did not believe it, saying that she would stay on watch but if a monster came she'd give one shout and then she was out of there.
Fortunately, nothing came to attack the resting party, and Semolina eventually woke Kaziel for the final watch. As Kaziel took his watch, the rested Evsalom approached him, curious regarding his noble status. When Evsalom mentioned his cousin Abdamar, who he thought Kaziel would like, Kaziel revealed to him that he had in fact found Abdamar's body during his travels. He handed the heart-broken Evsalom the signet ring that he had found.
Haida, who had been hanging on Evsalom and flirting with him, then approached Kaziel curious as to what had caused Evsalom's distress. When she learned of Abadamar's death, she became very upset, cursing and angry. She revealed to Kaziel that she had planned on blackmailing the Darkam family, but that Evsalom's branch was poor and it was her hope to get Abdamar to pay her off. Needing to figure another plan out, she brought Kaziel in, telling him that no matter what Evsalom needs to survive the Seam.
The survivors now rested, everyone awoke and began planning their next steps. Davaa explained the nature of Seams, and that the party either had to go up or down in order to escape. Ataidas and Davaa discussed scouting to find what landmarks and path they should follow, and proceeded to search for high ground to get a better view of their surroundings. However, Nadir was able to send Nura up into the sky and get a view quickly. Nadir reported to the party that there was a gigantic mushroom reaching towards the sky to the southeast, a crater filled with water to the northwest, ruins along the banks of a lake that fed into the river they traveled upon, and mountains to the northeast.
The party decided to head towards the mountains, continuing to follow the river. An hour into their journey, they found two small streams that connected to the river they followed. The streams were wide but shallow, and they found the land around them to be quite swampy. They decided to go through the shallow streams rather than around. As they made their way through the swamps, they saw another mouthless creature standing upon a mushroom, pointing at them...
