That's So Raven

You stopped for the last of your rations an hour or two outside Leilon.

A column of Knights of Vindictus was on the road heading the other way — south, toward the Mere of Deadmen. About a dozen riders. Two peeled off at Ubys's wave.

They flipped their helmets up. You didn't know either of them.

"Where have you been?"

They were heading to the Carthage Inn to deal with a goblin attack. Your blood went still: the goblins responsible for the Carnath/Carthage attacks were days dead. You killed them.

Someone was sending these knights down a road that no longer needed them.

One of the parting lines: "Go and see the scribe."

They rode off.

You came around the next bend and the ground rumbled.

A plume of dust erupted over the Sword Mountains foothills. From the silver mine.

Moist turned into a one-hump camel.

The cart accelerated.

You came into Leilon at speed and the town was screaming.

A cobbler grabbed Ubys by the sleeve and asked, "Oh! There you are. Where've you been?" — and then told you that Thaldrin Silvervein, patriarch of the head Dwarven clan, had led a rescue party into the silver mine to save trapped dwarves.

Ubys asked about Angus Silvervein. The Cobbler couldn't answer through his own shame.

You stabled the cart. You ran for the mine.

Two dwarves sat outside it, soot- and sweat-blackened, in shock, the entrance behind them shut tight.

"Brothers, lost within… being attacked. Thaldrin led them in, found the hive queen — a swarm attacked. Led it down a corridor, bidding they follow. Passageways collapsed."

"They died bravely… their place with Moradin is assured…"

You went in.

The light from outside died fast. The first chamber was very old — toppled mine carts, dust still hanging.

Ubys stopped to Decompose two dwarves. Catch up, he told you.

The next chamber was a barracks.

Three giant beetles — the size of horses, their movement wrong — were feeding on the dwarven dead and wrapping the still-living into cocoons.

The cocooned dwarves were alive. Paralyzed.

Moist cast Flaming Sphere at the center of the chamber. Two beetles caught the splash. Two cocoons did, too.

That's when the centipedes came down on Ubys.

Three of them, from pillars thirty feet up — acid and poison spit ahead of them. Ubys took 26 in the opening volley. He cast Sanctuary on himself and ran for the barracks.

AC cut into a beetle. The beetle's blood splashed back acidic — 3 DMG, every strike. He kept cutting. KeYs hammered. Falkor bit. Moist kept the sphere on the move and laid Scorching Ray for 29 DMG on the second beetle's flank.

The centipedes caught up to the barracks.

Falkor had been holding his action.

Held breath weapon — 10 radiant DMG to all three.

The centipedes turned to bite him. Most missed. One didn't — Falkor took 13 poison.

Ubys, out of useful spells, made the floor tremor with Thaumaturgy. As if a large predator were approaching. (The centipedes were unimpressed.)

The party closed it out across two more rounds. AC, KeYs, Falkor, Moist took the beetles down. AC took the last centipede with one final strike.

Much acid. Much fire.

Ubys cast Prayer of Healing.

His prayers seemed weakly answered.

AC looked at the cocooned miners and recognized the bug life-cycle. The cocoons were hosts, not food. The beetles were banking the living, eating only the already-dead.

You looked at each other.

You looked at the cocooned dwarves.

The mine went silent except for the dust.

Next session: the corridors deeper. Thaldrin, somewhere ahead. The cocoons, behind. And the question of what to do with them.