🎊22. the party!

session 22 • 04/02/2022 • 2,140 words

『 📜 』 adventure log

🌞 DAY 6 • 📅 ELEINT 27

Stonehill Inn

Henry!

After thanking Toblen for hosting the celebration party, Lera sets about mingling with the townsfolk, starting with Henry, closest to us. Soren enters the room, thrilled at the fanfare, but is immediately cowed by Henry's presence -- due to what had happened the last time the party met Henry -- but eventually makes his way into the room to mingle.

Sildar cha cha real smooth slidin right on by to Insert himself between Soren and Henry I'm crying. Henry catches up with the group, asking various questions and talking about Candlekeep, before thanking Soren for taking care of the Redbrand problem as promised. During discussion about the political future of Phandalin, Sildar suggests that Henry could be the next townsmaster, flatteirng him.

Alderleafs

Hugh goes to meet the Alderleafs in the neighboring table. Hugh checks in with Carp about the ball bearings, to learn that Carp has dropped them and caused the Alderleafs much strife.

Hugh, with this information, promptly offers Sid, Carp's brother, another 1,000 ball bearings, leading both parents to immediately jump to stop him. They look to Soren for help, who tries to distract Hugh by asking him to save his seat while he went to perform music on-stage, which Hugh happily does.

Soren performs an extremely cheerful tune to start the celebrations going. Several townsfolk vibe to the music, and begin eating / getting up to get food..... the Alderleafs included. Seeing this, Hugh quickly sneaks the ball bearings to Sid, unnoticed, before returning to the table.

The Dendrars

After Soren finishes playing, the group begins to walk around the tavern to mingle. Thel and Mirna Dendrar, the local woodworkers, thank the group for all they've done for the town, offering them three vials of fire-starter oil to help them in their travels.

Mirna apologizes for the inexpensive gift, and informs the group of a family heirloom that her alchemist family had left behind in Thundertree before they were chased out of the area by swarms of undead. She lets the party know that if we find it, we can keep it .

Freda Norle

We move on to the next table, where we find the grandma whom we have run into several times in Phandalin -- who always tells us to slow down and take things slow. She introduces herself as the local weaver, Freda Norle, and gifts us with a pair of extremely well-made boots. Hugh taunts Sildar by suggesting that he needs it, with how much he's been knocked over lately.

The Stonehills

We meet Trilena Stonehill, Toblen's wife. We introduce ourselves, compliment Pip, and let her know that we've been letting her son play with a wild hyena puppy.

Barthen

Barthen, at the same table, gives us two beautifully-wrapped presents -- a poisoner's kit and a forger's tools.

With the latter, he reminds us of the letter that we wanted him to intercept from Halia Thornton regarding the Zhentarim report on Soren, and tells us to come to his shop to swap out the letter soon. The group agrees.

Edermath

Also at the same table, we meet Daran Edermath, the owner of the orchard where we interrogated Fynn and his gang the first night we were in town. He gifts us a generous basket of fruits, and asks us to investigate two things:

• Mysterious noises in his orchard at night (the group looks away, whistling collectively...)

• Undead swarms at Old Owl Well have been endangering archaeological prospectors searching for Netheril ruins in the area.

Edermath asks us to look into the sudden swarms of undead. As Old Owl Well is near Wyvern Tor and Conyberry, we decide to knock out all of the "side quests" in one go when we have a moment's respite.

Elsa

Elsa thanks us for handling the Redbrand situation, "begrudgingly" forgiving Hugh's trespassing on and refusing to get out of her kitchen. She's genuinely very grateful and seems much happier than before.

Hugh attempts to set up Lera with Elsa by straight up lying to their faces, leading to varied results.

Garaele

We finally finish up by meeting up with Garaele, who had been sitting alone by the doorway and watching us mingle. We catch up briefly. She informs us that she paid the Alderleaf farm a visit today and found no sign of evil from her Detect Good and Evil spell, much to everyone's relief.

Garaele joins us at our table as we talk about Hugh's brain demon and mysterious dream a little more, and Soren attempts to identify the flail, this time with the memory that a pearl is needed to cast identify. He succeeds with Hugh's flail, managing to determine exactly what it is.

Vicious +1 Flail

You have a +1 bonus to attack and damage rolls made with this weapon. - When you roll a 20 with this magic weapon, the target takes an extra 7 bludgeoning damage.

Hugh, during this time, informs us that his brain demon talked to him last night. He also lets us know that he named his brain demon MYCO -- My Yucky Curious Organism.

!!!!?!?!??!

Lera braids Hugh's hair, finally!! :D She urges Sildar to braid Soren's hair, which Sildar does so surprisingly well, stating that he has "experience" doing so.

Lera also braids Henry's hair, which he is very happy about.

We leave Gravy and Truffle in Pip's Babysitting Services again, after clearing that it's OK with the Stonehills, and follow Barthen to his store to swap out the letter.

Barthen's Provisions

Mail Thieves

At Barthen's, he gives us the letter he intercepted from Halia. The letter is addressed to a "Darva", and says the following:

A Drow by the name of Sorennar Maeyirin has recently been recruited by me into our network. He will be watching a group from within and reporting back to me with the information. I will report further on information received.

He has dark purple skin, silver hair, a pink overcoat with butterflies, mushrooms, fish, and other various things throughout. He has a golden Drow slavemark on his face.

Be careful of his words, he is able to accurately lie and deceive those around him, his abilities can be very useful to us.

which we change to the following:

A half-elf by the name of Sorennar Mirick has recently been recruited by me into our network. He will be watching a group form within and reporting back to me with information. I will report further on any information received.

He has dark skin, long brown hair, tattered, battleworn studded leather. He has a large black tattoo covering his right arm.

Be careful of his words, he is able to accurately lie and deceive those around him, his abilities can be very useful to us.

-- changing Soren's "last name" and appearance. Soren idly comments on the last name he had originally given, letting it be known that it's based on a real person.

"Children"

Lera sends her letter to her father, as well as with the wooden arrow that Colt had carved for her. She attempts to buy Sildar a waterskin after losing both hers and Sildar's to Hugh when they were fighting over who got to keep whose. Sildar immediately stops her and tries to buy HER a waterskin.

Hugh sighs over the duo's renewed "competitive" spirit, and asks Soren to leave with him. Soren teasingly says that "yes, the adults will go move the crates while the children bicker", which immediately embarrasses Sildar. Sildar allows Lera to buy him the waterskin, but asks her to stop gifting him things, as he really doesn't like it.

Lera asks what forms of affection he does enjoy, to which he replies that he enjoys spending time with his friends, as well as the occasional hug / platonic touch. Lera awkwardly touches him on the shoulder and goes through 9 stages of grief as she remembers all the times SHE has put Sildar through 9 stages of grief just by spending time with him : )

She promises that she will try to act accordingly with his love languages.

BEAR HUGH BEAR HUGH BEAR H-

As agreed, we will be taking the cart and one single Rothe with us to rescue Gundren because Soren cried so hard about walking in the sun Gundren may be injured and require a mount.

Soren unveils the bear pelt cloak that he'd been working on for Hugh, greatly surprising and impressing Hugh, who immediately takes off his shirt and puts it on.

Hugh helps unload the cart while Soren stands and looks kinda cute, until Sildar and Lera rejoin the group. Soren runs off then, remembering that he wanted to buy food from Barthen to cook for the group for the journey.

Sildar and Hugh make short work of the crates remaining in the cart as Lera preps the Rothe for the journey. After Soren rejoins the group, we depart for the Triboar Trail once more, amidst cheers and merry goodbyes from the people of Phandalin.

Triboar Trail

Warm Tents

As we travel through the familiar hills and forests of the Triboar Trail, clouds begin to gather in the sky, and it begins pouring. Soren quickly stows his cloak while Lera, Hugh and Droop enjoy the rain. Sildar, however, sensibly asks for Hugh's tent and sits in it. Sildar is the only one who will not catch a cold tomorrow 😔...

Soren asks Sildar if the tent is cold, trying with all his little heart to get Sildar to invite him into the tent. Sildar says no, it's actually quite warm -- trying to imply Soren should get out of the cold rain to come join him. Despite not getting an invite in the end, Soren wiggles in anyway.

Identification

In the tent, Soren begins identifying all of the magic items that the group has obtained over the past few days. The group finally gets to enjoy some peace and quiet from Soren for the first time since the adventure started.

He identifies the following:

Stone of Good Luck (Luckstone)

While this polished agate is on your person, you gain a +1 bonus to ability checks and saving throws.

Bag of Holding

A magic bag that can hold up to 500 pounds of items in a separate dimension.

Alchemical Jug

This ceramic jug appears to be able to hold a gallon of liquid and weighs 12 pounds whether full or empty. Sloshing sounds can be heard from within the jug when it is shaken, even if the jug is empty.

You can use an action and name one liquid from the table below to cause the jug to produce the chosen liquid. Afterward, you can uncork the jug as an action and pour that liquid out, up to 2 gallons per minute.

The maximum amount of liquid the jug can produce depends on the liquid you named. Once the jug starts producing a liquid, it can't produce a different one, or more of one that has reached its maximum, until the next dawn.

Talon

When you attack a creature with this magic weapon and roll a 20 on the attack roll, that target takes an extra 10 necrotic damage if it isn't a construct or an undead. You also gain 10 temporary hit points.

+1 Rhythm-Maker’s Drum

While holding this [drum], you gain a +1 bonus to spell attack rolls and to the saving throw DCs of your bard spells.

As an action, you can play the [drum] to regain one use of your Bardic Inspiration feature. This property of the [drum] can't be used again until the next dawn.

Pearl of Power

After you write a message of fifty words or fewer on this magic sheet of parchment and speak a creature's name, the parchment magically folds into a Tiny paper bird and flies to the recipient whose name you uttered. The recipient must be on the same plane of existence as you, otherwise the bird turns into ash as it takes flight.

The bird is an object that has 1 hit point, an Armor Class of 13, a flying speed of 60 feet, a Dexterity of 16 (+3), and a score of 1 (−5) in all other abilities, and it is immune to poison and psychic damage.

It travels to within 5 feet of its intended recipient by the most direct route, whereupon it turns into a nonmagical and inanimate sheet of parchment that can be unfolded only by the intended recipient. If the bird's hit points or speed is reduced to 0 or if it is otherwise immobilized, it turns into ash.

Scroll of Ray of Enfeeblement

A black beam of enervating energy springs from your finger toward a creature within range. Make a ranged spell attack against the target. On a hit, the target deals only half damage with weapon attacks that use Strength until the spell ends.

At the end of each of the target's turns, it can make a Constitution saving throw against the spell. On a success, the spell ends.

Potion of Invisibility

This potion's container looks empty but feels as though it holds liquid. When you drink it, you become [invisible] for 1 hour. Anything you wear or carry is [invisible] with you. The effect ends early if you attack or cast a spell.

Potion of Speed

When you drink this potion, you gain the Effect of the haste spell for 1 minute (no Concentration required). The potion’s yellow fluid is streaked with black and swirls on its own.

MYCO

While Soren identifies, Hugh speaks about his encounter with the brain demon last night, letting the group know as well that he named it MYCO. The group discusses the bewildering dream regarding wedding terminology, trying to help Hugh figure out what exactly it all meant.

Lera brings up Hugh's advanced powers and strange appearance during the Glasstaff fight. With no wedding in Hugh's future, however, the group is stumped and decide to research the matter further in Candlekeep.

Cragmaw Castle Strategy

Soren, after identifying, inquires with Droop about his family at Cragmaw, wondering if we should watch out and avoid killing any goblins -- if kill any goblins at all.

Droop tells us about his family being held as indentured "assistants" by the cook, Yegg, who is very cruel to the goblins. He also tells us about Lhupo, a religious fanatic who commits heinous acts under the name of Maglubiyet, whom Soren recognizes as the goblin patron god.

Droop establishes that the rest of the goblins, while respectful of Maglubiyet, prefer not to associate too heavily with them. He lets us know that we may want to kill Lhupo.

Paper Birds

We circle back to the pack of 4 paper birds that we found in Iarno's study. Soren, now knowing what they do, laments that this means Nezznar is on the Material Plane -- "while he belongs in the Nine Hells", eliciting a laugh from Lera.

Soren distributes the paper birds, one for each person, though he hesitates to take his -- remembering that he may well have no family who cares about him left to write to.

Lera notices this, gently suggesting that he write to Nadhiir, his older brother. Soren sardonically notes that Nadhiir is likely also enjoying a cushy life with his mother while Soren and Rizoyn had suffered for their sakes.

Sildar and Lera convince Soren that it is better to send the letter and be sure that he's done his best to maintain contact with his brother / keep his brother informed of the happenings in the Underdark, rather than potentially regret it in the future. Soren agrees to consider this.

Lera will be sending hers back to Velprintalar, and Hugh will be sending his back to Druselfjord, his village. Sildar does not know who to send his to.

Just Wanted To

Soren concludes identifying all the potions around this time, enlisting Sildar's help in doing one. Sildar is confused and complies when Soren says that he can help by "giving him a kiss" -- surprising Soren with a wHOLE ASS kISS when Soren expected a peck on the cheek.

SilDAR is a BABY who wonders how the kiss helped : ))))))

Soren admits it didn't, he just wanted to get kissed.