Abyss Modified Session 18: The poor grooms bride is a spore.

We had a small group, recovering from the combat with the drow assassins, Xanaphia, Orion, Dinak, and their companions set forth completing the looting of the dead and repacked up their camp. Now with two carts they continued down the winding tunnels towards what the gnomes assured them was the way to the dwarven stronghold. After a few hours of uneventful travel, they found a large crystalline dome shaped chamber that fantastically reflected their lights. They could hear strange knocking noises and across the chamber they saw a pale wide-eyed creature that looked about the size of a goblin or gnome knocking on the wall with a pickaxe. The party gave the creatures a wide berth and made it out of the chamber safely.

The tunnels started to fill with warmer air, vision clouded with heat waves. They found the next chamber to be a multibridge cylindrical chamber that descended hundreds of feet and faintly an orange glow could be seen. The bridges started off pretty narrow but were fifty feet across at their widest point. There were a few close moments as both Eldeth and Xanaphia almost fell but were caught by Orion and Dinak throwing a dart and shooting an arrow respectively, pinning their clothing to the cart and saving them from what would have been a bad day. The snails slipped on the stone surface a bit slowing down the journey. Dinak spotted what appeared to be a floating green flamed skull by the exit of the chamber and shot off an arrow at the undead. The arrow went off into the abyss and the flame skull charged closer to the party, shooting beams of fire from its eyes. They quickly dealt with the first skull, Orion bludgeoning it and noticed many more below them in the steamy depths, two of which were alerted to the party when the other skull had exploded. Combat was quick, the other two skulls were shot and punched off the bridge and exploded down below. The party made haste and got out of that chamber, resting after a few hours of a quickened march.

After resting they made their way to a group of three damp tunnels the gnomes knew but grew confused when they arrived. Something was growing out of the right and center tunnel. It seemed to be a fungus and the party attempted to talk to it with to no avail. One of the gnomes with them paged through his book of underground dangers and mentioned some kind of fungus called Araumycos that was smart and giant, bigger than some of the smaller countries on the surface. Fear grew in the eyes of the gnomes and the party could hear skipping from the left most and clear tunnel as four mushroom men appeared, dressed up in fancy duds of surface folk. They gesticulated widely and the party all made their saving throws, resisting the rapport spores, the only way to talk with the creatures. One of the gnomes failed and translated, it seemed the creatures were preparing for a wedding between this giant fungal mushroom creature Araumycos and the demon queen of fungi Zuggtmoy. The party wanted no part in this wedding and promised to come back with a gift and went down the left tunnel, finding tiny mushroom men walking in procession. One of the snails ate one but within moments they could see the legs growing back from the remains. They made haste again, eventually resting for the night.

Dinak and Orion took the first watch, they noticed a troll in the distance watching them but it ran off. Later Eldeth and one of the gnomes took watch, and the troll struck, trying to eat the gnome. The party fought off the troll and Dinak, practically invisible watched as large frog demon ran and flipped one of their carts. The demon proved tougher than the troll and potentially was hunting it but the party looked to be easier prey. It took a few bites out of Xanaphia but was put down.

The next day they found their way to a side tunnel with strange ornate stone doors flanked by large dwarven faces. The gnomes made some sort of hand motions and whispered to the faces and the doors cracked open. They saw two large stone golems that looked like armored dwarves pushing open the doors and around their feet were thousands of what appeared to be goblin and elf bones. The snails made a path and the party rode a few hundred feet to another open set of doors with what appeared to be simple chamber with a large stone archway and a mummified dwarf sitting on a throne. They talked with the mummy for a bit, found out this was a secret way of the dwarves and no word of this secret should be uttered, or the golems would get them. With a smile it opened the portal and the party made their way into the underbelly of Gauntlgrym.