Critical Role & Sagas of Sundry - C2E6 The Howling Mines

Episode Date: January 16, 2022

The group questions the crownsguard for clarity about last night’s attacks, and their hunt for the gnolls leads them to a descent down a mysterious mine… Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Insurance isn't one-size-fits-all, and shopping for it shouldn't feel like squeezing into something that just doesn't fit. That's why drivers have enjoyed progressives' name-your-price tool for years. With the name-your-price tool, you tell them what you want to pay, and they show you options that fit your budget. Enough hunting for discounts, trying to calculate rates, and tinkering with coverages. Maybe you're picking out your very first policy. Or maybe you're just looking for something that works better for you and your family. Either way, they make it simple to see your options. No guesswork, no surprises.

Ready to see how easy and fun shopping for car insurance can be? Visit progressive.com and give the name your price tool a try. Take the stress out of shopping and find coverage that fits your life on your terms. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. Hello everyone and welcome. This is a night's episode of Critical Role where a bunch of us nerdy-ass voice actors, sit around and play Dungeons and Dragons.

Yeah! Apparently, someone's got mail on drag race. That was like standing on the dock, one. And Travis is the only one to jump in. Yeah, well done. So welcome, guys. Before we jump into tonight's episode, we have some announcements to get through. First and foremost, returning once again this week,

our fantastic partners and sponsor for the beginning of this campaign, D&D Beyond! We're doing great role. Awesome. Awesome. Legends and Dragons tool for use for your campaigns, whether be a DM or player. And Sam, do you have something to say about that?

Hey, our partner this week is D&D Beyond. That's www.ddbion.com. They'd like to invite critters to check out and Beyond, the monthly developer update and Q&A session for D&D Beyond. D&D Beyond product director Adam Bradford will share the latest thing the team is working on and answer questions from the community.

The next stream will take place tomorrow. The 16th of February at 11 p.m. Nope, 11 a.m. Pacific. Check it out at Twitch.tv slash D&D Beyond. And to celebrate, I'm giving out a prize tonight. It's another contest. All of you can play. And here's the rules.

Using D&D Beyond, you have to create a character right now, a level three character, any character, go. All right, dot, dot, dot, dot, dot. It's there. Wait, wait. I did it. Sphinxiftinger, Svincter, Svincter. Oh, you know what?

No, I don't know how to call it. I have 138 hit points. Wow, wait, at a level three character? Yeah, I'm Cali's. She's level 15. Ah, Cal is 35 points. Already done, right there. All right, Talis and .

But see how easy it is to create a character with D&D beyond? A level 3,500, Earth, Earth, is elemental. No, but this is a real good character. Your prize is attached to my mug. Oh, no. Oh.

Wait, wait, wait. No, no, no, no, leave it, leave it. Oh, shit. Put it back, I want to do this properly. Oh, life for it. What are you gonna take it? Lift, lip, lip. That's dead.

Yeah, yeah. Diomita Deep Hollow. Did you just. Congratulations. You could randomize your turn. Congratulations. See how easy it is, we all created the character in like 25 seconds.

This random character that I just created is really really fucking cool. I don't have sphincter next to Caleb now. It really named it sphincter? Yes. That's the name I gave them. That's as far as I got. You did it.

Delete. Oh, there goes Caleb. Oh, what is your name? Panalanam. Panlanan. Panlanan. There are four ends in that name. I am Panlannan, the wood half elf blood hunter.

What was yours? Callis. Callas. Callis. And what was yours, Laura? I was Alight, a level 15 fire genoc. Her name was a light? A light.

I'm I'm Iomita Deep Hollow, Lightfoot Half-Ling Fighter. Dude, my abilities are balls. I have a five decks and a four wisdom. That's sad. So we're using those characters for the night's game. No. Anything off of the 39-7 minutes.

I'm dumb, so I'm awesome. Are they better than four? Yes, you're, there's been trouble. There you go. Thank you very much, Sam. Congratulations, Talison. Thank you for being our sponsor. Quick reminder, those of you who have an Amazon Prime account, you can get a free subscription to the Twitch channel

by just going through your actual, yeah, you do it through Twitch, you link your Amazon Prime account to your Twitch name, and you are able to subscribe to one channel for free a month. So if you have not subscribed and you want to have the VODs available to you before they go up on YouTube, that's the way to do it. That's way to do it for no additional charge. So check it out. Talks Machina.

Look at that. He ruled one's and one. I'm sorry. Kids. Sorry, Matthew. It's okay. We haven't started yet, so technically it's a buffer. Talks Mokina next Tuesday, 7 p.m. Pacific, we'll be here on Twitch and Project Alpha, where our host, Brianne B. Foster will discuss what happens and transpires in this episode tonight.

So check it out next week on Tuesday. on Tuesday. Let's see, the podcast of last week's episode is available for download. So for those of you who missed last episode or want to listen to it on your drive or commute, where you just like the audio to create your imagination escape. Last week's episode is available for download now, wherever finest podcasts are located to be downloaded. Let's see. Are there any other major announcements from you guys? A little thing that is totally improvised. A week ago, a couple of weeks ago, a critter named Courtney, Forgive me if I'm getting that wrong, to tweet a picture of her with this scarf that she was making for Caleb, and she said, made the hashtag scarves for Caleb.

And then people just started talking about it, like I retweet it because I thought it was awesome. And the idea, they came up with the idea to make scarves for Caleb, but not for me, to give to shelters, homeless shelters, to veterans, to anyone who needs scarves or hats or mittens. I think it's a great idea, and you would make me happy. This is beautiful. I love it. Thank you. But don't. Don't pile me up in scarves. Send them to people who need them. I just think it'd be a nice thing to do. That's great. That's awesome, guys.

I love it. All right, and once again, A26L.A., our fantastic charity, we've been supporting since the very beginning of the show, almost three years ago now. They do fantastic work. If you have the opportunity to give your time to it or want to help donate, or at least just look up and see what they do,

I recommend to do it. They are fantastic, so thank you guys. And unless anybody else, does anything else, anything else to interject? I believe it's time for us to jump into tonight's episode of Critical Role. Welcome back. Guys are getting sloppy. You guys are getting sloppy.

Welcome back. So, last we left off, our gathering of friends have been traversing northward along the Amber Road with the distant destination of Zadash, one of the larger cities of the Vandalian Empire, as your destination. Upon traveling, you passed a caravan, spent an evening amongst trees where you found a wayward cluster of wandering buffalo. Like creatures. Like creatures. You continued northward for a second day, rushed on past sunset to rest in the city

of Allfield, a small farming town that's along the way to Zedash. However, upon noticing that some of the buildings in the eastern side of town began to light up with what appeared to be flame. You began to approach rather rapidly, seeing members of the city citizens fleeing and screaming, and apparently there seemed to be some sort of attack. Upon going into the town, you realized that a number of these buildings were being set fire by an incursion of knolls. You were immediately brought in by the watchmaster Bryce, who offered to pay you for each set of knoll ears that were brought to them, and you jumped into the fray, many

to kill quite a few, many of them still left with their quarry, it seems, which happened to be quite a number of bodies and or citizens still living that were dragged off into the ashen and cloud-covered night. Upon returning, many of you bruised, beaten, and at one point in danger of worse, you were given evening's rest at the feed and mead tavern, and we're told if you were interested in pursuing future coin in helping with the current conflict nearing the city to go ahead and meet Bryce, was it, out by the... The Broad Bar.

The Broad Bar. That's why I wrote Broad Barn now. That is why. I wrote Rod Barn. It's a different place in time. Glory side. So, you guys all bundled up into a singular room, above the floor of the feed and mead,

found yourself exhausted, passed out, and got an evening's rest. So you've all gotten a long rest, you've healed up, you've recovered your abilities. And as the uncomfortable warmth of the morning kicks in, with your small room and a number of warm bodies encompassing a very tight and not very drafty space, the partially humid early hours draw you from conscious.

you all begin to stretch your sore muscles and decide what endeavors await you with the new day. So what do you guys want to do? What do you guys want to do today? That bed was not my favorite. I liked it. A little step. You should try to sleep on the floor.

It's actually really, like, good, just support your back. It's good for your back. It's really true. You use a pillow or you just like on the floor? A pillow. Do you have to pray over your swords or anything this morning? No, no, everything's fine. They just sort of, they do what they need to do.

I just have to keep them clean. Yeah, well, we were sharing a room one night. Molly has a ritual, I think it's just part of his custom. Oh. Yeah, he performs over his swords. Yeah, I have to take care of them else they'll stop working, of course. Sure. Do you need to feed?

They do, actually, yeah. I've got to feed them some. Well, it's complicated. I don't like to go too deep into it, but I've got to use my bloodline on occasion. Actually, since we're already on the road, I should be honest, I wasn't entirely telling the truth when I talked to you that night. No. Well, you seem so honest. What is a... Oh, you're just a bundle of truth too, aren't you? What is a bloodline? I suppose it's only fair. I did tell you that these swords are special, and that they sort of use the blood of my family to activate themselves. Yeah.

And I know I might have said I was from a long line of priests. Oh my God, you killed your whole family. I didn't kill my whole family. Okay, never mind, keep gone, I'm sorry. Our family were less the priests and more the sacrifers, and we may have stolen the swords and run. I've been trying to keep a bit of a low profile when it comes to some of the authorities.

Yeah, I mean for fear of your life you ran. It's been a long time, but I'd rather not run into them. What gods were you being sacrificed to? Oh, I couldn't tell it was my parents. I was really, I was just wee by the time that happened. So is there a roving band of priests that are trying to find you right now? No, I hope not. I mean, it's been a long time. And where's home? Where's this place that you stole?

My parents never spoke of it. And you got to somewhere out east? The circus from that, how? Well, it was a bit of a mess, but just sort of ended up there eventually. Just looking for a place where I could rest, I suppose. It's funny you gave me an answer, but you didn't really give me an answer. Well, I don't know you that well. Kind of what he's been doing like this whole time.

That requires a drink. I understand that sentiment. Try to find a little respite, little piece. Yeah. It's a good place to be if you want to run but not run. Are there any others of your family out there on the run? Not that I've ever met. Was it just your parents and you that were being sacrificed? You know, I don't know. I never thought to ask.

Did they want to kill you or just take your blood? Apparently they needed us alive for you. alive for it, so there was that. Oh, so it wasn't so bad, they just slowly drank. It doesn't sound that bad, right? Yeah, is that not gonna kill you? So I was told. I mean, isn't that kind of where you're doing to yourself

on like a daily basis? It is what I do now. It's not that bad though. It's, you know, it doesn't actually, doesn't leave a mark really. You're in control of it. You're using it for yourself. Oh, yes, of course, and it can be very, you know,

come in handy. Does it have to be your blood? Oh, yes. Of our bloodline, apparently. Have you? Have you? You've tried? Any other bullet lines? Well, I've cut a lot of people with them.

Would you like to take a run in it? You could be lucky. I'll save that for another day. I had a funny feeling. I'm tempted. And what about you, Ford? Are you going to vomit any seawater this morning? Oh, oh, oh no, watch out.

Nah. That could have been worth like five copper on the open road at one point. I seem to have missed my calling. Always could use a circus geek. Any more, uh, why would you sleep, I guess, aside from the crappy cat? I know what you're asking. I didn't have any other dreams. It was fairly, uh, fairly restful.

No, no. None I care to speak of. Do we think there's anything left of this town? That is a question. Anything left? Anything left? Yeah, it didn't seem like the whole thing was on fire, right? Well, we couldn't quite see it at night, that's true.

Maybe we should go down and... Yeah, I would like to take a walk and see what it is we help to save. You can steal some things. Now... Well, maybe we do that second and first we take a walk. Can we get paid? There was talk of... I thought we already got paid.

Did we get paid? We did, but Molly was drinking, so maybe he does not remember that. He said he was going to bring the rest, I think. I think later. I've got to say, there's worse ways to make a living. I count it 60 gold. Yeah, Molly, didn't you say Bryce said it would come later? Bryce had said if you wanted to continue to help with this and there was more money.

There was more money. It must keep helping. Yeah, I mean this is kind of, it's not a bad gig. We could stay here forever and just kill Knowles. That was very scary. One of them almost killed me. But think about how good we would get over time. That's true, the 10,000 hour rule? Not the no-killer.

And Jester, we kind of agreed not to put anyone in harm's way in an excessive manner, so. When did we agree that? Did we not? I don't remember that. I don't recall making that arrangement. Did we agree to that? I just, maybe I thought that was an unspoken thing. Oh.

Usually when you agree to something, you have to say it out loud, most of the time. I believe you right. Unless it's like, we just agreed to it, you said it, you said it. What did you agree to? I can't tell it, does he go? Oh, but she's serious about it, I can tell. You're so good at this. Well, my social anxiety is getting the best.

I'm taking a walk, goodbye. I'm going to walk out. As the door slams behind Caleb, briskly making his exit. Do you want a donut this morning? It's a little more stale in the bag. I have to let you know. I think I'm fine. Do you want one?

Oh yeah, more donut for us. All right. Well, I guess we should greet the town. Fair enough. When did we say we were going to meet Bryce? I am yelling. I thought they were leaving. Oh.

Actually, I think they'll find us. Yeah. Maybe we can just stand in the middle of town and go, Bryce, until they show up, you know? Well, in front of Broad Barn. Okay, I have a question about this Broad Barn thing. Is Broad Barn like the name of an establishment, or is Broad Barn an actual broad, like a very broad barn?

It's a very long barn. It's a very big barn. What if it's a big barn? One direction. Yeah, what if... We didn't clarify, did we? What if it's like a tavern named the Broad? I don't know, I kind of confused in his delivery.

I bet we can ask the guy downstairs. Sorry. Yeah. Yeah, he seemed nice last night. We go downstairs. Okay. I'll fall over this. All righty.

So... It's a Zork game. We go down. I know, apparently. All right, so you head downstairs to the... to the only other real location within the Mead and Feed, feed and Mead Tavern, go either way. There's Crout, still there off to the side

and what appears to be one very, very dirty and ashy civilian who is currently, like slowly scruffing a meal kind of for the thousand-yard stair. Looks like they had been probably close to the action and chaos the evening before. As you walk down, Crute can look crossing us, hey, I see you awake. Do you think breakfast?

Yes, please. Yes, please. All right, it'll be about an hour, because it's just me. An hour? An hour. All right. It's just me.

Do you want some help? I mean. I'll go help you. Come on. I'll go in for this if it means a faster breakfast. All right, so the two of you jump in with Kruit. in what is a not very well-kept kitchen, but functional.

You know, the gristle, who knows how long it's been there, might add it the flavor, who knows. Are you ready for the city of last century? C plus. We'll put it at B in Panorama City. Yeah. Wow, that's an end joke. Yeah.

So you guys go ahead and help out. It does manage to cut down the time for back of separation, but eventually food is presented. I want to, after a word, After we've cooked, I'm going to switch out his salt for his sugar. Oh, boy. Make a slight of hand check. I want to see if I see this.

I don't, do I? She's good. You two caught up in the meal making. I'm 19. Oh yeah, I definitely don't see this. Yeah. And neither is crude. As you managed to do so swiftly, practiced like you've done this before,

and many other establishments in the past, maybe. But yes, so with that, after we cooked. Right. Obviously, he gave us all diabetes. That's great, yeah. After your to taste real weird. So as you guys finish your breakfast, finish your meal, the rest of the day is yours.

What does the town look like when we kind of step out? Oh yeah, let's do that. All right, so as you emerge from the tavern, and Caleb, you've already seen this. You see that the fire is an oven reduced to maybe a dozen wide plumes of gray-white smoke on the eastern side of the city. Rises from the ashes and charred wood remains

and wood frames where it appears some buildings used to be. It seemed much more dangerous and chaotic last evening, but looking at it now at the day, you can see it's no more than maybe a dozen buildings or so that were affected. They were just more centralized to cause the most chaos suddenly at that time of night. But you get the sense as soon as you look around that the folks of the city are on edge, understandably so.

You see the people are trying to pick up their lives and move on in the face of what recently occurred. The very air just kind of holds this tension as you kind of look around you. People walk past you with sacks of grain and tools, their eyes wide, darting around for unseen danger and glancing past the two teethlings, immediately instinctually kind of step back a bit

and make a wide berth. You watch children run from doorway to doorway, trying to stay out of the street as long as possible. It seems like it's trying to carry on, but it's going to be a process. Some folks are rummaging through the remains of the respective buildings. You glance over near where the central portion of your conflict last night took place, where the candle glow tavern is. And there you see, kind of amongst the smoldering rubble of the inn, a single halfling man

kind of sifts through the wreckage, a crown's guard. helping him lift heavier beings, and you see as he plucks sweaty cannabis, former life from the rubble. Go over and talk to him. Sure. Do we recognize this person? You have not met this person, though. You're a half-ling, too, so maybe you should talk to him. I'm not technically. I'm going to walk over. Okay. I'll join. All right. All right. We'll just go over and scare the shit out. I'm going to just walk.

I need a hand. You look over and you can see what I'm halfling man, maybe in his fifth decade or so, his ashy blonde hair, and comes to be a face cracked by smiling, though now too dour and soot covered to see any sort of smile on his face. As he kind of pulls through some of the rubble and he's making a small pile on the side, he looks up and goes, Oh, rock, can I help you? We were part of this commotion last night. We were wondering if you need a hand with anything right now. Oh. I mean, if you don't, if you don't, oh.

I'm taking off the guy. Okay, okay. And as you're gonna dive in. Lift. Okay, you go ahead and spend the next 10 minutes or so kind of helping move through some of the heavier beams that collapsed. There is still somewhat of a structure, mainly of the bottom floor,

but a lot of the top of secondary floor, the one that you were in last night has fallen in over time. And so it's moving some of the bigger beams out of the way. As you're pulling through and kind of moving some of the larger pieces of the structure, the other thing man goes, I appreciate to help names Thaddeus. Thaddeus, Candle Glow.

Oh, this was your place? It was. Oh, wow. 20 years since I was left this place, built by my grandpaps, Redis. Were you here when the attack happened? Oh, I was here. And then when they all came in, I was gone. I wasn't about to stay around, you know, and so, big,

Did you happen to see where they came from? Oh, I did not. I was in the process of cleaning dishes and dealing a couple of my patrons. One of them, and he points over to the rubble and you can see what looks to be a skeletal body that's kind of impartially clapped. I suppose Lehman's probably not going to be irregular anymore. You're going to rebuild, give him a fine plaque? Rebuilding. I've required something called money.

I think I'm probably gonna gather what I can here and shop up north and see what other work I can get myself too. How much gold do you need? I don't know, building establishment like this. I mean, not entirely certain, but I can check in, I assume it's probably a few thousand gold pieces for the structure. Oh, I just had that too.

I'm sorry, I don't. I don't have it anymore. But I could try writing to my mom and see if she'll help you. That's really sweet. Or is another thought. I mean, since you were basically robbed. Who were they? What happened?

Has this happened before? Oh, it hasn't happened as long as I've been here and I've been here most of my life here in the off field. You hear about these things kind of wandering on the outside and, you know, Crown's Guard keeps you safe. Anything comes too close, they just... Shoot them in the face with a bunch of arrows and shit, but. So much.

Thaddeus, did they seem to be after anything in particular? Were they here for property or people or gold or food? They didn't take any of the worthwhile stuff. Thankfully, it points over to a pile, and you can see there's some, looks like brass, almost like an urn or a vase. It's been kind of smashed and kind of dented by the conflict. You can see bits and pieces of a few keepsakes

that might be worth a little bit of money that's been brought out of it. He's like, I just mainly took all of our food stores. Most of my meats, most of my salted meats, the dried meats, the fresh meats, the butchered meats. It cleared out the butcher down the street. Shrimps scampies,

what a fried shrimp. Coconut shrimp. Fried shrimp. Don't engage. Don't engage them. I'm not we're all gonna die now. No flying. It's real looking, real curious, looking face you got there.

Excuse me, was there any, I saw in the middle of the freight, sir. Excuse me. In Halfling, I say to him, I've also been a victim of a horrible attack. Make a persuasion check. Oh, minus. 10. 10. Okay, but in half-ling, that helped. Yeah, sorry. What can that do?

I'm sorry. I was part of the fray as well. I was right in the thick of it, and I saw a cart pile tie with bodies. Are there people missing from town? Quite a few. You'd have to probably ask around some of the town's guard. How is the rest of the village fair? is everything as poorly off as you are? I mean, plenty of folks seem to get through this okay. They only took down a few buildings

and more worried about the folks that were plucked from their homes. Is yours the only business that was it? I haven't looked around. To be perfectly honest, I've been a little focused on any kind of gestures out with his hands with the rubble that was once his life. You had a lot of meat, didn't you?

Well, you have to present me, a lot of people around here eat meat. Would you say that you offer a large larger selection of meat than some of the other establishments in town? Oh, well, if you're asking me, then the best meat. Don't know about quantity, but quality was... I feel like I've been robbed of the experience of your fine, fine meat products, and I, for one, would like you to rebuild so that I might try some of your meats.

Well, if at some point the gracious God see fit to bequeathed Upon me a strike of good luck, and I can get the rebuilding in my frame. One day, you may be able to try one of my meets. I'm going to just take a look. Is the friend who's dead skeletalized? Oh yeah, well, burnt charge. A bird, okay. Where's this, where's this butcher that you mentioned as well? Oh, that's a... It kind of steps out through where the doorframe kind of is still standing, the one that you defended yourself through most of that battle. It's just kind of like a freestanding frame now. Yes. Was that in the butchers?

Because that would be some like real horror level of shit. I think you were in the barbecue, the barbecue shack. It's kind of awesome. I think this was a barbecue shack. Points over to a building across the way, which is one of the buildings that was nearby. There's the ruddy top butcher. Well, what remains of it?

And you can see that building too is it's still standing. And it's nowhere near as damage just the candle glow in. But it's sustained quite a bit of damage. It looks like the roof has kind of fallen in. I'm sorry, Mollymok, another question for you. Is there maybe, I hope it is still standing, but a supply store? Yeah, if you're looking for the, like,

farming supplies, general supplies, there's a. I'm sorry, I'm in the need of some incense. Oh, you could probably find something like that there at the Bradbarn. Oh, question answer. I'm sorry, I'm standing by four and back up. Question answer. You're wondering why it's called that at this point.

I bet it's big. At least wide. Yeah. Well, at one time it was a barn, but when they'd his farm stopped giving up a crop, and so they converted the barn itself into what was a general store, because they started selling off the tools they didn't need, but that made them more money than the crops did that year, so we just started importing more tools. And for the past 30 years, the broader barn has been kind of our common general supply place there on the western side of the all field. This is really fascinating. Wow, this is really good talk that we've had.

Of course, no. Did you just out-talk, Chester? I think I'm going to go look for the Broad Barn. That's a good idea. Yes. Don't pack up shop just yet. Let's see if we can like do something about these terrible creatures that have been roaming around. Maybe we'll find all of those thousands of gold for you and you can build.

you and you can build your shop backup. Well, y'all look like you're geared up to be making a mess. You're going after these things? We are, perhaps, persons of action. We're really, really, really tough. Some of us. I have no fear. Leans in real close to you.

Can I get on a stippy toes to kind of meet your gaze and he says, well, if you manage to go and kill some of the dog people, you tell him that of his candle glow says, hi. She really will. Okay. Here. It's like kind of a moldy donut that I'm like. Be well, child, the traveler is with you.

She's not a child, but I appreciate the gesture. Oh, please. You know my name, and I leave. Jess. Sure. Her name's gesture. It is a gesture like prince. The adventure formerly known as Jester?

He takes a bite and kind of of . A little out there. Also, I'm sorry, just between you and me, I know the look on your face a little bit, you seem a little manic. So if you have friends you could stay with right now, you know, you don't have to rebuild it today.

I recommend you take it slow. I don't think I have much of choice at the moment. Kind of gives a long stare and towards you that kind of just fades past. a little bit beyond, and then, anyway, I should get back to picking up the pieces, excuse me, and starts gathering more stuff from the rubble, and the Crown's Guard behind goes over

and takes the things he's already kind of gathered against putting them into a small crate and doesn't engage. While they were having that conversation, I'm like hanging back with Ford, if you're cool with that. Yeah. Question. You were.

A crazy ravenous dog humanoid person thing. Yeah. What would make you really hungry all of a sudden? I didn't phrase that question very well. No, I knew we were going with it though. Like how do we ring the dinner bills? What you're saying? How do we get them to come to us?

Yeah. Well, seems like they're into, to kind of meat. Yeah. Kind of anything. Yeah. But like... They done and took it all, I think.

But also like, they're really hungry. Yep. More so now. Why? Why more so now? I don't know. Why more so now? Well, I kind of just took all the Louvies cafeteria with them, so, you know, I don't think they're going to be hungry for...

Greetings, Adventurers. Spring has sprung here in Los Angeles, and that means it's a brief period. where it's only 75 degrees instead of 95 degrees. I'll take it. And that means I've been outside a lot more. Walking around, occasionally galloping after a toddler hopped up on juice boxes, traveling a bit. You know the vibe.

And after doing some spring cleaning, my wardrobe, I gotta say, looking a little bit sad. I want clothes that can keep up with me and my son, but updating my wardrobe every spring sounds pretty expensive. So that's why I wound up signing up for Fabletics as a VIP. It let me overhaul my spring. bring time outfits without obliterating my bank account. New VIPs unlock major savings on that first purchase.

So trying new fits feels way more doable. When I signed up as a new VIP with Fabletics, I got 70 to 80% off everything. It made it easy to grab a few new pieces without overthinking it. And the quality really surprised me. Everything feels premium and soft and breathable, but you're not paying those premium prices. What I like most though is how versatile everything is. You've got stuff you can work out in, but also wear out.

There's matching sets, lightweight hoodies, joggers, teas, you name it. The kind of stuff you can throw in in the morning and not worry about later. When I'm at home, my favorite thing to pull on is the oversized hoodie. It's so comfy I could just live in it 24-7. It's perfect for walking my dog on like a chilly night. But what I'm out and about, I've really been loving the ribbed Johnny Collar polo. It makes me look like I should be taking a high-powered meeting by the pool at the White Lotus, but hopefully with less murder involved. I don't know.

It's insanely comfortable. I highly recommend it. So shop now at fabletics.com slash critical role to get 70 to 80% off everything when you sign up as a new VIP. Take a quick style quiz and be sure to select Critical Role when prompted to unlock your 70 to 80% off. This is a limited time offer, so don't wait. Again, that's Fabletics.com slash Critical Role for 70 to 80% off everything as a new VIP. And now, on to the show. Greetings, Adventurers.

lately I've been getting a bit more intentional about what I wear from day to day because instead of just falling out of whatever laundry baskets nearby I've been leaning into pieces that feel easy and comfortable but still put together because it just makes getting dressed simpler when I have a plan. Quince has been my go-to to help with that because the fabrics feel elevated the fits are clean and everything just works without me needing to overthink it and Quint says all the wardrobe staples you need for spring think 100% European linen shorts and shirts from just $34. They're lightweight, they're breathable, they're comfortable,

your legs and torso will thank you and he will still look put together. And clean 100% Pima Cotton T's with a softness. Well, you gotta feel that to believe it, believe you me. Their pants also hit that same balance. They're relaxed, they're comfortable, but still polished enough to wear basically anywhere. And everything's priced between 50 and 80% less than what you'd find at similar brands. Quince works directly with ethical factories and cuts out the middlemen so you're you're getting premium materials without the markup. And since spring is here in Los Angeles, a brief period where it's 75 degrees instead of 95 degrees, I spruced up my wardrobe with a pair of the comfort stretch traveler five pocket pants

and the heritage washed denim shirt. Not only do they feel great, but I unequivocally look good as hell while wearing them. That's just science. So refresh your every day with luxury you'll actually use. Head to quince.com slash critical role for free shipping. on your order and 365-day returns, now available in Canada, too. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E.com slash Critical Roll for free shipping and 365-day returns. Quince.com slash critical roll.

For a bit. But what if they are so hungry? Then we would need to roast some meats. You know who else was really hungry out of fucking nowhere? Who? Big angry toad man. Devil-toed. Guy. I feel like I should get better names for all these things.

Yeah. He was hunger all of a sudden? Yeah. Hmm. I don't know. I mean it might be coincidence, but just... You thinking some of them knolls had some fiendish qualities perhaps? Well, considering some of them were in dead. Right. There's that whole like zombie null thing. I forgot all about that. Yeah. How could you forget that? How could you forget that? I have some weird dreams.

What do you have in mine other nights? What? I legitimately didn't understand what you said. Oh, nothing, I got shit in my teeth. Are you okay? Yeah, fine. Did you have a plan? Did you want to do something to ring that?

I was just kind of striking conversation. Oh, sorry. Yeah. Well, maybe we'll follow them to the barn broad. Okay, let's go to the barn broad. The broad barn. I was fucking with you. I was feeding.

I was going along with you. When did we hire Tom Stopper to write this? I know, seriously. Couldn't steal. So what are you guys off to? To the Rotten, yeah. Oh, okay. It's told it was in the western edge of town,

and since most of the city is built on two intersections of Main Road, you follow the core central kind of east to west path and on the way out, kind of where you first entered last night, even though you just ran past that you can see, there is indeed right on the edge of town, almost like the town was built to fill the gap in between, a very large barn that looks to have a lot of coiled rope, like 100,000 feet of coiled rope on the outside. The front doors are wide open and you can see a number of folks are coming in and out. Many of them with what looks to be cleaning, support, You know, heavy pieces of cloth, buckets, whatever can be used to start kind of getting rid of the remaining black splash and ashy covering of last night's destruction. You also notice as you approach on the outside, there's a bit of commotion. You see a dozen or so crowns guard and a handful of armed volunteers that all appear to be in regular city of farmer clothing that are all gathered in a loose huddle. with Bryce among them. You hear a loud grating voice from within that huddle. As you approach from the outskirts, you see what appears to be a middle-aged male gnome

of ruddy complexion and slicked parted dark hair. He wears very clean marooning gold robes, and that would lend an air of elegance were he not hopping around and pointing fingers. At which point he sees he starts shouting between the crew kind of just waving his hand around without any warning. which was your jaw brace, with Ruben called dead. That leaves no law master to preside forcing me to take that position as well. I do not need that added responsibility, but until we get a new lawmaster

and stated from Rexitrim, I have no choice. Bryce pipes up at this point, kind of glancing over and seeing your guys' presence. Storost, I've sent a request to both Zadash and Blade Garden for a, a supplementary force, but it may be weeks before any would arrive. Can we send trained hands at my approval to retaliate, at which point the Storoster, which is now been identified?

They cannot spare any of our forces while the surviving guard are drawn so thin. Answer the question. Maintain a vigilant perimeter and deflect any further incursions. Brace nods slowly. Can we at least have permission to hire mercenary strength to retaliate then. I feel not being proactive before the null force can fully

regroup would put us at a severe disadvantage, at which point gets cut off by the starrows that... Yes, that's fine. Higher outside. I don't want any more of my citizen's deaths on my record. Dispist!

And immediately just kind of pushes through the crowns guard and storms off, which is hilarious to watch a gnome storm out of a group of people. And just kind of off of the huff is escorted by three crowns guard from behind out of that space, at which point the crowd begins to kind of murmur and disperse and go about their business. Bryce turns and smiles at all of you. They've washed up from last night's damage and dirty conflict. So as they approach.

I turn to Jester and I go, look like inviting like, look heroic. I'm deeply sorry about that. Storostokash is high-strung on a holiday, and tensions have never been this high since he was assigned here eight years ago. So please don't take that to heart. He's just a... Dick. Your word's not mine.

It seems some people handle pressure better than others. He doesn't seem like the handling type. No, those in higher political positions rarely do, it seems. Anyway, I want to thank you all again for your aid last night. I can't fathom the further death toll had you not been there and jumped in self-less thieves, you did. Thank you. Bryce kind of trails off and looks back towards where Strosda Kosh has stormed off and goes,

fucking Dwindolian political bullshit. We've needed more trained guard here for... weeks, especially with Zohas bleeding into the valley, but we're far too south to matter. Every request has been declined due to all necessary forces being needed at the garrisons by Broken Vale. If they were doing their jobs at the Bluffs, we wouldn't have so many reports of violent beasts

in the valley in the first place. But here we are. At least I've gotten approval for a bit more cash. And to that, while I do not know what your business, here is in Orfield. If you are still interested, we are in need of some skilled mercenary work. We're going to kill all of them.

Yes, we couldn't help but over here that you were asking for some aid. How long were you thinking you might need these replacements? Well, I mean, until at least this threat has been dealt with in a satisfactory way, I've unfortunately not had my scouts return after they were sent the night before, which is not bodewell.

But I suspect we should see some sort of hopeful backup sent by Zadash or Blade Garden within the next week or two. In the meantime, we're a bit of a sitting duck scenario. So I sent a few guards to go to Zadash to see where other mercenaries could be sent forward. We do have some folks traveling on the road and we'll keep an eye out to see if anybody else

looking for some coin, but for now, you are our first line of defense, or offense, if you will. Well, I think I speak for all of us. We're certainly up to the task for a bit. Well, maybe for a little less than a bit. Can I ask, are there any other threats to this town besides those nose? Oh, there are plenty of threats.

Let's see, famine, syphilis, things that come in on less. on legs and with weapons, I mean. Civilist can come with legs. I feel like that was worth pointing out. Yeah. Why do both of you know that? Not wrong.

It's the teeth-linked thing. No. This backwards place has its fair share of issues, as I've come to learn, as being not from the region. But it seems to me that nothing on this scale has quite assaulted in some days. assaulted in some time. I mean, there have been wandering rumors

of terrible things and creatures wandering past the Jorhas border for as long as the Dwandan Empire's been around. That's the whole reason of the garrisons up north. But this far south, generally, the guard can keep things at bay. This is a very organized thing. I don't like it. I don't like it at all. It's new, then.

Well, this is new. Nothing will miss care. And it seems, it's from what we've seen that they were hungry. I've done a bit of research overnight, and it seems that Knowles are known to be very aggressively hungry creatures, and say famished to the point of obsession. Feel their pain, really. I can understand that. So you wish to hire us how much we are very experienced, but we'd like to know what we're talking about in advance.

about an advance. What kind of money are we talking about? The deal stands, 30 gold per nole ear, proof of a dead knoll. If you can recover any of the missing townsfolk here in all fields and bring them back safely, we're willing to pay 25 gold ahead, returned. What if we find a dead body and bring a back? Is there some lesser number for those? There is, because even if they are gone, we would wish to bury those we've liked to and I could probably muster 10 gold per retrieved member of the All-Field citizenry.

Specifically their heads too or just... Preferably all of them. Whatever you can find. It is permissible is what they're saying here. I mean, seen with these creatures did last night. I don't know what state you'll find any of them, but I'm just being hopeful. Do you know what area they might have gone to? Was there a... They seem to be heading east to a northeast direction.

That's where the scouts went before they left. I wish I had more information for you, but that may be a good place to start. Can you tell us at least what the landscape is like in that direction, what is over there? There are some spotty woods on the outskirts of the town that what Allfield was kind of built into. Beyond that, it's rolling hills and fields.

There are some older, long, grown-over settlements that have been abandoned. Small scale, but honestly, beyond here it's mainly field. If I might offer some advice, if you do see a ghost, don't engage. Do you know where they are, so we know how to steer clear? My dear, there are ghosts everywhere in this world. It's far more ancient than you assume. Well. Bryce, some of these knolls were undead or raised from the dead.

Do you have any inkling as to why, or have you seen that problem around here before? I don't know as to why, but it's not uncommon from what I could ascertain. Whatever dark powers they worship, it seems, allows some to progress beyond Death. Rumors are that when Norse go hungry and are left defeat on each other, what remains rises to fight alongside those that still live. That would be why some of them had chunks

missing out of them. This comes from research you have done. That you have read up on. Would you be able to share this greeting with me so that we are fully prepared? I honestly just I said with you most of all that I had learned. It's a smart book. There was a, more of a pamphlet, actually. The only other bit of information I was able to pull from that was they have this thing, this entity that they worship has a name.

Pulls out a few small notes. The fire hydrant. Does it start with an A? Sometimes if you go down through the alphabet. A, B. As you're saying this, they pull a small series of notes from their pocket. Yinagou. Yinogu.

Yinogu. With a Y? I would have taken forever. Well, let that be a lesson, young halfling. With a Y. With a Y. Y. Nogu.

Nogu. Nogu. Nogu. Nog. Nog. I don't know how it's pronounced, I only read it, so I apologize. Do I know anything about you, Nogne? Make a religion check.

With a... I would have advantage. We could die. A religion check? Yes. 18. 18. It sparks a memory in you.

Information kind of floods your mind, and you recall hearing about various demonic leaders of the abyss, creatures that once walked the prime plane, and use see images of this large, bestial, feral, angry demon, ever hungering, ever wandering to conquer and devour in its wake, leaving destruction, fedded meat, and waves and waves of yipping

angry hyenas to devour what was left behind. Yeah. Sorry, another question. May I call you Bryce? Of course. Bryce. Well, we were just about to go inside the barn here and get outfitted for this, well for many things,

but especially now that we're going to go take care of this problem. Do you have any sort of pull with these people? Might we get any kind of, you know, friendly? No. Well, sure. but I'm talking about some sort of discount for getting ready for the road. You're not that flush.

It's not so much about that more than, these aren't well-to-do people in their own right. And right now, honestly, rebuilding. It's asking a bit much, I was too far away. That's all right, it's all right. But you, as I know quite well from personal experience, have some coin to your name. Perhaps that will be of aid to you.

Yes. Well, that's a quick question, though. What do the nose normally eat? As far as I can tell, whatever living things they can get their hands on. Those buffalo creatures that we see rolling around. Probably. That's how we got to eat.

All right, that's... I will say, If there are any surviving captives, then haste is very much key. For if they are as hungry as they seem, regardless of the massive volume they've acquired through the evening, I know not how many the number is, or how hungry they are.

Take too long, they may not be much left to find. We'll get this stuff and head right out. Sorry, my curiosity gets the best of me. Always, you're talking about Bufferoux. creatures or something, but we saw these beasts on the outskirts of town. Do you know they looked like a sort of brown furred, beast of burden type creature? Do you know what those animals are? Right, yes. The valley oryx. Valley oryx? Valley orocks. All right, well we should get ready for the road. Agreed.

Yes. Walk into the store. Was it hit at all? Was the store that we're going into destroyed it at all? No, this was far enough west. It was mainly just a few buildings and the eastern side. Coming from where the woods were, it seemed like they were using sort of cover of tree and canopy upon the incursion and then immediately just assaulted kind of partway into the eastern part of the city, burned it from the middle, and then used the flames to escape out the back. What are you about to say? Bryce.

Patsy. Speaking of the Orrk. Are you all right? Sorry, just a lot of my mind. Just meditating. Speaking of the orcs, I asked you yesterday if you, if you were you, if you're You'd heard if any of the farmers had had their cattle hit? Have you heard that yet? I could ask around. I mean, it does happen on occasion.

It's fine, it's fine. We'll ask on who are you? It's good. It's good. It's good. Kenny, yeah. I don't know why I have... If you excuse me, I do have something to get to.

Of course, yes. But good luck. And Godspeed. Have fun dealing with the dick. with the dick. I'll do my best. Bryce turns around in leagues. Yeah.

Did I recognize Starostakash? Did he seem like the type that would have made a little side trip down to, uh, because he seems like the type? Was that a character D? Make a, make a, make a, I know, I'm like, I feel like an intelligence check. I am filing, I put a wall between that. Uh, intelligence.

18? 18? The robe coloring is what caught you, and the hair, the specific, like, slicked and then kind of part comb. You have seen this individual before. You were younger, maybe like eight or so years ago, eight or nine years. Good to know. But yeah.

We're just made of secrets, aren't we? Just made of secrets. Caleb, yeah? Yeah. In my personal holdings, I don't really remember putting this there, but apparently I have five sticks of incense that I have no intention of using. Oh, yeah. Will that do you any good? Well, that would be worth about how much do you am? Where does incense come from?

I think it was part of a thing when I, I don't know. A pack or something? I was T.D.D.B.O. and I don't know. I was part of an inventory pack then. I think so, yes. It would be negligible by comparison. I'd see maybe at most, like five silver's worth of, at most. That is really very...

Change your day, didn't it? Everything's coming up flowers now. Yes, this has helped me immeasurably. Don't mention it. Wait, wait, wait, wait. How much incense do you need? Well, it depends on how much I want to do with it. I want my cat back.

But it was maybe in the realm of like 15 or 20 gold I'm going to spend here today if they have that much. On incense and that five sticks was five silver's worth? Did anyone say that out loud? She has a good eye for value and ropes. It's a lot of incense to burn. There's a lot of parts too. It's not quantity. It is the quality of incense.

There it is. All right, all right, all right. And this was top shelf, but I still need more. So in we go. And then, but just I say, thank you, the guy. And I punch him on. As he walks in. As far.

I think both do that. He's going to separate. Keep up a good face for two seconds. All right, as you walk into Broadbarn, There are probably five other individuals that are coming through and picking up. It would look to be thick cloth for cleaning. You can see one person's picking up a few different

kind of burn balm kits. On the far end as they're checking out, there is what looks to be an extremely old gentleman with this giant, and kind of just gnarled tuft of a chin beard that just merges with this like halo, almost like a main, lions made of white hair. He has this really thin, long crooked nose.

Kind of like like Inge Book from Neverning Story. But no glasses. And he's trying to keep a smile in the rather dark faces of the people that are coming in with the evening's events coming around. As you guys walk in and approach, he can glance down. I was like, well, if y'all need some, you all just let me know. Oh, boy.

West Virginia. Do you have any pickles? Y'all want pickles. You seem like the type of place that would carry pickles. He leans back and rummages through what sounds like a small paper bag. They come in barrels, usually. You get barrels of pickles? There's like a small glass mason jar with like two pickles, and he goes, I'm willing to part when they share pickles.

Is it poop? Is it poop in a jar or is it pickles? No, it's pickles. It looks like he may have just pulled it out of his lunch. Yeah, only you put poop in a jar. That's true. Ah, could part wear them for around a great copper? That is a good deal, sir. I will give you the copper. Do you need more copper?

Are you all right? No, hold on. No, I've got copper around somewhere. Okay, because I'll give you two copper if I get one of those pickles. Okay, okay, okay. Here, I pick some lint off one of the copper that they have. He takes the copper from you.

Did you? Take the copper from you, slice four the pickles goes, he he he, he, good day. Excuse me, I just inhaled my own spit. Don't do that! That is not conducive to a lengthy lifetime. I am okay.

I am needing a very fine kind of incense, and I don't know if that is the type of thing this establishment would carry, but it's very important to do you have that sort of thing. You want incense? That's fancy. I'm sorry, it's very noisy in the shop. What did you say?

It's really fancy, that means? Fancy them, incense. Well, look at me, can you not tell how fancy I am? Yeah. That's why I'm curious. Well, you know, I haven't been on the road a long time, and I am carrying a smell with me, if you cannot tell. I got incense.

To the point, I like it. I would like to spend about 20 gold worth of incense. Do you have that much? I don't mean cheap shit. What kind of establishment do you take me for? Well, it's a barn, yeah. Tushay. He wanders away from there and

gathers what looks to be any semblance of anything that could be considered incense to some degree. And it's a massive volume. It's, you know, we said quality over quantity. This is definitely a quality or a quantity circumstance. Like two big burlap sacks filled with all sorts of fine ground herbs and things that could amount to. I would like to make an inside check to make sure it's not oregano.

Go for it. Come on, where's the Druid? That's what would be for oregano. That's vex. That's this one. Which would know if you were swindling. Perception? No, it's the inside. The inside? Oh, that's much better.

That is an elf. A what? An elf. Elf. 11. You just learned something everybody. There we go. Eleven in German.

He seems to be doing the best again. Okay, good. Good. This is, you know, this is really good. I will give you 17 gold for all this. Deal! One. He's counting this out.

Is there anyone else in the store? Anyone know? At this point, there's three other people in the store, and they're slowly filtering out. Okay. Do I see any little trinkets or anything? Little brass things, little baby bottles, anything? This store, it seems most everything they have here, it's a lot of them are bases of farming supplies.

A lot of them are, there are a few metallic joints that could be used for when you were, like, tapping a keg. They have some cake taps there. They have a bunch of dick. 16. Oh, that one fell. And I push the 16 gold forward. Oh, 16.

I appreciate your patronage. You've got an idea. I've got an idea. These are heavy. I know this may be a stretch. Do you have maybe any healing potions or anything like that? Or maybe, this might be weird. Some kind of poisons maybe.

That's pretty weird. That's, I'm gonna say there, sir. I mean, you look pretty weird, that's a pretty weird request. No, we do not carry poisons. Even for dealing with pests on a farm, that sort of thing. We have insecticides. I think that we'll work on a knoll. Yeah.

Exiticide, pesticide. Herbicide. I love it. I mean, insecticide generally refers to insects. And we're talking noles. Yeah, we ever chucked a bunch of insects, though? I mean, yeah. Stuff is bad for anybody, I guess.

Is it flammable? Oh. But we could accept it was flammable. Do it. How much is it? How much is it? For a bad of file that big, silver. You're gonna have to use a lot.

Like, what would that really, if I were to drink that right now, what do you think I would do to me? Probably have some real serious shits for a few days. It's like my zine. Wow, really. May I examine it? May I examine it? Yeah, please. Okay, I'm going to sort of look at it, smell it, look at the fluid. Do I know anything about this chemical at all?

You do. It's a very diluted form of acute point. to the point where it wouldn't actually affect any larger creature, but if put in a large batch of water used to spray down crops, certain insects, how are they called again, forget, anyway, aphids, things like that would die off. Oh, that's nothing. Yeah. It won't really do much, but, you know. Do you know about these sorts of things? Sometimes, not a lot. That's very impressive. I was selling yourself. Speaking of, and I'll ask him for the components to make acid, does he have that stuff? In a very anarchist cookbook kind of way,

like he doesn't sell you acid, but there are the materials available where you could create it, yeah? Okay. How much for all this shit? How many vials worth are you looking for? Just one. Just one? Oh, so run you ballot.

12 goal. All right, that's fine. Oh, oh, can you throw a med kit in there with it if you have any left? Looks around. I'm afraid we're clear out. Bit of them. You have things going on.

A lot of things, sorry. It's fine. My apologies. No, it's okay. I have this pickle. It's a good pickle. It was. Is it a good pickle, though? I haven't tried it.

I just drank the juice, but oh. I ate mine. It was quite good, and now we're just sharing the juice at this point. Guys, let's go kill moles. Juice is great. It is. Oh, whiskey. Oh, well, whiskey.

Picklebacks. Picklebacks. Pickleback. Drying drinkers. No, no, num, num, num, num, num, num, num. Like cheese, right. Yeah, so good. Oh, God, stop it.

Okay. Go back to Kentucky. Are we prepared? Are we prepared? Are we prepared now? Wait, no. No, I have things to do. Do you, do you sell any healing potions? I didn't ask that. We didn't. Not really, not really, pervayers and healing potions and those that have are usually held by the Crown's Guard.

By the Crown's Guard? Really. We didn't ask Bryce for any healing potions. I should ask Bryce for some healing potions. You actually asked the night before and Bryce had said that. And Bryce had said that they're currently being used to tend to people that are in really bad places. Yeah. Yeah.

It's kind of hard to walk through a war zone and be like, hey guys, do you have supplies? What do you need to do for the rest of the day, Kaelen? Well, you know, I would really like to get my cat back, so I would need about an hour to go do a little stuff. Do you have anything else to do? I mean, there's people getting chopped up and eaten, but if you really want the cat, you know.

No, no, no, that's... How are we doing, what are we doing? Are we taking our cart? Take the cart? Get some meat from the butcher? We might be able to go faster. I think if we were a little spread, if we were helped. Maybe I can put it on hold, although I really hate to, but let's come up with what are we doing? What is the plan? Well, I mean, I would follow the direction that they lived last night, so we can find a trail.

We're just going to go into the belly of the beast, because one of them shot me and killed me with an arrow. I mean, we could draw them out. Yeah, you just stay behind Caleb. You'll be fine. You didn't die, not. I saved these. Thank you so much, but I don't want to be in that predicament again. Yes, thank you. Can we draw them out somehow? Yeah. They are fond of meat. Here's my idea. Oh, yeah.

We stage a barbecue contest. Finest in the land. All the best barbecue will be there. And then when they come to sample our wares, I run and you kill them. You know, I love that idea. I want to understand it though, yeah. Small pick up. Time, again, is of the essence. Because you want to slow cook that stuff to dream really good.

Right, really get a good hickory chip under them. But, you know, the problem is people might be dying in the meantime. So if we could find more expedient solution. So are you thinking on having a barbecue here or setting up a barbecue on the road? I think we're in the middle of a field, yes. Just a random field? Yes. It'll take a while to make the science.

I got an idea. So it seems like less of a trash. Get them, Bo. You tell her. No, you take it forward, please. Listen, Bo had a fantastic observation. You know, if we happen to see one of those beasts of burden on our way out tracking, maybe we could wrang a one up and use it as a bait.

And if we don't see one, then Ford, you're the biggest. That's fair. Either way, we would probably need the cart. We could also see what they still have with the butchers. To bring a bit more. And maybe one extra horse. What did you say, Malihan? We could see where else they saw with the butchers.

Well, the butcher got severely cleaned out. We could see what slowners. Well, we just heard that. He might start. I think you're right. Extra horse, we need the cart. You have to carry one of those beasts if we kill one. I mean, and also I would say if we can try and figure out a way to set up our operation on the edge of the forest,

so that we're not in the middle of a field in the open hill. Well, is the... Hills aren't good. To try to, I'm sorry. Let me finish your thought. Hills are bad. Hills are bad to fight. Yeah, okay.

So... Unless you're on top of the hill. That's good. I'm not a technician, but it's not what we want to be in. I have a question. Go ahead. Are we trying to go back to these things where they live, their lair, their home, their camp,

or are we just hoping to lock into them on the road? I think we'd be making the best guess at this point. My best hope is to find out where or what it looks like where they're staying. And if we can without confrontation, get some survivors out of there. That would be ideal. But I like that idea.

Actually, that's not a bad idea at all. Maybe we can have like a survivler, like roundup team and then like a defense team. It'd be nice. But then how do we get all of the ears? And I'm just putting it out there, maybe survivors before ears, just for now. You can always go back out and get more ears

whenever we damn feel like it. Yeah, well, that's the thing. We can do both, but there is a time stamp on the people, so we should take care of the people first. Because then we are increasing how much gold we will bring in, because if they die, then we will not get as much money for them if they are alive. So we should get them alive, get them out, kill the baddies if we can at the same time, and if not go back a second time. I thought you said you weren't a tactician. Look at you. He's very smart. Extremely tactile. I have no- No social graces, let's do this. Let's go. Before, Pepper, are we getting another? Brace.

Are we buying another horse? We're going to ask Bryce if they have a horse. Why don't you four go get horses? Yeah, we get a no-a. Me and the sea man will go get some incense and stuff. Seaman? I thought I was the same man. Fucking, get your titles right.

Come on, brother. Come on, you want us. Take an hour to manifest. I'm proud, son of a bitch. You're a seaman. Wait, so wait. Now we need time. I'm gonna go get a horse.

You don't need to be there for that. Oh God, I really want my cat, but maybe. Let's go get some incense. I need to buy some tarts. Maybe you would be, we'll get the tarts. Maybe you would be heading you. You need a tart? I need a tart.

Oh, well. Minutes, we have minutes. You have tarts? Hold on, let me dig. That's a bag of pastries. There's this one. Wow. I think there's a blackberry one somewhere in here.

I can't tell what this used to be. Where does the tart stop in the bagged in? Is that the top or the bottom? No. Nope. It's all kinds of black, sorry. I have two tarts? Very stale.

I'm taking them. You can't tell if the sour smell is intentional flavor or just time taking its toll. They'll be tart one way or the other. Do we see any crowns guard around in the street? Overtime you will, yeah. They're scattered a bit thin, and a lot of them are currently focused

on either perimeter watch in case they come back or helping out those that need help inside the city. I'd just like to find one if I could. Okay. I see within 10 minutes of wandering through the city, if you guys have gathered yourselves, and me I'm heading towards the eastern side, you see a crown scar who's currently walking by

with what looked to be some wash rags under one arm and like a little streak of dried blood down the side of their face. It looks to be like a young man problem in his mid-20s or so, longish hair that's been heavily braided in the sides and then pinned to the back in a kind of a slate tuft of a ponytail. Howdy? Yes?

Sorry to bother, but we've been commissioned by Bryce to make a little expedition to go up to those nose. We're going to need an extra steed if the Crowns Guard has one. We're not allowed to give out any Crowns Guard supplies. If you're looking for a steed, you You probably have to go to the on-the-wind stables. They're going to be your best bet. And where would those be? Right. Points over towards kind of the northern side of the town. And you can see it's one of the buildings that has taken a little bit of fire damage. Are you concerned about the people that live in this town? The clock's ticking on their lives,

and you want me to go get a steed from another stable instead of saving their lives? It's not... I sure would hate to have to report this to Bryce. I think they'd be pretty upset about it. Make a deception check. 13? 13. It's like, look, I mean, no offense whatsoever. And if I can go find Bryce and see if we can get this around the watchmaster would be much more suited to make this habit. Reggie? Reggie. Disappointed, Reggie. I don't know what else to say. Let's go. Fuck yeah now. Reggie, you know, this is hard.

Town has been hit hard. You look very weary and maybe like a little down on you're like yourself. Maybe I'm just reading into things, but I would gladly pay you a silver for this horse. And let me tell you, Reggie, it would be the best deal you could possibly make. I'm going to use Charm Person. Oh. Did not make that DC check. So Reggie kind of glances over, you was,

let me see what I can do. And kind of just quickly makes his way northward to the outside of stables. Very nice. Thank you. About five minutes past or so, and you can hear the clopping of hooves as Reggie comes back with a very obstinate beast

on the reins, kind of dragging it towards You slowly guiding it. Reggie doesn't seem to be very trained individual when it comes to handling creatures, especially a beast of burden. This, will this do? Oh, good. I see you brought us your best, Reggie.

Thanks, man. Ignore her, she's very difficult. She's the Reds. Not wrong. You're a hero. Thank you. Best I could do. Good luck.

Here's that copper. Thank you. Thank you. I hand him a silver also. Thank you. Silver is way too little for a horse. You said silver and we're being fair. Just bring it back. We'll do our humble back. It's on loan. If we come back, it comes back. Probably. There you can't.

It's just a rental. We definitely won't use it as paid for the Knowles. Okay, bye. We make our way over to where we left our other horse in carbon. Okay. Easy up to find. You had placed it at a hitching post with a little bit of feet over the evening. So your cart and horse are safe and at your disposal.

I saw him take off into the forest. I kind of tracked a little bit, kind of right between those trees, but I mean, I don't know, we can start there. I bet they left a lot of tracks and probably some cart things. I don't know why, I thought you were gonna say they left behind, but they probably did.

Oh my god, they weren't ordering any underwear, were they? They were wearing what they were to be cobbled together or scavenged bits of leather and hide armors. But it had holes for their butts. It seemed like most of them would have had some means of easily disposing of their excruined. They don't care. They're just swinging low and leaving it behind. They weren't very well dressed. Well, yeah. If that's the direction you saw him head off in.

Yeah. Then I guess I'll try and, I'll be on the lookout for cart tracks. Okay. We're looking for cart tracks. As we go, and also, you know, we didn't have time. So here, off you go. And I will sit in the cart and go blind. Okay.

So while you were sending from, I'm going to keep a watch, you are keeping it out for tracks to kind of leave that. So go to make a survival check, please. I'm also, I don't mean that's not like my mind. That's not like my strongest. It's okay. It's okay. I'm keeping an eye out for it. Not bad.

16. 16? Yeah. Okay. Wait, wait. That was a six. Oh, I rolled a natural 16. So 19. 19. I thought it was a 13, I apologize. Very quickly, you come upon what looks to be

a number of nole footprints in the ground. One of what seemed to be multiple cart tracks. That was the one that you saw. Oh, no. Wait, are there nearby towns? Are there other nearby villages or something? They were multiple parts. They were just at heart carts.

Oh, we just only saw one. The last one. Okay, can I get like an odd estimate of maybe how many knolls we might be dealing with based on the amount of tracks? With that role, I'd say you surmise somewhere in the neighborhood of about 18 or so knolls. from what you can gather on the tracks that you found. Would the hunter's bane be useful for that,

for tracking these creatures? You can attempt to make an information. They would technically have some undeaderone in them. For the specific... Sure. Go ahead make a survival check to see if you can even find those tracks. Just a standard one. Standard survival track.

You're technically tracking ended, so you would get advantage in this one. 17. Same degree. You find the tracks, you see that there is the remnants of this null horde, if you will, returning towards a similar direction. You find what it seemed to be, three sets of cart tracks. I turn to the rest of the group and I go, okay, good news. We were real stupid if we thought we couldn't track them, because there was a fuck ton of them. So that'll be easy. Bad news is, oh God, there's a fuck ton of them.

That's it. Yeah, it is bad news. That's, yeah. Are the cartes all heading in the same direction, or would they split up? They're all converged into one path, and they head through the relatively thin woods that surround the northeastern side of Allfield. And as you progress on that path out to the other side of the woods, continue into the northeastern fields, where the rolling hills begin, begin. And these hills seem to go on for miles. I would be, Frumpkin would be in the air like three to four hundred feet in front of the cart.

And I wouldn't do 100% of the time, but I would talk for three minutes and then maybe go, hold on one sec. And then come back. So intermittent. Yeah. So go ahead and make perception check. Yeah. Tallgrass? Yeah. Or is it just open, fucking hills. Picked by beasts. No, no, it's tall grass across the hills.

Oh, that's bad back style. Bad backstay. Okay. The grass can vary anywhere from knee high to chest high in places. And it's a, the hills towards the top can get a little more rocky. The war is over and both sides lost.

Kingdoms were reduced to cinders, an army scattered like bones in the dust. Now the survivors claw to what's left of a broken world, praying the darkness chooses someone else tonight but in the shadow dark the darkness always wins this is old school adventuring at its most cruel your torch ticks down in real time and when that flame dies something else rises to finish the job this is a brutal rules light nightmare with a story that emerges organically based on the decisions that the characters make this is what it felt like to

play RPGs in the 80s and man it is so good to be back join the glass Canon podcast as we plunge into the shadow dark every Thursday night at 8 p.m. Eastern on YouTube.com slash the glass cannon with the podcast version dropping the next day. See what everybody's talking about and join us in the dark. Welcome to Mick Unplugged, the number one podcast for self-improvement and modern leadership. I'm Mick Hunt, your host, and I'm here to challenge your why and fuel your because. This is where leaders, entrepreneurs, and go-getters come to level up. Each week, I bring you unfiltered conversations, game-changing strategies, and the kind of motivation that transforms lives and legacies. I've learned from legends like Les Brown, Damon John, and Robert Irvine.

And now, I'm bringing their lessons, along with mine, straight to you. From modern leadership tips to creating unstoppable momentum, this is the podcast that redefines what's possible. Hit play, subscribe, and join the millions who've made. made Mick Unplug their go-to source for growth and greatness, because your next breakthrough is just one episode away. This is Mick Unplug, the voice and face of modern leadership entrepreneur and self-improvement. Let's get started.

There are patches where the grass doesn't grow as well, and there's just like open dirt and broken shale. After about an hour or so of tracking in that direction, you've come upon what's the Real Way Road, which is the main road that heads up towards Felderwyn. Did you say? Real Way? Real Way.

R-I-L-W. R-I. You can see it a little ways off. Also, in this time, I would have told the rest of the group, you know, before Not and I arrived in Trostenwald, just outside the city limits, We were laid by Knowles previously, and they were hiding in grass just like this.

It was very much like this, so we should be, I'm getting very nervous right now, looking at it all. In theory, am I actively tracking these creatures? The Undead, at least. The Undead tracks are falling in line with her tracking. They're moving as a group, but there's far less undead tracks than there are regular NOLs. So it's best you can to keep tabs on it.

I'm just curious how much of this hunter's vein I can actually be using it right now. I mean, you'd be leading it if she hadn't made an equally good role. So now both of you are leading this. The grass, is it dead or like vibrant green? Vibur and green for the most part. Never mind.

So you can't hear people moving through. Or setting the fire. Right. The wind is picking up a little bit and you can see, especially when you start coming up over some of the bigger hills, you can see kind of the waves cresting over the hillside and causing the shift of it. It's a very beautiful space.

The wind just makes it hunt to hear him. To your yard, or do you can tell? Still the morning hour or about midday? At this point now, you've been traveling, probably we'll say, an hour and a half. It's getting close to noon. No, no, actually, it's actually about 1137, so we're not quite very by the position of the summer.

Don't, no, no, don't do it. I don't know. I don't know. She's just so wrong. Sorry. He's sorry. It was right there. I know, I know. Anyway.

Beholder! Don't think I'm not tempted. Camping. So, okay, how rough and how open is our situation right now? Are we like in the middle of an open field? You're pretty much in the middle of an open field. But the tracks, you can see, because you can see the Rui Road south of you, and the tracks,

tracks begin to shift further north. As they were heading back, they were keeping off of the road best they can as well. You also do notice that within the tracks, you do find bits of grass that are spattered with drying blood. You don't know how fresh it is. Go ahead and make a perception check. Remember how I was like, this is like the worst situation to be in.

I feel like this might be the worst situation to be in. Right. What, survival? Perception. Perception. Wow. Did you see that? It's a one.

It's a one. Yeah. As you're having this conversation with Ford, you're just not paying attention to the road in front of you. God. God. If we're sitting in the cart, is the grass taller than us, or is it way lower than us? No, it's about as tall as the cart at times, at times gets lower, so you guys do stand out amongst the grass. So as you head over the hills or down below, you are above the grass line without an issue. So if walking on the ground as a human, is it like up to here?

Yeah. It's about up. to your chest at times, waist chest. Yeah. So if I stand up in the cart as we go, can I see out and like see into the grass and stuff? Yeah. What if I gave Jester a ride on my shoulders? Oh boy.

That seems like a good idea. Or while we're in the cart. What could possibly go wrong? You've seen teen work? In the cart. And you're holding you. I like it. I like it.

All out. Go make perception check. Jester. Oh, really? Oh, just his teeth. Oh. Oh, okay. 19.

Make a strength check. Okay, okay. Is it like a saving throw or just a check? Savings. Just a check. Just a check. Just a straight up. Come on, roll a 20.

Make it happen. That's okay. It's a 14. 14, okay. Righty's your eyes. Catch something you drop for a second, but Jester is, or a bow's behind, beneath you going,

oh, it's barely holding you up. The elbows are starting to buckle a bit, but just ral, Rally's and holds you up, still above. You kind of flatten your back out to give a graceful pose as you look ahead. I'm flying, six, seven, six, eight. Yeah, you are.

Two great. As you guys are coming up over a hill at this point, you get a good view down and you can see between the tall grass and the high weeds that are beginning to cluster this vicinity, there is a series of large hills that kind of all break down into this valley where the grass just ends in this area. It just looks like it's barren rock and dirt.

And you notice with that perception check what looks to be a few carts, what looks to be a few broken boxes, what looks to be some tables or contraptions in there. There's some semblance of civilization here amongst these hills off the road. There's carts! I see the carts! I think. I jump up and down in our hands.

Oh, God! She drops you. Oh, are there people in the cards? Are there people in the carts? Can I see? They appear to be empty. They're empty. Abandoned?

Maybe. I'm gonna start drinking. Just I'm gonna put you down. How much do you drink? Okay. I'm gonna take three big swigs. Okay. Good enough. And I would like to use Brampton to do a once around from above to see if any of those beasts are on the horizon anywhere for us to kill, and also if there's any survivors or anything here.

Perception check for Brumkin, if you don't. That is a 13. 13. Good enough. Should we, should we, should we pull the cart over and sneak up? Yes, my foot is how we should proceed. Okay. Let's pull the cart over.

Okay. And hide it in the grass. Yeah, that's why I kind of helped Jester hide the cart, the grass. Oh, but our horses, what if they get eaten? It's all right. It's fine. It's fine. It's fine. We don't care about the horses.

Let's just save ourselves. Who cares about the horses? Well, how are we going to get all the people back if we don't have horses to pull the cart? That's true. From a hundred feet up, I can see through Frumkin's eyes all of us being a bunch of dumbfucks in the back of a cart. It's true. Should we leave someone back to protect the horses? No. Seems a waste.

Would you want to be the one person that got attacked with the horses by yourself? No. Yeah, I think so. We stick together. All right. I'll be part of the Ford Expedition. That was like, disgusting. That was nausea.

That was nausea. I feel like I passed a stone. Oh. Yeah. Yeah. Now I'm ready to die. All right, so what's the plan, guys? I'm going to, does anybody have to sneeze?

What? Anybody feel like they need to? Should we? Sneeze? What? Why? They would like give away our stealthy approach? Oh, I see. Because bless you.

And you give you the last few tricks. Oh! I was waiting for the punchline. What is the last guest? Do you advantage on stealth? I have advantage on spelt. That's great. Smelf. Smelf.

He who smelted it. Mm-hmm. All right, so. What are you guys doing with the car, the horses? What do you do? We're hiding them in the tall grass. Okay. No rocks around, right?

No stones or boulders in the field. Not that big. I mean, the hills themselves are, it's just large rolling hills or this whole valley area. Let's try to get it in the depression of the rolling hill and just leave it. You have to back up a bit to get out of the view. I'd like to point out that we came up with a loose plan,

but we're not doing that plan. What was our loose plight? We didn't see any of them? We haven't seen anything yet. Yeah? We're not in any tree line or anything like that either. In a pinch, we could kill the horses. Can't kill the horses?

Oh, to use is it right. That's right. We could. We won't be able to pull the cart. I mean, I'm really strong, but I don't know if I can carry that many people. She's lying. She's not really strong. We have two horses.

We have really strong. Really? We could even just kick one of the horse. We wouldn't have to kill the horse, we could just send the horse off in their direction. Let's find out what we see first and then we'll decide. It's not going to how you test. I don't know. No, no.

Let's flank around. Everybody fan out in a firing line, just one straight line. We're going away from each other? Just within eye distance, right? But keep a line. Answer my question. I was curious about flanking once. Keep a line and we're going to move towards the cart.

We're going to use the tall grass, right? Towards the three carts? Yeah. Okay. Do we need to have some? some sort of like awesome whistle or something, like communicate with each other? I'm open to it if you have any.

Oh, what was that thing you did in the circus? That was cool. I can't do this. But we don't make any noise at all, but we just sneak in. Yeah, let's do that. Okay, so having placed the cart for what you assume is the best you can hide it,

who is helming the hiding of the cart? Me! Go ahead and make a survival check for me, for you. I will also help with it. All right, if you're aiding, then you do it with advantage. Okay. With the legs. 13.

13. Okay. I mean, sure. I get some, I put some grass and I put it on top of the car. Put your alarm around the car. Put your alarm around the car. Do we have the time for that right now? Yeah, it's a ticket. Oh, not like, right now it'll take me 11 minutes to do that.

No, do it. Yes. Why? People's lives, urgency, clock, time, all that stuff. Okay. Ten minutes, okay. All right, let's just go. So what is the marching order?

I'm going to be in ten minutes. You guys see you're flying in a line together. All right, so what's the order of the line then? Well, we're all even moving forward. We're just... Yes, but what's the order of the line? I'm to the left of Caleb there on the end. I don't want to be in an end.

Oh, I'm not on the end. No, but I don't do. want you to be on the end. I don't mind being on the end. How about that? Yeah, imagine that the ends are going to be where you're going to need the most strength. No, I would grab, I would grab knot by the shoulder and pull us into the middle somehow. Yeah. You want to be in the middle? Yes. Okay. Okay. Start with Molly. There, boom.

There you go. Good, perfect. Great. All right, so we have Molly, knot. Caleb, Jester, Bo, then Ford. Okay. I'd like you all to make a stealth check, please. as you make your way through the grass. Mm-hmm. Where's the back side? Sick. That helps. 21.

15. 16. 12. 16. 16. 10. Okay. Those monster calves.

As you guys stay low. Those bells. Through the grass, kind of pushing through your hands carefully as you go, hearing the wind occasionally rise and fall with the distant, the various waves of grass, beating. of grass beating against itself. You come upon where the grass begins to fall off, and you stay low as best you can before the grass itself comes to an end right on the outskirts of where the central area between these hills begins.

There, as you poke your head through, you can see three carts that are kind of scattered a bit amongst what looks to be a mine shaft yard, the exterior of a mine. You can see what appeared to be a large, wooden pan tables. You can see some pickaxes that are leaning against the side. You see the remnants of what seems to be some lanterns that have rusted, and there are the three cards. The cards themselves are spattered with blood, and you notice three creatures, similar

to the nulls that you saw the night before, but smaller and dog-like. These are just basic hyenas that are all gathered. gathered up around and are currently licking the blood that's been soaked into the wood. You see one of them ends up finding what looks to be a piece of meat or something that was hanging from one side and tears it off. The one who goes over it,

and they're going to be tearing and fighting over before one of them pushes the other over and it kind of, and it goes back, and it's licking the blood off the side of the wood. These three hyenas are just scavenging on the outskirts of these carts right now. They're just hyenas?

They're just hyenas? They're just hyenas. They're like magical undead hyenas? They're the ones from what you can tell. Not that. Tiger hyenas. Can we see how many entrances there are to this mine? You are this mine?

From this distance, you can't see any entrances. Do you think there's centurions? Yeah, I think they're going to make a big fucking stink if we... If they see us. Yeah? I bet they're their large system. Yeah. You should kill them.

But we have to kill them like all at once. That is correct. Yeah. I could make a distraction. Not that won't. Are you all fast, quick, and quiet? Yes. Sure. Who else?

No, just us. Quietish. There's three of them, right? What do you want to try and make a distraction and bring them closer to us? Then we can jump out of the grass. Do the old, the old jump out of the grass. About how far from the edge of the grass where we are to them,

would you say? About 50 or so feet, 60 feet. Can I use a minor illusion to create a plump little bunny? I don't want to have a hop out of the grass. But its front leg looks a little lame. Quietly, this plump, wounded, with like a hint of pink to the fur around the arm where it looks like it may have been bleeding a bit,

begins to hobble its way silently out of the grass just beyond the edge. I'm going to hide. Yeah, I'm going to hide. You guys are still hidden. I'm going to draw one of my swords and just out of experiment, try and get it to do that weird thing it did yesterday. Okay. With my hand.

Okay, so you initiate the right, and as you do, the blade begins to give a faint, radiant glow, a white-ish-yellow light that you will almost instinctually hold low in the grass to make sure you don't become a beacon amongst your hiding. you're hiding. You watch as one of the hyenas kind of, it's making its way the others kind of look over. They all begin to gather up and the three almost kind of go into this pack soup formation in the direction of the rabbit, closing in 40 feet, 30 feet, 20 feet, and with a rapid bulls, one of them just kind of runs forward and leaps out, does a pounce motion towards the rabbit and just skids into the dirt past it right to the front of the grass line where you are,

Beau. Now! I use sacred flame on the one next to it. Okay, and who was doing, what else? And then I'm gonna stab the third one. Okay, so you rushed, so the three of you, rush out and attack, three individual ones. What are you guys doing?

I will send Caleb, not Caleb, I will send Framkin down to the one that Jester was attacking right up against it to distract and chirp in his face. All rightyty. So, Bo, go ahead and attack first. Okay, I'm gonna take kind of the blunt end of the staff and just go right for its, as it skids by. I'm gonna take right in its neck.

its neck. Ten. Ten? You go to swing and as it sees you suddenly it backs away and your staff hits the dirt right next to it. It just barely misses it. Caleb, you're following up as... As Caleb sends Frumpkin right down to the one that Jester was attacking and I will send out a firebolt at the same time. Yep, go forward. Go ahead and roll your attack roll for the fire bolt. And that's an advantage if my birdie is bothering him up close. Right, okay. Okay.

You run after the one that your Jester is attacking? Yeah, the one that's attacking. Okay, go for it. Okay, so that's good. That is, uh, is, uh, is a, zizzizz, zz, zz, z, z, z, z, 21. Two one hits, criminal damage. Yeah, that it says, um, spells are all still new to me. There it is.

Oh, that's a big one. One point of damage. Big one point of damage. All right. It begins to burn the small, circular image in the outside of that haina, his body. He just has to make a deck save of over 13. The natural one, he does not.

Yay, yeah, yeah. Then he gets four more damage, radiant. That's enough. With the blast of the fire bolt and the incineration of the sacred flame, you watch that hyaena and just bursts into fire and plops to the ground while it just burns, smoldering its flesh becoming the meals that it previously feasted upon.

Molly and not? I'll take my run first. Yeah. That's, wow, 6-17. That's my brain. Good, roll damage. That's seven points plus three radiant, so. Yeah, the first strike just completely cleaves it in half.

Like it's momentum running, almost like it hits the blade, and you hold it out and the momentum just carries it over, seamlessly carving through it. Am I close enough to hit it? hit the third one that's still left with my second attack? You can have movement to close it. This is one right in front of bow, so you're a little ways away,

but you can close the gap while not in. I didn't get my bonus attack on that guy. Can I get the bonus attack? Yep. Okay. I want to try and just bring my heel down on top of it as it tries to scooch away. Fawken, did you see that? I did.

Yep, 17-203. You need to not use that dice for the rest of the time. Nine. Nine. Nine. Nine, again. Nine. The first, it hits the dirt and it backs up.

move out with your heel to go ahead and swing, and it actually ducks underneath and tries to snap at your heel as Molly closes the gap. Would you like to go? I release my bolt at that same one. All right. 20. All right, go ahead and with sneak attack. Okay.

I mean that's 13. Yeah, Molly, as you rush up, you watch as a bolt just goes right through the side of the hyena's head and it just falls lifeless. to the ground, all three of them out in a split second. I don't want to like make y'all alarmed or anything, but that was kind of fucking efficient. That was pretty well. Nice and done.

Everybody with Bo, you were missing like crazy on the ground. You know, I had a long day yesterday, okay. Hands are sweating? Yeah, just a faster than I'm not. Hey, look, we can use this hyena meat as bait. You were right. I'm gonna go pull my bolt out of the, out of the thing.

Is it recoverable? Yeah, thankfully it was clean enough shot. It didn't seem to get caught or shattered against any of the bones. Quick perimeter check, see if we alerted anything, anything's looking at. Natural 19. Glancing about the vicinity, does not like anything else is moving or near or has noticed your presence. Move to the cart, quick and quick check of anything left behind, clues. Do we need to drag these bodies? Is that what we're? There's no body. It's just bloods better. Do you mean the hyenas? No, the hyenas.

Oh, oh, oh. Well, they... We've got to figure out where we're going first. I'm also going to point out they hadn't been eating the hyenas anyway, so maybe they may be leaving bodies of their pets. Should we talk them into the grass then to get them out of view? That might be the smarter way to go. Do it. Okay, I'll pick them up and throw them as far as I can into grass. Like a massive shock put, you watch this tiny jester with a double spin each, chuck these relatively heavy beasts.

Deep into the grass field before they vanish, with that heavy, thud into the field. She's like Mrs. Trunchyroll and she's a not strong. Yes. If you want to throw the hammer. Hey, what happened to the little bunny though? And I'm going to look for the little light rabbit.

Oh dear. Bunny appears to have to no longer be around. That's really sad. They ate it before we could help. We'll have a funeral later. I'm going to keep a hole of my sword, but I'm going to wrap it in the coat so it's not glowing ridiculously.

So there's just the, there's the cards, there's the one mine entrance. You don't see an entrance to the mine, you just see what looks to be mining equipment. A mine. Got it. Mining, oh, I thought, oh, I'm misunderstood that too. Yeah, you see what looks to be pieces of equipment

and the interior of this kind of hill valley, this short little valley, seems to have been prepped for some sort of a mining expedition. There's no mine hole. There's no hole. You don't see one at them on, right? Take a look around to see if there's anything or they started or anything like that.

I'll take the opposite side that he's doing. I'm gonna look at tracks as well. I'm gonna look in the carts. Okay. You look in the carts and they are empty. You see a few wayward pieces of cloth. Everything in there is bloodied and caked and has streaks of it being licked up.

It looks like the hyenas had been in it for a while trying to clear off what was left behind from wherever the bodies that were within were taken. I would like you both to make investigation checks, please. You're following tracks? Make a survival check. With advantage? No.

Because there are undeads part of this, I'll like you. Survival check. 14. 14. 14? It looks like the dust and the dirt of this vicinity has been freshly swept or dispersed intentionally, meaning that once this little valley had been entered

and the carts had been emptied, something was smart enough. to intentionally cover the tracks. You, however, you old the 20, you said, as you begin to look about the base of the closest hill facing away from where you guys had entered, kind of in an eastern direction, you see a pattern of grasses, a pattern of grasses that seem to be interwoven,

meaning as opposed to a natural pattern, there is a, a consistent, kind of mesh to the way they've been laid. It looks like how we put the stuff over the car. And as you glance over, you can see what looks to be a net of grasses that has been woven and thrown over, leaving a small gap on the edge where you can see the dark exterior of what was a mine shaft structure entrance. That's cool. That's way smarter than what we did. They made like a net.

Killing net. You were like a lot of yours. I mean, you were just, you know. But we'll remember it for the future. That's what we're doing. Yours was handcrafted. I would just take this one. Is it heavy?

How big is this thing? Can we fold it up and stuff? It's about 12 foot by 12 foot. Oh, that's big. It could fit in a backpack. Maybe roll up. It's pretty thick. It's cut sticks.

Well, it's thrown on and kind of it's like put against the grass. It doesn't have sticks on its side. Like, does that have a frame of any sort? No, it's laid all the side of the same. Oh, it's a blanket. Oh, okay. Grass blanket.

We can take that. We can grab it on our way back and down on the cart. That was on the car because we were leaving. It's useful. I'm going to speak at low enough level that we just take everything we find no matter how useful. Like in Skyroom just wheels and just all this. We're gonna be cracking open clay pots.

The scavenger levels, man. All righty. It is too big for you to carry with you. Great. But it can definitely be taken with you should you exit. How about what's behind the grass? Let's discuss this. All right.

So as you pull it back, you do you see the wooden support structure of the interior of a mine shaft. That as soon as you pull it back and look inside, it looks like a barricade has been partially placed up on each side. You see piles of broken furniture, stools and chairs that are shattered and kind of jammed into each other to form some sort of a barricade on each side. You can see kind of dry-rodded pickaxe handles

and other pieces of general wooden beams used for that are all kind of pushed up against the sides with a small path, maybe about three feet wide, that you could walk through to enter. And it looks pitch black on the inside. There is no light source outside of what little bit of daylight is coming through from the entrance. I'm sorry, I was thinking about a thing you're saying

there is a way through for us? There is a way. There's about a two and a half, three foot gap between this barricade where whatever made its way. And once you enter through, you can now see since there has not been dust put, there is a definitive trail of blood that is just of blood that is dragged through and caked in the loose dirt and dust.

Should I give us a little light right now? Wait, before I go in. You're anxious to go. You want to go first? No, Jesus, no. No, please. There were hyenas out here, right? Posted as guards? Mm-hmm. If one of the hyenas had gone like, ooh, ooh, ooh, oh, would something have come out of this hole to come get us?

I mean, that is a fair assumption, yeah. Then why don't we make that sound and wait for something to come out and kill it? Well, but what if it alerts a lot of the knolls and then we don't have the element of surprise at all anymore? Where we're talking? Do you want to go into that dark scary cave? Doesn't look that bad to me? If he's a dark scary cave. Frumpkin is still just a sweet little bird, so I thought maybe a little quick flight in.

Canary and a gnairion. Oh, my. Oh, my. Oh, man. That was good. That was really good. It was really good. I was so painful.

Sorry. Uh-uh, do not be so. There's limits. I don't know if that's something Trumpkin can do, but unless not, you just want to, you know, go in there with Coma-Comicon. No, I'm drinking again. Okay. You are now officially intoxicated. Oh.

I don't have to roll, it just happens. Uh, yep. Great. What is that mean? Also, uh... I'll go in if you need me too. Oh shit! Oh, yes!

No! Oh, wow! D.M. Is that wearing a great friend? Yes, no. We get her hammered. She's the most fucking badass. Oh my.

Frumpkin has been a sparrow before. Sparrow's not a dark vision, is it? No. It's a night sparrow. No, it is the regular sparrow. So. My only concern is if you draw a mouth, there could be more than us, right?

I just want to get a quick peek if we can. Well, I mean, I couldn't send him in there. I have probably hit the wall a few times, but maybe if there's any fire or anything. You wouldn't mind? No, it's, you know, I can always bring him back. But you know, be careful, all right, but there he goes. Yeah, there's no light in there.

About 25 feet in, go make perception check for... You won't be able to see anything through it. Oh, you're full. Oh, 21. 21. What faint light is coming in from the interior, are you looking through? Yeah, I am. As soon as you come inside, you look, immediately it looks to be about 40 feet in.

The shaft widens into what looks to be sort of a common area. You see a handful of tables, some chairs, similar to what was placed in. similar to what was placed within the barricade, some sacks strewn about, some to be torn open and just scattered across the ground, some that appear to be kind of just still lopped in the corner. And is that from a light source inside or from some something coming in from where we are?

This is just a very high perception roll with a little bit of lights making its way in there. And that's where it goes dark. And there's a... As Frumpkin hits a sloping ceiling. Oh, and dies? No, just hits the... Hits the ground stunned.

It's like those birds that hit our windows at all. Yeah. That's why I asked. He just, oh. I think I have seen all I am going to see for the moment, but there was, didn't see anything in there. Not in that, mainly. Nothing living in there that I saw.

Not with, that was what a little bit from can saw with a quick glance before it got too dark and then hit the suit. Not, my friend, I think maybe this is a time where you could please, Don't go crazy, but maybe go in 30 or 40 feet. There's a room in there, and I don't think there's anything in there, but you would see.

I'm just going to go in there and get the nose. I'm gonna bless you before you go. So you can be sneakier. Hey! Consonets are God! Can sparrows hear? I can hear through my sparrow. I can bring the sparrow.

You can at least hear what's going on, like a wall. I don't want you to talk. That's correct. Ristig, go. Okay, I'll take the sparrow. I'm just going to jam it in there. Wait, wait, somebody, somebody, I don't want to get punched in the face while I'm blind.

Somebody please put a hand on the shoulder. Are you gonna hold his hand? Are we going in? No, he's gonna go into that other place. Oh. Okay. All right. So if something bad is going to happen, just shake me, please.

I'll punch you in the face. No, don't do that. Just shake me, please. Just tickle his balls. No, don't do that just. I'm gonna go in. Okay. Push him in the balls.

You can move past the barricades heading in towards the shaft. The barricade, like, there's a lot of stuff kind of jammed up here at the front. Almost like it was barricaded from the inside long ago and then it was cleared out partially going through. You make it through about the 35 or so feet of the shaft in towards where it opens up. And you almost, you almost try. You almost trip. We're 12 because your toe catches something and you kind of, and catch yourself.

And you look down to see what looks to be a long piece of rope that it was stretched across. Oh shit. That just got tugged in false slack. You didn't see that. You hear a, and with your dark vision glance up and see what appears to be a large log that had been affixed to the ceiling.

Come rushing towards you. Make a dexterity saving throw. You're a wee baby rogue. Great, check. Disadvantage. Did you give him, oh, that's on the same. Great, check. Good, good, good.

What is this? Decks save? Degsaving throw, yeah. 24. Whoa! With disadvantage. Not as junior. All right.

So, you, even in your somewhat hazy drunken stupor, see it just in time and back up as it right past your nose and slams into the wall to the left of you. It hits, and you see the dust kind of settle from the ceiling. That, my lads, was a dragon. All right. You guys all hear this from the inside. Oh, shush.

I'm okay. It was just wood. All right. What? What's going on? What's going on? I've heard of confusing thing. Something fell down, but okay, we're good.

I think we might have lost sand a little bit of surprise. Is it a bigger space in here? It is, actually. It opens up to be about maybe 35 feet across. on side to side, about 45 or 50 towards the end, and then it seems to descend into two different pathways. Any signs of life, anything? Make a perception check.

Eight. At the moment, no. But as you're glancing about, you can see that there are bags of supplies that are partially sundered and torn open. You can see tools, some of it look pretty interesting. There's like a crowbar on the ground across the way. There's other sacks that haven't been some of the same. spoiled yet. You see like some of the burlap is just dry-rodded and pulls right apart, and it looks like there might be some useful things in this chamber.

Okay. Real quick, I'll just poke through one of the bags. Okay, make an investigation check with disadvantage. Oh, well, then, okay, okay, eight. All right. You glance through and find a bunch of mill-dude rice grain. Right as you hear a I will freeze and slowly turn to the sound. You glance over and from the right chamber, you see as two knolls have appeared in the entranceway and have entered up, seemingly called from the sound

of the heavy impacting thud on the wall but a few moments ago. Are you selfed? No, he is not. They both, she is not, sorry. They both arrived to the top of, they both grabbed their spears. And I hear that, yeah. I'm going to say, help me, help me now, please come in,

Help me, save me, save my life, save my life. We have to go in. Here we go. What are you doing? I'm gonna draw on fire at one. Okay, so as they're both right there, rushing towards you, you say this and you're gonna and fire at one, the one on the right of the left.

The first one who spotted me. Okay, so the one that first spot you be the one in the left says it's rushing towards you, go ahead and fire. Oh my god. Okay, 18. 18 hits, going to roll damage. Eight. Eight points of damage.

Ten, three, three, eleven. I'm going to use Fury of the Smool. Okay, 11 points of damage. It hurts, but it's still rushing forward. They both begin to rush in to close the gap. The rest of you guys rush in. To get to him, it'll take the full round to get there. So you guys use your movement and dash.

And since those of you don't have dark vision, you can't see anything. I'm also, I've uncovered my sword at this point, so just a little bit of light. A faint bit of light. All right, so at this point, any of you with ranged abilities right now would be able to strike. But before you do, two of the Noles Russian and are attempting to attack the small goblinoid female who has walked into the

layer, the first strike. That is going to be a 21 to hit. Definitely hits. Any of us. That is six points of piercing damage. As the spear jams into your shoulder and scrapes down the front of your chest and glances on the rest of your armor and it It hurts, but you're fine. You're still feeling a little fuzzy anyway. The other one attacks, that is gonna be a 15 to hit. No. No, okay.

That's this one you do see coming and dodge out of the way. But they're both right up in your face right now, snarling and with that, the guys who have range attacks, go for it. Wait, so the whole party ran in? Yes. As those happening, the two humans in tandem said, wait, let them draw out to, fuck. It went so dark.

And run in. All right. So you guys have disadvantage on any of your attack roles because you cannot see. You are blind and the children. Should we do initiative or we're just going? For this one, because there's just two noals at the moment. I'm just going through actions here to keep going.

Dancing lights. On the one closest to me. Eldridge Blast on the other one. Okay, so the one that's closest to be the one that already took damage from the bolt. So that is a goal for attack with the guiding bolt. 21. 21 hits, going on a little damage.

Jesus. 10. 10 points? 10 fleets. All right. The one is now taking a crossbow bolt to the throat and it's taking a guiding bolt. You watch as it's a giant,

blast of light explodes around the snows. It kind of yelps and it encompasses its torso. This glittering light now the next attack against it has advantage. It is super hurt but it's still standing. You're making your attack? Yeah, I rolled the first one which was a 24 but with advantage, it's less, so 24. We said you were tagging the other one so you did not get the benefit.

Oh yeah, I'm sorry, so 24 for the first roll. Still hits, go and roll damage on that one. Oh, balls, that's... What are you using? It's an Eldage blast. It's a detent for damage. That's a D12. That's a D12.

Oh, that is the 12, sorry. That is the other character. Yes. Yeah, yeah. Old average they died, uh, nine, nine points of damage. Nine points of damage. Nine points of damage and the other man, it's blasted by the bolt of Alderche Energy.

However, it's still snarling and currently now they're both looking over at the sudden surge of newcomers. I've also got a distance attack. I'm going to use a devil's tongue on the one that just survived your hit. Okay, what is it? And I'm going to use vicious mockery. Okay. All right. And yeah, infernal.

You will feed the dogs in hell. Oh, yeah, there's good, that. That's scary. Jesus. All right, so yeah, they rolled an eight minus. Yeah, it does not make the save. So it takes 1D4 psychic. Oh, just eight, yeah.

Which is three points of psychic damage and has disadvantaged on its next attack. Got it, great. Four globules of light, dancing lights. All right, the room fills with light at this point. That was nice. So now the chamber fills, you can now see the scenery around you. Knott, you're up first. Oh, that's nice.

Since you were the first one to get a shot. There's one who... Super hurt one that's like kind of hurt. I'll go for the super hurt one who's right in front of me, right? Correct. It fits in there. Yeah, that's what we were doing. Laura discovered this last week.

Yeah. That's pretty great. And it stays up super good. It doesn't pull it down. So not, they're both right up in your face snarling. I'm gonna go to the super hurt one and I'll just be like, ah, and grab it, and I'll do shocking grass.

You have to put on the small, the small triangle, on the bottom. So go to make your Mealy spell attack, I believe it is, right? Yep, that's a 19. 19 hits. Okay, I don't know how to do this. It's not what I meant.

Hold on. Is this a 10? No, that's a 10, this is an 8. That's it, there we go. Seven. Seven image. As you reach up and grab it with your hand, watch as a burst of electrical arcane energy surges through its body, you watch his vein

just kind of pop, boop, boof, up its torso to its neck before it collapses into the ground, and you have to like duck out of the way before it slams. It would have crushed you if you stayed in the space you were, but you sidestep in time as the knoll falls to the ground lifeless. Am I in range? Where's the other knoll? Is it right on me? Yeah.

Okay. I will bonus action disengage. All righty. And run all the way. all the way around to the other side of the room. Okay. Okay, the other side. All right.

As you're doing that, the null that's right there, sees you rushing off, but now it's more attentive to the one who blasted it there. It's gonna go ahead and, so you would be, I'd say for the take of distance here, since the moment you saw you fired, it probably couldn't close the gap, so it's gonna go ahead and drop the spear,

pull out its longbow and take a shot at you from here. Oh shit. It's gonna be a 14 to hit. What's your armor class? 14. 14, all right. Not a great roll. You take four points piercing damage. More points. It catches you right in the middle of the sternum.

The armor takes the brunt of it, and it mostly just kind of snaps in the impact, but it hurt. It'll bruise. All right, that ends the remaining rolls. Remaining Noel's turn. Okay, so next step would be bow. Oh, are there any in order? Or close to me, I mean. There's one that you can close the gap with.

The one that's currently standing in the room. The other one's been killed. Okay, I'll close the gap. Gap, and just come at it with big double swing from my stack. Go for it. Finally, a decent roll. 19. 19 hits, gunwilled damage. Six plus four, so that's ten points of damage.

Ten points of damage. That's enough to do it. It had already been damaged previously by Ford's Eldish Blast, and you watch it snarls and takes the, pulls at its bow, swings, pulls back, notches, and releases the arrow. Moments before, or moments after it's released with a quick moving burst of action, you saunter up to its side and whom hit it across the torso with the stick. You feel seven different ribs break as it doubles forward. And as it looks to you for a second, you kind of take the, where the staff is broken in, and jam upward towards the lungs would be in it. And then just falls to the ground dead.

Kind of shake it off my staff a little bit. Okay. You broke its ribs to get to its organs. I pet off the ears. Okay. All right, so you guys take a moment here. It's an ear jar. That's an ear jar.

All right. Our pickle jar. It's now an ear jar. It's now an ear jar. What happened? We tried to find you. Oh. I don't know.

They're very clever. I was sneaking all the way down and they still discovered me. I don't know how. Look at the rope connected to the log. Yeah, as not saying this, your eyes wander off of her over to the river. You see this heavy tree covered and jagged bark as kind of, that happened after they discovered me. Right.

Put there all these bags in here. I was about to go through them. Do you want to help? Yeah. All right. I will keep an eye down the tunnel that they came from while they pillage. I'll look around. Are there any other entrances? Any other entrances?

And as you're looking, I'm going to pull all the dancing lights down to one and put the rag over and just walk beside both so that she can see. Okay, there are two shafts. Both seem to descend, both kind of curving off in opposite directions. They both have the wooden frame for support. Wooden shafts. Looking around me? Come on, you people. We need a corner and a camera for the corner and a camera for the corner and it looked paper. a hat for you to put you in the corner. I didn't even react to him.

He had to put it on. That's fine. Looking around, it looks like this was kind of a common area. This is the closest chamber to the exterior of the mine. It looks like there were a number of tables here that a lot of them knocked over and broken. A lot of what would have filled this chamber has been pushed into the barricade you saw up front.

But you're helming the investigation? So you're going to make an investigation check? No, that was me. Me and Caleb. You guys are looking down the shaft. Oh, sorry. For the backs. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But both of the shafts just descending curve out of view below. They go to a study like 45 degree degree. Do you get to do? Do you jump to help, I think, right now. Are we helping? You're looking at the sport? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sure, take advantage.

All right. So you get you're experiencing cotton mouth. That's not that. It's not that. It's so tiny. 11. 11? Okay.

You glance about and you find there's an untapped ale barrel. There's an untapped water barrel. There's a hooded lantern that still has a functional bit of oil in it, though it's only about half full. It's very rusted over, but you clear off the glass and the outside, and it'll work fine. You find a sledgehammer that the handle is not so rotted to the point where it wouldn't be functional,

but like a fair sledgehammer if you wanted to break any rock or stone. The crowbar that you had seen earlier, that can be acquired. I should write this down. Yeah. You find a small, light, weight rod about that long that has a short piece of what looks like waxed twine hanging from one end. Okay. Is it metal, did you say? No, it's not metal. It feels almost like a hard clay. With wax? Boom. Boom. Like a wax piece of twine on one end. Can I, can I, can I make a,

make a knowledge test to see if I would know what, what this is? Or? You mean an intelligence? That would be it. Well, is this an intelligence or is this, what would this be? Can I take a... I feel like I might have come across this. Would you a brain quiz? You had as good a chance as anybody to come across this. So if you want to make an intelligence tool. Is it an intelligence check?

I'm trying to remember. Oh, yeah, I'm not going to you. Okay. 11? 11? You haven't come across one of these. Well, I have it. And then the water and-

Oh, water jug in that, ale. Water jug and a nail drug or not jar. Barrel, cast, cast. Oh, so I can't carry that with me. No, they're like big, heavy filings. We can put them aside from them. You make an intelligence check. And we will be bringing them out here.

Okay, that's okay. That's Shiza. Where did it go over here? D&D Beyond. It is 10. 10. Okay, yeah. Very low.

All right. So. Want a lantern? Oh, yes. Huge. Did you light it? Is it a lit lantern? I haven't lit it yet.

I don't light it yet. So you can close off the leg. Oh, I can close it on and off, right? Like one of those things? Once it's ignited and the oil's lit, then yeah, you can open and close the hood. I'm one-handed, so I can't really help you light it. Well, what we got? Are we happy? Yeah.

I found a small rod and the crowbar and the sledgehammer. Are you going to carry the sledgehammer? Is it heavy? Well, not for you, beast mode. Did you just hold that rod up to us? You're not going to the various materials. Does the rod look like this? like crudely made or like prettily designed?

Apparently I'm looking at over. Yeah, as you're kind of looking at over, it's not beautifully made, it looks functional. Like a lot of the tools here, there isn't a lot of presentation more than function so what you bring into a mine. Okay, no carving, no glyphs, no nothing like that. Just cake and shit?

No, no shit. Yeah. Okay. You kind of take the rod and kind of smell it and a familiar scent hits your nose. You've worked in your alchemical time with a small level of explosive. As part of the element of the alchemist's fire, there is a reagent catalyst that, when the

chemicals mix, it causes a minor explosion that then burns heavily. There is an element of that to that, but it's very, very strong and a very intense scent to it. As soon as you smell it, it brings back memories of accidents that have happened in the past, and you, on a very small scale, and you immediately get this kind of wave of cold shiver down your neck that this is very very, very dangerous object if used him properly. Just careful with that, I think maybe maybe none of us should hold that. Maybe Ford, he seems sort of responsible.

No, don't make it a mustache. You know? It could blow up your face. It could blow up your face. Yeah, it's a boom boom stick. That's the alchemical term. Oh shit. I think if you put that near fire, it could go explode.

So who wants to hold it who is not just... Yeah, I'll take it. Give me my pencil though. Oh, great, throw a sharp at the picture. Should be it. Anyone watching it home, the physics was really demanding on that one. Yeah. Um, can I put the sledgehammer on my back?

Yeah. You can sling it in with your central. All right guys, left tunnel or right tunnel? I'll tuck the rod into my belt. Okay. It's fine. I'll go down the tunnel and scope it out for us. Well, before we do that, we should remember to check for traps maybe. Oh. Oh. Oh, can you do that? I don't know. I certainly can. You can't?

No, I can't. Oh, you can't. I can't do any of that. I can look for them. I won't be able to find them. I can look for them too. I don't know what a trap looks like. Well, what did that one look like that you got hit with before?

Big piece of rope. Probably should have seen it. Maybe look for rope across in the ground. Oh, God. Maybe we view this as an opportunity to grow and we look for those now. I will make a mental note. Great. Look for big pieces of rope.

This is a rope. Anything that looks out of the ordinary, out of place, on the wall, on the floors. You know, just have a peekie-poor around. Are you still shit house? I'll have a peekie-poo. Are you fucking hammered still? Don't tell me what I can and can't drink. You know, she does this from time to time.

She becomes a little unpredictable, but you can't argue with the results. You really cannot. I kind of like her when she's like this. It's good. Okay. She gets another shot. You want me to go ahead again? Which one are we going down, though?

There's two entrances, right there are two pads, yes. I'll go down one, just a little ways, and then I'll come back. You should actually stealth though this time, okay? I will stealth. I'm gonna stealth. You have a blessing. And search for traps. Okay, so make a stealth check first.

Advantage. Oh, good. Okay, 20 something. Well, with advantage, but then disadvantage from the drawing, so it's just a straight roll. So the first roll? Yes. Okay, good to know. And then you're a check for traps?

Yes. Make an investigation check. Okay. With disadvantage? With disadvantage? Because you're drunk. That affects everything. Yeah.

Yeah. You can't tell me what I can do nothing. You don't know. Dexterity-based and intelligence-based contracts. That's all of the checks. You don't know? So zero. Oh, wait, no.

No, no, no. I did the math wrong. It's 10. I'm drunk, guys. I know the feeling. Okay. Which path is this your check, inspector? The left. The left. Okay.

I knew. I love you. Do we want to check air current, temperature, nothing, anything? Yeah, little drafts, anything like that. Nothing? You don't sense any draft. The air is pretty stagnant, actually. Temperature equal on both sides.

It seems to be. The left path, the left path, you do not notice any traps, anything akin to what you stumbled across as you entered. It does seem to descend and curve out of the way, but begin to snake a bit. You get about 15, 20 feet down before it begins to rapidly curve, left and right, maybe about 10 feet wide.

You continue if you want? No thanks. Okay, I'll go back and report what I've heard, what I've learned. Do either of the two paths have more tracks coming in and out of them? They've seemed fairly equal. He's been keeping tabs on footfalls in here. They're both, there's traffic both ways.

You know, it could be really handy in this situation as some of that fancy fucking threat of yours. Keeping things, alerting us if things come in here. Yeah, I don't mind committing to one of these tunnels. I just want to make sure nothing comes behind us or comes up from the other way. Yeah, that's a good suggestion, yeah. But first, what are we doing?

What did you find out down that way? It just keeps going and starts snaking, and there's no traps, though. So let's go down the right one. Well, I think we should also send you down that one as well to have a look around. All right. Here I go.

Another stealth check, please. And looking for traps, stealth with... Disavit. Well, it's straight roll because of that. 25. 24, something. It's a lot. And investigation check with it.

Investigation is 13. With disavit. Because you're hammered. Yep. Yep. Thirteen. Yes. All right.

He began to curve down the right path, and there is what looks to be a slight depression on one side that you glance over and look, and it looks like some of the burlap that had been torn from sacks earlier in the tunnel had been used to cover what looks to be a three and a half foot wide pit that has been laced over to hide its presence. It's just burlap over a pit in the ground. a pit in the ground? Yeah, it's affixed with a couple of rocks in the sides. It's very light and would have fallen through. It only covers part of the path. It's like the tunnel is about 10 feet wide, and the right side of it is where that pitfall is.

But you notice it and go, oh. This one does not snake. This one just continues in what looks to be a continual curve for another 40 or so feet before you're starting to get a little far from your friends. You can continue if you want to. It just keeps curving and curving and curving. Looks like it's going into almost a downward spiral.

Oh, a downward spiral. Okay, I'll go back and report what I saw. Great album. All right. That's so true. All right, so one path goes wiggity woo, and the other path goes yippity-jow. We're gonna need any traps.

No traps. Oh yes, oh yes, there was a trap. That was one trap. I thought you meant any sprung traps. There was a trap. You've susted out. I sussed it out, don't worry. I'll take care of it. How far down did you go each way, about?

40 feet down the jiggity chow and like 25 feet down the Zibbidi zoo. Well, my instinct tells me that if there's something there that they would trap it, so probably more valuable if we're going on nothing, take the path that is trapped. I agree. Here, hear. He's so smart. Unless they want us to think it's the path that they've grabbed. Reverse psychology!

That's right, then it's actually the path that has least resistance. Unless they knew that you would think that. Oh, reverse, reverse psychology. These are dog people? Let's take the pathway to the trap and trap. Right path. As you all slowly begin to descend down the right. the right. What's thalthing?

We'll come to that just a second. We're going to go take a break. Oh! Yay! Just a little past nine. Nice indeed. All right, so we'll be back here in a few minutes to pick up the descent further into this mine shaft. Into madness. Into madness. Before we get to that though, however, we do have a giveaway from our friends at Wormwood.

As you saw it last week, we have another of their black walnut, two of their eventual arsenals to give away again this week. If you haven't seen, they're awesome and well made, and they can open it up on the inside. It has space for your dice, for your pen, place for a mini or eraser or anything else you want to carry your game. And it fits into the dice box. That comes with it as well. So we'll give me two of these during the break to enter this while we're gone. At break, you can go into the Twitch chat and enter when you're prompted the code word null. That's G-N-O-L. Do not enter it more than once, so you'll be disqualified.

And we'll come back from the break with two winners to this. Thank you so much. We'll see you guys here in a minute. And welcome back. So we have our two winners in the chat over the break. Congratulations in winning the Wormwood package to Ding Zero ATX and Luna Imperial. Congratulations to the two you guys. Donoble will reach out to you and get your contact information and we'll get those sent to you ASAP. So well done.

ATA. Yes. All right. So you chose the right or the left again? The right. The right. Okay. So, down the path, the shaft winds for about another 150 or so feet, before it slowly levels out

into what seems like a long chamber of multiple levels. What once looked like a solid mining vein is now strewn with bones, inflayed skin pinned to the rock walls with scavenged nails. Blood spattered across them with intent, painted a jagged smile of sharp teeth on each of these four hides.

Oh! A faint source of light in the center flickers. What looks to be a small stone altar holding a cluster of candles in the central level platform. It looks like about six knoll-like figures have gathered around this stone awl. We were scalping, we were stelfing on. Oh, I know, we're gonna get to that just a second.

Okay. While a strange seventh figure places small wet stones upon this altar, smaller than the other knolls. Let's get a perception check real fast from the two of you, who's leading the... I would have been, yeah, bringing them down, right? I can see in the dark. Yeah, I can see in the dark. All right, so we'll say, since you two would be at the front then for that, if you've jumped up first. Perception check to both of you?

Five. That sucks. Eleven. Okay. So you don't see much of the figure, but also right now, have you guys all do a stealth check please as you make your way down? No, he has a advantage now. Sorry. That's okay.

22. 15. 19. Oh. 22. 15. Okay. Okay.

No. No. So. Looks like this is the wrong path. This is the wrong path, everyone. I should probably go back to the up. I'm sorry. This figure looks knoll-like.

You see the ears and the snout, but as it reaches down and picks up these sweat stones and places them on the altar, giving small, dark, muffled barks and kind of shape-eeping sounds, you see elements that look like smooth human flesh. And the more that you focus in, you can see this looks to be a humanoid figure that is wearing pieces of hollowed-out knoll like armor. A hood, missing a jaw that is implaced over the top of the head. Sections of arms worn like a glove with a hand missing, sifted through. It seems that a lot of the body parts are discolored and rotting a bit from what you can see from the candlelight that's flickering across it.

You see long, bone-like spines, simulmonary. to what adorned the armor of that pack lord that you battled in the middle of the city last night are also affixed to the outsides and kind of pierced through elements of the shoulders and head of this flesh knoll hide that it's wearing. As it growls, mimicking the sounds of the knolls that it seems to be residing along,

the other knolls around kind of look, kind of pacing from foot to foot impatiently, kind of begins to speak louder and louder at this altar as it places a final wet stone on it, all the remaining knolls begin to bark in unison together. And they all at once leap onto the altar and begin tearing into the stones, which are not stones. They were glistening at this point you see hearts

that are now being torn and swallowed by the knolls at the altar. Oh, that was well done. Oh! They finish devouring the hearts, and the humanoid figure begins to bark a few more times. And then a broken common says, The hunger will be fed, and points to two of them.

Help me carry more meat below. The rest, feast on what remains. And turns around, and you now look across the way on the other side of the chamber, darkened. You see a knoll leaning in familiar, armor, the one that you had battled and had left with the carts, is just watching from the far end of the chamber down on the lower third level platform. The Big Mamizamama Zambah?

The weird kind of knoll priest, I guess you could say at this point that's been helming this little ritual goes and joins the armored knolls and steps aside and follows second, and the two knolls that were assigned by it leave as well. leaving four in there in the chamber currently. Including the armored one or no? No, the armored one leaves with the priest. So did you describe any sort of light source in here that they're working by?

The candle altar. Candle altar. Yeah. It's not extremely bright light, but for those of you who are human, it's enough where you can make out shapes once your eyes have adjusted to the low light interior. Got it. You watch as they begin to grab the body

in the ground. You can see there are now the grinding of bones as they begin to drag broken corpses across the floor and again just tear into the torso. Just, I'm going to cast very quietly. Oh. Because I saw you just regained nine hit points. Oh, nine! This is getting ridiculous.

You watch as four hyenas kind of fill into the space, where the knolls are, and begin to just sit at bay, kind of waiting for the knolls to finish feasting. One of them kind of gets close, and the knoll kind of just grabs its head, shoves it against the wall, and it snaps into the wall, and goes that backs up and then waits its turn. You can see the other hyenas that exist in this space.

Naturally, scavengers have to wait, being at the lowest of the totem pole. Four knolls and four hyenas. Fuck. And the one that got thrown to the wall just got stunned or hurt. It didn't get any one. It doesn't seem to be too, more than just keep it away from the meal. Yeah.

You know they go down there, very quickly. We keep waiting more, we'll just show up. Here we go. What? We're just gonna go? There's no plan? Well, maybe we can draw a few over to us and take them out on our terms. If we're planning to engage, should I show you the layout

of Worthy or Place? Yes! He says, coily, Would you like to see the layout of the room? We'd like to see the layout of the room. I don't like it's seven on eight. I'm not a fan. Seven? Yeah, but they're little. The hyenas are little. Oh, Yasha's with us, right? The hyenas are just dogos. Yeah, they got like four hippie-ups. You can take out two of them in one go if you were, you know, grown. Oh god, those

balls are so. Yeah. So here we have. Oh, one's an archer, one, two's an three's an archers. They all tend to carry a bow on their back. Shit, four's an archer. You can see now the hyenas that are waiting, patiently this one got knocked into the wall. They're just kind of scooting at the sides, waiting for them to finish their meals. The guys are right up here where the shaft opens, kind of glancing down into this chamber,

and that was where the priest and the other knolls had exited. We're up on top up there? You guys are up on here, which for the purposes of, yeah, we're holding. I think we're metal. That's fine. I mean, I hate it, but. Is there any way to do it?

even the playing field a bit. A little strategy for it and Caleb, come on. What about the boot stick that you have? Oh, that's good. Wouldn't that be really loud? Wouldn't that draw it back there? Oh yeah, yes, it would, but we could. It might bring the whole thing down on us.

Maybe we could use that to escape later. Yeah, definitely. There's a big column that's in between them right. Correct. Block them in. Is it a column or a stalagin type? It looks like it was a stalag type that then was reinforced as a column

to help kind of maintain the structure. I mean, if we can make some sort of distraction to get their attention, and if we can put our heavy hitters, our people up front, we can kind of try and hold them in this mouth range people in the back. Do you want to throw the rod at the column? No, I feel like we should do that when we get, when we're leaving.

Running. Like we shouldn't do that before we go in, because we're not going to be able to get to anything. There's another path down. Yeah, but this is very loud. It would draw things up here. Where would you want this distraction to be? Oh.

I can make a little... Behind them that make him turn away from us, because we're in a fatal funnel up here at the top. Yeah, I can make a little dancing golden person of light appear down at the bottom of the passage. All the way here. All the way in the chamber. You see more are going to keep coming.

Because everyone kicks one of the hyenas off the side. You just kind of sit there. You see, and see now we're trying to try the other way. Yeah, you know if there's more in there, they're just going to come in here anyway. And it's not confirmed. I genuinely feel like we should go the other way. The other way, there's nothing in this is it.

This is the other way. There's a whole other path. Nothing. No? That's nothing. Do you know? No, I just am guessing. Well, he's a question.

Do you think these things are going to do? to come out of here right away, or is that worth a shot? Maybe there is a way around to a way they're not expecting? Normally, miners build coal mines with connecting shafts and double exits in case one side collapses. You always want another way out. We just don't know where they've put everybody. We're here looking for villagers, remember?

You know, there's nothing saying we have to run in here. If we're not feeling this, we can backtrack and look in the other direction. In fact, I'm leaning that way. Can we, hey Matt, D.N. question? Mm-hmm. What kind of, if we were to try and back out of here and draw them towards us, what would that be just a tunnel?

Yeah, this tunnel is just a 10-foot white tunnel that continues backward. Unless we do it map here. If there's no. We've got these guys. We can try to try to. attacking them and if it gets bad then we use the G&D. Yeah, that's weird.

The D&T. Oh, more things are coming. Maybe it's the Whiskey Talker, but I think we've got these guys. What is this? What is this? If you wanted to, we'd go backward here. Here we can continue the tunnel just back this way. I mean, it's only like a death funnel of

where the ones dying, right? They're dying. They're dying. How far is it just on the map from like where we're standing to the farthest knoll? The farthest knoll there. It's about 60 or so feet. We can definitely do a distraction to get some of them to turn away from us. At least we get a round in.

Get a surprise round. The little golden person dance behind that guy there. Surprise round. We can get a surprise round on all of them. Surprise round get as many range and. many range and AEOE spells off as we can. AEOE surprise around. What are you talking about?

Fearful. Can I use this planning moment to cast armor abacket this something? You may. Spectral frost collects from the air on my armor. Oh, Jesus. There you go. There you go.

Which has a note to remind you from last time. I didn't give myself enough cold damage. Correct, yeah. So keep that mind. Okay. Are you going to try your thing, or should I try my thing first? What is your thing? Well, I can... I don't know. I could try something. I could do similar things, just have them see something behind them. But you could do the same thing. Yours are already cast, right? Not right now, no.

But it's like that. It's easy, this one. Okay. I could try to get one of them to fight with one of the other ones of them. Yeah, that's good. That was good. Just do that. Okay. I'm gonna sneak up to, down the steps to those, that little crook in there.

Right here? A little further back, yeah. Is that all right? Can I, do you like to roll or anything? Roll stuff? Oh shit. Okay, with disadvantage? Well, do you still have the...

No, you still have blessing, so. Oh, so 26. Okay. Okay. That puts me within 30 feet of those guys, right? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Okay.

And what are they doing, eating hearts? At a closer glance, you look and see. Or anything? One of them currently is holding what looks to be a pair of legs that are no longer attached to a torso. And it's just like stripping the flesh from the thigh and leg. And it's just like, tearing into it and takes like a piece

and chucks it off to the side, and the two hyenas fight over it. Another one back there you can see is catching what looks to be like a scapula and the back of a shoulder blade. And it's just kind of like breaking the bones and and like sucking the marrow out. It's, at a quick glance, you get the sense that some of these may have been denizens of all field as of 24 hours ago. So I'm going to start throwing up again soon, so let's either do this or backtrack, please. Are they carrying anything on their bodies on their person, anything, canteens or weapons or equipment or anything?

The knolls? The knolls. Most of them appear to be, have some sort of a long boast, long over their shoulder and have a spear that kind of dangles off to the decided who's been jammed in the ground next to them. Okay, guys, wait. Well, he's doing it. I'm getting ready and I'm doing this. And I'm going to cast mirror image of myself.

Oh, please, not that music. That music gives me nightmares from my childhood. Could we get something a little bit lighter, some lighter music here? Are you a fan of true crime TV shows? And what about Unsolved Mysteries, the show that jumped started all of our love of true crime? I'm Ellen Marsh. And I'm Joey Taranto. And we host I Think Not, a true crime comedy podcast covering some of the wildest stories from your favorite true crime campy TV shows all the way to Unsolved Mysteries.

Baby, you will laugh, you will cry. You'll think about true crime in a whole new way, and you'll also ask yourself, who gave these people mics? New episodes of I Think Not are released every Wednesday with bonus episodes out every Thursday on Patreon. And every Monday, you can listen to our True Crime Rundown, where we go over the top True Crime. headlines of the week. So come and join us wherever you listen to your podcasts. Look, there are a lot of celebrity interview podcasts out there, but there's only one Happy, Sad, Confused. I'm Josh Horowitz, and yeah, I'm the host of the show, so I'm a little biased, but truly Happy, Sad, Confused is the place for nerdy and intimate conversations with all your favorite actors and filmmakers. From

Andrew Garfield and Scarlet Johansson to Christopher Nolan, casting what ifs, backstage stories, and much more. Listen to HappySan Confused on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Duplicity or are you doing mirror image? This is back. Okay. Let's all agree, but this goes bad, we run. And we can try and... Yeah.

And suddenly there are three... Who can make fire? How many? Kailu. Three me's around myself. You very careful with it. If we need to close it off, light the tip of that little way. and throw it.

Are we going right now? Oh God. Oh, God. Are any of them holding anything that they put down for a second, or they got it firmly in their claws? The one that breaks and sucks the marrow out of one of the large, kind of shoulder blade areas, kind of takes and grinds the teeth against it, like scooping out whatever is inside, and then throws that piece onto the ground next to it,

then takes the arm and gets the splinter at the middle of the arm bone and try and get the marrow out of that. Okay. Can I, I mean, are you gonna do your thing? You're about to go? Well, I don't know. You tell me. Yeah, do it. I just want to before, I'm going to really quickly mutter a few arcane words and then there is another Caleb sort of blinking in front of me a little bit and behind me a little bit.

And it is hard to see me at the moment. Are you passing blur or you passing marriage? What are those words? I want to know for my own sake. I don't care. Can I kind of get into like a little bit more place with Beau? It's blurred because I am going to be. because I am still re-duplicates and you only have like a

scrubs. This is kind of, yeah. Because I just has married. Self-check. Mm-hmm. Does your spell have concentrating? Natural 20. Natural 20.

So there you go. You're concentrating on a spell to moment. So Bo, you quickly like, leap and land with no sound. Cat like reflexes and in the ground. Three point lighting. Your foot does kind of slide for a second. As you glanced down and looking where you stepped in, it looks like there's a bit of leftover.

leftover pieces of people. That kind of just... All right. I'm going to whisper a couple of words and use a mage hand to pick up the little piece of shoulder blade he dropped and throw it in the face of the other guy. Okay. It slowly lifts.

And one of the other knolls is eating. Then one goes, let me just go back to eating. They don't care. I thought they would kill each other. I don't know. That was it. That's all I got. A little half-ling-sized person of light appears behind the knoll at the far end there.

What is it? What are you using? I'm using dancing lights. You can use the four lights to make a little person, a little human-edge shape of light. Oh, right. And it is doing a little macarena behind the knoll all the way. Noal all the way. Over that way? Oh yeah, I have 120 feet of range, so yeah.

That spells not concentration, no. Right? Okay. Yes, it is. But I would know that. You would know that. So I'm not going to do that then. Oh, shit.

Yeah. Because of my keen memory that Caleb has, but not Liam. Smart, smart move taking that. I'm going to turn around and whisper to Caleb. Are you going to do the thing? But I'm using message, but no one can hear us. How far is there you? Are you going to do the thing?

If not, then let's just fucking... If not, I can do my thing. I send Frumpkin through the chamber and down and starts battering into the walls here. Smart, smart, smart. As soon as Frumpkin begins doing that, you watch as the one that's nearest on this side, the one that you had dropped the arm piece earlier, kind of...

It takes the bow off its back and needs to notch an arrow looking around. It's going to take a shot at the bird fluttering thing. the bird fluttering through. That is a 17. Once Fumpkins. Well, I'm sure that hits. We say, yeah. Can I just attack?

No. Six points of piercing damage. The bird goes... Are we trying to get spritic neck on them? And no one else... ...on the ground, and then dissipates. Disciates. You watch as the four hyenas suddenly rush in

towards where the bird had fallen. Okay. That's good. That's good. And they all go to the spot where it landed and find just an arrow lying there and they'll kind of just I cast spiritual weapon above the two knolls directly in front of me.

We're going to kick it off. So the range on that is? Range on that is 60 feet. Yeah, so you're placing it where? Right there. Yeah, right there. And it's just going to do giant lollipop down and smack one of them in the face.

All right, which one? This one, the one on the one on you. You're left. Okay. All righty. Go ahead and roll. Spell attack. Ooh, 19 plus whatever. Nice.

Good, roll damage on that. That definitely hits. That is nine force damage. And that's my bonus. Damn. And then, oh, well, I can do a cantrip. And then for my action, I'm gonna cast Sacred Flame with the same dude.

Same dude? All right, that is a 15. Oh, he saves, so is it half or? What kind of the check was it? That would have been his dexterity saving there, right? Yes. Yeah. Must succeed, so it probably just doesn't do it again.

Yeah, no damage. Okay, okay, okay, okay. Okay, so that ends your turn? All right, everyone else gets one action, and then we roll in an initiative and enter the evening. Can I run down the steps and hide behind a barrel, it's gonna make any fucking difference at all. Sure.

You don't get to hide though, but you're there. Yeah. You're standing next to a barrel. Next to a barrel. Alrighty. Who's him next? I'm ready. All right, Ford, what you got?

Do you point to one of them that is not undead? Just looks like a regular knoll, or I can just pick one. Regular knoll. All of the knolls in here look like regular knolls. Great. Did you aim at that one? No, I aimed at the other one. This one?

Okay, I'll take that far one. All right, what do you do? Can I focus? and summon my falchion into my hand. Yep. It appears into your space in a, looks to be a burst of kind of dull greenish-blue fire, and there you see it dripping with salt water across its blade.

What do you do? Can I use my bonus action to cast HECS at that, that radnol? You met? That one is now, Hex. You watch as the gore that's been dripping from the front of its body seems to almost roll up its torso in reverse before it slips into its armor and grasps itself. The darkened,

shadowed gore now holding it in place as the hex curse. Can I reach back and fire Eldridge Blast into it? You may. Okay. Uh, 16. That hits. Plus 1d6. 410, 1D6. 15 points of damage. Oh, shit. Oh, shoo!

That one immediately drops what it was eating as the blast slams into it as it's confused by the wrapping of the hex, and as it reels and kind of almost stumbles onto its back, its foot crushes one of the nearby skulls, and there you see this gaping wound in its chest. The armor's been centered, and there's a smoking plume of black and horrible shaded smoke pouring from it. Can I use my distance to move over here, if I may? What? 20, 20, 20, 30 as far as you could right there. Am I in your line of sight gesture? Anybody need that? No.

Okay. You? Okay. All righty. Okay. I'm gonna do something weird, and I hope it works and doesn't affect the rest of us. Never can't. I'll kind of move up kind of right here next to Ford. That works good there. There's 20 there. Let me go like one more just so.

All right, 25. That's good. And then can I reach in my bag and grab out, in my little pouch, grab out a hand, handful out of my 1,000 ball bearings. You do have a thousand ball bearings. I remember that. We had money. She bought a lot of fucking ball bearings.

A thousand ball bearings. Yes. And can I take it and just kind of like, you know how you can kind of like take your pocket and kind of flip it inside out? And just have a bunch of ball bearings kind of go tis-d-d-d-d-ding, t'ing, t'ing, t'ing, across this way. You hear what sounds like hundreds of tiny metal clanks and succession as ball bearings begin to to just spray down the stairs and scattering across the floor of the central makeshift ritual room as they kind of run through the various semblances of gore and the areas of the stone

work that are exposed between, you have spent your action scattering. Okay, I'm going to spend a key point and as my bonus action take patient defense. Okay. Nice. Nice. So as soon as you empty those out, you get back and go into your defensive position preparing for any sort of assault. Caleb. And the effect of that hasn't taken place yet, correct? The bulb bearings in this moment are now clattering down into the ground. Okay, did Ford hit one successfully? He did, yes.

That same one, I'm just going to firebolt it from... Uh... Roll for an attack. Fire bolt. So that is an attack range, Guy, plus six, that it is a 15 to hit. 15? 15? Yep, that hits.

Okay. Seven points of damage. The one that you had hexed suddenly goes up into flames with a, and falls back onto the ground. And I would use my movement to back up about 15 feet just outside of the chamber. You were just there. Nice. All righty. As the flash of red light arcs from his finger and kind of lights up the path before it impacts and kills the null, Caleb then steps back into the shadows trying to get out of the way. No.

Oh, I get a move, I mean I get a turn as well? Because I did the Magehand thing. Is that? Yes, but that technically did not initiate an sort of combat. It just bothered one of them. Mildly. A temporary inconvenience.

Okay, I will, sure, I'll send an arrow down into the one that Jester attacked. Go for it. That is the 23. 23 hits. 23 hits, gonna roll damage. Nine. Nine plus your sneak attack. Oh, this is a sneak attack?

Because you were a stealth, it does not know you're there. 14, all right. Roe, best class. That one, yes. The bolt goes through the center of his forehead and embeds itself right up to the very, very back. You watch it, oh, and just falls into the ground, kind of over one of the pile of corpse pieces

that was tearing through, becoming one of its meal. And then... And crouch back and hide. Okay, so you can make a hide check to try and disappear back there. Advantage. Advantage but disadvantage. Yeah. So 16.

16, okay. And you did your thing? Molli. I'm going to creep out against the wall closest to me and try and hide one of these coes over in the corner. As far as I can get into the... You can get right into the same kind of the similar space as not there. Not there. Does he see me?

I would say barely. Hello. Hi. And since I'm too far away for anything too crazy, for at least for a good bonus action, I will use my devil's tongue. I use vicious mockery on the knoll that's currently kind of in between, not the one that's actually the one that's further furthest from us. furthest from us because he's, it's gonna be the archer. Yeah.

And I'm just in, yeah. And in inferno, I'm just gonna say, I am too disgusted to think I'm ready, think of it. Oh. All right, roll the natural one on that saving throws. So yeah, that's, um, that's three psychic damage, and he has disadvantage on his next attack. Good to know.

All right. So now, everyone, please roll initiative. Hey, oh, way, oh, way, oh, way. Hey, whey, oh, yeah. Natural 20. Wow. Really? Do I actually roll with disadvantage?

Is this a dex or intelligence? It's technically a dexterity ability check, so it would be disadvantaged. Two. So six. That is so sad. All right, so 25 to 20? 23. 23.

Yes. All right. Oh, yay. Four would you get? Four. Sorry. Oh, so how else called natural 20 was? No, above 20.

I thought somebody else will have a little. So 23. I did, but I got a disadvantage. Right, yeah. Oh no. But wait, don't you have advantage with... On stealth? Just on stealth checks.

Yeah, that's right. Yeah, okay. So, so Mugg's at first. It's a fun little initiative tracker thing from our friends at the Axe and Shield. We're going to see it. See how that helps out there. All right, so 23. 23?

20 to 15. 17. All right, well, the knolls. Humans. The knolls roll in natural 18 plus 1. So they're at 19. So Knowles are next. Oh, the Knowles are next? Gotcha. And then both of you guys are at 17?

Yeah. All right. Just the blankies. Oh, God, I'm shaking. All right, 15 to 10. 13. Just your got 13? Yeah.

All right, 10 to 5? Six. Six. Oh, now I'm a four. The hyenas are before not. Okay. Then we have not, and then we have Ford. All right, so Molly, you're at the top of the round.

God, that's awful. Um... Because that's bad. I don't think I even fucking spelled it right. I think I botched that all across the board. That's bad. I spelled it hyenas. Hyeneas.

Hineas. It's a good to see her. Get the idea across. The special hyenas. Hineas. The nerners. What you got, Mali's. I'm going to get a little...

Don't you bunch. I'm going to get a little. Oh, can I do this? No, I can't do that. Fuck. This is... I know, I'm so sorry I should have my shit together. How far is five, ten, ten, three? Oh, God, it's too far to walk.

I'm gonna try and get one little crevice. Actually, I'm gonna hold my position, actually. I'm so sorry. Hold your position? I'm gonna hold my position and just use one more... The shell? Yeah, tongue on one of the other guys. All right.

Natural 20 on the saving throw, unfortunately. Oh, so... Sorry. Sorry. And I'm holding. All right. That's your turn. Yeah.

All right, the Knowles are up first. These two here are going to pull out their bow and begin to fire at Bow. Since you had been the first to kind of appear at this point and kind of their attention. They would have disadvantage on the attacks. That is going to be a 11. The other is a two 14s in a row. That would be 18 to hit. Oh, hit. Oh, 17 to hit. It hit?

Yeah, all right. 17 is my armor class. So that would be. This is with a bow? Yep. That's gonna be 10 points of piercing damage. I'm going to kind of cap paul try to catch the missile with deflect missiles. Okay. What do I, what do I, do you just spin? Oh wait. Oh, no, wait, this is a key point. Well, it's a key point to throw it back. Oh no, it's a key point to throw it back. It's just a reaction. It's 1D10 plus 7. Nine plus seven, so 16.

You catch it in middle air and reduce it to no damage. Fuck you dope. I just hold it out like a microphone and go, ting, ting, cling, clean. As you do that, the one in the bottom of the ground who's closest to you, grabs its spear off the side of the wall and runs up the stairs. This one hit the ball bearings? That's what we'll take the area check to see if it can do so.

That is a, it does succeed. It's a 15. It kind of slips and but it manages to make it way up the stairs. I just kind of laugh at it as it comes at me. He looks like stupid. Into combat with both Ford and Beau. It's going to go ahead and leach out of you with that. It's going to be a 16.

16 misses. I hope we at least heard the Lenington's bongol. So after you drop the arrow that comes up and you kind of parry this one off the side and go back into your defensive stance. All right, that ends. Both of those go there. Now that comes to Caleb. Yeah, I can see from where I am, I can see Ford and Bow with one of these things. So I'm going to just firebolt right from where I am. Okay, go for it. That's it. That's it.

Oh, no. Oh no. Oh no. It strikes part of the stone altar, splintering candle wax and pieces of remnant heart chunks, but no impact, unfortunately, on the actual null. Sorry! Missy where you are? Yeah, I will walk just inside the...

Wait, but have you... Did you go, Bill? I haven't, but we rolled at the same time. Yeah. Okay. Right. So, Bo, you go with your action now? Yes. Okay, I'm going to just take my staff. I'm going to try and crack this guy on the back of his head where he is. Go for it. Christ, all fucking mighty. Thirteen, does I hit? Thirteen, as you swing the bow back to trunk,

him in the head, it actually slips in one of the ball bearings you had left, and as it manages to catch itself, it just falls out of range. If you're sweep with a bow, you're like, shit. My own worst enemy. I'm going to do a knee and a round kick kind of double cop. Sorry, I can just do one. I'm thinking in advance. One kick with a knee. All right, go for the tack. Fuck damn. You want my dice bag? You slip on one of your own ball bearings in the second strike.

I managed to just catch yourself by grabbing the the fur on the outside of the knoll and use its body to right yourself and then it's a little slick and sticky. Good start guys. I just wipe my hand on forward on floor right. All right, Jester, you're up. Okay, I'm going to, has any of them been hurt yet? They're standing, this one's been hurt a little bit. Okay, I'm going to move my spiritual weapon over to the one on the ground directly in front of bow. Oh, I meant on the lower level. Yeah, and it's gonna hit him. Whoa.

16 plus five. 16 hits, or plus five even hits you more. So that's nine points of force damage. Nine points of force damage as Lottiebop hits at the back of the skull and it, and kind of leans forward and grabs the back of its skull, with this kind of pounding, throbbing pain in its head. And then I'm gonna use, Toll the Dull the Dissol the Dissue.

dead on the one in front of bow. All right. Nice. So was that to roll? I don't know what it is when I'm into it. He has to roll a wisdom saving throw. Okay. Still lonely.

And the range in that one is? 60 feet. Yeah, okay. So it rolls a nine plus zero. Nine. So he takes one day, twelve necrotic damage. Two. It's a little bell this time.

little bell this time. It's a little bit of, bing, bing, but it's a going to a little bit of blood kind of out of the side of one of the hyanine's ears. I'd like to think your lollipop makes like candy crush sounds when it hits me. That's very viable. A point of clarification. It's amazing. Is the lollipop, a chest was rolling from the flat kind or the round kind?

I'm picturing the flat kind with like so it's like, yeah. Right, gotcha. You're going to move it all? You're going to stay where you are. I'm going to stay right there. Okay. That ends your turn. And I don't make my mirror images be like,

I guess they're doing that because I'm doing that because they're my mirror image. There you go. There's just a whole dance number over there. A multi-justment. The hyenas go now. They're moving at 50 feet. Oh, it's the best. It does succeed in his next save. This one's going to attempt. Five, two, one. Leap up to there. Dexterity saving throw. does succeed. This one here's a lot of them.

Oh geez, this is a lot of them. That's a bigger one, it looks like. No. Succeeds, they're rolling pretty high for the saving throw. This one will be a three. That one does not make. This one gets part way over and then falls prone there. It uses the other half its movement to get up,

but that's as far as they can get. So we can't actually attack for this round. It's going to use its movement to make the rest of its rest of its run up to the top of the stairs. So that one does not get an action this turn because it's slipped on the ball bearings. It's going to be one attack against bow. Oh, it's effective.

With disadvantage, which is a natural 20. And a six. Yeah. Yeah, that is not hit, not at all. It's plus two. So someone tries to, Dehaina rushes up and lashes out towards you. You're just kind of, stop at the nose, and it pulls it back. Yeah, right?

Nose punch. Yep. two other ones that rush up and kind of come along the flank with the hyena to you, Ford. First one goes, that's going to be a 15 plus two, 17. That'll hit. All right. Oh, it actually has advantage in the roll. Because of the pack tactics didn't really help. Let's see here, it's the toughness.

Two six. You take two points of piercing damage. Okay. The other one is going to attack you. It will take ten points of cold damage and return. Which causes it to just shatter into ice and it bites you and then watches its snout kind of T-1000 style, it just shatters into a million ice pieces. You lost a knoll there.

Yep. No, you've got like a, you've got a knoll. It's worse. You should have that looked at. Thank you. The other one is going to attempt to strike at you. Natural 20, it's a critical hit. 20 to 10.

That pack tactics is nasty. You for dice-wise suffer eight points of piercing damage. It takes 10 and it explodes into ice as well. You watch these both these hyenas rush up and strike and both in succession. Just disintegrate into shards of ice across the ground. That's the coolest spell ever. It's so hard-core. Spell's gone though, right? I'm thinking it. That's it. All right. That's going to end the hyena's turn. Not you're up. Okay, I'll lean out from behind Molly Molly butt-ox and just sort of rest the hand across bow on his right his left cheek and fire on the the null that's engaged with Ford okay firing boom oh eight as you drunkenly try

and aim in the direction but is that bulbous butt you almost pull the trigger twice but you're aiming it's a sword and you're like no Is there no advantage for any of the engagement? No advantage, but he can sneak attack if he hits. That's how it works. And you finally go, and you watch this one of the elements of stone on the side of the cavern wall, kind of, as the bolt just hits it and goes sideways.

Doing good. I guess I will, am I still hidden? No, that exposes me. Do I have to hide again? How do rogues work? Yeah, you're revealed. Oh, I was revealed. So I have to hide again.

But you have to find a way to obscure something's vision to you before you can hide. Got it. Okay, I'll run up the stairs then and hide back near where Caleb is. Other side. Other side? Yeah. Right there. All right, yeah. And then hide. That'll work. So go ahead and roll a stealth check. That's your bonus. Well, I've cocked. Terrible.

Uh, nine plus eight. It's 17. Oh, wow, I'm so stealthy. You're rogue this go around, man. All right, that ends not's turn. Ford, you're up. Oh, it is by turn. Can I use my bonus action to move my hex from my defeated foe to my new foe right in front of me? You may. Yeah.

And can I whip my falching around and an up strike? Just try and cut right through them. Go for it. My falchon back and forth. I whip my falcham back in phone. That's only a 16. 16 hits. Oh good.

AC's 15. Can I say two-handed? You did it? I'll allow it. I gotta get a habit saying. Yeah, you got to say two-hand and allow it. Okay. One d ten.

That's a ten. Four, that's 14 points of damage plus the D6. It's 15 points of damage. So this one that had already, 15 points of damage, right? This is the one that you would hit earlier with it. So as you swing with your fouch after spinning it in your hand, you arc upward, as you do, you watch as the gore and shadow of your hex, which now seems to crasp around its chest,

almost reaches out to meet the blade in the middle, like the two bits of lightning hitting in the center of the sky, And as they impact, the blade carries through just the momentum, almost the strength coming from the blade, not from your actual body. As you do, you carve through a large portion of its torso. You watch as the height armor kind of folds off, revealing this huge gash wound in its chest. It's still standing, but it's horribly wounded now. You fucked with the wrong ones, son. That in your turn, right? To the top, Molly, you're up.

I'm going to run up to these two and join the fray up here. All right. First, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna take a swing at the big guy. Go for it. That's 16 to hit. That hits, good damage. And that's, just using my normal one. That's eight points of damage. Eight points of damage. As soon as it rears from the attack forward, you watch as in a flash, the cloak billows of Molly Mock's arrival. And as the cloak falls, you just watch as the knoll's head just rolls off of its shoulders. You didn't even see the blow that struck it.

Bonus action with the glowing sword goes down into the hyena. Go for it. What damn. That's a 11 to hit. That's its armor class. Aeena doesn't have a whole lot armor. All right, and that's eight points of damage. Eight points of damage.

With one strike, you turn around and look at the hyena, with the offhand and just carve right through it. With a flourish. Oh, wait, did that, because that didn't have the other. No, this one was the glowing one. Oh, the glowing one's your main hand. Oh, is my main hand? And your offhand is the other one. Okay, I didn't know that.

So whatever, what damage would have been without the bonus? Oh, that would have been four. Four damage? Yeah. All right. So it's still there. Okay. And it's wounded, but it's still like, ew.

I would have flipped them if I was on them. Wouldn't you have attacked with your offhand first? I was going to say I would have flipped them if I'd I was going to hit the one that didn't have much left. Right. Well, the idea is the bonus action attack happens as part of the attack action. Sure. I'll do it reverse next time. No worries, but yeah, just put that in my next time. It's all good. You still beat the shit out of it with your off, yeah.

All right, so that ends Molly's turn. Those two knolls in the back. This guy's going to go ahead and back up as he... Oh, no, no. Attempts to make... Dexterity save. Fails. Fails, so he falls prone, Use the direction and movement to get back up so we can only move another 10 more feet so we can't get that much further away. He's going to go ahead and take a shot. This guy's going to go ahead and pull back. He's out of the bearing range and begin making his way towards the door. No. They're both going to take shots at Ford. Actually, one at you and one at Molly.

They're not going to fire at you because you visibly caught one and dropped it in front of the line. Oh, damn it. Fuck that. Against Ford. It's going to be... Pimor guarded then. 19? Oh, that hits.

All right, then against Molly. I was blood maledict on that fucker. Okay. Yeah. Nope. That would, oh, okay. That brings it down to a 14. Yeah, that don't hit.

All right. So as the one that's going to fire at you, Molly pulls back its arrow, its eyes suddenly go darkening in and bleed from the inside. And it suddenly, oh, and releases it, and you watch as that arrow splinters against the central column. The one that does come towards you for however, does strike true. You suffer... Eight points of piercing damage, is this one catches you right in the abdomen, a little bit to the right, like tapping something kidney-ish in that vicinity,

and you feel like this sudden, like, dull pain and nausea to overcome you. That's gonna end the Nol's turn. Caleb, you're up. Okay, so I saw Knott dart in front of me and kind of chuckle to myself, see Nott walk past, I'm going to walk forward and say you are enjoying this too much, but okay.

And can I see these two? They were backing away, correct? You can see this one. This one is technically being blocked by that central collar. Alright, then the diamond cups up and I spin it and little charges of electricity crackle around it and I pick it out from my hand and it spirals through the room to that one. Go ahead and roll your spell attack? Come on, Grog. No.

Oh. Man, Caleb, so broken. Sorry. Would you roll? Two. Two. Plus six is eight. Did that do it?

No, unfortunately. And it just skitters off the central column and it goes spinning out of control as the electrical sphere shatters against the stonework and dissipates the energy absorbed by the surrounding stonework. But I was so eager that I actually came down the steps my full movement. I'll also say, I think we, oh yeah, that's right. You're double. Yeah, that would be your full movement there. Pretty close. That I don't want to go there. I want to go to the bottom of the steps behind Mollymok and Fort.

Okay, there. Yeah. All right. Uh, Beau. Right. Okay. Okay. How far away is you? How a hard time you see him? Is he? Can I close the gap? He's, you could say maybe if you look down, it's about 30 feet from you. Okay, can I do some cool monk shit?

Then do some, like, wall runny and like leap in a parkour and then get to this guy? We can certainly try. Yeah, sure. Make an acrobatics check for me. Acrobatics? Yep. It's going to end up with an office parkour gift. Hardcore.

Oh, that's good. Yep. That's an 18, natural 18, plus six. As you run off the edge, the hyena takes a swing at you. That is going to be a 14. You hear it, you feel it, snap at your heel, but does not actually grasp any of your body. My foot just taps his arm just a little bit, and I leap off of the dog. You push off of him, run across this wall, leap hit this pillar, and then use the momentum, leap in land right in front.

And as I'm leap, I'm going to take the step and just come down and go crack with a slap. Thick. Double-handed. Piece of shit. Roll. What was the other one? That was my eight side to die.

I'm trying to efficient my rules. It looks really cool, but as you swing down, the knoll manages to see you up in the air and just sidesteps as you whack, hit the stonework. I just scream as I come down the whole way, I'm like, pop into a just laughing at you with the complete miss. You roll for the other strike. Yeah. That's an 18.

There it is. It's the first time. You just slap them in the face. It's the first one. You know, still pretty cool. So damage in that one? Okay, that's just a D4. Four, so eight.

Eight points of damage, nice. So as laughing, its jaw is kind of dislocated and it snaps back into place because some of its teeth broke. It looks kind of dazed and hurt by it. It's looking pretty rough. It's taken some hits in the past. So, that's the end of your turn.

But you can't run it anymore. No. All right. That brings us to Jester. I say, don't laugh it, my friend! And I'm gonna send my lollipop over and hit it in the face. Yeah, that'll do it. Get a good hit Lollipop.

I don't know if it's gonna hit it. 8 plus 5. 13, no, I'm afraid that will not hit. Okay. As soon, Lollipop comes around the corner, it sees it coming. and moves to get Bo to intercede between the lollipop and itself, and at that moment you're like, I can't quite, and you just end up withdrawing and not actually making the strike this round for fear of hitting bow.

Toll the dead! All righty. So that's a wisdom saving, so that's a wisdom save. That's six, no. Yay, okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, okay. Good money, make money, make money, good money. Okay, seven. Seven points of damage?

Yeah. All right, you watch as the, the, you watch as the, you know, you release the surge of energy, the sound begins to vibrate its ears, is it kind of and it reaches up as both of its eardrums burst on the sides of its head, and it kind of falls to one knee, looking like it's completely ruined and dazed, and Beau, you have a moment to just kudegraa. You just break its neck with one swoop of bow. So it combined, you both finish off that note. Sounds great. That's so cool. That's probably so cool.

That's pretty cool. Oh shit. Already. Fuck out, that was awesome. Hold it dead at the bow. Jester, you want to move? I'm gonna just hang out to the right. Okay.

You can just just tune. The hyenas. This hyena here, which is now going to make it to do it. This one's going to go ahead and move past. Does Ford get an attack of opportunity yet on it? No, that one was not in a melee with him. That one's going to go ahead and move up to UFord. Attacking you Ford, that is a six.

No, that doesn't hit. Woo! Thankfully. Attacking you Maui. That is a 20. That hits. That hits. You.

Take two points of piercing damage as it just kind of snaps at you. Seeing that they're both beginning to glance about and see that their allies are starting to back away, and there's a lot of you open this upper area, they're both going to attempt to break away with the rest of the movement to rush past. I'm definitely going to take an attack for opportunity on that web too as well. Yep, both of you do. You got to get that last null before he leaves the new. 14? 21.

Both it. Roll damage. Is this main hand? Mainhand. This one is hanging on by a thread, though. It's the one of the damage last time. Eight points of damage. Yeah, you carve that one. They both, both of them as they're rushing,

you both simultaneously strike back at it as they're treating them and they just stumble down the stairs. Tink. Perfect. Their body's just kind of stumbled to the ground and end up, it's weird because their body's hit the ground and the momentum carries them as they slide across the ball bearing. It's almost like they're lagging.

Like, what's that? Kyrnick. Kyrnick. All righty. Finishing the hindus round? Not, you're up. Seeing the knoll's expression, I know it well. It's one of fear and about to run away.

Make an inside chuck. Okay. At disadvantage. 19. He's not disadvantaged from which is. I would really. 19. This knoll looks like. it's ready to fucking both.

It is on the way out of the room. The tide is turned, it's starting to see more and more of you appear at the top of the stairs as the hyenas and its friends are being destroyed. It's gonna run. Okay, I'm gonna put the hand crossbow up and just run as fast as I can straight at it. Using my bonus action to dash.

30, 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30. And I'm gonna say to it, hey you, if you spend all day in a well, well, that's a day well spent. and I'll cast hideous laughter on it. I'm glad we still get shushed. That is a man. It was really worried about.

It immediately goes, it goes, going to the ball's on the ground on its back and is now rolling with laughter, laughter that is like echoing through the halls and making its way through the tunnel. Don't you worry. Don't you worry.

All right. Forward, kill him! You made him prone and it's harder to hit that way. I would like to move up my 30 feet of speed. I just, I turn behind me, I go watch the ball bearings, watch the marks. Make a Dix 30 saving throw. As you hear that, just as you reach the bottom of the stairs. 13.

Okay, get to the bottom of the stairs and you just barely begin to slip and catch yourself. It's a DC-12. Oh, woo! However, you continue to run. That's... That's about as close as you get on your 30 movement. And I use my bonus action to move my hex to the laughing gnom on the ground. And I'll cast Eldridge Blast.

Actually, make a concentration check, so you've taken some damage. I forgot to maintain your hex's concentration. Oh, that's the worst. That's the worst. Save me through? Make two for me if you don't mind. This first one is 19. Correct.

That's fine. The second one is 18. Yeah, you're fine. Sweet. So the hex moves over. I'll remember that. If you take damage and you have a spell that's a concentration, you have to take the she's.

The spell rules. I know. Seven. Six. Fourteen. Eldridge blast? Yes. Oh, sorry, plus six, yeah.

Disadvantage. Disadvantage. That's even higher, so 14. 14? It still misses, unfortunately. It hits and gleans off of its armor. However, it isn't quite strong enough to actually make a painful impact on its body and slams into the nearby rock, causing a spray dust into Yeah, the attack has to hit for hex to work, right?

Correct. Yes. All right, that ends your turn forward. Molly, you're up. I'm gonna run down the stairs the opposite direction from the ball bearings. I'll see where I can get if I can get 30 feet. 30 else as far as you can get right there. And I'm just going to just also use vicious mockery again and just yell,

shut up already. That actually is a 16. What's your DC? DC on that is just says wisdom saving. Right, against whatever your spell DC is. Where is my spell DC? It's weird that's insane. Well, it's weird because I'm not a spell. Spell caster technically.

So we'll say the purpose is it's 8 plus Perkinsi bonus, which is 10 plus what of your charisma modifier? My charisma modifier is zero. Okay, so yeah. For a moment. All right. For now. We'll tighten it up with this.

All right, cool. So no effect on there. Molly's turns over. The Null's turn. It is laughing its ass off. Now does it make it... To get the end of its turn, it makes a... It makes a...

All right, which is a 17. So, it manages to shrug off the laughter. At the end of its turn. Yes. Yes. It's just on the ground, not going... It's about to try and get back up. Caleb, you're up.

Okay, so I'm going to go along the edge of the steps this way and come down toward it. And I am going to now to now... spin and flames look around it and I'll go, come on. And I flick that off my hand. And this time, it is also not good. It is a 13. 13. It has a disadvantage because it's still prone. Oh, for my attack?

Against spells? Against range spells. Same thing, Roth, same thing. Okay, yeah. You release it and it just skits across the ground. It's like skipping a stone across the lake and it slams into the wall behind it. Oh, I apologize. No, that's okay.

All of our strikers are. No, I don't believe in any of that bullshit. You all are crazy. It's just random. It's all good, man. Survived to level five and everything will turn. Yeah, unfortunately it does not hit. Not, don't worry about me.

Keep going. Everybody attack. All right, Bo, you're up. Okay, I kind of want to do this, like, as my two-handed attack, but for flavor, to skin it. Yeah, no worries. I want to stroll up, kind of channeling the rock, charge up the elbow.

And then we go, people's elbow. Go for it, go. Go for it, go. Right down. You have advantage because it is prone. Yeah, just full body working. Go for it. With advantage?

Is this, can I consider it like a two-hand out of it? I mean, it's just skinning your attack. So yeah, it's still in the game. Oh my God! Wow. Two and a three. Why? Ballberings.

So here's what you do. You walk up, tap, tap, leap. And right as you're in the air, the knoll's like, the knoll just kicks out of laughter. And rolls into the way and you, wham! Okay. Never recover from that entry. Yep, that shit just hangs out in there. The worst funny bone pain shoots through your arm as you get up.

You are going to be rubbing Tiger Bomb into that shit for years. You still have your bonus. Flavor. The only actually starts laughing again. My flavor, my second attack isn't really an attack. It's just I'm in so much pain that I go, gah, and I kind of kick it a little bit. What would you have an attack? I still have a bit.

Yeah, because it's still prone. You'll get it. Natural 20. That'll shut it up. I like it your revenge hits for always, like really hot. That's twice I've laughed at you and you've hit them while they're laughing. Yep. Every time I try to show off, it never works. That's what I'm learning. Okay, three double to six plus four, so ten.

Oh, okay. So as is laughing. You kick it in the head and you see it like stunned on the ground for a second. It's eyes kind of rolling in different directions. Nice, heavy crack at the side of its temple. I just kind of roll over and I go fetal for a minute. Okay, pose like, oh. All right, cool. Ending Bo's turn, Jester, you're up. Okay, I'm going to Skip over across the upper level towards the far stairs. So I can see it. And then I'm gonna send my spiritual weapon over to it

and smack it flat on the ground. That does have advantage because it's technically in melee with it. Finish that shit. Or like a row. Um, Jesus Christ. I don't think either of them hit. 13. Level three.

And lower. And less. Nope. Okay. out of the way of everything. It's doing what Bo did the last fight, but on the ground. Okay, okay. Then I'm going to toll the dead. Jesus. Oh, it's wisdom. Wisdom.

Lesser rules the National 19. Oh, wow. This is amazing. This one knoll is just holding on. It's so hard. All right. Wow. So Jester, I think that ends your turn, unfortunately. Jesus fucking cry. The hyenas are dead. There's no hyenas. They've grown down the knolls.

No one is just making it through. Just giant-purs. Inside its insanity, the knoll here. Looks like we made it. You watch as four shimmering gestures all just kind of kneel down and shake their heads in their hand. This was something like a Jacob's Ladder moment. Just the end of his life is just making a stretch. This is going to need some serious therapy.

Not you're up. I can't believe this thing is still alive. In six seconds. It's still kind of prone, right? It's prone, yeah. I'm just walk up to it and then point blank. Shoot, not point blank, but far enough away that I can see. You get a disadvantage.

All right, I'll stand back 10 feet and do it. No, you still get disadvantage. You get disadvantage of a range attack up close and disadvantage against a prone creature. So right now with your crossbow is disadvantage regardless. Oh, well, shit. Can you attack it with a sword? Yeah, I will slap that bitch. There you, now you've got advantage.

Now you've got advantage in the attack. Get your hands dirty. Thank God. Okay. 18. 18 hits. So go ahead and roll damage with your sneak attack. Okay.

13. 13 points of damage. How do you want to do this? I think since it's on the ground, I would like to pin it into the ground if I can by finding the thinnest thing on it and just sort of general. and just sort of jamming my support sword into the ground. As it's like cackling and moving around,

I like to imagine this is all happening simultaneously. It's like bows in the ground holding her elbow, the weapon misses, and it's like rolling in catherine, and it's starting to get up, and you're just like, there, fup. And almost unceremoniously, it's like, it's like, pah! It just falls a limp on the ground where you place it.

It's almost like the slow push from the same private Ryan. You're like, shh, shh, it's terrible. Oh, man. Oh. And it expires. I go around and I collect the knoll ears. And I put them in the jar.

If the room falls still, I say, well, he had a good run. A toast to that guy right there on the ground. Yes. Cheers. He was like, he was like Beyonce. He was one hot, I don't know.

Whoa. Whoa. What? I don't know. One point of damage. All of us. Everyone takes one point of second damage. Oh.

I have a question. How similar do hyena ears look to no ears? They're noticeably smaller and not null ears. What if we said they were baby noles? Baby don't. I'm going to cut them off just to do this. Okay, so. So five sets of noeliers.

Five, and yes. And four sets of hyena years. Yes. I'm going to call not over to the chest over on that side there. Do you see anything wrong with this? Is there anything hinky about that? Oh, I check for traps. Five sets of nolyers.

Checking for traps. All right. This is an intelligence check. Are you still intoxicated? It's investigation, I think. Does that shit worn off with some activity? It's getting, the next 10, 15 minutes or so, you'll be able to shake off the alcohol.

Okay, for now, I rolled an 11. Okay, it does not appear to be trapped. It's good! It does it look good? It's totally good. Take a step back, you've earned this, I will open it just in case. It's locked.

Oh. Uh, hmm. I will pick it! Okay, so go ahead and attempt with a disadvantage to pick it. What am I rolling? This is a, it's proficiency bonus, which is two, plus your Dex bonus.

That's good. Okay, proficiency in Dex, two, say, eight, okay. But disadvantage, okay. 21. 21. As the adrenaline pumps through your system, it kind of wakens you up a bit, and even with the intoxication that's been flooding your system,

you're still limited clarity and it opens that an issue. You glance at it and then the change, The chest looks like it's been bashed a little bit, like something was trying, like one of the Noles was trying to get into it and eventually just gave up and got Flomaxon and threw it on the ground. As you open it up from the inside, you can see what looks to have been essentially

a central medical pack, if you will, an emergency pack for any of the miners that had gotten hurt or wounded. So there are two healers kitten there. There are a number of disinfectant herbs and funguses. Anybody who's proficient in medicine would know how best to utilize those. I don't know if any of you are. Nope. Then it's a risky endeavor to maybe use one, but you do find what looks to be a pack of a small leather kind of hand pack that contained for glass vials, three of which was shattered from the rough movements that was tossed around, but one that is still intact. That contains a healing potion. Yes!

Is it a healing potion? It is a healing potion. It is a greater healing potion, not a standard healing potion. Whoa. I hand it to Caleb. Guys. You need this more than all of us. You're the squishiest.

Squishy. Well, that is probably true. Thank you. You take the two medicine packs and then... What do I do it? All right, fine. I'll take them. collect medicine packs now.

No, no, no, I need them. I could probably use those. I also like the idea of maybe giving the healing potion to the healer. To the healer? So she can heal without the potion. Can you heal yourself without the potion? Of course she can.

Oh, well, all right, then. I didn't really occur to me. I'll keep the herbs. And we can all we can. They're just herbs? Well, you can mark down medicinal supplies. Do what you call it. And you are not entirely as to how they're applied, but they're probably healthy.

Can I look at them since I'm proficient in medicine? Oh, you are? Oh, they're proficient in medicine? Yeah. Oh, I was asking if anyone was proficient with it. Oh, sorry, I was writing down null sets of ears. Fair enough. So yeah, no, the medicinal supplies that you've acquired can be utilized to remove poisons if quickly applied to where the poison was put or wounded.

That's great that too. I have a motion. So it's two uses. So if an action is taken to apply it to a wound that, whether a bite or a wound that was poisoned, it can help remove the poison. Oh, shit. And it's an action, you said? It's an action to apply, yeah.

There was a lot of Noel Chatter in here and a lot of exploding orbs and stuff, so I'm going to guess that we have alerted whatever is beyond that we're here. How do we wish to proceed? I mean, they make a lot of noise. They may not have noticed. Can I, since I'm kind of in that general vicinity, just go 20 or so feet into this hole and just kind of listen and see if I hear anything?

Yeah, they don't also, they don't send the orbs of fire through the air, though. So as you step forward a little bit, make a reception check. What was the question? I'm sorry? There was no question. Thirteen. Thirteen. 13.

The third team. You hear echoing, muffled in the distance, some yipping, some conversation in whatever this knowlish language is, you hear a deep, resin kind of, in a distant, an impact or a sound in yeah, that's all. It sounded like quite a ways away, like this echo had been traveling a ways down this tunnel. I've been down. You hear a few other kind of cackling chuckles that echo shortly thereafter.

I just turn around and kind of come back to the rest of the group and just say, there's something bigger. Jester, could you give me a heel a little bit? Took a little bit of beating. Oh, sure. Yeah, I'll cast cure wounds on him. Kind of think there's something bigger at play here.

Whatever is driving these Knowles, I think. I think is deeper in. Can I look around and see if I can find anything, like any papers, anything from that humanoid that might be intelligible? Make an investigation check, please. Okay, 20 total. Okay.

Looking about the altar, you find some smaller pieces of fresher flesh that have been stretched over the edges of the altar, like on the corners. And you can see this similar grin across the center. It's all blood splattered from the hearts that were placed on there. But as you kind of wipe a little bit of it away,

you can see stained into this loosely tanned what looks to be human skin, the same symbol of like the jagged smile, the jagged teeth that form a grin that the various tanned banners that are stapled into the stone walls show and reveal. But no notes, no books, no parchment, Can I do some sort of, can I try and figure out what this is, if I recognize this symbol in any way? I'd also like to join in on that with a religion check.

You've already made a religion check before, and as you come up and join her, this particular symbol, the grin matches the memory flash you had of this entity. Inagru? Yeah, Yinagoo. You gather this is probably the symbol that represents this entity. A cult of Yinagru. Yinagoo or Yinagoo? Ininagoo? Yeah.

Inagu. Inagu. Mr. Magoo. Mr. Magoo, you know, fake confidence. Are you clear now? Who are you? Cult of a knife. I'm fine.

How many fingers am I holding up? More than I think I have on my entire body. I think I don't have, I think I just have like four on each hand. And thumbs or? Okay. Okay. You good? Do we need to get out of here?

to get out of you? Yeah. I'm good. Okay. Yeah, no, we're fine. I mean, is this the plan? We were supposed to free living people, but we got some arms.

We could bring those back. No, I don't think, I mean, yeah, we could, but. I didn't say to bring back some, anything we could find. Are there any identifiable body parts? I think maybe. You take a few minutes to look around, which gives you two notifications. One, nothing seems to be a minute.

immediately coming into search as to what the noises were. And you do hear other distant sounds, impacts, and, like, cackling and stuff. You get the sense that the tunnels deeper in have some activity amongst just the knolls that live below, whatever they've converted this mine network to be. You also see that all the bodies in this chamber

have been pretty much picked of any identifiable facets. Jewelry, wedding bands. If you want to take some time to really pick through, you could try. No, we're still trying to get to people here. So our options are we press forward to something worse, or we backtrack and try the other direction, or we get out of here. We have the silver thread up top, right? Yeah. Did we do that? Did we do? No, we opted not to do that for the time's sake.

As we move forward? Oh, it took a few minutes. Yeah, we could do that now. How are you feeling Ford? Yeah, Ford, are we gonna be? I'm all right. Ford Explorers or Ford escapes. Jesus.

Yeah, I could do that quickly. I could put an alarm here quickly. I could do it the fast way. And know if anything's coming behind us. Uh-huh. Is that what we want to do? Do we want to go around? I don't know.

I'm a little terrified of what is down there. Can we can't? No, we can't take short rest. It's not enough time. No. That's up to you. That's a half hour is a short restaurant. An hour is a short restaurant.

It's about an hour. Yeah, there's two ways that I can do this. I can do it lickety split or I can take my book out and do it the harder way, but that's 10 minutes about. I say we go deeper. I think it's in front of us. I think there's something real big back there. So we're just going to march into it, okay.

I'm not convinced that they don't still have people alive down there. I'm pretty much out of spells now. That's okay. The short rest doesn't get a spells back, doesn't? Not for her, doesn't? No. Not for me, either. The press on.

Cervation. Wow. Oh, two-packed match. How are you with that sledgehammer on your back? What's you mean? Can you use it? Can you use it? How are you with it?

Oh. I don't know. It's a big weapon. She's got a badass size. It's more of a tool sledgehammer than a weapon sledgehammer. Yeah, I've got the side. Okay.

A sickle. Okay. Sickle. I'd like to volunteer that perhaps we move forward until we can see whether there are any living people that we can help. And we make a decision then. Okay.

I saw nothing that would clue me in as to what might be deeper and really big. Nothing that cut your attention to you in there. That went far better than the village, but also that big armored bastard wasn't there. Let's make a pile of these bodies too. Just in case maybe they think that they took each other Let's set them up like they all were making out.

Oh, okay. No, we don't have time for that here. We can't do that well. Like some sort of, like a circle jerky sort of a thing? Yeah. On the way out. Yeah. Loosely prop them up like that.

When we're victorious, we can do disgusting things as we leave. Not, I think you should take point again. All right. Did you do that, that, that, that? Do we want to adapt? I thought it was for going back the other way. Yeah. comes behind us.

I think that the reasons for doing that are slighter, and I don't want to blow my wad magically. Okay. If we were going the other way, I might. I would agree. All right. Let's go down to us. I'd push forward with not.

Are you drunk or am I not drunk? If you were to take like 10 more minutes, you'd stop being drunk. We'd talk for seven minutes, yeah. All right. All right. Wait for three more minutes and then go. Okay, so you want to wait until not shakes off the

The booze? The influence the booze, eventually you can have regained. While we wait for those three minutes, I turn to Molly and I say, Do you remember anything in your recollections if this Yai Yanogu? Inogu. Inagu. Yonagoo. Yule play. You'll play, is a female deity or a male deity?

Do you remember? It's hard to remember. It's a lot of aggression, anger. Sometimes I'm kind of just wondering what that whole, you know. Yeah, why are you curious about that? Well, the guy, the guy running the ceremony said that the hunger will be fed, ours and hers, right? That's why he said, right? Right, Jim?

I didn't miss you at? Yeah, exactly what the word said, yes. Do I remember anything about either gender or that this would be an aggressive, like other than just I saw a lot of aggression and kind of a feral aspect to this? That was it, yeah. I just wonder who hers is.

Who's, who is that? That is the crooks of the matter. Shall I find out? Yep. As you guys are having this conversation, you hear one sound that varies very strongly from the others that have encompassed this tunnel sequence. You hear this female scream, this high-pitched shrieking scream that says,

Oh no. You're a mean man. We have to hurry forward. This is what happens when we sit down and we talk. We gotta go. We gotta go. Can't bugger up with mom. Come on. We're moving forward. I charge your head. As quickly as possible. You guys rush down the tunnel deeper into the maze of mind shafts. What? And we'll pick up on that next week. Yeah. Who's baby? Where are they?

Why were they crying? We'll find out next week. That's one way to get your place. You're going to both mad mad, maddew as always. Also babies. And babies. Oh my God. We fucked up the nose, fuck at the nose.

I like that our pickle jar is getting filled with little... Filled with ears. I'm smushing them down so that there's like... Oh God, so it's like briny pickled no air? It's like you ever have pickled pickles? We drank all the pickle juice out of it, so really they just had to have a pickle soup. They're in their own juices. Yeah, there you go.

There you go. It's like a tip jar. Yeah? It's an interesting learning process of conservation of spells as you progress down... Well, I was saving them but then fucking Ford. for healing. I know. That's what cantrips are for. It's what I was using cantrips. I'm saying. I guess that's going to keep as you're continuing forward if you need to assault things. All right. Oh, quick announcement, which is kind of fun. So we're going to

have a guest next week. Yep, our first guest of the campaign. Oh, that's right. Oh, we've been to know this? Yeah, I did. Yeah, I did. Yeah, you did. I mentioned it. We knew what it's. We know what it is? Yeah, it's, yeah, actually, next week we'll be able to be able to be able to

to have on our show, Kari Payton. Oh, yeah. So good. Yeah, it's a long time friend of a lot of us here. We've worked a lot in the VO community. If you aren't familiar with him, you should look him up. If you've been watching The Walking Dead, if you're the Walking Dead, he's been awesome

in that show for a long time. He's been times go, plays Grimlock. All kinds of stuff. He's a phenomenal voice out, great actor. And we've been talking for a long time. He's been wanting to play in this for a long time, but he's been very busy, of course, those things. But he's in town.

He's so nice. I know. He's both saddened by out. He's fucking awesome. So yeah, we'll have Karie here next week. We're excited to have him join us. And yeah, give him a little love. He's actually at a Kansas City convention right now with Wilfredo.

Oh, nice. So if you're in that area of the next few days, you should go say hi and give him some critter love or on the internet as well. So yeah, I'm excited to have him next week. In the interim, guys, have a wonderful week. We love you. Thank you for joining us. And is it Thursday yet. Good night.

Welcome to Mick Unplugged, the number one podcast for self-improvement and modern leadership. I'm Mick Hunt, your host, and I'm here to challenge your why and fuel your because. This is where leaders, entrepreneurs, and go-getters come to level up. Each week, I bring you unfiltered conversations, game-changing strategies, and the kind of motivation that transforms lives and legacies. I've learned from legends like Les Brown, Damon John, and Robert Irvine. And now I'm bringing their lessons, along with mine, straight to you. From modern leadership tips to creating unstoppable momentum,

this is the podcast that redefines what's possible. Hit play, subscribe, and join the millions who've made Mick Unplugged their go-to source for growth and greatness, because your next breakthrough is just one episode away. This is Mick Unplug, the voice and face of modern leadership entrepreneur and self-improvement. Let's get started. Ever open up your podcast app, scroll forever, and still not know what to listen to? And there are millions of podcasts, and most of them, they just don't grab you.

That's why I created something you should know. Every episode is built around surprising, useful, and fascinating ideas. We're consistently ranked in Apple's top 200, with thousands of five-star reviews. But more importantly, people come back because they learn something interesting every time. If you're tired of searching and you just want something good to listen to, try one episode of something you should know right here on the platform you're listening on right now. The world of Sonic the Hedgehog has been thrust into a not-so-dark, not-so-stormy, hard-boiled detective story that probably nobody saw coming. Follow Sonic and the entourage.

Prepid Chaotic Detective Agency, as they take on their biggest case yet. This high-flying action-packed adventure will take them across the world, fighting for every twill they can fight. It's one heck of a tale, which is good, because this story might be the only thing that can save their lives. Well, if that's all, I can just dispose of you. Wait, what? All will be revealed in.

Sonic the Hedgehog presents the Chaotics Case Files. Listen now, wherever you get your podcasts.