Critical Role & Sagas of Sundry - Relics and Rarities Ep. 2 - Sam Richardson in The Trail of the Hidden Ones - Part 1

Episode Date: June 24, 2024

After deciphering the first part of the prophecy revealed by Sara Benthem, the adventurers journey to Briarcleft Forest with the assistance of R&R Brigade ally Ionis. Following a lead given to them by Professor Roundland, they seek out the Gem of Fire. Featuring special guest Sam Richardson! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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guaranteed on soil and mulch. Dig into spring garden deals for four days at the Home Depot. Now through May 10th. Exclusion supply see Home Depot.com slash price match for details. Relics and Rarities is sponsored by the Rook and the Raven whose unique disc-bound tabletop gaming notebooks grow and evolve throughout your entire campaign. Find your mischief and misadventure only at the rook and the raven.com. Well, hello, adventurers, welcome back to relics and rarities. So I, Professor Roundland, have spent the night scouring through the compendium of curiosities, looking for something that came from the clue that you figured out, something about the sun and gems and barrel and, and, and, she took your note to heart.

and I think I came across an item that might fit the bill. It is called the gem of fire. And it is said, you were so good, it is a curundum gem, however, not quite a barrel gem. However, it is said that it contains a moat of elemental energy, and that when broken, an elemental will spring forth and be at your command. Oh.

How useful. How useful, yes. However, it also carries a minor curse. Anyone who possesses it is terribly afraid of it being stolen. Oh. And so the history of it is somewhat unsteady. It comes in and out of history. We see it in some people's hands and not another's.

However, we have a tip that was most recently bought at auctioned by an extremely wealthy gentleman named Charles Featherstone. Unfortunately, he has gone off to live in a small village in Pine Swallow Valley near Briarcliffe Forest. This is a very small community. They tend to live off the land, but we think that is the best person to go and talk to about it first. Briarcliffe Forest is a very dangerous woods.

Many people have been lost in its dark passages. So I have asked a dear friend of mine, Ionis, please. Greetings. I am Eonis, Featherfoot, and I will be taking you through Briar Cleft Forest. He's one of the very few that have been able to survive many days within the woods.

Whoa, impressive. Thank you. Yes, would you like to tell them a little bit about yourself? I've spent many days and years tracking and forging and learning the ways of the wood, as I call it. And it is to be respected. Absolutely.

There are ingredients that you need to preserve and make sure they cultivate to use them properly. It's all about respect, really. I'm so happy to hear that. Yes, and I guarantee I won't get lost. Oh, that's reassuring. Yes, great. So at this point, before you head off,

again, we would like to offer you your choice of an item to take with you. You, Yonis, would you like to start this time? Yes. Anything in this room that has a special price tag on it, you may take as your own on this quest. I'm a gnomes, I'm having a hard time reaching these higher higher shells.

Say, how do fellow gnomes? In gnomish? In nomish. They couldn't hear what I was saying. We have a little conversation and leave you out of it. Oh my gosh, it's so nice to be working with another gnomes. They're talking about going to the park without us. I hope not.

They better not be. This little book. This little book, okay, please come have a seat. It's a regular size book to me. I was gonna say a little book for a little man. I think that you will find that when you write in this book, other words shall appear that will help you translate the things that you write.

In general. It's like a clue book, a book that gives, you know, information you need. Yes. Oh, I know, just let me know if you need help along the way. Viros. Yes. Take your turn.

Whatever you would like. I'd like to take this. Ah, the water skin. We are going into the jungle. You are. You can't be too prepared folks. I would say that you will find that if you pour this water out, you will never run out of water.

Oh. Oh my gracious. I'm satisfied. What happens if we fill it with beer? Oh, don't tempt me. Don't go there. What if it just keeps coming out? Oh man, to stop it, please.

This is too good to be true. Barrel, your turn? Well, after that last adventure we went on, I feel like I have no need for magical trinkets just for, oh. Oh. You know what goes with a waterston? I know where you're going with this.

Crackers. You will find that if you fill that, that it might change color and give you some information about the thing you've put in it. This is the perfect combination. I can't believe. We're so together, what's the word where you're like? You're thinking about the same thing.

Anyway. Yeah. It's called two-man wrecking crew. Ahnabella. See, that's what it's called. Don't worry, we're correct. Okay. Yeah.

You write down one-man-reckel crew, and it appears in a number of different languages on the other half of the page. So it translated that phrase. I see. Wow. The shell. You hold this up to your ear, and you hear the crash of waves,

and your feeling is that if you smashed it, it would become even louder. Can I use this against people? I mean, you could throw it at someone. It's funny. Don't throw it at me. But this is a one-time use. All right.

Your turn, Ricky. I've got my eyes on this. Look at him go. He's taking the child's shoe. The child shoe. Well, about your size, then. Yes. Those are massive.

But not that small. So yes, as you go to put this on your foot, you find that your foot shrinks, as does the rest of the rest of the rest of you. as does the rest of you until you perfectly fit to the size of that shoe. Oh, good. Even little, I'm a little bit. I'm a little freaked out.

Okay, I'm gonna take them off. Okay, that's it. So wonderful, you have your trinkets. We are sending you to Pine Swallow Valley. Let's go. I'm like looking at the sun shafts across Viros' face. It's like setting the seam. It's enough to make anyone week.

We can start with that and say that these are actually moon shafts. So as you have been hiking north, north towards Pine Swallow Valley and it's a few days walk. You notice that the days get shorter and shorter, to the point where you're only getting about an hour or two of daylight in the middle of the day. Everything else is pretty much dark moonlight. However, you do have a full moon. So you get these kind of beautiful, eerie lights that come through the tree branches at the top. Everything kind of glows green as you approach. It gets colder as well and Professor Roundland has provided you with the appropriate winter gear for that.

As you get closer to Pine Swallow Valley, you notice that the trees get a little denser, and the canopy becomes denser, less light comes through, even during the daytime. You start to approach where you believe the Pine Swallow community is, and here you can see that there are ropes strung between tree trunks,

and sort of animal furs have been strung over them like a tent. And when you peek in, you can see that leaves have been kind of bunched together to make little beds. You continue to kind of weave through this, and every once in why you see another of these sort of setups. Finally, you see and smell a campfire about 60 feet from you. And we know that Pine Swallow is supposed to be like a town, right?

Community is what it was told you, a very primitive community. Got it. I'm gonna see who's at that fire. Do you wanna sneak up on them? Do you wanna just walk in and say hi? I wanna sneak up and like kind of just from far like, kind of scout who's at that fire. You're gonna scout a little bit ahead?

Okay, is that cool with the rest of you? Okay, we'll stay. All right, so you're gonna roll a stealth check. So you're gonna roll a D20. which has, there you go. Perfect, go for it. Oh no, one. On your very first roll of his game.

Yay! You're gonna go up from that. What happened to beginners' luck? Yeah, right? Oh no. Good gracious. Apparently, Jonas possesses none beginners. So you, regardless of your modifier,

as you start to creep up, maybe because it's been kind of dry recently, all the twigs under your feet start to go, Oops. Making noise. You hear up ahead of you, someone goes, who's there? No one. You say no one?

They go, oh, it's all right. We're not dangerous. We hope that you are not. Please come and say hello. That's usually what dangerous people say. When they're dangerous, they say they're not, you know? I'm very, just keep up. I'm very quick.

Okay, good. I'll approach. You reveal yourself. I'll reveal myself. As you come forward, you see that there's a sort of small group of humans gather around a roaring fire. There's some children off to the side that play with a wheel

and some sticks and they kind of toss it around. As you come up, one man comes up, he says, well, hello, are you lost? No, I know these for us very well. Oh, well, we do not see strangers here very often. Oh, well, we come to travel. I'm with a group. Oh, dear, well, thank you for telling us.

Yes, please invite them to join us. Can I run back and then get them? Yeah. And you all come and enter the camp? Yes, is everything? Cool. Yeah, everything seems legit here. You've got children playing with wheels and sticks.

Seems, you know. Well, welcome. This is Pine Swallow Valley. We do not see strangers very often, as I have said. But we are happy to have you, and you may join us for stew if you would like. Stew? That sounds wonderful, thank you.

Oh, you're so welcome. Now, I will tell you, I've got some secret ingredients that could enhance any stew. Oh dear, are they natural? Of course, I only deal in natural ingredients. Please, please, go speak with Magnus, please. Magnus is our cook. Oh.

And he would love to hear what you've brought. Now, I would love, love to talk to the cook, but I'm afraid I'll have to talk to the financier, the treasurer, someone with a little cash flow. My dear, I regret to tell you that we here in Poncelloa Valley do not use any currency. I'm leaving. Wait, no, wait, no, wait. Don't make haste.

There are many dangers. Please do not travel alone. Okay. Yes, no, here, when you join our community, you give up all your earthly possessions. We share everything here. Well, now wait, maybe the little man has a point. I don't know about that. Not giving up my war hamlet?

It is not for everyone, but we enjoy it. Life is simple and pleasant here. We're just guests, so we don't have to give up anything, right? No, no, of course not. Oh, good. That's fine. We just have nothing to offer you. Oh, no.

Except your hospitality. Yes, oh, thank you very much. Look at these people. They have nothing, and yet they offer what little they have. It warms my heart. Oh, that's like kind, or something like. Kind or something like that. Yeah.

It's good. I'm gonna play with those children. A sort of large man comes forward. He's got a big smile on and he says, yes, stew is ready. And there's a big cauldron that he sort of sets on top of the fire. And it starts to kind of bubble and it smells amazing. Can we check to make sure it's not poison?

You certainly can. Yeah, can you try to that? She takes out her cup. Mm-hmm. I want to make sure these people, listen, sometimes, with people that live in the forest, you don't judge. In my tribe, they might put some mushrooms in there.

They might put some things in there. I think I should give it a try, because I'm used to eating wild mushrooms, but it might not be, I mean, you can have some too, obviously, wild mushroom soup, but last time I had wild mushroom soup, I woke up naked on a mountain. Oh, this is an interesting story. They should have anything like that.

like that. The large manor goes, ho, ho, I know what I'm doing. I cook good food. So you look at it, the cup remains the same color. It does not change. There's no, no poison in this stew. Perfect. I drink it. It tastes amazing. Hearty. It's delicious. It is all root vegetables and clearly some kind of gay meat, whether that's sort of a venison or a rabbit that's been stewed for a long time over low embers.

He looks proud, he looks to you, he goes, good, eh? Oh, it's delicious. I love it. Oh, good. Come, dig in, help yourself. I'll take some, yes. Magnus special. Yeah, well. Having some stew, of course.

No question. Magnus, do you cook for a lot of people before joining this community? Did you ever cook for any, like, wealthy parties or really fancy, you know, higher up men? Anyone named Charles Featherstone? No, this name I do not know. Before I come here, I'm just a simple peasant man.

I take care of my farm, but I come here. here with the little that I have, the little knowledge that I have, and I try to give what I can. I have no family, and so this is now my family. Oh, that's very tender. Very sweet. Is this a community of found people? Yes, I think all of us. We have sort of disliked our lives in civilization, all of the trappings and temptations.

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Our people have a long history with this area with the forest. I see that you treat it with respect. This is most important, yes. Even when we trap our game, we do it humanly. I will take a bowl. All right. So they've made kind of, even just like it's kind of a bark bowls that they have

and you just kind of scoop and it's a good like heaping, steaming stew pot. I've seen chef's table. Yeah, and so they all sit down around the table. Tell us, where do you hail from? Why do you come from? Oh, yes, we come from, we are here to see you as inspiration.

We've heard tales of this community and a friend here was kind enough to guide us here. and so we're just trying to see the way that you live. Oh, well, this is a very good thing you choose to do. We live very well, we enjoy our life here. In fact, how about Minna? Minna is our storyteller. She will come, she will tell you the story of our tribe.

I would love that. Excellent. Story time. So you do, you sit down, and they give you something that feels like a fermented honey, like a mead, and a little tankard, and they give that to you, and that taste just like sweet, pure goodness as it goes down. it warms you inside.

And Minna stands up and in the firelight begins to tell you the story of this tribe. She says many, many years ago, long before your great, great grandmother even took her first steps, we lived here in Briarcliffe Forest. And we had our dear, dear friends who were the people of the forest. And we were good friends, and we lived and we loved together. However, after a few generations, people began to be tempted

by the trappings of the civilized world, and one by one, left, abandoning their friends. After the last person died who had left, and the last person who remembered their forest friends left, and that memory faded from them, so did the people themselves. We now call them the hidden ones. We have returned because we believe

that these past ancestors made a mistake, and that we should come back and hopefully earn the favor of the hidden ones once again. I'm familiar with this. Oh, you are. I've been through these forests before. The hidden ones are this sort of soul of the forests. This is true, you speak wise words, sir.

It's important to give tribute and have reverence for them as we go through. Are they magical? Yes. I would say most definitely they are. When's the last time they were seen? Well, they're hidden. I've heard two hundred years.

Yes, sentience of years. Hundreds of years. And it is our fault. We feel we must make penance for this by taking good care of the forest to apologize for losing the memory of them. But how do you know that? they still exist.

They guide us through the lands. If you pay tribute, and if you are reverent, they'll guide you through the forest. They'll give you signs, hints, if you will. This is very true. Ah, yes. Another member of your community talked about the dangers around here.

What sort of things have you witnessed, or are there legend stories of? Oh, yes. Well, the wood itself is very, very dangerous. The ground is covered in thick, poisonous, thorny vines. You must stick to the path or else you will be terribly harmed. And then even then there are strange creatures that roam this forest. The ones that can withstand that.

They are most dangerous. We ourselves have not ventured very far into the wood. We try to stay this side of the briar in Pine Swallow Valley. If you, sir, have traveled within the barricleaf forest, you must be much blessed by the hidden ones. I have, and I've been through. I've communed with nature. I go through and I hunt.

I've been all the way to the other side of the forest and back. Oh my goodness. Sir, you must teach us your ways. I can. You ask and I'll answer. Oh my goodness. Well, how is it that you communicate with the hidden ones? To us, they have remained completely out of our reach. Well, when you're on a path, you plant a seed to regrow the forest.

And the hidden ones will then use this as their tribute. This does sound quite appropriate to them. I have an idea. Yes, please. Magnus, is he still around? Yes, yeah, hello, yes. Do you have a spare seed or two, something that is not cooked, but an ingredient? Of course there are seeds everywhere, they're in the trees, they are on the floor.

Could you pick one out for me, please? He says, I would be happy to. And he takes this sort of large Hulk, and he walks over, and he reaches very tall, and he reaches up into the trees, and he sort of almost like pulls off the branches, and these different seed pockets kind of fall down, and they're sort of hard on the outside, but inside, as they break. open. He hands you this one small white seed. Thank you. Ah, you're very welcome. Now, everybody around here, ladies gentlemen, non-binary, here we go. I'll set it down. You set it down. And I'll pull

out a vial that is dark brown liquid with a cork stopper in it. He takes out the stopper and he pours it on the seed and does druid craft. And I'm going to instantly make a seed pod open and bloom. Amazing. So you do this. And as you poured on it, and this seed sort of slowly opens, and this little white tentacle comes up and slowly opens, and it's this gorgeous flower that has come out with sort of white edges and yellow in the center. With no sunlight at all, this is just bloomed in the dark.

All of the children come around, they're just fascinated by it. As we stare at it, would you like to perform the ritual from this? Yes. I will perform the ritual. It's a dance that will further the bloom. Do you require music? I do. If you could provide...

Get your accordion. Mandolin. We've got a band here. Is here an appropriate spot, village? Please, yes. Wonderful. It continues to grow, getting taller and taller, and more petals sprout out from the sides.

And you can even swear a little bit of sunlight just peeks through the night sky, hitting the petals. A little... I give to me. Bravo! That was beautiful. As much as I would like to give that to you,

Wholesale, make a charisma check. 17. Beautiful. So this dance, it is really gorgeous, and his movements just seem to go so smoothly through. And you think to yourself, if I was the hidden one, I would absolutely come to this young man. And suddenly back in the line of the forest,

right where you can see where the briar starts to go, you see these little lights and they wink in, who win the force and they grow louder, brighter, and then start to fade away. It's this way. All right. I do believe you're right. Well, we thank you so much for the hospitality and the worn meal, but I do think we must be going.

We must be off. We would be happy to set up an area for you to sleep. We could spend the night. Spend the night here. We could spend the night. I mean, I've had a lot of steam, a bit loaded. This is true. Let's rest.

here and we'll carry on not at first light because that could be in the middle of the day. So it is your plan to go into the forest. Yes, we are going into the forest. Sorry, did we not say that? You did not say, why? What is your intention of going into the forest? We seek a jewel.

Yes. Oh, a jewel. A gem. And do you believe it is in the forest? We have reason. Have others come before us? Have you seen anyone lately? Oh, no, not in a very long time.

I'm Helga. By the way. Oh. Thank you. Very, very welcome to Pine Swallow. Your hospitality is greatly appreciated. You are most welcome. I do not know any other way.

Oh, that's okay. I'm sort of into, I'm Veros the good looking. I mean noble, I mean, worry. Ah, it's all good. All of these are true, I'm sure. Oh, yes. So she takes you over and she and a few of the others string together this kind of tent-like thing

with an animal pelt over the top. And again, they kind of push together these leaves and it actually looks quite inviting in there. Oh, I'm sorry. Is there some, like a pet bed or a bit of meat. Would you like to explain who's with you? We forgot about this.

In the forest. He comes out of the forest. He's been waiting for you. I whistled. And I call for my friend Mr. Fluffy. It was a panther and my pet and friend and sidekick. Well, look, a dangerous beast has come in. Very large, beautiful panther comes striding out of the forest.

Pretty much from where you saw those lights. and comes up and nozzles its head against Dionys's leg. Okay, he's rather long space, isn't he? That's a big kitty. He's a pudding. Oh, okay, we'll take your word. Wow. And of course he is like six times the size of Eonis.

Oh, yes, I'm sure we have some rabbit left over. We could certainly offer that to your friend, your companion. Thank you. He can hunt, but it's nice to give him a hand whenever you can. with the hidden ones that we had called, they were in a specific direction and you said over there, does that lead us anywhere or? Well, it's a whole maze and it turns,

because we have to follow the path. I see. Going just straight won't lead us there. At times we'll have to continue to ask tribute and continue to find a way from the hidden ones. And our destination is at the edge of the forest? You guys are looking for this gem, So I assume when you call upon the hidden ones,

you're asking for the direction of the gems. So you don't actually quite know where that is, but you're hoping they will leave you there. It could be anywhere. The forest is tricky, but I'm assuming that gems have to be inside the forest somewhere, the edge or maybe five feet from the beginning. Right, it's led us this far, so.

Right. Well, it sounds like these people would certainly appreciate a party, and I know a couple of people that are pretty good party started. Who? Oh, yeah, I'm being cheeky. Yes, ready, let's go. Oh, okay.

You want me to throw a party? Well, it seems like a festive time. Let's celebrate with these people. I thought you didn't like them. What? I would never say such a thing. Did you see, you stopped accepting money for the night. It's unbelievable.

Well, see, in my village where we keep the wild animals, there is an aroma. Your face, ever since we've come into this village, is my face when I approached the animal pens in my village. Ah, how perceptive of you, yes. Well, I've just thought that we could show them a good time. Well, we know how to show people a good time. All right, pull out the lawn darts and the keg of ale. We're going to start.

So you come back to the main area. Helga brings you this rabbit. She says, this is for your companion. At this point, another young man comes where he says, Hello, I am Christopher. We are so glad to have you here. We heard something about making revelry for this evening. Yes.

Oh, this would be most fun. We know many dances and songs, and we would love to spend the night. Although we must go to bed as we have long days of surviving ahead of us. We must hunt and gather. We could take this time for all of us to learn this dance, including the people of this Pine Swallow Valley. All right.

Sounds fun. So you spend the next couple of hours dancing with each other and getting to know one another, and everything seems really wonderful. However, you, looking around, you feel like someone's missing. Is Magnus around? Magnus is missing. I was going to go looking for him.

You do not see Magnus anywhere. You also notice that one of the little girls has kind of gone off to the side, and she's sitting on a log. She's not making, she's not in the party with everyone else. I would like to go snooping for Magnus. You'd like to go snooping for Magnus. Okay, you want to track him? Sure.

All right, survival check. That's fun. See if you can track him. Okay, that is a 22. A 22. So you go back into kind of the kitchen area where it was the last you saw him. You try to kind of see if you can figure out which are his footprints. And you're pretty sure because he is a large man.

So he has these larger prints and they go in a little deeper. And you start to follow them. And they go back to his little sort of space that he lives. And there you see that the leaves have been terribly disarrayed. And then you catch his footprints and they seem to be running off in the direction of the forest. Into the forest? Into the forest. Oh, dear.

Run back into the... You run back into the... You run back into the robbery, yes. Look, we have a situation. What? The cook, Magnus, he's gone. Gone where? I found footprints that seem to be his going into the forest.

Do anyone see him run into the forest? Not that I know. Everyone was partying. Who's stupid idea was this? I think it was... I think so, too. No, it wasn't. I'm just about to make a move on Helga. Do we have time?

No. No, we should go immediately and find him. I'm wearing her down very easily. I think she's not used to it. We need to find mad. You need to have a conversation about that. What? Later.

Christopher goes over and he goes to the little girl who's sitting there and you see him kind of patting her on the shoulder as she begins to kind of start to cry a little bit. I go sit next to her and say, you're right. These people are awful. No, it is I. It is I that is awful. What happened? And she begins to cry through her tears.

I have kept a secret. What? You should not keep secrets. No, you shouldn't. No, you shouldn't. No, you shouldn't. What did you do? be punished by them.

Well, you could tell me about it. So I told my dad here, she points to Christopher, and she says, I am so terrible, I am wicked. Magnus, he told me, he told me that he keeps a gem in the forest. And when you said that I should have said something, but I did not because I was afraid. Perhaps Magnus isn't his true identity. Mm-hmm.

That's okay, little girl. Don't cry. You have no reason to be sad. I feel terrible. It's okay. Sometimes, you know, telling the truth isn't always as easy as people say it is because like sometimes my friends say oh don't tell anybody this and somebody asks me and then I have to choose who to be honest to and it's really hard it's not easy it is very

very hard yeah I like magnes so much you're a nice girl you are a nice lady and you have nice food and you're nice people why thank you I'm sure Magnus is just a bastard don't worry about it no manus is so nice he plays with us and he tells us stories and he's so nice and he told me about his gem but he told me to keep it a secret and now I don't know I've told his secret and that is bad, but to keep his secret, that is bad. No, she's right. I mean, she's so, so tender, so focused.

I'm learning so much. I think that she's correct. You should listen to her. It's okay that you told it. It's for the better good. Oh, goodness, though. Because lying is bad, Ricky, and you shouldn't lie about. Ricky, where'd he go?

Ricky's left. You shouldn't lie about whose idea it was to do a party. All right, well, if you think it is best, he said that he has a cabin deep, deep, deep in the woods. and that is where he keeps it. Do you know roughly the direction? Oh, of course not. I've not been there.

He just told me he keeps a cabin in the woods. A secret cabin. I said to take the path and find the cabin, and I'll use everything I've got in my bag to tell, you know, to make Magnus tell us who he really is. We do know Magnus to be a very genuine and heartfelt soul. I do not know what is wrong. When did he join this community?

Quite recently, a few months ago? Mm-hmm. So yes, you take off towards that first path. And as you get you do notice that these briars start to creep up and they create kind of a narrow maze where only one or two of you can stand abreast. And as you start to enter into the main forest, it gets even darker.

Now, dark vision kids can see no problem, you know, as far as you need to. Humans, you're gonna start to have some trouble. Okay, if we're picking an order, I would like to be behind you. Okay. And you're gonna walk, you're gonna walk blind with your life. I'm gonna have me.

I'll take the front and, Well, perhaps... We shouldn't light any lanterns, yes. Scout a little bit, I should be like, I'll take the very front. Okay, front, would you mind flanking actually because you're big, you can get, I'll get in between you?

Yes, but we can also see. She can see. Right. So she can watch for that. She can see if something's coming up behind us while they can see what's coming up in front of us. That's why you're on the team. Thank you.

You're right on Mr. Fluffy's back. All right, so you see, Eonis, it's like, it's actually, it's kind of cool and sexy and lying he just sort of leaps up on top of Mr. Fluffy. And Mr. Fluffy's like into it. You see as soon as he's up there, Fluffy's like ready. Your friend, let's go.

And they start to stalk forward. He does that amazing thing with his feet that cats do. It's like this, like, huge paws. And also, Mr. Fluffy sort, you know, he's sniffing the ground, trying to track as best he can. This is fantastic. What do you smell, boy? So you walk for a while coming through,

and Mr. Fluffy is sort of following the snack, taking some sniffs trying to get it. but you come to an intersection where one path goes to the right and one path goes to the left. And Mr. Fluffy sort of stops. Test it to the right. Test it to the left and he kind of looks back up at you and you can tell that this is sort of his confused face.

He doesn't know which way to go. Mr. Fluffy doesn't know which way to go. I'll investigate the tracks here. Okay, you want to make a survival check? Yeah, okay. Pretty good tracker. I got a 10. A 10?

You look down, they're a little hard to discern. It would be very hard for you to tell which direction you went. Is this the time? This is the time to ask the spirit. So I drop a seed, cover it, and then I do a dance. Do your dance? Ooh, I wanna pour druid craft on it.

Oh, okay, you point. So yes, it blooms again very quickly. Does anyone join him in his dance? Yeah. Oh, there you all know it now? It's a gnome thing. It's a gnome. It's a gnome.

Yes, the gnomes. The gnomes do a fabulous little duet, A pada deer? You want to get it? Do your potadier. Do you go first or do that first? Oh, please dance. Okay.

Annabella, Mandelaide. Some music. A little music. Do, do, do, do, do, do do do do do do do do. Du do do do do do do do do do do. The vine grows. This time it's a beautiful purple flower. Very, although you can't tell in your dark visions, never mind.

It looks like a black and white. It's a black and white. gray flower, a gorgeous gray flower that grows out of the ground and more and more petals, seemingly endless petals, come out of it. Now make your charisma throw with advantage. Roll two and take the higher. These two. Mm-hmm. 14 with one charisma.

15. 15. All right, you've done this and you sort of close your eyes and wait. Suddenly a little light off to the right. just a little floating ball of light and it starts to go off down the path towards the right. You said this place was steps from the water. We just haven't found the steps yet.

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and save up to 20% to get the stay you expected. When you want savings, not surprises. It matters where you stay. Hilton, for the stay. 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 Cannon 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. It's this way. To the right. Let's go. All right. You walk for a little while down that path and suddenly you come across a huge, like a five foot across hole in the ground. And you can hear something off the path, off to your left. And it sounds like huge teeth chomping on bones.

So there's a hole in front of us. Five foot hole in the ground. And we're hearing from the side. And off in the woods to the side. There's a little path that kind of goes off the main path and you think down that way you can hear the sound of crunching bones. Can we see how deep the hole is?

You wanna look down in the hole? Well, you can't see anything. But, uh. I'll take a gander. You wanna look down, so you look down and it's a tunnel. It almost looks like it's been burrowed. So there's a little.

By human hands or by claws? No, this is huge. It's a five foot wide, you know, in diameter hole. So something really big seems to have like burrowed to the ground and come up, emerged up in this spot. Would I have any experience with these types of things since I have the wanderer, outlander sort of background?

Yeah, I mean, you could certainly make a survival check, maybe a nature check. Okay. Just tell us what you can. Maybe do a nature check. Yeah, yeah. Oh, I just want to see if it's dangerous before everyone pokes their head.

My roles right now are just like not great. You don't think you have any idea what this could be. This is outside of your scope of experience. If I experienced one of these before. Go ahead and make a nature check. 12. A full 12? So you look at it, it's not, again,

it's not something you specifically experienced either, but you think it's clearly big, it's clearly dangerous. It has sharp enough either teeth or talons or whatever it is to kind of climb through the rock, and it may not be something you wanna tangle with. This seems dangerous and it seems like it's ahead of us, but underground. I think if we tread lightly and quietly,

that's our best case. of action right now because we can't go around and above. Because it's a hole underground. The Hulk is underground, but you hear the sound above. Oh, you hear the sound above ground. Yeah. Let's travel down this hole. There it is.

I don't think we should do this. No, I think it could illuminate it as we go. Well, if we illuminate it, it might draw the attention. This is clearly a large beast's burrow. We should not go down this hole. Well, it's the only path. I would rather swing from the trees in a beautiful, acrobatic fashion, than go into this dark hole of a giant beast or worm or demon.

How many feet away is this thing? The hole is five feet in diameter. But the creature. You're not sure. I mean, you could certainly try and make a check to see if you can sense how far away it would be. How high. How high up is that? Is the what?

Are like the tree branches? The tree branches? We're talking, I mean, these trees are like 40 foot tall trees. So you could, the first branches are within reach. Before we move into here. I've got to get a vantage point, see what it is ahead. If we go into this hole, we might end up right in its burrow and be trapped. Single file.

And it'll eat you, they'll eat him. You hear another large crack of bone. It's eating right now. It's distracted. It's distracted. We need to move. I go up in the trees and scout ahead a little bit. Go forth.

Before you do, drink this. And he pulls out in it's a tiny heart-shaped bottle with a bright purple liquid in it. Down the hat, no questions. No questions. What was that? You are now protected from poison. I had heard that these thorns in the trees,

they're very poisonous, and so I just want to make sure you're okay. Now, I don't have a lot of these, so we have to use them sparingly. This thing is friggin' delicious, man. It is. Thank you. My pleasure. Ricky Huckster at your service.

Now, this will be good for one hour, so be very careful. One hour, wonderful. Stay here and protect. I leave. You leave Mr. Fluffy? Mr. Fluffy? Okay.

Mr. Fluffy doesn't like it though. He's like, oh, I'm petting it now. Pet him. I'm trying to sue them. I climb up. Start climbing. All right, make an athletics check. It'll be in your strength.

It's negative 1, so 4. It's a 4. It's a four. He grabs the first branch and goes, whew-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h. You know what? Mr. Fluffy wants to come on with me. So you jump on Fluffy's back?

I jump on Fluffy's back. All right, Fluffy can make an athletics check. Okay. He has Fluffy stats behind those other pages, yeah. Athletics plus four, okay. It's right for Mr. Fluffy. Are you on its back? I'm on its back.

10 plus 4, 14. 14. So you get on Mr. Fluffy's back. So Mr. Fluffy does a little bound, and he jumps right up on top of that first limb, and he gets his back. claws into the bark of the tree and sort of hugs it and is able to kind of shimmy his way up and you're holding on to his neck just along for the ride like this. As you get higher and higher up in the branches, you get a good, I'd say 30 feet up and you start to look around. On the path just ahead of you, you look down and you see what you recognize to be an umber hulk. It's a large beast that has mandibles almost like an insect and it is eating a bear carcass. This is bad news.

What do you see? It's an umber hole. What? Umber Hulk. Umber Hulk. Sorry, I got, I was still drinking some of that delicious juice. It's an umber Hulk. Oh no.

Highly dangerous, massive, but it's eating right now. It's ahead of you on the path. Ahead of on the path. And how far down is it? There's like a bend in the path, so you're talking another like 60 feet. Okay. But it is in our way.

It is in your way if you stay on the path. Oh, I've got an idea. We go down the hole and we send it over behind us. Not getting in the hole. Like a lure. So then it goes behind us. Yeah.

And then we get up and we book it. Yeah. Right. Or you distract it. And then it goes to that distraction and we go the other way. That's also a good idea. Ah, there we are. It would be out into the forests. There we are.

Totally different idea. I would like to do a minor illusion. You're safe. Before you do, I'll be getting into the hole. To hide in the hole. Sounds like it. I don't want to get in this hole. I just love this hole.

Okay, who he wants to get in the hole? I'll go. Take a vote. Who wants to go hole digging? Look, I will either decapitate the bug, or I will go in the hole. But we need action. Yes. If we get in the hole, while I do this minor illusion, I want all of our weapons going up in case this thing tries to come down, it'll die.

You can all be readied. Yes, you'll all be ready for... Okay. Okay. Weapons up. Okay. Okay. I am doing a minor illusion of a lion's roar.

Okay. Coming, oh, but if we put it back from where we were, that's where the people are. That's true. Okay, so let's put it east. Let's put it east. Just pick a direction. So ahead of it from where you are.

So like you're here on the path, it's here, and you wanna put the lion roaring here? Nowhere where we're going or where we've been. So somewhere just off to the side. Yes. Okay. Because then, right, when the lion, I mean, when the elk thing is like running, it'll get hit by all the poison and it'll just die on it.

Well, it's probably fine. It's made its way. You just thought this through. Yes, I thought it through. Lions roar, go. Okay. So are you still, everyone's in the hole or are you still in the tree? No, I'm still in the tree right now.

You're still in the tree, okay? You all get down the hole and you're ready with your weapons. I'm in the hole with my axe is up. Okay. Yeah, same. Yeah. Okay. Okay.

Fantastic. 30 feet off to the east. Suddenly you hear the loudest lions roar. Woo! Right through, through, that even sort of rattles the branches up high where you are. There's a lion up there, too. You see the Umberhulk stops eating,

and it turns to look in that direction. And even from your vantage point, you can see that it has four eyes on its front of its face, and they all kind of seem to look in different directions. Be very still. But then, you can see these little hairs on its arms and legs start to twitch a little bit, like it's trying to sense something. It turns in the direction of the roar,

and looking back at its bear, it digs into the ground, making a second burrow, grabs the bear, and pulls it down into the burrow with it, and disappears from your sight. This episode is brought to you by Netflix. Most valuable promotions in Netflix are hosting a blockbuster triple headliner Saturday, May 16th. Rhonda Rousey returns to face fellow woman's MMA pioneer Gina Carano in the main event. Plus co-main's Nate Diaz versus Mike Perry.

And the best heavyweight in the world, Frances Ngano versus Felipe Lins. Watch Rhonda Rousey versus Gina Carrano, live only on Netflix. Saturday, May 16th at 9 p.m. Eastern Center time, 6 p.m. Pacific time. 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 Scarlett Johansson to Christopher Nolan, casting what ifs, backstage stories, and much more. Listen to Happy Sad Confused on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Okay, go ahead. We'll just wait until he gets back. Guys get out of the hole. Did you come back down? I'm coming back down to the ground,

but not into the hole. Okay. You see all of us like huddled holding weapons. And I saw that. You saw it dig down and disappear. You're not quite sure where it went, though. What should we do? I think guys get the hell out of that hole.

I'll go out, I'll follow you. So Barrel and I get out. Okay. I think it sensed us. I think it knows that we're here. I just want to point out, I think there's a lion out of the two. So we should be ready for that. Okay.

So what? Do we book it? Off in the direction where you made the lion roar, you hear as if the dirt has been upended and something has come out from the ground right where you made that noise. Just quickly and quietly move down this path. We've got a little bit of time. Yeah, while it's distracted,

I still search for that. Are you doing this stealthily? Yes. So you're going slow and doing it stealthily. Absolutely. I guess you can't go fast and stealth. You kind of can. So you can maintain speed and do stealth.

And I think that applies to your party. I'm pretty quick. Oh, yeah, as a ranger. I believe that applies to your party as a ranger. So you still have to make the stealth checks, but you can move your full speed in this time. So everyone makes stealth checks. Oh, God.

Here we are. Hey! Crit! A crit for Virus. Redemption is mine. Oh, a six. A six? Nine. Right, because we add our initiative, correct.

No, you're adding your stealth bonus. Ten, ten. So you have a ten. Okay, Ricky. I have an eight. You have an eight. A seventeen. And you have a seventeen.

This time, although the two of you, and Ionis, you're trying so hard to kind of keep everybody together. Unfortunately, although few of you can see, one of you, I biffed it. I think stumbles, and you hear the rattle of glass. Suddenly the noise far off to the side stops. Fool of a nose.

You hear another digging noise, crunch, crunch, crunch, and the sound ends. Come on. Go. Battle stations. Come on. I try to be ready. I listen to him and I run it to the nearest tree.

You run to the nearest tree? and start climbing up, yep, give me an athletics check. Oh boy. Now, I'm gonna close by athletics. Eight. It's an eight. You're able to scramble up, but you're only like four feet off the ground.

Cool, I'll stay there holding onto this tree. I stand in the middle of the path, pull out Betty. Okay, start swinging it. You're ready for some trouble? I know what's coming. Okay. Oh, the Warhammer is out.

It's out. You two like back to back in the middle. That's right, okay. I get up high in the tree and ready a bow. Okay, so you're going to also make an athletics check to climb? On Fluffy, just to help me get in that tree. Then you'll add Fluffy's four. Okay, okay.

It's an eight. You guys pick the wrong tree. Fluffy's really, he's trying, but he can't get a purchase with his nails. So again, you only get up about like five feet within this time. I blame the tree guys. What do you do, Onvella? I put my gloves on.

Okay. Because I brought gloves. Okay. And I am also gonna climb a tree. Okay. Give me an athletics. Great. 11 plus two, so 13.

So, amazingly, Ana Bella in her beautiful cashmere gloves gets up higher than the little forest noes. What's gonna say, fellas, she's scry. So she's able to get up about 10 feet off the ground. So you scramble up that high and kind of cling to the tree up there. At this point, rising up out of the ground right next to you two is what looks

like a giant kind of insect with its mandibles going like this, and we'll roll initiative, please. That's better. Onavella. Annabella has a 12. That's a 19 for me just to put it out there. 19. Ricky?

17. 17 for Ricky. Get a one but an overall four. You know, is having a rub night. Libby, let's get it. It's fine, you're getting it up now. That potion, dude. And then your panther,

Does he takes his own initiative or I think he takes his own initiative? So you can roll an initiative for mr. Fluffy All right mr. Fluffy means And on that Panther page you'll see it'll be his dex bonus 21 yep so 21 so mr. Fluffy's gonna go first Faithful companion that cat can go So you are right now on mr. Fluffy but mr. Fluffy is up there in there now You know what let's just draw this out So this is gonna be your main pathway that you were on coming around

around like that. This was the first hole. You are in trees off to the side like this. Yeah, place yourselves where you were. Those of you in the trees. And then Fluffy and, oh, here I can help with that. Yeah, we were like back to back. Yeah. And oh, sorry, Fluffy's here as well. Oh, there's back to back. This guy pops up right over there. Enjoy more ways to save at Ralph's like low prices in every aisle. And when you download the Ralph's app, you can click and save more with digital coupons every week. Plus, you can earn fuel points to save up to $1 per gallon at the pump.

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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? 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 podcast. 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 Intrepid Chaotic's 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 When The Chaotics are on the case