Session 70 - Putting the Little, Violent Guy In Charge. A Good Decision?
28th April 2023
In-game timeline: Start of session: 1490DR Ches 9. End of session: 1490DR Ches 10
Our "Heroes" have reached a dead end in the cavern system. At least one of the Duergar that they encountered has escaped, but they find nothing more if interest around the camp so they backtrack to the river. Jaxii searches for signs of where the escaping Duergar may have gone and spots potential tracks heading north, along the side of the river.
A tunnel off to the side sparks their interest and they send Pacino to investigate down the tunnel. He sees some yellowy-brown coloured vegetation, but not much else for a short way and the party get bored with that line of investigation, so they abandon that tunnel and continua along the river path.
They follow the path for a while, and then lose the tracks. At a fork in the path they follow the route that seems more followed and end up at the grand entrance to the Sporerealm - through a stone arch revealing a glorious cavern of different coloured phosphorescent lights.
Standing "guard" before this entrance they meet Milo and Philo - two myconids who seem a little - absent minded. Perhaps due to the substance they are smoking and the small, dried mushrooms they are nibbling on.
Milo and Philo greet our "Heroes" and offer them a smoke and a bite to eat. Derrick and Jaxii take them up on their offer - not a great idea, as it turned out, but they only realised this about 15 minutes later when they suffered under the effects of these two hallucinogens.
Milo and Philo were very accommodating - surprisingly for a pair of "guards" and let the group into the Sporerealm.
The place was full of myconids and 'lesser' mushrooms and fungi. They were, as it turned out, in the middle of a "mind meld" as their leader, Legion, had recently been murdered and there were two myconid suspects - both advisors of the previous leader - Lamellae and Celium. The myconids were having no luck in deciding who was the murdered (and who out of the two advisors should become their new sovereign).
After Iwee joined the mind meld and explained their reason for being here, the myconid colony asked Iwee if she and her friends would help to resolve their dilemma and find out who the murderer was. Given that this seemed to be the only way that they would be able to get the bluecap mushrooms they came for, the party agreed to this.
They then spend the next few hours investigating the murder. They interrogate the two suspects - Lamellae is friendly and accommodating whilst Celium is much more curt and rude. They find Legion's pet - a flumph named Pootle, who does provide some useful information. As do Milo and Filo who happened to be on "guard" at Legion's place when the deed happened.
Lots of clues and theories later, the myconids are keen for the issue to be resolved and press the party for a decision. The whole group are agreed (or are they? Some minds keep changing, even at this late stage!) that neither Lamellae nor Celium are guilty of the murder, but that it was possibly performed by some outsiders - perhaps the Duergar that they had encountered earlier. Thus the group declared both Lamellae and Celium as innocent, which meant neither was put to death.
The myconids then asked which of the two should become the new sovereign. This is something the party did not agree on. Two thought that Celium should become leader, the other two were not sure and in fact wanted to not make the decision at all. After some pressure for an answer, the group, some reluctantly, stated that Celium should become leader - he was more focussed on making the community more aggressive and banning visitors, as well as in future maybe expanding the colony, whilst Lamellae was much more of a pacifist and wanted to keep the colony out of any wars, though this may open the group up to invasion.
At this decision, Celium became the new sovereign whilst Lamellae faded, and literally shrunk, to become a 'normal' adult myconid. The party were given a good amount of bluecap mushrooms, as well as a useful Vitality potion and a recipe to create that potion from yellowgill mushrooms (fairly rare, but potentially found above ground), and they all felt inspired at the fact that neither Lamellae nor Celium were put to death.
The party are allowed to rest for the remainder of the night - although they are unaware of the time, it is quite late and they are all quite tired.
In the morning Celium, the new sovereign, politely, but firmly, thanked the party for their help, but told them to now go and never to return, as under his rule the community will no longer accept visitors. He said they should avoid the area in future and that non-myconids will now be seen as an enemy.
Wondering if their decision was the correct one, our "Heroes" head out from the Sporerealm, and out of the cavern system. There is no sign of the escaped Duergar, but they welcome the sight of their horse, Thumb, who seems to have survived being left outside on his own for a couple of days. With a bag full of bluecap mushrooms, our "Heroes" start making their way back to Settlestone…