Timlin - Spider Hole

• Traded my contract to a guild for some new recruits. They seem sound. Don't know where the druid and man-at-arms went off to, but their muscle needs replacing ...
  • Badger - A druid with a weird sense of humor.
  • John - A tough guy. Seems like he has anger problems.
  • Nightingale - Some kind of protege of Xanthar's. These guys really like having Alena around.
  • A bard. Sigh.
• Showed up at the spider hole, but found beetles instead. Seemed harmless. Also found some mephits. I'm interested in how these elemental creatures operate. I have obtained some of their remains to either liquidate to fund my research or else glean some clue as to their elemental underpinnings.
• Went into the hole we found before. It descended more than I originally anticipated. We followed this for some time, before we discovered a strange consistency to the walls. We are still yet to encounter any spiders.
• We found some floating pink spheres, floating along slowly. They seem to react to our presence. One of the recruits, an overly-curious druid, touched one of them, and the thing seemed to pop. I analyzed its aura and found it to be magical. I'm very curious about these creatures, their method of locomotion, how they detect and nagivate obstacles, and what is their purpose. Alena finds this place oddly comforting. Perhaps by being so removed from the sun her natural perceptive gifts grant her a sense of superiority.
• As we proceed, I hypthesize, or I should say I fancy, that we are traversing the vessels of a dead creature. The strange give to the walls suggests veins, and the behavior of the globes is like that of blood cells. Our encounter later with the ethros serves to solidify this belief.
• We find a passage with a little girl, who is swiftly yanked away from us. I don't trust any of this, as this is not a suitable place for such a being. We set an alarm here and move on.
• We find a white porous floor with strange glassy spots along the walls. I am deeply suspicious of this and blast one of the spots, preemptively. And sure enough, my suspicions were confirmed. The glass becomes viscous and attacks us. We fight desperately, but begin to be overwhelmed.
• Syrana. This woman came upon us during the encounter and offered us a vial of substance, having the temerity to demand that I drink it, to save us from the blobs. Eventually, we are boxed in, and I have no choice but to drink it. The others have already done so and it has not treated their bodies well, but it seems to halt the attack of the creatures. It appears my elven mettle is stronger than most of the others, and I manage to maintain consciousness.
• Syrana takes us back to her outpost, where she lives with Myconoids or Myconids. I'm still not sure which. Alena has decided she doesn't like it much here after all. I question Syrana about the local surroundings, and it seems the mushroom folk are not the only game in town down here. The rest of my group and I will have to think carefully about who we ally ourselves with, and who we will destroy. Those decisions will ultimately determine how I come to power. Alena needs me.
• The cult of air. These guys sound like they have some skill in the magic arts, or at least their leader does. Syrana says there is a rumour that if any of the cult of air sees you, so does their leader. But nobody knows what that means.
• There's another group called the forsaken or forgotten or some nonsense. Nobody seems to like them much and they have been labeled "exploitative." Seems like no one would miss them.
• Ethros. The creatures that attacked us. They have the ability to stick to their opponents, which creates an elastic connection that makes shaking them difficult. i was hesistant to waste my magic trying to put them to sleep or blind their eyes, since they don't have those, but the druid had a flash of insight and poisoned one of them, and that seemed to wreak havoc on its internal geometry. They also had mild difficulty with my grease spell, so that's something.
• The vial is filled with something called venom, which now courses through our veins. It keeps the ethros at bay, but Syrana says it's addictive and dangerous. It makes sense that this venom repels the ethros, since poison in general seems anathema to them.
• Shrouders, or the shrouded, or some such name, is given to those who succumb to the venom. They become like this place, and attuned to it. Seems a dismal fate, or is it a path to knowledge?
• The myconoids want us to help them get to some kind of market. They don't offer anything in trade for this service, but a market is a place where knowledge can be obtained. Alas, I lack significant coin or valuables.