It’s morning now, and our three adventurers have just finished
breakfast.
Largo leads the team back to the orc camp, whose gates are closed and
only one guard is standing outside. K’sagsoda and Dax hang back
while the large Goliath approaches.
The guard, startled by the big man’s appearance – and remembering
what he and his friends did yesterday – clears his throat before
addressing him. “What you want?”
An ashen hand grips the guard’s shoulder tightly. “Chief. Now.”
With a mild whimper, the guard turns and opens the gate, and an
unexpected sight is revealed.
Bloodstains on the ground, signs of struggle, and only three orcs
visible in the camp where there had once been twenty. A large orc,
easily standing a full head above the rest – but still shorter than
Largo – steps out of his tent, thick arms crossed over his broad
chest.
“Were you here yesterday?” He asks as K’sagsoda and Dax
approach slowly, maintaining a good distance.
“I need to talk to you.”
“My men thought your display threatening, given my absence. What do
you want?”
“We need information.”
“What about?”
“We’re looking for a temple that’s supposed to be somewhere out
here.”
The chief nods. “Used to be one.”
“Do you know where it is?”
With a snap of his fingers, one of the three orcs in camp rushes to a
far tent. “Maybe,” the chief nods, the orc coming back to Largo
and handing him the torn piece of a map with an area circled, “that’d
be about where your temple is.”
“I’m also looking for maybe… I scratch your back, you scratch
mine. You’ve given us this map, so is there anything we could maybe
do for you?”
The chief thinks for a moment, weighing his options carefully.
“The mine. A woman came through here not long ago, asking if we
wanted to join her. Most of us said ‘no,’ but some wanted to
leave with her,” he says, gesturing to the blood stains on the
ground, “they changed their minds later. She headed to our mine and
now we can’t use it. Clear it out and I’ll give you a prize for
your time, but bring back proof it’s cleared.”
Largo nods. “Seems fair enough to me, Chief. Do we go through your
camp to get to it?”
“No, you leave.” The chief gruffs, pointing to the only exit to
his camp, and also presumably the same direction as the mine.
The adventurers leave and trek the little ways to the mine, finding
the entrance blocked by rubble. Largo attempts to move the boulders
out of the way.
[Rolls a natural 1.]
Seeing this large barbarian fail to move even a single rock, Dax
steps forward and manages to move a couple rocks, after which Largo
takes over and, with a massive sweep of his arms, clears the debris
seemingly effortlessly before heading inside, K’sagsoda in the
lead. Lucky, too, as there is a log suspended above them, ready to
splatter anyone who would enter against the wall, but the trap
remains untouched.
Laughter makes its way to their ears, a sort of giggling. Just around
the corner they can see three gnolls, two armed with spears and one
armed with a bow. In front of them are four hyenas.
They are dispatched with relative ease.
Using their stealth to make their way through the stone tunnels, they
head into a small dead end to search for anything useful.
Carefully walking back into the main tunnel, the party happens upon a
grisly sight:
A large chamber with a fire crackling in the center. On the ground is
a dead guard wearing the colors of the Leed soldiers, beside him
stand three gnolls huddled in terror. On the opposite side of the
fire is a large creature with reddish-brown fur as it sits in a squat
holding a gnoll by the arm, its feet off the ground.
It lifts the wriggling gnoll and takes a bite out of its side. The
gnoll gives a yip and stops moving almost instantly. After feasting,
the large creature makes a growl and the three gnolls rush to fulfill
whatever command it has given, fleeing in terror.
Largo reaches out with his greataxe and catches two gnolls off guard,
killing them both in a single hit each, whispering, “Ears,” to
K’sagsoda, who knocks an arrow and damages the third.
Dax, terrified of whatever is in the cave ahead of them, has no
intention of harming a fleeing creature, so Largo finishes it with a
thrown hand axe. They advance on the creature on the other side of
the fire.
The manticore rears up on its hind legs and roars, blood still
dripping from its crooked teeth.
[This mine was completely unplanned; definitely took a paragraph or
two from Critical Role]
K’sagsoda knocks an arrow and strikes the beast, but to little
effect as it completely ignores the arrow in its chest.
Largo leaps over the fire separating them and goes into a frenzied
rage, attacking recklessly against this beast causing it severe pain
but barely slowing it down.
The manticore snarls, the spines on its tail quivering as they launch
from the tail at the Aarakocra ranger, taking him down to half health
in a single blow.
Shaking himself, Dax manages to fully heal the marksman as he knocks
another arrow to strike again, this time causing significantly more
damage, Largo taking advantage of its pain to bury his greataxe into
its shoulder.
Strangely, the creature makes no attempt to leave the area of the
altar, upon which candles and a single basket rest.
With a great swing of his axe, Largo cleaves the manticore’s head
from its body, watching as it rolls with a sickening thump. He turns
and sees the basket on the altar, and inside is the manticore’s
baby, fast asleep.
Dax apprroaches, gesturing to the basket. “What is that?”
“The beast’s child. We should take it back to Leed, see if they
can raise it to protect them.”
The half-elf’s face twists in disgust, pointing to the downed
manticore, “You want one of those things
alive? In Leed?”
“It is not a thing, it’s a
baby.”
“It’s the baby of one of those.
They cannot be trained!” Dax exclaims, grabbing for the basket, but
Largo keeps it out of his reach.
Angered, Dax casts Command
on Largo, who fails his saving throw. “Give.”
Largo
gives him his greataxe.
He
attempts another Command
but fails, instead striking at the barbarian with Inflict
Wounds.
[Dax
rolls a 25 to hit versus Largo’s AC of 18.]
As
the wave of necrotic energy hits him, Largo drops the baby’s basket
and Dax takes it from him.
“Don’t,”
Largo begins, clutching his side where the spell hit, “touch. That.
Baby.”
Dax’s
left hand holds his holy symbol while the other hand holding the
basket burns with Sacred
Flame,
igniting both baby and basket.
TBC
