DND Blog

A place to keep DND session recaps, from various campaigns.

The Sixty-Eighth Session

June 11, 2022, Campaign: As the ground quakes, evil wakes

Percival emerges from a short coma determined to help the Forest. We persuade him to join us on our quest to rid the forest of corruption, permanently. To the northwest we travel, and get caught in a series of painful encounters. Jerry almost dies.

Table of Contents

  1. Last session
  2. The Fruits of the Jimenju Tree
  3. The next day
    1. A danger avoided
    2. The ichor puddles and the corrupted ents
    3. The Dread Tardigrade
    4. Oh fuck
  4. Next session

Last session

Fernard, the local favorite half-elf werebear, led us to the Jimenju Tree. The pale white fruits have faces, and speak to us, trying to convince us to eat them. Two Dragonborn laze under the Jimenju Tree's branches. We debate the ethics of it all, and then Percival bites into a fruit.

The Fruits of the Jimenju Tree

Percival's body relaxes. He faces the tree, and falls backwards. Ryltar races forward to catch him, but the tree's roots have already risen to catch him. They gently lay him flat on the forest floor. The roots bring him under the tree, and line him up with the Dragonborne, heads toward the trunk.

Ryltar sees a bloom of purple enchantment spread from Percival's mouth across his body, which fades.

There is an urgent feeling that we should do something to save Percival. We look through our pockets to find anything relevant. The anti-corruption potion glows with the purple healing magic of necromancy. But there's nothing we can do.

The tree natters on about how Percival has elected to become one of the Protectors of the Forest. Fed up with it, Jerry pops Silence on the Jimenju Tree for an hour. When the fruits' mouths move, we hear nothing. The grove's faint background laughter continues….

We discuss whether to wait for Percival, or to steal him away. Ryltar is in favor of yanking; Salris worries that disrupting whatever process is going on may cause damage. Ryltar is worried that when Percival wakes, it'll be the tree and him against us, which is worse than the current situation. But maybe the tree will be happy for Percival to accompany us on the trip to solve the problem of the forest.

We ask Fernard whether he's going to accompany us to the Ancient Elm. He says he can, but shouldn't. It's very dangerous.

"If you were to be able to find a way to solve all of this corruption, would you take it?" asks Ryltar.

"Yes," says Fernard.

Maybe we can convince Forest-Touched Percival to join us on our quest to solve the corruption problem once and for all.

We wait around. Day rolls into night; the forest grows darker. Fernard says he took eight hours, he was told.

A root reaches up from the ground, grabs a fruit, cracks it in half, and offers half to each Dragonborn. They each reach out and take their half, and eat it.

Before settling down for the night, Salris tries to gag Percival with some cloth. "What are you doing?" asks the tree. Roots crest up behind Salris. Salris says, "Insurance policy. He finds it relaxing while he rests." The roots recede. Salris makes a ritual of it, speaking a little poem in Infernal.

Ryltar asks, in Primordial, what languages the tree speaks. It replies in the Terran dialect, "I speak all languages spoken by those who approach." "All of them?" he asks in Aquan. "All of them," it answers in Aerial.

The night is warm and humid and silent.

The next day

With the rising sun, Percival shakes off the night's sleep. The Jimenju tree opens up the roots that were supporting Percival and the Dragonborn. He realizes that he's gagged. He tries to undo the knots, and eventually succeeds.

He comes up to the rest of the Party and greets us. Gesturing at his clothes and his equipment, he asks, "What's all this shit?" It seems unnecessary to him. Ryltar tells him he should hang on to the stuff. Salris greets him and pats him on the back with Remove Curse, and we convince him that he'll need his stuff to help protect the forest.

Fernard is willing to tell us which direction we're going to get to the Ancient Elm, but he's going to take the Dragonborn to the village. We learn that there's a Jimenju tree at each village site; they're not a hivemind but do send messages to each other via people.

Percival tells us that he's going to put his travels and research on hold to help the forest, but he's willing to try our way of saving the forest first.

We travel to the northwest, into the forest. It's still overgrown, but the trees aren't scored where people remove their gnarls. Percival does his best Cookie Monster impression, munching on all the galls.

A danger avoided

Jerry's 21 Survival leads us through the underbrush, where broken branches have fallen from the trees above. A group of 5-6 unnaturals, half an hour ago, headed west to east. Not the direction we're headed.

Ryltar takes a knife to one tree. The bark flops in rubbery fashion; the sap flows grey.

The ichor puddles and the corrupted ents

Pools of black ichor dot the forest floor. Salris directs Ryltar to start freezing them. He freezes the first one, and it freezes so fast that it crazes with cracks, and nearly shatters. Some of the corrupted trees turn toward us. Three huge trees, covered in black pustules, with gashes of a mouth and eye, from which more black ichor flows. The trees cry that black ichor on others, and scratch against trees as they try to move.

It's a black and twisted ent, without leaves. It's angry.

What approaches through the woods?

  1. Round 1: The three ents deal a lot of damage, not just on attack, but when their wounds spray attackers with acidic sap. We hold them off for a round.
    1. Jerry casts Lightning Arrow and hits one of the three big trees, dealing 9 piercing, 14 lightning, and an additional 11 lightning to the surrounding trees. The one she hit twitches.
    2. The three trees approach the Party. Jerry receives two of three swipes, for 27 bludgeoning. One throws a rock at Vurguron. Another throws a rock at Jerry.
    3. Vurguron moves into the space of the tree giant that attacked him. He receives some acid damage.
    4. Ryltar Slows two of the three.
    5. Salris hits Synaptic Static on two of the three giants.
    6. Percival does 26 fire to one tree.
  2. Round 2: One ent is banished; one catches fire and dies.
    1. Jerry casts Hunter's Mark on one of the slowed tree giants, and slashes twice. Black ichor explodes from the wounds, which she avoids, and lands a critical hit and a normal hit for a total of 33 magical slashing; her attack bounced off.
    2. The ents make slam attacks against Ryltar and miss.
    3. Vurguron takes some acid damage. He attacks, 13 slashing 4 radiant, and some more.
    4. Ryltar does some Ray of Frost
    5. Salris attacks with Banishing Smite, takes a spray of acid, and deals 27 force damage, pushing the ent below 50 HP, banishing it.
    6. Percival casts a second Fireball; the oozing black ichor catches fire. The un-slowed corrupt ent runs away, trips, and falls, smoldering. He dies.
  3. Round 3: The third ent dies; we wait for the banished one to appear.
    1. Jerry advances on the remaining ent, slashes twice, connects once, for 16 slashing. She takes 4 acid damage.
    2. The ent bludgeons Jerry a little bit, for 29 damage.
    3. Vurguron attacks it a little.
    4. Ryltar tries to Ray of Frost the ent and misses.
    5. Salris takes 1 acid damage, and kills the ent. Then he gets ready for the banished ent to reappear.

The ent will take a few more rounds to reappear. We try to clean the sap off with Prestidigitation and Mage Hand. Jerry summons the Abracadabrus and soapy water. Together, we all manage to scrape and scrub the sap off, and are relieved of its acidic effects.

When the ent reappears, Salris and Jerry eviscerate it. It sprays acidic ichor all over them, but fast action cleans them off without harm.

We take a short rest to heal up, and then continue onwards.

There's a babbling brook ahead. Ryltar uses Shape Water to move the water around us, so we have the opportunity to walk with dry feet. There's a log which we use to cross, and Jerry makes it across, pulling a rope.

The Dread Tardigrade

As Percival makes to cross, the log explodes into teeth. It deals 27 slashing to him.

What a bear made of water and plants looks like, surging forth from a woodland swamp.

Not safe footing.

Behold! A water bear, made of plants and moss and water and stuff.

  1. Round 1: It is a Groff, and we billy goats gruff have disturbed its sleep.
    1. The Groff bites Jerry for 34 slashing, and slashes at Percival, who blocks it with Cutting Words.
    2. Vurguron does some damage, but not much.
    3. Ryltar casts Mental Prison; with a 18 on die and a negative modifier, it succumbs to the illusion of whirling Ginseng cutlery. It is restrained and blind.
    4. Percival hits the Groff with his Storm Boomerang for max bludgeoning and 12 lightning.
    5. Salris Hexblade's Curses the Groff, and attacks.
    6. Jerry is informed that if the bear moves so little as 5 feet, it takes 10d10 damage, so she shoves, and shoves, and pushes it into the blender wall for 55 psychic.
  2. Round 2: Jerry almost dies, and then she's swallowed by the bear. The bear dies, and washes away with Jerry trapped inside it!
    1. The bear attacks Jerry, reducing her to 0 — she saves to 1 via Relentless Endurance and is swallowed by it. She disappears from sight.
    2. Vurguron kills the bear with his Shadow Knife. The bear falls into the river.
    3. Ryltar Shapes Water to stop the body from flowing away.
    4. Percival jumps into the water and prepares Bardic Inspiration to help Salris.
    5. Salris dives in, and with Percival's assistance, tries to cut open the bear to save Jerry. There's lots of dregs of moss and vines and water and tiny stones, which he hacks through.
    6. Jerry takes poison damage: 8d6 = 34 poison, bringing her to unconscousness. She passes her first death save.
  3. Round 3: The Party chases after the bear's corpse.
    1. Vurguron jumps in and tries to help, but the bear continues to move downstream, slowly.
    2. Ryltar reaches into the bear, and finds what he thinks might be Jerry! He pulls out a fish.
    3. Percival grants advantage and bardic inspiration to Salris.
    4. Salris finds Jerry's boot. Salris pulls Jerry half out.
    5. Jerry takes damage from the acid, and passes a death save. She's 2 for 1 now.
  4. Round 4: The Party retrieve Jerry and bring her back to health.
    1. Vurguron helps Salris pull Jerry out, but fails.
    2. Ryltar grabs Jerry and Dimension Doors to the bank.
    3. Percival climbs out of the stream to go cast healing spells.

We take another short rest and heal up.

A slow rolling fog creeps in, permeating the area.

Percival leads the way with Dancing Lights. The dancing orbs of light gather mimics in purple light; he moves the lights around and it turns out that the purple lights appear in response to the dancing lights only in certain areas. So he walks around a little.

Oh fuck

His foot lands on something soft, which screams.

In the distance, something begins crashing through the forest towards us.

Next session