After following the crude map you received from Laura the herbalist, you’ve arrived in the very heart of the forest. Only the faintest light filters through the thick canopy of trees, and the soft bed of leaves and dirt muffles your footsteps. The air is rich with the sounds of vibrant wildlife. That is, until you press forward and cross the threshold into a darkened section of the forest.
The songs of birds fade as you pass a dense cluster of trees. You are greeted by an awe-inspiring sight. The broken and rotting husk of a once-mighty tree dominates a small clearing. The ground is dark and ruddy around the massive trunk, which must be nearly 100 feet across, and stretches more than twice that distance into the air, its top shorn off and splintered like broken teeth. Heavy layers of moss and lichen cling to the stump, enrobing it in rich shades of green, yellow and brown. The sickly sweet taint of mold and rot hangs in the air.
A small fissure beckons from the eastern side of the great trunk. The opening is barely three feet wide, and curls up the scarred bark like a wicked smile. A dim purple light, so faint as to perhaps be imagined, glows from within the trunk. The thrum of a low wind whispers through the forest – but as you train your senses toward the rotted husk of tree, you realize that the sound is coming from inside the stump itself.
Girding yourself for what may lie ahead, you make your final preparations. The reagents you seek for the herbalist lie within. You need to recover seven ironbloom mushrooms, and get them back to Falcon's Hollow as soon as possible.
Ghundi swats another fly buzzing by his ear. Damn forest is conspiring against me, he thinks, scowling fiercely. Fer every one of these bastards I kill, ten o' his brothers come to avenge 'im.
Ghundi quietly makes his way across the clearing to the niche in the tree, checking the ground to see if any creatures passed recently to the old, dead tree.
Bah, he thinks, go to the forest she says. Get the 'shrooms she says. She dinnae say that I'd have to go crawling in dead trees wit' bugs and creepies.
Keeping low to the ground, he comes to the side of the niche and uses his small mirror to peek around the edge to see if he can determine what the lights are.
Crevas nods knowingly as he and the two others near the tree. He pops each knuckle on his right hand slowly, then opens and closes both fists simultaneously. He then looks at the old tree quizzically, wondering what secrets it holds inside. "Do you see anything in there, dwarf?" he says with a smile while waiting to see what Ghundi comes back with. After that, he slowly begins examining the old tree hoping the fungus the three seek is somewhere within.
Ghundi
Inside the niche of the tree is a hole in the ground. You are unable to determine what could have possibly made it. Along the far side of the hole the root system of the tree has created a natural ladder. Using the mirror, you can't see any light-source coming from the bottom of the hole, although the mid-day sun does allow you to see that the descent is further than your darkvision can penetrate the darkness.
The tree looks to be very old.
Does it look large enough for a person?
Does it look large enough for a person?
Easily.
"Confound it give me moment," Ghundi grumbles in response to the question. "Looks ta be some climbing in oor near future, but I doon't see anything threatenin' right off." He eyes the dead tree.
"What manner of foul wood is this?" he snaps, breaking off a piece of bark and watching as it crumbles between his fingers.
The tree looks to be very old.
The two confer over the ancient tree, and decide that it is the ancient Wickerwood Tree. Not the oldest tree in the forest, but it has been here quite a long time.
As you look closer, you can see that it is a tangle of several trees intertwined together, with a number of new trees growing out of the main trunk.
"Right, a Wickerwood," Ghundi mumbles. "Fat lot of good it'll do us sitting here. I'm headed doon. Stay close ta me, juss in case some beasties fancy us a snack."
Ghundi steps to the edge of the hole and peers down.
If nothing looks amiss, Ghundi starts to scramble down the makeshift 'ladder'.
Crevas follows the dwarven ranger down the ladder, curious to see what awaits below.
Ghundi takes his time climbing. At one point a beetle flies into his mouth, and between his cursing and spitting he almost falls, but otherwise make the climb down uneventfully.
Descending the hole, using the root system as a ladder, Ghundi eventually sees the ground coming up. Twenty feet above the ground, the root system stops, with the odd root extending down into a pool of water below, part of a larger cavernous room.
"Follow me lead, if ye can," he grunts before making his way down. He calls back up to his companions, "Might not be a bad idear for one of ye to stay up here and look for another way doon, so's we can get back oop."
Ghundi splashes down gently into the water, the liquid coming up to his knees. Down in the cavern, the dwarf can see that the chamber extends out to the edge of his vision in all directions.
Hearing Largos bark repetitively as he descends downward, Crevas looks up and sighs. Stopping his downward descent, he asks Ghundi "Dwarf, do you have any rope? I need to get my friend down here with us. Otherwise, he'll have the whole forest in an uproar." With that, Crevas ascends back to the surface and waits. Looking at the strange halfling while awaiting Ghundi's response, he asks politely "So, what is your story?" He then gives Largos the command for "Heel", motioning with his finger towards his foot.
Ghundi fishes in his backpack and pulls out a fifty foot length of rope.
"Here ye go," he calls in a hoarse whisper, tossing the coiled hemp up while holding one end.
"I dinnae know why, druid, but I dinnae think we should be makin' too much racket."
Crevas nods his thanks to Ghundi and ties Largos securely to the rope, making sure the knots are correctly done. "My thoughts exactly." he says as he slowly lowers Largos down to the dwarf. "If you'll hold him, I'll be right down." He then slowly climbs down the tree again, sliding down the roots besides the dwarf.
Once at the bottom he looks to see if Jero is coming, then unties Largos and holds him with one arm. "Shall we proceed then?" he says as he surveys the cavern.
Jero has for some reason always felt comfortable in encloses spaces beneath the earth, and feels a peculiar sensation of coming home as he descends the rough "ladder".
Largos the dog flails around in the air for the agonizing minute it takes to lower the druid's animal companion down into the pool of water below. Once in the water, he splashes around, getting out of the fetid water as quickly as possible.
Crevas slowly climbs down into the hole again, throwing the end of the rope back to Ghundi. He then slides down the tree roots and ruffles Largos' fur with a quick wave. Hoping to continue forward, he looks at Ghundi and says "Which way?".
Ghundi examines the ground and slowly turns in a circle, his eyes gazing around the cavernous room.
"Ach, give me a moment. I cannae snap me fingers and make 'em appear."
Ghundi looks around the room, and immediately notices gray roots along the walls (whereas the rest of the roots underground are brown and green).
Ghundi
The herbalist did say to search around the ancient tree--could she be wrong?
Ghundi makes his way over to the roots and begins rummaging around, looking for the mushrooms.
"Bah," he exclaims, "these cursed ironblooms only grow in dark areas, aroond places with rich veins of metal. Mebbe I'll find me some iron or copper down here while we look. I dinnae know if they'll even grow down here."
"Anyone of you lads know if there are any mines or some such in this area?"
[b]"Since we have no other leads, I humbly suggest we delve deeper - of course hunting mushrooms isn't my primary vocation, so I'll defer to the experts"[b]
There doesn't appear to be any metal, or any trace of this cavernous area ever being mined.
"Stay close ta me," Ghundi hisses, "and we'll see if we cannae find a way deeper."
Ghundi begins movies in one direction until he finds a wall. Then he plans on trying to find any side passages, or at least figure out the shape of the caver they have found themselves in.
After a couple of hours of walking the perimeter of the cavernous area, Ghundi has found that it is a roughly circular chasm, about 120 feet across. The root structure of the tree above grows down through the middle of the cavern.
There are no signs of any mining activity, or tunnels leading further into the earth. Aside from the skeletons with the mushrooms, and a little bit of fungus growing on them, there is nothing to be found in this cavern.