Session 351 - Into the Underways

 Date: 15 August

Moon: N̴̡͎͓̳͔͇̗̯͚͈͉̝͔̘͌͂͘͘͜͜Ę̶̛̛̥̝̰̰̞͙̯̽̀͊̃̽͊̔̒̅͊̐̎́͝W̶̜̗̫̬̠̣͓̤̹̪̣̝̱̍͗͐̉͊̕̕̚ ̵̛̦͉̖̣̰͛̒̀̓̌̾̒̋͑͘M̶̧͈͔̮̱̭̈́́͜ͅŐ̶͇̫͚̐̔̋͂Ö̶̬͎́͗́̇̀̓͊̾̃̄̿̆N̶̢̠̲̾̓͐̎͋̓͂̌̅̈́̋̚̕̕͝͠
Zenith: Oberon

Events:

--- Primordial Tech

- After many trials, our heroes have formed a tenuous alliance with the goblins who lead them to a secret door. Within is the nerve centre of the Pyramid - ancient machines and a God-summoning holo-plate hooked up to a huge green-tinted screen. This thing looks absolutely ancient.
- They turn it on, but no God hologram appears. Instead the screen turns on with green audio bars like a hi-fi and Oberon's voice is piped in... but it's a very early version of Oberon! Soon another Oberon joins him - the modern Oberon - connecting directly to the God orbiting the world.
- They ask many questions, discovering that the pyramids were constructed in an earlier epoch as a combination atmosphere repair system and Shub-Niggurath killer. They would take poison from the sky and pump it deep into the earth where it would kill the monster in the core.

- They also discover that they can cleanse further areas by adding pylons back to the grid. The pylons and further pyramids are accessible by rails that run underneath the entire Drudge Wastes.
- Before leaving, Grumblebelch asks for knowledge of the ancient technology and gets reams of dot matrix printed paper from one of the machines. Then she changes the passwords so nobody else can access the terminal ever again!

--- A MAP!?

- They continue through this hidden zone into a wide corridor, where they find what they discover to be debugging tools, including a talking Dwarf head that states problems with whatever it's looking at.
- The next room contains a mapmaking device! It busily prints out a whole new section of the world map!
- They pore over it, comparing it to their current (very old) map of the old world! Odo's eyes go wide as she realises that there's a pattern to these pyramids and pylons!

--- Obligatory Spiders
- Aximander is at the height of his moon-wrought powers. He is more Elf than Man, the devil himself, wielding powers inhuman and incredible.
- While everyone else is obsessed with the map, he walks out into the main hall and nukes the spider guarding the way forward. In a charred egg sac, he finds a Potion of Jealousy.

--- Golems Below
- Catching up to Aximander and stepping gingerly over the spider corpse, the others follow him down to the deeper level below the pyramid.
- There they find a fountain with nice, fizzy, minerally water. The fountain depicts Dwarves constructing a golem from clay.
- There's a smell of woodsmoke, and they discover that through the next area there are a bunch of giant golems arguing about the Idea of Thorns. One argues that cities are necessary for the spread of nature, another argues that cities should always be destroyed in the first instance so that nature can thrive.

- Odo and Tyler Lockheart wade into the discussion. Tyler, naturally, is just a centrist who thinks everyone should just be civil. He offers a joint. They talk Thorns for a bit.

--- Spiders Above

- The others have snuck past and entered a grand hall with many pillars. Robo-raptors are tied by chains to the pillars, and spiders scuttle in webs above!
- Aximander goes full Roy Mustang and starts blasting, balls of fire detonating in the webs on the ceiling and causing spider corpses to fall like rain, to the delight of the raptors!
- A Chaos Burst causes a wall of force to erupt against the ceiling and rain starts to fall! In the chaos, the party dashes past to a big door on the opposite wall.

--- Explosive Clues

- They find a hexagonal room, then turn down a corridor to find themselves in a sort of Dwarven temple! Guard rails head down the long corridor, and on either side are bas reliefs.
- The reliefs show a story of Goblins betraying Dwarves in a city, Dwarves forcing Goblins into retreat to the surface, a Goblin-made poison superweapon killing all the Dwarves in the city, and a final powerful hero who inverts the pyramids' poison pump sending it all to the surface to create the Drudge Wastes.
- A side chamber has a clay golem prototype. There is talk of attempting to animate it, but ultimately they do not.
- There is a corridor with 6 doors coming off of it. Everyone picks a door and opens it simultaneously! Everyone is blasted with various elements simultaneously!

- Inside the rooms are runes (hence the elemental blasts) and small versions of several pyramids. Given the makeup of the pyramids and the elements of the runes that blasted them, our heroes put together that these must be the elemental types of the golems in the various pyramids. Neat!
- There are also little models of the golems arrayed around the pyramid dioramas, which is pretty cute.

--- Various Cliffhangers
- The last room contains a big square hole in the centre of the room that leads down to some rails! It's the Underways!
- More interestingly for Odo, a side chamber has a big diamond as a keystone which is holding up the ceiling... She works with Tyler to create a device that will pull the whole thing out.
- Also interestingly, Sydney finds their way to a room with many dead stone Dwarves clutching little golem figurines. They surmise that these Dwarves are actually empowering the golems by sending their souls into them.
- Also also interestingly, Aximander opens the doors at the very end of the temple. The cracks in the stonework around it glow with a bright white light, and beyond the door is a shimmering corridor filled with scintillating energy,
- Odo PULLS OUT THE DIAMOND and the ceiling RUMBLES
- Sydney YANKS A MODEL GOLEM and the Dwarf's eyes OPEN
- Aximander steps into the corridor and SEES SOMETHING LOOMING

- We end the session because the pub is closing!

Total: 8000 exp

Treasure:
- A new map!
- Debugging tools, including a Dwarf head and a number of old coins with different numbers on them. (1000 exp)

- Potion of Jealousy

Total: 1000 exp

Enemies:

- 5 Black Widow spiders (500 exp)
- 4 robo-raptors (400 exp)
Total: 900 exp

OOC:
- Carter the Chronicler and Paymaster and Vanguard (300 exp)
- Kitty the Expedition Leader (100 exp)
- Ollie the Quartermaster (100 exp)
- Tom the Chef (100 exp)

Exp Totals:

- Carter / Sydney, Level 7 Magic-User: 76573 (Level up at 144000)

- Ollie / Jojo Fullbeard, Level 6 Muscle Wizard: 53689 (Level up at 72000)

- James G / Tyler Lockheart, Level 6 Specialist: 40088 (Level up at 48000)

- Kitty / Julian & Aximander, Level 5 Languid Wastrel: 32058 (Level up at 36000)

- Tom / Odo Grumblebelch, Level 5 Dwarven Barbarian: 15954 (Level up at 16000)

Level Up! +1d10 HP! +1 to Saves! +Lorebond! +Backstory!

Session 350 - Mighty Meta-Manipulation!

Date: 1 August

Moon: Full Clean Face
Zenith: Eris

New Backstory:

- Sydney owes Jojo a great debt for saving their life. Once per session, drop to 0HP to cancel any death dice they have accrued.

Events:

--- Go Before They Ask Questions!

- We open in a dungeon, drops of silvery fluid trickling down carved circuit-board stone walls, somewhere beneath the huge stepped pyramid above.
- A crumbled wall has just been mined out by Dwarves from Ur-Darghab, a task given in exchange for their lives by our victorious (and merciful) heroes. The Dwarves, job completed, shuffle off to tend to their crumbling dead. Their are cries of sorrow as they realise the gems of the dead have been taken.

- Thinking of the bloody gems in their pockets, and not wanting to cause an awkward scene, the party hurriedly rush into the revealed room.

- The caves beyond are the fractal low-poly style of Ur-Darghab, the faceted surfaces look absolutely gorgeous in Odo's dwarven darkvision.

--- Lizards!

- Arrayed around a slightly sizzling pool of trickling water, in a cave that's evidently only partway through being fractally beautified, are several part-robot raptors! Their red robo-eyes gleam, wet tongues licking their metal jaws.

- Jojo throws a hunk of boar meat and one of the raptors snaps it up. Odo, who's been checking out the ceiling, thinks she sees movement up there...
- They decide to leave well enough alone and go check out the rocks piled at the exit, when a sticky tongue slaps down straight at Odo!
- She's hit... then isn't? Reality shimmers with subtle energies. It's the effect of Sydney's new spell, Meta-Manipulation, slightly turning luck in their favour!
- Odo responds by trying to slice the tongue off! She fails... but hits! The tongue is cut clean in two, part of it flopping on the floor at her feet like a fish, the other snapping back up towards the ceiling and revealing the huge-eyed face of a giant cyborg chameleon!
- Sydney casts Slippery Slope to take the rubble down to crush the raptors, while Aximander grabs a spear and starts attacking the creature on the ceiling. It's a crit-fumble... it's a hit! The chameleon bleeds silver.
- Jojo joins the battle in earnest to head of an as-yet uncrushed raptor... and more tongues flick down towards her! There's more than one chameleon!

--- Goblins arrive
- Through the door once blocked by rubble, some goblins with thorny crowns emerge. "Not now!" shriek the party, and thankfully the goblins are ok with watching.
- Odo slays her chameleon, and is then summarily snatched into the darkness by another!

- Sydney gets tongue-grappled from a distance... but even without the aura of luck he's unscathed! The enemy chameleon fumbles... and fumbles... and fumbles again... until it's blown up its own armour, cut off its own tongue, and fallen prone and stunned into the water. I've never seen the like!
- That's Sydney's time to shine with their Wing Suit with a daredevil's soul, destroying the wings to burst straight into the half dead chameleon and make it full dead, then riding its corpse back into the fray!
- Jojo and Aximander are beating down a raptor with a combination of axe and flame, while Sydney's meta-manipulation runs out when they narrowly avoid a tongue and Odo murders the chameleon that's been trying to swallow her leg for half the fight!

--- Tyler Loveheart arrives
- What's that? It's Tyler Loveheart with the surfboard!
- He shows up mid-session as usual, surfing down the Slippery Slope as Sydney sends out a fan of Magic Missiles into the fray, and swipes a recovering raptor with his board!
- Aximander blasts it with pyrokinesis, igniting all the fluids inside it and sending it shooting off around the room like a rocket! It explodes in a spray of hot silvery liquid.

- Seeing its compatriots boiled, broken, beaten and scarred... the last chameleon turns invisible and legs it.

- Party at Sydney's Place

- Sydney summons their Safe Space so that everyone can have a rest. Meta-Manipulation really saved the day!
- The thorn goblins yell something down at the party who cover their ears and go "lalala" to avoid hearing the Idea of Thorns! The goblins have to quickly turn away though, since there are sounds of a giant chameleon attacking some goblins back there.
- Inside the Safe Space it's a huge flat, penthouse suite, seven bedrooms, and even a very nice modern kitchen! They drag the raptor and chameleon corpses in through the front door, getting blood and guts all over the parquet floor, and butcher them right there. The smell is quite something, and the windows of the flat don't actually open.
- Odo cooks the fresh meat while Sydney watches in horror as the others steal snacks from the fridge, get drunk on the wine that was meant to be saved for a special occasion, take way too long in the toilet, and generally make a mess of the place.
- When it's ready they feast upon Dino-Nike-Us, involving a tender mix of raptor and lion meat, a slow-cooked chameleon tongue, butter, and a marmite glaze. It makes them heal extra good with a night's sleep!

--- Discussing the Idea of Thorns

- In the morning, the place is a mess. Tyler's room is untouched, but only because he spent the night with Jojo who is positively glowing! The other rooms are full of tangled sheets, chairs are tipped over around the dining table which has something sticky spilled over the abandoned playing cards, and something unholy has occurred in the en suite toilet.

- Sydney is trying to hold back tears, and is about to say something they might regret, when mercifully there's a knock at the door! It's a noise complaint from the goblins. They're ok if our heroes stick around, so long as they don't unleash any more chameleons and turn down the music after 11pm.
- The rest of the party troop out of the front door past Sydney, who takes one last regretful look back at his trashed apartment and shuts the door. It fades away behind him, leaving behind only the subtle scent of unflushed vomit.

- They go to talk to the goblins, and only Sydney is brave enough to hear them talk about the Idea of Thorns! They pass their save, and can now speak uninhibited! Their leader is Graxxar, and he's extra thorny.
- The Idea of Thorns itself is a sort of anti-civilisation, pro-nature and accelerationist anarcho-primitivism. Previously it might have been a bad thing to destroy civilisation and return to living in harmony with nature, but since the apocalypse wiped out civilisation anyway it's the perfect time to embrace the Idea of Thorns!
- Sydney takes this with some scepticism, and asks what they know about the lizards.
- It transpires that they theorise the lizards are some sort of pyramid guardians, and they trapped them in that area behind the rocks to stop them eating them. These goblins also used to live with the golems, or at least were tolerated by them, until they kept going on about the Idea and got kicked out of the pyramid proper.
- Finally, they know where there's a secret pyramid control room, and offer to guide the party if they'll get them back into the main pyramid and into the Underways! What are the Underways? Secret routes beneath the Drudge Wastes... maybe they can take you there too...

Total: 7000 exp

Enemies Neutralised:
- 3 robo-raptors (300 exp)
- 4 robo-chameleons (400 exp)
Total: 700 exp

OOC:
- Carter the Chronicler & Vanguard

- Kitty the Expedition Leader

- Tom the Paymaster & Chef

- Ollie the Quartermaster

Exp Totals:

- Carter / Sydney, Level 7 Magic-User: 74793 (Level up at 144000)

- Ollie / Jojo Fullbeard, Level 6 Muscle Wizard: 51909 (Level up at 72000)

- James G / Tyler Lockheart, Level 6 Specialist: 38308 (Level up at 48000)

- Kitty / Julian & Aximander, Level 5 Languid Wastrel: 30278 (Level up at 36000)

- Tom / Odo Grumblebelch, Level 4 Dwarven Barbarian: 14174 (Level up at 16000)

Session 346 - Demon Blade Backstabs

Date: 27 June, 22 p.p.

Moon: Waxing Gibbous - Clean Face

Zenith: Vorn

New Backstory:

- Food was scarce in a famine-based LARP, and Julian was even-handed in sharing around what little they had. Everyone around you gets +1 HP when eating to heal.

Events:

--- Golem, Bronze

- We reconvene with the party in the Temple of Archaeopteryx, the Elven hero that once fatally took on an Apocalypse Dragon and had a clear love for putting souls into objects to turn them into magic items.
- They are in a room with curtains on each wall, both depicting a cool winged Flitting Gad taking on an army of electric ghosts and placing shackles upon a massive blue dragon.
- Phillipides Goath peeks behind one of the curtains and finds a secret room! A bag of gold is on the floor, and some acrid stench fills his nostrils.
- He lobs something at the bag and reveals that it's a trap - there are only a couple of coins in there and it's mostly filled with squirting acid. Ah.
- He retreats, which is fair enough honestly.
- Heading south, the party sees a statue standing ominously on a pedestal. It's a bronze man, looking more solid than metal lacework of last session's manikin statues, and a heat haze rises from its broad shoulders and big ominous brass sword. It turns, lifts its sword, and advances towards the light.
- A tremulous voice calls out for help from a room behind the golem, to the concern of all.
- Aximander emerges from Julian's body and binds the heat of two torches into a white-hot ball with his Elvish magic, then sends it at the metal man's chest! The chest collapses, molten brass pours from the wound, yet it keeps coming! Jojo avoids the worst of the damage from a strike of its massive sword.
- Sydney notices that it's avoiding damaging the curtains, and so Phillipides nicks the idea and cuts down one of them and throws it onto the metal man. It works! Faced with a choice between harming the curtains and harming the invaders, the brass robot shuts down.

--- Rebel Gad
- Investigating the voice, the party finds a Flitting Gad (being an Elf whose Heartspell is Feather-Fall) trapped behind metal bars, and scarred by the acid from a familiar trap. Sydney has his dancing time-rewinding clock with him, and offers healing and freedom to the Elf in exchange for information.
- It's a deal! She tells them what she knows about the Rebel Gads vs the Traitor Gads, to whit the Traitors are in league with the Red Elves from Mars and the Rebels are against them.
- She is freed, chucked into the clock, and rewound until she is healed. In thanks, she carves a symbol into Sydney's arm which will show them to be a a friend to the Rebels. Lovely! With that, she runs off because she doesn't want to push her luck.
- A quick survey of the route she left through reveals an exit, including a trapped door that shoots petrified centipedes. Duly noted.

--- Polarity
- They turn around and head deeper into the dungeon. It looks like the only way forward is via the hall with time-space anomalies that are, even now, pulling some poor Gad apart in slow motion. Sucks to be them.
- On the way, floating motes of light gather around the casters and grant them temporary mana! Jojo tries to Passwall through the floor, only to discover that it is not called Passfloor actually.
- Aximander, still controlling Julian's body, looks into the room at the end of the pull-apart gravity  corridor and finds a room where gravity is flipped! Fantastic!
- Looks like if you're not prepared for it, the gravity will invert every so often and drop you from ceiling to floor, this accomplished via a slowly spinning mask on one wall. Aximander is prepared though, and lands gracefully.
- He also grabs some coins from a burst acid-trapped bag, which was clearly just chucked in here willy nilly without the trappers knowing about the gravity effect.
- He jams something into the rotating wall-head to stop the gravity nonsense in the corridor, and hey presto! It's passable! Without these gravity whorls moving about you can just sort of walk around them.

--- Dithea
- Fiery motes gather around the party's weapons as they travel down the corridor, finally getting to the door that contains a tortured prisoner whose body is linked to the coins floating through the air elsewhere.
- Inside, they see said prisoner floating in the air. Her skin is a dull red. Three demon masks are arranged on a nearby wall, each of them with a hole for a gem to be placed on their foreheads. They have different personalities.

- After a bit of chat, it turns out that this red-skinned Elf was magically altered by her parents to make her closer to the "real" Elves - the Red Elves from Mars. She was herself the captain of the temple guards here, until she was caught nicking a sword that hates women and put in this torture chamber that punishes the greedy with the greed of others.
- She also tells them about the rest of the dungeon. Main temple is ahead, and they can always turn off to find a big egg full of snakes. Nobody is particularly excited about the egg.
- Tyler Lockheart turns up! Bursting through the door with his surfboard!
- They free Dithea and she walks off to escape this place... right into a gravity whorl. Mulligans are attempted and denied. Sydney tries ripping her out of the gravity whorl but rips off half her stomach and she dies inside the clock... which now has a taste for blood.

--- Sny Snid Snit Snave Sno Snee Sñakes 
- They move swiftly on, looking back apologetically to Sydney who is tearfully cleaning the blood out of the inside of the murder clock.
- There are battlecries and the ring of steel on steel ahead! They peek into the dungeon's largest room to see a winged woman in a circle of dead golems, slashing with a feather sword, reading death from a magical tome that destroys her foes.
- Everybody is smitten.
- Outside the room, down another corridor, there is a robot man with a couple of sick scythes who motions to Sydney after he sees their arm. Sydney goes to investigate and finds... the snake egg room! Snakes with corkscrew tails slither along the floor! Unfortunately, Sydney cannot speak Gad so can't talk to the metal man.
- Unperturbed, Sydney casts Speak With Animals snand snarts sneaking snin sñake snanguage.
- Sney sneak sñake snou sne snetal snan, snand snay snake snan snalliance!

- Back in the main hall, the cool winged woman has cut down all the other golems and entered... the treasure room!

--- Sudden But Inevitable Betrayal
- They bust in and find that the cool Elf lady is wearing some sort of invisible fabric over her nude body, wielding a sword that hates men, and wielding a bow with a sheep's head in the centre!
- Sydney unleashes their backstory - have someone make a romantic advance on you. The Elf lady is smitten and invites Sydney over to her side...
- Sydney stabs her in the back with an atrametal spear barely containing a black-fire fragment of a giant demon's soul! It's immediately fatal, and the Elf lady keels over with inky flames burning in her eyes.
- Just say no to boss battles I guess.
- In the room they find a ton of coinage with Archaeopteryx's face on it and many magic items. The cool Elf was wearing the Emperor's New Robes, holding the woman-hating blade Jackie the Ripper, and wielding the Bow of the Ram. All are duly looted.
- Also here - the Vaunted Prize which can be traded for anything, a filigreed glass jar containing Soul River Water which captures a soul on death (currently contains a confused old man's soul), and a Wing Suit which allows you to glide on real wings (currently a pigeon's). Sick stuff.
- The metal man with the scythes pokes his head around the door and realised that it's already over.

--- Sudden But Unexpected Betrayal
- They have a look around the main room, seeing that there's a fountain on one side and a cool furnace that blatantly attaches souls to items to make them magical. Much discussion is had about what soul they need to grab to make the ultimate magic item, counterposed by the argument that "we never go back to anywhere" so it's pointless to speculate.
- Aximander sits in the cool throne at the side of the room and... can fly! Holy shit! it will wear off in a bit but holy shit!
- They walk out with all the loot and... Sydney gets slashed with a scythe! It's the Robo Dude!
- Turns out he is here to stop people nicking shit, which on balance does make sense.
- Aximander can fucking fly though, and he zips back to bury his black-fire atrametal knife into the robot's back, pumping stored demon soul energy deep into its brassy body. The robot burns... but doesn't die immediately.
- Jojo leaps into the fray with a gambit, critting the robot as the robot crits her back, demolishing each other with a mighty Devastator! Only Jojo survives.
- At the last second Sydney whips the Soul River Jar onto the bot's forehead and captures its soul! A single brass coin spins in the clear water.
- Exhausted, the party stops to grab the robot man's cool scythes. They suck souls, apparently.
- Sydney casts their Safe Space spell and everyone piles into the door that they summoned, arriving in a pocket dimension consisting of a cramped London flat. For now, it's more than enough.

Total: 8000 exp

OOC:
- Chronicler and Treasurer: Carter
- Expedition Leader: George
- Vanguard: Ollie

Foes:

- A bronze golem (100 exp)
- A cool Elf (500 exp)
- A metal man (100 exp)
Total: 700 exp

Treasure:
- 460gp, 11000sp, 350cp (34035 exp)
- Bow of the Ram
- Emperor's New Cloak
- Wing Suit
- Soul River Jar
- Vaunted Prize
- Woman-Hating Sword
Total: 34035 exp

Exp Totals:

- Carter / Sydney, Level 6 Magic-User: 65759 (Level up at 72000)

- Ollie / Jojo Fullbeard, Level 6 Muscle Wizard: 42775 (Level up at 72000)
Level Up! +1d4 HP! +1 Mana! +Free spell! +1 to Saves! +Backstory!

- James G / Tyler Lockheart, Level 6 Specialist: 35101 (Level up at 48000)

- George / Poison Phil, Level 5 Fighter: 28175 (Level up at 32000)

- Kitty / Julian & Aximander, Level 5 Languid Wastrel: 19844 (Level up at 36000)
Level Up! +1d6 HP! +1 Mana! +Free Spell! +1 to Saves! +Backstory!

Session 343 - Loaded for Boar

Date: 23 May, 22 p.p.

Moon: Waxing Crescent - Clean Face

Zenith: Eris

New Characters:
- Shrub Junior, a Brackling related mysteriously to Shrub Nigeria on the moon. Their fruits are bananas, and they are shaped in a very odd pixelated manner related to their time in Fate's Matrix...

New Backstory:
- Aximander was gravely insulted and took the long circuitous Elvish route to get his revenge - a slow buildup of tiny slights and incredibly subtle social snubs that made his rival look both embarrassed and incredibly gauche. +1 Intelligence score.

Events:

--- Return to Splug

- On returning to the Goblin village of Splug after their failed attempt to get past the golems within the pyramid, the party discover that there is a great deal of controversy. Former guard captain Queezling insists that resisting the golems next time is a fool's errand since they can't rely on adventurers turning up next time, outspoken hobgoblin Horngus demands that the pyramid be covered off completely.
- Outside of town, near the moored flesh zeppelin Jonathon Toast, a lunar object crashes to the sludgey ground! Pulling itself from the impact site is... Shrub Jr! He immediately joins the party and is somehow trusted implicitly due to meme magic. He also gets some crab gear from the crab armorer.

--- Spike Time
- Given the lack of beef currently available to the party - a wizard, an elf, and a bananaman - they decide to check out the "marlingspike" they've been told about to the east. They go around the shiny metallic ferrofluid river and head in the direction of the spike. The terrain is oozy and gross, a sort of hardened muddy oobleck in which you start to sink if you stand still. Rock sticking out of the ooze is covered in colourful blooms of lichen, and a rainbow oilslick shimmer fills your footprints.
- Soon they see a bunch of people heading across their path from the north, white robes ooze-stained and white wiggly tails dangling from their sperm-shaped hats. It's some Zeanists! We thought they'd all died out years ago!
- Sydney steps forward as the face of the party, since Aximander is currently looking a bit too Elvish and Shrub Junior is well... Shrub Junior.
- It seems these Zeanists are fleeing their mushroom farm to the north after it was invaded by a winged boar! Shrub Junior latches onto this mushroom idea as a very swift resolution to his "go to earth, get high, leave" character goal. He suggests the Zeanists follow his tracks back west and seek refuge in Splug. Big pyramid, can't miss it!
- They thank the party and head off in that direction, the head priest saying that he'd be extremely grateful if someone can bring him a sack of the mycelium-rich substrate. The mushrooms are yours to do with as you please! Also watch out... Elves are abroad. Aximander pulls his hat down over his ears a little more.

--- Totemic
- They decide to check out this boar (and of course, the mushroom farm) and follow the Zeanists' directions. Low mountains loom to the north-east and they skirt the foothills heading for a mushroom forest.
- On the way, however, they find a mysterious totem pole carved with demon mask-faces. It leans from the wastes at an angle and gets taller and taller as they get closer. There is a shimmer of gold from the top.
- Aximander pokes the tower with his crab-spear and feels a jolt of energy go through him! He feels slightly less intelligent and slightly more wise. Curious.

- He's very curious about the shimmer at the top of the pole, so Sydney loans him his Cat Ring! Cat-Aximander ascends the pole as a rain begins to fall, and soon reaches the top with feline grace. There is a golden chalice up here, dripping the thinnest amount of milk into a bowl-shape cut into the top of the pole. He licks it. It's sweet!

- He bats it off the top and observes the bowl-shape it was in. There are phases of the moon drawn there with a demon's face where the full moon should be. Maybe they'll return then?

- Cat-Aximander drops from the top of the totem pole, lands neatly, and has his collar removed to turn him back into an Elf. Lovely!

--- Pig Egg
- They go into the mushroom forest, here mostly sprouting big portobello-style wide caps. Shrub Junior tries some, but they're both disgusting and inedible. Great.
- They follow the Zeanists' path around until they find the shattered tower they were told about. It is, indeed, a shattered tower, but it still stands! Big chunks of it have fallen away from the sides. There's no boar, but there are plenty of big white feathers in the mud. Arrayed around the tower is a fairly large campite, the tents ravaged.

- The party loots the camp, finding a book on Ur-Barakh, a vial of Bleed Poison, and a mushroom-based recipe for a Potion of Bounty.
- Inside the tower it's a mess - the boar has clearly scarfed up a load of mushrooms and left its feathers everywhere. Sydney grabs a sackful of feathers while Shrub Junior gathers a sack of the mycelium.
- Aximander finds a nest on the top floor of the tower and spots a pink and red-speckled egg in a nest of feathers! It's his now! Pig Egg acquired!

- From up here they can see an emaciated goat wandering around the camp. Another pet! Result! They run down and rope it before it can get away.

--- Hunting the Boar

- The trail the boar left is very obvious, seeing as it's leaving those white feathers everywhere. It goes into the mushroom forest and the party follow. Shrub Junior tries the mushrooms with taller caps and these are inedible too, but this time way too mushy.
- They hear squealing and crashing sounds, and carefully approach. It's the boar, charging at the mushrooms and smashing them up in a frenzy.
- Shrub Nigeria throws it a banana from his branches and the boar eyes it up. With a horrible tearing sound, a whole second jaw with a hawk beak snaps out of its pig mouth and grabs the banana!

- Shrub Nigeria coats another banana with Bleed poison, puts it in Sydney's alms bowl, and has Sydney's slime familiar carry it out. The hawk-jaw snaps out, devours the banana... and the boar starts spewing up blood!
- It dies in obvious agony.
- Sydney approaches and grabs the wings. They pull off horribly easily, leaving sweet-smelling wounds.
- A huge oink from overhead! Shrub Nigeria speaks pig, apparently, and knows that it's a mate-seeking call!
- They flee before the boar sees what happened to its partner, not to mention the egg!

---  Tyler's Orgiastic Return

- On their way back south, feeling pretty chuffed with their little adventure, and head back through some of the mushroom forest. There they come across a circle of standing stones. In the circle there are bowls with fresh hors d'oeurves and piles of soft bedding. Voices approach...
- Some goblins are walking in from the west, one in a pig mask and one in a bear mask. And with them... Tyler Lockheart! Where's he been? At the hairdresser, apparently.
- They mistake the party for orgy participants, to the visible confusion of at least Sydney. Can Goblins even have sex??
- In any case, they inform that they did indeed pass by a big spike on the way here and it was shimmering with rainbow hues.
- The party, uncomfortable, leave towards the spike. Tyler stays a while..

--- Sloth

- The mushroom forest gives way to foothills, then low mountains. It's fairly easy going after the sludgy wasteland.
- They crest a rise and look down into a shallow valley. At the bottom there's an enormous blue-masked demon covered in red vines!
- Julian cuts a vine and it spews black ichor... then starts writhing towards him! It's slow but steady, pulsing under the thorns.
- Sydney has a cunning plan - finally use Blight to kill all plants within a mile! She then realises that the goblin orgy will be affected from this distance... and Shrub Junior is also a plant. She has second thoughts about the plant nuke.
- She walks for about ten minutes to the south so that she's out of range of the orgy and Shrub Junior, then she'll cast it and kill all the vines!
- There she comes across a witch! The witch is cutting a pig's head, draws some dice from inside its skull, and invites Sydney to gamble with her...
- After losing some money to the witch, she gives some advice for free... the Blight spell will kill all the plants, but any that survive will hate Sydney for the rest of her days. Once again Sydney has second thoughts about the plant nuke.
- The witch also tells Sydney that the demon was stopped at great cost and bound with the red vines to stop it from destroying the world, so maybe don't free it?

- Aghast, Sydney returns to the demon with the witch in tow. Tyler immediately gambles sausages with her.
- New idea - drain the demon with their Atrametal weapons! Julian and Sydney drive their black blades into the demon's hide, evading strikes from the red vines as they do so!
- While the weapons charge, it's time to cook! They throw Ham, one of Shrub Junior's Bananas, old "Gambler's Sausage" from Tyler, Eye of Newt from the witch, and Mushroom into a pot and Sydney boils it up, creating a meal they call "Lucky Dip". It's... not bad!

- We end here since the pub is closing up. Next week... onwards to the spike?

Total: 8000 exp

Treasure:

- Mushroom-based instructions to brew Potion #290 - Potion of Bounty

- Book #117 - "Ur-Barakh, City by the Undersea" (100 exp)

- Bag of feathers
- Bag of drug mushroom mycelium
Total: 100 exp

Enemies Defeated:
- A half-dead winged boar (100 exp)
- A vine-covered demon, probably (1500 exp)

Total: 1600 exp

OOC:
- Chronicler - Carter

Exp Totals:

- Carter / Sydney, Level 6 Magic-User: 54472 (Level up at 72000)

- James G / Tyler Lockheart, Level 6 Specialist: 26554 (Level up at 48000)

- Kitty / Julian & Aximander, Level 3 Languid Wastrel: 6490 (Level up at 9000)

- Charles / Shrub Junior, Level 1 Banana Brackling: 1695 (Level up at 2000)

Session 334 - The Unravelled

Date: 17 January, 23 p.p.
Moon: Waxing Crescent - Dragonwane
Zenith: The Dead God

New Backstory:

- Celebus was destitute and turned to petty crime - stealing chicken sandwiches from the nastiest chicken shop in New Moondin. Luckily when he was caught they punished him by making him a taste tester, and the rest is history! +1 Dexterity

- Tyler Lockheart has a secret crush on Celebus! If your crush would be damaged in combat, you can jump in the way and take double the damage instead,

Events:

--- War Preparation
- With the door out of the room locked, the party does a bit of prep to hopefully deal with the dangerous Unravelled on the other side. Dorian gets to slurping down one of the dead monks and stealing its stretchy powers, Celebus raises the remainder as zombies, and Tyler resets the big swinging trap that they set up last week.
- Outside the door, the Unravelled monks are not well pleased by the murder of their friends. There is a bit of back and forth through the door, until Iskander gets bored and crossbows the guy on the outside!
- They are even more not well pleased and start setting up barricades on the outside. The party is sad because now they're trapped in here with nothing to eat but skeletons and like 10000 old sausages that Tyler presumably has in a big wet bag. 

--- Take the Fight to Them!
- Iskander jumps on the swinging spike trap and launches himself out the door! He discovers that they're setting up barricades, but too slow! An unfortunate monk is in the way and gets spike trapped!
- The monks have stretchy arms and attack over their barricades, but to be fair Dorian now does too! He uses the arm like a spring, smashing his sword into the enemies' faces!
- The really tall guy who's compressed himself into a long snakey fellow tries to slip past Tyler into the room, but Tyler's surfcraft is too powerful! They wrestle nobly, Tyler getting his surfboard stuck right into the guy's craw.

- The party retreats back into the room, hoping to bait them in. The skeletons quickly close the door and Celebus quickly casts his new Bone Claws spell which does exactly what you'd expect!
- Tyler keeps nailing dudes with thrown rocks, just ludicrous accuracy. You love to see it.
- Iskander kills the big giant snakey guy with his insane Fish Blades which are made of actual fish.
- A chanting sound comes from outside in the corridor. What could it be???

--- The Unravelled Cleric
- The source of the sound is soon discovered - some sort of Unravelled priest. He calls a ceasefire and asks why the ceaseless bloodshed??
- Celebus engages him in a battle of wits... achieved irl by having a glass of water with salty lemon and another one with just lemon. Who will win the battle of wits!?
- It's Celebus, but he doesn't believe it when he actually wins, declaring that there's salt in his drink even though he doesn't.

- In any case, the deed is complete, and the priest grants the party amnesty (for now) and offers to take them to the stairs down to the final level where his god waits in the darkness.

- It seems all these people have different ideas of who the Unraveller is, and everyone has an inconsistent story about what they want from their worshippers. Very strange.
- They also see one of the monks starting to knit the big snaky guy back together, starting with the face.
- After being allowed to rest in the room, heal up, and have a sleep (very kind), the priest shows them to the big grand spiral staircase that leads down to the lair of the Unraveller. He warns that there are cancerous beasts down there, and weird things out of time.

- At the bottom of the stairs, the priest points out the big cancer monster that's roving around, and says it's too powerful for him.
- Iskander drinks a Potion of Clairvoyance and detects in all the adjacent rooms... even finding some gold! Once they've killed the beast, perhaps they can get the treasure....

Total: 5000 exp

Foes Defeated:
- Several unravelled Dwarf guys (500 exp)
- Big giant snakey guy (1000 exp)

Total: 1500 exp

Exp Totals:

- Kitty / Dorian "Ditto" DeMone, Level 7 Inheritor: 80036 (Level up at 144000)

- Charles / Celebus Uppytus, Level 7 Necromancer: 74134 (Level up at 144000)

- Ollie / Iskander Fullbeard, Level 6 Fighter: 59086 (Level up at 64000)

- James G / Tyler Lockheart, Level 6 Specialist: 24859 (Level up at 48000)
Level Up! +1d6 HP +2 Skill Points! +1 to Saves! +Backstory!

Session 307 - Astro Moon's Shit-Eating Grin

Date: July 28, 21 p.p.

Moon: Waxing Gibbous
Zenith: The Allfather

New Backstory:

- Astro Moon had a good set of friends when she was young, and was a devoted follower. +X to actions that at least two others have succeeded at this round/turn, +1 per success

- Iskander got the wrong impression of his mentor, Zulu, and kissed her... she threw him into the Burning Bush while it was on fire. +1 HD of health for the rest of the session if you successfully romance someone

Events:

--- The Meatworks
- With Swan the Swift currently down with the novel coronavirus, the rest of the team decide to take on an ancilliary heist - the Meatworks! A horrible factory which creates the Meat Lord's most powerful mutant Meat Men. Take it down and the assault on the Meat Lord's citadel will be much easier.
- There are two obvious entries - the front door (heavily guarded) and the poop chute outflow into the river (disgusting). Luckily surfer bro Tyler Lockheart is here with his radical surfing power! A plan is hatched!
- Tyler is to wear three of the magic meat necklaces containing almost all of his team-mates, while Iskander with his so-so surfing skills will bodyboard in behind. Tyler does so stylishly, surfing up the poop chute, while Iskander nearly messes up by falling into the stinky brown. Luckily it camouflages him enough to remain unseen by any guards!

--- The Flushway
- They paddle in up the outflow and find themselves in a tunnel with a fairly thin ledge, all running with brown sludge. It is strangely familiar to those who experienced a certain chocolate factory on a certain lunar body. Must be their dodgy maps they brought with them...
- For some reason, Astro Moon tastes the faecal river! A rush of magic nearly sends her gobbling up big handfuls of the stuff... but luckily she passes the save! Phew!
- They find some noses that can be pressed to release antiseptic gunk. It's covid safe!
- The doors are big clenched mouths that open with an "ouch!" when you bop their nose.

--- Cauldrons and the Poop Guy

- Hearing voices and splashing behind one door, and not much other than a faint bubbling behind the other door, they opt for the latter. Inside are cauldrons full of bubbling colourful gunk... and at one side of the room a really fat guy in a big press!
- They talk to the guy and it seems he's being mined for his magical poop, which is squeezed out occasionally by the big press. It's very horrible, but the guy refuses to be released because they'll just do this to someone else. At least he knows that while he's here getting tortured it's preventing someone else from the same fate.

- Investigating the gunk cauldrons it soon becomes apparent that, yes, there's a random table. Who can resist drinking random goop in a dungeon when it's got a random table attached?!

- Results range from some big goop guy coming out and attacking you (this happens twice, both times eventually murdered!), some delicious strawberry-flavoured liqueur, and something that is just marmite.
- They check a side room and find some kids imprisoned! They are all references to some well known characters from a certain book about a chocolate factory! Maybe to be released later, who knows.
- Tyler peeps into the next main room through the gritted teeth, seeing little orange guys with buckets in their crab claw hands scooping frothy broth full of mutating flesh and eyeballs from big seething vats!
- Celebus charges up a spell and animates a bucket of guts as a distraction! The horrified target tries to drop the bucket as the guts start slithering over him and... the pub tells us they're closing early tonight!

- It's a cliffhanger ending!

Total: 4000 exp

Loot:
- Strawberry Liqueur x5
- Marmite x7

Murders:
- 2 big goopy blobby guys! (150 exp)

OOC:
Art Attack: Charles
Model Maniac: Ollie
Chronicler: Charles
Expedition Leader & Vanguard: Kitty
Quartermaster & Triage: Ollie
Chef: Izzy

Exp Totals:

- Charles / Celebus Uppytus, Level 6 Necromancer: 38953 (Level up at 72000)

- Kitty / Amanta, Level 6 Mantis Specialist: 36111 (Level up at 56000)

- Ollie / Iskander Fullbeard, Level 6 Fighter: 35874 (Level up at 64000)

- James G / Tyler Lockheart, Level 5 Specialist: 13459 (Level up at 24000)

- Izzy / Astro Moon, Level 4 Muscle Wizard: 13192 (Level up at 18000)

Session 303 - Let's Get to Work Drinks

Date: July 16, 14 p.p.

Moon: Waning Gibbous
Zenith: The Lady

New Backstory:
- Tyler Lockheart lost an argument with Swan the Swift over a choice he'd made. When you fail a Save, they automatically pass the same Save.
- Tyler Lockheart's father was an angry drunk, and he got good at dodging bottles. +1 Dexterity

Events:

--- Split to the Party
- Team Work Drinks, being Celebus and Swan the Swift, have been dragged to after work drinks by the staff of the bank. Swan is still massively fucked off about his treatment by HR, and stands seething in the corner.
- To prevent anyone talking to him, Celebus tells the assembled circle of drinkers that Swanny has the most tiresome job possible - Operational Risk. Swanny is ignored for the rest of the night.
- Celebus gets to work making idle chatter about the layout of the bank, since he's a new intern and all. Through the power of weaponised dramatic irony, this is all useful information for the second team...

--- Night Guards
- Inside the bank the Specialists of Team Heist, being Amanta and Tyler, have managed to remain inconspicuous as the staff all filed out. Now there's just the eyeball cameras and the night guards to deal with.
- Also, for those listening at home, the bank is an enormous pig and they're running around in its innards.
- At the work party Celebus is being told about the high-security safes are protected under acid, and the controls are in the guard room in the brain, and how the security protocols are a complete nightmare whenever someone actually wants to get their stuff out. Celebus, on his third pint, nods sagely.
- Amanta scurries across the floor of the bank's main hall, towards the brain. She slips past a guard without a sound, jimmies the lock on the door, and slides inside before the eye-camera comes back online. She sees a brief glimpse of a cat-like reflective coating on the thing as it turns back on - clearly night vision.
- She looks into the brain room itself, her big mantis bug-eyes peeking around the side of the door. There are guards playing cards... and at least one of those weird dogs with anglerfish heads sniffing around.

--- HR Approaches
- Back in the pub, Swan sees the HR lady that fired him and was so very fucking rude doing it.
- He sees her heading to the toilet, and follows with his massive axe.

- Celebus sees him leave and takes attention with a shit anecdote. It's easy to pull attention away from the Operational Risk guy apparently.

--- You've Got Buns Hun
- Amanta, in a cunning ruse, decides to pretend she's Olga the Cleaning Lady and offer the remaining guards in the guard room her remaining Slut Buns. These were obtained directly from a Lust Demon and very potent.
- Unfortunately for the ruse, she is a giant fucking mantis woman. The guards scream, the fish-dog screams, everyone screams. She tries to lob her buns into everyone's mouths and fails, accidentally falling onto the tray and devouring them all... except for one that is snarfed up by the fish-dog.
- It is suddenly realised that there is one big thing that everyone knows about mantis mating... they devour the male. This horny mantis is hungry for heads! In a state of lust-rage Amanta runs at the guards and they flee!

- Tyler picks this exact moment to sneak into the guard room and towards the bank of clearly labelled switches that lower the acid in the safe room. He chooses number one... and finds that only one can be used at a time. He sneaks back out before the enraged Amanta sees him, pursued by an amorous fish-hound.

--- Laughing Powder
- At the pub, Celebus sees the tentacle-handed supervisor who was dealing with the sausage sorting office. His name is Greg Hands, apparently.
- Celebus offers him a bump of coke, which Greg gratefully and surreptitiously accepts.
- Joke's on him! It's laughing powder! Greg bursts out laughing... and will continue for a good week or so.
- While he's distracted, Celebus nicks his keys. Now they can get back into the pub!

--- The Eyes Have It
- Tyler sneaks back, having managed to lose the fish-dog on the way. He drops into the drained acid pit and, against the odds, manages to ace the lock on the safe! Inside he finds a delicious, and very valuable, leg of cured iberico ham. Clean meat! They're rich!
- Back in the brain, Amanta has calmed down. She operates the next switch, draining the next acid pit down in the gallbladder.
- To my bafflement, Tyler once again easily opens the safe! Inside are various interesting bits and pieces which he scoops out before jumping out of the acid pit again.
- Suddenly another door bursts open! It's the guards who fled earlier, and they've brought another guard with loads of eyes! They charge at Amanta, who throws a Tooth Grenade she's been saving since the massive hands! It misses the eye guard but explodes on the other two, who are rapidly covered in rapidly-growing lines of teeth that tear at their flesh! They stumble on after her, the Eye Guard ducking back into the door he came from.
- Amanta runs back out of the guard room towards the gallbladder, and more importantly towards the lower lung where their drill-worm still waits for them to exit the place!

--- Heeeere's Swanny
- In the toilets at the pub, Swanny axes through the door of the stall and peers through at the mean HR lady with a wild look in his eyes.
- There is a loud scream and Swan emerges from the loos covered in blood.
- Luckily this is the Meatlands and that's not so strange.
- Before anyone can investigate, Celebus grabs Swan by the arm and meaningfully directs him towards the exit. To the bank!

--- Guards! Guards!
- Amanta is fleeing the guards across the main floor of the bank, hurdling queue barriers. 
- The main doors open... it's Celebus and Swan!
- The guards, surprised, are quickly cut down.
- But then, more guards! The enraged manager Kevin from before is here, along with another guard! There is a sound of loud gongs echoing through the place. The alarm has finally been raised!
- Amanta nips back to the brain room to engage the third and final lever. Elsewhere, Tyler tinkers open YET ANOTHER safe despite his 2/6 Tinker and finds inside half a dragon core!

- Swan and Celebus' skeleton swiftly despatch the hated Kevin with a wild axe-swing and skele-claw combo, ripping the guy's massive veins from his body.
- The Eye-man from before, having gathered more guards, bursts in with another anglerfish-dog! The dog goes straight for the skeleton because it's made of bones, destroying it easily. The Eye Guard shoots something nasty-looking from a blowgun, barely missing Igor.
- It's a quick and nasty fight. Igor's electro-punches and Swan's mighty axe doing most of the work, while true to form Celebus takes a few hits. Soon the guards have been eliminated, their blood slicking the pigmeat floor.

--- Pig Pen Shenanigans
- Meanwhile Tyler is still creeping around the place. The upper lung contains live pigs in pens, so he sneaks up the hatch and peeks in.
- There's definitely a few anglerfish-dogs up there, along with some guards who probably also have to muck out the pens.
- Tyler uses his fishing rod to unlatch one of the pig pens, and a fat sow comes grunting out. A guard investigates... but we don't have time for more so we end on that cliffhanger.

Total: 10000 exp

Treasure:
- 10000sp of fine iberico ham (10000 exp)

- The People's Polearm - 1d10 damage, +2 to hit per ally in weapon range
- Slab of dried beef (2000 exp)
- 3 Gifflewim Coins
- Ram's Horn that sounds like an air horn
- Half a Gravity Dragon core (5000 exp)
Total: 17000 exp

Foes Defeated:
- The mean HR lady (5 exp)
- Quite a lot of guards (500 exp)
- Several special ability guards (225 exp)
- A few anglerfish-dogs (300 exp)
Total: 1030 exp

Roles:
- Chronicler & Chef - Charles
- Expedition Leader - Kitty
- Vanguard - George

Exp Totals:

- George / Swan the Swift, Level 6 Barbarian: 41712 (Level up at 64000)

- Charles / Celebus Uppytus, Level 5 Necromancer: 31337 (Level up at 36000)

- Kitty / Amanta, Level 6 Mantis Specialist: 28495 (Level up at 56000)
Level Up! +1d6 HP! +2 Skill Points! +Backstory!

- James G / Tyler Lockheart, Level 4 Specialist: 11189 (Level up at 12000)
Level Up! +1d6 HP! +2 Skill Points! +Backstory!

Session 302 - Piggy Bank Heist!

Date: July 15, 14 p.p.

Moon: Full Dragon Face

Zenith: The Lady

New Backstory:
Swan the Swift burned an entire town down during a raid... which he insists was an act of mercy. +1 to actions that are noble or righteous.

Events:

--- Casing the Piggy Bank
- Inside a giant nostril deep in the Meatlands, the party plans their next move. The day is here. It's time to rob the bank! Not only will this hopefully make them rich, but it'll also destabilise the Meat Lord's meat economy.
- First things first, to case the place. Wearing completely unsuspicious disguises, they walk straight in the front door (well, mouth) of the bank. It is, naturally, an enormous pig.
- They note eyeballs growing on the ceiling and peering at people in the queue for the bank. Looks like that's a security feature! The queue inside is even longer and they clearly don't have enough clerks.
- When they finally reach the front, the bored clerk wearing very a sexy bank teller costume for some reason explains the banks' remarkably shit interest rates and other such minutiae. Iskander hides the worm-attracting relic bone inside a single sausage and deposits it with the bank. This will help them break in when they start the heist!

--- Infiltrator Worm
- They return to their nostril HQ and prepare. Celebus wraps and sews together the roll of wormskin they have to create a smaller worm and animates it. Digging equipment is a go!
- A quick detour to the shops to get heist equipment on the way, and the worm team is set.

- Eegor heads to the bank to create a sexy distraction, and the heist is a go!
- They drill through the ground, the worm innately able to follow the worm-attraction necklace even in undeath. It chews through the flesh and meat and comes out in what looks to be one of the pig's massive lungs!

--- Bloody Guards

Tyler Lockheart sneaks up the stairs carved out of the lung and checks out what's above. It's a heart! And inside, not noticing him, are four meaty guards.
- Celebus helps shave Swan's leg so that he can seduce the guards, and helps him into a sexy bank teller costume. He goes up the stairs, sticks out his shaven leg, and coos "seductively". The guard... falls for it! He follows "her" down the stairs... and she immediately betrays him! A swift trip and he falls into the grinding maw of the worm which is still grinding away like a sarlacc!
- The guy explodes into blood, and the other guards come to see what just caused a Wilhelm Scream!
- They drip blood from their pores, and it quickly becomes obvious that the guards can turn themselves completely into moving pools of blood!
- It doesn't help them for long. Despite Iskander's crossbow snapping clean in half the guards are, one by one, kicked into the sarlacc pit. Turning into blood can't save them from the worm!

--- HRmaggeddon
- Threat eliminated, Tyler sneaks up the stairs further and finds the other lung contains a bunch of pig pens and, yes, living pigs! He also sees at least one guard with an anglerfish-headed guard dog.

- Leaving that alone for now, the team looks out into the room beyond the heart. It's sort of a big stomach, with a fair number of clerks diligently working at desks tracking meat stocks. Clerks pushing trolleys piled high with strings of sausages push them back and forth across the floor, taking the meat money to and from the tellers out front of house.
- Swan, still dressed in sexy bank teller gear, tries to grab one of the meat-laden trolleys. The guy pushing it is aghast and complains to the manager - an incredibly angry man with pulsing veins in his forehead!
- After some wrestling, during which the manager gets more and more hulked out as he complains about overwork, Swan loses the wrestle and is kicked out onto the main floor! 
- Celebus sneakily shoots the manager with a stun blowdart, and the guy keels over. It's suddenly chaos as the clerks run about wondering what to do!
- Swan claims the manager sexually harassed him and HR is summoned forth! A very loud and very Australian HR lackey bustles past the rest of the party, who are watching on with amazement, and deals with the issue by having the guards take Swan to a debriefing chamber.
- Inside the debriefing zone... Eegor who was previously arrested for his sexy distraction out the front of the bank is there. Perfect.
- After various HR shenanigans Eegor and Swan are released from the chamber with their severance pay... a meagre two sausages each. What zero unionisation does to a mf.

--- Packing Meat
- Meanwhile the others sneak around, since basically everyone in the vicinity is still tied up with these Human Resources distractions.
- They see where the sausage trolleys are being taken - a big sorting pancreas. The middle-manager within has octopus tentacles and is processing sausage incomings and outgoings, taking in deposits and using them to give to people withdrawing their meat cash. He's busy and flustered and when the party seems to be getting in the way frustratedly moves them on!
- The door opposite gives way to a room with pools of acid and locked safes under it! Surely high value meats are contained within. There is no obvious way of draining the acid to get to the safes, so for now the greedy team can merely look and imagine what's within.
- Going out of the room, they hear a loud announcement that due to an HR dispute the bank is closing early! Convenient! Several of the clerks announce that they're going to the pub, and invite the party along with them! Must be new guys, see.
- Celebus and Iskander go to the pub with the clerks, while Amanta and Tyler hide until the bank is closed and sneak back to the sausage trolley sorting room to steal those sweet sausages. There are about 4000 all told, and they squeakily push the trolley back to the worm in the lung so they can store them for later exfiltration...

Treasure:
- 4000 sausages (4000 exp)
- Swan the Swift's dignity (priceless)

Enemies Defeated:
- 4 blood-transforming guards, worm food (300 exp)
- An extremely angry boss, stun-darted (100 exp)
- The HR system, survived (2 exp)

OOC:
Charles - Chronicler
George - Expedition Leader
Ollie - Quartermaster and Triage
Kitty - Vanguard
100 exp ea.

Exp Totals:

- George / Swan the Swift, Level 6 Barbarian: 34604 (Level up at 64000)

- Ollie / Iskander Fullbeard, Level 5 Fighter: 24508 (Level up at 32000)

- Charles / Celebus Uppytus, Level 5 Necromancer: 24129 (Level up at 36000)

- Kitty / Amanta, Level 5 Mantis Specialist: 21387 (Level up at 28000)

- James G / Tyler Lockheart, Level 3 Specialist: 4181 (Level up at 6000)