ADVENTURE 34: PLANETOID HULK
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NPC Roster:
Game Session Date: 13 May 2017
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The next week was a particularly boring one for the adventurers, as their services as slave-pirates were not needed and they were left in their cells. The neogi were busy during that time, though - they managed to find buyers for both the Star Beetle and the damaged Fishgulper.
The new dohwar slaves were a source of much-needed entertainment. They were full of stories from their travels and were more than happy to relate them - for a price. (Pretty much everything a dohwar did came with a price; they were merchants down to the bone.) Of course, as the adventurers were currently as poor as the dohwar, the penguinfolk took stories of the adventurers' exploits as payment. If nothing else, it helped to pass the time.
The dohwar ship's captain, Dorpp, had a unique perspective about his captivity. "Life is filled with ups and downs," he opined. "The good thing about our present situation is that things can only go up from here. And being a slave isn't all that bad. In fact, in many cultures, slaves are allowed to have slaves themselves. Hey, that gives me an idea: do any of you want to become my sub-slave?" He got no immediate takers.
"Seriously," continued Dorpp. "I will pay any of you your own weight in gold if you become my sub-slave for the duration of my own slavery."
This intrigued Castillan enough to play along. "And where are you going to get this gold?" he asked. "Everything of value aboard your ship was taken by the neogi."
"Oh, I have my ways," said Dorpp in his most mysterious voice.
"Okay," said Castillan, curious as to how this would play out. "I'll be your sub-slave - but only once I get my gold."
Dorpp immediately stuck his head between the bars of his cell and looked at his former crewmates. "Witnessed?" he asked.
"Witnessed," agreed the dohwar helmsman, Pip, from the cell on the left.
"Witnessed?" asked Dorpp again, this time swiveling his head top the other side of his cage.
"Witnessed," agreed the dohwar head administrator, Chit, from the cell on the right.
"So when do I get my gold?" asked Castillan.
"I will have your gold for you the next time we leave this ship," promised Dorpp. "At which point you will become my sub-slave." The dohwar's confident attitude gave Castillan pause, but as he turned the whole concept around in his head he couldn't see the dohwar's angle. He only regretted their present diet, which had each of the slave-pirates losing a few pounds. If he was going to get his whole weight in gold, then every pound counted!
Castillan only had to wait less than a day before being paid in full, for the following morning Slavemaster Scrotish unlocked the slave cells and led the group to the hold where their equipment was scattered on the floor. "Gear up!" commanded the slavemaster. "You have a mission!" As the adventurers put on their armor and gathered up their weapons, Castillan looked expectantly at the dohwar, who had no equipment to gather save for a single weega each - the distinctive beak-mounted dohwar sword used by the Deathsquealers. The dohwar cavalry force had been slain and neither of the current dohwar slave-pirates was particularly skilled in the use of the weapon, but their flippers prevented them from gripping a sword in the normal fashion and neither wanted to go into battle without some sort of weapon.
Castillan sidled up to the dohwar captain. "You got an extradimensional space filled with gold in that sword of yours or something?" he asked. "Because we're about to head out of the ship."
"I am aware," promised Dorpp. "Your payment is forthcoming."
"Quit the chattering!" commanded Slavemaster Scrotish. Then, seeing everyone was geared up, he ordered them to assemble on the battle deck, the uppermost part of the neogi deathspider. To do so, each slave-pirate had to slip through a hexagonal hole in the floor and scramble to right themselves once on the other side, for passing through the hole involved reorienting oneself to the opposite gravity plane. Binkadink went first, flipping himself over fairly easily; they'd had to pass through the switching gravity plane several times now and it was getting to be old hat. Finoula and Darrien followed, and Castillan was about to go next when Dorpp shoved him aside. "I'll go next," he said, dropping through the hole in what seemed to be the floor of the lower deck and popping through the other side, rising up past what was now the floor of the middle deck, then scrambling to reorient himself. He then looked expectantly at Castillan, who from his orientation was now upside-down.
As the bounder slipped through the hole in a practiced movement, Dorpp cried out "Paid in full!" while Castillan got his bearings on the other side. "What?" asked the elf, moving aside to allow Ingebold to come up behind him.
"During the transition between gravity planes, there was a moment when you were completely weightless," explained Dorpp. "At that moment, I paid you in full your weight in gold. You are now my sub-slave."
"Cute," snorted Castillan in disbelief.
"You mean, 'Cute, Master'!" corrected Dorpp. "I won't have my sub-slave failing to give me the proper respect!" Castillan just rolled his eyes.
Once everyone had climbed up to the battle deck, Slavemaster Scrotish and the slave-pirates were joined by a pair of neogi. "I am Taskleader Spung," announced one of the neogi. "I will be leading this expedition." As he briefed the slaves, the top of the deathspider rolled back, giving the adventurers their first view of the outside world in over a week. Surprisingly, the neogi vessel had landed on solid ground, with four of its spidery legs supporting the weight of the vessel. The world they were on was a small planetoid, judging from the curvature of the rock in the distance: the whole planetoid was probably only a few miles in diameter.
"We are here to investigate one of our umber hulk breeding facilities," announced Taskleader Spung. "We lost contact with the facility three weeks ago. We are going to enter the underground tunnels and find out what happened." As he spoke, he crawled up onto Chik'tak's broad back. "As we currently have no umber hulk slaves" - and here he glared in anger at the adventurers - "we will also take this opportunity to restock. In the meantime, we will be forced to resort to substandard riding mounts."
The second neogi scanned the remaining slave-pirates, looking over his options. "You! Fat human!" he said, looking at Gilbert Fung. "Bend down so I can easily mount you." While a few of his friends stifled giggles, Gilbert bent at the knees and allowed the second neogi to crawl up onto his back. It was unnerving having eight spidery legs clutching his shoulders, back, and sides, but Gilbert knew the alternate to compliance was instant pain from the agony gems.
As if reading his thoughts, Taskleader Spung added, "Your agony gems have had a longer time to attune themselves to your bodies," he said. "Any disobedience will be dealt with immediately, in a crippling - or possibly fatal - manner. Remember this at all times." Then, the neogi both suitably mounted, the task force left the deathspider and stepped foot on the small planetoid.
There was a large crater ahead of them, although upon closer inspection it wasn't so much a crater as the opening to a vertical shaft, some 10 feet wide and an equal distant down. Binkadink held onto his glaive and was lowered down into the shaft by Gilbert and Darrien holding onto its other end. Once down on solid ground, the gnome fighter looked around and saw no impending danger. "It's safe!" he called up to the others.
One by one, the others made their way down the shaft - all but the neogi who had been perched upon Gilbert's back. He held his crossbow at the ready, guarding the tunnel entrance from anybody who might try to follow the task force - or any task force members foolish enough to think they could break away from Taskleader Spung and escape back this way. Gilbert didn't care; he was just glad to have the creepy spider-eel off his back.
Now that the task force was all in place in the subterranean tunnels, Binkadink saw an opportunity for some petty revenge. Summoning forth his innate prestidigitation ability, he caused the hair on Taskleader Spung's body to alter coloration to a vibrant purple. Given the neogi's build, with an eel-like head and neck grafted onto the front of a spider's body, the little gnome was gambling that the taskleader wouldn't even have his own spidery-fur in view for the next hour or so, when the effect would wear off.
Getting back to business, Binkadink discovered several side tunnels forming a twisty sort of maze. Taskleader Spung - unaware of his new, jaunty coloration - said this was the habitation area and expressed confusion as to why they hadn't encountered any umber hulks by now. "They usually approach once we enter their habitation area," he said, puzzled.
But it wasn't long before the first umber hulk made its appearance. It came up from behind the group, its massive body pounding the ground as it raced toward the assembled group. Given a heads-up from the sound of its pounding feet upon the solid rock, Finoula spun around a corner and held her longsword Tahlmalaera at the ready to strike out once it got within range. Likewise, Darrien stepped next to the elf ranger and nocked an arrow into his Arachnibow, ready to let fly once the umber hulk came into view.
It turned the corner with amazing speed, swiping at Finoula with a massive set of claws as if already knowing exactly where she was. The swordswoman managed to swing her blade into the insectoid creature, but in doing so she got a good look at its double set of eyes, and she felt her mind wander off in all sorts of conflicting directions. Darrien managed to fire his arrow without succumbing to the umber hulk's confusion gaze as Finoula had, but then Taskmaster Spung called out, "Do not harm it! I want it taken alive!"
Ingebold spoke the words to a quick prayer to Moradin, and a magic circle against evil sprang into being around her. She moved over close to Finoula, to encompass her in the spell's effect; immediately upon doing so, the ranger felt her wandering, confused mind snap back into order. I'll need to stay close to Ingebold until this effect wears off, she thought to herself.
In the close quarters of the ten-foot-wide tunnels, Castillan bounded up the side of a wall, jumped to the opposite wall, and leaped directly over the umber hulk's broad shoulder. He landed lightly on his feet, pivoted in place, and struck out at it with his short sword, managing to surprise the creature completely and strike it deep for extra damage. A fatal amount of damage, as he soon found out, for after stabbing his sword into the beast all the way to the hilt, it fell over when he retracted his blade.
Taskleader Spung, horrified, called out "Slave 7: activate!" in his own sibilant tongue, and Castillan's head exploded in agony. He immediately dropped his sword and fell to his knees, crying out in pain.
"What the Hell?" demanded Castillan, once the pain in his head had a moment to subside. "How are we supposed to work for you if you kill us?"
"Disobedient slaves of are no use to the neogi," responded Taskleader Spung. "If you will not obey, immediately and without question, you will be slain and replaced by another more willing to obey." He had Chik'tak, still serving as his riding mount, approach the bounder so he could put his eel-like face directly into Castillan's. "You will not survive another such punishment," Taskleader Spung snarled. "I suggest you keep that in mind the next time you are given an order. You are easily replaceable; the umber hulks are not. Do not kill them!"
"But it was trying to kill us!" sputtered Finoula.
"Unusual, but irrelevant. Your lives are not worth that of an umber hulk."
"Here comes another one!" pointed out Binkadink, looking at the tunnels before them, where a second umber hulk was fast approaching. The gnome rushed forward, holding the blade of his glaive before him and making sure he didn't stray too far from Ingebold, whose magic circle against evil was the only sure thing keeping them safe from the hulks' confusing gaze. When it got within range, Binkadink slapped it hard with the flat of his blade, hoping to knock it out rather than deal it any lasting harm. Behind him, Taskleader Spung called out in his own language - one understood by the umber hulks in the breeding colony here - demanding the umber hulk stop its attack and wait to receive further orders. Neogi normally enjoyed a complete mastery over their umber hulks; they didn't need to use their inherent powers of mental domination over them the way they needed to do so with other creatures. The fact that this one was disobeying was a major concern to the taskleader.
In the meantime, Gilbert took the time to cast a mage armor spell on himself. Chik'tak, close to the rampaging umber hulk, spun his longspear around and struck at the beast with its blunt end, copying Binkadink's subdual tactics. With the beast's heavy chitinous armor, though, it was difficult to say if they were having any effect.
Darrien took a chance by sending another arrow flying at the umber hulk; he knew he'd be causing the hulk damage if he hit, but was counting on the fact that he wasn't likely to kill it with one shot. Judging from the tone of his voice, Taskmaster Spung was furious, but fortunately his wrath was focused on the umber hulk which refused to obey his orders rather than Darrien attacking it with potentially lethal arrows. The hulk, in the meantime, continued attacking Binkadink as the little gnome stood directly in front of it; its wicked claws slashed across the front of the fighter's armor and it seemed puzzled that its confusing gaze was having no effect on any of its enemies.
"Crap!" called out Gilbert Fung from the rear of the formation. "Here come another one!" Sure enough, another umber hulk was approaching from a side tunnel behind the group. Finoula stepped up to intercept it with her blade, hoping the fact the neogi was concentrating on the hulk Binkadink was fighting would prevent him from noticing her lethal attacks. Gilbert likewise shot a barrage of magic missiles at the hulk coming up behind them; that spell could be cast in such a way as to not leave any telltale marks on the body struck, and Gilbert got a wicked thrill out of successfully ignoring Taskleader Spung's orders.
Binkadink struck several times with the flat of his blade, then, seeing the creature starting to stagger on its feet, stepped back to let the others finish this one off while he helped go deal with the other one fighting Finoula and Gilbert. The dohwar waddled up behind Chik'tak and waved their weegas around, confident in the fact that Chik'tak was in their way to keep them from actually getting within reach of the staggering umber hulk's insectoid arms and claws.
Ingebold, trying to stay between the two groups and keep them both within range of her magic circle against evil spell, stepped forward to cast a restoration spell on Castillan, who had been severely wounded by the activation of his agony gem. Revived to full strength by her spell, Castillan stepped forward and attacked the southern hulk with the flat of his blade; Taskleader Spung might be over by the other umber hulk, but the bounder wasn't taking any chances on disobeying him, just in case.
Darrien cautiously shot another arrow into the northern umber hulk, targeting it to deal the maximum amount of pain with the minimum amount of actual harm. The umber hulk roared out in pain and collapsed on the ground. Darrien winced, but Taskleader Spung seemed glad to see the creature's chest rising and falling as it lay on the ground, unmoving. "It's still alive!" he said, pleased with the slaves' efforts this time around. Then he had Chik'tak spin around and oversee the fight against the other umber hulk. They arrived just as Finoula and Binkadink knocked it unconscious.
"Something is terribly wrong with the colony," observed Taskleader Spung. "Not only have the neogi overseers failed to reply to normal communications, but the umber hulks are not obeying me as they should."
"That serious indeed," agreed Gilbert. "Maybe we leave colony, get new hulks somewhere else."
"No. We will investigate the cause of these occurrences," replied Taskleader Spung. "Slave Six: follow that tunnel!"
Binkadink hurried to comply. Going the way the neogi had indicated, the gnome exited the crisscrossing tunnels and ended up in a large chamber with a boulder in one corner. Taskleader Spung demanded the slaves move the boulder out of the way, and after a few moments of heavy labor Gilbert, Chik'tak, and Binkadink managed to do just that. Behind where the boulder had been was a sloping tunnel leading down into darkness. "The hunting levels are down there," explained the neogi, "as well as the facility headquarters, where the neogi in charge live."
Binkadink looked at the slope of the tunnel - round in cross-section and slightly larger that the diameter of the boulder, leading him to believe the rock could be pushed down the tunnel at any enemies coming up from below - and judged it to be safe to slide down. So, gripping his glaive in both hands, he did just that. There was a slight turn at the very end of the slope and Binkadink had just enough time to notice the pool of water at the tunnel's end to slam his glaive out sideways, catching a side wall of the tunnel with each end and stopping his descent before he plunged into the pool. He called back to the others, warning them about the water, and stayed there to help slow their descent as they slid down one at a time. (All but Chik'tak, who simply walked down the tunnel with still-bright-purple Taskleader Spung perched on his back.)
Once everyone was at the bottom of the slope, Darrien used his Arachnibow to shoot a strand of spider-web back up the slope, adhering the end at the top of the tunnel. "We might want that to help us get back up," he told the others.
"Good thinking," said Gilbert, slapping the half-elf on the shoulder. It was a rare moment of praise from the grumpy wizard.
"I will climb up the side of the cliff wall on my mount," announced Taskleader Spung. "The rest of you slaves go underwater. You will find a tunnel leading up to the top of the cliff. Do not tarry; any stragglers will have their agony gems activated." And with that he had Chik'tak climb up the side of the wall. The three dohwar, with their penguinlike build, dashed off into the water in a shot and swam around, looking for the underwater tunnel. It was easy to find, and they led the way up the tunnel's slope with the other slave-pirates behind them.
Meeting back up with the neogi taskleader at the top, they found him twisting his eel-like neck back and forth in irritation. "There should be umber hulks up here at the cliff top at all times," he said, annoyance in his voice that this wasn't the case. "Come!"
There were two passages from the cliff-top. Gilbert and the dohwar were sent west to investigate the egg chamber, which they reported when they got back was completely empty. To the south was the camp headquarters of the neogi in charge of running the facility. It too was empty; Taskleader Spung was scanning through a log book written in the neogi script. "The last entry was three weeks ago," he griped, "and there's nothing here explaining what happened to the missing umber hulks! Were they taken by an enemy force? Who would dare intrude upon a neogi facility with thoughts of theft?"
The taskleader was furious at this turn of events but he was also afraid, for this base camp represented the limit as to how far he'd ever gone into the umber hulk breeding colony before - everything else was as unknown to him as it was to his slaves. "Come!" he called. "We go deeper into the colony!" There was a single tunnel leading down to lower depths of the planetoid and he sent two-thirds of his slaves down before him, with the rest covering behind him.
The tunnel sloped down at a gentle angle for a good half-mile or so before leveling out again. A side passage opened into an empty chamber filled with rocks and gravel at one end; Binkadink was sent in to investigate. As he approached the rocks, more started spilling from the ceiling, erupting into a small avalanche that preceded the arrival of an ankheg, who dropped to the floor and advanced in a frenzy. Binkadink altered his stance and readied his weapon, ready to carve into the creature's chitin with the blade of his glaive. Beside him, Darrien stepped up and shot an arrow at the approaching insectoid. But then the ankheg opened its mouth wide and spat out a wide stream of acid, covering not only the two combatants before it but Castillan and Finoula behind them as well. It was the ankheg's only chance at grabbing a quick meal and at that it failed, for although the acid burned all four of those whom it had touched, Binkadink ran up to the ankheg and slew it with his glaive in mere moments, before it had an opportunity to do much else.
There was a pool of water in a nearby cavern which the dohwar explored quickly and efficiently and which proved handy to wash off the worst of the ankheg's acid. Nearby were caverns of fungal gardens and another long passageway which had recently experienced a cave-in from the ceiling, for that way - believed by Taskleader Spung to lead to further hunting grounds for the umber hulks - was impassable at present. Before resorting to having his slaves try to clear the blocked passageway, which would likely take hours, there was another passageway to the south to explore. The group moved in that direction.
The first thing Binkadink noticed were the red rocks imbedded in the walls of this southern passageway. They glowed softly in the illumination of the everburning torches tied to the antlers of his helmet, not as red as rubies - they were a stone outside his personal knowledge.
As the group continued on, Finoula opted to cast a protective spell upon herself. The only one at hand was a protection from energy spell, but it seemed like a safe time to cast it. Running through her options, she decided upon protecting herself from the ravages of flame - and was amazed when, upon casting the spell, nothing happened. "Are we in an anti-magic zone?" she asked, looking up at the red rocks scattered throughout the walls.
Castillan was the first to grasp what that might mean, if it were true. He deftly picked at the agony gem on his forehead, feeling no resistance as his fingernails got a good grasp and he pulled it from his flesh. "Guys!" he called. "It's safe to get rid of your agony gems!!" And he held up his own to show them all the truth of his statement.
Everyone immediately began ripping off their agony gems - all but the dohwar, whose flippers weren't up to such fine manipulation. (Fortunately, Dorpp had a sub-slave to assist them!) While this was going on, Taskleader Spung tried in vain to activate the suddenly-dormant pain gems, realizing that he was a lone neogi in the presence of ten slaves he no longer had any hold over.
Castillan realized it, too: his short sword ran straight into Taskleader Spung's abdomen, just below the eel-like neck, all the way to the hilt. The bounder didn't know a whole lot about neogi anatomy but his deep blade-thrust did the job, killing the taskleader immediately; there must have been some important internal organs in there, getting carved up!
"Sub-slave!" called out Dorpp. "Gather up the agony gems! They may yet prove to be valuable!" Castillan pulled the sword from the slain neogi's body, a smile on his face not only for having killed their hated oppressor but also at the fact that his spider-fur was still a vibrant purple.
But while Castillan was gathering up the agony gems, Gilbert was examining the nearest of the red gemstones embedded in the stone cavern walls and Finoula strained her elven ears. "Did you hear that?" she asked.
"Hear what?" asked Gilbert, going back to his examination. "I don't think these stones cause anti-magic field." But now even he could hear what the sharp-eared ranger had heard: the unmistakable sound of claws on a stone floor. Many claws, as a matter of fact.
The reason for the sound soon became apparent, as an enormous creature skittered into the torchlight. The beast was truly hideous: it had a bloated, grublike body with flesh the color of pus; numerous claws like oversize scythes; and dozens if not scores of eyes of various sizes scattered above a gaping maw filled with needlelike teeth and dripping nasty fluids of unknown composition. The very sight of the thing caused screams of horror and shock from even the seasoned adventurers - this was like nothing they'd ever seen before!
Gilbert's magically-enhanced vision practically exploded in his head as he glanced at the ulgurstasta - it was not only undead, but an extremely powerful form of undead. "It undead!" he cried to the others, as the dohwar scrambled backwards away from the massive grub-beast.
Binkadink didn't back off; he steadied his grip on his glaive and prepared for its approach. Darrien, his face holding an expression of extreme disgust, peppered it with arrows, but several of these were deflected by wildly-swinging hairs that writhed along the length of the ulgurstasta's hide.
And then, in a grotesque repetition of the ahkheg's attack earlier, the ulgurstasta opened wide its fang-ringed mouth and a gush of fluids exploded outwards, engulfing the heroes before it. Expelled with the acidic fluids were four skeletal bodies, which plopped on the stone floor and scrambled to gain their footing.
But the heroes had no time to worry about that now, for they were suffering from the effects of the vile breath weapon - the acidic fluid also had a life-leeching necromantic component which drained the very life force of those it touched. Chik'tak and the three dohwar were instantly overcome, the massive rastipede and the smaller penguinoids collapsing into steaming piles of flesh on the cavern floor. Gilbert and Binkadink were seriously wounded, acid burns covering their exposed flesh, yet neither allowed himself to collapse. Finoula, Ingebold, Darrien, and Castillan had also been within the range of the acidic spew, but far enough back that the effects had been lessened.
Movement among the disgorged skeletons attracted the heroes' attention as they animated and stood upright, slowly advancing to attack. The slain dohwar followed suit, flesh sloughing off their bodies as they did so. To their side, Chik'tak's animated corpse did likewise, although he had trouble standing despite his many insectoid legs; lacking a skeleton, the rastipede's external exoskeleton had been partially burned away by the acid, giving his shambling corpse a weaker foundation for undead animation.
"Out of here!" called Castillan, realizing the horrors facing them were likely more than they could handle. He raced back to the northern tunnel, grabbing an item from a belt pouch and hurling it to the ground behind him as he fled. "Attack the undead monsters!" he commanded, and the fire elemental rising up from the remains of his shattered elemental gem moved to comply. As Chik'tak's shambling corpse was the closest at hand, the elemental being struck out at the staggering exoskeleton with a burning fist.
Gilbert cast a magic missile at the ulgurstasta before turning and running as fast as his bulk would allow. He was disheartened to note his spell fizzling as it was cast; had he been wrong about the anti-magic properties of the red gemstones in the walls? "Run!" he echoed.
Nobody else needed much more prompting, seeing the ulgurstasta crawling after them on its scythe-claws, the four humanoid skeletons and three dohwar skeletons advancing before it, pitted metal weegas still strapped to their beaks. From the front of the retreating line of heroes, Gilbert took a moment to cast a scorching ray spell at the ulgurstasta and this time was pleased to see the burning streams of fire cross the distance between them and strike the massive grub. But upon hitting the undead beast the flames fizzled out. Gilbert noted two things: there were none of those red gemstones in the stone walls of this section of tunnel, and past experience allowed him to recognize the effects of a natural spell resistance when he saw it. He still wasn't sure what the red gemstones were all about, but he was reasonably sure they hadn't dampened the attack on the rampaging grub-thing so much as its own natural (or unnatural) resistance to such things.
Darrien turned and shot several arrows at the ulgurstasta before turning again and resuming his flight away from the beast. The fire elemental was attacking the dohwar skeletons with great success; the animated undead forms of the merchants weren't much better fighters than they had been in life. But the ulgurstasta continued on in its pursuit, catching up to Binkadink with its snapping teeth and fortunately missing. The gnome spun, struck out at one of the humanoid skeletons that was likewise pursuing him, and sliced through the creature's spine with a single stroke. He allowed the swing to continue on into the hide of the grub-beast, carving deep into its putrescent flesh.
Out of the southern cavern, Ingebold turned and cast a searing light spell at the ulgurstasta, burning sizzling flesh from its massive form that splattered onto the stone floor. In response, the grub lowered its repulsive head and engulfed Binkadink in a circle of slashing teeth, swallowing the little gnome whole. Binkadink's body was pulled deeper into its gullet, acid dripping from its insides and burning the fighter.
But that turned out to have been a poor strategy for the undead beast, for Binkadink suffered far less damage from the acid inside the creature's stomach than he might have taken by its gnashing teeth. Sheltered inside its body, he was free to slash out time and again with his enchanted glaive, slicing deep grooves through its undead flesh. While Darrien's arrows and Gilbert and Ingebold's spells assaulted it from the outside, the gnome continued his frenzied attack from the inside. Eventually, the ulgurstasta rolled over onto its side and stopped moving, and Binkadink's glaive-blade poked out of the creature's underside, followed by the stumbling gnome himself. Ingebold rushed up and applied healing spells to the acid-burned gnome, then followed suit with those who needed similar attention.
"We want to go back there?" asked Gilbert, concerned that there may be more of the grub-beasts around.
"Might as well," argued Darrien. "If we go back the way we came, there's a guard and a ship full of neogi ready to put us back into slavery."
"I dinnae think there'd be more of those beasties about," added Ingebold hopefully.
"But that's probably what's been eating the umber hulks," reasoned Finoula. "I wonder how it even got here?"
"Let's find out," offered Binkadink, leading the way back into the southern cavern. By then, the fire elemental had taken care of the animated skeletons that had been disgorged with the ulgurstasta's "necrobarf" (as Darrien called it) or transformed into undead by the same substance. "Poor Chik'tak," Finoula said, passing by the rastipede's steaming exoskeleton.
"You not kidding," replied Gilbert Fung. "That bug the only one who knows the way back home."
With that grim thought in the back of their minds, the group went deeper into the southern cavern. They found several places of note: a necromantic circle carved into the floor large enough to have encircled the ulgurstasta (and which according to Gilbert was probably where the grub-beast had been brought to unholy life) and a campsite where four people - judging by the number of blankets - had stayed for several weeks. Among the remains of their equipment, the group found a tome detailing the ritual for creating the ulgurstasta. By mutual agreement, this was burned by the fire elemental before it left Castillan's service, returning to its own fiery plane. There was little in the way of loot to be had, although the remaining food and small barrels of water would likely prove to be useful.
But best of all was the back tunnel Finoula found, with a slight slope leading upwards. "With any luck," she said, "this will lead back up to the surface. And the necromancers had to have gotten here somehow...." Before they left, though, they went back and Ingebold cast a gentle repose spell upon Chik'tak's ruined body, and the others helped her tug it into her portable hole for temporary storage. "I c'n try t' raise him tomorrow," she said.
The tunnel proved to lead to the surface, where Darrien made a lucky discovery: a camouflage net draped over a large item. Removing the net took some doing, but beneath it was a wooden vessel in the shape of a dragonfly. "Woo hoo!" whooped Castillan. "We've got ourselves a spelljamming vessel!"
"True," agreed Gilbert, climbing inside. "But we still don't know way home."
"True," agreed Finoula. "But at least we now have the means to get there, once we figure out where 'there' is."
Climbing aboard the dragonfly ship, the group found it to be somewhat cramped for four necromancers and even more so for six adventurers. But the seat at the front of the ship, nestled between the two large portals that comprised the dragonfly's eyes, turned out to be a spelljamming helm. Plopping into the comfortable seat, Gilbert closed his eyes and let his senses expand all around the ship. He felt a strange buzzing in his head and instinctively realized he wouldn't be able to cast any of the spells he currently still had prepared; such was the price of powering a spelljamming helm. "Everybody ready?" he asked, and without waiting for a response caused the dragonfly to raise straight up from the planetoid's surface.
Cautiously skirting along to the other side of the planetoid, the group - watching out of the forward portals - saw that the Apex Predator had left the surface as well. And for good reason, as it was in battle with a ship that looked like it could have been plucked off any of the seas of Oerth: a seagoing galleon, by the look of it. Reaching out with the magical senses afforded him by the spelljamming helm, Gilbert focused on the new vessel and saw the words "Star Skunk" etched on the ship's side.
"It Captain Skunkbeard!" he called to his friends. "He must have tracked Chik'tak!"
"That bodes well," reasoned Finoula. "It demonstrates loyalty, in any case."
"Yeah, but how glad is he going to be when he sees Chik'tak's current condition?" asked Castillan.
"What should we do?" asked Ingebold.
"Go into battle!" advised Darrien. "We should help Skunkbeard take down the neogi ship!"
"Maybe not so fast," replied Gilbert, frowning.
"Why not?" asked Finoula.
"Two reasons," replied Gilbert. "One, the neogi turning away. Skunkbeard don't need our help."
"Well, that's good," reasoned the elven ranger. "And the other reason?"
Gilbert pulled his vision away from the helm-provided view of wildspace all around the ship so he could look his compatriots in the eye. "I get good look at Skunkbeard's crew," he said. "He look fine, but most of his crew skeletons! Star Skunk manned mostly by undead!"
Castillan thought about this. "But really, we're going to have to deal with him, undead or not. He's our only way home!" he argued.
"I know," Gilbert replied. "Don't like it, though."
"Nor I," agreed Ingebold. "But what choice d'we have?"
In the end, they decided to trail Skunkbeard's ship for a day, remaining out of sight. The next day they'd have Ingebold return Chik'tak to life and go plead their case with Captain Skunkbeard.
- - -
And so the adventure ended with a dilemma: do the PCs trust Skunkbeard? On the one hand, his message to them in the book at the receiving station made him seem like a pleasant sort, yet now they know he has a mostly undead crew. There's the fact that they stole his treasure back on Skunkbeard's Island, and the fact that they got Chik'tak killed in this adventure as further strikes against them. But even Dan, running Gilbert, realized that they don't have a whole lot of choice but to try to negotiate with Captain Skunkbeard. Otherwise, they have absolutely no idea how to get back to Oerth.
On the plus side, they got a dragonfly spelljamming vessel out of this adventure, and I made up a full-scale map out of construction paper for them to use as I expect they'll want to keep it as their main means of transportation for the rest of the campaign. (So long, Vistani wagon!)
The red stones were fluxstone, which has numerous magic-warping properties. I just happened to keep rolling "spell fails" on the chart I had made up.
But boy, did they hate that ulgurstasta! And that was after I toned it down a bit; the original description calls for its waving hairs (that provide it a measure of protection against arrows and other ranged weapons) to be a full 40 feet long - I thought that was kind of ridiculous. But I don't think any of the players want their PCs to face an ulgurstasta again anytime soon!
A final word: there was a story arc in several issues of The Incredible Hulk some years back called "Planet Hulk," which is where I got the title for this adventure, once suitably tweaked.
- - -
T-Shirt Worn: My TSR Silver Anniversary T-shirt, because it contained an umber hulk.
PC Roster:
Binkadink Dundernoggin, gnome fighter 11
Castillan Ivenheart, elf bounder 11
Darrien, half-elf ranger 11
Finoula Cloudshadow, elf ranger 11
Gilbert Fung, human wizard 11
Castillan Ivenheart, elf bounder 11
Darrien, half-elf ranger 11
Finoula Cloudshadow, elf ranger 11
Gilbert Fung, human wizard 11
NPC Roster:
Chik'tak, rastipede sorcerer 2/expert 4
Ingebold Battershield, dwarven cleric 10 (Moradin)
Ingebold Battershield, dwarven cleric 10 (Moradin)
Game Session Date: 13 May 2017
- - -
The next week was a particularly boring one for the adventurers, as their services as slave-pirates were not needed and they were left in their cells. The neogi were busy during that time, though - they managed to find buyers for both the Star Beetle and the damaged Fishgulper.
The new dohwar slaves were a source of much-needed entertainment. They were full of stories from their travels and were more than happy to relate them - for a price. (Pretty much everything a dohwar did came with a price; they were merchants down to the bone.) Of course, as the adventurers were currently as poor as the dohwar, the penguinfolk took stories of the adventurers' exploits as payment. If nothing else, it helped to pass the time.
The dohwar ship's captain, Dorpp, had a unique perspective about his captivity. "Life is filled with ups and downs," he opined. "The good thing about our present situation is that things can only go up from here. And being a slave isn't all that bad. In fact, in many cultures, slaves are allowed to have slaves themselves. Hey, that gives me an idea: do any of you want to become my sub-slave?" He got no immediate takers.
"Seriously," continued Dorpp. "I will pay any of you your own weight in gold if you become my sub-slave for the duration of my own slavery."
This intrigued Castillan enough to play along. "And where are you going to get this gold?" he asked. "Everything of value aboard your ship was taken by the neogi."
"Oh, I have my ways," said Dorpp in his most mysterious voice.
"Okay," said Castillan, curious as to how this would play out. "I'll be your sub-slave - but only once I get my gold."
Dorpp immediately stuck his head between the bars of his cell and looked at his former crewmates. "Witnessed?" he asked.
"Witnessed," agreed the dohwar helmsman, Pip, from the cell on the left.
"Witnessed?" asked Dorpp again, this time swiveling his head top the other side of his cage.
"Witnessed," agreed the dohwar head administrator, Chit, from the cell on the right.
"So when do I get my gold?" asked Castillan.
"I will have your gold for you the next time we leave this ship," promised Dorpp. "At which point you will become my sub-slave." The dohwar's confident attitude gave Castillan pause, but as he turned the whole concept around in his head he couldn't see the dohwar's angle. He only regretted their present diet, which had each of the slave-pirates losing a few pounds. If he was going to get his whole weight in gold, then every pound counted!
Castillan only had to wait less than a day before being paid in full, for the following morning Slavemaster Scrotish unlocked the slave cells and led the group to the hold where their equipment was scattered on the floor. "Gear up!" commanded the slavemaster. "You have a mission!" As the adventurers put on their armor and gathered up their weapons, Castillan looked expectantly at the dohwar, who had no equipment to gather save for a single weega each - the distinctive beak-mounted dohwar sword used by the Deathsquealers. The dohwar cavalry force had been slain and neither of the current dohwar slave-pirates was particularly skilled in the use of the weapon, but their flippers prevented them from gripping a sword in the normal fashion and neither wanted to go into battle without some sort of weapon.
Castillan sidled up to the dohwar captain. "You got an extradimensional space filled with gold in that sword of yours or something?" he asked. "Because we're about to head out of the ship."
"I am aware," promised Dorpp. "Your payment is forthcoming."
"Quit the chattering!" commanded Slavemaster Scrotish. Then, seeing everyone was geared up, he ordered them to assemble on the battle deck, the uppermost part of the neogi deathspider. To do so, each slave-pirate had to slip through a hexagonal hole in the floor and scramble to right themselves once on the other side, for passing through the hole involved reorienting oneself to the opposite gravity plane. Binkadink went first, flipping himself over fairly easily; they'd had to pass through the switching gravity plane several times now and it was getting to be old hat. Finoula and Darrien followed, and Castillan was about to go next when Dorpp shoved him aside. "I'll go next," he said, dropping through the hole in what seemed to be the floor of the lower deck and popping through the other side, rising up past what was now the floor of the middle deck, then scrambling to reorient himself. He then looked expectantly at Castillan, who from his orientation was now upside-down.
As the bounder slipped through the hole in a practiced movement, Dorpp cried out "Paid in full!" while Castillan got his bearings on the other side. "What?" asked the elf, moving aside to allow Ingebold to come up behind him.
"During the transition between gravity planes, there was a moment when you were completely weightless," explained Dorpp. "At that moment, I paid you in full your weight in gold. You are now my sub-slave."
"Cute," snorted Castillan in disbelief.
"You mean, 'Cute, Master'!" corrected Dorpp. "I won't have my sub-slave failing to give me the proper respect!" Castillan just rolled his eyes.
Once everyone had climbed up to the battle deck, Slavemaster Scrotish and the slave-pirates were joined by a pair of neogi. "I am Taskleader Spung," announced one of the neogi. "I will be leading this expedition." As he briefed the slaves, the top of the deathspider rolled back, giving the adventurers their first view of the outside world in over a week. Surprisingly, the neogi vessel had landed on solid ground, with four of its spidery legs supporting the weight of the vessel. The world they were on was a small planetoid, judging from the curvature of the rock in the distance: the whole planetoid was probably only a few miles in diameter.
"We are here to investigate one of our umber hulk breeding facilities," announced Taskleader Spung. "We lost contact with the facility three weeks ago. We are going to enter the underground tunnels and find out what happened." As he spoke, he crawled up onto Chik'tak's broad back. "As we currently have no umber hulk slaves" - and here he glared in anger at the adventurers - "we will also take this opportunity to restock. In the meantime, we will be forced to resort to substandard riding mounts."
The second neogi scanned the remaining slave-pirates, looking over his options. "You! Fat human!" he said, looking at Gilbert Fung. "Bend down so I can easily mount you." While a few of his friends stifled giggles, Gilbert bent at the knees and allowed the second neogi to crawl up onto his back. It was unnerving having eight spidery legs clutching his shoulders, back, and sides, but Gilbert knew the alternate to compliance was instant pain from the agony gems.
As if reading his thoughts, Taskleader Spung added, "Your agony gems have had a longer time to attune themselves to your bodies," he said. "Any disobedience will be dealt with immediately, in a crippling - or possibly fatal - manner. Remember this at all times." Then, the neogi both suitably mounted, the task force left the deathspider and stepped foot on the small planetoid.
There was a large crater ahead of them, although upon closer inspection it wasn't so much a crater as the opening to a vertical shaft, some 10 feet wide and an equal distant down. Binkadink held onto his glaive and was lowered down into the shaft by Gilbert and Darrien holding onto its other end. Once down on solid ground, the gnome fighter looked around and saw no impending danger. "It's safe!" he called up to the others.
One by one, the others made their way down the shaft - all but the neogi who had been perched upon Gilbert's back. He held his crossbow at the ready, guarding the tunnel entrance from anybody who might try to follow the task force - or any task force members foolish enough to think they could break away from Taskleader Spung and escape back this way. Gilbert didn't care; he was just glad to have the creepy spider-eel off his back.
Now that the task force was all in place in the subterranean tunnels, Binkadink saw an opportunity for some petty revenge. Summoning forth his innate prestidigitation ability, he caused the hair on Taskleader Spung's body to alter coloration to a vibrant purple. Given the neogi's build, with an eel-like head and neck grafted onto the front of a spider's body, the little gnome was gambling that the taskleader wouldn't even have his own spidery-fur in view for the next hour or so, when the effect would wear off.
Getting back to business, Binkadink discovered several side tunnels forming a twisty sort of maze. Taskleader Spung - unaware of his new, jaunty coloration - said this was the habitation area and expressed confusion as to why they hadn't encountered any umber hulks by now. "They usually approach once we enter their habitation area," he said, puzzled.
But it wasn't long before the first umber hulk made its appearance. It came up from behind the group, its massive body pounding the ground as it raced toward the assembled group. Given a heads-up from the sound of its pounding feet upon the solid rock, Finoula spun around a corner and held her longsword Tahlmalaera at the ready to strike out once it got within range. Likewise, Darrien stepped next to the elf ranger and nocked an arrow into his Arachnibow, ready to let fly once the umber hulk came into view.
It turned the corner with amazing speed, swiping at Finoula with a massive set of claws as if already knowing exactly where she was. The swordswoman managed to swing her blade into the insectoid creature, but in doing so she got a good look at its double set of eyes, and she felt her mind wander off in all sorts of conflicting directions. Darrien managed to fire his arrow without succumbing to the umber hulk's confusion gaze as Finoula had, but then Taskmaster Spung called out, "Do not harm it! I want it taken alive!"
Ingebold spoke the words to a quick prayer to Moradin, and a magic circle against evil sprang into being around her. She moved over close to Finoula, to encompass her in the spell's effect; immediately upon doing so, the ranger felt her wandering, confused mind snap back into order. I'll need to stay close to Ingebold until this effect wears off, she thought to herself.
In the close quarters of the ten-foot-wide tunnels, Castillan bounded up the side of a wall, jumped to the opposite wall, and leaped directly over the umber hulk's broad shoulder. He landed lightly on his feet, pivoted in place, and struck out at it with his short sword, managing to surprise the creature completely and strike it deep for extra damage. A fatal amount of damage, as he soon found out, for after stabbing his sword into the beast all the way to the hilt, it fell over when he retracted his blade.
Taskleader Spung, horrified, called out "Slave 7: activate!" in his own sibilant tongue, and Castillan's head exploded in agony. He immediately dropped his sword and fell to his knees, crying out in pain.
"What the Hell?" demanded Castillan, once the pain in his head had a moment to subside. "How are we supposed to work for you if you kill us?"
"Disobedient slaves of are no use to the neogi," responded Taskleader Spung. "If you will not obey, immediately and without question, you will be slain and replaced by another more willing to obey." He had Chik'tak, still serving as his riding mount, approach the bounder so he could put his eel-like face directly into Castillan's. "You will not survive another such punishment," Taskleader Spung snarled. "I suggest you keep that in mind the next time you are given an order. You are easily replaceable; the umber hulks are not. Do not kill them!"
"But it was trying to kill us!" sputtered Finoula.
"Unusual, but irrelevant. Your lives are not worth that of an umber hulk."
"Here comes another one!" pointed out Binkadink, looking at the tunnels before them, where a second umber hulk was fast approaching. The gnome rushed forward, holding the blade of his glaive before him and making sure he didn't stray too far from Ingebold, whose magic circle against evil was the only sure thing keeping them safe from the hulks' confusing gaze. When it got within range, Binkadink slapped it hard with the flat of his blade, hoping to knock it out rather than deal it any lasting harm. Behind him, Taskleader Spung called out in his own language - one understood by the umber hulks in the breeding colony here - demanding the umber hulk stop its attack and wait to receive further orders. Neogi normally enjoyed a complete mastery over their umber hulks; they didn't need to use their inherent powers of mental domination over them the way they needed to do so with other creatures. The fact that this one was disobeying was a major concern to the taskleader.
In the meantime, Gilbert took the time to cast a mage armor spell on himself. Chik'tak, close to the rampaging umber hulk, spun his longspear around and struck at the beast with its blunt end, copying Binkadink's subdual tactics. With the beast's heavy chitinous armor, though, it was difficult to say if they were having any effect.
Darrien took a chance by sending another arrow flying at the umber hulk; he knew he'd be causing the hulk damage if he hit, but was counting on the fact that he wasn't likely to kill it with one shot. Judging from the tone of his voice, Taskmaster Spung was furious, but fortunately his wrath was focused on the umber hulk which refused to obey his orders rather than Darrien attacking it with potentially lethal arrows. The hulk, in the meantime, continued attacking Binkadink as the little gnome stood directly in front of it; its wicked claws slashed across the front of the fighter's armor and it seemed puzzled that its confusing gaze was having no effect on any of its enemies.
"Crap!" called out Gilbert Fung from the rear of the formation. "Here come another one!" Sure enough, another umber hulk was approaching from a side tunnel behind the group. Finoula stepped up to intercept it with her blade, hoping the fact the neogi was concentrating on the hulk Binkadink was fighting would prevent him from noticing her lethal attacks. Gilbert likewise shot a barrage of magic missiles at the hulk coming up behind them; that spell could be cast in such a way as to not leave any telltale marks on the body struck, and Gilbert got a wicked thrill out of successfully ignoring Taskleader Spung's orders.
Binkadink struck several times with the flat of his blade, then, seeing the creature starting to stagger on its feet, stepped back to let the others finish this one off while he helped go deal with the other one fighting Finoula and Gilbert. The dohwar waddled up behind Chik'tak and waved their weegas around, confident in the fact that Chik'tak was in their way to keep them from actually getting within reach of the staggering umber hulk's insectoid arms and claws.
Ingebold, trying to stay between the two groups and keep them both within range of her magic circle against evil spell, stepped forward to cast a restoration spell on Castillan, who had been severely wounded by the activation of his agony gem. Revived to full strength by her spell, Castillan stepped forward and attacked the southern hulk with the flat of his blade; Taskleader Spung might be over by the other umber hulk, but the bounder wasn't taking any chances on disobeying him, just in case.
Darrien cautiously shot another arrow into the northern umber hulk, targeting it to deal the maximum amount of pain with the minimum amount of actual harm. The umber hulk roared out in pain and collapsed on the ground. Darrien winced, but Taskleader Spung seemed glad to see the creature's chest rising and falling as it lay on the ground, unmoving. "It's still alive!" he said, pleased with the slaves' efforts this time around. Then he had Chik'tak spin around and oversee the fight against the other umber hulk. They arrived just as Finoula and Binkadink knocked it unconscious.
"Something is terribly wrong with the colony," observed Taskleader Spung. "Not only have the neogi overseers failed to reply to normal communications, but the umber hulks are not obeying me as they should."
"That serious indeed," agreed Gilbert. "Maybe we leave colony, get new hulks somewhere else."
"No. We will investigate the cause of these occurrences," replied Taskleader Spung. "Slave Six: follow that tunnel!"
Binkadink hurried to comply. Going the way the neogi had indicated, the gnome exited the crisscrossing tunnels and ended up in a large chamber with a boulder in one corner. Taskleader Spung demanded the slaves move the boulder out of the way, and after a few moments of heavy labor Gilbert, Chik'tak, and Binkadink managed to do just that. Behind where the boulder had been was a sloping tunnel leading down into darkness. "The hunting levels are down there," explained the neogi, "as well as the facility headquarters, where the neogi in charge live."
Binkadink looked at the slope of the tunnel - round in cross-section and slightly larger that the diameter of the boulder, leading him to believe the rock could be pushed down the tunnel at any enemies coming up from below - and judged it to be safe to slide down. So, gripping his glaive in both hands, he did just that. There was a slight turn at the very end of the slope and Binkadink had just enough time to notice the pool of water at the tunnel's end to slam his glaive out sideways, catching a side wall of the tunnel with each end and stopping his descent before he plunged into the pool. He called back to the others, warning them about the water, and stayed there to help slow their descent as they slid down one at a time. (All but Chik'tak, who simply walked down the tunnel with still-bright-purple Taskleader Spung perched on his back.)
Once everyone was at the bottom of the slope, Darrien used his Arachnibow to shoot a strand of spider-web back up the slope, adhering the end at the top of the tunnel. "We might want that to help us get back up," he told the others.
"Good thinking," said Gilbert, slapping the half-elf on the shoulder. It was a rare moment of praise from the grumpy wizard.
"I will climb up the side of the cliff wall on my mount," announced Taskleader Spung. "The rest of you slaves go underwater. You will find a tunnel leading up to the top of the cliff. Do not tarry; any stragglers will have their agony gems activated." And with that he had Chik'tak climb up the side of the wall. The three dohwar, with their penguinlike build, dashed off into the water in a shot and swam around, looking for the underwater tunnel. It was easy to find, and they led the way up the tunnel's slope with the other slave-pirates behind them.
Meeting back up with the neogi taskleader at the top, they found him twisting his eel-like neck back and forth in irritation. "There should be umber hulks up here at the cliff top at all times," he said, annoyance in his voice that this wasn't the case. "Come!"
There were two passages from the cliff-top. Gilbert and the dohwar were sent west to investigate the egg chamber, which they reported when they got back was completely empty. To the south was the camp headquarters of the neogi in charge of running the facility. It too was empty; Taskleader Spung was scanning through a log book written in the neogi script. "The last entry was three weeks ago," he griped, "and there's nothing here explaining what happened to the missing umber hulks! Were they taken by an enemy force? Who would dare intrude upon a neogi facility with thoughts of theft?"
The taskleader was furious at this turn of events but he was also afraid, for this base camp represented the limit as to how far he'd ever gone into the umber hulk breeding colony before - everything else was as unknown to him as it was to his slaves. "Come!" he called. "We go deeper into the colony!" There was a single tunnel leading down to lower depths of the planetoid and he sent two-thirds of his slaves down before him, with the rest covering behind him.
The tunnel sloped down at a gentle angle for a good half-mile or so before leveling out again. A side passage opened into an empty chamber filled with rocks and gravel at one end; Binkadink was sent in to investigate. As he approached the rocks, more started spilling from the ceiling, erupting into a small avalanche that preceded the arrival of an ankheg, who dropped to the floor and advanced in a frenzy. Binkadink altered his stance and readied his weapon, ready to carve into the creature's chitin with the blade of his glaive. Beside him, Darrien stepped up and shot an arrow at the approaching insectoid. But then the ankheg opened its mouth wide and spat out a wide stream of acid, covering not only the two combatants before it but Castillan and Finoula behind them as well. It was the ankheg's only chance at grabbing a quick meal and at that it failed, for although the acid burned all four of those whom it had touched, Binkadink ran up to the ankheg and slew it with his glaive in mere moments, before it had an opportunity to do much else.
There was a pool of water in a nearby cavern which the dohwar explored quickly and efficiently and which proved handy to wash off the worst of the ankheg's acid. Nearby were caverns of fungal gardens and another long passageway which had recently experienced a cave-in from the ceiling, for that way - believed by Taskleader Spung to lead to further hunting grounds for the umber hulks - was impassable at present. Before resorting to having his slaves try to clear the blocked passageway, which would likely take hours, there was another passageway to the south to explore. The group moved in that direction.
The first thing Binkadink noticed were the red rocks imbedded in the walls of this southern passageway. They glowed softly in the illumination of the everburning torches tied to the antlers of his helmet, not as red as rubies - they were a stone outside his personal knowledge.
As the group continued on, Finoula opted to cast a protective spell upon herself. The only one at hand was a protection from energy spell, but it seemed like a safe time to cast it. Running through her options, she decided upon protecting herself from the ravages of flame - and was amazed when, upon casting the spell, nothing happened. "Are we in an anti-magic zone?" she asked, looking up at the red rocks scattered throughout the walls.
Castillan was the first to grasp what that might mean, if it were true. He deftly picked at the agony gem on his forehead, feeling no resistance as his fingernails got a good grasp and he pulled it from his flesh. "Guys!" he called. "It's safe to get rid of your agony gems!!" And he held up his own to show them all the truth of his statement.
Everyone immediately began ripping off their agony gems - all but the dohwar, whose flippers weren't up to such fine manipulation. (Fortunately, Dorpp had a sub-slave to assist them!) While this was going on, Taskleader Spung tried in vain to activate the suddenly-dormant pain gems, realizing that he was a lone neogi in the presence of ten slaves he no longer had any hold over.
Castillan realized it, too: his short sword ran straight into Taskleader Spung's abdomen, just below the eel-like neck, all the way to the hilt. The bounder didn't know a whole lot about neogi anatomy but his deep blade-thrust did the job, killing the taskleader immediately; there must have been some important internal organs in there, getting carved up!
"Sub-slave!" called out Dorpp. "Gather up the agony gems! They may yet prove to be valuable!" Castillan pulled the sword from the slain neogi's body, a smile on his face not only for having killed their hated oppressor but also at the fact that his spider-fur was still a vibrant purple.
But while Castillan was gathering up the agony gems, Gilbert was examining the nearest of the red gemstones embedded in the stone cavern walls and Finoula strained her elven ears. "Did you hear that?" she asked.
"Hear what?" asked Gilbert, going back to his examination. "I don't think these stones cause anti-magic field." But now even he could hear what the sharp-eared ranger had heard: the unmistakable sound of claws on a stone floor. Many claws, as a matter of fact.
The reason for the sound soon became apparent, as an enormous creature skittered into the torchlight. The beast was truly hideous: it had a bloated, grublike body with flesh the color of pus; numerous claws like oversize scythes; and dozens if not scores of eyes of various sizes scattered above a gaping maw filled with needlelike teeth and dripping nasty fluids of unknown composition. The very sight of the thing caused screams of horror and shock from even the seasoned adventurers - this was like nothing they'd ever seen before!
Gilbert's magically-enhanced vision practically exploded in his head as he glanced at the ulgurstasta - it was not only undead, but an extremely powerful form of undead. "It undead!" he cried to the others, as the dohwar scrambled backwards away from the massive grub-beast.
Binkadink didn't back off; he steadied his grip on his glaive and prepared for its approach. Darrien, his face holding an expression of extreme disgust, peppered it with arrows, but several of these were deflected by wildly-swinging hairs that writhed along the length of the ulgurstasta's hide.
And then, in a grotesque repetition of the ahkheg's attack earlier, the ulgurstasta opened wide its fang-ringed mouth and a gush of fluids exploded outwards, engulfing the heroes before it. Expelled with the acidic fluids were four skeletal bodies, which plopped on the stone floor and scrambled to gain their footing.
But the heroes had no time to worry about that now, for they were suffering from the effects of the vile breath weapon - the acidic fluid also had a life-leeching necromantic component which drained the very life force of those it touched. Chik'tak and the three dohwar were instantly overcome, the massive rastipede and the smaller penguinoids collapsing into steaming piles of flesh on the cavern floor. Gilbert and Binkadink were seriously wounded, acid burns covering their exposed flesh, yet neither allowed himself to collapse. Finoula, Ingebold, Darrien, and Castillan had also been within the range of the acidic spew, but far enough back that the effects had been lessened.
Movement among the disgorged skeletons attracted the heroes' attention as they animated and stood upright, slowly advancing to attack. The slain dohwar followed suit, flesh sloughing off their bodies as they did so. To their side, Chik'tak's animated corpse did likewise, although he had trouble standing despite his many insectoid legs; lacking a skeleton, the rastipede's external exoskeleton had been partially burned away by the acid, giving his shambling corpse a weaker foundation for undead animation.
"Out of here!" called Castillan, realizing the horrors facing them were likely more than they could handle. He raced back to the northern tunnel, grabbing an item from a belt pouch and hurling it to the ground behind him as he fled. "Attack the undead monsters!" he commanded, and the fire elemental rising up from the remains of his shattered elemental gem moved to comply. As Chik'tak's shambling corpse was the closest at hand, the elemental being struck out at the staggering exoskeleton with a burning fist.
Gilbert cast a magic missile at the ulgurstasta before turning and running as fast as his bulk would allow. He was disheartened to note his spell fizzling as it was cast; had he been wrong about the anti-magic properties of the red gemstones in the walls? "Run!" he echoed.
Nobody else needed much more prompting, seeing the ulgurstasta crawling after them on its scythe-claws, the four humanoid skeletons and three dohwar skeletons advancing before it, pitted metal weegas still strapped to their beaks. From the front of the retreating line of heroes, Gilbert took a moment to cast a scorching ray spell at the ulgurstasta and this time was pleased to see the burning streams of fire cross the distance between them and strike the massive grub. But upon hitting the undead beast the flames fizzled out. Gilbert noted two things: there were none of those red gemstones in the stone walls of this section of tunnel, and past experience allowed him to recognize the effects of a natural spell resistance when he saw it. He still wasn't sure what the red gemstones were all about, but he was reasonably sure they hadn't dampened the attack on the rampaging grub-thing so much as its own natural (or unnatural) resistance to such things.
Darrien turned and shot several arrows at the ulgurstasta before turning again and resuming his flight away from the beast. The fire elemental was attacking the dohwar skeletons with great success; the animated undead forms of the merchants weren't much better fighters than they had been in life. But the ulgurstasta continued on in its pursuit, catching up to Binkadink with its snapping teeth and fortunately missing. The gnome spun, struck out at one of the humanoid skeletons that was likewise pursuing him, and sliced through the creature's spine with a single stroke. He allowed the swing to continue on into the hide of the grub-beast, carving deep into its putrescent flesh.
Out of the southern cavern, Ingebold turned and cast a searing light spell at the ulgurstasta, burning sizzling flesh from its massive form that splattered onto the stone floor. In response, the grub lowered its repulsive head and engulfed Binkadink in a circle of slashing teeth, swallowing the little gnome whole. Binkadink's body was pulled deeper into its gullet, acid dripping from its insides and burning the fighter.
But that turned out to have been a poor strategy for the undead beast, for Binkadink suffered far less damage from the acid inside the creature's stomach than he might have taken by its gnashing teeth. Sheltered inside its body, he was free to slash out time and again with his enchanted glaive, slicing deep grooves through its undead flesh. While Darrien's arrows and Gilbert and Ingebold's spells assaulted it from the outside, the gnome continued his frenzied attack from the inside. Eventually, the ulgurstasta rolled over onto its side and stopped moving, and Binkadink's glaive-blade poked out of the creature's underside, followed by the stumbling gnome himself. Ingebold rushed up and applied healing spells to the acid-burned gnome, then followed suit with those who needed similar attention.
"We want to go back there?" asked Gilbert, concerned that there may be more of the grub-beasts around.
"Might as well," argued Darrien. "If we go back the way we came, there's a guard and a ship full of neogi ready to put us back into slavery."
"I dinnae think there'd be more of those beasties about," added Ingebold hopefully.
"But that's probably what's been eating the umber hulks," reasoned Finoula. "I wonder how it even got here?"
"Let's find out," offered Binkadink, leading the way back into the southern cavern. By then, the fire elemental had taken care of the animated skeletons that had been disgorged with the ulgurstasta's "necrobarf" (as Darrien called it) or transformed into undead by the same substance. "Poor Chik'tak," Finoula said, passing by the rastipede's steaming exoskeleton.
"You not kidding," replied Gilbert Fung. "That bug the only one who knows the way back home."
With that grim thought in the back of their minds, the group went deeper into the southern cavern. They found several places of note: a necromantic circle carved into the floor large enough to have encircled the ulgurstasta (and which according to Gilbert was probably where the grub-beast had been brought to unholy life) and a campsite where four people - judging by the number of blankets - had stayed for several weeks. Among the remains of their equipment, the group found a tome detailing the ritual for creating the ulgurstasta. By mutual agreement, this was burned by the fire elemental before it left Castillan's service, returning to its own fiery plane. There was little in the way of loot to be had, although the remaining food and small barrels of water would likely prove to be useful.
But best of all was the back tunnel Finoula found, with a slight slope leading upwards. "With any luck," she said, "this will lead back up to the surface. And the necromancers had to have gotten here somehow...." Before they left, though, they went back and Ingebold cast a gentle repose spell upon Chik'tak's ruined body, and the others helped her tug it into her portable hole for temporary storage. "I c'n try t' raise him tomorrow," she said.
The tunnel proved to lead to the surface, where Darrien made a lucky discovery: a camouflage net draped over a large item. Removing the net took some doing, but beneath it was a wooden vessel in the shape of a dragonfly. "Woo hoo!" whooped Castillan. "We've got ourselves a spelljamming vessel!"
"True," agreed Gilbert, climbing inside. "But we still don't know way home."
"True," agreed Finoula. "But at least we now have the means to get there, once we figure out where 'there' is."
Climbing aboard the dragonfly ship, the group found it to be somewhat cramped for four necromancers and even more so for six adventurers. But the seat at the front of the ship, nestled between the two large portals that comprised the dragonfly's eyes, turned out to be a spelljamming helm. Plopping into the comfortable seat, Gilbert closed his eyes and let his senses expand all around the ship. He felt a strange buzzing in his head and instinctively realized he wouldn't be able to cast any of the spells he currently still had prepared; such was the price of powering a spelljamming helm. "Everybody ready?" he asked, and without waiting for a response caused the dragonfly to raise straight up from the planetoid's surface.
Cautiously skirting along to the other side of the planetoid, the group - watching out of the forward portals - saw that the Apex Predator had left the surface as well. And for good reason, as it was in battle with a ship that looked like it could have been plucked off any of the seas of Oerth: a seagoing galleon, by the look of it. Reaching out with the magical senses afforded him by the spelljamming helm, Gilbert focused on the new vessel and saw the words "Star Skunk" etched on the ship's side.
"It Captain Skunkbeard!" he called to his friends. "He must have tracked Chik'tak!"
"That bodes well," reasoned Finoula. "It demonstrates loyalty, in any case."
"Yeah, but how glad is he going to be when he sees Chik'tak's current condition?" asked Castillan.
"What should we do?" asked Ingebold.
"Go into battle!" advised Darrien. "We should help Skunkbeard take down the neogi ship!"
"Maybe not so fast," replied Gilbert, frowning.
"Why not?" asked Finoula.
"Two reasons," replied Gilbert. "One, the neogi turning away. Skunkbeard don't need our help."
"Well, that's good," reasoned the elven ranger. "And the other reason?"
Gilbert pulled his vision away from the helm-provided view of wildspace all around the ship so he could look his compatriots in the eye. "I get good look at Skunkbeard's crew," he said. "He look fine, but most of his crew skeletons! Star Skunk manned mostly by undead!"
Castillan thought about this. "But really, we're going to have to deal with him, undead or not. He's our only way home!" he argued.
"I know," Gilbert replied. "Don't like it, though."
"Nor I," agreed Ingebold. "But what choice d'we have?"
In the end, they decided to trail Skunkbeard's ship for a day, remaining out of sight. The next day they'd have Ingebold return Chik'tak to life and go plead their case with Captain Skunkbeard.
- - -
And so the adventure ended with a dilemma: do the PCs trust Skunkbeard? On the one hand, his message to them in the book at the receiving station made him seem like a pleasant sort, yet now they know he has a mostly undead crew. There's the fact that they stole his treasure back on Skunkbeard's Island, and the fact that they got Chik'tak killed in this adventure as further strikes against them. But even Dan, running Gilbert, realized that they don't have a whole lot of choice but to try to negotiate with Captain Skunkbeard. Otherwise, they have absolutely no idea how to get back to Oerth.
On the plus side, they got a dragonfly spelljamming vessel out of this adventure, and I made up a full-scale map out of construction paper for them to use as I expect they'll want to keep it as their main means of transportation for the rest of the campaign. (So long, Vistani wagon!)
The red stones were fluxstone, which has numerous magic-warping properties. I just happened to keep rolling "spell fails" on the chart I had made up.
But boy, did they hate that ulgurstasta! And that was after I toned it down a bit; the original description calls for its waving hairs (that provide it a measure of protection against arrows and other ranged weapons) to be a full 40 feet long - I thought that was kind of ridiculous. But I don't think any of the players want their PCs to face an ulgurstasta again anytime soon!
A final word: there was a story arc in several issues of The Incredible Hulk some years back called "Planet Hulk," which is where I got the title for this adventure, once suitably tweaked.
- - -
T-Shirt Worn: My TSR Silver Anniversary T-shirt, because it contained an umber hulk.
