Immersive Ink

Willie is somewhat disturbed by what Kiplyn says about his crawl. He's with Dame S in wishing to explore NW of area 18.

Dougal pauses in reflection and lets out a sigh of relief.

"Strange... I do not feel as much aversion to that statue as I feel like I should. Hmmm..." he trails off into silence for a bit.

"Let's go explore that area northwest of the drip pit."

Turn 18

Our Hobbet Heroes return to the 'drip pit' and are greeted by the usual tirade from the Thing down the well. The party ignores the verbal abuse (as is their standard operating procedure). The northwest passage leads to a dead-end, cul-du-sac cave (area 30) that fills in an unexplored section of the map.

In the center of the cave is a large treasure chest. It is the classic 'pirate treasure chest' type, wooden with iron reinforcing bands, and a big padlock with a keyhole.

Surrounding the chest is a ring of 5 Giant Dalek-Headed Mushrooms. The shrooms stand twice the height of a Hobbet, and their stems are thick around as a torso. Their caps are studded with distinctive, ring-shaped pitted holes, like sphincter muscles or a whale's blowhole. These orifices are gently, rhythmically opening and closing, and the gills underneath flutter correspondingly with each breath. The entire mushroom caps are expanding and contracting like a bellows, drawing air in and out with peaceful respiration.

"I'll bet those mushrooms will do something if we approaching the chest... the chest itself may even be a trap to lure us inside! It looks too tempting." Dame Simonetta warns.

Kiplyn suggests "Why don't throw something into the middle of that patch and see what it does?" He holds out a sling stone and gestures with an underhand toss.

"Alright, but wait for us to step back first!" The Dame will retreat back as far as she can (while still being able to see the mushrooms).

Dougal readies a sling stone in his own sling, just in case he needs to attack the sphincter mushrooms.

Kiplyn would toss the stone into the mushroom patch...........

Kiplyn tosses a stone into the mushroom patch. The shrooms begin to rock slowly from side to side. Their swaying motions are groping and individual, as opposed to rhythmic or coordinated as a group. The mushroom caps pump like bellows, the gills undulate like the frills of a jellyfish, and the coaster-sized 'rings' silently pucker and relax, like curious goldfish mouths: OOOO oooo OOOOO oooo OOOO oooo

The fungi are definitely 'clustered' around the chest, as opposed to scattered randomly throughout the room. If you wanted to anthropomorphize them, you might say they are 'protecting' or 'guarding' the treasure. Or, they are just mindless fungi, feeding on nutrients from the rotted wood of the ancient chest, growing in a ring as mushrooms will do.

The mushrooms' movements are comically slow-motion, like big funhouse balloons, and it's hard to imagine any scenario they could get the drop on our Heroes and be any kind of melee combat threat. The concern would be some type of spore weapon or ranged attack. Too bad there is no Druid with the party, to identify these strange fungi! A non-druid could attempt a MYTH check to identify them, perhaps?

Or just rush in there, chop them up, take their treasure?

OOC: Welcome back @kipper!

"Well they're alive and probably want to eat us. If we want that chest we need to do something. Any ideas?"Kiplyn looks around the room...