Caverns of Ooze: Met Icthyglurg the Marid and Jaruk the Dao.

Dani rejoined the crew to delve into Shadowdusk Hold. We cut up some grell and nothics, learned about how the Shadowdusks used to be an important Waterdhavian family, and how most of them seem to be Far Realm-twisted insane mages. We've cleared the first floor of Shadowdusk Hold of aggressive creatures and are proceeding to the second floor.

Level 22: Shadowdusk Hold, 2nd tier

found a potion of invisibility, scroll of flesh-to-stone

Level 22: Shadowdusk Hold, Sublevel two. D-con and Zayeus stay in the Study to continue searching through the books. Dani, Geran, Tigre, and Orpollo continue to clear the level. In the remaining unexplored room, we are ambushed by a half dozen death slaadi but dispatch them, though we take some wounds.

Proceeding to Sublevel three, we encounter a gargantua set as a guard, but Geran talks our way past. Exploring the western wing of this level, we destroy a balhannoth and find a fine tapestry of long-ago Waterdeep, which Dani chooses to keep for her rooms at The Yawning Portal.

At the end of the hall, we discover a room with 4 pillars that radiate magic from runes of abjuration. Amongst the pillars is a blue dracolich that strikes Dani repeatedly with lightning breath while Geran and Orpollo try to puzzle out why most of our attacks seem to be ineffective against the undead terror. Orpollo works out that the runes are absorbing all but the strongest strikes from Tigre and we set to destroying the pillars in moments.
Though Dani continues to take injuries from the dracolich, it is shattered eventually... though we worry it will reanimate in a few days.

The room the darcolich guarded was the Shadowdusk family vault and it holds thousands of coins and several precious gems.

Found Potion of Cloud Giant Strength

Level 22: Shadowdusk Hold, Sublevel 3. With the dracolich felled and the vault looted, the crew patches Dani up so we can try to locate and secure the dracolich's spirit gem to prevent it being recreated.

In a room with a strange statue that morphed it's appearance, we fought two of the Shadowdusk family: a female who'd turned herself into a death knight and a male archmage who had been turned insectoid by the effects of the Far Realm. They had a slaad, an alpha grick, and some Far Realm creatures summoned to make the room more formidable.
In the fight against the greater star spawn emissary, Dani relied on her Rage Beyond Death ability for the first time.
With half the party seriously wounded, D-con and Geran cast Invisibility on us so we could retreat, take the portal network back to The Yawning Portal adn Waterdeep, and rest before we attempt another attack against the ignoble House of Shadowdusk and their Far Realm allies.

Gained potion of healing
Long Rest; Blessing of Corellon d100 = [[71]]. Dani wakes up female.

Level 22: Shadowdusk Hold, Sublevel 3. Rooms 30b, 31a, 31b. Toe-to-toe combat to destroy 4 death slaadi, 4 gibbering mouthers, 4 star spawn grue, 2 star spawn manglers, 2 eldritch horror hatchlings, and a will o' wisp.

Dani is subjected to the maddening effects of the Far Realm breach. She gains a from of indefinte madness: "I can't take anything seriously. The more serious the situation, the funnier I find it."
Orpollo casts greater restoration on Dani and she gives her two of her misshapen diamonds to replace the diamond dust. (-200gp)

In the next rooms, we face off with the death knight Zalthar Shadowdusk and destroy him utterly. He guards a room with an immense black obelisk within. When we topple the obelisk, we find a small yellow frog trapped within. It speaks to Dani telepathically, saying it's name is Tezca-Zyanya. It does not remember how it came to be trapped in here and hitches a ride on Dani's shoulder while it seeks a way out of Undermountain.

Proceeding down to the 23rd level of Undermountain, the crew enters the Mad Wizard's Lair. After navigating a few magic traps, they come face to face with Arcturia, the lich and Halaster's apprentice of transmutation magic. She is frightening to look at, but D-Con struck her with a meteor swarm and Geran followed it with a firestorm, destroying her before she could cast anything. Her 12 spitting mimic pets were more trouble than anything she tried to do.

The party finds and destroys Halaster's apprentice Trobriand.

Long Rest; Blessing of Corellon d100 = [[50]]. Dani wakes up male.

The party completes their fight with Halaster, destroying the Mad Mage (temporarily.)

Danifae finds a strangely fashioned pistol amongst the Mad Mage's assortment of oddities and applies her Opal of the Ild Rune to the weapon.

Dani also used the elemental gem (emerald / water) in the final fight with Halaster.

One of the more interesting evenings we had on the first few levels of Undermountain. Geran's Hypnotic Pattern put 3 of 5 Barlguras into a stupor, allowing us to focus on one of the demons and destroy them without taking much in the way of injuries. In a chest that was rigged up and hidden in the ceiling, we found a modest treasure in coin and valuables hidden by the pirate captain the riddle downstream mentioned. The Captain was a mouldering skeleton, so we're going to keep an eye on his legacy for him.

Down stream, we discovered a coven of Sea Hags. All three were civil, even if they did not extend the gifts of Hospitality, but we shortly learned that they had been predictably deceptive in their true answers. They had not eaten a humanoid in quite some time as they'd sworn, but we did find a young lad of about twelve, Devlin Stormshore, chained up in a room they obviously used as a larder. There was a nasty, foul-mouthed and poorly-mannered little goblin there. I didn't catch his name, because he resumed hurling verbal abuse and casual cruelty at the lad Devlin and Aidan of all people executed the mean little creature on the spot. Imolated him while the little bastard was manacled to the wall. I didn't know he had it in him.

The hags came rushing in behind with their pet giant crab familiars, obviously intent on preventing our emancipating the boy. Another Fantastically timed Hypnotic Pattern from Geran and we were able to destroy them one at a time with great ease. They'd amassed another modest collection of treasure, though guarded by the figurehead of a ship that screamed bloody murder at us for taking it. The coins and gems seem just fine.

Gained 1 potion of water breathing
Long Rest; Blessing of Corellon d100 = [[37]]. Dani wakes up male.

After the evening's rest in the secured cove of the late sea hag coven, we embarked down the River Sargauth towards Skullport. Some avaricious ghosts of treasure hunters swarmed us, which was not an issue until one of them possessesd D-con temporarily. That was a bit more hassle. In the chaos, the sun elf mage Marta Moonshadow ran off. Based on the three House Auvrandyr drow guards we found looking to ambush us where she left the river, we can only assume she is now with them. We took two of those guards prisoner and will add them to those we plan to turn over to Bregan d'Arthe's lieutenants.

Aidan began to follow the trail of prints the Auvrandyr pair and the mage left, which brought us into the southern edge of the space where Auvrandyr has begun mustering troops for the invasion of Skullport. Marta was walking under her own power, but it's unclear if she was a spy, captive, or both.
We've cleared a half dozen giant spiders set as sentries and exterminated two handfuls of troglodytes stationed to lie in wait. Danifae is covering D-con's flanks from Trogs and spiders while he used Haste and a Steel Wind Strike to cut down two squads of Auvrandyr troops in seconds. He is efficient when he is determined. The patrol's officer is a bit tougher, but still didn't last a core of seconds in a duel.

The crew pushes in to cut down the Auvrandyr drow priestess of the spider queen, slaying several of her drow retainers and capturing the house captain of her guard in the process. Dani thought leaving the traitorous Marta Moonshadow caged was no bother to Dani, but Geran and the others insisted on trussing her up and taking her with the other prisoners.

While clearing the remainder of the abandoned dwarven buildings where Auvrandyr had made camp for the invasion of Skullport, we discovered a strange room with some kind of magic fish on the wall. Geran solved the puzzle and collected a Elemental gem (emerald / water). In yet another building, we freed a captured drider (who has happily joined us since we have already accepted Norreed into our company) and a drow cook named Rizryn. Now that he is houseless (and seeing his two compatriots die quickly when they attacked D-Con), the cook decided signing on with Bregan D'arthe sounded like a great idea.

Bringing our coterie of followers and prisoners of war, we continued water walking down the Sargauth River, courtesy of Aiden's ritual magic, when we discovered three middle-sized ships full of Zhentarim Thugs and Zhentarim Martial Arts Adepts attacking Skull Island, a section of Skullport held by the Xanathar's Guild's Thugs.
Enemy of our Enemy and all, we chose to take down the ships rather than allow the Xanathar's Guild a stronger presence in the town.

At last count, one boat was burning within a wall of flame, another had begun to spew keelboats full of Zhent thugs to attack us, with some faerie fired and others incapacitated from Geran's hypnotic pattern, while a trio of other thugs were dealing with Aiden in Giant Octopus wild shape. Things are not looking good for the Zhent's assault, despite one ship's worth of keelboats landing on the shore and readying to assault the fortress wall.
Gained 1 potion of healing

Approaching Skullport, the party encounters an invasion by Zhentarim thugs and martial artists against Skull Island, the harbor defenses of Skullport. Aided by Aidan & D-Con's waterwalking, we surprised the invaders, taking many of them hostage. They were turned over to Bregan d'Arthe aborad Jarlaxle's ship.

After dropping off the prisoners of war and reconnecting the three bregan d'arthe members recovered to the garrison around SKullport, we resupplied and recuperated a short while before moving back into the caves.
Purchased a Shield from the Bregan d'arthe armory. (-10g)

Cleaned out a chimera nest, recovering a small pile of coin. Encountered the posted guards of the hobgoblin Legion of Azrok. His captain and partner, Lurana, promised 1,000gp and free passage through their desmense if we hunt down duergar thieves of Clan Ironeye who stole Azrok's dagger of blindsight. They were last seen stopping in for resupply at a tavern called The Black Tankard before heading deeper into Undermountain.
The next morning, the party shops at the "Gob Gobbler" the trading post for the Legion of Azrok. D-Con and Geran note that the proprieter, Kinrob, received a delivered parcel. Geran figured out that the bundle was an infant goblinoid. D-con and Aidan spirited the bundle away, but the shopkeeper noted the missing lunch parcel and confronted Geran & Dani as he shapechanges back into his true form as an oni!
Long Rest; Blessing of Corellon d100 = [[82]]. Dani wakes up female.

The shopkeeper is an oni. What the hell? Thankfully, Geran decided to respond to this new threat by casting greater invisibility on Dani and then retreating to shoot from cover. Between D-Con's defensive magics and Dani being invisible, the oni never scored a wound on either of them before they destroyed it. Geran and Tigre talked our way out of the mess with the hobgoblin captain of the watch, who didn't take kindly to one of the bugbears feeding goblin children to an oni.

As we began to hunt through lower Skullport looking for a trail to follow the IronEye clan and retrieve Azrok's dagger, we ended up in a tavern brawl with a deurgar and spectator that work for the fish (Xanathatr's guild) and as we emerged from the back door of the Black Tankard, we were accosted by a dozen Thayan warriors. We neutralized them and continued out of Skullport until we regrouped on the edge of town and prepped to descend to the 4th level.

Descending into the fourth level, we encounter a pair of ettin and a tunnel of piercers. We meet a mad human calling themselves The Alchemist. They offer us potions of their invention in exchange for materials gathered from elsewhere in Undermountain and a warning about drow posted to the east.
The party avoids a conflict with a number of Xorn and close in on this remaining force from House Aruvyndar when we encounter a room with a half dozen ropers.

Long Rest; Blessing of Corellon d100 = [[09]]. Dani wakes up male.

Past the hallway of ropers, the party meets Darribeth Meltimer, a Chondathan mage. After a short discussion, it becomes clear she has been down here too long and has become a little bit mad, discussing everything with her toad. Aidan and DCon begin to suspect the toad familiar is not what it seems. DCon destroys the quasit-in-toad-shape with a burst of magic missiles. Though this traumatises the poor mage a bit, it does allow the party to convince her to return to the surface. A visit to the Hospice of St. Laupinn, a temple of Ilmater, and a donation from DCon provides a greater restoration for Danibeth, restoring her sanity.
Dani sponsors Daribeth's coach fare back to Amphail to find her wife and Daribeth gifts Dani a rope of climbing in return.

Returning to the caverns we prowl through until we are ambushed by a pair of House Aryvndar sentries and a number of quaggoth. The sentries make good use of their innate spells, but we win through, moving in to destroy the outpost on the other side.

Long Rest; Blessing of Corellon d100 = [[10]]. Dani wakes up male.

Caverns of Ooze: Met Icthyglurg the Marid and Jaruk the Dao.

Dani rejoined the crew to delve into Shadowdusk Hold. We cut up some grell and nothics, learned about how the Shadowdusks used to be an important Waterdhavian family, and how most of them seem to be Far Realm-twisted insane mages. We've cleared the first floor of Shadowdusk Hold of aggressive creatures and are proceeding to the second floor.

Level 22: Shadowdusk Hold, 2nd tier

found a potion of invisibility, scroll of flesh-to-stone

Level 22: Shadowdusk Hold, Sublevel two. D-con and Zayeus stay in the Study to continue searching through the books. Dani, Geran, Tigre, and Orpollo continue to clear the level. In the remaining unexplored room, we are ambushed by a half dozen death slaadi but dispatch them, though we take some wounds.

Proceeding to Sublevel three, we encounter a gargantua set as a guard, but Geran talks our way past. Exploring the western wing of this level, we destroy a balhannoth and find a fine tapestry of long-ago Waterdeep, which Dani chooses to keep for her rooms at The Yawning Portal.

At the end of the hall, we discover a room with 4 pillars that radiate magic from runes of abjuration. Amongst the pillars is a blue dracolich that strikes Dani repeatedly with lightning breath while Geran and Orpollo try to puzzle out why most of our attacks seem to be ineffective against the undead terror. Orpollo works out that the runes are absorbing all but the strongest strikes from Tigre and we set to destroying the pillars in moments.
Though Dani continues to take injuries from the dracolich, it is shattered eventually... though we worry it will reanimate in a few days.

The room the darcolich guarded was the Shadowdusk family vault and it holds thousands of coins and several precious gems.

Found Potion of Cloud Giant Strength

Level 22: Shadowdusk Hold, Sublevel 3. With the dracolich felled and the vault looted, the crew patches Dani up so we can try to locate and secure the dracolich's spirit gem to prevent it being recreated.

In a room with a strange statue that morphed it's appearance, we fought two of the Shadowdusk family: a female who'd turned herself into a death knight and a male archmage who had been turned insectoid by the effects of the Far Realm. They had a slaad, an alpha grick, and some Far Realm creatures summoned to make the room more formidable.
In the fight against the greater star spawn emissary, Dani relied on her Rage Beyond Death ability for the first time.
With half the party seriously wounded, D-con and Geran cast Invisibility on us so we could retreat, take the portal network back to The Yawning Portal adn Waterdeep, and rest before we attempt another attack against the ignoble House of Shadowdusk and their Far Realm allies.

Gained potion of healing
Long Rest; Blessing of Corellon d100 = [[71]]. Dani wakes up female.

Level 22: Shadowdusk Hold, Sublevel 3. Rooms 30b, 31a, 31b. Toe-to-toe combat to destroy 4 death slaadi, 4 gibbering mouthers, 4 star spawn grue, 2 star spawn manglers, 2 eldritch horror hatchlings, and a will o' wisp.

Dani is subjected to the maddening effects of the Far Realm breach. She gains a from of indefinte madness: "I can't take anything seriously. The more serious the situation, the funnier I find it."
Orpollo casts greater restoration on Dani and she gives her two of her misshapen diamonds to replace the diamond dust. (-200gp)

In the next rooms, we face off with the death knight Zalthar Shadowdusk and destroy him utterly. He guards a room with an immense black obelisk within. When we topple the obelisk, we find a small yellow frog trapped within. It speaks to Dani telepathically, saying it's name is Tezca-Zyanya. It does not remember how it came to be trapped in here and hitches a ride on Dani's shoulder while it seeks a way out of Undermountain.

Proceeding down to the 23rd level of Undermountain, the crew enters the Mad Wizard's Lair. After navigating a few magic traps, they come face to face with Arcturia, the lich and Halaster's apprentice of transmutation magic. She is frightening to look at, but D-Con struck her with a meteor swarm and Geran followed it with a firestorm, destroying her before she could cast anything. Her 12 spitting mimic pets were more trouble than anything she tried to do.

The party finds and destroys Halaster's apprentice Trobriand.

Long Rest; Blessing of Corellon d100 = [[50]]. Dani wakes up male.

The party completes their fight with Halaster, destroying the Mad Mage (temporarily.)

Danifae finds a strangely fashioned pistol amongst the Mad Mage's assortment of oddities and applies her Opal of the Ild Rune to the weapon.

Dani also used the elemental gem (emerald / water) in the final fight with Halaster.

One of the more interesting evenings we had on the first few levels of Undermountain. Geran's Hypnotic Pattern put 3 of 5 Barlguras into a stupor, allowing us to focus on one of the demons and destroy them without taking much in the way of injuries. In a chest that was rigged up and hidden in the ceiling, we found a modest treasure in coin and valuables hidden by the pirate captain the riddle downstream mentioned. The Captain was a mouldering skeleton, so we're going to keep an eye on his legacy for him.

Down stream, we discovered a coven of Sea Hags. All three were civil, even if they did not extend the gifts of Hospitality, but we shortly learned that they had been predictably deceptive in their true answers. They had not eaten a humanoid in quite some time as they'd sworn, but we did find a young lad of about twelve, Devlin Stormshore, chained up in a room they obviously used as a larder. There was a nasty, foul-mouthed and poorly-mannered little goblin there. I didn't catch his name, because he resumed hurling verbal abuse and casual cruelty at the lad Devlin and Aidan of all people executed the mean little creature on the spot. Imolated him while the little bastard was manacled to the wall. I didn't know he had it in him.

The hags came rushing in behind with their pet giant crab familiars, obviously intent on preventing our emancipating the boy. Another Fantastically timed Hypnotic Pattern from Geran and we were able to destroy them one at a time with great ease. They'd amassed another modest collection of treasure, though guarded by the figurehead of a ship that screamed bloody murder at us for taking it. The coins and gems seem just fine.

Gained 1 potion of water breathing
Long Rest; Blessing of Corellon d100 = [[37]]. Dani wakes up male.

After the evening's rest in the secured cove of the late sea hag coven, we embarked down the River Sargauth towards Skullport. Some avaricious ghosts of treasure hunters swarmed us, which was not an issue until one of them possessesd D-con temporarily. That was a bit more hassle. In the chaos, the sun elf mage Marta Moonshadow ran off. Based on the three House Auvrandyr drow guards we found looking to ambush us where she left the river, we can only assume she is now with them. We took two of those guards prisoner and will add them to those we plan to turn over to Bregan d'Arthe's lieutenants.

Aidan began to follow the trail of prints the Auvrandyr pair and the mage left, which brought us into the southern edge of the space where Auvrandyr has begun mustering troops for the invasion of Skullport. Marta was walking under her own power, but it's unclear if she was a spy, captive, or both.
We've cleared a half dozen giant spiders set as sentries and exterminated two handfuls of troglodytes stationed to lie in wait. Danifae is covering D-con's flanks from Trogs and spiders while he used Haste and a Steel Wind Strike to cut down two squads of Auvrandyr troops in seconds. He is efficient when he is determined. The patrol's officer is a bit tougher, but still didn't last a core of seconds in a duel.

The crew pushes in to cut down the Auvrandyr drow priestess of the spider queen, slaying several of her drow retainers and capturing the house captain of her guard in the process. Dani thought leaving the traitorous Marta Moonshadow caged was no bother to Dani, but Geran and the others insisted on trussing her up and taking her with the other prisoners.

While clearing the remainder of the abandoned dwarven buildings where Auvrandyr had made camp for the invasion of Skullport, we discovered a strange room with some kind of magic fish on the wall. Geran solved the puzzle and collected a Elemental gem (emerald / water). In yet another building, we freed a captured drider (who has happily joined us since we have already accepted Norreed into our company) and a drow cook named Rizryn. Now that he is houseless (and seeing his two compatriots die quickly when they attacked D-Con), the cook decided signing on with Bregan D'arthe sounded like a great idea.

Bringing our coterie of followers and prisoners of war, we continued water walking down the Sargauth River, courtesy of Aiden's ritual magic, when we discovered three middle-sized ships full of Zhentarim Thugs and Zhentarim Martial Arts Adepts attacking Skull Island, a section of Skullport held by the Xanathar's Guild's Thugs.
Enemy of our Enemy and all, we chose to take down the ships rather than allow the Xanathar's Guild a stronger presence in the town.

At last count, one boat was burning within a wall of flame, another had begun to spew keelboats full of Zhent thugs to attack us, with some faerie fired and others incapacitated from Geran's hypnotic pattern, while a trio of other thugs were dealing with Aiden in Giant Octopus wild shape. Things are not looking good for the Zhent's assault, despite one ship's worth of keelboats landing on the shore and readying to assault the fortress wall.
Gained 1 potion of healing

Approaching Skullport, the party encounters an invasion by Zhentarim thugs and martial artists against Skull Island, the harbor defenses of Skullport. Aided by Aidan & D-Con's waterwalking, we surprised the invaders, taking many of them hostage. They were turned over to Bregan d'Arthe aborad Jarlaxle's ship.

After dropping off the prisoners of war and reconnecting the three bregan d'arthe members recovered to the garrison around SKullport, we resupplied and recuperated a short while before moving back into the caves.
Purchased a Shield from the Bregan d'arthe armory. (-10g)

Cleaned out a chimera nest, recovering a small pile of coin. Encountered the posted guards of the hobgoblin Legion of Azrok. His captain and partner, Lurana, promised 1,000gp and free passage through their desmense if we hunt down duergar thieves of Clan Ironeye who stole Azrok's dagger of blindsight. They were last seen stopping in for resupply at a tavern called The Black Tankard before heading deeper into Undermountain.
The next morning, the party shops at the "Gob Gobbler" the trading post for the Legion of Azrok. D-Con and Geran note that the proprieter, Kinrob, received a delivered parcel. Geran figured out that the bundle was an infant goblinoid. D-con and Aidan spirited the bundle away, but the shopkeeper noted the missing lunch parcel and confronted Geran & Dani as he shapechanges back into his true form as an oni!
Long Rest; Blessing of Corellon d100 = [[82]]. Dani wakes up female.

The shopkeeper is an oni. What the hell? Thankfully, Geran decided to respond to this new threat by casting greater invisibility on Dani and then retreating to shoot from cover. Between D-Con's defensive magics and Dani being invisible, the oni never scored a wound on either of them before they destroyed it. Geran and Tigre talked our way out of the mess with the hobgoblin captain of the watch, who didn't take kindly to one of the bugbears feeding goblin children to an oni.

As we began to hunt through lower Skullport looking for a trail to follow the IronEye clan and retrieve Azrok's dagger, we ended up in a tavern brawl with a deurgar and spectator that work for the fish (Xanathatr's guild) and as we emerged from the back door of the Black Tankard, we were accosted by a dozen Thayan warriors. We neutralized them and continued out of Skullport until we regrouped on the edge of town and prepped to descend to the 4th level.

Descending into the fourth level, we encounter a pair of ettin and a tunnel of piercers. We meet a mad human calling themselves The Alchemist. They offer us potions of their invention in exchange for materials gathered from elsewhere in Undermountain and a warning about drow posted to the east.
The party avoids a conflict with a number of Xorn and close in on this remaining force from House Aruvyndar when we encounter a room with a half dozen ropers.

Long Rest; Blessing of Corellon d100 = [[09]]. Dani wakes up male.

Past the hallway of ropers, the party meets Darribeth Meltimer, a Chondathan mage. After a short discussion, it becomes clear she has been down here too long and has become a little bit mad, discussing everything with her toad. Aidan and DCon begin to suspect the toad familiar is not what it seems. DCon destroys the quasit-in-toad-shape with a burst of magic missiles. Though this traumatises the poor mage a bit, it does allow the party to convince her to return to the surface. A visit to the Hospice of St. Laupinn, a temple of Ilmater, and a donation from DCon provides a greater restoration for Danibeth, restoring her sanity.
Dani sponsors Daribeth's coach fare back to Amphail to find her wife and Daribeth gifts Dani a rope of climbing in return.

Returning to the caverns we prowl through until we are ambushed by a pair of House Aryvndar sentries and a number of quaggoth. The sentries make good use of their innate spells, but we win through, moving in to destroy the outpost on the other side.

Long Rest; Blessing of Corellon d100 = [[10]]. Dani wakes up male.