Episode 2: All hands point to the seed. pt 2

The party entered a large, natural cavern. A thick carpet of glowing moss covered the floor and walls. The air was cool and sweet with moisture and the smell of flowers. Pools of water stand in shallow depressions, and the party heard water trickling down the walls.

After that; the heroes had some time to explore, then I asked everyone to place themselves on the map where their characters would be in the cavern. 

(Wayne, Aaron, Cheryl, and Ray took on defensive rear positions. As the other players moved toward the passage to the north.

From the dark passage to the north, they heard faint clicking sounds. A thri-kreen with a mottled brown, yellow, and green hide stepped from the shadows and faced you. More thri-kreen were behind it in the tunnel, but it was impossible to

see how many. The one in front spoke in a clicking form of common, saying, “Our clutch has come for the life-seed. Drop your pointed sticks and depart, or we consume your hind-limb meat.”

The thri-kreen was innately suspicious, but they were not immediately hostile. They came to protect the tree of life, and its safety and survival were their only concerns. The Characters negotiated diplomatically and gained useful allies. With more clicking “Our clutch followed the spirit smells to this place. A life seed is here, but its source tree is ancient.”

Upon this success the adventures trekked down the stairs to the next room where they entered the final portion of the ancient refuge and confronted Avor Firesworn.

The spiral stairs opened into a cool, fresh cavern that was blanketed with growing plants. Grass covered the floor and vines clanged to the walls and dangled from the ceiling. Water poured from two small fountains carved in the shape of a lion’s head. A beautiful and ancient conifer tree stood at the far end of the room, and a faint green radiance seemed to emanate from it. In contrast to that idyllic scene, several skeletons stood at attention. Their empty, malevolent eye sockets were turned directly toward the characters. Other forms that seemed to be composed of little more than the desiccated remains of dismembered and mummified arms, legs, and hands drag themselves across the room. Hovering in front of the tree is a humanoid figure. What remains of its flesh and its ancient armor are blackened and charred. Fire crackles from its burnt fingers, and its voice echoes telepathically in your heads. “Doth Gormack still desire to torment us after so long an age? We welcome you, and we shall render unto you the wages of hate that we have nursed these many long years.”

After some try’s at diplomacy, the characters broke in to combat. Not long after the characters, broken and bruised, have just defeated the tree’s guardians.