A Forest Without Bandits

Rest finds us throughout the evening, as the camera turns to Sidna's memories of her conversations with Svenna the previous evening. She sat down on her bed to be met with curious questions of how it went, and casually responded that the fact she returned means it must have meant pretty well, a cheeky grin on her face. "We did what we had to do." Svenna is flabbergasted, saying how surreal it feels, with Sidna remarking that they're just bandits, even going so far as to show her proof of victory in a backpack full of hands. She assures Svenna she'll get rid of them before turning in, she certainly doesn't want to sleep in a room full of exposed hands, and Svenna takes this opportunity to tell her about her new fortunes and her job here! Sidna jokingly brings her back to reality by waving Gir's hand in the air, getting a small laugh from her before Serafina rushes in to get help for Zeal.
 
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The camera pans out, now, and moves to the boy's room as Zeal wakes up. He notices his stitches and feels something weird: cold, not just heat and rage, inside of him. He remembers, though, Beans' scam and moves to out-cheat the cardsharp, lengthening his necklace so that he can look through it and win the game more easily. He heads downstairs, ready to win, and sees Svenna moving around with Lucy to get things ready for breakfast, and he orders himself an orange juice and a wine - making the world's first and saddest mimosa.
 
Vorach and Serafina wake up in close proximity to each other, the former doing so first and sneaking downstairs before washing up in the stables. He waits outside, kicking the tarp under the awning and noting that it's very likely to rain today, then sitting at the door and waiting for someone else to come downstairs so that he won't be alone in the room with him. Serafina stretches before pulling her flute out and beginning to play, an enchanting disney princess like melody that really brightens everyone else's morning.
 
Sidna, hearing this, has a bit of a spring in her step and decides to take a bath, passing Zeal and taking Vorach's place at the barrel. He groaned and wished her a good morning before offering her privacy, stepping inside and sitting at the table with Zeal as the two exchange awkward morning greetings. Serafina comes downstairs, but also moves to the barrel, exchanging her greetings with Sidna, who dunks herself before heading back upstairs to get dressed and write in her journal before coming back down.
 
When Serafina comes back in and sits from the barrel, Zeal (thinking they are a couple) moves over to play with Beans, who is grumbling about the fact that he lost half his gold overnight somehow, to which Zeal offers to help him maybe fill it back up! He sets down a wager of 5 gold and gets him excited. Zeal uses his magic necklace, which he can see through, to get the upper hand and takes Beans' pot, winning 20 gold. Serafina is trying hard not to laugh, and reassures a sad looking Connie that he does NOT have to give Beans any of his gold.
 
Zeal, excited about his winnings, goes and gives Svenna and Lucy a gold each before sweeping his hair out of his face and going back to the table. There, he concentrates for just a moment before summoning a pitch black crow companion, whom he names Krowk. A farmer takes note of this, and asks if he's a wizard. He affirms that he's, instead, the familiar, and when the farmer is confused Vorach mimes to him that Zeal might be drunk.
 
Sidna heads downstairs and asks why there's a spirit inside, and Zeal explains he summoned it. As she sits down, Vorach pipes up and demands, "No more executing prisoners," explaining that if it happens again he's going to start swinging and he'll take down whoever does it. Then, he apologises, saying he had a plan to have Serafina help him say shit so he wouldn't be an asshole, but he's gotta be honest. Sidna fortunately is on his side, and chastens Zeal when he doesn't take it seriously, the party coming to a consensus to no longer act in monstrous manners.
 
With the weight in the air cleared, Vorach's personality almost seems to swap, and he happily encourages Zeal's skill at cards and then offers to handle the cart and corpses while the others head into town to collect the bounty for the bandits. In the Lawmaker's quarters, they gave 6 goblin hands (5/per 30g) and 5 bandit hands (25/per 125g), and even convinced her that the extra effort with the leader would net them an extra 10 gold for a total of 165 gold. Serafina is handed the chest of gold by Sidna to look out for.
 
A little bit into the journey, Sidna unclenches her jaw and as casually as she can asks Serafina for some travelling music, with Vorach piping up that he likes bluegrass after Sidna says that she's good with anything. Not much longer after, the rain starts. While the wagon is comfortable and three of us are dry, Zeal, Greg, and Krowk have their own impromptu session in the rain (fuck the Lawkeeper!).
 
A few hours later, closer to noon, we approach the checkpoint and Vorach hops out with 4 copper and a peach for the guard, wishing him a dry evening! However, Zeal is a sly man, and as the guard goes to eat the peach he creates the sound of thunder right behind him, startling him and making him drop the fruit, to which Zeal sends Krowk to fetch it, cleaning it off on his vest and eating.
 
The rest of the journey passes without issue, with no oncoming traffic. Sidna posits this may be because they're no longer selling the potions that Moonspring was known for. As we approach, though, it's *notably* dark and quiet, with the only figure we see that of a lumbering one with a floppy hat that ran away from us. We agree that it's not our problem until they make it our problem, though, and we continue onwards - Vorach suggesting maybe we look at the tavern to see if something's wrong. Sidna doesn't notice much on the drive there, but Zeal does seem to notice that there's a bunch of people in the houses who are peeking out and then quickly hiding when they see some of us are out there.
 
Sidna and Zeal's senses of divinity and magic both feel a sense of wrongness in the air, and after a quick game of Vorach Telephone we start to move towards Poppy, the alchemist's. As we move through town, we notice way more of the shamblers, and Sidna steps on the gas, so to speak, as we make way as quick towards Poppy's with minimal detours. They keep skittering off before we can really get any look at them, but Zeal manages to notice through his special eye necklace that we're being followed, and Zeal encourages us to step on it even further. Sidna tells Serafina to keep an eye out behind us, and we zoom!
 
On the way closer, we come across a cart stationery on the road, with a bunch of shapes moving around it. Connie fails a perception check miserably and notices nothing, but Zeal does hear a lot of grunting! As we get closer, figures begin to approach, rather than fleeing. We approach and see it's in fact a bunch of fungus like people, who Zeal starts to speak to in Undercommon, yet they don't...seem to respond, properly. They're feral.
 
Sidna sees two guards standing ahead with spears outstretched in a defencive position. Sidna looks to the others, and Vorach affirms "I'm on your 6". She elects to ignore the mushrooms around us and move towards the guards, no use fighting the things around us. She takes the wagon in a wide circle, and we see the guards trying to fight off some fungimen who are attempting to drag a horse into a pit full of bodies. Sidna tries to question them but can't get all her questions out in time, so Vorach leaps out of the wagon and flings some black fire towards one of the fungimen, calling out, "Burning's not better, light 'em up!"
 
More fungimen charge Zeal's cart, being full of corpses, but are seemingly unable to do much more than smack at his horse, Greg, and so he uses a withering touch spell and kills a fungimen in one hit. Sidna calls to the guards and Vorach, and the three pile into the wagon at the first chance they can, with Zeal speeding up and attaching his cart to the wagon before hopping off. He asks Vorach if he can burn the bit, and Vorach says his magic's not strong enough - fire isn't really his thing. Zeal says he'll take care of it, and as the wagon speeds off Vorach throws a final dark flame towards the fungimen to kill one before Zeal runs ahead to throw down a layer of vines and plant growth over the pit. They're able to get out of the tangles, unfortunately, but Zeal still manages to get over and throw a huge gout of fire from his hands, killing fungimen, fungiwomen, and fugichildren alike.
 
At Poppy's, Sidna rushes to Poppy's to get the party sanctuary as Vorach moves to the back to help everyone off of the wagon. She notices that the interior looks barricaded and dark, which she deems to be a good sign. She pounds on the door with her palm and shouts to ask if Poppy is in there, a faint yeah answered a few moments later. She doesn't remember who the party is, but Sidna reminds her that they'd previously done her a favour, and we're allowed in: a short little halfling named Gio di Pace there instead of Poppy, who was expected.
 
It was a terrible choice to make, but we cut the horses loose and set them free to run - they're smart enough and this is spooky enough that they know to run for their lives and avoid the fungimen, thankfully! Sidna, Serafina, the guards, and Gio run in, with Vorach staying outside and dropping magical darkness to keep a watch out for Zeal and offer him a bit of safety.
 
Back at the corpse pit, Zeal summons Echo, who shrivels one of the remaining corpses before exploding the other, the two of them taking care of the pit to wither it entirely and keep them from propagating. Quickly, he ran into the house and assured the safety of the farmer inside, then ran towards Poppy's, finding Vorach waiting for him and then popping inside to the house after Vorach explained the door was still barricaded. To his credit, he went to have his Echo teleport out and bring Connie in, too, but instead Connie jumped in through the window and tumbled across the floor a few times. Damn impatient orcs!
 
Inside, there was Poppy, a half-elf dressed very well, two human guards we brought in with us, Gio the halfling, and a small figure in the corner somewhat hiding, with the torso of a person and the bottom of a horse. Vorach asks if they can tell us what happens, Sidna echoing his demand to know, and Poppy stammers out her answer:
 
After Sidna and Zeal's party brought back the mushrooms the last time, Poppy started to breed them in the pit to keep potion production going, and it seemed to be going pretty well until today when it got cloudy and super dark, they went feral and appear to be avoiding light and fire. The envoy isn't contributing much to the conversation, and is instead just being a posh fuck. Gio is a master of the arcane arts, thankfully, and can provide us some arcane support. Zeal asks if he can get some alchemist's fire from Poppy, and Sidna has a realisation and makes to follow her into her workshop.
 
Serafina and Vorach work together to make sure the guards are okay - they aren't really cut up, having taken a lot of bludgeoning damage - and seem to be doing okay, they just need to rest. Back in Poppy's workshop, Sidna worriedly asks if she's managed to sell any of the mushroom potions the past few days, or the raw materials. No to each, thankfully, with nothing leaving Moonspring. They put their heads together, but with no obvious factors beyond the dark clouds coming in, they can't seem to figure it out. Zeal asks the centaur if he has heard anything weird about the farmer, since he's the only other local beyond Poppy, but the boy only knows that the farmer likes money.
 
Zeal heads off with Echo to try and investigate the farmer's house further and see if he stole some mushrooms to grow in his cellar. Sidna continues to ask about local details, and finds that some have gone into the forest to harvest for local things, but apparently the forest has felt cold lately. Unfortunately that's the only strange thing, other than it's a little...cold, which they attributed to winds coming in from the mountain.
 
As she comes back with three bottles of oil and Poppy carrying some alchemist's fire, we end the session with Zeal's disappearance.
 
Important note: SERAFINA HAS THE EGG.