Down, down, down.

Down, down, down.

Down, down, down. It's not hard, going down so many stairs. They're spaced just fine. It's just the thought of having to go back up them.

Especially if one was in a hurry.

...All right, it's not just that. It's that you're going so far away from the sun and the sky that you've known all your life... the wind and rain...

But someone has to be mindful of the things that live down here-- and the things that don't live down here, right? The things that are capable of crawling up to the surface?

And that someone is you. So...

Down, down, down.

You reach the bottom.

There's a tunnel, going northish (maybe a little to the east).

There's the torch you dropped... Almost burned out. It bounced a few feet down the tunnel.

The tunnel has a very slight decline to it, too. Further down, further down... a lot more slowly than the stairs, though.

Sometimes the tunnel curves a little to the left. More often, to the right (more easterly). But always down, just at like a three or four degree angle...

So. It was about an hour down the stairs. Would have been 30 or less but you really really didn't want a trap suddenly popping you down the middle of that shaft, right?

The tunnel, about another hour, for the same reasons. Must be going somewhere, though, right?

Then you get to a door. A big, 12-foot high and 8-feet-wide door.

Traps are checked for again, even though there's been none so far. No sign of them. Magic, too, even though it's hardly the first time today. Nothing.

There's no lock on this door. Be funny if it was barred on the other side or something, wouldn't it? (No, it wouldn't.)

You open it.

...Um...

...wow.

The door opens on top of a sort of landing for stairs, about fifty feet square. Stairs lead down, to the right.

On the left, BIG stairs lead down, stairs that would be a little large even for a gnoll or a tusker.

In front of you... is a huge cavern. Enormous. Colossal. Like a good half a mile to the other side, and at least half a mile to either side, left and right. The ceiling is also a good hundred feet higher than where you're standing now.

And it's... not pitch black. There's glowing green-blue mushrooms and lichen all over, especially the ceiling. It's slightly brighter than a clear full moon night.

A whole little forest of mushrooms are down there on the cavern floor, about 50 feet below you.

Weird gas-bag things float around, like glowing periwinkle jellyfish, stunning moths the size of hawks that flutter here and there and using tendrils or tentacles to grab them and pull them into holes underneath. The gasbag creatures range from the size of the jumpy spiders you fought yesterday to, well, the size of the big spider you fought yesterday.

It's... bizarre. And beautiful.

Welcome to The Upper Reaches.

You think you see some sort of big... archway? gate? off to the left. And another to the right. There's definitely one across from you. You can't tell if there's one right below you or not.

Quintavia looked around from the landing, absolutely enchanted.  She'd heard rumors of such things, but had never had confirmation.  She scribbled notes about everything she saw, squinting in the torch light.

On the first set of stairs, Brakenjaw pauses to see if anyone else is coming with him; when the others appear, he breathes a small sigh of relief, and proceeds down slowly, keeping an eye out for anything strange or unusual. The trip is remarkable in that it's so unremarkable -- no horrors from the dark, only a long winding tunnel. He lets whoever wants to examine the door do so before pulling it open...

And then gapes in awe at the huge chamber before them. He steps carefully out on the landing, examining both sets of stairs down, before slowly making his way down the set better sized for smaller folk.

Reed carefully uses his expertise to assist with the search for traps, and general perceptiveness, as the party makes their way down. The gloom and low levels of light don't bother him as much as it would a lot of the others, due to his heightened senses. Still, he knew better than to assume it was automatically safe. Thankfully, though, it was.

When they entered the landing of the gigantic cavern, he looked around in awe as well as an appreciation for the "strange natural beauty" that they were witnessing right now. He had been into the Underdark before, back on the Eastern Continent, but only ever-so-slightly. And by slightly, that means once. and it was VERY close to the surface. It was when he he was 14, and he was with some Swanmays and a couple druid allies doing some Ranger survival natural type training. They thought that the exposure would be good for him, but yet were way too over-protective to let him really explore much.

So secretly, Reed was pleased by the opportunity that this sudden turn of events posed to him, because while he had a tone of Academic and theoretical knowledge about the Underdark, he finally would be able to get some practical time down here too to actually apply said training.

"This place is not as monolithic and sinister as the tales go, by the way. The Underdark, I mean. This part is the Upper Reaches, the part closest to the surface. But it's still definitely underground! There is a benevolent, graceful natural elegance to this place...but don't let that make you drop your guard, though. Because there is some pretty scary shit down here too. Even I have to be really careful." he said.

"Unfortunately, I don't immediately see anything indicative of a Kobold or Dwarf road to a city or some such, but I definitly think it's obvious they wouldn't be in the direction of the over-gigantic stairs due to physiological logistical reasons." he continued.

"But it does seem there are archways in this cavern that can be accessed from the various directions. I think, unless a more obvious clue presents itself, that we should inspect each of them - minus the giant stairs one mind you - and see if there are more subtle differences int hem closer up that could yield clues as to them leading to a possible dwarven or Kobold civilization."

Fiereljep had been guiding his chest down the stairs. It seemed a thing without legs had quite the issue with going up. At one point he considered just shoving it over the edge and reanimating what was left. It was when the issues with the stairs where solved that things got BOOOOOOOOOOOOORIIIIING!! something he mentioned like everey 3 seconds. Rock and dirt and some more of the same. It wasn't till they reached the grand place of lichens when the little pixie like a moth to a flame was drawn into the beautiful landscape.

"Oh so pretty."

The glowing gasbag creatures are suuuuper extra pretty to Fiereljep, too. But (unlike the moths) Fiereljep is able to resist fluttering near to them...

A couple of the big moths do come and investigate whoever's holding the lantern, though... They don't do anything bad, just flutter around like whoa, what's this red-orange light happening over here, that's new

Ruth watches the lichens and counts all the ways in which lichen differ from grass.  There are far too many such ways.

It's green (and purple! and blue!) down there on the ground, not just all gray and rocky... maybe there's facts about lichen/fungus to discover? To add into a mental folder labeled "AWESOME GROUND COVER FACTS"?!?!?

Yessssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss!

Stepping through the big doors, Gwendolyn looked around in wonder. She'd certainly gotten used to rocky, natural beauty, living in the mountains, but this seemed almost like an inverse, with the "sky" going up and up for quite a while. She'd certainly been more than 100 feet off ground level before (that would hardly be considered a big hill), but going under was an odd enough experience to make up for that.

There was also the matter of the glowing lichen and mushrooms. What was causing that glow of theirs? Was it something unique to the environment? Could she replicate it? If she picked some mushrooms (later, of course, on the way out, definitely, not going to get distracted again), could she make glowing paint with them and then stain glass with it? She could maybe make a flameless, magicless lantern! And she did have those pieces of that cult leader's staff to work with... But it would probably be better to finally take a good look at them first before just using them for a project like this.

Maybe she could sneak one mushroom. For science.



Gwen snapped to attention, releasing a harsh tweet, backing away from the mushrooms, and dropping her tweezers back into her toolset all in one fell swoop. Quickly, she extended her tweeting into a short little song, just to try exuding a casual air. Nope, no one was trying to snag a mushroom for research over here, no sir.

"Uh, yeah, that would make sense. Perhaps we could check out the big stairs after we've made contact with people down here? Something notable like that could lead to the Ruins."

Reed nodded.

"At the very least, we need to get up close and inspect each of the 4 main marches that lead out of the different directions of this cavern. If there's any clues as to what lies in which direction, it's most likely going to be on or around those arches somehow." he said.

MEanwhile Fier was collecting Lichen and seeing if he could transplant it onto the chest. How cool would a glow in the dark chest be after all. Heedles of any danger he might be in the small pixie explores all around touching just about everything except the gasbags as they might like a taste of pixie. He'll evem will try to pet a moth. How big are they?

The moths are about the size of hawks. (Well, small hawks.) They'd be scary if they seemed like carnivores, but they seem much more interested in the fungal life.

Quintavia took some fungal samples, though she was careful with them

There's more than enough glowing lichen and things on the walls that it's easy to take samples just as you're descending the stairs.

Halfway down, you hear a noise from off in the mushroom forest... maybe... 50, 60 yards away? It's like a cross between an eagle and an elk and just a little like a screaming goat...?

There's something else out there besides just mushrooms and moths and gas-tentacle-floaty things...

Asking opinions from her Traveling Companions, Quintavia tried to determine whether the creature is dangerous
She doesn'thave much to go on though

OOC:  17:55, Today: Quintavia Bergantal rolled 6 using 3d6 with rolls of 1,4,1.  Fellowship, Elven senses, Elven lore. – 6

Something's coming.

Coming your way.

It's leaping from mushroom-top to mushroom-top.

Something big. At least as big as a big dog.

More than one leaping somethings, actually... like four or five...?

What do you do?

Get ready to fight on the stairs at mushroom-top-level?

Descend down into the mushroom forest, and hope it loses sight of you?

Go back up to the landing to fight there?

Split the party, and do more than one of those...?

Seeing the creatures coming, Brakenjawz extinguishes the lantern and tucks it into his bag; he then readies himself to cover the movement of his allies, regardless of whether they decide to retreat back up to the landing or descend back into the forest.

Quintavia, holding her bow, suggests the high ground

Reed readies his bow as well, and agrees with Quintavia to go back up to the landing. The high ground could perhaps give them a momentary advantage if combat breaks out!

Fier agrees with Quint and readies his weapons as he looks at the shrooms to see if there is anything to animate while he flies up to ceiling level. His preference was not having to kill these things so deterring had his priority and the gasbags and moths seemed relatively safe at height.

Ruth also agrees to the higher ground and begins grinding rocks into the proper shape for throwing.

Not much in the mood to be left alone, Gwen followed the group's suggestion to head to the higher ground.