Quest Report - "exploring the upper excavation pt 2"

[Quest report]

Upper Excavation Part 2

Unsuccessful outcome: there are still significant sources of danger in the upper excavation.

David, Friday, John, Kyrat, and Morning Mist ventured into the upper excavation. At Fiddlestick’s request. The first encounter of the morning occurred while climbing the first ledge; 2 cockroaches attacked and David fell on Morning Mist. No casualties or close calls. We proceeded past a maggoty corpse which Morning Mist gave the last rights, “Be at peace, maggoty one.” Rather unceremonious, but we moved on to discover the ant pathway upon which brightmoss was carried previously and the previous expedition had bullied some off of.

We followed Friday’s lead across the lake to the old necromancer’s tent and to a pool of water. The pool squeezed down and led to a small amount of gold. It is hypothesized that this links up to another pool of water discovered and detailed later. A small passage behind the pool led to the same crevice that the ants had been coming up with brightmoss. We attacked a swarm of warrior ants. Our bombs seemed to have a good effect despite missing when hitting. David went down in the area with the necromancer’s tent because of lingering ants that had swarmed him. We waited while he healed those who had been injured.

Friday meanwhile made a bridge from materials at the Duergar’s old camp. I, John, had already crossed along the ledge and determined it was safe except for a few giant ants that did not attack us. It would later be found that they ran from a giant centipede that did a good job thrashing us got thrashed and ran away. We continued down the southern passage before the lake we had crossed previously. We found a vein of tin that could be used to create better equipment, but it is still not safe enough to call the job done.

Standing recommendations: a group with a few small adventurers goes in to clean up the centipede; another group could venture to the source of the brightmoss; a group with small adventurers could lure out the cockroaches and exterminate them from the side passage near the entrance; the 3 ant holes near the bottom should be examined to see if they connect to a dangerous location; the water hole near the bottom likely leads to some gold as well.

Alternatively, the erection of 2 new walls would likely make the way safe enough for miners. These should be accompanied by adventuring parties during construction and initial mining to determine if the required infrastructure and activity would make the ants in the lower section hostile. Beyond initial set up, I believe cheaper guards would be sufficient to hold off a small force of ants while the miners evacuate back to town in an emergency

- Written By: John Firehands

- source/citation: https://discord.com/channels/858449417152233472/861331235661807647