Story I: The Rift

Pyrrah's face pales, the pieces of the puzzle slamming together in instant clarity upon the prompting from Erran. She ducks back towards the tunnel and grabs Erran's shoulder. "It's got to be a Necrolid. It's like a giant worm that is way longer than it is wide." She gestures to the width of the tunnel, emphasizing her point on how monstrous this thing must be. "This one must be ancient, and they can grind through solid rock in seconds. No one has ever killed one this big."She shakes her head, the pieces still falling into place. "If it can saw through rock without any effort, it can cut through us in a heartbeat... Devanis needs to get out of there: now."

When Devanis turns around and heads back, he encounters Ameera following him. She gives him the message she was unable to send before. "Lets hurry back to the others"

Erran's eyes widen progressively as Pyrrah lists off the details of the creature, a feeling of dread coming over him as he thinks of Devanis.

"I may be an optimist, but I doubt we'll be the ones to break that record, we should definitely redirect our path."

Devanis rejoins the others. "As you might guess from the looks of it, this tunnel is actually a burrow. The grizzled ranger holds up a jagged tooth as large as a man's fingernail. "It was made by a monstrous worm - I can't recall the name. Don't worry, the tunnel is very old and there are none of its kind nearby, or else I would sense it. But other dangers may be close, who knows?" Devanis puts the tooth away. "The burrow opens up to a cavern roof with a 60 foot drop to a pool of water lit up by those glowing fungi. Do you want to go that way, or were you liking the crypt?"

"At the end of the tunnel we would have to drop down 60 feet? How would we do that?"

"Pitons and rope." Devanis says, patting the coil of rope strapped to his pack.

"That sounds exciting," Seraph adds, "I don't have those things, though."

Pyrrah glowers at the sword a moment but then looks at Devanis. "It's a necrolid, probably millennia old. You say it's gone, but I'm not sure indefinitely. Those small worms back there were its offspring. As long as the drop you found isn't just a continuation of its tunnels, I don't mind the idea of repelling down."

She looks over to Baric, color rising to her face. " Khuzd," She says, switching into dwarven. "I offer you my thanks for healing me. It was appreciated. " She didn't like owing debts to others.

Sword, you are welcome to my pitons. Rope climbing is my worst nightmare. I don't want to test my ability to fly.

"Oh, okay," Seraph replies, "Thanks!"

I'm good for a short climb. That sounds better than the death trap we came from. But not by much.

well if we're doing this, I will be wearing one of the harnesses in the climbing kits that we were given and clinging for my life. Ameera begins to search her pack. and the rope we have may be too short, who can tie up a safe system to get us down?

"If we need extra rope, I've got some. I'm afraid I don't have an exorbitant amount of experience rock climbing though... "