On the boat, the party discussed where they ought to venture next. The ultimate decision seemed to set them in the direction of Videl, with a possible stop at The Mitten.
So, they shored their boat on the western bank of The Drink, Fey and the dragonborn hauling it up out of the water for future use. They set their course southwest, and as they traveled by foot through the rocky terrain, noticed something peculiar on the horizon, perched on the edge of The Slit.
Tenli cast invisibility upon Orophor, and the little sneak made his way toward the thing. As he approached, it started to take shape, and soon he could see soldiers scrambling around an enormous pulley apparatus, lowering loads into The Slit.
He passed through the soldiers and up to the pulley, climbing into its bowels and finding a big, important looking gear. Searching his pack, he almost felt despair at having no more blasting jelly, before he realized! He still had an illegal quantity of fire oil on his person. He poured a flask out onto the gear and lit it with his tinder box, jumped down and scrambled back to the party.
Satisfied with a little more destruction, the party headed away from the Slit and further east. They soon came to a road crawling with soldiers running back and forth from the pulley back to Samso. They watched for hours, trying to determine a pattern.
None seemed to emerge. At any moment, a new group would come or go. They waited, patient. But the soldiers were unrelenting, huge, and looked to pose more of a threat than the gang of 20 they massacred before. Finally, they could take the waiting no longer. They decided to cross.
Luck, and Beorn’s pass without a trace, was on their side. The only thing they encountered was a desert-skunk, a scaly critter with nipples which Sven decided to lance with his javelin. Beorn quickly picked up the carcass and for seemingly no reason other than insanity, spread its guts all over the place. Tenli, considering their welfare, tried her best to cover their bloody tracks.
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They made camp. During the night, each of the watches saw activity in a dune to their south. Nothing threatening, but certainly intriguing. Tenli thought back to her many years spent in libraries, pouring over the history of Lorten, and realized they were in the territory of the sand folk.
The night passed without incident, and in the morning, the party went to check out the dune with all the activity. Various party members made perception checks. Nothing. Tenli pumped small gusts of wind on the sand, searching for something. Nothing. Orophor tried tapping a thieves cant on top of the dune. Nothing.
Tenli, in her frustration, blasted the dune with an Eldritch Blast. To her surprise, a glass rimmed tunnel peered out at them from the crater of her incantation. Tenli decided to enter. Beorn, after shifting into a desert skunk, followed close behind. Orophor too, why not.
They emerged after nearly an hour of crawling onto a rock shelf looking out over a glowing city. Far underground, the place was lit by glowing fungi lining the roof, casting everything in a pulsing green-purple hue. Tents and stalls of wood and homes etched into the rock face lined the floor of this enormous cave. Its inhabitant, gnomes dressed in bandages, scurried about below them.
The adventurers crept into the city, trying to hear anything of use. Most of it was idle chit chat - teens gossipping about how Bjogert still hadn’t got his pubes despite being nearly 57. A woman complaining about her tomatoes. The most interesting thing they heard was that Samso just wasn’t what it used to be - seemed totally focused on exports and with tightened security - not at all worth robbing.
Perhaps more intriguing even than that was outside the smoking cabbage stall, Tenli heard a group of teens talking about how they all want to get out of this hole, and emulate the sickest dune rider they know, who once did a double back flip.
Three hours later, they all climbed back out of the hole having experienced the Sand Folks.
Then spent another couple days walking before coming upon a buried cart with some loot in it. Beorn pocketed a bunch of rotten potatoes, and Orophor looted 10 gold and a slippery cloak.