This Sunday, we went back to Neng. Neng? What’s Neng, you say? I invite you to cast your browser back a full year, to December 2003 , where you will find our last Neng adventure, a time from when your humble recapper was but a newbie to this group, and hadn’t yet begun his humble recapping duties.
Caught up? Ready then? Congratulations; you have an advantage over the party at the beginning of last night’s session, which we’ll call “The Tale of the Well: Just Talkin’ ‘Bout Shaft.”
After much recapping on the GM’s part, the party found themselves back in Mothville, promising to investigate what had gone wrong with the Moth People’s Blue Light, which is the source of power for their entire civilization. Research revealed that the Blue Light had ceased to function as a power source at about the same time the Rambling Bumblers sealed the Rose Kingdom. The party had seen a column of blue light more recently, back in the Shaft of Many Platforms, but it went out when Merath brought her Rose Light into the shaft.
Theories abounded on how to restore the Moth People’s power source, most of which centered around items of ridiculous power that the Bumblers had acquired previously, which in turn required the Senior Bumblers to fill Nathan in on their past adventures. Nathan was suitably aghast at the amounts of Infinite Cosmic Power the Bumblers keep in their back pockets, but he didn’t say much about that.
Eventually, after deciding against simply dumping some Moon Juice down the shaft (which this recapper heard as “Moo Juice” for about the first dozen times it was mentioned, causing him to doubt the sanity of both players and GM), the party decided to take the prudent course and investigate the Shaft to try to determine the source of the problem.
That, of course, left them with the problem of how to get down the shaft, which consists of platforms suspended in air, each about 100 feet below the previous one. Theories again abounded (if the Moth People could run their kingdom on crazy theories, they’d be set), but the party settled in the end on using another previously unmentioned magic item, the Gloves of Infinite Sewing, or something like that. With the gloves, and large quantities of silk provided by the Moth People, Merath was able to create a rope ladder that allowed the party to safely traverse the levels.
Some way down, the party came across what appeared to be a Frost Dragon draped awkwardly across one of the platorms. Subsequent investigation revealed that the dragon was, to all appearances, dead. Although much brainstorming resulted, the party reluctantly concluded that there’s not much you can do with a dead dragon. Eleazar conducted a ritual to prevent the dragon from reviving as a zombie, and the party continued down.
As they continued, the party noticed that the number of bridges leading off from the platforms decreased, until the penultimate level had only four. One of those bridges had a gaping hole in it, and was uncrossable. All the bridges led to doors covered in Nefari symbols, and exuding a distinct air of Evil. Choosing the unknown over Evil, the party proceeded to the floor of the shaft.
The floor itself was blackened and cracked volcanic rock, overlaid with a spiderweb of crystal filaments. Closer examination revealed that the crystals contained black threadlike things, which formed clumps at the intersections of the web. The part also found another dead dragon, which had evidently crashed through the bridge on the level above. After determining that there wasn’t much more they could do down on the floor without breakin’ stuff, they went back up one level.
Once back up, the party chose evil over boredom, and decided to open one of the Nefari doors. This proved difficult at first, since Jacob was unable to budge it by main strength, and Merath wasn’t able to break the bonds sealing the door, but Bastriel remembered his Glove of Command, which opened the door quite easily. The party found a dressed stone corridor, with a sense of horrific evil about it, and decided to break for the evening.
Tales of the Rambling Bumblers 