After the confrontation with Yestabrod, the characters can hear sound and movement from the cavern to the northeast. Read the following boxed text if the characters investigate.
CHAPTER 5 I NEVERLIGHT GROVE
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Echoes spill from the misty cavern beyond, a cacophony of wheezing voices that wrap together like some kind of discordant music. The remaining heads planted in the Garden of Welcome begin to croak and groan, joining the horrible song.
Through the mist that shrouds the smaller cavern, you see the parade of creatures responsible for the melody. Their bodies are only vaguely humanoid, with clusters of luminescent lichen and tumescent growths forming chaotic patterns on their decaying flesh, their voices stabbing into your minds, both insane and gleeful in equal parts;
From rocky bed the toadstool rose, From chaos dark, her love She shows.
Wish! Yearn! Laugh!
The Lady will be wed!
CraveI Hunger! Dance!
Her joyous spores will spread!
Youth is gone, beauty rots, Araumycos and Zuggtmoy!
Joined together, heart to heart, Becoming one 'til death do part!
Hail! Hail! Hail!
The entourage is composed of twelve bridesmaids of Zuggtmoy and six chamberlains of Zuggtmoy
(see appendix C for both), all of which are lost in their own reverie. They are in the midst of conducting an obscene ritual of some sort—like a parody of a wedding ceremony.
Zuggtmoy's thralls make their way to Yestabrod’s garden, attacking only if the characters stand in their way.
Any character reduced to 0 hit points in this encounter is knocked unconscious rather than killed. If all the characters are knocked unconscious, the party wakes up in a fungi-tilled cave ld6 t 4 miles away from Neverlight Grove, with or without their NPC companions (at your discretion). Their drow pursuit level decreases by 1, and each character is infested with Zuggtmoy’s spores (see the “Neverlight Grove; General Features” sidebar).
DEVELOPMENT
If left alone, the thralls enact a mock wedding, with a chamberlain and a bridesmaid standing in for Araumycos
and Zuggtmoy. Yestabrod, if alive, assumes the role of priest to preside over the vows. If Yestabrod is dead, three spore servants rise from the garden and carry its corpse, moving it like a puppet to play out the part of priest. At this point of the ceremony, any onlookers experience a vision.
The tableau of the mock wedding is replaced by a vision of the inside of a great tower. Spiraling stairs and balconies are carved into its walls, with the interior lit by
phosphorescent patches of mold growing in whorls. In the center of the open space floats a humanoid figure, womanlike in form, but made entirely of fungi and mold.
She is easily three times the height of the fungal bridesmaids that move up and down the spiraling stairs, tending to their giant mistress. They croon a strange, soothing song as they weave the substance of the giant figure into delicate lichen veils and a long, mycelium train like a bridal gown.
The vision ends when the ceremony does, after which the creatures file solemnly back to Yggmorgus.
Characters witnessing the wedding rehearsal and the accompanying vision must succeed on a DC 10 Wisdom saving throw or gain one level of madness (see
“Madness" in chapter 2).
If the characters share their experience with Basidia, the sovereign leads the two circles loyal to it out of Neverlight Grove before it is too late. Alternatively, the characters can follow the wedding procession into Yggmorgus and witness the further horrors waiting for the Underdark if Zuggtmoy rises in power.
XP AWARDS
In addition to the XP gained for defeating Zuggtmoy's bridesmaids or chamberlains, each characters gains 100 XP for witnessing the wedding rehearsal.
Y GGMORGUS
When Zuggtmoy arrived in the. Underdark, she was immediately drawn to Neverlight Grove and its fungal riches. She cultivated Yggmorgus, a mushroom of titanic proportions, from the rich, rotting soil.
Conveniently secluded from the rest of the Underdark.
Yggmorgus is a perfect base of operations for the Demon Queen of Fungi. She has completely enthralled Phylo. and the hapless sovereign is growing a myconid and spore servant army for her. Zuggtmoy has also become aware of Araumycos, the largest fungal life form- and possibly the largest creature of any kind in the world, Araumycos is a vast fungus colony with a single mind, which tills the caverns and tunnels of the Underdark in an area the size of the High Forest.
Araumycos is so interwoven with the fabric of the world that control of it would grant Zuggtmoy nearly unlimited power in her new home.
Though Yggmorgus can't be seen clearly from the main cavern of Neverlight Grove, the unholy lights and sounds there can be discerned and sometimes even felt.
Characters who ask the myconids about it receive mixed responses. Sovereign Phylo and those loyal to it enter a state of near bliss when they speak about Yggmorgus, as if it was a paradise. Sovereign Basidia and its followers give wary answers. Phylo’s secrecy means that they aren't sure what lies beyond the ravine.
G
IANTM
USHROOMT
OWERThe cavern around Yggmorgus is huge, and the giant mushroom nearly fills it from floor to ceiling.
You have no clear reference to judge the towering mushroom's size at this distance. Thousands of smaller fungi ding to the main stalk, which itself splits into several lesser stalks, each long enough with a cap big enough to be the top of a great tower.
The cavern floor surrounding the stalk is covered by a carpet of fungi.
An eerie luminescence pours through slitted windows carved into the trunk, with the same cacophony of atonal music heard earlier echoing within. A stench of rot and decay wraps around you, seemingly threatening to penetrate your flesh and pervade your soul.
Yestabrod’s Garden of Welcome is a pale reflection of the true horrors surrounding Yggmorgus. A 20-foot- high crescent-shaped ledge hugs the cavern wall and gradually slopes down to the lower basin. The ledge is covered with a carpet of moss and fungi, scores of variously sized lumps, and pockmarks where pools of vile fluids suppurate and ooze, some drying out and scabbing over. The entire ledge is difficult terrain. Characters venturing this close to Yggmorgus must succeed on a DC 11 Wisdom saving throw or gain one level of madness (see
"Madness” in chapter 2).
Characters can discern the shapes of writhing creatures inside each lump. Most of these arc humanoids, though a few of the lumps arc
occupied by what appear to be gricks, nothics, and giant spiders. This is the Great Garden of Rot.
nourished both by the creatures subsumed within it and the faerzress pervading this cavern.
As if on cue, one of the lumps closest to the characters bubbles up and bursts. A dense cloud of spores and dark, reeking fluid explodes outward, even as the characters hear a piercing scream of agony and terror. Inside the pockmark left behind by the burst Is one of Xinaya's draw scouts—or at least what’s left of him. Other than a face, long white hair, and a breastplate, it is impossible to distinguish where the drow ends, and the rot and fungi consuming him begins. The drow feebly thrashes, his screams rising ever higher in pitch, until he locks eyes writh one of the characters and abruptly stops screaming. A brief moment of lucidity replaces his terror, even as his eyes roll back into his head in some kind of bizarre euphoria as he goes limp and slowly sinks back down into the fungal muck. Characters witnessing this must succeed on a DC 13 Wisdom saving throw or gain one level of madness.
Throughout the entire cavern, loud moans and cries of agony answer the draw's screams in a terrifying and deafening chorus, drowning out all other sounds until eventually winding down into a low susurration f groans and burbles. The entire
stalk of the giant mushroom seems to shudder, almost as if in delight.
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Characters who descend to the cavern's lower basin witness the next spectacle of unspeakable horror spawned by the Lady of Decay.
MAD DANCE
Scores of deformed creatures dance around the base of the giant fungal tower. The revelers are a motley collection of humanoids and various other creatures, all sporting tumors, cankers, and putrid patches of flesh all over their bodies.
They are joined by dancing fungi vaguely shaped and twisted into forms resembling humanoids. Some of these creatures are spore servants enthralled to the Demon Queen of Fungi. Others are myconids and other fungal life forms infested with Zuggtmoy’s spores.
The dancing creatures pay no attention to trespassers unless they are attacked. In that event, ld6 drow spore servants and ld6 hook horror spore servants (see appendix C for both) stop dancing and turn on their attackers.
Voices can be heard cackling and chatting amiably about Sovereign Phylo’s success at "bringing so many new guests to attend the party!” The characters see drow dancing as if their bones were melting, duergar roaring with mock merriment and vomiting slime, and even nothics laughing madly as they leap and caper.
If the characters observe the mad dance for a few rounds, they see a form rising up out of the fungal muck. It is the drow scout whose terrible end they just witnessed, wading out to join the other revelers in their mad dance. A character who witnesses this grotesque moment must succeed on a DC 15 Wisdom saving throw or gain one level of madness.
GREAT PALACE
Yggmorgus is the home that Zuggtmoy, the Demon Queen of Fungi, has carved for herself inside the great mushroom.
The general layout is simple enough, with the hollowed stalk of the mushroom making a towering central hall in which Zuggtmoy floats, surrounded by spiraling balconies where her growing number of bridesmaids attend her, singing as they weave her bridal gown to prepare for the fateful wedding day.
If the adventurers enter Yggmorgus. they come face to face with Zuggtmoy (see appendix D). attended by twelve bridesmaids of Zuggtmoy (see appendix C). Fortunately for them, Zuggtmoy is deep in meditation as her gown and veil are being prepared. She doesn't move, although she can speak and use her other abilities. Her bridesmaids attempt to chase off intruders, wailing and scolding them about how it is unlucky for them to see the bride before it is time. If the characters don’t withdraw immediately, Zuggtmoy awakens and uses her Mind Control Spores ability to send them away, using her Infestation Spores only if the characters insist on engaging the demon lord here and now.
Dozens of spore servants and myconids respond to Zuggtmoy's telepathic call if their mistress is in danger, attacking the characters heedless of their own safety. Any attack that successfully deals damage to Zuggtmoy damages her gown, driving the demon queen into a rage to attack the intruders.
CHAPTER 5 | NEVERLIGHT GROVE
L EAVING
N EVERLIGHT G ROVE
Leaving the myconid enclave is easier than finding it.
Whether they politely avoid Phylo’s invitation or flee for their lives and sanity from the Demon Queen of Fungi, the adventurers can easily receive the aid of Sovereign Basidia and the circles still loyal to it. Where the characters go next is up to them—a decision dependent upon where they have been, the pursuing drow, and whatever they have acquired (food, potions, treasure from the doomed drow patrol, and so on) during their visit to the grove.
Depending on how the characters interacted with the myconids and what tasks they accomplished for their hosts, they might depart in the company of a myconid guide, or even two whole circles of myconids fleeing the grove before Zuggtmoy’s madness takes them.
Sovereign Phylo doesn't stop the characters or Sovereign Basidia from leaving, still convinced the cause it embraces is one of joy and prosperity for its people.
In all probability, the characters leave the fungal grove with dire and horrific news. They have witnessed the effect a single demon lord can have on the Material Plane—and they realize far more and worse things are coming.
Regardless of how many battles the characters might have had inside Neverlight Grove, discovering that a demon lord is on the loose on the Material Plane is a major revelation. Moreover, if they were in Sloobludop to witness the rise of Dcmogorgon. they now know that more than one demon lord is at large, hinting at the magnitude of the threat.
If the adventurers simply passed through the grove and enjoyed the hospitality of the doomed myconids, they leave with only suspicions about their odd behavior, which can help them later in piecing together the greater mystery in the Underdark.
If the adventurers learned nothing about the presence of Zuggtmoy or her plans, you might pass the
information on to them by having a friendly myconid such as Stool or Rumpadump come to them just as they are leaving. The myconid enters rapport and shows them a vision of the Garden of Welcome and
Yggmorgus, saying these images come from the minds of other myconids in the grove, and asking what these
“strange dreams” mean.
CHAPTER 6 I BLINGDENSTONE