Phase Spider Queen

The Freelancers had been entertained the prior day by all the trick tankards that had been brought back from Amabel Villa, but this morning Fine Branch, the nekomata cleric of The Cat, was in a mood.  She had, with little effort, convinced a group to accompany her to Naranjos' office to seek out a mission.  It was Naranjos and not Damakaios because the Freelancers' leader was out on a mission of his own.

The armoured Mikumwesauk halfling was seated at his desk, studying the mission papers he had available, when the Freelancers filed into the room.  Quelenna, the Wild elf monk, leaned on the doorway, arms crossed in front of her.  Glesni hadn't actually been in the office before, and looked around at the ridiculous wallpaper, the little statues of mountain gryphons on the tall shelves, and the labelled pebble collection.  All the pebbles had dates and skylith names on them, and all the dates were within the last half-year.

By the time everyone was seated, Naranjos had filed many of the papers away, and started reading the missions from the 5 papers left.  The first two papers were very fancy paper.

• Phase spider venom, or troll blood, for House Hadid.  These are in different locations.  Trolls are in the tunnels inside Commerce.  Spiders are in the mountains to the west.
• Sugar Glider Hang Gliding is being attacked by weird mecha flying creatures.  Drive them off.
• Bad poetry wedding lady – investigate her more.  250 eagles each, but if no positive info will be less.
• High Abbot Grigorio of Most Serene Boundary, wants Freelancers to find where the mysterious knight person has found the sources of shadows.

Naranjos stopped and looked at the seated Freelancers expectantly.  Even seated, they were all taller than he, except maybe Ana.

Glesni:  interested in Monastery
Tai:  also Monastery, but allow spontaneous call lightning.
Fine Branch:  will use divination right away if wedding.
Quelenna:  just happy to hang out.
Ana:  I know fire wall!

Somehow the discussion that opened with the above exchange settled on going after the phase spiders.  Naranjos hesitated, then mentioned that the Freelancers had to negotiate for money from House Hadid to figure out how to find the spiders, which was how he knew they were in the western end of the Commerce mountains.

Naranjos:  also, some of the dwarves of Vathia Estia practically domesticated giant spiders, which is where spider silk comes from.  But, no phase spiders, because they can't be contained.
Ana:  so, fire wall is not great.
Tai:  you can burn them.

The Freelancers took their leave, but before they headed out of their villa, they stopped at the quartermaster to pick up antitoxin and mason jars.  The latter was needed so that the spiders' spinnerets and venom glands could be harvested.

The day was overcast as the Freelancers took off from Ripa Daneo and headed southwest over the mountains.  As they crossed the ridgeline, the wind picked up and they ran into rain, but it wasn't too bad.

For the first time, Quelenna was not riding pillion with anyone, but instead on Hau-kea, her owl gryphon.  Quelenna was enjoying the experience, although perhaps thinking about Koka the giant crocodile.  Hau-kea, perhaps, was less than thrilled with the rain.

Late in the afternoon, the Freelancers approached a mountain that looked somewhat like a bird, if one squinted just right.  On its south slopes, above apple orchards, was the fortified town of Kavali, a garuda settlement.  Two guards flew up to meet them and demand their business, and the Freelancers explained they were on a mission in the area and were looking for a place to stay.

The guards let the Freelancers in and directed them to The Benevolent Talon inn.  The meal was very good, with perfectly cooked meat, mead, and apple pie for dessert.  After dinner, Ana and Tai tried to engage others in conversation, to no avail; strangers without wings were not interesting to most of the locals.  Fine Branch prowled around the common room, but the nekomata knew better than to try gossiping with garuda.

The two elves, Glesni and Quelenna, just sat sipping ginger mead and listening.  As they sorted through the conversational flow around them, they realized two scarred and lean garuda, feathers silvery with age, were discussing a "nasty valley" to the northwest.  It seemed these were hunters, and they were unhappy at how it was "easy to get caught in the webs" then flying in there.  The elves smiled at each other, and sipped more mead.  It was very delicious.

The next morning was much the same as prior, overcast with a bit of a breeze.  The Freelancers departed and headed northwest, with Tai in the lead on the lookout for the valley in question.  They hadn't flown very far before it started to drizzle, which couldn't decide if it was actually fog or not, drastically reducing visibility to perhaps 60'.

After some aimless wandering around the mountain slopes, the group suddenly came upon the eastern end of an east-west valley which was perhaps actually a gorge, full of spiderwebs attached to the steep sides.  Ana shot a firebolt at the webs, lighting them on fire.  Glesni ignited an arrow with prestidigitation, and shot it into another part of the webs, lighting those on fire as well.

Then the Freelancers organized themselves.

• Glesni flew up 30' and lit another arrow on fire, holding it ready.
• Quelenna held her position, but got out a vial of antitoxin.
• Ana cast wall of fire on one of the cliff edges, and had Pelorus take position behind it.
• Fine Branch chanted "cats cats cats cats cats" to surround herself with spirit guardians.  The cheshires sworled around her in a 15' radius as she had Nighthawk fly up high enough so she could see Ana over the wall of fire.  Then she cast spiritual weapon in the form of an oversized shoe.
• Tai downed a vial of antitoxin, then flew lower, readying his axe.

Then Glesni loosed her arrow into the web, setting even more of it on fire, and the biggest spider anyone had ever seen emerged onto the webs.  Much of her coloration had turned blue, as a result of phasing in and out, and portions of her abdomen were pale.  Her chelicerae were a bright cobalt.
 

Tai slashed the huge spider with his magical battleaxe, the slash slowing her down.  Glesni's arrow pinged of the spider's carapace as Tai caught her on the backswing as well.

Fine Branch's spirit guardians burned the spider queen, who bit at Tai twice.  Her first bite missed, perhaps from being burned, but her second bite was a crit which pierced the Silver dragonborn badly, and poisoned him even worse.

Quelenna flew over to the spider queen on Hau-kea, fans out.  The monk's first strike was blocked by a leg and the second strike scraped on the blue carapace.  Frustrated, Quelenna punched the spider, burning ki to make it stun.  The creature shook off the stun anyhow!  At that, Hau-kea disengaged and flew over and behind Ana's wall of fire.

The spider queen, annoyed at Quelenna, bit at Tai again, but missed.

Glesni looked over at the wall of fire approvingly, but that didn't last long as three "normal" sized giant spiders phased in, one each next to Tai, Quelenna, and Ana, and bit them.  The spider on Tai was burned by Fine Branch's spirit guardians.  Quelenna avoided the bite but Tai and Ana soaked up some more poison, and the wall of fire fizzled out.

Quelenna:  now I'm cold!
Ana:  the poison will warm you up!

The spider queen disappeared.

Pelorus disengaged, and flew straight up.  Then Ana cast an uplevel'd shatter on the spiders attacking Tai and Quelenna, which didn't seem to discomfit them at all.  She chugged a vial of antitoxin as she surveyed the tableau from her vantage.

Fine Branch moved the oversized shoe spiritual weapon over to the spider on Tai, and it thwapped the spider with force.  Then the cleric cast toll the dead, adding "DIE" to her cast, and the spider was overcome by the necrosis.  Its legs curled up and it fell, bouncing off the unburned webs on its way down.

Spencer Thundersparks flew up, hooves sparking, and then a lightning bolt struck the spider next to Quelenna.  The lightning did not kill the spider, but smoke rose up from the unhappy creature.  Tai simply chugged a healing potion, as if he was merely along for the ride.

Glesni killed the smoking spider next to Quelenna, then shot the spider Ana had abandoned with another arrow.  Ikarus flew up over Fine Branch as the Cloud elf chugged a vial of antitoxin.

The spider queen phased in and fresh webbing exploded from her spinnerets, clobbering Fine Branch, Nighthawk, and Pelorus, and also catching Ana, Quelenna, and Hau-kea, leaving them all feeling like they'd been struck by a sticky sack of oranges.

"This is, in fact, actual bullshit!" Quelenna cried passionately, and turned into a mounted whirlwind of attack.  Her magical fans struck twice, slashing the queen's large fangs, and she burned more ki to make the slashes stun, but the huge spider unexpectedly shook it off.  The Wild elf followed up with a flurry of blows, the first one landing, and tried to knock the queen prone, but spider just wiggled and surprisingly kept her balance.  Quelenna's final blow skidded off the spider's head.

Hau-kea, having not appreciated getting battered by an explosion of spider-web, also attacked the spider queen, but entirely missed.  Perhaps the young owl gryphon was unused to actual battle, and facing such an unusual enemy.

The spider queen bit back at Quelenna with her large, glowing-blue chelicerae, but the monk dodged adroitly.

With the established webs burning off, the other phase spider climbed up the cliff wall until it was above Quelenna, then bit her head, piercing through her hair.  The poison did indeed warm the Wild elf up, but otherwise had no lasting effects.

Ana cast another uplevel'd shatter on the phase spider queen and the spider above Quelenna, the tones echoing through the gorge and damaging their carapaces.  Then, mindful of  her closeness to the cliff, the wizard had Pelorus fly to the other side of the gorge.

The spider queen phased out again!

Fine Branch cast protection from poison on herself, and moved the spiritual weapon oversized shoe up the gorge.  Nighthawk circled a little, ready to dodge.  Tai held the lightning bolt from Spencer Thundersparks' shoes ready, and Spencer also circled a little, ready to dodge.

Glesni looked at the spider that had bit Quelenna's head, and thought it was going to die.  She had Ikarus fly away from the cliffs and prepared to shoot the phase spider queen if she reappeared.

As if on cue, the spider queen phased in again, between Tai and Quelenna, and surrounded by Fine Branch's spirit guardians, which burned her.  A lightning bolt leapt from Spencer Thundersparks' hooves, striking her.  Glesni sent 2 arrows in her direction, but both missed and were instead caught up in the burning webs.  The spider queen bit at both Tai and Quelenna, but misestimated where they were and snapped short of her intended victims.

Then Quelenna again attacked in a whirlwind of fans and flurry of blows from her fists.  The fans slashed the spider queen and the first punch crit, killing the spider queen who just fell through the remains of the webbing.  The last punch was on the remaining phase spider, killing it too.  It let go of the cliff and fell, appearing to do so in slow motion.

The Freelancers waited for the burning webs to clear, also to see if more phase spiders emerged, but they did not.  Then they set about finding where the arachnids had fallen.

Tai and Fine Branch did the work of harvesting the venom glands and spinnerets from the slain spiders.  Tai had some trouble with some of the spinnerets.  The chitin was not really usable as it had altered over time with all the phasing.  These they placed in a bag of holding to prevent decay and reduce the mess.

After taking time to rest and eat, the Freelancers flew back to Kavali to relax and rest, before returning to Ripa Daneo the next day.  When they delivered the parts to House Hadid, who were so pleased to finally get their phase spider venom and silk, and also the size of glands from the phase spider queen, they paid 300 stars total.