Episode 8: A Great Upheaval Part 2

Aired January 10, 2017 (Pen & Pixels Episode 64)

Episode Summary

 * Justice and Dan sink into the mud pit, never to be seen again
 * With their goblin speaker gone, the party attempts to communicate with their goblin prisoner, Gleek
 * Gleek speaks only “Yes!” in Common, “No.” in Orcish, and “Maybe?” in Halfling
 * Through pantomime, the party is able to learn the inhabitants of Nightstone, including a baby, are being held prisoner and the direction in the cave in which they can be found
 * The prisoners are found stuck on ledges next to a pit of bats and being watched over by a dwarf (Morak Ur’gray, NPC leader of Nightstone) and Sylren (a moon elf played by Memoriesin8bit)
 * The bats are agitated causing a huge swarm
 * Selsig casts dancing lights which causes the bats to return to their pit
 * Selsig dives into a fetid pool and falls ill
 * Hark, the usually intelligent goblin boss catches everyone unawares and takes Selsig hostage
 * He initially offers to trade the lives of the villagers and Selsig for one gold each (32 gp) but then gives them a job offer instead to remove a monster that has been hunting the cave goblins
 * They agree to the financial exchange and notice Hark is riding a giant rat-drawn sled
 * Sylren dextrously catches a falling villager before they make too much noise
 * The villagers go free and the party expresses interest in hunting the monster later
 * Gleek (despite not knowing Common) is made the Goblin–Nightstone ambassador
 * Returning to Nightstone, Gleek lets the goblins in town know that Hark wants them back at the cave, referring to all party members by name, with the exception of Selsig who is simply a retching sound
 * The party follows Morak to the Nightstone Inn
 * In the middle of the main room there is a dead goblin with a crossbow bolt sticking through its body
 * They find an extremely rotund goblin picking through the pantry who is skeptical of Hark’s order to fall back
 * Find a human monk (Kella Darkhope) hiding upstairs, knock unconscious since the attack
 * She has a flying snake [quetzl(?)] hiding in her hood, Selsig recognizes this as a common symbol and messenger familiar of the Zhentarim--a criminal network
 * Morak sits the party down, and begins to explain what happened to the village