“Here lies all kinds of dead people pecked to death by abyssal infernal chickens. Thou should have been more powerful, or well trained, and been better prepared for thy fate.”

—Briv

Watch Everyone Tastes Like Chicken | D&D Beyond Heroes Ep 4

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The cast of Beyond Heroes, currently level 8:

• Todd Kenreck as the Dungeon Master
• Keen Dayeprath - Eladrin Eldritch Knight Fighter played by TJ Storm
• Briv Steelmarrow - Half-Orc Oath of Heroism Paladin played by Adam Bradford
• Penelope Half-Pint - Halfling Circle of Land Druid played by Hope LaVelle
• Alyndra Alexandria Garanahil Sarrbarand, Lorekeeper of Rime Spiro, Kinscribe of Clan Monkeymouse, Daughter of Oblivion - High Elf Cleric 1/Wizard 7 played by Jen Kretchmer
• Orkira Illdrex - Dragonborn Light Domain Cleric played by Lauren Urban
• Freely - Halfling Bard 2/Paladin 2/Sorcerer 2/Warlock 2 played by B. Dave Walters

Full Summary

An eladrin outpost deep in the jungles of Chult has gone silent. No communication has been received in days, and all scouts sent to check in on the town have disappeared. With their battle balloon Murray under repair, the Heroes have acquired native dinosaur mounts to travel through the jungle, intent on discovering what fate has befallen the outpost.

Penelope has perched herself on the head of her brachiosaurus, gleefully making fast friends with the herbivore. Alyndra rides an armored ankylosaurus backwards, uncomfortable and slightly scared but intent on keeping an eye on the rear. Briv has chosen a flying pteranodon to soar over everyone, though his metal bones make him a heavy weight to carry. Freely is being carried in the arms of a deinonychus so he can keep his own arms free for instant spellcasting. Orkira leads the charge on a triceratops, thoroughly enjoying crashing through the underbrush and clearing a path to the town.

The outpost is filled with impressive eladrin buildings carved out of wood, with intricate carvings meant to make it blend into the surrounding trees. Perpetual fairy fire keeps everything lit, and despite the recent rain turning the ground muddy everything is immaculate. However it is also disturbingly empty with not a soul in sight. As the Heroes ride into town Freely casts divine sense but doesn’t pick up anything, while Penelope uses the height advantage of her dinosaur to look up into the canopy. Unsettled and a little creeped out, Orkira realizes there are no other sounds coming from the thick jungle around them. Not just the eladrin are missing, but all the animals in the area are gone. All of the mounts are also nervous and uncomfortable, and picking up on this tension Freely asks his fellow halfling to talk with the dinos to find out what they can sense. Penelope casts speak with animals and has a chat with Barney the brachiosaurus. The dino confirms that there are no sounds anywhere nearby, and it can feel something unnatural in the forest.

Alyndra casts detect magic to search nearby for anything strange, and for a moment is distracted as she can almost see the outline of Briv’s metal bones through his flesh. But then something nearby in the jungle pings and she sends Grif out to investigate. There the owl spots a unique figure laying down on a swarm of compys that carry her through the underbrush. She is a humanoid with an amalgamation of human, dragonborn, and warforged elegantly melded into an almost seamless form. Spotting Grif she calls out a greeting, recognizing him as Alyndra’s familiar and claiming to be searching for the group. Hearing the stranger call out, Freely and Briv rush off to see who has arrived despite Alyndra trying to relay that information to everyone. Seeing she is distraught over being ignored, both Orkira and Penelope take a moment to listen to the wizard’s description before they all head over.

The newcomer introduces herself as BamBooBoo, and says she was sent by her father Avren to find the Heroes. This catches everyone by surprise, and after a moment of shock Alyndra is thrilled to discover she has a sister! They share an embrace as the rest of the crew are confused, and Orkira starts looking for scrying orbs believing this whole adventure was just an elaborate set up for the siblings to meet. While everyone agrees that Avren might have ulterior motives, they do believe the plight of the town is real. After a warm greeting from everyone, Penelope compliments their new friend on her unique and lovely appearance. BamBooBoo explains that she wasn’t born in the usual way, but was created when Avren was actually trying to destroy her. She considers Avren a father and magic her mother, and is now excited to have a sister to add to the family. Thinking they would like some time to get to know each other, Orkira offers to give them some privacy while the rest of the group continues to investigate the town. However the sisters decline as the extra long lives of an elf and a warforged give them more than enough time to catch up. The dragonborn reminds them that they’re walking into a dangerous situation and she no longer has the diamonds needed to cast revivify, before they all head back into town.

Taking a close look at the nature around him, Freely can see that a recent heavy rainfall has washed away many of the tracks, and on the horizon another storm is approaching. He warns his friends that they might need to seek shelter soon, and then begins to call out to the missing eladrin hoping to hear a response. BamBooBoo joins the examination of the ground, using her ranger training to see that the ground is so riddled with unrecognizable markings as to make tracking impossible. Inside one of the beautiful underground homes Orkira finds a dining room with spoiled food sitting out, as if everyone left in a hurry. Heedless of the warnings against eating rotten food, Briv enjoys a snack while figuring that this meal has been left out for weeks. The cleric stands ready but the half-orc has a strong enough constitution to avoid becoming ill. 

The halflings search several other huts and discover that there is a series of interconnected tunnels below the town, serving as both living space and storm shelter. As the storm approaches Orkira is worried about their mounts as there is no obvious paddock to shelter the dinos. BamBooBoo spends time calling her dozens of compies inside to safety, each by their own names, before sharing spellcasting duties with Alyndra as they cast sanctuary for protection and then command them to stay. The sisters share a joyful bonding moment as they expend all their 1st level spells trying to protect the dinosaurs. While Orkira finds their family reunion adorable, Briv is annoyed and rushes off to join the halflings on their exploration.

Deep in the eladrin tunnels the halfling pair discovers elaborate and spacious living quarters, and searching through the notes and maps they find the purpose of this Feywild expedition was to seek out a diamond mine. As they reach the domed central chamber, Freely once again uses his divine sense and this time locates a single fiend, while Penelope glances up to see the roof is covered in blood. Undaunted, they carve an arrow and warning in the dirt and then stealthy head towards the danger. Barreling through the tunnels Briv catches up just as Freely can sense two additional fiends. The rest of the Heroes arrive just as the two paladins are discussing their divine sense, and BamBooBoo offers to cast hers as well. Briv is dismissive of the multiclassing and announces he would rather let the “fake” paladins expend their resources first, which understandably causes BamBooBoo and Freely to angrily defend their abilities and worth. As Penelope and Orkira back away from this awkward argument, Alyndra breaks up the fight by demanding the direction of the fiends so she can send her familiar off to scout. The half-orc tries to head off again, announcing that he will be the one to discover what they are facing just as Freely suddenly can sense a dozen fiends.

Orkira asks Briv to wait a moment longer so they can try to scope out what they are walking into, but he assures her that a dozen fiends are a force he can easily handle. He acknowledges how shaken the cleric is after his death by the shadow of the Lady of Pain, but her lack of diamonds to cast revivify does not concern him. When the group takes a moment to discuss tactics Briv reluctantly agrees to cast his own divine sense, while Alyndra sends Grif down the tunnels. The owl rounds a bend and hears a strange hissing noise just before his connection to Alyndra is severed, just as Briv realizes the number of enemies he can sense has jumped from a dozen to more than sixty! Even his bravado is not enough to justify the danger, and he finally takes pause. Reaching out with her ranger abilities to gauge the general area, BamBooBoo is almost overwhelmed by the massive number of creatures surrounding them, and warns that Briv’s number may be much smaller than the horde they actually face.

There is a shared moment of shock that is suddenly shattered by the ground shaking, and a hole opens up beneath Penelope’s feet! She drops into the darkness, landing hard in the tunnel below, and immediately hears the same fearsome hissing noise. Turning around she comes face to face with an abyssal chicken; a featherless fiend with leathery wings and a horrific maw filled with razor sharp teeth. It slashes at her as Freely and Orkira jump down to help, the halfling letting loose an eldritch blast to destroy the offending creature. Seeing that the rest of the Heroes are all piling down the hole to the same spot and knowing they are surrounded by a horde of fiends, Orkira casts spirit guardians to create a protective zone. The swarm of abyssal chickens cannot get past her spectral firebirds without being destroyed by the radiant damage, and everyone is given a moment to regroup.

Curious but cautious, Penelope walks to the edge of the spirit guardian barrier and casts speak with animals to ask the abyssal chickens what is wrong. The horde is ravenous, murderously hungry, and say they were brought to this town by their mother. Intent on finding and eliminating the cause of the invasion, the heroes continue to move down the tunnels as they stay close enough to their cleric to remain inside her spirit guardians. Soon the dirt gives way to bones, humanoid remains picked clean of flesh by the fiends. It’s obvious they are entering a lair of some sort, and in an effort to try and be stealthy Penelope casts pass without trace to help muffle the noise. It works for a little while as the group moves into a wider part of the tunnel, but then Freely suggests to Briv that the corpses around them deserve some sort of blessing. The paladin very loudly gives a little eulogy, ignoring the need for stealth.

Once again the ground convulses and caves in underneath the group. Several go tumbling down into a lower chamber, including Orkira, and those left above are suddenly outside the spirit guardian radius. The army of fiends descends on those unshielded, biting and tearing into their flesh. As Freely sets off a thunderwave to turn the mass into chicken salad, BamBooBoo activates her channel divinity to turn the unholy and force the rest to flee. Safe again for the moment the Heroes discover they are now within a massive nursery filled with slimy, infernal eggs. They begin to pop and sizzle as they react to the radiant spirit guardians, and with some glee Briv and Freely begin to smash the eggs in an attempt to draw out the mother. On BamBooBoo’s request, and despite the harm it will cause, Penelope casts heat metal on the warforged so she can roll through the nursery scrambling everything she comes in contact with.

The destruction and noise are successful in gaining the attention of the mother. As the 18 foot tall mother hen of an abyssal chicken starts to descend from the ceiling Alyndra quickly burns it with a massive fireball. Freely marks the fiend with his hexblade curse before casting dissonant whispers, frightening it on a primal level and forcing the mother to turn and flee right through the ceiling and onto the surface. Just before everyone takes off after the creature Alyndra notices there are infernal hieroglyphs all over the cave marked in blood. She can tell this was a summoning spell meant to call forth a demon from Avernus, meaning someone deliberately placed the markings. Worse yet it’s still active and could continue to summon fiends! The Heroes take a moment to clean the markings, which BamBooBoo is especially good at as she has a history of working as a janitor. As the hieroglyphs are scrubbed away the connection between the two planes breaks, ensuring no more fiends will be pulled onto the Material Plane.

A series of sendings informs the group that Rarv has arrived in their airship Murray, and while the balloon is fixed and he’s ready to lift them to safety he can see the ground is covered in a swarm of abyssal chickens. Everyone is worried about leaving a bunch of fiends in Chult, but with the summoning portal destroyed the hope is they can track down and kill the Queen Abyssal Chicken to stop things from getting worse. Rarv informs them he saw the mother flying off into the clouds not long ago, and everyone scrambles up to the surface to give chase. As Freely climbs onto the ship to start raining fire down on the horde, Orkira finds that most of their dinosaur mounts have been devoured. All that remains is a single one of BamBooBoo’s compys and Freely’s mount that he’s named Fiaca. The deinonychus has climbed to the top of a tree, and the halfling beseeches Alyndra to cast fly on the dino to get her safely up to the ship. Green flames rain down from Murray’s cannons, slaughtering as many of the abyssal chickens as possible as the ship rises into the clouds.

With burnt chicken parts lying everywhere the group beings to clean the deck. BamBooBoo heads down into the cargo hold only to be surprised by the Queen Abyssal Chicken! One of the creature's spiked tails rams through the warforged chest in a horrific attack, but the noise is enough to bring everyone else to investigate. As Orkira helps dislodge BamBooBoo and casts cure wounds, Penelope is stunned that Rarv could miss seeing the massive beast getting into the hold. The three paladins unleash a series of vicious smite attacks that practically slaughter it, but before it can escape again Alyndra banishes the fiend back to the Nine Hells.

As Freely and Briv share a celebratory paladin chest bump, Alyndra pulls her new-found sister aside to chat for a moment as she knows they might need to part ways soon. Reaching into her bag she pulls out one of the Avren coins strung onto a cord for a necklace and gives it to the warforged. The wizard warns that calling on their father for help can have chaotic consequences, but if she’s ever in a bind he will come. When BamBooBoo wants to be able to contact her sister as well Alyndra scribes sending onto a spell scroll for her to use, and the two share another hug.

Landing back in Sigil, the group watches a cloaked figure run into Avren’s shop ahead of them. No one can see who the figure is, but they offer up a box containing a single abyssal chicken egg. Avren is extremely pleased to add it to his collection in the vault.

Thank you to special guest Amy Vorpahl for joining us on this adventure! The audience has voted for the title "Space Pirates" so watch live on December 11th at 2pm PT on twitch.tv/dndbeyond to see what amazing mission you have sent the Heroes on next!

Lauren "Oboe" Urban is the Community Manager for D&D Beyond, as well as a professional classical musician on oboe and English Horn. When she's not playing a Bard in real life she's a prolific Dungeon Master and player on a variety of livestreams and podcasts. She lives in Seattle, Washington with her husband Luke where they spend their free time playing video games and drinking tea. The best way to keep up with Lauren's busy schedule is to follow her on Twitter @OboeLauren