Xilyrah covers her ears, uselessly attempting to shut out the voices in her head, some from the weary party around her, but a few from her past as well. As much as she's become accustomed to being an outcast, she's never felt more alone as she does in this moment. As the exhaustion overcomes her, she falls into a hallucinatory sleep, muttering quietly, "I will find you. I will find you. I will find......."

Tozer shakes the grogginess from his mind in the morning; as he sits up, he reflects briefly on a fragment of a bad dream he had during the night: he struck Ront's corpse repeatedly with his maul, but the orc merely smiled and giggled in response. Then Ront stood up and, inexplicably, had a tankard of ale in his hand that he proceeded to drink with glee in front of Tozer. 

After the rest of the party is awake, Tozer says, "Water. Let the search begin."

As he readies himself for more travel through the Underdark, Tozer takes a moment to examine his maul as closely as he can, noting the damage caused by the grey ooze. "Possibly it can be repaired," he thinks to himself. He cannot fathom parting ways with a weapon fashioned decades ago by a member of the Stormspar clan. 

Sarith leads the party, and he begrudgingly explains when Beegred questions him, that he is choosing to stay off well traveled paths and doing his best to avoid the tunnels that are marked as dead ends.  Progress as the crow flies is not significant, however you climb up and down as often as you traverse even ground, so time passes faster than you think.  At one point, while Sarith examines a nook for markings, Narstin with his dwarven affinity for stone, realizes that some rocks and boulders can be moved to block the entrance, providing a secure place where the party can take a long rest without the requirement for watches.

(Decision time.  Use the secure nook take a long rest and waive the need to keep watches, or press onwards and cover more distance?  Discuss in OOC please.)

Feeling in good shape and still wary of pursuit, the party elects to continue travelling.  Before doing so, they attempt to make it look like the party entered the nook, but never exited.

After travelling for some time, the party decides to take a long rest.  They set up their camp and set watches to guard against dangers...

As the party settles down for the evening, Narstin, Sarith and Xilyrah take the first guard shift.  Not long after the others settle in to sleep, the nearest bend in the tunnel begins to glow with several bright moving lights.

Xilyrah sees the moving lights and via the telepathic connection attempts to rouse the others, "Arise! Something approaches!"

After a few days of testing the telepathic link, you have all figured out that Stool is the one that causes it, and it only lasts about an hour.  Xilyrah moves over to Stool, wakes him and silently makes a 'geyser' type of gesture.  After a moment of wondering if the message is understood, Xilyrah gets a face full of spores.  

She proceeds to mind blast you all, "ARISE!  Something approaches!"

Let me know how you want to set up for "something" coming from the right.

Lights or no lights?

The party scrambles to their feet.  Valthana instinctively reaches out in the darkness for Stool.  Everyone whispers suggestions and everyone ends up confused.  Sarith and Beegred move to the back, for reasons.  The party is half taking cover in the nook, and half setting up a defensive line.

The light that comes around the corner, approximately 90 feet away, is blinding to your dark sensitive eyes.  You all can't make out the shapes of the forms in the light, as you squint to try and peer within.

"Friend or foe?" whispers Tozer to no one in particular. "They're carrying a week of sunshine with them. Humans or halflings it would seem. Certainly not drow."

The dwarf doesn't like the idea of waiting in the darkness and surprising (intentionally or unintentionally) those who are approaching. Nobody travels through the Underdark nonchalantly; the place is too sinister, too unpredictable. So, anyone who suddenly stumbles into a large group of creatures may think with his sword first. 

With maul in hand, Tozer strides forward (to G5) and calls out, "Hail there! Who approaches? I am Tozer, dwarf warrior of the Stormspar clan." He pauses for a few seconds before continuing. "I seek no trouble, only safe passage through this place." 

Since Tozer has boldly called out, Sarith will use Dancing Lights to create a single humanoid-shaped light at M5.

Tozer's voice booms out down the tunnel.  Not long after, Sarith's humanoid shaped dancing lights appears between the party and the strangers.  

There is no answer.  (roll perception check for the party, ie: 2 separate or 1 with help/advantage)

(Beegred is literally in the dark. The people with Darkvision should make the perception rolls.)

Perception: Tozer 10 | Eldeth 9 (if rolling for NPC's is acceptable)

Eldeth closes her eyes to focus on the answer to Tozer's challenge, and instead only hears dozens and dozens of 'tick tick tick' noises.

Tozer cocks his head and focuses on the peculiar noise that reaches his ears. The almost mechanical, rhythmic ticking sound tells him that some sort of insect lies ahead. 

"I stand corrected, friends. Not humans. Not halflings. Insects rather. And I doubt they understand a word I said."

The dwarf looks at the others inquisitively. "Now what?" 

Beegred: "Do we want to kill these oversized fireflies? We already have enough light from Narstin and Sarith. Maybe we let them go away... If they are going to make a racket, I'll smash them so I can get back to sleep."

As you whisper amongst yourselves, the creatures continue to march towards you.  They are now currently just ahead of Sarith's dancing lights figure.  The creatures, which you can now see as your eyes adjust to the bright light they produce, are very large beetles.  They pause in front of the dancing lights figure, but begin to move forward again.

(What do you want to do?  Discuss in OOC)

Narstin, who apparently has prior experience with Giant Fire Beetles, knows exactly how to keep the group from posing a threat to them.  Everyone tucks into the nook and watches them casually skitter their way across the tunnels until they round another bend and are finally out of sight.  It takes all of you some time to regain your complete night vision.

You all resume your sleep or watches and the remainder of the long rest period passes without incident.

After all of you wake fully rested, you resume your journey.  Sarith leads you down caves that are lit by phosphorescent light (dim light).  Part way through the day you begin to hear what sounds like picks hitting rock.  The 'Tink' sounds have no pattern or rhythm, but remains constant.  The further you travel, the louder it gets.

Eventually the 'Tink' sounds become very loud when a tunnel branches off from your path.  Sarith wants to continue along another path.

(What do you do?)