“Why won’t you just die you stinking, slithering, poop snake!”

—Sofieus

Watch Silver and Steel Episode 5: Mom Genes

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The cast of Silver and Steel, most characters are level 4 while Avren is level 3:

• Jasmine "ThatBronzeGirl" Bhullar as the Dungeon Master
• Avren - Human Armorer Artificer played by Todd Kenreck
• Sofieus - Elf Alchemist Artificer played by Meagan Kenreck
• Freely - Halfling Lore Bard/Paladin/Divine Soul Sorcerer/Hexblade Warlock played by B. Dave Walters
• Cally Zaffrab - Warforged Soulknife Rogue played by Lauren Urban

Full Summary

Inside the claustrophobic hole under the dried-up lake bed, Freely attempts to get information from the creature he has encountered as Cally relays the conversation to Avren and Sofieus. The floor is littered with remains, both skeletons and meaty, and from the darkness a pair of glowing eyes peers at the intruders. Activating his divine sense, Freely can feel the waves of evil emanating off the creature as both Avren and Cally finish their descent and join him. Between the halfling’s glowing sword and the construct’s lantern they are able to make out the face of the creature that spoke; the heart-shaped head and wicked smile of an old but massive snake. She is skinny and sickly, but still quick and dangerous.

The creature claims this lair as their home, and derides at the term weredial being used to describe her creations. She says she’s remained in this place for years, sleeping and passing through darkness, and is only interested in things that amuse her. Freely can respect the creature’s ownership of the land, and asks if she would be willing to stop attacking the people in this area if they could work out a deal to bring cattle or other livestock to feed on. However the creature relays that she owes a debt to “the pale walker”, the one who woke her from her long slumber after she was buried here, and she must do their bidding. Cally recognizes aspects of this creature as beasts she has learned about, but something is off and unsettling.

Sofieus uses feather fall to descend into the snake’s lair and join her companions, immediately grabbing a stick of butter in preparation for whatever happens next. As the conversation continues she notices that the creature has slowly encircled the party, and passes a warning on to everyone. Freely finds out the snake is named Sooetta, and when she attempts to offer her the option to make a deal or be destroyed, the snake’s eyes light up and she attacks! Her whole body rears up and shakes, throwing mud and muck all over Sofieus’s face, before biting Freely with her nasty fangs. Freely reacts with a hellish rebuke, then hexes and shoots her with an eldritch blast. Sofieus blows an acid bubble but the snake is able to avoid it completely. Then Avren marches up to punch the snake square in the snout with his thunder gauntlets as Cally begins to carve through it with her shimmering blue psychic knives. Freely continues to eldritch blast the snake as he helps Sofieus wipe the gunk off her face.

Sooetta lashes out in anger but is unable to hit anyone, then she seems to sigh as a horrible miasma emits from her skin. While most are able to resist the effects, Sofieus suddenly finds her mind twisted by horrible memories. She feels alone in the cavern with the snake, now grown to a gargantuan size, and locked in place by this creature’s gaze. As she calls out in panic, Cally is able to connect to her through the psychic link and reassure her that she is not alone. The alchemist casts sanctuary on herself for extra protection as she tries to fight her own terror. Her husband is noticeably upset, punching the monster while moving next to her and calling out to Cally to help provide a defense. The construct verifies with Sofieus that her spell will help provide protection, then attacks the nearby tail as she also takes a defensive stance. Freely calls out to Avren with inspirational words of encouragement even as he continues to hit the snake with eldritch blasts.

Angered by the damage being done to her, Sooetta launches into the air and pins the halfling to the ground with her gaping maw. He manages to blast it with his hellish rebuke again, but now both the creature and the halfling are looking very injured. The tail whips up to wrap around Cally, but Avren jumps in front to take the hit and the grapple, convinced keeping the deadly rogue alive to continue to do damage is the best way to keep Sofieus safe. Angry and growing desperate, Sooetta growls out that they should submit, and when Sofieus panics and casts grease, the snake only laughs and taunts that it is seasoning for her next meal.

There’s a burst of magic missiles from Avren and a final psychic knife from Cally that shred through the serpent's head. Sooetta falls limp, and with her final breath whispers, “I die, I live, I die again. The pale walker will carry me to the great beyond. Await my return!” Still trapped in the dark nightmare, Sofieus watches as the massive snake withers and fades, shrinking and becoming translucent. She no longer feels paralyzed by its grasp, and after stepping on it to crush it’s skull she turns to find a blinding white door that feels inviting and welcoming. Gladly she steps through the door and finds herself back in her own body in the cavern with her companions. Avren rushes to her side and they share a relieved hug.

As Cally helps Freely get out from under the massive skull, she relays her fears about the strangeness of Sooetta and how they should do a detailed examination of the corpse and the area. The halfling begins to happily blast the body, hoping to blow it to smithereens, but the rogue calls out to stop until she can finish a full dissection as she pulls one of her real daggers to examine the head. The warlock is loath to stop, but eventually does to give the rogue time, and also to let the elf offer him a healing elixir and cast healing word. He casts prestidigitation to clean her off in thanks, and then starts to search the short branches leading off the cavern. It doesn’t take long to find a dead end filled with eggs, and without warning he begins to eldritch blast them all, which causes his companions to run to him in worry. They find sickly green yolk everywhere as he has managed to destroy everything, reassuring that nothing good could come from them. Cally is irritated as she thought it was smarter to investigate everything and learn as much as they could, but Freely is only interested in destroying evil.

Down another tunnel they find the corpse of a creature that resembles the weredial, but is not draped in strips of gore and looks more like a gigantic axolotl. There’s a large laceration on its underside, and it appears to have dragged itself down into the den before it died. Everyone is confused as how the monster they fought could look so thin and sickly when there was so much meat available. Cally returns to dissecting the snake, hoping to find the stomach to see what it was eating, Freely takes some time to bury the body before settling down for a long rest. Sofieus relays the details about what happened to her during the fight, which Avren believes was some sort of hallucinogenic effect and is upset that he had no way to counteract the effects. Bothered by the entire experience and uncomfortable in the cavern, Avren moves back above ground. Eventually they all find a time and place for a long rest.

Finishing her inspection of Sooetta, Cally finds the stomach is mostly filled with petrified remains of livestock and a few grizzly humanoid appendages. She manages to collect both eyes and the strange lavender fangs, and then as she finishes cleaning up she discovers some chalk marks under the mud. Calling over her companions, they manage to clear the muck away to uncover an old resurrection spell. This is an ancient way to infuse life, not the most efficient ritual, but still effective. Avren takes a moment to memorize the symbols as the group wonder if this is how the snake was going to return from the dead, so Sofieus creates acid in her alchemy jug to pour over the chalk and destroy the symbol.

Climbing up out of the hole and collecting the horses, the group notice that Avren is still deeply shaken by the events during the fight. He’s spent much of his long rest talking nonsense into a mirror, and has begun compulsively flipping a coin. Everyone climbs aboard their horses to continue to the collapsed mine, though this time Cally rides with Freely. She figures Avren might need some time to talk with Sofieus, and she has her own discussion that she needs to have with the halfling. As they ride she explains that she understands that they have only known each other for a very short time, and apologizes for presuming he would know about her tactics in battle. The construct was built for stealth and investigation, and asks if he would consider not rushing into battle. The halfling shows off his own impressive hiding skills, claiming that the end result was the same and that every hit he took was an injury others didn’t have to endure. Cally agrees that his skills are impressive, but points out that if he allows her to do what she does best first it will not get in his way. But when he charges forward it prevents her from using all of her skills to her fullest. Freely agrees to let her take the lead in their next battle, and Cally is pleased to be able for them both to be very effective.

As the ride continues, Freely takes a moment to message Avren as he can see he is still restless and upset, and reassures that what happened to Sofieus was not the human’s fault. Avren agrees that blame is completely on the snake creature, and that his wife is far more dangerous and capable than he is, however he does not have the ability to counteract the mental confusion Sooetta caused. That fact bothers him deeply. He is upset that he is not who he was as he used to have access to a much greater wealth of power, though both his wife and his warlock agree the new version is a much better person.

The conversation is interrupted as Avren can feel a strange tapping on his mind, a strange pull on his consciousness that he recognizes as Daisy. His newest and youngest warlock is distraught because her Mom discovered that she now has powers. She used a mage hand while making a shadow puppet show for her Mom, and now her mother is extremely angry at what Avren did. The young goblin frantically tries to warn her patron to flee the area before her mother’s wrath, and he reassures that as long as she continues to use her powers for good that she has done nothing wrong. The child admits to telling her mother the whole story as she is smart enough to never cross her mom, and wishes Avren good luck in not getting spanked or grounded.

As they continue down the road, Freely eventually grows tired of Avren continuing to flip one of his gold coins over and over, so he uses mage hand to catch it mid-air. He tells his patron that the coin won’t tell him a different outcome, and places it back in his hand with the smiling side up. This prompts Avren to grin at the halfling, and ominously declares that the coin belongs to Freely now, and annoyed but compliant he accepts the coin.

The group finally arrive at the gates of Port Argent after the sun has set. The city is more busy at this time of night than it should be, so Freely uses thaumaturgy to announce Avren’s arrival. Guards and townspeople turn to point at their arrival, and suddenly Avren is struck by someone casting toll the dead. As he recovers from the blow they notice a goblin woman standing in front of them, scowling in fury, and immediately she begins to berate the God of Mischief for giving her daughter warlock powers. There is a heated exchange between the two; Wendy, the mother, accusing Avren of taking advantage of a young child and teaching her terrible lessons and values, and Avren defending his saving of Daisy and decision to give her some of his powers so she could protect herself. Eventually Sofieus shoves a stick of invisibility gum at her husband, and quickly turning invisible leaves a few final taunts before heading inside. Surprisingly Wendy calms down, and with self assured confidence announces she knows where Avren lives before stalking off.

Who is the pale walker? Can the trapped miners still be saved? And what about Daisy's Mom? The adventure continues May 19th at 6pm PT on twitch.tv/dndbeyond!

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!