After leaving Argos’ tower, Jadeth directs the group back to her and Juno’s house. She pulls them into her bedroom, stating that her room has the thickest walls in the house. Slender gives a sly smile and Juno raises her eyebrows, but they follow her. She leans back on her bed and lets them know her reasoning is that Argos’ would be able to spy on them outside with his spell. Slenderbard lets her know the thick walls were unnecessary since the houses are in pocket dimensions. She tells him to shut up.
Jadeth and Slenderbard let Lil’ Mole and Juno know what they saw in the book. Juno is concerned that he had higher level spells written down, since mortals are unable to cast spells higher than 10th level after Karsus killed Mystral with his spell, Karsus avatar, temporarily destroying the Weave causing the Fall of Netheril. Juno tells the group that the only thing left of Karsus after his 12th level spell backfired is a giant crimson boulder-like creature with blood oozing out of every orifice, and Jadeth lets the group know that her old mentor opened a rift when she was chasing him to let such a monster attack her.
Since Jadeth is still suspicious of Argos’ motives, she asks Juno and Slender to investigate his tower to see if they can find where the tubes he was plugged into go. She says she would do it herself, but when she stands up, she does a little dance to make her chainmail jingle. Juno lets her know that she’ll have no trouble climbing into Argos’ tower, and Slender agrees to tag along to keep watch.
Outside the tower, Juno evades detection from the magic orbs that had been holding back the fog while Slender heads towards the front door to play his lute for the clone standing guard. As Juno ascends the outside of the tower with the flight rune on her cloak, she sees the clones that they had seen earlier in the day appear to have aged already since they saw them. She gets to the top of the tower, and unsurprisingly finds an open window. She sees that Argos’ is in a deep meditative state, so she silently slips inside to investigate the spellbook that Jadeth and Slenderbard told her about.
Sure enough, Juno finds the notes on the 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th level spells that her team had mentioned along with various other spells ranging from attacks to simulacrum creating, to clone spells, However, any of these spells would normally only produce one living clone at a time. She also finds a picture on an altar of a young Argos standing among a team of warriors. She recognizes the druid in the picture as Anny, the one that aided them through the mist. There is also a dwarven fighter, and a woman in dark gear.
Juno turns her attention to the tubes in the room, and deduces that they are made of the powerful magical conductive metal, mithril. She flies down the tower to follow them and finds a tinted window. She presses her face to the glass to realize that there is a woman on the other side. The woman is the same one from the picture, and Juno floats back up to see if she can learn any more about her. She does find an additional picture with just Argos and the woman, but she shakes her head and continues following the tubes down to the lowest level past several unaware clones.
As Juno attempts to pick the lock on the hatch the tubes feed past, Slender continues serenading the clone outside of the door. This effectively covers up any noise Juno makes as the magic lock gives her trouble and she resorts to using her crowbar to pry the hatch open. In the room below, Juno finds the massive mithril sphere described in two of Argos’ high level spells. It looks to be nearly full of magic. She retreats back out the steps, and goes out the front door past the clone.
The clone is confused how she got inside and tells her that the Arch Magus is meditating, but Juno lies and tells him that she asked if she could go in while he was listening to Slender’s music. She admits that he nodded, but may have just been nodding along to the beat. The clone shrugs it off since the music had entirely captivated him, so Juno and Slender head home.
Back at her house, Juno walks past three well dressed tieflings gathered around the main dining table on her way to talk to Jadeth about what they found. They smile warmly at her, but something seems off about them. Their eyes never quite seem to focus on Juno’s, and their voices seem too monotone and almost robotic.
She closes the door to Jadeth’s room behind her to find the masked tiefling laying back on her bed and staring at the ceiling. Juno asks who the people outside the room are, and Jadeth admits she asked the household servants to take the appearance of her family. Still distraught over what helping Argos could possibly entail, she hoped they could give her advice on what to do. Juno is put on edge by the revelation, so Jadeth tells her she can dismiss them. They leave the house and turn to dust upon passing the door. After she does so, she asks if Jadeth wants to talk about them.
Jadeth declines, citing that, while she can read Mole, Slender, and Nalla decently well, she doesn’t really know who Juno is. She admits that she assumed Juno was just a petty thief, but after what Argos’ showed them, she recognizes that isn’t the case.
Juno admits that she was formerly a researcher working to find ways for magic to help change the world for the better. Her partner, however, was using magic to experiment on tieflings to create the perfect army – one that followed orders blindly and didn’t need to be paid. She thought she had destroyed the research, but notes that the tieflings that attacked back in the previous town were the same ones that he had been experimenting on. She also hesitantly lets Jadeth know that she was blamed for the atrocities committed by her partner, and can never return home. That’s why she came to Argosia. She wants a way to clear her name.
Jadeth believes that she had nothing to do with it, citing Argos’ visions as pretty clear evidence. However, she still seems hesitant to trust Argos’ reason to give them the futures he showed. Juno dismisses it, and gets defensive at her changing the subject. She brings the topic back to who Jadeth is.
Jadeth tells Juno that she was the former heir to the Caldran throne. She was forced into exile after she tried to use her magic to protect her home from assassins and it backfired. She believed her magic is a curse from a god that despises her, and it’s caused her to hate all magic. She swears she’ll find a way to redeem herself and create a world free from suffering– a world where everything promises to stay alive.
Juno smiles faintly, but tells her she’s not sure such a world could ever exist. She tries to convince Jadeth that her god likely doesn’t hate her and that her magic could be used for good, but Jadeth is quick to dismiss that sentiment and asks her to leave.
In the morning, the group heads towards the old mining city, with Jadeth only stopping for a second to give Juno a new lockpick after she broke hers. In the mining town, they are greeted by a group of curious dwarven clones that look just like the fighter in Argos’ picture. They let the group know it has been a very long time since they’ve seen real people and ask why the group is there. Juno tells them they’re there to help with the problem in the mountain and asks what the issue is.
There are three main problems: earthquakes, beast attacks, and tons of giant spiders.
Inside the mines, the group comes upon a blood trail almost immediately. They follow it to a wall, where Juno and Slender find a secret passage. Jadeth spins around, having been looking at the wrong wall and chases after them. They continue to follow the blood trail into a cavern full of blue metallic glowing ore veins. Juno slams her crowbar into one to pocket a chunk of mythril, but it breaks the crowbar in the process.
Jadeth’s night vision is a bit better than her group’s so she stops everyone and lets them know there are incoming spiders. Everyone gets ready, and Juno gets immediately caught in a web attack. Jadeth cuts her free to let Juno move back as she and Mole take the front lines. As she backs up, Juno gets attacked by a spider that can jump between dimensions, but as soon as she strikes back, it disappears just as quick as it came. Jadeth uses healing light to try to help Juno, but upon not getting the results she wants, she shouts for Slender to do something.
Slender plucks a few strings as he tunes his lute and gives Jadeth a cheeky grin. He asks her for a ‘please,’ which Jadeth reluctantly gives him. With Juno feeling better, they deal with the majority of the large spiders. The phase spider reappears and chases Slenderbard and Spike down the narrow passage they came in at. Jadeth and Juno chase the phase spider, but Slender handles it just in time to protect Spike.
They continue down the caverns past the spiders to find a glowing purple stream. Juno identifies the substance as a healing magic, and Jadeth leaps into it for a soak. Slenderbard and Mole are quick to follow, but as Jadeth is floating in the warm spring, she sees another massive spider down one of the hallways. She calls it out to the group, but it retreats backward and spits out an icy web between herself and them. They brush the last spider off, and head to the northernmost cavern.
At the upper cavern they find the large gilded door that Argos specifically told them to avoid. They ignore that warning and enter in to find a man sleeping on a bed in a room full of riches. Juno’s eyes light up, and she silently darts for the closest pile. As soon as she enters the side chamber, a barrier appears to trap her inside. Slender moves forward to begin to investigate, and Jadeth tries to follow. Of course, her chainmail jingles and wakes the sleeping man.
The man stands up and comes into the center of the room for his form to stretch and grow until Jadeth, Mole, Slender, and Spike are standing across from a huge platinum dragon that’s missing a wing. The dragon turns to where Juno is trapped, outraged that she dares to enter his home while wearing the cloak stolen from him and then try to steal from his hoard. She backs up in the chamber of gold, telling the dragon that she stole the cloak from another noble. The dragon huffs and allows her out of the trap to retreat back towards the rest of the party.
The group assumes the dragon is trapped, but as soon as Jadeth says something about the chain around him, he brushes them all back with a shove of his good wing. He demands the cloak that Juno has on back, letting the group know it’s his missing wing that was stolen by Argos. Juno clutches it tight and tries to get him to reconsider. Each time she fails to negotiate the dragon comes closer and closer to blasting them all with his deadly breath attack. Finally, she tries to call his bluff, saying he wouldn’t actually attack his missing limb– he snarls and turns to blast his other wing. It catches fire with him seemingly unharmed. Juno gives him the cloak back.
While this escalates, Slender is considering how this dragon seems familiar. He remembers the old man from the path through the mist and yells out that he found his son. The old man immediately appears, but he looks up at the dragon in disappointment. He tells the group that he’s looking for his other son, but he’s happy that Ashokka found his missing limb. He then asks if the group came to his house to return the cloak, to which Slender and Juno say no as Jadeth tries to lie and say yes. Ashokka rumbles at them again.
The old man takes a few steps back and transforms into an even larger platinum dragon with 16 wings. He introduces himself as Bahamut, and as a thanks for returning Ashokka’s wing, he grants Juno one of his own. It transforms into another cloak that she puts back on. Bahamut also allows them to stuff their bags with gold, which Slender and Juno both run to do eagerly. Jadeth and Mole do so as well, but graciously.
As Bahamut bids them farewell again, Slender notices the huge seal that Ashokka is chained to and tries to translate the runes behind him. He translates it as sealing away a monster called the “dreadful longbeast,” and asks Ashokka what that means. Ashokka tells them it’s a being called the Dreadwyrm, God of Night Terrors. He suggests it’s been trying harder and harder to escape as of late, and Ashokka needs his brother to come relieve him to prevent that from happening sooner rather than later. He also informs them that Argos’ was supposed to be working on a way to kill it, but instead he stole Ashokka’s wing.
Mole mentions the border ethereal creeping closer and closer to the mountain, and Ashokka confirms that it’s likely the Dreadwyrm’s doing. The group notes that it means that Argos’ spheres are holding back the mist from reaching Ashokka, and that the miners need to get into the cave to allow Argos to keep creating more of the spheres. Ashokka informs them that the earthquakes the miners are experiencing are caused by their own reckless mining habits, and that the other creatures in the cave are kobolds that aren’t usually that dangerous.
Ashokka also lets them know that the caves in the mountain can lead out anywhere, not just the way they came in. With that awful revelation, they make their way back towards the queen ice spider that Jade saw and get ready for another fight.
Overconfident from the previous spider fight, Jadeth immediately takes a direct shot of poison from the queen spider. Slenderbard pulls a card from his deck of illusions and throws it to the ground next to him for a clone of himself to spring out. He facepalms at his awful luck and asks if they want to retreat. Mole refuses since the miners need to be able to access the mine to protect the material plane from the border ethereal. Jadeth whimpers that she needs a minute form where she hid behind a rock. Juno uses her cloak to fly high above the spider webs and takes a few shots at the huge spider.
Slender curses Mole’s resolve and runs out to follow them towards the huge spider. Jadeth comes back around the other side of the caverns after healing up to smash apart the webs. Mole swipes their weapons, but the spider dodges both. Jadeth fires her musket to finish the spider off and steals the loot from Slender. She yanks a gilded maroon cape from its mouth to flick the ooze off and shoves it in her bag. When one of the spider eggs begins to wiggle, she spins and blasts it with her blunderbuss before any more trouble can appear.
With the group being so exhausted, Juno leads them back towards Argosia. They quickly run into a new, much more dangerous problem: the caves shifted, and now they are entirely lost and badly injured in the dark.