"I've an idea as well..." Hamburg said with carefully metered excitement.

He reached into a pocket and rummaged around until he brought forth a bit of foodstuff. He made a sort of chirping sound with his tongue, muffled due to his mask, but similar to that of a grasshopper.

He knelt and held his hand on the ground, waiting to see what his magicks might summon!


Casting Summon Vermin cantrip: Hoping for a grasshopper or maybe a cricket!

Hamburg casts his fairly minor spell, and presently a grasshopper springs into view, moving up to the tiny bit of victuals in his hand.

Roak stands back as Hamburg summons his wee friend. "So...what's the plan with the grasshopper, Hamburg? Eh?"

Hamburg let the grasshopper nibble in the palm of his hand while he approached a spot on the ground where there were a few acorns. He gently placed the grasshopper on one of the acorns to finish his nibbles and backed away to rejoin the others. With the patience of a wizard, he waited to observe the interaction, if any, between one of the amber squirrels and the creature he had summoned.

"Stay there little friend, guard those eggs!"

It was worth a try.

"What are those eggs the furry creatures are gathering? Do they come from the tree?"

Clear that he had no idea what an acorn was, Hamburg could only surmise based on what he did know from experience and what he'd read about this mythical surface world he found himself in now... the mushroom addled mind seemed to accept this as something different than a psychedelically induced reality, but living his entire life in Cynidecea, well sometimes reality and faerie-stories blended together.

As Hamburg approaches the acorn the squirrels initially keep their distance, a couple of them moving away from him.  The grasshopper spends a short amount of time on the little nut, then hops off to nibble at the grasses next to it.

The squirrels pay no particular attention to the grasshopper.

Interested, Hamburg reached out a gloved hand and picked up an acorn which he held for one of the squirrels to take from his hand.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:30, Thu 02 Feb 2023.

All of the squirrels initially shy away from Hamburg, but one eventually becomes curious and approaches him, pulling back from the hand and the proffered nut it contains several more times before approaching just close enough to touch it.  At that point, it turns into gold, and the mind of the fungus-addled man reels as he feels its weight increase accordingly.

The small animal immediately snatches the nut to run back to the hole in the tree where its group have been hiding the golden acorns.

Hamburg continued the experiment by stacking a small pile of acorns and placing the grasshopper on the top. He sat back, still, and watched.

Roak stays and watches as well, intrigued.

The grasshopper displays no particular desire to remain on the top of the stack of acorns, and soon hops some fair distance off, paying more attention to the grasses.

The squirrels ignore Hamburg's pile for several long minutes, then one tentatively approaches it, turns a single nut golden, and absconds with it.  While it is gone its fellows descend on the pile, quickly turning the nuts into gold and similarly disappearing with them.

Hamburg removed a glove, revealing the pure white, almost translucent skin of his bare hand... and touched one of the acorns himself

The bizarre wizard is both startled and gets exactly what he expects, when his touch does not cause the acorn to turn to gold.

Although he tries to prevent it, Lanliss' mouth actually falls open. He quickly closes it again, but...

"Well, you don't see that every day. Magic squirrels with the golden touch!

Probably best to stay away from them, though all those golden acorns..."

Hamburg rose slowly to his feet and replaced his long glove. "Well, we know one thing, for certain... grasshoppers do not like acorns."

He began to slowly make his way toward the tree. "I suppose we might also have learned that the acorns are mundane, else my touch would have turned them as well."

The odd wizard was careful in his movements so as not to startle the squirrels. He wished to take a peek inside the knothole of the tree into which the golden treasures were being hidden.

OOC: Going for a non-threatening peeksie.

As Hamburg approaches the tree, the squirrels race up into its branches, calling out with squeaks and high-pitched barks of alarm.  These only grow louder as he approaches, and their movements more agitated.

As he reaches the tree, he can tell that he's going to have to climb it to get to their cache of golden acorns.

Roak sighs. "I don't suppose anyone brought an axe?"

"No, and I'm all out of fireballs. I could Sleep them, but it seems like a waste. We could just leave them be?"

Roak sighs. "Seems like a shame. Aye, let's move on."

And, without further ado, the party moves along!
This message was last edited by the player at 22:34, Mon 20 Feb 2023.

The party continue on past the cluster of oak trees, moves north, and follows the path around to the northeast, after which it straightens out for a bit, continuing due east.  All can clearly see that there is a much wider portion of the path that goes north and ends in a set of huge, ornate double doors.  The main path continues to the east thereafter, turning to the southeast some way off.

Hamburg sighed and returned. "We'll come back, certainly. I'll think on it. If we can find something the squirrels are interested in, perhaps a trade can be made."

The enormous amount of riches they were surely passing by did not really mean much to Hamburg, for his understanding of such things was rudimentary at best. But his curiosity was near feverish and he had to force himself to follow the party along the path away from the tree. He and his sinister skeletal hand waved a farewell to the squirrels.

Roak chuckled a bit at this strange exchange, but leads the group north toward the double doors!

Roak soon finds himself in front of a pair of huge wooden doors, carved in motifs of sleep.  Some of the images appear to be restful, and some are nightmares.  A few of them also seem to include motifs of death.

"Whatever happened to simply carving patterns, or peaceful woodland scenes...or just plain unadorned wood? Someone is trying too hard here..."

Lanliss waits for someone to inspect the door.

Hamburg's interest seemed to turn away from the squirrel horde as they approached the door. As soon as he was able to begin discerning the carvings, something about his behavior changed. He began to show great interest, even to the point of approaching the door and running his gloved hand over the depictions, lingering upon those of death...

From beneath the strange mask he always wore came bits of phrase as if he were having a private conversation with himself, and like a goblet of blood-red wine, it began to run over the brim when the flow was not properly contained.

His strange behavior might well remind the party of those days, only several weeks past, when the odd wizard would speak of necromancy and his dominion of dark magicks openly. With the lack of noxious mushrooms in this surface world, such behavior had slowly changed into something a little more...normal...if such could be said of any arcane practitioner. Apparently, somewhere inside the shroud of cheap costume and odd mask, another strange persona still existed, determined - as it were - to return!

At the hem of his black robes, the disembodied hand seemed to hunker in preparation to recede to the safety of the many hidden pockets, or perhaps to flee from the scene entirely!

Hamburg reached to open the door!

As Hamburg reaches for the door, darkness creeps in around the edges of his vision and that of his companions.  His hand is too quick for a rising sense of alarm to stay it, and the members of the party all black out as his hand makes contact, a sense of roaring sound and falling just barely perceptible before unconsciousness.

OOC:
Action continues here.