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The Golden Goose: Part I

Librarian Comment: 

This Critical Role one-shot was created in collaboration with Zenimax Online. It aired on YouTube on October 28th, 2021. You can access the video here:

Although The Golden Goose is one long video, we have chosen to separate it into two parts of transcription, split at the location of the video's commercial break. 

LIAM: Hey, welcome to the final installment of our very special one-shot collaboration with our friends at Bethesda and ZeniMax Online Studios and their 2021 release: Elder Scrolls Online: Blackwood. If you are jumping in for the first time, don't stress. The first two episodes of this series are available right now on our YouTube channel, so you can catch up after this. If you saw the first two, welcome back. Join 19 million players in The Elder Scrolls Online, the award-winning RPG, packed with adventure and exploration in an ever-growing fantasy world. The newest chapter from ESO: Blackwood is available now on all platforms and is optimized for Xbox series X, S, and PlayStation 5. The Gates of Oblivion year-long adventure is approaching an epic conclusion with the launch of The ESO: Deadlands DLC coming to PC on November 1st, and to consoles on November 16th. We welcome you to join in on all the fun, and please check out everything Elder Scrolls Online at All right, why don't we meet our returning players for this little adventure We'll start with you, Michelle. Welcome back!
MICHELLE: Yes, I'm going to do it right because the third time's the charm. My name is Michelle Nguyen Bradley, and I am playing Hoa Sen. There's a really cool graphic below me saying the same thing.
LIAM: Nope.
MICHELLE: I am playing an--
LAURA: Nope.
MICHELLE: I do it myself manually. I am playing Hoa Sen, it floats, and then you see my name on the bottom, and it does do the-- What's that screensaver that won't hit the corner? Anyway, I'm playing Hoa Sen. I am an Altmer warden, and I am also a hostess in this tavern of ours called Grelnok's Skull, subtitle: A Very Nice Hole, and I got it in one. Yes.
LAURA: You got it right, baby.
AABRIA: Proud of you, babe.
LAURA: Am I up?
LIAM: You're up. We're just going around the circle.
LAURA: It's my turn?
LIAM: Yeah.
LAURA: Hi, guys. I'm Laura Bailey. Today I'll be playing-- I don't have a picture of my character.
AABRIA: You don't?
MICHELLE: Where is it?
LAURA: But I'll be playing Grelnok, and I'm going to tell you my last name today, because why not?
SAM: Lore drop.
LAURA: Grelnok--
MICHELLE: Loredrop. 
LAURA: -- Nightbringer.
SAM: Nightbringer?
AABRIA: Nightbringer!
LAURA: What? So hardcore.
SAM: So cool.
AABRIA: That's a very cool name.
LAURA: In case you're wondering, I'm a dragonknight orc, and I play the barkeep in this here establishment.
MICHELLE: Is that your new voice?
LAURA: Yeah.
AABRIA: That was a voice journey.
MICHELLE and AABRIA: I like it.
LIAM: Are you sure it's not Grenlok?
LAURA: Positive.
LIAM: Okay.
AABRIA: On sight.
TALIESIN: Loredrop's a good last name.
AABRIA: I will fight over this. Hello! I'm Aabria Iyengar, and I'm exploring the space with my body now.
AABRIA: Which I regret a lot. That's fine. I am Tavima, your Redguard Templar, and, you know, the house bouncer. If we're showing off our picture, this is me.
MICHELLE: Yeah, we are!
AABRIA: Look at this forehead, y'all. That's a good crop.
MICHELLE: It's good.
AABRIA: That can feed armies.
LAURA: That's right.
AABRIA: Yeah, you're welcome, move along.
TALIESIN: Well, all right, then. Hello, everyone. My name is Taliesin Jaffe, and I am playing-- oh, I have a picture-- Mallory.
LAURA: Hi, Mallory.
TALIESIN: The Dunmer sorcerer who is also the cook in this fine establishment.
SAM: Does he have a last name?
SAM: Okay.
TALIESIN: We are not that clever.
MICHELLE: I thought his last name was Yes. 
LIAM: Is it Boyardee?
SAM: Mallory Boyardee.
TALIESIN: It might be now.
SAM: Hi, everyone, I'm Sam Riegel. I will be playing your Argonian waiter named Slaughter Grimm.
SAM: He looks like this now.
SAM: And he's a festive, optimistic chap who's ready to serve, and hopes that you'll tip handsomely. And Liam, I'll kick it back to you to send us into tonight's game of-- No, I'm not going to do it. That's your dub.
LIAM: Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. I have not sat in this chair to run a game in a while. It's going to be fun. Why don't we dive into the world of Elder Scrolls?
Part I
LIAM: Well, my friends, another day has dawned here in Tamriel. Summer has given way to fall, and along with the shifting colors of Valenwood's autumn leaves, change comes to Grahtwood. So, so much has happened since you five decided to enter the food industry together. It has been at least a year and a half since you opened the Leaky Jug.
LIAM: Hole. Skull. Skull? Skull. And the restaurant business has come with ups and downs. On the one hand, your eatery, today known as Grelnok's Skull: A Really Nice Hole--
HOA SEN: Yes! Nailed it!
LIAM: -- is a fixture here in town. The good and hard-working people in this little corner of Grahtwood have come to know the Skull as a place to rest their weary bones, enjoy a drink and a simple but satisfying meal, and discuss the goings on of their day-to-day lives, and any news that comes wafting in from the Aldmeri Dominion at large. But there have been challenges. The tax burdens have been far beyond anything you'd anticipated.
GRELNOK: Terrible.
MALLORY: Mm-hmm.
LIAM: Region's tax collector and representative for the Dominion's Department of Health and Safety, an imperious Altmer by the name of Diven--
TAVIMA: Is he still alive?
HOA SEN: That's his name?
GRELNOK: Is it Diven? I always get his name wrong.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Is it Divon or Diven?
LIAM: It was definitely Diven.
HOA SEN: Davin, Dovin.
LIAM: Kept you all jumping through hoops just to stay afloat. And the property you all purchased together came with some undisclosed quirks that you began to discover over the coming months. Between the minor labyrinth of vaults and long-forgotten ruins hidden behind the back shed you use for curing meat, to the massive chamber housing an effigy to Daedric Prince of Oblivion Mehrunes Dagon buried beneath the very foundations of your restaurant.
MALLORY: Should've had an inspector.
TAVIMA: This is why you don't waive the inspection.
MALLORY: Really should've had an inspection.
HOA SEN: Mm-hmm, inspection.
LIAM: Seems they left a few important details out of the fine print there. You've survived attempts on your lives by hired sellswords, fanatical cultists, and more than one stray creature of Daedric origin. But you've persevered, survived. You even converted the deep cylindrical chamber under this place into a working wine cellar.
GRELNOK: Yeah, yeah.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I didn't know that.
LIAM: The stony, four-armed meanie below now rests among vintages from across Valenwood and beyond. And best of all, this day is one you have curiously been looking forward to for months.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Of course we have.
LIAM: As summer was winding down and you were putting the finishing touches on your wine cellar, a plot of land just across the road from the Skull was purchased by an Orsimer gentleman by the name of Dulgan Groth, a reserved and focused fellow, little you can tell. He seemed to swoop in overnight, and begin construction of a substantially-sized building across the way. His plan: To build the finest inn anyone in all of Grahtwood has ever seen. Construction seemed to happen in record time, faster than any building in recent memory, surely. But a bustling inn within stone-throwing distance can only be good for your business. Weary travelers laying their heads down across the road will want food, drink, and the warm and welcoming atmosphere of Grelnok's Skull. It might take a few weeks, maybe months, but you're confident that a boost to business is all but inevitable. And so, Hoa, Grelnok, Tavima, Mallory.
LIAM: And Slaughter Grimm.
GRELNOK: He said our names!
LIAM: You are once again on the job. Would you like to throw any harebrained crazy changes to the establishment that have happened in the last two months? Now is the time.
TAVIMA: Absolutely. The entire exterior now is artfully charred wood as a beautiful homage to that time we burnt it down a little bit on purpose. So it's got a really almost Nordic vibe, very sleek, and dark, and I think it suits us.
GRELNOK: Mm-hmm.
TAVIMA: This looks really good.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Inside, as business has grown a little bit, I invested in a second living tray. So now, you might see two living trays whipping around the establishment, Rex and Rax.
GRELNOK: Rex and--
HOA SEN: They're both call Rex?
TAVIMA: I hate this.
GRELNOK: It's lovely.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: So Rax is a little bit more moody, I think, than Rex, but, you know, the customers, they really can't tell them apart at all, so.
LIAM: And they get shit done.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: They do, they do.
MALLORY: I've definitely expanded the menu a bit more. We're trying to become more full service so that there's actually more complicated fare that's available. I've also been delving into cocktails, and I've been pushing on you some maybe monthly cocktail ideas that I have.
GRELNOK: I've been turning them down every time.
MALLORY: I've got two I'm really proud of that I'm ready to--
GRELNOK: Yeah, not happening.
MALLORY: I-- I made my own little placard for the-- I made my little cards.
GRELNOK: Thank you.
MALLORY: I got more. I printed-- You have to print 100 minimum. 
GRELNOK: I cleared the bar area of the rats that had been living behind it.
GRELNOK: Just in casies. Got some new dish rags to clean with.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Sure, sure. That's a big upgrade, for sure.
LIAM: We high end now.
HOA SEN: Clean dish rags, is that it?
HOA SEN: Oh, that's amazing.
GRELNOK: I also wash them on occasion now.
HOA SEN: And you throw all of Mallory's cards into the fire, which keeps it nice and warm in here. It helps cut down on burning wood costs. I have installed-- Even though it's about to be the depths of winter, I thought it'd be very magical if we could have outdoor seating, so I've magically constructed some heating devices that are imbued with fire so people may sit outside in, it's like a translucent cover that covers the edges so that the heat is trapped in, and they can enjoy nature outside amongst the falling snow, and the thick fire pole right behind them that keeps them warm.
GRELNOK: It's nice.
TAVIMA: Look, I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I don't know how to throw people out of outside already.
HOA SEN: You just, you shouldn't be throwing them, but you can throw all the people inside outside.
TAVIMA: Okay, I gesture to the window. It's a part of the-- It's a part of this.
HOA SEN: Let's-- I'll keep that part clear by that window so you can still throw people out, but the people in my area, the outside--
TAVIMA: People in your area can also be rowdy. Brunch people are the worst. MCIHELLE: Okay, that's true, that's true. Maybe, what if there was a pit?
TAVIMA: Okay, I like it.
HOA SEN: Okay.
TAVIMA: I go grab a shovel.
HOA SEN: And then we made a pit that we throw rowdy customers into outside of the seating area that is nicely warmed.
MALLORY: The complaint pit.
GRELNOK: That's good.
LIAM: Just throw it in the complaint pit.
MALLORY: Mm-hmm.
LIAM: Well, it's a lazy early evening in the Skull. Place is usually a little quiet this night of the week, but there's actually a fair bit of foot traffic tonight. There's a pair of Dominion soldiers sitting at a table by Tavima's original stained glass window, having drinks over a game of cards. Decent-sized group of leather-clad Bosmer in from the nearby woods to the north warming themselves by the fire. Has been getting chillier of late. In fact, one of them, sort of a younger-looking Bosmer, gets up from the table, dodges as the two trays, Rex and Rax, sort of figure eight around each other past him, strides up to you, and says, "Oy, what do you recommend?"
GRELNOK: Uh, I don't know, ale.
LIAM: "That's the end of that story?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Grelnok, if I may, now might be a nice opportunity to upsell to one of Mallory's cocktails.
GRELNOK: Yeah, hold on one second.
LIAM: "I like cocktails."
GRELNOK: I pull a piece of really dirty paper from the ground, and dust it off. This one's got mead, berry juice.
MALLORY: It's a Nirnhattan!
GRELNOK: It's called a Nerdhattan.
GRELNOK: A Nirnhattan.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Nirn is the planet we live on.
MALLORY: And it's blueberry mead, for god--
GRELNOK: That's a stupid name.
LIAM: "Is it the planet we live on? I think that's outdated, isn't it?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: No, I'm pretty sure that the planet that we live on is Nirn.
LIAM: "All right, well, I'll take one of them, a cider, and two Arrow to the Knees."
GRELNOK: I like your style.
LIAM: "Thanks, it's--"
GRELNOK: Mallory!
GRELNOK: Get out here!
MALLORY: I come out running, just covered in some sort of terrible, terrible red-stained juice that is just-- clearly, something's gone horribly wrong.
GRELNOK: Make your fucking drinks.
MALLORY: I've been waiting for this, waiting for this.
GRELNOK: I pour the cider, I got the cider.
MALLORY: I go, and I very carefully balance the blueberry mead, trying to get a thin layer of vermouth on top, and then a little spiked toothpick with individual blueberries, and then sprinkle some sort of weird powder on top. It's a secret. And gently put it forward.
LIAM: "Mind if I sample the merchandise?"
GRELNOK: Mind if you pay fucking first?
LIAM: "We had a tab going, but here you go." And he puts two coins down.
TAVIMA: Don't forget to tip.
LIAM: "Ooh, that's nice. That'll put bark on the hide. Yeah, all right, we'll take a round of those for the whole table, if that's all right."
LIAM: "Forget the ale. I mean, I'll still pay for them."
TAVIMA: Who's cooking while you do this drink too slow?
HOA SEN: Yeah.
MALLORY: Oh, for fuck's sake! And I go running back.
GRELNOK: Fuck! And I try to start making what I saw him make.
HOA SEN: And don't forget-- I go over to the customers. Don't forget that the tagline for those drinks is: It's Nirn o'clock somewhere.
LIAM: "Oh wow."
HOA SEN: Because it's called a Nirnhattan.
LIAM: "That's catchy with ancient language, that's cool."
LIAM: Make a performance check on the drinks, please.
GRELNOK: Ah. Performance?
TAVIMA: Can I give advantage? Because I'm also helping. I saw he was holding a spoon, so I'm holding a spoon.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: While you try to float.
LIAM: Absolutely.
GRELNOK: Count on Tavima to always give me that advantage.
HOA SEN: Yeah, yeah.
GRELNOK: Oh, oh, oh. 12.
LIAM: Okay.
GRELNOK: A one and a two combined.
HOA SEN: Wait a minute.
LIAM: "You know, it's a little pulpier than the first one, but still getting the job done."
GRELNOK: But you like it that way.
LIAM: "Why, yes, ma'am, I do like it that way."
LIAM: He takes his drinks, and goes back.
GRELNOK: I could get the hang of this.
TAVIMA: Yeah, you did a good job. Yeah.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'll-- I'll approach the-- Those are the Bos--
LIAM: Bosmer.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Bosmers? I'll approach the soldiers, right? There's Dominion soldiers?
LIAM: Couple Dominion soldiers. "Damn it, that's three hands in a row!"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Excuse me, hello, hi. My name's Slaughter Grimm, I'll be your waiter this evening. Can I help you with anything, tell you about any specials, or get you something to drink to wet your whistle, if you will?
LIAM: "Good with these, but what you got to eat today? Anything new?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: To eat? Boy, I really should've checked with Mallory before I came on over here, huh? Mallory does have some seasonal dishes that he's been preparing as we transition into the autumn and winter seasons. Mallory, um.
LIAM: "You're not pushing that plowman's special anymore, are you?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: The plowman's special is more of a spring/summer, and, really, it's far too early for the pork, but, Mallory, sorry, I'm vamping out here.
MALLORY: The jugged rabbit's not going very well! Tell them to get the parrot and pumpkin salad!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I hear that the parrot and pumpkin salad is quite fresh.
LIAM: "How'd you get a rabbit in a jug?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You know, I asked him something very similar earlier today. Apparently, it's a gel. It's a jellied dish. They shove a rabbit in a jug with some jelly, and it preserves it for a long time.
LIAM: Two guys talk together. "We want two of the jugs with the rabbits in it."
LIAM: "And a pair of those Nerf-habits."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right, yes, sir, right away. I'll be right back. I am so sorry. I steered them away from the jugged rabbit, but that's what they want.
MALLORY: I-- It did not go well. It did not go well, I--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Can you just over-spice it or something?
MALLORY: So I am going to take, I made my own private performance roll on this particular dish, and it did not go well.
LIAM: Excellent.
MALLORY: This is a six, is what you're getting.
LIAM: Okay.
MALLORY: It is a jellied meat with a little side of juniper salad, and I put more juniper on there to hopefully hide the smell of something that definitely didn't pickle the way it was supposed to, and I am just going to throw as much seasoning as humanly possible on this, and just for fun, I'm going to add a spiced carrot cake along with it just to hopefully--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I will send the tray over with Vax-- I'm sorry, Rax, with Rax.
HOA SEN: Wrong show, wrong show!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Sorry, sorry, with Rax.
GRELNOK: Oh my god.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: And while Rax is making the delivery, I will go up to get their drinks from Grelnok. Grelnok, hey, while we have a second. Have you given any more thought to my proposal?
GRELNOK: Yeah, no.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Well, I just feel like I have seniority here, I put in a lot of hours. I mean, we all have seniority, we all started at the same time, but in the wait staff anyway, I am the highest ranking--
GRELNOK: You know what? Tell you what, Slaughter.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: So if I could have a managerial position.
GRELNOK: You know what, I will put you as head waiter.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Is there a pay increase, or any sort of--
GRELNOK: No, but you are now in charge of cleaning the bar top as well. Please take these drinks over to the table. I rolled an 11 on making those ones. Slightly worse than the previous batch.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Here you are, soldiers, sergeant, captain.
LIAM: "Yeah, all right, put it down."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right. Everything all right with the Dominion?
LIAM: "You know, it's shit, as usual. It's a job. Those jugs ready?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, yes, didn't the tray bring them over? Oh boy, I've got to go find them.
TAVIMA: I'm playing with the tray over on the side. Who's a good boy? Who's a good boy? Giving it scritches under--
TAVIMA: Hey, buddy.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Hey, oh, I think the tray needs to go to table two.
TAVIMA: It'll get there when it gets there. Who's a good boy? Who's my handsome platter?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's just, I'm up for this promotion, and I really need to just show that I'm doing a really good job. Oh, okay.
GRELNOK: What's that smell? Is that the food?
TAVIMA: It does smell weird.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, that's, um, that's me.
GRELNOK: Wait, what?
TAVIMA: Did you molt again?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: No, I don't molt again, but as is canon lore with my people.
HOA SEN: Oh no.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: We undergo an odor change that lasts some time.
GRELNOK: It's been a long time since you molted.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yeah, no, it's a period of years where we will smell a slightly different--
LIAM: It's been a while.
TAVIMA: Cole slaw, you got to get me up to date on what you use.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It is canonical, and I can't undo it, so it'll be like this for--
LIAM: At that uncomfortable moment, the front door jingles open, and two Grahtwood locals come in, mid-argument. "Well, you can tell him to keep his nose out of it. I have enough trouble tending my own fields. I'm not going to waste any time tending him. Got enough on my plate." "Too right, but at least the Dominion's been keeping their nose out of things lately. Bit of nice change from the constant shakedown we normally get." "Ah, I can drink to that. Bottle of red, we'll be at the heat lamps outside." And they just exit back out the door.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh! Hoa, that's your dominion out there.
HOA SEN: Okay.
GRELNOK: Wait, hold on.
HOA SEN: Bottle of red, please.
GRELNOK: Cups! Bwah!
HOA SEN: Okay, okay, gah.
HOA SEN: Yeah, one's good, one's out. Okay, okay, grab two glasses, I run out.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Find out what they're talking about. Sounds fascinating.
HOA SEN: That was their private business. They are just customers here for a reprieve from--
GRELNOK: Find out, find out, find out, find out, find out.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Gossip, I want the hot goss.
HOA SEN: Okay.
MALLORY: We all need to know, please.
HOA SEN: Okay.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Who's cooking?
TAVIMA: Who is cooking?
HOA SEN: Go cook, please!
MALLORY: For fuck's sake!
HOA SEN: Fix the rabbit!
GRELNOK: Is it just me, or Mallory's getting worse at this?
TAVIMA: A little bit.
TAVIMA: You know, everyone has a bad day.
HOA SEN: I open the door, go outside. Hello, here is your bottle of red, here are two glasses. I will wipe up that, there's just red everywhere. Okay, all right. Hello, what brings you to our lovely little corner of the world?
LIAM: "Well, I plow a field about two acres over that way, so, you know, my balls are cold as hell. Could we get that mulled?"
HOA SEN: I don't know what that means, but thank you for giving me information about your daily life. It's so interesting to hear about the lives of humans. What's mulled? Hey, what's mulled?
TAVIMA: When you hot the wine.
MALLORY: Hot with spices.
HOA SEN: Make it hot, okay. Oh, understood. I put the bottle of wine--
TAVIMA: If they're cold, why are they outside?
HOA SEN: I open up the fire lamp thing, I just put the bottle in. That'll be ready in, like, five minutes. You can just grab it, it'll be great.
LIAM: "Let me ask you something. How come your cook's never in the kitchen?"
HOA SEN: I think he's exploring a different way of serving the guests, so he's sort of checking if maybe doing, what's it called? Mixing-ology is for him, but maybe it's food. Anyway, going through a growth period right now, all of us, really.
LIAM: "I don't know anything about magic, so you're going over my head."
HOA SEN: Oh, I meant drinks. I don't really know why the cook's not in there. We should probably get a second-- We had another person, his name was Timothy, but he turned out to be bad news.
HOA SEN: What were you saying about the Dominion? I'm was supposed to-- Mm, was it ask you about it?
LIAM: He just nods, squinting his eyes, and doesn't say anything, and after a three-second beat, there's a large-- he rips a large fart.
HOA SEN: Humans are so interesting. I've been here about five minutes. I just stare, and I grab the wine. Here's your hot wine, there you go. I mean, it's fine to me, but, you know, it's hot.
LIAM: "Okay, okay."
LIAM: Puts two silver down.
HOA SEN: Oh, oh, oh, thank you. Would you like any food from the kitchen?
LIAM: "Oh, you know, last time I came in, I had the plowman's special, it didn't sit too well, so I'm going to sit this one out."
HOA SEN: Okay, it's seasonal, more of a spring, summer thing, so, I mean, we don't have that this time around, but--
LIAM: "Well, that's what they gave me, so maybe it came out of a back room or something."
HOA SEN: You know--
LIAM: "Got fuzzy."
HOA SEN: Oh, well, there's no telling how things get fuzzy from one room to another. Who knows? Okay, I'll let you go! If you want anything, just holler and yell. Just, if you see a tall, statuesque, Tavima-named person out here, then just be on your best behavior, lest you end up in the ditch.
GRELNOK: "Tavima-named person."
TAVIMA: That is my name.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That's how you recognize Tavima.
HOA SEN: Do we have name tags now?
TAVIMA: Absolutely.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Maybe you should get on that.
HOA SEN: Yeah!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Get the birds to start pecking them.
MALLORY: With some flair.
LIAM: You have to print 100, though.
HOA SEN: Yeah, the birds are back, by the way. I forgot to mention, they're back.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Well, service is going well, I guess.
TAVIMA: You all right, bud?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm fine, I'm just.
TAVIMA: Buck up, Coleslaw! And I just give you too hard a punch in the shoulder.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Well, I just, I'm looking forward to, you know, another one of our hangouts.
TAVIMA: I mean, yeah, but you don't have to say it loud.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I didn't realize our--
TAVIMA: No, no, it's fine.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: -- hangouts were secret.
TAVIMA: Everyone knows we're super cool, but you don't have to, like, be thirsty about it. It's cool, we're cool.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yeah, yeah, we're just cool, chill, just buds.
TAVIMA: You smell *wild** right now.
TAVIMA: What is happening?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It gets worse, it really does.
TAVIMA: Is this forever?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: No, I mean, I've never gone through it before, but I feel like it's a good year, better part of a year.
TAVIMA: Oh, vibes.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Of just a lot of different. Should I wear a cologne?
TAVIMA: It's a challenging odor, and I just, I'm worried about your tips, you know?
TAVIMA: Hold on. And I grab some of the juniper berry, the excessive juniper berries that spilled on the ground when I was playing with Rax, and I just mush them on you.
LIAM: Oh, for sure, a performance check.
TAVIMA: Oh no.
TAVIMA: Please don't make me roll. Aw, shit. That's a four, I got a four. I did a four.
HOA SEN: There we go.
MALLORY: Right on schedule.
LIAM: Kind of has a Friday the 13th murder costume vibe.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Where are you spreading this on my body?
TAVIMA: Chest and shoulders, baby.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Chest and shoulders.
TAVIMA: Chest and shoulders.
TAVIMA: Bottom of your feet.
HOA SEN: Does it tingle?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Cool, cool. Ooh, okay, all right. Maybe my body heat will sort of activate it.
TAVIMA: Oh, something's got to.
TAVIMA: No, no apologies necessary.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You know, if I still sort of stink, just keep trying with different aromas 'til you can mask it.
TAVIMA: Consent.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Because I want to spend time with you.
HOA SEN: I open the door. Speaking of smells.
TAVIMA: Whoa, whoa, private conversation.
HOA SEN: Oh, I don't know when it's not--
TAVIMA: No, I'm kidding, you're good.
HOA SEN: Okay. So, you all yelled at me to listen. He farted and asked for hot wine, and that was all the information. Did I do it right? I did ask him about the-- no? Okay.
TAVIMA: How much about us did you tell him?
HOA SEN: I might have let slip about Timothy.
TAVIMA: All right.
TAVIMA: It's a work in progress.
MALLORY: I'm going to wander back out from the kitchen. I think the longfin is fine.
HOA SEN: What's longfin?
MALLORY: I may have overextended myself with the new menu. I might've added a bit much. I'm not saying I miss Timothy, but.
TAVIMA: We killed him.
MALLORY: I could really use some help back here.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You could use some help? Someone that possibly, like a managerial-type, could put out an ad, and hire some new people, possibly?
GRELNOK: I don't want to pay anyone else.
TAVIMA: We could let--
MALLORY: That's a very fair point.
TAVIMA: We could let Slaughter do it.
GRELNOK: You want to go back and help him?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: No, no, it's horrible back there. I like to engage with the locals. I was talking about, if I were to be promoted to manager, then I could do a job-seeking endeavor, and maybe hire someone to go back and--
MALLORY: Couldn't you just do that anyway? I mean, why would that?
GRELNOK: Yeah, you know what?
TAVIMA: But you would cover it until you hire--
GRELNOK: That is part of the job description of the head waiter.
MALLORY: Oh, are you head waiter now, then?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I am head waiter.
MALLORY: Fucking congratulations.
TAVIMA: Good job!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Thanks, Grelnok, I'll get on that as well.
MALLORY: Does that come with a pay bump or anything?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: No, it doesn't, apparently.
MALLORY: Oh, thank god, thank god. Yeah, no.
LIAM: The front door suddenly clatters open again. Ting-a-ling-a-ling-a-ling.
TAVIMA: Oh my god, why are there so many people here?
LIAM: A third Dominion soldier comes running in out of breath. "Oy, Jamie, Aldwin, come on, that place across the road finally opened up its doors. They're giving out free food and drink! You got to see this!" Suddenly--
LIAM: -- there is a cacophony of chairs scraping along the floor, of coin clattering onto tables in a rush. The pair of soldiers ditch so fast, they leave without remembering to scoop up their cards and their coin. They're out the door in a flash, and in mere seconds, Grelnok's Skull... is empty.
TAVIMA: Oh, karma hit immediately.
GRELNOK: Why didn't we realize that the inn would have food?
MALLORY: Oh, for fuck's sake.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I thought it was just a stay place, lodging only, no?
GRELNOK: Can we peek our heads out the window and look at what's happening out there?
HOA SEN: I'm halfway out the door. Oh, wait, did you hear? There's free food across the street. Do you guys want to come?
LIAM: Hoa, as you open the front door, the first thing that hits you is the smell. The crisp night air is alive with the maddeningly delicious smell of cooking both sweet and savory. You make out simmering meats, and fresh baking, and are nearly intoxicated with the aroma, and you're not the only ones. Folk from all about these parts are here tonight, milling about the entrance across the road, smiling, and talking excitedly about this new development as they crowd in under a newly unveiled wooden sign lit by lanterns.
LIAM: On either side above the entrance, it sports a shining, golden waterfowl with the words: The Golden Goose Inn and Eatery.
GRELNOK: Mallory, you said, when food was cooking, it smells bad.
MALLORY: I don't know what they're doing in there, but I don't like it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: The Golden Goose? It's a good name that--
TAVIMA: It smells so good out there.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's an alliteration, you could tell your family about it without any--
MALLORY: Why do you smell like the jugged rabbit?
HOA SEN: It's a big day for smells for all of us today, I think.
MALLORY: This is a problem.
GRELNOK: What are we going to fucking do?
TAVIMA: Why don't we put our stinky friend in front of it?
MALLORY: I mean, fire solved our last problem, I don't know.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Wait a second, we can't just--
TAVIMA: Are we doing arson?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: -- burn down the neighbors, all right?
TAVIMA: I'm fine with that.
GRELNOK: That is a good point, we should send you out there. Just go stand in front of it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Someone has to do some reconnaissance first.
GRELNOK: Yeah, you go do reconnaissance.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm in uniform, they'll know I'm coming from across the way.
GRELNOK: You're wearing a uniform?
HOA SEN: Change your clothes.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Isn't this our uniform? I've been wearing this same green vest for a year and a half.
TAVIMA: I thought that was just a choice you were making.
GRELNOK: Is that why you smell?!
TAVIMA: Do you-- Go ahead, this is all you.
MALLORY: Are any of us wearing the same vest?
GRELNOK: Seriously, take the vest off.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: The waitstaff here wears the vest.
HOA SEN: You are the only waitstaff.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I know, but I thought this was a thing that we agreed to. Did I make this up?
HOA SEN: Uh... yeah.
TAVIMA: My guy, we did the robes that we found.
MALLORY: Oh, gosh, cracking, cracking.
TAVIMA: It let out more.
MALLORY: Oh, oh no.
TAVIMA: It smells hot.
HOA SEN: Should I light more candles?
GRELNOK: I don't think it's as bad, I don't think it's as bad. Get over here, come here.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Feel uncomfortable?
TAVIMA: Your eyes are watering.
GRELNOK: It's a different smell. I don't know if it's better.
LIAM: The door swings open and a really tall, strapping snack of a man with black hair, shiny black hair, comes walking in. He's wearing a leather vest. He's really big. And he pauses immediately as he comes in, both at the sight and the smell right inside the door. "I'm sorry, am I interrupting anything?"
GRELNOK: Welcome.
HOA SEN: Welcome, yes.
GRELNOK: Join us, have some food, drink.
LIAM: "No, I don't think I'll stay, but my employer, Mr. Groth, has sent me over to invite you fine folk over, and see what we've done with the place."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Well, we're pretty busy with our service for tonight, but if we get a second, we'll pop over to see what you got.
LIAM: "Sure, sure, just passing on the word."
AABRIA and HOA SEN: What's your name?
GRELNOK: What's your name?
LIAM: "Rennix, Rennix."
ALL: Rennix.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That's a good name.
GRELNOK: It's a good name.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's a fucking great name.
LIAM: "Anyway, I'm on duty, so I got to go."
TAVIMA: What do you do?
LIAM: "I'm the muscle across the way."
TAVIMA: I snap whatever's in my hand.
LIAM: He actually holds on you for a second, for a three count.
LIAM: "Ma'am."
TAVIMA: I blush and look away.
LIAM: He walks out the door.
HOA SEN: Tavima!
TAVIMA: I got to go to the bathroom, I got to go to the bathroom.
TAVIMA: I got to poo.
LIAM: Is that in character or not?
TAVIMA: It's in character. She's very good at flirting. I got to go.
MALLORY: The fuck was that?
GRELNOK: I thought you and here were--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I mean, I don't know what I thought, but that guy is really handsome.
MALLORY: He did have a vibe.
GRELNOK: Very hot, he was hot.
MALLORY: I'm still putting it out there, I feel like fire would really solve this problem. I just want everyone to keep it literally on the back burner.
MALLORY: Thank you.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: After Vivi's back, we should maybe go over there, and I guess accept his invitation to be neighborly.
GRELNOK: What if they poison us?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, Hoa, you're one with nature, right? You can probably taste something and know if it's poisoned?
HOA SEN: I mean, that sounds like something I could do.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Or one of your birds could!
HOA SEN: But then it would kill the birds.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Canary in the coal mine sort of thing.
HOA SEN: I mean, I could just check with spells.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: They wouldn't do that.
HOA SEN: I mean, why would they poison us if they're doing so well?
TAVIMA: I'm pooping. I'm gone.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That's going to take a while.
MALLORY: It's going to be 45 minutes of the game.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Grelnok, do you want to go knock or anything?
GRELNOK: We can go over first. Yeah, we can go.
HOA SEN: No, but the gentleman specifically "ma'am"d Tavima.
GRELNOK: He did.
HOA SEN: I think he was special.
TAVIMA: I can hear you from the bathroom.
HOA SEN: We're just waiting for you to get out of the bathroom, so we'll just stand here until you're done.
GRELNOK: I just go over to the bathroom and I knock on the door.
GRELNOK: Wait, I'm confused.
TAVIMA: Look, I ate some of the jellied stuff earlier, and then he winked at me, and my tummy fluttered.
GRELNOK: Yeah, no, I get it, I get it, he's fucking hot.
GRELNOK: But I thought you were hanging out with Slaughter.
TAVIMA: He's like a brother to me. Also, weren't you guys going to go on a hike or something?
GRELNOK: I thought you guys were--
TAVIMA: Okay, no.
LAURA and TAVIMA: All right.
GRELNOK: So you going to get it on with the fucking enemy?
TAVIMA: I don't know. I yelled 'I have to poop,' so I'm pretty sure I'm done here.
GRELNOK: Keep pooping.
TAVIMA: No, just give me a minute. We're out of toilet paper. Can you go get toilet paper?
GRELNOK: Goddamn it. I just pull one of the bar rags from my waist. 
HOA SEN: Don't put it in the pipes. You know what happened last time.
TAVIMA: I walk back out with it like: This is worse.  Throw it in the back. 
GRELNOK: This is why we have no customers. Let's fucking go get some good food.
MALLORY: I change into something slightly cleaner, so I'm not covered in a failed jugged rabbit.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm going to represent our establishment if we're going over there.
TAVIMA: You cannot put that back on.
MALLORY: I think you cracked it out of it, actually.
TAVIMA: It shattered, I think.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right, should we stroll over?
TAVIMA: Yeah, we should go.
TAVIMA: It would be neighborly.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: We should put up something, just close for a second.
HOA SEN: Oh, a sign!
GRELNOK: Closed for a second. Make sure you put a note on there saying our food is better than any inn in town.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Be right back.
HOA SEN: Our food is better than anyone else's in town, asterisk, we're checking to make sure that's a true statement, but we will be just right back in a moment. Heart, heart. Let's go.
LIAM: Everyone's heading across the road?
LIAM: Okay, all right, well--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: But casually.
ALL: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
LIAM: Sure.
HOA SEN: Do we need our weapons? Hold on.
GRELNOK: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I go back in, I grab my axe from over the bar, or my mace, or whatever the fuck I have.  I don't remember.
HOA SEN: Could be anything.
LIAM: It was given to me by my father, whatever it is. 
MALLORY: I got my spell walking stick, I'm fine.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Click! Bandolier of skulls. 
HOA SEN: I keep forgetting.
TAVIMA: Like, his flair is wild.
LIAM: Okay.
MALLORY: It's two pieces of flair.
LIAM: So you stride away from the Skull, missing the old man at the outdoor table who lets another one rip from six feet behind you, and you make your way.
GRELNOK: We'll be back, keep drinking.
LIAM: "I'll keep nursing this one, thank you."
GRELNOK: Can't believe he stayed there.
TAVIMA: Yeah, that's wild.
HOA SEN: It's warm.
LIAM: So there are crowds of people all about the outside of the Golden Goose Inn. They've moving in, they've moving out. You see people holding all kinds of pastries in their hands, and holding turkey legs, and you arrive. You push your way in through the crowd, and you arrive at a front desk which is just adorned with flowers, gorgeous flowers, and find a woman stationed there with dark brown hair, dressed in a dark brown robe, speaking to an older Breton man with a very long gray beard, and shaggy hair, and she speaks in what you make out to be a Nordish accent. "Oh, hello there, may I help you?" "Yeah, I've been traveling south a few days, and meant to push on, but I spotted your place, and was wondering if you were offering any rooms yet. Think I'll settle my bones down here for the night." "Oh, splendid. We are just so happy to have you here. You are our very first guest here at the inn, and we'll put you in the best room we have. Please, come in, enjoy our grand opening. All your food and drink is on the house tonight." "Oh, that's wonderful." He heads into the crowd. And then you guys are next in line. She sees you. "Oh, hello, welcome, welcome. We are just so happy to see you. You are from this part of Grahtwood, or?"
HOA SEN: I am the hostess of Grelnok's Skull: A Very Nice Hole, directly across the street. You can see our--
LIAM: "That's funny, because we have the same job."
HOA SEN: Oh, it's not funny, it's just, restaurants have the-- you are a restaurant, we were here first.
TAVIMA: Sick burn.
HOA SEN: How do you do? How is it that you are able to offer free food to everyone on this day?
LIAM: "Oh, I don't know how the business works here. I've only been on for one week. This is like, you know, I'm passing through, and looking for work, and they hired me, and here I am, and I am just so lucky to be here. I am so happy to meet all of you."
TAVIMA: She's so nice.
GRELNOK: She's really pleasant.
TAVIMA: I really like her.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What's your name?
LIAM: "Oh, Wendla."
LIAM: "Yeah."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Well, congratulations on the job. It seems like you went from nothing to having the job of your dreams. Just really, really fast.
GRELNOK: Is Wendla also super hot? As hot as Rennix?
LIAM: She's more pixie-ish. She's sort of like a Skyrim Bjork, I'd say. 
GRELNOK: That's so cute.
TAVIMA: She's really cute.
GRELNOK: She's really cute.
LIAM: "Yeah, it's so lucky to get a job when you need one. They're so hard to come by in today's age."
TAVIMA: Yeah, they are hard to come by.
GRELNOK: Now all I see is Bjork talking. 
HOA SEN: Well, we wish you luck with your endeavors. We were invited here by a fellow named Rennix to enjoy your offerings so that we may compare them to ours, the very best in town.
LIAM: "Oh, well, there's many things to choose from. We have all kinds of pies, and pastries, and any kind of meat you can think of. They even make a gazpacho, which is something I learned what that is this week."
TAVIMA: What is a gazpacho?
MALLORY: Cold soup.
LIAM: "It's soup, but they don't cook it."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Well, should we get a table, and then peruse the menu, maybe?
LIAM: "Oh, well--"
MALLORY: -- the middle of winter.
LIAM: "Tonight only, it's seating anywhere. It's more of a buffet, and they are handing things out, and you can mill about. It's like a big party!"
HOA SEN: You don't seat people in a specific table meant only for them in this moment?
LIAM: "Oh, well, that is the plan, but just not tonight because we are so excited to share our new establishment with Grahtwood."
HOA SEN: Okay, then we'll just wander in and sit anywhere, sure.
MALLORY: Buffets are just going to make you si-- I mean, why would you have shared food that everyone's touched in the middle of winter? Just doesn't make any damn sense.
GRELNOK: Does she seem fake nice or genuinely nice?
LIAM: Make an insight check.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Insight check.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Restaurant business insight check.
GRELNOK: I rolled really low!  Four!
LIAM: "Your hair is so pretty."
GRELNOK: Thank you.
LIAM: "Does it take a long time to do that?"
GRELNOK: Oh, well, it did, you know, when I did it, but it hasn't taken a long time since then because I haven't brushed my hair in a few.
LIAM: "Well, if you're in town, maybe you could show me how to do it. I would like very much to try it some time."
TAVIMA: She's so nice!
GRELNOK: I mean, yeah, I could do that.
LIAM: "We have much to eat, but I recommend you get in there, because the best will go fast."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, all right, let's go.
TAVIMA: Where's Rennix? I'm just doing a little scan, just a little scan.
LIAM: It's really crowded.
TAVIMA: Mm-hmm.
LIAM: Make an investigation check.
TAVIMA: Please no. Don't make this.
GRELNOK: I'm assisting her. I'm looking as well. 
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: How does this work?
MALLORY: Everyone's getting really weird. I don't like it.
TAVIMA: 12. That's very high for me.
LIAM: You see him for a split second over by the very, very packed bar, and there's a door to the left behind it, and you can't even see the bar, you're seeing glasses getting raised up, and a bottle flips up from behind the crowd, and then he disappears into that door, into the back.
TAVIMA: In due time. Let's do a lap, let's do a lap.
LIAM: And as you do that lap, you find yourself practically packed into a gorgeous, gleaming dining area. There are cozy nooks and booths on all sides, and a roaring, crackling fire, and everything everywhere is cottagecore to the nth degree. It is downright magical inside. In the heart of it all, you see a very, very tall Argonian woman with silvery scales catching the firelight, a giant quirked smile on her face, carrying two massive, precariously stacked trays of food as if it was no trick at all. The people around her just brighten, largely due to the free food, but also just, she has a really infectious smile that she shares with the entire room. "Okay, I have a fresh round of cranberry tarts. Get 'em while they're hot, and I want you to try the pumpkin cake and brown butter maple frosting. Watch your backs, confectionaries coming through!" She almost bumps into you, Slaughter. "Oh, hey, how's about you?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, hi. Looks like you're overwhelmed tonight.
LIAM: "Nah, this is good. It's the best exercise I got. I see your hands are empty. Are you hungry? We have an amazing ricotta and citrus upside down crumb cake in the kitchen right now."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Sounds amazing, that sounds perfect.
TAVIMA: What is ricotta?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Are you one of the waitstaff here, possibly low-ranking?
LIAM: "No, I'm the head waitress." 
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: First day on the job, huh?
LIAM: "I've been here about a week, but it's all been behind closed doors."
LIAM: "Just so grateful to be here, I mean, I--"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What's your name?
LIAM: "Oh, Mangla."
LIAM: "Mangla Mordrid."
GRELNOK: Can I sneak up behind Mangla and give her a sniff-ola?
HOA SEN: What? 
LIAM: For realsies?
GRELNOK: Yeah, I just want to walk behind her and smell her.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: A little pass and whiff.
LIAM: Make a perception check.
HOA SEN: This is what Elder Scrolls Online is all about, the smell check.
LIAM: Yeah.
GRELNOK: Goddamn, why? Why?! I can't smell. You're going to smell her, too. I rolled a 10. Maybe I'm distracted by all the delicious food.
LIAM: You are overwhelmed by the scent of fudge, and battered things, and brown sugar, and she's even got a gelato on the end of one tray. She has everything, and she just sort of says, "You know, I'd love to get to know you. I mean, I work here, so maybe we'll see each other around town. See you in a bit!" And she just spins away through the crowd.
TAVIMA: I got a cake before she took off.
GRELNOK: Right as she walked away, I was still sniffing, and then I caught a smell of Slaughter instead. 
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I just pick a juniper berry off my chest.
MALLORY: I'm heading towards the so-called "buffet."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, yeah, let's get an expert opinion.
MALLORY: Shoving my way there.
LIAM: Sure, sure. There's actually three buffet tables at various places in the room, and one is completely covered with, there's a whole suckling pig with an apple in its mouth, and it's just overwhelming how good it smells, and there's pheasant, and there's goose, and there's duck, ton of poultry on the table. On the other one directly across the way, there are several cakes frosted high. There's a-- what is that called? Black forest cake, chocolate cake.
LIAM: Deep and rich. And then the last one is just-- The last buffet is several punch bowls, crystal.
TAVIMA: Mallory, get ricotta, this is amazing.
MALLORY: I know ricotta is amazing.
GRELNOK: Are you just eating straight ricotta?
TAVIMA: No, I found a ricotta cake.
TAVIMA: And I don't know what part is ricotta, but whatever it is, this is *so** moist. Here.
GRELNOK: Ugh, you said "moist."
TAVIMA: It is good, though.
MALLORY: Going to go in for a little of the pheasant, piece of cake, and whatever is the most interesting looking of the punches.
TAVIMA: Thank you.
LIAM: There is a dark blue punch, actually.
LIAM: That has sort of a raspberry and a mint, at the same time, smell to it, and you can just get the barest whiff of alcohol on it as well.
MALLORY: Fuck, it's good! 
MALLORY: I throw the cup down.
TAVIMA: Do you want some of the cake?
TAVIMA: Yeah, here you go.
GRELNOK: Mallory, where's all the jellied meats? 
MALLORY: Clearly, they have a staff. Clearly, they have six people back there who have been working for a week. Baking like this doesn't just happen. Baking doesn't happen!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm going to try to flag down... Mangla?
LIAM: Mangla.  She said Mangla Mordrid.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Mangla. Mangla, hi. I know you're going. Just real quick, what's the kitchen staff look back there? How many you got back there?
LIAM: "I'm not going to answer any questions until you try this. Try this."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, okay, fine, fine.
LIAM: She hands you a little tart.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, it's so good. Try that. 
MALLORY: Fuck. Fuck!
HOA SEN: Thought you were worried about things being poisoned. Are we past that now? We're good?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, shit. I forgot all about that.
TAVIMA: No, 100%, we're going to die.
GRELNOK: It's too good. I just dip my tankard into the punch bowl and I'm walking away with it.
HOA SEN: So it is poison, Mallory.
MALLORY: Poison for my soul.
LIAM: Also, just to clarify, when you're talking to her, you're looking up. She is quite tall, and she finally answers your question. She says, "Oh, you know, it's actually kind of a light crew right now. I'm the only waitress on staff right now, although they plan to bring on one or two as business picks up, and Groth, who owns the place, he's the chef, too. You should watch him work. He's just-- he's an artist."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Thanks, thank you, thank you.
LIAM: "Thank you!"
MALLORY: Is there a window on the door? Is it one of those-- can you peek into the kitchen, or do I have to open the door?
LIAM: No, but it opens and closes at least once a minute, and you do catch a sight of this-- a short-ish Orsimer man who's got a very serious look on his face, and you can't see what he's doing down below, but he looks very focused as he prepares something.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You know, Liam, *I** know what an Orsimer is.  But for the people at home who don't.
HOA SEN: This is important.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Well, Laura Bailey is playing an Orsimer.
HOA SEN: Oh, thank god.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Cool. All right, great.
GRELNOK: Obviously. I'm going to just write that on my character sheet. 
HOA SEN: Oh god.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: ♪ Elder Scrolls Online! ♪ 
LIAM: You hear a big, barrel-chested voice say, "All right, all right, enough, enough." "What? I didn't do nothing." And you see Rennix dragging this floppy-haired, blond, maybe late teens kid through the crowd."All right, you've had enough. Come on, we're going outside." "No, I didn't even do nothing. I was just--"
GRELNOK: They're going to kill that kid.
LIAM: "-- asking what her name was."
TAVIMA: I'm so into it.
LIAM: He just dragging him past you. "Excuse me, ma'am, just doing my job."
TAVIMA: Oh my god.
LIAM: And drags the kid out the door. Gone again.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Did they harm her?
TAVIMA: I hope so.
HOA SEN: You should go talk to him.
LIAM: It was a boy.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, it was a boy.
TAVIMA: I hope so. I'm going to go look out the window. I'm looking, yeah, I'm just watching out the window.
LIAM: He's one-handing the kid's neck, and just drags him out into the road, and gets him here, and you can't make out the words, but he's like-- The kid's just like
TAVIMA: I think he's giving this dude therapy.
LIAM: And then he leads him up the road a bit, and around the corner, and just points, and the kid just walks ahead.
TAVIMA: Good form.
LIAM: And the guy's just watching him go, and follows after.
GRELNOK: He follows, what?
TAVIMA: Hold on, I'll be right back.
TAVIMA: I just want to know what--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Do you need backup? Are you okay?
TAVIMA: I think I'm good. I'll yell if I die of poisoning or whatever, but I'll be back in a minute. I just want to see what's happened, I don't know. And I take a sip of your punch, and then I run into the night, and try to stealth, and see what's going on.
LIAM: You want to sneak over?
LIAM: Stealth check.
TAVIMA: Please, don't make me have to roll.
LIAM: Stealth check.
TAVIMA: Can't we just do this with our minds?
GRELNOK: Can I give her advantage because I like her so much? 
LIAM: Nah.
TAVIMA: No, no advantage? It was a natural 20 if that would've counted.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, okay, great.
TAVIMA: But instead it is a nine.
GRELNOK: On the advantage?
TAVIMA: Yeah, it was a natural 20, but instead it's a nine. I got a nine, Liam, because you didn't let my friend help me.
LIAM: She's back in the place.  There are no friends here.
HOA SEN: Aw. But we're telling a story together.
LIAM: You creep your way over to the edge of the inn, and place your hand up, and turn around, and you look and see that he's down on one knee, and he's holding this kid's hair back, and the kid is just ralphing all over the base of a tree.
GRELNOK: Aw, he's helping.
TAVIMA: It's so nice.
LIAM: And then you accidentally knock a lamp right next to you, and it clatters, and you make a big clatter at the corner of the building. He just looks back.
TAVIMA: You good?
LIAM: "I mean--"
TAVIMA: I just wanted to make sure everything was okay.
LIAM: "I mean, I guess I'm fine, although there are better ways to spend a night."
TAVIMA: Why are you like this?
LIAM: "You all right, kiddo?" 
LIAM: "No."
LIAM: "I'll be in in a minute."
TAVIMA: Yeah, okay. I do a lap in the cold. I've got to cool down, this is too much. I'll be back eventually.
LIAM: Okay. The rest of you inside notice, for a brief moment, the bar has been swamped all this time, but it clears just a little bit, and you, for a brief moment, see a beautifully-crafted bar with gleaming brass fixtures coming into clearer view as the press of people sort of ebbs for a moment, if only for a bit, and you finally spot the barkeep. You see a woman with long, lustrous blonde hair who is the center of attention. Several local men and one woman watch in rapt attention as she pours drinks with extreme panache, very much like Tom Cruise in "Cocktail." She seems to be in the middle of a joke or story, and all the admirers laugh as if on cue, and a fiery-haired young Altmer child just happens to run through the crowd, laughing, face smeared with cranberry tart at that moment, goes running in front of the bartender, disappears through the door into the kitchen, and Triss just yells out, the woman yells out, her name's Triss, "Rennix! Rennix!" and Mangla's like, "I think he went outside. You know, doing his thing." "Tell him we got a runner. Can you take care of him?" "Yeah, all right, hold on." She comes up to you. "Could you hold these?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yes, I certainly can.
LIAM: She puts two massive trays in your hand. Dexterity check.
LIAM: Straight dexterity.
HOA SEN: Can I help?
HOA SEN: Oh no.
GRELNOK: Sucks so bad.
HOA SEN: That's fine.
MALLORY: We are the worst at everything.
GRELNOK: Why are we so bad?
LIAM: Mangla is making her way through the crowd, and you've got one, because it's about to go, you give it more support, and the other one just goes boop--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Don't do this!
LIAM: -- off your hand.
LIAM: 20 plates of things just go breaking across the floor in the middle of the crowd, and the whole crowd goes, "Hey!"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
LIAM: Mangla turns around. "Ah, it's all right. Let me get a rag." And then the door--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'll take care of it, you take care of your business. By the waiters' code, I will fix this, I will. 
LIAM: "Is there a Grahtwood code that I should know about?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: No, just, I will solve this. It's my duty.
LIAM: "All right." She seems impressed.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right, first, I'll pass the tray around, the other tray that I managed to keep, while looking for some sort of bar towels, or any cleaning supplies around, as I'm gleefully passing the hors d'oeuvres.
LIAM: "Oh, what are the ingredients in this one?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's a vegetarian... profiterole. 
LIAM: "That's not beef?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You would think. I got to keep going. 
LIAM: Rennix comes back into the place, and the woman at the bar is just like, "Ren, come on. There's a kid in the back. Groth is going to blow his stack." And he sort of puts his sleeves up. He's like, "All right, all right, I'll get on it," sheepishly, and pushes his way through the crowd, disappears into the kitchen. And are you still continuing around?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm looking for a bar rag that I can grab, so I can go back and wipe off the floor and stuff.
LIAM: Mm-hmm, there's a couple sitting on the bar.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Great, I go back, and so, with one hand up, I'm going to try to clean up the mess, and put the brokens back on the tray.
GRELNOK: I've kicked around the food a little bit in the meantime.
HOA SEN: Just spread it around?
HOA SEN: Ha, okay.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: On accident? 
HOA SEN: So it's a whole bunch of little spots, not one big spot.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right, I'm trying--
LIAM: All right, you better make another dex save to keep that other tray up in the air.
HOA SEN: Oh no.
TAVIMA: Oh, buddy.
HOA SEN: Okay, good.
LIAM: So your foot skids in some mashed potato along the floor, which was just spread as if a toddler had smeared it, and you almost lose it, but twist your arm around, and get the right leverage underneath, and, sweating, hold it, and Mangla's over by the bar, going--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right, I try to clean everything up as best I can, and go take the soiled tray back to the kitchen.
LIAM: Oh, sure. The door opens up, and Rennix is there with this little kid, and the kid's holding a tray of desserts, and his face is just smeared red with what you assume is cranberry. "Oh, all right, all right. I don't think we have an opening or anything right now, but--"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's all right, I do this on my honor.
LIAM: Okay, so Rennix sidesteps with the kid and starts to sort of usher the kid out through the crowd. You step into a kitchen, and the door swings shut behind you.
MALLORY: I just saw this happen. I'm going to follow in. I've had a plate, and I have not stopped looking at that door. I'm heading in now that I've seen him go in.
LIAM: You're going to step in behind?
MALLORY: Yeah, just right behind.
LIAM: Suddenly, the two of you are in a foreign kitchen, which is brand new, spotless, clean pots and pans hanging along the wall, fresh vegetables as far as the eye can see in straw and wicker bowls, and a man of eminent focus just chopping in front of you. And he stops when he sees you both then. "Uh, can I help you?"
MALLORY: Are you a demon? 
MALLORY: Are you an angel? Are you both? I-- So, we're from across the street.
LIAM: "Oh, I know."
MALLORY: Y-y-you know?
LIAM: "Sure."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Are you Dolden Groth? Dolden, is that your name?
LIAM: "Dulgan."
LIAM: "That's right."
MALLORY: What are you making there?
LIAM: "Just crudités."
MALLORY: Can I? It looks really fresh. Where'd you find that? Was that flown in or did you?
LIAM: "We have--"
MALLORY: I can do that.
LIAM: " -- relationships with a few of the local farms."
MALLORY: Oh, so it's all--
LIAM: "Came in this afternoon, yeah."
MALLORY: It smells fresh.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: As they talk, I'm loading up the tray with the stuff that he's recently prepared to make another pass through.
LIAM: "What exactly are you doing?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm doing what I do best, sir. I'm serving. 
LIAM: "Tell you what. Bring the tray out. In a week or two, come see me. See if we have a place for you."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I-- I have the experience to be a manager.
LIAM: "Let's see you carry that tray, son."
LIAM: Make a-- Yeah-- No, make a performance check this time as you get the door open with two fully-loaded arms.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, okay, that's better, 13. I mean, that's not better. It's better than four, 13.
LIAM: Yeah, you run and then just do a little twist, and kick the door with your heel, and it goes boof, and all the noise, and swirl of the crowd outside fills the kitchen, and you disappear, and then it's just the two cooks.
GRELNOK: I'm watching him come out the doors like--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Just doing recon!
TAVIMA: I come up behind you. What'd I miss?
GRELNOK: Well, Slaughter's betrayed us; he's working for the enemy.
GRELNOK: Don't know what Mallory's doing, he's in the kitchen.
TAVIMA: All right.
GRELNOK: This bitch as the bar. 
TAVIMA: She's really pretty.
TAVIMA: Are they all hot?
GRELNOK: I feel like everyone's hot here.
LIAM: While you guys are talking, behind you in a booth, totally unrelated to what you're talking about, you start to hear two people talking. "I can't even believe how fast they got this place up and running. They just started building it." "Ah, they got that tax asshole in their pocket."
LIAM: "Do they?" "Yeah, that Altmer shitheel pulled some strings, is what I heard, the prick."
TAVIMA: Where is Diven?
LIAM: "Good thing he hasn't been around in a while. He'd be lucky not to get his ass kicked for the bleeding he's given these parts." "Oh, he has been around. The other night, I come out of Grenlok's Skull, and was taking a piss by that big oak tree they got out back, and I seen someone skulking around the back of this place in the dark. They holds up a lantern, as plain as day, I seen that Diven shitbird peering around every which way, before him and the light just vanished! Creep. Fuckin' taxpayers." And they just sink back into the hum of the place.
TAVIMA: Hold on, I want to turn to these two, and go: If you ever need anything from Grelnok's Skull, your next drink is for free. But you have to ask me, because Grelnok will kill you. 
GRELNOK: I turn around as well.
LIAM: "Okay. Oh, gee willikers!"
TAVIMA: Yeah. But thanks.
LIAM: "I mean, it's just, it was free, so we came over here."
TAVIMA: No, it's fine, we get it. We also came over here, so, you're good.
LIAM: "But I'm looking at her, and it doesn't feel that way."
TAVIMA: Yeah, I know. 
TAVIMA: Yeah, that's the intended effect.
LIAM: "Oh, okay, just a little--"
GRELNOK: Stop pissing on the tree. The tree fuckin' smells.
LIAM: "Yes, ma'am."
HOA SEN: I pop up behind you two. Oh, is there new information? I've just been, I mean, I was gone for a moment, you probably didn't notice, but I've just been numbering all the tables. Because this is just chaos right now, and there's no way--
TAVIMA: Why are you helping them?!
HOA SEN: Well, because no one knows where to go, and it's very important to sit somewhere exactly where the heart belongs in the moment, and I don't agree with the situation at all, so I'm trying to fix it.
TAVIMA: You have control issues.
HOA SEN: I don't know what that means.
MALLORY: I'm going to wander back to the group, out of the kitchen. It was like a dance, he just would move from one station to the next, as if he knew, he just knew.
GRELNOK: They're just better than us. They're just better than us.
TAVIMA: In every way.
HOA SEN: In some ways, not every way.
LIAM: You all see Groth now enter the room proper. And he starts to make his own lap around the common room, stopping at different tables and different groups, nodding at customers, asking them how they're enjoying the food. At a certain point, he catches sight of you all in a little clutch. And with a measured, almost imperceptible smirk on his face, he tips his head to you. Then he walks over to a Rennix, taps him on the chest, and you can just hear him say, "He said he wants to see you. Downstairs in the larder." And the two of them walk back into the kitchen and disappear.
GRELNOK: That's why it's so good here, they've made a deal with the devil.
TAVIMA: We're very good at killing devils. Do we want to go and kill one?
GRELNOK: Yes, we should obviously go and see what they're talking about.
TAVIMA: Yeah, I'm very bad at sneaking.
GRELNOK: I know.
TAVIMA: I just want you to know.
HOA SEN: Does this place also have a secret basement with an idol?
GRELNOK: Maybe it does. Maybe that's why they built it here! Maybe they tried-- Oh my god! What if we go down into our wine cellar, and we find an opening that goes into their cellar?
HOA SEN: Should we go check?
TAVIMA: Or we could just go--
HOA SEN: Oh, okay.
MALLORY: We could just go down.
HOA SEN: Right, there's the stairs right there, okay. All right, all right.
TAVIMA: Hey, I want to slide over to Slaughter, hey. Hey bud, what is this?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What is this? I'll tell you what this is. This is the greatest day of my life. Everyone is so grateful. I've made so much in tips already, and I've been here for 10 minutes. The deviled eggs are great, everything's great. And they really respect me here, you know? There's smiles everywhere. And anyway, sorry to wander away from you all. What's going on?
TAVIMA: Do we tell him that we think this is all demons, and none of it's real?
MALLORY: The tips are only good because the food is free, put those down.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I can't put down a tray while I'm on--
TAVIMA: While you're what?
MALLORY: Well, here, I'll take that food then. That's for me.
TAVIMA: On duty?
MALLORY: I put the--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yes, my shift doesn't end for another two hours.
TAVIMA: You don't work here!
MALLORY: Take them and put them down.
GRELNOK: You're not fucking employed here!
HOA SEN: This is the enemy's lair! How dare you!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What happened? For a moment there, I-- I became lost in the ecstasy of service. I'm so sorry. I'm sorry. I'm back. I apologize. I'm just-- It just felt so right, you know? It just felt so good.
TAVIMA: Look, we can be nicer to you or whatever.
MALLORY: This place is a garden of delights, but it's built on lies.
LIAM: Wendla appears for a split second with a little tray and says, "Oh, Mr. Groth said he would like you to have some champagne, so here you are! One for you, and you, and you, and you. Have to get back to the front desk!" And she just flits off into the crowd.
HOA SEN: Is this poisoned?
GRELNOK: This is definitely poisoned.
HOA SEN: This one's poisoned, right? I do a poison check. No, Mallory! 
TAVIMA: I check with my mouth.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'll wait for your poison check.
HOA SEN: What, the one-person poison check?
MALLORY: I didn't swallow.
HOA SEN: It's medicine?
LIAM: Let's make a medicine check at disadvantage?
HOA SEN: I hate it. Okay.
MALLORY: I spit it back out.
GRELNOK: Us, or just her?
HOA SEN: Okay. With disadvantage, that's still a 16.
TAVIMA: Whoa. Didn't know that dice could go to high.
HOA SEN: Yeah.
LIAM: You take your-- How are you testing the poison?
HOA SEN: I'm using my newfound appreciation for smells. I gave it a good whiff, I pour some on my wrist. I do that thing, the perfume thing. I smell it again. And then I take a little dab, and I put under my nose, I do another sniff.  And that's how I check for poison!
TAVIMA: Amazing.
LIAM: There's just a hint of bubbling effervescence under your finger. It's delightful.
HOA SEN: It's not poisoned.
GRELNOK: Thank god, because I already drank it all!
LIAM: Seems rock solid to me.
MALLORY: If we're going to leave this world, I'm going to do it the way I came into it: buzzed.
HOA SEN: Are we leaving this world?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I feel bad drinking on duty, but I guess--
GRELNOK: You're not on duty!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You're right, you're right, you're right, I'm sorry.
GRELNOK: Hey, but seriously, you guys--
TAVIMA: You own your other, we--
GRELNOK: We own it!
TAVIMA: It's ours.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: But sometimes it doesn't feel like it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Well, I just feel like I could be afforded a little bit more responsibility, and not just responsibility that you don't want to do. But we can talk about it later, I don't want to lay this on you right now. It's just, I just feel like I'm valuable, and I should be treated as such, that's all.
GRELNOK: Slaughter.
GRELNOK: We value you.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That was the kindest thing you've ever said to anyone.
TAVIMA: It really was.
GRELNOK: Was it?
TAVIMA: I'm kind of jealous.
MALLORY: What's happening to us?
GRELNOK: This place is ruining everything!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: We're freaking out! All right, what are we doing? We're going to? We're going to sneak into their--?
GRELNOK: Yeah, yeah, yeah, we are sneaking into the--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What's happening?
TAVIMA: Apparently, what's his fuck, the tax collector/food--
TAVIMA: Diven is--
GRELNOK: Dayvon?
TAVIMA: Dayvon?
HOA SEN: Danny.
TAVIMA: I think it's Dayvon. Dayvon is behind all of this.
LIAM: It's Diven. 
TAVIMA: So we have to go find him and kill him.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That, I can get behind.
MALLORY: I'm ready.
TAVIMA: Drink that drink, my friend. Oh, no, look--
HOA SEN: Oh, you're still drinking.
TAVIMA: It's like step forward, and then a little step back.
HOA SEN: All right, well--
TAVIMA: Got it.
GRELNOK: I'm going to take a couple of cakes on the way out.
LIAM: Okay.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Wait, are we leaving, or?
GRELNOK: Well, we're going to sneak.
LIAM: I'm going to throw one memory into your brains. Because you watched this place under construction, and had brief, pleasant, but really brief conversations with that guy before, and people working on the place. And there were a pair of, like, what do they called? Hurricane doors on the backside, which are at an angle.
LIAM: Storm doors, yeah.
GRELNOK: Yeah, we're going to go there.
HOA SEN: Yeah.
TAVIMA: We all remembered that, and we're definitely headed that way.
LIAM: Okay.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: So we're going to leave the through the front door?
LIAM: There are still crowds of people at the front door.
TAVIMA: Look, this is going to sound horny--
LIAM: But it's a very large place.
TAVIMA: -- but I'm worried about the muscle. Where is Rennix?
LIAM: Oh, well, the last time you saw him, he and the boss went toward the back, through the kitchen door.
GRELNOK: Diven wanted to talk to him.
TAVIMA: That's right, okay.
GRELNOK: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
HOA SEN: Maybe we should go through the kitchen doors, and follow them directly then, instead of going through the front, where everyone can see us.
TAVIMA: I mean, the hot bartender lady would notice when people were running. So maybe we go around the back.
MALLORY: I feel good about the storm doors.
HOA SEN: Okay.
GRELNOK: Yeah, we should go out the front, that way, it looks like we've left.
HOA SEN: Oh, okay.
GRELNOK: Otherwise, we're sneaking into a kitchen.
TAVIMA: This was delicious, and it's time to go.
GRELNOK: We really enjoyed our time here!
MALLORY: That was very adequate.
HOA SEN: All done for sure, we're going home.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm going to take my five, okay? I'll be right back.
TAVIMA: You don't-- You do not work here.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's how we talk to each other.
TAVIMA: Mangla, he doesn't work here.
LIAM: "See you tomorrow though, right? I've seen you across the way a little bit."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Ah. What time do you open?
LIAM: "Ah, well, it's all flimsy right now, but I think the idea is to be open at six every morning, because it's going to be a working inn."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, okay, okay. Ah, we'll see about that, ha-ha! All right, we're going to retire for the night.
LIAM: "Okay." "Oh, it was so lovely having you, I hope to get to know you all better, and become the best of friends!"
TAVIMA: Oh, she's so nice.
GRELNOK: Okay, bye.
HOA SEN: We agree, and we are going to do that for sure, we're going to leave, and go to our inn now. We must take care of it.
LIAM: "Oh, you and I are going to be best friends."
HOA SEN: Yeah. Uh-huh! AARIA: I'm just giving Mangla a dirty look as we walk out.
HOA SEN: I'm so bad at lying.
GRELNOK: I'm giving everybody a dirty look.
TAVIMA: I'm not giving Wendla a dirty look. She's really nice.
GRELNOK: Okay, not her, but everyone else, every the customers.
TAVIMA: Yeah, for sure.
MALLORY: Traitors, every one.
LIAM: "You're right, it does smell like something out here. Where is that coming from?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I don't know.
TAVIMA: There's no way to know.
GRELNOK: It's the oak tree, it's this oak tree.
LIAM: "I'm going to go back in with the pastries, good night! See you tomorrow."
LIAM: So, you move your way--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Nirn be with you. 
LIAM: "And also with you."
LIAM: Pushing through what crowd there is outside, and the further away from the front door you get, it starts to disperse a little bit. You do see local old coot passed out in a chair, outside your place under one of the arcane heat lamps.
GRELNOK: He's loyal.
TAVIMA: Yeah, I like him.
GRELNOK: He's our fave, free drinks for him tomorrow.
HOA SEN: Yes, I run back real quick, and I put a little blanket on him.
LIAM: "Ah!"
HOA SEN: Going to have to work on that, maybe more vegetables next time you come.
TAVIMA: No, let him dutch oven that blanket, that's fine.
LIAM: Now, from where you are in front of the Skull, the inn is large, the inn is twice as long as your place, at least. And the back of the place where you've seen those storm doors, you can't even see from here. You'd have to travel further up the road, and then hook around the back of the place. It does start to thin out, although there is one, it's dark now. But you can see one person just strolling along on their own.
GRELNOK: How far away?
LIAM: From you right now, 40 feet, and they are just past the corner which you're discussing, moving past.
GRELNOK: Okay. Let's sneak around!
TAVIMA: Yeah, we're very good at sneaking!
GRELNOK: We're going to be super sneaky!
MALLORY: Super sneaky.
LIAM: ♪ "When I was a boy, I remember her name, Oh, de lally, oh!" ♪ And there's a man just drunkenly stumbling along near the back of that place.
TAVIMA: I deal with a lot of too drunk people. Is this guy real drunk, or--?
LIAM: Make an insight check.
GRELNOK: So he would cross our path?
LIAM: No, you'd be coming up behind.
MALLORY: I'll assist with that insight check.
LIAM: He's walking in the direction you want to go.
LIAM: Okay, scope him out.
TAVIMA: Okay, sweet.
TAVIMA: There we go. Plus five, dirty 20!
HOA SEN: Finally!
TAVIMA: Observation, pah-pow!
LIAM: You can, on the breeze, the autumn breeze, smell the guy a little bit. And he's he sounds like he is legitimately slurring.
LIAM: ♪ "A bonnie wee boy I was, I was" ♪ "I was" ♪
TAVIMA: He smells drunk.
LIAM: ♪ "Second verse, the same as the first!" ♪
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Should we bonk him on the head or something?
TAVIMA: He's not going to remember this.
GRELNOK: Just let him walk towards-- Just keep walking.
TAVIMA: Let him walk it off.
LIAM: He walks up to a tree and just sort of stops there. ♪ "Oh..." ♪ You hear urine. ♪ "When I was a boy" ♪
TAVIMA: We got a good 45 to 80 seconds.
GRELNOK: Quick, go, while he's--
HOA SEN: Walk around him.
GRELNOK: Drown the sound out.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Is it unlocked? Or are you going to make it unlocked?
LIAM: You can make a stealth roll at advantage.
GRELNOK: Ooh, yeah!
LIAM: ♪ "'Cause I'm--" ♪ Well, if you're all going.
GRELNOK: Ooh! First time, that's pretty good!
LIAM: ♪ "'Cause I'm really loud" ♪
MALLORY: Hey, not bad.
HOA SEN: 21!
LIAM: 16.
TAVIMA: Look at us!
LIAM: Great.
GRELNOK: We're the sneakiest fucks that ever lived!
MALLORY: We've never-- All it took was a really distracted drunk. 
LIAM: His champagne-fueled whiz continues to stream along the tree, and he sings, and you, 10 feet behind him, just walk by, and get a good look at him as you go, and continue on.
GRELNOK: Do we recognize him? Is he a patron of ours?
LIAM: You've seen him, sure. He's a townie. And then, where you want to get is about 40 feet that way on your right, back of the inn.
TAVIMA: Cool, cool, cool.
LIAM: You creep your way up, and the guy's singing dies down a little bit, and you look back and he is still singing, but he's flush against the tree, and you hear
LIAM: And you get right up to the storm doors, and there is just a solid iron padlock.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What do you got, what do you got, what do you got?
GRELNOK: Can any of us pick this?
HOA SEN: Heck no.
TAVIMA: I absolutely cannot.
MALLORY: I mean, that would be.
TAVIMA: Did you bring any bacon?
GRELNOK: Can I hold onto it, and just try to yank it, and see if I can yank it off?
LIAM: Make a strength check.
TAVIMA: I'm holding the chain, by the way, to keep it from rattling loudly.
LIAM: Okay.
GRELNOK: So that makes it at advantage? 
HOA SEN: That's how that works. 
TAVIMA: It's a good question.
LIAM: Like every other DM, I cannot resist your charms, Laura Bailey. Yes, at advantage.
TAVIMA: Yes! That was pretty good, strength check. That would be 18.
LIAM: 18? Pff. You watch as her guns go, ff, pff! And it's just that tight, because you had it--
TAVIMA: No one is hotter than you, just know that.
MALLORY: That was pretty--
GRELNOK: Not even Rennix?
TAVIMA: Not even Rennix.
GRELNOK: Fuck yeah.
LIAM: "What was that?"
TAVIMA: Oh, oh god!
LIAM: "Ugh."
TAVIMA: Go back to sleep.
TAVIMA: There.
LIAM: And you have two doors in front of you.
MALLORY: Going to time the swing to the snore.
GRELNOK: Oh, smart.
TAVIMA: That's smart. 
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Is it dark down there?
HOA SEN: Is it the snore or the door?
LIAM: It is dark, yeah.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Who has darkvision, who can?
MALLORY: I can see just fine.
GRELNOK: I got darkvision.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, go on down first.
TAVIMA: I don't.
LIAM: It's not far to go. It's only seven or eight wooden steps down, deep steps down, and there is a door in here, but a traditional door.
GRELNOK: Just hold on to my bicep--
TAVIMA: Yeah, cool, thank you.
GRELNOK: -- I'll walk you down.
MALLORY: I got you.
HOA SEN: Should we check for traps? Because remember the last time, with the doors that we kept? Mallory almost died that one time.
GRELNOK: Oh yeah, does anybody know how to do that?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I can't see anything.
TAVIMA: I don't remember that.
GRELNOK: Could you normally check for traps?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: No, I think that's another campaign. 
GRELNOK: Can we check the door or the stairs, and make sure that we're not walking into traps?
LIAM: Who's checking for traps?
MALLORY: I'll do it.
LIAM: You are?
GRELNOK: Mallory is.
LIAM: Okay, make an investigation check.
HOA SEN: Save us, Mallory.
TAVIMA: Let's go.
LIAM: Because of your vision, you do see a little squiggle peeking out from under the knob, and you bend down, and-- Who else can see in the dark here? And you see him lean down, you come down behind him, and there is a symbol etched under the doorknob.
MALLORY: Oh, for fuck's sake.
GRELNOK: What is it?
MALLORY: There's a symbol etched under the doorknob.
GRELNOK: Oh. That's usually a bad thing, right?
MALLORY: What kind is it?
LIAM: It is arcane in nature.
GRELNOK: Did any of us know how to make that go away?
HOA SEN: I know a bit of arcana, but you can't make them disappear. Can I have roll an arcana check?
LIAM: Absolutely.
HOA SEN: All right! Got plus two! 16.
LIAM: Yeah, you are very familiar with what that glyph means. It means that it's going to belch poison in your face if you tangle with it.
HOA SEN: You know, I sort of did a poison check. This is going to release poison if we open it. So we--
GRELNOK: How do we disarm it? Can we try to disarm it? How do we-- We don't have a Dispel or anything like that, that doesn't exist.
TAVIMA: Can I think, too, because I do rune stuff, I'm a Templar. Do I have any knowledge about how to disrupt runes to make them function poorly if you change their shape? With your sword, perhaps?
LIAM: If you change the shape with your sword?
LIAM: You, make a--
TAVIMA: It's like if you ruin a Stüssy sign, it's not a Stüssy sign any more.
LIAM: Make an arcana check for me.
HOA SEN: Do it.
TAVIMA: Ooh, 15.
LIAM: You saw a fellow Templar do that once and fail.
LIAM: They didn't do it very well. They were a pretty shitty artist. You think it is possible. And you know what your friend was trying to do when they failed, but it's not guaranteed.
TAVIMA: Good news, bad news. And I'm facing the wrong way, I don't know where everyone is.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Are with us right you?
TAVIMA: Good news, bad news.
TAVIMA: You can disrupt the rune, but if you screw it up, it goes very badly. So, that's the good news is it can happen, the bad news is I can't see, and therefore will not do a good job.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I can make a little bit of light.
GRELNOK: Yeah, yeah, yeah, let's do that.
MALLORY: Make a little bit of light.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, I'll pop a skull. And whisper some necromantic words to it.
MALLORY: Necro-romantic.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: And I will light it aflame.
LIAM: It flickers to light, and suddenly you guys are all aglow in this little cubby in the little angled set of stairs at the base of The Golden Goose. And now you all see this symbol, which is a series of spirals with two lines through it.
LIAM: And what your friend was trying to do was join the two in the middle, making almost a Z or an N type shape, but with a little bit of a curve in the center of that line.
TAVIMA: Okay. Do you have a piece of paper?
HOA SEN: Oh yes, always.
TAVIMA: Note, always. I draw out what I'm aiming for. I'm going to try to do this.
HOA SEN: Okay, do you want help?
TAVIMA: Yes. If you have penmanship, and I have a knife.
HOA SEN: Okay, I'm very good at drawing hearts, let's go.
TAVIMA: That did not instill confidence, but we're going to do it anyway.
HOA SEN: Okay!
TAVIMA: Does anyone-- Are we-- Is it okay?
GRELNOK: I'm going to back up.
TAVIMA: Yeah, good call.
MALLORY: I'm going to be ready to open the doors.
GRELNOK: I'm going to back up right against Mallory. I wish, Slaughter, you could get behind me.
MALLORY: Going to hold our breath.
GRELNOK: Put the skull on the ground.
LIAM: How far back? Are the backsies going outside or?
GRELNOK: No, we're just backing up against the storm doors, literally, just going to--
LIAM: So, four feet back?
LIAM: Okay, good to know.
MALLORY: We're going to hold our breath, and then open them and run.
GRELNOK: But I'm covering up Mallory and Slaughter to try to shield them from the worst, if something happens.
LIAM: Okay, okay.
TAVIMA: I put my little knife right up to it, and then I put Hoa's hand over mine, so it's like "Ghost," and we're just doing it together, and it's kind of cute that way. And I'm going to make an attempt.
LIAM: Let's make a straight dexterity roll at advantage with Hoa's help.
TAVIMA: Cool, cool, cool. Oh god, I got 11 on both of the dice. 12.
LIAM: 12?
HOA SEN: Oh, kind of low.
LIAM: You start to carve down a straight line, and you guys get to the point where the little bump happens, and it starts to turn into a little curlicue heart, and pff!
LIAM: And a cloud of purple and green mixed together wafts out. Everybody make a con save.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm going to use my reaction to cast a Bone Shield on myself!
HOA SEN: Of course.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Using two stamina points.
LIAM: Okay.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That gives me an extra--
GRELNOK: Yep, yep, yep.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: 10 temporary hit points.
TAVIMA: Don't forget, we all have a plus one to our saving throws.
GRELNOK: Oh, good.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: How did that happen, when?
TAVIMA: It's from our spider robes.
HOA SEN: Yeah.
GRELNOK: Good, that definitely helped my two that I rolled.
LIAM: Con save.
GRELNOK: Oh, con save?
MALLORY: That did not help.
LIAM: 11.
TAVIMA: What the hell?
HOA SEN: I, too, had a natural 20.
LIAM: Ooh!
GRELNOK: My con save is really good, I'm at an eight.
HOA SEN: Eight, yay. 
LIAM: Eight, okay. Okay, so, because I don't have any dice back here--
GRELNOK: Do you want?
TAVIMA: You want some dice?
LIAM: I need dice. I've been surreptitiously sending messages in a bottle, saying: Bring me dice, I don't have any!
TAVIMA: Do you want some metal ones?
LIAM: I'll take a d20, and I'll take a d6.
TAVIMA: You want, like, a whole thing?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I got a ton of d6s.
GRELNOK: I got a whole thing of dice.
LIAM: Sure, if you have it.
HOA SEN: Take the cake, take the cake.
LIAM: Wow.
TAVIMA: Going too.
LIAM: Is this citrus and ricotta?
GRELNOK: Mm-hmm.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: You just gave him plenty, that's fine, I don't have to do it.
MALLORY: That's a lot of dice.
TAVIMA: I still want to give mine, though.
HOA SEN: It's imbued with all that Grelnok energy though, so.
MALLORY: Rolled poorly.
TAVIMA: I think you need more, I don't care, here.
LIAM: Okay, great, thank you. Those of you who fail take eight points of poison damage.
MALLORY: Oh my god.
HOA SEN: Oh, that's not bad.
LIAM: And those who save take four.
LIAM: The cloud, it hovers, though, and does not move, it is still around you.
GRELNOK: Open the storm doors a little!
MALLORY: Oh, I flung them immediately open anyway.
GRELNOK: Oh, flung them, don't!
LIAM: Cling, clang, cling, clang, clung!
GRELNOK: Mallory!
LIAM: ♪ "I once was a farmer's maid -- There once was a farmer's maid" ♪ You hear someone standing up. "Oh, I got to go to bed. ♪ "I once was a farmer's maid, long a--" ♪ And the voice is getting louder. ♪ "Long ago, long ago!" ♪ And there is a drunk standing at the top of the stairs right now. "Oh hey, what's going on in here? Do you have room for one more?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Grab him by the ankles! Grab him by the ankles and pull him in here!
LIAM: "I don't know if that's a good idea."
GRELNOK: I run up and tackle him.
LIAM: "Oh!" 
TAVIMA: Why are you killing this man?
HOA SEN: Don't kill, don't kill!
LIAM: Ah, fuck it, he goes down. 
LIAM: You're able to drag him back, "Metal Gear" style, and plant up against the tree, because you knocked him out.
GRELNOK: Okay, great. 
HOA SEN: He's not going on this adventure with us, okay. I was thinking.
LIAM: Okay, so, the stairs cleared of hazardous material, and drunken men is now clear. And the door, this symbol has burned away, and the door is actually open, a half inch, and there is a thin line of light behind it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'll extinguish my skull.
GRELNOK: Can we hear anything?
LIAM: Oh, make a perception check.
HOA SEN: Good?
HOA SEN: Yeah!
TAVIMA: Let's go!
HOA SEN: It's happening.
LIAM: Very, very, very, very faintly, not on the other side of this door, but you just hear, maybe somewhere in the inn, you hear just. But then you strain your ears, trying to hear more, and half a minute goes by, and you don't hear it again. And then you're just listening to the silence.
GRELNOK: There was like a clicking, but it's gone.
MALLORY: A click like kind of clicking?
GRELNOK: I don't know, it was like fucking clicking. I don't fucking-- Mallory, it was clicking, I don't know!
TAVIMA: Like bones?
GRELNOK: Like what?
TAVIMA: What kind of click?
HOA SEN: Like giant spider clicking?
GRELNOK: It could've been. It could've been bones. It could've been, you know, mice eating through fuckin' crates, I don't know.
TAVIMA: We're not trying to stress you out.
MALLORY: Could a spider be clicking bones, though.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: We are fighting for the existence of our business down here. It doesn't matter what kind of clicking it is, we're going through this door.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Now, let's get it together, people.
TAVIMA: I immediately resp-- okay. I'm not facing him because I can't see anything, but I straightened up. Okay.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Come on. We've got to manage this situation.
LIAM: You leading the way? 
MALLORY: Are you?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yes, I'll lead the way.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: Bro, this is dope.
LIAM: Just opening?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Just opening and peering inside.
LIAM: Door swings open.
GRELNOK: Swings open!
LIAM: Light again, coming from within, through this door that you find yourself filing into a decent-sized room, lit by a pair of lanterns, both burning pretty low at the moment. There's a bed off to one side with some pretty fine linen sheets, beautiful red and purple pattern rug covering about half of the room's floor in here. And sitting atop one corner of that rug is a big plush chair that's beat up, but comfortable looking. And a side table holding the other lantern burning in the room. And then off to one side of the room is a desk, cluttered with lots of loose parchments separated into different piles, as well as some leather-bound books in the mix, and a small wooden chest or box sitting on one side on top of another stack of paper. And then you see a door. This room is only about 15 feet long, a door on the far side.
GRELNOK: This is Diven's room.
TAVIMA: Well, let's check. Can I look at the papers? We've seen so much of Diven's writing. Do I recognize his writing?
LIAM: Yeah, you don't even need to, for that, his signature's on everything.
HOA SEN: His name.
TAVIMA: Yeah, yeah.
HOA SEN: Why is he living in this hovel under the ground?
TAVIMA: He's a shitty little goblin!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What kind of papers are these? Are they permits, what are--?
GRELNOK: What do they say? What does this shit say?
TAVIMA: What do they say? I read them.
LIAM: Who's digging in?
TAVIMA: I look at the one I lifted--
LIAM: All you? Okay.
TAVIMA: And try to read it.
LIAM: Make an investigation check, please.
TAVIMA: Every time. A 10! 10.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Double digits.
LIAM: Okay.
HOA SEN: Ah, here we go.
TAVIMA: I know how to read, kind of.
LIAM: It's a lot of lists and numbers. A few of these things are definitely zoning permits. Two of them stamped with some sort of block in wax, and it says, "Expedited."
TAVIMA: Diven literally signed off on all of this.
MALLORY: Isn't it a little weird that he was living down here, though? This feels weird.
TAVIMA: This might not be his room. This might be Groth's room.
MALLORY: How expensive are these sheets?
LIAM: The sheets...
MALLORY: I can feel thread count.
TAVIMA: Give me thread count, please.
LIAM: Sure, make a thread roll.
HOA SEN: Count them.
LIAM: They're finer than anything in your place. They're finer than anything you've ever slept on.
GRELNOK: This is Diven's.
HOA SEN: I'm going to check the chest.
LIAM: Okay.
GRELNOK: I'm going to drool on the pillowcase.
MALLORY: Check it for traps before you.
HOA SEN: I check it for traps first.
GRELNOK: It's blue drool because of the drinks that we've been having, so it's extra gross.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Are all of our tongues blue right now?
LIAM: How are you checking the box?
HOA SEN: With my sense of smell? No, that's stupid.  Wait, is that dumb, or is that the best thing I've learned how to do in this game?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Smell that box.
TAVIMA: Smell-- 
HOA SEN: Because is smell perception? 
HOA SEN: I smell and I touch. I smell and I touch.
LIAM: Okay.
HOA SEN: I lightly touch.
LIAM: Okay, make a perception check at advantage because you have a history of smelling on this show.
HOA SEN: It was started today. 
HOA SEN: Aw, oh boy, oh boy. Oh, I rolled five twice. That's 10 though, total.
LIAM: 10.
HOA SEN: Double digits.
LIAM: Cedar, it smells like cedar.
HOA SEN: What a lovely smelling box. You know, we should start using cedar, maybe in our restroom because it has a lovely smell when it's damp.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What's inside of it?
HOA SEN: I just flip open the top.
GRELNOK: I lift up the rug, too, while she's doing that.
LIAM: You lift up the rug. Well, there's a big chair on top of it. So let's say you shove that off?
LIAM: Okay, so you're still with the box.
HOA SEN: Yeah, I'm just opening it.
LIAM: Oh, you're just opening it, and you're pushing back a chair. There are three crystal vials in the box that have a pale blue liquid in them. You recognize them from your heavier adventuring days. They are potions of greater healing.
HOA SEN: Oh baby!
GRELNOK: Three of them, we're going to be in a battle.
MALLORY: I'm definitely going to need one because I'm already eight down.
GRELNOK: Yeah, same.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, I can heal you, I think.
HOA SEN: One to you, one to you. Anyone else need healing?
LIAM: Grel, as you throw the rug back, there's a big, wide, four by four plank of wood under the rug.
GRELNOK: Yep. I fucking knew it. Let's check the wood for runes and traps.
LIAM: Make an investigation check.
TAVIMA: Can I help?
LIAM: Sure.
MALLORY: I want to watch this.
HOA SEN: How are you going to help?
TAVIMA: I'm also looking because I just got boned by a rune.
GRELNOK: Investigation or perception?
LIAM: Perception.
GRELNOK: That would be a 21 again.
HOA SEN: Nice.
LIAM: It really just seems like a big shitty piece of wood. Although, getting down close to it, you can just barely, through some of the cracks between some of the slats, see just the faintest red hue.
GRELNOK: There's a trap underneath the wood.
TAVIMA: Every time. I'm so tired of trapped stuff under the ground.
GRELNOK: How about everybody back up out of the room, and I'll throw something at the wood to knock it away.
TAVIMA: So we're not trying to sneak up and hear this conversation anymore.
GRELNOK: Well, you know, you've got to fucking get under there. Can you break the rune?
HOA SEN: I can try.
LIAM: Break the...
TAVIMA: There is no visible rune.
GRELNOK: There's no visible rune. How am I going to make it not unless we just set the trap? I don't know how this shit works.
TAVIMA: This poison sucks.
MALLORY: Yeah, I can still taste it.
TAVIMA: Yeah. It tastes like anise, and I only know what that flavor is now because I had a cake with that flavor in it.
GRELNOK: It was really good, though.
TAVIMA: I kind of liked it.
MALLORY: It really added something.
TAVIMA: It did.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Wait, there's a trap that we can't see, but we know it's there?
GRELNOK: Yeah, because I saw red through the wood.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Can we pry it up or something?
GRELNOK: If we move the wood, the trap will, you know, go. That's how traps work.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Well, we've got to try.
GRELNOK: That's what I mean, back the fuck out and I'll kick the wood out of the way!
MALLORY: I'm definitely backing out because I'm already hurt.
LIAM: Okay.
GRELNOK: How much do these healing potions heal for?
LIAM: Oh, those are the greaters. Shoot.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Just make it up.
LIAM: It's 2d4 plus four.
GRELNOK: Are you going to do yours? I'm going to take mine.
MALLORY: I'll take mine.
TAVIMA: Isn't it four?
GRELNOK: What, is it 4d4?
LIAM: Is it 4d4?
TAVIMA: No, don't worry about me.
LIAM: Come on, man.
TAVIMA: I'm not backseat DMing. You're doing a great job!
LIAM: I don't care, we're playing a game together. This isn't the Metropolitan Opera!
TAVIMA: I think it's 4d4 plus four.
LAURA and MALLORY: Oh, then I'm going to wait.
MALLORY: I have a little thing I can do, actually, for one stanima. Stanima, just for you.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: As we back out of the room, I'm going to just grab some of the papers, trying to find some that maybe have some blank spaces on it that we could add to later, or a page that has letterhead, but nothing else on it.
LIAM: Okay. Most of it's pretty full. You start flipping through, and as you're looking for blank sheets of paper, you're passing through lists of local businesses. There's a stone mason mentioned up north, several farms you recognize by name, two nearby wineries, and next to many of them, not all, price reduction for services rendered is listed and there's notation by three or four of them that says "Two years taxes waived."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: On those pages, do I see any indication of the business that got such preferential treatment, as if I need to ask?
LIAM: Well, if you're asking if it's the inn, it's not the inn, it's places that you've occasionally done business with before and other businesses in town, other farms.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, it's some sort of network of--
GRELNOK: Yeah, he's waving taxes so that this business can get shit faster.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
LIAM: You do find three or four sheets that could be used.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: The stone mason, is that the place that we went to and got ambushed at?
TAVIMA: Check for the name Orimen Granoth. But he was dead, I think.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yeah, well anyway, I'm taking those pages and this is good stuff.
LIAM: Okay.
GRELNOK: Why did he want this place to be successful?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Maybe he gets kickbacks.
TAVIMA: Because he hates us.
GRELNOK: No, but it has something to do with the cultists.
TAVIMA: This is all about us specifically.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Maybe he gets a kickback, or maybe there's access to underground temple stuff.
GRELNOK: It's got to be.
TAVIMA: If he puts us out of business, he gets access to our giant heck mouth.
GRELNOK: That too!
HOA SEN: So he probably is involved with the cultists, we should just assume that.
TAVIMA: We knew, we did! Remember when he tried to kill us a year and a half ago?
MALLORY: I thought that was just over taxes.
GRELNOK: No, it was because of cultists.
MALLORY: Oh, wow.
TAVIMA: Look, we've dealt with so much cult stuff, it is hard to keep it straight.
HOA SEN: So either this establishment is also hiding another hell mouth, as you put it.
TAVIMA: Heck mouth.
HOA SEN: Heck mouth, sorry, ooh, language. Or maybe the cultists who are living here are gaining some sort of power through the--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Do you think the staff here are cultists? They're so nice though.
GRELNOK: Yeah! There so nice and hot. All of them are so hot.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Are there nice, hot cultists in the world?
MALLORY: All of them. All of them.
HOA SEN: There all kinds.
GRELNOK: That's how they get more cultists!
HOA SEN: Yeah.
TAVIMA: But didn't they say they just were-- Yeah, they're probably lying.
HOA SEN: They won't let you leave once you're in.
TAVIMA: But Renix is probably different.
GRELNOK: Renix is probably a cultist, that doesn't mean you can't bone him.
TAVIMA: Thank you. I'm good.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right, so we're backing out of the room so you can destroy the trap?
GRELNOK: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Back up, back up, back up, back up. Then I'm going to use my Molten Whip on the fucking board.
TAVIMA: I forgot about that.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You're going to whip the floor?
GRELNOK: I'm going to whip the plank of wood and yank it away. I can do it from 30 feet away.
LIAM: Okay, is that an attack roll? Remind me.
LIAM: Come on, come on.
GRELNOK: I make a spell attack against the target.
LIAM: Yeah, do it at advantage because it's a board.
HOA SEN: Attack the floor!
GRELNOK: Yeah, that's really fucking good. That's a 21 again. What is it with this number?
HOA SEN: Finally!
LIAM: The whip lashes out from a distance, strikes the board and starts to pull, but it just breaks into three pieces, burning in chunks as you rip it away. Nothing happens, except that now there's a stronger red glow emanating up from a three by three, rough-hewn hole in the hard-packed earth here.
GRELNOK: Oh no, we got to go down another hole.
GRELNOK: This hole is not really nice, for the record.
HOA SEN: Apparently, many of the holes we've encountered are not very nice.
LIAM: You also see a rope ladder affixed to the earth next to it with a pair of iron bands that have been hammered down to hold it in place. Ladder lowers down that hole, and if you peer down it, if you want to. Okay. You see this small pit stretches five or six feet down into the earth. There's just enough room for a person to get through down this ladder. But then it opens up further into a much larger chamber below, awash in this red glow. You see stone form. It's dim down there, but a few of you are able to make out what looks like a large, muscular back and shoulders and stony arm.
GRELNOK: Is it another statue?
LIAM: It doesn't appear to be moving.
GRELNOK: It's another statue.
TAVIMA: Does it look like our homeboy?
GRELNOK: Does it look like our statue?
TAVIMA: Mehrunes Dagon. It's definitely him, right?
LIAM: If you two are both peering down, make an investigation check with advantage from up here peering down a hole.
TAVIMA: Do you want me to? I don't trust it. You're rolling 21s! Don't trust me. 11.
LIAM: 11. You've seen it a ton of times entering your wine cellar over the past months. It is identical.
TAVIMA: It's another of this guy.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Liam. *I** know what Mehrues Dagon is.
LIAM: Yeah, right.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: But for the audience, that is the Lord of the Underworld?
LIAM: Well, as you know, Sam, he's one of the 17 Princes of Oblivion.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Sure, sure. And it's Mehrues?
LIAM: Mehrunes Dagon.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Mehrunes, and is that a possessive?
LIAM: Nope.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, Mehrunes is his first name, or their first name?
LIAM: Mm-hmm.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay. You're welcome, audience.
TAVIMA: Thank you.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I cleared that up for you.
TAVIMA: I also knew it.
HOA SEN: Yes, we all knew it.
HOA SEN: Should we go down?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: We've got to go down there!
GRELNOK: I think can go down, but we can't spill blood around the statue is the key.
TAVIMA: Shit, that's right.
HOA SEN: Should I bring a rag of some sort?
GRELNOK: Just in case-ies?
HOA SEN: I take the linen, the nice--
MALLORY: I was about to say, let's grab that really nice, extremely expensive linen.
HOA SEN: Do you want to hold it?
MALLORY: Yes, very much.
GRELNOK: Can we hear any voices?
MALLORY: We can split it. I'm going to cut in in half.
GRELNOK: Are they here?
LIAM: Well, you got to make a perception check for that.
TAVIMA: Please, you do it.
GRELNOK: I'm listening. Everyone shut up for a second! Stop ripping. I'm listening at the hole.
LIAM: Roll a die.
LIAM: 19.
HOA SEN: Nice.
TAVIMA: Let's go!
LIAM: You listen for a full 10 seconds, and distantly, you hear
GRELNOK: Teeny little rats are nibbling on something, or dribbling a ball.
TAVIMA: Is it like blood?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Rats playing basketball?
TAVIMA: Tiny rat "and one" happening.
HOA SEN: Is it the wind rustling in the trees?
MALLORY: I'm going to give everybody a couple emergency blood rags from the cut up linen.
HOA SEN: Blood rags, blood rags.
HOA SEN: I is for inventory.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right, are we going to go down there?
GRELNOK: I guess so.
MALLORY: I mean, management should obviously.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm not management. Thank you, though.
HOA SEN: But you could prove that you are management material. I'm not really sure what you're trying to do, but I support you.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Thank you, Hoa.
MALLORY: I'll head down first, I can see.
GRELNOK: Yeah, that's a smart move.
TAVIMA: Very cool, thanks.
MALLORY: I'm going to grab and start heading down.
LIAM: Okay.
GRELNOK: I'm going to swing my mace on the chair and rip the cushion as we head down.
LIAM: Nice.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Just for petty?
TAVIMA: You just hear, as I'm crawling down: Nice!
LIAM: It splits and all the stuffing just pops out of it.
MALLORY: Like popcorn.
LIAM: Mm-hmm.
LIAM: So you all make your way down.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: ♪ Makin' my way! ♪
LIAM: As you're coming down this rope ladder, it's just dangling in space. It's not in the center of the chamber, it's about 10 feet away from the wall. So you're lowering down past Mehrunes, who you've seen so many times going to get a bottle of red. But there's no wine in here. You lower yourselves down and stand in, it's not super bright, but you can see well enough, the statue is what's emanating this red glow. It just slowly waivers, getting stronger and weaker.
LIAM: You lower down behind Mehrunes. As you move around the room a little bit to check the place out, you spot a leg on the ground in front of the statue.
TAVIMA: Please, how hot is the leg?
LIAM: It's not that hot. As you come around, you recognize, unfortunately, an old man with a long beard that you saw only about an hour ago, half hour ago, booking a room at the Golden Goose. There's a pool of very recent blood just pouring out of him on the ground. There is a huge smear of red on the base of the statue and far above your head, you hear, "This is comical. You managed to stick your nose into it at the last possible second, how lucky you get to bear witness. Have fun." You hear, the rope ladder just falls into a big pile on the ground.
GRELNOK: Can we see him up above?
LIAM: You see blonde hair in a hole and a big smirk on the barkeep's face.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's the barkeep.
GRELNOK: Should've talked to her!
LIAM: And she's gone.
GRELNOK: That was Triss! I heard somebody say her name was Triss! I hate Triss!
LIAM: That light up there, that pale rough circle, goes dark.
MALLORY: I'm going to gather as much of that very expensive linen as I can and just start plugging those, stopping the blood from getting to the statue.
LIAM: Oh, it's on the statue.
MALLORY: It's too late?
GRELNOK: I just wipe some of the blood off the statue.
HOA SEN: Yeah, we're just wiping it.
LIAM: You guys start making, in a hurry, start trying to erase time itself. And as that wiping hits the statue, your hear.
GRELNOK: Oh no, what was it?
LIAM: Looking up at the source of that sound, you see on the walls, two strange humanoid shapes, just skittering along the wall, legs and arms and a head turns and goes, and you see this eyeless face and a mouth and the hands have two digits and a thumb and the same for the feet. The two of them, at the same time, twisting their heads around go. Everybody roll for initiative.
GRELNOK: Oh god.
TAVIMA: We can talk our way out of this. We don't have to have a fight!
HOA SEN: Give them a snack.
GRELNOK: Oy vey.
TAVIMA: I got a natural one.
HOA SEN: Oh no!
TAVIMA: One plus one is a two.
TAVIMA: Here we go. I knew you were my brother.
LIAM: What are your dexes?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I have a plus one to initiative.
TAVIMA: I have a plus one to initiative also.
MALLORY: I have a plus one to initiative.
HOA SEN: I have a plus one, too.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: My dex is, yeah, plus one.
LIAM: Did you roll a one?
MALLORY: No, I was just amused that--
TAVIMA: I will gladly defer to my brother, Slaughter.
LIAM: All right. All right, so that's one and a one. What else did we get?
GRELNOK: I got 11.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: One and a one.
HOA SEN: Seven.
LIAM: Seven.
GRELNOK: Really?
TAVIMA: Great at numbers.
GRELNOK: What's your dex?
GRELNOK: Mallory?
MALLORY: Oh, 12.
GRELNOK: What's my dex?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That's my dex.
GRELNOK: My dex is lower than that, so you're ahead of me.
LIAM: Okay.
HOA SEN: Well.
TAVIMA: Crushing it.
HOA SEN: Monster going first, huh? 
LIAM: So these two creatures coming down the walls, these vermai, looking like something out of Pan's Labyrinth are about 40 feet above you and closing in, in this split second in time. But Mallory, you act quickly in this danger. You're up.
MALLORY: How far away are they again?
LIAM: About 40 feet up the walls.
MALLORY: That I can do, and how close are they to each other?
LIAM: They're almost on opposite sides of the chamber. So not too close. They're about 50 feet apart.
MALLORY: Well, I will pick one of them and cast a Lightning Splash.
LIAM: Okay.
MALLORY: Which makes a 10-foot sphere up to 60 feet away, and they've got to make a DC 14 dex saving throw.
LIAM: Okay. 14, you say?
LIAM: That is... a fail.
MALLORY: My god. So they take-- Oh, please roll well. That's not the right die, that would have been awful. There we are. That'll do, I guess. They take 10 lightning damage, or one of them take 10 lightning damage.
LIAM: Oh, it just crackles against the wall and just groans into the chamber.
LIAM: It looks seared like a burnt chicken, but it is still, in pain, moving on the wall.
MALLORY: All right, I am going to then duck around the statue and try and get a little cover because I'm squishy.
LIAM: Okay. All right, that gets us on to Grelnok.
GRELNOK: I'm going to see the one that he hit and I'm going to aim for that one as well, and I'm going to cast my Molten Whip at him.
LIAM: It's molting?
GRELNOK: It's a molten whip.
LIAM: Got it, got it.
GRELNOK: How far away is it?
LIAM: It's 40 feet up.
GRELNOK: Oh. Can I climb the statue of Mehrunes and use my whip when I'm 10 feet in the air?
LIAM: Yeah, because one arm is on the ground, planted, while the other three are in the air. So you can use that, I'm not even going to call that difficult terrain. You can get yourself up. Yeah, you can get yourself in range. You can run halfway up the statue.
GRELNOK: All right, cool, I'm going to run halfway up the statue. I'm standing on a shoulder and I'm going to Molten Whip one of the fuckers.
LIAM: Okay, go for it. The one that Mallory already targeted?
LIAM: Have at it.
GRELNOK: All right, that is a 14.
LIAM: That hits, sure.
GRELNOK: All right. That's 4d6 fire damage. That would, oh, not good. Six, eight, 10.
LIAM: 10.
GRELNOK: Fire damage, and I pull the creature 10 feet closer to me, which'll take it off the wall and drop it down.
TAVIMA: Let's go.
LIAM: The whip wraps around its neck and just yanks and goes. It gets pulled and you hear a little and it is dead before it is even fully pulled off the wall, and you whip your hand and it just whips it off the end, and it just slams into the ground in a broken heap.
GRELNOK: Away from the statue.
LIAM: Away from the statue. You do have that control. All right, Hoa, you are in play.
HOA SEN: Okay. I'm going to cast Swarm. So what this means, that I spend two magika to summon a five-foot radius swarm of fletcher flies that come out of my fingers. They're all everywhere, they're kind of on fire. They make a real loud noise, and they attack. So I'm going to attack the one that's, the last one, that's right, on the wall still.
LIAM: Right.
HOA SEN: They must make a DC 14 con saving roll.
LIAM: Right, I rolled that in advance and it failed.
HOA SEN: Yay! Okay. So it's 4d6 fire damage.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Wow. Great hit.
LIAM: The bugs, starting to glow like little embers, flutter up around this thing high on the wall and then they just ignite.
HOA SEN: 18.
LIAM: 18.
GRELNOK: Whoa, that's so much better than what I rolled.
LIAM: The thing just lets go, it peels off like a ruined sticker on the wall and then just falls, thunk, onto the stone.
HOA SEN: I did it.
GRELNOK: Good job.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: To the stone of the statue?
LIAM: Of the chamber, down on the floor.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: So encounter over?
GRELNOK: I still hear music. 
TAVIMA: You hear it, too?
LIAM: Over your shoulder, in front of the statue, there is a-- melted into the-- not carved or chiseled, just melted in, there is a passage, a low tunnel that you'd have to bend over to run through. You can hear from inside it.
GRELNOK: Are there any other doorways out of this room or is that it?
LIAM: No, I'll say I'm not going to make you roll for that. It's a pretty limited space. The only reason you didn't catch that is because you came in and you saw a body, Triss, oogity boogity.
GRELNOK: Uh-huh, okay.
GRELNOK: Well, we should go find out what that's about.
TAVIMA: Does it look like that's the hole where the yuckies came out?
LIAM: No, those things, as far as you knew, were stuck to the walls when you came in here.
TAVIMA: Then yeah.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: But there's something in there and it's coming for us.
GRELNOK: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Or we're going to it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Is it your turn?
LIAM: It's your turn.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's my turn! Okay.
MALLORY: Light it up.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I can't see in there, but I can certainly throw in there. So I'll pop a skull, pull the pin.
HOA SEN: What pin?!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Then underhand granny toss. 
LIAM: Make your attack roll.
MALLORY: That could--
LIAM: Four.
HOA SEN: Has any of these ever hit?
LIAM: Total, that's the end of that?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: No, plus six, so that's a 10.
LIAM: A 10.
GRELNOK: You were aiming for a hole?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: There is no way that hits.
LIAM: It just goes inside and you hear.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Do you think I hit?
GRELNOK: That sounds like you hit it!
HOA SEN: Or scared it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I didn't roll for damage, so probably not.
HOA SEN: Yeah. 
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I did it, guys!
TAVIMA: You hit the thing!
HOA SEN: Good job.
HOA SEN: We believed in you.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Cross off two magicka.
LIAM: You're all in a loose semi-circle around this melted pathway into the wall, but 20 feet back from it. You still hear.
MALLORY: Oh boy.
GRELNOK: We should go in.
TAVIMA: Can I drop to all fours. Do I see anything staring down this tunnel?
LIAM: You can't see in the dark, but it's dim. You know, it gets dark real fast in there.
TAVIMA: I was at trying to look while he softball pitched a flaming skull. Did I get any--
LIAM: Oh cool, yeah. I'll rewind to that, sure. Make a perception check.
TAVIMA: Oh god, Liam.
HOA SEN: You can do it!
TAVIMA: It's an 11, Liam. 
LIAM: It ignites and there's nothing right where that skull goes, but it does send a blast of light maybe 30 or 40 feet down and the same back at you. You can see two, maybe, shapes just on the sides of this chamber and then they're in dark.
TAVIMA: Fuck it. I'm going to crawl as far as I can get into the tunnel and fire off a Sunfire.
LIAM: Do it.
TAVIMA: Sweet. So it's just a big blast that I get to roll.
HOA SEN: ♪ Sunfire ♪
GRELNOK: ♪ Sunfire! ♪
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What'd you roll?
TAVIMA: I rolled another natural one.
HOA SEN: Oh no! Why?
GRELNOK: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
TAVIMA: So yeah.
GRELNOK: That's a wise decision.
TAVIMA: Yeah, thank you. That's a six total.
LIAM: You lean over, okay, and you're crouching to get by and you do what normally comes easy when you're fully erect, but you're just not in peak physical form at the moment in the right position.
TAVIMA: Hurtful.
LIAM: It ignites, and it does manage to splash back at you a bit, and you take...
TAVIMA: How much of the 3d8 do you want give me?
LIAM: 3d8? Not much. You threw it very far. So it came back and you took four points of sun damage.
HOA SEN: Not the sun type.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Are you dead, what's happening?
TAVIMA: Yeah, I'm dead.
GRELNOK: Hey, you remember when you single-handedly killed the bad guy the last time?
TAVIMA: Yeah, and summoned him or whatever.
HOA SEN: Yeah.
TAVIMA: I'm just-- Can you just yank me out of the hole? I can't see, I hit myself in the face with my own magic. I'm just going to wait.
LIAM: Closing in on you fast, you hear.
TAVIMA: I'm about to die.
LIAM: -- and hands on your body.
TAVIMA: Sorry, really quick, though.
LIAM: Yes.
TAVIMA: That happened, but for my bonus action, I do want to use Shield Wall. So I just roll over onto my back and put my shield over my face.
LIAM: Okay, and what's your AC?
TAVIMA: It's 17.
HOA SEN: Is that with the plus one from the--
HOA SEN: Okay.
TAVIMA: Thank you.
LIAM: "Meets it, beats it" is what you told me. The first one hits.
TAVIMA: Yeah. Hold on.
LIAM: Yep.
TAVIMA: Because whenever an enemy hits me with an attack, I roll a d6, and on a four or higher, the attack automatically misses.
LIAM: Nice.
TAVIMA: It's a five on the dice.
LIAM: So it misses. Okay. Okay.
HOA SEN: That's a good shield.
LIAM: But has a second attack, which misses as well. So the shield, this thing-- You just hear claws going, on your shield.
GRELNOK: Can we see what it looks like? Is it--
LIAM: It is in the dark. Anyone who can see sees similar forms to what were crawling down the walls.
TAVIMA: This is going badly.
LIAM: Strange bald-pated heads and gangly arms and legs, and sallow gray-green skin. No. And... No. No, but you have got... Oh, sorry, there was a third one. Okay, so the third one that is attacking you rolls a 17.
LIAM: And you roll a d6 for that as well.
TAVIMA: Six on the dice.
LIAM: Six on the dice? Nice. And then a 21.
TAVIMA: Roll that. That's a one on the dice. It hits.
LIAM: Okay. So you take a h-whopping--
GRELNOK: H-Whopping.
TAVIMA: H-Whopping.
LIAM: Six points of slashing damage.
TAVIMA: ♪ I suck so much ♪
LIAM: From the blind creature's hands. Okay, we are at the top of the round to Mallory.
MALLORY: Oh boy.
LIAM: Tavima is in a rugby pile.
MALLORY: All right. There's no way I can get by you, is there?
TAVIMA: I don't know. How much room is in this tunnel?
LIAM: None.
TAVIMA: Don't scooch into here, it sucks.
LIAM: Not a lot.
GRELNOK: Are you in the tunnel?
TAVIMA: I'm in the tunnel.
HOA SEN: Are your feet sticking out, or the whole body's in the tunnel?
TAVIMA: I think my whole body's in the tunnel.
HOA SEN: Okay, okay.
TAVIMA: So I don't look like Winnie the Pooh in this moment. 
LIAM: You do now, though, in my mind.
HOA SEN: Winnie-the-Pooh.
MALLORY: You're the strongest of us, probably, I would imagine.
GRELNOK: Probably.
MALLORY: Okay. So I'm going to hold my turn because we have the same initiative.
GRELNOK: All right.
MALLORY: I'm going to position myself for a shot when it's clear, let you know.
GRELNOK: All right.
MALLORY: Get her out of there. I'm ready.
GRELNOK: How far into the tunnel are you?
TAVIMA: I don't know, how far in did I get?
LIAM: You would guess between 20 and 35 feet.
GRELNOK: Whoa, you went far.
TAVIMA: I am hundreds of feet in this tunnel.
LIAM: No, that's not accurate because you were further back when you went in. So I'd say you guess between 10 and 20.
TAVIMA: Cool. I am hundreds of feet into this tunnel. 
GRELNOK: Can I? I can't. We have to wait until--
TAVIMA: Look, hold on. I try to scooch down as much... Just shoot them off of me, it's fine.
GRELNOK: You are laying on the ground.
TAVIMA: I'm laying on the ground with my shield over my head.
HOA SEN: You could use your whip and pull her out, but it might hurt her.
GRELNOK: I could, or.
MALLORY: Okay, okay. Wait, if I can see... Can I see over her? Can I--
LIAM: You can see, it's a big knot in there. You see her feet and a big shield covering most of her body from you. She's bent down low with a shield on top of her and there are things just crawling on the sides. The only reason they can get on her so easily is because they're sliding along the walls.
MALLORY: So I'm going to try, I think I can do this. I can make this 10-foot sphere. I think I can do this in a way where I get them and not her. I think I--
LIAM: Aim past?
MALLORY: Yeah, just aim past just to trim her out of the--
LIAM: And the range on that one again, remind me. TAILESIN: Is 60 feet.
LIAM: 60 feet. Yeah.
MALLORY: All right, and I'm going to spend that and one magicka to up the-- That's a DC 14 dex save.
LIAM: Okay. Fail. Succeed.
TAVIMA: See if I regret that.
LIAM: Succeed with a natural 20. One fail, two successes.
MALLORY: So one of them, then, takes--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: 100 points of damage.
MALLORY: Oh, I'm not built that way. That's another world. Five. Oh my god, come on. 14 points of lightning damage.
LIAM: Okay, you hear from inside.
MALLORY: That's all I got. And I'm backing up against the wall.
LIAM: You feel aand there is something half laying on your shield now.
TAVIMA: You got one. Thank you for not killing me.
MALLORY: That's all I got.
GRELNOK: I'm going to bonus action cast Hardened Armor on myself.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Hardened Armor.
GRELNOK: Hardened Armor. And I'm going to leap off the statue of Mehrunes, do a barrel roll on the ground, run forward, and try to slide over top of Tavima's shield as I slash one of the fuckers.
TAVIMA: Let's go!
LIAM: I like it. Make an acrobatics check, Rex. 
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It has all the excitement and adventure that you can find on Elder Scrolls Online.
GRELNOK: I rolled an eight.
HOA SEN: Cool.
TAVIMA: Can I assist? With a reaction, just give her a little push.
LIAM: Yes, you may.
MALLORY: Please, please.
TAVIMA: We practiced this.
GRELNOK: The second one was a four. 
LIAM: So you hit the ground and roll that ankle, and go.
GRELNOK: Oh, fuck!
LIAM: But you continue into this roll into the tunnel, slam into the shield, and your face is pressed into a sightless crayfish, blind weirdo's face in this tunnel.
GRELNOK: It's a lot tighter in this tunnel than I expected.
TAVIMA: Did I look comfortable to you?
LIAM: So you've got two bodies pressed to your lower half and two bodies scrabbling at your upper half.
TAVIMA: I have to fart so badly.
GRELNOK: From my position, just use my mace and hit it forward. Just a little tapperooni.
LIAM: At disadvantage, you may.
GRELNOK: Don't fart while I'm in here.
TAVIMA: Look, just.
GRELNOK: Oh, one was so good! But the other one was pretty good. 16?
LIAM: Hits.
GRELNOK: All right. 16.
MALLORY: Just bopping it in the face.
LIAM: Exactly. You can't swing, but you just angle it.
GRELNOK: I just bop it.
TAVIMA: Just wiggling a spiky thing.
LIAM: Eight? It collapses the creature's face inward and the upper jaw just breaks in. You hear.
TAVIMA: Wait, do you still kill it?
GRELNOK: I fucking got it.
TAVIMA: Yo, you rock.
GRELNOK: I can't move my arms.
TAVIMA: I'm sorry. It's very-- This is a bad place to be.
GRELNOK: It's pretty tight.
LIAM: Hoa, you're up.
HOA SEN: The hole is completely full of bodies and people, right?
LIAM: Yeah, it's just a black knot.
HOA SEN: I can't--
TAVIMA: Just plugged with idiots.
LIAM: Yeah.
HOA SEN: I don't know if I should-- Should I come in there, too? Are we all going into the hole?
TAVIMA: You should not!
HOA SEN: No? Okay. Well, I guess I can... I don't know what to do, y'all. You clogged the hole. 
TAVIMA: We did a great job.
HOA SEN: Is there room? I'm going to go crawl--
GRELNOK: Nothing else can come in this room, though.
TAVIMA: You can come in here. It's going to be not good for you.
HOA SEN: Well, do you want me to help you get out of the hole?
TAVIMA: I don't know what I want anymore.
HOA SEN: Okay, I'm going to try to... I'm going to just do the best that I can. I'm going to crawl into the hole.
LIAM: Crawl into the hole.
HOA SEN: And get as close. What do I see? Is there space above them at all, or is it packed like a little sardine can?
LIAM: You seriously just see... You see red legs bathed in red light from behind you at this point, moving and kicking.
HOA SEN: Oh. It's sort of a--
LIAM: And the bottom of a shield.
HOA SEN: Yikes. 
HOA SEN: Okie-dokie. And I put my hands on some of the feet. I've cast Frost Cloak, so at least y'all have now an additional plus one to your AC for the next 10 minutes, and you are resistant to cold damage, and if you're hit by a melee attack by an enemy, you do three cold damage to them in return.
TAVIMA: Thank you.
LIAM: So you are clumped together with dead daedric monstrosities around you, and you feel. And now things are even a little bit tighter as you've got chonky ice armor on, but you're safer as well.
GRELNOK: Chonky chonky.
TAVIMA: This is great.
HOA SEN: And I just shimmy. I don't know if I can use my action to get back out of there, but--
LIAM: You absolutely can shimmy back out.
HOA SEN: I just shimmy back out. I'll just wait here. I don't know if anyone else wants to go in the hole and try something else.
MALLORY: That's a very good plan.
TAVIMA: Hey, Grel?
LIAM: Slaughter, you're up. You want to light it up with a skull? 
TAVIMA: You remember that time I killed a cultist?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh boy. That seems dangerous.
TAVIMA: And it was really cool?
HOA SEN: Are you strong enough to pry out--
TAVIMA: Do you remember that time when you killed the guy with a lot of arms and it was really cool?
HOA SEN: -- any of the corpses, or our friends?
GRELNOK: I remember that.
TAVIMA: Yeah. This isn't that moment.
GRELNOK: This isn't cool.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: So if I go into this place--
TAVIMA: This isn't cool at all.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's just crammed with bodies at this point?
LIAM: Yes. I don't know how we got here, guys, but here we are.
HOA SEN: This is the rest of the episode. We're all just... We're putting butter in there.
MALLORY: Butter and castor oil.
LIAM: Yeah. I got lots of fun planned but I don't think we're getting past this hole. 
HOA SEN: Did anyone bring butter? Or oils?
TAVIMA: You knew we were prone to holes when you read the name of our inn.
HOA SEN: Prone to holes.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I can't see what's going on in there.
TAVIMA: Stop asking if you can see! You cannot!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I can't see, no. I can't see, so I'm just going to trust my ladies.
GRELNOK: Yeah, we got it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: They got this. I'm going to hold my action till I see a meanie.
LIAM: That's a sign of an expert manager.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yeah, you have to delegate. I'm delegating. 
TAVIMA: Thanks.
HOA SEN: All right.
TAVIMA: Okay--
LIAM: Also, I know I don't exist in this universe, but when you get back to the restaurant you should totally put "The Prone Hole" on the chalkboard.
TAVIMA: You know what? I would write it down, but I can't reach my pocket.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Are either of you injured, Hoa or Mallory?
MALLORY: I'm fine.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yeah, but I can't really see you.
HOA SEN: No, only by four, or five. I'm good.
MALLORY: I healed them.
TAVIMA: To recap, I've got--
GRELNOK: I've got some poison damage, and I rolled my ankle.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right, well then, you know what? I'll use my action instead-- Oh, I don't have enough magicka. Never mind. 
GRELNOK: Incredible.
TAVIMA: Okay, there's at least one corpse on me. Is there a moving one?
LIAM: Yeah, it's wriggling like a fish, going.
TAVIMA: Cool, okay. All right.
TAVIMA: I'm just going to try to use my shield to smush it in the place and then, in as much as I can try to get my longsword slowly into its body, is my goal.
GRELNOK: Don't hit me.
LIAM: Great.
GRELNOK: Don't stab me.
TAVIMA: I will not stab you.
LIAM: At disadvantage, please.
TAVIMA: Yeah, that's fair and fine. Crap. Oh wait. Shit. There's a natural 20 on these dice, but I don't get to use it. But the other one's a 17 plus-- 23.
LIAM: 23 is good. By the way, I had the 20s sanded off your dice before you got here.
TAVIMA: Yeah, thank you. Hey, these are my ones from backing your Kickstarter, and they rolled good and I didn't know what the--
LIAM: Thank you.
TAVIMA: I didn't know it had a little VM on it. I was like, is that a worse one? What is that? Cool.
LIAM: Because of that, I might've had you roll dice, but instead, the longsword just goes
TAVIMA: I'm doing it slowly not because it's difficult in here, but I just want to make sure if I'm accidentally stabbing Grelnok. She would say something.
HOA SEN: Yeah.
GRELNOK: I wish you could see it. I wish you could see it. I can't really see it, either, because it's behind me, but--
TAVIMA: I'm not stabbing you, right?
GRELNOK: No, you're stabbing it.
LIAM: You see the side of this thing's head and the skin on the back of the head, just a point pierces through slowly.
GRELNOK: That's fucking cool.
LIAM: Like through wet cardboard.
GRELNOK: It was good. It's a good kill.
TAVIMA: It's good in the hole now. It's a really nice hole.
LIAM: And the hole grows still. 
GRELNOK: Can you grab my feet? Grab my feet--
TAVIMA: Do we not want to go in farther?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Are you asking us?
TAVIMA: I thought the point was to go into this.
MALLORY: Let's--
GRELNOK: I'm going to wiggle off of the shield and try to wiggle further down.
GRELNOK: Ow. Okay.
LIAM: Takes a minute, but you slowly dislodge yourselves and three corpses of daedric horror from the chamber. And you're still stuck underground.
HOA SEN: Oh, right.
GRELNOK: Is there anything further down the tunnel?
LIAM: It goes on quite a while.
GRELNOK: We should probably go down the tunnel.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: And there's no other entrances or exits in the main chamber?
LIAM: No, you didn't find anything.
GRELNOK: Should we try--
MALLORY: Heal really quick.
GRELNOK: -- to do anything to the statue? Should we try to chop its head off?
LIAM: It's made of stone.
GRELNOK: When has that ever stopped us?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You're right.
TAVIMA: If we could just take a tight five or something, I'm very injured.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Do you want some recovery spells?
TAVIMA: I'd be okay if we could just, you know, wait a minute or so for all of our *majica** to come back. 
HOA SEN: Oh, yeah. Yes, please.
TAVIMA: That'd be great.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Are you going to heal, Hoa?
HOA SEN: I'm fine. I don't need healing, I mean.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: No, I mean, can you heal us, or do you want--
HOA SEN: Yes. Oh yes, who needs healing? Everybody, yes?
GRELNOK: I need healing.
HOA SEN: These two, okay.
HOA SEN: I do,-- Get ready, kids. Fungal Growth! I cast it.
LIAM: Oh, jeez!
TAVIMA: I could've caught that.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You brought a prop? What is this? What's happening?
GRELNOK: I could've caught that, and I dropped it off the table.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What did you just throw at them?
HOA SEN: They're my little mushrooms. I cast Fungal Growth.
GRELNOK: I've still got mushrooms from last time.
HOA SEN: Oh yeah, I have plenty to go around.
TAVIMA: These are cute.
GRELNOK: Aren't they?
HOA SEN: Anyone in the zone gains 1d4 hit points for three rounds. So just roll 1d4 three times.
TAVIMA: Thank you.
GRELNOK: Fucking. Are you fucking kidding me? Three points.
TAVIMA: Nine, thank you. That's really bad.
HOA SEN: All right, well.
GRELNOK: Pathetic.
TAVIMA: I still have to do mine.
GRELNOK: Hey, can I climb up the stature of Mehrunes and hit my mace on his head?
HOA SEN: I'm taking a short rest while this is happening.
MALLORY: Oh yeah.
TAVIMA: Yeah. Yeah, are we taking a short rest?
GRELNOK: 24 to hit.
LIAM: It hits. That statue does not dodge.
MALLORY: Our short rests are shorter than normal short rests.
TAVIMA: They are.
MALLORY: We get the hyper--
GRELNOK: That's a 13.
LIAM: You smash the 30-foot statue as hard as you can with your mace and a fleck of stone goes.
GRELNOK: It's possible. I don't feel like doing it, though.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Make sense. Ambitious.
TAVIMA: I'm just laying on the ground, Rune Focusing myself.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: So we're short resting?
TAVIMA: No, I just need magicka to do it.
TAVIMA: Just needed a minute. And I glow a little bit.
TAVIMA: Okay. Back up to full.
GRELNOK: All right, nice.
TAVIMA: Hey, nice work hitting the guy.
GRELNOK: Thanks, I got a fleck of stone.
TAVIMA: That's pretty good.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Grelnok, are you okay to continue?
HOA SEN: We have potions.
GRELNOK: I know, I just don't want to waste it. The potions are really strong and I'm not quite that hurt yet. You know what I mean?
TAVIMA: Want me to punch you and then you can drink it?
GRELNOK: Hit me.
GRELNOK: Let's go.
MALLORY: All right.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Into the hole?
HOA SEN: Into the hole.
TAVIMA: Perfect.
GRELNOK: Do you want to light a skull so we can see? So *they** can see. I can see.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I've got three or four left, sure.
TAVIMA: I can't see shit.
GRELNOK: Oh, well--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: No, it's okay.
TAVIMA: Look, there's-- hold on. And I want to crawl back into that gross tunnel with the yucky dead boys and bring some skulls back.
HOA SEN: Yeah. Bring skulls!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: But if you're already in there, might as well just keep going, right?
TAVIMA: Yeah. 
LIAM: You pull three shattered--
TAVIMA: I step on the neck and then pull.
LIAM: Right, but they're spongy and flesh-covered still at this point, but they'll probably dry out.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: These are the daedric skulls?
LIAM: Yes.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: And again, *I** know what a daedric is.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: But... What's a daedric? 
LIAM: It is a creature brought over from the realm where Mehrunes Dagon exists.
LIAM: And wishes to bring with him here.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, great. These'll do great. I whisper some disgusting necrotic words to one of the skulls and it catches aflame.
LIAM: Poof.
LIAM: And the chamber lights around you, and it just seems to stretch on. It's dark. The light fades out after 30 or 40 feet.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I will lead the way.
LIAM: Okay. Slaughter Grimm.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Do we have to crawl?
LIAM: You just have to bend down. So you're not actually on all fours. But it goes on for a few minutes. You lose track of how many minutes it takes. But eventually, you see a red glow coming from ahead of you.
GRELNOK: Oh no, another one.
TAVIMA: Orientation-wise--
LIAM: Yes.
TAVIMA: Do I have any sense that we are, perhaps, moving under the street and back towards our bad boy? Our wine cellar.
LIAM: Make a straight intelligence check.
TAVIMA: Why? Why can't I just know a thing? These dice are awesome. Just straight intelligence?
LIAM: Yeah.
LIAM: 19.
TAVIMA: Let's go. All right.
GRELNOK: Is that our dice?
TAVIMA: That's your dice. Thanks, y'all.
LIAM: You actually think that you're going more parallel to the road, away from both The Golden Goose and from the Skull. away from both The Golden Goose and from the Skull.
GRELNOK: What if this stretches under the entire city?
TAVIMA: Probably. Yeah.
LIAM: And as you--
TAVIMA: Is Grahtwood old for Dagon stuff?
TAVIMA: Sorry. I used all of my thoughts.
LIAM: As you creep closer, you can see in the distance another statue's base.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's like a network of statue rooms?
GRELNOK: Is there already a thing sacrificed at it?
LIAM: You do see something on the ground.
GRELNOK: Is it moving?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: With my vast knowledge of Mehrunes Dagon, do I know that there's any numerology connected with his imperiousness? Like, he loves the number three, and there's three chambers of devotion to him?
LIAM: Make a history check.
HOA SEN: Yeah.
TAVIMA: Let's go.
HOA SEN: Good.
LIAM: Yeah.
LIAM: Kind of out of your purview. You understand how the dead of this world work, and you understand service with a smile, but not necessarily the Prince of Oblivion.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay. Well, I guess we forge onward?
TAVIMA: Yeah, I guess.
HOA SEN: This town is quite cursed with cultists and ancient tunnels with statues. Do you think there's a special reason why?
MALLORY: It is weird, isn't it?
HOA SEN: Did this used to be part of, what was it, heck?
TAVIMA: Another heck mound.
HOA SEN: Another heck?
LIAM: Yeah.
TAVIMA: Looking up, is there any sort of passage up to the normal world?
LIAM: Have you crept all the way to the mouth of this tunnel?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: We're at the mouth of the tunnel.
LIAM: Okay. There are stairs identical to the ones in your wine cellar that spiral up, but here, there's also a lot of stone crumbled down on one side of here, and it's just black up top. So the stairs seem to go nowhere. Also of note in the room is the floppy-haired blond teen whose throat is slit and entrails are spilled out across the floor. And there's a smear of blood across the base of the statue.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: The one who was barfing?
GRELNOK: Rennix did it.
HOA SEN: He was a baddie.
GRELNOK: Now you can't fuck him.
TAVIMA: Yeah, that's the conclusion we're all--
GRELNOK: He killed a kid.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Are you okay? Are you okay?
TAVIMA: That's really nice of you. I'm good, thanks.
LIAM: And amongst the rubble on the ground is another passage.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Another passage?
GRELNOK: Another passage.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Like a similar-looking tunnel?
LIAM: Yeah, and from the angle looking at it is-- It seems to be doubling back almost in the same direction from where you came. Maybe more of a V, though.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: So they form some sort of--
GRELNOK: Triangle. Like three.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Well, this is the third one, so maybe--
HOA SEN: Four?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Four or five. Like a pentagram or something.
GRELNOK: Oh, creepy. All right, let's go check it out.
TAVIMA: Is this one doubling back towards the one under The Golden Goose, or back towards ours?
LIAM: From your 19 from earlier, you're guessing away from the Goose, more angled towards your home.
TAVIMA: Okay. Triangle going back to ours.
MALLORY: Doing another quick search of this just because I want to see if there's anything else.
LIAM: Okay, investigation check.
GRELNOK: Can we hear Rennix?
TAVIMA: Oh, please no.
MALLORY: Don't even know why I'm looking it up. Nine.
LIAM: You take a quick minute because you're tense as fuck. And really, besides the piles of rubble that presumably fell from above some time in the distant past and this poor kid, no.
MALLORY: All right.
HOA SEN: So through the tunnel, then?
LIAM: Okay.
GRELNOK: Can we hear Rennix? Can we hear them talking?
LIAM: You make it about halfway up this tunnel and you do hear voices. You hear, "Hurry, we've wasted too much time already." "Hold still, damn ya." "Where is Diven?" "Never you mind where he is. Our role is here."
TAVIMA: That's Rennix's hot voice, shit.
GRELNOK: We gotta go and kill him. We gotta go kill him.
TAVIMA: Gotta go kill.  Let's go kill him.
LIAM: Charging in?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Should we do this smartly? Sneak?
GRELNOK: We run in. 
LIAM: Right where you are, if the other tunnel is any indication, you're about 200--
GRELNOK: Okay, we sneak down the tunnel as fast as possible.
LIAM: Okay.
GRELNOK: And then as we get toward the end, we run in.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
LIAM: Okay, cool. So stealth checks, please.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Stealth checks only to be rendered useless.
GRELNOK: We can get pretty close.
HOA SEN: 11.
TAVIMA: Eight.
LIAM: Okay. You, hand on the shoulder of the person in front of you.
TAVIMA: Oh yeah, I can't see.
LIAM: Except for Slaughter Grimm, who's clearly the leader here. You make your way up through the tunnel, creeping, creeping, creeping, creeping. You get about 20 feet away because the light is starting to spill in red, and you can see crates of wine that you fucking bought.
GRELNOK: They're in our wine! They're in our winery! I knew it, we could've gone back to our winery and come down the--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That's why they wanted us to come over and have food. They were clearing the space.
LIAM: You charging in?
HOA SEN: What?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Let's sneak in.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I don't know.
GRELNOK: Let's go kill them.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You're the leader, you decide.
GRELNOK: They're in our fucking bar.
GRELNOK: It'll be fine.
HOA SEN: Maybe if we sneak in, we can save some of our product from being destroyed.
TAVIMA: Stop talking and fucking sneak.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: If they win--
TAVIMA: Oh my god.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: We lose our lives, but also our business.
GRELNOK: Slaughter, they're killing someone right now. They're killing someone in our winery.
TAVIMA: You gotta do something, buddy. This is your moment.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: This is *my** moment?
GRELNOK: Be a manager.
TAVIMA: You're in front. You have to sneak--
HOA SEN: I feel like they're bullying you--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm going to manager up.
GRELNOK: Go kill them.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right. All right, I will lead the charge in, skull blazing. And I'll race in and say: This is our establishment, goddamn it! And we are closed temporarily!
LIAM: Your voice echoes into the winery as you clear into your own wine cellar, your friends hunched down and coming out behind you, and you see, standing in the center of the room at the base of the statue, two people in hoods and cloaks turn around. And you see Rennix, you see Triss, who's holding up a blade and she's got a little kid with red hair and tart smeared across his face.
TAVIMA: Oh, it's cranberry baby.
LIAM: "What the fuck?" And that's where we'll go to break.
HOA SEN: Now I can get it.
TAVIMA: This is good.
MALLORY: This is very fun.
GRELNOK: And you guys wanted to sneak. This kid would've died immediately.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You're totally right.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That's why you should be the manager. 
HOA SEN: Trying to explore all possibilities.
MALLORY: Some management material right there.
LIAM: This is a culinary delight, you guys.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
TAVIMA: This is fun. I want to eat all of the food that was described.
GRELNOK: I know. I'm hungry for sugar now.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Do we need to throw to break? What do we do? What are we--
LIAM: If we're still rolling, we're going to go get a snack break that pales in comparison to The Golden Goose, but we'll see you back here in a few.
TAVIMA: Brrah!