Chapter 16: The Fetid Wedding

Zuggtmoy, Demon Queen of Fungi, plots to “wed” Araumycos, an enormous fungus occupying a large area of the Underdark. After uniting their powers in an unholy mockery of matrimony-in truth, a demonic rite of domination-Zuggtmoy will gain the power to transform the whole of the Underdark into her new Abyssal domain. The only things in her way are a core of resistance in the myconid community, the rage of her rival Juiblex, and the determination of the adventurers.

The characters receive a warning about Zuggtmoy’s plans from Basidia, one of the myconid sovereigns of Neverlight Grove. After traveling to the caverns of Araumycos, they reach out to Araumycos’s alien mind with the aid of Basidia’s rapport spores, and try to free it from Zuggtmoy’s demonic influence. Juiblex seizes the opportunity to crash the wedding, and the two demon lords do battle. When the characters sever Zuggtmoy’s link with Araumycos, Juiblex destroys her material form, leaving the adventurers to face the remaining (and weakened) demon lord in battle.

Wedding Invitation

The adventurers become caught up in Zuggtmoy’s plots when they experience a vision from the rebel myconids of Neverlight Grove, delivered by Sovereign Basidia. The characters know of Basidia and the myconids' struggles if they visited Neverlight Grove (see chapter 5). Otherwise, the myconids reach out to them if they sheltered Stool or Rumpadump for a time.

Basidia’s vision can come at any point, whether the characters are asleep or awake. You can choose to have the vision affect all or some of the player characters, or to have some of their NPC followers affected as well. Read the following text aloud, making adjustments as necessary if the characters have not met Sovereign Basidia.

A soft, glowing light rises from ahead, emanating from a vast cavern. The entire surface of the cave-floor, walls, and ceiling-is blanketed in moss and fungi, all in shades of white and soft pastels of pink, violet, green, and pale blue. The diffuse light the mushrooms shed makes the vista waver as if seen through mist.

“Araumycos,” a voice says in your mind. You turn and see a myconid sovereign standing beside you where there was no one before, recognizing Basidia of Neverlight Grove. “The largest and greatest being of our world,” the myconid says sadly. “All that you see before you is Araumycos; all this and much more. All is in danger from the corruption that will claim the whole of the world if you do not help us.”

Although myconids can normally use their rapport spores only over short distances, Basidia explains that Zuggtmoy has been spreading her own spores throughout the Underdark, channeling faerzress. By tapping into this growing presence, the myconid sovereign can rapport over great distances to ask the characters for their help.

Zuggtmoy, the demon queen who has corrupted the myconids, has made her intentions clear. She is leading her new followers to the vast cavern complex occupied by Araumycos, the largest life-form in the Underdark and perhaps in all the world. There, the two will be bonded in a demonic ceremony, giving Zuggtmoy dominion over a fungal kingdom larger and greater than any surface-world realm. To that end, she and her followers have been performing rituals and releasing spores to lull the great Araumycos into a kind of charmed sleep. The full implications are unclear to Basidia and the myconids, but as Araumycos is the oldest and most powerful being known to them, they greatly fear what Zuggtmoy’s corruption of it will bring.

Fortunately, there is hope. Basidia believes it can assist in creating a rapport between the adventurers and Araumycos’s vast, sleeping mind. The characters can help to awaken it and aid its struggle against the demon queen’s influence. Or, if there’s no other choice, they can destroy Araumycos before Zuggtmoy can claim the great creature as her own.

If Stool or Rumpadump have met the characters and are still alive, they join the rapport between Basidia and the characters, offering their support and encouragement as they implore the adventurers to intervene. If the characters saw the hideous Garden of Welcome in Neverlight Grove-or, worse yet, glimpsed the horrors of Yggmorgus-the myconids remind them that the whole world might become like that if Zuggtmoy unites Araumycos’s power with her own.

Basidia proposes that the characters travel quickly to Araumycos, where the myconid sovereign will temporarily immunize them against the effects of the demon-tainted spores released by myconids under Zuggtmoy’s influence. Basidia will then initiate a rapport with Araumycos while Zuggtmoy and her followers are preoccupied with the wedding ceremony.

Basidia and its followers can meet the adventurers within Araumycos’s vast cavern complex. The sovereign is too closely watched to slip away and meet them before that, and it recommends that the characters avoid contact with other myconids on their travels. Basidia can use the extended rapport link to fix on the characters' location, and promises to find them when they are near the center of Araumycos. The vision then ends.

Myconid March

Shortly after the party receives Basidia’s vision and warning, myconids and fungal creatures throughout the Underdark fall under the influence of Zuggtmoy’s spreading spores, making a slow and steady march toward Araumycos, their “queen’s betrothed.” Thousands are on the move, and the procession has a bizarrely festive air, the fungi capering, dancing, and skipping as they celebrate the impending nuptials.

That behavior alone is alarming enough. However, under the demon queen’s influence, the myconids and other fungi release clouds of spores as they move through the tunnels of the Underdark. Strange perfumes and scents fill the air. The marching myconids sow chaos as they move through the Underdark, passing around the Darklake. Other intelligent Underdark creatures give the procession a wide berth.

Characters making their way toward Araumycos can avoid much of the risk by following Basidia’s advice and staying away from the myconid march. If not, they run the risk of falling under Zuggtmoy’s sway (see “Random Encounters” in this chapter).

Uninvited Guests

The fungi of the Underdark aren’t the only ones on the move. Juiblex the Faceless Lord has caught wind of its rival Zuggtmoy’s intentions and mobilized an army of oozes now making its way toward Araumycos. The demon lord wants to slow Zuggtmoy’s progress toward her goal. More importantly, though, Juiblex seeks the opportunity to appear at the ceremony, either to thwart its rival’s intentions, take advantage of Araumycos’s vulnerability, or both. Though Araumycos represents the perfect mate to Zuggtmoy, Juiblex sees it only as a living feast of tremendous proportions.

With both forces on the move, outbreaks of violence between oozes and fungi become more common, although the followers of Zuggtmoy outnumber the Faceless Lord’s creatures.

Araumycos

Some forty miles southeast of the Darklake lies the vast territory of Araumycos (see the Underdark overview map in chapter 2).

Araumycos: General Features

The domain of Araumycos is a bizarre fungal realm in the heart of the Underdark.

Light. Araumycos’s tunnels and caverns are dimly lit by phosphorescent fungi.

Terrain. Fungal life fills the caverns and passageways in the region, with visitors literally walking upon and within Araumycos upon entering its domain. The floor is carpeted with thick mold and fungus, creating patches of difficult terrain throughout. In some tunnels and caves, fungi growths obstruct passage. Characters either have to climb or hack their way through the fungal growth. In other places, the fungus covering the floor is soft enough that characters can sink into it with no warning. Use the quicksand rules in chapter 5, “Adventure Environments,” of the Dungeon Master’s Guide for such areas. Creatures that fail to escape become food for Araumycos.

Random Encounters

As the characters travel toward Araumycos, use the Creature Encounters table in this section rather than the Creature Encounters table in chapter 2.

Once the characters enter Araumycos’s territory, use the Araumycos Encounters table instead of the random encounter tables in chapter 2. While the characters are in Araumycos’s domain, check for a random encounter twice per day: once while they are traveling, and again while they are camped or resting.

Creature Encounters

Araumycos Encounters

Death Tyrant

Characters within 1 mile of the death tyrant’s lair feel as if they’re being watched even when they aren’t. While defending its cavernous lair, the tyrant avails itself of its lair actions.

Treasure. If the characters defeat the death tyrant, they can plunder its hoard: 4d6 × 1,000 gp, 5d6 × 100 pp, 3d6 500 gp gems, and 1d6 magic items (determine each one by rolling on Magic Item Table C in chapter 8 of the Dungeon Master’s Guide).

Demons

One or more demons encounter the party and attack. Roll a d12 and consult the Demons table to determine what the characters meet.

Demons

Fungi

This encounter occurs only while the characters are traveling; otherwise, treat it as “no encounter.”

The party happens upon a cave overgrown with fungi. Roll a d6 and consult the Fungi table to determine what special type of fungi can be found here.

If this encounter takes place in Araumycos’s domain, an overabundance of fungi cover all of the other cave exits, requiring the characters to hack or blast their way through (or find a route around).

Fungi

Gnoll Pack

A hunting pack consisting of one gnoll pack lord and 3d6 gnoll has been driven into a frenzy by the presence of Yeenoghu in the Underdark. The characters can’t be surprised by the gnolls, whose incessant cackling gives them away.

Gricks

A grick alpha and 1d4+2 grick lair in a cave. They spring out from hiding to attack any creature that stumbles into their territory.

Mold Pit

One party member (determined randomly) steps on a pit of soft mold hidden beneath a thin carpet of moss, and sinks into it. The effect is identical to that of quicksand (see chapter 5, “Adventure Environments,” of the Dungeon Master’s Guide).

Myconid Parade

The characters stumble upon 1d4 myconid adult, 2d6 myconid sprout, and one or more spore servants. Roll a d8 and consult the Spore Servants table to determine what kind of spore servants are present.

Spore Servants

Subjects of Zuggtmoy, the myconids and their spore servants caper and dance madly to music only they can hear. The myconids insist that all other creatures they meet join them, releasing a cloud of spores if anyone refuses to do so. They can release this cloud once, and any creature within 30 feet of one or more of the myconids when the cloud is released must succeed on a DC 11 Constitution saving throw or become charmed. While charmed in this way, a creature can do nothing other than dance and use its movement to follow the myconid parade. The creature can repeat the saving throw at the end of each hour, ending the effect on itself on a success. Casting lesser restoration, greater restoration, remove curse, or similar magic on a creature also ends the effect on it.

The myconids and their spore servants attack only if they’re attacked or prevented from continuing on their march.

Oozes

The characters encounter one or more oozes. Roll a d4 and consult the Oozes table to determine what kinds of oozes the characters encounter.

Oozes

If the encounter occurs en route to Araumycos, the oozes are slithering toward the giant fungus. Otherwise, the oozes are feasting on Araumycos itself. In either event, the oozes fight only in self-defense.

Two-Headed Trolls

Warped by Demogorgon’s presence in the Underdark, these trolls have each grown a second head. As part of its Multiattack routine, a two-headed troll can make a Bite attack as a bonus action on its turn. The party encounters 1d4+1 of these hungry creatures, which otherwise have the statistics of a normal troll.

Enter the Groom

In the time it takes the characters to reach Araumycos’s caverns after receiving Basidia’s message, Zuggtmoy and her fungal entourage arrive at the site of the ceremony, near the center of those caverns. The entourage includes hundreds of myconid adult and myconid sprout, accompanied by awakened zurkhwood and bridesmaids of Zuggtmoy, as well as ambulatory fungi such as violet fungi and gas spore. Various spore servants fill out Zuggtmoy’s entourage (see the “Myconids” entry of the Monster Manual and appendix C of this adventure).

Basidia’s Aid

As the characters approach the center of Araumycos’s great cavern complex, Basidia meets them with a small detachment of loyal myconids. The myconid sovereign explains that it can infuse the characters with rapport spores and neutralized servitor spores, enabling them to blend in with the fungal servitors accompanying Zuggtmoy. The characters then have a few hours to make their way to the center of Araumycos’s territory where Zuggtmoy’s ritual is set to take place.

When they are sufficiently close to the epicenter of the ritual, the characters will be able to enter rapport with Araumycos. Basidia’s rapport spores help facilitate the process, but Araumycos’s sleeping mind isn’t in full control of the defenses of its body, and might interpret the characters' presence as an attack. Basidia warns the characters that they must be on their guard for a reaction from the vast fungus.

Once the characters have entered rapport, they must seek out Araumycos’s sleeping mind and awaken it to the danger it faces. Basidia doesn’t know if Zuggtmoy will become aware of what the characters are doing, but if she does, they will have only a limited amount of time before the demon queen tries to stop them.

Ooze Spies

Once Basidia has explained the plan to the characters, read the following boxed text aloud to the players.

Even as the myconid sovereign’s thoughts fill your mind, you become aware of a faint hissing and fizzing sound. The fungus around you dissolves to a formless goo as something moves in the undergrowth to surround you!

A pair of regenerating black pudding, spies for Juiblex, slither through the undergrowth to attack the party. The characters' myconid allies fall back from the fray, desperate to protect Sovereign Basidia and pleading for the adventurers' aid through the telepathic rapport they share.

Empowered by Juiblex, these regenerating black puddings have an Intelligence of 6 (-2) and the following feature, which increases each pudding’s challenge rating to 5 (1,800 XP).

Regeneration. The pudding regains 10 hit points at the start of its turn. If the pudding takes fire damage, this trait doesn’t function at the start of the pudding’s next turn. The pudding dies only if it starts its turn with 0 hit points and doesn’t regenerate.

Across the Fungal Fields

Once the characters receive Basidia’s spores and overcome Juiblex’s black pudding spies, they should set out at once for the depths of Araumycos as the rapport takes hold. Unfortunately, they have no means of assuring the slumbering fungal entity of their intentions, and the growing threat posed by Zuggtmoy and the demon lords has roused Araumycos’s defenses.

The pastel colors of fungi transform the caverns you pass through into softly glowing meadows. The floor is spongy, and the myconid spores are making you start to feel drowsy-at least, you hope that’s what’s behind this strange sensation. Then you feel the ground beneath you shift as something moves-a number of a thick, spiky tendrils bursting from the ground.

Two fungal creatures resembling otyugh rise up and attack the characters. Created by Araumycos to perfectly duplicate the abilities, traits, and actions of otyughs, these creatures are plants rather than aberrations. They attack until slain, whereupon each bursts into a cloud of sweet-smelling spores as its body dissolves back into the larger mass of fungi filling the cavern.

Read the following to the players when the final creature is defeated.

The creature bursts like an overfull wineskin, releasing a clear ichor and a cloud of dusty spores. The deflating bulk of its body sinks back beneath the shimmering fungal field where you stand. Your vision starts to swim, and you feel dizzy and faint. Your limbs are numb and your legs no longer support you.

A successful DC 13 Intelligence (Arcana or Nature) check confirms that the characters are in no physical danger but are entering rapport with Araumycos. The adventurers are paralyzed as the myconid spores fully take effect. Even creatures immune to sleep and paralysis are affected as the spores seep into mind and body. The characters collapse harmlessly to the soft surface of Araumycos, its fungus quickly spreading across them as the rapport begins. When this happens, continue with “Into the Gray Dream.”

Into the Gray Dream

The rapport with Araumycos affects the adventurers like an astral projection spell, sending their astral bodies out into the Astral Plane where Araumycos’s vast, dreaming mind resides. Their bodies remain unconscious in suspended animation while they are projected into the Astral Plane. Read the following aloud to the players.

You are floating, weightless, adrift. A gray, silvery light spreads around you like the dawn of a cloudy day, illuminating a peculiar realm. All of you are floating in a silvery haze that shimmers with swirls of color. Objects drift past in the distance, but whether they are small stones or rocks the size of mountains, you can’t say for certain. Your moment of reverie is broken by the sound of Basidia’s voice in your mind. “It begins.”

The adventurers, now psychically linked with both the myconid sovereign and Araumycos, are aware of the demon queen and her minions performing Zuggtmoy’s demonic ritual.

Through your link with Basidia, you sense that Zuggtmoy’s wedding ceremony has begun. Receiving the myconid’s impressions, you become aware of a huge crowd of fungal creatures and spore servants—hundreds, perhaps thousands of them—watching as a grotesque procession makes its way through them. Myconids of all sizes caper madly before a troupe of giant animated mushrooms, bearing a mossy litter upon which sits the Demon Queen of Fungi in all her terrible splendor.

Zuggtmoy is draped and veiled in molds and fruiting mushrooms woven into a grotesque gown. Vaguely humanoid figures set with clusters of luminescent lichen and tumescent fungal growths follow her like bridesmaids, carrying a veil and train of lacy mycelia. Stepping off the litter as her followers set it down, the Demon Queen of Fungi rises to tower above all the creatures around her. “My betrothed,” she intones, the meaning of her words clear within the vision. “I am here at last.”

The Mind of Araumycos

Navigating on the Astral Plane is largely a matter of thought and perception. The characters feel a psychic “pull” in the right direction as they seek out the consciousness of Araumycos with their own minds. A creature flies through the Astral Plane at a speed in feet equal to 3 × its Intelligence score, but a feeling of timelessness on the plane makes it difficult to judge the length of the journey.

The characters' thoughts draw them toward a distant, floating object. It appears to be a hemisphere, until its slow rotation reveals its true form: a giant skull missing its jawbone, formed out of some kind of pale rock. As the characters draw closer, the skull reveals itself to be the size of a small mountain. Its surface is covered in lichens and broad patches of mold, the colors resembling those of Araumycos on the Material Plane.

Through the empty eye sockets of the skull, the adventurers can see that its interior is hollow and filled with a bewildering variety of giant fungi. Tendrils and growths extend outward, twining together to form a mass suspended in the middle of the open space - a brain-shaped fungus the size of a castle.

The closer the characters come to the floating skull, the more strongly they feel a presence - the mind of Araumycos, to which they are linked. That consciousness is largely unaware of them, lulled by the insidious influence of Zuggtmoy’s spores and unable to resist the demon queen’s presence.

Wedding Crashers

When any character enters the skull or touches its surface, the mind of Araumycos stirs-and the Demon Queen of Fungi senses it. Read the following to the players as Zuggtmoy uses the connection of the rapport spores to push into Araumycos’s mind.

“Who dares?” a voice shouts in your mind. “Who dares disturb my intended nuptials?” Spores and tendrils erupt from the surface of the skull, coalescing before your eyes into the image of the Demon Queen of Fungi, her dead eyes glaring with inhuman fury.

Zuggtmoy projects her psychic presence to confront the characters, while at the same time maintaining limited control over her material form. She intends to complete the ritual necessary to grant her full power over Araumycos, needing only to delay or destroy the intruders in order to succeed. The split in the Demon Queen’s attention works in their favor, as Zuggtmoy’s demonic rival Juiblex chooses that moment to launch its attack and claim Araumycos for its own.

Before Zuggtmoy acts against the adventurers, the demon queen is distracted, turning away to glance at something they can’t see. She hisses the name “Juiblex” like a curse, then recoils as if struck. Her image then vanishes.

The Sleeper Wakes

As the psychic din awakens Araumycos from its trance, the shimmering colors piercing the silver of the Astral Plane flare even brighter. The following round, Araumycos enters into full rapport with the characters and their myconid allies. The entity reveals that Zuggtmoy has already infected its mind with her demonic influence, which Araumycos can feel growing in strength. It’s only a matter of time before it falls to the demon queen’s will. Focused but fearful, the entity asks the adventurers to cut out and destroy the diseased part of its mind before it’s too late.

The characters are guided to the far side of the suspended fungus cluster inside the skull, where a dark mass is spreading. The first time any character comes within 20 feet of the dark mass, it erupts with the effect of an Evard’s black tentacles spell. The infected area of Araumycos’s mind has AC 13, 100 hit points, and vulnerability to necrotic and psychic damage.

When the infected area first takes damage, Zuggtmoy senses it and turns her attention away from Juiblex in an attempt to stop the characters. As she exerts her will over Araumycos, a burst of spores spreads out in a cloud from the infected area. Any creature within 20 feet of the infected area must make a successful DC 19 Constitution saving throw or take 3d6 poison damage and become poisoned. While poisoned in this way, the creature takes 3d6 poison damage at the start of each of its turns. A poisoned creature can repeat the saving throw on each of its turns, ending the effect on itself on a success.

As the characters destroy more of the infected area, the view beyond the bounds of the skull chamber begins to darken. When the area reaches 0 hit points, a powerful psychic wind howls through the area. Each character must make a successful DC 15 Intelligence saving throw to avoid the mental effect of a psychic wind (see “The Astral Plane” in chapter 2 of the Dungeon Master’s Guide). This psychic wind has no location effect, as the rapport ends thereafter and the characters awaken back in their physical bodies. Physical damage and ongoing effects suffered by their astral forms aren’t carried over to the characters' physical bodies.

Let Them Speak Now…

If the characters free Araumycos from Zuggtmoy’s influence, they weaken the power of the Demon Queen of Fungi, fatally distracting her. With the loss of many of her fungal minions and the amount of power she has expended to perform her ritual, Zuggtmoy is weakened to the point that Juiblex overwhelms her, destroying and consuming her material form and casting her essence back into the Abyss.

Characters reduced to 0 hit points in the battle on the Astral Plane are catapulted back to their bodies on the Material Plane. Their rapport with Araumycos is broken, and they are helpless to intervene further in the conflict going on within the entity’s mind. You can have a group of oozes or spore servants from the Araumycos Encounters table appear in the cavern where the adventurers entered into rapport with Araumycos, so that characters shunted out of that rapport can defend their compatriots' helpless bodies while the fight continues.

If all the characters are defeated on the Astral Plane, the awakened Araumycos remains conscious enough to resist Zuggtmoy with a final effort, sufficient to distract the Demon Queen of Fungi and thereby allowing Juiblex to overwhelm her. In any event, the characters can hear the battle between Juiblex and Zuggtmoy unfolding in the ritual cavern just a few minutes ahead of them.

Retreat

If the adventurers retreat from the sounds of battle, they barely escape from a partial collapse of their local section of Araumycos’s cavern complex. They race ahead of a small horde of Zuggtmoy’s minions, which are crushed by falling rock that also seals off the characters' escape route. Basidia and some of the myconid rebels survive, and will accompany the adventurers out of Araumycos’s caverns before returning to Neverlight Grove to root out any remainder of the demon queen’s infestation.

To Battle

If the adventurers head toward the battle between the two demon lords after awakening from their rapport, they arrive just in time to see the grotesque display of the Faceless Lord slurping up the defeated Zuggtmoy into the mass of its body, enveloping and dissolving her before turning its attention toward the newcomers.

Fighting the Faceless Lord

Under normal circumstances, Juiblex would be an overwhelming foe. Fortunately for the adventurers, the Faceless Lord’s battle with Zuggtmoy has weakened it. The characters might also have aid from allies, the newly freed myconids, and Araumycos in overcoming the demon lord.

Apply the following penalties to Juiblex:

• Its current hit points are 200.
• It has no more uses of Legendary Resistance for the day.
• Its Eject Slime action has been used and must recharge.
• It has no lair actions or regional effects.

Basidia rallies thirty myconid adult and thirty-two drow spore servant to fight alongside the characters. Their attacks are incapable of harming Juiblex. However, as they swarm around the demon lord, one time per round (as agreed upon by the players), a character who would be hit by an attack can have a myconid or a spore servant hit by the attack instead. The myconids can also fight off oozes, allowing the adventurers to focus their attention on the demon lord.

If the adventurers freed it from Zuggtmoy’s influence, Araumycos aids them by releasing spores into the cavern, granting all living creatures in the area immunity to poison damage and the poisoned condition.

Victory or Defeat

The characters might overcome two demon lords if they are successful in this chapter. If they fail, terrible consequences unfold for the myconids and other creatures of the Underdark, though the adventurers will get another chance to take the fight to Zuggtmoy, Juiblex, and all the other demon lords in chapter 17.

Escaping Defeat

If the characters lose their battle against Juiblex, their best hope lies in Vizeran DeVir’s ritual. In the worstcase scenario where one or more heroes fall in the fight against the Faceless Lord, their allies might be able to carry them to safety so that they can be healed or restored to life.

If the adventurers flee from Juiblex, the demon lord pursues them. However, Araumycos (or its death throes) triggers a cave-in, allowing defeated characters to barely escape. Juiblex then turns its attention to feeding on Araumycos and is one of the demon lords drawn into battle by Vizeran’s ritual in chapter 17.

Achieving Victory

If the adventurers succeed, they achieve a great victory with two demon lords banished back to the Abyss. The creatures under the demon lords' influence eventually return to normal. Neither Zuggtmoy nor Juiblex is truly destroyed, however. Each demon lord reforms on its layer of the Abyss, never forgetting those responsible for its defeat.

The elimination of the Demon Queen of Fungi wins the adventurers the eternal gratitude of the surviving myconids of Neverlight Grove. Basidia quickly assumes leadership of the grove, taking steps to heal the minds of those myconids afflicted by demonic corruption. The myconids also declare their intention to cleanse their home of Zuggtmoy’s lingering influence.

The removal of Juiblex from the Underdark causes most oozes and related creatures to revert to their normal state. If the Pudding King survived this long, he retreats to Blingdenstone, but it’s a far easier matter for the deep gnomes to deal with him and his oozing minions without Juiblex around.

Developments

Even if Araumycos survives, its fate is unclear. The entity’s mind has clearly been damaged by both the necessity of cutting away its corruption and the buffeting force of the psychic wind that followed. Basidia and the myconids offer to meld with Araumycos to try to heal it and guide it back to wholeness. Though not as serious as death, the trauma still causes a significant amount of fungal die-off in areas of the creature’s domain, potentially uncovering lost ruins or other hidden sites.

In addition to possible victory over one or two demon lords, the adventurers receive one last bequest from the mind of Araumycos. A puff of rapport spores or a lingering psychic connection informs them of one or more of the secrets of the Underdark gathered during the entity’s vast existence. If you want to provide the players with any remaining information about virtually anything in the adventure, this is an excellent opportunity to do so.

Treasure

In addition to (or instead of) providing information to the adventurers, the last connection to the surviving Araumycos can bestow a charm of heroism to all the player characters (see “Other Rewards” in chapter 7 of the Dungeon Master’s Guide).

Additionally, the thirteen timmask mushrooms on the list of required components that Vizeran needs to create his dark heart talisman (see chapter 12) can be found in the aftermath of the failed wedding ceremony, sprouting in locations touched by Zuggtmoy or Juiblex.

If the characters didn’t collect traces of Yeenoghu’s blood from the fallen goristro in chapter 14, any successful weapon attack against Juiblex in this chapter leaves traces of the Faceless Lord’s blood on a character’s weapon. Collecting this blood for Vizeran DeVir provides another component he needs to craft his dark heart talisman.

XP Awards

If the characters rid Araumycos’s mind of its demonic infection, award each of them 2,000 XP. If the party delivers to Vizeran all of the components he needs to craft his dark heart talisman, award each character an additional 2,500 XP.