Soldi, day 72 of Summer, 553

25 Exiles gathered today for our expedition to the Pitch caves.

Despite having two Strange Stones along, we weren't getting far today, as they were in Yor's pack and were going to stay there. No teleport-capable Full Mystic was available to join us on this trip.

After waiting around an extra bit in hopes that a Mystic would arrive late, we set out anyway toward the Foothills anyway. We reached the Pitch caves in well under an hour.

Without the possibility of teleport to PC6, we set our sights on getting a few pathfinders safely to their training book, and on allowing trained pathfinders to scan the pit area of PC2 for possible paths there.

We quickly controlled PC1, and both missions were successful. Several exiles reached Giayl's Guide to start or renew their lessons, increasing our complement of skilled pathfinders.

Several already skilled pathfinders found nothing of interest in the pit of PC2, as expected.

Since we stayed in PC1 for a long time doing these things, however, the spawns continued to increase, until at least we were reduced to retreating upstairs in the face of more than a dozen Crimson noids from both PC1 and PC2. Then it was back to the old standby of rescueing fallens via chain runs until we were ready to head home. Everyone was retrieved safely, and we returned home without incident from the upper cavern through Ethereal Portals.

It's unfortunate we didn't have a Full Mystic along, but given how few of them there are and the tight time constraints of this fairly large group, it's not surprising that this would happen eventually. And presumeably will again. So we took that lemon and made what lemonade we could from it. There are plenty of other things in the Foothills that need periodic re-investigation, for when this happens next.

The large Crimson spawns we encountered were a strong reminder that we cannot dally in these caves. If we had been just passing through as we normally do, we would have been long gone from PC1 and PC2 when by the time those spawns appeared.

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