As Tobias fitted Geronimo's mandibles with hook horror claws, Ajuni and Marcus harvested the bluecap, giving Mormeros time to rest his bloody head. Though Tobias accidentally burned the resulting sporebread loaf, they scavenged and roasted some Nilhogg's Nose over a bonfire. Not aware of the fungus's olfactory-altering outcome, they dug in and found their sense of smell exponentially heightened. Marcus nearly took out Mormeros with a well-timed ass whistle, and after a rest they continued with Queez and Ploom through the tunnels.
The journey took the adventurers deep below the mountain before spiraling up through winding passages, using ropes and pitons to ascend steep cliffs and massive domed ledges. They encountered pockets of Faerzress, a magical radiation that made spellcasting a gamble, but their light, noise, and numbers kept the Underdark's smaller denizens from attacking. As they traveled, Ajuni spotted a strange Tongue-like fungus that Tobias recognized and harvested, but did not tell of its effect.
Ploom informed the party of their final destination, a set of stone doors inlaid with a draconic visage that was fitted beyond a Lake of Acid. The large underground chamber was crisscrossed by partially destroyed bridges, and as they planned their way forward, they were ambushed. A Cave Fisher lurked from a faerzress-leaking tunnel onto a bridge below, and it spat a filament that wrapped around Ajuni and pulled her onto the bridge. As it dragged her away, the half-elf deftly cut the filament with her new magical dagger. She ducked a pincer claw, sprinted away from the faerzress, and teleported to safety.
Before she made her escape, however, Marcus reacted with panic. To his human eyes, "Junebug" had disappered into darkness in less than a second, and he had to take action. With Ploom atop his head like a sentient sombrero, he heroically leapt onto a different bridge below to find Ajuni. The cave fisher, deprived of its meal, spotted the easier target, and spat filament at Ploom. The flumph put up significantly less resistance than the sorceress had, and was reeled in then crushed by the fisher's powerful claws. With its dinner in hand, it scuttled back into its cave, and the party deemed it too difficult a rescue mission to follow.
Queez quickly fell into a deep depression, having lost their life-mate and only friend. Mormeros was never a fan of the flumph to begin with, and suggested throwing the disconsolate aberration into the acid, but [Everyone Disliked That]. After running through some random side tunnels screaming out Ploom and Ajuni's names, Marcus returned, and quickly devised a system to get everyone across the acid. The Swine would jump across the various broken bridges, hammering pitons into the stone and attaching ropes for his party members to climb across.
Attached by rope, Marcus cleared the first break in the bridge with ease and began hammering in a piton. The rhythmic sound of metal on metal, in addition to his previous cries for his party members, alerted other creatures of their presence above the Lake of Acid. He jumped to the highest bridge above in an attempt to survey the darkness using Ajuni's driftglobe. Fast as hounds, a pack of strange brain-like creatures raced toward him, looking to possess his body. Marcus swung back below the bridge, and the Intellect Devourers were left exposed for Tobias and Ajuni to light up with fiery spells.
As they heard more rushing toward them, they quickly readied a battle plan. Tobias used another packet of Pixie Dust on Geronimo, flying up to join the Swine on the high bridge and face the Devourers head-on, while Ajuni and Mormeros would blast them apart from below. However, the two were not able to provide supporting fire as an even stranger brain-like creature threatened. Hovering high above the acid, a Grell tried to use the Intellect Devourers as cover for an easy ambush, but Mormeros noticed in time and magically slowed the creature; this gave Ajuni multiple opportunities to blast it apart with fireballs, but she couldn't quite the Grell down. As it descended on Momo, Tobias launched a fire bolt from above that pierced the brain.
Though the Intellect Devourers mashed Marcus's mind multiple times, the bridge crew managed to defeat wave after wave of the psychic brain-dogs by shoving them into the acid lake eighty feet below. Atop a flying Geronimo, Tobias found that their proposed course would take them close to a lair that appeared to be inhabited by Giant Spiders. He spotted a Drider guard outside wearing a magical Piwafwi, but the party was too concerned with their imminent death to focus on magical treasure. To avoid another potential fight, Ajuni gave Mormeros her Potion of Gaseous Form, and teleported across the bridges alongside Marcus, who hulk-jumped his way across. Now in cloud form, the tiefling floated to the doors uselessly gloomy Queez.
Tobias spotted a lock in the eye of the dragon's outline and immediately broke his thieves' tools trying to pick it. The crew did not have time to figure out another solution as more Grell pursued them. Rather than relying on a steady hand in a moment of action, Marcus downed his Potion of Giant Strength, granting him Fire Giant musculature through runic magic. Mormeros distracted the Grell with illusions as the now hyper-beefy fighter pulled the doors apart with brute strength! The party slipped past him, and as the sharp beaks of their predators neared, The Swine slammed the doors shut.
The party had finally made it to the Silver Dragon's Hideout, an icy drawbridge crossing a chasm that protected its entrance. The bridge was watched by a draconic statue that radiated evocation magic. Mormeros hovered in front of it to investigate, unknowingly activating the statue, and was blasted by a cone of cold so powerful that his gaseous form turned solid. The sound of the trap was accompanied by the howls of Winter Wolves, who sprang from a second tunnel. Not wanting the statue's spell to reactivate, the party raced across the drawbridge, nearly slipping into the chasm below. They met the wolf pack at the other side of the bridge, but found that the creatures were not immediately hostile.
The alpha of the pack Nihima approached to ward them away, but Mormeros stepped forward. A specialist in the art of the bluff, the silver-tongued warlock told her that he was a friend of the Silver Dragon. He learned that the winter wolves had made a pact with "Argynvost" to defend the Hideout generations prior, and that a Thaluud had tunneled inside years ago, somehow trapping itself. Mormeros convinced Nihima that an army of monsters were coming to attack the Hideout, and promised to rid it of the thaluud. As the Winter Wolves prepared for war, they allowed the party entry.
Abjuration magic protected the door, but it yielded to Marcus' human hand. Awaiting before them was an open fort of unknown riches and unconscionable danger.