Bancroft and his companions returned to the barrowmaze, where they began their investigation with a barrow sealed by a stone door. The party examined the heavy stone barrier, but quickly realized their crowbars would be insufficient to force it open - they would need sledgehammers or similar heavy tools that none of them had brought along.
The group proceeded to the next barrow, where Bancroft observed stone doors inlaid with bronze highlights. A wax seal suggested the contents were still intact. After much discussion among the party, Ovarf broke the seal, which melted to the floor. The moment they wrenched the doors open, a hideous moan emerged from the barrow, and Bancroft fled with the rest of his companions.
Casting a few nervous glances at the strange circling birds overhead to the north, Bancroft and his friends went further east. This barrow had the symbol of the elemental plane of water inscribed on a bronze seal at the center of a large double door. They managed to pry the doors open with crowbars.
Inside, Bancroft saw waist-deep water filling a room with three exits. As soon as they entered, he saw the water begin to swirl, forming into a guardian spirit, a water weird. Gravelgnasher fled immediately. Ovarf threw a dead duck at the creature and then fled, which caused Bancroft to flee as well. Tohru tried to speak to the thing in Primordial, to which it replied “Protect” in the same language, and then attacked her.
After Bancroft and the rest of the party left, Tohru tried to trade makeup tips with the water weird. It grabbed her and tried to drown her. When Bancroft saw she did not emerge, he and the rest of the group returned to get her. Ovarf threw a goose into the water and distracted it from Tohru while Lluht pulled Tohru free. The creature grabbed Ovarf and drowned him immediately. Bancroft and the rest fled.
Outside the barrow, Bancroft and his companions were surprised by a giant toad. Tohru attempted to charm the toad with a toad mating ritual dance, and somehow succeeded. They spent more hours digging while she worked with the toad, but she failed to interest it in anything more than the most primitive mating instincts.
Bancroft and the group returned to town for the night, and back to the same barrow in the morning. They were promptly visited by a pair of giant toads. Selfa ran, and Bancroft watched as Tohru tried her mating call… and found her boyfriend-toad again. The two toads, jealous, fought over Tohru, who fled.
Bancroft and his companions briefly investigated another barrow, but had to flee from a group of six skeletons.
They returned to the first barrow, where they found a solitary toad corpse, quite fresh. The group took the opportunity to butcher the creature, hoping to find something of value, but the toad was worthless.
