My Dal'octopus Teacher

Dala'gse felt a quickening in his blood and felt for the moon with the wild parts of his being. Even though the party had seen it on numerous occasions, it still startled them to watch his dwarven form convulse and then writhe, appendages blubbering out into tentacles as his head expanded into a bulbous mass. 

The Dal'octopus slinked over the gunwale and flopped into the water. 

The party felt another two thuds on the hull of the stone sloop and heard the planks groaning against an unseen force as the ship came to a halt. 

Ironica dived into the white-frothed water where the Dal'octopus had submerged. The rest of the party peered over the sides into the cold, clear, depths. 

What they saw was the stuff of nightmares. 

[TRIGGER WARNING SAFAD]

Sixty feet below, anchored--somehow--to the ocean floor, were nine sets of eight beady eyes that seemed to glow a hostile red. Chitinous legs splayed out from bristly thoraxes and fang-tipped chelicerae pointed skyward, eagerly tasting the water. 

The fabled Sword Coast Sea Spider, a ten foot aquatic arachnid. One of the fell creatures spelled certain death for most ships of this size, and the party had been led to what must be a major nest. Five of them had thick ropy strands of webbing protruding from their spinnerets, taut with tension from where they attached to the sloop. As the party looked on, the spiders tugged down on the webs in unison. 

The sloop buckled under the party, and like a thin sack laden with too many goods, the bottom blew out in an explosive retch of splinters and debris. 

Now they were all in the water. 

What followed was a chaotic minute, where every ten seconds felt like an hour of happenings. 

Ironica ripped a seaweed pod off of Laurie's knotted wrack necklace, and tossed two more to Rya and Safad, before biting down on hers to grant her waterbreathing. She dove down to help Dala'gse who was engaged in underwater melee, tangling his eight tentacles with a sea spider's eight legs. 

Safad hadn't had time to take off his breastplate, but inflated some of the spacious pockets in his Kulius robes and started slinging chromatic orbs at the spiders. 

Falka crushed the Hark's emerald, and summoned a water elemental called Herbert to join the fray. She tried her best to rain arrows down through the water at the spiders. 

A school of reef sharks joined the battle, attracted to the sea spiders clickety keening and the frothy water, beginning to fill with blood. 

Rya hurtled lightning bolts at the spiders. 

Slothrop grabbed the closest debris and began kicking toward shore. 

The spiders took aim with their webs and attempting to latch on to the hapless swimmers, harried by the sharks, and reel them underwater to envelope in a leggy embrace. 

And so it went. 

Dala'gse managed to roll one of the spiders on top of himself and use it as a shield. Ironica followed suit, hiding under the hulking husk of one they managed to kill. Falka tried to protect a shark-bitten Slothrop while firing arrows. Safad kept at his orbs. Herbert was in his element, and doled out massive damage to the creatures. 

Yet the pestering sharks were wearing away the party and when the spider web attacks managed to hit, they were devastating. Slothrop was brought to near death by the sharks. Dala'gse was almost forced out of octopus form from damage sustained. Rya was knocked unconscious and only saved by a healing spell from Safad before he was knocked unconscious and poisoned when he was reeled in and bitten down on. Ironica flitted between spiders, exploiting weaknesses while they were engaged with other party members. 

But Herbert was in his element. He turned the tide of the battle. And after nearly half the party was knocked out, the last spider was slain, and the last shark swam off. They'd done it. 

They went digging in the nest and found all sorts of valuable salvage from wrecks past. 

Herbert told them he still had 59 minutes to kill on the Material Plane so they used him as an outboard motor for a raft they mended together from the detritus. He ferried them most of the way toward the island of Orlumbor. As they traveled, they reflected on Arumbelle and felt a closeness to her in the water. As they did, a sea lion and an otter joined them for the final leg of the journey, toward what looked like a semi-submerged temple. 

A couple watchers called out to them, offering sanctuary.