Moving on from their explorations of the looted and spoiled storage rooms, the explorers move south through a passageway into another natural chamber. Here another fast-flowing underground stream joins the one flowing from the waterfall. The combined waters rush past and exit noisily through a hole in the west end of the cave. A sturdy arched stone bridge spans the river. Mishok examines it and finds that it is structurally sound, and appears to be of dwarven make. On the opposite side of the river, they find a shallow stairway, leading down into stagnant water. At the bottom of the stairs, they see a door ajar just around the corner, most of its height submerged. Curious, but wary of the water, they devise a way to get a peek into the flooded space behind the door. Cycek acrobatically secures his “immovable rod” in mid-air just outside the door, and swings from it by his knees. Using Ekso’s old “staff of wizarding” which has been illuminated by Mishok, he nudges the door open and peers inside. He can discern, as near as he can tell, a set of three adjoined rooms, similar to the vacant storage rooms they had recently encountered. It is difficult see to the far reaches of the room, and the light does not fully penetrate the dark stagnant water. Seeing no compelling reason to further explore the room, Cycek dismounts, taking his immovable rod with him.

They follow the river upstream to where it emerges from a hole in the cave wall. Here, the cavern narrows and a set of stairs winds upwards and to the east. They follow these stairs and emerge into another cavern, again bisected by the river. The far side of the river features a number of stalagmites. As they enter the cavern for a look around, long tendrils lash out from the largest stalagmite, and entwine each of them in a a clinging grasp. Before they can react, the tendrils retract, dragging them roughly off of their feet and through the river. Mishok is yanked close to the stalagmite, which opens up a single great red eye, and more horrifyingly, a gaping fanged mouth. Mishok struggles, but the maw bites down on him, causing a bloody wound. Sartan and Cycek try to break free, straining against the rubbery bonds and hacking at them with their blades. Davros, however, fires arrows at the weird cave monster’s deceptive body, managing to pierce it’s horrid eye with several well-aimed shots. The desperate adventurers barrage the creature with a flurry of attacks. Neither blade nor fire seem to cause much harm, but they do drive the creature to uproot itself and take evasive action. It begins slowly scaling the cave wall behind it, pulling its captives off their feet and holding them aloft, while it continues trying to devour Mishok. Davros lands another damaging arrow shot, and the creature casts him into the river. He is swept downstream, into the adjacent cavern, but he manages to pull himself free from the current and back onto dry land. Cycek tries to limit the creature’s ability to move, by forcing the immovable rod between his lower back, and the encircling tendril. This keeps him from moving, but the creeping stalagmite-monster unspools more length of tendril as it moves further away. Davros runs back into the cavern and delivers yet another devastating arrow shot. The creature, having gained the ceiling, finally falls dead, its prey falling as well, landing with a jarring thud on the stone floor.

Sartan hacks into the fallen creature to ensure that it stays dead. In doing so, he slices open its digestive tract and sees something shimmering in the pale light. Looking closely, he see’s a number of gemstones. He eagerly retrieves them from the revolting gore and stores them in his pack.