All the worlds ended, literally broke apart, but the Heartless Prin- cess saved the bits she could, embedding her icy city at the top of a new patchwork planet made of the fragments of the old. You are her trusted aides and servants and envoys, but today, she’s on death’s door. Learn the secret of the Princess’s heart, find out why she’s sick, and implement a cure. Along the way, discover the true pur- pose of the Icy City’s Sewer Guild.

Prep While all the info needed to run this scenario is contained here, the Player’s Handbook (PHB), and the Monster Manual (MM), consider reading the Icy City Explainer to understand some of the whys and hows of what follows. Ask the players how they know the Heartless Princess and why she chose them for this adventure. Ask them for the most strik- ing detail about her.

Introduction The Princess’s physician, Dr. Grawlix, gives the Princess eight hours to live. Her blood is poisoned,Sample but there’s file no apparent source of the disease. With the Princess on death’s door, this adventure has a de- finitive deadline. In some of the sections that follow, time is explic- itly subtracted from this eight-hour timer. However, it’s up to the DM to track the timer outside of those occasions. Count combat rounds, and treat player planning outside of combat as occurring in- character. Remind them that short rests take an hour, and long rests take eight hours, make them impossible in this case. Make sure the players know the clock is ticking and that you’re treating their talk as part of that timer. Luckily, an unusual person has an unusual, potential solu- tion... The Sewer Guild The head of the Sewer Guild thinks he knows why the Princess is dying. Guildmaster Grumbar the Incessant has been keeping the passages under the Icy City safe since the world’s inception. He is one of two people who know that the sewers are the passage to the Princess’s heart. It’s lodged deep beneath the earth, and it is the force that holds the patchwork world together. If the Princess’s blood is poisoned, maybe the source is in her underground heart. Grumbar is a bulky half-orc plumber (stat as scout) armed with an oversized spanner wrench and a light crossbow. He wears a straw raincoat over leather armor. Under the coat is a huge ring of keys to various gates and chambers in the sewers. He rides through the sewers in a small chariot pulled by a carrion crawler named Howard (named after Grumbar’s mentor’s dog). He also has a jolly pig (boar) named Rations that serves as the office mascot. The other driving force of the Sewer Guild is Ruby, a human mortician (commoner) who serves as the organizing brain behind the Guild’s agents. Originally born in a backwater swamp village, she maintains her thick accent as a way of remembering where she came from. Her thickly lashed eyes are at the ends of slug feelers that grow from where human eyes normally are. If the PCs make nice with her, she might be willing to supply them with a couple po- tions of healing for the mission.Sample file If the PCs choose to accompany Grumbar, he and Ruby make them deputy members of the Sewer Guild. If they complete the mis- sion, they’ll be rewarded with full entry into the guild and the power of a sewer patron (see Conclusion & Rewards). Once the PCs are ready, subtract their planning time from the clock and let them now how long they have until the Princess dies.

Travel In lieu of a detailed sewer map, the following method is provided for tracking travel. Allow a PC to roll Survival or History to find the saf- est, quickest path through the sewers. If they ask Grumbar for help, they get advantage on the roll. two hours of travel, monster encounter: gelatinous cube, 1-9 treasure 10-12 one hour of travel, monster encounter: oracle wall 13-15 one hour of travel 16+ half hour of travel, treasure

The sewers are large and ancient. They’re a mishmash of architec- tural styles, human, elven, dwarven, and giant. (They’re large and wild enough to count as wilderness for the purposes of a ranger’s abilities, and having a ranger in the party reduces travel time by 30 minutes, to a minimum of a half hour.) During travel, Grumbar’s happy to answer questions, and he has a few of his own. Some of the information he has: • The sewers, like the planet, are an assemblage of tunnels and wa- terways and natural caverns from a number of worlds. • The Sewer Guild has existed since the formation of the planet. Grumbar has been, so far, the only guildmaster. • The sewers all drain to the Princess’s heart, grown huge in size. The inner workings of said heart, though, have been a sacred mys- tery to Grumbar. • What he does know is that the final defense protecting the heart is a minotaur’s maze. • In addition to the Guild,Sample other sewer file residents include oozes, molds, ancient stone golems, carrion crawlers, degenerate giants (of the hill, stone, cyclops, and fomorian varieties), and animals and an- imal-folk: alligators, rats, fish, frogs, and strange mixtures of them all. • The Guild doesn’t just maintain the structure of the sewers; they also maintain the ecosystem. All the animals and intelligent beings are vital to keeping the Icy City clean and healthy. • There’s an ancient shrine to the god of oozes somewhere in the tunnels. Its presence is a symbol of peace and cooperation between the slimes and the flesh-folk. • Rumors persist of an oracle that takes the shape of a talking wall. • Some clandestine organizations punish their members by stranding them deep in the sewers. Some of the questions he has: • How do the PCs feel about government agencies? Are they the best way to maintain commonly used infrastructure? • Does waste gross them out? How do they feel about their bodily functions? • Are they ever available to pig-sit Rations?

Monster Encounter A gelatinous cube has grown to fill the entire passageway the PCs need to travel through. It’s not aggressive, so Grumbar would prefer not to attack or kill it. Can the PCs figure out a way to move it? PCs proficient in Nature will know that an ooze only gets this big when the ecosystem provides excessive amounts of waste and/or a lack of scavengers; Grumbar insists there are normally numerous cubes scrubbing the tunnels, so where are the rest? (Despite it’s larger size, the cube has the same stats as those in the Monster Manual.) If the PCs can’t figure out a way to circumvent the cube, Grumbar can plot a course around it, but it’ll subtract an additional hour from the clock. The other encounter is an oracular wall. As the PCs are trav- eling, a section of brown bricks arranges itself into a huge masonry face. It slowly tells the PC that it can answer questions for them; treat it as a single casting Sampleof commune fileor legend lore. Its answers are given very, very slowly, and the PCs might regret taking the time to communicate.

Treasure While navigating the tunnels, the PCs spot a human-sized leather bag dangling from a stone gargoyle’s mouth 15’ above the ground. A stream of filthy water also pours from the mouth, emptying into a pond of sewage 10’ deep. Retrieving the bag without falling into the sewage requires an Athletics or Acrobatics check, DC 16. Falling into the sewage might call for an increased chance of a monster encounter in the next section (encounter happens on a roll of 1-15), or it could even lead to the Poisoned condition (PHB, 292). The sack is of unknown origin but might have been origi- nally assembled by a giant. Inside are: • an item from Magic Item Table B (DMG, 144) • an item from the Trinkets table (PHB, 160) • an item from the Items in a Giant’s Bag table (Storm King’s Thun- der, 18) If Storm King’s Thunder isn’t handy, substitute a weird thing that you think a giant might carry around in its pocket. Once all encounters are dealt with and questions have been asked and answered, the group reaches a rusted iron door with a large keyhole in the center. Grumbar uses his keys to open it and warns the PCs that they’re about to enter the minotaur’s labyrinth.

Sample file Karl’s Labyrinth The maze is made up of a hodgepodge of materials: brick, clay, stone, and the odd hedge or curtain. Written across the walls are snippets of Abyssal language; those able to read Abyssal can easily realize that these are bits of love poetry. As a DM, write some lines ahead of time or rejigger your favorite love poems. The maze is generally comfortable and aesthetically pleas- ing, scattered with art, soft chairs, plants that thrive underground, and seemingly random wardrobes. The wardrobes are filled with clothing that would be appropriate for a 9’ tall female bovine hu- manoid. In my experience, many players hate mapping and navigat- ing a maze. As with sewer travel, below is a table that symbolizes the process. Alternately, create a maze and make them map it. Or give them a paper maze and tell them that each second it takes the players to solve it represents a minute of their characters solving it. Or mix these methods.

1-9 three hours of travel, monster encounter: grell, treasure two hours of travel, monster encounter: pentadrone, trea- 10-12 sure 13-15 one hour of travelSample file 16+ half hour of travel, treasure

Whenever you deem appropriate, have the PCs find Karl, the mi- notaur. He’s wounded, only just recovering from unconsciousness. If the PCs talk to him, he’ll tell them that a male human spellcaster with stinking gremlin minions subdued him. Could this attacker’s entry into the heart be the cause of the Princess’s illness? (He is.) Additionally, his attacker stole a prized item from Karl: an engagement nose-ring for his future wife. If the PCs bring it back, he’ll reward him with a treasure from his maze (see Treasure be- low). Karl views life in general as a maze, a complicated system of dead ends, switchbacks, and confusions. Birth is emerging from one maze to another. His own maze is a test for his future mate; whoever finds him is destined to be his one true love. Give the players a moment to reflect on their characters’ feel- ings of love and commitment. Make it clear that this won’t take time away from the clock; ask them to tell the group how their characters feel about relationships and romance.

Monster Encounters A grell is visiting Karl as part of an alien approach to raising prey: interdimensional matchmaking. By bringing prey together and en- couraging them to breed, the grell can eventually feed on many in- stead of just one or two. It was in talks with Karl to find another minotaur until Karl was distracted by his attacker’s arrival. Unless the PCs can convince it that they’re here to make babies for its con- sumption, it attacks. Also in the maze: Karl once hired a pentadrone modron to help with the maze’s architecture. However, Karl’s reasoning (love) drove the modron mad. It’s wandered the maze for months, trying to understand romance. On sighting the PCs, it’ll probably attack immediately. Can the adventurers help it understand their fleshy hearts? Sample file The pentadrone is missing an arm, so it only gets four at- tacks per turn.

Treasure Roll on the 250 gp Art Objects table (DMG, 135). Alter the result so that it features a bovine or romantic theme. The subject matter is so specific that the item is instead worth 200 gp to general buyers. Some of these objects are big enough that they’d be hard to hide from Karl. Do the PCs need to sneak it past him? Do they find it after they talk to him?