The group enters the stump - which is some fifty feet high and a hundred feet across - through a narrow crevice in the side.  Within, the air is moist and warm, the rotting wood of the enormous tree creating both a pungent aroma and a good deal of heat.

And much of the wood has rotted: the group stands in a wide, open space, perhaps some forty feet high and eighty or ninety feet across.  Black wood blocks out the sky above them, but a pale purple glow suffuses the area.  The glow emanates from a large patch of mushrooms which fill the centre of the stump and cover slightly more than half its diameter.  Within this patch can be seen the distinctive, crescent-shaped capes of moonsong mushrooms, one of the three types of fungi which the group have been asked to retrieve ... and a type which is known to cause drowsiness if the spores are disturbed.

Hoping that Mai-Ling's elven heritage will protect her from the spores, the group sends the monk foward to investigate.  As she approaches the patch, however, a cloud of spores suddenly fly up, engulfing her.  Taken by surprise, she finds herself succumbing to a feeling of physical fatigue, rather than true sleepiness.  Matters are made worse when two-foot tall, humanoid-shaped fungi creatures burst out of the patch and grasp at her with their arm-like tendrils, seemingly attempting to choke her to death!

A battle ensues, and the whole group picks up some bruises and scrapes, but eventually the six fungal creatures are destroyed, and the group is able to gather the moonsongs while waiting for Mai-Ling to recover from her poisoning.  During this time, Zook notices what looks like bones within the patch.  Beardhammer wades in to investigate, his dwarven constitution easily shrugging off the spores.  He returns with several items, including a dagger made of a strange, dark, non-reflective metal that the group identifies as cold iron: anathema to fey creatures.  Mai-Ling is given this prize.

A look around the stump's interior reveals two more areas of interest: a fungal shelf to the south, and a rather suspect-looking ladder to the north, which climbs up to a wooden ledge some thirty feet up the inner wall of the tree.  The group decides to investigate the fungal shelf first, and quickly disturbs two more plant creatures: though these violet-hued monsters are obviously of a different type to those from before, for they are larger in size, lack a humanoid shape, and have poisonous spines on the end of their whip-like tendrils.  The creatures are quickly overcome, though not before Beardhammer and Mai-Ling discover that the fungal shelf will not support the weight of a human-sized creature.  When they try to jump onto it to fight the monsters, it gives way beneath them, and only quick reflexes prevent them from falling into the twenty foot drop that proves to be below.

With the monsters destroyed, the group considers heading down into the root-cavern that lies beneath the shelf, but eventually the decision is made to investigate the ladder on the other side of the stump, instead.

Somehow, Mai-Ling is again chosen to take the lead, and begins to scale the ladder, the plan being that if she gets to the top okay, she will secure and lower a rope for everyone else to climb up, since no-one trusts the ladder's strength very much.

It is not the ladder that proves a danger to the monk, however.  Instead, it is the nest of monstrous centipedes that lair about half-way up it.  These beasts burst out of the wooden wall and crawl all over Mai-Ling, biting her repeatedly.  Eager to get assistance against this threat, the monk opts to imemdiately tumble down to the floor of the stump once more.  The centipedes, clinging to her as they are, thus come under concentrated attack from the whole group and are soon overcome.

Able to now safely reach the upper ledge, the group follows it around to what looks like a hollowed-out branch on the south-western side.  En route, however, they are attacked by a vicious swarm of spiders, which prove a formidable challenge to overcome, as their tiny size and huge numbers make them difficult to harm and almost impossible to avoid.  Mai-Ling in particular is bitten hundreds of times - it's just not her day - and Will Dunraith has to invoke the power of Denithae to heal the group during the encounter, the first time he has demonstrated this power.

Reaching the cave-like opening into the branch, the group see that the walls are coated in small, red-capped fungi: these are bloodrose mushrooms, the second type the group requires.  After discussion, they again decide on sending Mai-Ling in first.  Surprisingly, given her experiences so far, the monk agrees.  Less surprisingly, when her entrance causes a deformed, almost hag-like tree spirit to emerge from the rotten wood, Mai-Ling retreats even more willingly.

The twisted tree-spirit attacks with magic; spells of sleep and charming; as well as with a quarterstaff that is smeared with a poisonous red resin.  The battle is hard, for the spirit is resistant to most weapon blows, and Will once more has to call on the restorative powers of Denithae.  Mai-Ling has the first success against the creature when she moves in to use the cold iron dagger, but inflicting this injury makes her the target of the spirit's enchantments, and she finds herself desperately trying to stop the violence between her new friend the tree spirit, and her old ones in the group.  Fortunately, her efforts to restrain Beardhammer prove fruitless, and the group eventually destroys the warped creature, breaking its hold over her.

After gathering the bloodrose mushrooms, the group double-checks that there are no other areas accessible in the upper reaches of the stump, then uses their vantage point to peer down on the chamber below.  They imemdiately spot the remains of a small humanoid, near the back of the fungal shelf ... doubtless a previous victim of the two monsters that lurked there.  The group uses a grappling hook and rope to retrieve the remains, and pocket the loot they discover, chief of which is a fine set of thieves' tools.

Now it seems there is no other way forward except down, into the roots of the ancient stump ...