30 Minute Dungeon Delve 5: The Rat Warrens

Idea: Mutant rat warren, caused after a magic ritual backfired. The tunnels are full of strange magical effects and inhabited by mutant rodents.

Hook: People have been found dead, eaten alive with their flesh and skin torn off, often near the entrances to sewer tunnels. The tooth marks on the corpses look like rat bites, but are far too large for that in many cases. You have been hired by a noble to fix the problem, so the peasantry doesn’t get too unruly out of fear. The noble will pay you 50 coins up front, and 50 more if you come back alive.



Key:



1. Piles of bones are just inside the sewer tunnel, most completely picked of flesh, with tooth marks on the bones. (A silver dagger, worth 50 coins, can be found among the bones.)

2. Some mutated, but harmless rats chew on the leftovers of a victim. The rats have features such as extra limbs and eyes, unusual proportions, etc. (The victim evidently was an independent adventurer, and has a small bag on their belt containing gems worth 450 coins.)

3. There is a vast carpet of rats here, all eyes looking at the party in unison as soon as the adventurers enter. (The rats will attack as soon as anyone gets close enough, and upon closer inspection, it is revealed that all the rats are connected to one another by their unusually veiny tails.)

4. A badly mutilated corpse with a strange corked bottle next to it lies against the wall. The bottle is full of red liquid with the words “Aqua Vitae” written on it. (If the liquid is drunk, whoever drinks it will explode as hundreds of terrified rats claw their way out of them.)

5. There is a crate in the corner, splattered with blood. (The lid appears to be partially open. If opened fully there is a large venomous rat that will leap out, starving. In addition, 600 coins and some rat poop are in the box.)

6. There is an enormous 6 legged rat here, chewing hideously on a dead dog. (Once it smells the adventurers, it will attack.)

7. Rat-like claws stick out of the ground, slashing in spasms. (Anyone who walks across the floor will take damage from the clawing. The claws have toothy mouths in the middle of them. The claws don’t seem to be connected to bodies, instead having “roots” of fleshy rat tails.)

8. A rat with a human face and hands cries out in fear, cowering in the corner near a metal box with a combination lock. (The rat was once a human wizard named Jenkins. He will explain that he was attempting to experiment with growing sewer rats to large sizes to create a cheap source of food, but the ritual backfired and caused him and the rats to mutate horrifically. If the adventurers escort him out of the dungeon, he will tell them the combination to the box next to him, which he claims contains a magic item he can no longer use with his small size. Within the box is an obsidian dagger that causes wounds which can never heal.)

9. Floating grotesquely in the air is a wiggling orb made from hairy brown flesh with worm-like tails sticking out of it, squirming incessantly. On the floor beneath it is a magic circle full of strange lines and runes. (For every round spent near the orb, roll 1d6. On a 5 or higher, anyone near the orb gains a rat-like physical mutation as determined in the table below:)

1. Shrunk down to rat size
2. Rat body (hands and head stay the same)
3. Rat head
4. Rat claws
5. Loses human intelligence and begins to act like a rat
6. Rat life-span (ages extremely rapidly)

10. Some barrels full of tumorous squirming flesh with teeth and claws growing out of it. (If the barrels are broken open, the mass of meat collapse in on themselves in a sickening manner, as they have no skeleton. The barrels seem to have formed roots into the ground made of rat tails.)