Tiny Fables Session 13: The Library and the Origami Snake

22 Oct, 2026

Players

• Cherry Summerholme, the Worm Wrangler (Greenie)
• Crocus Grant, the Sewer Guide (DD)
• Jack Witter, the Bat Cultist (ChaosKnight)
• Dill Halva, the Dam Builder (Dingo)
• Cornelius Dunhall (drunken hireling)
• Nettle “Wine-by-the-Goblet” (wild fae child)
• Lavender Deerider, the Message Runner (ChaosKnight)

Summary

Month of Star. The Second Fair of the Tenth Week

The group recoups in the bathroom after their encounter with the Origami Tiger stealing Nettle. Their resolve to save Nettle stands firm. Jack is roused from unconsciousness by the crying Cherry. Dill silently sheaths his Nettle Sword and grabs his spear from down the hall.

The bathroom group stares at the Bathroom Mirror, its silver frame ensconced with shell-like designs, warps as if breathing. Helped by Cherry,  Jack climbs the sink, touches the Mirror, which ripples like the still surface of a lake. It’s cold to the touch.

Jack puts his head through, volunteering as he is the most injured. Jack witnesses a space of perpetual twilight and a set of Giant’s Stairs, encased in numerous bookshelves.

The group passes through the Mirror together and descends from the top of the Giant’s Stairs, slowly and methodically. This strange place smells of wet paper, the silence punctuated by wooden groans as bookshelves strain under the weight of knowledge. Ink splotches mark the surface.

The group reaches the end of the Giant’s Stairs, Cherry and Jack exhausted from the journey, as Dill surveys that the bookshelves have become mouse-sized at the bottom of this strange, silent place. Ahead, a passage is seen, filled with more mouse-sized bookshelves.

As Cherry and Jack rest, noshing on their strange rations, Dill explores further. The passage is another narrow row of ornate bookshelves. They reach a point where the shelves collapse, spilling many books into a pile upon the floor.

A strange cut stone end point juts from them. Dill pushes the books aside, and find its to be a stone sarcophagus, the size of a mouse. Upon an inscription in “Mouse Scraws and Scribbles” reads “The Mother Embraces Her Child”. Dill, unnerved by the eerie silence, the twilight dim, and this stone sarcophagus, runs back to Jack and Cherry, now resting, and about the coffin.

The group springs into action, thinking the coffin holds Nettle. The weeping Cherry and Jack push with all their might, as Dill says he doesn’t believe it to be Nettle. “It's too big for him!” Jack and Cherry call him a “rat” for his insistence.

Jack and Cherry push the stone lid aside, finding a skeletal mouse adorned with a chartreuse chapron. Within the sarcophagus, a Glass Violin and four Tangerine Candles, nothing more. Cherry takes the Glass Violin while Dill and Jack take two each of the Tangerine Candles.

The day has passed by, even though the entire space is still drenched in a twilight ambiance. The group decides this is a good place to rest, all curling up together for warmth.

In the evening, Dill hears a loud crack like a thunderstorm, followed by distant rumbling that pierces the eerie silence, coming deeper down the passage; Cherry and Jack are awakened, but nothing more happens as they resume their slumber.

Month of Star. The Third Fair of the Tenth Week

Whereupon the morrow, the group presses northward (?) finding a hexagonal reading room with faded red velveteen couches and Persian rugs covering the floor. The room is dominated by an upside-down ceramic bowl, the size and design of a fae home. Silver cracks run along it, in a kintsugi-like fashion.

It possesses no door, but around its circumference the adventurers can see it's not built into the floor itself. They debate about “how to lift a house”, whereas Dill takes his shovel to one of the cracks, smashing open a small hole.

A church bell-like ringing echoes once more through this silent place. Dill’s paws quickly make a crude entrance, wide enough for him. He lights one Tangerine Candle, illuminating the darkness within.

Upon the wall or roof, the distinction between what constitutes the wall and roof within this structure for a Dam Builder like Dill had some deep philosophical ramblings, but they are able to see a desiccated arm stapled to the wall/roof. Within its paw: a Door Knob, a pip purse lashed to its arm, and a Dented Silver Flask.

Dill calls out what they see to Jack and Cherry. Dill’s spear is too short to reach, but another mouse upon one’s shoulders using the spear is likely to pry the arm from the wall/roof.

Jack climbs upon Dill’s shoulders, and they are able to pry the arm, which falls to the floor. The group gathers the objects; Dill takes the Dented Silver Flask, strangely warm to the paw, shaking it as fluid sloshes inside. All believe the Door Knob to be of value and keep it

With more loot in tow, the group examines the room itself, finding a passageway east and north. Unsure of which direction to take, Jack flips a coin: heads to the north, tails to the east. The coin lands on tails.

They find another hexagonal room, this time filled with the musty, moldy odor of rotten books. More shelves have collapsed along its northern side into a huge pile, while the southern bookshelf holds six glass ossuaries that display the bones of six previous adventurers, detailing their names, the date of their deaths, the manner in which they died, and by what. Some of the bones within each are adorned with golden filigree.

One name sticks out to Cherry: Olaf Lofgren, who died in Mother 4791 while exploring the Shimmering Bog by a Bog Newt

Cherry is tired, exhausted, and blames the Fae for all their current problems. How could she trust Prince Sylvester! She takes the Glass Slipper given to her by Prince Sylvester and shatters it upon the ground in a violent rage.

The crash and breaking of the Glass Slipper awakens the Origami Snake from beneath the pile of moldy books. Near indecipherable text is written upon its scales, as Jack is the first to see the fiend arise from the mound. Jack lights a Tangerine Candle, charging headlong towards the beast, screaming “For Nettle!”.

The Origami Snake hisses as it catches on fire, sinking its razor-sharp paper fangs into Jack, consuming him. Dill and Cherry draw their spears, prodding the burning beast. Their spears pierce again and again, and in its final death throes, the Origami Snake bites down, bisecting Jack Witter in twain as it collapses into a burnt heap upon the book pile!

As the Origami Snake burns, a scale remains upon it: the rune for Be Understood. Dill takes the spell as the two survivors mourn another loss to their party as the quest to save Nettle intensifies.

In a plume of purple smoke, the message runner, Lavender Deerider, appears! She speaks of her debt being finally cleared to the planar phase spiders, but it seems they have dumped her in this strange place instead of her home.

Gathering herself and her bearings, and as introductions are made, Lavender notices upon the ossuary two names she remembers: the happy couple of Wilfred and Yara Waldridge, died travelling in the Forest of Pwyll by a Mandrake in Star, 4782. Lavender is in shock; if the current year is 4791, and she has been gone since 4782, that means she’s been temporally dislocated for nine winters – old history to a mouse!

Aftermath

Treasure Found:

• Glass Violin (worth 500p)
• Four Tangerine Candles¹
• Dented Silver Flask (contains still-warm coffee)
• 60 pip purse
• Door Knob Held in the Desiccated Hand of a Mouse²
• Be Understood Spell Tablet

Foes Encountered:

• The Origami Snake
  • 12hp, STR 12, DEX 10, WIL 10, Armor 2
  • d8 bite
    • Critical damage: Swallow whole, d4 STR damage per Round until rescued or escapes
    • Has a spell etched into its scales - Be Understood. Appears as small text on scales

Rumors:

• The Stone Coffin held a skeleton of a mouse adventurer; the stone coffin inscription read “The Mother Embraces Her Child”
• Lavender Deerider was teleported/dumped to this strange fae place after paying off their debt to planar phase spiders
• The Ossuary held the following information on those interred
  • Olaf Lofgren died exploring the Shimmering Bog by a Bog Newt in Mother, 4791
  • The couple Wilfred and Yara Waldridge died travelling in the Forest of Pwyll by a Mandrake in Star, 4782
• The Current “In-Game Year” is Mother, 4791, meaning that Lavender Deerider has been “missing” for 9 mouse years

Deaths:

• Jack Witter was bitten in half by the Origami Snake in the Ossuary

XP Awarded:

• N/A

Notes

• Another sauceful session; time flew by!
• The self-sacrifice of the long-time character Jack Witter, in an effort to save the adopted fae Nettle, was especially touching
• I made the dungeon using bits of my newly acquired Stygian Library, alongside following the steps, using the Mausritter and Tiny Fables tables within the respective books as well, and this Uncle Ktrey table for the books and this one for introducing Lavender
• Overall, prepping this was a joy, but sadly none of the players investigated any of the found books that I spun up. Much to my surprise! I can use them elsewhere, so not all is lost.
• I’ve included my notes of the actual dungeon / in-session notes below

Origami Tiger Lair

Looks: Loose paper cover floor, ink splotches, ornate wooden bookshelves

Sounds: Crinkling, rustling, groaning and cracking bookshelves

Smells: Books, moldy wet paper, dust

Threats: The Origami Tiger & Snake

Found Book Titles

1. Hannah Glass - The New Art of Cookery
   1. Green cover, claustrophobic kerning
   2. Recipes for housewives. Lots of soups and “pie” recipes
2. Shale Tunneler - An Even-Tempered Rebuttal of Bladed War
   1. Orange cover, bountiful bookmarks
   2. Philosophical dialogue about the spiritually-destroying nature of warfare and opines for the adoption of pacifism and non-violence as a moral framework
3. The Vicar of Patchford Downs, Brie Witter - How to Root Out Heresies
   1. Slate grey cover, tantalizingly timeworn
   2. Details how to spot out heretical beliefs amongst villages to properly educate and elucidate fair mouse souls in the Benevolence of the Mother
4. Boldo Thorne - Salves and Saps of Gravewinter
   1. Ice blue cover, sundry sun-damaged
   2. Physician's guide on treating winter-related ailments using tree sap and other winter-related threats
5. Tarragon Winterholme - Common Sayings of the Northfolk
   1. Brown and sand cover, lousy with ligatures
   2. Details the aphorisms of mountain mice; “With a good friend the hours are short”, “The shoemaker goes barefoot”, and “The first time, forgive; the second time, hang”
6. Chicory Pipp The Fatuous Fashions of the Fae Courts
   1. Lilac cover, smells of vanilla, flattened flowers
   2. Details of the ephemeral fashions of fae like glittering platform shoes, tree-motif face masks, and velvet cravats
7. XXXX - The Many Vengeances of Erigone the Librarian
   1. Brick red cover, playful pangrams
   2. A collection of mouse tales about Erigone's revenge on those who wronged them.
8. Gideon Evans - The Skies We Sailed: A “Maritime” Memoir
   1. Seafoam green cover, festooned with footnotes
   2. Details the escapades of the famed Lilliputian sailor and his airship, the High Wind

Mausoleum Room

• Large stone coffin. Within a skeletal mouse corpse wearing a chartreuse chaperon
• Inscription reads: The Mother Embraces Her Child
• Coffin contains
  • Violin made of glass (worth 500p)
  • 4 tangerine-colored candles (invisible things, illusions, etc. are dispelled when illuminated using the candle)

Ossuary Room

• Six glass displays containing bones
• Golden filigree bones in each case, worth 20p per bone
• Destroying glass awakens the Origami Snake

Chapel Room

• Lectern with book
  • Brother Everett Toddle - The Hammer of Heirodianus
    • Silver and blue cover, flecked flyleaves
    • Lost treatise on the martial arts of the Brotherhood of the Branch. A refutation of Shale Tunneler’s - An Even-Tempered Rebuttal of Bladed War
    • Bare hands deal 1d8 dmg; wearing a monk’s robe counts as Armor 2
• Simple altar with wooden bowl. Motifs of Warden Tree, moons, and seeds
• Lapis-lazuli lantern with blue candle in it as Electric Lantern, recharges as Light Spell
• Beehive contains Black Honey (6 bottles/18 uses total)
• Black Honey
  1. Be Understood, but only for mundane/magical insects
  2. See UV light
  3. Skeleton becomes brittle. -2 STR
  4. Subtle yellow-and-black bands appear on the consumer’s fur.
  5. Sprouts spring, dealing enhanced damage (d12) to both defender and attacker. (as the sting is wrenched free, bringing their viscera with it).
  6. Body becomes light and filled with hollow spaces. Impaired damage from falling
  7. Sprout fae wings, fly at twice their movement rate
  8. Skin/fur hardens and counts as Armor 1
• Paper Bees as Bees (detachment)

Steam Vents

• Big value opens steam vent (1d6, blast) with blinding, scalding steam
• ADV on DEX to hide in mists
• Humid air destroys paper/books/documents

Calculation Engine Room

• See Stygian Library

#tiny-fables