Critical Role & Sagas of Sundry - Chapter Four: Across the Desert | Sagas of Sundry: Madness

Episode Date: April 20, 2026

Recently unearthed from the archives, Sagas of Sundry: Madness is now available publicly for the very first time! Turn down the lights and turn up the volume because you're about to experience MADNESS..., an original macabre tale hosted by Ivan Van Norman where cast members Marisha Ray, Liam O'Brien, Jeremy S. Walker, Erika Ishii, Xander Jeanneret, Alejandra Cejudo play a giant puzzle game to build the tension. You don't want to know what happens if the tower collapses! MADNESS begins to settle in as the players find themselves in a unique situation, in a unique place. Narrowly escaping dangers, they stumble upon more questions then answers – as they attempt to learn exactly 'what' is happening here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Starting point is 00:02:00 And who will find a dead end? These are the sagas of Sundry. I am Mr. Wren, and there will be. Sir, may we please come inside? We had a report that there was gunshots coming from this building. Yes, there's been a horrible accident. Selina, you see something from the body of the landlord. A pair of keys.
Starting point is 00:02:29 All right, I'm going to need each one of you to give a statement on what happened. What is this? It's just a flasker. This is an accident. Are you sure that he wasn't shoved over? Selina Sukiyama, it's a very unique name. Thank you. I feel like I've heard that before.
Starting point is 00:02:45 He watches he whips out a pair of handcuffs. Put out your hands. Oh shit. Have a nice day, everybody. I don't think these are cops. What? What? If they're not cops, then who are they?
Starting point is 00:02:56 Everyone, there is a place that you could find answers at. And I think it'll be in the landlord's room. Wait a minute. This is all of us. There's Tom's Diner. There's the institution. All of the Highlighting. items.
Starting point is 00:03:08 This is my ex-ex. That's your boyfriend. This is my ex-ex boyfriend. Jordan. Holy fucking shit. Who's Jordan? I killed Jordan. He died because of me.
Starting point is 00:03:18 It seems like it was an accident. That's not you killing somebody. Because I didn't tell anybody. This is a mixtape that my ex made me. I left this behind. I left all of that behind this. What I'm getting away from? What did he do to you?
Starting point is 00:03:32 Constantly beat me. He gave me cigarette burns and made it look like I was a Joe. made it look like I was a junkie, so I couldn't tell anybody. Why does he have all this shit? Why does he have this? I don't know. To get us to do something.
Starting point is 00:03:44 As long as power consistently flows through the machine, the rifts should remain too small for physical encroachment. However, all the mechanisms in the walls of the building are very sensitive. If a fuse were to break, you'd have time to fix it, but not much. And you watch as sand. You're all seeing that right?
Starting point is 00:04:04 Yes, it's real. Or we're all seeing it. I suggest we get the fuck out of this room. We should be right. Yeah. That's the only way out. As you open the door, a hot blast of wind gushes into the room and just over the horizon.
Starting point is 00:04:18 Maybe it's a mirage, but it feels like something is punctuating this vast wasteland. You know what the dumbest thing about all of this is? Because this is the first time I haven't felt alone. Hello, everybody. And welcome back to Matt. Well, when we last left you,
Starting point is 00:06:01 and before you realized that sand was pouring inside of the landlord's apartment and you opened the door to see a vast wasteland before you. I would like to acknowledge how amazingly you all managed to put that room together and unlock its untold secret many of which were your own. And for that, I believe that deserves a reward.
Starting point is 00:06:28 So, very rarely will I do this, but I will give you a block in which to replace the tower, knowing that this block represents the glue that now bind you all together through the strife that you all suffered in that room. Who's going to put it in? Ooh. I'll do it.
Starting point is 00:06:55 Taking one for the team. Haven't made a pull yet, either. Emmett. Where do you want to put it? I'll hope you place it. What do you think? I mean, that middle cross-hares. Yeah, that's real.
Starting point is 00:07:07 This is dead zone here. That middle bit that we need to brace, I think. And it gets wobblier at the top. How about here? I think that's a good choice. On this side? Yeah. You'd like to place it on this side.
Starting point is 00:07:19 Yeah. Okay. Do it. Do it, do it. Oh. Please, Louise. You know, you can push it in all the way. I have it.
Starting point is 00:07:30 It will not be shifting. Right, yeah, that was a good choice. It is still really teetery. Ivan, you're gonna die. Oh my goodness. Oh no. That doesn't feel like it did shit. The choice has been made though, Emmett.
Starting point is 00:07:48 Take a seat. Hey, you did your best. You know, it was good, it's good. Thank you. As the blinding light of the burning sun piece, into the Guardian's room, you gaze out into an endless desert. Rolling windswept dunes lay before you as a hot gusts of wind encompasses around you.
Starting point is 00:08:13 You can hear a low, ominous moan in the far distance. Now, as you all exit through the door, you can feel the sand packed tightly underneath you with small bits of broken stone, broken stone concrete that seem to be scattered around you. And you also see that the door that you walked out of is simply of the door frame. There's no building, there's no room,
Starting point is 00:08:50 there's only the door with the guardian's room on the other side of the frame. In the distance, you can see hardly anything, except for one far off distance, distant shape. But there is a lot of desert in between you and that shapeless form. What would you like to do?
Starting point is 00:09:16 I'm gonna examine the sky. Is it still that purple? It's purple. It's relatively cloudless. It's also very twilighty. Is there a sun? There is a sun, but you can see that the sun that has been blaring down upon you
Starting point is 00:09:33 so brightly, it is still. setting and nighttime is coming. You can wait to travel the deserts at night when it might be cooler, or you can get a head start now and start trekking across the desert. Well, we have no idea what's going to be out here at night, and we're not going to be able to see anything. I say we go now. Yeah. We're just going to leave the door, like the only link back to the real world? What's real? Are you even sure if that's real? I mean, where are we supposed to go? if we go through the doorway. I'm also worried about your cuffs.
Starting point is 00:10:09 It's okay. I think I've been okay so far. And maybe they're right. Maybe I can't be trusted if my hands are free. We trust you. I don't think that matters here anymore. Yeah. And whatever is between here and there,
Starting point is 00:10:25 probably better that you have your hands free. Emmett, would you like to make a pull to remove Selena's handcuffs from her hand? Yeah. Go ahead. Come on. Too early to die. It's too early to die.
Starting point is 00:10:59 Shaking like a leaf. Your hands are bleeding from the digging that you're doing as you try to find a rock big enough to pull Selena's hands free from the handcuffs. Just pull. Can you try another one? Can you give up? Leave her in the handcuffs?
Starting point is 00:11:30 Emmett. If you want to not make the pull, you don't have to, something bad will happen. I can stay in the handcuffs, it's fine, it's fine. Holy shit. There's something in it. There's something in it. What is this?
Starting point is 00:11:50 I am so stressed out. I'm not worth it. You got it, you got it, you got it. Take your time, take your time, take your time, you're good. Deep breaths. Ciner meters. We got it all day. Fucking move. As you lift your hand. hands up with the rock above you.
Starting point is 00:12:15 You take the rock and you lift it, holding Salina's hands right in front, and you're shaking hands as something inside of you, your hands bleeding from them. You lift the rock up and place it. I don't want to put the weight of this on. And place it. I am sweating so much. It's the desert, man. You lift your hand and you take the rock down.
Starting point is 00:12:40 down. Careful, careful, it's still a thing, it's still a thing. And you smash the lock down onto Salinas handcuffs over and over and over again, and you feel as the links slowly start to fall apart as the handcuffs themselves crack. And Emmett, while you were digging in the sand, something very interesting came to you.
Starting point is 00:13:10 You peered across, and part of the rock that you're holding had something attached to it. It seemed to have been a small envelope, weathered, torn, and taken apart by this desert wasteland. Just simply swept onto there, and inside of that envelope there was a single torn fragment. The rock that you hold the same time seems to have some writing on it.
Starting point is 00:13:47 Not anything that you can determine, because the wind and the sand has almost grinded it down to nothing. But why don't you tell us all what was in the letter? With this forthcoming endless spiral of insanity, it's broken, that's coming in midst a sentence. With this forthcoming endless spiral of insanity, but I prevented it.
Starting point is 00:14:13 The machine works, even the mad, Telsa, Tesla, said the machine couldn't possibly produce the amount of wattage I required, but he was wrong. Don't worry, though, dear nephew, I didn't dare tell him the purpose or reason for fear that his men might throw me two streets. Our work must be done quietly lest we attract any of the watchers' acolytes, which brings me to the subject of our opposition. I have successfully eluded them all my life, but they are more powerful than ever. Their order is many hundreds of years old, managing to exist like us out of sight. beware of their influence, especially amongst local.
Starting point is 00:14:55 It breaks off there, but I'm gonna guess law enforcement. Watchers. I wonder if this has to do with the amulet with the eye. Amos? No one's ever thought I'd been worth it before. You feel the ground begin to rumble, never so slightly. Um, the rubble, is it only around the door,
Starting point is 00:15:35 or does it seem like there's rubble that goes into the... There's rubble scattered all over this endless waste land. Spires of great stone that pierce out all throughout this broken, sandy frontier. I think, yes, we should move forward, but maybe as we move along, we can move some of the rubble that we find to make a pathway in case we get lost in the desert.
Starting point is 00:16:00 We can get back to this spot. Brecht drums. It's the only way. Yeah, only way back. And as you walk, amongst the desert laying these breadcrumbs. Selina, you find yourself gazing at the amulet as you continue your walk.
Starting point is 00:16:16 And then you look up and realize that the stars are coming out. And something's odd about them. They don't feel correct. That's when something decides to come inside of your mind. And you can hear it, Selena, just a different voice what you're used to. It is something much older, much meaner, much darker. And you can hear it.
Starting point is 00:16:47 It speaks to you. It says, ha, Salis is my sky. Always be with you. Come, my child, come be with me. I am your personal darkness. Make a pull. Make a pull. Pull it out from your mind.
Starting point is 00:17:16 Pull it from your madness. Make the madness pull. The stars, they are not part of this world. You are somewhere else. And now the distance of infinity starts to break your sanity apart. And what little was inside of there, Selena. The fact that you're already holding on to this world that you live in with such a small thread is now being put.
Starting point is 00:17:43 and it's being taught. I am your personal darkness. No. I am with you. I can't control me. Watching you. It's real. Come back to us.
Starting point is 00:18:02 You're worth it. I. You're worth it. And the voices stop. And you realize that while the stars are not the same, You are amongst friends, Selena. They trust me. You are with people who not only didn't abandon you,
Starting point is 00:18:24 but helped you. And that is small comfort as you walk through the desert wasteland. It takes hours to get closer to this distant object that is so far away. But you walk it. And though time passes slowly, it does pass un-eventfully. How long have we been walking? A couple of hours, but you can't tell with the sun here.
Starting point is 00:19:23 I'm exhausted. Do you all want to stop to rest for a while before pushing on? I need to rest. There are several rocks that do appear to be jutting everywhere. Some of them could be inviting shelter if there's nothing already using it as shelter. Is there any type of vantage points that I can like climb up and see if I can see anything a lot? Absolutely. Okay, I want to try and climb on top of one of the boulders, see if I can find a shelter.
Starting point is 00:19:52 As you climb up to one of the small boulders, you lift yourself up and you peer over the horizon and you can see broken pieces of wooden stone that seem to be in various places. But sand, always sand, Abigail, as far as the eye can see. But not too far from where you're looking, where you were walking to, this distant amorphous shape that I described earlier, seems much clear. And you can actually see a stone castle in the middle of the wasteland, broken, in ruins, and across it is a mountain. Small, probably the size of a large hillock, but stone. And you can faintly hear the trickling of water.
Starting point is 00:20:49 Do you see anything up there? Yes. Damn it. What is it? Castle? So a fucking castle. That sounds promising. Okay, let's go.
Starting point is 00:21:07 What are we doing here? I don't know. We were arresting, but. Well, I mean, I'm gonna get up and go get in a castle and lay on the fucking sand. Why would anything be that inviting out here? What if it's a trap? Where else are we gonna go?
Starting point is 00:21:23 You also see something else, Abigail. In the corner of your vision, you see one of the sand dunes is moving. And though far up, off, you can see that it's moving it quite a distance towards you. What's wrong? Greetings adventurers. Spring has sprung here in Los Angeles, and that means it's a brief period where it's only 75 degrees instead of 95 degrees. I'll take it. And that means I've been outside a lot more. Walking around, occasionally galloping after a toddler hopped up on juice boxes, traveling a bit. You know the vibe. And after doing some spring.
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Starting point is 00:26:54 That's Shopify.com slash realm. I lied, that castle looks real fucking nice. Maybe we should make a run for it. Sounds good. And you can all start to see the sand dune in its stage. Now, the first thing you notice is one of the great spires of stone that I talked about was piercing in through the wasteland. You actually see it just up out into the middle of the horizon
Starting point is 00:27:22 as it bleans with dust flying everywhere. And you watch as smaller boulders fly up. Run! Go! All of you run! And you go! go towards this castle, this great monument of safety, as you can see something inside of the dune
Starting point is 00:27:44 split out from the sand, and four wide, piercing bits of smoldering, ashen, gray mouth just as it purses through it, and you watch as a giant snake-like form, with plates of armor just crash onto the barren horizon as you are running. Somebody make a pull to get to the castle. Make it over there as this giant earth in form
Starting point is 00:28:21 is pulling its earth and where and falling forward. You have to be fucking kidding me, right? This isn't real, this can't be real. Don't fucking look back, just go. Run! And you can hear the sound again. As its mouth opens wide, a long slit of jagged teeth
Starting point is 00:28:41 come across each end of its face as it slides across the wasteland. And you can see as rocks and piles of rubble are falling off of its tumbling form. It is moving. We can make it, we're almost there. Come on, Jude. It is moving so fast.
Starting point is 00:29:02 But you run and you fall onto the concrete and the stonework of this oasis, and you fall into it, and you can hear the hissing of the sand as it continues to move across the desert past you. It's gone. You can't hear it anymore. And you see something when it fell, the great creature in its lust,
Starting point is 00:29:36 to come after you and consume the meager amount of nourishment that you five provide. It hit the ground and left you with something. Who would like to pick it up? Is it gone? Oh, it's gone. But it left that. That's one of its baby teeth. This is a baby tooth?
Starting point is 00:30:09 You imagine if that thing would have caught us? Yeah, that's instant death. You have a Warriors trophy now. You do. I mean, might be a little gaudy as like a necklace, but I mean, it's kind of cool. You don't think it works? It is.
Starting point is 00:30:24 I think it works. It suits you. Oh. Now I'm this- I guess we can laugh after all that. Wow. It still has a, as you can see, it still has a little bit of its gum. Oh, and when you smell it, oh, it actually has this burning,
Starting point is 00:30:43 sage and juniper with just a hint of cinnamon. Not bad. Well, I'm gonna use this in case we encounter another. We have a couple of weapons. Yeah, that's a good idea. I mean, it's pretty sharp. I mean, I've always wanted to stay in a castle, but where the fuck are we?
Starting point is 00:31:11 Well, as you look ahead of you, you can see see that you aren't in the castle yet. In fact, you came to a large stone outcropping that is the foundation of which this oasis currently is. And on the oasis is the ruins of the castle. But before you even see the front line, you're actually surprised to see a exotic array of fauna that is ahead of you, making a small but modest tree line
Starting point is 00:31:42 that leads into an undergrowth of vegetation. There's gotta be water there. Yeah. There's gotta be. Hey, what if we're all dead? I was thinking the same thing. Or what if we're just hallucinating and none of that's real?
Starting point is 00:31:59 And you all feel real and this all feels real, but things have felt real before. I suppose that even if we are all in one mass hallucination, we still have to stick together and try and get through it so we can come out the other end. You walk through the low vegetation as this foreign sound of greenery continues to boggle your mind.
Starting point is 00:32:30 And after some time, you do come across a small earthen stream, its rocks cradling the water in a soothing, basking embrace. embrace, the now bright starlight beaming its meager rays onto its glass and form. It's beautiful. Does anybody have a light? Any sort of fire? Cigarettes, of course. I pull up like a stick. Is there like a down branch? Actually, most of the trees around you are poems. Long fronds do scatter a across the ferns that kind of lay across the form. But no burnable wood that I think you're looking for. How about, like, is there like even just a green piece of
Starting point is 00:33:29 frown or of bamboo even? We can strip the leaves. Absolutely. And then I take a piece of my sweater and I rip it off. The bottom, wrap it around to make a crappy makeshift torch. What about stones? There is plenty of stone. A chel going in on the water.
Starting point is 00:33:46 You throw one of the stones into the water and it makes us satisfying. Well, it's not acid. We need some kind of container, something that can withstand heat. We need to boil the water. And you have your flask. I do, but I mean it's small.
Starting point is 00:34:11 We'll take turns. There's still booze in it? Yeah, there's still booze in it. Don't, it'll dehydrate. you. But it's booze. Use it on the torch. We could light it. That's right.
Starting point is 00:34:24 Take a little bit of the alcohol. Maybe take a little bit. As you wrap it onto one of the green fronds, you take your starting material of your journal, and you douse it in the sweet alcohol. Not all of it, though. Just a little. Okay, all right.
Starting point is 00:34:43 And you... We could need it for medicinal purposes. I agree. I would agree with that wholeheartedly. Between the starter fluid, the starting material, and the accelerant, you are able to put together a makeshift torch that helps punctuate the coming darkness as you continue to hear
Starting point is 00:35:03 the babbling of this stone brook in front of you. And you can hear something in the background. Berus nictus, valus, gnomos, telos, balus, Balus venus. Arush tuskenus, barus, tenus, verus, nectus. Talos,
Starting point is 00:35:24 carus, Venus, Venus, Necktus. Does everybody hear that? What is it? Is it Latin? What is it?
Starting point is 00:35:33 Letters talks about an order, an ancient order. Maybe there are other people that they can help us. Selina. What is the amulet? doing is it doing anything it feels warm it has an inviting comforting tone to it that
Starting point is 00:35:54 would feel oh so pleasant around your neck it wants me to put it on don't do that selina do you mind if I see if the amulet talks to me I it's not that I don't trust you I just want to see if it works the same one the rest of us Be careful, okay? Hey, if I look like I'm about to do anything stupid, will you promise to stop me? Yeah, yeah. I've done some stupid shit.
Starting point is 00:36:30 Me too. Abigail, you hold me amulet, and it feels just like a beautiful sterling, old piece of jewelry. And while it is beautiful, it is not pushing you into any particular direction. I don't know. Feels like a crappy cheap piece of jewelry to me. Looks like a crappy piece of jewelry to me. Maybe I'm more susceptible to it.
Starting point is 00:37:05 Amit. Why don't you hold it? Maybe it's better you don't have this. Thank you. Yeah. I'll just, I'll, yeah. I say we get into the castle. Okay.
Starting point is 00:37:21 Let's go. All right. Let's go. As you move through the underbrush, back into the tree line again, leaving the babbling brook behind you, you find yourself going upstream, following the same pattern as the brook itself. And just as suddenly as the tree line began on the stone outcropping, you feel it begin to end as you slowly come across a courtyard. And the first thing that you sense is the smell. It is the smell of death. As you come closer,
Starting point is 00:37:56 you begin to see bodies lined across this stone courtyard with several hooded robed men gathering in a circle. In front of you, you can see they're all wearing large, glassy, green masks, and you can see a single tendril, mind you, dangling from the bottom as it sways in a sense snake-like form back and forth, like a snake's tail.
Starting point is 00:38:33 As you can hear the chanting bellowing, all of them have their heads and their gazes towards the heaven, as you can see the rolling purple clouds above them. Felus Nairus perlas, delos, Niktus. Fenley, you hear something coming into your brain, but chanting is coming in line with you. You can hear it, start to permeate into your mind. I'm gonna try to understand it. You feel like for a moment you could comprehend,
Starting point is 00:39:12 you could grasp this language If you just had something to hold on to, if you just had something to touch, maybe it would happen, it could come to you. I never had a chance to hold the amulet. Maybe I should see if it's reacting to what's happening. Why? Why do you wanna?
Starting point is 00:39:36 I feel like I've heard this before. Like I feel like I could understand it, but. Yeah? What the change? Yeah. I need... I'll be careful. Wait, wait.
Starting point is 00:39:48 Here's the deal. You have to hold my hand while you hold this in case anything that happens. Okay. Okay? Yeah. You watch as the endless void comes across into you. Blackness envelops your mind
Starting point is 00:40:05 as something purses deep into your brain. You can hear it. GERUS, Verus, Berush, Perus, Delos, Deus Nectus. GERUS, Berus, Velus, Delus Nectus. Open your mind and I will open the void of endless infinity. Make a pull, Fendley, fight the madness, take it away, pull it out of your brain as it comes and purses deeply inside of your psyche.
Starting point is 00:40:34 Kerrush, vanus, Benos, Velos Nictus. Kerros, Verus, Velos Niktus. Come on, family. I am with you. Look at me. And I will awaken the void of your mind into endless infinity. Okay, what is this? Okay, watch it?
Starting point is 00:40:55 Look at me, and I will awaken the void of your mind with endless infinity. Delush, valus, balos, delosh, nictus. Don't let him... ...a lindombeckus... A litless eye opens into the sky, and it pisses. and it peers down upon you, Fenley. Look at me! I let go, I let go, I let go.
Starting point is 00:41:22 You drop it and nothing, nothing. The chanting is still there, the people are still there, but the eye is gone, the voices are gone, and the chanting has come down to a very low hum. What happened? Fenley. Open your eye and I will open the void, 10, this infinity. Look at it.
Starting point is 00:41:45 me and I will awaken the void of your mind into endless infinity. Look at me and I will. I will awaken the void. The void of your mind into endless infinity. Void up your mind into. Fenley, you look in front of you. You can see on a stone dais a book with five eyes gazing out in front of it,
Starting point is 00:42:19 and you can see it has been left there waiting for you. Dammit! You see on the second floor of the castle a door, an archway. With a door that seems strikingly familiar, a brass handle on an old 1930-style doorframe. Look at that. Apartment door. It's our apartment door.
Starting point is 00:42:59 It's the end. Maybe you did it. I have a feeling we're just getting started. I found this. It's a book with five eyes. Should I open it? Should I look? I'll open it.
Starting point is 00:43:19 Are you sure you should be the one to do it? I'm already this far gone. It might be all of them. more reason to not. Just throwing that out there. If you feel comfortable, I just like... I have to be worth it. In different languages.
Starting point is 00:43:50 I can only get snatches of English. Arabic, Cyrillic, only parts of it are becoming legible. Anything that is legible, any keys or words? This is a journal. It talks about Malik Abdelah Mosein. The name on the invoice. It's the name of the landlord. M. M.
Starting point is 00:44:14 Malik Mosim. The top. Malik. Abadala, Mersin. The thief has built a device. The last entry says the thief has built a device or a machine. We haven't found it yet, but it's somewhere in the old granary now operated by his nephew.
Starting point is 00:44:33 The nephew in the letter. The fool turned it into a hostel of some sort and has living something something. in a different language inside. Our eyes in the police and courts have already secured the rights to purchase the property. Those fake police. But he continues to impede our progress.
Starting point is 00:44:51 Now all that's left is finding out what this nephew knows and ensuring he doesn't share it. The nephew. Was our landlord the nephew? Yeah. And that's why they killed him. That is exactly why they killed him. And this invoice, this is for extender tubes
Starting point is 00:45:07 and bulbs and around this. It's all a hardware. To build the machine. It's in our basement. We've been fucking living over it. They haven't noticed us yet, but I don't know how long we can stay out here. We need to get to the door. Is there stairs?
Starting point is 00:45:25 Stairs anything up. Emmett, you can easily boost every person in this room up to the second floor, to the doorway. But you will have to act like a human ladder to have people climb on you to get to that second floor. The cultists seem completely engrossed in their ritual at the moment. Garush, barros, paros, baros, take this.
Starting point is 00:45:51 We're getting hell out of here. No, Emmett, you will not be making a poll for this. This is actually a skill challenge. So, how this is going to work is, this represents the second floor in which you need to hang from in order to get all of your friends up to safety. Now, in the meantime, your four compatriots will have to physically climb up your body,
Starting point is 00:46:21 but we can't have them do that. Instead, they will be taking this pile of wood. It doesn't stop. It kept going. Yeah. Oh, of course. Cool, cool. And have to stack every piece of wood
Starting point is 00:46:40 along this guiding. guiding frame. Now, it can go off the borders once it's raised up, but every piece of wood must make its way onto this block. Emmett, should you fall, you'll have to make a pull after this challenge is done. If you don't want to go back up after you have fallen, one of your compatriots can jump up and take your place instead. But if they fall, they'll have to make a pull. And so on and so forth, until all of the wood has been stacked. So it's fucked up, Tetris. It's your own personal tower of dread.
Starting point is 00:47:26 All right, Emmett. See all that time on the typewriter will pay off. Hope you don't have carpet tunnel. Uh-oh. When you're in place, tell me, and I will tell them to begin. All right. You got this.
Starting point is 00:47:44 Okay, go, go, go. Big flat pieces first. Yeah. This is way too big. Selina, why don't you take the lead and tell us what you're thinking? And we'll do it. That's pretty good.
Starting point is 00:47:51 That's pretty good. Like, like, sort, somebody sort into shapes. We want to try and get the same thickness. Yeah. Sort, sort thickness pieces. So this, okay, these are thicker. Thicker pieces. Perosh, bearish, nechtus.
Starting point is 00:48:06 You can hear the cultists speaking and chanting. As. Thin, thin, any more thicker ones? The first person. climbs onto Emmett's strong shoulders. These are getting tiny. Come on, what about this? Okay.
Starting point is 00:48:20 Big slap pieces? He's can hang. Already starting to hurt. Hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry. Okay, okay. I'm gonna make us on the other little kind of quarter. He's down, stop. Oh no, Jack.
Starting point is 00:48:32 Stop. Emmett, do you want to keep going or do you want someone to come in place? It's sweat. Who's gonna take his place? I got this. Jude? Emmett, you may join the build team. We can do this.
Starting point is 00:48:50 I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. All right, as soon as you're up, I will declare. Go. Okay. As Emmett falls down from the second floor of this building, he collapses under his own weight.
Starting point is 00:49:10 And Jude up on deck to climb next instead, lift his hands up and grasp a hold of the table. of the tight, wet stone dais. You can hear as it's starting to rain. We got it, we got it, we got it. Thunder and lightning. Dunk! You can climb.
Starting point is 00:49:33 All five of you, lift yourself up to the second floor, as Jude takes the last of your meager weights and pushes you up, pulling you up, Pulling his own weight up onto the second floor and tasking himself to roll onto it and bring forward. All right, everyone sit. It's not done yet. Camroder.
Starting point is 00:50:03 Emmett has to make a pull. He has one pull for his time holding everyone up. And win Emmett. fell from the second floor. Come on, Iman. He hit both at his feet in a way that it fell across. And for a moment, GERUS, Verus, Barosh, Nikthus.
Starting point is 00:50:30 It stops. Amit, you try to find somewhere to hide anywhere. God knows you've seen these bodies. You've looked at all of the gore around you. Just imagine how they might dismember you. How they might cut your body. I'm not going to make it. Small piece.
Starting point is 00:50:49 You can do this. It's loose. It's no, it's weighted wrong. I'm not gonna make it. You can do this. Emmett, you got this. He's hiding somewhere in the hopes that the cultists will fight him.
Starting point is 00:51:03 Take it slow, take it slow. They're somewhere close. They stop, they've begun looking for him. They've taken the circle and they've broken the ritual. And they begin to look. Look, checking all the different places around them. We've come too far. Hemet, you began to go across various parts
Starting point is 00:51:27 of the castle, chasm, small nooks and crannies that are around you, and you can just see the bodies around you. Holy shit, holy shit. You gotta be fucking kidding me. Oh, shit. You're gonna be fucking kidding me. But they don't find you, Emmett.
Starting point is 00:51:47 you find a small staircase. It's just big enough to hold you, just wide enough that if you could crawl sideways along it, you can make yourself up to the second floor. Sit down, Emmett. I can't believe that happens. That was gonna go. You were like Indiana Jones with a bag and the ice.
Starting point is 00:52:18 You're a gravity wizard. pushed it up, and as the face of the cultist is right here, looking at each side of the angle as he comes around, he lifts his head up just to ever so peak overwards. Gerush, Varus, Nectus, as he walks right by, and you climb up with your four friends up to the second floor, and you open the door to the lobby of your apartment building. And that, my friends, calls for a smoke.
Starting point is 00:53:07 I managed to get back to our apartment before my flask ran out. I call that a good fucking night. As Jude is enjoying the smoke, and Selena and Emmett share a tender, tender embrace, you all reflect on what just happened on the other side of this door when the lights go out. Hotels.com is the place you go to book hundreds of thousands of hotels. It's exactly what it
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