Critical Role & Sagas of Sundry - Vox Machina Ep. 38 - Echoes of the Past

Episode Date: November 30, 2021

Vox Machina take some well earned downtime! Scanlan continues his dance with the mysterious gnome girl, and the group agrees to venture back to a mysterious cavern they had abandoned years before...   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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had a meeting with the Council of Tal'Dorei, where they were able to provide information, a witness, and have the guidance of the now no longer charmed sovereign Uriel Tal'Dorei to alleviate them of any wrongdoing in the Briarwood's arrival in Iman months ago, and reinstated their membership in the council, dropped the charges that were against them within the city of Iman, and the party basically have now become, once again, lauded and accepted within the city. At the same time, Yoriel, going through a bit of emotional breakdown with his lack of seeming leadership in this whole circumstance, it was discovered that the reason his defenses were improper was because there was an individual

on the actual counsel who was a traitor, who had been working with the Briar Woods and is secretly a follower of Vecna from what the documents seemed to say. However, he had fled, and the party decided to go ahead and probably do a little better job than the local guard would find out if he was too far or not. They found that he was still in the city, beneath the city, and happened to correlate his current location with the clasp, the Thieves Guild of the city's current underground base, which the party had previously had a few run-ins before. So making their way to the inn that houses one of the secret interests to the clasps hideout, they encountered a a band of traveling musicians. Dr. Dr. Dr. Drenzel's wondrous performance group made their way. The magical term, what the actual full term was on that one, you wrote for it. Oh, their troop? The troop name? Oh, man, I wrote that three years ago. I know. I wrote it down a document that I didn't print out.

But I will for future shows. But Dr. Drenzel. We'll look it up on the break. Yeah, there you go. And it had a great performance. That's your first. Yeah, that's the one. Yeah. And discovered a number of past individuals of Scanlan's performance, history, as well as a few new friends, and got into an epic flute duel, of which he threw, and in doing so,

being made of his word, gave the remaining gold coins in his patch to a young gnome. It was worth it? Was it? Well, we'll find out. It's kind of Tom Wait's song. Yeah. The distraction being successful, the rest of the party snuck through the kitchen into the hatch, and they had an encounter with the clasp after calling out to them within their own hideout,

telling them they're after this fugitive and not planning to do any terrible business within the guild and managed to convince them to let them go about their way. And Vox Machina had a showdown with the traitor, Ryskell Daxio, within his cell, before he had he was supposed to be ushered out of the city, given a new name and essentially be given free reign in the world. The party then beat him down pretty hard and are currently dragging his bleeding unconscious corpse

towards the Cloud Top District to turn him in. So, he's not dead. It's an unconscious corpse, which means it's technically not a corpse. It's true. I don't know why I said corpse. Foreshadowing. Oh no. What are we gonna do? A near corpse.

He is borderline corpse. Okay. Nair corpse. So, Torfors. Most dead. Yes. Torfords corpse. Not all of it.

So as you guys make your way towards the center of Iman, the central wall that surrounds the Hott District comes into view and the front gates that face the kind of southwestern side of the city reveal themselves down the thoroughfare. There you see the foreguards that are posted at entrance, notice you approaching, and they immediately, the two of them begin to. come up to you. And you've interacted with these individuals a few times as your experiences here in the city so far, and they've grown to recognize you just by appearance and, well, you guys tend to stroll up as a posse of confidence, which draws their attention.

Walking with my quick. Exactly. We're a reservoir dogging. Walking really slow. At this point, the sun is setting. It's probably getting close to dusk. You guys stroll up and the two guards approach immediately. Can I ask you what you're doing here? You've got someone... We have a present for Uriel. Open the gates. What's the present?

Are you questioning part of the council at this moment? No, I'm just... If there is business to be done, I have to go ahead and put up the chain of command and make sure that I'm doing my job so I don't end up being lashed for my... Of course, darling, and you're doing a wonderful job of it. Well, I appreciate that,

and I would appreciate you just help. helping me do my job if that's all right. We have a present for Uriel, open the gates, send it up the chain of command. Turns around and walks back. The other guy kind of looks back awkwardly and follows him. He gives a couple hand motions and the gates open up to the inside of the cloud top district.

He's on the back of the bear, right? Bear we left at home. We left we left in the alley. We left with us. We don't remember. He's trying. Next time. Next time.

Bear's a necessity. I'll get you Trinket. No. We take him inside. Wait a minute. What? Where's Trinket right now? Where is Trinket?

Where is Trinquet? He's in the alley. I'm getting him right now. No, no, no, no. Come on. I know where he is. What did you do? What did you do?

This is just like when David Copperfield felt a field made the Statue of Liberty. disappear. It's just like it. Exactly. David Cover of Fields. It's amazing that you can like hear her footsteps. It's like a cartoon.

It's like an ad for like at most surround. You just hear, tch, ch-ch-ch-ch-t-t-t. They totally like a Pixar intro. Oh my God. I am excited to the prospect of watching this happen right now. Nothing can go wrong. This is a great idea. No one helper.

No one helps her. She can do this. You got this, Laura. You got this. Oh boy. You got it, you got it. Help me. You got this.

Can you see? Can we do this? No. Travis, move your butt. You dug this hole. No. Travis can move. He's not going to help you.

I'll move. I'll move. Okay. This is a wonderful little microcosm analogy for pretty much every session. Yay! So worth it? It's totally good.

It's well, you guys. Sure. That's a good core body workout. My gosh, I'm so strong. That was the best opening of our show. What's your string? Very low. We should have played our theme music over that.

So, pushing towards the Central Palace, the gods approach once again. These ones are a little more stern than the line. ones you met on the outside of the district. What's your business at the palace? What? We just... Look, we have a body over this bed. Let us through to Uriel.

He's been looking for this man. The guards kind of approach. They look over at the bear. They know this man. They should know this man. Look at his face. You found Riskowdakshund. You should look at his face.

Of course we did. All right, men. But don't, don't tell him. It's a surprise. The other guards begin to step forward. Like, we'll take it from here. No, no. No, you will.

We would like to deliver this personally, as that we do not know if he has any co-conspirators, so it would be best if he didn't leave our immediate vicinity. And we really want to see his face when he opens it. That's the best part giving a gift. Guard raises his hand. The guard stopped. What? Very well. Proceeding.

Steps aside, and the guards can separate. You can see them all looking a little nervous that they just basically had their job done for them, and it's not going to do well, down the chain of command in the very near few. future. You guys step into the palace, make your way to the main hallway that leads to the central throne chambers. Uriel is not there at the moment, so the guards ask you to wait. You wait about five, ten minutes or so before the doors open again, and Uriel is kind of hastily walking in and sitting down on his throne. The rest of the council isn't present for this. It's just him currently. And I believe Broffert Taforis is there as well. The

the dragon-born, the female dragon-born on the council with you guys. So as you approached, Urielsos town, Rob's kind of swishing about him. All right, it hasn't been too long. You requested my presence, and I am here. What do you need? Bex, this is all yours. Oh, well, not on me, this is all of us.

But we found you're a traitor for you. Really? And he stands up, and the rest of the guards that have come up behind you to kind of keep an eye and make sure anything weird goes wrong, forward a few steps and he, bring him forth, hold him in irons, chains now. And all the guards go and pull him off of Trinket, kind of throw him on the ground face first. He slaps into the marble flooring of the chamber. Yeah. A little bit of blood smear across the ground as his face kind of glides against the- He doesn't feel pretty bad. You might not want to. Oh.

You'll survive. And you can see now that there's a look of pain to anger in Uriel's eyes at seeing the face of someone he trusted for so long. As the guards take the manacles that you guys already had on him, chain his legs together, they put another set of menacles across the back of his arms, so his arms are actually held in two places to the back. They lift him onto his knees and drag him up to the very bottom stair that leads up to the central Deyes with the Thrones Ron, and he's kind of unconscious head-hulling about. Uriel looks down and wake him up. Us? someone, I don't care.

Wake him up. I walk over and I slap this shit out of him. May he kill him. Oh, he's dead. With a resounding slap sound, Riskel sends a spatter of spittle and blood that kind of coasts across the floor. His head shakes.

As it looks up at you, you can see his teeth that were once white, now glistening with fresh blood across the entirety of his Hello, gorgeous. Do what you will. He looks up and sees Uriel. My liege. What would you have of me?

And Uriel just takes a moment of just intense staring at his face. For so many years, you played me and my family. You played the people of this city, of these lands. You forsaken the name of your father who plucked you from nothing. Look at this. The skull kind of takes a moment and chuckles to him. himself, this throaty gurgle as he's still kind of trying to breathe through the blood that's

pulling in the back of his throat. A stage of our existence. Or will die, I will rise again, for I am his blood. You are his blood? Oh God, he's having me. Duryal kind of steps back up on his throne and sits down. Raskol, Daxio, you be found guilty of treason to the peoples of Taldorei. I command that your sentence of death.

Beheld immediately. Sovereign, if I may, can we just ask him a few questions before you do what you're gonna do? Quickly. He's talking crazy. We should find out why, right? Who's talking crazy? Can he say, I'm born of his blood? What do I... One of Vecna's children? Are you one of his priests? You're one of his...

You're the chatty, Cathy. I don't know what I'm asking. You never do. As you're asking that, There's very many parts to our one to him. I'm but his blood, but there are many, many different pieces that make them whole. Where are these pieces located?

Oh, everywhere, good answer. So when you say you are his blood, you actually mean more literally for once? Is that what I'm getting? No, people. Good question. Eyes narrow and he looks for a moment, almost disappointed in

confusion. Just killing me now. I'm impatient with this existence. That's not a problem. Is there somewhere where you want you, where you would like to go after you die? Or are you gonna wake up like right after you die? I guess we'll find out.

Yeah, and are you gonna wake up like a baby so we have like 20 years before we have to worry about you again? Or you're like a zombie straight, straight away, just up and at him. You might come back like as a dog. Please, please kill me now. And this poultry existence. this portrait of existence. But if you come back, it's like a fish, and then you just kind of screwed and stuck in the water.

Yeah, or like a penguin, and he's like a bird that catfly, but he could only swim. Oh, that's true. That's so sad. Yurio. As thanks for bringing you this gift, we need to run grog out once in a while. Might he have the honor of removing this shit stain from the world? Unless of course you would like to do it yourself. Uh, Yuri Rial kind of plates for a moment.

Use at your disposal. I only ask that you do it soon in my sight. I'm sure there's no more useful information we can clean from this man. So Ryskell, Grog could do it kinda quickish, or take a very long time. I've seen him do it. I start stretching. You can get sent off on your way

to whatever asshole you think you're going to. But he could make it very uncomfortable. He could just like, you know, strip you of all your limbs and then leave your hanging, not dead. I once saw him kill a man with his taint. With his own taint. Roll an intimidation check. The taint intimidation. So easy.

Ew. Please. Please. I wanted to make this pun my entire life. Intimidation, you said. Oh, hell, I'm using luck just in case it could do better. Uh-huh. 17.

17. He tanked intimidated. He'll get out of my system. I'm so sorry. He's eyes are going to roll back in his head, and he's like, begins to fade back into unconscious. No, no, no, wake up, wake up, wake up. What's the marble?

What's the little bowl? What's it do? What's you talking about? Oh, then you're not very knowledgeable, are you? I guess Vecna didn't tell you of his plans. You aren't very important, blood, just kind of... The deal with my master is power through not knowing. He is the one who knows all.

The fact that he keeps it from us means that he trusts us. That's the stupidest thing I've ever had. I agree. Really? I agree on. Take off his little marble, please. Wait, wait, wait, wait. There's not going to get any information out of it.

Well, maybe we should have Pike cleanse his blood so he didn't come back. Oh, that's a good idea, Pike. Why don't you bless him? Maybe you'd be more afraid of that before I think so, you know? Why don't you make him holy? His eyes kind of drive around for a moment with a look of sudden curiosity and worry. Oh, I think that would be fun. That's not possible.

Yes, it is. Sarenrae can always use new servants. Right, Pike? Yes, of course. I've seen him we grow afoot. It's amazing. Exception check. Oh, which one?

All right, all right, all right. The good one. That's not the good one. Big Lord. A level. Does Pike, do I get advantage? Because Pike is helping? Because she is helping with it

and she is the source of it, I would say, sure. Go to a little advantage. Ha, that's much better. 23. 23, okay. You see now at this point, his breathing is is quickened and he's swallowing more regularly, there is a look of sincere nervousness

in his eyes. His power is great. There is nothing this paltry little child of a being could do to keep his will from his promise. Oh, you shit head. Oh. Well, maybe we'll just give it a try. Do it. I have fakes. I'm going to walk over to him. Just stay still.

It's better on the light side, so hold on. It worked for me. It was really quite an experience. All right. Master, have mercy. You're looking in the wrong direction. Do you, I mean, do you know, unless you have something to share with us, do you know of his awakening?

Let me just let you come to them. Do you have any details? Something that could lead us to him. your god of secrets? No, he's too strong. Fill him with holy light, Pike. Do it now. You're right. And then he'll help us for sure. Yeah, because maybe he'll remember and he'll tell us. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Yeah. Am I doing it? Go to restoration? If you want to? It's whatever you want to try. I got it. Okay. So as you pull out your symbol of Seren Re, your metallic clings of your feet across the sparse marble flooring, you approach as the symbol glows. You can see in Pike's eyes, her pupils go white as the energy of Seren Ray's holy blessing

begins to kind of spill out the sides. With each step, the skull begins to twitch and pull away. He's glancing about, looks towards you, Grog, with the look of... Please have pity. As Pike reaches out to touch him, he goes, I don't. I know little. It is the nature of his being.

The rituals, one repeated, one once, attempted before. I know not if it worked. I was not there. You rushed in. It was not time. What did it need? What would have made it? Time.

The Winter's crest. The festival marks a time when the barrier between the realms is thin, where the magic lay lines across this world, cross, and swell. You forced our hand. I was not there. I do not know the answer to this, and I hope it was enough. It probably wasn't. Are there plans to attempt this at the next Winter's crest that you know of?

At this point, you can see now this look of despair hits his eyes and then resolve. He goes from this fearful moment and the realization that he's already expressed more than he should, but hopefully it's not too much to fall out of the favor of his Lord. And a smile keeps across his face for the first time since this whole thing. He just grins and he leans forward and puts his neck out. Megna's going to be so pissed at you. Have we tried to restoration him first? Oh yeah, she didn't do it yet.

She didn't do it yet, right? Did you want to cast the spell on him? And then we'll kill him. Yeah. Yeah. Do you do it? Yeah. Why not?

Let's see what happened. When I crouched down, I take two fingers, and I get him by the nostrils, and I pull back the top of his head and say, Do it? Pike, pour in your holy light right in his mouth. Give it all to him. Like, as you reach forward, you take the Seren-Rae symbol, and you jam it into his open mouth. As it does, it's a... Yeah, just like that.

A burst of divine light comes spewing out the sides, and you see him choking on some unseen force, probably a combination of some swallowing his own tongue. So much holy day. But as you pulled the symbol back, completing the spell of restoration, you can see the energy pour through his body and he's shaking now out of fear. His eyes are going to roll back, and from the sound of it, he's actually swallowing his own tongue. Oh, he's falling his own tongue. Did greater restoration just kill him?

He's choking. Oh, well, we're all going to. Hold on, hold on, I stick my fingers into his mouth and I grab his tongue and pull it down. Oh, God, just to just be, ugh. Oh, God, just so terrible. This guy's an asshole. I know, I don't.

It's a big hand to get in there, man. That's really uncomfortable. He earned this grief. You hear Uriel's voice behind you say, Enough, get it over with it. Sorry, sorry. All right, good try, Pike. I was really good.

That was really awesome, Pike. Nobody else has any other questions. Just keep it clean so we can burn everything afterwards. What happened to him? How about it, Grog? I take out Craven Edge, and I step back, and I'll with a huge swing, aim right under its Trin. Trin?

Trin. As the blade is drawn from Grog's back, you can see it draws this trail of shadow behind it, almost in the slow arc as he rears it back for his swing. as the blade with a flash, impossibly fast, arcs its way across Rizkell's throat. You can see his eyes open up with sudden realization as the moment of pain and death hits him. And his smile draws across his lips as the head slowly rolls back.

The blood then just gouts out and begins with a blast pumps of his heart. His body slumps forward. The guards holding it as they can, just kind of spilling a pool out in the center of the floor. Oh, geez, Uriel. As this happens, Grog, you feel this wave of exhilaration, this almost ecstatic pulse of joy come across your body. This sense of taking his life here with this blade. This first time you've really actually used it was delightful. I've got ghost pimples. Was that good for you guys or what?

I don't know if you should be smiling this much. No, he just killed a man. Have a little respect. No, not happy time? Quiet happy time. Gereal stands up. Guards, have this mess cleaned. Burn the body.

Thank you very much. Really quickly, let's, have we looted the body already? I feel like I did, didn't I, when he was... We did. We got the... Oh, yeah, we got the old skull... ... missing behind. All right, good.

Can I turn to the side and go? How was that? You hear the voice creep up and say, Now we see eye to eye. I don't see you anywhere. The aura of shadow from the blade retracts, and the blade becomes just an onyx blade. It appears to have rescinded its presence.

Be shy. I'm sorry, it's like the odd couple. Craven edge and grog! Oh man, I so badly want to fix that sword to save ground, but at the same time I don't! Sovereign, you know, I know we just talked earlier today and everything, but feels like we should get some sort of reward or something for capturing this guy, doesn't it?

I don't know, is that impolite to ask? I mean, we did do it pretty expediently. It was the same day, wasn't it? It was. And he kind of likes this for a second, Once's head. Very well. We were prepared to put out a bounty for his arrest, and I feel it would only be fair to provide you with his bounty. Snaff's fingers, the guard comes up and he whispers to him for a second.

As he walks away, he will have a sum of 5,000 gold pieces delivered to great Go keep this evening. Thank you, Southern. I appreciate it. Now, please be on your way. I have business to attend to. Thank you very much. Good evening, you'll look. Sure.

It's up and more, so. I think it could have been more, honestly. Whatever. Really? Yeah, not. Should I add that now? Should I wait till actually gets delivered? Probably gets to live.

It could be intercepted and still in one way. A lot can happen. Why would you even say that? Why would you even put that out there? What should we do? Should we just go home then? I suppose so it's been a long day. We've been taking damage today. We should go. Yeah. We should go heal. All right.

There's something we're going to do, though. Time is it? Dusk. By now the sun's probably set, and so as you step out of the palace, you look up in the skyline, little plumes of clouds throughout, but you can see the distinct bright oranges and purples of suns that have taken. And to the far east, you can see the dark blue of creeping night. How long has the sun been down? It just went down.

It just sat. It's been hitting towards dust. Who wants to get a drink? Yeah. Fuck. We were just in the tavern all day. We were just in a fucking tavern. Yeah, doing business.

We weren't really drinking. We were pretend drinking. Right. My friends were we supposed to be pretend? This all makes... You're supposed to spin it out. Right. Now the door incident really makes sense

if some of us were really drinking in that tavern. You tea? That would just hate those. Yeah, let's go get a drink. Yeah. I'm all right with that. Same tavern? Or should we go to...

No, no, no. Let's go to Old Faithful. Where's Old Faithful? Well, old Faithful technically would be the Laughing Lamia, which is where you guys originally stayed when you first came to a mountain. Let's new faithful. Or do we want to branch out and, you know... Find a new place?

Yeah. Let's go... Let's start a pub crawl. Pub crawl. Pub crawl. I like it. I like it a lot. What's the closest pub here?

Who's leading the pub crawl? Wait, wait, hold on, hold on. Hold on. What? I'm yelping it. Oh. No. I feel so much better for every terrible thing I said to that.

Oh, oh God. That was the worst. That was the worst one, you know. Oh no. You're going to lose experience points for this one. I feel like my intelligence went down one. There's no rule set for like reverse inspiration. But I'm going to start looking and designing that.

The entire party's intelligence goes to one. You get a 1 D10 bonus against a roll versus him. Right, exactly, yeah. It's got to knock it down a peg. It's like the bait chip system. It's great. Okay, so who's heading the pup crawl? Am I heading the pub crawl? You don't know this town. Who knows this town the best?

None of us know this town. I've got a map. I mean, it's technically our town. We should get to know our city. Seriously? Percy. I'm walking in direction. All right. Go and make an investigation check. All right. I'm going to use a different dye because it's funny that way.

I probably said that. Sounded like you. I'm walking in a break. Yeah. Oh, good. Can't really do this wrong. You'd be surprised. Oh, right.

So, over the next couple hours, you've You meander a while through Avedar's Promenade. There were a couple dives, but the clientele doesn't seem very jovial. Wow, this is the worst pub call ever. This took two hours. Yeah, you find about four different establishments, but most of them appear to be less of the party hardy crowd and more of the my life sucks, I need alcohol crowd. Scannon? I feel we need you. I feel like I am not, I'm still recovering my spirit. All right.

Do you need me to yell at it again? All right, I will roll in investigation. It couldn't hurt. All right. Let me talk to some people and see if I can find some things. Investigation? 18. Much better.

Okay. Chatting around. There's a good place to go. I'm looking for a speakeasy in particular. Something off of eating fat. Something off of eating fat. Right. Word-a-mouth type place.

Okay. Let's see. Let's see. Oh, I like that he's checking out his yellow pages. He's got a list of everything back there. All the battle maps he drew over the last week and we're doing pub crawl. Like, fine, we're doing pub crawl. Whatever.

Whatever. Or just a place that comes highly recommend. Doesn't have to be off the beach. Or poorly recommend. So you eventually hear about a place called hoarths. Horwarths. Horwarks. Horths.

That's what I'm a thing to say when you're on there. H-O-J-H-H-O-W-R-T-H. H-W-R-H. We have no. Have we been to H-Words? We've not been to H-Warths. Like Walworths, but Holworths? Sure.

Like Faworths without the G? Yeah. Kind of, I guess you would say. Hoarths. When you get there, it appears to be more of a, more of a text on. business, but upon, from what you've heard about, it's more of like a business that runs the front and then the real actual companies in the back.

Nice. Textiles and beer. Yes. Okay. So as soon as you guys approach, the guy is running the front, he's this kind of weasly-looking mousy gentleman in his late 40s, kind of thin John Waters' mustache, and he kind of gives you nods. I take it you not here for the, yeah, just around the corner of background, points you over.

as you guys walk in, there is a pretty happening establishment in here, actually. There's a harp player on the far edge of the room on the stage who's playing a very beautiful piece. It seems almost like, even though she's just playing the harp, it's almost emanating the sound of multiple instruments around. You, there's probably about 10 or so people in here. It's not extremely crowded, but everyone in there appears to be rather upper crust. Folks that either have descended from the Cloudtop district to rub shoulders with the less elite of the town and a few wealthy merchants. It's a pretty pretty decent place for Apple Rousers who have some

coin to spend. That's us. Let's get around, shall we? Yeah. Oh, I would say you could buy Scanlon but you have no money. You gave me a thousand dollars. I did, so you haven't had to buy something. I'm feeling generous. I'll buy us around. All right. So you guys get around. round of drinks, you kind of look over the events of the previous weeks, chat amongst yourselves, and you meet a few individuals in the establishment and make a few friends. Overall, it's a pretty decent way to finish a rather long day of more work than you had originally anticipated. As the buzz begins to wear off and the evening draws closed, you guys find yourself

getting a little hungry, and this place is pretty much solely a bar experience as opposed to a straight pub. It's probably a place. pushing close to 11. We got home. No. What? God, the evening is our, what do they say about things like that?

The evening is our oyster, right? Isn't that what they say? Sort of? Sure. Guys, back close. What? She said that. May I said it's pretty close.

It's pretty close. Oh, thank you, Pike. Let's stay all night. Oh, boy. Okay. Come on. Come on, man. Let's do it.

We can see the sunrise. We never do this. Yes. We never take time for ourselves. Kila's been day drinking and night drinking. I have. She's that girl. Come on. I'm walking up to the bar keep and I say,

Hi! Oh God, it's so loud. We need to keep drinking but also eating. So where's the closest place to do that? Yes. At this hour, and the gentleman is talking to you now, is like his chin is, Pierce has been broken at some point in his life,

so as he talks, the job, all kind of swivele from side to side in an awkward, like, old, like, Disney cartoon way. It's hard to really put into words. But his hair is spotty in places. Like it's been kind of thinning in the front. But he's well dressed. It's one of those things where, like, the outfit does not match the persona. But he kind of looks over to you, well, at this point in the evening,

food might be a little hard of a cure, unfortunately. As far as I know. Guys, there's got to be like some street-leadenders. I'm going to find. Gross. I'm going to find the most interesting, boisterous clientele in the bar, and I'm going to approach them. Yeah, are we getting in a fight? No.

No. Not yet. Okay. Go make reception check. Thank you for not making that anything else than that. Yes, that's much better. 20. Okay.

As you're glancing about, and you're talking to the front of the bar and the rest of you guys are, you know, finishing around a drinks, you Are looking around? Hmm? I just remember 5,000 gold being delivered to the keep. It helps. We have servants. We have people for that. It's fine.

Drink more. It's fine. So you glance towards the door and an individual walks in that definitely kind of matches the expectation of what you're looking for. A familiar individual. A gentleman of purple gold trimmed robe. gold-trimmed robes, a darkish complexion, a tied goatee, and a smile on his face. And it suddenly makes complete sense. This is the kind of place that Gilmore would go to drink.

Yay! As he comes strolling in, you just kind of has a smile on his face. You can see a little bit of sweat on his brow, like he said it kind of a long day. We're just kind of a rush here. It looks over and immediately sees the whole other view there. Well, isn't this the luckiest day for me? Kilmore! Look at this motherfucker right here! Vaxel down! He runs up and grabs you. Oh, I lift him. I lift him in the air and I

swirled him down on a bar stool, and I give him a playful slap on the cheek. Not that hard, but like... How are you? It's so good to see you. God you look good! You as well, my friend, you as well. I have... Kilmer! Kimmer! What do you drink? We're buying. What are you drinking? Oh, obviously, whatever she's having.

Do you have any food? They don't have any. They don't have any. They would not serve food here now. It's a finer establishment. Where can we go? It's a good, Kilmore. And he thinks for a second, he reaches back into a small satchel he has on the side,

and he pulls out a little pouch. He opens the pouch, and he reaches out, and he pulls out what looks like a small wooden domino, like kind of a size. Woodman clearing is a small, into these tables for me? Oh, sure, sure. You wouldn't mind helping me because of any of these tables from.

Stop, you lot. Unnecessarily knocking over the drinks off the table of one of the nearby individuals at the event. But they don't argue with the Goliath. It's clear. Heads apart some room. He gives a nod over to the bartender who, you can see there's been a rapport here, so he's like,

all right, allow it. He tosses the wooden domino on the ground for a second, whisper something under his breath, does a hand, gesture and it suddenly extends into a wooden table into a familiar sight. This is a hero. A hero. Oh, Gilmore. These things are not cheap. As the, as the, you can see in his other hand, he had pulled the gem and crust of the chalice

from the middle of his pouches and it kind of dissipates in the archie energy. He kind of says, Well, I figured it was a special occasion. Wow, Gilmore, this is too much, really. This is a very. This is a very. This is a very. This is amazing. You're such a kind, generous, sir. No, actually, I've gotten word that you've been spreading the wonders of my brand. That's true. Everywhere we go. That's not true.

But you've been doing it a bit, which is more than I expected to be honest. So I appreciate that. I really do. Not only that, we've, I don't know where it has reached you yet, but in Whitestone, we're working towards establishing a Gilmore-themed library for the people with your name attached to it. Well. Something respectable for a change. Oh, I don't know about that. I've still got to finish building my shop in West room.

But when that is done, I'd be more than happy to look into it. If you need any help. Whitestone. Whitestone. Hmm. That place has been kind of dour as a word. It's a new market-turning around. Really turning around.

You can turn a coin and do right by the world. They are in need and the place is going to explode. I'm telling you. It's true. So even then changing the name, they're making it more hip. It's gonna be called Wisto now. It's great. Just shortening it.

Another for her as well. She's had one drink. All day. All day, one drink. All day, one drink. When do we tell her that's a shirley temple? Look, it's been fermenting for a while. So hammered up this cherry juice, you guys.

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Has filtered out of the bar, the Heroes Feast. After finishing being consumed, itself has reverted back down to the wooden domino, which is a different enchantment than what you're used to. You're more druidic, divine-based heroes' feast that you summon out of the actual element. This is almost like an implement or a focus he uses for the spell each time. It's a different way of getting the same effect.

Interesting to you not being an arcane caster. But nevertheless, as it winds down a bit, you guys are all kind of finding yourselves settling in, Can I sit down and talk to Gilmore for a moment? Of course, of course. And Kila gets up and moves and sits next to Bax. I go and challenge Grog to a dark game. Nice.

Yes. Yes, my dear. Into a really weird thing in Whitestone, I bet you know some shit about it, because you know shit about everything. Weird things in particular, is that what you're insinuating? Kind of, yeah. All right, fair enough. Beckner. The moment you say that, you see his kind of jovial exterior kind of hardened for a second,

and his eyes closed. It's a strange name to bring up this late in the evening. That's best, right? Yeah. Yeah, I kind of almost died. Because of him, I guess. Almost is better than actually, so congratulations. Thank you. But yeah, there's a spinning, there's a spinning. A spinning bowl of death, really, a little orb that kind of sucks things into it. It's black, it's under the ground. We don't know what to do with it, really, and I'm kind of worried, I guess, about it. Spinning me glad ball, dear. They were trying to wake him up, but they said it was too early. They did it before Winter's crest.

He thinks for a second. This is the only, the only orb of spinning death I'm familiar with is a sphere of annihilation, but those are generally generally a bit larger than what you're describing to me at the very least. Oh, my gosh. Well, I feel like maybe they wanted it to get bigger. I don't know. Oh, oh, there was a hand and an eye and... Those generally kind of follow around the phrase,

Vecna. Oh, really? I don't know too much other than just what I've been told historically and bits of information that I've picked up through years. Vekna, you kind of thinks for a second, and he starts looking about it, anyone else who's near the table,

although you guys are off or throwing darts. I'm listening, and, yeah. Like, I don't know where you are, but I soon can. No, I'm, I'm listening, I'm listening. Okay, this is, Lekna, many names historically, the archelich, the whispered one, the dying king and the lord of the rotted tower,

the undying king. God's like titles, it seems. It's arrogant in my opinion. Um, what I heard, he, uh, born a mortal, used his capabilities to attempt to cheat death in every way possible. And then once that was acquired, then naturally went on to the next great endeavor, becoming a god. Attempted to ascend 600 years ago. But in that time, his cult expanded across the rebuilding civilization. and nearly achieved it until it seemed that the remnants

of good in society went and followed him to his place of worship and thwarted his ritual. He was slain, but as you've seen, when entities of such power get to a certain point, death is but a hurdle. You have enough individuals that believe you are God, that willpower is strong enough to keep you enduring. So his influence exists and has for many years.

I don't know if he's a god per se. Not yet. But there are those that treat him as such. And that in itself is dangerous, because that means he's probably still out there. And I'm pretty sure he's very interested in finishing what he couldn't before. What was he just trying to be?

got? Is it? That's all I've heard. I'm not a scholar in a religious rights, and for the most part, a lot of his history has been, well, destroyed and kept secret. It's his belewic. But anyway, if you've indeed come across any of this foul business, I recommend you stay far away. Far away. Bad news. Bad news. Anyway, sorry. Dower's subject. I didn't mean to bring the mood down on that one. It helped us. Well, it's been a fun night, guys, but I'm tired of letting Grog beat me in darts. You really suck.

I don't know if it's because you're so tiny. They put the dart board so high on the wall. Yeah, but you put darts in like two people's arms. I mean, are you really that? One of those people was giving us the stink eye. That's true. He's queered out like a little girl, terrible. But we should go home.

What? We should go home. Kielis, please, don't be this way. We'll go out again tomorrow and it'll be fine. You say that now. And then tomorrow some crazy person will show up at our door and want us to do something crazy, and then we'll never have a free night again.

I'm super old, let's go. You know what's really cool to do at the end of the night, actually, what will make you be there for the sun coming up? is if you do four shots of fire water in a row. Yeah, yeah, it's a thing. It like reinvigorates you, but you gotta do them like back to back to back to back. I do hear that cures the hangover.

I was going to encourage, no, I'm going to encourage this now. I think this is a great idea. Listen, listen, only because I'm identifying with your need for revelry, why don't you and I go do four shots back to back to back to back to back. Let's do it. As you guys stand up and begin walking away, Gilmore looks to you and goes,

I like her much better this way. Gilmore, I love you too. Actually, you stay here. I'll bring it to the table and I go to get the shots. Okay. All of your drinks, leaving your paid for, Gilmore takes care of the tab. Oh my gosh, Gilbert.

Come back with the shots. Well then, wait, look one then. You want a shot, Pike. All right, Pike is a shot. Nine shots. Ten shots. She says two shots. Oh, two shots?

She wants two shots. So wait, Army, and you're doing the, doing the shot. when you're doing the, doing the, the quad droop. Yeah, quad. Quad. This is the stupidest thing. And a quod. No, no, what?

She wants to see the sunrise. Let it happen. We're all going to learn a valuable lesson. Yeah. It's amazing. I come back with 10 shots. All right, so who's drinking? One shot?

One shot. Four shots. And two for Pike, so 11 shots. All right, I need Constitution saving throws from all of four. Do we get a Constitution bonus from the, from the Heroes first? No. No.

I don't want it anyway. I don't want it anyway. Oh, that's not good. Oh, wow! Eight total. Oh, boy. Fourteen. I quickly backed away from people.

16. Okay. As you all... Oh, I'm sorry. Mike, what did you get? 18. 18. 18.

20, I'm so sorry. 20. So Percy, you take your shot. It burns down you're fine. Plank. Bam, bam, the little gnome, takes it in her gut, grins. Wives edge of her chin and looks over to Grog with a bit of a challenge look on her face. Grog, you look over to Kuloth, and both of you guys start just slamming down the line.

As you hit that fourth one, you can feel the burn on the inside. You, a little bit of that hero's feast begins to creep up, and you get that kind of acidic, you know, have to kind of stop a little bit and take it back down. but you're good. Little mild sauce. But you're good. You kick it back. There you go, girl.

As soon as you open your eyes from the, you look over across the way and all you see is Keelah, your expression go from a big smile to neutral to a worried frown and looking to the door. She's going to take hit points. I can't go outside. Oh. No, I got it. I got her.

You got her? No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. No. No. Max, hold her hair back, hold her hair back. We should pick her up and carry her around the ball. I need to stay here. Come on, Keyleth!

I'll go help her out. We've got her, we've got her. All right, Brady and Pike? Wait, okay, where, I want to help Keylet. Because she, yeah, go ahead, go ahead, hold up, go ahead. Okay, so as you guys all- Hi, tell me a story. As you guys drag Keyliff outside.

Outside. Scanlan, you're staying? I'm not going near that shit. All right. Max is staying and Pike, you're staying? Yeah. All right. As this is happening, Gilmore kind of sits up and begins to finish off his drink.

It's good to see friends. It's okay. Indeed. Well. Just don't get your, let me get it in the street. It's getting very late. I've only been back a few days, and I have a lot of business to tend to in the morning. I'm sure you do. Could I borrow your ear for a few minutes?

Certainly. It would be my absolute pleasure. Um, you want some privacy in private. Oh, well, it'll be me to stand on the way of a private conversation. He stands up for a second and kind of walks over to the far table in the corner, right by the stage where the, the, uh, the harpist's was playing but is no longer on the stage. And you just kind of sit down and expectantly awaiting. Can I watch this conversation from the doorway? Well, if you guys are, the doorway just leads into the textile

portion, so if you guys aren't leaving the place entirely. Well, I just, I just, I just need a, I figure we're just outside the door. If you were hanging by the textile, I've taken her all the way out. I'm just kind of watching. Okay. Okay. Okay.

Okay. This should be fun. No, that one, that one cursed me before. That one was bad before this do this one. Oh, that's better? That's better? Um, uh, uh, 18. Okay. You do manage to make it all the way outside of the building before you...

Grab the hair. Oh, God. All right. Oh, go. Go. Go. Oh, go. Oh, no. Don't do that. That looks really bad.

Gift for eternity. Give it for eternity. Giff it. It's the internet. You can't take it back. No, it's there forever. All the Percy Lifts shippers now have having a few people back. All right, so. I'm so sorry.

It's okay. I'm so sorry. You'll be even sorry or in the morning. It's all right. Greg said it'll make me stay up. It's okay. It's okay. I know.

As you sit down with Gimelor. Yes, thanks for that, darling. We have known each other a long time. Yeah? Yeah, yeah? And, um, I have a lot of love for you. You are an amazing man. Well, I'm not disagreeing with you there.

That is part of your charm. I don't even know what I'm saying to say. I just feel I need to be honest with me. There's no question you and I have danced around each other a bit for the past few years. And I have been curious. Well, curiosity is this spark of arcane pursuit and knowledge, among many other things. I've come close many times to going further than I have. We're a charming man, but I respect you very much.

I mean to tell him, I can't do the dance anymore. I am in love with someone I don't feel. think loves me, but all the same. It wouldn't be fair to me to think that we might galley. And I don't want to be a liar, so I want you. Well, I certainly appreciate your honesty. And, well, I would be lying if I didn't say I was a little disappointed. But at the same time, the heart wants for the heart wants.

And I'll have enjoyed our flirtation. Perhaps our paths aren't meant to be quite so entwined. Such as the flow of fate, my friend. And he gives that little kind of sigh of digesting heartbreak a little bit. But, you know, there's like a nod to him of understanding and acceptance, and he kind of looks up to you again with that kind of whip crack of a Gilmore smile and says. I wish you luck. The path of an uncertain heart is never an easy one. Should you ever need an ear to bend or a shoulder to cry on, well you know where I am.

And if I'm not there, you know how to get a hold of me. Now reach out. A hand behind his head. So you are an beautiful archaing bastard. And my kiss I'm full on the lips. Vax getting all the kisses. Pat him on the shoulder. I'm just being appeased. That's true. He takes his cup, which is empty,

and kind of like holds it up to the last drop, kind of pulls out. Good night too, Vax walks out into the night. As Gilmore walks by you guys, he looks over a kiloth and goes, you go to some water. Oh, yes. Why does my mouth keep producing saliva? Yeah, I'll get her water. I'll get her water.

a little jug of the fire water and wash out about. Can I cross lesser restoration on her? You can. All right, let's do it. So I watch that whole conversation. Pike. Just to give her like still a little bit of a buzz to just took the bad part out of it.

A proper use of divine magic. Can you divine the sad out of alcohol? Can Pike follow us all around everywhere? All the time. Pike is the best wingman. Hey, maybe Pike is a headhead of a picture. Pike, I miss you so much. At which point.

Come here. Come here. I'm sorry, you guys. The nausea. I'm so sorry. As Pike embraces you, the warmth of her hug is also matched with the warmth of the divine energy that briefly flows through your body, and for a second you feel as if you're weightless.

And the nausea is gone. The drunkenness is still there, and the buzz is still finding its way through your system, but not as heavy as it was before. a little more conscious of yourself and when the warmth fades, you feel much more in control of your current state of your mind, your well-being, and the contents of your stomach. Holy shit, what kind of shots did you give me, Graz? The weak stuff, yeah. I think they call it regret.

He schnapps. He schnapps-slager. Goldslager. Gold-slager. Goz-slager. Kiko, Saga. Yeager. Lemon, citro, vodka. Oh, man, I love the same.

Should we go home? I think it's time to go home. We've left our mark here. Does Keel's lose the benefits of the Yales feast? She said she wretched it all over the ground. Oh my gosh. Why would you ask that question? It's such a dick question to ask.

My body absorbed and processed on the calories. It had been a few hours, or about an hour since the initial feasting to wear the drinks. So she's had enough to maintain the effect. But the gentleman who owns the establishment is probably not going to be very happy in the morning when he has to clean up. It's outside. It's outside. It's outside. We get some dirt over her puk. Yeah.

We're not sad. We're not seeds and berries anyway. Come on. You guys make your way back to Gray Skull Key. As you approach the front gate of your establishment, you see Cordell and Shane keeping their evening watch over the gate. Cordell kind of shouts down to the rest of you guys. You've got guests waiting for you. Oh, shit.

What? How long have they been here? It's over and looks to Shane. Shane kind of looks over at him. It looks on her head. I think probably at least two hours. But the... How many times have we told you don't let guests in when we got here?

They had your permission. Oh, who is it? It's a bunch of them. It's, uh... Oh, it's my friends! This is why I wanted to come home! Oh! The party keeps going! Cornell!

And we've learned nothing. He looks over at Shane, Shane, goes, Don't do that, Cordell. Just... God damn it, Cornell! We pay you! It's okay. It's okay. Ignore, let's go. The gate opens.

You guys come inside and you find as you enter the keep, the smell of a recently cooked meal is permeating the air of the keep you hear laughter and a little bit of music in the distance. And as you walk towards the eating chambers, your central feasting area on the bottom floor of your keep, there indeed you see the, they're recently discovered friends. Yes. Is that little, is it a halfling teenager that was picking pockets at the bar is he here? He is in.

Can I walk up to him? Yes. You go to come to Samson, right now, by the way, is asleep on a table. It's way past his bedtime. He's just kind of like on the edge there. I nudge him awake. Hey, sticky fingers. Hi.

Hello, Miss. Hey. So, I saw you at the bar. Who? You know, getting things off of people pockets. Off of people pockets. pockets? Yes, me again?

I told me they wouldn't miss him. No, no, it's totally fine. I don't care. You haven't done that here, have you? No. No, honestly, he tells me to. And points to Dr. Drenzol at this point, which Dr. Drenzol has been like, Scandlin!

Finally! It's lovely to see you. You can see now there's like three bottles of wine that have been drinking that are open and about. Do you bring those? No! But they were provided, and I'm not one to not drink what is not provided. Well, thank, thank you. Oh, good. Oh, Cordell. Cordell, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. You opened wine and I yelled at you, I'm sorry.

Cordell's not even here. Cordell's on the front gate. Oh, Cordell, I figure Cordell walks us in. No, they're up on the front gate. Keyleth is talking out to nothing. Thanks, Cordell! The lesser restoration didn't have quite a strong effect on reversing the alcohol, but she's not puking, so that's good. Right. I thought you to have still drunk. I'm not putting back.

Wow. Doctor, thank you for coming over and bringing the gang. It's so great to see you again tonight. Oh, you guys as well. And you can see the rest of the people are kind of watching. Zed's kind of fallen asleep. Esselmere is just in the back corner kind of watching everyone. Is that the singer?

Yeah, she's the older, mature, elven woman who's kind of keeping an eye. Kaylee is there kind of sitting next to Drenzel, and Kent Plucker has a little, kind of loop that he's just kind of on. Well, come, sit, let's just start. Sit, unless it's too late in the night. I have a conversation I'd like to have. Oh, please, lay it on us. Anyone want to go to bed? No. Oh.

I like her. Yes, but let's do this anyway. All right. Lena, bring around some meats. Wait, we already ate. We already are. We're fine. All right, Lina, go back to sleep. She looks tired, like, more meats. Okay. Is it all right if I go to bed? Yes, please.

Steve, well, glad you made her home safe. She wanders back off, kind of bags in her daughter Drenzel kind of waves you all in. So, a little proposition that we talked about. At the bar, earlier today, the old man who didn't need his fortune. Yes. Allow me to elaborate a bit in a more private setting, if you don't mind. More private than our house? No, no, no.

This is the more private. This is the more private. Ching-ching, everybody, Ching. Is that lipstick on your face, fax? What? Maybe it is. I don't know where it would have come from, though. It's the land of magic and mystery, who knows? As Drenzwell holds out as Muggy goes,

Now, when we arrive to come play the Winter's Crest Festival here in Iman, one of my contacts will save. Old client of mine last year in Amon right around the same time, mentioned a peculiar thing. Apparently, a wealthy lord here vanished about a year ago, and his estate was sold to a private collector. Apparently, this collector keeps his name off the books and couldn't really find any information about who he was

or really what his business is, but he just acquired the entire estate. People were curious as to what his business was, as the previous individual was rather well known in the circumstances of other dubious and disappearance. but I don't know really how that all went together. Anyway, this older collector was fairly active at this estate until a few months ago.

The windows have darkened and stayed as such. No furniture touched, the interior elements unpacked or moved. Just went away. So I'm thinking either this fellow has kicked the final bucket. At his end, or is off on some extended business trip. Even his acquisition in all of its contents, ripe for the picking. Problem is, we can't get into the Cloudtop district.

Captain Kaylee have tried numerous times, almost got arrested. And you can see Kaylee kind of gives a nod with their shoulders, kind of shrugging. Still got a few things to learn, apparently. by winking. That's the first thing I throw out there, dear. He goes back so seeing as how you folks have got some pool in the town, I was thinking you could either, you know, find a way to get us in, quietly, carefully, let us do our work,

give us some tips on the best way to stay out of sight, or you could go in. Grab a few things, come back here with the spoils, and we'll take our cut. The kind of eyes look over to you and you. It's... I keep the feeling that this kind of work is not unfamiliar. It certainly thinks we've done in the past. Didn't we discuss this and assume that this was a house that we had been in once before? Are we talking about... We thought it much.

Are we talking about... Are we talking about the guy that we first came into his house in Amman, remember? The diplomat. We don't know either way. They went missing. Do you know who used to reside there, doctor? The name escapes me. What about a position?

You do recall the Cloud Top District was not your disposal when you first came here. Right. So it's a new place. It's probably General Creek's place. Possibly. When you guys went to inspect. Rage looting. Yeah.

Down in the dungeon, there was the demon. Teleportation device that led us to install. It could be a different house. This was a while ago. Does it sound like? General Kriegs place? It was big, what, did you get a description of the place? Yes, yes, red brick building, iron fence running the outside. That's it.

It's like every house though, right? Actually, no, most of the houses there have various colors such. Kriegs was built more utilitarian and was very minimalistic in its interior decor. In fact, most of it seemed kind of unused from what you saw other than the man's servant that lived there. The house, for the most part, the bedroom, everything that you searched seemed like it was barely touched by a more. He was a dragon. He was a fucking dragon. Was that his house where he's describing?

It seems pretty damn close to the description from you recall. If we were to be interested, it's true that you are pointing us in the direction of this place, but we would be doing all the work. We would need a very high percentage. Well, I just... I had previously discussed a 60, 40, 40s. I know, I know that's what you said. I know. I said hi.

70-30. 80, or I'm not doing shit, you can send him in. Hey, it's my friend. A tough bargain, but 80-20 it is. All righty. I'm gonna have to think for a minute before I'm comfortable with us. You just agreed to it. You just did.

He agreed to give you a cut if we go in. Hang on, hey guys, guys, what if we just agreed to? Fair enough. Fair enough. Here's the thing, if you haven't noticed, we have a keep, an embassy. We're known. around town, the council members. We can't go stealing things from people's houses. No. Well, that's unfortunate. I'll find somebody else.

Well, hold it, hold on, hold on, hold up. He made a deal with you. If he doesn't do it, we'll find somebody that will. He's a man of his word and we'll back it up. You don't have to do it. You know, Vax, we have sort of told the sovereign that we are interested keenly in the security of this area and if this is an unsecured house, we couldn't just be going in to try to secure. See? See? Picking of the people. That's the Scandland shorthold. And remember there were dangerous things in the house. We can make sure that it's safe now, protecting the, you know. Just, God forbid, a child wanders in there. God forbid. I will say in a dangerous spot. I don't know what we're talking about. We're not talking about breaking into a living man's home. Krieg is gone. Creig was a dragon.

And then it was obtained by somebody else who you don't know who it is. Oh, are we talking about General Greig? Oh, yeah. He was so dreamy. He was so dreamy. It's a dragon. Creag. I've heard that name.

I think that may be the gentleman. Oh, you know, Creek? I don't know. Perhaps we should at least take a look to see if there was something else down there that was dangerous. I mean, not to be, you know, suggestification. Let's do this. We'll set off to do this in the middle. In the meantime, we invite you to stay at our keep, drink of our wine, eat of our food.

Yeah, more wine. Please, make yourselves at home. Yeah. Is this not the greatest bar to have lived? Yes. We think so. It's true. It's true.

Thank you. Scalding, you humble us all. We're happy to do so, and thank you very much for your fine hospitality. You humble us all by comparison. We have one room in addition to what we stay in. Would all of you be staying in the same one? Or would you want to stay in the temple? We have a couple of rooms.

Remember, we got a dungeon. Our Dragonborn room is available now. And as well, we have a dungeon and I'll stay in the dungeon. I can stay a large bed if Kaylee would like to take that. I could sleep on the floor. You invited them to stay because you want to, you wouldn't phone Kaylee?

Are you really cock-blocking right now? Are you talk-blocking in the keep? As you're saying this, Kaylee is just watching this with a smirk on her face. I'm not one to turn down a soft bed for any. Yeah, can't wreck that game. Trandall kind of gets over goes like, huh, ha ha ha ha.

Good luck. We can also put some beds out in the workshop, which has now been vacated also. Right, wait. I go out some beds in that. How long are you guys stand? Zed sits up, the large bearded gentleman goes like, Stay out.

I'm happy to sleep here, this is fine by me. Just give me a flat surface, and he kind of just goes over one of the tables Is that Z, the drummer? Who is it? Yeah, he's the drummer. Why don't you invite a little pickpocket to sleep with you? Do you keep an eye on him?

Doesn't steal stuff? Where are you going, perv? Are you going perv? Let's all turn in, shall we? All right. I'm gonna stay up and keep an eye on the doors when they go into their rooms and make sure they actually stay. Actually, no, I'm gonna go find Jarith.

All right. Jared, do you mean? Yeah, it's been that week. Oh, no. As you guys are going to all stood up, shut up, Keelith into her room. Can I per se? Good night.

You guys all find your way to your rooms. As you had, you guys all, you know, arrange some beds for those who need it, for the most part down in the dungeon area. The couple rooms are kind of crowded up with the other folks, except for Kaylee, who is following you Scanlan with a bottle of wine and two glasses. two glasses. Oh my. She's gonna rob you blind. As you all go to your various rooms, Kaylee pulls out the chair and the chair in the table in the front of your bedroom, sits down against the poor glasses of wine and sits across. You guys have drinks and

begin various conversations about she's that good of a flute player. player. So she asks you about your history and kind of your travels and how you met Hunter Drenzel and everything. I tell her all the best parts and leave out the naughty bits. Interesting tale. Kingslayer, leader of a rebellion, you know. So you've said, a number of times. She drinks a little bit more of the wines that's it done. I guess I should tell you a bit about myself then. Yes, please. I'm fascinated. Well I, uh, I grew up in Kymel, mostly, before moving to Westruen to train at the College of the White Duke. Finest of the Bard's he was.

My mom gave all her savings to put me up there. I only joined the troop about six months back. It was my third year at the Dukes when the good doctor came through, and I seized the opportunity. Now, to be perfectly honest up front, I've already heard a bit about your tale, Shortald. The charming of the pauper prince, your rendition of Summer Sunder, the cliffs of Dagger Bay. I've been hoping our pants would cross. Oh, Kilaful. You're out there, drunk, you're drunk, just go to sleep.

Mething. Clips of Dagger Bay. Go ahead. Degra Bay is a place. Yeah. Go ahead. Well, I'm flattered and you have quite talent for, quite a lot of talent, for just having played with the truth

for six months. I was impressed back there. Thank you very much. You know, I've heard most of these things. stories. My mother, Sybil. Who? Sybil, a fine gnomish lass. She was some years ago. She came across a smooth silver-tongued floutist who blew through like the wind and disappeared.

Took her innocence with a promise, then vanished just as suddenly. Left her child to raise on the income of a quilter she did. Now, growing up, I hear tale and tale of your musical feats, as my mother took in a third job. No. Support us. A few bad harvests, just south of silver cut. Being the only tiny female fairfolk in such a rural town means being preyed upon, so I learned to use a blade quickly and to wield my charm just as viciously.

It seems that runs in the family, aye? I am. I practiced. I stole, lied about my age, and eventually paid my way into the Duke's College, so I I can find you, prove you as scoundrel. At this point you see her stand up, and she begins to draw a small blade from her side. She's gonna fight me. Oh my god! Her face is hardened and still as she stares at you. You see a slight tremble in her hand.

This day, Scanlan Short-hulled, I beat you at your own sum. Now I come to take your dignity. Now take up your sword. First of all, Kaly. It's so wonderful to meet you. Don't try yet on me. I don't know. Listen, I have my faults for sure, but I didn't know that you existed. I would have come to visit.

I would have come to meet you. How can you fault me for something that I... The war is over and both sides lost. Kingdoms were reduced to cinders, an army scattered like bones in the dust. Now the survivors claw to what's left of a broken world, praying the darkness chooses someone else tonight. But in the shadow dark, the darkness always wins. This is old school adventuring at its most cruel.

Your torch ticks down in real time. And when that flame dies, something else rises to finish the job. This is a brutal rules-light nightmare with a story that emerges organically based on the decisions that the characters make. This is what it felt like to play our first. RPGs in the 80s, and man, it is so good to be back. Join the Glass Cannon podcast as we plunge into the Shadow Dark every Thursday night at 8 p.m. Eastern on YouTube.com slash the Glass Cannon with the podcast version dropping the next day.

See what everybody's talking about and join us in the dark. Oh, please, not that music. That music gives me nightmares from my childhood. Could we get something a little bit lighter? Some lighter music here. Are you a fan of true crime TV shows? And what about Unsolved Mysteries, the show that jumped started all of our love of true crime? I'm Ellen Marsh.

And I'm Joey Taranto. And we host I Think Not, a true crime comedy podcast covering some of the wildest stories from your favorite true crime can't be TV shows all the way to Unsolved Mysteries. Baby, you will laugh, you will cry. You'll think about true crime in a whole new way, and you'll also ask yourself, who gave these people mics? New episodes of I Think Not are released every Wednesday with bonus episodes out every three. Thursday on Patreon. And every Monday, you can listen to our true crime rundown, where we go over the top true crime headlines of the week.

So come and join us wherever you listen to your podcasts. Do you even remember civil? Could you describe her a little more detailed? Thanks. Make a, uh... Oh, man. Just make a wisdom check. Just roll a 20, your wisdom model, fire.

Okay, good. Wisdom, which is a negative two. 16. 16. You vaguely recall, Sybil. She had golden hair, very eager to escape her simple beginnings, and very quickly, you jumped out of there very fast. From your perspective. Yes, Sybil.

She was passionate, intelligent. Really, a lot of handsy. I mean, I think I remember her quite well, and she was a wonderful person, and you should be honored to have such a wonderful person as your parent, and not someone like me, because I was a scoundrel. You're right. You are a scoundrel. I have been in past moments in my life a scoundrel. Do you even realize she nearly invited your daughter up to sleep with you? I mean... I don't care. I wouldn't have let it go that far. I...

You have no boundaries. You take what you like and you keep walking on. You trick folk. I draw your blade. I don't want to fight you if that's what you're insinuating. Listen, I know that I've made mistakes in my life. I've admitted as much as before and I don't know why I'm this way. I must need to do a lot of soul searching to come up with an answer, but there is a woman who I love very dearly and who I would do anything for, and I'm trying to be a better person.

I haven't been to a whorehouse in months. That's a big step for me. Big step. I know that sounds callous and crew. But I've tried to be a better person. If you're here to fight me, I'm afraid you're going to. going to be terribly disappointed because I will just let you kill me if that's what it takes. I didn't know you existed and my heart is breaking a hundred times now for not knowing it.

Every year that you've been alive as a year I could have been a better person and known someone who could have made me a better person and I'm only sorry that I didn't know it. If there's anything I can do for you from now on, if you are truly my blood, I will, because among my many faults, ego is certainly one of them, and knowing your part of me makes me love you even more. Make a persuasion check. With advantage for that speech. Persuasion check.

With advantage, with advantage. It won't matter. Is there a manipulation check? 32. You know, said it won't matter. Oh. She's big, she's big. She's big.

The bird. As she stands there with her blade out, kind of staring at you, you can see the veins and her neck tensing. I slowly unbutton my shirt and show her my chest and say, stab me right here if you'd like, and I will not resist. You've earned it. Take me. You see the tear begin to roll down her cheek as her jaw clenches? jaw clenches. And she thrusts forward and rolls a natural one.

A natural one. As she goes to strike towards you, even in that moment her will falters and the blade just falls limp. It hits your chest and you feel the piercing of something pushing into your flesh but no more than maybe half an inch as there's no real force behind the blade. and as the hand releases her weapon, it clatters to the ground as a momentum carries her arms around. As she holds you there, her kind of tosseled, you know, short pixie brown hair, you can feel the wetness across the back of your neck,

and you just hear her voice trembling in your ears say, why can't I do it? All the years building up to this, and I have the chance, and I can't do it. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry that you're going through this and I'm more sorry that you're going through this by yourself. But I think deep down, you're a short halt and there's something that you have that's connected to me and I to you, and perhaps I misread that as some sort of icky attraction and I apologize, but I've known

for a while now that something is missing in my life, some sort of focus and some sort of more compass and maybe it's just arrived at my doorstep. You say that, and her arms kind of tense for a minute, like an involuntary just trying to pull you closer, then they lax, and she steps away, kind of reverting her gaze, keeping her head down. She bends down and picks up her blade. Doesn't she that just holds it limply at her side?

And she begins to walk for the door. And then she opens the door, and looks back at you. and looks back at you, because her eyes kind of finally meeting yours, and you can see kind of the wet stains across her cheeks. You're still a scoundrel. It's what's kept you alive this long. In some ways, it's kept me alive this long. I've got a lot to think about. I want to go for a walk. I need some pressure. And she closes the door behind it. I just sit for a moment and think about everything. Try to remember more about Sybil. You worked your way through a lot of Talduri in those days. You, uh...

Yeah, you did. Yes. She was, she was. Yes, I think, yeah, she wasn't that giant. No, she was, okay. And I have a very restless night thinking about everything in my room. Okay. And with that, we're going to go ahead and take a bathroom break? Oh, dear.

The morning comes around, consciousness comes to all of you. You... I had witty. In the night, I had gone to find Jared. Oh, right, Jared. Just to tell him to keep an eye on the rooms and everything. Because, you know, I'm sure they're all great people, but I know they have some shady practices,

so I just want to make sure that. My daughter you're talking about, by the way. We don't know that. I'm having to take care of this for you. He loads his crossbow and kind of plops himself down at the edge of the hall where he has a view of every single door to the south end of the deep, and he's like, just perched and ready.

All right, you guys come to consciousness the next morning. More hung over than others, depending on the individual. Gross. Come down. Breakfast has already been prepared and kind of waiting. Poor Lane has been trying to keep it warm for you. And part of it's already being eaten by your guests, who half of them fell asleep in the actual dining room. Nevertheless, all of you come down, Scanlan, you eventually come out of your confused reverie. Not a lot of good sleep throughout

the evening and Kaylee never came back throughout the night. Is Dr. Dr. Dranzel around? Yeah, as you head down to the main dining area, Dranzel's there and he's a little hung over himself and enjoying the remnants of his meal. Poor Lena is not designed to produce breakfast for over 11 people in the morning. Old friend, a quick word.

Yes, good morning, scannon. Good morning, well, morning to you as well. Did you know? about. Did you know about the girl? What does she do? What does she do? You see, like he looks a little worried now. He's like checking his pockets. Does he seem, can I inside check him? Does he seem genuine? Oh my. Oh my. Three. Three. Three.

Wow. He's pretty genuine. Okay. Yeah, he's hard to read beyond just like, like, hungry. I'm just like hungover and mildly confused. You spent a lot of time with him, so you know his demeanor pretty well. But yeah, he seems like, if she's anything wrong, let me know.

She's part of my troop, I take responsibility for it. No, no, she's a fine player and a fine upstanding person, and you should take special interest in her. She's a good one. Just please, if she continues on with your troop, take good care of her, all right? Of course. As long as she keeps bringing in the change

and doesn't piss me off, I think we're good. All right. All right. Fix his hat and kind of puts it on, finishes his breakfast. Can I check around, just look around the keep and make sure, like, I mean in the general area and see if anything's missing?

So paranoid. I'm seriously, I do not trust these things. Where's our fat thou? Yeah, where's our fat thou? Did it get delivered? It never got delivered. I mean, who are you asking? I'm asking the guard at the front if anybody came from the keep, from Yeriel.

Okay. Cordell and Cheney have are just now changing over into the next morning staff. As they're getting their stuff together, the morning staff would be Kendrick. Natiba? Natiba? And the Netebe, yes. Wow. I wrote them down. It's not a big...

You pulled a rabbit out of the hat. Yeah. So as they're changing over, you walk up to them and ask them and she said, Yeah, yeah, I know we had a messenger combined, dropped something off for you guys. Where is it? Well, we gave it to Irvin and he brought it inside,

but you guys weren't home. What did it look like? It's a small wooden thing, right? Where did Irvin put it? You know, it was like a small... Where do you put it? Where did you put it? I... We... Ervin took it in.

Where's Ervin? They both put each other. Look, our shift's over. Just tell me where the fuck Ervin is. Probably inside the keep. I don't watch your little old man servant. I'm sorry. I'm supposed to watch the front of the gate. Fuck. I go inside to find Ervin. Okay. Ervin who is, you know, dressed up as his proper servant entire now that he has to entertain guests.

You know, he's... hair is kind of slicked back and it's kind of a scoop of a balding male dome. Yes, thanks honey. May I be of service? Wonderful today. Oh, you... No, box, box, where to go, box. The box that came last night? Oh, oh yes. No, there was a delivery. Yes.

There was a... I was looking for you all, but no one was... was home. So I asked around if anyone had seen you and your guests said that she were to be coming and they would hold it for you until you arrived. Our guests did. Yes. Our guests did. I go storming into the breakfast area. Dr. Dr. Dre. Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. He stood up and just put his hat on into the room.

Ah, yes. Yes. You had the best night to eat here, I bet. It was comfortable. So comfortable. Lots of wine. That box give it to me now. Oh, ha ha ha ha. Yes, we were making sure that it was, wasn't pilfered by any untrustworthy types.

Of course, of course. That's so kind of you. Ah, we're more than happy to help. You being such fine host to us. It's the least we could do. It kind of leans over to Kent and. You can read lips. I can read lips.

I can read lips. So, so. Ken, you better go get the box. Right, okay, steps away, runs up to the guest room that they were staying, comes back down, carrying the small chest. I open it up and count it. Okay. It'll take you a little while. It's a lot of coin. You get, for about the next 30-ish minutes, you're going to be. 30-ish minutes or so you're counting through and you're starting to get towards the bottom of it. You've gotten to about

Roughly the three and a half four thousand gold section before Kent comes up to you behind and takes a small Satchel and empties it into the chest as well and goes That is well. Sorry. Keeping it separate so in case In case we got robbed as I think you. Right, you wouldn't lose everything that's so kind of you thinking ahead. What nice friends you have, Scanlan.

Well, you know. They're so giving. They're cool. How was last night, huh? Pretty wild. Thank God the walls were made a stone. Have you all come downstairs or all sitting around? You all eventually come downstairs? We're all having breakfast.

Let's just say I struck out. You? Struck out? Maybe I should have a go. What do they know? No. No. She doesn't like.

I don't like Archon. She's, she's, she's... What is Archine's supposed to? Yeah, what does that mean? She's, she's off limits. Oh. Right? I saw her first. You can't call dibs.

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Are you in love? Yes, you could say so. Oh. Oh, yeah. Did you hear that pie? No, I don't think she did. Do I know what?

What? Scanlon said he said he said he said, he's in love with someone else somebody else can I insight check him you can yeah because it was often quiet in your room Scanlan it's normally so loud it's normally so loud okay heard him insight check 18

were you being honest I think maybe yeah uh no Scalyn seemed uh pretty honest, if guarded. At this point, Dr. Drenzel, is like, speaking of which, where is Kaylee? I haven't seen her all morning. I don't know, she ran off last night,

but we should find her. Oh, you scared another one away? Oh, scared. I kind of liked her. Your breath is disgusting, disgusting. Get a root, do something with it. It's disgusting.

I'm sorry. Oh. Actually, what happened? That's fine. Ask Pike. Pike, what happened? Oh, it's fine. We just had so much fun and we did shots of fire or something. Grog. Water, fire, water. Fog's idea.

Heavy on the file. Grog. What? We had a good time. You had a very good time. You were very passionate. You were like, I need fire water. I said, okay.

No, that sounds like something I'd do. And then we, um, we had a good time. plan to investigate a house and possibly Pilford. Yes, yes. Wait, we did what? Yes, we're gonna go do that today. We're gonna investigate a house. Wait, no, what was the second word you said?

Possibly. Yeah, possibly. The third word you said? Investigate. That one? Yes. What? What? It's a bad guy's house, it'll be fine.

Yes. Who's house? We don't know. We don't know. We don't know. Don't worry about it, Keyleth. We'll talk about it on the way. Yeah, it's all. We're gonna make sure the city's safe from the house.

It's empty. We're just gonna make sure it stays empty and safe. Last time we were there, things attacked us, so we got to double-check it. Yeah, the dragon that we provoked. So, you know. Mysterious things have been happening now. People have been disappearing. What do you all want in the house? Nothing.

What do you all want in the house? We don't know what's in the house. It's a mysterious thing. thing to be happening in this town. Yeah, it's just an investigation. We're going to check it out. We won't do anything untoward. Super easy.

This sounds like nothing we would ever agree to. What? Ever. We would never just agree to investigate a house with nothing. Well, somebody said that they were afraid like bad things were coming out of it. So we're not gonna go into a house with bad things coming out of it.

We don't know what these bad things are. What did we agree to, Percy? Percy, what did we agree to? We... Percy, tell me. We agreed to take a look inside this house, and if there was anything valuable, we would liberate it. And while you guys do that, we'll wait here and eagerly keep an eye out for Kaylee.

And, uh... You want... Yes. How that is it. Yes, please do. And you keep a good eye out for that. Yeah. And if you have a gig tonight, do you have a gig tonight anywhere?

Not this evening, no. All right. You have the ball. You can use our place as a base of operations, but please try not to steal anything else. I wouldn't dream of it, Scarlane. Well, you would dream of it. You would absolutely dream of it. Just don't do it. Got tips us out a little. Wait, now we're gonna...

Understood. Maybe we could pay Jarrett a little overtime. I fully, fully intend. And as you turn and look over at the door, Jarrett's there with his crossbow, still kind of at the side, just kind of look at it in. We're getting sober. Hmm. Thank you. All right, let's go check out this house.

Yeah, let's go. No. You want to stay and take a look after these people? Maybe. Okay. Well, no need to be coy, stinky. I'm not gonna go stealing from some house. We're not stealing, we're investigating.

When you guys aren't even giving me all the information. You'd have it. Maybe if somebody wasn't so drunk last night, they would have had the information. That's very fair. Well, maybe if I didn't have friends who are such douchebags. Oh. Oh. Wow.

She is the worst drunk. And we leave. I didn't even get to see the sunrise. I'll make sure you see a sunrise. Come on, we need you with us anyway. No. To keep us honest. Percy. Pike. Pike.

I kind of just, I think we should just go. Yes! You know, how about we just go? You could just wait outside just in case something happens. Fex. I don't want to steal anything either. We should take it. At this point, Zed, the kind of rather rotund drummer

is finished eating his breakfast. He's got bits of egg kind of in his beard. He kind of spins around and goes, I am more than welcome to stay here with us. Yes, she is, because it's our house. As do we do this the last day we leave, so at the very least. I don't even know what we're doing. Yeah, we're going to go to the house.

We're going. I'll walk out. Hello, she's coming. I'm coming. Trinket follows before I do. Okay. Trinket's coming. Trinket is a bear.

Yes, a wise bear. Kate, seriously. I don't want to stand anything. I'm going to find out why these. hear me, I'm whispering to her. I think we're already on our way, aren't we? We're walking. I want to find out why they want to get into the house. That's all.

Look at it this way. Something shady's going on. The last time we were there, something looked at us through things on the wall. Right? And we haven't been back since. And we fled. We have no idea what we left behind. We left in a hurry. And the new owners also left in a hurry. Okay. Let's go. We're keeping things safe. No, we should stay. We should go to hell. Yeah, let's fucking go. We're keeping things safe. Fox Machina, woo, let's go.

Alright, it's tough being the good one. So, uh... I don't like them at. Are we taking the bear or leaving the bear? Yeah, what are we gonna do? Fucking taking the fucking bear. All right, let's go. Just a simple... The simple. This is my whole fighting fucking thing

is I have a fucking bear. That's the whole point of the class that I took. I keep the bear. What kind of class? They're going to night school. Yeah, classes. Writing, creative writing. Creative writing.

Immon community college. I'm learning things every day. Everyone says words. I don't know what all these words mean. What's a douchebag? We can remember how to get back to that house, right? Yeah. Just skate over that one.

You guys make your way towards the top district. You go out to the gates and you find your way across the central kind of residential area to the far northeast side of the district. This is further away from the palace within viewing distance from a lower's tower, which still stands over the entirety of the district, like this looming monolith, currently empty and cold as she's over in white stone for this investigation. However, you do come across the familiar site of General Krieg's homestead. the one that you infiltrated a little over a year ago. It looks like it's a little dilapidated,

but it's, strangely enough, for a person who's purchased this estate, there wasn't much attempt to try and beautify it, or the ivy has just kind of overgrown the bottom of it. There is still the Iron Gate around it. It is currently closed, and there are no guards posted around it. It just looks kind of empty and vacant dark in the windows. It's about noon. Have a look around?

Yeah. Go around the back. Yeah. You guys scoot around to the back side. Anything particularly looking for? Any signs of life? Anyone around, watching? Perception check. Does you wish to look around? Oh. 16. All right. We have Percy and Vax kind of glance over. You take a about five minutes or so, just paying very close attention

to any sort of possible movement or light within the building. Nothing. It is dark. It is motionless. The windows are closed. It's just a dark interior, and you can't really make any details out of the inside from this point because it is so closed off. Some of the curtains are actually been drawn shut, but not all of them. A few of the windows are open. What about around the house, outside the house? Outside the house, the grass, the lawn that surrounds this.

Or surrounding buildings. Surrounding buildings, there are a number of other homes. as well, but like I said, this area is the more upper-class, upper crust aspect of Eman, a number of various manners and rather decadent buildings. Each building has its own color scheme, its own architecture. Each thing is trying to be distinct and different in this kind of microcosm of the societal space of Eman, where most of the gold passes through, they have their own worries about presentation, which is interesting, because in the In the middle of all these very beautiful homes, you have General Krieg's home, which is pretty basic red brick, utilitarian, and kind of sticks out like a sore thumb by comparison, or doesn't stick out at all by comparison because it's just so normal looking.

Can I just ask you guys before we do anything, maybe it would be best to, I mean, tell the guards that we're in very very investigating a disappearance, we've heard things about the house and we need to check inside. What cards? I agree. Are there are. Are there? Are there?

We're not going in, but if we say we're going in the house because we worry for it, then it's okay. Should we tell them when we go to the bathroom too? Maybe, Quark. We're above them in rank. Yeah. Not, but the guards have the ability to call higher authorities. higher authorities on us, so we don't want people.

Guards that we can see right now. Glancing about, there are none in your immediate vicinity. You're not that far from the Citrine Garrison, which is the centerpiece of the higher military folk, and they do have their own guard station about. You're about a 10-minute walk from the palace, which has a number of guards throughout. And you do have some patrols that come to the city,

but in the middle of the day, in the cloud top, it's not as pressing a place for guard presence, so you haven't seen any immediately around you. But I'm sure if you wait for the next like 15, 20 minutes, one will probably come your way. I mean, they probably have a key to General Creek's place. You just barge on in. Well, it's owned by someone, isn't it?

It is his private property. Somebody buy it after him. Yes, it's a private property. Oh. I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, go tell the guard, so we want to go inspect something. Well, we're better at this than then.

Let's just, I just, I'm just, I'm just, I'm just, I'm. go do what we do. Right, Trinket? Mm. As he growls into your ear. No. How can you resist that? If we come across a god, I'll be happy to inform them before. Well, why don't we at least do a little bit of pre-planning?

Do we need like a warrant or something like that? Oh, fuck God, I walk up to the door and knock really loud. There's a gate around the outside. There is a gate. I thought we were on the back. No. There's a round back. The gate, the fence itself is about seven feet tall with, you know, little metal

poodle paler spikes on top. I'll hop over that. All right, go ahead and make an acrobatics check. Hop check. 15. Okay, okay. You definitely avoid falling upon one and spearing your manhood, thankfully,

as you grab the edge of, kind of loftily heft yourself over the top of the gate, landing within the other side of the kind of browning yard that hasn't been well kept. You might want to tell the guard, I'm walking on the yard. Oh, Jesus. Let him know, I'm going, and I go off towards the house. Such a take.

God walks away from you guys towards the house, brazenly in the middle of the midday sign. God, that rhymed, well done. And I stand next to Vex, irritated. Okay. And during that whole exchange, I've just been changing cloaks, I'm putting on the red one.

Great. Okay. He's got like 17. I don't need. to be subtle, I'm just standing around. You guys are arguing he's making a fool of you. I'm just changing my clothes. I think if you would be so kind as to just

have 17 clothes. Work the game. Do you bring around one of those like rolling wardrobe racks? Yeah, rolling wardrobe racks. It's on wheels, it's on wheels. It's functional. It bobbles on the cobblestones.

I said you guys go ahead. Follow me. They really, they smush up to about the size of the cabbage. That's really all right. So you have a very wrinkly red drug up right now. What I think is that Grog and Pike should lead the way, stealth in, pick all the locks, and I think everything will go really well.

I'm just going to hang back. I think that's the way to do it. Please, just do your magic. No, I think this seems like a great idea. I don't even know this. Grog just not. That's fist is now hitting walking to the front gate. You know, I could sky write that we're here in the sky again. There's no reason to be stealthy about it.

There's no way. and so at the door. Can I try picking the lock? Do you have a lock pick? She's gonna literally try picking the lock, yes. Do I have a lock pick? I take Pike by the hand and go, here you go, chum, and I slap down my set in her hand.

Vex appears seemingly out of nowhere and slaps his lock picks into your hand. So, Pike, I'm having much better at that. It happens to everyone. Pike, you want to try and pick the lock? Yeah. All right. Do it. Do it. Go ahead and roll a D20.

Do it. And just add your dexterity. I'm going to inspire her. Okay, go for it. God. There's no way this is not going. All right, I'm going to inspire her. There once was a gnome with a mace who had an adorable face.

She never would bed me, but I hope she won't forget me. Because oh, how I do love the chase. That is a real easy D10 inspiration, I think. That's a panty dropper, as Sam would say. would say. Yes. I would. So go and roll D20, add just your dexterity modifier.

Sam's a friend of ours. Okay. Which is what? So in addition to the 20, in addition to the 20? Yeah, what would you roll? I rolled a six. Okay. And then what's your dexterity modifier?

One. That's a seven. Now go ahead and roll a D10 and add that to it. Okay. I rolled a nine. Oh! That helps. All right.

You are very inspired. Wow. Okay, that puts you at a 15, which is actually directly to the seat at the door. Wait, 16, 16. Even better. Everybody meets a new road. With the rattle of metal plate, the untrained eye. And a couple times you hear the metal kind of beginning to bend as she, having no previous

experience really with lock picks from what you know, you're afraid she's going to break your tool set. However, she's picked up a few things while she was at sea with, you know, more of the swash buck to the western shores. And much to your surprise, she, the door opens and the dark interior of the home is at your disposal. This is our problem. We've been approaching doors without pike. Yep.

Who, he needs pie. The door slayer. I reach down and high-bond. The door slayer. She pushes massive statues, she unlocks all doors. I stick my head in the door and I go, hello, is anyone home? I give him.

I give his pick back to him. Okay. And I say it was just, it was just Lux back. It was just luck back. Shut up, baby, I know it. I came back and I go, there's nobody answering from inside, Vex, you might want to go tell the God no one's inside.

Really? I feel like we have a blessing of Sarenrae, though, to go inside of this man. As you step into the home a little bit, the first thing you know is the smell. An immediate pungent scent of decay hits your nose. The source is not an immediate visual range, and you can't really tell what type of decay it is, but it's definitively a terrible smell,

and one that permeates the interior of the foyer. It smells like roses inside. I'm coming in. All right, you come in. Except for the sin experience. As you guys walk in It catches you off guard. There's the main foyer open before you. The only light currently within the interior is the bit of sunlight that's bouncing in from the front open doors and a few of the windows in the distance. To your left is a dining room. There's a big red carpet in the center of the room. There's tapestries for the world. Actually, the decor in here is much more garish than you recall. When you were last here, it was very simple. It was very minimalist, and you got the impression that the house for the most part was not being lived in outside of the servant. You recall there was a passageway across from the foyer that led to a gallery. and that, which had the trap room, the little portal in it.

Yep. Oh, right. Yes. The false way off the back. Should we have there? Wait, let's find the source of the smell. Trinket is actually really good at sniffing things out, so maybe he can lead us to the smell. Good boy.

Drink it comes slipping off. Go ahead and make a perception check for a drinket. There's our music. Okay. It's too much. It's advantage because of his. smell. True. What? Wow, those suck both times. Shut up. They do. 16. Oh, that's good.

Enough to open a door. Okay. So Trinket sniffs through, steps into the center of the foyer, kind of pushes just past the carpet into the middle of the dining room and looks up at the table, and as soon as you look over and Trinket kind of growls for a moment. And you see there, see there on the Sunday room table is a meal set up, drink, food, but is completely molded over to the point where parts of it have kind of bloated and spilled off and liquid is kind of, you know. Welcome to Mick Unplugged, the number one podcast for self-improvement and modern leadership.

I'm Mick Hunt, your host, and I'm here to challenge your why and fuel your because. This is where leaders, entrepreneurs, and go-getters, to level up. Each week, I bring you unfiltered conversations, game-changing strategies, and the kind of motivation that transforms lives and legacies. I've learned from legends like Les Brown, Damon John, and Robert Irvine. And now, I'm bringing their lessons, along with mine, straight to you. From modern leadership tips to creating unstoppable momentum, this is the podcast that redefines what's possible. Hit play, subscribe, and join the million who've made Mick Unplug their go-to source for growth and greatness, because your next

breakthrough is just one episode away. This is Mick Unplug, the voice and face of modern leadership entrepreneur and self-improvement. Let's get started. Look, there are a lot of celebrity interview podcasts out there, but there's only one happy, sad, confused. I'm Josh Horowitz, and yeah, I'm the host of the show, so I'm a little biased, but truly happy, sad, confused is the place for nerdy and intimate, conversations with all your favorite actors and filmmakers.

From Andrew Garfield and Scarlett Johansson to Christopher Nolan, casting what ifs, backstage stories, and much more. Listen to HappySaid Confused on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. The petrescence is kind of spread across part of the surface. I throw the gas mask on. It's been there for quite some time. You don't know quite how long. Free food grown. I know it smells pretty good in it.

Is there dust on the ground? Is there, has it been that long? Yeah, you check down and you kind of put your finger across it. And it is a little dusty. It's not been an extremely long period of time, but there's a layer of dust. Is there anything, like, changing the dust? Is there any tracks in it or anything?

Currently, from what you can see? No. Have we all entered? You've all begin to walk into the four, yes. Let's search the upstairs first. See if there's a body or otherwise. Oh, God, this isn't helping with the hangover. Does the smell get more intense?

more intense at the food? Yes, the smell gets more intense as you enter the dining room. Oh, so that's the food. I almost can't smell you. Can I kind of like Druidcraft the table and take like the decaying food and maybe I don't know, grow some flowers out of it, try and make it look nice? Compost it? Try and compost it, yeah. Sure. You take a moment and concentrate and I use your druid craft. The fungus begins to reform and more mushroom-like spores begin to appear out of it and sprout from the current festering mass. Whereas once was just like a nasty spore cloud-based fungus you've now converted into almost a colored mushroom type presentation. I don't eat it, Grog.

They're probably lessen the stench over time, but no immediate effect as the smell has been hanging here stagnant for quite a while. It's a little bit of a while. Thank you for you. It's like a big old terrarium now. So it's a big old house. Can we like split up and get it all the way? Split the party. Yeah.

Split the party. We've all got earrings. Let's just start checking rooms and we'll get to the room that we know is iffy lost. Okay. So wait, we're checking all the rooms that are probably okay. Yes. I'm going to start upstairs check the bedrooms. You mean the not okay part being the teleportation room? Yes.

Yes. All right. What's that pipe? Can I? spirit guardians to be around us. Oh. You can. What is the duration on that one?

10 minutes. Yeah, you can do that. Nice. So as you guys are walking in, Pike clasps her holy symbol, closes her eyes for a second, and you begin to see these almost glowing orbs, like these kind of ghostly entities that just begin to swirl and follow around you.

Wow. Similar in the spirit stuff as to the color of Pike's form, when she was alongside you guys in Whitestone. Who's heading upstairs? I'll go upstairs with Percy. Sure. Okay. Anybody else?

Sure, I'll go upstairs too. Is there a downstairs? Like a cellar? There is, but we're not going there again. The downstairs would be the path that you guys found last time. I should remind everybody that you were immune? You didn't inspect the rest of the house at that point.

There's lots of downstairs rooms. We should remind everyone you are immune to poison, you are immune to curse, you've got a bonus on wisdom saving throws, and plus 1D10 temporary hit points. Oh. From the Heroes Piece. Yep.

Nice. Poison charm. What was it? Currie. I may remember them all. All right. Well, you guys go upstairs and we'll clear out this floor before we go anywhere else, and we'll wait for you to come back down.

I'll stay on the middle floor. I'll be team middle floor. As Vex, Scanlan, and Percy head towards the stairway, they step across the red carpet in the center of the foyer. Need all three of you to make a dexterity saving first. Oh, God. Oh, I didn't see perception. Exception. Shit balls. Textility, huh?

Natural 20. It is. Nice. Shit. 24. 12. Adequate. As you all step across, there's a sudden smell of,

you've had, you've smelled it before, and it's the fresh strike of a lightning bolt or something that is, has burned in the atmosphere. You look over at Percy and both of you feel that. this kind of slight bit of tension, energy in the room, and you dodge out of the way. At which point, suddenly, there is a burst of force energy from the center of the room that surrounds Scanlan, blasting you in the process, and you feel like you're lifted off your feet, but instead of being thrown upwards, you slam into what feels like a roof that's far too low than the one you've seen. You go ahead and take 16 points of force damage. Okay. And you land on the ground prone. You look up around you, and there is a

of arcane force energy right now that is holding you in place in a 10 by 10 foot area. Just, oh shit. They didn't even make it out of the room, right? This is in the room that we're rolling. This is in the four. You guys just don't want, all right, we're doing this. Go. Not even two steps into your plan. So we're all still there. We can see them? Yeah, you all see Scamlin currently now trapped in this force cage. The long, ghostbustering.

Don't mind. Don't mind. Hang on, hang on, hang on. Let's just leave them for a minute. Just leave them. Can we leave it? There's a fierce wind. I could fix it. But why don't we leave it?

Can you dimension door out? Scan that? Roll another dexterity check. Oh, shit. It's closing on, isn't it? Natural 20. Okay. You can see the cage itself, its unstable energy occasionally arcs across, like a Tesla oil.

And you just managed to dodge out of the way. You can see now this cage not just holds you in place, but it also perpetually tries to try to damage those who are captured. Oh, I just manage. I feel a little bad. I'll let them out. Just spell magic. Oh, you've got that. Okay.

I did today. As Keylet waves her hand, now the entire force cage is vanishes into the air. Oh, did you guys see that? Yeah. It was like, you know, an aquarium. It was kind of fun to watch. Yeah.

An aquarium at death. You were like a dick in a box. Oh, the glow. Yeah, no, that works. Oh, wow. Wow. Step one, let's go gently checking for traps as we go up to the stairs. Thank you, Keelah. I'll say for the purpose, I take it back about your brother.

The purposes of this, everyone roll an investigation check. Everyone who's going upstairs? Everyone is going upstairs. Natural 20. 28. 14. Okay. The three of you going upstairs, you find no further traps. You go through the rooms on the top floor. you find that where previously most of them are empty a lot of them been furnished now but most of the furnishings have been untouched like the house was being set up

to be almost like a summer home or a side home for no signs of life but no signs of life everything seems to have the same layer of dust that you found on the floor of the foyer there is no real wealth being kept here because I know that's probably what you're looking for it looks like whoever had intended to this this collector hadn't quite gotten to the point of wanting to move any of their fortune or the masses into the upstairs area. All right. But it has been

largely untouched for a number of months. So we go down. Now, we're looking for paintings, amazing, old painting? 14. Oh, 11. 11. Grog?

Oh, 11. Pike? 13. Okay. You guys take a little while to the kitchen. You find a basement. You open the latch

and you go down and look throughout, and it smells kind of mildewed down there, but just from general dampness, almost like recent rainy weather, just kind of soaked into the ground soil there and was left to mildew a bit. But the, you don't find any other signs of life, looking about all the rooms. Like you find the music room, there's the main kind of living den area. Mostly, it's almost like a showroom. Like everything was set up, but then never had the chance to actually host anyone or someone to actually live there and enjoy it.

Are there any further signs, kind of like the feast of people leaving in a hurry that seems like someone was here in the left really fast? From what you can tell, the meal that was prepared, the pots and pans and stuff that were used to cook it, are currently in like a small basin that carries a little bit of still water that's just been slowly evaporating over time with bits of dried food and crusted around the sides. The meal itself appears to have been abandoned not in haste. There's no signs of a struggle. The fork is still resting partially in the now mushroom fungus-fungus covered pile. Even getting near it, you're still like, mm-hmm. But there doesn't appear to be a sign of a struggle. What's up? How big was the feast?

It looks like it was just made for one person. Interesting. Are there any sculptures or pieces of all downstairs or like desks? Actually, there are a number of rather garish tapestries around. One of them, or a number of them are just of different animals running and hunting and chasing, not like in a very beautiful way, but like the kind that you'd find at an airport. What? Just kind of, you know, a very, you know, Cade, first of light, you know.

Wow, you paint a picture there. Yeah, they're all traumatic and similar and none of them seem to have any other thing rather than whoever order them seems to like animals. No historical acts, no mythology, nothing like that. No, not in this current setup. Detect magic on any of them? You scoot through them kind of using, do you have detect magic, memorize? No.

I just kind of want it to like arcane it. Then make an arcana check. This is to inspect and see if you see any signs of. I'm not good at it. So mildly hungover. Yeah, it's still really hungover. 14. 14.

Going from place to place, nothing seems to jump out at you as enchanted or any sort of arcane nature. The only room you haven't inspected yet is the hallway across from the foyer, the one that led into the original gallery room and then into the hidden. The funhouse. Let's all go. Can we check the fucking carpet? Huh? Can I do a... Remember there were a shit ton of traps before we got to.

What's up, Pike? Well, Grog's our trap, man. Can I do a religion? check just to see if there's any Beckna stuff here? Yeah, smart. Mm. Yeah, make a religion check. 20.

Looking about and keeping this in mind, you don't see any sort of religious iconography, any of the artwork, any of the small knickknacks that are throughout the den. Nothing here speaks of any sort of religious connotation, or at least whoever has decorated this place, did so purely out of just a visual aesthetic choice. So yeah, nothing catches your attention in this room. Okay.

All right. Let's go. That's good. All right. Who's going first? Pike? Sure. Pike, then grog.

Is there the marching order here? This is going to the... Trinket, then me. Drink it? Then me. In person. Just Pike get a cloak. I guess me.

me. All right. Then Vax's Wardrow Rack. Then me. No, it's got to go behind, but I have to pull it behind. All right. Do I get that invisibility cloak again? No.

All right. You guys stop to, it's a short hallway, and it leads you into a 20 by 80 long room. And here you do see a number of tab. And there are the ones that were left previously, actually. This room has not really been tight. touched much since you came in when Krieg currently lived here. You can see these tapestries are much older. These ones depict more mythological moments. One of them shows like the elemental creation of existence. It's almost like a biblical type, very artistic representation of the

creation of the different planes. You've seen it done before. Is that the same one that was here last time? Yeah. Same one, right? Yeah, same one. You do see there are a number of small cylindrical platforms. platforms that rise up in the center of this room. You see on the first sets a series of bronze busts of a particular man wearing a cloth wrap headpiece. His features are still kind of nondescript. There's a lot of detail in the clothing and the kind of the neck wrap and the head wrap. But when it comes to the actual features of the face, it's very simple and plain. Not enough to recognize anything.

Kind of like a god of secret. No? No. I'm actually going to ask you all to roll a history check. Oh, all nice. Come on, me, you're right, die. Okay, go, wait, go, wait, go, wait. 22. 26. All right. Nice. What is this a history? History, yeah.

Or herstery. 21. Horstery, personally. All righty. So, glancing at this, the three of you, you don't recognize the face at all. at all. And the best you could recall is there have been tales in a far-off continent called Marquette, which is a largely desert, like desert landscape. The few bastions of civilization that exist in this desert, there is one that is a central town, referred to as Enkarel.

You've never been there, you've heard of it, and it's this little oasis in the center of this vast desert. Oh, oh, wait. Yeah. That's where risk or was going to go. It's also where Jarrett is from. Jarrett's a mole. Kill him.

And you've heard that the city has been lured over and run in a very benevolent way by an individual referred to as Jamon Sa'ord. Jamon Sa'ord. The city has existed for about 400 years, and since his existence has... has been run by Jemann Saort. People don't know if he's human, what he is,

but he's apparently lived that long. How long? 400 years, it was released. But the most that you've heard about Jemann is human, but his features are hard to make out. Like even to look into his face, it still seems like you can't focus. That doesn't sound good.

That's as much as you can assert. And those thoughts come to you three, and you see this busts, these series of busts that seem to depict this individual. And it's best to your knowledge, that's probably an artist depiction of Jemann Saourd. Which you've never seen in Tal'Dore, anything of this type of construct. But we know that that's where Riscoll wanted to go as well. I'm going to pull out the symbol of Bechnad that I took off of Riscoll.

Okay. I feel like we might have, I feel like that's not also the first time we've heard of On Karol. Well, Jared's from there. I feel like even before then, like a long time ago. Can I check the traps while that's all? Marquette. Marquette is the continent, correct? Correct, yes.

And Encarell is the city within the continent. On. 20. It's like a desert continent. The whole continent is like desert. Desert mountains. So it's like Australia. Okay. I'm looking about there are no traps in this room.

It looks to be pretty clean, pretty clear. Also, there are the pillars. There are a few other things. golden T set made appear gold on one of the pillars. There is a mostly, a very old-looking set, not complete set of ivory carved dominoes. There is a human skull, a humanoid skull. It doesn't quite look human. It looks elongated and the teeth are sharpened. It looks almost elvish. With one eye socket has an uncut, rough emerald embedded in the socket. Which one? The right socket.

It's pretty pretty cool sounding. That's straight up Goonies. This place has been pilfered before, and no one took that. I go over to the dominoes. I'm going to examine the skull. Okay. I'm going to help Percy examine the skull. Okay.

Are you just taking a look at it? I'm taking a look at it. I'm checking to see if it's attached to the, it's sitting on a column? It's sitting on one of the columns, it's part of the collection. It's just seeing if it's attached at all and then very gently turning it. turning it if it has not, if I don't see any. As you kind of reach out and take it in its weight and you lift it off the slingledishable pillar.

I don't quite, yeah. I wasn't quite, I was just gonna turn it. I wasn't quite gonna lift it. Well, as you turn it, it turns freely. All right, I give it a little lift. You lift it up off of the pillar. And as you do that, Ques the boulder.

Thank you, very, everything happens. It is in your hands. However, everyone dies. Yeah. It's heavier than you expected it would be. And... Oh God's gonna talk to me, isn't it? There's a part of you that just kind of

like a slight cold chill runs down your spine. A recognizable cold chill or a brand new cold chill? No. Just like every person has that little part in the back of their head that says, this probably isn't a good idea, but whatever. I hate you. So much.

So you're holding it in your hand. What do you want to do? Like a magnet for evil. I'm a little evil magnet, I know. I'm checking, is the emerald set or is it the emerald just, is it set into the socket or is it removable? It's set in the socket actually. And the emerald, go ahead and make perception check.

All right. Natural 20. All right. Glancing into the socket here, you can see, the emerald is actually set within the socket It is set with meticulously jewel-crafted gold inlay that actually kind of almost like a very deep set filigree that binds it within the socket itself. It's very deliberately placed. And the craftsmanship of the very fine gold filigree, and yet the uncut nature of the emerald seems strange. And as you inspect the emerald itself, it seems almost like while the gem itself is stationary, there is the ever so very,

faint image of movement within the gem, almost like a freshly disturbed pond, like a slight ripple of the surface of water. There is just ever so slowly shifting within the gem. I think I found something evil. Maybe you should not be touching it. Can I do like a nature check to see if I can recognize what kind of a skull it might be? Sure. The skull does not come from any beasts that you're familiar with. You've not encountered a creature of this physiology. And it definitely doesn't come from the realm of nature,

from your understanding. Pike, don't you think you should have a look at it? Yeah, can I give it a, what do you see inside the gem? It's like a ripple, almost like a pond. It's just gently disturbed. Oh, I have a thought. Why? Yeah.

This is precisely the sort of awful thing that I would design I wanted a way to look into a hallway. Oh. I'm going to place it back on the column facing the wall. Okay. Like, do you want to look at it further? Can I, can I give it a look? I kind of want to look at the T-sit.

I know, I want to go look at the T-set. Let's look at the evil skull first. Okay, so. What are you trying to check about the skull? I don't know, like, if it's, if it's, if it's, I don't, I don't know, I don't know what to check. If it's evil? Is that like an Arcona check or?

Depends on what nature you're trying to ascertain of the skull. You're trying to figure out. Yeah, I mean, I want to check if it's evil, but I don't know. It seems like it is. I mean, we've been talking about... There are spells called Detect Good and Evil. Some fuck nut with one eye, I feel like... Yeah.

Oh, it's back there? Yeah, it was the left eye. It's in its right eye. Still. Still, yeah, but still. And its left eye is empty. Do detect good and evil. That's be nervous.

I have it, I have it, I have it, I have it. Let me do that. Do you have memorized? Yep, it's right up here. All right, so, as per the spell, I get the rules up here real fast, and because the question comes up often, you want this app on your phone, it's called Fight Club Five.

Nice in the store for free. You have to kind of do some updates and uploading of your own to find information on the web on how to do it, but that way you know and stop tweeting. I won't tweet them about them later. I don't mind. It's fine. All right, so. Tech good, Neil. You're going good. All right, so you take a moment and you focus in... By the way, this is a concentration spell.

Doing this will get rid of your spirit guardians. Okay. I think that's okay. I think that's fine, that's fine. Okay. So as the, the orbs that have been rotating around for the past, you know, it's been about 10 minutes, they probably would have faded anyway. Gently dissipate. You focus your intent on the skull. And this object, while it is not a desecrated object per se, there is an essence with inside that does not strike you as moral. There is something about its very nature that does give you pause.

You're unable to ascertain the nature, given the fact that you would have to take some time with it to really do so. but you get the feeling that there is some power within it, but probably not the kind that is very fortuitous for someone of your persuasion. Okay. I think it's bad. You think it's bad? Let's have it face the wall. I don't want it looking at us. Okay. Can I go take the top off the T-set and look inside?

you go ahead and take the top off the T set and look inside. It is empty. It is polished, and the light that comes in and as you open the top, it just kind of refracts the image from the outside of the T set, and it's just a beautiful craftsmanship. The actual gold itself is very smooth on most of the T kettle of and stuff and all the cups themselves all have very, very intricate scrolling on them that have been hand-carved in. It's a beautiful set. This is like a royal gift. This is something that, you know, people who, who trade across political boundaries used to, you know, send goodwill to the other side. This is probably worth quite a bit. Is somebody stamping on it to, like, show who it's from or anything like that?

You look on the bottom and it has the initials L.M. Love, Macna. The street cousin of Beckna. I would recommend that if we are going to preloin things, we should do it on the way out rather than the way in. Yeah, definitely. All right. dominoes just like on a table? Yeah, some of them are set on the side, there's a stack,

and then a few of them are set up. It's deliberately placed in like a nice presentational like QVC style. Turn it and look at all the cool dominoes type. I'll grab the table and I'll shake it. Okay. All the dominoes scatter and fall off the sides. To be clicking on the ground, some of the ivory chips

a little bit on some of the corners. Oh! I think that seems to happen. I think it's evil. It's dominoes, of course it's evil. I'll reach down now. I'll pick up one of the ivory dye. Stands there, cold against the very well. You taste it. As your tongue touches the ivory of the domino, it tastes somewhat salty. I believe it tastes like a domino.

Okay. Can we go look at the teleportation thing now? Let's go down. All right. You guys make your way to the far back wall of the room, and there is that same tapestry that you saw before. It depicts a large storm cloud that is roaring over the cliffs. I'm just going to peek behind the tapestry. There's a door behind there. You open up tapestry and it's just a flat stone wall. Okay, nothing there.

Are you sure? I lick the wall. Okay. As you lick the wall, your face passes through the wall. Oh! Oh! Isn't that the same door we found this? Yeah, we've already done this once, you guys.

It's not a crazy. I forgot about that. Where did my face go! It was just like a little bit. this last time except there was brunch. That's all I remember. As your head passes through, you kind of look about and you can see stairs that descend

for about 40 feet into darkness. I grabbed Scanlon by the strut and pull him back. I thought we accidentally found him. I started. I grabbed my sister by the ear behind me. Oh, ow, I'm laughing so bit. So wait, wait. There's still the tapestry in front of it?

Yeah, there's a tapestry in front of me. Can I take the tapestry off? You can, yeah. I kind of want to like take it and kind of put it over my shoulders and jump a little. Like make it a parachute? Yeah. Okay. See if it's a flying in a tapestry.

Okay, as you take the tapestry and you put it around, you grab onto the ends of it and you jump in the air. It jumps with you and lands with you. It's a very heavy tapestry. Most tabitry is the amount of craftsmanship that goes into it, the material. This one particular, it falls. very, very heavily against the wall and doesn't really gather any arrow. In her defense, the last time she tried this, it did fly away. It's not a flying tapestry. Good try. Maybe just put it over top of that skull and keep it hidden for now.

Okay, I take the tapestry to put it over the skull. Okay. As you throw the tapestry on top of the skull. Oh boy. Nothing? You're such a hassle. It's all explodes. Just fun to mess with you guys. All right, so you guys progress down the stairway?

Yeah. Perception check. ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ. Stown back. Oh, God, really? 20. 19. One.

Glancing in the next room, and this is a small chamber, you guys have seen before, it's about 30 feet across in the far end. There is a small circular stone platform about six inches thick, which has deep inset ruins carved in a circular pattern across it. It's less polished than the ones you've seen at the Lyceum in Imon, but it is definitely the last teleportation circle you took to the cavern that housed General Krieg, where you had your encounter.

And the last time we were here, I found a safe path through. Do I remember it? You actually distinctly recall the pattern, the best of your ability. Up up, down, down, left, right. I want you to go ahead and make a wisdom check. You have advantage. Thanks. No, wait, the saving grows, never mind. That's terrible then.

I could use luck. I couldn't use luck, yeah. 20. 20, yeah. You recall the exact pattern through. Leading the way, stepping from stone to stone to stone, you guys following his pattern, you managed to make away all of you, including Trinket who has to...

Yeah, it wasn't nice last time. He remembers. You make your way all the way across the room to the teleportation circle, and this is the end of this portion of the hallway. What do you wish to do? Do we step onto it? How does it work? I don't remember. I think we just run ahead. You just step on to the platform. Wait, does it look like there's been anybody in here since we were left? Go ahead and make a survival check. Survival. What, enough? That's my third one of the night. Can I do that one too?

It's all like survival stuff pretty well. Can I assist Grog in finding if our footsteps were the last one's out? True. I was giving this more to the, as a means of giving the train tracker a better look into this. I'll give you a simple perception check as you're not quite sure. Where's the unnatural one?

But with Keyless help, that will give you advantage. I love it. All right. It's hard to tell. This room itself is pretty dark. The little sconces that hold this kind of low flicker of eternal arcane light. Even they're just gently flickering on the sides of the walls.

And the low light, it's hard to make out any details to the ground. And for the most part, the stonework here seems unchanged. So. They suck. Are we going on to the teleportation path? Let's do it. I guess so. I think we assume we're walking into trouble.

Trouble is our middle's names. Well, let's think of what happened last time we were here. There was a dragon, there was some loot. There was a bunch of gold. There was a bunch of gold. And there were three eyes in a wall. Saying they were coming for us. Saying they were coming for us.

Didn't we crack one of them? We did crack one of them. One cracked. They all cracked. But we weren't the. Maybe they've reformed. That what were those? Four orbs and then one eye showed up

one of the orbs and then all four. Can we send like a probe? Can't you make a little person, a little fake little person? Well, hang on, hang on, hang on. I can make a fake person to push something or lift something, but he won't be able to. Can't take a magic ride. These aren't the same gyms that we're holding

Uriel's family. No, those were different. These were dragon eye things. How I miss your damn ponies. These were palan tiers hanging in a wall where another dragon somewhere peeked through and was like, oh, let's do it. All right, let's just go through.

through. Okay. Is each one of you step on individually under the platform, there's a brief moment of the wind beneath your stomach being lifted, you feel those butterflies hit as suddenly your imagery shifts, and immediately you find yourself standing on a similar platform elsewhere. As you step off, as you feel force pushing you forward, as each individual starts appearing behind in rapid succession, immediately you notice the air changed to extremely cold. You recall the, there's a...

This is right, it was in the mountain cave. Yeah. Looking around, you can see, there are directly near you, there are a few stalagmites with a little, like, layer of snow and ice on it, and there is some, a couple patches of what looks to be bits of ice that are kind of solidified on parts of the floor. Across the way you can see immediately

a large portion of the entire tunnel has collapsed. There were just piles of rocks and stones that have filled about 60 to 65% of what was previously General Krieg, or as you found the name to be, Brimsyth, Brimsyth, sorry. Rimsyth's chambers. All the rocks had crumbled onto where the dragon horde that you were rage looting before currently resided now just held beneath the boulders and rocks. There are pockets of the cave that are walkable. To the left, it ends to where the boulders and rubble has fallen. To the right, it continues outward towards the outside of the mountain where you guys recall stepping to the edge of the precipice, and you notice that

this mountain was very, very high up in the mountain range somewhere in the world where there were just ice and snow-capped mountains as far as you could see into the valley of high crags. Well, if I recall, it wasn't too far from Stillbend, right? Because Keyleth kind of recognized it as for home mountains, like two hours. You recognize it as the cliff keep. Right. Which is the large mountain range of the north of Tal'Dorei, which contains Craghammer.

The very south-based contains Gat Shadow. And it's where the Umbra Hills leads up into. It's a huge mountain range, but it's in that range. It's a huge mountain range, but it's in that range. Is there any sign of the pile of gold that Grog started rating? Make a perception check. Make a perception, check. Everybody?

Everybody wants to look around. I want to look at all. How do I cast? Oh, 18. Oh, 18. 17. That's all I've cast, right? Percy, do it.

Check, yo. Checking. Oh. Nine. Natural 20. Yes. All right. Yes.

The combined vision of U3, dancing about. You see there are scattered bits of gold and silver, occasionally visible around the floor, but they're all independent and kind of probably thrown about during the scuffle or the collapse. You guys notice, one, there are bits of dragon bone trapped beneath the rocks. Exposed elements of these bones appear to be scraped and already sundered by somebody harvesting the remains, the long decayed remains of Brimsyth. You also notice there are two tunnels to the north and south side of this chamber across from where you guys entered. They're smooth, about 10 feet in diameter, and both kind of carve into

the heart of the rock. Can I do a nature check? Sure, go for it. Sure, go for it. Yeah. Don't those fuckers do that type of shit? 20 total. 20?

Okay. You, the way these tunnels are created, and you've seen Umberhulks and things of that nature carved through, there is a rough aspect to that digging and burrowing process where the Earth itself has kind of an uneven, you know, a general purpose direction, but is in itself a very kind of haphazard just grab and tear what's in your way type. the form of burrowing. These are round and smooth. You know, like scratch marks, claw marks, almost seems mechanical type of it. I'll assist in that perception check.

Okay, you guys can do that. And none of us remember them from... No. No. In fact, one of them is burrowing through the actual rubble on the north side by where the horde was buried. No. All right, taking a look. That's because it's the flat.

13. Okay. As you step up and look about the rubble, the best you can make out is parts of the rock. And the rock here has been set since the collapse of the side of the tunnel. There are a series of scratch marks across the set stones and rocks here, Meaning that something large has rummaged through the rubble here. Something with bladed or clawed appendages has been here and has very viciously or hurriedly attempted to find its way through the rubble. The dragon. Yeah. You also notice there are a few small, there is, there is a to the kind of immediate left and kind of northwestern side of this cavern, there is a small

alcove that just appears, disappears into the wall out of sight. It's... I'm going to go check that out. That wasn't there before. Could it... Or was that one there before? It wasn't... No, that was there before, yeah. Is it a small acove? Does it seem like this could have been made by dragon, these scratch marks and stuff?

Uh, you, dragons... Yeah, is your favorite enemy. Go ahead and make a... Go ahead and make a... I'm scared of all of my 20s, right? Right now. Come on, roll, roll good. Roll that shit.

Go ahead and make a nature check. A nature check? Yeah, with the advantage because it's your name. Oh, shaka. Well, this would be more, this would be, these dragons are magical entities. It would be more Arcana, but yeah. Plus two on dragon check. Arcana?

They're magical entities. I'll give you either or, but what did you get? What did you roll? Just don't know what you rolled. I rolled 16, but I get plus two on any investigation for dragon info stuff. Okay. So these marks across could very easily have come from a dragon, a very large one. You also notice that there are elements of the rocks amongst this rubble that there appears

to be soot and singe marks across it. Are dragons known for digging, or are there certain types of dragons that are known for digging? There are a couple, yeah, that can burrow and dig through rock and Stone, in particular, the... Rock dragon. The blue dragon, the one that you guys actually defeated in here, can burrow naturally, as can the white dragons are natural burrowers, although not the most intelligent of all the chromatic dragons.

You also know that some of the metallic dragons also, like the brass dragon, is a burrower, as well as as... Would they be capable of making the smooth tunnels? No, that's true. Not that smooth. Those come from something else. You inspecting the alcove? Yeah.

As you look inside the alcove, immediately you see in the shadow, and a little bit of light is coming from the outside part of the tunnel, and it is pretty obscured here. I would recommend by putting a torch up if you have one. Yeah. So spark up a torch. You inspect the inside of this alcove, and immediately you see the reflection of the light across the surface of something.

humanoid standing there in weight. Whoa, and I back up and draw. Okay, you draw your weapon and aim it, and what you can see as you take a moment is an older man, wrinkled in face, eyes open, mouth agape in fear, his arms out before him back to the wall on the inside, frozen solid. I found something. I'm inspecting him as best I can, frozen solid. frozen solid. Did you do that? No, no, I found this. Investigation check.

It's cold blood in. 14. It's terrible fun. It's hard to tell what may have frozen. The temperature here is very cold. It may have just frozen to death, but his, the moment of him, like his face and his expression leads you to believe that this was more in a moment of duress, more immediate than a slow, subtle over time. What is he wearing? What is he wearing? His clothing is very, very well made. There is embroidery across the sleeves and the base of these ropes. He appears to have jewelry on him. He has almost not quite a fu-man chew, but a mustache that extends beyond here.

The hair is braided and goes to his lower back. He is human, hunched, and that's a human. that's about the most you can make out of this visual state. Does it look like he might be my son? The resemblance is uncanny. No. On top of being purely human and knowing you've ever recognized now. I suspect everyone. I wonder if he's the owner of the house.

Try and sleep with it, maybe it will be. The northern tunnel, the smooth tunnel as you inspect over, bringing your torch whoever was inspecting the north one. You're suspecting the north one. Where not? All right, you don't have to if you don't want it. to if you don't want it, but as you guys look up, having low light vision helps in the circumstance as well. You can see a little bit of a glistening. And as you peer into

the smooth tunnel ahead of you, you can see that where the rock was burrowed through, a portion of it has opened up a pocket and there is a small fountain of gold spilling into the tunnel. A fountain of gold? A fountain of gold. Or like, not like a perpetual, pieces of gold. It looks like they were whoever tore through here, gold pieces that were buried as part of the collapsing tunnel were exposed and then kind of just spilled into the tunnel. Well, I heard it. It's a Scrooge dragon. It's a Scrooge dragon. It's a Scrooge dragon. I go over and put it down to the gold. I open up the bag of holding.

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Why are we here? Wait, wait, wait. Why have we come here? Yeah, and remember last time we did this? Are we just getting as much money as we can go and leave, or are we trying to kill something, or are we trying to seal this place off? Why are we here? I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm with Scanlan. There's gold. We should definitely take that frozen man and bring him back out.

Is our mission to take money and leave? No, no, no, we're getting to the frozen man. We actually have a mystery. We have to deal with this. We're just getting... Actually, I can't hear her. What does she say? I think she's frozen in place.

The frozen man is obviously dead. The frozen man is very dead. Oh, he is. He is dead dead. He's dead dead, but he might be the owner of the house. He's not three. Like you're frozen. But we can still hear you, so keep talking. I'm gonna reset you.

So, right, because they said he was an older art collector gray-haired man, right? Yeah, I'm about what elements of the individual you've heard about does match some of the description of this individual. Okay. I'm sorry. Yes? Yes. I would like to see if I could cast speak with dead and ask some of some. questions. Okay. We might have to unfreeze him for it. Well, maybe not. Maybe not. I can

kind of, I can't, I can't, I can maybe do that. Torch heating the face. Yeah, I'll, I'll, I'll light up my fire hands and kind of start melting just his face. Nothing on his mouth? I don't care about anything else. It would, this spell does require the corpse to be able to speak, so you would have to thawing. Okay. It's going to take you a little bit, but you, you You know, using your simple juridic powers, or you're just using cantrifts, essentially. Or your fire hands. Your fire hands.

Yeah. So it'll take you a little while, but you begin to thaw the corpse. What's everyone else doing? We're trying to get the gold out from the wall. Okay. No, we're not yet. I'm trying to get the gold out from the wall. All right, well, if you're going,

I'm going with you to protect you because God knows drinking. I'm keeping an eye on the south, on the south. Just let you guys know, I can move Earth. Okay. We can move around Earth. Yeah, yeah. Out of curiosity, I'm going to carefully make my way towards the mouth of the cave

and just see if there's anything. And I'll carefully follow it. Problematic out there. Perception check the whole way. I'm with Vex. You guys step along. You go with Vex in the tunnel. You're watching the South area as they pass you

and you're currently following. Strickett coming with you guys? Or Trinket staying with you in the tunnel? He's going to be with us in the tunnel. Okay, cool. So, and you're with... I'm with Vex and Trink. So you start scooping the golden.

You can see now there's, you know, some of this appears to have been taken. Like someone has been through here and it looks like there has been some attempts at looting this area. And so elements, you know, it looks like someone has already kind of pulled in here and there's an empty pocket there, but you start pulling gold out and kind of scooping it into the bag of holding. As you guys are walking away, you feel this lurch on the floor.

I stop. Wait, that's not us. But can we feel it? Can everyone feel it? Do all of you guys begin to feel like this vibration in the ground? Okay, maybe we should stop. We don't learn. We don't learn. More, faster, faster, faster, faster, faster. It gets louder and more violent. You can see the coins like on the ground, getting to rattle and move from the vibration.

Percepts to work to tell if it's an earthquake? I think because we touch is cold. It certainly feels like an earthquake. Make a nature check. Um, uh, 19. 19. It feels like an earthquake, um, but... Earthquake, get to the archways.

Uh... Find a bathroom. As the shouting has happened, towards the the center of the room, the ground just explodes. There is a blast of shrapnel shale that bursts in the vicinity. No one's immediately there, so none of you are harshly impacted. But at this point, you now see erupting from the ground a large form beginning to just burst out of the ground. I hide. Pike, Pike, ask the dead guy who it is. Yeah, I take, because Pike and I are by the The dead guy, right? Yeah. I take Pike and I back her behind the dead guy and hiding.

Okay. You guys see this form now in the low light, emerge. What is it? 10, 15, 20, 25 feet up. This long cylindrical mass curves up and then begins to shift. As it does, like a giant arm. It twists around and stares at the room. And what you see before you is this elongated worm-like structure. where a giant mouth opens up. With rows and rows of sharp teeth on the interior of its toothy maw. Deal with it. It's the perfect circumstance for the term.

As you see, like strands of saliva pull apart and you can see a very, very hint of color underneath the dark surface, a very deep, purple tone to its thick, segmented high. We fought one of these before, right? No, you have not. We have not. I'm not.

I hide. I hide in my cloak. Yeah, he heard you. That's a big bag you've got in my pad. And that's where we're going to leave tonight. Welcome to Mick Unplugged, the number one podcast for self-improvement and modern leadership. I'm Mick Hunt, your host, and I'm here to challenge your why and fuel your because. This is where leaders, entrepreneurs, and go-getters come to level up.

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