Critical Role - C2E83 Dark Bargains

Episode Date: November 7, 2019

Join our November fundraising drive with OSD to support active duty military, veterans, and family members. Donate now at: https://critrole.com/osd Tonight's episode is sponsored by our friends at Eldritch Foundry, makers of the highest-quality, on-demand miniatures.Now trapped within the astral dreadnought, the Mighty Nein must decide whether or not to trust the entity that they discover waiting inside...Watch Critical Role live Thursdays at 7pm PT on https://www.twitch.tv/criticalrole

Once upon a time, a group of curious storytellers breathed life into epic tales set in the wide fantasy world of Exandria. This is Liam O'Brien, here to welcome you to Critical Role. We'll dive into the story in just a moment, but first, a few notes. This is the audio-only version of our broadcast that streams Thursdays at 7pm Pacificm. Pacific over on twitch.tv slash criticalroll and youtube.com slash criticalroll. If you subscribe to our Twitch channel, you can watch the video on demand immediately after the broadcast.

And it's also available Mondays at 12 p.m. Pacific on YouTube. And of course, for all you wonderful podcast listeners, freshly minted episodes release right here on the Critical Role Podcast Network one week after our broadcast on Thursdays. With all that said, let's get into the story. Hey, everybody.

Welcome to Critical Role, where a bunch of us nerdy-ass voice actors sit around and play Dungeons & Dragons. We play Dungeons & Dragons. I'm doing it now. Welcome to our Halloween episode. We play Dungeons and Dragons. We play Dungeons and Dragons. I'm doing it now. Ooh-ah! Welcome to our Halloween episode. It's all sorts of insanity. Before we get into our announcements tonight,

we'll just go around the table and say what we are and show off the costume. Taliesin. I'll start with Sam Riegel, the Invisible Man, which is very good. He'll be here shortly. He's so good. He'll shortly be here. I am Barry Allen, I'm the Flash, I'm the fastest man alive from Injustice 2, so yeah.

There we are. Which, in case you haven't realized, the theme of this is. There's a theme. The theme, characters that we've voiced. Yes. So Taliesin has voiced Barry Allen, the Flash, which is awesome. How you doing? Laura. Hello.

I am Kate Diaz from Gears of War. Yeah! Specifically, Gears of War V with this particular ensemble. Which is fucking sweet. It's so damn. Damn. Do you have your hand? It's legit.

I kind of did. Your titties broke your nose. Yeah. Right. That's absurdly awesome. It is so... Yeah. What? Where'd you get that? You handcrafted that, right? Of course!

Or my friend at Microsoft was really awesome and sent it. Blaine, I love you. Fantastic. Yes. Over at this table. Angara. From the Hidden Sand Village. I got a gourd. What'd it do? In the backpack.

I manic panicked my hair for the first time since high school for this bit. Yeah! Good man. That's it. So proud. Marisha. See, I thought I would pay homage to all the voiceover roles that paid my rent for so long.

You know, could give a shout out to a main character, but why not some representation? That's right. For Soldier B. Soldier B! That's right some representation? That's right. For Soldier B. Soldier B! We've all been Soldier B. With such classic and infamous lines as Sniper, right up ahead.

Or, Grenade, six o'clock! Or everyone's other favorite, Grenade, eight o'clock! Or. Grenade, 12 o'clock! Or? Grenade, 12 o'clock! Or? Or? I need a medic! Oh, that's good. I need a medic. That's pretty slick.

Could you give us three, one close, one medium, and one long range? No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Ah! There it is, there we go. So bad, so bad. I felt it. Thank you, thank you.

And thank you, Soldier B, for being the hero of my career. Thank you, Soldier B! So. Taking that grenade so that we all could live. Travis. Yes, I am Two-Face from Batman The Animated Series.

Either that or I stuck my hand in the airplane toilet bowl. Also viable. The makeup drop. I just did half my face. He did this, by the way. It's killer. I thought he was messing with me. Yeah, kids, get a theater degree.

It's not totally useless. Once a year, you might get to use it. The more you know. Dun-dun-dun-dun! Sam will be arriving here shortly, but I'm representing Little Overwatch, hello, as McCree. And it's difficult to sit in this outfit. Yeah.

I feel your pain. Sam, though, did you show it off? Did you show it off? You got to show it off? Yeah. Because you glow, too. I'm showing off a little bit. Yes! Some proper arrangement there. Goddamn. I didn't bring the wire.

He's going to lose his moustache. Just stick with the sand. Oh, sick. I can't. Goddamn. I didn't bring the flashbangs because I figured you wouldn't see them, but then they made me stand up, so there you go. Oh, I see.

But anyway. He's a badass motherfucker. I'm excited to see what Sam dressed as. Yeah. Anyway, bringing it back in. Let's go ahead and go into our announcements tonight before we start our session. So we have two sponsors tonight.

First, our friends at Eldritch Foundry are sponsoring tonight's episode. For those who aren't familiar, they make super high quality, awesome miniatures on demand that you can customize and print on their website. They've officially launched their service. They've had some beta going on for a while. It's now officially launched.

You can go check it out. They provide, legitimately, as the technology progresses, for customizing your role-playing game minis and printing them out, it's the best I've seen so far. It's amazing. They already have a bunch of options available on their platform. I'll continue to add new ones like Warforged, Orcs, Half-Orcs, starting next month, I think, is when they're starting that one up. So look for that. And right now, you can enjoy 15% off your order when you use the code CRITROLL. It's back. CritRoll! CritRoll!

At checkout on their website, which is eldritch-foundry.com slash critroll. CritRoll! Check out their website, and thanks so much for supporting our show. Yes. Next up is the return of our friend, D&D Beyond. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Sam is not here. Liam. Man, oh man, what is not to love about D&D Beyond? We use it, we love it, every rule, every character at the tip of your fingers, but I gotta say, Sam not being here to sing D&D Beyond's praises, it just feels off to me,

because really, what a magical combination those two make together, like Chris and Cross, chocolate and peanut butter, Taliesin and ancient Sumerian blood sacrifice. They co-mingle and make each other better. So rather than try and fail with some non-regal comedy routine, I just want to make a toast

in their honor, that's it. Excuse me, one sec. Oh jeez, my gourd! Oh jeez. You're gourd. You're Liam this time. Okay. Oh no. Moment of silence. It sounds like a weak fart.

Silence. Das ist ein Bär. Das ist ein Bär. It's not going to fit the whole bottle, because we're out of time. Oh no. Oh no. So close. So thank you, Sam. And thank you, D&D Beyond,

for continuing to support the show. You can find out more about their wizardry over at dndbeyond.link slash critical role. Cheers, dears. All in one. Cheers. No. Chug.

All in one. Chug. Go fuck yourselves. Nice toast. Thank you, Liam, and thank you, D&D Beyond. A quick reminder, Daylight Savings Times ends this weekend in the United States. And if you don't know what that is,

we're so jealous of you. If you don't know what that is, Google it. So be sure to check out wheniscriticalrole.com to make sure our broadcast time calculations work for you if you're not part of that whole weird time change that makes little sense. And in case you missed our stream yesterday, I painted one of our favorite NPCs, Orly,

the skip back, which you guys created. No. Ooh. I apologize. That's your time machine. Barry. That's what happens when it speeds up. It's revving up. It's the time treadmill. But I got to return to form doing oil paints with Babs Tarr on pub draw.

Mar's so mad, I'm not! After 20 years. It would've sucked with the I am so rusty. But if you didn't check it out yet, it's on VOD right now on our Twitch channel and subscribers, it'll be on our available, be available on our YouTube tomorrow morning.

So check it out then. Yay! Marisha, you have some stuff to talk about, too. Yeah, the very first episode of Mini Primetime with Invisible Man Sam Riegel. It is on YouTube for you to check out right now. I love it so much. It's so fucking funny. It's good. As many of you all have pointed out, it's weird.

Yeah! No, I feel like after episode one, they kind of found their groove and it normalizes. Mm-hmm. So next week is Liam's episode. Ooh! Gonna be joined, Peyton and Caleb, doing some dirt and grime techniques.

Caleb. It's good fun. And finally, Undeadwood Part 3 airs tomorrow. November 1st, 7pm on our Twitch channel. VOC will be immediately

available on our Twitch channel. And it'll come out on YouTube on Sunday, which is amazing. And of course, if you prefer listening to the podcast, you can catch part two, which released, I think, today, or it's releasing yesterday, or I think it's there. I don't know, but it comes out on the podcast network, too.

It's so good. It's really good. It's beautiful. Thank you. It's a lot of work. Enjoying whiskey while watching. Need a medic? Man down! Defibrillator. Perfect.

Well, I think if that's all of our announcements, I think it's time we go ahead and jump into tonight's special Halloween episode of Critical Role. Yeah! Critical Role! McCree! The adventure begins They were always beside you Your nerdy best friends

And the DM to guide you And they rise from the flames For the battles ahead Villains beware Cause you're about to be dead They got magic and flair They got falchions and cunning They don't see over there

There's a monster incoming Inspiration is waiting Rise up, don't think twice Put your fate in your hands, take a chance Roll the dice Can you answer the call? Digging deep in your soul As the legend unfolds

Now it's your turn To roll As the legend unfolds Now it's your turn To roll And welcome back. What? Goddamn it. All right. So, last we left off, I'm going to get back. What? Goddamn it. All right.

So, last we left off, I'm sorry. The Mighty Nein had been in search of Yussa, an archmage ally of theirs that they had gone to after it seemed that all was nearly lost when it came to their struggle against Obann as he races towards some sort of endeavor in the name of the Angel of Irons.

After discovering that Yussa had vanished into the heirloom sphere that you had given him months before, you made contact with an ally of his named Allura Vysoren, and then proceeded to go into this sphere, known as the Folding Halls of Halas, where a series of interdimensional rooms are connected by a singular, twisting tower, only some of which have been explored.

Following the footsteps of Yussa, you've made your way through multiple chambers, fought golems, made golems, managed to hunt down the Permahart, which was a specific artifact that maintained the undying nature of the Laughing Hand. And after destroying that. Hold it! Objection!

Oh my god. Oh my god! What? What? Hold it! What? Objection! There it is. Are you Sonic the Hedgehog? What?

This is not an official Phoenix Wright wig! No, we know. We gathered that much, Sam. No, we know. We know. This is not an official Phoenix Wright wig! No, we know. We gathered that much, Sam. No, we know. I had to hold it while someone glued it down! Does the audience get a full view of your ponytail? I don't think Phoenix Wright has a ponytail! Well, no.

But he does now! Phoenix Wright has been going through some stuff. Yeah. He hasn't done well after the divorce. We were just so excited about my hair actually, it was like, okay, so then you just do that. I love it. Back to you, Matt!

I only have two lines in the video game! I'm like a Miami trial attorney. Thank you, Mr. Wright. In discovering through some notes that Halas had been experimenting with cloned bodies and seemed to have some sort of ritual chamber somewhere in the dreadnought, which you had found on the map, you went to investigate this dreadnought

and discovered it was an astral dreadnought that had been chained down, its eye covered, You investigate this dreadnought and discovered it was an astral dreadnought that had been chained down, its eye covered, and held adrift in the center of the astral sea as via the door you had followed. You pulled one of these levers, which then opened the jaws of the astral dreadnought, and then you all proceeded to step inside of its mouth.

Come on, man. Come on, man! Come on, we're okay, right? You say that like that's weird. Choices you make in the dead of the night. Look, I ain't judging. Don't seem as wise. Did you know you're dressed as a cowboy? Believe it or not, I'm well aware.

He also has a weapon. You're dressed as a Sand Village weeaboo? I don't know if I can get a weapon. You know, you're dressed as a Sand Village weeaboo. I don't know if I can get a shot. So after stepping into this astral dreadnought, you found yourselves now standing in this cold, almost natural-seeming cavern, larger in diameter to where you cannot see the walls around you, ceiling above you,

but a few burning bits of light in the distance, somewhat look to be a small arrangement of furniture. And that's where we left off. So, Mighty Nein, as you now walk into wherever the interior of the Dreadnought sent you, what would you like to do? How lit is it in here? Where you're standing right now, pitch black.

You can see what little bit of light there is, maybe 100 or so feet ahead of you. That's illuminating those bits of furniture around. What kind of light does it look like? Does it look like candlelight? From what you can tell right now, it's brighter than candlelight, more like torchlight, though you do not see the specific sources

of where this light may be. It could be lanterns or things around the vicinity, but you're not close enough to make out specifically the light sources. And any sounds whatsoever. Make a perception check. Oh god. First roll.

Everybody's casting Streaks of Tinnitus. So good, except for my seven. Seven. Seven. I mean. Looks like somebody hit you with goodwill. This was, this is 2499, guys. 22 bucks to us.

The hair, yes. So with that. We just catch on fire. You listen intently and hear nothing. It is still, silent, in absence of any movement, sound, or life. Anybody else? Can we hear each other? silent, in absence of any movement, sound, or life. Anybody else? Can we hear each other? You begin to test that theory?

Are you talking out loud, though? Yeah, you can hear the snap sound. Okay. Did you say something? I snapped. What? I snapped. Oh, okay. You snapped?

You said something. Like mentally, like you had a break or something? I mean. Not yet. About to. I'm going to light up a bit. Okay. The light around you expands, but as you cast the light spell,

for the radius of that, nothing. Whoa. Just an absent void of cavern, no walls. What's the distance on the light spell? Not far. Does the floor appear to be stone or wood? I was just going to say, I get down on my hands and knees. 20 feet, yeah.

Start feeling for the door. Okay. Yeah, if you want to make an investigation check to search for the door, the floor appears to be stone, fairly solid, pretty standard. Thank you, thank you. Six. Okay. It's rough in the sense that it looks,

it's not a perfectly polished, flat, marble-like floor. It looks natural somewhat, but it is flat enough to seem, it appeared to have been worked. Not pegged, but flattened. Yeah. Yeah. I summon Frumpkin just to my shoulders like a scarf. Okay. Squitch him. Hey Nott, doumpkin just to my shoulders, like a scarf. Okay. Scooch him.

Hey Nott, do you feel like investigating that table and chairs? Carefully, very, very carefully. Table seems fine, but that chair. Don't trust it. Not for a minute. All right. I'm going to do a little barrel roll,

shimmy on my hands and knees over to the chair and investigate it. Okay. As you move forward, you begin to see some of the reason you couldn't see the light sources is there are actually torch sconces that are placed on the inside of pillars that from where you were standing

were blocking your perspective of them. So as you get closer, you can see there are light sources on the other end of these pillars that previously weren't visible from your entry point. You made a stealth check, you said? No, I'm just shimmying. You're just shimmying for the hell of shimmying. Yeah, and I'm going to investigate the chair first,

followed by the table. Okay, well, as you approach. Oh, oh shit. You should have made a stealth check. You can see now in the space, it appears to be some form of laboratory. You can see all manner of strange instruments. There are three tables that are outfitted

with boxes and strange contraptions. You can see large glass jars filled with all manner of implements and strange objects that might be, whether they be components or elements of rituals, it's hard to specifically make out at this distance. You see a collection of old tomes across one of the tables and in the center of the tables, you see a body. Living body or dead body?

On the ground, laying still. On the ground? The body's on the ground next to the table? Yeah. I will shimmy over to it and see if I can glean what sort of body it is. Can any of us see it, or is it just? If you guys are moving ahead with the knot,

then you might be able to, but if you're keeping a distance and letting the knot go ahead, unstealthily. Yeah, yeah. It's at least moving forward somewhat. Slowly. Yeah. Same. We do the creep. Okay. Do it then.

Like the, oh. Okay. And I am summoning a small mote of fire into my hand and holding it. All right it to add to Caduceus' light. Okay. As you begin to see the light source of your friends behind you approach slowly and help illuminate the space a bit further

as you begin to peer towards this body. Its head is faced away from you. You can see the feet and the legs in this direction and arm over and open to one side. It appears to be dressed in long red robes with gold trim. The boots are a dark brown leather wrapped around the foot with a soft sole that seems to be glued in.

You can get closer if you want to make more detail. You shimmy over and look at this fellow. Okay. Are you going to go to Dothulur? I'm just shimmying. You let her fuck. Yeah, then I'll find out. That's the whole point of this.

Did we take a rest before? No, we didn't take a rest before this. We did, I thought we did, a long rest. Or full up. Okay. You did. You should be. Aside from the many spells you've cast in the interim. But you guys slept in the Permaheart study, if I recall.

Yeah, I slept through some gods. No, you slept in the Golem Workshop. That's where you did. Is this laboratory surrounded on all sides by darkness? Does it seem like it extends beyond? From what you can see, there are four pillars that set the perimeter of this laboratory area that are about 60 feet, 70 feet from each other,

corner to corner, and then beyond that, once the light fades, nothing. I pull the wire out while we're still a ways back and whisper to Nott through it, perhaps you should wait till we surround that area so you're not alone. Okay. We split, we have to split around.

Me and Vann. Yeah. So I guess I'm holding until they give me some sort of signal to go. I'll tap bow and head right. Okay. As we... I guess you'll go left, then. I guess we'll go left.

I will stay in this center position. As we creep to the right, I want to look towards that blackness. Does it look like this place has walls, or does it just... Make a perception check. Yeah, and do the pillars extend up to anything? No.

Yeah, do. Yo, that was a journey and it fucking paid off. Natural 20. To a total of? 23. 23, okay. Looking into the darkness on all sides, you do not see any sign of walls.

You catch a couple things. One, following the pillars upward, you do see that they seem to just faintly thicken before they reach the outside of your visual range. Okay. And in between them, atop the ceiling, there's a faint red glow. Ever so faint. Atop the ceiling, there's a faint red glow.

Ever so faint, like you barely wouldn't even have noticed it if you hadn't had eyes as keen as yours. Like a universal glow coming, or like a point, like a dot? Like a point of light. You don't know how far it is, because once the darkness takes in, you begin to lose any sense of depth, because you don't have any clear images to gauge that.

Just this faint, dull, red glow on the ceiling in the center of these pillars. I just tap forward and point it out. I'll slightly call it out. There's a light. Don't touch anything. Huh. A light where?

Over at the Frankenstein house. Did you say where the light was? Straight up, straight up. Follow my finger. Following. No, no, you got to keep going, though. You got to keep going. Following Beauregard's point,

you, especially you, you two would be able to make out just that faint bit of a glow. Most everyone else, for the most part, is having a hard time picking out specifically what it is that you're pointing out. I can pretend that I see. You can, yeah, if you want to feel like you belong. Like you're part of the rest of the crew.

I do. Is it moving or is it just sitting there? It seems static. Are you coming left with me or did you stay left with Caleb? Oh, I started moving. I do. Can you move in, or is it just sitting there? It seems static. Are you coming left with me, or did you stay in the middle with Caleb? Oh, I started moving. I'm moving with you, then. As you guys are approaching two,

and Nott, you notice this, the body itself. We're doing it. It's sitting atop what looks to be a large series of glyphs that are drawn on the floor, and almost like a combination of black dust that has been laid in lines and shapes, and a dull reddish-purple tint heavy powder chalk that has been used to write

and fill spaces between it. Two sigils are overlapping somewhat. Are they circular, or are they just random? Elements of them appear circular in ways, but because they intersect, it becomes almost like this deranged arcane equation. Am I on them yet? If you want to get closer, then expect to find them.

Well, they told me to hold, so I'm holding. Yes, you're holding. Does the body look placed or like it fell? Taking a look at it, just with your passive perception. Good question. You can see the body as you head around the side, as you guys were slightly moving onto the outsides. They were right.

It looks to be a human man in his mid-50s or so. Ruddy skin with long black hair, trimmed facial beard. His eyes are a piercing amber color. Ruddy skin with long black hair, trimmed facial beard. His eyes are a piercing amber color. He doesn't appear to be decaying. Just not moving. Eyes open? Eyes open. Looks healthy. Does not look like Halas.

Is the chest rising and falling? Very, very much like the portraits of Halas you've seen throughout. Yes. Is the chest rising and falling? I would say you would notice that the chest is indeed slowly rising and falling. Oh. I don't know about that.

Okay. What do we do? Maybe he's in a meditative state. I will take out my little wire and... Are you in position yet, or am I still holding? You can reply with this message. We are around you. To Caleb.

I'm keeping very careful watch around you. We are, so should I go? What can you tell from there? Yeah, maybe inspect the table and stuff first. Dead body on some sigils. Not dead. Powerful, frozen, charmed, petrified wizard on the floor. What do you do?

I don't know, sometimes monks will do this thing where they'll go into this almost like an astral projection or something, I don't know. I want to try to sneak closer so I can see somewhat what she sees, these sigils she described. Okay, you sneak closer and you can see these symbols the body is currently laying on top of.

Hi. You can make an arcana check if you'd like to try. Oh my god, what if when we destroyed the Permahart, it knocked him on his ass? My streak continues. That is a natural one. I draw a Conjectured Stage Whisper. The nature of the symbols drawn eludes you.

They are arcane and ancient and outside of your realm of specialty. I will cast Mage Hand, and if I'm close enough, I'm going to poke the body. Okay. The ghostly hand slowly drifts towards

the still body of what appears to be Halas before nudging it. No reaction. Okay. That didn't work. You think it's dead? Sam, just in the pockets. Try not. Caduceus.

What? Try tickling him. Okay, I will Mage Hand Tickle. You watch as this ghostly spectral hand loosely molests the unmoving body of Halas under the arms, on top of the knee, pulls a boot off and goes for the bottom of the foot. Behind the knee, sure. Does that thing where they crack an egg on the head. Right, right.

Let the yolk run down. No reaction at all. That's that Kristen Wiig character. Eyes unblinking? Eyes unblinking. But breathing. But breathing. Yeah, he's like...

He's in a trance. Or petrified, or... I'll search the pockets. Comatose, or... Make an investigation check. We could greater restore him or something. 16. 16. Looking through his pockets, and you see now on the table around him, too,

there's numerous things to look for. In his pockets, you find a pouch of gold dust worth about 550 gold total. You want to write that down? Sure. A collection of chalks and inks, one of which is the piece of chalk that you can see matches the color

of the reddish-purple hue drawn across the floor. A pouch of blackened soot that you're not quite sure what its nature is, but it appears to be what elements of this circle were built from outside of the chalk. That's all that's on him at the moment. There's the tables around. I'm going to move up behind Nott and cast my

I'm going to strike this guy naked. Ooh, ooh, ooh. You know what, actually? You rolled your 16 investigation. About four feet from the corpse, underneath one of the tables off to the side, you see what looks to be a singular, beautiful ruby about the size of your palm.

Not your guy's palm, but your palm. It's polished into a smooth sphere with a little bit of golden filigree that appears to be embedded around the top and bottom of it. Okay, I'm going to make a few trips back and forth with the Mage Hand to get all this stuff. Okay. Get that ruby. Okay. While he ruby. Okay.

While he's doing that, I just want to fixate on the light, on the red light, and see if it moves, track it, just on that. How far is Nott from the, gotta be the area? Within 30 feet. I have walked up behind her and wave my hand through the air and cast Detect Magic.

Okay. Looking through Detect Magic. Okay. Looking through Detect Magic, you can see that there are a number of the small little elements on the table and around the tomes and such have a faint magical essence to them. The ruby that you see drifting towards Nott as she plucks it from the shadow has a fairly strong magical essence to it.

And the writing on the floor, does it give off a specific school of magic? Detect magic, yes. It would be necromantic. Not good. Yeah. Holy shit! We are just on that part of the roller coaster. We're like, I don't know.

As you pluck the ruby from the mage hand and go to place it in your pouch, a voice suddenly fills your mind that goes, You! What do you do? Just her head? Me? Just you. Nobody else heard anything.

Yes. Guess what? I see you have found your way to my situation. Do not be alarmed. But I think we can help each other, yes? Caleb, are you hearing anything? No, what are you hearing? I'll be right back with you.

Yes, I'm sure. Can you help us out of here? That is possible. It's very possible. Not who are you talking to. Look at me, who are you talking to? Who are you? I'm Look at me, who are you talking to? Who are you? I'm Halas Lutegrand.

I'm the Houston mage of Zydel, and you are within my private home. Halas Charlemagne something. What is he saying? He gave me his name. I can hear him. You can't? He sounds... Are you Zemnian?

I am Zydelian. Oh, he's not Zydelian. He seems nice. Zydel, and actually a lot of the basis of the Zemnian language and the culture of the Empireem'nian language and the culture of the Empire itself stems from what used to be a society known as Zydel. So that's instant recognition.

Yeah. In real life. Yeah, that's sort of Xem'nian, sort of. Hold up. Do you want to talk to Caleb? He's pretty smart about these things. All right, but of course, whatever he was right to put in front of me. It is imperative that we have a conversation.

Whoever of you seems to be the most willful and able to accomplish. What is he saying? He wants to know which one of us is willful? Ugh. You need to know which one of us is willful? You need to know which one of us is the smartest, is that right? Is willful? Any one of you that you would see as a leader, a person who is able to make decisions.

He wants to talk to our leader, I think. Would we have noticed any of this stuff happening? I grab Nott by the hand and just start slowly pulling back away from Chris. Where are you going? Hey, where are you going? Cadian's our leader. Hey, secrets don't make friends.

I'm not keeping a secret. Could we maybe back it up a little bit? Everybody take 20 paces back. We have to back up. We're back up. We're back up. Back from. I'm still looking at the red dot.

Okay. It's not moving. Beauregard. Yeah? That thing is talking to our little friend. No, that makes total sense. Wait, which one? Me. Who's talking?

Halas is talking to me, can you stop? Halas is talking? I didn't see his mouth moving at all. You know, now I know what it's like for you to talk to the Traveler. Itas is talking to me. Halas is talking? He's not moving at all! You know, now I know what it's like for you to talk to the Traveler. It's like this weird thing, like this voice is in your head and it's kind of comforting. What did you grab? It's not in my head.

He's talking to me on the outside of my head. Oh. Nab. What? What did you grab? I grabbed a sack of gold, some chalk, some blackened soot, and this ruby that I'm still holding. Ooh. Listen to me.

It's really shiny. The circle in there is death. Can I see it? Jester, I'm holding it with my mage hand right now, just in case it kills us or something. Oh, okay. Will you hold it up a little bit, kind of up into the light?

So you moved from grabbing it to moving it with your mage hand? Oh, maybe I had... So the moment you had to retrieve it from the mage hand is when you're holding it in your hand. Yes. It's right here. Sure, sure, here. Is it talking to you now?

You look closely into it. Jester! You look closely into the ruby and you can see this swirling mist of gray that leads to purple to red. Jester! Put it down! And a faint glimmer of two golden amber eyes that peer back at you and a voice goes,

There's eyes coming out of it. Are you the one who would be considered the leader of whatever this incursion might be? The leader of? See, nowion might be. The leader of? See, now she's talking to him. All of the world, you mean? I'll snatch it back. Not the brave, please put it on the ground.

Okay. Please do not touch it, anyone. Okay, but it sounded kind of okay. It didn't seem really good. What was it asking of you? It asked me if I was the leader, and I was about to say, you know, yeah, totally. Caleb, what's your hesitation?

This, him, has made clones, other bodies for himself. He wants to live forever. He wants to live on. I don't know what that is. I don't know what that's plans are. That is dangerous to touch. I go and sit by it and pull out my book

and I start to go through the steps of identifying. Did it feel like it was drawing us to it when it was talking to us? Or did it feel just like a dude talking? It felt like, similar to when someone messages you back, it was just a voice in your mind. I have a theory. What is it?

Is the ruby thing glowing? Is it glowing a little? It has eyes. From where it's sitting there, it just looks like a ruby, just a stone. There were eyeballs looking out at me. Oh, you saw eyeballs? Yeah, yeah, yeah, I saw two glowing,

amber-looking eyeballs looking at me. I'm going to walk over. Is he trapped in there? He's, yeah. Do you want to try? Dunce, do you want to talk to him? Maybe his little soul got trapped in there and it's not in his body anymore. What if his soul jumps out of a stone into whoever's touching it?

Yeah, can I have nine more minutes, please? Yeah, yeah. I'm not looking into it directly. I'm looking at it in peripheral. It seems like we're alo- hello! Can I yell and see if there's an echo? Yep. Hello, hello, hello. Hey, that goes. Anybody see a wall?

Fjord, come here with me real quick. Yeah, yeah. I want to walk over to under the red light. I want to get closer to it. Oh yeah, that red light. Yeah, you see it? Yeah, totally. Right? Yeah. Do I see any others?

Make a perception. Around the room like it, not necessarily up there. He doesn't see it. He doesn't see it. He doesn't see it. There are no lights. 14. 14. You focus and you move a little bit,

and you focus and you move a little bit, and once you step out from directly underneath it, it's hard to find it once more on the ceiling, and only because you've already seen it once, you can just barely see that faint bit of that hue. Once again, the shape, the source is too far and too lost, mostly shadow, for you to seen it once, you can just barely see that faint bit of that hue. Once again, the shape, the source is too far and too lost, mostly shadow for you to make it out, but no other sources can be found.

Probably because this place is like a nightmare, I just want to see if we can find a boundary and I'll send an Eldritch Blast just in one direction. All right. You see the dull green light before it fizzles out. It reaches the extent of its distance before it vanishes. Nothing for at least 120 feet. Yeah, let's try and not cast as much as possible.

Because these pillars, these pillars, they get fatter up at the top, like there's an archway or something. It feels like it's got to have a ceiling. Oh, I got an idea. Yeah? You have a ball bearing? Oh. Oh yeah. All right, here? You have a ball bearing. Oh. Oh yeah. All right, here, give me a ball bearing.

I hand him my bag of balls. I cast Light on a single ball bearing. Okay. First one free. Roll a strength check. This'll be funny. Hey! 18.

18, okay. You watch as it goes up, and as the light arcs up, you watch as the pillars turn into a rough goes up, and as the light arcs up, you watch as the pillars turn into a rough archway, and then you see a roof. Similar texture as the floor beneath you. Did it get anywhere near the red dot or no? You're just throwing it up there.

If you want to try and throw again at the red dot. You're not letting it in. I catch it as it comes back down. That's still lit, so it's all yours. Close it up, close it up. Okay, roll a dexterity check now, since you're aiming. Yeah, I mean, roughly how high is this? Just a straight dex check?

15. That's fine. It goes up, and as it reaches the portion where that red glow was, you can see now the ceiling there has what looks to be about a 10-foot diameter glyph or series of symbols, like a circular pattern that is giving off this reddish glow. Are those directly above the glyphs on the ground?

It would be, yes. Is the table in that glyph area, or just off? The tables and books and everything are around it. There, all the, there's just like a rough bit of materials from this laboratory. But his body is definitely in like, the circle underneath those glyphs. It's in it, but it's not perfectly in the center. It's kind of, it's in it and off.

Like, looking at it, it may have fallen. Ober. I fell. Oh, weird. So, and I can see more of these red runes. He accidentally grabbed his staff. Stabbed to death with a bicycle. That's why he can't run away.

You do a few more tosses. Nope, just that one. Just that one. There's a red rune there. We don't have any pieces of the heart, right? It all turned into goo and shit. I'll take that back. We're going to check out the table.

Okay. You open the books. All of them are're going to check out the table. Okay. You open the books. All of them are in a language you don't understand. Okay. So neither of you know Zemnian, correct? I've picked up a few words. A few words. You recognize it as Zemnian. Okay.

But there are all manner of, you do recognize certain arcane signatures and glyphs and symbols from spellcraft from what you've seen in Caleb's book. There are what looks to be some sort of a spell book or something that contains a lot of spell notes. Other things that are research elements that have a lot of sketches.

You can see small devices. You can see one page that has a sketch that looks just like the ruby you found. Okay. How many books are there? I draw a dick on the ruby. Four, you said four? Yes, Jester wrestles it from you and hastily sketches a tiny penis

across the ruby drawing. Now it's a happy ruby. I will take the four books and run back to Caleb. Lebby, Lebby! I just want your nickname for you. Lebby! Whatby! I have this funny nickname for you. Lebby! What? Lebby, I'm trying it out, see if it sticks.

Let him finish. How many more minutes you got? Because these are amazing! Just a minute, please, please, please. Okay, one minute. All right, you cast Identify. This is a ruby, but it is designed as a reliquary. This is a ruby,

but it is designed as a reliquary. Meant to be either something that is used for a focus of worship or a focus of a ritual or a focus of any sort of other attentive focal point that is required. It is very beautifully made. It looks like it's been, aside from the spill it took on the ground, maybe being dropped or tossed away from the body,

looks impeccable. Yeah, I throw a rag over it. Okay. Do one of you clerics have the ability to judge the normal health of a body that's eyes open and breathing, but not responding? I can do a medicine check on him. I mean, I can check his health.

Could you see if he was diseased or? You'd probably have to get right up next to him. Poisoned or dying. I'll stay outside of the sigils, but I'll just get a look at his body, if I can. Okay, good making medicine checks. With all assist. All right, the two of you. Guide me.

A guidance. Mm-hmm. Mm. Mm-hmm. Maybe we should just throw something in there and see if it catches on fire. Nice. 23.

23? Ooh, body armor's healthy. He seems healthy. Why don't we go, can we send in Vily to drag the body out of the sigil area so we can look at it? I don't think that's a good idea. I mean, it's Vily, it's not us.

He's still standing back where we. Yeah, what if he leaves that circle and all of a sudden is like awake? What if breaking that sigil sets something off? What if the body changes while it's out there? What if it kills him, what if it doesn't? There are so many pessimists in this group. Fairly decent chance that this on the ground is the jar.

Is it the jaw? What's a jaw? The jar. Oh, the jar, not like the actual jars, but like it'd really be like it's a symbolic jar. A jar of what? Of Halas. Yeah. Ooh, gross. Mm-hmm.

So, this has two eyes in it. This is maybe talking to us. Please, nobody touch this. But what if he's been in here for a long time? What, can I just touch it and see if he's been in there for a long time? I would really prefer that you do not. Just one little pinky touch?

What if he's suffering in a little ruby prison? I don't want you suffering in a little ruby prison. That's a good point, but currently, we have no way out of here. We see a red light above us, and that's about it. Sudden access to the best amount of information about this place we could hope for. Yeah, yeah, maybe we do,

but maybe the first thing we do is not touch it. And you said that the runes line up with the runes underneath. They appear to be directly above, yes. And you said that the ruby thing was tossed to the side. Or maybe he dropped it. It had been dropped or tumbled away.

It had been found beneath one of the tables in shadow. He accidentally put his soul in this ruby and then he fell over and the ruby fell away from him. He did step one, he didn't know what step two was. Let the wizard read the Xem'nian books. I'm going to scoop down Frumpkin and place him in front of this gem and tell him to meow if anything problematic happens.

Okay. And then I will go over to the books and start perusing them. Yeah, I brought them to you. You brought them over? Yes. I move 10 feet away from the ruby and start looking through them. They're spell books, Lebby.

They're spell books. It's going to stink. I know. I don't think that's true. Look, there's all sorts of stuff. Maybe there's some new spells that you could learn. Kind of like him more now. I know, right? He's kind of better.

Can we just call you Labian? What are the books? All right, so... Go ahead and just roll an investigation check for me. Standard investigation check. It's so good at rolling these days. That's better, 22. 22. 22.

A number of the books are ancient ritual tomes and spells dealing with manipulation of the soul, in line with some of the previous notes you've seen of his research in the Permahart study, including the elaborate magical equations for some powerful spells. One of them is a partial notebook and a partial spell book, and within it are the spells Magic Jar, Trap the Soul, and Clone.

Holy fucking shit. What does it say? Among them are numerous scraps of various spells in mid-design. Oh my god. Partially constructed, unfinished magical equations, mostly escaping your understanding in their broken, half-formed state. However, because you rolled a high enough investigation,

one of them catches your attention. One of the partially developed spells is tied to Halasa's work, seeking to alter his own body permanently instead of relying on the failing clones. This looks to be one of the last things he was working on before permanently instead of relying on the failing clones. This looks to be one of the last things he was working on before he fell into the state

you see him in now. Do you tell us all this? The transmutative theories and advanced arcane mechanics within this partially designed spell are incredible and connect some dots about reforming a living body to become a different type of similar body indefinitely. Oh my god.

Boo! Boo! No! Boo! Boo! Do you tell us this? He is... He is tinkering with some crazy things here. He's trying to alter himself, make him other than himself. I mean, we kind of knew that, though.

And it also sounds like something a lot of us have actually done, like, what do you mean, like? Yeah, like disguise himself. No, no, no, no, no, more, more, locking it in. Not tricks. Pair locking. Transformation. Total. Like through a polymorph?

Did he succeed? It's not finished. But what's with the ruby, then? Yeah, what is the ruby? Fuck the ruby, how close is he in that spell? Where is the book that you said there was a- The spell, that spell, how close is it to being done? I don't, I need time with it, Nott.

As you glance through the spells that you found in the books, the magic jar spell specifically asks for some sort of a focus or device. As you read through the incantation itself, it enables individuals who touch, I'm going to confirm specifically here, but to touch and or within a certain distance of the gem. Ooh.

Distance. Distance. I'm going to double check this, because I'm coming from memory here. I don't want the internet to yell at me for getting it wrong. You are ten feet off! I know. That's how it works. That's how the internet sounds.

Hi! That's Mickey Mouse. It allows the spirit of whatever figure has transferred itself into this focus, this reliquary, to possess another person within 100 feet. How am I going to get away from this thing? Oh boy! I pick up the book and say,

move away, even further away from that rag. Far away! Very far, into the dark, move away, even further away from that rag. Far away! Very far, into the dark, move. All right. What? You all back out, if you're following Caleb's instructions, you back out into the shadow.

Aside from the lights that you currently carry, to keep the vicinity itself somewhat visible, you take a few breaths at a distance. Why did we back away? Like a disgruntled librarian holding books and one hand is on fire, because that gem, if you are close to it, he could overtake you. How long does that, well, why is he not hopping?

Close to it, we don't even have to touch it? Weird question, then why hasn't he jumped back into his own body yet? Why didn't he possess us then? Maybe he did possess one of us. Maybe one of us is secretly her lost now. Quick, ask me a question that only I would know the answer to.

What does Caleb smell like when he hasn't bathed in too much? He's stinky! Specifically though, what's the smell? Eggs, a little bit of like, sort of like taint smell, you know? Another element of the spell as well, it wasn't pertinent initially as you were going through, but it is in hindsight,

the individual would be ready or able to place their soul back into their body as long as it's also within 100 feet. Say that again? So he could put it back. He could jump back into his own body. But hasn't. He hasn't. He kept asking which one of us was the leader.

Maybe he was trying to size out who was the most powerful. That is what he was trying to do. There's something inherently wrong with his body, though. Something he doesn't like. Maybe it's a bad clone. Maybe. Maybe he's aging. Maybe he can't leave because it's like. Maybe it's a bad clone. Maybe. Maybe he can't leave, because it's him. Maybe.

I pull out a bit of Lose the Flame, pull out some catmint, and a spectral frumpkin appears in the air, and then giant claw, and it rushes out to the body in the center, grabs it by the foot, and drags it. He watches the? Away from that gem. The large mitt of this spectral, exaggerated cat claw grab and ragdoll

this body of Halas in the opposite direction of where you are until it disappears in the shadow beyond your visual range. All right, I'm assuming you just removed an option for him, it, smart. If he wanted that option, though, he would've taken it. Yeah, it was only just removed an option for him. It, smart. If he wanted that option, though, he would've taken it. Yeah, it was only a few feet away from him. True, but that is to be said. Maybe he has a mode of meditation or rest.

All right. The sigil worked too far away, we can't see it. The other thing we haven't looked at is those glyphs, one of you can go up there, right? Can't you just run up a column? Yeah. But that puts you closer to the gem. Yeah. Well, you still have that cat claw thing, right?

You can get the gem further away. I have about 20 seconds left, do you want me to? 20 seconds? It lasts a minute, I mean, we don't really say how long. Yeah, drag it off in another direction. Just get it a little bit further. Make the clock, out of the darkness, towards the gem, and I will take it in a different direction, 90 degrees.

Make sure you remember where you left it. Yeah, he is straight out, and the gem is going to my direct right. He's good at remembering stupid things like that. He's correct. Can I, is there a pillar nearby that looks scalable? Like I could do some dope monk shit up it? You can certainly try. Yeah, that's nice. The pillars themselves

are mostly smooth. They look like, similar to the floor and the ceiling around here, hewn to be somewhat straight, though they themselves are somewhat rough on the surface, so there aren't outcroppings, there aren't platforms, there aren't things on it that you could hold onto. You would either have to physically shimmy up

like a palm tree or be creative elsewhere, because it is a challenge to get up. You can have some fabric. I was going to say, I'm going to untie my belt from around my belt, my cobalt soul belt, and throw it around the pole to give me... Like Mulan. Like Mulan! The pillar itself is probably about...

It's about five foot wide, so diameter is probably pretty long, but you can gather through your outfit and material, from your previous outfit as well, and things, you can fashion a piece of material that'll wrap around, and you can attempt to make your way to the front. Wait, just in case, and I hold the little pearl

up to my forehead and some geometric designs in the air, and I cast Fortune's Fapor on you. All right. Make an air reroll? Yeah. You're attempting to shimmy up the pole? I don't have that. Go ahead and make an athletics check for me. I touch her shoulder as she's about to go up and then say.

Don't waste any spells. No, just the Traveler and I both believe in you, okay? Thank you, Jester. You're welcome. Can I just give guidance? Thank you. You're patting the shoulder and some real shit. That's a d4 on checks, right? D4 for a minute.

That was going to be Guidance, thank you very much. I was in the process of expelling magic from my hand, Caduceus. Now it's just wasted magic. I thought it was just friendship. Oh, that makes me feel a little bit fuzzy. Have a spell. That's funny. All right. Okay, athletics?

Athletics. All right. What is she doing up there to look at the gold? I will use that Fortune's Favor immediately. That's bad, dude. That's not bad either. 23. That's not bad either. 23. That's great, okay.

It takes you a bit of time and it is physically strenuous. You feel the sweat starting to fall on your brow, even just a quarter up this pillar, and you're having to stop and take a break every now and then, just pulling taut to catch your breath. You want to just smoke him. Just. Pull, swing up, pull, and just making your way up.

You guys are watching. Stop whenever I get the shakes. Yeah. You are able to see in the darkness, so you do not need the specific, any sort of radial light as you approach, but you do manage to get towards the very top before it begins to widen, and as it begins to widen, it becomes more and more difficult to climb until eventually you can't go any higher,

but you are about, I'd say, 10 to 15 feet beneath the roof. You're about 85 feet up. Are there any, is there any lips, any edges? Make a perception check. Kind of holding. Burning forearm. Perception, Azuisin? Yep. Oh!

Fuck you. Boo! It was on it twice before it fell off. 22, 22. Five. You are losing strength and you see, in no way, shape, or form, a handhold or any place to grab onto. Okay.

Your arms are starting to give, you're shaking. What am I doing? I'm just going to stand underneath her just in case she falls. Okay. Okay, I'm going to just look up and can I start calling out glyph shapes? Is that weird? What do I see? What do I see?

You see a 10-foot diameter red circle that is drawn on the ceiling with a series of other lines and symbols within it, many connecting. Yeah, is it chalk or is it carved? You don't see a material, you just see the glow. Chalk, does it look rough and quick, or does it look? It looks intentionally placed, and it looks deliberate and permanent.

How the fuck did he get up here? With whatever, with my remaining strength. It's probably permanent. I take out a ball bearing. Tink! Right in the center of it. Throw it up. Hit the rune. Hit it. It hits the center of the runes, nothing flashes, no glow, it just hits

and then continues to fall, and eventually hear, Ting! Ting, ting, ting, ting, ting, ting. You guys hear the pulpit. Watch where you're dropping those things! I know we're going to have to dispel that thing, right? If only we had a rock that just dispels things. We would be happy to dispel it. What'd? If only we had a rock that just dispels things. We have to dispel it.

Jesus. What'd you say, Davy Crockett? Any other discerning factors I can get from her? Roll an arcana check. Roll an arcana check. If you're trying to glean. Do I still have Guidance? Nope. Nope.

Okay. 17. 17. Only because you've been around Caleb for quite some time, and the base studies you have, you have no idea what this glyph does, what its purpose is, but you make up enough of the symbols to gather

it's probably something conjuration-based. That's as much as you can make out. Oh. Okay, I'm going to grab the fabric and position my feet and start sliding down the pole. It is a great relief as you begin to make your way below. Still, itself, a physically tense activity to do so safely, until you get within a certain distance

that you feel comfortable, 40 or so feet for a monk. You just drop. I got you. I got you. Just move your feet. Don't hit him in the face. Just drop. Jump off the pole and then just use her hands like little stepping stones, go onto the floor. That's pretty cool.

Not what I had in mind, but I liked it. Thanks for the hand. Well, from sneaking into your spell books and reading them when I've been bored, Excuse me. I think that glyph looks like the ones when you conjure shit. Like what?

What do you mean? Like my cat? Yeah, like your cat. Or like your cat's claw, or any time that you draw something and something comes out of it. It looked... Bobo, is it the exact same as the glyph on the floor? It is very different. No. This looks... This is necromantic

down here on the floor, this is death. And that's conjuration. Oh, so they're going to conjure something dead. That seems like a waste. Do you think that glyph is what is making this space exist? I mean, we flew into the mouth of a giant thing. Yeah, but we're obviously, obliviously in a different place now, you know?

Like, we're not inside of that thing anymore, we're in another plane. I'm going to start looking around for any sign of where an exit to this room might be. Okay. So you begin to just pick a direction and start walking? I'm not going to walk, but I'm like to start looking around for any sign of where an exit to this room might be. Okay, so you begin to just pick a direction and start walking? I'm not going to walk, but I'm looking to see if there's anything around that feels like a path,

or if it's just this straight beeline, if it's just the beeline to this. You moved your arms and it was so fast, it was just a lure. SAM and LAURA and SAM and LAURA and SAM. I'll do a quick run around the whole place in one second. Where'd our clothes go? Okay.

So make a perception check with disadvantage. That's fair. Because it is mostly dark at the distance you're searching. Yeah, I'm not going alone. Oh, I meant to do that. Oh, well, that's terrible. That's a 17. 17. It is.

You walk on for the better part of a minute or so in one direction, and the darkness continues. I don't lose sight of them. Do you press on? No, as long as I don't, I'm not going to lose sight of them. I'm not going deep, I'm just doing a little. You move about like three or 400 feet away from them, like carefully stepping, and there's still darkness ahead of you.

Okay, I come back. You come back from there? Yeah. Three or 400 feet away. Shit. Yeah, it could be a way for him to get out of here or possibly to summon forms. Yeah, because why would you put a teleportation circle on the ceiling?

Well, it might be. If he can fly, what difference does it make? Or if he can reverse gravity or something, then he all of a sudden, like what if he has a whole other laboratory up there? Did I see another laboratory in the ceiling? You did not, from where you were at the moment, no. Contouration covers a number of things.

Teleportation is one of them. It could be also summoning forms, perhaps, to inhabit. We have the books, right? Yeah. We didn't come out of that. We came, where did we come from? From a door which disappeared, and we have no way out of here now, and we're going to be stuck here forever.

We have two options. Dispel or destroy the glyph. Touch the stone. Oh. Or step into the glyph. I pulled the body and the gem far away from his little laboratory. I would like to go back to the laboratory

and search it for anything, because I didn't go into the middle of it. Make an investigation check. I'll come and assist. Yeah, we're going to, let's stay as a group. Because I've already been over there. I'll point stuff at you. Sure. Natural 20.

All right. Oh fucking hell. Stay as a group. You find a small box that contains 100 gold worth of powdered silver. Ooh! You find 1,200 gold worth of powdered silver. Ooh! You find 1,200 gold worth of rare incense. Rare incense? You can see small braziers

that are around this ritual circle where you can see ash where this incense was previously burned as part of this, whatever the last ritual was. That's nog-nog. You also find in one of the tables what looks to be what was once eight, there's now four missing gaps,

but there are four pearls that are worth 100 gold each. All spell components. All very serious spell components. And that's the extent of what's there. What were the numbers on the powdered silver and the rare incense, please? Powdered silver was 100 gold. 100.

Incense was 1,200 gold worth of rare incense. Understood. If we do wake him up so that we can get out of here, we are going to be in a lot of trouble for stealing all of his stuff in here. I think perhaps he's probably all right with it, especially if it gets him out. Should we throw Caleb's cat at the circle?

In case it is a teleportation and activates with touch? Up above. Yeah. Or down below. It would ensure that no common person could activate it if it's fucking on the ceiling. I try to throw a ball bearing at it. Oh, right. But that's not a person, right?

Neither is a cat. Cat's closer to a person. Make a very good point. I mean, I could go up there and... What if you teleport away and then we don't even know where you are? Well, we could try. Frumpkin, but normally when I use circles to travel for us. You have to activate it.

And I have to activate it, it takes time and it has to be on the same plane of existence. And I don't know where we are. Doesn't look like any other teleportation circles we've used where it's just constant. It looks far more intricate than any of you've seen Caleb make. But did it feel like a teleportation circle?

You wouldn't have the experience to know. Caleb, get up here and look at it. Because you rolled so high, you caught an essence of the, it was a conjuration school. Do you want to go up there? Well, I can get myself there, but I don't know that I will have the intuition. I can get you there.

Or if you can get Frumpkin there, that's another way to take a look at it. These spells were soul jar, clone, and magic jar, trap the soul, and clone. Like a clone? Trap the soul. No, I got him. Sorry, Beau. No? I touch Caleb

and give him spider climb. What the fuck? You don't know what... We don't know what those do, though. Da da da. Something like that. That is a new trick. I don't know either.

I start to climb up the column. How are your forearms? If we get fucking lifted here. Doesn't matter. Like a hobo Spider-Man. Caleb. I'm clean now. I know, but the long coat. We've found fancy purple robes now.

I got a pretty jacket. Like a well-dressed hobo Spider-Man. Yeah. Yeah. You're clean-shaven. Yeah. Don't forget the promise we all made that we wouldn't leave without anybody else. I don't want to leave by myself. Hold your arms out in case I fall.

You won't, you can't. I got you. Oh, it's on. You climb up there, and as you're heading your way up there, the darkness begins to take you. You don't have much any means of light. Oh. Oh, well, I put the, for now, the dancing lights are on me, the globules.

Okay. You light up the space and as you begin to climb up, you can begin to see the red glow that they kept talking about that you couldn't quite make out with your eyes previously. The closer you get, the closer you get, you can see now the diameter that is set there. The size of it resembles the teleportation circles

that you've written as far as it's similar to its size, but it's very different in its construction, much more intricate, the details in it are almost fractal in some ways. Make an arcana check. Okay, I was going to say, does it look like it indicates more than the single plane, a single plane?

I cast Fortune's Favor on myself. You can do that again. Okay. That's a good call. Don't fuck this shit up. Ooh, uh-huh. Two terrible rolls. Arcana, 14. 14. Four and a two.

You have no idea what this does. You can read that it's conjuration-based, and there are elements of it that are kind of familiar, but it's far more advanced than anything that you've encountered, especially of this type of permanent-based ritual sigil. Yeah, you're not able to make out anything else about it. So I climb a little bit higher,

and I'm hanging from the ceiling like this, and I go, and Frumpkin is right here, and I lift him by the scruff, and I reach up and say, touch it, please. You just, you dab your cat onto the circle. As he's going to do that, I'm just holding him. Gently wipe your cat against the ceiling. Like, what are you doing?

Okay, you're just holding, what are you doing? I want him to do this, that's what I told him to do. So I'll check on the target. To touch it. Okay. Yeah. I don't expect much, but I'm going to try everything. Okay. Frumpkin reaches up and trepidatiously reaches a paw to the center of the circle.

You watch as a bunch of the lines across it begin to glow and connect. All of them begin to gather together, and then Frumpkin begins to float for a second, and then is scattered to atoms. Pick you up around the bend, buddy. Scattered to atoms? Yeah, what do you mean? Like violently or disappears?

Like TV? Like in or disappears? Like Mike TV? Like in the air. Yeah. Sure. Frumpkin just vanishes and in the place where it was, the fey essence itself is just a slight cloud of sparkle dust that just dissipates. I know what that is.

Down below, everyone hears, So this circle does not like cats. What do you mean you know what that was? You were saying? Did we see a giant pup? Oh, did we see any of this? Did we not see any of this? You see the brief flash on the ceiling above

as you're watching Caleb go up to the top. Yeah, Frumpkin's gone. Haven't seen it yet. You can see almost everything. I probably, if I saw a cat go poof, then I know what this is. I take 30 seconds to memorize what I'm looking at. Okay.

And then I start to climb back down. It's a trash can. What do you mean? Oh my god. I don't get the reference. If something's not working here, you can just get rid of it. Pop it up.

Your necromancy spell Goes wrong. Fails. You just like, Slip gravity. Not said, you reverse that gravity and That was me, I said that. I didn't say that. Jester. It's okay.

One of the detectors. Okay, so it's a meat grinder. Maybe. A garbage disposal? It makes sense. This is, if you're experimenting in a room like this, you'd probably want a way of getting rid of something quick. All right. And you didn't find anything at the laboratory?

I just found some of the things that he was working with, some of his components. This is? Does it look like the columns keep going past this circle in the other direction? From where you walked, the distance you made, there were no more columns. So this is the end of the columns,

it's just this stops here and there's nothing more other than this little side. For as far as you walked, yeah, it just seemed to be. I'm going to walk around the perimeter of this thing to see if the columns start again on the other side or not. Are you going further? We're over at the little testing facility with the table. Correct.

So I want to walk around, just around the perimeter of that. Okay. Not in the darkness, but to see, because there's columns on the outside, right? Correct. I want to see if they mirror on the other side. Okay, yeah, there are four columns

that all encircle the central space. So they do mirror each other in the sense that they kind of... But there's no columns, I was thinking, there's columns leading up to it or no? There's just the four columns? No. Okay. From where you guys were previously and from where you walked, you saw no other columns. Okay.

You can keep walking if you want to search for columns elsewhere in the chamber, that's up to you. I would say simultaneously, to make the most of the spell that Nott has gifted me with, I'm going to walk up the column again and start exploring the ceiling around and see if there was anything else that we missed. I'm going very carefully, so I'm going to step on an atomizer.

Okay, make a perception check as you go around. I do that thing where I see invisible stuff. Perception, you said? Mm-hmm. 12. 12? All right, you spend a few minutes. How long is sputter time? An hour, yeah. You spend a number of minutes slowly making a round

and spiraling outward to make a good scan of the vicinity on the roof. Globules are just hovering. It continues to be just continuation of that stone. And once you are outside of those pillars once more, it is just ceiling, featureless, beyond just the continuation of rock. All right, so while he's doing that,

I turn to Jester and I say, listen, this is essentially a crime scene. I mean, yeah. So what happened here? Why don't we reverse engineer this? Halas is in here. He wants to transfer his soul to another body. So he puts it in the ruby.

He falls down. Why would he put it in the ruby before he has another body to put it in? Maybe he had one. He was ready to do the thing, the transfer, and something went wrong. The body rejected it or fought him or was flushed up the toilet.

That's true. Or maybe it wasn't a good fit. Can we all hear this? Yeah, of course. Maybe more people keep coming down here through the hole, and he keeps trying them out. He keeps possessing them with the ruby into his... Maybe he was waiting for Yussa.

Or... Waiting for Yussa? Or? Waiting for Yussa? Or waiting for someone worthy? Who knows how long he's been waiting? It might not have been that long to have been. Or maybe, maybe he can't. He's missing something. He's missing something.

He didn't possess any of us. He had the opportunity. Maybe he can't do it right now. He needs something. Maybe we should look at the ruby and find out. Talk to him? Yeah. Maybe we can't do it right now, he needs something. We should look at the ruby and find out. Talk to him? Yeah. Maybe we can flip it over, maybe there's a rune on the back or something that was scratched or something

and now he can't use it. I've got an idea. What? I'd have to look at the body. We can do that. Yeah, we can go look at the body. But maybe the ruby was a failsafe. Shlurp, shlurp, shlurp, shlurp. You mean he tried to?

Like, what do you mean? Send the soul somewhere else, it didn't work, and it went there instead? We killed the heart and a bunch of stuff died. Oh! Maybe this just happened. Maybe it just went in there when we killed the heart. And if you were that obsessed with not dying,

maybe you have an emergency ruby. Back up. So that the next person who wanders by can get you back into something comfortable. And you would be able to glean that from looking at the body? Well, if the heart's all messed up. Oh, inside the body? Yeah.

Well, let's go look. But he's alive, you can body? Yeah. Well, let's go look. But he's alive. Can I take out the sword and have it glow? Surprising. I'll use the word, got to spot, and can I cast See Invisibility? I'll raise the sword above my head,

my eyes flash. Okay. You glance around the space directly around you. The sigil on the floor, the intensity is a little brighter. Almost like putting on certain shades that brighten colors a bit. You can see the glyph on the ceiling itself

is a little more visible now, but nothing invisible catches your attention. Let's go inspect the body, Mr. Caduceus. As a group. All right. We got the light up. Going to head to the body really quickly. Okay, we all walk to the body.

Okay. Would you like me to put the bubble up so we can talk to this gem from within it? Can we do that? We can. Sound goes through. Yeah. But you have to be touching the ruby for him to be able to talk to you. Is that the case?

That's what it seemed like. That's what it worked like with us. What if I cast Zone of Truth, and then I hold the ruby, and I'll know if he's lying to me? It's like work on gems. I don't know if you can tell if a ruby is lying. It works on creatures,

and what if it's a soul, is a creature, right? So maybe it will work. Maybe. I mean, we got to touch that stone. Well, do you have any magic that blocks possession or transference of souls? You're very smart. I wear a counterspell, but I don't know if it's like that.

The hell does counterspell do? That just shuts down a spell card. Does he also take over your body, or do you share consciousness? What does his spell say? I like Jester's Zone of Truth idea, personally. Then again, I like most things that you do. Thank you.

What does Zone of Truth say? Well, it creates a little area where people that are in it can only tell the truth. And you remember I, oh, that wasn't with you, Caduceus. Objectively, two people have touched, Objection! Yes, have touched the stone, and he did not seem to overtake either of them or any of us, we were all within 100 feet.

He's not interested in me or not. Why would he be not interested in us? But maybe we can use that to our advantage. His poor taste in people, we can still talk to him. He won't possess us, we know that's okay. Maybe I'll just talk up somebody else and that way he won't want to use me. Here's what I'm worried about,

that if he does possess one of us, that that person is lost for the foreseeable future, possessed by possibly one of the most powerful mortals in history. So, and it looks like we are running out of options here, but if we do this, I think we combine our plans and throw up the dome, and all of us but one sits just outside.

I think it should be me. I do, too. Why? dome and all of us but one sits just outside. I think it should be me. I do, too. Why? You are all magic users. Ah, that's right, and you pop pop. If I was a powerful sorcerer, I would want to ensure that I still had magic capabilities going forward. We have no idea if the dome would actually interrupt

a area spell of 100 feet, right? It would interrupt a spell of that nature. If he were to come back into his full power, he might very easily be able to pull it down, but. Can you tell me this? Because I don't know. But I want lines of defense. Do we know that he's a sorcerer or a wizard?

He's a mage. Mage. But I mean, is his magic learned? Yeah, it seems like it. He's learned it. Look at this book. Use your body to cast magic. And you're pretty willful.

He kept asking for somebody willful. Majestor, you're also very willful. You kept asking for somebody willful. Majestically, you're also very willful. No, I'm not, I'm very docile. I think Beau's got the right idea. This place is called the Magesbane for a reason. That is true. I think Beau has the right idea as well. Can I still cast Zone of Truth?

Sure. Yeah. Uh, you'll have to be outside the dome. It's not concentration. I think you could cast it and set in with the rest of us. Yeah. Well, we are over here at the body. Do you want to look at the body? It'll also mean that we can't lie.

Let's do it. All right. Let's do it. Well, wait, let me get the dome up, please. While he's getting the dome up, I'm going to look at the body. Yeah, same. Okay. Are you going to get the dome up next to the ruby? I wonder if it is better to do it away

from his circle in the middle, or? I think we do it away, and you go pick up the ruby and bring it here. I think so, I think we do it away, and you go pick up the ruby and bring it here. I think so, I think we get away, in case he draws any sort of power from the center. Okay. Shit. Any cuts, scars, or stabs?

He wraps around, throughout the body, going through his robes and everything. Doesn't appear to be anything, interestingly enough, for his age, no scars. How's the chest? I want to open the shirt and take a look at the chest. The chest appears to be intact. How are the abs?

Does he wax? He does wax, yeah, it's pretty smooth. Is the heart beating? Pretty polished, the heart is beating. I detect undead. It just doesn't grow. No undead aura. Ooh. How old does he appear to be?

Is he a human? Mid-50s or so. Do we have manacles? We do. We do. We should chain them up. Yeah, try using them. I'll pull some of the manacles out. Aren't they like magical manacles?

We have the magical manacles. I don't know where the card is, but I know that we have it. It's the ones from Lorenzo's. They kept us from doing spells. Yeah. All right. Yeah, try that. We'll slap those on his.

It was awful. Yeah. I literally don't have that card anymore, though. Okay, so you place the manacles upon the body of Halas. You prepare the dome. You said you're doing? Yeah, yeah, so before I do, I just... Yeah.

Sorry, indigestion, I'm nervous. What's up? Be careful. Yeah. Yeah, no, talking to a super genius, ancient, powerful mage, I'll be great. Beau. Yeah. You'll be great.

You're super strong. What is she trying to find out before we do this? I'm doming it. How to get out of here. And Beau is going to be outside the dome? Yep. Are you sure that one of the people who can do Counterspell shouldn't be right next to her?

We can step out of the dome and do it. Whenever. She's going to be right next to the dome. Just like on the other side of the glass. Fjord can literally stand half in and half out. Okay. Yeah. I just step right into the middle. How are you doing?

Right down the middle. It's pretty great. All right, the dome is completed. You all step inside except for Beauregard. Oh, well, I keep outside of it, too, because I have to cast Dawn of Truth. Okay. And I'll give you one last Guidance for the roll.

Literally stand half in and half out in the spirit of tonight. Legs out, though, right? Yeah, don't. Just a slower half. Actually, different. I'm going to give you a resistance. Just doing a downward dog.

I'm going to give you a resistance instead. Me? Yeah. Resistance two. You get a d4 to a saving throw. Yeah. That's good. That makes sense. Okay. I'll Mage Hand and drag the ruby over.

Okay. I'm going to cast. The ruby is brought, lifted up and then brought over by the hand, the cloth you had thrown over it. Caleb is still draped over it. I'm going to cast Zone of Truth over the ruby. Okay. Then I'm going to step into the thing.

Okay, well. I don't know if it has to make charisma save. It does. What it's all about. I haven't been this in-game nervous in a long time. No problem. The dome is almost completely invisible at this time. There's just the barest pale blue so that we see where the water is.

We can see everything. It's for magic users, so he probably wants you. Okay. We can put her down pretty easily. We have to. Yeah. You guys know. I'm going to roll with my robot hand. You got to make a sound.

What do you roll? Okay. What's your spell DC? It's 17. What dice did you roll? I know whether the creature succeeds or fails. Correct, the creature succeeds. Fuck me. It didn't work, but Beau won't be able to lie.

Good idea, casting it, though. We can move outside of the zone now. It didn't work on him? So. Then I'll move outside of it. You can just dump it. Okay. No, I want to leave it at that. Okay, you move outside of the zone.

Because it didn't work on him, right? Nope. On the gem? No, it's not. Let's go. Okay, you grab the stone, you look towards it, and you can see deep within the swirling, multicolored mists within the ruby,

the red transitions internally to other colors, and you can see two amber-colored eyes, just irises that are bright yellow-amber colored, looking right at you, and the voice goes, I was wondering where you all had gone. I'm happy to see that you have not abandoned the conversation. No, not yet.

I'm Beau, by the way. Beau. I am Halas Lutgran. I am thankful for your aid and your keen eye. And I promise you, riches,'s spoons, whatever you need, should you be willing to dispel this gem of imprisonment that I found myself in. Ah. And then what would you do?

Where would you go? I would stay here. I built all of this. You've seen, I assume, to have gotten this far, what I'm capable of creating. What happened? Why aren't you in your body anymore? I had been toying with various

arcane means of testing the boundaries of one's mortal shell. I had this gem specifically commissioned for this purpose, but it appears the design was sabotaged by one of my many enemies, I assume, and I found myself unable to escape it. A rare moment of a lack of foresight.

Interesting. And care on my part. Who was the person that sabotaged you? I can only imagine there are many, many that would love to see me in this state. However, none have, so that is a comforting thought. Should we keep this between us? We'll keep this between us, yes. Maybe.

You have any idea how long you've been in there? I have no idea. By the time dilation, I have been unable to adjust since I've been stuck in here, so I assume it's still set in a rapid progress, I believe? Yeah, yeah, totally rapid progress. How long have you been inside this halls, then? Oh, couple weeks.

Couple weeks, much time has passed on your, I assume you hail from Exandria, yes? Maybe. You are stubbornly forthright, not at all. You may not be aware, but a lot of time is passing in your home plane. No, I'm aware. All right.

There are ways to disable that. So it's actually a portion, as part of my design of this device, to adjust the passage of time slower, quicker, or within the normal passage. I previously set it in an advanced case as I was hoping to bypass a few nuisances and... Outlives. Lifelines. But then here I've been, and well,

I guess the rest you already know, since you look at me with such a already well-informed expression. Well, you have left quite the trail of little shrines behind yourself, so yeah, we put the pieces together. Nice color scheme, by the way., like the red and the gold. Branding is important.

Mm-hmm. Beau, how's it going? Yeah, what's happening? It's talkative, we take it. Hey, Halaz, can you hold for one second? Certainly. Tink. Doot, doot, doot, doot.

He wants us to let him out. He wants to go back into his body. He promised us riches and any boons that we wanted. He's stuck in there. What did you say about two weeks, Fjord? Oh, he's asked how long we've been in here, and then he's like, oh, you know, a lot of time has passed between this time and the next,

and I was like, yeah, I already know that. Did you ask him what the symbols on the roof are for? No, I haven't gotten that far yet. What about how to get him out? He said he wanted a little Dispel Magic. Dispel Magic? That's all it takes? Something, yeah. So. That's what he said, right?

Dispel, he's like, dispel this? He said to dispel the Gem of Imprisonment he's found himself in. To dispel the Gem of Imprisonment. I suppose. A Gem of Imprisonment. So that's why he can't. He thought it was a regular one, and then it is a trapping one.

That's why he can't actually possess any of those. What a stupid guy he is. Right. Yeah, well, he said one of his lackeys or colleagues sabotaged the gem. Can he hear us talking about him right now? You're not currently holding the gem, I assume. No, I put it down. No. Do you have no idea?

I mean, he's pretty cool and stuff, but that was a pretty dumb move, is all. Keep working him. Come on, you've got leverage. What does the symbols do? How do we get out of here? How would we dispel it? We don't want to let him out, right?

I mean, if he's the only thing that's- Promise him whatever he wants, just to get information. Does he seem nice? He seems charming. Tell him how long he's actually been trapped and see if he starts crying. Wow. But I don't know

how long he's been trapped. Ask him about the promo. Well, I mean, tell him nobody's heard of him in like... Centuries or something. I mean, I think it has been that long. I think it has, too. Ask him what year he thinks it is. He also said something, though, about how he can adjust the timing

and he can undo the time and shit, though. Maybe he can go back in time. Go back, talk more. See if he starts crying. Make him cry, Beau. You really want to make a ruby cry. All right, Halas, you still there? Yes, Beau?

Yep, it's me. Thanks for waiting. Okay, so listen. You know, I am kind of the acting liaison for the Mighty Nein in this instance. What year do you think it is? What year do you think it is? What does it matter? I don't know, do you want to know

how long you've been here? What year is it for you? The year is, what year is it? What year is this? I believe at this time it would be 836 PD. Wild stallions! It's 836 PD. Well, based on the fact that we are now working

through time in a different aeon than I am familiar with. Ooh, yeah. Not knowing what PD refers to, and 800, wow, yeah, it's been really- Oh, wow. That is very problematic. Uh-huh. It's, oh no.

Yeah. Oh, he rocked his noodle. By the way. When the gem wizard says, wow, shit's fucked up. I sat him down really quick. Goes or sits. Come again? Yeah.

I sat him down really quick. That Travanaar has what? Did he sound sad when he said, I know? He said he didn't know what aeon it was. I pick it back up. Ask him how to change bodies perfectly. Yeah, I'm getting you. There's a lot. There's a lot, a lot.

Okay, I pick it back up. Okay. Sorry, sorry, I dropped you. I dropped you for a second. Ask him if he's a good wizard or a bad wizard. Ask him how to get out of here. Ask him if he can hear all of us talking. Can you hear my dumb team shouting behind me?

No, but I can communicate with you as you are holding the gem. Right, right, right, right. Okay, so look, we'd love to help you out. You know, because we're very kind in giving people. I assume that much. You seem to be very curious folk. Mm-hmm.

Curious makes you useful. All right, that, you know, it sounds a little ominous when you put it like that. You do realize that, right? Like, nothing about what you just said is trustworthy. Stay on target, stay on target. Come on, keep working. Why are you here? Why have you wandered these halls?

Might as well tell them the truth. Yeah, come on. You familiar with an arcanist Yussa? Nope. I am not. Remember, 800 years? 800, so much. Time shifts? Well, I don't know, maybe Yussa came through here.

Well, we got this ball a little bit ago, and then we actually came in a few months ago. Your dragon, super pissed, by the way. You left him hanging. What? No, no, I'm for this. Oh gosh. And then we came in here looking for another mage

that got sucked into your happy fun ball, and kind of stumbled into here. We were just trying to get somebody out. Yeah, and now we're trying to get out. Yeah, ask him maybe how we can help him and us get out. I'm working on it, You jumped my line, man. I was working on my pitch. I can only hear your half of the conversation.

And you heard me building up to my pitch. I have no idea what's going on. So here's the thing, man. You want to get out, we want to get out, everyone wants to get out, right? Is there a fly in that? I think that sounds like a reasonable comparison, yes. So we can grab your body, scoop it up.

You can tell us how to get out of here. Then we'll let you out. We can go our separate ways. Or be friends, I don't know. Do you want to be friends? Do you like friends? Ask him if he's nice. Make him cry. Are you nice? Do you cry?

That's a lot of questions. Ask him if he be sad right now. Okay, hang on! There's a long sigh. This is why people don't like us, by the way. Who's being honest? Grab them! Keep going.

Just how we get out. Morality is relative, and I do not know, by your standards, what is considered nice or useful. So I will say, given the lack of information we have about each other, I myself can also prove useful. Imagine an individual responsible for creating such the space that you've found yourself in now

could be capable of doing quite a few things in your favor. If you were to take my body and take this gem and manage to find a way out of this sphere, I can guide you. I really don't like the long horses. Then we could be useful to each other. He did imprison the Permaheart. Didn't necessarily know who it was.

He's been using it and studying it. He could be an ally. We need to make friends. Ask him if he wants to be a lich. What? Yeah, that's kind of where it's going. You know, Halas, we've kind of picked up on a few themes and interests of yours.

Such as? Cloning yourself. Well, that is a relatively standard means of continuing one's existence in a dangerous time of war. Pretty standard. Not anymore. That war is long gone.

In fact, I mean, we're in another war, but no, actually. What you're doing is kind of taboo now. Most people don't really like necromancy. Oh, that's unfortunate. Yeah. Well, they don't have to worry about it. I keep to my experiments, they keep to their interests.

What I do here is not guided by the laws and morals of the rest of Exandria, and what I do does not hurt anyone. What? Does it? How old are you? Apparently time isn't relevant, right, Halas? I'm asking you a question, as you've asked me many. How old are you?

26. Very young. Yeah. But you, I can tell, have seen some terrible things in your time. People you care about taken away. You can see all that through this? No, I can sense it in the way you talk.

For every person you've lost, what if it was unnecessary? What if there was a way to shrug off these confines of expected mortality that might have worked by the designs of some inferior, self-imposed deities? Would you not be curious enough to pursue that possibility? Interesting temptations coming from the man who got himself trapped in a ruby.

Look, I'm not proud of it. But when you focus intently on specific ideas, sometimes you lose track of the small details, a mistake I will not make again. Beau, if you mentioned a war, you should ask who was fighting and perhaps mention some of our foes, see if they ring any bells. Or more to the point, see who he was favoring.

I'm working on it, I'm building the thing, keep interrupting. We're actually sitting in silence quite a bit. We pretty much. All right, Halas. Yes. You know, I feel, as they say, the devil is in the details, and if you are messing with things that are

necromantic in nature, that maybe you wouldn't want to be clumsy, as you were, so. So quick to judge the term necromantic or necromancy. I also ascertain by this that you're probably not one as well-versed in various magical interests. Are you a spell user, spell crafter, a weaver of things arcane?

I don't know, what do you think? You said you can sense a lot about me. This is not how this works. Do you find your friends healing your wounds? Pulling you from the brink of death and watching all of your cuts and hemorrhages reversed? Okay, I get the point you're making. That's necromancy. Yeah, I get it. There are many things that stem from necromancy.

To judge one thing based on its school shows, um, how do you say in the common tongue? Ignorance. Yeah, I knew they could've told you that one was coming. Oh, he called me ignorant. Um, okay. It's going well, it's a good conversation.

How do we get out of here? Wait for your attention! Okay, you mentioned a war. So what war is that that you're referring to? Because I have some big fucking news flashes for you that I haven't even gotten to yet. So what war were you talking about? There are conflict all across the world many times.

Yeah. There were those who were unhappy with the ruling of the various deities, and as such, the betrayers rose up against them in that conflict. Some of us were no longer of interest to the shackles left in our endeavors. Many of the various city-states began to fracture

while others joined together. There are many conflicts there. So which war in particular of that realm are you interested in? I was not part of any. These things did not concern me. I was more focused in building my own abode. Well, one of your little Betrayer God experiments,

the Laughing Hand, does that ring a bell? Yes, that was connected with the unique sort of divine mutation that I was researching. Yeah, well, he's stomping around the world right now, wreaking havoc. Divinity is useless. And this Permaheart? Yes, has its uses, And this perma-heart?

Yes, has its uses, but I cannot with this Laughing Hand. What use is it to you? Death is an inconvenience, one of my experience and power is not willing to cut through to. So I would seek other means of prolonging one's life without having to give in to such base, easy transitions such as leechdom or means of undeath.

And I, the whole deal is messy and difficult to control and. Dying? Undying. And you tempting us with being able to alter time. What does that mean? Not altering time outside of this vicinity, but the things that are shackled to the tower machine can be transitioned to move slower or quicker relative to the Prime Material plane and others.

All right, we're going to continue to have this conversation, but I want to get out of this room because it's fucking boring. Oh, you're stuck inside the dungeon. The what? The dungeon? What? Well, I assume this thing is how you're here.

You walked into the mouth of the Dreadnaught, and I will say, quite impressive or extremely stupid, either way, you are within the Dreadnaught's dungeon. You're saying dungeon, right? More or less. It is a space that is contained within its belly and outside of its belly at the same time.

There is no escape out here, aside from shifting between the planes. But I may have a means of showing you out, if you agree to take the gem in my body with you. We'll take the gem in my body with you. We'll take the gem in your body. All right. All right.

What, what, what, what? Are you talking to us? Yep. What happened? What are we doing? I'm going to put you down for a minute, I lost. Round up his body, he's going to guide us out of here. In exchange for? He wants us to let him out, and I tell him all of that.

Yeah, you exchange all the information with the party. He sounds really nice, I like him. But did he never explain to you exactly how we're going to release his body? I think it's an ongoing conversation, but I don't want to really end up saying something or piss the guy off when he's agreed to guide us out of here. The truth of the matter is, you know, if it or piss the guy off when he's agreed to guide us in here.

The truth of the matter is, if it wasn't illegal or anything when he was around, then maybe he didn't know it was bad. Then really, is it bad if it's not hurting anyone? No, I don't think so. We don't really have a choice. I'm wary of him. I don't like that he called you ignorant, though.

There's something about him. For a guy who seems so steadfast in his knowledge and confident in his abilities, I seem to rile him up pretty quickly. Well, that's also you. Yeah, I know, I know, but this one's different. This one's different. But we're inside the belly of a dreadnought that we can only escape

through a Planeship spell, which Caleb, you cannot do, correct? The best I could do would be to banish one of you away to a random spot in our world. Well, I could do it. We could, no, no, no, no, banish. We could cast it at a higher level and I could banish multiple people.

To where? To a specific plane. Not pinpointed. To the plane that they are from. Are from. But without a pinpoint location. Right, so if we banished multiples, everyone might end up in different places. Or in the ocean, or 500 feet in the air, or. Or a volcano.

Well, look, I mean, he's offering to guide us out. I mean, we can try and just get to the door of this place and then decide from there. From within there, he's going to explain it, or he wants to? Yeah. He can just walk us through it. He wants us to walk. I'm not going to throw him back in his body

until he tells us how to get out of here, so no. Here's the thing, there's nothing wrong with a contract. So we've got somebody we need to get out of here. We need to get out of here. And maybe a little help dealing with what we're going to be facing on the other side. That's three requests just for this. I feel like that's fair.

And then for that, we'll put him back where he should be. He could be very useful to us. I just. We would be fools to take him at his word on anything. Agreed. Well, yeah, but. It's better to have somebody's word broken than to have no word at all.

I'm also fucked for choice. I will say this. I sort of empathize with him. You know, he wants to be out of this thing he's in. He wants his life back. This is his house. He wants his life back. This is his house. He wants his life back, and that's something that's worthy. However, I will say this.

We do have one more option, possibly. We could talk to Allura. Yeah, I can call her again. And maybe she can get us out of here, and if she can't, then we're fucked. Or you can just give us insight on if abusing him is a bad idea. That's actually, that's really clever.

Yeah, let's give her a call. That's right. I'll just leave him on hold. Yeah, that's what I was raising my hand for earlier. Has it been 24 hours since the first time that I used it? You've used it. Technically. Technically, I've used it. Technically. Technically, I've used it three times.

You have. But we slept. But we slept. You slept twice. Yeah. Twice in years? That's 16 hours, or. I'd say it's been probably about, past the crest of 24 hours. Okay, so I can use it again?

Yeah. Okay. All right. So you. I bump it out. Mm-hmm. Allura? Oh, yes. Oh, I'm sorry, did I wake you up? It's all right. If you talk faster, it'll be more normal for her.

No, if I... Oh, yeah. Okay, Allura, so here's the deal. We went into the mouth of a dreadnought, and it turns out that it opened this other plane or something, and now we're stuck in this thing, and we found the body of Halas, but he's trapped in a little ruby, and he's asking to be let out, and he found the body of Halas, but he's trapped in a little ruby, and he's asking to be let out,

and he seems kind of sad about the fact that he's been trapped for so long, but everyone's kind of unsure whether or not we should do it, and then we were like, Oh, hey, dungeon? And then we, oh yeah, we're in the dungeon. And then we were like, oh, you know, maybe Elur can help us.

She might know how to get out, because you have to be able to shift planes or something. All right, that pace was easier to follow than usual. I'll be right there, hold on a second. Who are you talking to? My wife, I woke her up. Aw, can I see her? No, she's trying to sleep.

She turns the mirror away. Okay, trying to go over this. So you went into a dreadnought's belly? Yes, yes, yes. I would not know how to get there. Oh. To even attempt to get you out. That's a good point.

Yeah, you'd have to come into the right. Get Amazon Prime, a Plague Shift spell, and a hair cutter. You're certain that he's trapped within this gem? Yeah, yeah, yeah, he said he was in a, what is it called? A gem of imprisonment. A gem of imprisonment.

But he thought it was like a jaw. He thought it was like a jar, a magic jar, but it's. Soul jar. But then he said, what if someone sabotaged him? Tricked him. Yeah. And then he got stuck in it instead. Yeah. If this was a magic jar, and then he got stuck in it instead. Yeah.

If this was a magic jar, and he has not yet attempted to possess any of you, he's either being extremely clever or is indeed trapped in this gem. Whatever you do, be careful. Take everything he says with a grain of salt. How confident are you in manipulating somebody of this mage's extremely Not at all. Extremely.

Like control person or something? Just manipulate, or at least be, to not give too much information. Oh my god, we are so good at manipulating people. We're secretive. Yeah. We're conniving. We constantly get things the way that we want them. People have no idea that we're so secretive.

But we aren't like that at all with you because we really like you and you're cool. I appreciate the candor. I would say, then, utilize the skills that you have at your disposal, as you say. Be mindful not to give too much information. Ask questions more than answer them. And whatever you do, do not give him what he wants

until we've had an opportunity to discuss this in person. I would like to see this gem. You got that. I already rolled up the gem. Maybe we can put it over here. Oh, yeah. Oh, well. No, I'm not going to hold it up.

No, put the mirror over the gem. The. It's very pretty. And I flip it to the other side, to the back side. That's also very pretty. DMs to clarify, I cast Identify on it and pinpointed it as a gem of imprisonment, correct? No. No?

Or were those just his words? No, I cast a spell. Correct. Yeah. You do know that not every object can be identified by a first-level spell if it doesn't want to. Okay. And for this device to have bypassed the attention of such a powerful mage, by a first-level spell if he doesn't want to. For this device to have bypassed

the attention of such a powerful mage, you get the sense that whatever might have been altered by this is not identified through the spell. Okay, so in an arcane sense, Magic 8-Ball came up and said, Outlook cloudy? Kind of. All right. I think we know the deal we have to make, then.

I do have to go. Oh. I have to sleep, and I'm keeping my wife awake. Okay, well. I'm alive. We're going to talk to this guy, and he's going to get us out of here, I guess, and then we just won't let him out, and then I'll send you a message when we're on the other side.

Please do. Okay. Tell her it might be time to start making our way back to the tower. Yeah. Meet her there. Well, I'm assuming she can bamf in like she did before, so she doesn't need a lot of time to prepare, right? Because you're so powerful? Right, and based on the time dilation

that I'm still experiencing, preferably just let me know when you're done. You got it. All right. Sleep well, my beautiful wizard. What are you doing? Why would you, what are you doing? That was, all right.

Good night. And the reflection returns to the mirror. So I think the deal we make is we get us and our friend who's trapped in the prison. That's not our friend. Our benefactor. Mm-hmm. Our prey, our, we get our mission complete,

which is to get this person out of here. It's so cool to get the speech from the flat. I know. We're doing this voice-over task. I know, it's weird to do this voice-over. I'm going to take it off the part, too. Doing Allura's this has been very unique, let me tell you. I can only imagine what it is for you.

However, this feels totally normal. We make a deal that all of us, including the one person we're looking for, gets out of here alive, and then we'll take him and his body and the ruby out, and then the person that he helps get out there will then look into getting him back into his body. Sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Ask him about the Prison of Soot. The what? The Prison of Soot. Where are you seeing this? Yeah. All right, picking it up. Everyone, don't say anything you don't want him to know. He can't hear us. He can't hear us, only you. Don't say anything you don't want him to know.

I also, before you touch it, I think we should assume that he could get out of that whenever he wants to. Yes. Possibly if touched by someone he likes, like Allura. He's either manipulating us, or? Telling the truth-ish. We assume he's manipulating us, and we try our best to make him cry.

All right, Halasi there? Yes, I am. Cool, good, good, good. All right, here's the dealio. Oh, great. We're going to go find our subject of interest. We're going to complete our mission

that we were sent in here to do from our benefactor. We're going to find this Yussa, and then we're all going to get out of here, all right? You're going to help us, right? Ask him how we can carry his body across all of this stuff. You're strong. But what if we get attacked?

You help me, I help you. That is the arrangement we've made, yes. For now, William can carry him. Oh, good call. All right. How do we get out of this room? Exactly. Let's get out of here and then we'll go from there.

How do we get out? I've arranged a plane shift circle directly above the laboratory where you probably discovered me. Yeah. That should take you to my study. Okay. Great. We have to step into it. What's great? He wants us to go into the Planeshift Sigil.

Circle, celebrative, whatever thing. It's a Planeshift Circle. It's a Planeshift Circle. That could have taken us out of here already?. That could have taken us out of here already? That one could have taken us out of here already. Jesus. We're so stupid. Well, we kind of knew that.

Or it could have killed us, we didn't know. All right, so how do we get up there? You're on a polymorph. If that's really the way out, and that's his offer, we don't have to take him. Yeah, but we made a contract. Did we? We also need him to take him. Yeah, but we made a contract. Did we? We also need him to explain how to use it,

because it just evaporated Frumpkin. He could also be lying, and that could just kill us. Kill us. Well, what would be the point of that? Killing us. Yeah, but he wouldn't be able to get out of his gem. That's assuming this is, again. But it evaporated, just what? Let's treat him like an ally, let's just do it. One of our friends. But it evaporated. Just what?

Let's treat him like an ally. Let's just do it. He's an ally. Let's just keep talking. Yeah, if you mistrust everything, we're never going to move. Ask him how it works. Just we ask him how it works.

That actually makes us more vulnerable, because then he just has to tell the truth to Billos. All right, I lost. Yes? Here's the thing, we already discovered this teleportation sigil. Oh, wonderful. We threw a cat at it,

and it looked like the cat evaporated. Well, it vanished, yes? That is the nature of things when they are projected between planes. You know, I don't know. I've always been the projectee. I've never really witnessed anybody doing it. So now you have.

What will happen to the cat will happen to you, and you will return in my study. Like Mike TV? Don't worry about it. Who met her? Who met her? Whoever's this Mike-a-te-vee-lee is. I certainly hope. Machiavelli, yes.

Ask him how we get up there. Do you have a good recommendation for how to get up there, or did you just reverse gravity the shit? Reverse gravity. Reverse gravity is one way of doing so, with a feather fall, or a fly is a very simple way. That's my usual means of doing so.

I don't place such hidden exits readily available for groups that wander into the belly of such a terrible beast. It is but a trifle bit of magic for myself whenever I come to my ritual chambers. Man, so you would just take off and fly and just shoot through that? That's pretty cool.

We are going to be taking some. It's a cool visual. How are we going to do it? I don't know. We are going to have to bring his body up there, too. Thunder Steppy? DM question, now that we know where it is and how high it is, about how high off of the ground.

It's about 100 feet. I can take somebody up there. I could take somebody up there. I could take somebody up there. Yeah, we can get ourselves a body. I could walk up there. And I'll carry the body on my back. Is he able to? What about little Vily?

Oh, Vily. Wow. Someone can carry him if you polymorph. Pause on that. Like a polymorph. Ask him if he is able to operate the circle from within there, or if one of us is supposed to

do so. So can you activate this beast, or are we supposed to do it? It's permanent, you just touch the middle of the circle and it will transition. Like the cat, got it. Nope, we just touch it. I take the next 10 minutes to re, wait, no, that's incorrect, I think it's longer.

I could ask my cat. You could, if it hadn't been. Well, we just need to get up there. Yeah. Yeah, all we need to do is get up there. Yeah. Yeah, all we need to do is get up there. Yeah. I cast Polymorph. I cast Polymorph. Okay. Do it.

Let's go. Giant Neeko. All righty, you can carry a handful of figures. I carry Caduceus and I carry. Right there, there, there, there. We got to carry Vily and the body, too. Okay, I'm not going to go through. I'm going to throw you guys, let you guys touch it,

and then I'm going to come back down. Okay, cool, let's do that. All right. Elev going to throw you guys, let you guys touch it, and then I'm going to come back down. Cool, let's do that. All right. Elevators. So you take Caduceus and Varka first. All right, make a strength check as a giant eagle to carry a solid stone medium-sized golem. I might have to just carry Willy by himself.

Might be a singular journey. I'll take Sleeping Beauty. 12. It takes you a while. Better part of maybe three to four minutes to get to that height, and you're starting to get tired already. And then even then, it's less like being able to throw

more than having to lob as an upward movement. Willi's going to go ahead and try and... That's just it. Oh, try and... That's it. Oh, rolled Willie Bomb. Managed to, as part of that motion, spring as well and make just enough of an arc, otherwise Willie would have fallen, taken a shit ton of damage.

You've seen me. He would have broke. Just missed. He's low on HP. There you go. But then does, and atomizes. Whoa! Oh, you don't even know. As an eagle. Ah!

So I pull it back down, I grab Caduceus, and knock. Sure. I hold in my claw, anybody who wants to come get in there. I'll get the sleeping body as well, that's in the manacles. Okay, so you take Halas' body. Yeah, put the manacles in. All right, you guys fly up. All right. Don't forget your books, Dan!

Look, Halas, there you go, there goes your body. Can you see it? There it goes. No, I cannot see outside of the gem. Well, it's going. Fjord, Caleb. Caduceus, Nott. Up and out. Out of my hands. Are we dead? Who's next? Fjord and Caleb.

Sunset this campaign, let's go. All right. Both of you, upon contact, to this little vanish. Left is Beau. I come back down, I grab Beau. All right. Mm-hmm. We're all that's left, right?

I squeeze on and I smoosh Beau up against the, she's just on my back, right? Yep. Beau vanishes and then you press up against it. You vanish as well. Oh no, we forgot Derek. No, there's no Derek.

He's been erased from our memory. As to what happens after touching that circle. We'll come back to it after our break. Roll your new character. Yep. We'll be back here shortly. Wow. Oh man. Just in the memory of my mom.

I have been slick this whole time. Yeah. In the meantime, we do have our awesome friends at Wyrmwood are giving away the Wengie with Turquoise Inlay Coffin Dice Vault, which is available through their Kickstarter campaign, which ends tonight. If you haven't had a chance to get in,

tonight's your last chance to do so. Halloween, to win this awesome thing tonight, put in the code word tonight, which is DREAD, D-R-E-A-D. Once only in the chat, more than once, you'll be disqualified. Only for folks in the U.S. and Canada, excluding Quebec, because of stupid giveaway laws. We'll have a winner for you when we come back.

Y'all just sit back a minute. Oh, shit. Hello, Critters. This is Ashley Johnson, president of the Critical Role Foundation. Y'all just sit back a minute. Oh, shit. Hello, Critters. This is Ashley Johnson, president of the Critical Role Foundation, our 501c3 nonprofit organization with a mission that might sound familiar. To leave the world better than we found it. We partner with other nonprofits to raise funds supporting causes that mean a lot to us. And we allocate 10% of all donations to an emergency relief fund that allows us to provide immediate assistance in the case of natural disasters

or other unexpected emergencies that require quick action. To learn more about the Critical Role Foundation and to donate, visit criticalrolefoundation.org. And welcome back. So before we get back into the game, we do have our winner of the one-word giveaway. It is NotFish. Big fan.

NotFish, congratulations. We'll have that sent to you ASAP. Is it N-O-T-T fish? N-O-T-F-I-S-H-H. Not fish. Oh! Is that your secret handle, Tal? Not fish.

Not fish, no, no, not fish, not fish. All righty, folks. Let's go ahead and jump in now. That's where we last left off. Vaporized. I used a go in there. Vaporized. Your hair is no good.

It's not regulation. It's pointless now. It's a fur's nest. It looks like you killed a porcupine. It's terrifying. I have to thank Tara Strong for getting me this wig. Why are you thanking her for that?

One by one, you apparate in a darkened space, strangely familiar. Familiar? You are now standing within a hexagonal chamber, sitting at a heavy angle to the left. It appears to be some form of a study, a place you've already been before. You can see a desk, furniture, bookcases, and shelves,

but it's all been tossed a bit. You can see the portrait of Halas up on the wall. You can see the bookcases themselves previously passed by that were locked and a large stained glass window that shows all the different planes, inner and outer, where you had previously pressed a red object and were tossed into any other chambers before.

Now, much of the furniture has been set on its side, rolled and emptied. You can see the carpet has been set slightly askew that was previously in the center of the chamber, as well as broken pieces of what appears to be a mage hunter golem, similar to the one that you had previously fought, now scattered and left amongst the bits

of toppled furniture. We didn't do that. No. I never used it. Is it it? The chamber has no visible exit aside from the doorway you entered, which was strangely the same doorway you entered the first time, though the means of arriving is different.

I reach out to my cat with my mind for him to come to me. Meow. Thumpkin comes around the corner and looks over towards you. Told you I'd come back around. According to the map, there are several exits here to go to other rooms. We know where we need to go.

The prison of Sue. Wait, we've got a guy who can tell us where to go. Yeah, we're just asking which room to take. We're going to. Are we sure that we think Yussa would be in the prison? Yeah, the Traveler told me that Yussa was there. What'd you say? Are you sure this is Halas? He hasn't been seen from in a long time? Prison? Yeah, the Traveler told me that Yissa was there. Prison? Are you sure this is Halas?

He hasn't been seen from in a long time? He knows the way out? I mean, who else could it be? And didn't know how to get out and made sense with what we found. Also doesn't change how we work with him. Ask him how to get Yissa out of the prison of Sit. Ask him how to change my body permanently.

In time. We'll get there, right? Isn't that like a... Hey, Halas. You there? I'm not going anywhere. Good, good. So we think that the person that we're looking for

is in your prison of soot. Ah. That makes sense, that's where the mage golems are supposed to take them once they've been subjugated. How do we get them out? We didn't hear that part. Yeah, no. Sorry. Thank you for relaying that, Beau.

Yeah. Yeah. How do we get them out? All right, how do we get them out, and how do we not get caught by your mage golems? I would say, perhaps, being careful not to expend spells of a particular level or higher. The power tends to draw them and activate them

to hunt you from chamber to chamber. And there are multiple throughout my halls, but the prison has many. The prison is a series of chambers, tower-like, but at an angle. We usually take no more than two captives per lair once they have been absolved of their objects and means of escape.

It is called the Prison of Soot for a reason. Uh-huh. There is a type of dust that hangs in the air. I would not recommend speaking out loud for more than a handful of words at a time. It's drawn to the vibration of one's vocal cords. Right, sure. And what does it do

when it is in contact with one's vocal cords? Paralyzes them for a day or two. Big punishment, big punishment. There was soot in his pocket. Can you tell us what that was? Is that the same type of soot that was in your pocket, or punishment. There was soot in his pocket. Can you tell us what that was? Is that the same type of soot that was in your pocket, or is that a different soot? No, that was specifically for a ritual

I was unsuccessfully attempting. Mm. Beauregard, could you ask him if his golems are all identical, or if there is a variety that we are unfamiliar with? Did you have different lines of golems? Was there a summer line and then a spring line? Or are they all pretty much the same?

There are many variations, depending on what I've wanted them to achieve. The Mage Hunters are to prevent my chambers from being ransacked by others such as myself. There are some that are meant to aid me in the construction of these halls and the extensions of them. There are those that are designed to gather materials

for this purpose. There are some that are designed to forge other golems. There are those that are designed to maintain my physical well-being. There are many types. So we'll... Ask him if he has any sexy golems. That's actually a great, yeah.

It is? Halas. Halas. Does it get a little lonely in here? In this gem very? Also a happy fun ball. Do you ever make a sexy time, golem? You know. Sex bot.

You know. Bot. Bot? Yes. Ancient, powerful, ancient, powerful wizard in a stone, and we're asking him if he has a fuck doll. Hey, he knows I don't fuck around, okay? So was it going to be a loss? Come on, you got to be honest.

Is he crying? No. I do not. No, you do not have a sex bot? Or no, you deny it? Because you know, if you deny it, that's almost more incriminating. He's going to hate us.

We should probably stop. We should probably betray us. All right, we'll pick this up later. How do we get out? Is there many doors here to find? If we wanted to get into your chamber that led to the Prison of Soot. Or the most direct way to the prison.

The Circleband Chamber. Behind one of the bookcases, there should be a black wooden door. A black wooden door behind a bookcase. That's what he said. I'm assuming you're, yeah. Yeah, there's one, the one that's the bookcase to the left

of the stained glass door on the bottom has been moved to the side, and you can see behind it, flush against the door, is a hidden door made of wood that looks to be charred or blackened to give it that very, very dark exterior look. Hey guys, I found a door! According to the map, this goes to the Circle-Bound Chamber.

Which then leads to the Prison of Soot. Should we check on what we're going to find out in the circle? Yeah. Oh yeah. What's in the chamber? What's in the CPC? This chamber contains a, what's the word I'm looking for?

A utility person of which has been a source of important information in some of my previous research. I hope you're not frightened by fiends. Well, no. Don't worry, they cannot hurt you. I have ensured that, unless it's been tampered with. If I've been gone that long, I cannot be certain it is there.

I cannot be certain it is still bound, but last I checked, what millennia ago it would seem, it was of no issue. Can you be a little bit more descriptive on what it is? It is a horned devil. A horned devil. A horned devil. Like Obann?

Like a devil devil? Yes, from the Hells, yes. From the Hells. Horned devil from the Hells. Horned devil from the Hells. What was the last time you checked? Well. Yeah, homeboy's been checked out for just a hot fucking second.

Whatever it is, whatever it says, do not believe it. None of these creatures are dubious, devious, and will say whatever it takes to get what they want. Rejected. Okay. All right. Can you give us a detailed map of the soot, since we can't fucking talk to them when we're in there? Well, we're not there yet.

This soot, this soot isn't in this chamber, right? No, it is after this chamber. That's what I mean, though. Oh, but I guess, yeah. We get our questions out now. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We're talking in the study, right? We're in the study.

We got one more room to go before the soot room. Well, Beauregard is walkie-talking here. I know I looked at this room through Frumpkin's eyes earlier and it looked rolled and it looks rolled now, but while she's talking, I'm going to look around those shelves where the books were and just see if I'm missing anything. Make a perception check. Can I roll one as well with my

C invisibility still up? Sure, go for it. Balls. 16. 16? All right, what'd you get? Balls. Okay. You notice there's the Stained Glass Portal, which you had escaped. The shelves are barren.

Either Yussa or if anybody else has been in since last time you were in here has taken most anything of interest out of this chamber. You notice that there's the simple brown door that you came out of, which also leads back, you would assume, to the entrance you first arrived at when you first came here. There is also a red gold door that is exposed

near the opposite end of the chamber where it looks like there was some sort of a tapestry that's been torn off now and has revealed this door. You also notice there is a trapdoor exposed under the carpet that is now askew. We didn't really have time to search this place our first visit here. But we do know that there is.

Hey, here's a surefire way to figure out where each door goes. Can I go up to the painting of Halas? Oh, that's Pun! You can pry that out of the book. Yeah. Oh, can I grab that? I go to the painting of Halas.

Do I notice any scars or anything on the painting that would make him look a little different than the body that we have? Make perception check. Yes. Oh, Traveler, guide me. Damn it. 13.

13? I mean, it's a painting, and paintings are generally intended to be an optimal representation of an individual, so it looks pretty consistent with the body that you're currently lugging on top of Caduceus' shoulders. Okay. All right, well, did you find anything, Rhyght? You didn't find shit.

This place has been empty. There's no faster way to the prison of Sot. Hey, Halas, what's behind this, like, golden red door, by the by? Just curious. The golden red door leads to my personal bedchambers. I would not recommend going in there. That's where the sex box is.

I was going to say, you'd be into it. Okay. Just another point in the sexbot's favor. What's the Fleshman Facility? There is no sexbot, it is heavily trapped, and I will not tell you how to disable them because you should not go in there. Sounds like something the sexbot would say.

He doesn't want us to go in the bedroom. No. Ooh. No. Ooh. He said it's us to go in the bedroom. No. Ooh. No. Ooh. He said he's heavily trapped and he's not going to tell us because he doesn't want us rummaging through the sex spots. He doesn't have a choice.

He needs us. If we die in his bedroom, he doesn't get out of here. No, he's been in here for hundreds of years, if not longer, I think he's okay with it. And now he's in an easier place to get to. He's right in the entryway. I can disable a trap or two. Why are you even thinking about it?

Why does he want us to go in there? Because it's his bedroom. What do you have in your bed? Do you have anything in your bedroom that I can't see? Well, no, but I don't really have a bedroom. We did at the Xhorhaus. No, I really don't really have a bedroom. We do, but that is your house. No, I really don't. He slept on the roof.

If the astral dreadnought wasn't enough. Let's just go to the prison of soot. Poor Yussa's just waiting and waiting. Let's just not be rude to someone who's doing us, I feel like he's being very fair so far. You're totally right. Let's not aggravate somebody's feelings. We have to steal there.

You've stolen a lot of stuff here already. Have I stolen your stuff? You're being very fair so far. You're totally right. Let's not aggravate somebody's decision. I have to steal there. I like stealing stuff. You've stolen a lot of stuff here already. Have I stolen your heart? You know, if we were going to steal and all, you did that right, Louis. If we want to steal stuff, there is the fucking horde that was left behind

by the blue dragon that we didn't get to take anything from. Which we'll be on the way out. Exactly. To be honest, I am dreadfully curious about what most personal items and writings might be in his bedroom. However, I feel like we have pushed our luck quite hard here. I would have been more excited

if he hadn't been a living person. Hey, Yussa. Yes? That's not Yussa. I mean, fuck. I know what you meant. Although. Freudian slip. I know. Wait, this isn't Yussa. I mean, fuck. I know what you meant. Although. Freudian slip. I know.

Wait, this isn't Yussa, is it? Are you Yussa? All right. He's all over it. He's so gross. What's behind this trapdoor? So we found a few of them, we're just curious. So the trapdoor leads to the Fleshmen facility.

It is where I tend to any injuries that I sustain. Aw, that's cool. That's kind of what we thought. That's like a doctor. I mean, Fleshmen, that sounds like men's flesh. It's pretty cool. Which one leads to the sook? Oh, that's the black one.

That's where we're going. All right, the news here. Any doors we haven't seen that we should know about in this room? Anything else cool? We're just curious because we're taking a little tour. From the study, there is the tapestry entrance chamber through the soft wooden door. And if you press onto the red location

under the stained glass, it brings you to the Dragonslayer. But you said you've already visited this dragon? Yep. What's his name? Why do you ask? I don't know. I just want to know what you named your dragon. Did you name it, or did you just?

I don't name the dragon. The dragon is named, but then I used its name to bind it. Well, you're an intense person, Las. You've seen my home. You did not assume this already. I'm intense as fuck. So what's your name as dragon? Or what's the dragon's name?

Oh my god. We're in a loop. How do you name a dragon? Fleshman, Vasil, Emi, let's go to the fucking Circlebound Shaver. Yeah. Thalissas. to the fucking Circlebound Chamber. Yeah. Thaleshas. Thaleshas. That was the name that it had. Unless it's changed it since.

That is the name of the dragon. It's a decent amount of clerical work you have to go through. It's not, he probably hasn't. Then let us continue, please. All right, so, I'm going to put him down. Okay, we're not going to really talk to him in the chamber, right?

We're just going to go through the chamber and then go. There's a horned devil there. He can't hurt us. We don't know that. As long as he hasn't broken free of his bonds. Beauregard said that he's unclear whether he's still in his bindings. He's been here for centuries.

I think we should as well. Yes, we should ask a Q&A last chance. What do we need to know about the Prison of Soot? What to look out for? Where are the traps? How do we get through them all? All right. Want me to do it? Yeah, you want to talk to him?

Yeah. Hey, Alas. Yes. I know the first thing. Cool. No. I'm going to hand you over to Nott. Well, very well. This is happening. Come on, come on, come on!

Let's go! I mean. Hand it over. You're going to immediately ask him how to? No, I'm going to ask him about the traps. I'm the trap person. You're going to immediately ask about a trap? No, you're going to ask him about the traps. Halas?

Yes? Not the brave here. No, we're going to ask them about the traps. Halas? Yes? Not the brave here. We're going to be going into your Prison of Soot, and we wondered if there's any traps that we should know about going in so that we don't fall into them. I do not recall any traps.

It is not designed to be a trapped chamber. It was designed to be a containment and information gathering chamber. How many levels are there? It is a singular chamber. It's just one room? Yes. But you said there was two prisoners per chamber. That is the prison.

Oh, I'm asking about the prison of Sorn. I misunderstood. I thought you were referring to. No, I have an accent. I've been in a gym for a long time. I feel you. The prison, I believe, was designed to contain 27 floors with the ability to expand beyond them. It hasn't required use as much as I anticipated.

Hi, we're on a three-way call. Can you hear me? Hello, Chester. Hi! Wait, did I tell him my name before? That's creepy. Yeah, I believe you. Did I? Do you guys remember me telling him my name? That's fine. I like your freckles.

Thank you. They're so awesome. Thanks, you guys. Okay, so where do the new prisoners go? Do they go up from, like, fill up from the bottom to the top, or the top to the bottom, or are they put in randomly? The programming on the golems is particularly limited. Their utility, yes, but I believe it's from the top

to the bottom. How do you open the doors? How do you open the doors? How do you open the doors? You use the golem to unlock them, or I unlock them myself. Well, you're not here, so. So you would have to improvise. Okay.

And if we, will we know who's in the chamber before we open a door? The cells are open. The cells are open. Oh! Meaning there are bars, so. Oh, I see, so we'll see who's in there. Yes. And we can only open the ones that we want to.

Are there dedicated golems in the prison, and if so, how many? How many golems are in the prison? I believe, last I checked, and it could have changed, it's been a while, I had eight arranged throughout the entirety of the prison. Do they have an off switch, a safe word, something? No, they just know to not attack me.

If we looked like you, would they attack? It's possible. I haven't attempted the limits of such a thing. I do not recall if they are bound to the essence of myself or just the visage. You are welcome to try it, but I cannot guarantee it would be in your favor. Are they attracted to arcane users

if they're not casting? Are they like your fireflies? Ah, yes, you've made your way to the garden. They are drawn to the usage of magic. Wow. Got it. And then the voice thing, does it have anything to do with volume, or is it just a mount of words?

Vibration of the vocal cords of any kind of speech is what will draw the suit. Oh, we could write. That's an excellent idea for it. That might be a way out through the prison. Yeah. How do you change a body permanently? I'm uncertain what the question is referring to.

We found some notes in your lab that you could possibly alter a body permanently or change someone into another person? I say, I mean, there are a number of things. There is upper-level polymorph abilities and the higher echelon of arcane manipulation in which you can transition one person to any other person or one creature to another creature,

to a creature to an object, an object to a creature. The spectrum is indefinite. What relative are you asking about? Any spells or any magic that might be acquired by someone like me with a limited ability, or a wizard. Well, you, if you have a limited ability, probably not much in that regard, but there are things that could be useful, yes?

Like? Like things I could discuss once you let me out of this device and return me to my physical body. Does he have any problem with us taking someone else with us and leaving in exchange for letting him out? Taking someone with us and leaving? Oh, I think he knows that, right?

Yeah. We've said that clearly. Yes. You're going to be breaking someone out of your prison. Do you have a problem with that? Not if it means that your end of the bargain is maintained. All right. Let's go in. Let's go in.

Let's do it. All right, so you're stepping through the door towards the Circlebound Chamber. All righty. CBC. As you step past the doorway, this one isn't, you're used to the rush and the vacuum-like pull from room to room. This one seems relatively calm,

like stepping across soft cobblestones through a short hallway. Part of the way through that hallway, the smell changes into a heavy smoke with a hint of sulfur to it. You pass a threshold you didn't know was there until suddenly your eyesight changes and shifts, and this dark charcoal-colored room now surrounds you.

Deep red tapestries hang from the walls, depicting elements of the blood war between devils and demons. All sorts of massive, grotesque, violent, and detailed displays of carnage between the two warring factions of fiends surround the interior of this chamber. A blood-soaked table sits next to a rough-hewn stone door that holds all manner of gruesome cutting and carving tools,

as well as a large empty basket equally splattered with dry gore. A few other small tables and a singular shelf line the edges of the room. In the center of the room, a 15-foot circle of dull, burning purple light strikes lines between its boundaries in a tangled glyph, and sitting atop the strange circle

is a set of folded, leathery wings wrapped like an egg of textured skin. Sitting on top of the glyph. Mm-hmm. Let's just ignore him and keep going. Do we see any other doors? No cages, no constraints, no manacles. You do see a rough-hewn stone door.

Yeah. On the opposite end of the chamber. No cages, no manacles, no open chains, no broken. Make a perception check. I whispered last. 18. 18? You don't see any chains, no broken. Make a perception check. I whisper, she asks. 18. 18? You don't see any chains, definitely. Let's just go. Well, we don't know which door it is.

Wait, before we go, we have to figure out how we're writing stuff, right? Because past this, we're in the soot. Get out some paper. Yeah, I've got my journal. Halasi? Caleb has some. I hand out some paper scraps to people. Is that rough-hewn stone door

the way to the Prison of Soot? That is. Okay. What is it? Sorry, the rough-hewn door. Sorry. The rough-hewn door is not. That leads to the carving farm. That's the wrong door.

What door are we looking? What's a carving farm? Is it a butcher? It's the chamber that I use to maintain my sustenance. To maintain his sustenance. This guy's fucking weird. What does he mean, sustenance? You eat, you eat meat, you carve meat. I eat and carve meat, yes.

I'm prepared by one of my golems. Meat, what kind of meat? You are so curious. We just want to know how to be safe. Avoid the carving farm. He says not to go in there. We should totally go in there. We should totally go in there.

We shouldn't go in there. Oh, we don't go in the carving farm. We didn't go into his bedroom and we're going to go in the carving farm? Exactly. The astral dreadnought. You should have gone to the bedroom if you wanted to poke about.

What kind of beast does he feed himself from? What do you like to eat? We have some vegans in the group and they're just sort of curious. Why are you so interested in changing bodies? We've asked quite intensely about wanting to know this magic and its acquisition. It's something that I'm curious in.

You seem unlike any goblin I've encountered in my times here. You seem unlike any ruby I've encountered. Touche. Press him on that one question. The wings begin to unfold. We should go, we should go. We're going to go.

Standing, you see this 12-foot-tall humanoid creature from beneath. The edges of the circle barely hitting the perimeter of its wings expand and seem to flash against what looks like some sort of a faintly, only momentarily available barrier before it vanishes from sight,

almost like each impact causes it to show up for a second before it dissipates. You see two large clawed hands press against it as this large, devilish humanoid of dull red and brown skin, clawed, hooked fingers, these hoof-like, backwards legs, a long pointed tail, and a heavy set of curled horns that protrude from each side of its head, its burning red eyes

and fanged jaw facing in your direction. It just looks out to all of you. Happy Halloween, both of you. All right, let's not, let's, let's. Where's the door, where's the door, hello? Words, it has words. Words, oh, it's been some time, some time, words. It's been some time.

I start looking around for another door. Make a perception check. Ditto. Is the thing chained to anything, or is it just trapped? No, it is inside the invisible dome. 27. Bell jar. It has been some time.

Time, time, what a construct, time. 10. What an idea, time. What time is it? We couldn't tell you. 10 o'clock, Levee? Hard to say in here. It gets close to the glass in your direction

after you say that phrase. What'd you roll? 27. And you rolled a? 10. 10. Behind where this circle is, there's about a 10-foot gap, and you can see what looks to be a set of drapes that are closed, and from the bottom of it, you can see what looks to be the bottom of a doorway.

With that high perception roll, with a little bit of light there is from each flash of this creature putting its hands against the barrier. I'm going to slowly start making my way there. It looks like a dark iron-type bottom foot. I'm going to just start making my way over there. Yeah, follow Caduceus. Okay.

What are you doing here? We have not had visitors for some time, at least a few days, maybe. What are you doing here? Days? Weeks, Ma. Just a couple days. Weeks? I'm kept here. What is you? What is you, pretty one?

I've been here for some time. Pesky time again. For some time, I imagine, I've been here. Going towards the door, and I'm pulling the curtain to reveal. As you see Caduceus doing this, revealing it, its wings have now filled the space. The crackling of the barrier is now consistent.

You hear this little crackling sound as it's trying to push against it, as it's looking intently at all of you, its head twitching and shifting around to each of you. It seems to be hungry to take in all the information of what surrounds it and the fact that there are just many people wandering through the chamber. Ah, ah, so what?

What have you come bring companionship questions? What do you bring me? Why are you here? He opens the door. It doesn't open. Fuck. Is there a keyhole? I'm up there. Lassie, Lassie, how do you open the door?

I need to open it. What do you mean, you need to open it? What do you mean, you need to open it? Oh fucking shit. Your body needs to open it? Well, I have means of opening the doors. I built everything to work based on the certain skills and magical crafts that I have. I will go join Caduceus at the door.

We'll go over that as well. What? I'll walk over to the devil. Okay. Unlock it? I'm going to whip out some tools and start seeing if there's a lock. Would you, friendly speaking ones, once so full of honor and respect and words, so full of words, please check and see

if there is a dark green tome on that shelf for me, please. What's your name? I do not recall. It has been too long. My name, I have lost my name. Perhaps it's in that book. Are you just in here with no books and no anything? You're just in this little circle?

For a long time. Time, immeasurable time. It's a word that keeps happening. What is it about this word, time? And you, time and time again, we say the word time. You remember Halas. You see now the muscles tense for a second, and now the wings push intensely

against the outside of the barrier. That Trixie bastard and his Trixie circle. He pushes even harder again and flashes brighter and the arms recoil a bit from it. His Trixie questions and his Trixie tricks. I'm at the door before these books that he referred to. and his tricksy tricks. I'm at the door before these books that he referred to. Oh, how sweet and tasty his soul would be, would have been, had it been brought here.

I almost had it, almost had it. You almost had what? His soul? His soul. Vlas has made many deals with many devils, but it's reason not of every contract. He is the prize that one sought after by even the highest in the Hells. It would be so tasty.

You get the sense this devil's a little crazy. What does the Lost keep you here for? What have you done for him? Well, I have granted him with insights. I have granted him with gifts. I have granted him with insights, I have granted him with gifts, I have granted him with hellish boons and directions towards his strange pursuits, but I don't see the entirety of his designs.

I said his tricks. You mentioned a green tome. There's books on the wall here? Oh, you like books? I'm sorry, I was thinking that in Zemnian. I'm at the door, but I heard the mention of the tome. So there's lots of books on the wall, or just a single shelf? Not a lot, maybe four on a shelf across the way

from near where you guys entered to the right. All right, so eyes on that, but also on the door, and Nott was tinkering. I'm just going to see if it's locked or if it's magical. Make an investigation check. 23. 23, the door is locked and it is trapped. Okay.

I guess I'll start untrapping it, or attempt to. Do you remember a loss ever coming through here and going into this door right here? What? This door? This door? Yeah. A few times.

Other things come through, big things, common things, things brought through the door. Do you remember how they opened it? Carlin Stings brought through the door. Do you remember how they opened it? The golems opened the door. It opened for them. Maybe Willy can open it. I tried to disarm the trap. I rolled a 22.

A 22? That's not that great down here. You fiddle with it for a while and realize the nature of this trap is not a contraption that can be disabled via the tools you have at your disposal. Do I sense that it's magical or it's mechanical? Or both?

It's both mostly magical. Okay. We try maybe. Yeah. But I have wandered over to look closer at the books on the shelf. There are three or four. Yeah. I don't want to touch,

but do they have any writing or markings on them? No binding on them. No binding. Oh, sorry, no like? No words. No words on the binding. Right, and one on them? No binding on them. No binding. Oh, sorry, no like? No words. No words on the binding. Right, and one of them is green as this thing.

Correct. Not touching that one. As you're walking towards the books, you see the creature looks excitedly in your direction. Ah, that one, that one, fourth page in, I believe. I left you a present there, a little poem. You'll like it, you'll like it. Going to cast Zone of Truth.

Over the demon. Okay. The devil. All right. I think they're immune, aren't they? We'll find out. Ready. I shall know. Okay, and what's the DC?

17. 17? He's crazy, maybe his charisma's low now. No, it works. It works? Does it still work? Yeah, it's tricky. What should I ask him?

What do you want to ask him? How to get him? You really don't remember how to get into that room? I don't, it's been a while. I will not glance it with all the knowledge. It's just the bits I tried to take. Will any of those books hurt our friend if he touches them? Will this book unleash you?

This book? This green one that I'm not touching? That green one is a special one to me. Will it let you out? It's a special one to me. Yeah. What does it do? It contains a poem.

What kind of poem? A poem that's written in my language. Will any of these books? What does the poem say? I cannot say it. It's a gift for others. What's your name? I don't know my name. Wow.

I let him rot a little bit longer. I return to the door. Will any of these books hurt us if we touch them? Oh, they help. The green one helps. The poem helps. What about the other ones? I don't care for the others.

Will they hurt us if we touch them? I don't know what's in those books. The green one's the one that's fun. I speak a single arcane word and cast Knock on the door. Okay. Roll a d20 and add your intelligence modifier. Oh boy. That didn't run real well.

Uh, that is 26. Boom, you hear this heavy impact knocking sound, like someone had taken a giant hammer to a metal door. With that, the door opens, trap also seemingly disabled at the same time. Oh! Oh, hand out the paper. We're in trouble. Oh! Oh.

Hand out the paper. We're doing it. Where are you going? Teach me how to read and write. Just kidding, I'm very smart. Don't go in there. Things don't come back from there. You won't come back. I need your help to bring me the poem

and read it for me. Are you guys leaving? We're walking towards the door. Just quickly read the poem and read it for me. Are you guys leaving? We're walking towards the door. Just quickly read the poem. No. I'm going to. I might read it to you if you tell me what it does. I need someone to read it for me

so I can remember things. I feel so bad for him. I'm going to block the door so it doesn't shut. I can, if it's got a keyhole. Well, lock it so it doesn't shut? Or block it. Oh, block it. Yeah, and what do we see beyond the door? Because so many passages here are dimensional.

Correct. Whoops. Beyond this, this has a set of stairs, it looks like, that descend downward about 100 or so feet, where you see another door or door frame. You're not able to see much beyond that. Walls on the other side, on either side of the steps, or just space? Open space. Yeah.

Oh shit. That's the best. Makes me want to fucking shit my pants. Terrible. That was a near spectacular. Open space, open space. I think we should move on. Good to move. Where are you going? We'll be back.

Back soon, please don't leave me. We are just going to get some help. Time is relative. Leave me. We are just going to get some help. Time is relative. Leave me. Time, time. Ah, it's that word again. I'll go through the door and down the stairs. I follow Fjord.

Right as I'm leaving, I sing of the ruby of the sea as the best lay ever. Just so he has a little ditty to hum as we leave. Just like a positive. That's a good one. Did you tell the horned devil? Not really. I'm going to give myself something to chew on

so I don't make, don't speak. What did I? Oh, that's a real good idea. This is going to be really hard, you guys. Oh, Jesus. I take my belt off of that idea and I tie it around my mouth. Also, before we go in, I'm going to cast Light and I'm also going to cast

Bidibidim. Do do do. I'm going to cast Bidibidim. Disguise Self to look like Halas. Does that stay up, though? Yeah, that's just on. Is that not a spell? This is very low level. It's a low level spell.

It's before we're going in. Okay. It's not going to be attracted to the spell, right? It's literally, it's like something I can, I can biologically do it. Okay. All right. It's not even a spell slot. You descend the stairs.

Can I have a marching order, please? I guess I'm in the front. Fjord in the front. Be behind Fjord? I'll be behind Beau. I'll go last because I was singing on the song. Is Vily carrying the body? Is that right?

I thought Caduceus was carrying the body. Willi's got the body. Wouldn't be good if I lost. Willi's in the back? I lost. Oh, yeah. Oh. Fjord's in the front.

Beau's after Fjord. Put me anywhere. My naught's in the middle. Jester, where are you? You're in the back. You're in the back. So that means Caduceus and Caleb are with the rear? Yeah, I held back with Willy and with Jester. Okay, so I'll put Willy back there with you guys.

You got it. Okay. So I'll put my way back there with you guys. You got it. Okay. So, as you descend the staircase, it's a very weird feeling here, being able to look off, and it's not just blackness, you can see distant stars, and as such, it feels, as you're about halfway there, begin to lose a sense of up and down, almost. You're not sure if it's rotating or not. You can see a slight shifting of the stars

and begin to feel yourself almost leaning to one side, which begins to throw you off balance. You have to get low and hold onto the stone. It's going across a very, very high, very thin bridge, and it leaves you feeling really uncomfortable. You come to the bottom of the stairs, and one by one enter, emerging from the story portal, and you arrive within a cold, dark room

that is circular, about 60 feet across, and seemingly crafted from a dark slate-colored brushed steel that forms the walls in this cylindrical chamber between a granite floor and ceiling. A single, wide staircase seems to descend from the other side of the chamber from where you entered, from your current position, while two low flickering torches burn

on the left and right sides of the room. Other than that, it's blank. Do you see anything going up? Nope, but you look up and you see a familiar stone relief, similar to the one you saw in the first chamber you arrived, of the mage hunter golem currently sealed and held in stasis about 40 feet in the air above you.

Wow. I will motion to not and stealthily point towards the stairs on top of the descending staircase. Okay, I'll scurry forward and scan for any traps. Make an investigation check. Investigation or perception, please. 19.

19. No traps, just stairs that head further down. All right, I'll start down the stairs. Okay, you guys follow? Mm-hmm. All right. Heading down to the second floor, the stairs continue downward, and where you would assume a tower would be

a spiral staircase, this just goes down and down and down, and the circular chamber that you enter again is at an angle, and it's now across the way, a mirrored set of stairs that continues further down to another floor at this angle. However, this chamber is even colder than the previous one, and the air itself seems heavier. Breathing is slightly more labor, thick,

like there's a lot of moisture, but there isn't. The room is similar in shape, makeup to the previous, though an odd stack of heavy-duty cases and chests made of a solid dark material are clustered to the right and left sides of the chamber where the torches were previously. Your eyes now begin to focus in the space around you now from the firelight that's flickering. The air itself around you, you can see,

carries tiny, near-invisible particles like dust. Inhaling doesn't cause the particles to move near you or away from you when you exhale. Moving your hands displaces them, but the air doesn't seem the particles to move near you or away from you when you exhale. Moving your hands displaces them, but the air doesn't seem to shift them. I'm going to write down, ooh, ooh, I bet that those chests hold all the stuff that people have gotten taken away from them.

I'll point to it and give a thumbs up. Go steal it. I show it to the rest of the group. Okay, I'll go over and pick a lock on a box. Okay. You approach them, and as you get closer, you can see they're all of a deep, deep jet black material. As you get close, you can see the sheen on them

is slightly greenish. It's actually the same material that you saw some of the golem ingots that you had there and you saw the heavy door in the king's prison. The king's cage was made from a man time. So they are pretty heavy duty boxes. Mm. But they are pretty heavy duty boxes. But they are locked.

I'll try to pick one. Go for it, make a lock picking check. What is that? What are you doing, Nott? I'm going to try to pick it, I don't know what that means. Write down. Check for traps.

Traps, brah. Which roll? 19. Aps, brah. Which roll? 19. A 19. You can start backing up from this. Yeah, back up, we all back up. Okay. Caleb gesticulating madly,

just trying to show explosions with his hands. Okay. It doesn't unlock. Ting. It doesn't unlock. Oh. I need you to make a constitution secret. Eight. No, 11. Oh boy.

Oh no. Is this going to be like a Vex'alian woman. Hold on a second. Oh. Oh? Can't heal you in here. Mm-mm. We can feed him a potion. Yeah. Or. No. Sorry, my apologies, there is no saving throw.

Oh. You watch as Nott is working at the box. There's that click sound, and there's this bit of shadow that just drifts off of the body as Nott collapses. Exactly the same shit. Time is a flat circle. The box also vanishes.

I drop down and start gently shaking. No breath? I scoop her up and start quietly going back up the stairs. Yeah, we're going to go back. I'll follow. Yeah. Same, same. All right, you guys back into the stairs. Yeah, we're going to go back. I'll follow. Yeah. Same, same. All right, you guys back into the chamber. Back so soon?

Shut up! Up the door. Next room, next room. What is problems? Spare the dying. Is she sleeping? Spare the dying. It has no effect.

I mean, it just is a, it just a, Revisitify, revisit a, it's a stability. Yeah, it doesn't, there's nothing. That's if they're at zero hit points. No, not dead. Revivify, cast the Revivify! Okay, we go. I have Revivify, I have a thing.

You're going to do the Revivify? And you have the diamond. And I have the diamond. Me and Caduceus both, he gave me one right before we came in here. Okay. Which diamond is it? Just to make sure we're burning the right one. It's the...

We can do the fast one, because it's been real quick. Okay. Which one's the fast one? 500 gold. Wait, no, you need the... Revivify. Revivify is the 500 gold one? Yeah, it's the 300 gold is for Revivify. I don't give a fuck, I'm just using it.

Well, I've got the 300, so yeah, we can go ahead. Yeah, we do it. Okay. A tense moment passes. This is inside the Circlebound Chamber, correct? You guys said to do it. Yeah, we didn't fully say we were going back to the study, so sure, it's in the Circlebound Chamber.

Up to you, you can take it into the study if you want. We can make it to the study. If there's time, because we need it as we enter a minute. As we enter a minute, so what would you do? I would just drop and do it on Circlebound. So in the middle of this chamber, beyond where the containment circle is, you reach down, grasp the symbol of the Traveler,

and as you place the diamond onto the chest of Nott's currently lifeless body, you see the diamond crumple black and turn to dust. No, no, no, no, no. As the dust drifts away, you see the hand of the Traveler catch it in the air and then place it onto the chest of Nott's body.

The hand gives one hard push on Nott's chest, and in that moment, you watch Nott's body come back to consciousness. Shack for traps. That's what you were saying. Yeah, yeah. I didn't, this, I don't know what. Also, yeah, look, we're in a terribly dangerous place. Maybe we just look for you, sir.

That's fine. Check for traps all the time, okay? Okay, okay. The last thing you remember was trying to unlock it and then hearing a word or a phrase said in your head, and you can't remember what it was, but that's the last thing you remember. It was strange.

Phrase. Halas, okay, okay. Do you still want what you want? Yes. Well, don't do that. Well, I'm sorry, I'm. It's all right, it's all right. Glad to have you back.

Jackpot, Rhymes. All right, all right. I will, I'm sorry. Shall we try again? Mm-hmm. Hey. Welcome back. Welcome, welcome. Oh, hi. Hi, bye. Well saved. Quick on the draw, you are.

So you've come back. You said you'd come back and read me a poem. Yeah, we're going to go again, sorry. Be right back, promise. Thought we lost our keys, we didn't, we're good. I stopped down the stairs. You guys just dart back out. Do I have any hit points?

You have one hit point. Oh, cool. Before we go in. Should we take an hour rest before we go back in? Good. That would be bad for me in study. Max security prison, yeah. Let's go and rest for an hour or so,

isn't that one hit point? Yeah, we're juggling time, but also we're in a massive deathtrap. Short rest, then? Yes, please. You're taking a short rest? In the study. Okay. Okay, it's another day. It's another day.

It's another day. Just use them all. Of course I'm going to use them all. It still won't add up to total. Arcane recovery. Well, I'm good. Can I, I guess, look around the study area or some shit, I guess, while they rest?

I'm good, too. I'll keep Beau company. Yeah, we're going to take a little library tour. So if we see anything, I'll look for shit that might be hidden or might not have been found. Just a reminder, don't touch the stained glass. Yeah. Make an investigation check. Okay.

24. Beyond the chamber entrances that were outlined by Halas, we're not speaking to him. Unless the chamber's empty. This place was pretty thoroughly rolled. Okay, can I go up on the platform where I previously touched the glass, and now with everything that we've gone through

and sort of studied in the Cobalt Soul and learned, does this depiction of different planes mean anything else, show anything else, reveal anything that maybe would have been just images before? Make an intelligence check. Nah, four. Four. Beyond what you've gleaned before,

if you want to make one as well, just in case we're late. Low roll. Just a straight intelligence check? Mm-hmm. 17. 17. Looking at it, it's a depiction of the inner and outer planes. The connectivity of them seems to have shifted slightly

since last time you looked at it. Oh. Like it's the same, the same, you know, symbols and everything, the same colors, same elements, but you notice it's just, some of them have shifted slightly. I flipped through my journal

because I took a drawing of it, which I actually did. I pull it up and I compare. Yeah, it looks like elements of it are orbiting slowly, and you've caught it at another point in its orbit. Wow, it's like a living map. But wait, this is post-calamity?

Mm, this is pre-calamity. Pre-calamity. Or you do not see a divine gate depicted on this. Huh. Yeah, so I imagine a divine gate goes somewhere up there. What? I don't know, maybe this map is on a timetable relevant to the Happy Fun Ball. Maybe this is like a, I don't know. Maybe it's like a calendar, like a window to the Happy Fun Ball. Maybe this is like a, I don't know.

Maybe it's like a calendar, like a window to the outside. Like frozen in a different time, I don't know. If it's been a short time in here, perhaps that actually shows where it is outside. Does that make sense? Does that make sense? No, I thought it said the window was pre-calamity.

The window is pre-calamity. Halas imagined pre-calamity, designed his fancy window, and now time has moved on past it. It's moving, I don't know. Yeah, animated. Maybe I'm just overthinking it. It's not like an app. Tickle and tickler.

Yeah. What did you just say? Tickle and mickler? Tickle and tickler. It's a little, like, slightly animated thing. Yeah, it's not getting real-time updates. You're at it for two minutes and suddenly you see a dolphin. What did you say? Tickle and muggle? Little and tickle. Little and tickle. Little, like, slightly animated things. Yeah. It's not getting real-time updates. You stare at it for two minutes

and suddenly you see a dolphin. Like a ship. Yeah. That's right, ever so slightly. Just let your eyes go across the island. Anyway. All right. I think I'm overthinking it. Let's keep going. Let's go back.

Should we try this again? Yep. Yeah. Let's not talk to anything and let's be careful. I used a fourth-level spell to help cure Nott a bit more. Okay. Hey, you're alive still. We move straight through the room.

We don't even talk. We go straight to the other room. Okay, we move past the other collection of large adamantine chests and boxes that remain. Tying my mouth again. Okay. All this stuff in the boxes. Probably. Oh well.

Liquorice stick. Finishing through that chamber, you come stuff in the boxes. Probably. Oh well. Liquorice stick. Finishing through that chamber, you come to the third floor. This floor, now further revealing the prison tower to be this slightly strange angled arrangement, has a new set of stairs in the same place as the old one. It seems each room itself is just another extension of the previous as far as the design goes,

minor adjustments. One of which being this is the first pair of barred prison cells you've come across. There's two sets of cells, one to the right, one to the left, maybe 20 by 20 feet each, up against the wall on the other side. Both seem to have bodies in them. Glancing over, you can see one is clearly skeletal,

been there for some time, while the other is in an advanced state of decay. Some of the skin and flesh remaining. The smell's awful. What would you like to do? What does the clothing look like on the one that's decaying? On both of them, really.

Both of them are wearing what you can see were once nice bits of well-designed attire, though left dusty and now thick with whatever has decayed through it. You do notice that they both have a collar around their neck, identical to the one that the golem had affixed to you when you guys had encountered it at the tower engine.

Move down. Okay. Further down, further down. You move to the fourth floor. Identical to the previous, though each cell in here also contains a new body. One is long dead and rotting, while the other appears to just be sleeping. At least is not moving, similar to

how you found Halas's body. It's dirty and covered in soot particles. Collar? The collar. Collar. Collar, yes. Both bodies have collars. And their visage is turned away? Obscured, or can we tell?

Low light, if you approach the cell, you could probably get a good look out. I'll squint through. Can I knock on the bars? If you'd like to. Mm-hmm. The bars ring a little bit, the body looks over and you can see, a bit disheveled, bright-eyed and slightly, not coming out of a sleep,

but just coming out of rest, a surprised Yussa. Points to the collar. Oh, he can't talk anyway. I write down, we're here to break you out. I fill an entire piece of parchment with the words, check for traps. I will check for traps.

Okay. On the locking door. Make an investigation check. 27. 27. The trap, the door is indeed trapped. The manner of the trap seems to not be anything immediately present.

You can see there is some sort of a very, very faintly hidden line, like a pulse, similar to what you've seen in some of the other glyphs that you see Caleb write or what you've seen in the previous Halasas Ritual Chamber, but it goes up the bar to the ceiling and then continues up to the previous floor. So it can't be undone on this floor?

Meaning you can see that it is trapped in the nature of it, but you don't understand. Something, it is connected to something. I see a ley line of energy going upstairs. Got it. Yeah. Unclear what that means. Okay, so. Is only the door trapped, or are the bars trapped, too?

I don't know, are they? The bars are about that far apart, like about an inch and a half. They're pretty thin. but the bars are not trapped from what you can tell, you've only checked the door. Pull Caleb. Are the bars magic? Oh.

I can only give an estimate and inspect them. I can't detect anything. Make an arcana check? Yeah, anything. Make an arcana check? Yeah, I'll make an arcana check. Is it 29? Looking at the bars, you don't see any carvings or runes or anything on them that would belie an enchantment necessarily on them.

It seems to me most of the defenses of this particular prison are the entire suffused atmosphere of the prison and the traps based on one you've already encountered, as well as the exits to each of these cells. So the bars, you do not believe, are enchanted in some way. But the difference between door and bars is,

again, I'm sorry? The door opens, the bars don't. The whole wall is bars. Yeah, it's all bars, but except there's one section that can open. So there's a door in the section of it, and that's the problem part. Okay. I bust out my paints.

I write down, I think, on a piece of paper and hold it. I'm going to pull out my paints. Okay. And I'm going to try to draw, paint some holes. I'm going to move to the stairway. In multiple metal bars, so I can pull out a window section of the bars. Okay, so you're painting it as if it was clear?

Yeah, I'm painting it as if there's nothing, if there's a little gap, right. Basically, I'm painting what is behind the bars. Are you doing the Roger Rabbit dark hole? Fully, yeah, I'm painting what is behind the bars. Are you doing the Roger Rabbit? Yes. Fully. Yeah, I'm trying to paint them away. Make a performance check. Yeah.

I'll move to the stairwell and keep an eye on the downward stairs. My eyes are darting. You got to see, it's touch, okay. Guidance is just touch, so I'm going to go. I'll let you either make a performance check or dexterity check, your call. Okay, I'm definitely going to go.

So either you're practicing and training yourself in a performance standpoint, or you are working on something. You're going to hate me, Guidance is not just touch. Yes, oh, it's verbal. Yeah, so you would know that, though. Oh, it's the action, the range is touch. I wouldn't have done it, yeah. Okay, fine. Sorry.

Is that orange one? What, this one? Yeah, it's been good. That was a critical one. Oh, good for you. It's a nine. Ha, okay, got it. That's eight. They both stopped.

Yeah, but still, it was better than a one. Eight. Okay, you do an okay job. The bars look weakened, but they're not going to be an immediate pull-out. Make a strength check. 15. 15. 15. The bars come out.

Yussa immediately gets up onto his feet. Steps through the gap you made. I dance around in silence, holding bars in my hand. We move, we're going to book. Quickly. Okay. You begin to head up the stairs, use a following suit. You head up to the next floor.

How's the, is the golem above, in the? We're only on the third floor now. Yeah, you're going up to the first. He's in the first, okay. And he is probably working. You head up to the second floor. Here we go. Pass the chests and the boxes

up to the first floor. Golem's still. In the ceiling? You pass the chests and the boxes up to the first floor. Gollum's still. In the ceiling? Situated in the ceiling. Wow. Get the fuck out. Let's go. All right, you guys head into the circle-bound chamber. There, as you step in, there you see the horned devil, who's, ah, twice returned, twice returned, twice, do you know?

Shut the door, keep going. Where are you going? Keep rolling. You made a promise to me! We didn't make a promise. We come back, that was always said. Back to the study. And begins to just yell loudly. Poor guy. Anguish and frustration,

the wings battering against the exterior of the barrier, flashing behind you as you exit. Yussa's like, trying to cough, but the collar's still on. We remember how to get the thing off, right? Of course, yeah. I'll check it for traps. Once we're in the study.

Yeah, in the study. Okay, go for it. 28. He's not trapped. I will try to unlock it. 20, 30. 20, 30. The collar falls off and Yussa immediately grabs his neck. Oh, that is much better, thank you very much. So thank you.

I appreciate this, but we can talk more when we get out of here. Yes, yes, yes. We can go through the, probably we know how to get out through the treasure room. Yeah, the red bucket. Yes, that would be the way to go. Yeah, he looks back towards the prison, he's like, They took all of my components and most of the things that I had taken

from this last journey through the halls. Well, it's going to get weirder once we're out because we found something. Mm-hmm. Should we tell him now? I would just hate to leave it all behind. Well, you could try to get it, but it's super duper trapped, and if you don't do it,

you die and also the thing bounce away, so possibly it's already gone. We should probably tell him before we go any further. Then let's continue on. I'm fine. You don't want to tell him what we're holding? I think this is the best place to do it, actually. Actually, this might be the best place to do it.

Why? Do you have the map with you still? Yeah. You see a medium that takes it from and looks at it and starts plowing it out. We've added a little bit that we found. Yeah. Interesting. We also. This is the best place to do it.

Time is passing really fast. That's true, we should. Well, we. Because we got to talk about it before we get out. Why? I would prefer to enter his domain with some permission. He comes out here or he comes out in our world. Or he does not come out at all. Well, that's a discussion.

What are you talking about, if I might ask? We found Halas. He's the reason we got you out. You found him. Yeah. Yeah. He did help free you. He wants us to free him. He's trapped in a gem prison.

He's trapped in this gem prison. He's trapped in this gem prison. There is no honor amongst mages of his ilk. Whatever arrangement you make, do not fulfill it. Why? Or do it at your own folly. I'm not dealing with this thing. No, no, no, let's just, you guys. What?

Get out of here. That's fine. Do we leave the gem here? No, we take it with us and we give it to Yussa or Allura or somebody that's going to keep it super safe. Yussa, would you be interested in protecting a gem and the body of Halas? No offense, but we gave Yussa the happy fun ball

for him to protect and he got lost in it for an eternity. Do you know how many years have passed? for him to protect, and he got lost in it for an eternity. Do you know how many years have passed? 35 years. Make a deception check. We all age. Natural one. Still a powerful wizard, we still want him to be our friend. Yussa's right eyebrow cocks up and goes,

Well then, I appreciate you taking your sweet time. We would feel inappropriate not at least ruminating on the notion of freeing Holos, considering that he was pretty straight with us in getting you out of here. Oh, he's been as straight as he said what he thought you needed to hear. He created a laboratory full of freaks of nature.

He was carving pieces of a heart out so he could live for an eternity. We should not free him. We can get out now. That has lived as long as I have and been amongst mages of his ilk and stronger. At a certain point, morality becomes unnecessary. I think we're fine not releasing him.

I think the only question is, we should let you know, we also destroyed the Permaheart in here, but we've also made contact with Allura by Sorin. Ah, good. Is this something that someone of your group would like to oversee, or should we leave this here? It's tempting to leave it behind, but I would hate to think what happens

if somebody else were to get him within their grasp and make the mistake of releasing him. Hold onto it for now. Do not touch it. The fact that he has not taken you over means that this is not what I assumed it would be. We know that none of you have, at this point, Yussa suddenly looks extremely suspicious of all of you.

What? What? None of us have lost. You think one of us has been turned? We thought that, too, maybe. But no, everybody has maintained their normal amount of chaotic ridiculousness. It would be pretty impressive if anyone was capable

of pretending to be quite as crazy as the rest of us are. Yes, sir, I would have thought to leave him here. I find it hard to trust anything he has told us, and am wary of carrying him back to our home, if he is able to get out whenever he wants. If he could get out, he would have gone out through one of you already. Maybe he's in you, Caleb,

and you're wanting to leave actual Caleb behind. If I know the nature of this. I have not touched the gem. If it does not have the means of possessing somebody, and the body is not within a certain radius, dispelling would destroy it. How about we leave the body here and take the gem with us?

And dispel it in the real world? Not dispel it, seeker, do I? Can I just tell if Yussa seems on the level right now? Make an insight check. Yeah. I'll back you up. What does that mean? You get advantage. Advantage. He's eyeballing as well. Yeah, go for it.

Go for it. My insight sucks. I'm not giving you advantage. Oh, sorry. I can roll it as well. I'd say both of you guys roll separately. One. Young. 15.

You, Cesar, are a pretty hard- hard to read person in general. You haven't seen him quite as frazzled, though for a person who looks as dirty and fresh out of prison, he's a little more put together than he was when you first found him. Does he smell as bad as Caleb used to? No, elves and humans have very different ways of ripening.

Let's not forget why we came in here in the first place, is we're trying to make friends. And you don't smell anymore. Yes, we are trying to make friends, and are we trying to go out the door that has the dragon's hoard? Let's go with the dragon's hoard and let's. So we're leaving the body, taking the gem.

We're listening to the person that we're going to be listening to. There's no chance that this gem will just suddenly magically work. We're going to the person that we're going to be listening to. There's no chance that this gem will just suddenly magically work. We're going to find out. You, sir, I don't suppose you've touched that red pane on the stained glass window, have you? That one there?

Yes. Yes, it's how I cataloged it on the map. Of course. By the way, did you go through there and already take all of the bounty that was in there? Yes, what do you think is within one of my bags within an adamantine box? It's empty. Well, one of those boxes. Not all of it.

I have, this was not my first trip through here. All right, well, let's go and collect what we can. Oh man, you got a lot and it all got taken? That's balls. A lot of it. But I can always come back. You're going to come back? Not alone. I've only met but a small portion of this.

Yussa, this thing is called the Mage's Bane or some. Oh, it's Mage's Bane. Yeah, you got sucked into a prison, dragged off by a mage golem. And we came in here, not died. Why would you touch something that could potentially hurt you or kill you just out of curiosity?

That's just stupid, man. You're going to come back in here? Nice nod. Well said. You don't think we're worried? Maybe, if it suits me. Not anytime soon. I've learned a few lessons from this experience. Let's leave here. Time is passing really fast.

Everybody up to the platform. I, what would be a fun idea, would be to leave this body in the prison. Like locked in the prison? It doesn't matter, he can get out. The golems aren't going to imprison this body. They're trained for his essence. We could leave the body with the Fiend, though.

Oh. No. No. That's kind of fucked up towards Fiend. That's kind of mean. Why? I don't know, it's just like, here's the person that's been torching me for a thousand Why? I don't know, it's just like, here's the person that's been torturing me for a thousand years.

Just a brat. He can't answer, and he's just like. That is pretty fucked up. Yeah. Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay. Let's just leave him laying on a table here in the study, and I'll put his arm above his head and make him positioned, kind of sexy-like.

I disagree. and I'll put his arm above his head and make him positioned sexy. I disagree, this is the easiest room to tolerate in here. Where do you want to put him? I command Wheelie to take him back through past the demon, back to the stairway, and I dump him into the stairwell. He's also still wearing the anti-magic manacles, too,

so that's exciting. The body? Mm-hmm. Oh yeah, we should get those back. No, do you want those? Yeah, just in case. All right. I rifle Oro's off his body. Okay, you retrieve the manacles? Wait.

I'm just going to say, if we ever need to find out where this body is, could those be used as some sort of a scrying device? Different plane of existence. Okay. Oh no, it works across planes. Does it? No, just messaging.

I guess you could, can you scry on a body? Yes, on the same plane. But it has to be on the same plane. Okay. All right. All right. Let's go. Devil back past the plane. Okay. All right. All right. Let's go. Double back past the demon.

Okay. After the body's dumped, Willie makes his way back to you. Yussa gets a little impatient and is waiting for the golem to return and goes, I need to be on the other side. Presses the red little island gem on it. He's impatient now?

He has been here for a while. I'm going to hop as well. I'll do the same. All right. Each time, it shatters once and then reforms, shatters again, reforms, each person being pulled into and vanishing into the darkness. One by one, you all tumble out of the open space

into the area where the dragon's lair once was where you last fought. You can see the grooves in the ground that lead towards the secondary sphere, the exit sphere you had previously used, still aglow from the last time that you were here. It had not been disabled, because the creature that deals with that was killed.

The creature, by the way, corpse, still remains. Oh, you want to salvage a blue dragon corpse? It's in the early stages of decay. Never mind. Because it hasn't been an extended period of time. Teething Claws? Possibly, I mean, Teething Claws will still be there. That's where stuff should do it.

Pretty decent consolation prize, too. Is there anything lying about? There's probably a handful of coins scattered throughout that use it and vacuum the whole place. Oh, he's been in here, too, already. Yeah, yeah, he's been in here. Yeah.

Is that a medicine check to remove parts? I'd say... I'd say go ahead and take a medicine check with disadvantage because it is a different biology. Can I help out? Sure. I'll give you advantage. All right. A single roll, at least. Or a...

What? It would be disadvantage on the world because it's never a single roll. Oh, a single roll, sorry. 15, okay. 13. 13. It can be done. You'd probably need to use or have some help with Fjord's weapon as well,

or any enchanted dagger as well. It'll take you probably a good hour or so to harvest. All right. An hour? We're going to waste a day? Another day? Another day. All right. An hour? We're going to waste a day? Another day? Another day. Almost out. Sure? Sure. Okay, Yussa turns to you and goes,

If you wish to stay in the office, you can. I'm going to return home and have a meal. We'll talk when we return. All right. He steps over and touches the exit sphere and you watch his body finish. Look, I'm only judgy when it comes to me risking myself for them.

So, give him a loud, a little. I'm just pointing out, that's all. Yeah, well. As they're harvesting, I'm going to pull Caleb aside and just say, hey, listen, I know you're pissed at me right now, but if he can help me, isn't that worth pursuing? I have his books.

He's a very bad man. I know. He got sealed away for tinkering with things he shouldn't have been. He's a bad man. I know, but... Okay. What are my other options, though? I have his books.

But they're unfinished, right? Well, let's just put a pin in it, okay? Give me some time to read. Okay. And we'll talk to people who know better, maybe, what to do with an archmage of this magnitude. Okay. Okay. This place killed you.

Yeah, he made it. Fashioned it. While they're harvesting, I'll go over to Jester and say, I realized the last time we were in here, you were in quite a pinch. You almost died, and I think it's remarkable that you helped Nott die. Yeah, well, she helped me out a lot, too,

when we were in last time, so. I'm glad you're here. Thanks, Fjord. Glad you are, too. Come a long way. Fuck. I'm ready to go back. Me, too.

But I don't want to go back to all of the bad stuff. I just want to go back to happy stuff. This was a nice escape, you know? Yeah. I can see why someone would get addicted to living here. Or at least visiting often. Yeah. All right. Right.

In the harvesting time, Caleb puts Alasdair's books out and is showing them to Nott and saying, this page talks about the jar, and starts sharing and translating roughly what everything is in and sharing everything that's in those spells and books to try to quell her fears. Okay. Any time it takes for you guys to wait for this, about an hour or so, you manage to harvest

from the dragon corpse. A number of them break and shatter and splinter from not being experienced in this, but you put nine blue dragon's teeth. Yeah. Ooh! Nine times. I'll put that in the haversack. Thank you. Oh, you're putting it in the haversack?

Yeah, I'll do it. All right. As well as four claws. Let me negotiate with these. These are four claws. Of course. These are of a young blue dragon. Nine. That'll do. I'm going to start the, I'm going to decompose on the rest of it.

Okay, immediately you can see the fungus begin to grow over it. I've never seen anything like that. Shall we away? Let's go home. Go to the sphere? All right. One by one, you each place your hand on the exit sphere, feeling that surge of energy, and once more,

you emerge as a group in the center of Yussa's study, where you had entered the Heirloom Sphere a number of what seemed to be only a couple of days ago, but now sits a much larger period of time has passed here in Exandria. There, as soon as you arrive, you can see Wensforth like, Excuse me.

Um, master? And begins shouting down the stairs. You hear footsteps a moment later, and Yussa approaches, now clean, dressed in these long, beautiful, gold and silver robes, a tan elven skin framing the somewhat warm and delighted smile that he's trying to hide

at seeing you all return. Well, it is very nice to see you all once more. Thank you for everything. I've had some time to reflect that you may not have had, but I'm very thankful. Did you call Laura yet? Would you like me to? Yeah.

My mustache is all coming off. Four hours, here we go. I use it like you, so to? Yeah. I shout, my mustache is all coming off. Oh shit. Four hours, here we go. I use it like you, so it's like a... Wait, wait, wait, stop putting it on my face. Hang on, wait, wait. It's fine now. We're almost there. He's breaking his mustache. The whole time, the whole time.

Why do we always pick characters with facial hair? So I could reach out to her right now, if you would like, and she could come. She did say that she had some curious news and wanted to speak with you on something you had left with her before about this Angel of Iron's business.

We only spoke briefly on it. She said she still needed something of yours. Yes, she does. She needs something of Yasha's. He closes his eyes and you see his fingers trace a familiar element of the sending spell. He says, The Mighty Nein have returned, and one piece.

Just a moment. That was really short. You didn't say the whole 25. You know you have a lot more words you can use. Yes. That's kind of a waste of magic if you're not going to use up everything that you could do. You should really say all of it.

Being concise is a very useful skill. Jester, did you know that you could send short messages? I know I can, but it seems wasteful. It does, he doesn't even know if she was pooping. Yeah. You could ask so many other things. So many other things. I'll keep that in mind.

At which point, you hear new footsteps arrive as Allura has apparently teleported to the tower. You can see her in very, very nice, very, very nice dresses. It's beautiful with jewelry around, her graying hair pulled back into the same braid, but you can see jewels put through it. She goes,

Terribly sorry, we were attending a formal event, but I've, this has been gnawing at the back of my mind since you left. Come, come, Yussa, help me clear the floor a bit. And they both, in moving tables and stuff out of the way, Wentworth goes, All right, I'll just, I'll go lay down, have a nap. Leaves the chamber.

Allura says, as they're moving stuff out of the way, goes, So glad you survived. Really remarkable work. If I could have that hand me in right back, if that's all right. Oh. Are you sure you don't want to let me keep it? I snatch it. Thank you very much.

Okay, you didn't do one. You're very, very much more than meets the eye with these folks. You've made some good friends, Yussa. I've encountered a few of similar traits in the past. So, I know you've mentioned this Angel of Iron scenario, right? Done a bit of research into it.

She moves one of the tables over there with you, sir. It appears that word has gotten around in some circles they're dealing in the Chosen of Betrayers. That is a worry for us all, to be honest. I'd like to perform a ritual that peers past the veils. It would require all of us to partake in it, if you're comfortable. Gives us a better chance of success.

Perhaps we can shed some light on this plight of yours, and hopefully not, but perhaps the plight of many. Gather some things for me, and Yussa goes, I know exactly what you mean. Get that teal orb there, and they start pointing out different things. They need you to gather, there's a teal crystal orb on the southern wall's fourth shelf.

There's silver cording wound around a hook along the western wall. There is incense being kept in a brass pot on the floor by the desk, and they require a personal effect of the person that they're attempting to peer through. I'll go get the orb. I'll get the hook with the wiring wrapped around it.

I'll get the incense. Who are we trying to peer at? Yasha. Oh. Okay, we got to peer at? Yasha. Oh. Okay, we got to find, who has something of Yasha's? Oh shit. Anyone have one of her flowers? Didn't she give?

I gave her, no, she gave me a, shit. I'm looking. Flower crown. Nope, that was from... This veil you're attempting to peer through, will they be able to peer back? I certainly hope not. This is more of an information gathering than an actual attempt at scrying

or peering at the other side. All right. It's an involved, more of a custom element of a legend lore-type spell. Oh, do you have flowers? I cannot guarantee it'll work, but. Flowers? Does it have to be one of her effects

or something that she liked? They can certainly try something. Whatever you have. I have a fabric swatch that I found. No, that was. Do we have any of her weapons? Or did anyone give her a weapon that she gave back? Did we pick up those brazes she had made?

No. I have this drawing that I had done of Yasha a long time ago that she liked. She was holding it, she looked at it, I don't know if that's why. Give it a shot. We're not really in the habit of carrying each other's shit around.

Yeah, but sometimes when we get new stuff. I was also thinking, did we move stuff around? We didn't think to grab anything from the house before we left, did we? Yeah, like when she got, did she get a new sword? Did she get a new? Yeah, she has both of them. She carries her old sword with her?

Yeah, Magician's Judge and the big-ass bone cleaver thing. Yeah. I meant she did just leave. She wasn't in the habit of carrying a lot of random things. She had to stuff back. She may have some effects on the Xhorhaus, yeah.

She doesn't have any of those at all. Let's try the drawing, that's all we have. Unless we want to, yeah, hopping to the house and hopping back would be complicated. Yeah. And there's nothing in the room. She didn't leave anything in it. I've gone in the room a lot.

I left one more time. I really hope it's enough. If at least you keep an image of her in your mind as part of this ritual, that might aid its chance. And you see now there's drawing this large circle. It looks like a circle, but then it sometimes looks like an oval and different elements connect. There are points where she begins to point out

for each of you to sit, but it's not a continuous circle. It's odd in its shape. As you sit here, and then you here, hold hands at this juncture, and you can see they're all holding hands, but sometimes it's cross and the connection, it's a strange mingle. She asks Yussa to go ahead and light the incense.

He goes ahead and takes the crystal and places it in the center of the ritual. Now think to your friend, think to this entity, this angel of Irons. Will it to reveal itself through your connection to your friend and let it show us itself without obfuscation? All right.

She waves her hand in the chamber window, shuts closed, cutting off the sunlight. Yussa snaps his fingers and a lot of the candles open up around the sunlight. Yussa snaps his fingers and a lot of the candles open up around the chamber. You might get to, but it's fun to see someone else do it. I think you did that the first time we met. I know.

It goes to show, I'm super powerful. As you all take hands and begin to focus, concentrating, Laura begins to recite this incantation. The incantation moves from an old draconic to elements of common, to old draconic to elements of common, speaking of looking beyond the veil of what exists and instead call the memory and knowledge of the worlds beyond, current, past.

Let it all come and reveal what may stand before the future. Let all shadows be cast aside. Let all wisdom pierce the veil and reveal the true nature of what it is we seek. As you all begin to focus and concentrate, you can see smoke begins to swirl around you and gather. It's like low, dark fog that settles around your knees and then begins to take over your torso.

You can almost barely see your hands beneath the surface of it brimming. A little bit of light from the peeking element of the windows and the crackling candlelight begins to darken and subside. In this darkness, you can see tendrils of similar type dark smoke swirling between your linked arms as shapes begin to gather

from them into chains, chains that pull and bind between you in odd ways. Many chains, loose then taut, loose then pulled taut again. The chains all begin to gather again in a center circle as the lord begins to chant louder and louder. Wind begins to pick up sourcelessly, blowing each of your hair into a bit of a mist of a tangle.

All the chains gather in the circle, binding to something. You see a shape, female in form, in the center of you all, rising from the smoke. You see it take the form of Yasha, held in these chains that wrap between you. As they continue to rise above her, a cloud of sparks bruise above her head while the chains gather, formless and writhing.

Allura stops her chanting and looks up to it, her eyes squinting against the intensity of this wind wrapping around her. Something divine watches over her, but it is held at bay by this angel. That was bad to happen. It's stuck on your beard. There you go. I got it. Yeah!

Still looking good. How could possibly... Concentrate harder, show us, reveal the form of her captor. You all begin to tighten your grip and focus even stronger on her. The writhing cluster of chains begin to separate. In that space where she was, her form vanishes

and left behind it is a black, lightless void. The chains that were tangled once begin to fall into place. Seven points, seven segments around the pit of darkness, endless, yet living. It's strange to look in the blackness of night and feel the emptiness, but this, you look into this emptiness and you feel something immense, something old, something mad.

A deep, guttural shout quakes the room. The ritual shattered, the windows break on the tower, light filters in, the candles are out, and all of you feel your arms thrust apart, breaking the connection. This thing here chases her roofs. She looks to you, sir, Ysicus. There is no angel of our hands.

It is a guise for the Chained Oblivion. Oh. For there is Dune, the terrible mad god of endless hunger and destruction. It masquerades its efforts for freedom by this angel's name. He looks to Allura, and Allura looks to all of you. This is a terrible portent.

I must inform the council. And that's where we're going to go ahead and leave off the episode. Pick up there next week. Fucking shit. Cool, cool, cool, cool. Object cool. What are you doing?

Okay, yep. Yeah, that makes sense. I've seen the imagery in the book about the Chain to Blvin. It really sucks. Jane Merritt weathered in the hearse? This guy has been whispered since the start of this campaign. Oh my gosh. Just looking into the weather in the hearth? This guy has been whispered since the start of this campaign.

Oh my god. Just looking into the darkness of the void shattered the ritual. It may be, or it could have been timing. You don't know. Or someone burped. That was you. Boy, oh boy. Regardless, Pippa goes in there next week.

Oh my god. Oh my goodness. Now we're carrying around Halas and a gem. We'll give it to him. I believe in this tower. Great job, Matt. Holy shit. Guys. Happy Fun Ball. Happy Fun Ball.

Four sessions in the Happy Fun Ball, Jesus. Ready for more. Could have done more. Yeah, all this just. Kind of want to see the carving farm. Kind of want to see the cave. Lending in there, he never saw the cave. Oh, it's in the bedroom this was just. Kind of want to see the carving farm, kind of want to see the cave. Lending in there, he never saw the whole thing. Oh, it's in the bedroom.

Crystal Caves. Yeah. Want to see that sex mod. We found another room. We found, we went off the map. You did? We went off the map. We added to the map. There were a number of off-the-map rooms in there that weren't found.

Little sad, but also, I think four sessions is enough in there. Worked out great. Level 15, we'll come back or something. All right, we'll be back next week. Yeah, high doom. Happy Halloween, everybody. Happy Halloween!

Thank you for joining us. Don't forget, we love you very much, and is it Thursday yet? Good night. Thank you so much for joining us on this adventure. To help new listeners discover the show, please give us a rating and review on whatever podcasting app you're listening on. Until next time, is it Thursday yet?