Critical Role - C2E89 Lingering Wounds

Episode Date: December 27, 2019

The Mighty Nein take a couple days of downtime in Rexxentrum to research, train, and reconnect with faces from the past...Watch Critical Role live Thursdays at 7pm PT on https://www.twitch.tv/criticalrole

Hello, bees! This is Laura Bailey, here to welcome you to the Critical Role podcast. If you'd like to tune into the show as it airs, you can watch Critical Role Thursdays at 7 p.m. Pacific on twitch.tv slash criticalrole and youtube.com slash criticalrole. Our lovely Twitch subscribers can view the episode on demand right away. Or you can find it on YouTube Mondays at 12 p.m. Pacific. And of course, for all you fantastic podcast listeners, Critical Role episodes hit feeds on Thursday mornings, a week after the episode first airs. With all that said, let's get into another episode of Critical Role. Hello, everyone, and welcome to tonight's episode of Critical Role, where a bunch of

us in the Reass voice actors sit around and play Dungeons & Dragons. We're Dungeons & Dragons! We are in our last episode of 2019. Oh! What? Yeah, last session before we leave for the holidays. But I just got here. I know, we'll be back next year. Okay, okay.

Which is only in a few weeks. Just 12 more months. Exactly. But before we get into tonight's session, we do have some announcements to get through, beginning with the first of our two fantastic sponsors for the evening, a returning friend of the show, Backblaze! Backblaze!

Sam, if you don't mind. This episode is sponsored by our good friends at Backblaze. Yev is in the studio hawking their premium backup technology for both Mac and PC, unlimited online backup for all your fanfic, docs, artwork, music, pics, vids, that's how the kids say it, and it starts at just $6 a month. You can also recover files from anywhere on the go, and they go directly to the iOS or Android app, or you can order a hard drive with all your stuff and Backblaze will ship it to you overnight. Which reminds me, I recently had a computer hard drive crash

and they sent me my hard drive and while I was sort of restoring everything, getting it back up and running, I found an old file that I had forgotten about from far away. I was shocked to find an old script for an anime trailer that was produced in the mid-90s. Turns out a Japanese studio did an anime-style remake

of Gale Force 5, you know, the popular film starring sitcom icon Gale, as played by Ashley Johnson. Oh yeah! Oh yeah, I forgot about that. This was an anime remake, so some of the things won't seem as familiar to an American audience, but. I forgot that I was the one that started it. You did do this.

Me as a guy. But I thought. Yes, you're responsible. I'm responsible for this. But I thought we could just do a dramatic reading of the trailer script that I found on my hard drive, thanks to Backblaze. And it's just for the people at home.

Yeah, so you guys have some scripts to read, and there'll be some musical accompan Yeah, so you guys have some scripts to read, and there'll be some musical accompaniment, and you know what? Let's take it away, guys. From the studio that brought you mobile virgin boy Senpai, mega princess bluesy Shippuden,

and Kazam, comes a brand new anime adventure. Mid-90s. Gale Coon, you're a transfer student. Want to get some ramen at the maid cafe? I want to, but I've been feeling strange powers growing inside me, and I need to do my best to discover my hidden destiny below the cram school. Huh? Not me.

An ordinary girl with a pet cat named Neko and a powerful secret. A giant alien robot is attacking the hot springs. Our club meeting is ruined. I need to stop them. I call on you, ultimate Kaneko vampire stalker. Unleash my final four. With the power of friendship, Gale can transform into a mecha mutant student council vice president.

You will never defeat me, Gale-san. For I am Henderson, a four-story tall Gundam, and you are a helpless high school junior with a nosebleed. Gig me with a chopstick, Henderson! Roar! Coming to theaters, it's Her Miracle Bebop Neo-Gale 2047. This winter, get gilled. Whoa!

Very nice, guys. Very nice. I would've watched that. You would have watched that in the mid-'90s. I feel like, had they ever made it. Yeah, I'm realizing it was good. I would've bought that while school. Your anime reactions are tipped off.

Yeah, absolutely. I have a lot of experience, so. But thanks to Backblaze for helping me find that whole script, and don't forget, guys, you can get a 15-day fully-featured trial right now at backblaze.com slash, huh? No, backblaze.com slash Critical Role, and start protecting your stuff today. Thanks to Yev, thanks to Backblaze.

Thanks, everyone. We gotze. Woo! Yay! Yay, backblaze! Oh my god. Oh god. We're sorry. I'm excited for the Kojima remake of that in two years. Look, man, those last 15 years have to be for something. It's true, it's true.

We've all earned our. SAM and LAURA, SAM and LAURA, SAM and LAURA, SAM and LAURA, SAM and LAURA, Our second sponsor tonight are our friends returning from the beginning all the way through to now in campaign two, D&D Beyond. D&D Beyond! They're amazing folks doing great stuff. They have a special offer for the holiday season

where they're offering 15% off individual digital books, including Eberron, Rising from the Last War, their recent campaign, and D&D vs. Rick and Morty as well. Yeah! So go check all that out now at dndbeyond.link slash happy holidays. Thank you guys so much for watching. That's perfect warlock.

Yeah. I haven't heard that rendition yet. That's what just woke up. I love that just everything sounds bad because of my voice right now. I'm going to be singing all night. And Sam made you power up. You're like a good friend.

That's a perfect warlock. Love you, Ashley. Ashley Sundownin'. Oh, no. Well, thank you very much, D&B on, for supporting our awesome show, and go check out the stuff if you haven't yet. Yay!

But due announcements to get through, beyond that, yesterday we hosted our special end of the year fireside chat here on our Critical Role Twitch channel. Bunch of us showed up in comfy clothes, chatted with chat, answered some questions, and then played a bunch of Jackbox, which was ridiculous. We're into some things.

But yeah, if you missed the livestream, the VOD is available now on our Twitch channel if you're a subscriber, and it will be on YouTube tomorrow morning. So check it out then. Oh, cool. Take off your holiday with that chaos. Also, we mentioned it last week,

but issue four of our comic book series, Vox Machina Origins, is now out. It came out yesterday. In your local comic book shop, or you can get them online. Grog is good. Grog is the best. Quintessential Grog and twins in there.

Quintessential. You can find it at your local comic stores, or you can find it at Dark Horse Digital or Comixology, other great places where comic books are found. Once again, amazing art from our longtime artist, Olivia, sorry, Olivia Samson, who's amazing, Jodie Houser, fantastic writer, and the art here on the cover. You can see Sam Hogg did this amazing cover

for this art piece, but check out if you haven't yet. It's awesome. We're also off for the next two weeks for the holiday break. We're going to be taking some time for ourselves, for our families, and a lot of sleep. We'll kill Santa. No!

Oh no, sorry. Chutney's back! Chutney's back! Bloodshed still needed. You should have killed me when you had the chance! Okay, that took a turn. Wow. We'll be back, here to pick up where tonight's episode lands off on Thursday, January 9th.

Oh man. At 7 p.m. Pacific. Aww. I know, I know. Wow. We're all hitting that wall. But thank you guys so much for your amazing support of everything that we've been trying to do and build here at the channel. We've got a bunch of really exciting things to show you guys coming very soon in the new year.

I can't wait to do so. But have a wonderful magical holiday. Rock it out. We'll see you guys in 2020. But first, we do have an episode to get to. But Travis, you have an announcement. Oh yes, some of you have noticed that some of our content has started migrating over to our official CR channels,

and that takes just a little bit of time, because, you know, our content is pretty long. It's real long. So it takes just a little bit. We promise we will get it to you as soon as possible, in a couple days, hopefully, and we thank you very much for your patience. Aw, love you. Ding!

Ding! All righty, so with that being said, let's go ahead and jump into tonight's episode of Critical Role. Oh, what? 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 roll the dice roll the dice roll the dice Roll the dice Can you answer the call? Digging deep in your soul

As the legend unfolds Now it's your turn To roll Welcome back. Motherfuckers. Last we left off, the Mighty Nein, after having their showdown with the cult of the Angel of Irons,

destroying Obann, the Laughing Hand, and freeing Yasha in the inevitable end from his influence, you were taken to the throne room of King Dwendal. And upon meeting members of his council and the Assembly, you were tasked to prove yourselves a bit by helping at least bring some sort of an arrangement between them and the Dynasty together

to essentially help forward a possible peace talk or negotiation in this conflict that's been going on for quite some time, based on the relationship that you have seemingly built with the Bright Queen. You were brought under Ludinus Delef from Martinet and oldest member of the Assembly, who then spoke with you in his private quarters about elements of the conflict,

some of the source of the tension that has led and eventually brewed into the war that broke out. And you were given a little bit of guidance as to how much you were to guide the war that broke out. You were given a little bit of guidance as to how much you were to guide the next step in this. You then went back to your, or you were asked, as part of this arrangement, to inspect the beacon that was supposedly found

by the word of Trent Ikithon. As such, you were brought by Ludinus to the Vergesen Sanatorium, a hidden structure somewhere in the northern elements of Western Rhinander, where you were brought to a subterranean research facility where you met Trent Ikithon as well as two of his scourgers, one of which was familiar to Caleb.

You inspected it, found it to seemingly be, indeed, an actual beacon. Had a bit of a tense back and forth interrogation via conversation. And then upon returning to Rexxentrum, began to forge a few paths with the time that you had given. It was up to you as to when to choose to engage and begin these negotiations.

There was no timeline set, but time is of the essence for the more time that goes by, the higher chance there is of this temporary ceasefire to be broken. So, you guys, after voicing a few possible interests here in the city of Rexxentrum, you now stand in your chambers, we'll say, within the Camarouth Cottage,

figuring out what to do with the time you have. So, Mighty Nein, after venturing back from some purchasing at a nearby creepy store and having some conversation about what the next order of business is, you are still gathered and the city is yours. What would you like to do?

I'm going to spend a couple days working on my bone flute. Yeah, no, that's good. Your bone flute? Oh, that's right. That's the new euphemism in Exit Drum. Working on your bone flute. I was really looking forward to that, I think. I would like to find a garden somewhere

and start reading my book as much as I can for the next couple days. Then also maybe get some therapy at night by going to some fighting with peoples, but we'll figure that out. But I would like to get as much reading in as I can. Okay. All right, so easy enough to find a garden, actually. In the Shimmer Ward where you guys are staying,

there are a number of public gardens that are just out for general meandering for those who live in the space or are guests of it. So not too far from the cottage where you guys are staying, you find one beautiful, almost five-pointed pentagonal garden that has these various intersecting walking paths made of beautiful cobblestones and larger stones that situate themselves

between art sculptures and statues and some trees that rise up. It's very beautiful in contrast to a lot of the areas of Rexxentrum on the outskirts of this particular region. But you can take some time to read your book. How much time would you like to take? Let's see.

Let me think about that. Okay. You're working on your bone flute. It sounds, it's a death whistle, basically. You've just handed me. Yeah, yeah. Just sitting in probably another park and Ah! What? just sitting in probably another park and HURRRRR! What?! For those who haven't heard.

The same park. Holy shit. What the? I just keep moving. I believe it was the Aztec. It's the Aztec death whistle. I believe it's the Aztec death whistle. It just sounds like goats screaming.

Yeah, yeah. It's meant to sound like a person screaming in a shrill voice, and they would have many, many of them, supposedly, blowing it at once as they were charging into battle as an information tactic. It's just amazing. And they carved the skulls that you would blow in the back of, and it was awesome.

It's amazing. It's rad. I meant to ask you, by the way, the little symbol that you gave me, it's made of seaweed, and you said it had a blue crystal in it. Yeah, like blue glass. Oh, beautiful, okay. Is it actually made of seaweed, and you said it had a blue crystal in it. Yeah, like blue glass. Oh, beautiful, okay. Is it actually made of seaweed, or is it?

No, it's copper and steel, and the copper is patinaed green. No, no, it's glass. I don't have that shit. Blue glass. What am I made of, money? Cool. I'll draw you a little picture. As you're reading intensely through your book, Yasha,

every 20 or so minutes, you'll hear this distant, high-pitched shrill sound that catches you off guard, and as you turn to look, your adrenaline briefly pumping, you remember that's Caduceus practicing. Got the perfect ball lock. It's weird. Who else is doing anything particular over the next period of time?

I want to scry on Kiri and see what she's doing. Oh shit. Okay. I can be back. So you go ahead and focus a bit. It's just like a big turkey diner. You're horrible! You asshole! You are a terrible person. Happy Thanksgiving!

As you're taking some time in your own chambers, your private chambers here in the cottage, placing these symbols on the ground and focusing intently on Ciri's whereabouts. You feel your consciousness extend a bit into the clouds above before rushing down towards the overlooks, the mountain cliff sides of the Silverquell Ridge down into Upper Hupperdook.

Upper Hupper. Upper Hupper, if you will. Glancing towards it, last to memory you can recall, there appears to be quite a bit of damage that Upper Hupperduke has sustained. Up-up. Up-up. Up-up, as the kids call it. Hanging out in Up-up.

It's good branding for property. It's got the stack of letters, just in block H-U-P. It's so the stack of letters, just in block HB. It's so gentrified. I prefer down Duke, though. Downward Duke? I'm breaking up, though. Dodu.

Dodu. Dodu. As you try and wrestle your concentration during the scry from the various terms that make their way through your brain, Jester. You can see the damage that you had heard of some sort of an attack that had come to Hupperduke. It doesn't look terribly recent,

but there are small levels of construction that are beginning to spring up again. The city is reclaiming itself in those regions. With a flash, there is a sight of a dark-feathered young girl making her way through the street, hood up, cloak on, holding arms filled with what looks to be partially stale bread,

a small basket with a little piece of cloth wrapped over it, and she's walking along, darting from shaded corner to shaded corner, not to call too much attention before. Does she look too skinny, or does she look like she's eating okay? She looks healthy.

Okay, okay. She's not withering by any means, but she's also covered in feathers. But as best as you can guess, she doesn't seem any worse for wear. Yeah, she's malty. As you follow her for a bit, returning to the same abandoned butchery

where you had encountered the family that had agreed to take care of her, the place has been far spruced up, whereas previously it was just a boarded, shut locale filled with dust and abandoned pieces of furniture, many of which was either in disuse or broken. You watch as she comes through the door and the inside, and it feels like a little more of a home.

You see her bring the bread and place it on the counter and break it apart and look around. Nobody else is home yet, so she just grabs a piece and sits on a stool and begins eating it quietly, but she seems okay. Oh, that's good, that's good, that's good. Okay. The ten minutes of the scry wear off

and that's the extent of the vision you have. I could use some bread, that's made me hungry. I'm going to get some bread. Okay. Eat it. Then I'm going to send message to the Plank King. Wait, what? Are you going to do it? Oh my god. Wait, what?

Boom. Oh my god. All right. Hold on. Wow. Cod's slowly worrying to life and Matt's head in the back. Oh god.

Wait, what? Wow, you've sent the DM down a file. Go on through binders. Okay, what do you send to the Plane King? Hey, Plane King. It's Jester, do you remember me? How are things going there? We miss you.

Are you guys causing crimes and stuff? How's your hair? You put me? That's actually, I think, dead on. At first, you think it may not have found its source from the protracted silence. That's such a fucked spell. Like, it might just hit you at any time.

It's pretty fucked up. Fuck it, stop! I never thought of it in the wrong hands until it was in the wrong hands, and it's fascinating. It's here, it's here, it's here! Ah! Goddamn, that's great! Yeah, you just hear, hello!

Toot toot! The voice comes back and goes, I am not really certain who this is. But business has been business. Why do you ask? And that's the only response you get. You didn't have a lot of interaction with the Plain King, and you gather he's genuinely unsure who this is.

I like it. You said Jester. I know, you should remember me. All right. I'm going to send a message to Beau's dad. The Tal'Dorei Council. To Beau's dad, okay. Wait, what now? Okay. To Beau's dad. The Tal'Dorei Council. To Beau's dad, okay. Wait, what now?

Okay. This checklist is crazy. I'm so happy. Sending is dangerous. How are things going there? Jesus. Did you heed my warnings before? We are keeping eyes on you. Yes, I'll keep, everything's fine.

I don't know if you're responsible. No, no. But thank you for helping with the competition. Just let us know what you need. You've become their god. Can I take your credit for something somebody else did? Politician. She's a warlock picture. Superstitious. I remember there was that competitive wine family

that got attacked by the Coyote Bomb. Hmm. Competitive wine family? Yeah. Like they just drink wine? No, no, no. No, oh, wow, that's fair. They sell wine and make wine and compete? Business rivals.

Okay. Business rivals are perfect. Last message of the day that I'm going to send today. Oh yes. I'm going to send Last message of the day that I'm going to send today. Oh yes. I'm going to send a message to the inevitable end. What? And just say, hey, so you kind of disappeared, but I just want to say thank you so much

for helping out back there. If you want a friend, because it's probably... Send another one. Pretty lonely there with whatever you're doing. If you want a friend, you know, just let us know. Thank you again. Also, like your hair. The response come back.

I think I know how this is. I appreciate your aid in breaking his will. And I show appreciation by letting you live. That's so good. We will not meet again. Oh, come on.

That's it. Didn't even comment on the hair, now. Does she know that she can respond twice? I said two, I said half. I'm just going to doodle in my journal, the inevitable end. Fading out of a wall. Okay. Okay.

It's pretty well done. There's some good shading, some good crosshatching on it. Like, you're getting better and better at this as the weeks go on, yeah. I'm also going to draw what I imagine Beau's dad looks like melting into a puddle. Does it look like Beau with a mustache? Kind of, yeah. Okay.

All righty. Anybody else? Yeah, before the day gets too late, I ask Fjord and Nott if you would accompany me on a quick errand. Of course, yes. To Stalker Walkers. And I will lead them through Rexxentrum and go and cruise past the Soltryce Academy.

Okay. I don't want to go in or anything, but I thought both of you would appreciate it, seeing it for different reasons. It's much different than I expected, I admit. I actually looked forward to coming here at one point, learning. It's technically possible.

You hear a heavy door open and you watch as a group of what looks to be 12 students, all in very neat uniforms, emerging off in the distance as their teacher is giving a soft lecture to them as they head through one of the exterior gardens. It's a beautiful campus. It's massive. You know, the Trespirations of Ash

and the Hall of Irudition there did not prepare you for the scope and kind of splendor of this particular location. It's, with the context of you learning about some of the people who have been involved with it,

it might have darkened it a bit, but objectively it's a very well-crafted and very well-kept campus of towers and walkways and large marble halls and tall windows. You, in particular, watching this class pass by, your words escape you for a moment as you are immediately brought back to those early days. So hopeful, absorbing all knowledge

that you could possibly get your hands on. They look happy, being students. Believe me, being a young man here and attending school was like nothing else. It felt very important. It was a great honor. Were any of your professors just sweet, kind-hearted souls, or were they all sort of ulterior motive-y?

No, I didn't. It was a wonderful place to go to school. With good teachers. And just bright people. It was exciting where everyone around you was so... Their minds just sparking, and I was not going to be a soldier like my father, and I felt like I belonged, finally.

Do you ever wonder what would have happened if you had stayed there, and if those bad actors hadn't gotten their hands on you in that way, do you imagine you'd, well, you might be. Oh, um... Probably a teacher here.

At least that's what I thought when I started. It was intoxicating, I never wanted to leave. I wanted to just go through the revolving door and stay. I think you'd probably be an excellent teacher. You've taught me quite a bit already, without any formal, you know, classrooms or anything. Well, you are very bright, like the people in there.

But I mean, think about that. You'd be surrounded by knowledge and books and eager students. That would be a pretty cool life. I think you're right. Maybe one day you could do that. Maybe not here, but there could be a place.

Well, maybe I focus on you for the time being. You're such a good student, you need to thrive. I wouldn't mind that. Do you want to go inside? We could disguise ourselves and walk around. We tend to be students. Ask where the Chow Hall is, or whatever they call it. I don't know, is that what they'd call it at schools?

Yeah, yeah, mess hall. Mess hall. I don't think so. You know what I would like to do is go back to the cottage and start sorting through those papers we took from the Archmage's Bane. See if I can't start to figure that out. Yes, that would be tremendous.

Are you sure you didn't want to check on anyone else while you're here in Rexxentrum. I think it is a bad idea to stick my neck out here any more than I have. Or send us to check. Let's just lay low and get out of here. It's, I'm not welcome here.

Okay. And to be clear, you think this place is still capable of good. Yes, it can make positive change, affect lives in a good way, not just lead people down dark paths and... Probably. dark paths and... Probably.

Your grievances are personal, then, not with this establishment? It's a fairly tangled knot, Fjord, I'm not sure. All right. Mm-hmm. Thank you for coming with me. Thank you for showing us. You're a good friend. As are you and you.

Oh, who, me? Maybe not you. I don't want to wear out my welcome. Yeah, let's go. Okay. And for the time being, I will head back, and I will spend as much as my mind can focus on it here, time on those incomplete writings.

From Halas. From Halas. Go make an arcana check for me. Yes. Oh shit. 16. 16. Got that. I have a plus 10, but I always roll up. Not a bad start, not a bad start. As you're pouring through the notes, you pull out your own blank sheets,

and in a very beautiful mind kind of way, begin to connect the dots, begin to improvise on the incomplete glyphs, and following the threads, begin to improvise on the incomplete glitz, and following the threads and making sketches, and then finding problems in your work and then scrapping it. And you begin to see the early patterns of what this may have been capable of

and what ways you might be able to bend it in the direction of some of the things you want to accomplish. You do know at this stage, and really digging into it, it's not going to be a quick road. Who knows how long it might take, but much like any new project that gives you a hint of a very strong goal,

that little peak of obsession begins to percolate in the back of your mind, and you begin to consider how much of your waking time you can spend to solve this problem, because you're fairly confident in what you've seen here. You could probably do it with enough time. Ooh. After a couple hours of that,

I will hang out in the common room and pretend to read a book and watch for my colleagues and wait for them all to leave. Okay. Anybody over here? I will spend the mornings and the evenings trying to meditate more on the Wild Mother.

Okay. Trying to practice putting myself at the feeling what she needs or wants to show me, or just making myself open to whatever that might be and proudly displaying in a place of prominence the little pin that Caduceus gave me. Whereabouts are you meditating? I suppose just a room. It could just be a room that no one else is in,

just trying to find a quiet space. Okay, good. Outdoors. I would find a garden also. Okay. Back indoors. Back indoors. Start small. All right. Woo! In doors, back in the angels. I'm so small. All right.

As you quickly turn around, you knock on the door. Pluck a single flower out of your rain outside. You head back to your personal chambers. You know, make sure the balcony is available so some of the cold debris can come in. It's still overcast, it isn't a bright day. The rain's been off and on

since you've been here in Rexxentrum. But there is a cleansing chill that comes with the wind that is still welcoming and makes you feel more at ease and connected to nature beyond this massive city's walls. Focusing and closing your eyes and remembering what it felt like in those few moments that you were communing with the Wild Mother, in those visions you had when she tore you from the caustic grasp of Uk'otoa

and had taken your sins as her own. And it takes some time, but eventually the chill begins to pass, and a familiar warm breeze from those moments comes into your mind and you feel at peace. Time begins to crawl. Focus comes to your mind, and you can hear the waves

crashing into the shore from when you grew up. And you find that peaceful place you haven't found in a while, and just stay there. That's very cool. I do love the ocean. And in between that time, I will find Beau and try to work out with her whenever possible.

Okay. Between meditation, pumpin' some iron. Fighting pit, fighting pit, that'll be happening. We'll get to that. Beau spends her days working out, early morning workout before. Sure. Yep. Like 6 a.m. Totally at 6 a.m.

I had too much breakfast. Absolutely. Too much breakfast and some orange juice on the first one. All of it came up. I didn't do that again the second time. No, you only have to do that a couple times, you know, before you do that. Tend to just eat afterwards.

And I spend my days at the library. Okay, to the Rexxentrum Archive. The Rexxentrum Archive. Okay. And I have a list of things I would like to research, but I don't want to Caleb this either. Backhanded compliment? You can if you'd like. Huh?

Well, what things would you like to research while there? Pride's calling if they have any current records of their archeological digs. Okay, starting with that. Go ahead and make an investigation check for me. An investigation. Nezo-American Devil. Which, with your new level?

Is a 12. I think you took your Mystical Irudition investigation. I rolled a natural 19, so that's 31. Skadoo. I did a good one. Yeah. Good investigation roll.

Yes, Pride's Call, you learn a lot of things. Pride's Call was one of the initial dwarven societies that joined the Dundalian Empire as it began to expand out of Rexxentrum. It was not conquered by any means. It was an agreement of mutual interest. It wasn't until Grim Golier, the mountain-based dwarven society

on the far eastern side of the Marrow Valley was brought in, that kind of a jealousy between the societies began to come in. As Grimgold took over military activities, pride's called again to fall out of favor a bit as far as the poster child for a lot of their military might.

And so since then, a lot of their focus has now gone towards their strange and unique landscape due to the geothermal activity that transpires in the surrounding mountains. You discover that there is indeed an excavation a little bit to the east of Pride's Call. It began with a sinkhole that had fallen in years ago. A portion of the ground that just suddenly caved in.

And as investigations began to go into it, it was discovered that beneath that cave-in, there was ruins. Cool. The excavation immediately was taken and brought into the jurisdiction of the Cerberus Assembly. But as part of that battle for it, Yud-El-Fan, the High Curator of the Library you're in,

also sought for some control, and they managed to arrange with the king a joint custody over the excavation, though the troopers simply having final say. So they're both in this counterbalancing overlook of it. It's like a 49-50 win split. Kind of, yeah. Okay. You also, oh, he rolled high.

It is believed since then that the ruins are from an Arcanum city called Shattengrad. We've heard of that. You may or may not have. No. I don't think so. I don't believe you have. Shattengrad was one of a number of prominent cities in the Age of Arcanum. This was not one of the framed floating cities.

Only a handful of them were elevated through brumestone. This one probably existed here before it was destroyed, before or during the Calamity, but has since become a very intense point of focus for possibly unearthing any sort of arcane weaponry, any sort of technology that was being used at the time, anything that can be used to give the Empire a leg up

as both a leader in trade, a leader in technology, and now with the conflict with the Kryn Dynasty, a means of defending and or essentially becoming a much easier victor for the conflict. Interesting. You also do learn in your research less about looking at the books and more asking questions around the library,

in which Yudala Fon is present now, because they have returned from the council where you saw them previously. Yeah. And probably speaking a bit with Yudala, you uncover that there was indeed an object recovered from the ruins a few weeks back, described by some of the actual Cobalt Soul at the scene

as a geometric shape pulsing with some strange dull power. So. Yudala had already, and it's not like the beacon is unknown in these prominent circles. Like, the beacons of the Korean Dynasty aren't some guarded secret. It's part of their central religion, so for those that actually look into it and research

or are in places of prominent cultural information sharing, the beacons are known. So this object is definitely confirmed as a beacon of the Dynasty. Unfortunately, it was discovered by hired teams by the Assembly, and before it could be properly discussed, it was already claimed by the Assembly, and as such, has not been seen since.

But that does confirm. Go ahead. That does seem to line up and confirm with some of the things that Ikithon had spoken about at the council. Does it have any confirmed dates? Any dates of the Uncovery? It would have been three weeks.

Three weeks ago? Three weeks ago. Oh. Okay. Wait, that tracks us. That does track with what you say. They weren't lying? But it means that there's another beacon still missing. It means that there is a third beacon

that the Empire is aware of. Oh. It summoned the Empire. It took the first. Or all. Oh, no. They stole the first. And the second. There were two that were stolen originally, it seemed, that were being held by the Assembly. One that you returned, one that is still at large.

Which, and the one that was found in this room. Right, so there's just one floating and we have no information on it. And the one that they showed us was accurate, time accurate, right? They said they found it a couple weeks ago. Yeah. Right. But that's why.

They were still totally shady and lying to us about the fact that they already had another one. This was the first time they'd ever come across one. Yeah. Couldn't scry on a beacon, could you? Well, she used her spells for the whole thing. Well, you're here for a couple days. That's not happening.

So something like a beacon, are they identical? Or do you each? Because you only scry on the one that you would have seen. Yeah, that's true. Oh wait, well, we saw one. We saw one at the sanatorium. It says it's a creature that you choose. A creature, instead of turning into a creature,

you can choose a location that you've seen before. But not a thing. Technically an object, no. It's like find object is a spell for things in order that. So like a location you could scry on or a creature you can scry on. As we've learned and refined over the years what the boundaries of scrying entails.

Yeah, I know. Who knows where that third one is? Shit. Somebody knows. And we've talked to them, somebody knows. Well, so, and we've placed Trent and Ludinus both in Zadash when the Tri-Spire was busted. Yep. And we've placed Trent and Ludinus both in Zadash when the Tri-Spire was busted.

Yep. Then we then saw Ludinus and Felderwen talking to Lady. You don't know if Ludinus and Zadash. Zadash was Trent and Ormuthas. Yeah. Oh, sorry. We saw them flying around the tower. It was Trent and Ormuthas. But then we saw Ludinus and Felderällrägen with Vess DeRogna.

Walking together and talking. And Vess DeRogna was leading the investigation. She's the antiquities artifact. Correct, and she's the one who had hired your husband and was performing the experiments to try and extract and create the potion. That's how we got the potion. That's how he got the witness.

And that's also where we got the tripod. And you know, he's in danger for knowing what he knows. And that fucking chair. Fucking mastermind chair. Can we scry on that chair? Do we know where it is now? And then we heard...

Scry on location. It has to be on the same plane of existence. What if it's a creature? The chair. You can certainly try. It's returned to its... The chair dimension. Yes. We'll have to describe what's going on. The Audubon Empire.

One of these days. The Audubon Empire? Amazing. Terrible. Amazing. Terrible. Amazing. Terrible. No, you should not have. Someday, in the end of this campaign, we're going to enter a full banquet hall and all the chairs are going to be mimics and it'll be what we deserve.

Yeah, do it. And the door. Anything else you want to research? So many things. That takes you a good, you've done some pretty deep research and some conversations around, so it takes a number of hours to get that out,

but you still have time in the day to. Okay, I'll give you... Okay. Go ahead. Is there anything that, I'll come back to this other one. Is there anything, since I'm on the beacon train, that mentions multiple beacons across time in history? Is there anything, since I'm on the beacon train, that mentions multiple beacons across time and history? Is there anything that clocks how many fucking beacons are out there total?

Roll another investigation check. Whoa. Actually, I'll say investigation or religion. Those are your two choices. Investigation. You have commune. We need to talk a few things. Same.

We got commune up. Ah! It's not the blue one, but it looks like the other blue one. 14. 14. Most of the information that exists in this archive reinforces your existing knowledge of the Kryn Dynasty, their worship of the Luxon, and the beacons symbolizing parts of the Luxon

when it initially dispersed itself throughout the world to help bring light and energy to a once cold ball of rock. The number of beacons is unknown, from what you can tell. You have no information, nothing that seems to point to any sort of number, a total. The only thing you do know is that

they're searching. The Kryn Dynasty is always looking for more. Okay. It's part of their religious directive to find and gather the beacons. Okay. When we saw that second beacon, did it look like the first one almost identically close? Pretty close.

Slightest differences, though? Slight differences. Like, the shape could be a little bit smaller or a little bit larger, the... Like the handles on it, are they the same? The handles are different because the handles are constructed to be a holding device for it.

So depending on who was crafting it, those that you had seen that were taken from the Dynasty all had a very similar filigree outer element to it. The one that you saw that was being held by Trent beneath the sanatorium had similar metallic wrappings to it, but they didn't have the same creen design to it. It was more functional.

What about the fusty nut in the middle? Are they slightly different sizes? They have the same surface? They're all still that geometric dodecahedron shape. Their sizes can vary, at least from the three that you've encountered, or the two that you've encountered. The one that you saw was a little bit smaller. Okay. But comparable.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Minor, minor difference. I'll call it there for the day, I guess, because I got to carve up for tonight. You actually carve up a day before your event, so you're just going to be slow and lethargic. As she gets back to the... She finds out it's too late.

As she gets back to the cottage, I'm going to sit next to her. Hmm? Hmm? What? Huh? Are you avoiding me? No. Because we've been here, and I haven't hardly seen you at all, and I think I know why.

Uh, no, honestly, we've just been really busy. You know, we got here, and then everything kind of got attacked, and then it was like, oh, you're going to immediately negotiate for King Dwendal, and I'm like, huh. Right, but you went, and you went to go do something, and I haven't seen you all day. I've just been sitting here. Oh, I'm sorry.

Did you want an invite? I was just reading books. No. Oh. No. Yeah, I didn't think you'd be interested. Exactly. No, why do you think I'm avoiding you, though? Because...

Because I didn't save you. Oh, no. No, that's not, no, not at all. I was also super hazy and unconscious, so you could've, I was unaware. But now I am. But now, yeah. I shouldn't have told you then.

No, it's, look, I trust your judgment. I wanted to know, I wanted to. I was good, you know, Yasha had me, she pulled me back, we're a team, you know? Okay. We're good. All right. You know, I trust your judgment. Caduceus is, you know, also kind of a hot mess and might need help sometimes.

Well, he was swallowed at the time. See, I was unaware of that, too. We haven't really actually conversed about any of this. That sounds fucking insane. Yeah, and I was literally, I was next to the blob, and from my perspective, like, I could hear Caduceus. You know? I could hear him. He was like,

Help! Help me! Jesus Christ! Please go do something! Fucking terrible. That's, yeah, like, I think you made the right call. Like, I was good, you know? I was nowhere close to dying, clearly.

I was just a little unconscious. But you were about to die. Like, you were bleeding out, like, you were bleeding out so hard. Really? I swear, like, maybe a couple more seconds and you'd have been gone for good. A string of the death flute playing in the distance.

I'm just thinking, like, are you guys in the lobby of the hotel? Yeah. I'm just at a corner table just going. He needs your help, too. That's kind of what it sounded like from just the little screams. Oh yeah, from inside. Yeah, no, it's a team effort.

I know, I know. You had Caduceus and Yasha had me, and then sometimes you'll have Fjord, sometimes I'll have Fjord, sometimes Fjord and some else. You know, and I always got you, as long as I don't have to get Caduceus first, you know? So, no, we're cool. Okay. Yeah.

Well, I'm sorry, anyway. You don't have to. It's been bothering me, so. Why? I don't know. Because, you know, I don't want you to die. Thank you. I don't want to die either.

I'd be about to die. I cast a message and I sent a message to your dad! What? Is that okay? Wait, what? So he sounds really paranoid and stuff, you know? And so I've just been sending message to him to make him more paranoid. Sometimes I just do that.

Is that okay? Wait, you said you, wait, how long, wait, how long have you been doing that? Since you told me about him, and we sent that first one. Oh yeah, uh-huh. And him being paranoid. Wow, okay. I think he thinks we're responsible

for killing that other family or something, because he's like, Oh, thank you so much. How can I repay you? Thank you. Everyone's some whiny bitches, wouldn't you? Are you okay, Beau? Yeah, no, it's okay, it's hot, it's just hot.

It's an expositor. Did I do something wrong? No, no, it's just, yeah, I think you're, yeah. So I don't know, it's a lot to unpack. Yeah, yeah, it's fine. Oh no. That is what I should be apologizing for. I mean, you know. Wow.

You might want to evaluate, there might be a pattern of you reaching out to personal people connected to our pasts without us knowing, which, you know, it's a little weird. You know, first with Astrid, and now. That was not what made me do it! Okay. But I did it, I did it.

Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's good, well, it. Yeah, it was a tag team. But I used to help Caleb because he missed her so much. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I get the intent. And your dad was really bad to you, so I was just trying to make him suffer. Honestly, hearing you say that is super endearing and makes it a little better,

but not because you're making my dad suffer, but... Oh, I am trying to process this, Jester. I'm really sorry, I'm really sorry. I won't do it again, Beau, I promise. Unless you're sitting there and you're like, say this. Right, yeah, yeah. They won't do it if you're not there. Well, so what's interesting is he thought that we were,

what did he say about the other wine family? Okay, so he thinks that I'm god or something, I don't know. Uh-huh. And my staff is caught in my hair. But he, oh, it's, we'll fix this, we'll fix this. Don't worry about it. Your little band came out. Okay. Okay, okay. I send a message. Okay.

I can't remember what they said the first time, but he was like, and then I was like, oh, I'm watching you, or something, I can't remember exactly, and then he sounded worried, and he's like, oh, I knew this was going to happen, or something, I can't remember. And then this time I was like, I'm still watching you better behave,

and he was like, oh no, and he said, are you responsible? Do I have you to thank for helping the competition or something like that? But remember, somebody did something to a family over by your family? I do remember that. So I think that's what that was about.

Why does my, I think of a little concern that my dad feels like he is, had a part in that. Did my dad have a part in that? Does my dad think he had a part in that. Did my dad have a part in that? Does my dad think he had a part in that? Maybe he just thinks that whoever's looking out for him, he's maybe, maybe. He's hella superstitious. He went to fortune tellers and shit,

so why he thinks I'm his ever-loving problem. Actually, that's the Traveler. Maybe the Traveler has made contact with your dad or something and maybe he thinks I'm the Traveler. That feels like a jump. That feels like a leap, but I'm not saying it's not a possibility, it just feels like there might be other more possible.

Well, what we need to figure out, Beau, is who your dad thinks is watching him, because it didn't seem odd to him that somebody was. Well, he rambled his whole fucking life about some woman who is going to come back for his fortune and all this shit, so who fucking knows what he thinks? There's something there.

We should figure it out. He just saw some kooky fucking tarot card reader. He believes he was all he's able to get got. Beau. What? Those tarot card readers know what they're doing. Think of Molly, he was so smart. They're suggestions.

They're not, they're things to... They can be. Molly knew things, Molly knew things! That wasn't spit-worthy, motherfucker. He said, when I asked him, I asked him, I'm searching for something, and he's like, you already know about it, and we already did. Ooh, that's true, that's true.

He knew the gentleman was my dad. I don't think Tarot cards told him that, though. I think he was just molly, and if you shotgun blast things into the air, saying you think you know things, then you're bound to hit one of them. What's a shotgun? Oh, don't talk about molly like that!

I read about this thing called a bad news once, and it would sometimes explode. Oh, that's weird. Yeah, but I'm just saying, if you just gamble on being right, sometimes you'll be right, and I think that was Molly's game. I don't like thinking about it like that.

He was just brilliant. Well, he was brilliant. And he's on to the future. And he was basically a god. He wasn't. No, he wasn't. Look, I got a tattoo in honor of the guy. He taught me a lot about how to balance

when to bullshit when you know, and when's a good time to actually know. We are kind of diametrically opposed in that way. I appreciate everything he did, and I miss him every fucking day. But tarot cards are fucking bullshit, that's all I'm saying. Agree to disagree. All right, that's fair.

They're fun, and I enjoy them. And admittedly, I got some like, bios because of my dad. Right, right, right. Maybe I can grow to like him again. Maybe you should learn. Here. I'm going to basically hold onto them

just because I wanted them for the tattoo reference for a bit, but. What are you doing? Is this help? Is this not? Maybe. This is a tarot card. Sign up.

I'll come in. Hi. I'm going to learn tarot cards. I'm going to read your future soon. You just wait. I can't wait, I would love that. I'm going to run upstairs. I'm going to run upstairs. I'm going to run to the room and start practicing.

Okay. Maybe you can refresh my brain down to, yeah, I'll be good. Thank you, Val! Bye, Chaz. Thanks, good talk. I'm going to walk over. Hey, Caduceus, come in. This is the most amazing thing.

Oh, you were here the whole time in the other room. I was? What? This is amazing. This is the greatest thing.. Oh, you were here the whole time in the other room, right? I was, what? Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is amazing. This is the greatest thing. The bone thing? Yeah. Yeah, we've heard it. Yeah, you want to try?

No. Yeah, all right. I'll just roll my ears down. Why did I say yes? Probably flip. Ah! So good. I think it's a little tinny. I think it's better, it sounds better when you do it.

Yeah, it's a little more robust. Yeah. This is going to be all worth it someday. You'll see. You see the elderly dwarf, Kela, Cameroos, behind you guys at the clerk table. You guys have been in the main area of the cottage. Just looking forward to doing this.

Hey, Caduceus, you've been here all day. Yeah. Where's everybody? Are they here? Ugh. Caleb's over there reading. Fjord is close by. Aasha went out to read, I don't know why.

Yeah. Is she outside? I parked a couple blocks down last night. I saw her. It's been later in the day. At this point, it's probably post-sunset with how much you've done your research and everything and Renown's Gathering, so if you, how many hours of reading do you want to put in?

Well, I want to read it as much as I can. So get as much reading as I can. And so if I take a point of exhaustion for that first night, I don't know how that works. You can if you want to, it's your call. Yeah, why not? Okay. Yeah, let's do it.

If you're taking a point of exhaustion for a night of no sleep, then I'll say you can knock out 24 hours in that book. Let's do it. Damn. This is a book you have to read for a certain amount of time? Yeah, before it locks in. Yeah, because you guys aren't in a stressful situation,

you have some downtime. You might have to move locations a few times, because at some point in the evening, there are some crownsguard that come through and usher you out of the garden. Walks closed. Yeah. But you can continue reading without issue. Beyond that, I make a constitution save.

You can read in the room. I'm just going to be there practicing tarot cards. I won't bother you. Okay. Well, that sounds good. It's a real page turn. Whoa. It's a real page turn. Whoa! That would be a 27. Yo. Okay, yeah.

Only a single point of exhaustion through the night without getting any sleep. Sorry. Nani? 25. That's still pretty high. Still good. So one point of exhaustion. Okay.

And you are hired. Zul'kha. Yeah, so one point of exhaustion. Okay. And you are hired. Zul'kha. But you finished 24 hours of reading. Jester. Huh? Are you going to look up and research actual books on how to read tarot cards, or are you going to make it up? She's going to make it up. The Traveler will tell her.

That's right. I'm going to talk to the Traveler to help me out. Holy shit, yes. I'm going to stare at the cards and see what they mean to me. What I feel when I look at them. That's pretty accurate. Oh, we have to get Laura

to set up tarot cards now. I'm already on it. I know you would be. This is your charge, Taliesin. I know. To get. This is your charge, Taliesin. I know. To get her the right deck. This is what happened to my Christmas card. It's okay. I didn't need a break anyway, that's okay.

But I am self-taught. Because they speak to me. Help! Help! The Jester School of Tarot Reading was birthed this day. All right, great, focusing that. You guys have been, Himalabit, we have. I guess I would have been there

in the common room reading and just blushed and listened to that entire insane conversation, pretending to read a book. Insane. All righty. At some point, I went out to buy 20 crossbow bolts. Okay, easy enough. And then get an extra 10 that have a rubber tip or a dull tip.

What's the intent? Training bolts for a young child. Oh. Okay. Yeah. Okay. They have the stud tip, ones that are hitting it. Yeah, that can be done. It'll cost, I'll say, for the, you're not having them custom made,

you're having existing bolts being retrofitted in that way, so it is an additional bit of work, I'd say, for 10 bolts, beyond the cost of what it would be, it's an additional five silver. That would still hurt so bad. Oh yeah, no, it's an additional five silver. That would still hurt so bad. Oh yeah, no, it's going to fuck someone up. It'll be a rubber bullet. It'll put an eye out.

It's a rubber bullet with a long iron shaft behind it. Somebody gave Ronan a crossbow, a wooden crossbow. Oh, a stork axe? With little ones with a rubber tip. Yeah, you can get them with a red fair. They fucking suck on your head. I can imagine. All righty, so you go ahead and get that.

Yep. Made perfect. Fjord, anything you wanted to tackle? Aside from just meditating? Meditating, working out. Working out. And underground fighting wings. Okay. Which I get back, and we talk about that.

Yeah, look, I mean, look, the ocean. You win for this, Yasha! The that. Yeah, look, I mean, look, the ocean. You win for this, Yasha! The ocean has people on top of the water, in the water, and the bottom. It'll cut from some of your reading time. Okay, so we have two days, so maybe I'll take, you know. You can have more than two days,

but it's your guys' call with the time you want to take. If we're really going to know Rexxentrum, we have to know Rexxentrum. You can finish, I would say, maybe you can finish your reading. They can research where to go to fight, and last night out, we have a big party, and that's our big out, is a fist of cuffs. I'm into that.

You just have to get some sort of daytime nap. I can't punch. Yeah, I can get a little nap in. A little nap? I actually prefer, I Yeah, I can get a little nap in. A little nap? I actually prefer, I don't like sleeping in one chunk of time. Oh. I sort of like putting it in spurts.

Power naps. Get little power naps. Grazing, grazing like a deer. Yeah. Can you sleep sitting up or standing even? I can sleep anywhere. But eyes open? I've never tried it.

Try a nap. I could sleep anywhere. With your eyes open. I've never tried it. Try now. Are my eyes still open? They are. Are you sleeping? I'm sleeping. I don't think I can sleep with my eyes open. Maybe if it was really dark. It was dark enough, you know,

when a room gets really dark and then you go like this and then open them and you can't tell the difference. When you go like what? When you're like, and you can't tell if they're closed or open because it's super dark. Were you asleep just then? No. Oh, I was trying to catch it.

Yeah, I wish I could fall asleep that fast. That'd be so great. Okay. What's the plan, guys? All right, so are you going to join them or are you staying to read? No, I'm going to join them, so. Okay, so I'd say we'll subtract the time you guys are out from your reading time.

Okay. So just keep that in mind. I'll keep that in mind. All right, so you guys are looking for a fighting pit. Do we all get to go and watch it? Are you going to let us know that you're going? Yeah. Hey guys, we're on the fighting pit! Ooh, I'll go.

We're going to go look for one. If there is, yeah, we have to locate it first. There's always a fighting pit. There are fighting pits in the city. Oh, shit, why do we not ask Caleb? Caleb, have you gone to them? He's not a fighting pit type of thing. Make a history check. I mean, look, he's got the wraps.

He's like blood spored all day. Scrappy, yeah. That's a one. I mean, like, you assume. I've heard people, maybe not in this city, talk about fighting pits, but I've heard of fighting pits in cities, so ergo. Well, sometimes.

Like what we would do in my tribe is you would just go out into the middle of the square and then you would punch somebody. Oh! They would get upset and then you would just start fighting. Oh, like a city brawl. You mean like you assault someone and then a fight begins. What's assault?

It's like a... That's when you fight and go to jail. Oh. Yeah, it's probably a bad idea. That's a bad thing. Especially coming so fast in. Coming off of, you know. Keller? Keller?

Keller, is that your name? Keller? Keller. Ah. Any fighting pits around here? Not the Tynor. You have a concierge or something who might? She points to one of her grandchildren who's over there in the corner,

digging his finger deep into his nose. The teens. Fucking kids. They'll know. You know. They'll know. Yeah. Hey, teen, get over here. Hey, teen. What's up? Hey. What's up, team? Hey, fellow team,

come on over here. What's up, team? No, I'm good. He's moose neck on it. I'll pull out a little, what do I got? I'll pull out my big flask. Oh. Make a persuasion check.

Why are you giving alcohol to a 100-inch person? I mean, he's a dwarf. He's probably like 45. Persuasion? Yes. Oh, I get a plus two on persuasion. When did that happen? Bringing it to five. He goes,

Grandma! Wait, wait, no. Hey, um. Wait, wait, wait. Hey, um. Wait, wait, do you want candy? He leaves the room. He's been made uncomfortable. There was two of them, right? Yza and Pama.

Maybe that was Pama, we need Yza. Where, do I see Yza? Which one has a crush on me? You have a high wisdom and a fairly decent insight. These children. I can also recognize faces. Right, no, no. These children probably wouldn't have information regarding Underground Fighting Ring.

Damn it. Just saving you the time on this one. These kids probably don't get out much. All right. They're lame kids, they suck. They do. We got to go elsewhere. Yeah, look, we won't work for our supper. Let's just go out onto the street and, you know, look for someone that would know where this is.

Who's helming the search for a fighting pit? I would recommend, I'm going to stay in and read tonight. I have so many searches to do, but I would. No! I would recommend. Beau! It's okay, it's okay. Beau! Come with us.

Nott needs some help, so I'm going to do a bit of work. I haven't had time to breathe in weeks. Try the Mudtop Ward. If there's going to be a fighting pit, it would be there. All right. Thanks, man. Who's helming the search? I will assist.

I'll help, I'll do it. All right. Oh no! How does that happen? Nobody said anything, so I did. Jester steps up to the plate. Where are you? Come on! Choice in a vacuum, I'm sorry.

And begins the process of looking for seedy locales throughout the mud-topped ward that might have people that they can talk to, that she can talk to, assisted by you, Fjord. I'm used to seeing some shady characters. I would like you to make an investigation check with advantage. Oh, I thought he would do perception.

Nope, I should have done this. You should have done it. You should have done it. I just realized I could have used my reliable talent on the persuasion. Nine! Are you going to guide me? You have my hand there. I have that now.

That was with advantage, with nine? It still would have only been 12. Yep. Very low investigation. I have really low investigation. I have good perception. So, it's not so much that you don't know where to find the places, that's part of it,

but the places you do find, your special brand of personal engagement seemed to be a little less, I don't know, trustworthy? I don't know what you're talking about, Matthew. A few of the rougher subjects you come across tend to shut you down rather quickly. Fighting? Fighting. I don't know what you're talking about there.

And just walks in the direction. You spend the next hour or so following Jester's lead, and it's just like every film montage where it's just doors slamming. I don't think they said they had any. Sorry, guys. Caleb said they had some. Here, let's, did we pass a dive bar? You've passed a few.

Which one looked the most gizzy? That'd be the Grim Shelf Tavern. Let's go back to that, please. It's a good move. Get a drink. Sit for a minute. What's the most gleezy? It'd be the Grim Shelf Tavern. Let's go back to that place. Get a drink. Sit for a minute. Maybe we ask one more person, maybe the barkeep there or some shady,

big fellow or big lady with some muscles. All right. What was it called? The Grim Shelf Tavern. Grim Shelf Tavern. It's a small dive. It's maybe 30 by 20 feet. It's a little closet of a bar. It sits maybe 12 people total, and as you walk in,

there's already eight folk that are drinking that all look to be, I don't know, anywhere from the range of grizzled miners to cutthroats to beggars. a range of grizzled miners to cutthroats to beggars. And there's conversation at certain tables and some people that are playing cards, and as soon as you enter the building, everyone turns and the room gets quiet

and watches you as you enter. Does the inside of the tavern match the outside footprint? Yeah. Yeah. Make an intelligence check. What he says before we just peek open the door. 21. 21. It seems to. Should we go to another one that's bigger?

Is this wrong? Is this the wrong choice? Don't know. If it's not here, I feel like someone in here knows where it would be. All right. Hold on. Yasha. Do you want me to go ask somebody? Okay, so I'm going to walk inside.

Is she just going in? No, no, I'm going with her. Okay, so Fjord and Yasha, you guys enter. The room quiet, they watch as you walk in. Eventually, they go back to their muttered conversations and drinks and card games. You can see at the edge of the bar, there is a burly-looking man,

probably in his early 60s or so. Imagine, if you will, a very, very, even more sunburned, Hulk Hogan. Right now, Hulk Hogan with this stained cloth apron on, sleeves rolled up, tattooed forearms, looking forward with the full skullet going down and this, as opposed to just the Hogan stash,

it's just a big beard goatee mess right here. Yes. Probably has three teeth in his mouth, and as you walk up, he looks over. I am so, oh, cannot get you. Well, actually, we had a question. Are there any fighting pits around here where you can sort of, fighting pits around here?

Where you can sort of have a little play time. If you know what I mean. Why are you two looking to go get your asses beat? No, we're looking to go beat asses, so. Make a persuasion check. Ooh. Okay. persuasion check. Ooh. Okay. I will assist. Okay, what do you say to assist?

You know, we have lots of coin to spend and frustration to get out. We are rather unintimidating, couldn't hurt to share. Now is this persuasion or is this intimidation? Depends on how you want to take it. I want it to be intimidating. So how are you intimidating? I want to be.

So as you're talking this conversation, she changes tracks on this. So you're like, hmm, got some kind of... Well, not necessarily intimidating him. But just looking tough where you'd're like, hmm, got some coin. Well, not necessarily intimidating him. But just looking tough where you'd be like, oh yeah, they want to go have a good time. I think, I don't know. I'm persuading him.

I'll take it. I just, it's a negative two. I was trying to persuade the DM. I understand, I understand. 11. Did you roll with advantage? No. Yeah understand, I understand. 11. Did you roll with advantage? No. Yeah, because he's helping you. That's right, that's right, okay.

Yes, okay. 17. That's better. 17, that's much better. There are no place. Not here. Ever the Stone Coffin? The Stone Coffin? We have, no. What's the place you'll be looking for?

The Stone Coffin. It's a basement ring beneath the King's Cup Butchery. You'll need to ask the owner, the proprietor. It's a basement ring beneath the King's cutbutchery. You'll need to ask the owner, the proprietor, Jekyll Bronn. Jekyll. So you're looking for the stone coffin? She'll probably take care of you from there. She'll take care of us.

Jekyll Bronn? Jekyll Bronn. Bronn. Oh, I thought it was Jekyll Brawn? Jekyll Brawn. Sorry. Basement beneath the King's Cup of Cherry. King's Cup of Cherry. Fantastic, I appreciate you sharing what you know. I'll slide two silver across the bar.

Yes. Take it back and I'll slide a gold across the bar. Yes. Take it back and I'll slide a gold across the bar. Pleasure doing business with the both of you. Hey. May cold look down upon your glory. He takes the silver and puts it away. Oh. Yeah, okay.

Thank you. You see he probably noticed this not very well hidden symbol on your belt buckle and got a spark in his eye. Not the kind of person that would turn you in for unapproved iconography. I give him a nod and remember that that symbol is out and about and I cover it.

I don't know, maybe just like, you know, loud and proud, why not? Well, I think in these parts, uh... Genuinely. It's not okay. This is not okay. I mean, we have a little bit of favor. Yeah, but I feel like the Wild Mother is so different. I'm still not technically legal or allowed or permitted.

Okay, well then, I'll show it. All right. So you guys ask around. It's nighttime now. It's, you know, we'll say close to 1030 or so by the time you've gone on a couple hours of wild goose chase. Trying to sleep by 10.

You do sleep. So just letting you know at this point that it's into the evening. Eventually, you come upon a particular building that is set between a high-end hat shop called Scythe's Toppers that is set between a high-end hat shop called Sized Hoppers that is currently closed,

and a cellar of fine pottery that is also closed. But in the center, you see what is probably the largest butcher shop you've ever encountered. Dozens of salt-rubbed animal carcasses hang on hooks and display by the front window. Being this late in the evening, it looks like it's in the process of closing. There's maybe two customers still in there.

You're surprised they still open this late for a butchery. There's a swinging door that opens and exits as one person steps out, holding what looks to be a large cloth-wrapped section of meat, pushes past you, and you see one more customer in there that's currently giving an order. There are other staff that look like

they're going home for the night, that are putting their stuff away. You can see there's a plume of smoke that's rising from the chimney, and you can already smell the hickory and smoked meats from even just a good 10 yards from the front. It's pretty decent butchery. As you walk in a bit,

pushing the swinging door to the side, you can see there's a number of tables where waiting customers would probably sit, though it is mostly empty at this point. The front counter is where you would imagine a whirling bevy of butchers taking orders would be. But right now, you can see there is just one individual that is in the process of giving the final cut

to the previous customer. You see a female half-orc, fit woman in her 50s, standing about six foot or so, and is finishing the final cuts and then handing them over to the last customer before looking up to you and goes, Oh, we're closed. Sorry, perhaps you could make an exception. We're looking for Jekyll Brom.

You fail me, but you can come by tomorrow. We're open. Oh yeah, I'm just afraid we wouldn't be able to find the stone's coffin tomorrow. Make a persuasion check. Oh, I'm dizzy. 18. All right. Still good.

Sorry I can't help you there. I have to ask somewhere else. Wants for the customer to leave and go off for a bit. Understood. Laugh-wrought. Yeah, no type of business in this part of the city. My apologies. Yeah. All right, we're good. Come here.

Pulls you off into the side office chamber where you can see there's a desk. It's pretty well furnished. Most of the shop looks pretty simple and functional, but the inside of this personal office, she has a desk and a chair and a couple of chairs that face the front of the desk, where either she had some intense conversations

with employees or other people. Nice collection of brass knickknacks across it. It's a nice desk. It feels out of place for the rest of the establishment. But she sits down in the chair and puts her feet up crossed on the edge of the table, looks up at you with the two curled tusks that rise from the lower jaw, glances over with a smile.

So, you both looking to make some money? Indeed, or lose it. Or for the activity. See, there's the type of mindset I like. People pay to be entertained. You can make money either way, depending. Depending. Downside, however, is the next big fight's in a month.

Ah! So you kind of missed a big event. But if you're looking to fight soon, I can call an especial bout. Most definitely. but if you're looking to fight soon, I can call an especial bout. Most definitely. Won't be the run of contenders, but we could call in some of our local usuals for a bit of one-on-one fights.

The buy-in's more expensive, because I've got to throw it together in my own time, so. Of course, and it's quite a bit of work on your end, it seems. What kind of timeline are we talking about here? One day, two days. One day. Tomorrow night, would that work for you?

Depends on what you're asking. We got two different types of belts. One of our special belts is fists. No armor, no weapons. Fight to unconsciousness. Standard buy and entry for these special bouts is 75 gold pieces. Winner takes 150 plus 10% of the crowd's pot.

Unless you want to challenge our champion. I just couldn't resist, not knowing what that might be. It just helps so much. There's a 200 gold buy-in. When it takes 400 and 10% of the crowd's pot. Who's your champion? You ever heard of Kal'Dimmons? Kal'Dimmons?

You've got it. Hmm. No, I don't believe so. Don't worry. She can hit like a truck. There's a reason she's the champion, so don't underestimate her. But like I said, standard entry.

We just take any sort of other random asshole that wants to go ahead and jump in there with you. Same thing for your champion, no armor, no weapons. For that sort of belt, yeah. There's also steel belts, that's armor, weapons, whatever techniques you want to bring to the table, as long as you don't accidentally endanger any of our crowd visitors, compatriots, patrons.

Standard entry for that's 200 for the special battle. When it takes 400 plus 20% of the crowd's intake, we could find our champion there. This is very interesting. You are quite handy with the blade. Buy in for that, though. 600 gold each. When it takes 1,200 gold pieces,

plus 20% of the crowd's pot. Crikey. Did you hear something? Crickets. I'm drawing this to the... There might be a few more of us that would be partaking in the fun, so I think we need to ask them, maybe.

How many are you thinking? If it's a lot, that's going to be more challenging to put together on Short Day's Notice. I think we'll have more participants. They'll be paying the standard fee at the door. I don't know how many combatants we'll have. Ah, all of these participants of Watchers, if you want people to go ahead and put down some money on it,

that's always welcome. I think there might be two to three combatants, and our party might be, oh, six or more. Three I can do. No more, not for within a few days. I understand. You have to wait for the next event for that one to work out. What do you think? Unarmed or

magician's darts? I feel like an unarmed feels like, I feel like I miss it. It's been a minute since I've hit somebody with just my fist. So you want to go in there with just the fist spell, right? I don't know, what do you think, Fjord? You know.

Maybe not. I appreciate your purest nature, but I think I would probably go with the weapons. Stealing for your weapons? For me. We could each do different ones. No, you're choosing which one you want to go into. Depends what you want to pay for and who you want to fight.

But I would defer to you. I'm actually more interested in seeing you do your thing. So if you want to do unarmed, that's the way we should go. Can I think about it and decide tomorrow, We're more interested in seeing you do your thing, so if you want to do unarmed, that's the way we should go. Can I think about it and decide tomorrow, or do you need to know? It depends on who I'm looking for, either. I have to know who I have to call in here. Yeah, okay.

You guys can do different ones. Yeah, I'm going to do unarmed. So we got one for fists. Standard or champion? Yeah, do your thing. Champion. Fists. Fist cuts. She gives you a look over. She called you champion.

You've seen some toughness in your day? You could say that. You got some scars, got some arms on you. All right. 200 gold. 200 gold. Okay. Yeah. That's worth a little night of happiness.

All right. I will be able to speak on behalf of our third combatant. I believe she will also partake in unarmed combat. All right. Not a champion's fight. I believe she will also partake in unarmed combat. All right. Not a champion's fight. And for myself, the steel. All right, so 75 gold pieces for your compatriot to enter standard.

75 and mine. And mine was? Yours is 200 for the standard entry, or 600 if you want to go against the champion. Standard. Standard. So 275. Somewhere for the champ. Is there a possibility of having two champion counts?

I think the champion's only around for one fight. It's a bit tough on the ass, give that one. Yeah. Of course. Pigeons. I feel like, you know what? I feel like Beau would want a champion. Maybe we get this for her, you know?

And then I can just fight. Standard? Yeah. Sure. What do you want to take on the champion for the steal, Vana? Ooh! Do that, do it, do it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well. That's 600 gold. Yeah. Oh, that's tempting. You got all that shit, you got rage. Okay. You got... Oh yeah, yeah, I can use all that. You got the Purpose of Tea? I mean, but remember, it's whatever technique,

so only some damage is halved, and if they come in with that other shit... Well. It's up to you. Yeah, I'm going to go with it. I'm going to stay. I'm going to stay with what I asked for. Unarmed.

Unarmed champion. Unarmed champion. Unarmed champion. Unarmed standard. Unarmed standard. And you,'m standard. And you? Steel. Standard.

All right, 200 gold and 275 from you for both of those. Got it. Pay it up. I reimburse you. Thank you. No more entries. Should be able to lock this down by tomorrow night. I'd say check in tomorrow midday,

just to confirm in case one of them's busy and can't make it. Is there something else that we should mention as a token of our agreement other than Stone's Coffin? Stone Coffin? Well, what do you mean, this voice? I don't know, like a code word, something to keep it fun and lively, you know, like, you know, chicken wax, or...

We'll wait for about this time, and I'll close tomorrow. Come on, boy. Say you're in for that special cut that I put aside for you. Special cut. Special cut you put aside. Yeah, that moist brisket. It's that lean tri-tip.

Are you making fun of me? No, no, I'm not. I was rolling. He was just going through his, he knows all the meat cuts. I'm trying to put a a tip. Are you making fun of me? No, no, I'm not. I was rolling. He was just going through his, he knows all the meat parts. I'm trying to put a little flavor to it. Yeah. I have some questioners.

Good meat joke, I like it. We'll be back this time tomorrow, then, and we'll have some fun. All right. While they've been in the office, I've been using my special paint and just painting googly eyes on the boar's heads that I'm assuming are out the dead pigs and stuff.

Yeah, yeah. And any animals, I just want to paint the googly eyes on them with the special paint so that they turn into real googly eyes. Yeah, it's grotesque. You paint it cartoony and you back away and slowly they go and become actual like just bulging white eyes going like,

just sticking out of these terrible, like open, organless pig corpses. This is fucked up. Oh ho ho ho ho ho. I was picturing it way more plasticky looking, but ew, this is fucked up. Real eyes on a dead pig. Ugh. No. No, no.

Well, I've got to close up. See you tomorrow. All right. Thank you, Jekyll. What's your name, by the way? My name is Yasha. Yasha. You are? Fjord. Fjord.

And who's your third compatriot? Come here. That'll be Beau. Beauregard. All right. Whatasha. You are? Fjord. Fjord. And who's your third compatriot? That'll be Beau. Beau Regard. All right. What are you here from? Ooh, well, uh... Fort Damali for me. Doesn't have to be accurate. It's got to have something to announce you with. From...

From Xhorhas. Ah, good cover. You, the other one, the other one. Where the fuck would Beau be from? I think she said she's from Upperduke. Upperduke, Upperduke? Upper, Upper, Upper? Upper, Upper. Up-up. Up-up. Up. Uppup. Uppup.

Uppuppup. Uppup. I'm Uppup. Yep. Makes a note. Started down Duke, went Uppup. Truce. Go pee-pee pup. All right. Field trip. Uppuppa. I'll see you tomorrow.

Yep. Leans out, steps outside. You guys watch as they emerge from the office. You say, I've got a crew here. We finished our business, purchase is made. Your meat will be ready tomorrow. Yep, meat will be ready tomorrow. MATT and LAURA:"Thank you!"

Thank you, good night. Good night, pushes you out, closes, locks it up. That was a complete success. We have three fights. I just listened to see if she could. Fuck! Run away! Let's go!

You guys go charging into the night. What'd you do, what'd you do, what'd you do? So we have three fights. Yasha's going to fight unarmed with their champion. Oh shit. I signed you up for some bare bones standard fare. Fuck yeah, you know me so well. Yep, and then I had to use a sword,

because let's be fair, I'm not really at the order of the day. You're very puny. You're very strong. No, he's not puny anymore. Look at how strong he is, and I poke on his muscles. Look at how strong he is. I know, but you can't. CKM. I saw, I saw, his pecs just moved.

Yeah, they moved. No! Sure, his pecs moved. I understand, they moved. No! His pecs moved. I understand that, but it seems still gangly. Every time he picks up the sword, I hear his wrist crack a little bit. I thought it was just the wind. I thought there was just dramatic wind.

If I get the time. No, it's from the pushups. Tendinitis. Yeah. Don't worry about that. It's like a tennis elbow. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Build your pectoral muscles.

Toot toot toot toot toot toot. Just a tennis elbow. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Build your pectoral muscles. Do it again, do it again, do it again. Yeah, just poke a boob. Ooh! Yeah. You can do that. Your little weasel moves every once in a while. Right? Kill me! I'm not dying.

If you got some pecs on you, you can probably do that. Yep, your weasel's moving around in there. I'll throw some bacon down your shirt. It's a racist! All right. All right, let's go home and go to sleep. It's late, come on. Yep. All right, you guys get back. It's a little bit past midnight after all the traveling

and checking things out and making this whole thing work out. Situated for tomorrow night's whatever this is going to be, you found a fight pit. Uh-huh. You finish your evening's research. As soon as they left, 20 minutes after they left, Caleb went up to his room. Can I use that homebrew to do something super simple here? Masturbate it, yes.

So he goes up to, Caleb goes up to his room and places five pieces of amber. Silver thread everywhere. Five pieces of amber on the floor, after he masturbates. And takes his holster with the books off and places the entire set of holsters and books into the center of this circle of five amber pieces and mutters a few words and starts to trace his fingers

through the air and casts Widogast's Vault of Amber and the harnesses and the books just shrink in and a little beam of light burns along the floor towards the piece of amber closest to Caleb and they are gone. He collects up the pieces, the largest one, and puts them away into his bag and sets off for the Shimmer Ward

to find her house. All right. So. Situated in the northeastern reaches of the Shimmer Ward, you come upon the address stated in the letter. 31st Wodestone Manor. A respectable manor house rests on an expansive property that seems to bear numerous other abodes

across its sneaking grasses and fencing, all which wrap around and sit in the shadow of one of the ominous towers of the candles, a familiar one. Her manor house is one of many ominous towers of the Candles, a familiar one. Her manor house is one of many that sit on a property that encircles Tredekathan's Tower. You can see the manor house is largely built from bleached pale wood and dark window frames,

making for a curious contrast. It looks very nice. How many stories is it? This home is one and a half. The second story is, I mean, it's two stories, but it's not a major building. It's a smaller, additional room, maybe. It's nice, but it's not as big as some of the other estates

you've seen here. But it's, you know, at this point in time for you, I'd say it's past sunset, so it's evening. Some of the lanterns in the district are lit. Some folk are walking through, For you, I'd say it's past sunset, so it's evening. Some of the lanterns in the district are lit. Some folk are walking through, but most of the Shmur Ward has died down. Is it lit?

The interior is lit. Well, he stands in the street for 10 minutes, thereabouts, and just stares at it and the tower and finally works up the courage and approaches the front door. If there is anything to knock. There is a knocker, a little iron knocker. Yeah.

A few moments pass before the door. You see a male halfling in a nice, formal-looking suit. Hair pulled back and a loose ponytail, dark hair. Looks young, opens the door and goes, Might I help you? Yeah. I'm here to see the lady of the house. And who might you be? My name is Bran Aldric Amundrud.

I'll pass this on to the lady. Please be patient. The lady will see you shortly. If you would please step in. There is a guest holding chamber, if you would mind waiting for a moment? Of course. Of course. As you step inside, the hosting chamber is this very sparsely decorated room. The interior, while the exterior looks very nice,

the interior is very minimalistic. You've seen a lot of garish homes from the inside of a lot of affluent folk that just fill it with decor and paintings and it's very much a display. This house, a lot of the rooms just feel more empty, but not in a way that feels like it's unintentional. It's just very, everything is particularly placed and spacious, and this hosting chamber is no different.

Small table under the window, those two couches. Not much else, the walls are pretty barren here, but you're brought to the seat, and what you gather now is probably the servant of the manor exits. I sit absolutely stock still and don't move a muscle. You can feel your heartbeat throughout your whole body, just, just your entire chest is hot and swelling

with the nerves that are curling in your stomach. You begin to hear footsteps approach. The archway that leads into the hosting chamber, a figure steps in and raises a hand. the archway that leads into the hosting chamber, a figure steps in and raises a hand. The low candlelight in the room, it gets brighter to lighten the interior. You see a human woman in her mid-30s,

dirty blonde hair, extremely short in the back, but long and sidecombed in the front, framing the right side of her face to just past the chin. She looks over towards you, a familiar face of older, with a hard look in her eyes, but a smile, with a heavy scar that is new, that rides from the top of the brow down to the bottom of the chin. with a smile, with a heavy scar that is new, that rides from the top of the brow

down to the bottom of the chin. She's dressed simply. I rise. It has been some time. I was not expecting you, Brian. Let's speak in our regular tongue. She responds in, Of course.

Hi. Hello. MATT and LAURA talk. Um... I think I've been imagining and dreading this moment for longer than I care to admit. Hmm. I'm sorry dread was a word, but

I'm sure you have your reasons. There's so many things that I... Sit. Sit. And she steps across the room to meet you on the opposite couch. And sits and rolls her sleeves up on her blouse where you can see the same marked maze-like tattoos that you had previously seen

on Adewolf's, or the arms of the halfling that was next to you. What color are they? They appear to be black. Okay. She sits down and pulls him up a bit, crosses her hands across her knee, and sits across from you. So much. What happened?

A lot of things have happened, Bren. Where would you like me to begin? The last thing I remember is my home. We're chosen for a reason, from obscurity picked from the rest of the riffraff for something that we can do. And to seize such a destiny

can cause a lot of heartache. And we can do some terrible things. It's strange. I find myself wanting to apologize. Still, so much of me feels like I failed. But a lot has changed. I know some things now that I didn't as a boy. I'm so glad to see you. I'm glad to see you, too, Brennan.

I mean, it's been well over a decade that we still often have talked about and wondered where you were, if you were okay. How did I? He's in a cold sweat. How did I get to the sanatorium? We took you there. You had a breaking point.

And understandably, began to lash out. Part of that same spark that was seen in you could create a lot of sparks everywhere else. She reaches up and scratches a bit, and you can see there's burned scars on the side of her neck there.

But for your own good, we took care of you, and we brought you there. But we had to subdue you first. You were too dangerous to us and to yourself. I was there a long time. We always hoped that you'd... that you'd improve, and at times you did. I mean, to be honest, even looking at you now and hearing some of the things that you're doing,

I mean, you've defied all of our expectations. And if you feel like you've failed then, know that everyone's path goes at different paces. You've certainly proven now that you are in no way shape of failure. What are you doing these days? I'm doing a bit of tutelage. I'm doing a bit of tutelage.

I'm doing what we were meant to do, I'm doing what we were meant to do, which is keep our people safe. Is it difficult for you? At times. But I take pride in my work. I've stopped some terrible things from happening. I've seen some of the possibilities of what can be done

in the right application of the right minds. Had you heard that my friends and I were here? There was rather rapid chatter once. Trent had notified us of the return of the Lost Pup. You know what the Mighty Nein and I are leaving to do. I've heard. And I'm very curious. It seems,

I mean, it seems so, not what I would have expected from you, so much more. I'm impressed,ressed and proud. When I came back to myself and for guessing, there was a woman, a patient, I think. She healed me, and this might be hard for me to convince you, but she helped me see things.

What we did that night, I did fail. But I didn't fail the Empire. I failed myself and my mother and father. He lied to me. I know he lied. And if he would lie to me about that, it is hard for me to understand what he wouldn't lie about.

Bren, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. She reaches out and touches your cheek. Insight check. Insight check. Oh god. No, no. Good insight check. Good roll, good insight check. Oh yes. 27.

Since everybody else is at this table, I don't have to whisper, do you? Yeah. She seems very genuinely mournful for your pain and your suffering. But there's also a hardness to it, and a less, this was a terrible thing that happened. This is more of a, like a less, this was a terrible thing that happened.

This is more of a, I'm sorry you suffered as we've suffered, as many people have suffered for ever and ever. Life is suffering. And some things are necessary. That's what you glean with a very high insight check. Does she seem horny? You're not there.

To be gifted in a world filled with hardship like this is to do things we're not proud of, and to question the choices we make, and to regret the things we wish we could change. Do I agree with everything that I've been asked to do? No. Do I think about it? Do I lament?

Do I see the faces of the people I've watched expire at my own hand? All the time. But I also know the reason that we get to sleep every night in a comfortable in-bed or in a manor, as do the many families and children, just like we were, just like the families we once had, that don't have to make the choices we did.

They still get to live happily and comfortably because the few, the chosen few, made the hard choice, and do what few have the will to do. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I will never forget what we were.

And even now, all these years later, I can't shake it, I still care a great deal about you. At least the girl I knew.

But at least the girl I know. But... he has blinded you. You and Wolf. And all of his little helpers. And I mourn our childhood and our souls. So he just puts her hand on your knee. I understand your anger.

And as much as he's been our teacher. He's not infallible. He's just an old man with the right connections who will one day pass like they all do. You always were ambitious. So are you apparently, Bren. Like I said, I'm proud of you.

It's good to see you. I think I better go. Raise my hand slowly up and just touch the scar, run my thumb down it. Too many scars. I regret none of them. Except one. What was that? Except one.

Thank you for allowing me to your home. Maybe we will see each other again. You're welcome any time, Bren. I'd like to see more of you. Yeah, maybe. I'll speak in common again. We'll see. My friends are depending on me.

Of course. I think you should probably get to them. Just sort of hang on her face for a minute. Think about staying. Walk towards the door. She gets up and follows behind at your pace, keeping her own distance from you so as not to crowd. ice, keeping her own distance from you

so as not to crowd. Good night. Good night. She grabs and squeezes your hand for a moment before giving a nod to her servant who opens the front door. Ah! Releases it and just stands there, arms crossed in front, watching you.

I turn and go. And I will wind my way back to our lodgings. And that's where I take a break. Oh man. So many questions. So many questions. I didn't trust a single word coming out of her mouth. She was honest, and I think she was just trying to...

I think she's just... One. What? She's actually Trent Agathon. No. Two. Trent Agathon's upstairs. She just got done boning him and came downstairs to talk to him.

That could be. What? He's hella old. Yeah. Exactly. She doesn't care. She's brainwashed. It's a harem. It's some sort of cult thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

She thinks he's amazing. When you touched her face, your hand connected with skin, right? Not illusion? Well, he would have had to tell me. He thought. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, she thinks she's amazing. When you touched her face, your hand connected to a skin, right? Not illusion? Well, he would have had to tell me if I thought something different. Yeah, no, you found it. You feel feathers.

Did it feel extra wrinkly compared to what you were touching? Was it way more wrinkly? Was there stubble? Touch blows illusion spells, so I would have had to feel something different than that. Yeah, but Trent Ikithon could know some crazy dunamancy spell that overcomes that.

I think you just really moisturize a lot of people. You can't really. Summon Tova Kree. Yeah. It's a supple, beautiful skin. Amazing. Great move. Good, he's been moisturizing from the beginning.

You can't un-Redford your face. That's just... Why would you? Why would you? Exactly would you, exactly. Oh man. All righty, well, we're going to go ahead and take a break here, be back here shortly, guys. We do have our final one-word giveaway of 2019.

We have the, god, this name always comes up, Paduk. Paduk? Paduk? I always get, like, Paduk. Like, I end up pronouncing it 17 different ways and then never remembering which one's the right one. So this dice vault, this is actually one of my favorites, the orange color is awesome.

To one of you lucky winners out there, the keyword tonight is holidays, plural, holidays. Holidays. Enter it once, more than once, you'll be disqualified in the chat. And once again, the U.S. and Canada only, excluding web, this is Stupid Laws. We'll have a winner when we return here in a few minutes.

Why, hello there. This is Critical Role's resident art dad, also known as Liam O'Brien. We are continuously amazed at the artwork this community creates. That's why each Thursday at 8 a.m. Pacific, we share a curated gallery of

submitted fan art over on CritRole.com. If you'd like to submit your art for consideration, visit critroll.com slash submit. And thank you to all of the incredible artists who share their talents with us week after week. Welcome back. That was almost. I've never done this successfully in my life. That's okay. I'm just done this successfully in my life. That's okay.

I'm just going to chip it, too. You got other things to do successfully. We do have our winner of our one-win giveaway. The winner tonight is Broke Little Toe. Oh! Those are the worst, man. I know, congratulations. Congratulations, Broke Little Toe.

Earlier this year. Yeah. We'll get that to you ASAP, happy holidays. Or just pull that shit off. Congratulations, Vado Mortensen. Nah, I'm good. So. Oh, good one. Mm-hmm.

Ah! He kicks the thing and. It's the Erynburr, Erynburr snack. As you all rest for the evening, by the way, your 24-hour reading span, if you're still going through the night, is reduced to, I'll say, with the search and everything, to 21 hours.

Got it. You still do have a point of exhaustion, which will carry into this fight. Oh no. If it happens the next evening. So, as you all come to the next morning. So sad ass. The day is yours.

Anything else you want to accomplish during the day, or do you want to? During the day. Back to the library! Oh god. For me. Okay, all right. We'll start off starting with Beauregard. You make your way back to the library. Before I leave, though, I go,

Jess, I'm going to the library. If you want to come, just earn it out there. You don't have to, but you know, I felt bad for not inviting you before. Cool. I'd be worried about it. I think I'm okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you have anything? Draw some dicks, please.

Okay, yeah. Or anything you want to, it doesn't have to be dicks, Beau. You could draw an elephant butt. Okay. Just something about that is funny to me. It is. All right, I'm going to go. You're going to the library. Yeah, do you want to go, Cat?

I mean, kind of, yeah. Oh, okay, yeah. Yay! Okay. That's sounding a lot better, I have to say. We're really getting it together. You can't take that. I'll stay good, producers. Take that. I'll stay here then.

You, okay, anybody else? I'm going to the library. No, have fun now. Don't, Cad. Enjoy yourself. Enjoy it for me, will you? Yeah. Are you sure you're good? You're working on your thing?

I have a little homework, yeah. I mean, they've got lounges there, like studies if you just want to change your scenery. Sometimes I find that just a change in visual perspective might help you make some more progress, you know? Get out of this B&B. Don't distract him, he's trying to save my life!

All right, okay, I want to fucking go. That's a fair point. I will do my homework at the library. I won't get in your way. Okay. Yeah, let's go. Have fun, you two. So just the two of you go to the library?

Yeah. All right. And I'm going to bring all my Halas papers. You got it. Wow. Halas! Christmas and Halas. All right, you make your to bring all my Halas papers. You got it. Wow. Halas! Christmas and Halas. All right. You make your way to the Reckless Chim Archive. The library is open to Expositor Beauregard.

Okay. Who and when instituted the six approved gods of the Empire? What the fuck did you just say? Who and when instituted the six approved gods of the Empire is the first thing that I want to. Go ahead and roll an investigation check. Okay, because if it was Dwindle, that's interesting. If it wasn't Twintle, that's also interesting.

I like the Easter Egg. Dwindle. Get it. What is that? I don't want to, do I want to use this one? I feel like this one's card. Dwindle. Get it. What is that? What is that? Do I want to use this one? This one's interesting. Yeah, that one's fine, that one's fine. This one's fine?

Yeah. You've been rolling real good all day. It's the shitty plain blue one that sucks. Okay, okay. 28. 28, yeah. It is not dwendal, actually. Looking it up specifically,

and give me just a moment here. Sorry. No, it's all good. Deep dive. Okay, there was, shortly after the time of the Marrow War, which was when the Empire and the Jeweless Dominion were at war over the northern and southern regions. And that's like early Crane dynasty

versus Empire, right? This isn't dynasty involved. This is the Jewelist Dominion, which is the other human civilization that was to the south. This is where Zadash used to be the capital of. So it was a war between Empire and the Julis. Old Empire. Old boundaries,

old countries. Old countries. We're talking around 545 PD, so this would have been hundreds of years back. Right, right. But yes, PD reads draw days. Because a lot of the priests that rebelled from the Julis Dominion against the Dominion, sorry, I'm talking about the rule of the priests that rebelled from the Jullis Dominion against the Dominion, sorry, about the rule of the Empire,

the Emperor of the Time, which would have been Manfrid Dwendal, he was the one that his spies had discovered that a lot of the Jullis interests and a lot of people that were rising up against him were priests of a lot of these various religions and they were using religion as their large tool to cause people to rebel against the Empire's rule.

And as such, he wanted to abolish all religious, all religious worship within their area, but it caused even a further uproar and a lot of the fury just even further fed into the Jewel's Dominion, so when they'd finished, they decided to choose a handful of ones that fit easily within the overall goals of the Empire, and so the deities that were chosen were those that fit within its ideas of society

and knowledge and, you know, things that aligned with their goals easier than other entities that perhaps wouldn't be down with an empire. The gods and their stands were getting in the way of progress and science. To an extent, I guess you could say, from some perspectives, yeah.

And Manfrid. And Manfrid. So Manfrid was like, ah, this Melura shit and this like Kord shit is like, not cool because you're like blasting me with lightning and shit. More or less, yeah. Or just, you know, a lot of the philosophies were harder to fold into the philosophies of the Empire. Remember, they didn't destroy the Jewelless Dominion

and burn everything down. They defeated the people that were helming the Jewelless Dominion and then told everybody who was part of it, like, your lives can continue as they are. You're just now members of the Empire and you now go through our tax system and we're all here, but your life doesn't change

and we're good. And at that point, there was no other alternative and then it was absorbed into the Empire, and the Empire now spanned the entirety of this portion of Western Wind Endir. For a while. Yeah, kind of. Whew, went into a deep question there.

All righty, I had to go into the history. So that means that basically the six approved deities of the Empire are so systematically and innately taught that it's hard for anyone, especially you mentioned Manfred Dwindle, so that means that it is a true monarchy in terms of only...

Correct, it is a through blood or marriage monarchy. Yeah. And it's just that forced upon of like, these are good and these are bad. It's like systemic bigotry. Kind of, yeah. To that point, too, it's not like

they throw you in prison forever if they catch you with a, you know, prying for their god. You get fined for it with a little bit of jail time, you know, and there are many people that do worship other gods very, very privately. Just keep it out of the public eye. You have a couple of them in your party.

But yeah, so it's, I put it, for people getting busted for playing to other gods would be the equivalent of being busted for marijuana possession in a lot of states in the U.S. Right, or like jaywalking. Yeah, like, you know, it's, you're like. That's where I went, too.

Yeah. You're like, yeah. Really, bro? I took it. Like, you're breaking the law, but shouldn't be against the law? Come on. Yeah, so. Are you that bored?

Okay, yeah. We're smoking on the street, dude. I mean, come on. Yeah. Exactly. Somewhere in all of this, while you're reading, Caleb looks up and remembers their first trip to the library together, where you just fucking hated

the books and smiles at her, totally engrossed, and just watches for a bit, and goes back to what he's doing. Fair enough. Okay. Do I have another question? Do you have another question? Did we, okay, and correct me if I already know this. Always on the Teldori Council. Did we, okay, and correct me if I already know this.

Who was on the Teldori Council? Mm. Every time we ask, somebody on it dies. Oh! What? No! Who's left? All these ravens start landing.

That's the question we're asking now. Yeah, bird style, just. How are you? Felt a great disturbance. The six shackles of... Six shackles. The six shackles of the... Six chain oblivion.

Chain oblivion. We saw three shackles. But you saw one. You've only encountered one shackle. Three chain, that was just one. One shackle, three chains. Josh saw one. Okay.

The shackle, and for the record, the shackle is a term, there is no actual physical chain. I was thinking the chains, like there's two locations. No, the shackle is a metaphorical term for this. Like the pinning. Yeah, this artifact that is one of six things The shackle is a metaphorical term for this. Like the pentagon. Yeah, this artifact that is one of six things

that initially helped bind it before the Divine Gate was instituted. Okay. In theory, if all the shackles were still broken, the Chain of Believing is still in the Abyss and still on the other side of the Divine Gate, but the Chain of Believing is so different than all the other Betrayer Gods

and the type of power and danger that it represents is so unknown that there's worry that if there was a Betrayer God that could break through the Divine Gate. Is there like a shackle? Betrayer God could maybe be one. Or sorry, the Chain of Believing would be the one to do it. There's six grounds.

That's sick. So my question was, where are the other shackles? Can I find any information on where the other shackles are? Roll an investigation check. Shackle, a shackle. Is the Dawnfather the main deity in Rexxentrum, or shared equally among the five? It's shared equally amongst them.

But the Dawnfather's the coolest one, I mean, well, in shape, guys. Platinum Dragon, right? Platinum Dragon's pretty great, Bahamut's great. I mean, they're all pretty even, and they all have their own different belief systems. Why don't you let me pick first? Because that's just... You should have.

Natural one. Natural one. That puts us earlier than we thought. There's information about the shackles and about the binding of the Chain of Oblivion, but as to the location or information regarding it, nothing. Mind you, based on the scrolls that had to be hustled out of Vasselheim by Obann and members

of the Angel of Iron's cult, you have information to at least make you think that that information is very, very, very intentionally near impossible to find. You found the dictionary definition of shackle, and that's as far as you got. Kind of, yeah. I'm like, I know this already!

Yeah. I'm pretty sure another one would be in Vasselheim. Yeah, Vasselheim sounds right, right? You got no idea where any of the shackles are. If you went to Vasselheim. But Vasselheim is the Dawn City. It's where civilization began long before the Calamity and before the Age of Arcana.

It was like the first city in Exandria. Because that was kind of my thought, was like, how far along in progress did they actually make? She would know. In terms of breaking shackles? If you broke another one before? Do you know if they were successful in disarming another shackle before?

Do you remember this is the first shackle? No. The first one that we went to was the first one that we were able to find. Occasionally, I walk by Cain. That's a natural one on that, too. You spend a lot of your day trying to find that information. Yeah, and you get a nosebleed.

Old magic. Occasionally, I walk by Caleb in the later half of my day and just go like, and I walk off. You get those library farts? Yeah. It's fundamental. I talked about the bookstore, boobs. Yeah, of course.

You walk into a bookstore, you got to. It's a thing, it's a condition. That's cool, though. It's a cool story. You ever go in a library and your stomach starts hurting? It's the old pages. I like that. That's cool.

Dude, there's a condition, it's a condition. There's prune juice and then like, it just punches through. So if there's any more questions you have, you only have enough time to maybe research one that isn't too extensive, depending on your role, because you spent, I'd say, all the research you've pulled together from going through all the books

and pulling everything you have available at the Rexxentrum Archive. If I had any extra time, I guess. Probably seven hours you've spent and you're already reading all this stuff. There's a phenomenon that explains why you poop at bookstores. Says Buzzfeed.

It's called the Mariko Aoki phenomenon. I am jealous. Written and created by Mariko Aoki. Yeah, I'm jealous of Mariko Aoki. Could be caused by the smell of paper or ink having a laxative effect, the association with reading on the toilet at home. Caleb is super regular.

I mean, I have used the Barnes & Noble toilet a lot. Which Barnes & Noble? Sorry, Anna, I feel bad for the Barnes & Noble janitors. There's all these questions. Why do I have to poop in bookstores? It's not there, look it up. Humanity, it's crazy. Just bring me a book.

No, I think I'm good. Okay, condensed request. We don't even need to dwell on it, but for the amount of time that they're there, Caleb will spend more time on Halas's works. I'm sure this is much time, but I'm going to put in some more. Okay. And then get distracted

and pull out the, everything okay? Yeah. The collar. Do you miss the stone? I hate that. Sorry, go on. Sorry. The collar that had got clunked around Caleb's neck in Happy Fun Ball, and I want to spend a couple hours examining it and seeing if it can be

used, altered, as something that is no longer dead. Could it be reawakened, enchanted? Could I work it over time to use it? Okay, well first, for your initial part of the day research, you're going to roll not an arcana check, just a straight intelligence check. Okay.

25. What'd you roll? 15. An arcana, intelligence. Oh, intelligence. If your intelligence is minus five. Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry. Plus five, intelligence. Oh, intelligence. If your intelligence is modified. Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry. Plus five, 20. 20, okay. That's pretty good.

Okay, you start connecting more of these patterns. You begin to look into the elements. You've transmuted metals and elements, but to transmute flesh, bone, things that have a living presence is a whole different thing entirely. And looking at a lot of these elements of Halas's research, there are some breakthroughs,

but it is incomplete, and as you continue to improvise in those spaces, too, you begin to watch it spiderweb out. The ideas begin to expand. It's like thinking it would be a simple equation, and the equation gets super long, and it looks super messy, but it's working, but it's super messy.

But you're getting a little further along. You're getting some good leeway on it. Once again, who knows how far the goalposts are, but you're still working on it. As far as working on that neck piece, go ahead and make an arcana check for me. I don't know how that'd be the first thing. It just means it's like really fucking...

That's a 16. A 16. Yeah. Looking at it, you can see recreating the construction of it, but the nature of its enchantment that prevented spellcasting is old and a type of magic that you haven't encountered before.

There are some similarities to the scripts that are being used in the spell that you're currently working off of Halas's work. So a lot of it just plays off of his own script. You get the sense that he learned a lot of basic arcane techniques and then began to build off of that to create his own language within that space. That's why it's so challenging to follow.

With these, you could see the possibility of doing so, but you have no idea, nor do you have anywhere near the tools. Yeah, that's about as far as you can get. If I just throw a Detect Magic at it, what school radiates off of it? For that, I would say it would be... I'll say...

Let me check something else. Dewomancy. Yeah. It would be one that's wards. So it's like abjuration was my first instinct. I'm going to double check real fast. Just to be safe. It's right here.

Let me see here. No, that's not what I wanted. Oh man, come on. This lore dump. Sorry, guys. By Dwarven Forge. This would sit, there are elements of abjuration and elements of illusion, working in unison for this.

Well, Caleb will just tuck it away for a rainy day, to be continued. Okay. Anybody else? Hey Fjord. Huh? What? Do you want to go work out?

Do you work out regularly? Well, no. But I know that you work out regularly? Well, no. But I know that you work out with Beau and she's at the library, and I didn't know if you wanted to get a workout in before your fight tonight. Yeah, sure, that would be great. I mean, I'm not looking to go into the fight tired

or anything. No, you're not, but if you want to do something or something, I could help. Yeah. Lead on. Oh, I'm leading the workout. You said workout with you. Oh, well, I thought, you know,

do you need somebody to spot you? Do you lift? Do you do like... Do you even lift? Do you do sit-ups? Do you need, like, you could lay on the floor and I could hold onto your legs and push them and you could work on your core. Right, yeah, no, it's mostly body weight stuff.

Did you want to do it with me, or just watch me work out? Either one could help, just whatever. Okay, yeah, I mean, we usually start by doing 25 push-ups. Okay, let's do that then. Okay, you first. Okay, I do 25 push-ups. Okay, let's do that then. Okay. You first. Okay, I do one of my pushups. How fast should you do them? Roll a strength, oh, this would be,

I thought it was check. Hmm, seven. Seven? The first 15 are pretty solid. 20 starts getting a little slow. Those last two or three, it peaks to the arms shaking. The warming? Yeah.

But she gets there. I feel a little better about this. All right, I'll try and do 25 pushups. Athletics check. Yeah. Fuck you. Yes! Is it a one, is it a one? Natural one.

Is this like you immediately get a cramp? Is that what happens? The first three go okay. You are so kind. The fourth one, you hear a pop. Oh, come on, man. I got to fight tonight. Yeah, you do.

Oh no! Oh no, are you okay? The fifth one, he pushes, and he's just holding it, and he's shaking. Are you okay, Fjord? Yeah, no, I'm fine. Do you guys, do you do this all the time? What did you do?

I don't know, this is, this is. Did you break a rib? What's going on? I feel like this was not sticking out before. Oh my god, did you get a hernia from just doing a push-up? I thought you were really strong, Fjord. I push it back in. No pushing back in!

I'm going to push it in and I'm going to cast a new wound at the same time! Can you do like magic? Can you make it go away with your little hamster uniforms? Cure wounds. I will allow to heal hernia. I'm here. Is that greater restoration?

Either. You know what we didn't do? We didn't warm up. This one was stretching. We let ego get in the way. Yep, stretching. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I think maybe that's good for today. That's it, huh? 25 push-ups.

Four, maybe three push-ups. That's a good warm-up for tonight. Four hand push-ups. I feel like my pride is hurt. No, no, no, no, no, you were really strong. That was impressive. I've done more than that. I believe you. I really.

I super duper believe you. I don't feel like you do, but. I've come a long way, it's really. You're going to do so good tonight. Mm-hmm. Maybe I should just back out. No, no, no, do it, Fjord! Oh no. You're really it, Fjord. Oh no.

You're really strong, you're anti, well, and you're doing it with the weapon, right? Why, do you think that's important? Yeah. Just because, you know, Beau's going to be doing it with Oud and Yasha, and both of them are like... Both of them are like... Brawly.

You know them. Brawly. Like really good with their fists and stuff, and I don't. Right. You can try, do you want to punch me and practice? No, no I don't. I signed up for the weapon one. Okay, well, that's good. Good thing I did. It signed up for the weapon one. Okay, well, good. That's good. Good thing I did.

It's going to be good for. Right, I got the failure out of the way first. I can't do it twice in one day. Exactly. Right, yep. And hey, you have that peck thing you can do. It's not moving on one side. There's a little atrophy going on. A lot of serotonin coursing through me right now.

Just rest before you die.'m sorry, I did that. I'm sorry. No, it's all right, it's my fault. Okay. The Traveler is with you. And the Wild Mother, too! Good for you, you got two of them on your side, and you're great. Does the Traveler interface with the Wild Mother a lot?

Is there an established relationship there? Yeah. Really? They totally like each other. All the time, they go on dates. They go on dates. Roll a religion check. They go on dates. 20. Wild Mother, one, already in a relationship with Erathis.

Both ladies. Yeah, I don't know that that's accurate, but I will think on it and see what comes through. The Traveler, right? You don't know his fucking name, Fjord? Of course I know his name. I just think it's odd that he's telling you they went on dates when that's not what I understand.

Well, the Traveler doesn't have to tell me that. I just know everybody wants to go on dates with him because he's super cool. Does he date a lot? He gets around. Oh. Bit of a floozy. No, just sought after, you know what I mean?

Not really. Deities that are hooking up all over the place. Pretty new to me, concept-wise. He pulls. Is the Traveler a fuckboy? Eat your heart out, Zeus. Totally. Just saying.

Okay. Well, wish me luck. Good luck. Thank you for the workout. Thanks. Do you feel tired, at least? Are you sore? I am so exhausted. I am shaking, I'm going to be sore tomorrow.

Even the slightest bit. I appreciate you saying that you are, even if you're not. This got so awkward. So proud. Good workout, guys. Glad I could save some face in front of Jester. Anybody else want to tell anything?

Please? When I wake up, I would like to take a very large cup of coffee or whatever is the morning fuel and go back out to the garden, sit up against the tree, and read until the fight. Okay. So you were just like, Yeah. All right, cool. That'll put you at about full day of reading,

we'll say with a couple of breaks there, an additional 10 or so hours before you have to begin getting ready to head on over to the evening's event. Okay, so 31 hours, I've read it. Okay, I'm getting there. All righty.

Anybody else? Or are we moving on to the evening's event? Let's go to the evening's events? Let's go to the evening. Okay. So, as nightfall takes the city, you gather yourselves and begin walking to the mountaintop ward of Rexxentrum to find the butcher shop that had previously been scouted.

King's Cut is closed, but as you're approaching, you still see the occasional individual walk up and be let inside. You eventually make your way, same thing, knocking on the door, are let in by another one of the employees of the butchery as they lead you inside, they're like, Um, sorry, can we close for the night?

Oh no, yes. Mm-hmm. Yes, we came here for the... Shit. The special cut of, we have some, a cut in the back. What? There's something in the back. What? There's something in the back for us.

Yes! We have a... Are we eating here? I can't eat any of this. Well, that's right, you weren't here. We have a cut of meat in the back downstairs that we have for us,

that we are partaking in. Make a persuasion check. Shit. Seven. Oh! The employee goes, Uh, I'm sorry, we're closed for the night. You'll have to come back tomorrow.

No, this is actually, is Jekyll here? She's closing up in the back. Would you mind actually sending her out? Because it's very important that we speak to her. She's busy at the moment. I'm sorry. Champion special cut. The champion special cut.

It's a cut, a very special champion's cut. I'm just going to leave. I'm just going to go outside and walk around a bit. After a loud sigh opens the door, unless you guys are close behind. You are then ushered beyond the doorway that led into the office of Jorkel, beyond the butcher block counter where most of the customers interface with

and make their purchases, to what looks to be a storage hallway to the back. You're led through and there's another employee there who's waiting and is currently standing in front of a door. As you approach, the first employee gives a nod. The second one nods back, opens a storage door, and then, supposed to to being a closet, there is a staircase that leads down.

You guys can already hear chatter and laughter. As you head down the staircase within, as it opens up, immediately see to the right and left of you two shelves of liquor with tables on each side with food and snacks already laid out and prepared with two other employees that are in the process of gathering elements on plates. In front of you, across the way,

you see there's a small wall, two little outcroppings and spiral staircases that curl up to a secondary floor on each side. Immediately across from you are iron bars that go across and separate this small area, this entryway, from an open square fighting pit that is just scattered in rock and dust and gravel. The doors open.

You see there are two guards to each side and one white-robed figure who's in the process right now of sitting and having a drink and just sitting cross-legged on the ground. You notice as you arrive, there are torchlights flickering and you can see these staircases that spiral upward. There are separate balcony chambers that are open and overlook this battlefield,

where there are probably, you'd guess at this point, close to a dozen figures that are up there sitting, eating food, talking, watching, or waiting for the battle to commence as their entertainment for the evening. As you guys walk into this space. About how many people? That are sitting up there,

you say about a dozen maybe, a little under a dozen. Okay. It's not a huge crowd, but for given a day's worth of time to prepare for this, it's not bad either, given the scenario. Do they look fancy? Some of them look pretty fancy. Some of them look moderate.

You can't really tell from down here. You do see off to the side on one end, there are two figures that are currently stretching. You see one appears. That's important. You see one gentleman who looks to be half-elven, older, maybe in his late 50s, very sun-wrinkled skin from a lifetime

of probably working outdoors. Light brown hair, but it's actually lighter than skin tone. A bit of a beard, and as much as a half-elf can muster, you see a lot of effort went into trying to cultivate this beard. It has hand wraps around the fingers and is currently in the process of air punching a bit, preparing themselves for a bout.

You gather this is one of the contestants. You see the other one is a real rough-and-tumble-looking female dwarf who is currently sitting in a chair and giving herself a shoulder massage with one hand, and the other one is just drinking this tankard. She's got this scruffy mutton chops that come down the side of her face. Her nose, you can see, has been broken multiple times

and has healed back to the point where now it's just this very character-like nose. The hair is mostly red, but you see a bit of gray streak coming through it, and it is tied into a topknot bun, something similar to that design in the back of the head. Arms are thick, just battering rams. You can see all sorts of scars.

She's wearing a leather tank top, it looks like, element there. Not thick enough to be considered armor, but enough to just be a stylistic piece of battle gear. Just scars and patches of hair around the scars and the shoulders and arms. She's just drinking. That's got to be hell, right?

Could be. To the other side, you see a man looks maybe in his 30s or so, tall, dark skin, jet black hair, long. It's braided in the back and goes to just past his waist, wearing scale mail. He has a shield in one hand and's braided in the back and goes to just past his waist, wearing scale mail. He has a shield in one hand and a battleaxe in the other, and he's practicing in the air

before he turns and watches you guys in. Gives a nod and a look. Wait a second. I know you guys. What, in the Harvest Clothes Festival? The pit fight, we won, we won! Yeah! Oh!

You were? Hang on, I've been looking at this a lot here. Comes up, you're the Super The attack? The Super Seven! Ah, the cross. Which one were you? Sure. Hang on. Oh, I'm Darrow. Darrow Adlock, I'm the leader of the stubborn stock. We both went head to head at the end,

but we both managed to take out our creatures and we shared the pot, which was amazing. Fought the very large crocodile together. Ah. Yep. Yeah, I remember. I remember you. Wait, is he the guy, is he in white robes? Or no? No.

No, scale mail. Scale mail. He's got long, dead lucky hair. He's got two pins for Panther Beasts. For Panther Beasts. Ah, something. He's like, sure, all right, yeah, no. You're all looking good? Things have been well?

Yes, no, we've been traveling a lot, you? Well, for a while, yeah. We were doing some mercenary work around here in the Empire. It's paying really well now, since the war started up, you know. But, yeah. A lot of stuff in the Xhorhas?

Have you been on other borders? No, no, no, just doing bodyguard work and local stuff. I don't want to get involved in the war. I'm not about to become a sacrificial pawn. Sure, yeah. I mean, I'm an Ajaric coast all along. Yeah, are you fighting tonight? Yeah, yeah, you guys come on the watch?

Some of us are participating, actually. Oh, no way! Yeah., actually. Oh, no way. Yeah. Yes, we. Oh, who's fighting what? I think Fjord might be fighting you, actually. He goes and gives out a big hand. Shh! Does it hurt?

Roll a strength check. Why is it all about stats? Fuck you. That's out of the Seven. Oh no! It doesn't hurt as much, because you rolled a natural one. Boo! He's like, boo! Oh!

Oh, you got a grip there, my friend. That is very, oh, ha ha. I look forward to the tune-up with you. This will be most fun. I agree, I agree, yeah. It's good to see you guys. Anyway, I agree, yeah. It's good to see you guys. Anyway, I got to stretch. And hey, good luck.

Same to you. Let the Father look over you, friend. Father, yep. That's three for you, man. What do you mean? Three what? Oh, I don't even know. Never mind, Tori. Three what? Three gods. Don't worry. Don't worry, it don't even know, never mind, don't worry about it. What? Three gods, don't worry about it. Don't worry about it, it wasn't there.

After hearing this conversation, approaches from down one of the sides and goes like, Oh, hello there, you made it. I'm so glad you all could finally come along. We were hoping you all would show up. Hey. We had a hard time getting in. One man band.

It's all right. Yeah, that was my fault. I forgot what the cup was. It's all right. Yeah, that was my fault. I forgot what the cup was. It's all right. There's plenty of alcohol. Everyone's happy to wait and be nice and tasty. The pot's been in. Quite a bit of money to possibly win tonight.

So let's see if we can do it. Are we ready? Need some time? Let me know when we're going to go ahead and get the first vow going. Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, can I bet on people? You can do that. I would like to wager. Sit me down for some wages.

Sure. Guys, okay, how much do you want to wager? I would like to, the three of you, you said? Yeah. I would like to wager 100 gold on each of my friends. Oh yeah, me too. Yeah, same, same. Oh, you guys are so supportive.

I hope we don't fucking let them down. Well, that's why I'm doing an even spread. Oh god, jeez. No, so if one of us fails, you're still fine. I'm going to do even spreads, except for the Beau fight. I'm going to add another 20 for the Beau. You have my ring up.

Okay, so 420 for Beau and 100 for the other two. I got you. Make us some good money. 100 for me each. Make us some good. 100 for me each. Make us some gold. Hey. Can I give you money to bet on myself? Make sure you get your rage month. Okay.

I slip him some money under the side to put in a bet for myself, on myself. How much was it? Another 100 gold. One. What? Two. No! Jesus Christ! 10 minutes later, I bet another 100 gold on Beauregard. In addition to the 100 she gave you.

So 200 on Beau, because she just slipped me some of her money. I so-so-so. And 100 on the other two. All right, gotcha, okay. Thank you. Anybody else? I got my 100 on each.

98. I'm slipping out and leaving. 99. Oh, wow. Are we going to stay and watch? 100. Do any of us see you go? No, if you don't want to be seen, I'm slipping out and leaving. Nine to nine. Oh wow. Are you not going to stay and watch? One hundred. Do any of us see you go? No, if you don't want to be seen, you can roll a stealth check. With advantage.

23. Nott is gone. Pulling some back shit. What's your passive perception? My passive perception is not high enough. Nope, didn't think so. Yeah. Not just. 19. Just Irish goodbyes, ghost out of it.

Irish fucks, where is she going? Not fucking, where is she going? Okay. All right, so with all of those put in. Holy shit. Ja'Kel goes, All right, go ahead and find yourselves a seat up there. We can go ahead and get some food snacks already provided.

And we'll get this rolling now, right quick. I need snacks, I want to eat some snacks. She's gone. To give you guys an overview of what it looks like. Yeah! Oh, yay! You asked for a fighting pit. Oh, wait.

He made you a fighting pit. This fighting pit is brought to you by Dwarven Forge. Everything you need to know is at dwarvenforge.com. I can't believe you. Matthew! Oh shit! We love you, Matthew Mercer. Wow.

What the fuck? Is Trent Itchycrouch in these balconies? Oh, so cool. Oh, they light up? Hey! Oh my god. Moody lighting. This is so cool. This is so cool. Oh, they light up? Hey! Oh my god! Moody lighting! This is so cool!

This is so cool, Matt. Aw, you guys. So are we up top? Yeah, we're already there. You guys have just arrived in the center here. I want to touch your tail. Ooh, look at these fancy people watching. There we go, and whoop.

Wow. Whoa. The lights, the sconces. So as the rest of the battlers are stretching off to the side here, you guys can decide where you want to be. So we have Beauregard is fighting, Fjord is fighting, and Yasha are fighting. You guys are just keeping here for the time being.

The rest of you can sit where you like. Yeah, Nott come sit with. And Nott is gone. Where's Nott? I don't know. Caduceus. I think, yeah, I'll take right up that side over there. That side over here? Yeah. Okay.

And join that edge there. Caleb? I will sit down between the clerics, and as I do so, I'm going to pull out a wire and whisper and say, are you good, or do you need some space? You're joining in on the side as well? Yeah. All right, moving the table to the side here.

You guys push into that end. Door closes. Door closes. All right. I just sent a message saying, are you good, do you need some space? I don't know if she's blown past the range of it. Right.

She may reply to this message, she knows. I'm good. I'll be right back. Okay. It smells so good. Which point? It smells so good. I have Starlight. Which point, Jaquel arrives out in the center space, stepping into the middle of the tournament range. Which, where is the best one I can use for that?

I'll just use one for that now, that's what I found. I step aside and go like, Everyone, thank you and welcome to the Stone Coffin. An impromptu fight, yes, but who are we to turn down some proper unexpected entertainment, eh? All right! Ah!

What's up, Shelly? Well, all coin is put in. We've closed the outside doors. Let's go ahead and call our first bout for the night. Woo! Coming all the way from the mud top. You've seen him fight, you've seen him drop. It's Ovo!

And the older man who has been shadowboxing since coming out, he's like, walks out, steps into space, someone gives a yeah, cheers. You got it, you got it, you got it. Fighting an old guy? Yeah, I'm pretty sure. And where did you say you were from?

Most favorite terrain. Upper Duke! It's right. Upper Duke. Up, up, up, up, up. Oh, all the way from up, up! Beauregard! Woo!

You can do it, Beau! Take off my exposer robes, and I'm just in my sports bra kind of tank. Up and joins the others at the edge. Huh? The door is closed. Kill him! Well, no, I don't think's not what we're going for. I'm hopping away.

Oh, Jesus Christ. Begin! Roll initiative. Let's go, let's go. Beat up that old man! Okay. Honor the legacy of Vatimakuna. Oh, so close.

Initiative is? 13. 13, so close. Initiative is? 13. 13, all right. Ovo goes first. 12, 12, 12. Ovo goes first. Doesn't matter. Better math. Ovo is up there, he's like, gets his ground, looking you over and goes.

I'm looking at him, was he, can I glean anything? Vast. At'm looking at him, was he, can I gleam anything? Vess. Vess, at first look, even for his age, he's pretty ripped. And he looks a little beat up, like he's seen some fights, he's seen some scraps in his day. And he's going to go

and come in for initially a body blow, followed by two quick punches to the face. Okay. First is going to be a nine. Miss. Second one is going to be, ah, 26. Hit. All right, on that strike, you take

seven points of bludgeoning damage. That third strike is going to be a 24 to hit. Hit. That is going to be a 24 to hit. Hit. That is going to be four points of bludgeoning damage. So the body blow, you duck out of the way, but in pulling back, he immediately uppercuts you in the chin, a third strike across the face, you feel the blood come out of the corner of your mouth,

but you get the feel he's prime. He's not going all in yet. He's trying to feel for your defenses and read you. He's an experienced fighter, for as much as you may have looked down upon him upon arrival. It's your turn. I never said that. I did, though. Your turn, I figured. It's your turn.

I wipe the blood, look back at him, nod. Ooh, he's going the brother route. Okay. I feel it all over. Okay, okay, okay. I shift my stance a little bit to adjust to more of that Wing Chun.

Yeah, you know, Mai Tai. Yeah, Mai Tai. Muay Thai. Mai Tais are good. And then, going for pop pop. I'm going to go kind of on the inside of him. I'm going to try and break his defense. Go for it. That's funny,

because pop pop is what his grandchildren call it. Get her, pop pop! Pop pop the pop pop. It's looking amazing. First hit. Mm, yeah, 27. That hits. Oh. Pop pot at the pop pot. First hit. Yeah, 27. That hits. Stunning Strike. Roll damage first. But first.

Oh, Jesus Christ. Seven damage. Seven points of damage in the first hit. Stunning Strike. Yeah, first d8. That's a 15. Yeah, it works. It's 15. Oh, he just resisted.

It's the first hit. Yay, pop pop! He flexes. Old man out. Catch the blow. Second strike. Fucking pop pop. Second strike. Yeah, 28. 28 definitely hits. You roll damage.

Don't kill my grandfather! 11 damage? 11 points to damage. Stunning strike. That's a fail. He is stunned. So he deflects the first one, like, slips off the stomach. The second one, you go into strike.

Where are you punching? Right in the dentures. No, Woha! That's me, Vxterous. Oh! No, Pop-Pop! What's wrong with him? I'm going to do what he did to me. I'm going to do an uppercut with a cross right across his face. Going to go for a meta.

His teeth are up! We're right for that temple. So whack, it hits, and you watch him take a few steps as he stumbles to catch himself. As I see him take those two steps, I'm going to do a full barrel rotating double kick. Pop with the... That thing that I do.

Flurry of Blows. Thank you. I'm a little delusional. Happy holiday. That's okay. Happy holiday. Flurry of Blows. Go for it. Advantage on both of these attacks, because he stunned. Yes. Attack.

19. 19 hits. Thank god I did that. 12. Put him in a bodyguard. All righty. Damage, and then. Sweep the leg, Johnny. Jesus Christ. 17.

17? Yeah. Hits. Ooh! 10 damage. 10 damage. You watch him just like, and he falls and catches himself in the hand, and then has to get back up.

And then after doing the full rotating roundhouse. You see his eyes refocusing. It's his turn now. As I come down the hill, hit him, and then watching him extract Aspects, which is absurd for an old man. Well, let me do it, because it leads man. Well, he is analyzed. He has gingivitis.

His pockets are full of Werther's butterscotch candies. He's resistant to very good scotch. Fiscally conservative. He's part of the greatest generation. We'll give you socks for Christmas. Okay, boom. Okay, okay, sorry. There it is, that's the turn. That's it.

He has no condition immunities or damage resistances or immunities. He's a dude. He's a dude. He's a dude. But he is definitely stunned and you definitely have analyzed him, so. Okay. So you're going to move or stay put?

Did I knock him back any or anything? Or no, I'm still face to face. He's just fucked up. No, I'm going to stay here. Try to focus him where you are. No, well, he's stunned. So you get to go again. Yeah, I'll...

Yeah, I'm going to get to go again. I'm just going to stay here. Okay, it's his turn. Oh. He's stunned. Yeah, he can't do anything. He goes like, Come on! I got you! That's his turn. Okay, I'm going to... He's like, what on! I got you!

That's his turn. And I'm going to... He's like, what's a TikTok? What's a TikTok? Oh, Jett! I'm going to take the top of my turn to just turn and look at Fjord through the bars and go, and then go right back into it. All right.

Make that money. Make that money. Oh. Pop pop. Yeah. Advantage from both attacks? So as he's stumbling back, I'm going to rush forward with a knee, his sternum, and then go for a palm strike

to his chin to continue to press on him. First knee lunge, go for it. Still at advantage, right? Yes, this is like Jason Bourne against the Pepperidge Farm guy. 24. 24 definitely hits. You roll damage. 12 damage.

Roll damage. Right in the chest. You see a little bit of spittle. Street fighter style, when you accidentally hit them and they throw up in Street Fighter II. I'm going to keep pushing into his triangle and go for Paul and Shrek. What was the second attack?

24 with 13 damage. Watch two teeth go fling out. Chicklets! That's your action, you still have your bonus. I feel bad. Feel bad. You're on a bone! But I go for the Stunning Strike for that last one

with his cracked teeth. Let's see, yeah, Stunning Strike again. Uh, 16, he makes it. He makes it. Pull up some vinegar. But he's still stunned currently. Yep, and you still have your bonus action. So Flurry of Blows.

Mean, mean! So another ki point, so Yeah, and you send me bonus action. So, Flurry of Blows. I'm going to spend another ki point, so. Burning through, but. Forest law. While I've got advantage. You guys see how monks are in a duel at a live show. A natural 19, 29 with a seven on my hit, so 13. 13 damage? Yeah.

Can you stunning strike on the bonus action? Yes, I can. So how's this attack now? I was like. And then, I'm going to back around and go for a full roundhouse for another Stunning Strike on my left. You go for a Stunning Strike against the head,

and then with the momentum, you into a spinning back kick to the head. Yeah, St stunning strike again. Both of those are 16, so 26, and I rolled an eight on an eight, so 14 damage. 14 damage and stunning strike. 14. Fail.

Oh no. Oh, buddy. Pop pop. Oh, pop pop. All right, so like. I've never seen him so badly beaten before! He's like. Looking up at you, one eye is like,

you can't see the white because it's just red. It's red. He's like. That's his turn, you go. I turn. I turn. Everyone's like, whoa! Whoa, whoa, whoa!

It's your turn, what are you doing? Um. Oh shit. I turn and I look at J'Kel. Do I see J'Kel behind me? No, you don't see J'Kel anywhere behind you. You just see Fjord and Yasha going. I go, is there a ring medic? Yes, I am!

Finish him! Elbows for his grill. Okay. Ooh, ooh! With advantage. He's like, Janice! Specifically the girl. You already took out the party.

My first one! Are you my grandson? Oh no. Roll your attack. I have advantage. I feel so bad about this. But it's Christmas. Natural 18, 28, nine damage.

Nine damage, okay. It's still standard. And what was his attack? Huh? This was a, what attack? Oh, I was elbowing him in the face for my first pop. Second attack with advantage.

For my second pop. He's making that broken wimp type sound from there. Second attack with advantage. For my second pop. He's making that broken windpipe sound from there. Yeah, he is. Both of those are 17s. Okay. 12 damage. 12 damage. All right, you have everyone on a section still.

After you elbow, you go once again in the side of the head and he's like, Oh! What are you doing? How is he looking? Oh, he's fucked up! Come on, come on! Put him out, put him out! Yeah, bonus action.

Put him out of his ring. What are you doing? People are like, fucking take him down! Ah! Okay, I'm going to, okay, okay. Can I, as a flavored Yes? Flurry of Blows. Get him into a sleeper hold and just go sleep.

Go sleep. I'll allow it. And just try to like, in this, in like a, so I'm not breaking more of his dentures kind of way. I'll allow it. All right, all right. What dentures are left? My fucking forehead hurts so much. You're just sitting down. And she only punched him seven times

before he couldn to sleep. All right. This is a no-wake-up. Eight damage? No, not in any capacity. All right, eight damage. I'm a horrible person right now. All right, and your second one?

Sorry, it's just adding light. I can't go to sleep yet, I haven't taken my pills. 27. Okay, damage? 11. Okay, damage? 11. Okay. And stunning strike again to try and end this. Fucking god.

I already know how you want to do this. Okay. My grandson graduates to eighth grade tomorrow. And with rapid shushing, he goes to sleep in Bogart's arms before eventually, once you feel him go limp, you set him down. Everyone goes.

Yeah! Holy shit! Wow, that was dark. The door opens, and the white-robed figure rushes out and grabs him and heals him up for a second, and he shoots up the consciousness and help the robot. I help him up. You pick him up and he's like,

Oh man, I'm done. And the victor goes to Beauregard! Oh my god. And a big round of applause for Robo once again! Robo's like. And I just kind of... Are the back of his pants covered in brown? Oh no.

If you're lucky. Oh, shit. I smell the rat. Out of the pit. Oh no. And Ovo immediately grabs a tankard and sits down and just starts drinking. Looks up at you and goes,

Hey. Oh. Give that dude some money. Yeah. Holy shit. Hey, man, I could have maybe illegally bet it on myself. I don't know what the laws are, but. You're an underground fighting pit. Yeah, there are none.

You know what, let me get back to you. Just sit for a second. You bet on yourself? Don't, no. I didn't say that, you're delusional. Oh. Make a deception check. That's blood coming out of your ear.

After a while. 11? 11, he goes, If you give me what you bet on yourself, I won't tell them. Yeah, let me think about that, I feel real bad. Yeah, I'm going to. Yeah, it's not like a hard sell, I'm going to be totally honest.

All right, fine. Was that good? You were, dude, I, you know. I knew it. He's just stumbling around. Yeah, he's doing circles in his face before he sits back down again. Hmm. I'm leaning against that back wall

and I raise my Mai Tai at her. It's so cool. and I raise my Mai Tai at her. Yeah, you get the sense from the cheers, people recognize him. He comes here and fights probably a lot. Based on that fight, he probably doesn't win a lot. But most everyone who fights here wins a little money. Oh boy. Yeah. So anyway, you get the sense he's a win or lose,

I still get paid type fighter. At that point, Jekyll comes out once more and goes, So that was a rapid display, but it was just the warmup, because now we're taking here to the battlefield our second fight of the night. This one, not fisticuffs. This one's to steal.

And I'll bring here, first time to the battlefield, all the way from the Menagerie Coast, Darrow of the Stubborn Stock! Neil looks over at you and goes, Hey, friend, may the best fighter win. He rushes out with a jaw, with his weapons ready. He's so good. He comes through and he's like,

Yeah! He's cheering the crowd, just because they're cheering. One woman who's up there dressed really nice throws a rose down towards him and he goes, drops his battleaxe and catches it in the air. Maybe evil times, guys. Yeah, green knight! Yeah!

It's always the little green knight. And the other challenger, Fjord! Where'd you say you were from again? From Port Damali. From Port Damali! Yay! As I walk in, I point to him, and I open up my hand, and I cast Armor of Agathys,

or Armor of Agathys on myself at 5th-level. It's like pulling in all the moisture of the air. I look at him and say, I'm excited for this. Time for a tune-up of some new tricks. Don't worry, friend. I got a few tricks up my own sleeve. You see him reach up and grab something around his neck and close his eyes for a second.

He grabs his shield back up once more, has his battleaxe at the side. Shit. And... He's going to go ahead to concentrate for a second and you watch as the battleaxe suddenly begins to grow with a bright light that shines like a vibrant white torch and 20 feet around him. All of a sudden, it's just this lighthouse of a battleaxe

glowing as you see the holy symbol around his neck that you now notice, the symbol of Pelor glow as well. I told you that guy was really hardcore. Everyone goes like, Waaah! Yeah, cheers again to both of you guys, as you have all this icy, frozen armor

that's now spines of jagged frost just sticking out of you, and the other figure just holding this beacon of light. I just stand there and raise my fists. Your fists? Everyone who looks down goes like, all right, looks like an interesting fight here, weapon on, bare knuckles!

He's starting to believe. Okay. Oh my god. The owlbear's here? Big A! Roll initiative. Woo! 11. 11. All righty.

Darrow goes first with a 13. So Darrow's like, Fred, come on. I want you to show me what you got, but first, let me show you mine. He rushes in towards you, at an angle to push over to this direction, is going to go ahead and begin

with two melee attacks against you. Okay. With the battle axe. The first one is going to be, 24 to hit. Yes. The second one is 24 to hit, same roll as the last. All right, you take, from each blow,

well, your first attack, you take 10 points of slashing damage. Okay. And eight points of radiant damage. Okay. As it strikes you, this flash of radiant energy blasts off the impact. The second strike is 13 points of slashing damage.

Okay. And seven points of radiant damage. Gotcha. How much damage does he take from Armor of Agathys? Two strikes? Yes. So 50 points of cold damage. 50 points? What? Five, zero? Damn!

Yeah, high-level Armor of Agathys is rough. Every hit is 25 points of damage? That's one and a half to two hits. For every spell level, it's five points of damage every time it takes damage, as long as the armor lasts. As long as the armor's not working. Is the armor still around after that damage? The armor's gone.

Yep. Okay. The armor, so the first strike hits. You see a flash of light and then a spray of jagged ice that swings back for a second hit. It impacts and the ice armor shatters. There's a blast of bright light, a mist, and it looks like a bunch of moisture that just evaporates around as the mist dissipates.

You see Darrow is just filled with broken pieces of broken ice and frost. He's now bleeding, goes like, ho ho ho ho, that was very, that was very tricky. Well done. And he's going to use the last of his turn to, hold on, let me see here. Ooh, what is he going to do?

He's going, as a bonus action action to cast Sanctuary on you. On me? Or on himself against you. So he's like, oh, okay. Let's try this again. He takes the holy symbol there and you see a little glow. You're not quite sure what it means.

He's like, okay, show me what you got. Okay. I will summon the Star Razor. The blade appears in your hand. I will use my bonus action to cast Hexblade's Curse on him. Okay. And I will use one of the sword's two charges to cast Faerie Fire on him.

Okay. First, let's go ahead and... Oh my god. Cast Faerie Fire on him. Okay. First, let's go ahead and... Oh my god. Cast it on him. Yeah, it's a beast. It's a beast. Hanks Blade's curse. How often can you use that?

Once a day. Once a day. God, that's... See Invisibility and Faerie Fire. Faerie Fire is such a complex spell. Hanks Blade's curse on Blacklight. H flex spell. Thanks, Blades of Curse, I'm blacklighting. All righty, and Fair Fire, is it a charisma saving throw? Uh, yeah, it is a great question.

Fair Fire is a dexterity 15. A dexterity 15? Yeah. You were the dragon last time. 15 exactly. He makes it, great. Sorry. It's fine. He's got Sanctuary, young dog. He makes it, great. Sorry. It's fine. He's got sanctuary, young dog. He does.

Okay. All right, is that your turn? It is. All right, so that happens. Okay. That was cool. Good times. He's now seeing some strange stuff.

He's going to whirl around to this side to try and keep you towards the center as he's backing and spinning around. You got some tricks there, friend, some crazy bits, and he sees the shadows gathering around him. That doesn't feel good. He dabbled in some weird stuff. All right.

Sorry. He's going to go ahead and... I like this guy. I like this guy. Yeah, I like him, I like him. He's going to go ahead and use his bonus action to cast Blinding Smite. Okay. Laudie.

Laudie. So the head of the axe glows even brighter for a second and he's going to make a swing towards you, breaking his sanctuary. That is a natural 20. Mm-hmm. Ooh, boy. Yeah.

Are you going to? No. That's a good boy. All, boy. Yeah. Are you going to? No. That's a good boy. All righty. So you take... Actually, he's going to go ahead and pump his second, third level spell into this to Divine Smite. Ooh, Pally Pally. Yeah. Okay, okay, okay.

This is going to be ugly. All right. So that's going to be... I'm new to this. Ooh, there's a lot of the ancient. Oh, and it's going to, you can do that after you've hit? Yeah. You can just hide? Holy shit.

It's going to be nasty. It's going to be bad because he doubles his dice? Yep. Yeah. Oof. That sounds like a lot. How many hit points do you have? 99. Not anymore, you don't.

Oh god, Matt. It's going to hurt. I don't know if it's going to knock you down. I mean, it's going to suck. It's going to suck. It's going to really suck. What level is he doing it at? The third level. Three DAs. It's going to really suck. What level is he doing it at? It's a third level. Three DAs.

It's just come up. Okay. It's a lot of math coming at you real fast. I know, I know, I'm waiting. Got to spare the dying ray to go, just in case. Oh boy, he's wincing. Get him, Joke. You take... 92 points of damage.

Ooh! Yeah! That's a change of points of damage, how? Wow. How many d8 did you just roll? All of them! He does 1d8 with his act, plus 1d8 radiant from having the Paladin ability.

Then 3d8 radiant damage from the Blinding Smite hit, which was critical, and then a third-level Divine Smite is an additional 4d8, and then that leveled really well, and then all that got doubled, and then on top of that, his bonus to damage. Yeah, well, he takes three points of radiant damage. Oh! That was amazing.

He might have just missed it. You guys watch as the impact hits, and it's like a shockwave that expands outward. Fuck. This divine light impacts and cracks through every shadowed nook and cranny of Fjord's armor before he's just surrounded in burning, searing light and he screams out instinctually,

like you've smote demons and sent them to other dimensions for a second. You're afraid Fjord's about to tear apart at the seams before it fades and leaves him smoking. I also need you to make a constitution saving throw. Shit. Blinding smite, yo. Oh right, the blinding smite.

It's because you wore him out with those pushups. 13. 13, you are blinded. Oh no, Fjord! This is bad. Oh no, you're from Jett's with a crit. Nah. No, Fjord's the grandpa in this fight.

Oh no! I can't find my... Bust out the Noxian. I'll just put this on you for both of you. Oh no. Kaelas leans over to Jester and just says, this is very violent. Oh god, this is so much worse

than I thought it was going to go. It's until the spell, at the end of each turn, you have to make a constitution saving throw to see if it maintains. At the end of my turn or his? At the end of your turn. Okay. All right, so that's his first strike. Yeah.

Oh shit. No. Because you are blinded, he has advantage in the attack roll. Cool. That is, nope. He's going to miss you. Another natural 20. Miss him.

Does a 16 hit? No, it doesn't. Okay, you are fucking lucky. All right, those are his two attacks. Oh my god. He backs away a bit. Actually, no, because you're still, he's going to be standing there and watching you,

just there, reeling from it, go like, look up at the rest of the crowd and go, Ha-ha! They rally them in bed. People go, they're going nuts. People are cheering, it's crazy. It's your turn, Fjord. You can do it, Fjord!

Is he in a straight roll? He's Faerie Fired? He doesn't believe me. And Fjord. You can do it, Fjord! Is he at a straight roll? He's Faerie Fired? He doesn't believe it. And Fjord is blind? No, he resisted the Faerie Fired. Ah, 92 points. Yeah, that was crazy. Well, that kind of changed any strategy I have. All right, let's try, fuck it, right?

We just got to go for it. With my bonus action, I will cast Banishing Smite and I will take two strikes blindly at him. Okay. Yeah. Go for it. Disadvantage? So Blinding Smite on, disadvantage on the attacks. Yeah, there's no canceling because of the hex

or anything like that. No. No, he does extra damage. Oh, I don't think so. Come on. That is a 16 to hit? 16, you swing wide, woof, with his shield, to flex it off to the side and woof, you feel it hit dirt.

Cool, good swing. Fjord, to your right! Fjord, to your right! Got it. Oh, three and a four. Oh! I'm sorry I made you laugh. Stay in shape. This time, you telegraph the swing, and as you go wide, he just looks over

towards some of the crew above him, goes like, and ducks it while looking at some of the crowd watching with a bit of a smile. That's rude. Fuck you, Green Knight! I missed, didn't I? I missed. No, you got him, Fj missed, didn't I? I missed! No, you got the sword, you got him, he's dead!

Yeah, yeah, cool. Banishing smite, do you still have concentration? So you still maintain it, if you can maintain concentration. Sure, or just stay conscious. We'll make you constitution saving, girl. Oh, oh, right at the end, okay. See if you can resist the blindness. 13. 13, no. Still blind.

Man, these are piss poor rolls. You used up all your luck before. I did, I really did. His turn, he's going to go ahead and shift over this way. Good man. And lean in and be like, are you okay, man? What?

I feel kind of bad. No, just go for it, this is great. Put it on a chart. He is the old man! He is! Don't old man me, let's go. I don't know what that means, but okay. You can go with Pop Pop.

He's going to go ahead and first attack with advantage. Oh no. I'm going to teach Ronan Pop Pop as soon as I can. It's a 21 to hit. Yeah, it hits. You take double ones on 2d8. Eight points of slashing damage

and one point of radiant damage. Nine points of damage. Nine points of damage. Correct. You see me fall backwards, unconscious, but my relentless endurance as that half-orc kicks in. Oh shit! That's right, so you're still at one hit point. So I pop up to one hit point.

Yay! Yay! Yay! Come on! We can actually see the cartoon birds. And he takes two points of radiant damage. Got it, got it. All right, make a concentration check.

A concentration saving throw to see if you can maintain your smite. 16? Yeah, you're fine. Okay. Second attack, with advantage. Oh boy. That's going to be 20. Yeah, that'll hit. Yeah, that'll do.

That'll do. So the strike knocks you up into the air. He hits you with the flat end of the battleaxe, just for sheer impact. It's a spanking. Knocks you in the air. It's 200 gold. Onto the ground, and everyone goes like, cheering, and you see him going like,

but he's looking at Fjord like, This is good. He throws the ax down on the ground and reaches out and lay hands you for, Hey! Oh! Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh! The other guy.

He lay hands you for 15 points. A lot of characters got built. He's had a really bad day. Very kind of you, I take it I lost. He pulls you back up, he's like, I mean, only this match. Yeah. But some of that stuff I saw you do was pretty crazy.

I actually had a hernia this morning, so I don't want to make excuses. Oh, that explains it all. Norris, he takes your hand and holds it up, and he's like, That's not necessary. Good job, bad guys! Oh!

And Kevin's cheering. Woo! Yeah, yeah. Drinks on the house for the combatants? They are now. My treat. Great, good. I'll be over here.

Everyone cheers. Let's just pretend we didn't see it happen, okay? I think we were all in the bathroom. We were in the bathroom and it happened. I'll go grab a whiskey, I go up to where everyone else is. Wow, that was, what'd you think? That was amazing. You did good.

I was in the bathroom, I missed the whole thing. Did you win? You missed my fight? Yes. Oh, well, it was a hard-fought battle, I would say. Fairly, Caleb, how would you describe it? He did great. Fought valiantly.

Yeah. It was just as I knew you would for good job. Stick-to-itiveness. What? You did not go. Wait, where did I go? It was because I lost. She stepped out. No, no, before the fight. No, where did Nako go? It was because I lost. She stepped out. No, no, before the fight.

No, she wasn't near right there. I'm going to go back down to the bar. I'm going to come with you! Yasha, please do better than I did. Yeah, okay. I go get drinks with Fjord. All right. As Jekyll walks back out to the center of the ring,

all right, everyone, that was quite a display. as Jackal walks back out to the center of the ring. All right, everyone, that was quite a display, two in a row of extremely fast battles. Long way from Grog, that was rough. I'm sorry. But once again, you did 50 damage from not even hitting him. Thank you, I never hit him. I got to rework this strategy.

That did not work. You had some shit rolls. Yeah, it was some shit rolls. He rolled really, really well. For our final battle tonight, we have our returning challenged champion of fisticuffs here in the Stone Coffin. Can I bring out Cal Demons!

The crowd goes, Blue! The door opens up, and you watch as the dwarf woman sits up, finishes her tankard, throws it on the ground. Ping-ting-ting! Rolls in a circle, locks it out of the center. That's pretty great.

Yeah! Cracks every part of her body. I like it. And the one person with the guts enough to try and take care of Yasha from Xhorhas! Then he goes like, cheering, in claps. Let's go, Yasha!

Walk out, they close behind. The medic comes up and heals you for an additional. Don't fucking touch me. Okay, the medic turns back around. I start warming up, hitting my muscles. I lean into her and I say, So you're the champion? Yeah.

You're a reason. Well, you better give him a show, then. Well, I'll apply money. Kisses. Whee! You're waiting for it, and you're waiting for it. The room gets quiet and tense. Everyone's just leaning forward over the railing.

All the breath leaves the chamber as Jekyll goes, Begin! Roll initiative. Go, Yasha! Oh! Get it up, Yasha! So I get advantage. Yeah, you do. One of you wins fucking initiative. Six. Oh, you were. With advantage.

I have no thing to add. Cal goes first. Everybody wins. Oh no! Oh no. Yeah, we all lost advantage. You all lost initiative. Oh no. Cal goes, bites her lower lip

before charging towards you. Bonus action goes into a rage, frenzied rage. Ooh. Frenzied rage, three attacks. Yeah. So just so you're aware here, fists, for standard of this, are just one damage plus your strength modifier plus whatever your rage bonus

and everything else would be. So just keep that in mind. So running forward, reckless attack on you with advantage out of the gate, all three attacks. Or under two attacks, because the bonus action was used to rage, so just two attacks on you. Natural 20. Uh-oh.

Which means it's now two damage and I'm going to die. It doesn't do much. Criticals in a fist fight don't do too much unless you're a monk. So it's going to be seven points of bludgeoning damage on the first hit. Okay. Second attack is going to be, ooh, not good! 11. Okay.

Not 11 damage, just 11. No, 11 to hit. Oh, oh, no, that doesn't hit. Yeah, no, roll a one and a two. Shit. And, oh, that's it. That's it for this round? And it's just, at this point, finishes?

Come at me. It's your turn. Okay. She's grinning through it. Wait, are you going to rage? I mean, sorry. That is... You have advantage because she does.

Yeah, you have advantage on your attacks against her. Are you raging first, or are you? No. No, interesting, okay. That's better. That would be 21 to hit. That hits. I just look at her and I backhand her across the face. Oh!

Okay, that still does the damage, so it's one damage plus your strength modifier. I love it. So four, yeah. Four, reduced because she's raging to two. Great. All right. You have a second attack, if you want.

Yeah. So you just. Advantage. Advantage, okay, that was good. That is... Yeah, okay, that was good. That is... Yeah, okay. Oh shit, the other, the first one was 16. 23 to hit. Hits?

All damage, or no, all damage to this one, because it's just another... I do it again with my other hand. Oh! So four points to do, it's like. Forgoing the raids, damn it. Wow. It's like four raids. damn it. It's like, more pain.

Everyone in the crowd goes like, Oh, what? The room gets really loud and gets really quiet, and she's like. Fuck it, I did it. And jumps at you like a feral beast. Oh gosh. Is now, for this attack, not fists, but fingernails.

It's going to scratch towards your face. Going reckless again, three attacks. Natural 20. Oof. Once again, I know, this dice is rolling really well, but it's still seven points of bludgeoning damage. Okay. Second one is going to be 25 to hit

and six points of bludgeoning damage. That bonus action third strike is going to be only a 14 to hit. That does not hit. The run misses. The air leaps and the first one claws across your face and scratches while the hand grabs the front of your tunic area and holds on, feet planted up on your chest.

The other hand comes down and attempts to gouge into your eye and you pull back and she scratches across your face. Now you have scratches on both sides of your face. That third time goes to try and come down and pummel you and you just push her off and she lands back onto her legs. She looks like she's going crazy. Oh man. It's your turn.

Oh man. All right. You get advantage because she's reckless attack. Yep. Okay, 21 to hit. That hits. Okay, so... I... Still holding back on your rage? Yeah. Okay.

But why? But why? I push her, and I get really close to her, and I say, is that all you got? Are you using your action to shove her, or are you using your action to make an Intimidation check? No, I'm just saying that to her and then I push her. Okay.

Are you doing damage to the push or just pushing her? No. Okay. Just pushing her? Just pushing her. Make an Athletics check. Okay. Cocky. I like it. Uh.

22. 22. Okay. Just double check something here real fast. What's this Yasha doing? She's killing her with kindness. Back hands, okay. You want to push her five feet away with your push or knock her prone?

Just push her five feet away. Okay, so you push her five feet back. It's your first strike. You can move in closer if you want to. Yeah, oh yeah, so I can attack. Add advantage. Nope, doesn't hit. Okay, so the second time you move forward

and you try and slap her again? Yeah. You're going to slap and she catches your wrist. You see her eye twitching. Not unable to understand and really figure out what you're about. Everyone's like, oh shit! You pull your hand back and break her grip.

It's now her turn. Yeah, she's going all in again, three more strikes. She's going to leap over you and land behind you and try and get onto your back and begin trying to pull away and pummel the back and sides of your head, just boxing you from over top. That is going to be a 24 to hit.

Yep. You take six points of bludgeoning damage. No. Seven points of bludgeoning damage. Yep. Oh no. And that's a 17 to hit? Yep, just hits. Then yeah, you take another six points bludgeoning damage.

Oh, oh! With that bloodied, I finally start to smile, which you haven't seen in a while. Okay. She just wants to get beat up. This is some weird sick thing. 19 plus seven, 26. Yeah, 20, 26. That definitely hits.

She's still on my back. Yep. I just shove her off onto the ground. Just pull her off onto the ground? Yeah. Slamming her onto the ground, doing two points of damage? Yep. Would be four, but two, because she's raging still. So onto the ground now.

Arms and legs are curled up in a defensive position, almost like a spider knocked onto its back. What are you doing? Second attack? Yeah, what are you doing for the second attack? It hits, it hits, it's 20 total. Well, 20 total. That hits, yeah. Okay. I'm going to kick her in her side.

Crack into that bit there? All right. Yeah. That's another two points of damage. All righty, is that your turn? That's my turn. All right, she's going to, after being thrown onto her back, she gets back up, growls loudly,

and is going to go ahead and flank around to the side, and is going to attempt to swing to pick you up to throw you on the ground. She's going to make a shove attack, make an athletics check. 16? 16, she rolled a 16. They both got even, let me see.

Is this like a game of war, and then you go again? We'll see, we'll see. Who's quaking? This is athletics versus athletics. All right. Let's roll. So Xhi would be equaling, so the defense, no, yeah, so you get knock prone.

She grabs and sweeps you up and slams you onto the ground. So you're knock prone there, and the second strike, she's going to bring both her fists up and gorilla slam on top of you, with advantage because you are prone. That'll be 25, so you take six points of bludgeoning damage again.

Bonus action, go for a second slam. That is a 20 to hit. That hits. Six points of bludgeoning damage. As you were just being pummeled into the ground, you watch every impact, the heavy, there's now foam curling at the corners of Cal's mouth. With every hit, the rocks nearby surrounding the point of impact

shake and scatter a bit. It's your turn. Okay, so I would like to try from the ground as she's going down to grab her wrists and try to bring her close to me. Is there anything to grapple her? Yeah, 17. 17?

Or well, I guess. Is this a grapple you're trying to do? And she'd only have advantage on this because she didn't Reckless Attack. Oh, okay, I rolled 10 for both. Okay, gotcha. What do I add to that then? If you're trying to grapple her, Athletics check.

Athletics check, okay, 17. 17, and she has advantage on it because she's raging. But still rolls only a 15. So you do, you have her grappled now. You are on the ground, you reach up, and you have her held to you with your first attack. So when I grab her by her wrists, I pull her close. I say, you're fucking weak.

And I push her away. Make an intimidation check. Oh my god, yeah, she's so hardcore. Oh! Orphan nature. Use your strength for it if you want to. Okay, 19. 19.

Natural fucking one. Oh! As you push her away, she's frightened of you. She backs up and is like. Yeah. Looks up at everyone around her, and everyone's leaning in and going, what is happening?

She's like. Yeah. It's her turn, and she steps back, and steps back to about 10 feet away from you. She's frightened. She's frightened. Yeah. Holy shit. Oh my god! She's going to lose her rage.

It's a good turn. Oh my god. She's going to lose her rage. Oh no. All right, it's your turn. Okay. So, technically, the grapple, I think, is. This is very different than I was expecting. To me, a grapple is an attack, so it does maintain the rage.

She would have to not attack her this round to have the rage drop. Or not be hit. Or not be hit, yeah. Okay. And she can be frightened while she's raging? She can be frightened, yeah. Well, I shouldn't have double-checked that.

Think how crazy this would be if it was an old man. That'd be so mean. Is that all you've got? No! You're weak! I know! You're old! I came for rice pudding! Okay, I will say, because she is a Frenzy Barbarian,

she is immune to frighten while raging. Oh, got it, okay. So she's not frightened of you, but you're still seeing a reaction out of her. The frightened condition hasn't broken through, she's not backing away so much, but she's definitely like, she can't figure you out. In the middle of that blind, like, feral rage, you're cutting through a bit.

Okay. So then on her turn, she is going to attack you. Will not be reckless. It's a cool move. Because of that, I'll say. That's going to be a 21 to hit, so six points of bludgeoning. And an 11, miss. Bonus action. I take it you used your turn on your turn to get up, right?

Yeah. And then the third strike would be, that's cocked, natural one. Holy shit. So like, claw, punch. You've broken your streak, Yasha. It's your turn. Okay, so I walk up to her,

and I go up to attack her. Mm-hmm. Oh, I don't have advantage, right? No, because she's into Reckless's turn. 16? 16 just hits. If you want it. Oh, that's true.

Well, that hits. 60 hits, what? Oh yeah, I'm going to go reckless. Okay. Thank you. 17, that hits. Okay. She will have advantage now. So I am going to punch her in her stomach, but I'm going to pull the punch.

But the crowd won't notice that. So not do any damage? So, no. All right, so she reacts I'm going to punch her in her stomach, but I'm going to pull the punch, but the crowd won't notice that. So not do any damage? So, no. All right, so she reacts from the blow and looks confused, that's your first attack. Maybe she's just trying to make Fjord feel better. You're not bigger.

You don't know. Yeah, that takes 25. 25. You pull the one punch back and she's like. You don't know. Yeah, that hits. 25. 25. You pull the one punch back and she's like. And then I smack her again. For another two damage? Yeah. All right. Nothing, nothing.

She's got a little bit of curled blood at the corner of the mouth from the slap, which hits. What are you waiting for? She leaps towards you, puts her hands around your neck, and is going for a strangle, which from a thematic standpoint, with advantage, that definitely hits. Six points of bludgeoning as she's pushing in towards your windpipe.

19 to hit, another six points of bludgeoning damage, and bonus action, 21 to hit. So that's another, so three, so that's 18 points of bludgeoning damage this round as she's now on top of you. You're strong enough to hold your weight, and you're having to go on your back foot to hold it, but she's pounced on you like a creature,

and is just pushing in your windpipe, looking through your eyes with absolute fury. It's your turn. Okay. Let's see, yeah, 18, 10, oh my god. Okay, so 25 to hit again. Definitely hits, what do you do? So she's in front of me. Yeah. So I would like to run up against the bars

and push her up against the wall. All right, so you spin her this way? Yeah. All right, just make a strength check for me, if you don't mind. Not good. It's okay, she didn't get good either. Five.

Five? Total? Total. Technically, she didn't get good either. Five. Five? Total? Total. Technically, she still wins. So you go to pull her around with that first strike, and as you go to push, she actually pulls her leg off of your chest and puts it behind and prevents you from moving it further.

You can use your second attack if you want to try again. Yeah. All right. Reckless. Oh, you do have advantage on your strength checks. Oh. Because you are, oh no, you're not raging, so you're not. Oh, sorry. The second one is. So, why did I just roll twice?

Because she was reckless attacking. Well, this is a strength check if you're just pushing her. So the first one was? I think the first one was a four, so seven. Seven, yeah. You're pushing her, but she's digging in, resisting, resisting, she's scraping across the ground. You're getting.

You see the dirt groove, push behind her as you're slowly pushing her towards the bars. You don't quite get her there, but you're definitely getting some ground with her. On her attack, she's still clutching onto your throat and is going to continue to squeeze. Misses the first one. And she's going right up close with ease, so.

That's going to hit, that's another six points of bludgeoning damage, and 12 points total. 12 points total. Yeah. Still just squeezing absolute anger in her eyes, but still out of confusion, the head's turned to the side. Your turn. Okay. I'm going to shove her back into the wall again,

see if I can do that. Strength check. 14. Natural one. Okay. Yeah. So I'm going to shove her up against the wall and I'm going to scream at her, show me why you're the fucking champion! Oh shit. So as you in the metal bars,

the guards and the healer back away as dust shakes off of them. The bars, the sound of it, the iron clattering, fills the chamber with this heavy impact sound. Everybody on this end is leaning over the bars to see where it's going. You hear a table get pushed over off to the side of someone,

just get excited and knocked it over. For her turn, she's going to turn back and release. Or not, she's going to pull her thumb away from your windpipe and is going to attempt to headbutt you. That is going to be reckless on you. Yeah, that's six points of bludgeoning damage. Crack right into your forehead. You can feel the skin split and the blood begin to warm down

the front of your face and nose. Second headbutt, that's going to be a 20 to hit. Another six bludgeoning damage. Crack a second time, her head split as well. There's just blood in both of your faces, but she just. Third one is going to be a 15. That's 15 hit. Doesn't hit.

The third time, she goes to headbutt you a third time, and it's just too slick, and it skids off the side as you move your head along the way, it's your turn. Okay. I'm going to try to shove her off of me. Okay. Natural 20. Mm-hmm.

Okay. So I'd like to shove her off of me. Yeah. Natural one, two natural ones in a row. Whoa. And just shove her off ones in a row on her. And just shove her off and throw her against the wall. Okay, so you push her this way into the bars again, on this end? Yeah.

So you pull back and shove her off, she slams into the bars, they rattle from the impact. She's like, Come on, champion. You're so close. Fucking finish it. Oh!

Jesus. The fuck? The saddest bit. Are you moving in to close the gap? Yeah. All right. Ashley Johnson, you crazy motherfucker. I know, what the fuck?

Do you feel intimidated? Yeah! 24, my voice is not fully there, so I'm like, I tried to do the yelling, I'm like, I'm just going to stick to whispering. No, it's good. That's cool. Because it's not fully coming out. Where is Harvey dead?

Where is Harvey dead? So another, all right, another two damage. 24. Another two damage. As you rush forward, and what is this attack? I'm just going to push her again into the bars. Into the bars. She's going to grab both the hands as you push her into it

and knock them away, and is going to go ahead and attempt to punch upward with an uppercut towards you, reckless. That's going to be a 18? Yep. Six points of bludgeoning damage. All right. Yeah, another six points of bludgeoning damage. All right. Yeah, another six points of bludgeoning damage. That's close.

And then another six points of bludgeoning damage. Boy. Just. It hits you in the stomach extremely hard. You weren't quite ready for your muscles to contract in time, and you just take full impact at the inside of your torso, and you feel all the organs seize and pan, the impact ripple inside.

Your vision's starting to go a little. Great. Damn. Oh wait, why am I rolling? Oh, reckless. You are, well, she was reckless, so you have advantage on that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 28.

All right, that hits, two damage. Okay, so I would like to... Actually... I don't want to do that. Hold on, I was thinking something, but I don't want to do that. Hold on, I was thinking something, but I don't want to do that. Finger of death. Yeah.

I'm just going to take the bottom of my boot and I'm going to push her up against the wall. She's like, you just push her and hold her against it? Okay. Like Scarlet, right there. her and hold her against it? Okay. Like Scarlet Redbeard. Yeah, just not really any damage. You have your second attack? Yep.

Crush her. What's your advantage? 15. 15 misses. So no damage, but she's still holding the boot there. Her turn, held to you, she's going to go ahead and attempt to punch right underneath where the knee joint is to see if she can. Ooh, yeah, that's good.

Six points of bludgeoning damage. Knocks you underneath, the knee buckles, and she shoves your leg off to the side. You catch yourself. Second attack. I grab her, and I just say, Finish the champion. She looks so furious and so weirded out

that she just doesn't know what to do and is like, . That is going to be a 15 to hit. It doesn't hit. That will hit, another six points of bludgeoning damage. As she hits me, bloodied, just a smile of relief before being knocked unconscious.

And as the final blow, Yasha swings back. Her feet go into the air and on the ground, the smile on her face. So you don't even try the relentless, well, you're not raging, so I'm not raging, yeah. And so you just, the eyes roll back as the grin hits that you all see.

And everyone goes like, Yeah! And they cheer, Cal, Cal, Cal, Cal, Cal! And Cal's like, Yeah! They cheer, Cal, Cal, Cal, Cal, Cal. Cal's like, but all the cheers die away a bit because Cal is not celebrating. Cal is just like she had seen a ghost,

is just staring at Yasha unconscious on the ground, the blood caked under her fingernails, a little bit of blood trickling from her jaw, just like, and just leaves the entire arena, storms through the gates, up the stairs, and out of the venue. I ruin people. She's going to give up fighting.

Wow. Everything gets quiet. Okay, that's been a real interesting evening. Thank you all for coming. Let's go ahead and do some payouts here, and thank you for making time here in the middle of the week. Yeah!

I'll jog over to the open bar since I'm down there anyway. Yeah, okay. It's like going forward. Medic! The medic's already rushed over and you heal. I think, what is the thing? Oh no, that's only if you're raging. 14 hit points, you heal.

I just look at Fjord. 14 hit points, okay. We agreed to have our asses kicked. A show of solidarity. That was the conversation when you all were alone? Don't try to understand. Uh-huh. Are you intentionally trying to deceive her?

No, I'm just lying. Bonos. Yeah, bonos. Bonos. I'm going to look over at Caduceus. She was a champion, for sure. I think, um. Oh, we're going to have to have a talk about that. I think Yasha needs some.

Yeah, we're going to talk about that. Yasha comes out of our gate, yeah? Yeah, Yasha does, comes out. Hey! Joins you guys in the four-year area, other folks are starting to gather. How are you feeling? Hi, friend? She is very, very strong.

She is a champion for a reason. Yeah, kind of. Yep. Yeah. She looked like it. I think I gave it my best. Mm-hmm. You certainly slapped her your best.

Are you okay? Felt like a lot of whispering. It's just all like a lot of like... Yeah, I think I was just off, I don't know. Because it just wasn't my fight. Okay. I'm sorry. I can pay you guys back. No, no, no. No, no, no.

I know you tried your hardest. It's not the fight. Yeah, I'm sorry. Do you feel good about the fight? I feel great. Yeah, yeah, see, that's apparent, actually. That's kind of what concerns me. Yeah, you had this sort of a grin when you went out. I mean, I do, I did as well.

I enjoy the feeling of being knocked unconscious, but it seemed like you really, really liked it. Did you, uh... Did you figure out what you were trying to figure out in there? I don't think I did, but... There was a... A moment of release, I guess.

I'm going to get another Mai Tai. Let's actually, let's go to the bar and get a round of Mai Tais, yeah? Yeah. Yeah? Yeah, yeah, Yeah. Yeah? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The official drink of Rexxentrum. Yeah, Mai Tai.

The landlocked Rexxentrum. Rexxentrums? A Mai Tai. Yeah, before Yasha even makes it eight or nine steps from where she is, Caleb's already got two large flagons from the bar. So he can't just hand one over, it's a huge umbrella, just hands it to her, holds her gaze for a second,

and says, I get it. That's still just only two Mai Tais, though. Like, I want a round of Mai Tais. Yeah, but you got the Spring Break Mai Tais. Gathering your winnings. Yeah. Winnings? Yes.

Caleb, you put in 300. 200, this winner right here. Right. Cronebeater. Right, 100 of yours and 100 of hers, right? Yes, 200 total. Correct. So that would mean you would get...

I just split whatever I get back with Beauregard. Okay, so you get your 100 back. So 200 back, plus the additional 400 you get on top of that. 400, okay. So I split, so that's 600 total. You get 300. Thank you. I have 300. I'm sorry, you got 400 total on that, so that's 600 total. You get 300. Thank you. I have 300.

I'm sorry, you got 400 total on that, so it's 200 each of you. Total, okay. Beauregard, because you were the actual entry, you win 150 gold, plus 10% of the pot, which would be... 260. Nice.

So it's a total of 310 that you made on top of that. 310 gold. Total with Caleb? No. No. In addition to Caleb's. In addition to the cheating money. Damn. So I made 510. You should wail on old days more often.

Holy shit. The lesson is punch old men. SAM and LAURA, LAURA and SAM go up to Ova with 100 gold. Here, go to a dentist. Eggie. Yeah. Thank you.

And he gets a payout on the side, too, from somebody else. Hmm. He makes money every night. Cool. Yeah, he's doing well. Yeah. Plasma donation.

Yeah. I feel a little less bad for him. Bye, man. I'm just going to go. Okay. For Jester, you put 120 on Beau. So you get the 120 back, plus the, what was the extra amount I told you it was the? What, what? Double your.

One plus two plus two plus one. Right, it was the double amount, so you got 240. 240 back, wait. Correct, you spent. That isn't. You spent 300 and... 320. 320, and you got 140 back, or 240 back.

Oh, okay, so I just, okay. You still lost money. It was a one-to-one thing. Yeah. Okay. Sorry, Vex. Same, 200 back. Fair. So that is all the winnings distributed.

I'll double-check that when I have time over the break if need be. Woo! What have you been doing, Nott? Robbing the hat store. What? What? Size tops, or what's it called?

Size topper. Size topper. Okay, go ahead and roll a... Oh god. Go ahead and roll the Thieves' Tools check. Come on. Using your dexterity. I get reliable talent, 23. 23, yeah. You poke into that hat store.

It is closed. It is a beautiful array of all sorts of strange hats. Not like the highest end, but it is a good array. And you have the pick of the litter. I want a top hat for myself. You got it. What else they got? They got any of those weird Bavarian things?

No, no, they do have... Trichorids? Which is just shit. They have a little feather thing. Oh, I need to be something like that, akin to what I guess I could say. There are plenty of detailed bonnets with all sorts of faux flowers

and veil elements of it. There are wide brim riding hats. There are, there's, there's... I'll get a hat for everybody. Okay, okay. We cut back. You get to decide which hats you got. How much are you drinking right now?

An ignition of pot. Oh, plenty. Just walking down the aisles, drinking. I just hear dance of the sugarplum fairies going on. Find a little mirror. No! Woo! That's amazing.

Get a little yarmulke for Beau. I don't know. All right. That'll take it. As you guys wander outside of the butchery and catch up with Nott, who is clutching a pile of hats. The fuck? I got presents! Where did you get this? Did you buy those?

All those hats? Yes! Sure. It's so late. Where did you find a place that was open selling hats? There's an all-night haberdasher. What'd you get for me? I got you, well, your horns are an issue. Yeah, it's going to be a little teeny hat

if you're going to. I got you just one of those tiny little doll hats that you put on with a little strap. That's so cute, I love it. Thanks, I hate it. Thanks, I hate it. It got you a fez? It's weird with this head to get this sitting right. It's taller.

It suits you in a weird way. Really? It goes with your very, you have a very vertical aesthetic. It does nothing to keep the sun off, I don't really see the point. Yasha got you a yellow beanie? I like it.

It fits. If you flip it down, it'd be more your style. If I flip it down, it'll be sad. Oh, shit! I got you this weird Bavarian hat. Oh! That's really long. I feel like a bird.

I got a nice top hat for me, but it's like one of those big ones. You know, like a Mad Hatter hat. It's a Mad Hatter hat. I got you a baseball cap. Or the Xemnian Equivalent. Yeah! I went to the X-Equivalblin, all I got was his hat.

Hello, little boy. Hi! And Fjord, I got you just like a cleric's, not a cleric's, a clerk's visor for doing the counting. Oh, good. I would have thought a cowboy hat. I was really expecting a pirate's hat.

Hold on, I'm going to go back in and find a cowboy hat. Is she just running next door? Roll an investigation check. Oh god. Is there anyone out in the street? 19. You recall seeing, it's not a cowboy hat, it is a rider's hat, but it looks strange like a cowboy hat.

You do find one. Here, give me that one. Okay. I just throw that one back in through the window. Oh fuck, let's go to the farm! My time! Woo! With hats adorned, drinks on the way,

you stumble out. Some of you soar physically, some of you soar emotionally towards an evening of hat drinking. Hat drinking. And that's where we'll end this holiday episode. Oh, we'll also go to some Kentucky Derby. Kind of, yeah. Hat drinking.

I drink pretty much. I see your true colors shining through. Man, that was a strange second half. Yeah! You too! That was really cool. No, it was great! It was hot.

It was dark. It was, it was, it was. Holy shit, Yasha. That was fucking cool, Yasha. Dude, Yasha dark, Yasha. That was way to Trent Reznor. It was dark. Holy shit, Yasha. Two of the five. Yasha dark, Yasha. Way to Trent Reznor. So fucking cool. Really interesting move there.

I loved it. Her, my, so today. Yeah, 15-year-old Ashley's coming out. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I dig it. Is the Stormlord just Johnny Cash? Yeah. I mean...

All righty, well, we come back in 2020. Whoa! Pick up from here, a whole lot of threads, some reading to do, some weaving to do, all sorts of insanity and a looming prospect of trying to sew this negotiation together between two warring nations. So we got a lot to look forward to. 2020!

Oh man, that's crazy. I know, it's weird. I'm going to ride in on my laser car. Happy New Year, everybody. Happy New Year, everybody. Happy New Year, guys. Seriously. Thank you so much for joining us for this crazy year, and for many of you years beforehand. Have a wonderful holiday.

Through all of it, I know for some people it can be a tougher time, but know that we're there with you. We appreciate you guys. We love you all so very much. And is it Thursday yet? Have a good night, guys. Have a good holiday! Happy New Year!

Oh, hey, Ashley Johnson here, and I sure do hope you're enjoying the adventure. Remember when you first found out about Critical Role? Was it through a friend or a family member, or maybe even through the words of a stranger in the review section of our podcast many listeners find our show through word of mouth and recommendations so please consider rating and reviewing our podcast because each review makes an impression that may just

inspire someone new to give our show a try and that more than anything helps to support us thank you for joining us on this adventure. And until next time, let us try to leave the world a little better than we found it.