Critical Role - C3E49 The Aurora Grows

Episode Date: February 23, 2023

Bells Hells travel the aurora-filled skies of the Hellcatch Valley, concocting plans and gathering allies as the days tick down to the apogee solstice... Due to the improv nature of Critical Role and other RPG content on our channels, some themes and situations that occur in-game may be difficult for some to handle. If certain episodes or scenes become uncomfortable, we strongly suggest taking a break or skipping that particular episode.Your health and well-being is important to us and Psycom has a great list of international mental health resources, in case it’s useful: http://bit.ly/PsycomResources Watch Critical Role Campaign 3 live Thursdays at 7pm PT on https://twitch.tv/criticalrole and https://youtube.com/criticalrole. To join our live and moderated community chat, watch the broadcast on our Twitch channel. "It's Thursday Night (Critical Role Theme Song)" by Peter Habib and Sam RiegelOriginal Music by Omar Fadel and Hexany Audio"Welcome to Marquet" Art Theme by Colm McGuinnessAdditional Music by Universal Production Music, Epidemic Sounds, and 5 AlarmCharacter Art by Hannah Friederichs Twitch subscribers gain instant access to VODs of our shows like Critical Role, Exandria Unlimited, and 4-Sided Dive. But don't worry: Twitch broadcasts will be uploaded to YouTube about 36 hours after airing live, with audio-only podcast versions of select shows on Spotify, Apple Podcasts & Google Podcasts following a week after the initial air date. Twitch subscribers also gain access to our official custom emote set and subscriber badges and the ability to post links in Twitch chat!

Hello, spellcasters, sages, and spectators. I'm Ashley Johnson, and you're listening to the Critical Role Podcast Network. Tap into our magical narrative by watching Critical Role as it airs on Thursdays at 7 p.m. Pacific on twitch.tv slash criticalrole or youtube.com slash criticalrole. Twitch subscribers can watch the video on demand right away, or you can catch it the following Monday on YouTube. As always, Critical Role will be available right here in podcast form on Thursdays, a week after the initial broadcast. And now, let's scry into the story and see what mysteries it holds for us, shall we?

Hello, everyone, and welcome to tonight's episode of Critical Role, where a bunch of us nerdy-ass voice actors sit around and play Dungeons & Dragons. We're the best! Yay! We love you, guys! Before we jump into our session for the night, we do have some announcements to get through, beginning with our first sponsor, Forum. Sam.

Okay, here we go. What's up, TikTok? Here's a day in the life of my life as a Critical Role ad wonderkind. At 645, I get to my station. Here's my desk mates, RayRay and Texas Tea. Say hi, guys. Then I check out my assignment for the night. Looks like tonight is Thorum. They handcraft unique wedding bands out of everything from meteorite to whiskey barrels. Hashtag Whiskey Life. Hashtag Drunk Fingers. Hashtag Space Thumbs. It says here they ship every single ring within one business day and have been making rings for over a decade. Okay, y'all, be sure to stitch this

video with saying something that you've done for over a decade and it better be dirty. At about 650, I pick a genre of ad. Here's my genre options. Oh no. I can either do a stupid character or both. How about Australian Batman? Crikey, Robin, it's Auckland Joker. Why so Yahoo serious? Oh no.

Or a self-deprecating bit where I smile a lot to cover up my deeply rooted emotional problems. Nah, that's more of an Instagram thing. I could do a game show spoof where I ask Ray Ray which one of these is a real material that Thorum makes rings out of? World War II rifle stocks, dinosaur bone, or Damascus steel? Oh, whoa, nice millennial pause, RayRay. It was a trick question. They're all used by Thorum. I think

I'll go with option D, social commentary, where I mock a well-known trope from a major social media platform. Cue the TikTok dance music! Dance, RayRay! Dance, Texas Tea, dance! Are you going to dance? Oh no, no, no. This dance is called, If Millennials Are Old, What Does That Mean for Us? Oh no. Then at 7-10, I end my ad wanderkin day in the life by saying, whether you need a wedding ring, anniversary ring, or just want a ring that looks awesome, head over to Thorum.com and

use promo code CRITICALROLL. That's T-H-O-R-U-M.com and use promo code CRITICALROLL to get 20% off a truly unique ring. Thanks, TikTok. I'm running out of time. Be sure to like and subscribe. Oh, oh no. Ray, Ray, you fucked that up. I got to do it all again.

All right, here we go. Marisha, we got some other announcements to get through. Marisha, please, for the love of god, more announcements. We'll be taking a break. Immediately. Yeah, starting now. Now, our end of the month break is next week. Thank fuck.

Oh, thank fuck! It's the last Thursday of the month. Thank fuck. We'll be returning with Campaign 3, episode 50 on, oh shit, YouTube! Fuck! Oh no! We'll be back, too!

Wait, wait, wait. I think we're past the time, we're past the time. We're past the time, we're good. We may be leaving just in case. I don't know. We're gonna get demonetized always and forever. So subscribe and buy merch, because everyone everywhere on YouTube

is getting demonetized. This is about programming. We're going to be returning with campaign three, episode 50, March 2nd. Support your local YouTuber. Hell yeah. Travis, what's up? Throwing away my gum. Wow, I heard that. I almost saw it. You can watch the entire second season of The Legend of Max Machina Reborn! Prime

video, all 12 episodes, waiting for you to watch, rewatch, theorize, have a dance party. They have dance parties when they watch? Sure. Yeah! Don't forget, you can find all of our Twitch watch parties, breaking down everything from season two over on our Twitch and YouTube channels. Shoutout to our lovely host, Mica Burton, and all of our wonderful guests. Yes! So much fun. So much fun. And thank you, thank you so much for your support. We hope you enjoyed the second

season. Get yourself ready for season three. Ooh! Ooh! And I do believe that concludes our announcements. So let's go ahead and jump into tonight's episode of Critical Role. It's Thursday night One by one we climb until we reach the top Two by two we fall Will we meet our end or meet our destiny? Hold your breath and roll How do you want to do this?

It's Thursday night All ye critters come join us It's time to continue our flight There is magic and mystery, who knows what will happen in life But one thing's for sure, we all share the same goal. Adding more allies, taking more chances. Hold your breath and roll. You can certainly try.

It's Thursday night. All ye critters come join us. It's time to continue our fight There is magic and mystery from darkness, our friendship will rise But one thing's for sure, we never give up on the fight Oh, get ready It's Thursday night So, last we left off.

Sorry. Wow! Last we left off, Bell's Hells had barely escaped the Fey Realm after leaving a twisted mass of arcana and metal behind that was once considered Amalia's Key. Seemingly beyond reconstruction in the time window before the solstice is to arrive,

you are chased into the woods as you reached for the Exandrian Gate out of the realm, the flying fey dragon and its rider above the Sorrowlord himself. You manage to dodge murder, have a bout of rhyming interactions with the Keeper of the Exandrian Gate, and then eject yourself through back to your home realm,

which you've found to be beyond the threshold of a Shenador and actually within the older home turf of Imogen. Upon deciding that with the solstice being within a short period of time, actually within the older home turf of Imogen. Upon deciding that with the solstice being within a short period of time, your best journey forward towards it would be to recall your airship as your port buddy was seemingly discovered,

the plane rider, Ryn, vanishing from communications on site. You walked over towards Jelvan, where you're from, interacted with your father to ask some questions, gauge the tension of that relationship, and through some conversation, managed to acquire a keepsake, a relic of your mother's. The airship arrived, spooked the bumpkins,

as Captain Zandis did call them, and you climbed atop the silver sun, heading in a northeastern direction back towards Hellcatch Valley. 11 days. 11 days! Oh my god. Cool.

Until the solstice begins, as you now rise up into the clouds of the sky above, the horizon looming before you. You begin to pick up, Orym, this very faint drifting energy throughout the sky, just this faint filter, almost like ethereal waves that occasionally just ride through the sky

and then vanish from your sight. You've never seen this before. You're the only one with the keen enough eyesight to pick up the pattern. The sky's different. What do you mean? Just watch for a minute. Do you see that?

Do we see that? It takes you a good moment to really focus and pick up on it, and it's just these faint little waves of color. Rapidly changing color. Kind of helps if you cross your eyes a little bit. Oh, yeah, yeah. You can see it better.

That's a cell. You think we're near the edge? The edge of, oh. No. No. Okay. Well, that took the edge off. Have I ever seen anything like this around Jelvan before?

No. It's odd, because you focus on it, and it's just these momentary drifting sparkles, these little waves or veins of color that the way it looks across the sky, you can't tell how close or how far it is. There's no way to gauge the distance between you and at times it just, it's almost like a cloudless dream lightning,

but technicolor and ghostly in just moments. Is it all going in one direction? Does it seem like there's a flow? Make a perception check. Yeah. Sorry, I was having a moment there. It's not going to last.

11. 11. Don't believe it. There doesn't appear to be a continuous flow and the shifting sometimes goes left to right. Sometimes it looks smaller, larger, further, closer. It's hard to gauge at this particular height, but it is oddly beautiful.

Is it all different colors? Yeah, sometimes it comes in a purplish tint that goes to a dark red. Sometimes it has a turquoise that drifts to a faint yellow and then it's gone. It's unique. It's beautiful. Captain Zandis.

What is this? What's going on? Have you ever seen anything like this in your years of travel in the sky? Like what? Just hold still for a moment. Give it a minute. It helps to cross your eyes. Slightly cross your eyes. Then unfocus, focus on the middle,

and then unfocus your eyes. What in the hell is all of this? Don't really know what that is. What, should we go around that? I don't know. Is this a good thing? I don't know. It's a thing.

I'll go a little lower, I guess. The ship kind of. No avoiding it. Maybe. It is everywhere, though. I think it's everywhere. I mean, it... On the horizon.

You look on the horizon, and where you focus, you see it, the moments, and then you adjust to another part of the horizon, and you see it again, but different colors, different distances. I'm going to lay down, look up, just stare right at the sun, whatever's up there. Just vintage imperception.

Nothing up there. Disadvantage of perception check. Ah! Nothing up above. Okay. This is weird. Does it feel like it's alive, like it could be some sort of entity, or does it feel like it's just part of the atmosphere? Make an arcana check. Oh yeah, good. I have really good arcana. So it's all good. Three. Wow, five, six, seven, eight.

Three. Wow. Could be either. Kids, it's not above us. It's clear, or at least it looks clear. I don't know. Is it close enough to maybe try to touch it? Make cotton candy out of?

Yeah. You reach your hand out, and there's nothing there to touch. It's one of those things, once you put your hand up, you get a little more depth perspective on it. It is not close. Oh, it's not, okay. It's very far away. It is definitely far away,

or it just looks far away. It's hard to tell. It's not anywhere where you can reach it. When Xandis dropped down, is it still eye level, or did it seem like it's above us now? As Xandas drifted down, it still remains about eye level. And it's definitely not above us. Nothing this pretty can be dangerous.

Just to double check, can I use Hunter's Bang to see or smell or feel if this is any kind of fey realm bleeding over? Sure, make a perception check. 14. 14. I mean, you are uniquely attuned to outer magics, dark magics. You don't catch anything of that regard,

but there is the faintest bit of a buzz to the air around you. Like the faintest touch of a tongue to a nine-volt battery. There's just this ever-present vibration. And... It's potent. The air is. It is potent.

That very faint little taste at the end of your tongue of energy. I got a weird idea. Mm-hmm. Just in case, this may just be stupid. Let's find out. I'm going to try and I'm just going to spark up. I'm going to see what happens if I set up a pulse.

Spark it up! I'm going to have a magic effect, see what happens to a magic effect in the middle of this. Explode the ship! So I spark and I rage, just standing there. I'm just going to, I'm not even going to use my hammer. I'm just going to knock together. Okay, well go ahead and roll for what happens.

Well, this could get fun. I'm afraid. Two, so that is. This is the same person that smashed our. I think that's big. Yep. That's a. The lens. Smashed Fearne's backstory.

It's space. Yes, correct. Okay. As you begin to channel that power and emotion within you, there's just a gentle spark that drifts over your head that has a similar coloration, like ever so faint before it fades again.

So there's a very, very minimal reaction, but it's present. Is there anything? You would've all just seen a weird hole in space and time, just a broken mirror suddenly just flicker above me. I see what's going on. That's not okay.

There's so many weird things you can do, Ashton. Is that just you? Yeah, was that you or was that the sky doing that? I don't know. I'm pretty sure that wasn't, if it was me, I haven't actually had that ever happen before. So that's usually, I mean, things happen that don't happen before. That felt weird, even for me.

I don't really do things, things just happen to me. Things happen that haven't happened before. Yes. Life needs things to live. I know that's the stupidest fucking thing I've ever heard. I didn't say such a thing. Yes, Fën, you were saying? Oh, I was just going to look over the side to see if it's also under us. Did we already do this? No. Did someone already do this?, I was just going to look over the side to see if it's also under us.

Did we already do this? No. Did someone already do this? Yeah, I'm going to look over there. You don't really see it beneath you. You just see the countryside to the north of Jelvan and the rolling forests and jungle and the occasional splintering main roads that lead out of the Talon Highlands to the northeast.

You're more or less keeping above the road as the path that you're taking is pretty similar to the one that just heads into the Hellcatch. So you're probably aiming a little bit more southward to cut across at the most direct angle that the ship can. I don't really know what that is, but it's not too hard to do the math, is it?

It's because of the souls test coming up. Yeah, in my 400 years, I've never seen anything like it. It has begun. But hasn't there been a solstice closer a couple times in your lifetime, at least? Perhaps he's just so old he doesn't remember anymore. It may have happened plenty of times. It hasn't happened with a key as built up as the one.

We're also just in one place. As we keep flying, maybe we'll see it change or fade, or it might give us a sense to what it might be. I guess based on your age, you may have seen something like this, but it was stronger a long time ago. As you were in the northern region of Wildemount, in which during that time of year, which you recall,

the sun was low a lot longer through the day, and so your nights were more extended. During that time period, you indeed watched these shifting colors, and they grew more intense as the days went on before reaching this incredible display, and they just moved and eventually faded over the next week or so.

It actually does ring a bell, but I thought it just might've been the tea that I was having at the time, but this is great. They've also, you know, they're calling this an apogee solstice. I don't think I really know what apogee means. Big, strong, important. Do you actually know?

No, I don't. I'm just guessing. I don't know. Isn't there a definite, isn't apogee really a thing? Let me search my memory banks and see if that's something I can do. I'm going to search my memory banks and see if I can. Roll an intelligence check. Yeah, download a dictionary.

Where I have Ciri in me? What is this check? Just roll your intelligence modifier. Boy, two. Oh, wow. You have no idea. You're so smart. All of us are just so smart.

I am smart, I just don't know. Oh, jeez, it's like an apex. It's like the highest point of something, of us are just so smart. I am smart, I just don't know why. Oh jeez, it's like an apex. It's like the highest point of something, a culmination. So big, important, just like what I was saying. Exactly. So it's not like a normal solstice, it's a tall, big, fatty solstice.

So what are we going to do? Yeah, let's come up with a game plan here. We should contact people, we should prepare. Because we're heading towards something with, oh, just a shit ton of giant old automatons and armies. We need weapons. We got to break this thing down?

We need allies. We need allies. Who do we got? Eshteross, dead. Rin, frozen. What's the Tempest busy? Who do we got? Eshteross, dead. Rin, frozen. It's a good start. What's the Tempest busy? Well, anyone from the Grim Faraday, obviously.

Are they around? No, they're on a different planing. They're on the fire planing. I mean, well, some of them are on the Shadowfell and some of them are on the fire planing, but. Did we ever check in with them, by the way? To see if the Shadowfell team is doing okay? No. Okay. So that's on the roster.

How badly do we need this? Need what? Allies? Allies, things, people. Badly. Real fucking badly. Well, I can see this is going somewhere. Oh.

Yes, you should. Okay. Wait, is this you're calling in the rich lady? Hexum. I'm calling in Hexum, and I got one other one I can call in. But what can she, is she on the way? Can we pick her up?

She's not on the way, but she knows fucking everybody. Who's the other one? Maybe she would know something. How far are we, are we closer to where we're going than Jrusar? Yes. Yes. It would take from where you're heading now about a little longer to get to Jrusar.

Okay. And then to go from Jrusar to where you're heading now about a little longer to get to Jrusar. Okay. Then to go from Jrusar to where you're heading, it's another like six days. But we're passing over-ish Boceris. Wait. Oh yeah. Who's the other one? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, you got to talk now, Ash.

I can try and dig up the Nobodies. The Nobodies, that's his whole group. Oh, that's who he is. What if we recruited that hive mind in Boceris? Justi? Justi's a lot. I don't know if you really, well. If we're dealing with automatons,

I could try Dancer again. Maybe we need a lot. Don't you connected motherfuckers? I still have the weird bag of drugs that Justy gave me that connects us to the hive. I've never tried that stuff. I am, there would've probably been a time in my life where I would've been really into that right now,

but I don't know. It's there. I did have another idea. Someone, probably the only other person who really knows how to work these Malleus keys. Vex? Ira. Ira. Ira. Yeah.

And a hit. A hit. Yes. You just seem cool. You know, Ira doesn't seem to have many loyalties to anybody, and we certainly know. Well, we can message him. Yeah, no, he might make it work. And it might serve his purposes to fuck it up.

Yes, because he certainly doesn't like the Cerberus Assembly, we did get that. That's all right. You know, we could also. Chetney, would you be okay with that? Yes. Okay. As long as we're just guarded in our ask. Just in case he has sold out,

I don't want to give away anything. I wonder if he'd do it for shits and giggles or if there'd be a high price tag. There would be a price. I'd rather play a price, you know what you're getting. I'm sure he'd want something from the internet. Vex's husband, remember him? Ugh. He was the inventor.

Yeah, no, I know that he was a real asshole. It would be good to have an inventor on our team as well. I don't know, just putting it out there. A prissy piece of shit, yeah. Lord and Lady Whitestone, whatever they're. Lord and Lady of Whittleton. Not so smart. I could make shit with metal.

Let's try and come up with a list of people we don't owe. Let's find a list of people who owe us. I thought you said a list of people that we don't owe. Let's find a list of people who owe us. A list of people that we don't know. Well, that, too. Ira might be, Ira's an option. I don't know what Justi could do, but we could ask. I can look up the old crowd.

But who did we, and we need stuff. Who did we report that Eshteross had died to? What was her name? Oh yeah. She can tree jump. No, not her. Not the one that can tree jump. Oh.

Not Shania Twain? Mistress. Ashadri. Wait. That'd be worth a reach out, I think. Employer of the Green Seekers. They may not care, but. Oh, the, I think. Employer of the Green Seekers. They may not care, but. Oh, the Green, what about, yeah, the Green Seekers.

They're like private dicks. Also, is this for them? Yeah, but they're strong. They have connection. You know who's really strong and really great? Nannamari? Dorian. Oh. Oh. Dor?

Why haven't we told Dorian what's going on? I told him a little bit. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know how we'd get him here little bit. Yeah. Yeah. A little. I don't know how we'd get him here, but maybe. How we'd get anyone, and also anyone we want to get involved. First, what's the plan?

I don't know. Not everyone's going to hop an airship. Not everyone can get there, and then what? You barely know what's going on. We're giving you a 20-second message to brief you and meet us out in the hole. If we called Dorian and said, we need you, you know he'd be here as fast as he could. He says he's far away.

He walks through a portal to find someone to teleport him. Does he know you're, sorry, the voice of the Tempest? He's met her, but she's out and about. She's under something, but she's out and about. She's under something, right? Yeah. At the very least, the more people

we get the word out to, the more it's possible that they can do whatever they can from where they are. So Dorian has a good time. Oltgar. Oltgar? Yeah, didn't you mention him once? Oh yeah. Your old pal? He's not my pal.

He's the one that... Thought he was a boss. Should we just take a side note and do backstory? Instead of doing this. Look at the sky with fucking focus, people! Shit's happening! I thought you said he was a very talented emcee. Nana's always an option.

But will she actually come over? I mean, I imagine she could. Give Nana a minute. I imagine she could. So is this going to be like? We called in a huge favor with her on the other one. Cheats! My Nana, she'll do anything.

The Hivemind, Dancer, Imahara Joe, who can give us a car. Oh, he was the shit. We can pick up a car, drive it there. What would we do with a car? It's a giant hole in the ground. Just imagine this. The skyship descends, all right?

Dust flying everywhere, wind blowing everybody's hair. What's that in the sky? The front of the skyship, I don't even know if we have one of these, but the front of the skyship goes down like that. Vroom, vroom, vroom, vroom, vroom, vroom! The car just jumps out over, and we're like, vroom, vroom, vroom! And then straight into the hole

and crashes fiery at the bottom. Straight down into the, didn't we see a ramp down like that? And we're just picking off guys left and right and firing things and blowing off magic, and it's so fucking cool, and then the car crashes, but it doesn't matter, the damage has been done. That's how we did that. Several of us died.

The damage was done, really. We could also ask my parents, since they're already sort of... No one's on the car idea anymore. Maybe they can get the car and they can drive in. I'll also say, maybe Joe's got something else. Joe. Justy. I have a few other contacts I haven't used in Vox Ros. I could talk to Pocket.

I could see if we can find the nobodies. I got people. We can buy some shit. Who all was in the nobodies again? Milo? Milo was the only one that you got. There was Zeeland, Shady Sally, Bennett, and me. Shady Sally.

Right. Bennett and maybe it's a matter of contacting Milo and Milo can contact everyone else. Oh, that's fine. Milo, Shady Sally, Bennett. My only thing is, is we've got a very long list. We've got only nine days and a limited amount of times we can call people.

And also, Matt has to change characters for each of these sendings. You guys can do that out, too. Well, I'm prepared. Another thing. You're the only one at this table, clearly, who is prepared for the solstice. I'm just putting it right there.

Just something else to put out, as well. Fearne, what do you think would happen if we mixed Mori and Ira together? They'd be fucking on the field is what would happen. I mean, it could be. Sorry. I don't know where that went. I think they had a thing.

I think they had a thing. I don't know. Who was that? But they'll figure it out. Listen, I feel like people will put stuff aside. This is bigger than everyone's bad day squabbles. Yes, it's much bigger. It's much bigger than past relationships gone bad. Maybe new beginnings, you know?

But something I did just want to toss out there real quick. Ah, your arm is dislocated. Sorry. Something to keep in mind. Otohan is fucked up. Yeah. So is the Cerberus Assembly, and we saw just a little bit of what Trent could do.

Ludinus. I'm just. Wrong campaign. Ludinus Delef. Fuck! So 99 announcements clattering my brain. Yes, just, you know, I just want to throw it out there that we might be asking people to come and die. Yes.

They're going to, shit's going to get weird anyway. You know, the whole moon potentially being a deity-eating being. Yes. Yeah, you're going to die anyway, so don't you want to die trying to do the right thing? But also, we've made a list. We should probably check it twice

and figure out who's been naughtier. Nice. Let's say we double, let's say we, oh boy. That's something you might be interested in. Let's say what? Really? I've lost track of what a That was not okay. Sorry. Where'd you go there?

The realms have been crossing. Bah. Maybe. Where'd you go there? The realm's in the crossing. Bah humbug. Bah humbug. Let's say we quadruple the number of people who can help us. What are we going to do to make a difference once we get there? All we know how to do is break it.

Are we parking five miles away and sneaking in? Breaking is a good... Vroom, vroom, vroom. We literally, do we have to, because what do we do, charge in? Well, we have to get eyes on it first, right? Maybe if he doesn't give us a vehicle, maybe Imahara Joe could concoct

some sort of a bomb or something for us. If we charge in head first, we die. When we were in that dream and we were moving into the sinkhole, and moving down and in, was it a focused vision, or could we have seen inroads from topsoil down into the sinkhole? Did we notice any?

You mentioned cranes, but I don't remember if there were. There are walkways that spiral down into the interior of it. I mean, it is an excavation, so people had to be able to travel into and out of to pull out earth, dirt, dust, rocks, as well as artifacts and ruins, and be able to be part of this excavation

before it was taken over by Ludinus. So, yeah. Here's an idea. Please just let me finish. When we were in the dream, looking at those other automatons and the architecture of the place, it reminded me a lot of myself.

I'm just wondering if we could have Imahara Joe fasten me with something explosive, and I just go in and act like I'm part of their automaton crew, get in, hit the button, blow up, and then that's it. And then lose yourself? Wait, no, no, no, no, hold on. There might be a way to reconstruct me

after the fact or something. I also have an idea. Are we finished? Are we good? Yeah. Okay, then no, but also, yeah, teleport. Okay, what if, guys, in the Hellcatch Valley, y'all remember one of the creatures we fought, the one chasing after its baby?

Wyrm. Oh yeah. The dust drive. I have one of their pincers or tusks or something. They burrow deep underground. We almost carried one with the skyship. Yeah. What if we find a way to burrow under? Hit it from the side.

We could charm it or something. Charm monster. Yeah. Who's good with animals? Are you? Yes! Do you have charm? Monster, though. It's not an animal, though. It's good with animals, are you? Yes! Do you have Charm Monster? That was not an animal, though, it's a monster. I am amazing.

It's a monster, it's a monster. Animals, obviously, but monsters, that's a new thing. I was able to communicate with it at the time, I don't. Oh, that's right. You could communicate with it or you could feel what it was feeling? We would have to travel with it a long way because if we fly in, we're moving target in the air,

so we have to land way early and then get, I mean. That's the reason for the car. That sounds fun, to be honest, but we'd have to get it from 50 miles away. I don't know, it just felt like, that's an interesting idea. I will say the camouflage part of that idea, though, is not insane.

Not the blowing up part? But yeah, to Ashton's point, yeah, you might be able to at least take something in as a delivery method. They're ready for a bomb. They are not ready for a tree. They did see you. They could cover you.

I mean, we could cover you in another body. Joe could make some sort of a distraction. Because you were similar to them? Or they're the same size? No, not same size, but similar. The ones you saw there were 15 feet tall, these massive automatons that were just hulking around. But you said that the architecture

or the design of the area was familiar? Well, there were heavy ruins in the space that weren't familiar to you, but the construction of this central Malleus Key, it was much larger, much more... What's it called? Much more... Fortified? I'd say fortified is the word I'm looking for.

And the overall design of its fortification and the tech that you could see that it's based on was very reminiscent of elements of your memory that you've been able to recover. It's bonafide. And we know that these ruins are pre-calamity ruins. You were told by Planerider Wrynn that these were Tristan Ruins,

which was a mysterious historical culture that followed ley line nexuses and built ruins around them, and that's what this excavation was about. Like the ancient aboriginals of this area. More or less, yeah. What was your headpiece mask that you found? Yeah. That wasn't

the same people. These were different people? No, that was the... Sorry, I'm just trying to get everything. It's Shari. It's okay. Yeah, that's the whole conversation. I believe... Yes, we still need to have that.

We might've talked about this at one point, maybe, but to have an inside man would be great. Your mother? Yeah. Would she do it? Would she give her fuck? Oh, I don't know. Yeah, what's your vibe with Mom? She always cuts it short.

Feels like you have to see her in person. Maybe, but... God, if I can catch her when she's sleeping. You can keep trying. And maybe you could say, we're coming, it's happening, we're going to fuck up some shit. Are you with us or not? Yeah, I got to try to pull her back.

It feels like she doesn't have a choice, you know? And she's trying to keep us away. Imogen, you keep getting spotted during your dreams, right? Yeah. Are you able to look around and see if anybody's doing the same thing to you? I tried it after our last...

But the air is different now. I don't know if something might be more clear. Everything's still the same, right? There hasn't been any shit. It's just very, very charged. Sure, let me... Let me just step away from everyone. I'm going to try to get away from the group a little bit,

and I'm going to open my mind up and see if I can sense anything around. Okay. You open your mind to the space around you. You do not sense any other presences, which leaves you at ease. Okay. There is this very, very faint, underlying,

best way I can describe it is almost like a static or a buzz that you haven't heard before when you've done this. This very light which just rests on the periphery of your consciousness. If I look out at the floating lights, If I look out at the floating lights, does the ripple coincide at all with the static,

or is it just a constant white noise sort of vibe? It just feels like a constant white noise. I mean, there's maybe some bursts where it gets a little louder or softer, but it's perpetually there. Uncertain if the two are connected. Weird. In between you and you and you

feeling things in the air, I don't know. I don't know. I guess that... Who knows if there's a way to harness it? Use that energy. Well, maybe we should start checking off some of the folks on the list. Reaching out. Yeah.

Do you have it today? I do. Wait, have we rested? We did. We rested. My eyes don't work anymore. Yeah, I think you did take it at the beginning of the day because I'm down one of the spell slots when we tried to contact Wrynn or something. We haven't slept since then.

I think we all know who the first person we want to reach out is to, right? Dancer. Ira. Imahara Jett. I was going to say Ira, but those are also good. Ira? Ira. Ira feels... Ira is the best start.

Okay. All right. You had these kind of plans. Tell him I said hello. I will definitely try. I got to think about what we're going to say here. How much do we fill him in? Howdy, y'all. It's a little late for subtlety.

No, I'm aware. Yeah, yeah, I would say... Yeah, you're good at this. Silence is a way out. What can we offer him? Isn't he in this for money, or is he in this for power? I think he'll get out of it what he wants to get out of it. He could walk with something from that Malleus Key

that we don't give a fuck about. Where is the, what's the valley, what's the excavation site? The Tishton. Tishton Excavation, yeah. T-I-S-H-T-A-N. He's been to the excavation site? He's been there.

Didn't he help deliver gear there? You're uncertain. He was present for the creation of the Feyrealm one, and that was the end of his relationship with them. You do recall that the device that he built in the Calloway Hideout seemed to operate differently from the other Malleus keys, or the one that you've seen, and the way it was described.

And he utilized it like an odd, flexible telescope to look to the northwest of where they were, to the west-northwest. Is the northwest-northwest the Tish'nishkavishn? It is loosely in the same area based on the conversations you've had with members of the Verity, yes. Got it. Okay.

I would also think we could probably ask what his intent is. Yes, it's all about. And at your discretion, you could hint at what we've already done. Okay. Let me also, real quick, make sure we're... 30 seconds or less. Yeah. No pressure.

I'm just making, just quickly going over what we've learned from Ira before. And then we know how much time is left. Okay. What are you looking at real fast? I was quickly just making sure we know. Fucking, fuck. When did we see that? Was that before the Heartmoor or after?

Fucking fuck is what I heard. Fucking fuck. It was after the Heartmoor. Was it after the Heartmoor? Yeah. There we go. Bassuras, right. Here we are, here we are.

Outside of Bassuras. We can go ahead and just go. No, no, let's just watch you read. Okay. All right, I'm going to try to contact Ira. Oh god. Very well. You got this. You got it. Yeah.

And I'm trying to get him to meet us there. I think we need to find out what he is intending. Just, I guess first, just, we're going to fuck up the Malleus Key. Are you in? All right. Because it's not his. If so, where are you? We can do that coordinating later.

All right. Yeah. All right. Mm-hmm, yeah. All right. Here we go. Ira. Have some fun for ya. We're going to fuck up the Malyas Key at Tishton. You want to play?

That was so hot. I would definitely say yes to that, wow. I'm just going to sway. When people respond to your Sending spell, it's normally like a conversation that's sourceless within your mind. This voice seems to creep up over your shoulder into your ear.

Oh, really? All this time, I thought we were on the opposite sides of interest. Curious how you intend to help, but I'm listening. Okay, okay. All right. He's interested.

I think he wants to do it regardless of if we're doing it. So he might already have an idea? A plan? God. Does he have a plan? Is he already gone? We can figure that out once we pick him up. Yeah.

Fuck. You said he wanted we pick him up. Yeah. Fuck. You said he wanted to know our plan? Yeah. Should ask where we meet him. Yeah, do we tell him our location and can he get close to that? Or do we just ask him where he is? Or both? I don't mind. Tell him where we are.

We're passing over Baciris. And how long, Captain Xandas? I don't know. Captain Xandas kind of went sober. Oh, well, if the weather is nice for us, maybe about six days or so, six, seven days. Fuck. Oh. Six days of doing nothing?

This is so fucked. This is great. Look, this here is one of the fastest ways to travel in Exandria. You don't like what you're doing. It's all sun. You're very happy with. Look at the perennial sunning in, you guys.

It really adds youth to your life. God, what's this smell? Here comes the sun! Do-do-do-do! What's that extra hole? Don't you have the Oshie nose before? Wow. Follow your nose.

Yeah. Okay. Just changing up the Exandrian gnome lore here. Okay. Passing over Basuras in about six days. It's looking white, though. Where are you? Or if, yeah. Doesn't he also like,

He needs some Basuras in six days. Yeah, Desi? Let's take the active. Maybe ask him to. You watched him vanish. Tell him where we are. Yeah. Where we're going to be, and ask him where he is or something.

Tell him to join us on the ride. Yeah. Maybe tell him about the stuff in the air. Maybe he'll be interested by a ride on an airship. Yeah. All right. Hey! No bad ideas. Okay. All right.

Then we don't have to blow through every ounce of arcane energy you have. Yeah. Anyway, how are you? Okay. I need to see the guy. That's crazy. Meet us. Ooh.

So direct. I mean, it is. Take off your shirt. We just left Jelvon on an airship. God. Skyship in Matt's world. Oh, Skyship. Is that within your realm of capabilities? If not, Bosphorus in six days.

We're passing over Bosphorus in about six days. Laudna says hi. Laudna says hi. That's it. Jeez. Frigga. I've always wanted to ride the skyship. Well, you know where to find me.

Oh fuck you. Still in the place we last met. You're not, are you? Hanging out with the Calloways. Calloway Hideaway. All right. That's just north of the Boss Room? Yeah. That's actually called a bad place to

have a little rendezvous planned. Yeah. All right. All right. Okay. Look at that. One for one. One for one. Okay.

Wait a minute, didn't he ditch us? Didn't he bamf away at the Calloways? Or did he? He did. So, but he's back there now? He stole the crown. The apparatus is still there. We've got Ira and my parents will follow. Who was the other person that was in there?

Imahara Joe's around there? Oh, no, the little halfling. Yes, hang on, wait. You had a cool name. It's a goblin, actually. Hondir is who you're talking about, right? Hondir. Yeah. Yeah, Hondir and the-

Who's also part of the Grim Verde. Correct. Who was told to stay with the Calloways. That is a good place to touch down, because if Ira is able to dance us around the flat disk of Exandria, then we could park the ship where it can't be seen and then get in close.

And we don't have to deal with the mess. It's just science, Chet. The mess of Valseris. Yeah. All right, well, I used up all of my third levels. What do you got? I got a couple. Who am I calling?

I can make a meteor swarm any time, Liam. When I'm doing my perception, I can feel it going down. Mysterious cataracts just coming on extremely quick. Do we want to keep contacting morally ambiguous people, or do we want to get into disappointing friends? Which direction do we want to go? Well, if you're wanting to contact Joe to make some sort of camouflage for you, if that's really going to happen,

then he needs all the time he can get. Joe would be a good- So you need to hit up Joe so he has time to make something. We should probably see if we can hire him to deliver to the hideout. Oh, yeah. And just to remind you, we already did the bomb.

I think they're going to be expecting one. I don't think it's a great plan. Might as well have bombs. Yeah, just for that plan, for the tie it to FCG and send it in. I don't think that tie it to FCG and send it in with a bomb is a great plan. I don't like that.

No, but we could chuck some bombs into the hole. I'm still a little bit, I think we can do better. Already kind of a bomb? A killing machine? Like the inside, the little sparky that this is? Yeah, you can self-detonate. It's like a switch, right? Just like kill, kill, kill.

No. Well, I mean, we don't even have to do that. I could be invisible and walk down there with a bomb. And then leave it and then come back out. They got all kinds of magic that can see through that stuff. So do I, motherfucker. Do you have magic that can see through that? No.

Bomb will be final plan in the meantime, because I will throw you off the edge of the earth. What do we want him to make for us, a bomb or a camouflage? Camouflage or... Like, how would he know what to make? Actually. He hasn't seen these guys. Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute.

25 words? I seem to have, I seem to have. Maybe he's got some idea about how we can drill underground. We were talking about drilling underground. I mean, mining equipment is a thing that exists. It's a giant junkyard. That will take so much more than a couple days.

And a week. Well, unless there's... It's at the very least worth seeing what's available. That monster- Aren't there fucking holes? There's sinkholes all through Hellcatch, really. There are, yeah. Is this one of them? You don't know? But on the map, they're hundreds of miles apart.

It's not that they're. They are. People have figured out how to move around these things. If we locate that monster, which I don't know how we would, but if we did, maybe Imahara Joe could make us some sort of a cradle, a carrying cradle for the Skashe? Well, you remember why that creature was chasing after them in the first place.

For its babies? It had captured a baby, yeah. A baby? So what if we capture a baby? Okay. Holy Bobby. It'll follow us. Now. Okay. How do we capture a baby?

I don't know. People do it, though. So would I have any idea how they, what sort of, I don't want to say mining operations, but do people clearly go down and explore some of these things on occasion? These sinkholes? Oh yeah. I mean, there's a lot of different interests out there, dude,

because the sinkholes, there's something odd about the occasional arrival of one, and then the occasional vanishing of one. Interesting. And some of them within have deep, deep-set subterranean tunnels from a time long before that people are trying to study the source of. Many of them tend to be dustra travel tunnels,

and then some appear to be much older. So there might be a way of finding out if there's some sinkholes next to the site, and there's got to be, people have done mining operations. Is it possible to find something that may not be able to drill fast, but a way of trying to,

at least seeing if someone knows if there's any tunnels that come close enough to where we're trying to get to. Ask around. Imogen, you're essentially suggesting we kidnap a baby and then use it like an Etch-A-Sketch. Pretty much. Over top of it? Why, yes, I am.

We're barely going to make it in time if we beeline it. We're going to go, sorry, I'm just trying to shoot holes in everything because things are fucked. I like the idea of trying to see if there's some way of getting close to it underground and then finishing up that run. Well, you're right.

Or maybe we should focus on the simplest plans first, and then tonight we can do a dream and look for sinkholes around the area or something. Just curious, we never went near the Drowned City, right? You did not. Contact anybody else. Hexum maybe is possibly a good catch-all for Joe. I'll try Joe and just ask if we can do a bomb.

On the bomb, we tried to blow up, the first Malleus Key, and that thing barely made a dent from the inside. So we're talking about. It's dynamite. A stick of dynamite is different than a full fucking lock. Of course, I get that. But you described that key

that we're headed towards as massive, so it's got to be massive. Well, well, well, okay. From what you told us, I remember, you have that arcane power accumulator in your body, and it can detonate if it's overcharged with arcane power. Right, that's how we took down the other one. That's how we took down the other one.

So basically, you're already a bomb. So maybe we can ask Joe if there's some way to make an overcharge situation. Yes. But it'll kill FCG. Maybe the only way to chop off my head or something and keep my memories. No, no, no. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Hang on, though. Hang on. Why would that work?

I don't know where my, you're right. I don't know where my memories are stored. I see what Fearne is going for, though, because there were other little arcane cores that he had hanging around his shop. We don't have to use you, but we could use a similar something to maybe go around and attach them to the,

I'm assuming this Malleus Key is going to work. Do we still have some of that radiduum, regiduum, green powdery? Oh yeah, that stuff. You're welcome. Wow. I love it when we all get dumb. Yeah, you do. You don't have to keep any of it, right? Yeah, you don't have to keep any of it. You gave it. I don't know if we got the key. We got rid of it. Yeah, you got rid of it. We didn't steal any of it, right?

No, you gave it to Joe. You delivered that to the... Oh, to Percy? No, to the lord and lady. They took all of it, if I recall. Or no, we gave them some of it. I don't think we gave them all of it. No, they blew myself up. Well, no.

No, no, no. No. Change member says yes. Keep it on the table. I wonder if you could just suck in all the power and then just leave. It'd be good for draining the batteries if we got real close.

I actually have an idea that I think would work without anyone having to explode. Okay, what's that? I'll write it down. Okay, okay. Captain Zandis. Yes, what can I do for you? The Drowned City. I'm just looking at this map that I look at every night

before I go to bed. Why do they call it the Drowned City? Have you been over or above it at all? I went around it. It's an archeological dig, but it's not much of a city anymore. It's old, it's apparently drowned. I mean, I try not to fly over the Hellcatch too much

for obvious reasons. To limit you all, we just keep on going over it. It's just a party. An archeological dig? Like open mines? Or sinkholes that have been mined? I don't know. What's happening in there? Well, so in this map,

Tishton is, we're going this way again towards Basurus, right? Essentially, but we're way over here. You're south. Oh, we're south, coming up north. Yeah, kind of like, if you're looking at it this way, they're coming from the Talon Highlands, which is the southwest of where it is.

So you guys are coming up over those mountain ranges, over to Bassuras, and more or less, from what you know, the area to the northeast of where Bassuras is, on the northeast part of the map, is the loose area you're heading. Okay. What's this? Is that it? That's a sinkhole.

Or at least a recently known sinkhole. But it's here-ish. Or is it up past this corner? Could be up in this area. Well, the Drowned City's there, and an archeological dig seems weird. It's not like we have time to waste, but. Nothing at the moment.

We're wasting time one way or another. It just seems weird that they excavated. Sorry. Every once in a while, I get my youth back and it's hard to resist. Every once in a while, I just- Why do they look at you like that? Huh? What? It's like Laudna. She just radiates magnetism and horror.

I just figured that maybe we could take a look at the soil and how it was excavated and know if there are any things that we can manipulate from the ground before we get there. If it caves in, is it loose? Is there something that we can do to activate those big ass worms? I see what you're getting at.

I mean, I'm... Hey, everybody. So stupid. Holy shit. Oh my god, you put a fucking GoPro on it? But what's even more dumb is that it's not even on, is it? It is on. Oh my god. They can trigger it remotely from the control room. It has too much power. It has too much power.

I know. To Chet's points, back on task, they're using this Tishtin excavation site for a reason. You mentioned that it felt familiar, the architecture. We know it's pre-calamity. They're using this excavation site because it has obviously, probably some sort of power, right? It's just like the one in the Feywild.

They needed all of these little power-chargey, orby battery things. So I'm assuming they are using whatever is there in that excavation site to generate an immense amount of power. In stored batteries, which they've duplicated, it seemed like, from that dream, but also if they're really hedging their bets here,

you would also have a mainline power source, like a pipeline. 100%. Yes, that's what I was trying to get at. Thank you, Chet, you're so smart. Thank you. Magnetism. All right, I'm going to call Joe.

What am I asking him? For a bomb? On wheels. Let him know the situation. Time is of the essence. Tell him we all said hi. Don't. Time is of the essence.

Fuck him. Tell him exactly where we're heading and the whole situation. If he has any ideas and that we do need to get in and fuck this thing up, and that we're tempted to stop by this other site and take a look at it and see if there's any. Yeah, just let him know. We're thinking about heading over here,

but we're also going to go over to this place. There's lots of plans in the air. You know, however he can help, that'd be great. All right, I'm ready. Here goes. over to this place. There's lots of plans in the air. However he can help, that'd be great. All right, I'm ready. Here goes. Oh boy. Grass here. Need a bomb. Can pay.

And a single rider vehicle. Fast. Six days delivered to Calloway Getaway. I don't know if he knows what that means. Respond. He doesn't. He's never been there. And that's not. I have six more words? Yeah.

What else can I say? Any of the things we discussed? Blowing up the Malleus Key. Does he know? He didn't know what a Malleus Key is. Blowing up something. World going to end. Yes, world going to end. I mean, a really, really, really big one. Yeah.

Really, really, really big. Oh, hey. Oh, okay. I can see what I can put together. Let me talk to Esmer or Verna. Don't know the place you mentioned. That's it. Okay, okay. I can follow up.

Oh boy. Are we going to? Top of the list. Look at the sky, not fucking around. Do you want to die? Whoa. Wow. How did you do that?

Sorry! That's some deep poetry. That would have been helpful yesterday. How would you find the Calloway Hideaway? It's hidden. Maybe the Calloways can, and we'll go pick it up. Get a hold of the Calloways. They've got some days.

Maybe the Calloways can go get it. That's a good idea. Scratch that. Calloways will pick've got some days. Maybe the Calloways can go get it. That's a good idea. Okay. Scratch that, Calloways will pick it up. They're not alive. And maybe some information about what's happening so that we can have a very smart person thinking about our situation. Please. Like what?

There's a device we need to blow up? Mentally talk. Ah. There is, tell them about the key, where it is that we're going to be trying to fuck this thing up and that the solstice is going to be a big deal. How would that help him make a bomb?

I do. May I just try to see if, I don't know how I would know how to do this, but I want to just see if I feel if anybody's watching us. Fuck yeah. Make a perception check. Okay. So I just feel it in the air. Oh! Whoa!

Sorry! Mark! I was reacting audibly to something Taliesin was saying silently. I took the scribe all while the phone goes up. Yes, mark. Oh yeah, good call.

Nothing? All right, keep going. 14. 14. What did you say? Scientists were able to recreate one sound. All right. Sorry. I'll send another message All right, sorry. I'll send another message to Joe.

Okay. Second message. Scratch that, Calloways will pick up. What else? Look at the sky. Danger close. Paint a picture. I have to, okay.

The solstice will bring mayhem. Look at the sky. With your eye. Wait, did you tell him how many days? Oh my. How soon he needs to make it? In nine days. We all say hi. We all say hi.

Or is it 11 days? You only got three words? Laudna says hi. Oh no! All right, that's a lot to process. I'll look out for the Calloways. Don't know how soon, but soon as I can. And that's the last of you. That's great. So earnest.

Forthcoming. I still got some more sendings, last you get. That's great. So honest. Forthcoming. I still got some more sendings, if you want. Who else? Well, I guess probably the Calloways. Are you going to ask them for bombs? There's a lot of days to travel, too. Huh? There's a lot of days to travel, too.

You can take them day by day if you want to, or you can do them all at once. Your call. No, yeah, I mean, they will have to be day by day. But crossing them off the list as we get them. We've got Hexum, we've got Joe. The, um... We can only contact people. Caleth, we've got Dorian.

Grim Verity. Wait, can you talk to? Yeah, okay, we can talk to him through the stone. You can't talk to people you don't know, can you? No, which is dark. That would be crazy. Only people that I've met. I forget. You don't know, can you? No, just don't. That would be crazy. Oh, the people that I've met. I forget. I think I have to be familiar with them.

Okay, so. So potentially. I don't know, Milo's not here. Yeah, I haven't, I was able to contact Fearne's parents before I met them because she told me about them. Actually, so Hexum would be a good one. You know, No Pocket, Jum would be a good one. No pocket. Jester would be off the list. Milo.

Let's hit up Milo. At the very least, Milo might know where the rest of the nobodies are. Okay, and what am I saying to Milo? What do I want Milo to do? I was going to have you. I can talk to Milo. I don't know Milo. Just, can you reach out to the nobodies

and we'll call you again tomorrow? Situation dire. We're going to be in Bowsorus in six days. I can't believe it, but I need to meet up with them. I've got a job. We've got a job for the Nobodies if they meet in Bowsorus in six days. Can he build stuff, too?

Lilo, yeah, but they're not anywhere near where we're... They've been in Jrusar for a number of years, as you have. Yeah. Getting them to Basris might be a little tricky. Sure. All of you. All right. To Milo. Milo! Ashton wants their friends back.

What's that voice? The Nobodies reassembled. Oh god. For a fun mission. No. Can you get as many of them as you can to Basuras? In six days. In six days? Pink.

To Basuras, six pink is what the last two. Is that everything? Letters? You're fucking with me. That's it. Oh shit! Wow, what a waste of a- You cast a fourth-level sending. Can we not do the weird,

like, you're trying to date voice? I don't know, that was like trying to, like... Smiley day. Oh god. No, I'm not fucking with you. We need them to get a hold of Justy when they get to Basuras. Justy.

We need them to get a hold of Justy in Basuras. Ashton is super serious, he's doing that face. Six days. Six days. Yeah, is that face. Six days. Shit. Six days. Shit, yeah. Is that everything? Shit's fucked. Shit's fucked, they say. Thank you. Okay.

I can't get to Bastros in six days. Oh, rest in. I don't know where the others are. Okay. I can try. where the others are. Okay. I can try. That's cool. Wait, why six days? Don't we have 11 days?

Well, six days to Bostrus. Oh. Who's next? I got two fourth levels. You want to do Hexum? That's also a good lesson at maybe trying to figure out who is the best people. Who can get there. Yes. We could try Hexum. Who is the best people there. Yes.

We could try Hexum. How is Hexum going to get there? She won't, but she knows fucking everybody and she's got people everywhere and she was selling shit to them for the first place. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. What is the directive? Get someone to Baciris to help us?

Why don't we reach out to someone from the Grim Verity? That seems like something we really should do. Because we haven't thought of it yet. Which is clearly why we don't. Like, one of the first things we actually mentioned. That's actually the first of my list. Here we go. Yeah, same as mine. Grim Verity is right here on our list.

Number one. Number one. All right, well, we know. Who do we know? Um, what's his butt? Oh no, she got feeble-minded or something. That's number one. Number one. All right, well, we know. Who do we know? What's his butt? Oh no, she got feeble-minded or something. Oh no, no, no, but the people who were in the fire plane with us.

Why can I never remember his name? I know, and it's a cute name, too. That's a cute name. Evan Old Kai. Evan Old Kai, Dr. Baron Vestishow. Yeah. Can't hurt. Probably him first, right? Sure.

The only reason I hit Hexum is because she does have people everywhere, and she may know someone that can get us some equipment, something like that. These notes, man. She knows people. I can't follow mine at all. I just have Orgrio, mobster. Doesn't have a leg, but has a canku?

I know. Wow. Holy shit. What is that? Holy shit. I don't know what that means. Are we sure that was an elf? I don't know if that says leg or something else.

I think when our campaign's done, that becomes a coffee table book, if that is. Don't have a leg. An ARG, where everyone's trying to figure out your notes. And no one would be able to. You're going to be testing AIs on this shit. Oh no. Someone has a canku?

I don't even remember that. Who has a canku? Anyway. Yeah. It's a canker sword. It was a canker sword. Canker sword, that's one. That might have been jet lag notes. That's okay.

So yeah, let's do Grimdarity. Okay, okay. I'll send a message to Ebonald Kai. Very well. See if he knows how the Shadowfell team is doing. Maybe give him an update that we destroyed the Fey Realm one. Yeah, because who knows what,

and let him know about Wrynn. And let him know about Wrynn. Okay. Can somebody count? Because Chetney's got this future piece of tech going right now. And let him know about Wrynn. And let him know about Wrynn. Okay. Can somebody count? Because Chetney's got this future piece of tech going right now. Okay.

You've got this, you're very capable. I'm just trying to think of... You have it. I was just thinking of it. Chet's got it, he's got it. Okay. I'm back. Hi. I didn't know where you were.

Let me roll a d100 real quick. Oh shit! No, I'm just kidding. We destroyed the key in the Fey Realm. And I've seen the key here reinforced. How goes the Shadow Realm? Rin is taken. Need help?

Goddamn, you're so good at that. That's very good. Oh dear, day's a jester. Yeah. We still are waiting in Reen's domain. They can't leave. Fucking stuck. They can't leave. Oh fuck. As far as I know, our compatriots

went to the Shadowfell, but I have no idea of success. That's it. Oh no. We have a plan right. We have to play while I'm out of there. Yeah. All right. I think I've got enough vitamin D. Just counting on his fingers

as his legs are in the air. And toes! Wow. Shit. Wow, that sucks. They might be stuck there. Fuck. Unless they can find a scroll. Maybe Wren has scrolls.

Hope they packed a bunch of weapons. No grocery store. What happens when you get hungry in the Shadowfell? Is it normal, or do you get weird? I hear the fire flame. I hear the fire flame. Who knows, but Wrynn might've gotten the other team to the Shadowfell.

Holy fuck. Yeah, we might be hit, you guys. And we don't know anyone in the Shadowfell team to reach out to. Yeah, no. No. Shit. Well, I have that idea, if you want to hear it. Oh, I thought you were going to write it down or something.

Yeah. So it doesn't involve any of us getting close or blowing up, but in your dream, it was a sinkhole, right? Yeah, it was a big hole. Open air and near the bottom, along all those cranes and walkways, there was the key.

More fortified, double power source, but still open. Well, we're on a massive airship. What if we just crash the airship into the key? We could charge up the crystals on here. One of us would have to steer it down. Why? Yeah. I've got federal law. Because it would be so glorious. Captain Zandas?

That's not a bad idea. Yeah, she's not listening to the conversation. She's like, Did you say my name? Never mind. Okay. I mean, we could create distractions and we could make redundancy plans and everything,

but if really the failsafe is that thing can't work, it can't function. Hi, brother. I doubt much will if you crash this fucking thing into it is that thing can't work. It can't function. I doubt much will if you crash this fucking thing into it from thousands of feet in the air. I'm sure there'll be lots of magic and they've got to have some kind of defenses, but... I don't know.

Unless there's a latticework over it or something that we didn't know about. There might be. Well, we can do more scouting in Dreamland. I do think this is a good redundancy plan. I would rather have Joe working on a way of making whatever we do with this worse than any little, you know.

Sure. I wouldn't rule it out, though. 35 people. Not all. That's an interesting idea. Making something to make this worse, yeah. We'll make it up to Captain Zandis. Oh yeah. Okay.

Well, he'll be on the ship, right? What happened there? I heard my name twice. We were saying, it's just so smooth this time around. You can really feel the mastery of your craft. Well, thank you very much. Just wait till we get to the Hellcatch. You'll be changing your mind really fast.

That sounds right. You might, too. How fast can this go? Buddy's fast. This is as fast as it goes. If it were, theoretically, well, never mind. So we would have to sort of- Terminal velocity, obviously. Chop off all the things that keep it afloat.

Right, the little, the brimstone. Yeah, the stones. Can't just point it down. Turn it off. Turn it off. Can't we blast the brimstones? Yeah. Like once we land, some of us could be like, gaboosh. Well, if you let them go, they just go that way.

Oh, that's nice. We'll have to figure something out. I don't know, I'm going to think about it. We could just keep the brimestone if we're able to. Let it go. Chain the, I mean, there's a way to make the- We could still use the brumestone on another boat. I mean, if we win, it, I mean, we'll win.

There are obvious, there's problems with this plan, right? We saw a plane rider, Rin, close to the key. We'd have to move that statue if there's any hope of saving them, so. There's got to be a way to, I mean, the fact that we're not flying up into the air right now, I don't actually know how these things fly.

I should really look into that. Over the next few days, a few of us should learn how to captain this thing. Yeah. That's actually a good idea. I can probably do it. I'd be in for that. Fearne? Yeah. That would be great.

Oh, I'm joining you for this, yes. I absolutely want to learn how to fly this thing. I think I've done some boating before, so I think. Whoever learns to fly it maybe should be someone who can jump off of it and not die, like someone who can feather fall or turn into a bird or something. I can't do that. Well, turn into something.

Who all is down there? We know that Rin is, and Im turned into something. Who all is down there? We know that Rin is, and Imogen's mother almost definitely is. She's a real problem to do. Last us all, yes, she's there. Hey, DM. These ravines in the map, these guys.

Yeah. If you were up on ground level, are those that they go down like that? Correct, yeah. Some of them are gradual, some of them are cliffs, some of them actually pull back in. A lot of them have just been there for a long time and they've been cut deeper by sudden monsoons

and heavy, heavy floods that carve through and just get dug deeper and deeper into the Hellcatch. Are they tens of feet deep, or are they more like semi Grand Canyon deep, like hundreds of feet? Semi Grand Canyon. So another thing to consider is we don't also have, we don't have to attack from above

where it would be easy to see us. We could go into there. Yeah. We could try. I mean, if we're close to the ground where shit's already fucked up in the Hellcatch, but you could Top Gun Maverick that ravine. Yeah, full Maverick. Up and over and in.

It's a great story, you should watch it. Inverted. Best of all time. Can we invert this cut? Oh shit. Because I was inverted. So. Okay. This. Okay.

That does feel like if we do that, we would still need a sky team and a ground team. We're also relying on dreams. Who all is down in this hole? It's Rin and Imogen's mom, but... Rin and Imogen's. Rin and Imogen. Is everyone who's there willing for their cause?

Are they putting people to work? Are there innocents down there? You've tried pleading with your mom, but have you threatened your mom? I have not threatened her. And I mean, yes, to Orym's point, we are talking about, I mean, there are going to be casualties, let's be honest,

but your mother, could you live with that? That. We've got to try to find a way to have a ground team. Yeah. If nothing else, then to get Rin out of there. Otherwise, people are stuck in the Shadowfell. People are stuck in the Shadowfell. People are stuck in the Fire Plane. There's so many lives lost if Rin goes down. I wonder if your mom could help Rin.

Maybe. It's very likely. It's going to come to a point, if she doesn't join us, I despise the idea that that is a choice that is going to have to rest upon your shoulders. Would Mori or Ira maybe have the power to break Renan out of their state? Could we send a team in? Just grab your mom, get to Rin,

free them, and then Rin's our ticket out for Sky Team to unleash mayhem from above? Big magic heavy hitters. Yeah, that's depending a lot on Mori and getting Rin out. Even if grabbing Imogen's mom, we know how powerful Imogen is, and we can only assume her mother

is that much more powerful. If she's not on our side, that could backfire. We got Ira. Maybe. He's on. That's true. Do Ira and Rin have any history? Did Wrynn mention that they knew Ira? Or were aware of?

Aware of, maybe, yeah. Ira's got some magic. Yeah. Yeah. Is it worth it to find your mom in dreams again? That's what I want to try to do. Make an offer? I want to try to do that. We put a pin in this for one day, one night? We did some good stuff today.

We should go as fast as we can and do some dreaming. Maybe learn a little bit more about what's on the ground down there besides the robots? Mm-hmm. And we've seen Hotan and your mother have tangible influence in the dreams, kind of, sort of, kind of? To an extent.

It would be fucking badass if you could have some sort of tangible influence on whatever is going on. I don't know. The key, something. I don't know. If your mom really actually is on the up and up, she clearly still thinks that this is some sort of negotiation where she can get you to leave. So I suppose it's time to make sure that she knows that that time has passed.

She has to fucking deal. Yeah. And if she doesn't, she's... Well, then she's leaving you out in the cold, isn't she? Yeah. She's done it before. Yep. But.

That is what they do. You have the locket. Anybody else on the list we want to reach out to? Yeah, anybody last minute? Hail Mary. For the day. For the day. Dancer, the Hive, Hexum, Lord and Lady Whitestone, Shashandri, Mori, your parents. Grim Verity, we just called you.

Oh wait, that's right. Yeah, we just did that. Let me put that up there. Shashandri, maybe? Actually, wait, I can't do it anymore if I'm going to do the dream. Say, have somebody roll a d20 for me for your first day of traveling. Oh no!

Do it. Oh jeez. Oh go. Oh jeez, I've got so many. Oh go. What are your eyes? Better better roll call sound first. I think I might have left it up a little long. It's hot! Stay still!

Eight. Eight, okay. All right. The sky is pretty clear. The travel is nice and smooth. The winds do not batter the side of the skyship as you head, eventfully, Fuck.

forward. But yeah, so the first day of travel is fine, and that brings us to? Oh, that's right, we could roll for really great winds that send us faster. That's possible, yeah. That's if we roll high? We just don't know where those numbers are.

If it's even or low or dead in the middle. There's a chart we cannot see. Mm-hmm. Okay. I hate charts you can't see. I know. All right. So that finishes your first day of travel on the skyship. Is there anything else we should do before the day comes to a close?

Yeah, I'll take out the stone. What? You've been really going at that stone. That's a cookie. Oh god. Oh, you're a cookie. Oh god. Oh, you're a beauty! Oh god! Takes out the edible.

So impressed. That's the favorite. Dorian. Still talking into a cookie. Oh, Orym. Our jobs are weird. Update. People were chasing,

unleashing hell in a week. There's a crumb out of my mouth. That's not part of the message. We're headed there now. Odds not good. Given said where. More tomorrow. Where are you?

Do you have Flame of the? Do-do-do-do-do. I have Depositors. Do it. Now it's in there. Let's not know. Cousin. Orym, with the rest of the Crown Keepers in Tal'Dorei,

Orym, with the rest of the Crown Keepers in Tal'Dorei, the opal's getting a little dark. the opal's getting a little dark. Oh shit. Little busy at the moment. I don't even know how to get to you. Ugh, what does that mean? Shit.

Spider crown. What are you doing to yourself? Why are you doing that? Vogueing. Okay. You bit the. Ow! No, that wasn't good.

Compagio. Dorian's out. You want to do it? Dorian's out. Bye. Why are you so handsome? Well, no. On another continent. That was a long shot.

I better not eat this. I'll save it so that we can still talk. Maybe we can talk to him every day. Maybe we can talk him into finding a portal or something. So ablaze. I mean, if he brought all of them along. We don't have enough chairs at this table, Ashley. I know, but how cool would it be? How would we be here?

How'd you know? I won't, I won't. They could be sitting in a, you're like, I know. Oh god, Fraser. You could fit at least one person on your left and you're all right. Oh my god, that is so cool. Don't even. He's like, don't.

You need a cat spray bottle for us. Yeah, I know. What if we sit for years? Sit down. For years now. You need a cat spray bottle for us. Yeah, I know. Sit down. For years. Sit down. For years now. What if we just bring back every guest we've ever had tomorrow? Cool.

Cool, yeah. Zahra, this is Orym. All right, what are we doing? Going to sleep, dreamies? Yeah, getting ready for the night. That or do we want to just quickly drop something to Hexum? If we do, it'll use the-

Oh, you've already gone, okay, that's right. We're still in the, we'll wait till tomorrow. Okay. Are we going to try to reach out to my mom tonight? If you'd like to. It's the same time zone, right? It is night there. Maybe they sleep during the day

because the moon, the Ruidus is up at night. Last time I tried to do this, last two times I've tried to do this, it's been busy when we go, and that's in the middle of the night. Oh man. Do you want to stay up all night? Or maybe, what time is it now?

I mean, she was there once. Yeah, but if I hit her when she's dreaming, then Otohan Thul won't be able to see us, won't be able to... I mean, Thul' knows we're coming. I'm not too worried about that. I know, but what time is it right now? We're going to try a different time.

I mean, you guys have been traveling for the majority part of the day. Time is wibbly-wobbly as we're doing this journey, because it's just sitting on a skyship. So we'll say, whenever you want it to be, it's the end of the day, and we'll be doing that for the next few days, since you're just riding on the skyship.

So I could do this towards early evening, so hopefully before Ruidus comes up. Like to. Sure. Okay. I don't know how I'm going to fall asleep, but I'm going to try. I'll give you some chamomile tea that I cook inside my stomach.

Mm. And I- Stomach tea. I made a nice little... Ow. Does it beep when it's ready? Yep. And I pour out of the hole in your side. Aw.

I'm a little teeny-tiny cookie. And I'm going to make you a nice little cinnamon cookie. Just to make you feel good at night. And I'll cast this dream thing. And just because Orym and Fearne, you haven't seen this place yet, right? Mix it up. And Ashton, too.

We can only take two other paths. The goal here is not to go to that place. I'm trying to hit up my mom's dream. Sure, but they haven't experienced this yet, so I'm bringing them, if that's all right with you. Sure, yeah. We'll stay out of the way. Okay. I won't even, you this yet, so I'm bringing them, if that's all right with you. Sure, yeah. We'll stay out of the way. Okay. I won't even.

Oh. You won't even know I'm there. Listen, though. Having experienced it, if something goes poorly, just get out. Wake up. Wake up and force yourself awake, because if something happens and Imogen or FCG

loses their connection, their tether, you could be stuck. What are we supposed to do to go in there? I just hold my hand, but before I cast this spell, Enhance Ability is not Concentration. I believe Enhance Ability is Concentration. Oh, it is? It didn't work. We tried that last time. Oh no, it did.

I did get wisdom. Oh, that it did. I did get wisdom. Oh, that's right. Advantage. I did your charisma. Charisma, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think I should do that again because you're doing persuading. Right? No, you did wisdom because my perception.

It was my perception. I'm going to do charisma this time. Because you're trying to convince her to do something. Right? Okay, I'm enhancing her charisma. Okay. And all right, I'll hold my metallic hands and just try to drift off to sleep.

Go. I will vibrate in a nice, soothing vibration way to soothe them. I don't like noise. All right. So you are? As the three of us are slowly drifting down, Orym's going to dozily look over at Imogen. Hey.

If I had a daughter like you one day, I'd be real proud. Thanks, Orym. If I had a son like you, I'd be real proud, too. Thanks, Orym. If I had a son like you, I'd be real proud, too. Well, I have a mom. She's pretty great. Well, my son's pretty great. I'm sorry?

She's talking about the book. Oh, mister. I thought you were also my mom. No, Imogen, you're not. Sorry. Dream your dreams. I tell it. Allogen, you're dead. In your dreams. I tell it. All right, so you are. Oh yeah, I have five kids.

I don't know. I don't know either. All right, so you are attempting to connect with Imogen's dream and bringing along Orym and who else? Fearne. Fearne, okay. You cast the spell. You drift into a familiar unconscious space, holding onto the control

that you're just beginning to try and harness. Now, previously, you've begun to push into your dream space towards different energies, being drawn towards locations, and this you're trying to directly connect to your mother. Yes. I'd like you to make a d20 roll and then add your spellcraft modifier.

So. Guidance. For this, no, because this is You're a sleepy bubble of light, so this is okay. you are sleeping with. Okay. That's good. 28. 28? So you add plus five?

Oh, I thought it was my spellcasting. Not spellcasting. My charisma modifier, then. Sorry, yeah. Okay, yes. My brain was a little weird on that one. Then 24. 24. 24 is very, very good. Okay. You concentrate just as the sun begins to set.

I mean, and Ruedas is in the sky. Like both moons, you know, at different speeds do at times meet and cross each other during the day and night, but in a weird way, you feel like that empowers you in the moment. And as you try and concentrate, that sense of redness surrounds you. You then feel this immediate

gravitational pull at an incredible speed. And then the red dust surrounds you. You stand there, drifting in the midst of the cloud, the familiar state of your dream, the storm that chased you for so many nights in recent times. You now stand in the middle. No ground, no field, no farm, just you

and the motes of light that represent your companions as they are pulled alongside you. Whoa. A moment later, you watch as a shadowed female form emerges from the cloud. Arms and legs mostly made of dark immaterial, like a spiritual being that is just beginning to push through the dust storm.

And within a moment, the eyes open. You see the dark hair become a light purple. You see the shaded semblance of material just flapping behind, like she's half there, half aware, and the voice echoes in your mind directly. Imogen? Mama. Come on.

Where are we? We're coming. We're coming. And I need your help. The shadow reforming is to take on more material. As the focus of your mother begins to crystallize, the realization of where she is, who you are. You watch as now an image of an older woman with familiar features to Imogen,

but mature, longer hair, a harder look, an expression that is a unique mixture of longer hair, a harder look, an expression that is a unique mixture of surprise and concern, as well as a coldness. Imogen, you shouldn't be here. I know you keep saying that. Tell me there's still part of you that cares.

Tell me there's part of you that knows what you're doing is wrong. Why is it wrong? You want to destroy half the world? I think you misunderstand what's going on here. The world will be saved at the end of this, and we'll be free. The world will be eaten at the end of this, and we'll be gone.

I wish you could see the things that I can see. Show me. You left to protect me? To find out more? She drifts forward towards you, about a foot from where you are, and reaches out. Don't push me away. Do not send me away.

She touches your forehead between your eyes. There's a flash of light and images that cross past your mind. A massive glowing lattice in the sky pulling apart as red fills the air above. Thousands and thousands of voices in unison around and a sense of freedom. The cries of history snuffed in a moment. In the beginning of something new and beautiful.

Like endless possibility. Like endless possibility. Without guidance, Without fate. Without this gift. And in a brief instant, you remember what it was like to not be like this, to just be you. She pulls her hand away. You return to the core of this dream.

You see in her face this empathetic concern. I'm doing this for both of us, and he's doing it for everyone. I know change is hard. We've been toys since the beginning. I wish you could understand.

I wish you all could understand. She takes note of the moats around you. She puts her hand forward and a flash of white light and you all come up to consciousness inside the skyship once more. Did y'all see it? Mm-hmm. You saw everything? Oh, hell.

It's hurt, hurt, hurt. Did they see what I saw in my mind? I think. Well. So her, heard her. Did they see what I saw in my mind? You just saw her touch her forehead and then pull away. We heard her a little. You heard her. Speech. Yeah. What if it's not that bad?

I mean, what if what we're doing is just fighting change? What if it's not that bad? I mean, what if what we're doing is just fighting change? What if? Well, Imogen, I wish my family didn't have to die for her brighter tomorrow. You're right. I'm sorry. You're right.

I'm sorry. I get a glass of water and a damage. I know how hard this has got to be for you. I'm sorry. No, I swear, I want to see this through, I do. It was just overwhelming. She just presented this vision of love. This just didn't seem so bad.

Of course. But I... It's impossible. I mean, you love her, and she... It's hard to love someone who thinks in a completely different way. Okay. Just go with me on this. Okay. Just go with me on this. What if...

What if it's not that bad? What did she show you? Like, what did she do when she touched you? I saw... I saw the gate opening and red pouring out, and just all the burdens and just all the burdens being pulled away.

I just felt free. We're talking about something that's never happened before. Did she show you the future, or did she show you what she wants you to see and feel? She's probably showing me, but she's been showing you what she wants you to see and feel. She's probably showing me, but she's been shown. Orym.

It's all cultist bullshit, I know. She's been brainwashed, and it's not real. And that thing up there is a god eater. It destroys. That's what it wants. It wants not real. That thing up there is a god eater. It destroys. That's what it wants. It wants to eat. Right? It just wants to eat.

It's selfish. Yeah. I mean, maybe. We don't have all the answers, right? But that's... Very few. We don't have all the answers, right? But that's very few. We don't know that. The other gods locked it away. I forgot about that.

Yeah. And the gods are good? The gods are just gods. They're not good. They're not bad. They're just fucking selfish. Everybody is fucking selfish. My god's good. The change bringer.

Are you good? Are we learning? Told you. Are we learning? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Are we in a Tom Stoppard play? Oh boy. Wow, really? We went to Stoppard? All right, I'm in. It can't be done by luck alone.

It can. Yeah. Oh boy, I feel like you all of a sudden. I snort to the building in suspense. Oh. Yeah. I get the sting checked tomorrow. All right, well, ask the change bringer if they want us to succeed. I get this thing checked tomorrow. All right, well, ask the change bringer

if they want us to succeed. All right, I will. Yes. But we've already established that at least the change bringer right now thinks they're bad. Maybe the change bringer's feeling guilty. See, this is what happens when you start externalizing every fucking problem that you have. Easy to take a look at.

There's a bunch of people who are treating other people just like they're fucking nothing, like they're fucking pawns. It doesn't matter what the fuck they want. They're doing it wrong. It is not hard to see. You're being fucked with. We're all being fucked with.

Whatever the fuck they say that they're doing, that's where I draw the line. If they had such a great idea of what the world was supposed to be and what that thing was, they could just tell people, but instead they're making everybody miserable. They're killing people. Fuck that, fuck them, and I'm going to be more than happy

to drop a fucking ship on them. I agree with Ashley. So sick of this shit. It's not a new plan, it's an old plan. It's a plan as old as the world. Leave a string of bodies behind for your better tomorrow. It's easy to make a nice world if you keep killing everybody who fucking disagrees with you.

You can get down to five, it'll be amazing. Fucking Utopia. Well, good night. I'm going to have a drink. I think I'll join. There's no tobacco? No, Ashton and having a drink. Oh, okay.

I am grabbing a bottle and going up into the... Don't drink often, but it feels appropriate right now. Fun. I'm going to be at the stern, just checking out the sky, seeing if that's different at night, with the air so charged. Ooh, is it brighter? With the sky dark against the backdrop of these flittering colors,

you can now see the flashes of color you saw were just pulses along now a network of faintly visible rivers in the sky of energy. The magical ley lines of Exandria are slowly beginning to glow with the approach of the Apogee Solstice. No! That's so fucking cool!

Make a perception check. And they're all different colors? All the different ley lines are different colors? They change as they go. For advantage. Can I use Hunter's Bane for advantage? Not for this one, I'm going to take it away. This is just a one.

Four shoes were fucked. Is that a d4? God, I'm fucking sorry Bane for a minute. Not for this one, I'm going to take it away. This is just a one. Purple horseshoes were fucked. Is that a d4? You can't do that. That's a perception. You can do it on skill checks, but this is him on the stern on his own. 17. I don't know how. 17.

While they're doing this, and you're keeping an eye over it, you swear it looks like they're ever so slowly moving. Like? Yeah, like how? Like moving along the lines of the river, or moving, like clouds in the sky? Shifting like clouds in the sky at an almost imperceptibly slow speed.

The lines? They're locking into place. Mm-hmm, they're going to overlap. Don't cross the stream. And how are the moons? How's Ruidus looking on this beautiful night? So fine. Its same dull red self, the faint bit of visible shadow with enough focus that you can see that passes upon it

and is not flaring. It is just looming over, sending a slight chill through your shoulders as you glance above it you can see that passes upon it. It is not flaring, it is just looming over, sending a slight chill through your shoulders as you glance above it with the periphery glow of the visible Exandrian ley lines, giving this contrasting beauty that just dances along the horizon at different distances.

Cool. And Cath is chilling, right? Yeah. Cool. If you'd like to conclude this evening, and so their business is done, let's go then. Wait, wait, wait, wait. We'll stay, all right? You say, wait, wait, wait?

Yeah, quick drink with Ashton. So I am definitely downing a bottle, and we'll... Are you all right? No. I was very well-spoken. You know, once in a red moon, you got a really good speech just chambered in there. I...

Oh no, it's complicated. This is not the person I thought I was going to be. Oh, yeah. it's complicated. This is not the person I thought I was going to be. Oh, yeah. Ashton. Who the fuck are you, and where the fuck did you come from? We don't really know. We know a little.

But the most we know is that you were jettisoned from a portal and you became a rock and then you joined a band of misfits and criminals and did criminal things. That's about all we really know. That's about all there is to know. I am a blank slate. I don't believe that.

Well, you wouldn't. All of you have, well, with one exception, a place that you came from, people who made you who you are. All except for one. And... I hate you all a little, you know that, right?

Are you jealous of us because you feel like we have more of an identity than you? I am jealous of you because I know things you don't. I know loneliness that you don't. I know the truth of people that none of you do. Maybe one of them. I mean, you know things, too. Don't think I don't know that. I was also alone in the woods for 30 years. I know loneliness. I made a dead rat my best friend,

so I wouldn't go fucking mad. I don't trust that rat, by the way. I think he go fucking mad. I don't trust that rat, by the way. I think he's a rat. You're scaring me a little, Ashton, and that's coming from me. How is the swings of fear of dying again versus the crippling obligation you feel to everybody for risking themselves

to save you going. I wasn't afraid to die. It was the latter. But now. It still haunts me. I mean, this is one of the few things that we have in common, is that we've both died. Do you ever think about that?

How do you grapple with a sense of deep indebted onus? I literally pledged myself to one of the worst people I've ever met to work for them for years for a bunch of people I haven't seen since. I... I... I...

What was it like waking up and having them there? I just... I want to know what it was like to come back and everyone was still there. Genuinely, that is something you know that I don't. It was one of the greatest feelings. Because it wasn't like that the first time.

I've never known such kindness. And maybe Ashton should cut yourself some slack and allow yourself to feel the same. I'm, uh... I haven't opened up in a while. This group is strange that way. Didn't go well last time.

We'll see how it goes this time. Although, you know, it may not matter in a couple of weeks. Maybe in this last couple of weeks. We can both work on affording ourselves a little bit of forgiveness. I mean, it doesn't matter in the long run.

You know, I love you all just a little bit. And you hate us just a little bit, too. Yeah. What's with the fucking mask that you pull out and stare at a little bit and that you wanted so badly to steal from that hoax of a museum? It's a helmet, and did you just

what the fuck is up with that, Mae? Yes, I did. Give me the drink. I take a swig first before passing it back. There are rules. I have very little memory of anything that happened to me before the orphanage, home, whatever the fuck you want to call it.

I do remember people who may have been my mother and father, I don't know. I can't really, it's all a blur. They don't have faces. It's just an idea. It felt like that, I guess. Who the fuck knows? There was an accident, and I do remember that.

I remember there being an accident. I remember watching somebody who felt like family just get torn into pieces, just absolutely ripped apart. And then I was in the desert, and I don't know how I got there. I don't know how I got to Basrus. I was just found.

With the one word, there was one word that stuck in my head and always stuck with me, and I didn't think it mattered. I didn't know what I would ever do with it until I saw it on a label beneath a cheap suit of armor in a stupid fucking museum filled with bullshit.

There's a lot of bullshit. This fucking helmet was the first time I saw the word Ashari. That's actually why I'm even with this group. So I heard the word Ashari randomly and thought maybe I just had a fucked up memory. I've just been waiting, hoping that I could indebt everybody enough that maybe people would help me once I helped them, because that's how the world works.

Although I'm getting a little weird here, I will admit. So yeah, that's that. And you've got your powers after you had the potion-y goop poured in your head. My extremely useful damage, yes. Useful damage. Yeah, it's what it is. Well, that's something else we can relate on.

It's very true. Well, let's keep figuring it out, shall we? And then maybe you don't have to be so jealous of us for knowing our past. I'm a little worried, but I'm a little, yeah. I don't know. If we survive, if this goes well. You keep saying Ashari. Drashari? Hishari. Hishari.

Hishari. He's drunk. Hishari. I don't even have my retainer Hishari. Hishari. He's drunk. Hishari. I don't even have my retainer. Sounds a lot like Asshari, like Orym shit. It's he said it once and then I was in. You haven't talked to him about this. Not yet, no.

Maybe you should! Now? We're going to be on this boat for another fucking week. Seems like a great fucking time. We brought it up at one point, and we did bring it up at one point, if I recall. I know that there's information I have that I shouldn't. Jesus.

I'll let him know, but I'm not ready for that yet, I guess. I don't know. You said you saw yourself and could be dead in 12 days, so. Yeah. I'm not spending that 12 days trying to figure out shit. I don't even know if I want to know. I'm spending 12 days doing my job and keeping you safe and making sure that everyone deals with their bullshit,

and hopefully keeping FCG from... Exploding himself. I mean, honestly, more than exploding himself, exploding everybody. Yes. And not because of the stress thing. I've spent way too much of the last chunk of my reality

trying to convince that bloody robot to not sacrifice themselves at every waking turn because they're going to get everybody killed in their desperate attempt for martyrism. You can't trust somebody who just wants to die all the time. I love them, but they are very dangerous and not for the reasons they think. Is this all pretty rich coming from you?

I know, right? I love a project. I am a project. You are. You're irritatingly stable for someone who's so clearly fucked up. I don't know how that works. I'm happy to know you.

I'm looking forward at some point to getting punched by you, but I don't think this is the evening for it. Every bone in my body would break if I punched you. Oh, you've got powers. Why don't we get to bed? You're a little worse for wear. That's very fair.

I somehow managed to help Ashton back to bed, even though I have strength of four. I'm very good at this. Strength of four. I'm very good at this. Okay. Thank you. I'm going to pull Orym aside. Okay. Yeah. Hey.

So, that dream thing was weird. But I don't really know what I'm asking you, That dream thing was weird. Um, but I... I don't really know what I'm asking you, but what do we do if Imogen decides to go to the other side of things? He hops up on his shoulder so that he's right there. I'm thinking the same thing, too. I'd like to think I have faith in her. I do, too. I do, too.

I don't think it'll come to that. But if it does, Fearne, are you with me? Always. I'm sure it'll be fine. Yeah, me too, me too. It'll be totally fine. I just, I just,

we just gotta, we just gotta watch our girl and make sure. Yeah, it's fine. It's totally fine. This is so not a big deal. This is, we're going to be fine. We're going to be great. It's going to be a success.

If it does, if that moment comes in the middle of hell, I'll do my best to get her attention. You're going to be the one who has to do the thing. I don't know if I can do the thing. I don't know if I can do the thing. What's the thing? I don't know. Put her to sleep. Hold her up.

I'm quick. I can knock things out of the air with a shield, but I'm not as strong as you. And she's strong, so. I don't know if any one of us is as strong as her, but it's fine. I think I just, that was weird. That whole dream was weird.

Her mom gave me the willies. Pat, I run on your other shoulder and say, give us about a 5% chance overall. So the good news is Imogen is just one of many problems. That's a higher percentage than I was thinking, so we're good to go. Like a little flea. We are.

Yeah. As the tension of the evening's conversation sits palpable across the cabin of the evening's conversation sits palpable across the cabin of the skyship, the Silver Sun, and the tension that rides across the arcane energies that swim through the atmosphere of Exandria above, another night of your journey comes to a close.

The solstice is in ten days. We're going to go and take a break. Get back here in a few minutes and pick up this journey. See where we go from here. See you 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 CritRole.com slash submit. And thank you

to all of the incredible artists who share their talents with us week after week. And welcome back. So, beginning the tenth day, you all return to consciousness upon the skyship

Silver Sun, heading towards the eventual destination that you've chosen. What do you wish to do for the day? As this journey itself can begin to rally into a rapid succession, but. Do we need to roll for weather? Let's go ahead and do that, actually,

as the day progresses. It's still more than a roll of detail. Is that for me? Orym's doing goblin squats. That would be Marisha, your turn. Yeah, that's right. By the way, guys, just last night, I had a little bit of an epiphany. I know why the change bringer was messing with me

with the coin flips. Oh yeah? It's because I was asking about the change bringer. Gods are mysterious. They don't want you to know anything about them. When I ask about myself, she gives me good advice. When I ask about her, she's not going to answer me. She's a god, right?

She's just messing with me. I made no sense whatsoever. I agree with Ashton. 11. 11, all right. Another day with fine weather, though that same Aurora continues to greet you in pretty much all directions, But a day's travel without issue. You are beginning to see the edge

of the Talon Highlands now and pass by the Highland Bluffs and the mountains there. You can see the distant dusts and dunes and craggy landscape that is the Hellcatch Valley approaching before the end of the day, most likely, or at least within the next day. So, any other business for the day ahead of you? Oh jeez.

Do we know anyone deeply religious? Right here. Besides you. Anyone? Praise be to her. Do you know any clerics? Any high order paladins or stuff like that? Somebody who would fare to lose a lot if the gods go away. Why, do you need convincing?

Right here. No. But if we're looking for powerful people that will actually help us. That Pike person. Yeah, that baker. Oh, she was so powerful. My gods.

That's right. My gods. We should contact her. And say what? God stuff happening? Yeah. Can you stop baking for a second? Help us, oh powerful one.

Okay. They're going to release the god killer. No, mine's very no-killer. They've built the key, right? Yeah. Remember that person that helped with Eshteross, that was all beautiful looking?

Oh yeah. Was the one that was like, that could talk to dead people, right? Was she a, that doesn't, was she a, no, she. Was she a? She was. Sorry, I'm bad. Was she?

She was, no, she was. She was, right? Was she? Yeah. Yeah. Who was she? Who was she? Did she? Was she? Yeah. But she's, I don't know. Yes, she was. Who she was? Did she?

Was she? Yes, she do. Naughty dog. I just really liked her. She was cool. I know, we never talked to her again. She was so cool. Want me to send to Pike? Sure, or do you want to send to,

are we still contacting Hexen? I think I got a plan. Let me, like, I'm going over something in my head tomorrow. Tomorrow. Either one. Oh, who? Oh, okay. Maybe see it for other friends. You're a cleric, she's a cleric.

Sure. All right, I will send a pike quickly. Okay. Boy, will she remember me? You remember me? You'll remember me. Robot holy person here. She knows. Big god stuff going down.

God Eater about to be released from Ruidus on the solstice. On the solstice. We need your deific help. Research, reach out to us. Ludinus. Ludinus is in charge. Ludinus involved. Whatever his name is.

Don't laugh. Peace be with you. Oh, wow. Um, okay. Uh-oh, buddy. Robo-buddy. Get into the fucking place. Come on. Let me see what I can find.

Take some days. Nope. Okay. That's it. Just, you get the sense, she's processing what you told her. Maybe we try again tomorrow. Yeah, maybe you should ask her if she can send that necklace to us.

Oh, sure. I think she has powerful enough people that she can, she'll reach out to us if she wants to talk to us. Yeah, but we got to tell her, like, they're wanting to take everybody's power away. Everything, everything will change. You want me to tell her that? I mean, she's smart. to take everybody's power away. Everything will change. You want me to tell her that? I don't know. I mean, she's smart.

She has all these people that she can start asking. You're right. Yeah, it's one thing to say it. I need a way to show it. Hard to do. Hey, Xandas! Yes? What color is the bottom of this here ship?

Like dark brown, wood, does it have a color? I mean, you've seen it a few times when I went to go pick you up. Listen, I'm old, do me a favor and just tell me, will ya? Yeah, it's the same wood color as the rest of the ship. Shit, I knew it.

Laudna? Yes? How do you feel about doing a little spider climb underneath the hull? Ooh, sounds fun, sounds risky, sounds thrilling. I got these paints from Joe. I might want to paint the bottom of the ship white. That's right, you got the paints.

Just might help with our approach, if we do decide that coming in from above is better. Come on, us. Yeah, sky blue, a little white, maybe get some floating ass clouds. Sure. I mean, it's your ship. That's a lot of painting to do.

That's going to take a lot of your days. God, I wish we only had like six fucking days! Do you want me to fly down and we can paint it for a few days? No, we keep flying. We ride on. Oh, you are crazy, I like it. Okay, okay, yeah, do your thing.

A couple of hours to do it, I don't know if it'll work, but maybe we can just get a primer coat. I like it, let's see what happens. Maybe I have a spell to help make it go a little faster. Paint simulator, Chorecore Games. So here's the interesting thing. The paints you bought, how much did you buy? Oh my, a gallon. It's a big ship, bro.

A pint of paint? Yeah, but if I mix with a little turpentine, a little water. Ooh, yeah, a little whitewash. Get a little shot in there. Then we have a little party. Yeah, I think there's a quart each. It's not a lot. There's no way to make this ship invisible, right?

I don't think, I don't have the power, do you? No, I think I can only make people invisible. I don't think that's a thing. I was just throwing it out there. All right, are we going to take a take? Never mind, it's fine. You take that old thing and be like, Black!

What? That's like a first shot on it. It was worth a shot. Shit. Want to talk to Hexum, or are we just going to power on? Do we want to hit up Hexum for weapons and materials and see if we can get some contacts in the underground black market in Bosphorus, or do we want to see if we can get her to give us a name

of maybe sneaking a couple people in, since she's the one who's sending crates to them? Those are the two options when it comes to Exen. I'm tightening it up right now. That seems really useful to send in spies like that. It's just, I don't know how we'd organize it with just a few words. Supplies it is there. Yeah.

From Ashton, big trouble coming, bad for business. Need your contacts for weapons and supplies, I owe you. That's from Ashley, big trouble finding a patch for business. All right, sends them to Hexen. Yeah. Okay. So you reach out and tell this to Hexen? Yeah.

Hexen responds. All right. Contacts where? Within Jrusar. Did I say Baciris? Did you fucking say Baciris? I would have said it. I wrote it down. I would have said Baciris. I would have said it. Ah, you did say Baciris.

Yes, I did. And I also mentioned your potions or some shit. Most of my dealings there are through the coal. You dropped my name on Yunus. Yunus? You know Yunus is... I know Yunus? You know Yunus in the Salmagunda Strip. He's actually a general supplies dealer in the Rahadenn where you guys stayed.

Oh, is it in my notes? It should be in your notes, yeah. But they're a general seller of tools and wares. They may have some interesting shit and they might give us some cheap shit. Okay, cool, cool, cool. We're going to drop. All right.

So if we actually go into Bocerous. If we live, we'll have like 80 extra gold. Where did we leave off with Ira? Fuck yeah. Ira's been meeting us in? Bocerous. At the Calloway. At the, no, okay.

So that's ranged, okay. We should probably eventually reach out to the Calloways to tell them that they need to go pick up the thing, pick up the bomb. Yep, we'll do that. Maybe we'll all. Doesn't need to do that now, but need to do that eventually. Sometime in the next few days. Correct.

Just assume that I will have checked in with Imahara Joe and given him more specifics about a bomb that can be mounted on the front of a ship. Holy shit. Okay. Impact. Arcane bomb. It's got to be arcane. Yes.

None of this bomb shit. Barcane. Barcane. Ar-com. Went to a barcane. A bombcane. Sure. Okay. In getting this across to Imahara Joe,

Moira responds like, All right, left turn. Yeah, it's going to be pricey. I think we have lots of money, right? Do we? I think so. Won't matter if we dead. You guys got 12k in gold from Shashadri. Yes. True.

And then close to 800 platinum from Eshteross's bounty for Treshi. Did he keep it all or did he pass it out? Look, I've been a fucking team player. close to 800 platinum from Eshteross's bounty for Treshi. Did he keep it all or did he pass it out? Look, I've been a fucking team player. I don't need that shit from you. Everybody's got stacks, okay? Mine just happened to be bigger.

Don't be jelly. Jesus. 800 platinum? He's compensating. Yeah. We pass it out. We pass it out. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I think you put your platinum into gold. You transferred it or something.

I think I also had some left over. Then we just go on. All right. Another day. So another day goes by. Oh, my turn to roll? Yep. Indeed. It's my turn! It's your turn!

Your turn! To roll 19. Ooh. Oh. Indeed. It's my turn! Your turn! Two roll. 19. Ooh! 19. 19. A pretty solid approach to the Hellcatch Valley as you begin to break into the more tumultuous skyscape

above the desert land here. The winds are stronger. You can see bits of gray and storm fronts and dusty wind storms creeping along the perimeters of the valley itself. You recall, once again, why this region is rarely traversed by skyships that are taking the trade routes around it,

as much time as it adds. But this is the journey you're headed. But so far, so good. Great. Great. So that puts us at the end of that. I'm going to be spending some time just trying to learn a little bit of basic-ass stuff about how the skyship works,

how it flies and how, just a little bit of the physics of it so that I can have a sense of how to get the skyship to crash and keep it. Yeah. Make an intelligence check for me. Oh lord. Yeah, I don't know if I should. Well, someone else should.

Because he can't jump off, or they can't jump off if they need to. What would be required for steering a ship? You know? There's only one way to find out. Do you want to learn? Zandis is like, I mean, you own the ship

and I'm technically your employee, so for the time being, I can sit around. I'll give you some pointers, you know? Maybe one day you could be your own captain. Ooh! You know, when you buy out the rest of my contract and I can retire early. Captain Calloway. Has a nice ring to it. Captain Professor of my contract and I can retire early. Captain Calloway. Has a nice ring to it.

Captain Professor Calloway. I like it, I like it a lot. All right, teach me. 20. 20? Yeah, I'm shocked as anybody. Make an intelligence roll for me, if you don't mind. Oh boy, here we go. That's cocked. Okay.

18. 18? All right. Okay. I'm doing okay. So on top of Zand is teaching you about how there are certain controls all around here, little rods you pull on and handles that change the pitch and law and adjust the amount of energy

that's going to the different brumestones. I also learned more. What does this red one do? Don't do that! The whole shit like. Fuck! What the fuck? Well, that's one way to learn real fast. Hopefully we didn't lose anyone. Did we lose anyone?

No, we're okay. All right. Yes. Was that not? But you ask the right questions, push the right buttons to learn which things can lead to a catastrophic descent, as well as a dangerous ascent. You also figure out the means of loosely controlling. You also learn a little more about Brumestone

with those high rolls, too. Brumestone is naturally buoyant within, when it is excavated or pulled from the ground of Exandria, it just lifts and stays where it is. It's easily pushed and seems to just float on its own. It's through charges of arcane energy that its buoyancy is adjusted. That's how the ship works.

Each of these controls controls these very, very faint runes that are marked along the deck of the ship, either underneath or on top of it. You can see where they all connect to the different brumestone devices. So with each different point of control, it raises the amount of power that's going to them. It doesn't take a lot.

So it is runic-based, though? Yes. Okay, okay. You've seen it before, and you thought it was just maybe nice design on the ship, but as part of this description, Kazanis is like, no, these are actually what carries the arcane charge to each of these brumestones

and makes it go up or down or left or right. Cutting off the charge drops. Okay, okay. The sails help pick up the wind and give it, it helps with the up and down. It's the forward motion that's challenging, but that's what the sails pick up the wind and it pushes it forward at a very, very nice speed.

Okay. Makes sense. I know my trick, okay. Yeah, over the next few days, you start picking up more and more and these conversations continue and you get a decent feel for it. In case you got to bump off the captain and take the ship for yourself, you never know.

Yeah, you never know. Any other business for this day? Yeah, can I say that I sent a message to Nana Mori. Nannamori. We're going after the big one. If there's anything you can do. Also, do you know how to bring somebody back that's been turned to stone? Nanna responds. back that's been turned to stone. In a response. I'm recovering

from a mild injury, but I'm strongest at home anyway. I'll be watching, and I'll do what I can, when I can. Then yes. There are ways. Cool. Cool, cool, cool.

She's the best. So helpful. Well, if we can't heal Rin on the spot and we find a way to get her out, at least we know we can bring her to Nana Mori. Yeah. Think that she'd remain intact in the hole.

I think that she'd remain intact in the hole. If we crash a ship into her? No. That's not what I mean. I mean, if we have a ground team and we need to move Rin fast, could we throw her in the hole? She doesn't need to breathe.

It's true. She's portable. As long as she doesn't break apart, I think that's... She was right next to the key, too. Yeah. I hope it carried around that... Statue. Statue, and it never broke. It's true.

Fill the hole full of pillows. Didn't we talk about doing that before? We might have. I think it's actually a good idea, the more I think about it. I don't see why it wouldn't work. Sandwiches and pillows. I feel like it doesn't rattle around in there. I feel like it's magical enough that when you open it up, it just is like. I think when you open it, gravity reasserts whatever. It adjusts based on its current positioning. Yeah.

Oh, so if we do it, then we got to make sure, if we open it again, to open it on the ground, right? If you placed it, if it's in the ground, don't place it on a wall, because then it'll shift and fall down. Everything will shift inside of the hole if you put it up on a wall. Okay. On a ceiling,

everything would fall out. Ooh, good to know. Right. Actually. If you had a way of affixing it to a ceiling. Right. Try me. Doesn't really deal with stick packing.

Yep, not really. That's what glues. At some point, I'm going to just send a message to Dancer, my old creator, and just tell her, you don't have to respond, but on the solstice, you should get somewhere safe. And maybe tell Esmer as well to get somewhere safe, and I'm sorry.

There's no response. Okay. You know, if you have the ability to send out a message to somebody, why didn't you ever try to contact that merchant, the one who sold you, the one who found you in the first place? I don't know them. I heard about them.

Yeah, but if you're familiar, you can at least try. Am I familiar? They described the person. I could try, certainly. I mean, I don't know if it'll be any use right now. I could try, certainly. I mean, I don't know if it'll be any use right now. Yeah, but. Want me to try right now? What would I see him even say?

I don't know. I don't know if it's a thing to help now, but if you want to know more about yourself, they seem like the place to start. Should I? Trust yourself, FCG. I think that's what the Chainspringer was trying to tell you.

Chainspringer said I should. Oh, okay. All right. Oh boy, but they won't know who I am. Maybe they will. Choose your words carefully. You found me, you sold me. I'll reach out to Dee. Okay.

Smiley day there. Yellow automaton you sold in Basuras to Dancer. Do you know where you picked me up? And are there more of me? That's good. Nice. Thank you. A wonderful surprise.

What? Oh, Roha. Oh, Roha. Oh, Roha. Oh, Roha. Roha. That is my gift to you. A return to your own path.

I pulled you from the wreckage. And your future is yours to make. And there are more of you. And more to come. I might have siblings. That's a fucking horrible experience. Yeah, he's so hot. Damn. He's such a hot robot. Yeah, you heard a really hot voice in your head.

He's a hot robot, says he. He's such a hot robot. You heard a really hot voice in your head. He's a hot robot's husband. I'm by a robot. I think I feel sexually awakened. Oh. Nightmare. Sawblade. Is it time to get a dildonic device? Tele-dildonic device? Is your tongue rigid?

The meat tongue? Oh my god. Is it swelling? It's engorged. It's engorged and moist. Turgid. No! Ah! Touché, motherfucker!

The silver sun suddenly lurches and crashes into the ground. Can't fight over it. Duh-duh-duh-duh-duh. What about your box? Is it hot? Oh, I just made a cookie. Yeah. Ding! What about your box? Is it hot? Oh, I just made a cookie. Ding! Too loud.

That's impressive. So when you get aroused, you make cookies? If you get me aroused enough. No, she's got a half-baked. Aw. Oh, I'm sorry. Why is this cookie so salty? Oh!

Oh! Oh, Ron! Oh my god! Oh, Bailie! That made me gross. Stop your piss! Everything else was fine. Stop it!

Hi, 20-year-old Ronan! No! Incredible. Oh, my hearty night. It's going to be like, oh, what the fuck? Ow. So.

Anything else to achieve on this day? No, we press on. All righty. It is now seven days to the solstice. Seven days. Shut up. I need someone to roll a d20 for me, please. That's you. I don't wanna.

Do it. You got this. Sub five. Roll one. Sub five. No! If you look down. Sub five. How do we get a fast thing for like, I'm doing something down here, I can't. It is more challenging here in the Hellcatch.

Sub five. Challenging. I'm working on a peanut butter recipe, a peanut butter cookie recipe for the next couple days. Oh god, nope. One. It is, isn't it? No fucking way! I cursed it. I know, it is, it's one!

I cursed it. Roll a d6 for me. Roll a d6! I knew it! I knew, I knew I was going to roll bad. I put it out there. Give me six. What am I rolling? Give me six.

I need six. Six. One. No, my dragon. I do want to hit something really badly. Three. Okay. A three.

Oh god. Suddenly, god damn it. as the day progresses, a massive wall of dust orb begins to rise up to the east. Just loom like this dark, pressing cloud in your direction, and you hear Zandis go, Well, that's going to be a real tough one.

We're going to have to get a little low to the ground, and we're coming up on Basara soon, so just, I guess, hold on to something! Oh man, I always fly off these ships. Oh god, that's right. Tie yourself in. Or go underneath, go under! Yeah, let's maybe do that. I'm going to use my grapple hook

to grapple myself to the mainmust. All right. That's nice. I'm going to tie myself onto something in the front, or something on the, what am I saying? Next is Andas, so I can learn how he's navigating in the dust storm. Oh, nice. So I can learn.

Nice. All right. So keep an eye on them. I'll help you in column. The rest of the crew. Ropes, tying. Rope to the mist with FCG. All right. I'll say, who's helming the rope-tying effort?

Rope-tying? Oh god. I went in the hole. Into the, you went inside? I'll tie ropes. All right. I'll tie ropes. I've done a lot of ropes. I'm dexterous. Okay, all right. Yeah, go ahead and roll a dexterity check for me,

if you don't mind. Dexterity check? Yes. Did I assist him? Oh wait, you already. So just add my modifier? Yeah, just add your modifier. Come on! That's terrible, I rolled a two, so that's a seven. Could I I assist him? Oh wait, you already. So just add my modifier? Yeah, just add your modifier. Come on! It's terrible, I rolled a two, so that's a seven. Could I have assisted him? Because I was tying ropes, too.

This is technically a skill challenge, and so it's individual rolls as the challenge goes around. Oh, I see, I see. Here I go. So. Three. You go around and start helping everyone with their knots. And for the most part, you've got most everyone secured, You go around and start helping everyone with their knots.

And for the most part, you've got most everyone secured, but the storm hits at a more rapid pace than you expect. And as you're getting over to your final section to tie yourself in, the whole ship lists to one side. And as it begins to spin a bit, Zandis just goes, hold on! And you just barely holding onto the side. You start to slip off to the side

and Zandis sees this happening and goes, Nah, shit. Goes ahead and, as opposed to spinning with the wind, tries to spin against it to keep you from careening off the side. In doing so, you watch as one of the sails like begins to hear the cracking sound of wood.

What's the next thing someone's doing to try and help protect against this storm or to hold things down? The mast is cracking. Did you say the mast is cracking? You hear a crack in the wood. I'm going to try and take a quick run out straight towards the mast with my rope

and just start lashing it down with my body. Okay, roll a strength check for me so you can try and hold it in place to use your own physicality with this rope to try and keep it able to survive the brunt of this storm. I will cast Enhance Ability on him. Natural 20. Oh! You cast it so well.

Yep, I did. He does a natural 20 on his end. You throw the rope around, hold it tightly, and embrace the stone-like form that your body sits within. You become just a shield of rock around the somewhat damaged sail mast. And it does not move.

Yep. Nice. While they do that, I'm going to spider climb up to that crack in the mast and start pumping mending into it. Oh, legit. Okay, okay. Also, go ahead and roll a d20 for me and add your spellcasting modifier.

Oh, bullshit. Six. Six. Six. Four successes before two failures. So you attempt to mend this mast as you're holding it and clutching it, holding it in place. And right as you're watching the wooden aspects

pull themselves together, a heavy gust wham, rams into the side of the ship. The ship begins to spin almost out of control. And as you clutch onto the side of the ship. The ship begins to spin almost out of control, and as you clutch onto the side of the mast and onto Ashton for as much of a grip as you can with the spider clam spell holding you in place, you hear the terrible sound as that one sail rips off and is lost into the storm.

The sail, not the mast. Well, the sail and the top of the mast. It breaks. God damn it. Zandis goes, All right, it's all right, just keep it held down! And the storm continues to blow for another hour and a half. The ship is brought low,

as low into the storm as possible to keep the heavy winds from battering it. And when the storm finally clears, about two hours later total, you're not quite sure where you are in the Hellcatch. It takes Zandis another hour to triangulate where you've been blown. By the time the clarity of the day comes to you,

you've lost a day of travel. Oh. By the time we get to Basra, the solstice will be happening. And then it's another couple of days. Unless we can make up and die. That's not in trouble. How? We won't even be able to travel at full speed now.

Well, it was six days up from Bassuras and 12 days to the solstice, or 11? That's now... You said seven days till the... Seven days to the solstice as of today, yeah. As of today, but we're only three days away. Oh, how close are we to Bassuras now? Oh, you'll get to Bassuras tomorrow.

You were going to get there today, but you got blown off course. Got it. Okay, okay, okay. I knew it. Okay. It's okay, Ash. I was trying to busy myself, so Matt wouldn't look at me, but it didn't work. It's you!

I got some over here. As we're detangling from the mast, I just have that, and I got really drunk, and I'm pretty sure I probably said some stupid shit, so whatever I said, I'm definitely sorry, and a little, I don't know. I'm sure it was bad. Hi. Sorry. I owe you something, not a drink. I owe you something. Sorry. You remember everything you said. Don't bullshit me. God, I hope I do, oh boy. You know, Ashton, and I understand the irony of this,

but you're not as hard as you look. Yeah, I've never heard that before. Yeah. Thank you. You're softy. Thanks, Scrooge. You're welcome. Ah! Good to see you. How did you do that?

See, FCG, there's more of you on the way. I, uh... It's my sister, C. Thanks. Well, I'm going to make a duck to Orym. When this is over. Stupid. Yep, yep. All right.

End of the day? Any other business for the day, or do we move on to the following day? Oh, right. Do we need to ca- What do the skies look like compared to the beginning of this game and the waves of red cloud? Your perceptiveness already,

in previous experience, seeing it, makes it easy to clock now that you look out in focus, but the colors are much more prominent, to the point where even in the middle of the high sun of the afternoon, you can see these curtains of shifting energy, these long tethers that look almost like a mile high at times, these moving, shifting curtains of magical energy

that slowly flow and shift. You watch them all ever so slowly move across the landscape, like the most minuscule shift in a rainstorm's payload. At night, it is like a natural celebration of color and light. With the night sky now around you,

as the auroras are more visible, the ley lines themselves are breathtakingly beautiful. And matched with the knowledge of what's to come, deeply ominous, you can see occasionally those pulses still traveling through. They're just brighter

and more recurring. Do we need to reach out to Ira or the Calloways or anything since we'll be there mañana? Calloways, did we reach out to them? We have Calloways, we have, did we do Shashadre? Did we talk to Calloways at all? Did we do that? I feel like we haven't reached out to the Calloways.

Greensleeves, Keyleth. We didn't reach out to any of those. We did reach out to Keyleth earlier and she was busy doing stuff. I'm kind of curious if anybody else, if these are localized, or like how, everywhere, do you think these lights are everywhere? There's an easy way to figure that out.

A historian cookie. You going to eat all that? Hey, buddy. Okay. I have a weird request from the other side of the ocean. Can you see the ley lines? Is your night sky lit up? Ashton says hi. Ash says hi.

You'll know it if you see it. Yeah. Yeah, it's... It's real colorful up here, too. I'd take it in and enjoy the display if things weren't so tense at the moment. What's going on? Talash, nice hand. Whoa, whoa, whoa.

Fjord says hi. What if this is really affecting Opal? Oh, maybe that's why she's... Why is he saying it's so tense? Who's Opal? Opal's a friend of ours from, we met her in Tal'Dorei, and she's a little younger and coming to grips with problems of her own.

She's half the world away, though. I don't know what to do about that, Fearne. I know, I just... I think if we fix this, she can fix that. We'll deal with that later, okay. Always a list. Calloways. Yeah, we'll message the Calloways,

tell them when to expect us and to go pick up the thing. Calloways. Yeah, we'll message the Calloways, tell them when to expect us, and to go pick up the thing. Uh-huh. Also message Ira, tell them when we're coming. I've got one third level left. So I'll message Ira, you message Calloways. Sure, done. All right. It happened.

I guess for the sake of travel and brevity, Birdie responds, well, Ira already told me. So we're going to go ahead and prepare for your arrival soon. Mahara's okay. I'll go start moving. That's Ira pretending to be him. Because he ate them?

She's wearing their faces right now. You got to respect the craft, though. It's really. Sure. All right, so. Flame, dry. Anything else before the next day in which you arrive at Vassar's? Hopefully, with a good roll.

Nine. Let's do it. Let's do it. Let's go for it. It's all you. Hey, Mijin. Six days till the solstice. Oh boy, Orym is filling all the empty hours on this boat just doing the Zephyr Ota on the deck of the ship. Just because he's stressed the hell out. Just cookie, cookie, cookie.

Go ahead and roll your 25. Come on, Jyn. Stress baking. Oh, Jyn. I love stress baking. Chka-chka-chka. 18. 18. 18. Ooh. 18. 18, okay. The day is calm and while the clouds

do mar the sky with shadow, the winds are gentle. Though it brings a unique smell, almost like a forest fire occasionally that comes through the wind, but you see no smoke nor forest. No. But nevertheless.

Whatever. Midday, you can see the carmine curtain, the large red walls that wrap around the majestic, clustered city of Bassuras before you. A familiar sight, last seen when you fled upon this very skyship. But there it is before you, the track of the Deathwish Run wrapping around

the nearby edge of the canyon that encompasses this northern side. What would you like to do? We ran out of town before, right? Obviously we would know this. Were we chasing a town? Yeah, I feel like we were. I feel like we'll be. I feel like it was not.

There's so many different factions that we just have to. Because we were going to. I mean, you nuked the town and then we got out of there. Correct. Plenty of people. There's a missing corner of one of the neighborhoods. Check your ball.

Check your balls. Check your balls. No sign of anything? They don't really stretch. Should we land at Vassaros, or should we go to the Calloways? I think the Calloways. I have a Calloways, and then drive out to Vassaros. Because they're going to meet us at Imahara Joe's.

No, no, no. They're picking up from Imahara Joe's. No, no, no. They're picking up. They're picking up. Oh, from there, okay. Yeah, so if the Calloways, if we want to send them a message and say, hey, you guys go check in at Eunice's, because I don't think we should go into town. If they're already there. You don't want to stay in town?

Drop Hexum's name, maybe get some health potions. Yeah, some health and some whatever. God, we should be there. Hard to know not being there, but yeah. We can reimburse them, whatever cash it is. Hopefully they are that liquid. So am I dropping you off outside of the town, or are you going? No, over wheelie,

the Captain Zandis, where the Calloway Hathaway is. Oh, so we're not, at which point you see this, like, some sort of a harpoon or weapon is launched from the city. Right, okay, we're just going to move on and cruise away from this. Oh shit. They do remember us.

Wow, I've never heard of that happening. Chetney. Yeah? I was thinking about your idea of painting the ship. Yeah. Well, we might not have enough paint to paint the bottom of it. Going off of the disguising ourselves to be allies idea, what if we utilize that symbol that was on those crates

of the Cerberus Assembly? What if we make ourselves paint that on the ship to make ourselves look like an incoming assembly ship? That was like three diamonds or something. I think I've still got those crates. Yeah. It couldn't hurt. I don't know. It just might maybe deter them for a second. I know the Cerberus Assembly members can just bamf in and out, but if it's a shipment, or Otahan's crew.

Can't hurt. They had a symbol, too, right? What were those fucking people's names? Paragon's Call. Paragon's Call. Yeah, hopefully we're coming in hot enough that we don't really need time to see it, but you know. Sure. The Paragons, I think, would be more likely to know a ship wasn't theirs, but on the other hand, that other Sybil, I think, is a really good idea.

Wait, if we're pulling up to the Calloway Hideaway, isn't it bad if we park the ship there? Wouldn't people be like, oh. Wouldn't be a hideaway anymore? It wouldn't be a hideaway anymore. Maybe we can park the ship on the other side. Just leave the ship in the air. Like a couple thousand yards away?

I thought we were getting off and they can fly away for a little while. Sure, let's do that. Yeah. All right, so passing beyond the city of Bassuras, you guide Zandis over to where you recall the hideaway was. Are we probably gone? No, it's the same platform,

the northern edge of the mesa where the pathway leads into the cavern is there. The skyship slowly descends and lands little ways away from the entrance, per your request. And you can rapidly leap off on the sides of the skyship and then it picks up and just begins to run a loop until you're ready. A quick rope down? Like, SWAT team style?

Yeah, if you want to, sure. Yeah, yeah. You all descend. It's a quick walk from where you were dropped off, about 20 or so minutes with a jog walk from where you were dropped off, about 20 or so minutes with a jogging pace until you come around to the top, the northern side of the mesa.

There you see the crawler that was left, the crawler that you previously left there. We have a car. In the entryway to the hideaway. We're taking it. We're fucking a car. In the entryway to the hideaway. We're taking it. We're fucking taking it. Yeah, we're taking it. We're fucking taking it. It's a good call.

Is that the secret knock? What? The secret knock is just insistence, yeah. Doorway shuffles open. You see Birdie there on the other side. Hi. Oh, there she is. Come on in here. Big old, huh? Oh, and all your friends around here, too.

Hey, come on in, come on in. We're expecting you. Not exactly the best circumstances. No. Everything seems fine. Nothing seems out of place. Good perception check. Thank you. Where's Ira?

Oh, he's still fiddling on the device there. Oh. You mad? Sure, yeah, go right ahead, he's like. 10. 10? The telescope still has the same, like, Yeah, go right ahead, easily. 10. What's here? The telescope. The telescope still has the same growths around. They're acting fine, nothing seems different.

Make an insight check. Okay, that's good. That's, yeah, okay. So that's seven. Never mind. They seem fine. They seem fine. They're cool. All right, should we go see Ira?

Yeah. Yeah. Calloway, did you get the goods from Joe? Olly steps in, wiping his hands with dirt and soot on them, and he's like, Oh, you've all arrived. Very good. Fearne, good to see you. Hello, good to see you.

Course, course. Welcome, friends. see you. Of course, of course. Welcome, friends. I heard we're all in a bit of a frenzy, so up this way, please. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Bring it in, bring it in. Could be the end of the world. Might as well.

Who's that? Dad. Dad. I know. Who's that? Dad. Dad. I know. Who's that? It's embarrassing, and the same thing, I was like, what is it? I was like, is that Hondir? I was like, I couldn't remember.

Sorry. Now we look open. You step into the familiar laboratory, the cluttered space that you had previously encountered Ira Wendigoth the last time. There, you see the same device, the cluttered space that you had previously encountered Ira Wendigoth the last time. There you see the same device, and you hear the banging of metal, and you see the familiar shape of one long, thin spider-like arm clutching to the side

as most of the bodies within the device. You see, sitting in a stool on the opposite side of the room, just looking up, the familiar form of Handir, the Grim Verity goblinoid member who had been living in Bassuras this time. He looks over towards the rest of you. Oh, so you've made it.

Welcome. He's here. I guess you're talking. He points over to this heavy series of satchels that are placed on the furthest corner of this chamber. It takes you a moment to see it separately from the rest of the clutter around it, but you see these two large clusters

of smaller-sized arcane cores that all have been welded together to be about that large each. And they give that faint bluish glow to them, just filling that space with this faint, soft, fuzzy halo of blue light. Right about that time, the clinging stops and two legs step out from inside.

Another arm grabs the top end, and like a daddy-long legs, Iroindagoth slowly emerges, the long ears folded within before they flop out and shake slightly. Turns around, that horrible, vacuous grin and sharp teeth and just that black, void-like eyes. The rest of you with a bit of dirt smudged in the face. Wonderful, you've come. So,

what can I do for you? We've been busy. Yeah, yeah. Do you really want to mess it up? Very. Great. Well, why? Well, let's just say I hold grudges a very long time. Grudges against who, in this case?

I was contacted by Lutenis to design the first key. And I grew curious. They offered me inspirational designs, examples of some strange technology that caught my lure. And I'm not one to just build things without information. I like to know what I'm working on. While all of us can enjoy a good mystery. I guess I grew more curious than they were comfortable.

So, finished with my first design after the initial tests, they kicked me from the project. I want to destroy what they've built. I want to show them that I'm superior designer. I want to take from them everything they've worked for, and I want to look them in the eye when it happens. And I want to look them in the eye when it happens. I want to laugh.

I want to laugh. Jesus. We know what they're trying to achieve, right? For Dathos? What are they working on? Best that I know. They wouldn't tell me in detail before they absolved our contract.

But they wanted a channel. They wanted something that could gather a directly focused amount of energy through a focus, a lens, if you will. The initial design was just to grab and hold, to be an anchor. That was the first key. It was to be a accelerant, a bolstering device.

That's the one in the Fey Realm. Mm-hmm. I had an intent for the next build, and they arrogantly said that they didn't need me. They could do it on their own. They were dissatisfied with my work. So I hope the Calloways take the crown. Well, we finished what you started.

How so? Doesn't know. The Fey Realm Key is destroyed. His eyes narrow, and you see there's this interesting conflict of a bit of arrogant frustration that something he designed had been destroyed, but immediately melts into a delicious enjoyment. Mind you, I...

It was more of a prototype. It was very difficult to break. It was. But... This is good. This is a step in the right direction. Oh, I bet they're scrambling. Oh, I bet they're scrambling. Oh, I bet they're so unhappy. They are.

They seem to be adjusting their designs. Would you still know how to harm the one in the desert? I've been keeping an eye. He looks back at the machine. What are you looking at? The moon or something else? The side. The side? Do you want to see?

Yes, very much. Yeah. I had to make some adjustments. The lens that I was waiting on seemed to be rendered unusable. Motherfucker. So it's a bit, ooh, improvised. Reaches over and grabs you with his long spindly fingers

and wraps them around your head and plucks you, lifting you. Sure. Like a radish. He's always so much bigger than I realize. Yeah. He's long. And places you before the eyepiece. Okay.

Clutters up at the side and adjusts a few things. And pushes your head up to the eyepiece. As he's adjusting it, you watch as the strange, extended metallic viewing piece seems to bend and shift. It almost coils like a serpent in a westerly direction, a northwesterly direction. As you glance through, it seems to almost bank imagery.

In theory, it's just pointing towards the sky, but you're getting a downward view of something. It's very odd. You see, having been in a somewhat immaterial, almost dreamlike vision, a transference of your consciousness to an in-between within the space, you recognize immediately the shape of this sinkhole.

The edges, some edges are pushed up and others are sinking downward, but at all points, there are bridges that connect at different levels within. You can see there are multiple walkways that curve down and these thin connecting points where figures are walking across. You can see on the outside little tents

and bits of the excavation. Whether they're old or new, you can't tell from this distance, but you can see just figures moving around. You can see the dust trails of crawlers that are coasting and driving around, which immediately you can infer that the Paragon's call is definitely

in some way, shape, or form present. At which point, Ira leans in real close and goes, What do you see? What do I see? I mean, I see the sight. It turns another knob and it's almost like the glass flips. As it does, all of a sudden,

your vision is much closer. You are right at the edge of this pit. Within the pit. With this perspective, it's a few hundred feet across and two, three hundred feet, it's hard to tell, the full width of the sinkhole. And you can see people walking around, some dressed in vanguard robes,

some you can see in the armored attire, the Paragon's Call, the crawlers themselves, not mingling directly, they're still working together, but they all seem to be keeping to themselves a little bit. You also watch, passing by, a clearer look at one of these large automatons. It's egg-shaped torso, heavily armored. You can see the runic design to it

takes Aeorian inspiration, though it is not directly from your build or others. This has more modern automaton feels to it. It's a modern construct, but you can see where the inspiration seems to be pulled from. The glass slips once more, and you have a view over this.

You can see the half dozen bridges overlapping, but they never quite cross the center. You can see below, directly head on, the pointed edge of the central spire that's marked there, almost in a fork-type shape. It sits facing your direction and the shadow takes it from within.

You can just see points of light, of moving lanterns and light sources all throughout the scattered ruins beneath. It is a small village down there. You can see structures, buildings, some partially crumbled, some partially still well-maintained, and some partially unexcavated that are still built in the dirt and rock.

The glass slips once more. And now the image is staticky. And as you peer inward, you can see dozens of figures walking around, carrying things, hammering things. You can see a flash or a spark, a greenish flash, and it looks like they are coating elements of it. Coating?

Like placing and almost like welding or fixing something to the outside of this massive tower. And there's all sorts of heavy machinery that has been built around it. It's almost too much to take in from this overhead view. It is purely directly above. And then you watch as suddenly, numerous points of light alight to the inside of the wall of this tower,

and there's a warm flash of light and the vision's gone. And you just see darkness. As I was looking, I was describing in Mercerian detail everything that I was seeing to the rest of the group, but slightly more eloquently than you did. Of course, don't. As you're describing this, the rest of you watch as

Eyreg stands or sits behind FCG, the mass of long elbows and knees looming over as he looks at the rest of you, listening to what he says below before going, it seems about every minute on the minute, it emits some sort of burst of anti-magic, like a dispel wave. Every minute on the minute?

Best I can tell. Oh, this is going to take a hell of a shot, kid. Yeah, it is. That was about right. Do you have a theory of what exactly this is, what they're trying to do? What are your thoughts? Tell me all of it.

Well, I can only assume it has something to do with Ruidus. They've made much mention of wanting to destroy it, reach it, tether it, lock it, break it, free it, I don't know. But they have a lot of interest. They paid well originally, and I was curious. I didn't ask too many questions until I asked too many. Why, do you know? Do you? Of course. Whether we're working together or not. Are we allies? Are we friends? You tell your friend what you know, right?

I'm comfortable with colleague, I think, at this point. Yeah, last time we saw you, there was a little bit of trickeration on your part. Oh, it's just my nature. I know. I can respect that. Do you still have the crown that you absconded with? Oh, I do. And imagine what would happen if such a powerful artifact

were to suddenly surge What would happen if such a powerful artifact were to suddenly surge in their device? I don't think they are so clever as to prepare for too much power, right? It's funny you mention that. That's actually precisely how we made the Malleus Key in the Fey Realm go boom. Is that your solution for this one? One. But I need to get closer. They've been moving things. Yeah, they have. They've been shifting

and dividing the power sources. I feel like they did it after we took out the wand. Yeah. Have you just been watching from afar here? I've been trying to. When you say dividing the power sources, you mean several meters away from each other, hiding them? From what I can tell,

I can't see them from above anymore. Ah. So they may have hidden them. Still need to be tethered. One assumes. There's got to be something connecting them. It's probably a point of weakness. They've been...

Maybe. There's a few odd things they're building in there I'd like to see closer. I can't figure out what they're for. Do you know how to get closer? I mean this. Numerous ways to get closer. Did you see Rin get taken?

No. I look over at Hondir. Hondir, eyes go wide. He's just been quiet this whole time. The plane rider is gone. Yeah. Turned to stone at the base of the key. Reaches in and pulls out a small necklace

and holds it for a second and closes his eyes. Reaches in and pulls out a small necklace and holds it for a second and closes his eyes. Lips his chin a bit. How are you praying to? Those who came before me, I am not a godly figure, but I believe in those who have made sacrifices before us. Ira, you're crafty and powerful.

Is there any chance you can send us there? Oh, I can do short bursts for myself and maybe one other, but what you're asking is a bit outside of my bailiwick, but I am excited to ride on the skyship. You certainly can, and maybe one other is exactly what we might need. Yeah. That's true.

Would it be safe to park the skyship here, or should we keep it up in the air? Oh, it's quite a long walk. No, from Bassuras. Would they be able to see it? From here? With the right eyepieces, yes. We shouldn't dally too long. Why? Are you expecting?

Could use a little repair if we had the moment, but it's serviceable. It's missing a sail. Sure. Shit. We went to go see my nana. And... We went to go see my nana. And she says, hi.

But how'd she say it, though? Hi. As you look at, you look. You say that towards her, hi, and you blink, and in a blink instant, Ira's right in your face. Shit. Well, next time you see her, you tell her I say

hi. Ah, young love. Nothing like it. Thanks, Mara. I like it. It's all romantic. All romantic. I'm never going to give you up. Is it late? Did it take us the whole day to get here?

At this point, it's early afternoon, mid-afternoon, so you still have more travel if you'd like to for the day. And we're still four days away from Solstice? You're six days away from the Solstice. And how far travel are we from the excavation site? You're roughly four to five days, depending on how the- Oh, that is so, I didn't realize it was so far.

We got a day. How much of a drive is it to get into Bassuras from the hideaway? A drive? You mean on the airship or on a car? No, no, no, if we took the car into Bassuras. It's a few hours into Bassuras. Okay. Oh, Bassuras, too.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, the crawler. Ira, have you ever been in any of those sinkholes around the Hellcatch? Have you ever gone down where the squiddies be? Not myself, no. I don't make a habit of crawling into subterranean holes unless I have a reason. Fair.

Well. You going into Bassros? I mean, should we take a look? What do we need? Just to shop? Just to go to Eunice's and stock up, if we need it? Let's to Eunice's and stock up? If we need it. Let's do it. All right, let's make that quick.

Who's that? We can't all of us go on the crawler. Nope. No, why don't we? I'll stay here and continue to chat. I'll help repair the sail on the ship with my fucking awesome woodworking skills. I can help paint, if we still want to do the paint-y symbol thing.

Pick up some paint in town. Sure. Put it on the list. I'm going shopping. Yeah, let's go. Let's do a very quick shop run. I'll stay here and delicately load the bomb onto the boat. Okay. I'll go with y'all. I toss 500 gold to the team.

Whoa. Buy some fucking potions. You might need to pay Imahara Joe while you're there, too. Well, we'll take care of that after. I throw 500 gold as well. Okay, so. Here's 3,000 gold. I'll do it.

Hey, big spender. Okay, so we have 4,000 Gs with us. I got 2,000 and change on me. Yeah, I've got about that, too. Okay. All right. All righty. Vroom, vroom. While the rest of you stay back,

as Ira begins to gather the rest of his things and begins to place them in this awful, black alligator hide-looking medicine bag. Folds open in the top and begins placing tools and objects and weird trinkets. Then eventually, this oddly familiar glowing crown goes inside and latches. As soon as he latches it, he twists his hand

and it just vanishes. Oh wait, he just bamfed? No, he bamfed his bag. His bag. Iroh. Yes, my dear. You mentioned you were replaced. That they didn't think you were adequate enough.

Do you know who they replaced you with? No. I do not. I'm one to believe that perhaps there is no replacement. Maybe they just ran with it, I don't know. For you, darling, of course not. Oh, here it comes. Is this where she wanted to stay?

Yes, if this, if the floor would have wanted to stay. Yes, so just flirt with the keeping man. You got a Virginia's Day. Yeah. Martini in the other hand. I grew bored of the project early in anyway. On to bigger and better things. But if there's anything that draws my attention faster than inspiration,

it's spitefulness. It's quite a grudge for being fired, honestly. Well, definitely burned a few bridges in working with them. Sure. You certainly left quite a reputation in your wake in Jrusar. Anything that we can harvest from this little

tiny Malleus key to help us in our cause? Power cores? That's what that second device is. It points to the second satchel that you are carrying over. It's like, one was from Imahara Joe's, the other I pieced together for interest. Oh. Does it do anything different, or is it just blow?

It goes boom. It goes boom, okay. It's just going to say it, too, which is the worst part, and then we're going to feel really silly. Little flag. Yep. Do you happen to know anything about... What's his name? Predathos? Name does not ring a bell, I'm afraid,

but you can tell me what is a Predathos. I was just... What the fuck are you doing? Seeing you now. Insight check. Make an insight check. Oh, pardon. 23.

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and at your local game store. Whiz Kids, they're the whizziest. I'm pretty sure the copy of this is set up. No, not another set. I'm going to make up mottos for them. Okay. Just like they asked for it. Unless somebody's saying that. I think, I think,

I think Proudathos was like a... A cereal. A C, oh, Proudathos, it was a cereal. And I was just curious if you liked it. Make a deception check. Okay. Oh boy, oh boy. Good job, Fearne.

Team's all divided up. Summer going shopping. I thought she was going shopping. 21. Ay! 21. Interesting. Maybe you'll have to tell me all about this cereal on the journey. Uh-huh.

Okay. Cereal killer. Hey! Hello. In the interim, who's going to Vassaris? We are. All right. It's a tight ride.

Easy rider. You all clutter in as the back feet push off the monstrous growling crawler, tearing across the desert ground, leaving this large trail of dust in its wake. You gather your bearings and then push on to the southward direction until eventually you come to the long bridge that carries you

across the ravine once more. The wind, while it is gentler than previous days, it is still enough to cause the bridge to shift and rock slightly to a point where it is, you are able to feel it even amongst the vibrations and push of the crawler, and it's a little off-putting. Just tell me when we're over it. I like riding these things.

What? Man, I love riding these things. Within a short enough time, you begin to approach the outside of the Carmine Curtain and the bustling city of Bassuras, the trash heap of the Hellcatch Valley. Do you do anything to? Cover ourselves slightly?

Oh yeah, we're cloaked up. Cloaked! Yeah. Okay. You swallow yourselves in cloaks and materials to hide. You have a little. We should probably have painted over the little sign on our crawler, too, just to cover it up.

Sure. Since we were very- Probably been blown, like sanded, blasted by this point. That's true, that's true. But you cruise through the main gates. There are two very well-armed Gajahkandas crawlers There are two very well-armed Gajacandas crawlers, keeping a watch as you pour through,

and they keep a tight eye. Just do a three-view, a group deception check. I'll give you advantage, because they're not looking for you specifically, but they're, I'm so good at corruption. That's so great. With advantage.

Thank god. 22. 11, it's good for. With advantage. Thank god. 22. 11, it's good for me. 11. Okay, 22, 11, 11. I have a negative two. There's definitely an intense stare as you ride through the gates,

but you don't read any sudden change in physical activity, any sort of mood shift or posture alteration. You continue tearing through the city streets, following your lead as the driver. Going straight to, I know where I'm heading. Going straight there. Specifics. In and out. In and out.

You rush to the northern side. Going straight to Taste's Hall. Get a burger. Yeah. Just one other burger. Couple t-shirts, couple pond Get a burger. Yep. Just one other burger. Couple t-shirts, couple pot holders, whatever's new. Just one of everything. I got rid of my pot holder, he took it.

Oh fucker. That's true, you pick up another one. You do rush over to the Salmagundas Strip on the northern side of the city. There, going past the bustling courtyard that sits all these numerous carts and buildings and tents, you see the massive structure that is the Caravanserai, bustling courtyard that sits all these numerous carts and buildings and tents. You see the massive structure that is the Caravanserai,

the Ra-Ha-Den, where you stayed before. You, knowing directly where Eunice's General Supply Shop is, you go ahead and park and chain up your crawler near one of the specific hitching posts, which is not designed for a crawler necessarily. It's designed for a number of other creatures and beasts, but it works enough for the time being. You approach this very simple-looking stone domicile

that's been converted into a general supply shop, and you see the back of it has been expanded. They took out the back wall and then affixed a storage facility beyond the back of it. But as you enter the front, it has these long metallic beads that look like they're collections of pieces of scavenged metal and iron and aluminum and other ores that have been strung together on this long cable. There's just numerous ones. As you push through, it gives this shiny, clattering sound that's not beautiful, but

definitely unique. Stepping into the shaded interior, there's not much business going on here, but you do recognize Yunus, this homely-looking male dwarf in what would be the human equivalent of his 60s. He looks older. He's got this thick, bushy white unibrow that sits over a shaved upper lip and a very, very long gathered white beard that drifts down past his navel, wearing simple light white clothing, both on shirt and pants for the hotter temperatures here of Bassuras, and is currently in the process of enjoying a cup of tea and looking over what looks to of a folded piece of paper before you enter and folds it, puts it away. Oh, hello, welcome to the general store. What can I do for you?

Hi, Eunice, right? That's me, I'm Eunice. Excellent. Honestly, we're in a bit of a rush. We're here, we've heard this is the place to shop in town. Jiana Hexum. Yeah, look around. Jiana Hexum said that you are just the place to go to get something special, potions,

maybe something magical. We've got a little bit of work to do and we would love an edge. And when she says that somebody is the person, they are the person. Gives a curious glance out of one eye. His normally squinty vision, one eye pops open a bit, stands up, folds the paper, puts it away,

walks around to the door going, I can't say I've heard that name before. I appreciate someone's inquiry over someone else's recommendation, but that's not the sort of business. Closes the door and is like, Real sorry about that. All right, all right, come here.

Oh! Yeah, the voice change. There's a simple back door and this extravagant-looking locked doorway. Pulls out a ring of keys and goes ahead and unlocks the simple door and opens it. Oh, yes. And leads you into this small back chamber

where there are just a bunch of latched chests, curved chests, box chests. Looks like this is, some of them look empty, but there are some that are closed and latched. And he steps inside. As you're about to step into the threshold, he puts a hand out and turns back to you. So what are you looking for?

What do you have? Well, we've got all sorts of things. We got a... Fuck it all. We got food, we got Barad-Inn's Root, we got all sorts of toxins, poisons. What are we talking about? Toxins and poisons might be a little more

than what we need right now. It's going to be less of a one-on-one confrontation issue and more snatch and grab. We've got to get into a heavily armored facility, getting our shit together and trying to get out in one piece. Health potions, any weaponry, defensive measurements. Stuff. Stop me. Stop me. Anything interesting? Uh, you know, I mean.

I promise it's actually for a good cause for once. I've got tools and weapons. I got all sorts of regular ones in the other room, but if you want something special, let me see what I got. He rubs his beard a bit and goes and starts locking some of these and opening them up, rummaging through, finds two larger healing potions, and sets them aside and goes,

I got those, those I can do and help you with. Yep, good, that's a start. These four is interesting, interesting, yes, yes, interesting, okay, okay, okay, okay. They don't surprise. Gets down and opens up another chest and pulls through. He dusts off something and opens this small lid on it. Pulls out this intricate, thin-looking circlet and sets it down. It's this fine silver circlet that

almost has a coiling design around the edges. It looks very, very lightweight, almost like a silver-like material. Sets that down on the table. Goes and pulls out another small box that has a dark, polished mahogany lid. He pulls it up and pulls out this long chain of a dull, almost gunmetal coloration. In the middle of it is this beautiful, brown-yellow cut gem. Sets that aside, and then looks around and goes, and leaps up and grabs this one bag that's hanging in the

ceiling, pulls it out, opens it up, and pulls out this odd-looking thick leather. It's like half between a belt and a girdle. It has two belts along the side, but it has a thicker piece of leather that's affixed, too, and sets it down and goes, All right, these are interesting. They're not cheap, but they're interesting. What do they do? Ozyraa takes the necklace and holds it up. This.

The necklace or the circlet? The necklace first. He puts it on his. This necklace is a hearty little enchantment. It will rejuvenate and empower your personal fortitude, your endurance, your general health and sense of well-being. Okay. It's not a very unique name.

It's called an Amulet of Health. All right. That's the point. For those that are interested, it is an Amulet of Health. Yep. Well, it runs. Pulling it up.

I should actually write this down, too. Amulet of Health. Wanderer's Constitution is a two, or something. Whoever wears it, their constitution becomes a 19. Whoa. Whoa. Just straight jumps to 19? Just straight jumps to 19. Holy fuck.

That's going to be a two. It's a four, right? Fuck. Yeah. It must be a two. It's a two, yeah. All right. Wow. Wowzers. What's your constitution? Four? Six?

No, you're thinking of my strength. Of your strength, yeah, that's right. Don't insult me. Insult my strength, bro. Okay. The circlet, he goes up and pulls up and doesn't put it on, but holds it and goes, This is called the Circlet of the Hidden Eye.

And it's situationally useful for the kind of things that you're talking about, I think. Getting a glance over it and looking at it, let me pull up the actual item here. While wearing this circlet, you're immune to magic that allows other creatures to read your thoughts or determine whether you are lying. Creatures can communicate telepathically with you

only if you allow it. Someone attempts to perceive or detect you through divination magic, they must succeed on a DC six of wisdom saving throw to do so. On a failure, they are unable to locate or perceive you through the spell or scrying sensor. Oh my god. And they suffer psychic damage.

It's like a tinfoil hat for you. A DC of what? 16 wisdom. 16. Okay. That It's like a tinfoil hat for you. A DC of what? 16 wisdom. 16. Okay. It's a workable tinfoil hat. I don't know if you guys have enough money for all this shit. We probably don't, but we'll figure out where we're going to go with it. And the third thing, and then we'll find out the damage. Yeah.

The third one is called a Belt of Momentum. It's an item that a number of them were made for some of the local crawler gangs, the ones that like to get their hands dirty and close the gap in distance really quick. Belts of Momentum, leather belts that, when you move more than 25 feet in a straight line and successfully hit a creature of huge or smaller size,

it takes additional damage and you can, if they make a save, be pushed 15 feet away from you. Ooh. You should become a human battering ram, essentially. You get enough. I always have thought that someone of Chet's age should probably be wearing a girdle. I feel like it would suit him.

It's definitely starting to slump. Yeah. It needs a little posture help. Yeah, it needs the ribbon. Could get easily two or three inches out of that right there. What'll everything run us individually? The potions in each item?

Oh wait, there's a stone, too. Oh, was that the necklace? That was the necklace. Got it. Indeed, indeed. The two potions. All righty. So. So we are two potions, or potions of greater healing.

Mm-hmm. Let's see if Let me pull my list here. Jesus Christ. All right, here we go. Those will run you about 300 apiece for each potion. The belt is 2,500 gold pieces. Mm-hmm. All right. The circlet is 5,500 gold pieces. Mm-hmm. All right.

The circlet is 5,000 gold pieces. And the amulet is 7,000 gold pieces. Ugh! Buy them all. End of the world. It's adorable that you have that kind of money. All right, what are we sitting at? Grand total of cash that we have on us?

Okay, wait, everybody look at their money, yeah. Should have given them that money. I'll retcon and give you another 1,000. 4,000 gold. Can you do that? Retcon? No, no. You gave them the amount you gave them. Fair.

I've also got 95. Check that. If you dump all the money, we can then re-divvy. Yeah, I know. Just trade them your glass hammer. Yeah, exactly. I'm going to move on. Okay.

Oh, so 33. You should definitely get those ambitions, though. Plus four, so 73. And then how much do you have? I have 3,400. 34. A little extra, but just 3,400. Riveting. Sorry. And you have how much do you have? I have 3,400. 34. A little extra, but just 34. Riveting. I have two. Sorry.

And you have how much, Ash? 2,374. Two, three hundred. Just because I'm curious. Okay, so we have. I also have 1,000 bucks of gems, in gems. Okay, we have about 13k in gold. So what is it altogether?

Let's see, 7,000 plus 5,000. Goddamn. That's 12. 12. Just under 15. We have about 13k in gold. So what is it altogether? Let's see, 7,000 plus 5,000. Goddamn. 12. Just under 15. So we can't get the amulet. 1500, 100. But we can get the girdle. We can get everything but the amulet. Correct, and the two potions.

Or we can forego the girdle and get the amulet and the necklace. How much do we have total? We have 13,000 gold. Including the gems? No, with the gems, that puts us at about, yeah, at 14,000. So I was going to say,

how far away are we from the right total? Math, it's worth it. Do we need the belt? I feel like the... For you? Yeah, we could. Do you want the belt? No. We could drop it. Okay, well then. It'll be good for Orym. It's 12. Oh, that's true.

It's, we can already shove people around. 1,200, 600. I'm going to wear that damn butcher's bow. Plus six. I'll just be a fucking nightmare. I'm doing it, too. I'd rather have one. Yeah.

So yeah, we're plus 600. Dripping blood continues. 15,000. 18,000. Okay, so 15,000 is what he. It's 15,000. So, okay. So 15,000 is what he's asking for everything. And we've got 14,000 if he takes gems. If we give you, this is everything we've got.

This is 13,074 gold. And we've got $1,000 worth of gems with us. Actually, do we need those gems or anything? No, we're good. I think he's asking for 15, 100, right? I think that's... We don't want the belt. Just trying to shave off the grain.

I'm saying if we get everything, the total is 14,500. Okay, hold off on the gems, then, I would say, for one second. Let's see what we can do. Or 15,100, sorry. So what do we have, Justin, gold? 13. 13. And...

I mean. If we did a clean sweep, would you accept 13? For Hexen. Make a persuasion check. Come on. Come on! Where's Vex when you need her? Let's go. Guidance, bless. Get out of here.

Come on, dog. Where's yours? I believe in you. That's great. Am I getting advantage because anybody's helping me? Mm-hmm. I mean, I have a mild threatening demeanor, I suppose. That's not persuading. No, no, I'd say for this, it's a mild threatening demeanor, I suppose. That's not pretty. No, no, I'd say for this, it's a straight roll for this. I'm smiling. I know, I know.

I'm smiling. 23. 23 is very good. Boom! Yeah! It was the smile. It was the smile. It was the smile.

I'll tell you what. 13,000 gold and the gems. For everything. For the lot. That's a deal. Plus this rope. No deal! Yes! Sick.

Oh my god, okay. Everything we have is gone. Goodbye. Technically, don't. Okay. I put this back. All right. What are you doing, sir?

I know, I know. Being honest? I used it when we blow up the other key. That's true. What did you just say? It has been a bloody honor and a privilege. Blow up the key! I've's true. What did you just say? It has been a bloody honor and a privilege. Move up the key! I've got one silver in my pocket.

Goes ahead and closes the door and leads you back out to the main entryway. As it closes, it goes like, Thank you very much for coming. I'm going to close up shop for a little bit. If anyone asks, I'm just going to go on a lunch break. Sorry I couldn't help you. Yeah, we try. Closes the door. Wow Sorry I couldn't help you. Yeah, we tried.

Closes the clock. Wow. I'm bad at that. 3,400. It's going to change to 78 gold. Yep, that's fine. No problem. This is the end of the world. Yeah. The rest of us got gold.

Gold comes back. All right, let's go. All right, let's make our way back. Make our way back to town. All right. Those are some good fucking scores. We're hiding our stuff. I would like you to make a group stealth check.

Group stealth check. Oh, I'm going to use Pass Without a Trace for this. Oh, Pass Without a Trace? Yeah. Great. Pass Without a Trace. That's not an advantage. This would not be an advantage because this isn't you cruising

at the very next speed on a crawler. This is walking through the city. Or getting back to your crawler in the middle of that open space. So. 15. 15, that's plus the 10? Yes, it is. Okay.

24. 24. 31. Okay, okay, okay. No, no, no. Okay. You get a few interesting glances as you step through the street, getting back to your crawler,

and you can see there are a few, being a crawler parked in the middle of the Slamaguna Strip, people that do not actually wear any banner or allegiance to any of the other crawler gangs, you can see a few odd views and some figures, like some people have been walking by the crawler while you're in the shop, and as you step out,

they step aside and scatter like they weren't even paying attention. You're getting a few looks, but nobody is encroaching upon your personal space. It's just a general curiosity. You step back onto the crawler, absolving the hitching post of the chain, and the legs pick up and begin to tear away. People step beyond the path and let it

carve its path back into the deep city of Bassuras, unimpeded and without issue. Nice. Until eventually you tear back out past the eastern side of the Carmine Curtain, long past the bridges, and then return to the Hideaway, your goods in tow. Yay. I like shopping.

I do, too. I'll admit, I really like shopping. It's been a bit since you guys went shopping. Like the rest of you who've been waiting and partying. We've been doing a family therapy session with you and your mom and dad for a while. Great. Make an a while. Great. Make an insight check. Okay.

13. 13, okay. I understand. So the rest of your group returns. You've caught up a bit with your parents. Hondir's been helping around there quietly, nervously asking, you know. So have you heard anything

from other members of the Verity? I've been in a... Oh. I've been laying low intentionally and assuming that things have gone well in my absence. I've done my part and I'm not a person to... Are we back? Yes, you've returned.

They're kind of... It's a hot situation. It's rough, it's bad. They're a bit scattered. There's some in the Under, the Down Low, the Underdark. The Shadowfell. Shadowfell, thank you.

And there's a few that are trapped in the Fire Plane. All right. There are many of us around Exandria, and we've done most of the work we can do. We've left it in the hands of allies who are more capable of these final stages, I suppose. So that's good. That's good. Well, good.

I mean, some are stranded in the fire plane. Like just wandering the fire plane? No, they're in a house. Like they're stuck in Planerata Wren's house. Oh, they should be safe there. I think we'll have a chance to. What if Wren is gone? Then I guess we'll have to find someone

to go and retrieve them soon. Absolutely, positive outlook, that's right. Work the problem. But right now, they're fucking stuck. And apparently Arnold Trott was captured. Unfortunate. By who? I don't want it.

By the vanguard? Yes? No, he was captured by Vasselheim. No, no, by Vasselheim agents. Oh. There were a bunch of big, scary Judicators. This was taken by Judicators.

That does not bode well. Well, I think I'll stay here. That's a good idea, truly. I'll stay here with the Calloways. They could use some tending while you... He quietly looks over towards Ira, and is like, while you move on. Yeah, but you have some kind of perimeter security system

or an early warning apparatus set up, right? I mean, you just got Ira over here looking through a telescope and just peeking on in. I'm pretty sure you could backtrack that somehow. Maybe. You don't have anything, do you? I do not. I'm a researcher. Okay.

No, but you'll sleep fine. Here's the thing. The forces in Vasselheim were trying to take care of the Grim Verity because they wanted their secret kept safe, right? They didn't want the secret of Pardothas to get out. That is true, yes. So...

would it make sense to tell someone in Vasselheim what Daleth is doing? If you have enough proof to convince them, otherwise you're showing your hand and liable to end up where other members of the Verity have been. Yeah, I think we've been trying to tell them. We've...

We've made attempts to get this across, but the Ruby Vanguard, Lutonys, has been very careful to keep all of his cards hidden until very recently. And when told of these things at such a juncture with little to convince. Well, we haven't seen a few friends in some time. The shame is, I think we probably could, right as the solstice begins.

It may not be enough soon enough, but such is the nature of his plan, and such is the nature of his plan, and such is the arrogance of the temples that have been around for so long. Anyway, I do not wish to waste any more of your time, which is so precious in what is coming. You can almost see him understanding the perspective of the people

that want to break out old Master P. The temples being arrogant, not listening. Yeah. Well, not the, I mean, to changebringer Temple, I'm sure it was very responsive. I'm sure. Make him say, Ah! Have you heard from Pike?

I have not, but you know. She'll reach out when she needs us. How many days away are we? Damn. Four? You are six days away. So are we going to rest and go tomorrow? I guess we have to, right? We're going? Yeah.

Tomorrow? Is there any reason to wait? No. I mean, what time? A plan would be good. If we go and we're caught, I mean, I'm is it? The plan would be good. If we go and we're caught, I mean, I'm down all of the spells that we've used to message people today. So yeah, let's rest and go to bed.

Which is a lot. I mean, but. I'll take the rest of the day to paint that symbol on the sides of the ship, if that works. Yeah. Okay. So you adorn elements of the ship of the Silver Sun with symbols of the Cerberus Assembly. Cerberus Assembly is what we said, right? Yeah. I think that's right.

I used the crate that Ashton kept for reference. We can rest on the ship. We can rest on the ship. I keep thinking that it's right there, but it's four days travel, right? So no, fuck it. Let's get on the ship and go. Okay.

Okay. All right. I the ship and go. Okay. Okay. All right. I can paint as we take off. How long does that spell last? An hour. Okay. You can recast it a few times. Yeah, okay.

So as the skyship ascends once more into the... Tie a rope to your body. Yeah. The slowly setting sunlit sky, the ominous gathering of dust clouds on the horizon, you begin to push northwest once more as Ira climbs aboard the ship with you. And Zandas immediately turns and is like,

All right, you found everything in the, what the fuck is that? I mean, he grabs an ax and is like, No, no, no, no, no, no. Okay, this is Ira Windegoth. He's a valued guest of ours. Totally trustworthy, very creepy. I reckon.

In your head, Captain Zandas, you hear, do not trust him at all, but he is of value. Just worthy, very creepy. I reckon it. In your head, Captain Zandis, you hear, do not trust him at all, but he is of value. Zandis puts the axe slowly down. Well, if you're a guest of our bosses, guess you're a guest of ours as well, creepy tall man. Welcome aboard the Silver Sun. Make yourself at home?

And Ira curls forward and then stands at full height, like arms at the sides, legs, and is nearly 12, 13 feet tall at full height. And then gives a soft bow to the head and goes, It is a pleasure to be aboard your fine craft. Jeez, so tall. Then the legs bend and the arms bend back down to almost a regular height,

an average seven foot in that position, before knocking the tails of his long coat behind and then pulling the bag from the ether. Where shall my quarters be to sleep? And the captain goes, Right, about that, I'm going to go ahead and have Kaleel go and show you around. Kaleel, could you deal with the weird one?

Kaleel's like, Yes, of course, I will. Thank you, captain, for your incredible show of bravery. Yes, I will show you to your cabins. Oh god. And as leads Ira beneath the deck, you watch as he slowly pulls and grabs the bottom of the door. It's like a weird folding of a paperclip

as he pushes into the doorway before the head turns with a grin towards the rest of you and then vanishes beneath the deck. We should show everyone what we got. Divide it up? Yeah. I've already, I think there's really only one thing, I mean, one thing obviously has to go to you. This ring clip? Yeah. This ring clip.

All right. I'm going to take the belt unless anybody really wants to punch people at a running speed. I got night vision. Where's the hull? Oh god, whoa, yeah. I'm going to hop down and grab the bib and bring it out. Gross. Wear it in the blood.

He does like, spatter blood all across the deck. We don't know when we're going to need it. Yeah. I would like a mask, please. Also, how's your health in general? How's my health in general? Who needs the necklace? It's a con for a mask.

My con might not be as bad as some others. I've got a con of 15. What's your good same 15? 18. Mine's 14, but I already took the circlet. I mean, were you at, Chetty? 14. Throw it that direction, then.

Why don't you take it? I don't want it. No. Okay. Who else has got 14? Trying to respect our elders, Chet. What's the constitution of your area, Chet? Worries me. I don't think his constitution can stop that.

It's just time. I'll say, I don't mind doubling you up, if it comes to it. No problem. Honestly, we're just more or less likely to be attacked if we have you around with us. Those d10s are rolling true still. Or killed, I don't know.

So I should let. But if they land. Keeping you up what? Put a fey land. Keeping you up and running is probably a good idea. Laudna goes down a lot. Laudna goes down so much. How much does it improve your? Is it a plus one or a plus two? It's a 19.

How much? It would jump me out. 19. Plus four. Whoa. That's huge. That is a big jump. I think that's a big deal. You're all level eight, right? So that would, or are you all level eight?

Yeah, you're all level eight, which would mean for you, it would be an additional 16 hit points. Oh, take it. Killer. Take it. Yeah, you drop a lot of paper. And I just toss it at you. Ah!

Are you doing this? Take'm throwing things at you! Take an HP damage from the necklace that gives you HP right now. Perfect. Take the amulet. I'll take the amulet. Chetney, I'm just going to pitch. I think you should give Imogen the butcher's bib.

What? I'm not wearing the butcher bib. Just for dramatic effect. No. What? You're absolutely right. It really looks like a look. I take it off. Imogen! No! It stops midair.

Does it stop all the blood? Yeah, full on, like Neo with blood. It's just. No. A couple drops. Best use of telekinesis, actually. They're all going to laugh at you! It does the thing where it goes, boop,

and then it goes up. 15 or 20 is a crit. I don't want to be a bloody butcher. I'll be a bloody butcher. Ooh. You should be a bloody butcher. Well, no, this is your- You're a born bloody butcher.

That's a, say again? You're a born bloody butcher. You better believe it. It's like made of skin, just like, look, it's made of skin, just like your band, Fearne. It's true, but you love that. You wanted to put that on. I'm going to go full wolf

and just bleed all over myself. I'm going to feast on the faces of people. It's going to be fucking awesome. I already have my blood. You'll know where I was because I'm going to leave a blood trail behind me. Grandma already gave me something. You go cross-country skiing and shit. The circlet is achievement, right?

I believe it is achievement. Yes, do you want to take off the, oh, the Feywild shard. What's that do for you? The Feywild shard? Yeah. It doesn't do anything other than give me a chance to accidentally lose all my hair. Oh, cool.

It can do some cool stuff if you work out really well. Yeah, exactly. I'm kind of into that. Are you a sorcerer? No. You have to be a sorcerer. Oh, you have to be a sorcerer? You can give it to Laudna.

Yeah, do you want? What? Here, I pull it out of my hair. What is it? Is this the thing that makes weird stuff happen? That's the trouble bubble, yeah. The trouble bubble? It's only if you use sorcery points.

Only if you use sorcery points. Look up the Feywild shard. I think it's kind of perfect. That makes me very happy, actually, the more I think about it. Yeah, yeah. I can do this crazy thing. You have to probably get rid of it.

All right, well, you figure out all your shit. We're taking off. Oh yeah, we're off. We're up and running. All right. The ship continues on into the night. Does anyone want my Pearl of Power? Just, we already gave it to you. We'll do it, we'll figure it all out.

We'll take it to you. I haven't been using it, but yes. All right. Another evening comes to a close, and another day of journey begins. I'll say, if we're bringing the night down, just real quick, Orm is on the deck of the ship, pulls out the stone.

Oh wow. Oh my god. Listen, what's going on over here is really bad. Get the group, head underground. Stay there. Till you hear from me again. Miss you. He responds, He's like, That's a burger. He responds,

I'll see what I can do. There's plenty of places underground, I'm sure. It's a little hairy on this end, too. You take care of yourself. Be careful. And then he sings a song. Yes. Kiss from a room.

That's a good bell. Okay. Shit's so good. Like, Robbie's so talented. That brings us to the next day, five days to the solstice. Ooh. Let's go, Orym. Is it my turn? Indeed. Huzzah! Three. Oh no! That brings us to the next day, five days to the solstice. Ugh. Let's go, Orym.

Is it my turn? Indeed. Aja. Three. Oh no! Yes! No! Yeah! We don't have time!

Roll a d6 for me. We don't have time for three! No! No! One. That may never be another time. I got a one on the d6. What does it mean? What does it mean?

I love you. Thank you for fucking this up. Okay. Yep, he's touching all the things. Go ahead and grab that tarrasque. Let's go. Well, it's been fun, kids. It's at this time that the windstorm begins to kick in, but where is the dust of gray and brown and yellow

previously stormed through and blew about. This one has odd arcane coloration. This one carries with it sparks of energy and magic and weird bursts of uncontrolled Exandrian arcana. This is an arcane wind. Oh! Triggered by the shifting Exandrian arcana. This is an arcane wind. Oh! Triggered by the shifting

of the ley lines with the tumultuous weather of the Hellcatchers as. Magic hailstorm? P-p-p-p-p-p-p-p-p. Ball, blue skin. Glitter, glitter, glitter, glitter. Ah! God! In my eye. It seems like a darkened storm,

and then you watch blue, purple, green lightning arcing through the cloud around you as you all begin to ratchet yourselves down. This is another skill check. I run and dive in front of Fearne. Fuck! All righty.

So who's going to make the first attempt at trying to ford this storm? What are you doing to help the Silver Sun prepare for this? This is like magic. It is a heavy dust storm, but it brings with it an element of unpredictable magic as well. Oh boy.

Unpredictable magic dust storm. Indeed. Well, I'm going to just run up to Captain Zandis, who's at the helm, I assume. And it looks like there's lightning strikes all over the place. Like off the side of the ship, like through the wildfire, through the clouds.

But it's all different colors that match the shifting and the ley line sparks and pulses you've seen getting brighter and brighter with each day. Well, then I don't know if this is going to help, but I'm going to cast Protection from Energy on him. Oh, nice. On them, on Zanis? Yes, on them for lightning, I guess.

Okay. Yeah. Zanis is like, Okay, this is certainly getting weirder times every time we go out together, so that's cool. A lot of stories to have. We survived this. I'm going to write them down in my eventual book. If we survived this.

What are you doing, FCG? I'm just giving you a little boost against the elements, if that's all right. Oh, please take it. I'll take anything. You go ahead and reach out and touch Xandas and you watch as this half-inch-wide divine barrier washes over their body with a slight crackle. watch as this half-inch-wide divine barrier washes over their body with a slight crackle.

Chilling Springer is watching you. Sure whatever, as long as somebody's watching me, because I'm watching this craziness! And he shifts the ship to the right to effectively ward off this heavy blast of arcane wind. The shift begins to lift a little bit, but Zandis is keeping it in tail. Go ahead and roll a d20

and just add your spellcraft modifier, and we'll use this as part of the initial skill test. Okay, well, that's a natural one. Ah, man. So that's a three. I have four. Buddy. So you cast this spell on Xandis,

and you watch as the energy wave washes over them. They're like, oh, this feels a lot more confident, and the crackles go get brighter, and Xandis is definitely protected, but bolts of energy begin shooting out from the protective energy field of Xandis and striking parts of the ship. I'm going to.

Oh no. I need the rest of you to make dexterity saving throw for me. Yes! The flex capacitor. Suddenly, Xandis becomes a lightning rod for this arcane energy and the lightning that would be protecting is now being pushed out across the entirety of the deck.

Oh no! 19. What is this, a dexterity save? Dexterity saving throw. 15. Okay. Oh, I see me too. He's going to roll. That is 23 points of lightning damage. Oh sorry, you succeeded, you just have.

That's 11 points of lightning damage. 15. 23 points of lightning damage. Seven. 23 points of lightning damage. 19. 11 points of lightning damage. Eight. 23 points of lightning damage. 19. 11 points of lightning damage. Eight. 23 points of lightning damage.

Natural 20 for 25. 11 points of lightning damage. 20. And that's 11 points of lightning damage. But Xandas is fine. Xandas is fine. Yay, I did it! But the ship, you can see burn marks across the deck

as the energy sparks through, and Ira immediately curls out from the side and goes like, Oh my. Oh god. All right, so that's a... One fail. That was a natural one. So that counts as two.

It counts as two failures. One more failure and this skill check is done. Oh no. Who's bringing up the next thing? It's four successes before three failures, and you've already got two out of the gate. Oh god. Oh god. We've got this, guys thing? It's four successes before three failures, and you've already got two out of the gate. Oh god. Oh god. We've got this, guys. Four in a row.

I got one or somebody else. Yeah, do it. No, do it. If you got it, go. You or me. Okay, I was going to and turn into a fucking wolf. I'm going to run to the main mass where all the sails usually break and the main beams, and I will get my claws out and climb up, and I will post up on the ropes and sails and just be ready for anything that starts to break

to start working my woodworking magic. That's great, that's great. I'll save for that. Go ahead and roll a perception check to keep an eye for anything that begins to crack and receive damage from the storm. 20, dirty 20. 20, that's a success.

All right, as you're keeping an eye out there, your woven cloth's dug into the sides of the wood, you watch for any sort of heavy listing to the structure of the sails. And you see one that begins to creak a bit, and you immediately go over and grab, pull her up to it, and then hold it. And with your weight between the two masts,

you're keeping it in place and not being bent to the point where the structure is starting to sustain damage at the impact of the wind. You're feeling pretty confident. You've got this side of the ship pretty solid. You're full on like Spider-Man at the front of the train. Yes. Just like. Like.

Oh! Camille McGuire, the master of on-screen Spider-Man faces. Who's up next? The one who's responsible. Colorful lightning going everywhere, right? The lightning shooting off of Zandis is subsiding, but there's colorful lightning going all throughout the clouds nearby.

Orym runs to the front of the ship and jams seedling down into the woods, face down, and vines go out onto the deck. I take my hands off of it and say a little prayer to the goddess who booned me this and hope it acts as a lightning rod and just keeps it off everyone else. Interesting.

You're trying to what, create a lightning rod? Attract the lightning. Keep it away from us, our flesh. And just hit the sword. Okay. Are you attempting to reach out to ask help from? Yeah, I did pray. Okay. Go ahead and just make a wisdom check.

Okay. Nine. Nine. Nine. Oh boy. The lightning strikes the sword. And as it hits, the lightning seems to almost freeze in place, like and just locks,

like time stops where this bolt of lightning is. It is bright and the flash is held sustained and there's this odd moment of confusion and awe. There's this massive filament that is plasma bright at the head of the ship. And in this odd moment, the air and quiet seems to still and everyone looks at each other confused before it ramps up with intensity and this massive lightning blast ends up distil and everyone looks at each other confused before it ramps up with intensity and this massive lightning blast

ends up striking the front of the ship and the front of the Silver Sun Oh no! explodes outward, exposing part of the front of the ship's deck below. Yes, good. With this much wind now hitting and entering the hull, you can hear screams from the ship inside,

and you, seeing this, one of the sails begins to crack a bit. You hold it tight, and Zandis goes, I'm going to have to bring it down. I have to bring it down or it's going to come apart! Everyone just hold on tight! Begins to spin the wheel as the ship begins to turn and rotate and go into a downward corkscrew spiral, barely holding on as it spins

within its own slow descent, eventually coming to a very hard landing onto the dusty ground below with a It eventually skids to a stop, turning and almost full tilting to its side before it just stops and comes to rest into a pile of dust as the arcane storm slowly passes by over the next 20 or so minutes,

crackling and whirling away. Clarify that the crawler does not bring over the flyer. Wow. By the way, we definitely brought the crawler along with us if it fit on the ship. As it goes, it's boring. I mean, we talked about it. Okay, the crawler wouldn't fit on, well, here.

Hmm. Oh, wait. Roll a d20 for me. Put the crawler in the hole! I mean, 17. 17. The crawler, which you had affixed to the deck of the ship. Okay. You had affixed with such care and obsession with it

that it nearly, but does not get thrown in the midst of this storm. It carves up a lot of the wood on the deck and has left a lot of damage around it, kind of being essentially a spike-bladed ball that's been thrushed around, but you do not lose it in the midst of the storm. You do, however, lose a day of travel. Oh, great.

When I recover seedling, does it have new superhero powers from its? No, it's very hot, though. Yeah, ah! It's like. Why? There's a hole in front of it. Oh my god.

How are we going to travel? This thing is not going to fly anymore, really. Do we take the rest of the day to repair? You lose a day of travel because it takes a day to get it back up and running. The only other option would be to make a cart and hit drive, and it would take the same amount of time, I guess.

I guess we bed down and fix a boat. Let's fix it. Let's fix a boat. It takes the majority of the rest of the afternoon into the evening to repair it. The crew's on task, and it eventually gets itself back up into the sky. It looks a little ragged.

It's definitely taken a few unfortunate blows, and it was not built to withstand an arcane wind, such as that, but it is back up in the sky. You would think these damn gods would want to be on our side right now, right? Gods on our side. You tell your fucking change bringer to give us some help.

Was that you? Yeah. Yes, it was. No, I can't. Whenever I ask questions about her, it's misleading answers. I only can ask questions about myself. That's interesting. What other rules are you going to discover?

Ask the change bringer if you stop questions about myself. That's interesting. What other rules are you going to discover? Ask the changelog if you stop worshiping them. That's not fair. Why not? Just see. Should I stop worshiping you? That's a big old no. Worth a try. All right, let's fix this thing.

We got time to make up. We're up and out, we're flat. All right, so's fix this thing. We've got time to make up. We're up and out, we're flying. All right, so you're up and flying once more, right as the evening takes you to the sky, and another evening's rest. You can take a long rest. Long rest. Yay. Great.

Phony. And with that. Phony, phony, phony. That's me. What you need, babe? I'm pretty fully equipped on inventory. Do you feel, have any interest in this Feywild shard? Well, let me see what I'm worth.

It's for part sorcery points to be used. It's a sorcerer item. Oh well, we'll sell it. We'll hold onto it. Yeah. Because you're fully equipped, too? Nobody else wants to? Can anybody else? Nobody else is.

No more sorcerers. Oh, because nobody else is. No idea. This is why. Nobody else. We find it crazy for a certain reason. I have ideas. Yeah. Who's rolling? Well, the evening comes to a close.

The Aurora itself is extremely bright now. It's like, from all perspectives, on the deck of the ship, you are swimming through the Ethereal Sea. There is just curtains of color and energy and sparkles and flashes. It is a dreamscape around you on all sides with the backdrop of the black starlit sky.

The beauty is transitioning slightly more and more into terrifying with the intensity of the aurora and its shifting energy is now becoming more and more present as the face of magic across Exandria is changing. Like it does about once every two centuries or so. Finishing out the night, that brings us to the next day, four days till the solstice.

Will somebody please go ahead and roll a d20 for me? Yolo. One. No! Roll a d6 for me. You are lying. No! They're d6 for me. You are lying. No! They're not on our side. Six.

Six. They're not on our side. Okay. So. Fuck. Mine is. Another dust storm kicks out. Oh, fucking hell. Magic wand or just a dust ease? No, this is a regular dust storm.

It's not as heavy. It's not quite as heavy as the one that initially battered your ship about. It obscures your vision a bit. Xandis just goes, This is not really good luck with this timing. I mean, this, you sure you need to do this? We could just take a vacation.

We could just go to like. We don't have time. Shmuel Bay is maybe just a few more, another week. Wish we could. Okay. After, after, after. Well, okay. Well, we'll keep pushing. We'll see if it's still there in a few days.

Yeah, we'll see. Um. What can I do? Orym, you're the first to see Shit. some sort of shadow in the storm behind you. Shit. And right as you clarify it following,

you also hear the and the faint glow that it emits. As you hear, guys, you turn and look and watch as the glow is light sources flapping. As a massive, fiery bird in hot pursuit of your skyship begins to push through this storm. What do you do?

A fiery bird? Like a red and orangey fiery bird? Its body is more like black and purple feathers, it looks like, that lead into flames, and its wings are just massive flames. Your first thought is, possibly Phoenix. Make an arcana check.

Got to get this fucking shit on the ground. Yeah, like... Nine. Damn. Hard dive. Hard dive. Hard dive? Hard dive. And this goes, okay, once again, please hold on!

Cranks one of the various levers and the front glowing brumestone rocks dull. And the ship just goes and goes into an immediate dive. Right as the creature comes into a dive behind me. How close is the bird? How close is it?

It's about 100 or so feet away, and it is gaining in the dive. As it's now going into a. Can I just try to use a sorcery point and cast Command on it? I actually attempt to rage again while I'm sitting there, and I tap my hammer down on the ground, and the rainbow sparks start,

and there's a probability matrix now around us as well. Okay, okay. If I can assist. Fair enough. All right, so you're casting Command. Yes. That is a wisdom saving throw? Why, yes it is.

It's a natural one. Okay, what do you command? Grace. Leave! It's into a full dive and it's catching up on the ship and then immediately it picks up and just darts. As the ship is still going down, you watch as the dust storm is passing by and you can just begin to see the shadow

of Exandria approaching it. Xandris goes, got to pull up or we all die! Yeah, yeah, pull up. Reverse it and the two front brumestones glow with that heavy hum. As the ship begins to pull up, you all feel yourselves like the G-Force pulling you down. You all grab on it.

It actually hits the top of a big dune. And the ship, you feel the rocking of the impact, but then it bounces up. You hear the creaking of wood, but no serious damage. The storm's still blowing by. It's not as dense below here.

The ship picks up again, begins to drift at a mild speed, trying to be careful of the wind, and you hear again, Yeah! It's coming back. Yeah, it's coming back. It only lasted for a minute. You all see that glow from the dust above

as this gargantuan bird is now swarming down towards the ship. Are there any, this is a stupid question, are there any, now that we're low to the ground, any sinkholes on the horizon? Make a perception check. Oh boy. 18.

18. Okay. You see there's a ravine not far from where you are, but there's no sinkholes immediately that you can tell. Xandis, maybe some cover in that ravine? I'm going to try and do cover, but it's looking at us, look at this! And begins to pick up the speed, and now that this is coming into the ship,

it picks up as much speed as it can safely, and the wind is still battering it from the storm, and it's trying to keep it together as they're just it can safely, and the wind is still battering it from the storm and is trying to keep it together as they're holding the wheel, and the bird is now cruising above. You can see it coasting as its head looks down and these burning coals for eyes, and its darker head and this sharpened beak

and just screeches, and you watch this flame burst out of its mouth as it screeches. How many feet? About 100 feet above you, and it's beginning to hone in. And we're in the ravine now? No, Zandis is heading towards it.

They're currently steering it. Okay, okay, okay. I knew this was going to be weird. Still 100 feet. Ladies, can you throw anything back in its face? It's too far away. I need to get a little closer. I'm going to try and get a little closer. I'm going to just try to hit it with a lightning bolt. With a lightning bolt, okay.

That's long. You can start throwing damage spells at it. Actually, where the fuck is Ira? He's staying out of this. Okay. He's not a dummy. His suntanning is one of those. All right, so. I'm going to team up with that lightning bolt and throw a ray of frost at it.

Okay, dexterity saving throw is 13. Oh, great, great! So that's 8d6 of damage it takes. Go ahead. 86. 86. Oh god, I'm just dropping everything. Pick a good one. Good call.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. Ooh. Chika-chika-chika-chika. Oh god. That's one. Mm, pow, pow. 10, 15, 21, 24, 27, 21, 24,

27, 28, 29. 29 points of lightning damage, you got it. The bolt arcs through it and slams into its body. You see it takes the impact and you know, it shrugs it off. Lightning, immune to lightning. It's less resistance and more just, this is a... A big ass. It's a it off. Oh, big burn. It's less resistance and more just, this is a powerful beast.

I'm going to throw a Ray of Frost at it. Let me know the moment it gets within 60 feet. Okay, it's closing quickly, so now. Now? Oh shit! Oh fuck, while I did a Ray of Frost, fuck! Okay, well, 19 plus seven to hit, so 26 to hit. That hits. And then can I immediately throw another spell at it?

A lot of people are going to go while you're doing that, so. All right. Seven cold damage. And its speed is reduced by 10 feet. Great, so its 120-foot fly speed is now 110 feet. Cool. Oh boy. Is it within 60 feet?

Yeah, it's just about to slam onto the deck of the ship. All right. Oh, sorry, you go, you go. Polymorph! Oh yeah! Polymorph. Polymorph. Okay, what are you turning it into, or trying to? A goldfish.

Remember, it's fucking falling. So it's going to immediately turn into, no. It just turns right back into. Have we learned nothing? It's okay, she does her thing. She's doing her thing. But it might goldfish onto our deck and then we can just catch it.

You said a goldfish, right? That was your first instinct? Yeah, yeah, yeah. We'll see if it fell. I can't. That's going to be it. That's a 13. What's your DC?

Uh, 16. That hit? 16? Yeah. Oh, I got a plan. Yes! I got a plan. Into a goldfish. Push.

And the wind just carries it up into the windstorm. That's true, it would be like, fly away. It's a tiny little fish, it's a heavy windstorm, and the fish just goes. Yeah, they get carried miles. And disappears into the dust. Like frogs, they just get carried in these things until they get dropped on a town.

It might be three minutes before it hits. It could be longer. They stay up there forever. That's great, yeah, let's keep going. Go, go, go. Let's just go. Okay! This is kind of awesome, I'm not going to lie!

Is the goldfish gone? We can't see the goldfish? Yeah, it just got picked up into the storm. Okay, amazing. Somewhere a half mile away, there's a family camping, and they're like, what is that? Ooh! Family camping.

That lasts for an hour? Mm-hmm. Okay. Wow. Wow. It doesn't take long, within a few minutes, to feel that the safety of avoiding the imminent strike of this strangely roused and angered beast has been averted. Vindication! Yeah.

For the fucking goldfish! Yes! Healing moment. We're're sideways. So, no travel is lost. Woo! The day completes that issue. Wow.

How many days do we have left? Well, if you finish this day, it'll be three days to the solstice, and two days of travel to get to where you're going. Oh god, it's coming. It's easy. Seven days of travel. Finishing the fourth night,

unless anyone has anything they want to do. Nope. Nope. That brings us to three days of the solstice and two more days of travel. Does someone else want to roll a d20? I'll tell you. 17. 17. Clear skies.

Clear skies. Clear skies. Clear skies. Clear skies ahead. The dust storms have settled, it seems, for the day. You now have a beautiful view of the Hellcatch below. Beautiful in the sense that it is beautifully clear. The Hellcatch is beautiful in its own right, in its oddly barren and desiccated landscape.

You can see the number of the wicked-looking trees. The, you would know these as Hagado trees, that this part of the Hellcatch climb up, looking like withered arms that reach for the sky about 20, 25 feet off the ground. And you see them pushing through cracks and such with elements of pale green and orange leaves and small seed pods that scatter around

as the ship's keeping low and passing by. Nature is odd, but definitely robust across this valley in unique ways in comparison to the rest of the continent. But. If the skies are clear, I'm going to take a little bit of time to spider climb underneath, check my paint job,

make sure it hasn't been sandblasted off, and maybe do touch-ups if needed. It's been somewhat sandblasted, but in a way that makes it look weathered. Oh, fine, I'll leave it. It's good. Orym. You feel this strange pulse in your side pouch. This weird, like a weird thrum.

You get a message? Boom, boom. You get a message. It's not your stone. You forgot a message. It's not your stone. You forgot about this. You keep looking into it. It was a gift from a long time ago, but this small seed. That thing was this big, right?

Yeah. Yeah. It's settled in the bottom of your pouch. What? And it is. I forget about it. Imposing. Well, I'm going to examine it if it's going off. It's got this faint green glow to it. Wait, am I remembering right?

This is back from EXU. EXU, yeah. Yeah, not Keyleth. This is from... You got it from one of the other druids. Yeah, in... In the Ancient Ruins... You got it from one of the other druids. Yeah, in... In the Ancient Ruins. Yerdal Talk.

Yeah. Yerdal Talk. Yes. Maniac Ruins. What does it mean? I don't know what it means. Roll a nature check for me. That's not going to go well. Five.

Five. It's a seed. Yeah. Try talking to it. Five. I mean, it's a seed. Yeah. Try talking to it. Yeah. Hello? I mean, I mean. Am I the only one who?

It's a seed. Feed the seed? Give it water? Put it, put it, it's a seed. Yeah, but. Grow something. We're in the air. Yeah. Hydroponic, put it, it's a seed. Yeah, but. Grow something. We're in the air.

Yeah. Hydroponic, man. Give it some water, though. We can land. Okay. Does anyone have any water on them right now? No. Wait.

Of course, we've got a canteen full of stuff. Go get some water. All right. You just pour it on there? Hold on. I've been holding onto this to plant it. Is it really just an organic seed? Do you want me to identify?

Ooh. You can take a look at it, sure. I got rid of the thimble, but I've got a ball. Do you have a pot or something? I don't know. Wait! It's big. I have a chamber pot. That'll do it. Perfect.

Wait, did I? Comedy. Didn't I give that to, who'd I give that to? How big is the sink in your hand? It's like ostrich egg, if I remember. I think that thing just goes to the ground. I'll identify it, just to see if I can glean anything additional from it. We can use the Tal'Dorei.

Oh, the tankard. It'll fit? Yeah, it'll fit in the tankard. Do we have some soil or something? I mean, you could just put it in water and it would. I actually have some soil. You're kidding. Do you? I have graveyard soil, I believe. Perfect.

Let's do this. Do you have any receptacles or containers? Well, no, we have this tankard. I have graveyard dirt. Will it fit in the tankard? Very snugly. Yeah. Should we give it a little more room?

Any kind of, you got any spare chamber pots? Wait! Spare? I don't know, I didn't clean them myself. We've got crates. We've got empty crates. We've got some crates in the back. We've got barrels and things. All of our rooms have chamber pots. I open up the hole and I pull out some of the crates,

which if anyone, you can garden in a crate. Oh, yes. You can garden in a crate. I pull out a small crate. We're which if anyone, you can garden in a crate. Oh, yeah, that's true. You can garden in a crate. I pull out a small crate. We're going to have a nice plant by the front. Okay, great. Let's do this.

By identifying it, do I glean any knowledge about how to grow it or what it will? It is a message bloom. A message bloom. Something's trying to come. And indeed, upon being planted and watered, it will convey the message. Oh, what?

That is so fucking cool. I want one. All right. Start tilling. I am not good at this. I just found the planter and this is not my butt. Place the grave dirt within the small crate, open the space, put the seed in, and water it. There's like five, six, 10 seconds go by,

and you watch as a single green sprout curls up, leaves unfurl rapidly, and As the stem extends upward, you watch as this bud begins to swell and then opens wide into this vibrant display of bright blue and purple petals. As it opens up multiple layers, multiple layers, you hear a voice come through, a familiar voice. Not just any voice, voice of the Tempest. You hear a voice come through, a familiar voice.

Not just any voice, voice of the Tempest. Orym, the Cult of the Dark Heart beneath Terra was a challenging maze of dangers for the Ashari present, but the Darkheart Behemoth was dealt with and the rift returned to its controlled state. We lost some good warriors in the fight, but their sacrifice will be remembered and cherished. I message you because I attempted to apprehend Vareo, the head of this Ashari sect of betrayers,

but he vanished, shouting, The Vanguard will prevail and the world will finally be free. We couldn't stop him. But given all you've told me and the signs pointing to a connection between these events,

it would seem our paths are converging. Please let us know where this vanguard makes its work. Perhaps I can gather those who can recover within the Ashari to help stand against lewdness in this vanguard. Wait, what? Wait, wait, what did she say? She's fucking cavalry all over.

Yeah, so there's, okay, did the message end? I'm going to step on it. That's the last of it, and you watch as it finishes, and the beautiful bloom rapidly withers and crumbles. Did we all hear it or just? You all heard it, audibly. It emanated from the plant. Before we deal with that,

what happens to the seed at that moment? Like, does it crumble away? It crumbles away. Oh. Well. Then the name of the betrayer was Vareo? Vareo. V-U-R-E-E-O. Vareo.

That's actually my proper play. Yeah, it was. Vareo, okay. V-U-R-E-E-O. Correct. Now it just scribbles. It was just like I scribbled a name. And her voice just tinkled into the air

for all to hear, right? Yeah. Was it Ashari or what did? Ashari. It was Ashari. Okay, just checking. Yeah, it's got her. Double checking. She's going to help us?

We just have to, you have to reach out and let her know where we're heading. Sure. Wow. All right. Oh boy. Sure. Wow. All right. Oh boy. That's good. Let's get some first good luck with that.

Shit, do you have that? Yeah. You got the juice? Let's do it. Yeah. I'm sending a message. You're going to ask Captain Zangis for a description of where we are currently or where we're heading or something to describe.

She was wanting to know where it was all converging, so I was going to tell her when we were going to arrive and let them know it's at the... Does that make sense? Because I feel like if we try to meet up with them, it might. What do you think? Well, the...

Ira knows, but... All the magical curtains of light that we've been traveling through, they're not all crisscross, right? Are they all moving like a path? You've seen multiple layers of it, almost like they've all been creating this unique funneling direction.

And you've crossed through a number in this journey. But now as you grow closer, you, looking for this specifically, you can see they're all converging towards the direction of traveling. So a nexus of ley lines north of... Vassar's. Northeast of Vassar.

Yes. All right. And we'll be there in two nights? We'll be there? About, yeah. Okay. Should all travel well. Okay, and it can be more than one message. Sure, yeah, yeah, yeah.

We'll tell her, our ETA. Yeah. Give her all the information, and then let's just go from there. All right. Messages. and then let's just go from there. All right. Message rec- Bless you. All right. Bless you.

Message received. They're converging at the Nexus, northeast of Basuras. The Tishton excavation point. We should be arriving in two days' time, if all goes well. Thank you. Hardness, is that it? Thank you. Laudna says hi.

I appreciate the heads up. We'll gather who's available and able-bodied, see that our wounded are taken care of, and we'll attempt to meet you there as soon as possible. Holy shit. Be safe. This is big, y'all. This changes things. We might have a chance. It's got a big player. I know. I don't want to...

I don't want to attract too much attention, but I think we got this. Cannot believe you said that out loud. You've got powerful friends. Nice to meet up with you. It's the first time in a long time. I'm just kind of stunned, sorry. Well, let's press on. Yeah. Yeah.

Okay. I bet my sister's coming. Sister? What? My husband's sister. Oh. Who's she? Leta. Leta? Yeah.

She's an Ashari warrior? She is, like me, yeah. When my dad died, she took over for him, when my dad died, she took over for him, when her dad died. She serves as the right hand of the Tempest. Oh, wow. Amazing. Feels hopeful.

That's a new feeling for... Well, let's just breathe deep, have a drink, a meal, and it'll pass. Let's do it. Last roll is you, Marisha. Oh no. All right. As the night comes to a close, an odd calm comes across some of you

with that glimmer of hope finally rising and bringing some light to the dark path you've seen before you this trek. I'm going to pull out the locket and just read it over and over and over again. Okay. Anyone else have anything they wish to do for the evening? Very well.

You can take your long rests as you sleep through the night. Two days until the A apogee solstice. Oh god. I'm cooking, I'm baking all night, by the way. Okay, so we come right back down to the following day. Somebody roll a d20 for me, please. Marisha.

Let's go. Oh, Marisha, Marisha. Let's go. I believe in you. Nat 20. See if I ruin all that hope we just got. 15. All right. 15.

The change-bringer watches over you. You can see the ley lines grow stronger and brighter and more chaotic with their pulses and energy flashes. And you can all smell and taste in the air this electric energy. There's this vibration to the atmosphere around you.

You can't help but be excited and scared by it. And as you grow used to it, you begin to forget what that feels like until you take a moment to focus again. Every time, it's a rush of adrenaline. You can see more storms being whipped up by the shifting of these lines. You begin to now take note that in these ley lines

pushing towards this nexus, they are making the weather more and more dangerous along with them. But you managed to avoid any of that for your last leg of the journey, bringing you to your final evening before arrival. And that will be the day before or the day in which the solstice arrives.

Oh boy. Oh my god. Whoa. If I step away and I open my mind up, that white noise, what does it sound like now? It's like a heavy wind blowing directly into your mind. It is hard to focus on it, and it gives you an instantaneous mild headache to try and just leave that space available.

Anything during the day you wish to do, or do we come to the final evening before your approach? Just working in my room on a project. Can I get a look-see to see if I feel like anybody's watching us? Make a perception check for me. For some dumb reason. 23.

23. You keep a keen eye around you for the majority of the day. You catch yourself being spooked a few times from the flashing of the energy as you now approach where this nexus is building, where the ley lines have been shifting and maneuvering over towards this excavation site, but you don't see anyone

or feel anyone who's uninvited. Sure, she's scribbling. Dark. You don't see anyone or feel anyone who's uninvited. Sure, she's scribbling. Dark. As you all bed down for the final evening on your approach. I'll say Orym, before bed, spent some time kneeling, sitting on his heels on the deck of the ship with a sword and shield on the deck in front of him and sword and shield on the deck in front of him

and meditates on the last few months and meditates on the last six years and thinks of everyone in the family and, of course, his father and his husband looking at these ley lines. Is Rudas still with us? The majority of the turn, yeah. The current rotation has Rudas low on the horizon,

but visible. Okay, so he's just breathing through it all and thinking of everything that led to this point, and then goes to bed early because. Actually, can I, while you're meditating, can I come up behind you and in your head you hear big moon, little moon? For a little while longer.

Does it ever feel tainted? No. Surreal, yeah, but not tainted, no. Does it change anything, knowing what you have on you is something completely different than what you thought, though? Not much in life is the way I thought it'd be. Was it for you? Sometimes.

This is us. That's me and him. Anyway, that thing has been in the sky for a long time. A lot of people have laughed and wept under it, had children, put their parents in the ground. None of that is meaningless, and that's true for me, too. If anything, it makes... It makes it seem like I was always meant to be here right now. I don't know. Chance? Fate?

Fate. That's what they're trying to get rid of, you know? I don't know if you heard my mom say that, but... they want to get rid of fate. I'm grateful that whatever it is brought us together. Hugs are around the knees. Okay. I'm going to go try to sleep. Yeah. I'm not worried about you.

You telling the truth there? I always tell the truth, don't you? All right. Get some rest. Don't torture yourself too much. I will. Scoop up my stuff. Put a pad downstairs. Okay.

I'm going to go and find Laudna. Okay. Are you in your quarters? Probably. Okay. Are you in your quarters? Probably. Okay. Hey. Hi. Adam, are you sleeping? No, I was just staring at the wall with my eyes open.

Big night. How are you feeling? Um. Good. You don't have to lie to me. No, I know, yeah, no, it's terrible. I mean, it's scary as hell. Yeah. Worried about you.

Yeah. This is a lot. Yeah. I feel like, I don't know, like I haven't talked to you in a while. You've been busy. No, I know, I know, I just, I haven't talked to you in a while. We've been busy. No, I know, I know.

I just, um... I don't know, since you came back, been almost scared to say anything. Say what? We want this, right? We want to do this. Preventing a god-eating god. It's not good.

I understand the appeals of how it all sounds. I don't think there's anything wrong in considering what could be with that type of change. I really don't. What makes me nervous about all of it is the unknown unknowns. It's the... The things that we can lose

at the cost of some sort of perceived freedom. Yeah. If it takes away all of our magic, anything gifted to us from something greater. Yeah. We still have the chance to live a normal life. If you wish to have a quiet life,

in a cozy cottage, in a field, raise horses, just be. No gods or fates or destiny can keep you from that, can keep us from that. The gods have never kept us from our ability to have choice. Yeah. You have a choice.

A very difficult one. But that is just as much of a real power as your abilities to fly or speak in people's minds. If anything, it is the most important power that you possess. Don't let them get in your head. Try and claim otherwise. Yeah. All right.

I know we haven't talked much here recently, but I think in a way, it's just... I feel so comfortable and so bonded with you. We transcend words, our relationship. You always have me. I'll always be there to support you. No matter what you choose. And you don't have to make these choices alone.

I'll give her a hug. I love you so much. I love you more than anything. You know, I had a amusing conversation with Ashton the other night. And they asked, or commented about how odd it is that I'm the more grounded and secure one. Between the two of y'all?

Yeah. Because I feel like I have a strong foundation. Because I feel like I have a strong foundation. And that's you. That's you and the rest of these crazy borderline murder hobos. of these crazy, borderline murder hobos. Yeah.

You're my tether, Laudna. Sometimes I feel like I'm about to float away, but as long as you're there. You quite literally pulled me from darkness and death. That tether goes beyond this realm and We've got this. We've got this. You're very capable. Yeah. My mom was trying to show me a world that

would be freeing if I just went back to being normal. But I feel like our weirdness is what makes us right. Is that dumb? Not at all. In this locket, it says, the better halves make a better whole. You have to love it all.

I don't mind being your better half. And I think you're absolutely right. Look at us, do you really think we're absolutely right. Look at us. Do you really think we're destined for normalcy? No. No. That's boring, anyway. These weirdos are going to get shit done.

Hell yeah, we do. All right. Want to cuddle up? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Anybody else have any other business for the evening? Ashton is just going to spend a couple hours with a bottle of something at the very, very back of the ship, having an argument with people who are not there. Oh.

And they benefit. Okay. You see a small blood trail starting to eke out from under Chetney's room. He's fucking asleep with the bib. Oh, in the pool of blood. That was so fucking gross. He drew blood whiskers on his face.

It's so gross. Give in. Bless you. Naked in a chair in front of a mirror, just gripping with a bit. That's amazing. I'm just going to take out my dulcimer, and I'm going to play

a song that sounds like Blue Moon, but we'll call it Red Moon. Okay. Okay. Blue Moon. We'll just watch them in there. Okay. Anybody else? Very well.

Tonight, I'm baking some profiteroles. Some critical profiteroles. Some critical profiteroles. Oh boy. Oh jeez. Oh. I like that. I know. All right.

Those of you who are still awake on the deck at night before going to retire for the evening, the network of arcane threads that wrap around the sky over the Hellcatch is a sight few see in their lifetime, and that weight is felt. And amongst the tension of what's to come, you also can't help but appreciate the beauty of something

on this scale, removed from the context of those that wish to abuse. And in the silence, just the sound of gentle wind blowing by and the occasional shout of a drunken Ashton and the beautiful tunes of the dulcimer played across the front of the damaged, but holding silver sun.

The night before the solstice comes to a close. And with the morning comes the soft, cloudy, dust-filled skies of a gentle storm. As you begin your final day's journey to the site where everything is to happen. That's where we'll finish tonight's episode. No problem. We got plans.

We got allies. We got this. Damn. We have music. Okay. We could ask for anything. I'm allies. We got this. Damn. We have music. Okay. We could ask for anything. I'm scared. I'm ready. I am so ready for this. And it sends out

anti-magic waves every minute? Yeah. Yes. Every minute, just a little. A lot can happen in a minute. A lot can happen in a minute, if you're careful. Yeah. Just going to funnel a metric buck-ton of Dispel Magic at the moon. Oh yeah. Dispel it.

Dispel that moon. Crack that Fabergé egg open. Just Counterspell that. That'll work. That's it. Yep, that's it. Who's got a wish spell? You can't Counterspell anti-magic, can you? Well. I guess we can find out.

Wow, that's an interesting question. Don't think about it too hard. No, it's hurting already, I feel it. Actually, just go behind you and unplug it. That's true. Try to turn it off and on again. But on that note, we'll see y'all for what's happening next time.

Until then, have a wonderful night. Thank you so much for joining us. We love you very much, and is it Thursday yet? Good night. Good night. Thank you so much for joining us on this adventure. To help new listeners discover the show, please give us a rating and review on whatever podcasting app you're listening on.

Until next time, is it Thursday yet?