Critical Role - C3E51 The Apogee Solstice

Episode Date: March 16, 2023

Bells Hells race against time and lifelong plotting as they attempt to stop the Ruby Vanguard from releasing the god-eater Predathos and potentially dooming the world... 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. 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! "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

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

you can watch the video on demand immediately after the broadcast. And it's also available Mondays at 12 p.m. Pacific on YouTube. And of course, for all you wonderful podcast listeners, freshly minted episodes release right here on the Critical Role Podcast Network one week after our broadcast on Thursdays. With all that said, let's get into the story. Hello, everyone, and welcome to tonight's episode of Critical Role, where a bunch of fraternities work as voice actors, sit around and play Dungeons and Dragons, wow. What a perfect time for me to malfunction

because it's our eight-year anniversary doing this shit. Which, not to add to all the hilarious discourse about scripting, but we're apparently synchronized to wild event likelihood with our anniversary. Yeah! Just like you planned. Just like I planned.

Episode 50, except this is 51. It's 51, exactly. Read into that. Fuck! Look, everything is a pattern, Marisha. Thank you so much for joining us. Before we jump into our session tonight, we do have some quick announcements to get through, beginning with our first sponsor of the evening,

actually, I think our first sponsor of the evening. Actually, I think our only sponsor of the evening, but a big one, Octopath Traveler, Sam. Hey, hey, hey, shoppers, have I got a deal for you. Introducing the incredible new Octopath Traveler 2, a brand new entry in the Octopath Traveler series that takes HD 2D graphics, a fusion of retro pixel art and 3D CG

to even greater heights. But that's not all. Octopath Traveler 2 fights tough grease stains. Here's how poorly a leading RPG game cleans this gravy-stained T-shirt. No thanks. But here's Octopath Traveler 2 dealing with that same tough stain. Oh! Wow! That's not true, but it is incredible. But here's Octopath Traveler 2 dealing with that same tough stain. Oh! Oh!

Wow! That's not true, but it is incredible. But that's not all. Octopath Traveler 2 is a tale of eight travelers intertwined journeys across an all-new world called Solistia, a world that changes between night and day to give players more freedom. And it slices and dices with ease! Ooh! Whoa!

Wow! Again! Again, totally false, but totally incredible. But that's not all! Don't take it from me. Here's testimonials from real people who enjoy Octopath Traveler 2. Here, Taliesin.

With no relation to previous versions, series veterans and new players alike can enjoy Octopath Traveler 2 without issue. Plus, it smells minty fresh! Oh wow, that would just open that up. Okay. Familiar mechanics from the original game have been preserved, new mechanics have been added, and it cleared up my acne and whitened my teeth. Are these testimonials completely fabricated?

Yes. For a game like this, you might expect to pay $5,000, $6,000, even $80,000. But if you purchase now, you'll get it for much lower than that. But that's not all. I don't know the actual price. Much lower than that. But that's not all. I don't know the actual price. I can only assume it's less than $80,000. Oh, what you're going to pay for it, yeah. But that's not all!

Order now and we'll also throw in characters like Hikari the Warrior, Agnia the Dancer, Hasty the Apothecary, Artetio the Merchant. Oswald the Scholar. Tornade. The Thief. Terminus the Cleric.

And everyone's favorite. Oh, shit. Oh, shit. The Hunter. But that's not all. Octopath Traveler 2 is in it. On Nintendo Switch, Steam, and PlayStation 4 and 5. Go to OctopathTraveler2.com today. But that's not all!

Actually, it is. That's all. Matt, back to you. Now, for our podcast audience, I'm legally required to state the following. One, Octopath Traveler 2 does not fight grease following. One, Octopath Traveler 2 does not fight grease stains. Two, Octopath Traveler does not cut things. And three, Octopath Traveler 2 is available for $59.99 USD, but the price may vary depending on where and when you buy it and with what currency you use. Number four, Sam Riegel is wearing fake teeth. That's why he sounds weird. That's actually. Okay. That is actually.

That is actually. Now that's out of the way. Marisha, up to you next announcement. Yes. Next week, Matt and I will be doing a panel at South by Southwest. Which is bonkers. South by, South by.

Yeah. South by, South by. That's what the cool kids call it. About storytelling and world building through games. The panel will take place on March 13th, and you can attend in person or with an online badge. You can find more info at critrole.com. Awesome. Thank you, Marisha. Laura slash whoever's helping Laura.

I don't have much of a voice in any of these. Oh no! So silly. How do we do that?! Oh no, it's so sad. It's so sad. So Liam, you can't do that. How do we do that? Hey, hey, hey, you guys! We got merchandise. Beauty of Exandria creation, Yasha Nydoran.

Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! That's actually really bad. The sleeves are pre-cut. The sleeves are pre-cut. Oh shit.

It's so cool, it's so pretty. It's a crew neck sweatshirt by artist Adrian Hilton. It's very good. It's good.. It's a crewneck sweatshirt by artist Edryn Helton. It's very good. Checking out. Oh, as hell. I wore it out in public and I got compliments on it. Did you really? I did. By just randos?

Yeah. Show some skin. So sexy. Sexy top. Sexy or empowering. Or empowering. Both can be. Both can be. I'm both. There you go. Or empowering. Or empowering. Both can be. Both can be. I'm both. There you go.

Awesome, well, thank you very much. And I believe that concludes our announcements. So let's go ahead and jump into tonight's episode of Pulse Chef. Wait, what's our plan? Critical. Critical. 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 He might But one There is magic and mystery, who knows what will happen, he might But one thing's for sure, we never give up on the fight From the healer to the renegade, we all share the same goal Adding more allies 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 play 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. SAM and LAURA say goodbye. And welcome back. So, last we left off, Sam found a bunch of hands. And also, Bells Hells, upon traveling all across Marquet

in search of a number of varying threads, have watched them converge, as are the various ley lines towards this nexus point on the northeastern side of the Hellcatch Valley. Here, above an ancient ruin that has been partially uncovered by one of the nearby academies

and then taken over by the Cerberus Assembly, specifically Ludinus Delef in preparation for the Apogee Solstice, which is nigh. You've all taken your airship, the Silver Sun, to this location, divided your troop along with some allies you brought up with the crew of the ship. You have on the ship currently waiting your second team,

which is FCG, Fearne, and Ira Wendigoth, the Nightmare King. They are standing by at the ready, while the rest of you have begun a slow infiltration of this sunken pit of an excavation site. Along the way, you encountered a couple of members of the Ruby Vanguard. You defeated them, partially disabled

one of the massive automatons that they were using to guard the space, and encountered two other individuals that were also in the process of scoping out and infiltrating this. Beauregard Lionett and Caleb Wittogast. Precious babies. After a brief conversation

and aligning your interests and goals, some information was traded and your groups scattered out amongst the region of this excavation. Helps build the tension by staring at you in quiet. But nevertheless, while the ground team gathers themselves up on the ship, FCG, Fearne, what are you up to?

Oh. Oh. Oh god. You had a week, I'm sure you're ready. Did not think that we would be going first. So Xandis is with us still, right? Xandis is with you, the rest of the crew's currently off and is keeping safe near a cavern quite a ways away. The dust storm, while definitely blocking visual past a certain range range is not in danger

of rocking the ship at the moment. The best Lestat vibes right now. There's really, yeah. Have you said your goodbyes to the light? Honestly, I think we would just be practicing with Xandis going over and over and over the plans for the sky ship. The flying, the sailing. Securing the payload.

Yes. Getting the bomb ready, arming it. Yep, polishing the knobs, doing all that. Polishing the knobs. On the thing. There's nothing worse than a greasy balm. You want it to be nice and shiny. You want it to be a nice and shiny driving wheel.

Okay. Driving wheel. Fair enough, all right. But also, maybe I'll just chat up real quick, real quick, I don't want to. Ira. Certainly, Ira is currently at the end of the ship. The long eyepiece, the spyglass that you've seen him wield and glance is now currently piercing through the storm with it some distance in the

direction of where this excavation is. Wait, did I take that from him? You gave it back. You returned it. Oh, that's right. Can you see our things, though not them at the moment. This device, it is different than my original designs. You mean the device you're using right now,

or the device that we're going to explode? Yes. What's different about it? I don't fully know. I need a closer look. Well, you're going to get one later. So we go ahead and... Yep, it's at the time being, Ira goes, Ira goes, I may need to get a bit...

I guess when it's time to get close, and we're about to prepare ourselves for the final descent of your fine skyship, I'll see what else I can suss from its design. For right now, this storm is frustrating. And I know that you hold ill will towards the folks that built this, but also your allegiances are a little bit murky.

What's your ideal? Like, at the end of the day today, what do you hope happens? End goal type of a thing. Yeah. What do you want to manifest to happen today? No one really asks me these questions. It's been so much time. Well, it's important to set a goal so you know if you've achieved it.

Long fingers curl and scrape across the pointy chin. Ah, wanton destruction. Punishment of those that wronged me and disrespected my ability. Maybe take a few pieces of odd, obscure, and somewhat curiously twisted machinery, or whatever can be scavenged from the destruction,

laugh in the face of those that crossed my path, see them to their demise, or wherever else their punishment and imprisonment may bring them, and then, I don't know, where the winds take me. Where the winds take you? You don't have any plans beyond that? What's your five-year plan?

Do you have an end goal in life? I mean, are you just wandering around causing mischief and menace? Or do you want to settle down? Make a preservation check. Start a family? Titans. A little Nightmare Kiddos?

Persuasion? Yes. That's a seven. Oh. I don't like to discuss long-term plans, namely because I don't spend a lot of time considering them. I'm goal-oriented, meaning I focus on the goal. I've been focusing on this goal for a number of years, but not much past it.

I like that freedom, that possibility of seeing what inspiration hits in the moment of anything. Fearne, you're like that, too. You're very in the moment of anything. You know, Fearne, you're like that, too. You're very sort of in the moment. That's what keeps life fun, you know? Hmm. Yeah. Just kind of flying by the seat of your pants situation.

Maybe I need to do that, too. Of course, it's fun. Maybe I just need to be more in the moment and stop worrying about stuff. Don't even worry. Just like, yeah, it's fun. Maybe I just need to be more in the moment and stop worrying about stuff. Don't even worry, just like, yeah, it's, well, you know. It can be fun, except when bad stuff happens, like with us, and then you start to worry. Anyway, I think it's fun to just be carefree.

All right. Yeah. I feel a little bit nervous. I can sense that. Yeah. You want to know what the secret is? Yes. To life? To being completely free. All right.

Friends complicate things. Oh. The less threads you need to maintain, there's nothing to hold you back. I need to maintain. There's nothing to hold you back. We need some friends. All right. Continues to look out into the dust storm. Should we reach out to them?

Yes, you're able to, right? I am, but I mean... We don't have a signal. Did we have a signal? Did we come up with a signal? They said they were going to call us, but I don't, it's been a while. Well, we can just wait.

No. We can, we can. No, I'll reach out now. Okay. I'll reach out. Who should I call? Who's good at this stuff? Who's really good at talking right now? Imogen? Well, I would reach out to Imogen,

or I would reach out to Laudna, or... Maybe I'll do someone that we haven't heard from in a while. Don't cut me out. Well, I mean, I don't want to save your voice for when you actually might need it later. Fall in.

I will send Ascending to Orym of the Air Ashari. All righty. Fearne and Grass checking in. Have you made it inside? Are you safe? Are you going to let us know when to go? How's Imogen's voice?

Yes, three more words. Three more words. Okay. Ira hates friends. Oh, that was good. That was good. That was really good. We've made it. Made some friends.

Could use some help with robot here, Letters. Any advice for a jumpstart? Not sure. Plan might be changing. Give us a solid location. Don't go. We're on the rim. That wasn't an accident. Oh my lord! What, what?

My lord! I heard Imogen sneezing in the background. I think she might have some post-nasal. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, the dust. Yes. They said that they found an automaton of some sort and they need help with it.

Well, that's right up your alley, right? Yeah. I could, oh man. But we're here, oh. I could go, I don't want to leave you. Well, well. They're not too far. No, they're not too far. Well, how would we even get there?

I mean, what can you do? You can turn into something, can't you? I can, but I was going to save something to make sure that the people on the ship live. But I mean, that doesn't matter. Just run. I mean, technically, if we succeed, everybody wins and lives, so.

I mean, as I established before last time, when I thought it was bizarre at the time, when I flipped the coin and my god told me to leave innocent people on the ship, I think she may have been foreshadowing this moment right here. I think in a weird way, she was telling me, leave the skyship in the capable hands of Xandis and Arah.

I don't know who to trust here. Me or this? I trust you. I'm not sure about the coin. I trust the coin. Well, maybe you need one more flip. Okay. Heads we stay, tails we go.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sorry. Yeah. You know what, though? I already said to live in the moment, to be present, to just go with whatever happens. So we should leave. This is happening. Okay.

Maybe it was a sign. I'll flip just in case. We go. Okay. I'm going to go over to Ira and Zandis. Are they in the? Ira's at the front of the ship, near where you guys are. Okay. I'm going to go over to Ira and Zandis. Are they in the? Ira's at the front of the ship, near where you guys are.

Zandis is back, actually, still controlling the ship. Do you want to deal with Ira, or do you want to deal with Zandis, or do we go as a team? First of all, before we do anything, I'm going to use the Pearl of Possibility. Is that what it's called? Moat.

Oh, I have one of those, too! No, not the Moat of Possibility, the Pearl of Power. Pearl of Power. Well, I have a moat. I have a moat. I'm going to restore one 3rd-level spell to myself. Okay, yeah. Okay, okay. Give me back my sending that I just took away. What's the moat thing?

The moat gives you rerolls, I believe, twice a day? You drink the potion, and it should say on the Potion of Possibility, I think it gives you two. I have two again. You get three. Potion of Possibility? It just lets you reroll, though. I think it gives you two. You get two. Most is a possibility. Yeah. It just lets you reroll, though. It doesn't give you extra spell slots.

It lasts for eight hours or until used. Eight hours? It lasts for eight hours until it's used, yeah. Attack roll, ability check, saving throw. You can spend your fragment to roll an additional d20 or choose which of the two d20s you use alternatively. When an attack roll is made against you, you can do the same thing and make them reroll.

Are you going to take it? Yeah, I think so. That's a luck roll. Go. Go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go. Do you want to try to convince Zandis to stay with this? Oh my god, you're glowing. Yeah. Really?

It's odd, because when you drink it, it has a cold metallic sensation to it. It's flavorless. It almost makes your hair stand up just a little bit from the immediate cold sensation. And then becomes this weird buzzing in the inside of your stomach, like a weird static.

And then suddenly, for a brief moment, you feel like there's trails off your hands. And for a second, it reminds you of when you ate some of the things you weren't supposed to in the middle of the forest. But then a clarity hits you and you have this sense that you have a little more control over your direction in life than you normally do.

Hello. Oh, perfect. I feel so tuned into everything. What is this deep baritone? What is this deep baritone? Oh, this deep baritone? Yeah. I don't know. I feel like, you know that feeling

when you put your tongue on a battery? That's how I feel all the time. Is it? Okay, do we talk? Are you going to take Ira or are you going to take Xandas? I have a good thing going with Ira. Maybe you should talk to Xandas. Great. We're just telling them they're going to take the ship are you going to take Xandas? I have a good thing going with Ira. Maybe you should talk to Xandas. Great.

We're just telling them they're going to take the ship on their own and we're leaving. And that Xandas can trust Ira. That does not sound like a very convincing argument. But we do know what Ira wants. Crashing the ship aligns with Ira's goals. Saving Xandis's life might not. So how do we?

How do we? I mean, and there's so many other people on the ship. No, no, we got them all. That's right, we got them all. Jeez. Weez! Sorry, I remember, I remember, I remember, I remember. All right, all right. It's going to be fine, it's, I remember, I remember, I remember. All right, all right. It's going fine, it's going fine.

Hi, guys! Hey, you fellas. Hey! See, Ira's still glancing over the edge, big, long knee bent over the front, like a captain in the front, leaning into a storm, pulls the spyglass back. We need to have a group meeting.

Well, I suppose we should go to the captain then. Yes. Skitters off in the direction of Zandis. Zandis is like, what sort of meeting are we talking about, huh? What's going on? Really tell me, I'm in the dust here, literally and figuratively.

Sure, sure. Well, we were thinking that we need to leave. Guidance. Oh, we're going in now? Well, we were thinking of the two of us needed to go separately right now, possibly, and then you and Ira are going to do the ship into the thing yourselves.

But. Zanis glances over the wheel, and Ira's curled there, yourselves, but. Zandis glances over the wheel. Ira's curled there, looks up and smiles at them. We can do this. Zandis goes, Okay, right, no, I guess we should have a conversation

for once, me and this person who my life's in their hands. Okay. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, Ira, it's very important that you get Xandas safely off this vessel before it crashes. Of course. Yes. Can we trust you on this? He's very important to us and to our escape plan

and to your escape plan as well, to get us all out of here. I am a creature of my word. I will get your captain off this vessel safely. I promise. Insight check. Make an insight check. Okay.

I mean, he is... 23. Oh my god. Hey! I'm getting a whisper. Oh! This whisper is, Sam does this, is brought to you by WizKids, I guess.

That was it. That's it. Sends a lot of pharmaceuticals before this game starts. Apparently. How will you get Xandas off the vest? You said you have some, well, okay. What am I hearing? I'm only catching a few words. You've got a spell that can take you

and a fellow creature short distances, correct? Yes. Not too short, though. Like, as you're plummeting from the sky, you'll be able to get safely to the ground. With someone else, not just yourself. Indeed, just one of you, though. Just Xandis.

Which would be Xandis if you leave us behind so yet. That is true. Okay. So then you and I just. You feel good about this? No, but I don't know. Yes, I do and I just. You feel good about this? No, but I don't know. Yes, I do. I do. This is, I trust you.

I trust you, Ira. As a... You're going to do this. You're going to do this. And you're going to do it so good. I appreciate your mode of confidence. The black, vacuous space that is his eyes looking back at you unblinkingly.

But what I need you to do is to destroy. Okay? Oh, I intend to. Okay. When do we destroy? We will send you a message psychically when it's time to go.

And Captain Zandis, to help you in today's events, here, take this, and I'll give him the Potion of Possibility. Can you go ahead and drink that now? It'll make you just a little bit more fortunate. They glance over at it. I've drank in weirder things without really asking a question, so bottoms up.

That is, that wasn't even liquid, that was... Okay. Throws it over their shoulder. All right. So we're going to go in. I can't see anything with these glasses on. We're going to go in now. Yeah, we're going to go. Changebringer, please grant them good fortune and luck We're going to go in now. Yeah, we're going to go.

Changebringer, please grant them good fortune and luck, and we'll see you. Can't talk. We'll see you there. Indeed. Ira leans in real close to you and gets right up into where your ear would be and just goes, I think it's missing a lens.

Oh. What did they say? The main, the big one? Just an observation. You mean like the one that we had, but was... Yeah. Oh, that's good, isn't it? Could be.

Might be that they're not ready. Oh. Thank you, I'll tell the others. Don't fucking act like that. Save travel. You too. Okay, let's go. Are you carrying me?

Am I? Are we just walking? Are we stealthing? We could use magic, right? We can use magic, yeah, of course. Why wouldn't we? Do you want me to get you a little closer and drop you off? No, no, no. Like, what's safer?

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. It's fine, it's fine, it's fine. We're going to walk, we're going to walk. We're going to walk, we're going to walk. We're going to walk, because we should, yeah, yeah, yeah. We're going to walk. Yeah, I'm not really stealthy. No. Okay. But isn't there like, okay, we're going to walk.

We're going to stealth. We're going to walk. All right, I'll take you down just to drop you off on the ground because I don't think you're going to want to jump off from this high up. Oh, we're floating right now? Okay, okay, yeah. Cran takes you down,

drops you onto the surface of the Hellcatch Valley and leaves you to your devices. So here you are now standing, the two of you alone in the middle of this rapidly coasting dust storm. All right, here we go. Yeah. Right before you leave, Ira goes,

That way! And don't get lost. I didn't know that was a possibility. I can see it. We can see it, right? From where we are? No, you're like a mile away, right? We're just going to go that way. We're just going to go straight.

We'll go that way. Yeah, 10 minute walk, we can go. All right. Extra slow for stealth. Okay. Yeah. So I'd like you both to make stealth checks for me, please. With advantage, because you are in the middle of a dust storm. With disadvantage for me, because I'm me.

So just a single roll. Guide yourself. Forgot to. I got a 14. You said advantage? Yes. Okay. Okay, okay, okay. Um, um, um, um, um, um.

Where's the Sharpies? Where's my four? He's been thrown in at home all the time. And he's got his own method. He's built a technique for dice rolling. He won 20 to six yesterday against me. He beat Travis' ass in rolling. 17. At rollies?

17 and 14, okay. I'll take him to Vegas. You cruise forward into the dust storm in the direction where you believe Ira was pointing, carefully and quietly. This is because you're going stealthily, it'll take a little longer to get there. But who's guiding?

Who is paying attention to push through this storm? Who's paying attention? Whoever it is to be rolling perception or survival. I have pretty high of both. What do you have? Well, we don't know. We don't know. We don't know. I trust you. You do?

All right. Can I guide her? You can. Okay. I will guide the shit out of her. So Fearne, go ahead and make a perception or survival check. Okay, okay. And with the Guidance. You should move this. I know, I should.

You should move it. Okay. Shut up. 27. Oh! Okay. I know exactly where to fucking go. You do. You saw the point of Ira's arm

and quickly picked out just a few shadows on the little bit of horizon you could see through the dust storm and watching the pattern of the wind as it's traveling and waiting for it to shift, you begin to triangulate where you're going and where you're standing, and do not lose any time in the approach.

So what would have been 20 minutes? Oh, well, what is 20 minutes now? Because you're moving at half speed stealthily to approach the edge of this pit? It would have been longer, or you would have been lost. It would have had to have been found, but you feel confident in the direction you travel. While you're traveling and trying to catch up with this,

what are the rest of you doing? Letters, letters. I mean, they just checked in, but that was all I got. Are they coming? They were asking if everything was on track. Is everything on track? Do we want them to come here now?

Are they coming? They didn't say. Oh shit. Do we need to, are we waiting for them, or do we go down? I say we give them five minutes. We keep getting, we've been spotted the second we got boots on the ground here.

I don't know. I mean, the inside of this thing is pretty cavernous. We could hide inside of that if we could make it go, but I don't know if we want to call them back or... And how many uniforms did we just swipe? How many uniforms did we just swipe? So now uniforms did we just swipe? We took three. So now we have how many uniforms total? We had three, or we had some that were shunned.

Three good ones and three iffy ones. Three good ones, okay. All right. I've got like 20 minutes left on my wolf form, I think. Mm-hmm. Oh no. How many of those did you get, three? Uno. Oh no.

Unless you take a short rest, right? Yeah. I mean, oh, but that's an hour. I mean, how long have we been here for? You've been here for about, I mean, actual arrival, about 20, 25 minutes or so from the combat to meeting Beau and Caleb to, it's up to you guys. You don't know quite how imminent the solstice is.

It's your call. If we're waiting for them, we could just start's your call. If we're waiting for them, we could just start burning a short rest while we're waiting for them. If you already got a little bit of a head start on that short rest. Well, we got this warder, if that's what they're called, on its back, half hidden by a tent.

Do we want to try to stand it up or leave it hidden? It's half hidden. I think we leave it where it is until the letters get here. There's people walking all over the place here. That's okay, if they come over to inspect it, we just cut their Achilles heels and add them to the piles. Or we just be irritated at it. I get the feeling this is the sort of thing

that happens all the time. This is very complicated. Oh, just like, look. I could be the head mechanic. I work, I love working with metal. Oh wow. Make a deception check. They spotted you and I like that.

It's very frustrating. It's weird, scarves and everything. I feel like that was special circumstances. Yeah. Well, I think these uniforms we have are better, she said, convincing herself. I really wish Letters and I had exchanged more meaningful information.

It's just like them. It's about this moment, about halfway through your short rest. Oh shit. That you notice a pair of individuals beginning to approach from a western angle. You can see their scarves and cloaks flowing a bit in the dust storm as they begin to look in the direction

of the hulking automaton that is partially covered. Friend or foe? Very much not friend, or at least you don't recognize these figures and they appear to be in similar garb as to, at least one of them appears to be in vanguard robes. Okay. You want me to handle this?

Approaching? We can just say our warder went down. Yeah, corrupted power core, waiting on replacement parts. Sure. All right. The bodies are hidden, right? Yes. Where are the soldiers? They're in the big tent.

Stripped them and then put them in the, all right, and then we threw on some of the extra gear. Sure. We all have to be out here, too. Chat, do you two want to handle it? Sure. Let me duck into a tent. Yeah, I'm going to duck into a tent.

If I say chickpeas, that means it's an emergency. Chickpeas means punch somebody? Yep. Okay. Okay. Now I want chickpeas. Let's go. Oh god, I killed so many. As the two figures approach,

one of them appears to be a stockier dwarf-like figure, from what you can tell, not wearing a vanguard attire. This one appears to be more in a patchwork, Paragon's Call outfit, and is walking two feet away from what looks to be a tall, thin figure, humanoid, hood up, both of them with scarf wraps over their face. As they begin to approach.

I just kick it. Ah! A voice enters your mind and sourcelessly goes, What is the problem here? Damn thing just went down. Just started shorting out and going crazy and then hit the ground. I say back in his brain.

Make a deception check. All right. I'm okay with those. 19. Whoa. Nice. Okay, okay with those. 19. Whoa. Nice. Okay, okay. Okay. The figure, you don't make any details

from beneath the scarf necessarily, but it's odd to have another voice in your mind. You're only used to really one. The individual glances and looks over. The Kahl figure walks up and you can see the beard beneath the scarf blowing to the side as they pull their walking stick, their staff-type thing they're walking with,

and they just go ahead and poke the sides of it. These things are ridiculous. The individual looks back at you and you hear the voice go, We'll find someone to fix it immediately. Yes, sir. They both turn and continue to walk and loop around the outside.

I look busy. Did you recognize the voice? Yeah, did I recognize the voice? Male voice? Male voice, yeah. Accented. Sound affluent elven voice? Male voice, yeah. Accented. Sound affluent, elven? More or less, yeah. Wizard shit?

Not sure if it was wizard shit, but definitely sounded like at least a... Mr. Pantsy Pants? A little fancy, yeah. And the person they were with, the gruff-voiced individual, physical type? Big, strapping, small, tall? Pretty wide and beefy. Stacked, strapping, small, tall? No, pretty wide and beefy.

Stacked, strapped weapons? Make a perception check for me. Disadvantaged me because of the dust storm, actually. Oh, that's a good thing. Not bad, 14. 14. Yes, there was what looked to be a large rifle-like device that was strapped onto their back.

You can see it looks like a cutlass or some sort of a curved short sword on the right side. Then, of course, they have the staff that they're walking with through the dust storm. And the one that marked out the orders, did they seem to have any armaments on them at all, or unarmed? Unarmed.

Everybody clock that. Mm-hmm. That's a big disparity between those two. Well, the other doesn't need to be armed. I know! Yeah. But because there wasn't any sort of occurrence, through a quick bit of deception, You can continue our short rest.

You continue your short rest. Okay. Before you finish your short rest, you see two more figures get into a ride. Goddamn it. It's fine, it's fine. Through the dust. There are many individuals that are doing patrols

and keeping watch around here. You very rapidly notice these figures both look odd in their shapes. They are not normal individuals. Where are we? Oh, okay. Oh god, these ones. I say into their heads.

FCG? Ah! Is that you? Oh god! Over here. Fearne. What? I'm hearing things. Come on.

No, it's a voice I don't recognize. It sounds evil, malevolent of some sort. Oh no, someone's already trying to break in. Something tired, worn, withered from sickness. Say, get out of here, I don't want it. Get out of my head. Get out of my head. Get out of my head, you devil woman. Wait. Who is it?

It's got a twang. A familiar twang. It might be. Who do we It's got a twang. A familiar twang. Who do we know that has a twang? It's Holly Hunter. What's a twang? Imogen, is that you? Can you hear me? Yeah.

What have they done to you? It's a dust storm, you know, it just got. Oh no. Just get over here. Stop making me talk. Okay, I'm sorry, yeah. Where is O'Ree? Where are you? Oh, you're right in front of me! I see him, I see him, I see him.

Hi, hi. Hi. Hi. You're all so alive. So good you came. We did. Yeah, what are you doing here? You told me to come! I asked you for advice on that thing. Huh? This is the Fae? Yeah, that's why we came.

You said you needed a robot. What's going on with Xandis? Xandis and Ira are taking care of it. They're actually getting along great. The two of them are going to do it. A lot in common. They both live in the now. You're now in red.

Ira's a Fae sociopath. Well, now, let's not judge, lest ye be judged. I will judge you! It's a certain way of thinking that he said that he was. Watch who you're calling a fae sociopath in front of. Fae sociopath! That's true, I belong to you all. But you know, he's...

Ira's a man of his word. Ira is a man of his word. He even said that, and I think he did. See, he said it! Ira's a man of his word. Ira is a man of his word. He even said that, and I think. See, he said it. Ira's a man of his word. Yes. Ira's a man of his word. Ira's a man of his word. I really think they're going to do it.

He's so fueled by rage and wanting to destroy this thing, I think he'll do whatever it takes, even if it means doing the right thing. He told him a secret. He said he was looking through the. Oh yeah, he mentioned, thank you. He mentioned that he was studying

the thing that we're trying to explode, and he said that it looks like it's missing a lens. I don't know if that. Like the one you had. I don't know if it's ready. Probably. It might not be ready to go, which might buy some time or... That's great. That'd be good.

But that means it wouldn't work, right? Or that it would work wrong. Oh. Well, then it couldn't be ready any moment. They could just be transporting it from someone's pocket. So I think we should just operate. So if we see anyone go up and start working on it... Just meh. Like the last time. So if we see anyone go up and start working on it. Just murder.

Like the last time. Or if we need to act like we have top secret clearance, we could have news on the delivery of the lens. Do we still have the other lens that we broke and refixed? We still have it, but it doesn't work. Yeah, but they don't know that. We could hold it up and say, we're supposed to put this on the top of the thing,

let us through. FCG, that's brilliant. Well, I think it was more Chetney's idea. It was a pro-sponsored idea. Chetney, that's brilliant. Your voice is weird, too. Is it the dust? The fucking dust just got in there.

So Laudna, that was a great idea. It's in a hole. Let me open it up. Thank you. I'm hopping in again. I'm brilliant. Do you want to see if you can get this big thing working. Oh, this is the thing? You go over and you can see this massive automaton,

probably 15 to 20 feet tall. It's hard to tell from this angle. It's partially now covered at the base of the dust that's blown in around it. But it is a rotund egg-shyped entity, apparently. Egg-shyped. I don't know when that happened. Like in an eggs.

All right. Someone, oh, before that, back off a second. How is Zandis and Ira getting off that ship? Do they have a plan? Do you have a plan? Ira is, as they're plummeting to their death, Ira is going to grab Zandis and teleport them somehow to the ground.

He promised he would. He vowed to us. Yeah. And they'll be okay? Yeah, I think they're going to... They got this. 60-40. There's nothing to do about it now. I'm calling it 60-40. Which is the 60?

I think I'm going to keep that to myself, but... I don't need to that to myself, but. I don't need to read your mind. No. You want me to turn on this robot to fight for us? I don't know, maybe. Or just to get us down inside.

Maybe you could pilot it. Or we could hide some of us in it. Yes, it's got a big old belly. It's like a one-bedroom in there. All right. Someone hoist me up. Studio. You guys are watching out,

and no one's coming, right? I got you. I got you. I'm keeping a lookout. Okay, yeah. There is a doorway-type front to the compartment that is its central torso. It looks like it's essentially a central cargo space

in the middle of this automaton that is used both for defense and being sentinel to the facility, but also for carrying and helping construction, hauling of things to and from. But as you, with Chetney's wolf and help, crawl inside and look about, yeah, it's definitely sustained a bit of damage.

There are some scuffs and some dings on it. The interior, you can see the power cord is completely fried. You see the bits of the inside, basically, based on the conversations that you had with both the professor and Imahara Joe, you thankfully glean at a quick glance the basics behind what should work inside, though it's not.

And I have a sense of, so I know how it's supposed to work. Can I figure out what's wrong with it? Is it just? Its power core is fried. It's destroyed. It's just the power core. Yeah, you look inside, and there is one of those arcane orbs

that's built up in the inside and it's housed within. You can see it's cracked in dark. And so there's one power cord that I can identify that's the fault. It's the power cord. Oh, the power cord. I thought you said cord. No, sorry, the orb there. There's a central arcane claw at the bottom of it

that connects to the rest of the device, the inside. I mean, wow. Okay. I'm going to try. Is there anything attached to the core? Yeah, there's a claw-like piece of machinery that's clung to the top of it that arcs off and attaches to where you see runic,

splayed, almost vein-type bits of machinery spread throughout the rest of the device. And that's the only connection point? Is this like a core? You can see. Half of it's embedded into the top and into where the head is. I'm going to help the core.

Can I just investigate around to see if I can, if I were going to tether myself to it somehow, is there any plug, socket? Make an arcana check. An arcana check. With a guide. Guide, thank you, thank you. With a guide.

With a guide. Fucking pigeons in the Sandstorm. Not great. Desert story. Not great. Desert pigeons. Not great. Seven. Seven? You don't see anything. Wait, wait, wait!

It says there's a little A next to my arcana. That says, that means. Advantage. I can't tell why, though. Whatever, trust it. It says, advantage on. Because of your Aeomaton ability, Harmonia's? It says, intelligence checks made to reveal information about a creature or object

you can see. I can see this. Yeah, so go ahead and roll again. And Geiger's one. A natural 20. Oh! You glance up and you see the cable that's connected to this power core. It's dug into the crystal,

but you can see the cracks that have spread throughout and make it loose on one side. So you, since it's on its side, you reach over and grab and yank on one end and it dislodges. You pull it off and it comes free and you can see it. It's almost like a three-pronged claw at the end of it. And you realize it has a small connecting point in the center of it. You realize it has a small connecting point

in the center of it, and when it's affixed to a source of power, that can be used to generate and run power to the automaton. Okay. I got to open myself up. Or maybe I don't. I got to try something first before I pop open.

I don't know if I can even pop open myself. I'd have to do surgery on myself. Wow. Wow. First, I'm just going to try this first and see if it works. Okay. I'm going to undo my scrunchie.

Okay. And take my hair down, my wires. And I'm going to try to tie them into this connection point, see if I can't wrap them around in a specific way to get metal on metal. It's totally hot wire. With a natural 20 on your arcana check, allow it.

So you go ahead and you take these things, and you know that you could probably get this up inside and attach it to your actual core, but you go ahead and attempt to see if there is some sort of loose connection here. And while it's probably not as much power as can be put into it, as soon as you begin to tether them in there,

basically wrap the claw onto your head, it clasps on. You also hear a loose flash of sparks from the inside of this area, and suddenly the still lifeless automaton begins to hum slightly. I'm going to try to pump a little bit more energy into it or something. Are we turning it back on

without changing its programming or altering the runes or anything like that? I don't know. We're going to find that out next. As soon as that comes on, you're still yourself, but you sense your consciousness also connected to whatever this is, and it is more or less just a blank psychic cockpit, if you will. You suddenly sense, you have control of your body,

but you now sense arms and legs beyond your physical self. Get away from her, you bitch. Oh man. All right, I'm going to, I've never had legs before. This thing has legs, right? It has legs. Oh.

All right. Like Bambi. I'm going to try to. I thought you were going to say Ariel. I'm going to try to stand up on my legs. I'm going to like this. I'm holding it in front. I was scared. Just watch out. Watch out, everyone.

But all that time with the wooden feet was four letters. This is different. The tent wrapping gets lost in the storm and vanishes, but you now have a free-standing, 16, 17-foot tall automaton. Oh shit. Oh shit. I'm going to try to move its appendages, try to see if I can get a sense of balance

and limitations on rotation, that kind of stuff. Maybe do a little bit of a chicken dance to just get my bearings here. Yeah, it's functional and fluid. You know, there's a little bit of a stickiness in the right shoulder. It looks like some of the plating has been damaged from the battle that it sustained.

Can I do the robot? Make a dexterity check. An actual 20, no, it's a four. Weirdly, not a very convincing robot from a giant robot. It's a bit predictable. Oh, it is. Are there any of those things down in the pit, or are they just along the rim?

When you were down there, you saw one down there. In your earlier vision, you saw one down there in your earlier vision. You saw more around the perimeter as well, but that's just the glances that you've had. Okay. Who can we put in here? Who else can we put inside this thing? What do I do, guys? Well, first off, do we get that short rest?

Yeah, I'll say you guys can go ahead and take your short rest. Dope. So I regained a couple spells before with my sorcery points, and then I'm going to use the short rest to get my sorcery points back. Okay. I'm going to use two, three days. Outside of you, you could fit

four standard people uncomfortably on the inside with two smaller people acting as one, likely. Four people. So three medium-sized or? Four medium-sized or if you have a- Two smalls. Two small acts as a medium. Got it. That's, is that everybody?

One, two, three, four, plus two smalls. No. No, we're short one. One person can't come in. Are you looking at me? No, no, I'm just telling you, because you're my friend. I could be on the outside, absolutely. No, I don't want you

to go outside. I don't know if I like being in small, confined spaces. Oh. I'll do it. If I need to. I'm not very stealthy, so. I am. I'm very stealthy. Did we end up using a short rest last time?

A castler would be a free ride if you wanted to. I burned one. Burn that, but. You did. I don't think you did, because we wore a costume. Yeah, I think I helped. Whatever. I will wait for some sort of confirmation. Could Orym hide inside? I can't remember. Yeah, I think I held... I will wait for some sort of confirmation. Could Orym hide inside?

I can't remember. Actually, I know where. This thing's best if he cradled it slightly open. You can certainly try. Other thought, we could take the hole and maybe line the bottom of the row bit with the hole and give us an extra 10 cubic feet. I don't think it'll fold out enough for that. I'll say the interior of it, the floor isn't flat.

Okay. So. Never mind. That was a good thought. It was a good thought. Well, it's just one of us. You mentioned friends. We don't have anyone else with us, right? Oh, right. We met.

We just met two people that are down in there now. We're working with Rin. Oh, I did burn a range. A range, it was just the last one I traced. They're gone. Yeah, one was named Doe, and the other one was Ray, and then me.

The three of them. Don't Ray and me? Yeah. There's such a musicality to them. I don't know why the a capella groups get so radical on these parts, but. They just have to have puns. Yeah.

They seem to know a lot about the Cerberus Assembly. One of them looked like she could handle herself in a fight and then some, and the other one looked like some sort of a Like a daddy. of a magic zaddy or something. Oh, he was a zaddy. Either way. They were both zaddies, let's be honest. But yes, they were like,

they said that Lunas hasn't been seen for three days. He's MIA, but also that he's getting a little radical and a little on edge, you know, and that maybe he's anticipating some sort of... Oh, wow. You came on. Yeah, I'm really excited. It's in the adrenaline.

The way they painted it was either Ludinus is getting a little loopy, he's letting things slip, or that's a feint of some kind. They said that Wrynn was turned to stone from a glyph, and getting a little loopy, right? It's letting things slip, or that's a feint of some kind. They said that Wrynn was turned to stone from a glyph, some sort of a magical ward in here, so we should be looking out for those.

And then the ginger guy, one of the dudes who had red hair said that there was- The accent, yeah. Yeah, accent said that there was some sort of mesh devices on the key itself that he thought had... Or in the cavern walls. Cavern walls? The pulses, they don't come from a single point.

They seem to shimmer through. Oh, and then did we mention the golems, the mage hunters? Mage hunters. Mage hunters. Oh my gosh. It's a lot. So no magic.

Keep it on the down low. Unless we're in a fight, or it's immediate. Then this whole thing is amplified by a bunch of these mirror-like structures, and then there are these four hook-like spires, and it's all powered by a bunch of magic orbs and residuals that are buried. It seemed to be buried underground.

Yes. They're not out on the surface this time. So we're going down in there? Mm-hmm to be buried underground. Yes. They're not out on the surface this time. So we're going down in there? Mm-hmm. Yes. Matthew? Yes? How do I see? You take the glasses off. This automaton does have a dual sensor

that's actually connected in the center and the front that is magically utilized to scan the space in front of it. From the standpoint that you see, it is mainly, there's less color and more texture and geometry. So it's a unique perspective from what you're not used to. Topographical readout. Yeah. Terminator? Kind of, yeah. Cyberdyne escaped from New York.

But you can see through that if you were to concentrate just on that vision and pull out of your own. Please forgive me. That's way cooler than a belly button hole. That's all you guys got, though. All you guys just have a little thing. Move! You think it's a good idea, since we can't get everybody inside, should we have two people outside to chaperone?

I'm pretty good at lying, so I should probably stay on the outside. In costume? Yeah. In costume? Yeah. In costume. Just make sure you cover your hair. Yeah. All right. Who else should be with you?

Or use your hair, if the movement suits. You're going to tell them that you're Miley Cyrus or Emma Stone? Oh wow. Or someone, Lindsay Lohan. Lohan? Yeah. Is it Lohan? I don't know. Lohan?

Lohan? Yeah. W-W-W. Should be like in my opinion. It's the clown. I like the idea of this thing holding me in its hand. And then I can be out there, I can be looking for those glyphs on the ground

the whole time, and then if things go bar-wrong for you, I can just. Ba-wrong? Ba-wrong. Well then, it can be everybody but the two of you, because there's no point hiding you if you're sitting in the hand anyway. You can just be intentional. I mean, why not just walk around

if you're going to be outside of it? Well, I got spotted immediately. Yeah, hide in the hand, hide. You're probably back down to your Chetney form. Yeah! All right. Fun side, baby. I just want letters to cradle me like a rare bird.

Terrible liar. Oh my god. There we go, there's team. Don't break the mangle. No, I'm just leaving them there. I'm the only one outside now? No, Orym's out there, too. But he's in a fist.

Yeah. We're mistaking with a second person. Do we need a... Wait, were you suggesting that Orym basically acts like he's a prisoner, like he's dead? No, I think he's small enough that most you'd see his little cloak hood, and it would just look like some shit in the thing's hand,

if you saw that at all. He's so wee. Is that the plan? I'm not writing on top, I'm writing in. We'll find out. Like in that type of a situation. I feel like one more person outside, but that's just me. You know. You should be able to talk

rather than me. Swing by the order's side. Should anybody else be outside? Let's try this. How many if we're trying to take out some of these mirrors, right? On the way down? I think it'll be a pop-in, pop-out situation. All right, all right.

Actually, can we do a quick fire drill and then see how long did it just take us all to get inside? It took you about 20, 30 seconds to get all inside. Okay. That's fast. It's kind of a mess, though, so maybe next time we'll do a little faster. It's not fast in a fight. Just making sure everybody's aware. It's true. All right. It's a bit of a time of car circumstance.

So who's got, are you controlling the pop the hatch button? Am I? Because if trouble comes, you can't be slow on the trigger. You got to be decisive. I am in this thing. I am tuned into every nook and cranny of it. If trouble comes, you can't be slow on the trigger. You got to be decisive. I am in this thing. I am tuned into every nook and cranny of it. If you say pop, I'll lock. Plus I can communicate to y'all on the inside

like what I'm seeing. Don't lock. I won't pop when you say lock. And I won't lock when you say pop. And where's the entrance? Is it a shitting them out situation or a puking them out situation? It's the front of the belly.

Belly, it's a co-op too situation. Oh, that's cool, you can open it and maybe like. Oh. Bioshock. Yeah. Yes. Also, where am I going? Down. I'll just follow you. You're the little girl who's leading around the big robot.

Full Bioshock. Did you get the lens? Yeah, I have it out. You're the little girl who's leading around the big robot. Full bio job. Did you get the lens? Yeah, I have it out. Boop. That's a good story. That's a last resort. Last resort. Okay.

Another wave of warm, magical energy pulses out from the outside as you're now getting closer to the edge. You can see that again. Let's see. Feel free to just, if you see anything. Say something. Yes. I'm excited.

TSA. I'm excited, too. This is going well. This is a plan. Remember this moment. And don't forget, at some point, someone, I can't probably while I'm attached to this, someone's going to have to tell Xandas to go. At some point, when we're ready. And the goal is to tell him to go

once we maybe disable this meshy mesh? We'll see. We'll see what we get done. Criteria for telling Xandas to go. Wren is secured, maybe. Mesh is disabled. What else? We'll see. We'll see what we get done. Criteria for telling Zantz to go. Wren is secured, maybe. Mash is disabled. What else? Shit hits the fan and we have no other options.

Shit hits the fan. Okay, now the other question is going to take an hour for the Ashari to get here, right? They're bonafide. They're bonafide. So should I tell them now? Because it's going to be- This could take hours. I should I tell them now? Because it's going to be- We don't know how, this could take hours.

I'd say tell them now, because if we're not, if things are starting in an hour, that would be great. Even if we do tell them now, we still need, like, don't we want to be able to send them a signal at the last moment? So maybe I tell, oh god. Maybe like, hey, any other little notes? Let's go in and just see what we see.

We can still, it's doing ascending, it takes two seconds, right? Other doing ascending is magic. True, but it's quick. Bots of time between the pulses. Yeah, what if we get in there and then we can't do it? Also the mage hunters. The mage hunters is what I'm not afraid of.

Okay. I don't know. I'd say, honestly, I'm not afraid of. Okay. I don't know. I'd say, honestly, I'm happy to just say, ticking clock, one hour, and if you hear from us, sooner than start then. Ship drops, Shari come in, one hour. Oh boy, I'm so tired. Do you want me to try to do it,

or to save your spells, or are you okay? It's better. That's what I would do. We've talked to them before. Sure. Don't do that with your shoulders. You know, I'm down for an hour timer. Keep the clock running.

All right. It could be a fucking miracle we're making it out. Looking at the size of this ruin, does an hour seem feasible for getting? You haven't gotten to the edge of it yet. Okay, well, let's get to the edge and then we'll take a look in. Oh god. And then we'll take a look in. Oh god.

And then we'll see where we're at. You have to look right in this thing. You're all crammed in very tensely with no light, unless you create a small light source within, but it is like. Small light source within. It is, you're pushing into each other, elbows are smashing into the side of rib cages.

It's not comfortable by any means. Shit, you. I'm relaxed. For you, FCG, it's a fascinating sensory experience. You don't feel, like your body, you feel pressure. There's something unique about your construction that is sensory in ways that this is not. This definitely feels like wearing a suit of armor.

But as you walk, you feel the power behind it. You feel the weight, the heft, the strength. It's interesting. It's interesting. Yeah. How do you feel? I like it. I like it a lot. Do you feel like a big old daddy? Big daddy. I was trying to give it a different name, you feel like a big old daddy? Big daddy.

I was trying to give it a different name, but it sounded a little weird. Is that a thing? I'm taking notes. Big old daddy. As you begin to step to the edge of this excavation with you, Imogen, following alongside,

you can see at the edge of the rock before it begins to plummet off into this deep pit, the network of structured bridges and long wooden walkways that cross the outside edges from place to place down the interior. While the dust storm blows overhead and there is some level of dust that still finds its way down within,

and it is much clearer past a certain point, the first thing you notice at the edge are a number of pikes and spears that are placed into the rock and dirt along the edge, which look like they're holding almost like beads, necklaces. Upon a quick glance, you can see some weapons

hanging on them, you can see heads. Oh. You can see an iron mask without eye holes and script scrawled into it. Oh, adjudicators. Then you begin to make out that maybe these are Kahl's trophies placed on the exterior

as both a warning and an intimidation attempt. That's a lot of adjudicators. Mm-hmm. With that sort of context, you also see a lot of these things adorning it are holy symbols of different gods and entities that had come, likely on the previous vessel that crashed. Fuck.

Left as a display of the things they cast outside of this pit. We're fine. We're fine. We're smarter than all of Vassalheim. Yeah, the things we were running from, they were weird. You step up to the edge and you can see one of the ramp-like declines that is carved into this excavation

that begins to wrap down the inside of this. There are a few of them, but one that's closest to you is not too far from where you met the edge of the pit. The two of you, side by side, begin to slowly descend down, down, down. Glancing over the way, you can see a number of sources of what is almost like a combination of torchlight in some places,

others just a soft blue glow of magical light orbs used to illuminate the space below. You can already see from way up here all manner of ruins exposed below. You can see tables and signs of the excavation that previously had taken up residence here before it was co-opted. Even looking below, you can see dozens of figures walking around, handling business, too far to make out too many details, especially with your vision being a little separate than what you're used to gleaning from. But looking below, you can see there almost the entire height of this pit, maybe about a little over halfway up to three quarters of the way up its full depth, is the spire itself. You can see the green pulsing glow

of the residuum that now lines it throughout the extremely dense black metallic armor that has been heavily reinforced around this central spire as it comes to that fork towards its peak. You can see the four smaller spires that hook inward facing its direction where it looks like there are other clusters of individuals. Are they working on them, loading something? You can't quite tell from this distance. Another pulse of that odd dispel-type wave

shoots up the side. Make a perception check, both of you. I'm peering out from this thing. pulse of that odd dispel-type wave and shoots up the side. Make a perception check, both of you. I'm peering out from this thing's hand, too. I'm outside the... That's true. 11. 17. 11, 17. 21.

21. Right before the happens, you see it seems to emanate from two devices along the base. Not from the spire, not from any of the mirror devices, though you see them all gently light up in reaction as this wave cascades upward. Everything with some arcana attached to it reacts in some way as it carries up and passes through. As the wave hits

you, it scrambles you for a moment. You don't lose control, but for a second, your vision gets to get fuzzy and you have to take a moment to right yourself before the weird static and this loud hum that it seems to thrust into your mind begins to slowly fade. But you glance down over the side, and once more, you see the next wave come. These two devices that are set at the northern and southern edges of the base of this excavation, beginning to glow different glyphs across them before they send out the wave simultaneously. What do they look like, the devices? You can't quite see the full shape of them. You just see the glow and then the pulse emanate

from them. Can I ask just for structural clarity? We've got this prong or key or whatever this thing is that doesn't clear the top of the pit. Correct. From where we are, do we have a guesstimate? Does Orym have a guesstimate how far to the bottom we are? Probably about 150 feet. 150 feet, and then you said there are four smaller, not keys, but other... It's like arced towers that are facing in towards the key.

Are they coming from the bottom, or are they coming from somewhere halfway up the pit? They're coming from the bottom. The bottom. Okay. You said the spire key goes halfway up the pit? A little past halfway, almost to three quarters. Okay. The glowing that's emanating from the four prongs. From the two devices in the base

that are emanating this kind of a stealth. Okay. And it's dark down there, other than the lighting up of the glow? No, there are light sources. There's people working, and there's torchlight, there's orbs that are giving off blue light. There's a lot of bustling work, and you see other figures that are walking on different levels of

the pits, curving pathways, and across some of the extended bridge, almost like long catwalks that run across the excavation in different places. There are tunnels or cavern holes, cave entrances you can see along this path where it looks like storage spaces are off to the side. What would you like to do? If we keep just walking down, will we just spiral all the way to the bottom? It looks like you would, yeah. How long does it look like it'll take?

I'm not moving very fast. Is those extra spires coming out? Yeah, the smaller curved ones, yeah. Can we see the mesh that Widogast described? The mesh-like devices on the edges, or is that? When you see the dispel wave, just like how everything that has some sort of arcana to it just slightly glows, you can see dozens of these little dots

that are embedded in the sides of the tunnel. Yeah, but it's all mainly based around the bottom of it. Fuck. Okay. No point in going to the bottom. But it's all coming based around the bottom of it. Fuck. Okay. No point in going. Yeah, but it's all coming from those two main glowy points that then emanates out to all the little motion capture balls. Correct.

We should try to make our way down, right? Sure. And Beau and Widowgas, we're going to go for one of them while we try and do the other, correct? I don't have the key in mind. What'd they say? Pretty sure that's what they said.

Because they got a head start. Do you remember if they said they were going to go for one of them? They're going in to try and disable both of the device that's dispelling this and or looking for any means of disabling the power sources for the key. So they're going for the whole smash. I just message Imogen and

say, like, do you have any eyes on our friends? Yeah, then fuck that. We wouldn't see them. They're too high up at this point. But continue to walk down, I believe? Yeah, please. I guess, when should we call on the Ashari? We should call it like... When do we even want to set the clock?

I mean. Does it look like a one hour walk? To the base? No, probably about, at the speed of this, and doing it carefully, without drawing attention, about 10 minutes. Well, we want a distraction. That's the plan? Yeah, we should call them in. To draw people out of here?

And how fast do we think we can get down there? 10 minutes. Yeah. Yeah. Or even less than that. Heat of battle, things just pop off like that. Okay, I'm going to wait until one of the pulses goes and then immediately after, I'm going to cast Ending. Okay. You're going to step down.

Down the... immediately after I'm going to cast Ending. Okay. You're going to step down the, sometimes 15, 20-foot-wide walkway. Sometimes it looks like parts have chipped or fallen off and it gets to about 10 feet wide, which gets a little nerve-wracking for the width of your current shell, but doable. Thinking on the site of the Adjudicators hanging on the pikes, just thinking on it, did we notice any signs of damage, ruptures,

slashes, or did they look mostly intact? I'll say make an investigation check in hindsight as you were glancing through, peering through the front belly entrance. Dirty 20. Dirty 20, nice. They appeared to be worn, damaged. There was some sort of, whether it be from,

if they were part of the crash or they were part of a scuffle, you're uncertain, but you do definitely see... Goddamn it. I think we have Nott as a guard as well. You do definitely see... Goddamn it. We have matters of guard as well. Maybe matters of guard might come. They weren't technically guards. Those were NPCs.

Thank you. NPCs don't wear fucking cutlasses and a goddamn rifle on their back. But yeah, it looked like they had seen some sort of wear. Okay. What's all wear? The next wave comes through as you time yourself to go ahead and cast your spell

right as it passes past. Mm-hmm. What are you doing? Casting Sending towards? Keyleth. Keyleth, all right. We're heading into the pit. If we start the clock now, you'll be here in an hour. That should give us enough time.

Anti-magic pulses every minute. We're trying to take it out. Love, Scarlet Johansson. She responds. Okay. I'll gather the forces I have. I found the tree. Within an hour, likely.

We'll look for a sign. All right. No pressure. For a sign. Go on. DM. I can assume as soon as Pate gets hit with one of these anti-magic blasts

that he'll go bye-bye? Oddly, no. No. You watch him lose cohesion for a second and then pick right back up. My baby! It's on. The energy waves of this aren't fully dispelling things. They're just scrambling a little bit.

Interesting. Do the rest of us feel anything? You feel like a. Okay, that's all. Just like a gentle breeze suddenly blows by with a bit of warmth. I didn't want to do it, because it would maybe come back.

Did you describe, I think, that when those pulses come, all the little, the dozens of little points down below kind of flare a little bit as well? Yeah, everything that has some sort of enchantment to it seems to light up slightly, almost like there's just a wave of lights going up. Orym remembers that Caleb and Beau told him that Wrynn got hit with a petrification glyph,

so he is looking for those on the ground, especially when the surges happen, to see if anything lights up on the ground or walls. Okay, so I'll consider that your passive perception is we're descending, and when you get closer to the actual base, we'll make an active check for that, too. That's right, we could theoretically use some of this to our advantage if the glyphs disable for a minute,

but then come back when they pass. Yeah, plus we have to consider that it can't be like, it can't be a localized glyph. People have to go down there and service that thing. It has to be in reaction to something trying to disable it or hurt it, right? I don't know. People have to work on that shit all the time.

Hopefully we're going to know where they are. Hopefully we'll see. Those kinds of glyphs, I mean, we don't know this, but those kinds of glyphs can have a condition set to fire off, right? So it could be an order given. Yeah, those could be all kinds of stuff. Can I just check in with Pate and say,

how did that feel? Did you black out for a second? Did you go away, or was it just a little woozy? No, it's more of a little woozy. It is sort of like I just, someone kicked me in the nuts for a second and I'll get a little fuzzy, and I was good to go. I just need to say that. I didn't even have nuts.

What's it like having nuts? You don't know, you don't have nuts. I don't know! We should add Chetney. What is that? What's it like having nuts? How big are yours? He curls up and you tell me, you constructed him. Did you build him with nuts?

Rats have really big nuts. What? They do. Rats? How do you know this? Because I used to have hamsters. Hamsters, if you'd, if they had big nuts, and I think rats are the same way. I mean, it was a dead rat body,

so I imagine they'd be shriveled and a little decayed, but I wouldn't have taken them off. That would have been cruel. May not be the proudest of raisins, but they're my raisins. I have no nuts. Fantastic. Mine's right. It's right about this time you see two figures that are walking up the ramp, and they're probably

going to be crossing past the two of you. You see them walking by what is now visibly on the left-hand side, an open cavern that leads into the side of the tunnel. You're about 20, 25 feet down from the tops. Yeah, let's go into that little cavern. I take my cloak and I just roll over my face. I will say for this, I need you to make a stealth check.

Okay. 11. I rolled it too hard. 11, okay. While you both continue to walk down, you head to the edge of this, the two figures that pass by. You see another one in a vanguard robe, hood up, scarf half down.

Looks to be either a half-elf or just an elf without quite as eccentric a feature as female. Older, just glancing back at you and the large automaton as you pass by. The other figure you do recognize as an armored General Rattanish. Ooh.

Oh shit. Well, we're covered. I'm covered. Yeah. Why do we keep running into people we know? There's got to be 500 people here. I see a Paragon's Call. Yeah. Why do we keep running into people we know? There's got to be 500 people here. Has he heard of Kald? Yeah. Yes. He was Otohan's right hand.

Plus, I had a shaved head the last time I saw him. Correct. Or no hair, rather. As you're walking, Rutanish goes, What did you find there? Points at the hand. Prisoner. It'll be fun.

Really? I hear this and druidcraft, a flower with red berries growing from it, and I just go across my mouth and face and wait. Okay. Nice. I want to see if perhaps this is one of the friends of our fine new decorative lady. Decorative lady.

Wrynn, I think she's a decoration. He's going to recognize Orym. Really? I don't know. Has he seen Orym? I don't know. Orym was one of, I mean, you're at the event, but you were just in the crowd. Yeah. Okay.

Open up. All right. I'll just roughly throw him on the floor. Are you acting unconscious? Oh yeah, potato. I just play possum. Deception check. Come on. It's not high.

Guidance, guidance, can I guidance? There's no guidance here. No magic. Touch it. Shit. 18. Hey! Rotan just glances over. Almost feel bad for the thing.

He was spry. It'll be fun. All right. Walks over and gives a little kick to the side. Puts the hand on the side of his battleaxe that's hanging on the side of the belt. Apparently there has been sightings of, whispers of more coming from Vesselheim,

so stay pushed. I don't think they'll get here in time, but just in case. whispers of more coming from Vesselheim, so stay pushed. I don't think they'll get here in time, but just in case. They step around the outside of the cavern entrance and continue heading up the ramp towards the top. Interesting. Hmm. You can pick him up.

Pick him up? Kick him again. Grab my legs. Oh, Kick him again. Grab him by the legs. Oh, wrong command! Just throw him over my shoulder. Swing! How's everybody doing? Put him in your hand. Put him in your hand while you can see.

I'm going to give myself one point of blushing damage. Yeah, I'll allow it. I'm feeling great. Yeah? Yeah, I got to pee, but you know. It's always funny when you're hiding. Just let it out, just let it go. In here? Yeah, why not? Everybody cool for the Wiz?

Hey, please, Danvers. Well, we don't know what it's going to do to the robot. It might, you know. Vote for yes, no, maybe. No, no, just no. Fuck. Missing out. Later. You see, walking across the catwalk, a couple other figures that are inspecting

and it looks like they're writing notes down, looking over the central device. Further down the pathway, you can see another tunnel that leads off to the left-hand side. This one is a bit wider and you can see within, there's two tents that have what looks to be some open and empty crates, some cots. And you can see what look to be a pile of bodies.

Recognize anybody? You, from what you can see within the hand, don't recognize anybody at a glance, no. Wow, there's a lot of dead people in here. Should I go look? Talking about 10, 30? Quick glance, close to 10. What kind of clothing are they wearing?

I mean, they're wearing thicker, desert and Badlands-ready, cloak, scarves, but they all look to be just like traveler's garments. Nothing that signifies vanguard, nothing that signifies call. Unlucky fuckers. Okay. How long dead are they?

Like, weeks. You're, it's hard to tell from this distance. You have to get close and inspect. No, I'll stay here. Okay. You continue to curve around the edge of the descending pathway. I would like you to make a dexterity check for me

for the machine. Sure, sure. Guidance, guidance. No magic. Wait, fuck. You start and we just. The fuck? Wait, but can't I just try?

No. Well, then try, because it's going to point at us. I'm so sorry. Dexterity check. Yeah, just roll a d20. Okay, 17. 17. As you're stepping along the side, it's a...

I'm just like, nope, nope. Because you're not so terribly used to this body, there's a moment where you see where elements of this slow curvature crumbled, and you saw it and get a bit nervous at its approach. The moment you get there, you hold yourself steady and then push past, and deftly, you're picking up the swing of this body.

Wow, nice. Feet are so fun. Back onto a firm space, continuing to descend. You can see, as it widens a bit, there are three figures. Another one in vanguard, two other Paragon's Cull members, and behind them, a secondary warder that is approaching from behind. How do you get past if there's two warders on the... Yeah, I see it.

Oh, are warders what I am right now? Yeah. The pathway here is a little, there are parts that get wider, like outcroppings that stand there as positions to watch over and where the long catwalks are attached to. There is a space they can go across, but it's going to be a tight walk. They get there first and they do stop

and wait, knowing that you're going to be making a passage there. Search your dominance. All right, how? Are they looking at me? Are they making eye contact? Do they seem like they don't care? At the moment, they don't care. Okay. Just adjust. Just do a little adjust.

Next wave hits. You feel it cascade through your form. The runes on the outside of the automaton shell light up once more as you push through that scattering, that static, and eventually come to the opposite end of this outcropping. With that, you do-si-do and passing each other. They're definitely leaning on the inside,

forcing you to go around. Oh, Jesus. As you do, they do get a close look at you. I would like you to make a stealth check again, and I would like you to make a deception check. 13 this time. 12. That was a 12 for everyone at home. All right.

They walk by, the automaton just cruises past. The two call members walk. The one vanguard member stops and turns its head in your direction and you hear a voice in your head. Oh. What's your business?

Delivery for General Temult. I don't think I've connected with your mind before. What's your name? You say your mom. With your mind. With your mind. Your mind. That's none of your business. Make an intimidation check.

Come on. Come on! Come on, Will Arnett. Okay. Natural 20. Oh! Go fuck yourself! Yes!

As this individual is kind of Thunder rolls. An untrusting curiosity and a forceful push into your mind, and you're, up until recently, unfamiliar with having that willpower resistance within your own will, but you're focused, and you immediately push back

and slam them out of your consciousness as they visibly clear their throat and catch up with the other two paragons, Carl Lembers and Megan Tadalia. I'm Batman. Oh. Cool.

That's fine. You're about halfway down the pit now, and you've gone past the peak of this massive Malleus Key. As you descend it, you can see the cresting pulses of greenish glass exterior veins of the residuum that has been burned within. Now you can see at the bottom of this platform, you can see the massive machine

that is affixed to the base of this key. You can see the glowing engines and the armored exterior. This thing has been heavily reinforced. And now, with the wave of energy around it, you can see there's also some sort of an arcane field around this device, some sort of shell or shield. Like an energy, not a physical barrier, but like an energy barrier.

Like some sort of arcane boundary is visible on parts of this machine. You also see a number of these figures that are based around these four smaller, kind of curbed spires. They have ladders and staircases, and they're up inside and they're placing things within, and you recognize the crates that they're reaching into

and the small vials that they're removing from them and affixing up inside these four smaller spires. They are filling with, installing into them more of these vials of possibility. Oh jeez. Dude, what the fuck are they making? Gallons of possibility. Oh my god. You also see another familiar figure

step through one of these groups. This is the worst dairy farm ever. A dark red, tattered cloak and cowl. The gray hair. The familiar, frightened visage. Yeah, right there. Right there in front of you. Oh my god. Put it it, I see it!

Put it away, put it away! You got your circlet, can I? The legendary Otohan Thul, who steps up and speaks to somebody and turns around and pulls her cloak up. You watch as something behind her ejects. Two vials fall to the ground and somebody else installs two into the back.

The cloak falls over it once more. Same cylinders that are going into the spires? Mm-hmm. So she's just getting all these possibilities. She's just getting the roll lock all the time. Got to find the dunamis bunny. Orym is keeping her on the high of her subject. There's a dunamis bunny around here with a drum.

She then walks off and exits the central area to some direction. If you want to see where she's going. I do. That is a 24. 24. You keep an eye out and you can see now down here, there's at least 25, 26 people,

the immediate visual range, that are running different bits of the preparation around here. You watch where Otohan scoots through and heads towards one entranceway, or I would say cavern entrance that descends out of view. Okay. Shit. Okay. In your head, you hear,

Well, fuck. We didn't really think about what we were going to do when we got down here. Shit. Okay. In your head, you hear, Well, fuck. We didn't really think about what we were going to do when we got down here. Nope. Tilt your head down to the right. See that entrance down there? Oh shit. Yeah.

Yeah, what about it? That's where she went. Oh yeah, no, I saw. You know, with the roll that you made, you do see there are some small alcoves built into it, but there are four, you rolled pretty decently. I'm going to have to get closer, but you can see at least the one that she went through

looks to be more freshly opened. You can see there are mounds of dirt on the outside and piles of rock. The tunnel she went through was recently excavated. It's a freshly cut crevasse? Indeed. Wow. Mm-hmm. Do we see, at the base, do we see Ren?

Mm-hmm. From this angle, you do not. You continue to descend, passing by. One other call member that comes by carrying an empty crate. Doesn't seem to pay much mind to you. As soon as you get a secondary look, you now see towards the southern base of the key,

hidden within some of the twisted ruins. And you can now get a better view of these ruins, too. There are staircases and structures. This was the center of a society, some sort of a small village or city that was built here that was long lost to time around this device. And tucked into one of these curved bits of ruined stone, you see a statue-like figure.

You're uncertain if this is part of the ruin or if this is Rin, but you do see what looks to be a still stone-like figure. The ruins, do they just look like they were excavated by the previous people here? Were they built into the sides of the pit at all? No. They're uncovered. It looks like this existed long ago, and part of this excavation, whatever sinkhole seemed to emerge here or whatever excavation long dug within has been slowly peeling away at this city lost to time.

Okay, okay, okay. Is Rin completely out in the open for all to see, or she's not hidden amongst junk? No, she's right next to one of those four curb spires and surrounded by about, easily within eye shot of about 20 people. And how many people are down there, like 20 people? Like 25-ish.

There are individuals leaving into other tunnels and there are some that are coming back up. There's definitely an energy about the movement here that people are getting ready for a big event. Maybe we start by disabling some of these and maybe that creates a distraction. Here on the ground floor? Is there anywhere on the ground floor

that looks like it's hidden? Anywhere that looks hidden? Alcove or under a bunch of bodies? It looks like there are a couple of alcoves. Small, not full caverns, but little 15-foot space ways into the bottom outer wall, as well as a number of other tunnels and caverns

that splinter off from it, yeah. Also, as on the trip down, looking at all these people scurrying around, there's like 20 of them, if I just get a bead on one or two of them as I'm looking everywhere, do I get a sense of, obviously not Thule, but of just all these strangers walking around, if I pick one or two,

do I get a sense of their class level and their HP compared to mine? Sure, yeah. Glancing at a few of them, you look at, let's say, a Paragon's Call member. Class level's lower, strength is higher. What was the other one you were asking? Well, I just asked HP and class.

I'm just like, do they seem formidable? Like, one person seem formidable compared to any one of us? One person doesn't seem as formidable, but there's a lot of them. There's a lot of them. And they're no pushovers, at least the Paragon's cult member.

You glance at another individual who's in vanguard robes, and they're maybe a little less on that scale. Make a perception check for me. Boy, super low, two threes. That is a 12. Gotcha, okay. Should we check out some of these alcoves?

Yeah, do I see my mom around anywhere? Make a perception check. Come on. I'm off. 17. 17. That's really good for me. You look about the crew beneath here, and amongst the various vanguard robed figures, the Paragon's Call members, and what looks to be even

a couple of individuals that are shackled robed figures, the Paragon's Call members, and what looks to be even a couple of individuals that are shackled and put to work that aren't adorned in any familiar symbols or colors of the factions that you know have joined here, sit amongst the center of the crew. You get this weird sense and you glance up towards one of those catwalk bridges and you see a figure leap from it. Then just begin to slowly drift down.

Within the dark shadow of the space, you see the silhouette of the figure as it descends. As the glow from underneath the various light sources that are patterned out amongst the busyness that encompasses the bottom of this pit, you see the long leather coat flickering by the braided, familiar color hair of your mother

as she just glides down and begins conversing with one of the other figures at the base of the key. She's a vampire. That's one way to get down. Wow. Boy. What are we doing? People in my belly, come up with a plan.

You watch as she gestures and a large piece of metallic armor, one of those jagged plates that you've seen being shipped down from above, lifts up off the ground by itself as she gestures over, and it fits itself and clings to the outside. One of the spires or the key? The key.

She's a lot stronger than me. No, no, if you believe in yourself. All right, FCG. I'm doing stuff. What do you want? What are we doing? Do we want to start with one of these alcoves? Are we breaking things?

Are we hiding? What are we doing? You see now another wave come through. This time, with a closer up look, you can see these devices. They're small, self-contained, almost arcane engine-looking devices. There's one on one end and one on the other, and they have these V-shaped spikes that shoot out.

As they flare up, it's like a weird crackling and a hum noise goes, and when they both blast, you can see that wave cascade out and upward. Now that you're closer to it, you can see it's not a central wave. It's two patterned waves that bounce off as it heads upward,

and that seems to pretty much cover the entirety of the site. And it's bouncing off the mirrors, or it's just like? No, they're just like, ricocheting off the walls. Is Rin's form within that flow of energy that we're seeing go up? That flow of energy hits everything in the chamber.

Everything in the chamber, okay. Other question is that the passageway that Fjull went into and other passageways down here, are they big enough for the warder to fit into? Make a perception check for me. Maybe the warder can stand in front of it. 20. Did Wrynn have a? The passageway.

23. Oh, let's go up. Oh, people can't. It would be very, very tight. And that's at the entrance. You're uncertain if they widen or grow smaller upon entry. We could start a confrontation out here, but the two people from Wildemount

said that they have the power source squirreled away in chambers dug out underneath, so that's got to be what she's going to, and there's more. We want to try to zap them of their juice. Yeah. Feels like that's a good place to start. Do we walk the warder up to one?

I keep thinking of water. Can you fetch me some water? Yes. You want help when Grandma says it. Yeah, that's Kentucky shit right there. I'll mosey on up towards one of them. Out of it first, in case they're not welcome down there. Right at the door.

Let's scout, yeah, scout, see what's in the cavern. All right, I'll walk over to the cavern and peek inside. Okay. You come down to the base of this walkway. You're now effectively on the ground floor of this tunnel, and there's broken rock and shale around you. You can see there are tools, pickaxes, shovels, all means of excavation within here. You can see empty crates and boxes that

have been stacked to the edges, things that have been carried in here, familiar crates, many that you saw within Hexen's abode that carry these vials, as well as a handful of small black cases that are marked with a Cerberus Assembly. You can see the occasional somewhat flinted shard of residuum left on the ground, a small little flake of it that glitters and glows when that energy field fills up. It's almost like seeing a hint of glitter scattered across the dust before you. Many of the figures watch as you approach and keep an eye out as you begin to enter. Those who are visible, which would be both of you, primarily just you, since you're the non-automaton,

how are you passing yourself off as you begin to enter the exterior, the surrounding space of this excavation? Fuck. What the shit? Head held high? Mm-hmm. And do I have a notebook or anything?

Do you? I don't know. Do you? I don't really have anything like that. Just a proud Tara Reid. Just like, I'm going to cross my arms and look around like I'm keeping an eye out for people fucking with us. You got it.

You do glance around and you see a few more bodies that are pushed to the edge of this. Clean up? I know. Looks like they weren't important enough to evacuate, but at least to put off at the side. These look like they were dropped within or fell into the pit and are a bit meshed.

One of them does appear to be the familiar physical form of adjudicator that you had encountered before, though arm heavily broken as it seemed to have landed somewhere in its torso. You can see where its face is in the ground. Most of the dust that has poured through from the storm has filled up most of the gaps, but you can see where the face is. The mask removed, and it's just this bloody skull where it was pulled from. Another big crate cracks open, and you see two more large metal armored shards lift up in the air

as Laeliana is guiding the reinforcement of the devices. Not far from you. Can you recognize the material that these shards are? Metal. Make a deception check as you pass through. I'll give you advantage because you are accompanied by an automaton, you're not walking straight through, and you are wearing proper vestments.

20. 21. Okay. Now are you heading towards one of the alcoves 21. Dang. Okay. Now, are you heading towards one of the alcoves? Are you heading towards one of the cavern entrances? Are you heading to where Otohan was going? What are you doing?

An alcove. I follow your orders. An alcove that looks like it's not very busy, so I can get FCG mortar up against it. Okay. You glance off to the left-hand side, coasting on the outside edge of this excavation, so you don't have to get directly face-to-face or rub shoulders with any of the immediate workers here. There is one alcove that looks like it's large enough, about 20 feet in or so, and it looks like this was a storage alcove. You come into this space as you walk over

the heavy footfalls of FCG's water automaton behind you. A couple of figures glance over and look and then shake their head and go back to their work. On the inside of here, you can see there are a few tables and there are other clusters of tools and materials that were used for the excavation that now lay abandoned at the moment, no longer finding their purpose.

Mostly dark, no light source beyond anything you wish to bring to the space this far end of the base. Seems like a good place to get out. The next wave goes through. Just two things. I don't know how we get Rin out of this. And two, if this is the best transport we've had, if we get out, it changes the odds. Yeah. We're also, this is like a break room we're in.

Once we're out and we step out, it's on. Yeah. I can put Rin in me. We have to pick it up, though. Everybody. People are paying attention to the statue in the garden. Everybody swarms this most important place if we kick it off.

I don't know that this is the right idea, but we could follow Thule and corner her and deal with her alone. Oh. Well, wait, didn't we saw people gathering down here like they were gathering for an event? What if Otohan is about to make a speech or some shit? That's fair.

Maybe there's some sort of something where everyone will be focused, and then we can wreck some... Should we just wait? Yeah, Tomeitons are on patrol duty, though, so if it stops to listen to the speech, they might be like, what the fuck? Johnny Five alive over here?

Why don't we stay in here? We keep sussing it out and keep jumping from cavern to cavern. Another option. Again, I'm not, I'm just weighing options. Ful went down a freshly cut crevasse and there were a couple more, right? Yeah, you can see from where you're currently standing,

a secondary one about 30 or so feet to the right of the one that Ful went through. They're just like tons of go. Those go into the earth. Where the Jormundwyn. They're telling us to go. Those are where they're storing their Earth. Or is it Jormund's shit? Their Goju's. Yeah, because we can always go in, jump out, fuck that shit up, jump back in,

and keep rinsing and repeating until we feel like there's maybe a good opportunity to bust the main power of the Horde. How long has it been since I called? I'd say about 15, 20 minutes. Okay, so we got T minus 45 minutes. Let's go to the next one. It feels like that might be the right thing

instead of getting out here, right? So yeah, let's go to the next cavern or alcove or whatever and see if we can blow it down. You walk over, continuing your baseline patrol of the bottom of this excavation site, passing by a crew that begins to walk over, continuing your baseline patrol of the bottom of this excavation site, passing by a crew that begins to move over and cross your path.

I'd like another deception check from you, with advantage, as they cross your walkway to not draw any suspicion. That would be a 27. Whoa! Whoa! Oof! Act on the oil. They rolled high, too, but not as high as a 27. Whoa! Ooh! Act on oil. They rolled high, too, but not as high as a 27.

Whoa, whoa, whoa. They walk past and glance in your direction. One of the call members just, you can tell just to look at them as they're glancing around, there is a heightened security state here, and people are actively looking for any sort of infiltration.

And you can see from some of the bodies around here, some of the displays at the top of the cavern, that they've had a few incursions already, or at least encounters, and already know that this is probably going to increase as they approach the event. So they have that suspicious glance, but as soon as they see the automaton

come out of the alcove, and you walking comfortably alongside it, they put their head back down and walk into the far end, pick up some more tools, and begin to head back in towards the center of the ruin. Let's go. Let's go. Are you heading to the other cavern, or the one that Otohan is in?

No. No. The non-Otohan. Okay. So you cross. The non-Otohan. The non-Otohan, there we go. You cross past the one that Otohan went into and have that breathless moment

where all sound seems to. I'm sure she's Scriball. She's still in there. Yeah, she's still in that direction. You pass beyond it, around the outer edge. Another one of those waves cuts through. Now you're glancing around, and you can see there are little glyphs that begin to appear and little breaks in the ground.

You can see parts of the landscape within the ruin that the other workers are. You watch as they move. They move carefully, and they are avoiding specific places. You see one in the ground. So I'm going to whisper those out to Imogen. You only see one from this position.

You have to get closer to really make it out, but you're out on the outskirts. You see one that you can mark to everybody. Watch where other people are stuck in. Okay. Still bodies everywhere? Not as many on this side, but there is another opposite side ramp walkway

that is a little bit ahead of where this other secondary entrance is, but you then begin to approach. There is a figure standing, who walks over and perches their back up against it and takes a deep breath, almost like they're either taking a break or they're acting as a sentinel to this entryway as you begin to step up and approach.

They look over towards you as the automaton begins to step forward and they give a nod. A nod back and keep walking. Okay. You're walking into the entrance? Ship change. Yeah. Yeah. You could also get down some stake, too. Undead owl or? Yeah. You also get to get down some stank, too. Huh? Undead owl or?

Yeah. This figure's wearing vanguard vestments. Casual appearance at a sentry post. She's a general. They put their hood back a bit, and you can see this human, male, very pale skin, balding ring on the sides, like a friar haircut. pale, very pale skin, balding ring on the sides,

like a friar haircut. He crosses his arms and pulls out some sort of a hand-rolled cigarette and begins to ignite it with flint. Smoke break down here? Right from that can hide for a while, what? Put it away. I'm going to keep walking like I'm going to go through the entrance.

Make a deception check. That shit will kill you. With advantage. 21. 21. Takes it and flicks it onto the ground and stomps it out. Just leans against the wall, but puts the cigarette out. Those things okay?

Muffled from excitement. But now that you're approaching this entryway, it looks like it's just wide enough for the automaton to step into and block and not get much further than that. Do you want to block it? Open the front door and block it? Sure. Sure. I'll... Underneath the legs, there's a walkway,

but you can't get much further than five feet into it before you become the archway. Is Smokey watching us? I mean, he's off to the side, and he's not smoking, but he's pissed off a bit. Tell me when. Well, I want to look in and see what's going on. What's through the entrance?

It is a descending cavern that winds around just out of view, but it rapidly goes into a 45-degree angle. I mean, we could open up the belly and pop out. I'm going to try to. Yep. Go? Yep, abandon ship. All right. We're getting out.

We're getting out. I'll just pop open. So you step into, the belly opens up. And it's a little janky from the damage it sustained from the battle and squeaks a bit. It makes a loud screeching sound,

and the figure who's posted there turns and looks inside, looks a bit curious about what you're doing. I just turn and kick the warder. This fucking piece of shit. What are you doing? That's none of your business, son. Intimidation check. She's sunning. I'm 52 years old.

I say that in his head. Okay. Oh yeah. Take advantage on the intimidation check. All right. Come on. Okay. 23, 24, no, 22, I'm sorry. 22. 22. You say that into his head and immediately he goes, there's a look of recognition for a second,

and goes, puts his head back up and begins to mingle with the rest of the working crew and vanishes at a set. Before a, has there been a pulse? One. Boom. Yeah, there is. Wait here for a second.

I sent Pate down the... Down the... Don't worry, I got it. Just be shut your mouth! Right, right, right. Look through his eyes. The tunnel curves down almost in a complete, not full 360, but definitely a 180 back below,

and the ramp eventually exits into another fresh cavern. It looks like it's been haphazardly opened, has an entryway in the center there, mainly just rock and broken shale. It's very rough-hewn, but there is, towards the back of it, a cluster of various arcane power sources. a cluster of various arcane power sources.

You can see there are arcane cores. You can see there are cylindrical designs. It looks like a haphazard collection of different power sources from different places all across Exandria that have been tethered together. You can see it's partially armored in places, and it's been affixed into the wall, and where they're all attached, this heavy piece of mechanical cording, you can see there is, almost around the outside of it, residuum tethers that seem to carry and

emphasize the power coursing upward into the rock and above. Okay. I relay that. Any sign of people? There are three figures in there keeping watch. You see two Paragon's Call and one Vanguard figure that are sitting at a table.

And they're all faced open towards the wall. I'd like you to make a stealth check. I go invisible. I tell him telepathically to go invisible. Which he can do. Which he can do. He goes invisible. As we came down into this lower area, before we picked this cavern and went by the guard,

that she's mind fucked, about how many caverns did we see, roughly? Along the base? Yeah, different avenues that we could. Full 101. Yeah, full 101, you cross over into the next one, that's all you've seen. Just two. Just two so far,

but you've only really been around 40% of the outer wall. All right. There's three motherfuckers down there. Apparently, you said they were just chilling, playing cards? They're not playing cards. They're talking and conversing, and you can see one of them, their knee is bouncing with nervous energy.

They're just been assigned here. What are they saying? Anything of import? Roll a perception check for Pate, if you don't mind. It's not a very high DC, necessarily, but always fun to see what gets rolled. It's so nice. What luggage you need.

What would I use, his wisdom? Yes. 10. 10? He listens in and one of them is like, I just, I don't know, there's something about this that just makes me nervous. I haven't been part of something quite this big, you know? We're just taking people's money outside of the city.

You notice, glancing over Lurah's eyes, this is one of the call members who's talking partially to the other call member at the table and also to the Vanguard figure who's faced partially away. The other one who's... And here there's this one small light source, which is this singular oil lantern.

It looks like an oil lantern, but the flicker in it is just a steady magical glow. So it looks like this is a magical lantern. Most of these within here are, so as not to run out of fuel. As it's placed on there, the other Kahl figure is a massive half-giant, sits back in the chair and goes, I don't even care. They're paying well enough. I say I could probably retire after this. So we have a half-giant. Who was the other Paragon's call?

Big guy, little guy? Little guy. Looks to be a stocky halfling. Stocky halfling. And then the vanguard member, does that person look like a mage? Do they look like some of the other higher stationed or just another lackey? This one looks to be,

they're wearing vanguard robes. You can't really tell in the low light, you can see they're humanoid, but you can't see more of that with Roll of Ten, unfortunately. Okay. I relay that message. Looks like we've got one vanguard member two paragon's call, one of them half giant.

They seem very uneasy. We might be able to use that to our advantage. We're going to get in there quick and keep it quiet. Get in and keep it quiet, or we could try before we keep it quiet. They seem very uneasy. We might be able to use that to our advantage. Catch them in our ways. We're going to get in there quick and keep it quiet. Get in and keep it quiet, or we could try before we keep it quiet to have them, like General Otanis, General Timo,

requests you topside at the rim, like send them all the way up. Mm-mm. Right, with your mind powers or something, so maybe they walk and keep going so that we don't have to get noisy in here. Murders. Yeah. But that also doesn't help us with the noisy

that we're going to have to get against the batteries, right? Maybe, yeah. Unless we can leave some kind of a... I wish I had a silence spell. Yep. Does anyone have a silence spell? Nope. We never saw a mage, hunter, golem, or anything like that.

I don't think we would know what it looked like. I mean, it looked like a golem to start with. Yeah, oh right, yeah, yeah, yeah. These are not golems. Okay. We could roll in three for three plus Imogen, if you wanted to. Right.

To try and give orders first, and then if it goes bad. Yeah, like, wear the shift change. Right. Yeah, shift change is good. Okay. Who's going in? Who's wearing robes? Yeah, we got two Paragon's Call, right?

Robes and one Vanguard robe. You were in Vanguard. I was in Vanguard. You were in a Vanguard. I think I had a Paragon. You did. Yeah. And then you had Paragon. I looked Paragon. You were in Vanguard. I think I had a Paragon. You did? Yeah. And then you had Paragon? I looked Paragon, yeah. There's a few Paragon outfits. It was taken from the encounter in Eos,

and there was three Vanguard members that you fought when you first came to the entrance of this. Why don't we do you three, and then the rest of us will stay back a little bit, but being near. What if someone comes up and is like, what are you doing, automaton? Just all by on your own. Well, it's broken and is like, what are you doing, automaton? Just all by on your own.

Well, it's broken down. Oh, just acting like a broken down guy. Well, if I look around, are there any other automatons like me around? You saw a number that were in the process of bringing materials. But they were all working. None were at rest?

Currently, yes. Okay, and are there any bodies around? Or any charms of rocks? This cavern that you've wedged yourself into? None. Well, I'm going to back out of the wedge. The end just made me look on guard. Yeah, are there any piles of rocks or anything that I can just do busy work,

like piling bodies or piling rocks or clearing a path? You can certainly do busy work. I'm going to do busy work. Okay, all right. Is it just you within? Who all is staying inside? Is anyone who's lagging behind,

are they getting inside the warder? Yeah. They're going to stay inside, yeah. Okay, so exiting the warder. Who's exiting the warder? I am. Ashton, Orym. I'm exiting the warder. Okay. Oh god.

I'll fix your sword, Orym, at the break. I'm going to keep arm at the break. I'm going to keep Pate down there. Right. Okay. And give any... Just continue to be their eyes until they get down there. Okay. Okay.

You got it. So, we have the three of you walking in vanguard ropes behind Imogen as you descend the cavern below. So you can see what they're doing? I can continue to watch. I can also cast touch spells for Fatté, so. You can.

I can help in that way. Okay. You step into this rock chamber and it has a winding, not even like a rocky stair that's just made from digging into the dirt below. You can see the table across the way and some of the open crates,

as well as the different pulsing, thrumming glows of energy sources that are all mashed together in the far corner. As soon as you step in, the figures glance over. One of the call members goes and points over. The vanguard figure turns around and you see they are a green-scale dragonborn beneath the hood with one cloudy cataract eye.

Glancing over, you immediately hear in your mind, What is your purpose? There's trouble on the Rim. What trouble? There was an attack, General Ratanish. Says to be on the lookout. Y'all are needed up there. Make a deception check.

Come on. This does not have advantage. 18. Okay, 18. Okay. 18. This figure goes, Really? Ralph and I suppose we should get to it.

Stands up and glances at the other two. You both look back at them, give a nod. They stand up. I want to have a second just to see. I want to see if there's any funny business this is making. It is funny business. Make an insight check. No doubt. It's on.

Yeah, they're going to. No, seven. Seven? No. Hard to pick up on immediately, but they walk past. They spread out a little bit. The two call members wrap around the four of you. Flanking. And the central vanguard figure walks past you

to get a very up-close glance at you. And as they move just past your shoulder, looking into you, you hear in your mind once more their voice go, . Well. Let's see what you're made of. I need you to roll initiative.

No! This combat will be brought to you by WizKids Minis, the Vox Machina box set. The Vox Machina is available now for pre-order. Find these and many more Critical Role Minis at wizkids.io slash crminis and your local game store. Whoa, we are in it. Can I roll as well for Patayne? Whoa.

Roll for Patayne. You can, actually. I also, I don't, you can, actually. I also, I don't think I can be surprised. Does it say that? This is fucking me. Hold on, where is it? Let me double check.

Because it's pretty. Wait, we're all rolling initiative. Are you in there? Well, no. Also, if you are surprised at the beginning of combat, you can act normally on your first turn if you want to rage before doing anything. Indeed.

So we have, so I don't know. Chet, probably up here. Right? The Ruby Vanguard. Actually, probably would have been a little further. The person here is the dragon, is the... Indeed. Oh man.

So it is on. Don't have a Ruby, a dragonborn Ruby vanguard figure necessarily, but we'll just say that this figure is the one that just walked past before saying that. Then the other two call figures are here, the tiny one, the halfling, and then this one here, which is the large half giant. So from that point, let us go ahead and do initiative 25 to 20. 24. Okay. 20 to 15?

17. Okay. 15 to 10? 12. All right. All right, 10 to five? And five for Petté slash Shlomna. All righty.

I want to say Pâté was probably invisible. I'm just going to put This is Pâté here, up on the edge of the cliff, keeping watch. Okay. But top of the round, Orym, you were the first to react. As soon as you see everyone tense and move inward, you know immediately what's coming, and you go ahead and jump to the task.

What do you do? I spring to it. I slide right under Mage's legs and drag my blade along the lower part of his leg and try to whip him up and drop him on his back with a tripping attack. Go for it. Nice.

Ooh, that's low. That's not going to hit, probably. That is a 11. 11 does not hit. And then I will just bring it around and stat. His leg, I guess, lifts out of the way, so I will then flip it around and then try to dig it into his calf and do the same.

That's better. That is a 17 to hit. 17 just hits. The save is strength against 16, DC 16. That is a failure. He's on his back. So the first strike is you try and cover up, or it steps back.

It steps back as soon as you slide down and you watch this mental field just deflect this flash of psychic energy. And then as soon as they pulled their leg up, you smash the other leg out from underneath with another slight and they. I'm trying to drop them right in front of Ashton. How much damage was that?

14. 14 already. Okay. Then I'm going to dive and roll under Imogen's legs, crawling up onto this little rock outcropping here. This guy might get attacked by opportunity. That's fine. Over here? Yeah, nope, too far. Right there?

Oh, you got it. Okay, he gets attack opportunity against you. Okay. That's going to be a 13. Doesn't hit and I immediately do bait and switch with Imogen so that we trade place as I flip, roll back under her and push her up onto that rock. You get an extra seven on your armor class

to the start of my next turn. So up here? Yeah, shield up in front of her. You got it, awesome. That finish your go? Yes. All right, next up we have the guy who's on the ground gets up from prone for half his movement,

and is going to go ahead and move back this way. Actually, no, he's not, because he's in combat with both of you. He just stays in place, and instead is going to go ahead and cast... He's going to cast Hypnotic Pattern. Ooh. That's a good one.

Shit. All right. I love this one. He's going to go ahead and create a Hypnotic Pattern in this space. Does get their friend in it over here, but I'm going to need all four of you to go ahead and make a wisdom saving throw for me.

Cool. Advantage. I have advantage against being charmed. You do. Natural 20. Ooh! Oh, snap. 10. 10? All right.

15. 15. 15. 15. 15. 15. Suddenly, you watch as the figure stands back up, and they put their hand out in front, their eyes flash. You put your gaze away, but the rest of you suddenly see this splash of tetanic color in front of you, and your arms drop to your side,

and you just stand there, currently charmed. While you're charmed, you're incapacitated and your speed is zero. You all are frozen in place. All three of you? Yep. How's Pâté? That would be 16. Pâté was not in there.

I rolled 16. 16 succeeds then. So the two of you do. The two of you just drop there, staring into space, almost drooling. You manage to shrug it off. This is exultant energy. Oh shit. Subtle.

Not as forceful maybe as yours, but present. I would think that any bump I was giving to Imogen's armor class is gone, too, because I'm just... I'd say logistically, it's him guarding you, so I'd say yes. Okay. From a narrative standpoint, it makes sense. Nevertheless, that finishes with you both frozen, actually. You're not.

He's uncertain. No, because you didn't get affected. He's going to stay put. With that, it's going to come to Ashton's go. Ashton, you lose your turn. I can't do shit about it? No roll, so does the save roll. Nope. All right.

Cool. If you take any damage or someone uses an action to shake you out of it, you're going to break out of it. But otherwise, you just stand there, stupefied. All right. Stupefied. Chetney, you're up. Cool, this is fun. I'm going to move so that...

Hmm. If I move opposite of Ashton, is it still considered flanking, even though he's Catatonic? No, because he has to be threatening the target. Oh, fuck a duck. Oh, and technically his friend was in the... Oh, he did succeed with a natural 17,

so the Cull member is not affected. You can tap me on the way around, but I'm not going to. Takes too much mana. Oh, wow, okay, never mind, shit. But if you don't have damage to the figure, it might drop concentration if you're feeling confident. Yeah, that's what I'm thinking. So I will stay where I am

and not move into a flanking position, and I will bring out Turmoil and use the magic board to unleash the full scythe. The blade shoots out of the scythe. With my bonus action, I'll draw it up along my calf. Ah! And you just see flame dance up the side of the scythe. This is what we got, motherfucker.

And I'll take a swing against the figure that cast Hypnotic Pattern. Okay, go for it. Oh, let me run my. Blood Rite, that's three. Okay. That is 19 to hit. 19 hits.

Okay, 19, and the second strike will be... Ah, 19 plus, 27 to hit. Yeah, both hit. Amazing, okay. Let's do some 26. Come up. Eight, 12, plus three, 15 on the first one. 15 damage.

Maintain concentration. Amazing, and 16. 12 plus three, 15 on the first one. 15 damage. Maintain concentration. Amazing, and 16. 16 points of damage on the second one. 16 on the second one. Maintain concentration. And let's see, on both of those. On 1d thunder damage on each, sorry.

Yeah, 1d8 thunder damage. Yeah, go for it and roll dice. Where's the fucking? There it is. Five, one, six points of thunder damage. Six points of thunder damage. All right, got it. All right, Chetney, you're going to stay put?

Did the thunder damage connect to the save? It does, yeah. Okay. It'd be all high enough to save my time. Yes, that is, that's it. Okay. I'll stay there. All right, so you see that finish there. That now goes to these two figures' turn.

This one runs in. It's going to go ahead and pincer you against the others. They both have advantage on their attacks against you. First one here is going to strike you with its big old mace in its hand. Oh my god. With advantage, thankfully. Okay, 17 to hit.

That does hit. It does hit, okay, cool. Very cool. Very cool, I like it. You take eight points of bludgeoning damage. It just cracks you up inside the head. You pull out of the way just in time before it takes any heavy impact, but you feel your ear warm from the cut at the side of the mace.

Second strike with advantage is also going to hit. That's even higher than that, that's 23. Oh yeah. That's only three points of bludgeoning damage on that one. The opposite side, the other one is going to go ahead and strike you with short sword with advantage. than that. That's 23. Oh yeah. That's only three points of bludgeoning damage on that one. The opposite side, the other one is going to strike you with the short sword with advantage. It's going to be 15.

Misses. Misses. Second one is going to be 20 to hit. Yes. That one deals five points of slashing damage to you as they both just start unleashing upon you side to side, being careful not to wake up the other ones. Fuck! Finishing their go, imaging careful not to wake up the other ones. Fuck! Finishing their go, imaging you're up with Pate on deck.

Okay, I'm going to use my bonus action to talk to FCG, because that's the last person I have a telepathic connection with, and say, We're made, get in here. I think Demi Moore just said to me, I'm going to go in. I think Demi Moore just said something. I'm going to put my hands to the side of my head and lash out with a psychic whip

against the dragonborn and the half giant. You got it. What's the save on that? That is a 17 intelligence. 17 intelligence. Ooh, failure. And both failures. Okay.

So that's 3d6. Five powers. Psychic damage to both of them. Wow, that shit. Six points of psychic damage, but both of them have to make a choice Wow, that shit. Six points of psychic damage, but both of them have to make a choice on their next turn. They can only move, do an action or a bonus action. They don't get all three.

Got it, all right. So both of them get struck by it. Concentration check. It's a natural one. Nice. While it wasn't a lot of damage, you struck right in the middle of its mind. As the dragonborn grabs the sides of its head

and clutches them for a second. The pattern vanishes, and both Orym and Ashton, your eyes blink back to consciousness, frustrated. You grab your weapons at the ready for when the next round comes. Would you think that my shield back up in this moment coming to would then protect Grave?

I'd allow that. Great. I'm going to back up with my movement. We'll lose the AC bonus. Oh, I have to stand next to him? Yeah, he's guarding you with his shield. Well, then fuck it, I'm going to back up with my movement. We'll lose the AC bonus. Oh, I have to stand next to him? Yeah, he's guarding you with his shield. Fuck it, I'm going to stay right around. Okay. All right, finishing your go, that brings us to Pate with Orym on deck.

All right. What's the creature, the dragon up on the top? That's Pate. I don't have a Pate mini at the moment. I'm going to have him... Or actually, this will be... It's a little more viable. I'll just use his little bird.

Shit. Tiny. That works. I also don't want him to get fucking punked. Which were the ones that got, that can only make one choice? Both of these. Are they both wearing armor? Oh.

The vanguard one is not wearing, it looks like they're wearing robes. You don't know if they have armor underneath. The other one is. The big one, the half giant. The big guy. He's going to fly up to the big guy and I'm going to dump a shocking grasp into him. Going to grasp and shock you!

Nice. You have advantage because he doesn't see you. I have advantage, which I will happily take. Yes, 18. 18 hits. Awesome. Mr. Mercer, can I change my mind and back up? Because I'm going to lose it anyway.

He's about to go. Okay, fair enough. Allow that. Oh no, wait. No. Seven damage, no. Yeah, seven damage. Seven damage, all righty.

And um. Oh, it takes the hit to the chest. Falls to one knee for a second. And it can't take reactions until the start of its next turn. Good to know. Does that give Pâté time to back up a bit? Pâté wants to.

Yeah, I'm going to have him move back. Yep. All right. This figure here does get an attack opportunity. I would've had him go the other way. So he's going to stay there. Okay, Pâté stays in the place. Bring to the top Orym. But. Okay, Pathe stays in the place. Bring in the top oar. But does that, can we get in now?

Yeah, do they get to move? It'll take you guys about. They also don't get a reaction since they failed on Marley. That's true. So yeah, Pathe can move. They don't get reactions. So there you go. For you all emerging from that,

it's going to take you two rounds to get there. So just keep that in mind. Okay. Do you want to start moving or? Might as well, yeah. All right, I'll mosey on back over to the entrance. Just make sure you're not being made. I shimmy up to it.

Yeah. It opens and you all can dart out, but you have to- Let me just take a peek. Yeah, anyone watching? Is anybody looking? Well, it's facing the inside of it. So you only can see the cavern. Did you see anybody watching us? I would have looked around.

Make a perception check. 10 plus six, 16. 16, there are many people around. As I go over there, I'm going to carry a rock and throw it off to the side. Okay. It looks like I'm doing stuff. Okay, and you lean into it. Door open, hinges.

Are you staying inside the automaton? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm not leaving this. The two of you emerge and climb out of it. So it'll take you one more round before you get there. Like a total star cosplay. All right. Now to the top. Orym, you're up. Okay, Orym is going to dive into a roll

under the half-giant's legs and end up flanking Arcane. Nope, right here. So I am flanking with Ashton. You got it. I'm going to use my blade to spin him around toward me with one slash. That is a 21 to hit. 21 hits.

That is a 10 for damage. Then I will try to just stab straight up into his good eye. That is a 21 to hit. That hits. And that is a nine, nine? Nine, nine, nine? Uh, diggity diggity diggity diggity.

Yes, nine damage. Okay, nine damage. How do you want to do this? Oh, nice. Exactly what I said, I'm gonna use the first swipe just to spin his body around towards me and then just up and catch the non-cataract eye. So now he's got two problems.

Okay. Fiala blow? Oh yeah. Yeah. And he just crumples to the ground. Oh no! All righty. Are you close enough to that motherfucker that we can catch him between the two of us or no?

The half giant? Yeah, the half giant. I mean, it's not an, if you move. Okay, I just want to make sure that's filled up. You could do a diagonal line. You'd have to cross through the. Oh, there's actually, there's actually, there's actually nowhere I can go

that where I don't break out. Oh wait, oh, you're right. No, they don't have a I can go where I don't break out. So you move five, 10, 15 to get there. Oh, you're right. No, they don't have a reaction right now. They don't. No, but I can just then get, yeah, sword up and shield up, and then just circle around and get him pinned between Ashton and I.

You got it, so you can definitely do that. Good call. Holding that in place, that finishes their go. It would be the Exalt's turn, but he's gone. That brings us to Ashton with Chetney on deck. You motherfucker. I say to you, and as I say it, I take a swing at the big asshole right there,

and let's get some of the half giant. I'm not even going to, do we bother to rage right now? These guys don't seem like they're really worth it. Don't jinx this shit. Should I rage? Yeah, let's fucking rage. Yeah, you might take. I got two more after this.

All right. I'll be fine. I say out loud, like an idiot. They're basically gods. Oh! It's fine. I give myself a little shake, and the crazy rainbow sparkles start popping up. No problem.

So I am suddenly a terrible little bit of rainbow bright madness. I'm going to nail this motherfucker right in the goddamn head. Go for it. So, let's guess 17 plus nine, that hits. That definitely hits. So let's do some damage,

because it's been a little bit. I'm trying to remember what the damage roll is. Okay, there we are. This is against the half giant or the tiny guy? Half giant. Yeah, got it. I assume we've already been hurting that giant. Yes, the other one hasn't been hurt yet. Okay, so.

That one is cocked. That's six plus eight, so. 14 points of damage. 14 points of damage. 14 points of damage, you got it. Which one had the nervous leg energy before Imogen engaged the dragonborn? Oh, that was the tiny one there. All right, and let's do this again.

Oh, thank god, that's nine, 18 to hit. 18 does hit. All right. That's 18 to hit. 18 does hit. All right. Just for the roll. Ugh, that's the worst. Wait, can I re-roll? I'm trying to remember. I think I had a thing where I can re-roll. You have defeat for it. Or the Burge Crusher. Move a five. Shit, I can't remember. Anyway, that's okay. That's just a terrible roll. 10 points of damage. 10 points of damage.

10 points of damage? That's enough. Yeah! That'll finish that one. So I roll him one way after seeing him do the spin, and as he's going, I try and turn him back around, but the head just comes clean fucking off. Oh man, just full on. Boom, boom, boom.

That's how you fucking do it. And now I'm going to roll around to the other side of that little fucking golem. Well, actually, no, I'm going to stay there. All right, you got it. Finishing your go, Ashton? Chetney, you're up. So I'm going to take the scythe

and I'm going to do a huge flourish, a big swoll over my head, and I'll bring the flaming scythe just under the chin of the guy that we haven't hit yet. Yeah. And I'm going to stare into him and go, you can keep your head if you want, but you're going to have to help us drop your arms.

Make an intimidation check. Oh shit. I'll give you advantage, given the current circumstances here. Oh. Yeah. 19. 19. Okay.

The halfling, the stalky halfling who currently has the short sword out, just snow hoes it, throws his blade at the ground. Ting, ting, ting, ting, ting. Nice, nice. Ashton, Norm, help me drag these bodies out of the entryway. You, come with me.

We walk over towards the corner. All right, Norm, help me drag these bodies out of the entryway. You, come with me. We walk over towards the corner. All right. Yeah. Okay. At this point, as you start dragging the bodies, both of you emerge into the cavern. Or no, you and you. The two of you, sorry.

Ready. Oh, whoa. Ah! It's over, it's over. We took care of it. I appreciate it. Asha's up there? Yes, he's still up there. It's over. It's over. It's fucking over. It's over. We took care of it. Pache's up there. Yes, he's still up there.

It's over. It's over. What did you do? To the guy that we left alive, hands on your head. I'm going to pat him down. Anything on his body, around his neck, necklace, anything, undercarriage? Yeah, you see the symbol of the Dusk Maiden, the goddess of death around the neck.

Hide armor, a couple short swords, some daggers. About 56 gold pieces. I keep your gold. I'll take that gold. I used it all. I'm buying all these sheets. Have we seen any of this stuff come off this guy? Which stuff?

Do we watch you pull everything? Yeah, you seem like taking it. Duskmaiden. Fucking, what the like taking a nap. Duskmaiden. What the fuck is that about? Duskmaiden? They make us wear them, what? Who? Wait, what?

Who makes you wear them? McCall. It's part of our attire. How do they get away with having a goddess? What do they make you wear them? I don't know. They tell us to wear them. It's part of our presentation. Fair. So here's the part where you keep your head.

We're going to turn one of these off and then you get to go free. What you do after that is your business. How do these work? I don't know. I don't think the kind of person knows how these work. Yeah, but you got eyeballs, don't you?

You've seen people coming in, messing with them, touching things? Anything you can recall right now will keep your lower jaw attached to your head. I mean, they just kind of... They put them all there in the corner and they combine a bunch of these,

bunch of these, I don't know, strings through them and they ran it through the wall up there. Any problems? Make an insight check. 14. 14? Yeah. Ooh, whispers. I got it. I threw away my...

Whiz Kids exists. It's a company. Nice. It makes things. Take the glasses off. You were very good in The Hunger Games, by the way. You just only found me. I don't know this stuff, okay?

I'm a hired hand. It's supposed to be a fucking payday. What do you know? Do you have the slightest idea what this thing is about? Yeah. That old elf fucker keeps talking about it, ranting and raving and shit. I got no love of the gods, not a problem to me.

They're paying well, helping for it. But if you all have problems with this, please, don't, it's nothing personal. I can walk away and no harm, no foul. You'll get a payday and you'll come out with us. So just stay there and keep your mouth shut. Any way of communicating with this area? Anything we need to know about speakers, communications?

Usually it's the, looks over towards the dragonborn that's lying, leaking, and no longer moving on the ground. Did you search his body? Whose clothes aren't rifling? Okay, good. Okay. He's about to die. Zoot the bush. Keep an eye on the tunnel entrance, too. I tell Pate to keep an eye on the tunnel entrance. Okay, take an off. You go, too. I tell Pate to keep an eye on the tunnel entrance.

Pate, get up. You got it! Clings to the side. Um, all right. I'm just looking at you. I'm just watching you. Did you just ask him if there's glyphs on the ground? Are there glyphs on the ground in here?

Right in front of it. Oh, good call! Right as you're standing, about to head towards it. Oh my god. You put your foot back. You were so lucky. I thought about it as I moved over there. I was like, good call. Any other traps for Janelle?

That's the only one I know is. Why don't you do us a favor and stand right next to that glyph just so we have it as a marker. I'm not going to stand on it. Not on it. I'm not near it. Next to it. Goes over and, hand stolen behind his head,

walks over and carefully steps around to the other side, but on this edge of it and like, There's got to be another one in here. Why would they just put the one? You know where the other one is. I don't really. They avoid that one every time they come in here. Why would they just put the one? You know where the other one is. I don't really. They avoid that one every time they come in here to attach more to it.

They just keep building. The past few weeks, they just keep attaching more of these orbs and stuff to it. There's going to be a big boom in a second. We'll see if there's more, if there isn't. They had to move them all down here, and then they just had to rewire the whole thing, but that's all I know.

We could avoid the boom if we could disconnect it. I think so, too. Where did they move them from? They moved them all down here? We were up top first if we could disconnect it. I think so, too. Where did they move them from? They move them all down here? They moved up top first, and then about a week ago, they changed everything. Oh, one pulse. Yeah, because that'll show any, one pulse will show any of these things. I agree with Chetney, though.

I think maybe we could just disconnect the cables. We might even be able to position them in a way. This is inferior metalworking. Can I move around the glyphs and look up on the side at this basic bitch shit and do an investigation check? Just check where you're standing. Before, is there anything on the Exalted one that is connected to this, or what do I find?

Searching the studio. Amulet's charms. No amulet's charms. Key fobs. No charms, nothing like that. It's actually pretty plain equipment and a locket. A locket. Is it openable? It is.

And there's a little girl in there. Oh, why do you have to do this? Harsh. Bad guys are still people, and you don't know why this person was here. Yeah. Mm-hmm. We'll keep that. Damn, did you say you don't know why this person was here? I don't like his motives.

Everybody here is here for the same reason. Money. I mean. Well, there's money and then there's- It's possible everybody's been brainwashed. Or somebody's being held hostage, or they want to get something back that's lost or. Or you're just angry. That's just another layer.

Okay, investigation check on this side. Go for it. Thank you. Can I use my? Guidance. I have advantage on my clues and deductions based on those. Yeah, just a single roll on this one. I think it's advantage on.

You might deduce the location of hidden objects from the appearance of one kind of. Oh, hidden objects. Oh, this is for what? This is a gnomish thing? Hunter's Bane, yeah. Oh, Hunter's Bane is for? Oh, just for, okay, thanks for that. Yeah, certain supernatural things.

Perfect. Not great. And you had Guidance. Because you did Guide you. Yeah, so add a d4. I have one, I swear, it's in here. There's one behind you, man. I don't think.

Thank you. Eight. Nice, so 15? 15, yeah, I mean, you can see there's, amongst all these devices that are clumped together, the energy is crackling through and pulsing, and you see it's in immediate proximity, as they're pressed

to touch each other, the pulses seem to spread between them. It creates a larger hive battery, if you will. The ones that can't be pushed into this pile, amongst other pieces of machinery, there are these rigid cables that are all attached that have that residual vein within and through them. It looks like it's functional. It's not well-refined, necessarily. They had to make do with moving these down here and assemble something quickly. I check the scryball. Nice. Check the scryball. It is moving.

It is moving. But away? Which way? Towards us? So FCG. Oh fuck! As you are there, putting rocks over, you see Otohan Fool emerge from that one cavern with another vanguard member talking, and they've both been walking in the direction

of the entryway that you were just blocking. The vanguard member splits off and enters the crowd with the rest of them as Otohan now begins to walk towards the entryway of this cavern. Oh shit! So sorry, Otohan's going in their cavern? Yes.

Not our cavern. Our cavern. Your cavern. Our cavern. I will try. We're heading towards it. I don't know if I can cast, I don't know if I can do anything while I'm attached to this thing, but I'm going to try to cast the Message spell

and tell Laudna, danger's incoming. O'Donnell said this. But I don't know if it works. I'm cosmically attached to this thing. You are. The Message spell doesn't require you to see the person, right? You have to point in their direction.

You know the direction of them. Yeah. Also, given those circumstances, because you are still able to control your body, you go ahead and cast Message in that direction and you hope it finds its... Yes. The big robot body just points this way.

Coming in here? I catch that faintly in my head as I'm already looking at the scribal. Otohan's coming. What do we do? Should we hide in the hole? I don't know. There's bodies in here.

There's either a diversion that sends her out of the cavern or it's on. Otohan steps into the entryway of this cavern and begins to descend towards where your friends currently are. And we're going to go to break. No! I'm going to give you a break to think about what the fuck you're going to do here.

I'm going to think about what the fuck I'm going to do. It's on, guys. We'll be back here in a few minutes. See you shortly. Thank you for listening to the Critical Role Podcast Network. This is Marisha Ray, Critical Role's Resident Creative Director, with a quick reminder for you. We take the last Thursday of every month off from our typical Campaign 3 adventures. Some months we'll enjoy a short rest, and others we'll air a one-shot or just try something new.

Since this year's podcast feed is on a one-week delay from our initial broadcasts, that means the first Thursday of the month may look a little different around here. To stay up to date on our latest programming happenings and when our shows will air on Twitch, YouTube, and here on the Critical Role Podcast Network, check out our weekly programming schedule published to CritRole.com every Monday at 10 a.m. Pacific. And now that you're sufficiently reminded, let's get back to the show.

And welcome back. So, last we left off, let me go ahead and change the scenery here since we're actually subterranean now in this weird underground space to match the proper lighting and vibe.

But all of you suddenly were notified that Otohan was rapidly approaching the chamber. What do you do? I'm going to Press of Digitation, the blood on the ground. With her, clean the murder scene. Clearing up the murder scene, okay. Bodies are dragged behind crates, both corners.

Who's going to hide up in that corner? Just block her in. I'm going to go right there. You're going to go right here? I'm going to shimmy in there with Chet, too. Have we had another pulse? When was? The pulses don't reach in this chamber.

Okay. The pulses don't reach in this chamber. They just seem to go up the center. I'm going to then, shit. I'm going to. You're just going to take a shit? I'm going to shit. I'm going to then, shit. I'm going to shit. I'm going to mirror image. Oh shit.

And then I'm going to spider climb and get up on the fucking ceiling. Get up on the ceiling. I'm going to hide behind those crates and I'm going to hide behind those crates. Over here? Oh, I didn't even see those. Uh, yeah.

Your call. Yeah, over there. Over here? Duck down there? Yeah, the best't even see those. Yeah. Your call. Yeah, over there. Over here? Duck down there? Yeah, the best coverage I can get. Actually, that's right in the line of sight. I'll go to the other side. Okay, so move this crate a little bit

and hide in the space? Yeah. Get down and... The entrance is right here. I'm actually going to post it behind this thing and hide my small ass. One more up? On that little platforming?

And your stuff. Yeah. Right there. Got it. Just doing the little... All right, so Fearne, with Chetney back there, are you going to head and... We're tucking more, Fearne. Yeah. You want to get this way?

Yeah, let me tuck that way. Yeah, we'll come. No? Well, find some cover. Should some of us be in the visible so she... Well, you're out in the open still. We're just getting her to come in. Just getting her to come in.

Okay, I'm just going to turn around. Face this? Dramatically. In front of the thing where if she pushes you, you're fucked? Not directly in front of the glyph, no. I'll go to the side of it. Over here? Sure. Okay. Fair enough.

Can I prep a spell for the minute? If you'd like to. That she steps in? What is Pat Tay going to do? I'll have Pat Tay, he's still, yeah, I make him go invisible again. And I'm... He can cling to the ceiling with you up top.

Yeah, yeah. Okay, all right. Also, knowing it could be the last pastry I ever have, eat FCG's Danish. Nothing like rapidly hiding in it. Yep. Absolutely. Okay.

Well, you are set, and you watch as Otohan begins to descend the short entryway to the subterranean caver, and vanishes around the corner. Can I have Liam and Marisha go ahead and roll d20s for me? Oh no. Oh no. What does that mean?

Probably for Beau and Caleb. But you have... Oh no. No, you don't have advantage on this, so yeah, so just each roll. Actually, you would probably have advantage on this. Just a straight roll? Straight roll. Seven.

Seven. I would have have advantage on this. Just a straight roll? Straight roll. Seven. Seven. I would have advantage, like EJ. 13. 13, got it. Okay. Right as Otohan turns the corner into this cavern, you hear. As light flashes and consumes the space behind you,

you look backward, and the two machines that were emitting that dispel wave have both detonated. Nice. One second after the next. Immediately, as the flames and smoke begins to blow up into this space, you can hear shouting and voices begin to fill the vicinity.

The crew that is currently working on the centerpiece is now scattering and searching around, and you can see chaos is now erupting in the center of that chamber. At this point, you all hear that same explosion upstairs, and Otohan turns and then begins to wrap around. I'm instantly going to let go of my spell, and I don't even need to see her. Otohan's not in begins to I'm instantly going to let go of my spell

and I don't even need to see her. Otohan's not in the room. I don't need to see her. She just needs to be within 120 feet of me. You don't need to see her. For what spell is this? My Psychic Lance. Psychic Lance.

That's that pass. A creature you can see within range, it says on the spell. No. Fuck. Oh, and also the other creature's name. Even utter creature's name. If the target is in range, then it becomes a target. You can't see it, you're right. I should keep on reading.

Okay, all right. Ooh, it's interesting now. So that is... Oh boy, oh boy. A what save on that one? Intelligence. Intelligence save. She's probably pretty intelligent.

She's probably really stupid. That's going to be a fail on her point. She's going to use Legendary Resistance to succeed. Hey! She knows. She does now. She knows. She does now. She knows something struck her.

Okay. Doesn't know from where, though, I imagine. Well, we'll find out. We'll find out. All right, so roll damage, right? Okay. Oh, she gets to resist it, even though. So it's still just damage. Half damage, she's not incapacitated. Got it.

She doesn't know what direction? I don't know. Hard to tell. She's not here what direction? Hard to tell. She's not here. It's only against her. Don't fuck with her. Ooh, okay, okay. You block it for a grand total of four seconds. 11, 21. I can block it for two seconds,

then she'll push me out of the way and fuck me up. 22, 24, 28. 28 points of damage, reduced to 14 for the save and not capacitated. So you know you strike the mark. And though you feel it deflected somewhat from the strong will of Otohan, wherever they stand across the way,

you watch just as she begins to disappear, lurch over for a second and begin looking around rapidly, just to see if she can. We got to call in. Now's the time to call in the ship. No. Otohan looks around angrily

and begins to run back out of the cavern in the direction towards the rest of the chaos. Can we let her go? Okay. Can you block her in? Do we let her go? Okay. I... Can you block her in? Do we let her go? As she's coming, I'm moving a rock and I'm just going to look like a fucking dumb robot. And as soon as she gets within range,

I'm going to just chuck it straight at her. Oh my god. Okay. All right. Let me go ahead and pull up those water stats here. Oh god. Oh, there. All right, if Let me go ahead and pull up those water stats here. Oh, there. All right, if you could go ahead and roll a d10.

I'm sorry, a d20, adding 10 to it. Oh, terrible! 12. 12. So right as Otohan goes charging out, you throw the rock, and Otohan, without even looking up, just puts her hand up and it shatters into a bunch of rubble and stones that scatter around her. You can see the psychic

feel that shatters it and spits at the foot of you. Oh great. Assuming that it was a mistake, it seems, but is now charging out into the open area of the opposite field. Maybe we let her go? I guess let her go. Should we call in the? If the shield is down? Yes. Call in the airship?

And we might as well fuck this ship while we're here. I'm going to just go in and start beating, I'm going to find a nice place to start breaking this shit to fucking. It's going to explode big like the other ones did. Well, we start working the cords, right? Okay. Yeah.

To disconnect. Cut the cords. We cut the cords. Okay. So you hear the shouting upstairs and you can hear the chaos up there yelling. No other explosions at the moment, but there is definitely a loud swell of activity and voices from above.

You are now standing there in this form and you can see in front of you, now wards are starting to glow up, more are starting to be initiated. You can see figures are running around. People are looking into the alcoves, and they're starting to start checking any spaces for anybody who could possibly be doing this.

I'll walk with purpose, just back and forth. Okay. So it looks like I'm doing something, and as I do, I'll walk with purpose, just sort of back and forth. Okay. So it looks like I'm doing something, and as I do, I'm going to cast Sending, and I'm going to tell Ira, it's time. Project Chicken Little.

Launch the airstrike. Very well. I am so excited. That's all you get. Ah, okay. In the interim, you guys are attacking these? We're breaking the cables. Okay.

So you start going through, smashing, cutting, just destroying. For the sake of this unstable pile of arcane. Or just the cables. I understand that, but you don't fully understand that. Those who are helming the strikes of this, I need you to make an arcana check for me. I'll help with that because I am proficient in arcana.

How far away, did I see the statue, Rin, as we were walking down the spiral? Guidance on that. You would've probably seen it. How close to me now? Very far away? About probably 60 or 70 feet from you towards the center of where the key is.

Because I'm helping. I'm going to start making my way to Rin. You got it. 17. 17? Because I was helping, I'm being guided. 13 plus four is also 17. Okay.

It jostles a bit. Elements of it begin to spark and glow, and one of them does detonate in a dull fashion. I do need the three of you to make dexterity saving throws for me. Okay. All right. Dirty 20. 20, that's seven points of force damage.

15. Seven points of force damage. that's seven points of force damage. 15. Seven points of force damage? 21. Seven points of force damage. You all manage to just dodge out of the way before the bulk of it strikes you, and as it detonates and explodes that one core,

the others crack but stay, not triggered into a chain of detonations like what happened in the Feywild, but it's on the cusp. I have a stick of dynamite that I pull out. We can run and leave it. You say good? I was saying, you feel like you did a fair amount of damage with the arcana checks here.

You're uncertain if it's enough to necessarily sever all the power, but it seems like a lot of them aren't connected at the moment. You can keep going, but it would take another arcana check to see if you. Maybe try it again? Maybe only one of us.

Does anybody have anything ranged so we don't have to be right up on this shit? I can light this, throw it in, and we can run. But he goes, boom! Yeah, we don't want to hear those loud noises. I don't think they notice, but okay. I mean, I have a dagger. Scorching Rays?

No, that's not. I can just try and Eldritch Blast it from a distance and hope that my aim is real. From a distance. I don't know. Well, we'll find out. I can slice it from a distance. I'm shit with arcana. Yeah, same. Someone could tell you where to hit.

I got a chance to do another arcana roll. It is another arcana. It, same. Someone could tell you where to hit. I got to check if there's another arcana roll. It is another arcana roll. It's another arcana roll to try and, whoever's doing it, to see that they can do it in a way that doesn't trigger the chain reaction of all the damage. I'll just toss an Eldritch Blast at it. Let's all back up.

Yeah. Do I get advantage on this? With an arcana check? Yeah. Yeah, so make an arcana check, and this is you using the Eldritch Blasts as the precision elements here. Do I get advantage on this with assistance? Could you go higher? Guidance. Guidance.

I'll say... I'll say, I'll say. I'll say, I'll say, yeah, I'll go ahead and take advantage of this one now. That's a cantrip. Plus Guidance. Ooh. Similar roll.

Guidance? 18 for this one. 18. Plus the Guidance. Plus the Guidance, ugh. Not a greatance. Yeah. You do strike a similar space. It causes another one to detonate. But we're back. But you're all further back from where that core was, and you watch as that one detonates. It sends another one rolling, and then a third one detonates and sends rocks spinning this way. There's a bit of a chain reaction, and it does make a little bit of noise. You're uncertain if anybody heard it at the moment, but you have done a significant amount of

damage between a number of these power cores and you've separated a number of them away from the connected devices that carried the power up to the upper region. FCG. Yeah? You see, one, the Flying Woman, who is was gliding around ends up landing on this platform that's halfway up the key, and is just looking around. People begin looking up at her and then scattering off, and you get the sense, having known Imogen

as far as you are, they're receiving orders silently. You also see two flashes of light. One, you see apparate this massive, 12-foot-tall metallic entity that has armor across it with blue streaks in it. It's a refined humanoid form. One is this massive armored iron fist. The other one is this large man-catcher claw device

with hooks on it and runes all across it. And the other flash near the base of the key. You see an older elven gentleman with long silver hair. Oh my god. An extended staff with a hooked point at the end, almost a fork in a similar design as the top of the spire of the key. His long blue robes with this pointed shoulder, pauldrons out. This is both beautiful make and almost ceremonial garb

as much as it is armor. We're totally ready for this, you guys. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's pretty heavy. And they're near the base of the main spire. Correct. And Rin is close to that? Yeah, about 15 or 20 feet from the key,

behind one of the four smaller... But there's still action, activity around? Like, me walking around the space is not going to be like, what the fuck is going on? People are moving. They're moving. You're not certain how they move normally

and if they'll take notice, but we'll find out. I think you, before you go. I've already sort of walked away. You've already walked away. You've already walked away. All right. I'm just going to keep on, maybe not making a beeline for him,

but trying to follow the traffic patterns of other people and trying to weave my way closer. Understood. Weaving your way. Weaving my way. Go ahead and make a deception check. Can I guide myself? Allow yourself. Yeah, you can guide yourself on this. It isn't a super high DC, but it is definitely a challenge.

What did you say? Deception? Deception. Deception. Dirty 20. Dirty 20. Okay. Okay. That's pretty good. You scooted past the DC. So as you begin to weave through, you hit the side of one of the ruined walls, it crumbles a bit, but it's moderate damage to an already damaged ruin that nobody seems to immediately pay attention. A couple people look back and shrug it off. But you can see individuals are now, one, searching tremendously around every nook and

cranny for anybody who was responsible for this. The two devices you can see are twisted and splintered open. They were detonated from the inside, whether it be from an explosive or somebody that knew how to trigger them to explode themselves. But you can see there's black cinder circles on the walls and space around where they were. Fear magic. The woman who is floating and landed is in the process of quietly communicating with the silver-haired man that you assume at this point to be eluding this.

And... Yeah, it is chaos in here at the moment, but it is beginning to calm, and it's beginning, like, the initial energy is beginning to get a little more focused as people are finding paths around and things from the floor. The floating blue one is in a trench coat

with a braided purple hair? Yes. Got it. You start sauntering up, and you are now with an ice, you're about 30 or so feet from the both of them. Jesus. You got this. You saunter up in the middle of the room

and you're the only one in the middle of this and people are moving around you and there's that moment where you're like, oh, you're in the thick of it and you're not sure. One man army. Dun dun dun dun dun. What's going to happen, Seth? There's magic-y, mage-y things around me.

What are you going to do? Is there anything near Rin that's not Rin? There's a ruined wall. There's stones and pieces of rock, and there's the large curved tower that Rin's right behind that's pointing towards the central key. And that's not damaged at all? No.

Okay. I mean, I'm just going to go pick her up. Like, yeah, maybe with one hand, I'll just grab a piece of that ruined wall and just, again, move it aside, like I'm trying to clear it off or something, and then with my other hand, I'll just reach down and grab her,

so it all looks fluid. This is going to be fun. I'm a dumb robot just grabbing rocks. She seems like a rock to me. Yeah, yeah. No. No, you don't know. Go ahead and make a sleight of hand check. Come on. From within the automaton.. No. No, you don't know. Go ahead and make a sleight of hand check. Come on.

From within the automaton. I will guide myself, if that's possible. Yes, it is. Sleight of hand, I have a plus zero. Great. Oh my god. Come on, she's a rock. What's in the rocks? Okay, that's a five.

Oh! Oh, my heart. So you grab the chunk of wall stone, right? You hit it and the wall. Oh god. You hit one of the load-bearing sections of the ruin as it now falls. Onto Rin?

No. No! Why would you do that? I thought that's what he was talking about! Onto Rin. No. No! No! I thought that's what he was talking about! Onto Ryn. Oh! No, he did it! I killed Ryn!

No! Guys, I killed Ryn! You picked up Ryn right as it was happening. You were trying to. Yeah, yeah, did you scoop up Ryn, though? We'll see, we'll see. I killed Ryn. It's okay, it's okay. He's an NPC.

There's a 20-foot wall that tumbled over onto the side, and you just see, where Rin was, it's now just stone and rubble. You don't see Rin at the moment. Because it's also stone and rubble. But now, the room, all the heads go and shift right over to where you are, because after two, essentially, terrorist attacks in the chamber,

another wall collapsed, and you're standing in the middle of it, clutching a piece of stone. I will, with my body language, because I can't communicate like this, just hold up the rocks and go... As if to say, oops, sorry. Make a deception check.

He is the meme. I guess I'll die? Can I guide myself? Sure. Much better. This is deception. Correct. 22.

Okay, that's good. That'll do it. Now this is, there's two rolls here. One is for the populace, the other is for the generals. 23, actually. 23. Populace, natural one. Great. You see most of the crowd around you be like,

and they just go about their business, like just super frustrated with this imperfect arcane tech. and they just go about their business, just super frustrated with this imperfect arcane tech. The generals. Uh-oh. That is, hold on. This is close, this is close. That was a natural 11.

I know. He's looking, He's looking everywhere. There it is. That is... What's the eyebrows? I don't know. You're so fucking lucky. You see the lavender-haired woman You see the lavender-haired woman in the coat looking down at you, glances over towards Ludinus.

Ludinus looks back at her and she takes up and flies up through the center of the area. It's like dodging through the various catwalks as he looks down and goes, and then does this with his hand. And the entire automaton deactivates around you. Oh. Do I deactivate because I'm tethered to it?

You do not deactivate, but you currently cannot move this automaton. You are just frozen right in the middle of this space right now with everyone running around you. Oh god. Okay. This also means you lost your visual perspective, too. Oh god. Oh my god.

You're now within essentially a dead shell with no vision. Meanwhile, what are the rest of you doing? All right. All right. I think we were going to try to dodge the other one. Try to stealthily do it. This is toast, right?

This is very much toast. Anything that might function there is going to be working on a minimal amount of power, if at all. They are looking for us. Do we want to have a few invisible people and some of us get in a hole? Actually, I need Ashton and Orym to come over to the guy that gave up.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, all right. All right. Here's what we're going to need you to do. You see that thing? Yeah. Oh! Well. You made your choices.

Sorry. Had to be done. Really quick, do we have a second or no? Quick rifle through the pockets. We already did. Anything personal. All right, never mind. Okay. Black man. Didn't like that. Are we going to take the invisibility route, or just try and act confident?

I think everybody's pretty hurried, so we should just get in there, I think. All right. Without the invisibility. Act confident, act hurried, let's go. Do we need anything from the hole before we... We're all pretty geared up, I think. Hmm? Do we need anything?

I'm going to open up the hole real quick before we go. Or no, we're going? I don't need anything. Yeah, I don't know what we're going to do. All right, we're going. Let's move it. We had a second. Orym, though, as they're leaving,

will drop down and rip that locket and spool it up and stick it in his pocket. I can turn one person invisible. As you are heading up towards the tunnel, two vanguard, or sorry, a vanguard and a call figure begin running. You hear footsteps rushing down. As they're now searching the alcoves.

Are they rushing in? They're rushing in, yeah. Act frantic, it's fucked. I have Pate with me, but he's still invisible as well. All right, okay. Because who here is not adorned in disguise? I think we all are. me, but he's still invisible as well. All right, okay. Who here is not adorned in disguise? I think we all are. No, no, no, I put red on you.

Everybody's got it on. All right, I will need a group deception check as you try and pass by these two figures. Ugh. Come on. Come on. Okay. Fuck yeah.

Okay. Dirty 20. Dirty 20. Dirty 20. Dang. Fearne? Plus three. 11. 11, okay. Shit.

23. Dirty 20. Dirty 20? Whoa! 10, which is really good for me. That, well done. You rush by as the two figures come up, and I'm like, anyone in here? No, no, there's no one.

Something has happened. Shit. Compromised. They both just run in rapidly as you all push past, and one of them goes, compromised, what the fuck is this? Let's go. That was the line. No, it's been compromised.

Everything's fine, you can go look somewhere else. No, we got it covered. No, something happened. Well, we left the fire behind. We did. All right, let's go. All right. Quickly. As you're exiting now the chamber entrance

and you look out into the base here. All of you hear a singular voice come through your minds, except for maybe you, since you have a device that doesn't let you. That says, Friends, individuals who have come with us on this journey, our timetable is being accelerated. Please gather at the key.

Gather at the key. This is not a voice we've ever heard before. You recognize this to be Otohan's voice in an elevated bit of... an energized tone, I'd say. I'd say mind PSA. She's gathering, okay. Which means we're now going to be going

against the stream and standing out. Well, as long as people are going to be gathering, so we have literally this quick two minutes. Face it and move backwards. Let's maybe swing wide instead of cut through. You swing wide and head around. Eyes on the warder, too, looking for FCG as soon as we're out.

We just see this. You walk out and you just see this. Or actually, we shut down, so it's leaned forward, but you see the warder in the middle of the ruins, down just locked in place. Any sign of a? If I could have both of you roll d20s for me. Come on.

Five. Oh, fuck. Come on. Five. Oh god. Fuck. Come on, be afraid. He's a big, big boy. Come on, Beau. Oh my god. No! Six.

Six, all right. You made a one face. As you both are, all of you are gathering at this space, looking out into the group, you can see everyone's now beginning to filter out a bit from the chamber. So they're still holding up posts and looking. People are looking up to the center.

And the first thing you see is a figure begin to fall rapidly and then stop in place. And you watch as this figure suddenly gets grabbed from, actually it would be this hand, from behind. And the lavender-haired woman glides down gently behind it as the form of Caleb Widdegasp stands with the mage hunter golem

clasped around the back of his neck in the middle of the city. This is an interesting position to be in. Fuck him. We got to get out of here. He's coming in. We don't know these people. No sign of Beau?

Not at the moment. How far is that? From where this is happening, this is about 60, 70 feet from where you are. Oh, oh, regard. So the battery's dead. Oh, it's been a while. Happy anniversary.

And how are we doing for random people running all over the place in the chamber? It's full of people? It's filled now. It looks like there's about 60, 70 people all gathered throughout the city, just looking inward towards where this key is. So we're on the periphery of a lot of people down below

looking up at a show. Correct. Any sign of a fucking airship? That was the end of the sentence. It's the end of the world! But you do see another figure begin to descend the stairs, the slight ramp that leads to the base, the opposite side from where you entered.

And this is a familiar woman with long blue robes, sleeveless, dark skin with the hair up that you have met, the Beauregard figure, who is just walking as the lavender-haired woman has her hand extended. as the lavender-haired woman has her hand extended. You hear the voice ring out from the center as Ludinus, arms out, goes,

Thank you all for joining us. It seems we've had expected guests. Caleb Beauregard, you have been expected guests. Caleb Beauregard, you have been thorns in all of our sides for quite some time. I think it's only fitting that we give you front row seats to what you've worked so hard to fail to do.

At which point Beauregard now begins to walk through the crowd, and as they gather, they just begin to shackle and chain, gag, and set her there. We got to keep doing our thing. Yeah, we're going better. We can't be gurgurch. So go on. You're all of us. Ludinus looks down.

Someone, please, free our ornament. And people start shifting the stone out of the way and pull up the slightly damaged statue of Ryn, the right arm broken off. Oh! Oh no. Oh no. God, I broke Rin. I mean, that's a lot better than where I thought she was.

Yeah, I thought she was shattered. She's... She can regrow an arm. As I'm sure you all heard, we are working at an accelerated pace. A number of entities look to close and I would hate to disappoint with the timing, so. He turns around and where he's standing

on the platform at the key, you can see there's this six-inch wide opening, like a space in there. And he places his arm into there about the elbow. like a six inch wide opening, like a space in there. And he places his arm into there about the elbow. And as he puts his arm in there, you watch as those green residuum veins begin to light up and glow up the entire spire as he's now essentially fueling it with his own arcana.

And it's taken many years of research to ensure that my appreciation for perfection can be rightly accomplished. And he looks over towards Liliana, who's floating there, and she goes ahead and puts her arms and pulls him outward, and you watch as, partway up the spire, about 25 feet above him, armored sides of the spire shut downward,

exposing some openings in the side. And there you see held in place this small 12-sided device, this dodecahedron about this big. Fucking beacon! Rimmed in gold. Holy shit. That is affixed in the center of this portion of the spire.

As the energy is flowing through it, Ludinus calls out, Well, I guess it's time we brought it to us. The energy charges up into it. You watch as this device begins to glow, and everyone around you in the chamber seems to freeze in place. All of you feel yourself stop, like you can't move.

You're not breathing, everything's just locked. And the stars above, the storm, pass by. Hours go by in seconds. Before the red moon before the red moon is held aloft.

What? I shifted time. And all of you come back into place as Ludinus pulls his arm out and you see the hand, his arm, is now somewhat withered and dark. Very well. While this is happening, I think it'd be best to show you the scenery around you, just in case you're wondering.

Oh, yes, please! Just, I think it would be a good point of perspective. Oh god, Matthew. Jesus. This is brutal. That'd be great if it was like the time machine, and we'd split up time, and this guy was like Out of 10,000 miles an hour.

Woo-woo-woo! Oh my god! I need your life. If he did speed up time, then where are we? We don't know. Did he speed up time or did he? The hours passed by in seconds. But did he freeze on? What? Did he freeze? Where or did he? The hours passed by in seconds. But did he freeze on time?

What? Did he freeze? Where are we descending? Whoa! Oh my god, that is so cool! That is cool. That's so cool! Oh no! Wow! What a craft project! Well, this fell.

Oh my god. Nice job, FCs. Okay. We're going to save our friend's life! With the statue there. Oh my god. Here. You have a loot in this. Oh, he's all the way up there?

Yeah, he's up on the platform above. He's going to fall. He might fall. He's doing the land. He's doing okay. The platform might fall. Fucking dick. Liliana floats. Oh, hi, Mama.

In the sky above. Here. She's got your word. In the middle of this space. Lies. Oh, it's pretty great. There are many, many. Oh god. Many. I think we can take them. Yeah, no problem. There are many, many. Oh god.

Many. I think we can take them. Yeah, no problem. That's okay, those other two people are going to, hell, wait, they're fucking under a trance. I'm sure we won't have to fight them. They'll be fine. Beau's chained up.

Beau's chained up, Caleb's caught by a robot. Beau's chained there on the ground. Caleb. Oh, there he goes. We won! Caleb is firmly held. We'll help. Oh my god. It's been a while. It's been a while.

It's been a while. Oh my god, dude. Many, many more all gather around. Which one? No. There's Polly's? I don't know.

Oh, I see. I thought you were saying her fight. No, I'm saying, yeah. Oh shit. Polly's like Rose. Rose? Yeah. Oh shit. He looks up. Where are we?

Conks his head strangely. Oh no, here they come. As a shadow seems to obfuscate the red moon above. Oh my god. Yes. Before rapidly descending. Can I try to jumpstart myself? While this is happening, sure.

Make an arcana check for me. Oh god. Well, you know what? Go ahead and roll a d20 and add your spell cast modifier, which would be your wisdom. Did you check with the change bringer to see if you should jumpstart yourself? Maybe she says no.

Did you Guidance? Yes, Guidance. I did not. Well, is this a check? This is a spellcraft check, so yeah. Okay, well, Guide. 15. 15. No, it's nothing. It's been shut down. Okay. Get out. You all hear the sound of something heavy,

high-pitched whine streaking. You can see the blue glowing stones of the brumestone as the silver sun comes descending at intense speed straight down into the tunnel. Everyone below goes He watches, Ludinus goes. Throws his other hand up, the non-withered one, and right as it is coming down on top,

a force field appears right on top. It impacts and shatters, scattering outward and just killing dozens and dozens of the surrounding watchers and workers here of the Paragon's Call. The rubble of the silver sun just rings the exterior. No damage to the central spire, but in this space around.

Rubble. Oh god. And wreckage. Oh god. This is so violent. Destroyed bits. Oh god. Any sign of? Flames. Did it get what?

Immediately begin to encompass the area from the crashed wreckage. There's that old soul monk in the front. Yeah. Maybe she's okay. She was in the dome. They were under the force field. I feel like they were under the force field. It shot outward at this point.

Where are we? You're on the outskirts over here. Any sign of Sandus and Ira? So we'll say you guys are all out over on this edge here. And that's when Scanlan Shorthalter. And so it would be fair to derive that that force field was from Ludinus and not some sort of enchantment cast on the key.

Correct. This is like a semi-spherical wall of force was placed to protect the top of this. This is major league shit. So many of the figures now, as soon as the wreckage slams into the ground, flames begin to emerge from it, smoke pours up and begins to fill the space.

People around start shouting and people are like, into the ground. Flames begin to emerge from it. Smoke pours up and begins to fill the space. People around start shouting and people are like, you can hear the cries of pain and aching in the vicinity. In this moment of chaos, are you doing anything? Can we see Xandis or Ira? Make a perception check. Those who would like to look. Oh. Okay.

I guess I will try to disconnect my wires. Okay, you go ahead and disconnect yourself fairly easily. And the door is closed. I don't have the servos to open it, right? I would have to blast out or push it. The front of it was damaged when you got there, so it's a little bit ajar, but you can try and force it if you want to.

I will try to push it out and see if I can open the door. Make a strength check for me. Gingerly. Strength check. That's an eight. Eight. It's not moving. Oh my god.

I'm terrible. What are the rest of you doing? 30, 20 for perception. 17. On one of the upper curved walkways that separate the center of it, there's the two that wind around. The one you came down is on this direction. The one on this way, you see two forms appear.

One tall, spindly one, one humanoid-looking one, just as the spindly one skitters away out of sight. Is the humanoid one just like, Holy shit, what's going on? He figures, just goes running up the side out of sight. Okay. See, man of his word.

We told you guys. Yeah, we did. We did. We did. We did. Is anybody, except for our major players, moving on the ground in all this wreckage? Are people backing away from the carnage of this? Yeah, people are backing away.

They're trying to help friends out from underneath it. Do we even dare go through the other battery, or it's here, the moon's here? They're going to push the button, right? I, uh,. I feel like I want to free Caleb and Beau. May I pop out, Mr. Please? How long has it been since I called the Ashari?

With the time setting up, I think this has probably been pretty close to an hour. Can I ask on Beau, is it multiple pieces of manacles and chains or is it one big-ass body harness? Oh, it's like... All the trappings. It's multiple clasps across both ankles, legs, knees,

wrist cuffs, elbows, behind the body. Ludinus knows who he's dealing with. And is Imogen's mom still holding Caleb? No, Caleb is being held by the Mage Hunter. By the Mage Hunter. Does he have the collar on, or is it just around his? It's just around his neck. He's holding him there.

With Beau's manacles, are there, is there, so the different chains, are they pulled together at one point? It's not like loose chains manacles. They're almost like both arms are held together by short clasps of metal at the elbow, or the wrist, the elbow, and the upper arm from behind. And then down on her knees is clasped with the ankles,

and then across where the knees are. May I cast Heat Metal on the chain parts of the manacles to try to just, drippy drippies, heat the little metal bits. You can certainly try. You might get Beau in the process, but. You can go ahead. I'll save for this, because this is very specific.

I'm going to wait. It's possible. It is, but. I'm going to go unless anybody else has any ideas. I'm going to go, too. I'm going to go, unless anybody else has any ideas. I'm going to go, too. Kick it off. All right, where are you going? I want to step up and look at the golem.

Okay, so you begin to approach the side of the golem over here, and you can see it's holding him off, but it's like, I'll move with Imogen, but I'll move around the side, closer to Liam and Tal. Okay, so it's over this side. In which direction is the, um. Like maybe up on this rock next, yeah.

Which direction is the other power supplies? The one that Otohan was first at was that direction. And there is, now that you're looking across, you can see there are a couple other tunnels on this side, too. Was there a second Mage Hunter column as well? This is only the one you've seen so far. Yeah. That's fun.

So I saw Iroh. Can I quickly, before he gets out of range, send him a message? Sure. We took down one of the power sources, but it's likely not going to be enough. How do you propose we take down this fucking telescope? That is indeed the question.

With all eyes upon it, you'd have to do a frontal assault, and that would be suicide. Let me see what I can muster on the other side of this chamber. You see another and a vanish off. Can I, should I try and get this power source behind me

and keep with that? He's out of range now. Fuck! Ludinus continues to speak. I'm going to say that I'm running alongside Imogen, but I'm going to aim toward FCG's position as this progresses. I'm going to say that I'm running alongside Imogen, but I'm going to aim toward FCG's position as this progresses. I'm going to start making my way.

Make a move. Thank you. Taking cover behind that part of the ship. Okay. A little further back. A little further back? Yeah, right there. Ludinus shouts out amongst the chamber, shrugging off. As people are freaking out, you can see Liliana looking across the field, and as she does, everybody in the area begins to calm. They're being consoled. Their emotions begin to relax a bit. Even as their friends are on the ground

bleeding out or expiring, they look back towards the center as Ludmus speaks. The greatest lie ever told is that we need them. We are their gardens, their cattle. They created us to feed them with our faith, our hopes, our souls, lapping up their fables to give them form, purpose, control. What are you doing? I'm going to try and take cover on the far side of the map. Over here?

Yeah. Okay. Stay hidden. I'm going to go behind that map. Over here? Yeah. Stay hidden. I'm going to go behind that box. Over here? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That box, as you look at it, is a chunk of the silver sun. You glance and you're like,

oh, I know this room. What's her boat? Beau isn't being held by anyone. She's just in shackles? At the moment, yeah. She seems mind-controlled. In fact, the person who was holding her got crushed. The person that shackled her.

So she's no longer mind-controlled? You don't know. Oh, wait. Does she seem like she's fighting against her restraints or just? Make a perception check. Nine. 10.

10? You have no idea. Yep. I'm going to try to look at the golem in front of me, and I'm going to whisper, Release. And I'm going to try to cast Command on it. Cast Command on it, oh. Okay.

Let's go ahead and... That is what save? Wisdom. Wisdom. Okay, he fails. The golem pulls away and the claw disconnects from the arm and is now a collar latched onto Caleb. He's been released.

Mm. Mm. Comes with that. So he's still muzzled. He's still shagged. He can move, but he's muzzled. They did not give us this world. They took it from the Titans, slew them in their home,

and tilled its soil to harvest us for all eternity. Where are you going? I'm going to tell Pate, my invisible Pate, to go follow in the direction that Ira went. Follow in the direction that Ira went? Yeah. All right. So is the sound of fire and wreckage

falling and crashing around us, or is it quiet? Yeah, bits of it, it's still crackling, and there's still some moans, and things are creaking, and there's still some moans and there's still things are creaking and there's still bits of wreckage that hit the sides of the tunnel. They're falling. It's like a half-nightmare hellscape,

but there's just this calm upon everyone who's watching in lewdness, just holding court in the center with Illyana. Okay, Orym is going to sneak through the rubble and get down in front of the warder. I'm going to use Seedling to squirt some vine up. The warder over here? The one that FCG is in.

I guess it'll check for me? No. Try and scoot through the wreckage. That's shit. That's seven. Roll a two. That's seven. You begin to scoot through the crowd there, and one of the people that stepped out of the wreckage goes ahead and grabs you on the side of the shoulder and goes, I will pause for a second and think and let time pass. Okay, they just hold your shoulder in place and they look back up towards Ljubniss.

But we, their special children, surpassed our masters. We questioned their gains. We found our own will, our own power, our own drive to create that eclipsed their own. We unraveled their weave and killed one of them, became one of them. Then, then they feared us. Who's doing what? I will, grasping by that person in the face, and yank it hard as I can against this wood to try to knock them the fuck out. Okay, that's a dexterity save for them?

Yes, it is, right. That is a natural two. Okay. Crack! I'll go ahead and just, for the hell of it, for the narrative reasons here, I'll just go ahead and roll to see if they, with an eight, yeah.

Crack! They go, for the moment, unconscious. And you are? You want to alert anybody else, or? I'm opening with all the fire and, yeah. Crack! They go, for the moment, unconscious. And you are? Can I alert anybody else, or? I'm opening with all the fire and, yeah. Make another stealth check for me. Cool. Question.

It's 14. 14, okay. At the moment, you're pretty sure nobody noticed it, and they're on the ground, unconscious, with a bloody nose. Can I see at all out of my? You just have a little bit of view of the ground before you,

and the frowns around it. All right, okay. All right. I'm going to turn invisible. All right. And I'm going to go straight for the wooden stairs. For the wooden stairs over here? Yeah, the wooden stairs. Okay.

You turn invisible. I'll dash. Okay. Well, that was your action to cast the spell, and then movement to get there. Fuck it, it may be moot, but I'm going to go for this other cavern and disconnect this other power source.

I don't know what else to do in the meantime. So you're just going to double move off in that direction? Okay. Are you doing it stealthily, or? I'll do it stealthily. Make a stealth check for me. We are so split up right now, y'all. We're very split up. That's a good thing, I think.

What's that little ball on top of the, the things coming out of it? Is that the beacon? No. No, beacon is actually housed partway in here. Oh, got it. If it's that bad, I saw you leave. I'm going to turn and head towards you with a...

Pass without a trace? Well, I'm going to be, at the very least right now, I'm going to be heading towards you as if I'm going to see what's up. Okay, so double and dash. Yeah, you can get over it, too, because you're much on your feet. Pass without a trace.

Okay. 18. All right, 18, stealth check. I'm going to use invisibility on myself as well. Okay, so you vanish as well. 25. 25? Nice.

Okay, great. So you both head that way stealthily. Once we hit the cavern and we're out of sight, we'll haul ass. What are you doing? I just might as well keep with the plan until something else changes. Should be about there.

Can I cast Enhance Ability on myself? Sure. Bull's Strength. Bull's Strength, and you begin darting over in that direction, right? It's a move through its rough terrain, so dashing will get you to the bottom there, and that's going to be the end of your turn.

Okay. You cast Bull Strength. Yeah. All right. You cast it on yourself, and you're going to try and force your way through. I'm going to try to push open the thing again. Strength check with advantage. Terrible. Even worse.

Can I also guide myself? I guess I should have said that. A little late on that, unfortunately. Now they're both terrible anyway. 10. 10. It's, unfortunately, it's sustained some damage and without the control of it, it's locked in place as you get up underneath.

Lewdness continues. The Calamity was not a tragedy. It was a punishment. Their war amounted to them little more than a contest, and we all suffered for our excellence. A genocidal admonishment for following our own will. They still fear us, hiding behind their gate,

reaping our dreams as they deceive us into ceding our agency to their whims and squabbles. They should be afraid. What are y'all doing? Get Pat Tate down here now! I'm going towards the stairs. What are we going to do when we hit a cliff? Going up the stairs with all of my 35, if I can.

He gets you right there. I don't have to get close to it. I'm just trying. I'm going to go first. I'm going to, there was a little bit of broken gap in that doorway, and can I see letters through that little bit of hole? You glance under.

There's no light source on the inside, so you just see dark stuff. Okay, well, I'm going to stick with my plan. I'm going to use another Grasping Vine on the front door, or whatever opens up on this thing. Then I'm just going to plant a foot against its leg and pull as hard as I fucking can. Okay.

Go ahead and roll again, as you're pushing at the same time, and this will be both of you working together to try and get it open. I'll guide myself. I'm not a plan, I don't have to touch the ground. Ooh. Sorry. You watch yourself. 19. 19, yeah. 20.

The DC was reduced with your help. So with that, you go ahead and pull, and part of it breaks off at the hinge and opens up, giving you enough room to get out, and you pull the vine back down. Anybody see us? We okay? Right under Mama, so I'm all fair. Liana.

Right as that's happening, I'm going to say in her head, Mama. You notice, as she's floating there, she looks down and she begins to lift her hand in the direction of you, Orym, and then as you say, Mama, she's like, you hear in your voice, Imogen?

Mama. It doesn't have to be like this. Where are you? I can't see you. Mama, I love you. The better halves make a better home. Please remember. Make a persuasion check with advantage. Come on, lock and shoot.

This is it. This is it. Okay, okay. 19. 19. She watches her hands out, and you, for a second there, Orym, you feel like your arms almost begin to pull apart at the seams, like they're locked in place and starting to tear out of the shoulders, and then it stops. She looks past you, and you hear a new voice say, Imogen, I told you to run. I've been telling you to run.

Why did you come here? I want to help you get free. It doesn't have to be like this. It's the only way we can be free. No. Where it seats, you and me. Why do you think we have this power? The root is born, exultant. It's been building a bridge. Where are the Morin? This is all stuff he told you. How do you know he's telling you the truth?

I just do. There's a deep, bassy detonation beneath the ground that it quakes and moves, and everyone turns for a second, and then they all look back to Ludinus for direction, and he's holding his oneened, somewhat withered hand, gives a motion to not bother. I check and pat his eyes.

Was that Ira? Hmm? That was Ira. Nice. With my action, I'm going to try and climb the side of this telescope as quietly as I can. I don't know what it'll do, but it's another 35 feet of movement, we're going up. Okay, go ahead and make an athletics check for me.

Like King Kong. So I have advantage, but only when I'm in my... Only when you're in your wolf form. Oh, it's balls. Oh jeez. 11. 11. You get about three, four feet up, and it's too slick, and the edges are too sharp. You cut your finger and fall back and

hit the wood with a heavy thud. You can see Ludin's like, you heard something. I'm in crashed-ass airship. I'm going to spider climb into the chamber that I was rushing into as to not set off any glyphs. Is there light anyway? There should be light. Okay. I'm just going to follow

the well-beaten path quite slowly into this room. Okay. After the explosion happens, Liliana turns and looks, and out of the corner of that chamber, you see Ira begin to shift rapidly through the ruin. Ilyala turns and puts a hand out. Oh no.

Does he have advantage? Yes, magic resistance, he has advantage. And she banishes him. Oh! That sucks. He's fine. He's just going for a minute? No, he's from another realm. He's gone. As long as she maintains concentration. He's back to the Fey Realm. All right. I would like to question myself.

Nice move, Matt. But she says, I'll hold it for one minute to banish him permanently. She has to hold it for one minute to banish him permanently. We got to conquer in the head in the next 60 seconds. I would like to try, with my Ring of Telekinesis, to try to look at some piece of the telescope and try to just pull something to get it a little more. They lifted the shield around the beacon, so that is up right now.

Fuck. What about in the front? No, but I mean the beacon. So the beacon is exposed. It is somewhat. Do I know what the beacon is? You have no idea what it is. I know. None of you have any idea. But it looks like a power source. It is somewhat. Do I know what the beacon is? You have no idea what a beacon is. I know. None of you have any idea. But it looks like a power source.

I mean, is it a thing that they unshielded? Looks important. I was going to try and go for the beacon, but I didn't want a metagame. Yeah, you wouldn't. But it looks important. Make a perception check. Where is it? I'll make a perception check.

It's kind of under the... It's underneath the device right there where you... 17. 17? I mean, you see many things look important here. I'm not going to do it. I feel like that's a little, I feel like this is metagame-y, even though I want to.

But you're going to try and use your Ring of Telekinesis to try and pull parts of it away. Yeah, I'm trying to maybe even the little ball or something on that front piece. Is the whole thing covered or just the top bit? I mean, most of this thing is armored in places. It's been reinforced for over a week because of the destruction of the Fey Key.

Okay. Hang on. Somebody else can go. Okay, well. Let me. Ludmus continues to know. No. By the way, is the golem that's holding Caleb back to normal again, or is he? Yes, it's returned back to its position here.

But is it holding Caleb? No, Caleb is no longer held, but Caleb has a collar locked around him. Yeah. And you are freed at the moment. I'm still sitting in the belly, just watching. Not easy. Yes. At this moment, Ludinus looks to you.

To me? Yeah. I'm inside the belly, I didn't come out. You made a loud noise off to the side and glances over. That's fair. You, you are not given life by any god, but by the hands of mortal creators like us. I clutch my coin. We are the new source of life, of creation.

Stay in my legacy all you wish. I have worked selflessly for a thousand years to find the means of shattering these chains of fate and oppression. Let me be your villain if it means liberation for all and forever. You begin to hear the sounds of fighting at the top of the pit.

Are you sure? Wind begins to pick up above. You're both down there trying to destroy another power source? Yes. All right. You are at that moment. Now you've rushed down there. We'll save for, because this is weird time where it's moving more, little bursts of action.

So you get down there and you're facing it. You're not sure where the glyphs are in the room. I was spider climbing on the walls to avoid them. I was just watching for footprints. There clearly is going to be a beaten path and I am gingerly taking it. Perception or survival, I'll say. Survival for the tracking element of it,

perception to just pick up the... Stressful. So stressful. None of them are particularly good. Here we go. 17. 17, okay. You follow the pattern and you feel fairly confident.

I'm not going to get all the way up to the damn thing or anything. You get within 10 feet of it. Oh, I'm not even going to get all the way up to the damn thing or anything. You get within 10 feet of it. Oh, I'm not even going to get that close. Okay. But I say, you get somewhere in that space and be like, you're fine, and you think you see a direction where there's nothing. I'm good for the moment.

All right. I'm just going to unload some Eldritch Blasts, similarly, just very pinpointeded to do this directly. Jesus. Okay, go ahead and roll an arcana check for me. Why did he do it like that? Because it's fun. There's no good.

18. 18. So you true the core, detonate, and you see some of the tethers fraying out and arcane sparks fly off. There's still a large chunk of it connected, but you did some damage to it. Do it again? God, I wonder if there are just fucking decoys. I won't get to that in a second. There's a few other booms.

I am watching behind us now to see if anyone's coming. I don't know how much power he needs. Make a perception check. Shit. I have a feeling we're working towards a mixed success. The rest of you are watching from this, and you can see the veins of strongly reinforced, threaded residuum

that is marking through it. They've all been solid this whole time, and you see two of them dim slightly. Okay, okay, okay. 18. 18? Okay, glancing about, you don't see anyone coming at the moment. I'm just keeping an eye out.

Okay. I'll try and call Pate back to me in this time. Keep going. It's going to take one minute. Begins to fly back. Ludin is still caught. Keep him in this area for me. In this area? He's my eyes. So he can keep watching.

Ludinus looks up towards Liliana. Liliana, you can see sweat on her brow, and she's still lost in thought for a moment, figuring out what to do. You feel her tether control loosen on you, and you hear back in your voice, Imogen, it's already done. It's going to be okay.

It's not too late. It's not. You're strong, Mama. You're so strong. He's strong. You hear Ludinus say, Born in you, chosen Ruid is born. Seeds of Pregathos's power.

The burgeoning Scions to now break these bonds, you have all gathered here for your true purpose. You see a lot of the surviving members of the vanguard around looking up, and you can see this dull red glow beginning to emanate from their skin. From their skin? From Lyanna, you can see around her body

and through the coat from the inside, red energy beginning to drift up underneath. What's that? Oh, we can't see no. In the invisible space where Imogen is standing, her outline begins to appear as red mist-like energy begins to drift off of her body. Fearne, a faint bit of red mist begins to emanate from you.

I forgot. Oh! We didn't know that was going to happen. And also me? I'm not alive! Do you continue to attack the? We'll again, another arcana check. Go on, bitch, go on, bitch.

Can I try and make another crawl up the thing? Yes, you may. Another arcana check for me. Not great, not great. Dirty 20. Dirty 20. Dirty 20. You begin to climb up. This is a real tough climb.

You just hit the DC to start climbing this, so you get about 15 feet up on the side there, and you're like, your fingers are hurting, but you're holding onto it. Okay. Eight. Eight. You hit what looks to be a couple other parts

of the device that are already defunct, and it's not doing additional damage. Anything you got from a distance? I pull out the dynamite. Fuck it. Mm-hmm. Ready? Ready. Light it. You light it. Throw it in there.

Let's go. All right. You both just go running back out. Sure. Hearing that behind you as you're just charging out there. Okay, okay. If we get to the entrance before it goes? You don't even have a chance to look

at how long it'll take to go. Okay, no. It's just going, so you guys should start going. All right. Everything scales in the universe, even ecosystems. Tonight, we unleash the natural predator of the gods. Tonight, the children inherit the world. You hear dust kicked up in the air. The cloud of earth that's risen and thrown up

begins to slowly dissipate, as you see what looks like a large boulder has slammed from above, as the boulder slowly begins to unravel itself in the center of the ground. A shuriken power! Oh, come in here! Look at the air! Key to your Oh, show me the power! Oh, look at him!

Look at him! KTR, KTR! Whoa! Holy shit. Double Marisha. I know! Oh my god, triple Marisha. Triple Marisha.

I should land this. Triple churned. By the voice of the tempest, halt this into the deep, rumbling earth, cracking sound of the voice, and castsest. Halt this! Into the deep, rumbling earth, cracking sound of the voice, and casts Mass Cure Wounds. You can see many of the wounded around suddenly come to bear. Any of you who've taken damage from previous anything?

Yeah. I just hope she doesn't get fucked up, and then I don't know if we're there yet. I don't know if we're there yet. My character's tonight. What if they all die? What if they all die? Including the new one.

I know. 35 points of healing. Amazing. Anybody else hurt? I mean, yeah, but I don't think we're there yet. No, you're not there. You shouldn't see it. I'm going to be crazy. Is there still, like, there's a cover over this whole thing?

Like a protection? A slight barrier? You don't see one at the moment. I don't know what that was. As she lands, Ludinus looks down and smiles. Right on time. No. And he just says,

You guys. No, casts Power Word Stun on her. She immediately freezes up, turns over, and you watch as Otohan darts out of the shadow. Oh shit, I forgot about her. All three. Oof, oof, oof. Oh no.

Of her echoes that she creates from the back, surround Keyleth, who is unable to move due to Power Word stun. Let's do a full round of Otohan Thul attacks. Right as she comes up, can I let go and attack? Let go and attack? Yeah. She's nice here. I'll say go ahead and roll initiative against Otohan Thul, because this is not a surprise round necessarily. Otohan Thul, by the way, also that red mist drifting off of her body.

Of course. 12. Should we roll initiative two? Y'all got me super-power. Yeah, if y'all want to go ahead and roll initiative on this. Anybody who wants to jump in is nearby. Only you two aren't there. You're rushing there. I'll go with the two of us. Okay, we got it.

This is Otohan Fool versus the troop here in the middle of this way. My target would not be Otohan Fool. No, fair enough. Okay. All right. The 25 to 20. 20.

All right. All right, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. All right. 20 to 15? 17. 15. All right. Oh wait, 17 to 15?

Yeah. All right. So Fearne, you were 15? 15, yes. All right, Oh wait, 17, 15? Yeah. All right. So Fearne, you were 15? 15, yes. All right, 15 to 10. 12. I rolled a 14, but I think it's just Otohan. Wait, you rolled 14 as well?

No, you're part of this initiative, too, since this is now the turn of war. All right, and then who was lower than that? It was Imogen, what'd you get? 12. Imogen? All right. Fuck. It was, Imogen, what'd you get? 12. All right. Fuck.

10 to five. All right, we'll get to you guys here in a minute. So at the end of each round, we'll see how close you can get there. So top of the round, with a 21, is Otohan. Fucker. Fucker. Otohan rushes in. Again. Advantage on the first strike.

Ish to the summit blade. Two 18s. Okay. That would be a lot. So that's going to go ahead and be 1d8. So that's 15. Take your time, Matt. Voice of the Tempest, here we go.

Take your time. She got a lot of hit points, wasn't her, Tully? Is going to go ahead and... Once your Tully's done. She's going to use a Psydice to do Psionic Strike, which does an additional... Just the key. I don't know why.

An additional 14 points of damage on that one. And they have to make a strength save to be knock-prone. She's stunned, so she can't make it. She gets knock-prone. Oh no. At that point there. So now she has advantage on the strikes again, but she does additional damage

to things that are knock-prone. Second strike is going to be... Yeah, that'll hit. Hang on, little girl. Do I see what kind of strikes these are? Are these just melee-type? These are melee strikes. This is a full-on ambush.

This is a piranha feeding. It's just an absolute... That last strike, I'll take half of it. Take half of this last one? Yeah. Last one that she took? Yeah. That would have been

29 damage total, so you would have taken 14. Okay. Don't, don't. Okay. Don't. This one is going to be 20 damage on the second strike. It's going to go ahead and third attack.

That's a crit. That's going to be a sense of 22, 28 points of damage. She has 150, sorry, 126 hit points as an Earth Elemental. How much did you say? 126. 126 hit points as an Earth elemental. How much did you say? 126 hit points as an earth elemental, and then Keyleth's hit points after that. That's how many she just took? No, that's her max as the elemental.

So. Before going back to Keyleth HP. Yeah. Power stun's a rough one. Stun? She can't be killed. I don't think so. That is... We're off. Power stun's a rough one. Somebody else should hit her. If I hit her, I feel like it's going to ruin any chance I have of persuading her to come here. There. You need a fucking good chance.

So that's... Yeah. Okay. With your magic. There, and then she's going to offhand strike with Scream Needle. Do you have Dispel? She used Unleash on Incarnation

to get that fourth strike on that. That is going to be with advantage. Another crit. Wow! What? This is still the same round of attacks? Yes. She gets two for each duplicate, I think.

So she gets six attacks. 24 plus four, 28. Fucking Echo Knights. We should have fucking pinned her down when we had a chance in that little tunnel. I know, I know. She was in between. It wasn't like he could just drop and close it off. She was already moving back.

Yeah. And then is going to go ahead and... Action surge. Yep. There you go. So next attack, advantage. That hits for 21 points of damage. The earth elemental form falls. Fuck. And now on the ground. Yo, what's up? What's up, bae?

Oh shit, sorry. Oh! Look at her mini, it's so pretty. Can you look on the bingo already, or is that done? She circled. She's already circled? Two more strikes. Two more. Jesus Christ.

Yep. That's 15. Can we end this game? Tyler Black Knight's fucking vicious. It's funny it's not even Echo Knight. Two more strikes. Jesus Christ. Yep. Can we end this game? Tele-Echoknight's fucking vicious. It's funny it's not even Echoknight. Is it not an Echoknight? Fuck off. No, that backpack she has gives her the Echoknight abilities. Oh my god. But that is going to be 12, 16. I don't know that. Okay.

Damage. I don't know that. I was just sitting there watching Keyleth die, being watched by Pate, being watched by Lugna. It's going to go ahead and, because you can do it with action, it's going to be another unleash incarnation for another attack. These ladies be killed out there.

She's still going. She's still going. Fucking piece of shit. That is going to bring us to... Jesus H. Fuck. She's not looking great. One round, man. As Otohan goes and

strikes all the incarnations into this frenzy, Otohan goes and strikes all the incarnations into this frenzy. The earth elemental form cracks, and then what was once shale and pebble becomes red blood scattering on the ground. As Keyleth lies, frozen, eyes wide, Otohan goes for a heart strike, and there is a dark flash in the air.

You see where Otohan's blade was. Instead, you see a cloak of feathers. Oh! Jesus. What? Fuck, what the hell? Black raven feathers. Wait, put it with the bingo. Is Vax on there?

You see a masked figure with long- Shut the fuck up, man! Shut up! No fucking way! You cannot be serious! Oh my god, where is it? She is now standing over and protecting her body. Daggers in each hand.

Don't you even dare. Oh my god! Oh my god. Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god! FCG, your turn. What are you talking about? What are you talking about? Oh my god.

Oh, I forgot to bring over the facts figure. Fuck, I'll be right back. What do you think about what we'll do? What do you mean we'll bring it back? No, don't leave him here! What do you mean? Fuck. What? Where? What we'll be right back? What do you mean? What?

What is happening? He's dead! He's already dead! He's unhinged! You can't do this! Champion! He's going to start bringing in, he's going to bring in characters from campaigns we don't even know about! Who's that? Paul Leechitt. Okay, wait, I'm sorry.

Who am I helping here? Is there going to be any other characters besides Marisha and Leottes? It's just Liam and Marisha apparently. Who am I helping? Am I helping the Ashari woman who seems to be almost dying? Well, she's being helped by a... Sure, but she seems on death's door. I'm a raven man now. Another skyship comes and it's Fjord and Jester!

Flew in from the ocean. I thought you said 40 Jesters. By level 20, that might be possible. Oh, technically. FCG, what are you doing? I want to help the woman who just got rocked, because I know that that's Orym's Bey. But I mean, other than healing her a little,

I don't think I could do much. I feel like if she gets a turn, she's going to probably be able to do something good or get out of there, right? Oh, she's a little tiny druid, theoretically. All right, I'll jump down. With her fucking nose. And scoot forward towards the fight.

Yeah. Make an acrobatics check for me, if you don't mind. Oh god. Please, god. Guidance myself. All of this lewdness is just up there. What the fuck? Acrobatics? There's no fucks waiting for my turn. It's like 11.

11? 11's enough to land and not drop on your ass. You need to do 10. There's only a 10-foot drop. So you land and you wheel over and you're now over the base of the ground over there. You're about 15 feet from the Voice of the Tempest. I want to help her,

but I don't think I can do anything that would do anything. So yeah, I'll... No, there's, well, nope, can't help. I mean, I can dispel his collar, but... Do that. I don't even know who that man is! Yeah, but...

What are you doing, FCG? Or what his collar is. He's been real strong, though. FCG. Who's he? What you doing, buddy? Caleb? Oh yeah, is. He's been real strong, though. FCG. Who's he? What you doing, buddy? Caleb? Oh yeah, you weren't here. We weren't here to meet them. I don't know that man.

You told me that there was some people. I don't know what's around his neck. I said a ginger. I said a red-haired man. Sure you did. Sure you did. What'd you do in FCG? Who is clearly a villain, because he's being called a guy. Do I have any sense

that this collar around his neck is magic? Based by the glowing runes that are currently affixed around the throat, yes. Okay, I will dispel the collar. Okay, go ahead and roll a d20 and add your spellcasting modifier. This is a very high DC because it is a very high enchantment.

Okay. Oh boy. I don't think that guidance works on a war. Okay, 13. 13. You go ahead and unleash the Dispel, and you watch the runes glow, and then lock themselves in place.

It wasn't high enough to break it. Sorry. That's fine. Yeah, yeah. That's fine. It's a good shot, good shot, though. It's a chance for a turn. You know that it reacted. Uh-huh. That's it, that's my turn.

Finishing it, I should just go? Orym, you're up with Fearne on deck. Here's what I would like to happen. We rolled initiative. So much shit just happened. Matt, here's what I would like to happen. What would you like to happen? Let's see if it happens. Orym comes trucking off of this rubble like a ramp,

and with the boots of striding and springing, leaps and in the air, grasping by into that, and I want to swing down and land right next to Otohan. By all means. Action surge, because I assume that took action and movement to do that much.

From there, well, it was running the leap and then the grab on that as a 20-foot pull. Okay. Make an acrobatics check for me. This will let me know whether or not you have to use your action to do so or not. That is a 15. 15? That's good enough. So you run and leap off with the boots, use that vine to pull you an arc around, which gives you the arc of movement without having to, because it's a bonus action to

use the vines. So you land there, you still have your action. Okay, so I land behind, and I pass by a feathered angel on the way by? Yep. Land behind Otohan. So attractive. I'm busy, I'm busy. I'm right behind Otohan. I want to slash the fuck away at the contraption

on her back and break it to shit. Okay. So go ahead and make two strikes. Hits, 18 plus nine. Okay, 18 plus nine, yes, that does hit. And I'm just, I'm not even trying to hurt her. Yeah, just the defense. I'm just trying to wreck that thing.

That is 12 points. 12 points of damage. Next one also hits, 16 plus nine. That hits as well. Like, literally, you have to have a 25 to hit this. Okay, that's 10 points of damage. 10 points of damage? Is it still holding in place?

It's still holding in place. Action surge. You see it's starting to spark, and Otohan already is looking over the shoulder. Action surge. Okay. That is a 22 to hit. 22 does not hit, unfortunately. Misses. Shit.

It is barely holding on from what you can see, but you go ahead and strike a second, and Otohan backs up, parries one blade, and then with the other arm, captures your other sword, and holds your other attack in place and goes, Don't you even dare interrupt. Not one more time.

It's the end of my turn. Okay, finishing Orm's go. Fearne, you're up. Fuck. All of her duplicates are doing the same thing. Oh, I take 14 points of damage. All right, all right. You do, yeah.

Oh dear, okay. Ah! All right, all right, all right, all right. What we're going to do here is, I'm just going to peek around. Just so you know, it's got three hit points, so. Is it too late to make the, can I make the final one a goading attack

so that she can't hit and so that she's, I'll allow it. Fuck, you will? Because it's still her, technically. So two things have to happen if you allow that. She has to make a wisdom saving throw to see if the goading attack succeeds, and it's eight more damage. Or it's a roll.

Okay, go ahead and roll. If it's three or higher, you destroy the dice. It's one. Oh! Oh my god! It is a 14 on the wisdom saving throw. She got a 14? Yeah. Then she's a disadvantage on anyone else, except for me.

You got it, okay. Oh boy. Fuck. All right, that changes. So close. All right, Fearne. All right, all right. I know, it's so close. Are the Root of Storm,

they're just glowing and fizzling, or are they going away from us right now? I think so. All right, where's Otohan? Are they more powerful? Otohan is right here with the three echoes right there. Okay, so I've been seeing what Orym has been trying to do with the pack.

So I am going to peek out from behind. Oh, hi. Just my head. I'm going to keep my legs. Beep, over here? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then shoot Scorching Rays at the pack. Yeah, go for it. Come on, roll high, bish. Roll high.

Higher than you've ever rolled before. It is. Three separate rolls. Three chances. She'll be okay. She'll be three chances. Not that one. Garbage. Probably not that one ever rolled before. Three separate rolls. She'll be okay. She'll be three chances. Not the garbage. Probably not that one. Absolute garbage. It rolls. 14. 14 misses, unfortunately.

Here we go. Come on, Rich. That's worse. Two go wide. Here we go, this is the one. Natural 20. Just absolute, absolute disgust. Get rid of that, guys.

Oh, I'm so hard to control. Yeah, no, but it's a very specific, small part of the back that's already hidden by a cloak, and you could disable part of her skill set to do so. That's all right. Mister? Yeah? Lock and load, baby. Shits into a gun.

Please, this monkey shooting. Okay, he's going to take some shots. He gets one shot, right? He gets two, I believe. Ooh, the flame seed? No, maybe not. Let me just make sure this is getting a little carried away here.

Can I? There's not a monkey in this. It's one. Almost, just like a goose. Carry me. That was my... So I can watch through Pâté's eyes. That was my plan.

All right. Sorry, it's just one. It's just one. Go ahead and roll a d20. Okay. Mister, don't fuck around. I'm going to laugh until this monkey gets the shot. 17. God damn it. It's got to be 25.

It does like. I was like, what? What a dumbass turn. What? No, I mean, we're... I'm going to stay tucked in there. I'm going to stay tucked in. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

To get it up there. It's a good idea. All righty. So Liliana's go. Ugh! Jesus. Liliana is looking at Ludinus, the energy drifting off of her,

and witnessing all these things, this culmination of so much work, so many things through the years, and also you being here and the conversation, and she just looking at you. She's going to hold her action. With that, it is now Chetney's go with Imogen on deck. Is it not Ashton's?

They're still running. At the end of the round, they haven't got there yet. At the end of the round, they go ahead and put themselves in initiative. Can I, as I'm running, too, a mirror image? Okay, got it. So Chetney. So I crawled 15 feet up the telescope.

Yep. All right, see y'all. 15 feet up, invisible. Come on. I'm going to, hybrid transformation, turn into a werewolf. Okay, so you are no longer invisible. No longer invisible, and I am going to use the claws that are like,

and I'm going to and jump, and I'm going to try and backpack onto the back of Ludinus. Roll an athletics check to climb the rest of that distance. You have advantage because you're in your woven form. That is a 24. 24 will succeed as you climb up the side here,

and you're going to leap towards Ludinus. Okay. I have his stuff right. The gods do not deserve it. Oh fuck! I know, right? You said something about natural predators. Ooh! Oh!

All right, so you're trying to grapple him? I am trying to strength grapple his hands to his side if I can. I know it won't do much, but I'm just doing it and getting those fingernails in there if I can. Just. Okay, so you're, okay, got it. Restraining his hands and trying to keep him

from doing all this shit. All right. From being in the car wash. All right. I'll say for the purposes of this. Yeah, I would have to go do this. I love that. This is going to be Athletics check versus his AC.

Because this isn't just a grapple which stops him from moving. You're trying to actually bind his arms for the moment. And for that sort of targeting, it's going to be considered an attack roll, technically. So it'd be a athletics check versus his AC. I usually have advantage in the hybrid form, but do you want to do it a straight roll?

No, you have advantage. Okay. So you leap down towards him. It's a 19. Ooh, nice. 19 is his AC. Uh-oh, he's falling. Shield. Ah!

Oh, no! You leap towards his back, and right as you jump towards it, he's looking out this way and he goes, and you watch as this field skid across the top and slide over. Oh no! As you go over the top, you get one upside-down glance of lewdness

just scowling at you as you begin to fall down. Oh no. Oh no. I thought I got harpooned on the floor. Well, I need you to make a dexterity saving throw. Okay, okay, that's fair. Go hard or go home. Natural one.

Oh no! He's going to get harpooned! Ah! Just going to hammer her real quick. This is going to shit. Real fast. You take 12 points of piercing damage and are currently restrained

as you are now partially impaled on a section of the Malleus Key. This is okay. This is okay. This is okay. Only half to six, because it's piercing. Yeah, fair enough. Yeah, okay. Yep, but just through you. You know, if you get yourself off of this,

the wound will start to close a little bit. Just out of curiosity, because I'm laying there like, from where I am, can I see any glowing parts of the telescope from that point, or is that piece higher than where Ludinus was? The glowing parts of the telescope? I mean, it's... The gray glowing part? Like the angular piece that was on...

The dodecahete on it. Yeah, just out of curiosity. It is fitted just below here, so it's about 10 feet away from you. That I can totally reach as my thorax is impaled. Yeah, that's the issue. But that was good. That was a worthy sacrifice.

Good shot. Imogen, you're up. Oh god. Mama? Oh god. Can you hear me? Yeah, I'm going to step out so I can see what the fuck's happening. Okay.

And I'm going to try to help out Orym and Witch Bolt the pack. Okay. On Otohan. So because Otohan did turn to parry the weapon, you do now have a view as she spins, the cloak's up in the air

and you see the damaged, cracked device. Go ahead and roll for Witch Bolt. You are invisible, technically. So you would have advantage on the strike. You would break invisibility, though. Okay. That's, well, a 21. Hey!

It's got to be 25. 21 and 14 is nice. Oh! I didn't know if maybe it got to be 25. 21 seems nice. Oh! I didn't know if maybe it had a better view. No, unfortunately, the Witch Bolt goes wide and hits the ground and arcs off, burning the ground around you. You're drawn to Otohan's attention.

Otohan looks back at you and you can see she's trying to speak into your mind, but there's just a blank there. The person you are trying to reach is not available. Does that finish your turn? Yeah. You're like, blank there. The person you are trying to reach is not available. As I finish your turn? Anywhere you want to take a shot at Demogorgon's mom for that concentration? For my bonus action. Worry that a lot.

I'm going to say, into Mama's head, I'm going to say, Help me. Because I'm visible now. You are? I'm going to look up at her. Yeah, she sees you on the ground now. Make another persuasion check.

Man. Loop to Vader, here we go. I'm scared of all my dice. Mama, Janice Joplin. Oh god. Really? Really? Yeah, that's where we're at. She looks down at you,

with this sad look in her eyes, and the tear crawling from her cheek as the tear drifts off, joining the rest of the glowing energy and mist around her. She says back in your head, This is for the best. Dude, they're about to be raptured. I think you're totally fucking right.

Does that finish your turn? Um. Let's see. I'm going to use my bonus action. Just use your bonus action and say, Doctor Her. I'm going to stay on where I am. It's all good.

All right. That brings us to Ludinus' turn. Ludinus, looking down at all of this happening before him, smiles. Grins over the space and says, And now, the final piece, the sliver of divinity, the lens. He snaps as he reaches his other non-withered hand

back into the device, as the Lyanna who's holding her action goes ahead and casts a spell down towards the Champion of Ravens. You watch as suddenly all the mirrors on the side of the tunnel turn on at once and these bright beams of energy shunt into him like hundreds of reflecting mirrors.

He triggers something within the machine, and you watch as the champion screams out in pain and is compressed down into a sphere of dark shadow. He, he, he? Vax is pressed into just a sphere. Liliana lifts it up with her telekinesis and places it into the empty spot of the machine. Oh my god. Oh my god.

And now, you see sparks shooting off parts of the machine, the power's not quite there, and he's like. Did we hear a boom go off behind us yet? Mm-hmm. The explosion that I might hit, and you see other parts of the power powered down, and he's like. It'll have to do.

It is time, my children. And right as you look up, you can see there's other skyships beginning to appear. Oh, what? Different Vasselheim and other forces have begun to arrive, just as the red moon glows above. Oh my god. You watch as every Ruid is born in the chamber. just as the red moon glows above.

You watch as every Ruidus born in the chamber stands tall, including Imogen, as red energy filters out into the center of the spire. It's being drawn in and glowing, just all of these living batteries all pouring into the center device as it begins to rise and crackle before. Oh, cool!

The energy begins to gather and form. Seludanus glances up. Let us destroy what will unmake them. And you watch as this incredible, thick beam of red energy fires up into the sky. It lights up and sends every cloud scattering out of visible sight up into the air, up towards the red moon of Ruidus. You watch as all the skyships that were just about landing begin to crumble with the force blown away from whatever fires up into the darkness.

In that moment, Ludin is still holding his other arm into the machine, smiles, his eyes wide. A thousand years. You couldn't stop me. You couldn't. Some of the machines spark, but he's like, he looks a bit nervously, and then swallows deeply.

It's too late. It's too late! The red begins to glow brighter and brighter. It's too late! It's too late. What is happening? The red begins to glow brighter and brighter. You watch as all of the tethered Nexus energy, all the converging power of the ley lines begins to spark and grow lighter and lighter. Magical energy begins to flow out in all directions.

The sky goes from pitch black to a deep red to a multicolor explosion of magical arcane energy into white. A familiar white. MATT and LAURA say, MATT and LAURA say, MATT and LAURA say, MATT and LAURA say, The high-pitched whine subsides, and your vision comes back to you. Images racing in your head of

what happened. It is confusion. It is a pain, a fog, a fugue. Vladna, you glance around as your vision comes to, You glance around as your vision comes to, and you see yourself sitting on the edge of a rocky cliff, almost. The smell that hits your nostrils is sulfurous and

acrid, acidic almost. It's hard to describe. You're unfamiliar with it. And you look around you and there are these pools of strange colored liquid under the shadow of night. Only the things in your close proximity you can make out with your predilection

to experience the dark. But you're in an unfamiliar landscape. It seems terrestrial. You look to your left and you see Ashton half-draped over this outcropping. You come to consciousness a bit and shake your head and look over and see Laudna. You both see this almost like chasm space below you.

You can see these little bits of natural geysers like poofing, steamy water. Ashton. We won, but we did it. What the? Where are we? Where is everybody? You glance upward, and you see about 10 feet up,

slowly sitting upward, Orym. Orym, you almost fall off the edge of this cliff as you catch yourself and look down, and you see some rocks tumble, and you can see Ashton and Laudna, both separate below you, about 10, 15 feet. Orym? I started looking for the voice of the Tempest as well.

What is this? I don't know. Do I have Pâté with me? Pâté isn't with you. We're okay, though. We're not hurt, we're not. No more than you were moments ago. Where's everybody else? I'm going to start searching. Perception checks.

26. While they look around, I look up. Does this cosmos look different? The stars look familiar. Little bits of clouds. You glance around and don't see anybody else around you, but as you look up and you scan the horizon, in some distance, you see, just above the cloud line,

the red moon Ruidus standing, and a singular solid red beam that just vanishes below some sort of far-off mountain line. We were in a pit, but now it's endless landscape? You are in some sort of odd valley-like chasm with no light beyond the starlight, so you can't make out much more than the details that are immediately around you.

I don't understand what you mean by red beam yet. Meaning you just see Ruidus off in the distance. He's away, we can't see him. With just a red beam that's just sustained beneath it. Are we even still on Marquet? Oh god. Why the three of them? FCG.

Oh. You hit something soft. You look around and it's the faintly dawn light cresting over some direction. You gain your bearings and you look around you and you reach your arms in this crowded dust or sand, but it's white.

It's like fine crystal, like a snow. You reach around and pull yourself up, but your wheel scoots a little bit in this weird crystal desert landscape. No features? Is it dunes? It's just white dunes. And the sky above me? The sky above you is stars

and the slightly rising sun. And I just look all 360 all around me. Anything in the distance? Any clouds? Anything? No, it's a clear sky. No cacah, no ruidus. I have no idea.

Clear sky, no features, sand. It's just dunes. Oh, I'm choked. The sun's up. But the sky, are there stars? There's stars features, sand. Just dunes. The sun's up. But the sky, are there stars? There are stars above, yeah. And do they look the same, or are they, I wouldn't? Make a nature check or survival check. Jump.

Nature is terrible, four. You have no idea. You have no idea where you are. I'll just try to move around a bit and see if anything. You scoot up the dune a little bit and head over the top, and the first thing you notice is there are these rocky outcroppings,

like the occasional, what looks like built-up cliff sides or mountains that pierce the middle of this tundra around you, this almost snow-fallen desert. You can see mountains far in the distance. Make a perception check for me. Guidance. 26.

26. You see, from where you're standing, you get the highest dune you can in the space, and you can see, in one direction, there is this endless, snow-covered desert, it looks like. The air itself is cold. You see to the east of you, this large snow-capped mountain range.

To the south, you can almost see this heavy snow-covered forest that seems to just spread out. And in the northern direction, you see what looks to be an ocean. You also, with a high enough perception check, glance down and you see, slowly digging their way out of the snow, Fearne.

Fearne, oh wait, she was rudisborne. Fearne! Fearne! Hi. Is it still you? How would I know? Is she glowing? Is red dust coming off of her or anything?

No, not that you can see. Where are we? We're in the snow. Are you cold? No. No. I'm going to look around. Where, where, where, what? I don't know. Is anyone else around?

I'm going to look around for anybody. Orym? You begin to yell and shout out, and Chetney, you hear them call out just as you're figuring out your bearings, and Imogen, as you feel your vision return, begin to hear these shouts as well, as you both begin to climb opposite sides of this dune

to meet up with the other two, FCG and Fearne. Where's Orym? I don't know. Where's Laudna? Where are you? Where's Orm? Where we? I smell around. Do I pick up any scents of Orym, Ashton, Laudna, anything on the wind?

Make a perception check for me. I'm looking up at the sky. I'm looking for Ruidus. 20. No scent of Ruidus. No scent of your missing friends anywhere. But as you glance around the horizon, you know where you are. You're in the middle of the Crystal Sands tundra. And from where you stand to the east,

you see the Flockhead Mountains, where your hometown of Uthodurn resides. And that's where I finish tonight's episode. Oh! Yeah! Where are we? Oh my god! Where are we? Who the fuck knows? You split the party. Yeah. Holy shit, Matt.

Why did, why did? The beam is still in the sky? We can still see the beam and the moon. Yeah. So we still have visual. Yes, you do. But you guys are on the other side of the fucking planet. We are. Where's Uthodurn? Wait. We are a thousand miles away.

I need a North Pole. Maybe. Like the North Pole? Get in close. Fuck. Oh my god. Who has the sending stone to Beau and Caleb? I will note to all of you, which I should have remembered in this,

amongst the stars in the sky, you do still see the glowing, gossamer-like auroras of the Ley Lines and the still very present apogee solstice setting across the skyline. What sent us away? Where did we go, R'garde? But we'll pick up there next time. Oh my god.

Oh, I should have mentioned, too, when she did telekinesis, he reappeared. So he wasn't fully banished, but couldn't do anything in time before all this went off. Okay, okay. Thank god Ira's okay. I just want to make sure you know that. It's important. Okay, good to know you know.

Did Vax die again? The champion of the Matron of Ravens became a spherical lens that was put into the telescope before it went off. Used the tempest as bait and we played into it. Cool. Played right in. We called her in. We called her plane-righter in. Oh boy.

All right, I'm done! All right, on that note. He shot through the beacon. He used the beacon, so maybe the beacon... This is coffee, coffee table talk. Yeah. We'll save it for while we're fucking up and back. We need an aftershock. Yeah.

It's almost like we have one, but nevertheless. I think we'll go ahead and finish there tonight. We'll pick up next time. Thank you so much for joining us. We love you very much. Eight years! Happy eight-year anniversary. And is it Thursday yet? Good night. Thank you for listening to Critical Role. We hope you enjoyed that exciting adventure and want to

come back for more. If you did, well then please leave a rating and review wherever you stream the Critical Role Podcast Network. Word of mouth is the best form of advertising, and maybe your experience will encourage another listener our way. Well, see you next time.