Critical Role - C3E86 Doorways to Darker Depths

Episode Date: February 29, 2024

Bells Hells stumble upon a secret entrance to Exandria from Ruidus, but this lucky portal leads to a place just as dangerous as the one waiting for them in the sky... 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, Hexany Audio, Ghiya Rushidat, Karam Salem, Neal Acree, and Colm R. McGuinness"Welcome to Marquet" Art Theme by Colm McGuinnessAdditional Music by Universal Production Music, Epidemic Sounds, and 5 AlarmCharacter Art by Hannah FriederichsAnimated Introduction by Kamille Areopagita, Kevin Areopagita, Mark Adams and Peggy Shi 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

Here at Critical Role, we love telling stories and making narratives come to life, which is why we're so excited to share that we're bringing a new semi-improvised fiction podcast into the Critical Role fold with our show, Midst. Journey to the small desert town of Stationary Hill on the planet Midst and follow the intertwined lives of three complicated antiheroes as they deal with unsolved murders, cult brainwashing, supernatural darkness, and, oh yeah, their moons suddenly falling from the sky. Ugh, freaking moons, they're so unreliable these days. The story's created by an extremely talented group of friends known as Third Person.

These playfully omniscient, fourth-wall-breaking narrators describe all the action, play every character, and take an unorthodox approach to storytelling that really makes the experience come alive. Look to the Midstle of the Week, that means Wednesdays, for new weekly episodes at midst.co, your favorite podcast app, or Critical Role's YouTube channel. We hope you enjoy this amazing story as much as we do. Hello, bees! This is Laura Bailey, here to welcome you to the Critical Role podcast.

If you'd like to tune into the show as it airs, you can watch Critical Role Thursdays at 7 p.m. Pacific on twitch.tv slash criticalrole and youtube.com slash criticalrole. Our lovely Twitch subscribers can view the episode on demand right away. Or you can find it on YouTube Mondays at 12 p.m. Pacific. And of course, for all you fantastic podcast listeners, Critical Role episodes hit feeds on Thursday mornings, a week after the episode first airs.

With all that said, let's get into another episode of Critical Role. Hello, everyone, and welcome to tonight's episode of Critical Role, where a bunch of us nerdy-ass voice actors sit around and play Dungeons & Dragons. We don't ask! Don't ask. Before we get to our episode tonight, we do have some announcements to make, including our new sponsor, SAM. We have a new sponsor, if I recall correctly, and they actually make these really amazing. Maps! They make maps! Our sponsor has an incredible Patreon page, offering subscribers access to more than 4,000 beautiful,

oh, sorry, hand-drawn maps. Show one of the maps over there, Travis. With more being added every week. Oh! Gorgeous. Look at these amazing maps. They're so beautiful! Actually really gorgeous.

Yes. Wouldn't you like to know the name of the site? Yeah, please. The name of the site is called Chepekoo. Each map pack includes up to 10 variants, including time of day, weather, and magical effects. Grab fantasy battle maps for Dungeons and Dragons, Pathfinder, and any other fantasy TTRPG

to take your game sessions to the next level. Whether you're running a classic dungeon crawl, or something offbeat like a kobold brewery, or a giant elder brain skull. With Cheppoku. Cheppoku. Cheppoku. The maps will have the imagination to match yours. What's happening?

Why are you two dancing? Oh, I'm sorry, Matt. I didn't know we needed a reason to express our emotions through the power of dance. Word. No, it's just that whenever emotions through the power of dance. Word. No, it's just that whenever you say the name of the sponsor, Chapecoo. Whenever we say it, Blazing Hot Music plays.

Yeah, Matt, that's because the sponsor has a bumpin' name that gets the booties. Droppin'. And the booties. Droppin'. And the homies. Poppin'. But that's not all they have. Their archive is bursting with more than 4,000 battle maps and variations, like these.

Look at this! Oh, that's where we were supposed to hold them up. Oh, that's nice. Weiss is good. That was great. And if you, okay, put them down. And if you subscribe to their Patreon at the $5 Master Cartographer membership tier,

you can get access to the whole lot. That legitimately does sound amazing. It does, actually. I just, I don't really understand the dancing thing. Did they ask you specifically for that? Who, Matt? The sponsor. Why won't you say their name, Matt?

I can't, I just don't. Say it, bitch! Fine. Chapecoo! Chapecoo. Chapecoo. Chapecoo works seamlessly on most popular virtual tabletops, including Alchemy RPG, Roll20, Encounter+,

Foundry VTT, Fantasy Grounds, and more. All the maps are also available with walls and lighting presets for Foundry VTT, letting you jump straight into the action and level up to the $10 tier for dynamic animated maps, animated maps, that set the scene for campaign-defining encounters. Head over to Patreon, choose your membership level,

and get your adventures started. Go to www.shapercool.com slash Critical Role. Matt, back to you. Oh, oh, oh. Yeah, yeah. Shapercool. Okay, all right, great.

That was awesome. It just stops. Oh my god. My god. Yeah, yeah. Cheap-a-coop! Okay, all right, great. That was awesome. There's no end. It just stops. I almost skipped. Oh my god. My god. Wow, great work. What? Great. Why do you do this to us every week?

I'm so sweaty right now. Perfect, well, thank you, Cheap-a-coop, for sponsoring that insanity. Laura, you got some announcements? Da-da-da-da-da-da-da! Da-da-da-da-da-da! Almost as impressive as. It is.

What is it? Our Luxon Beacon Oversize D20. Ooh! What? Oh, dude! We're doing this? It's available in the US, the UK, and the EU. It's our third Everything Dice collab! Yay!

And this one. You guys, they put so much stuff in these boxes. It's so beautiful. Is it available at Rueides? Ah, sure. This is... In your dreams. It contains, I don't know if you can see it, but this, it contains a liquid core.

It's sparkling. It's beautiful. It's hand-painted. I watched my language. It's hand-painted! There's beautiful gold. Oh, wow. I watched my language. It's hand painted! There's beautiful gold hand painting on there. And this beautiful art on the box is by Anna Z. I'm just so in love with it.

That's really cool, actually. Don't look too close, you might see too many possibilities. We might get lucky! There's stuff on the inside of the inside. That's what I'm talking about. Not the liquid core, there's a print. That's what's hand-painted!

Well, you didn't paint it, but. That's so cool! I know, it's pretty great. Anyway, check it out, it's in the store. Send it around! Send it around, motherfucker! That's awesome, thank you, Laura. Stop Bogarting the Die. Marisha!

Ah, we just announced a brand new chapter of Candela Obscura, The Circle of the Crimson Mirror. Premiering next week on Thursday, February 29th. You can check out the trailer right now to get a taste of the three episode arc created by the incredible cast and game master, Liam O'Brien. Woo!

Along with Atalos and Jaff. Oh! Amy Carrero, Alex Warr, Yvonne himself, and Imari Williams. Hell yeah. Join us next week as the Circle of the Crimson Mirror teeter on the edge of survival as their present collides with the threats of the Forgotten Past. Damn! Hell yeah.

Awesome, thank you, Marisha. Liam, you're up. Yeah! Oh my gosh, you guys! The Tales of Exandria II, Artagan has just released its second issue in this four-issue arc. I accidentally wore this hoodie today. So pick up the new issue of this Traveler's Bookie story

at your friendly local comic shop. Ha ha ha ha. How do you actually know me? What are you? I don't know what you became at the end there, but that was great. story at your friendly local comic shop. Ha ha ha ha. How do you actually know me? I don't know what you became at the end there, but that was great. It happened. Like a Muppet. Oh!

Oh. It sounds just like me. You even have my mug. Just a little impressive. Single white female. Oh my god. It's like, who's the twin, right? Single blue female. There you go.

Hurry up, I'm sweating my ass off. Yeah, so hot. We're coming to Seattle. You're sweating your ass off? Yeah. Okay, right? Single blue female. There you go. Hurry up, I'm sweating my ass off. Yeah, so hot. We're coming to Seattle. You're sweating your ass off? Okay, I'll make it quick. We're coming to Seattle for Emerald City Comic Con. Yay!

Join us March 2nd and March 3rd for a panel, photo ops, and more. You can find out all the details at critrole.com slash events. Events. Events. So hopefully see you guys there. And I believe that concludes our announcements. So let's go ahead and jump into tonight's episode of

Where are we? Critical! Critical Role. 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 Be my

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, taking more chances, hold your breath and roll. You can certainly try. It's Thursday night. All ye critters, come join us. It's time to continue our fight

It's Thursday 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 And welcome back.

So, last we left off, Bell's Hells, after arriving on the Redmoon Ruidus, trekked into one of the villages on the outside of the central capital city of Kravirus, encountered some of the locals, made some friends, ran into some enemies, took some out, took some captive, and then in the process of looking for a means of continued travel towards the process of looking for a means of continued travel

towards the city of your destination, some of you ran into Otohan Ful, who has been seemingly progressively on the trail of you since your arrival. Through a brief bit of a chaotic scuffle and an escape, you all whisked yourselves away into the sky and facing an oncoming storm, sought shelter a little ways northward,

or what would be considered north-esque from this small astral body. Upon diving into a nearby chasm, delving into its depths and finding some odd water network, caverns, and continuing to follow this strange source of water, you trekked through these winding tunnels, found a high, splashing waterfall, climbed to the top, and found ancient ruins

emerging from inside this rock-clustered cavern, seemingly from times long forgotten. As you trekked through these ruins and began to look for a way of getting back to the surface or finding a safe space to rest, at the very least, you found some unique elements, lost to time forever, locked in this moment before cataclysm, and then found the source of this burbling river of water that was carving from the rock.

Out of curiosity, Fearne transformed into some multitude combination of various water creatures. No, a sheep-leafed sea slug. Sheep-leafed sea slug, that's right. It just had the function of a salmon. I get that. Yeah, it just looks like that, but it functions like a salmon. Great, thank you for clarifying.

Yeah, yeah. It's just the new, it's like salmon with a new Street Fighter skin. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was good. Yeah, it functions like a salmon. Great, thank you for clarifying. Yeah, yeah. It's like the new, it's like salmon with a new Street Fighter skin. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was good. Yeah, two-player color. Upon pushing through the forceful water, you eventually found yourself in a less cramped space, in a less constantly pressured coursing water.

Clambering upward towards a light source, you breached into what seemed to be an unfamiliar lake beneath a blue and cloud-doppeled sky. Beautiful cold air surrounding forests and mountain tops with white snow dusting across their peaks. That was where you left off. So, Fearne, as you've emerged into this space, what do you do?

Wow. All right, let me turn around and see what's behind me. Is that how a salmon swims? Uh-huh. But these are my leafs, like, fluttering around. Oh, that's right. Yeah, yeah. All right. Like a ball gown.

Make a perception check. Can I turn around and then stick my head under the water to make sure that the portal's still there? Oh, good call. I'll make a perception check to glance for the portal. What you assume to be a portal. Oh! Natural 20! Natural 20, okay.

Glancing beneath the surface, you... So that would be a 29. 29, okay. There is no visible portal from the surface. As you delve down into the dissipating light, the dark depths of this surprisingly deep lake, it's a fairly robust depth to it. As you continue downward, you begin to feel the water

tugging in a direction ever so faintly. And that tells you where, perhaps, this transition is occurring. Down towards the deep, cold, black, mucky bottom of this lake. You can see there are these tangles of various underwater plants that have overgrown and built this space,

this shadowed cluster, almost like a underwater bramble forest that rests across the bottom. Those are nice. You feel the water tugging more and more powerful. And you can see one section about five feet above where some of this twisted, gathered, silt-covered plant expanse is. You can see where the water is slightly manipulated

to the point where the visuals shift into a twist. All right, I'm going to head for that to try to go back through the portal. Okay. You catch up to it, and like setting yourself into a massive river current, you feel the water pulling you forward. You rocket towards it

and immediately come through into the dark underground and then emerge out of the side of the cavern entrance. The rest of you watch as Fearne just kind of onto the rock next to you. Okay. Step up. Foul! In fish form or in Fearne form? We can still hear her thought.

Okay, so. She's like plowing out of the bay. But she's a slug. She's not a salmon. All right. So it's a portal. It's legit a portal. Where? To where? So it looks like a lake. It's legit a portal. To where?

It looks like a lake. I can't really tell, but I think, I didn't want to stay out there just in case. You could eat by a seagull. Something, yeah. So maybe somebody should come. We should figure out where it is. Bring a rope?

I don't know. There's a forest, there's a lake, there's snow-capped mountains. Did it look round? Shit, I didn't even check anything. Did you see exactly how cloudy it was? I think slugs don't see color. It was cloudy, it was really cloudy.

It was really cloudy. Got it, got it, got it. Well, does anyone want to come? That doesn't sound like the moon. It doesn't sound like, it didn't feel like it. I really want to go there and check this out. I also want to sleep for eight hours before we do it, so. Oh no!

I'm so tired. Yeah, that's a good point. I am very tired. I know we got fart form for only a little bit longer, but man, if we go into the warp world. I'm so tired that if you disagree and we get into a fist fight, you might win. Do you want to, Is this a challenge?

No, I mean, I'm sorry. I was on the time! We have some of those berries we can eat. I've eaten all my berries. Not enough. They were really good. Y'all ate your berries? Well, I could go back. No, I didn't, that's right.

I didn't eat my berries. That's right. Did you see anybody eat that? Five berries each? Fearne, was there anybody else? We could send just the- No, I could go back. I just wanted to make sure I could get back to you. We could send just the few of us who are healthy and well-rested.

Yeah, and actually, I'm not too bad. And if something bad happens over there, you can just cast a spell. You've got a spell to cast, right? Yeah, I can spare the dying. Yeah, but how do we know if there's a problem back here? Can I, when I'm dying? Two tugs on the roof.

Why don't I give Fearne my immovable rod? What? Nothing. Okay. I'm a b-boy. I'm a b-boy. Where's my hard-boiled egg? Throw down some cardboard. I'm just saying, y'all fucking scarred me.

I'm trying to be sensible here. It's just a new attempt, throwing it out there. If y'all want to be stupid and crazy, I'm happy to. It's my favorite place to roll. Fair point, Ashton. I mean, we are safe in this pocket. Yeah. All right.

That way, if something goes wrong, which, considering everything that's happened over the last 12 hours, how the fuck long have we been here? You've been here about a little under six hours. So in six hours, we've had what is, on average, three weeks of our own bullshit.

So maybe there's another week of bullshit on the other side of this portal just waiting for us. That's really quite reasonable, Ashton. I cannot believe I'm the voice of reason. This is really gross. So wait, we're going to sleep before we go through? I think we should sleep before we go through. Oh, this could be huge.

If this is a portal to Exandria, this could be our back door. But counterpoint. Counterpoint. If a couple of us go through. Just to see. Just to see, we can actually turn into mist and see where we are in the world,

as opposed to just going through. That's fair. That's also a good point. Shit, that's actually very true. I'm doing remarkably okay. I'm all right on health. I'm just, I have a couple major spells, I think, in me still. I haven't been touched.

I'm okay on health. I've got a little bit of something, but I'm not at... I can pass on, I'm so full of magic right now, I could pass some on to you. Gross. We could funnel. That's right. We could ruinous funnel.

By what method do you do that? I don't know yet. We'll see how it happens, but I imagine it's through the mouth. Mouth to mouth or? Probably. Mouth to ass. Mouth to ass. Like centipede. Centipede style.

Sea slug. Skins like a sea slug. Explains the plumage. Jesus, like. Y' plumage. Um. Jesus, like. Y'all had some days, like. Is it yet? Some fucking. Man, it's getting weird, y'all. A compromise version is sending

me or someone through a fern, firing up, getting a good look around, and then coming back, and then resting in here. Yeah. What happens if we turn into a cloud of underworld? I'm afraid you have a small contingency of a few of us going in. Yes, with the party.

Yes, 100%. That always goes well. How big was the pipe, oh, strange voice in the sky? Six feet across. It's about a fairly rushing like three feet wide or so, like three to two and a half feet wide or so,

like three to two and a half feet wide altogether. So the water's coming out forcefully and then it ends up spreading out into the actual. You have to be a strong swimmer in order to get. Decent. And a pretty small person. Sluggy, how far did you have to swim forward to get to the other side? Not far at all.

I mean, you have to go down to get to this portal, but you go up and you're there. I mean, I didn't have any trouble at all. It's up a peace stream, right? Essentially. A little bit, yeah. Where it emerges from the rock and trickles out into the actual river, you have to go into where it exits

and then push against the stream at a slight angle. Let's make a bold decision. What are we doing? I think it's Orym and Fearne, at least, and maybe Chet, because Chet's small. You are small. And untouched. And untouched, all right. Can you swim? Fuck yeah. I will eat my berries,

just to get me on top of. I think you can float. Oh, you're going to go to Laudna? I know I want to go to Laudna, it's killing me. But a lot of my spells left, because warlocks. What if it's the other side of the moon? Yeah. What's the color of the other side of the moon? Yeah. What's the colors of the sky on Ruidus? I can't remember.

Oh, the sky above, since you've been here, the atmosphere, it's just a black and star-dappled expanse above. So it's like at the very, very top. Then as you look towards the horizon, it becomes this faint pinkish-purple coloration that fades to red as it hits the edges of the mountain ranges.

Is the oxygen, this is above the table, the oxygen trapped under a magical barrier? I think so. Yeah. Probably. Cool. Okay, I'm below the table. I mean, I'll admit I want to go, too, but I think the idea of sending everybody is a bad idea. Yes, especially if people are tired. I'll stay behind.

I really want to go. I really want stay behind. I really want to go. I really want to go. I really want to go, too. How about this? What if we all go? We stay behind, and then five minutes after they go, we go. Well, here's another question. Fearne, how hard was it to swim back? Was it super easy?

I didn't have any problems. So I'm pretty sure. Can we fix the magical rod and have a rope that goes through so that we can, so maybe I can give you the rod and you can still. Dev, Zav, last counterpoint. Counter-counterpoint? Yes. Okay.

We would be taking a long rest on that side that we don't know is safe or secured or what dangers lay beyond. We could do it here and it's just us. Right, this is the hot pad. Yeah. Yes. No, I'm not saying to sleep over there. I'm saying go over, check it out while we're misty form,

come back, sleep here. You're assuming we come back. Yeah. That's the point I'm talking about. That's not a counterpoint. That was the first point. I'm saying we shouldn't go cloud form. We should rest and then go and fuck the Cloudform.

Well. That seems like making decisions out of fear. We need to be making decisions out of confidence. We're on the moon, this is our only shot. Letters has an earring now. They are very confident. Where did you even find that? I found this divot thing and I drilled a hole in my...

Head? Head. I don't have ears. I feel called out, and I am going to agree with you, just out of guilt. And shame. I think I'm learning this therapy thing. Yes.

You can shame your... I'm manipulated and totally on board. You can shame your manipulated and totally on board. You can shame and manipulate your patience. Kind of proud. Let's all go through. We'll turn into clouds and we'll just fly up in the air, see what's going on, and come back. Okay, well, why don't we still affix a rope?

Is there a place to tie a rope off over here? On this side? No. Wouldn't it just go through the water stream? Yeah, we could come on out. Well, we affix a rope on this side and then we fix the immutable rod on that side. That part, I know, but it doesn't need to fix here. It just needs to go through.

That's true. And then I wonder if we could put something flashy on it so it's easy to find in the lake if we ever have to leave and go off somewhere. But what if somebody else came inside? There's nobody else here. Who's going to look on the bottom of a lake for a toilet flush? I got a detailing chisel

that works as a spinner. Giant fish. We have toilets. Oh, damn. Just blacked out. We'll put a hook on it, just in case. I mean, might as well eat while we're here. Is there something we can put outside of it? Entities.

It's not obvious. Ancient demons. Okay, what's going on? We're just going. Wait, but first, I want to get a spell. Oh yeah, oh yes. Can we do this before we go? Yes, how do I give it to you?

Well, that's become a thing. Oh god. What spell are you doing? I'm going to pass. We're going to connect, Ruitously. Oh, okay. So you're giving your spell slots over to... Wait, what if that alerts somebody?

No, it's not going to hurt anybody. But what if it does? We're about to leave Dimension. Why would the Great Heavenly Father above give me this power if it wasn't? If it can't be used? Yeah. Okay, let's do it. I'm going to sit down and try to connect. I think he's cool.

Okay. He's across. I'm going to try to find my red thread. Oh, you're still a fish. Do you need any romantic music to make this happen? Or are you just going to outdo it? I think we just need to focus. I think we need to focus.

And really pay attention to our personal bloody bridge. Yes, yes, very much so. Connected. They're syncing up. They much so. Connected, they're sinking up. They're sinking. We have been sunk up. Let's be real. We were traveling to the moon. The minute that you think about

the siphoning of someone's energy and you willfully release the tether to the magic that you usually hold onto. Rapidly, you feel that immediate siphon into you and you restore the appropriate amount of sorcery points based on the spell slot that she gives up. So what spell slot did you give up? Fourth. Are you give up? Fourth.

Are you okay? Ninth. Yeah, all of them. I just gave them all. Oh, give it to me. Okay, so you gain an equal amount of sorcery points as you would if you had converted your own fourth-level slot. Ma sang. How did that feel? Are you all right?

Yeah, I feel great. I feel great. It didn't feel like? No, it didn't feel like anything. Okay. I mean, there was just a little zzzz thing. And that was it. Ever so faintly winded, if anything, but that's about it. I feel a little tired, actually.

A little sleepy, a little worn out. Do you want one of my dicks? A little slug-ish. Ah! Nice. Oh, you're a teeny slug! I just siphoned energy from a teeny slug. It's okay. How about Good Bear Nibble? Okay.

Okay. Half a hit point. Okay, is there a place to affix the rope on this side, just so it doesn't get sucked away? I'm going to give myself a fourth level back. Okay. Glancing around, there aren't any branches or anything to that degree.

At that point, you could maybe tie it around a rock and leave a rock off to the side, Todd, off the edge of the water. But there aren't a lot of outcroppings that would be good for that, given these surroundings. A lot of the rock around here, at least beneath the water as well,

has been smoothed with mineral and heavy water. Okay. I gave myself a fifth back, I like. Okay. has been smoothed with mineral and heavy water. Okay. I gave myself a fifth back, I like. Okay. I can offer, if we, I cannot believe I'm about to say this. Oh, what is wrong with me?

You're going to leave your hammer? No, we can leave the immovable rod here, and then we can bring my hammer to the other side and tie it off to my hammer. Why, we don't need to leave the... What about titans, pittons, piton? Does anyone have? Chet, do you have any kind of tools

that we could dig into the rocks? Why do we need... Just so the rope doesn't get sucked away. I don't know that we need it, but it couldn't hurt to do it. Yeah, I do. Easy enough to hammer. Wood mallet.

Into the rock you... There you go. I've got some rope. I do. Easy enough to hammer. Wood mallet. Into the rocky, there you go. I've got some rope. You want to go for like 100 feet? Easy. Yeah. I tie the rope onto the immovable rod, hand the immovable rod to the salmon slug. I grab it with a couple leaves. Ready?

Maybe Orym gets in front of you so Orym can hold onto the rod. I get it. Why, why? What form are you right now? I'm a sliver. You can't carry an arcane rod as a slug. Watch me!

Okay. Have you seen how fucking big salmon are? Yeah. Go ahead and make a strength check. Is she the size of a salmon or the size of a slug? I was picturing the size of a slug. I was picturing the size of a salmon, but looking the size of a, I was picturing the size of a slug. I was picturing the size of a salmon, but looking like a slug. I hate this table.

Are you able to turn back into your tall self and then back into a slug? Of course, without a wall. Because that could hide the rod inside of you. Here, you know what? Maybe you should take the rod. Okay. And then I will go. But you'll lead the way.

But I will lead the way. I'll just sit on your shoulder and pull you forward. You're going to, I don't understand the physics of it, but I'm trusting in my friend. Just perfect. All right.

I'll go a little bit in front, but you take the rod. All right, I'd like you both to make strength checks for me, please. You got this. Race the chaos. All right, I'd like you both to make strength checks for me, please. You got this. Race the chaos. Someone guidance me. Guidance! I'm asking for it. Guidance. I'll guide you.

You can't guide in that thing, I assume. You cannot cast Guidance while you're in the room. You can say Guidance, though. Yes, you can. Guidance. Oh. Hey! It's all right. It's going to be okay. That Guidance really is. Mentally.

She can think Guidance. Yeah. All right going to be okay. That guidance really. She can think guidance. Yeah. All right, so what do we got? So. I rolled a two. But the good news is I got a four on the d4, so it's a six. Okay.

No, it's a 10. Oh! Ooh! It's a 10. It's a 10 total. Because I forgot that I actually have modifiers on my sheet. Okay, all right. Look at those. I have 15. Okay.

This is athletics? Yeah. Strength. Wait, did you say athletics or strength? Oh, I think it's a strength check. If it's just strength, then it's, that's not saves, so strength, then it's four. There are six, then it is six.

Okay. Not athletics. Could it be athletics? Sure, sure. It's swimming. No, it comes to the same point that it takes you a while to get there. The two of you together, it's a lengthier journey

than your first endeavor out there. What was a five-minute press against the water becomes a 30, 40-minute, grabbing a hand, holding the hand, hanging on for a second, losing your grip, and having to catch yourself again, pushing against the water as it's forcing yourself back, climbing and climbing.

You know the path in front of you, but you do not. And for a certain point, you begin to wonder, is this a joke, or is this something that we missed? Like, what? Am I in danger? You need to keep coming back for air. Oh, because you still have air. No, you don't. So yeah, you can just keep in this force pulling forward,

but it takes you a while to finally get through and then eventually your hand reaches up and catches it around the side of a lip almost. As you pull, it's not like a hard rock. It's like a weird... Softer? Squishy? Furry? You start drowning, no. It's not like a hard rock. It's like a weird. Softer? Squishy?

Furry? You start drowning, no. It feels like there's a branch or something on the side. You just have to pull yourself forward, and as you do, you emerge from the center of this cavern and into the bottom of the lake that Fearne had described to you. I've never been anywhere like this.

I'm just going to go out of the hole and make sure, float and make sure everybody gets through. Okay, well, the two of you get through. Does anybody else follow it? Oh yeah. Oh, all of us, yeah. Yeah, we're going. I want to give them a minute to see if they can click the rod.

I've started to walk away and find my fortune elsewhere. I can see Chetney doing that, though. Time is precious, I don't have much time. Fuck these guys. He just heads back into the room. Mind argument with a slug, fuck me. Perfect. All right, so able to fix the rod there, and you can feel the water pulling you back in

as you emerge from it. You swim around, clicking it in place, pull back into the water, and you can feel it, you're having to push against the force that's pulling you towards the entrance. You can see the rope get pulled into it, taut and straight. The rest of you, this is probably the same extended rope

that you used for the waterfall, correct? Which would be, you still have about 20 feet of slack come through out the water, and you can see it flickering in the stream as it's marking its way out of the rock. But you all slowly begin to pull your way through the cavern. It is intense, and it's dark,

for those of you who can't see it. Oh, I put the lights in front. Okay, that helps you. Yeah. Well, there's three of us. I will also cast Light. It's one of the few spells I can still cast. There you go. I have darkvision.

Yes. The glass is really... I have dumb vision. Perfect. The arduous journey eventually leads you to the bottom of the lake, where all of you, as a troop, begin to emerge and pull away from the intense draw of this small portal

that you had emerged from. Now, all swimming in this lightless expanse, you begin to clamber up to the surface, where you break. We should be quiet, though. Oh, we're in our brains. We should be quiet, though. We should think quietly. We should think super quietly.

How far to a shoreline? From where you stand here, probably a few hundred feet. I'm going to drop my wild shape. You said lightless, as in there's no celestial bodies in the sky? So the bottom of the lake has very little light, and then as you swim up, there's a little more to it. You get up there and you can see,

there's gray clouds and there's a little bit of dark blue sky peeking through. It has that almost, like the moment in Twilight where the sky is brighter than it is in the darkest points of the evening. I thought you meant Twilight the movie. No, no, no, no, no. Ow!

No! I'm sorry about that. But you can see the little bit of that twilight, like catechist light that hits the bit of the snow that comes across the mountain range that surrounds you and make out the textures of the forests. You can, it's one of those beautifully bold moonlit nights

where the atmosphere around you is very well detailed once you take a moment to let the light in and adjust. But you've been underground for quite some time, so you're already pretty well adjusted to a lack of light. Can we see, I was going to say, Katha. Yeah. Katha's in the sky. Katha is in the sky. Yes. Well. Yeah. Catha's in the sky. Catha is in the sky.

Well. There's Ruidus in the sky. How about Exandria? Or Ruidus. Maybe we're on the other side of Exandria. Do we see Ruidus at all? We couldn't see Catha when we were on Ruidus. Right.

Go ahead and make a perception check. Everybody? Everybody who's looking up there. Everybody. 30. Yeah. Balls. Balls. 30. Oh fuck, right.

22. Goddamn. I eat carrots. Yeah, you do. I just look at Orym expectantly. So whatcha see? The carrots thing? We're probably in. Yep. Whatcha see?

I eat carrots. They don't help your eyesight. They're good, though. They are good. They are good. They don't really help your eyesight? No. Beta carrot team. There was too many carrots during World War II,

and so the Europeans were like, fuck, what do we do with this? And they were like, If the carrot council wants to advertise with us, though, we will say whatever. We will say, yeah, good job. Eat carrots, because then you will be able to see the pilots. We'll turn you us, though, we will say whatever. We will say advertising. Eat carrots, because then you will see the pilots. We'll turn you orange, though.

You do not see any signs of Ruinous in the sky from where you currently are. You can see the bright color of Catha kind of cascading down, and just the hint beyond one of the clouds above, the glow of white as it peeks beyond. You can see the moon starting to shift beyond. There's no sign of ley lines?

There's no sign of the bridge? There's no? Oh, with a 30, you can definitely see the ley lines. Okay, so we're home. This definitely has a feel of an exandria in space. Do we need to be on land somewhere to turn into clouds, or can we do that floating in the middle of the lake?

We might, you know. If we start to do it, though, we'll go comatose for a minute. And then we'll sink. We'll probably sink and die. So we should probably. But we can breathe underwater. But we have water breathing. Sure, but. But what happens if you're a cloud underwater?

Right, maybe we should just go on land. I think we would bubble up, but let's get to land. Follow me! Why mess with the science of it? I just go butt-flash, poke at it. Just making your way towards the curtain. Yeah, go for it. I'll lap you.

Fuck! It's so surprising every time you go. I know, he really just turns it out. It's all the characters. Sure do. You had sex with him. Yeah, I did. Was it good?

Sure. Was it also surprising? Well, yeah, because it was werewolf time. Right. It was great. Get yourself a monster sometimes. You get to try. Oh, it was werewolf time.

That actually tracks way better. Anyway. Slowly. We book up far in advance. I had to be more careful with this. I really am. Following Chetney's wake towards the nearest edge of this lake. Got a rudder.

Okay, okay. Bring it in. Roll, roll, roll. Bring it in. 10% of story, 90% inn it in. Bring it in. 10% of story, 90% innuendo. It's been a trend as of late. That's what she said. Sorry. It's okay.

All right, eventually clambering onto the shore, out of the lake, very dark and muddy edges of it. The silt layer is very thick, and your leg, you can feel your boots sinking into the outside of the waters. Immediately come to the forest line itself, and it's beautiful and pristine. You can just faintly hear the sound of owls

and other evening nocturnal birds just occasionally hooting and calling to each other in the distance. We know those birds. We know those birds from home. Yeah, we're home. Do we recognize the trees? Is it a type that grows in a certain area?

Make a nature check. Oh. I'm going to start misting. I feel like you should check this out. No, no, no, I was going to say I'll assist you. I can assist you, if anything. Like, you know trees better than I do. Only in certain areas, but sure.

21. Okay. You rolled with advantage, right? I did. Okay. Did you roll? I did not. Okay. Okay. So these are a type of pine, higher altitude tree.

Just the atmosphere here. It's chilly once you emerge from the water and you can see there's that evening mist over the lake that you couldn't quite see when you were in it as much. But now as you get out of the water and look upon it, you can see there's this low-hanging mist that drifts just above the water level.

Looking around, this is probably a higher altitude, richer oxygen. Deciduous trees. We're high up. Are there mountain ranges? I think we see snow-capped mountains. No, but on Marquet that we know of? Oh yeah, what mountain ranges do we know?

I mean, you know of a number of them. Like this. None that you've been to. There's, in some parts of Ashannador, have thick forested regions. There's also, I mean, you've seen a number of forests, but nothing that feels like this.

Not from your personal experiences, at least. That's fly. Even the Talon Highlands, up towards where the most southern and highest peak tip of the region, not quite this kind of a topography or biome. And you said we cannot see Rudeus and the bridge? You cannot see Rudeus and the bridge from here.

Once I hit 60 seconds, I want to go straight up. Yeah. Okay, so. Have my wee man eyes and ears detected any kind of movement around us? Any kind of threat? Make a percent point check. That's important. Yeah.

That is a 17. A 17, okay. Great. Well, here. Roll with disadvantage because it's the middle of the night, even with the moonlight that's here. Disadvantage, you say? Yes. Oh, that's worse.

Well, it'd be a single roll for you since you have advantage. I'll take the first one of those I did, so it's 14. 14. 14. You don't see anything shifting or moving around here beyond just the mist hanging in the trees, occasionally shifting with the occasional burst of breeze that comes and presses gently through the region,

but that's it. Okay. Got time. Got time. So heading up. It's been a minute. Okay. Are there any immediate landmarks, especially considering my first notion,

A, are we on an island, and B, does it look like the forests around Whitestone? Okay. As you finish transitioning into your mist form, you all carry high up into the air and looking down, you can see, indeed, this is cradled in the middle of this massive, sprawling mountain range

with all manner of higher regions that are snow dusted and other parts that fall into dark shadow. But from this high up, there's, you know, the texture all just becomes a blanket of gray from a certain height. You don't recognize the region here from sight. This does not appear to be the Alabaster Sierras or any place near Whitestone, at least,

from your personal experience. For all of you, this is definitely a location you're unfamiliar with. Is there maybe even a landmark that I've read about? Can you do that thing? Yep. Make a history check for me. Also from this height, it's all land around us, right?

We're not on an island? I'm not on an island, no. And not a cluster of islands like the Shattered Tees? No. 15. 15? Nothing quite come into mind. I mean, once again, you don't have a very clear perception of much detail beyond just this dark forested landscape.

But from what we can see, it looks like only land. For now. Past a certain point, you start hitting the lower cloud cover and it becomes almost impossible to get a full perspective. But the further away. Game level hasn't loaded yet. Yeah. Yeah. The draw distance is starting to get a little wonky.

No little lights, no tiny cabin lights popping around. Any towns? Make a perception check. I'll roll with every we're allowed to roll. They're alive. I got we're all allowed to look around. Sure, but disadvantage. Unless you have darkvision. Do you want advantage?

Because I was instead of me. I was, it's one, so. Okay, that's better. So that was a good one. Guidance. I'm going to roll a six. Oh, buddy. I'll take Guidance. Get out now. Oh shit. Okay, so. I'm sitting with her. 21. He's assisting me. Oh, buddy. I'll take Guylands. Get out now. Oh shit. Okay, so I'm sitting with her.

21, so he's assisting me. Yeah, I'm assisting. 21. What the fuck is that? You don't, in this region, you do not see any sort of noticeable light source, but you do see from this height, what looks to be structures built on the, not quite the full opposite edge of the lake,

but maybe a third of the circumference away. And the lake itself has a, goddammit. Oh, wow. I just realized what that's about. I did, too. Ah. It's to do. Ah. It's really unfortunate. Really.

You're fighting to hold onto this narrative tonight. You're doing it. You're doing it. The lake shape has this oblong, almost kidney shape to it, and from where you initially took off into the air, it's about a third around, you can see there are a cluster of structures.

It looks like a village. It's dark, but you can see the buildings present. Yeah, no, you're right. That looks like a thing. Can we just head that direction and see if we can see something? Yeah, we absolutely have to know where we are. And how long do we have left of this?

Like an hour and change. Okay, okay. One to two. About two hours left of this, yeah. That's a long day. Okay, okay. Not a long day. No. Longest day.

All right, let's go to the structure. Okay. Rapidly, you all coast down to this area, and as you head above it, it is a modest village, probably of about no more than 150 structures together. As you can see, there are four different small lake docks that carry about 20 or so feet out into the lake. There's walkways and there's

what looks to be just neighborhoods. Very, very simple. A lot of it built from wood and logs taken from the surrounding forest. But it is still, there's no lights lit up at the moment. It's just a quiet, sleepy silence. Do we see any people wondering about? Any late-night stragglers?

Not at the moment, no. Let's get in and take a good look. Yeah, it has little clouds. Yeah. Peeking a couple windows. Windows open, yeah. Are we going to be creepers? Yeah.

Yeah. Okay. As you all come down to street level here, we're going to bring this into a... Oh. Since we're no longer in the cavern, we're coming down into the evening portion of this area. You begin to coast through the streets

and you can see there are many windows closed, some that are open, some doors that are partially ajar. No warm hearths inside, or hearths inside any of these buildings. It is just dark and still. Does it look abandoned? It's looking pretty abandoned, and a lot of it looks like it's been

just falling to the elements. No light sources whatsoever. On the structures, any kind of water wheels near the water or signs of industry or agriculture? Any signs on buildings? Like, welcome to blank population zero? Or plague go away? No plague signs.

You do see some buildings that are labeled. You do see some buildings that are labeled. Very simple, nothing presentory like major cities. Mainly just for function. You see one that says Fishmonger, another that says General Supply. It's written in common? It's written in common.

Are there supplies in the General Supply Shop? Is it empty or is it still stocked, just dusty? It's deeply dusty and still carries some supplies that are long untouched. Are there any signs that the dust has been disturbed at all? Fucking stoked right now. Make an investigation check.

Fuck. Also, I want to look and see if there's any job, like post boards or..., or town hall, anything that looks more than a store that would have records or writing. Yes, 100%. Do they have a judicial branch and a legislative branch? Yeah, are they a three, two-party system?

Ours. 11. 11. This is 14 different avenues where this was checked. Yeah, I know. I can rewind if you need, so. No, this was checking for supplies. I was in the supplies.

Also, I want to know if the layer of dust has been disturbed or if there looks like not long accumulated. Not long, I assume. You can see it looks like not long accumulated. You can see it looks like, it looks very much like a village that was once thriving and just everyone's gone. And they didn't, it seems like,

while they didn't leave immediately, they didn't necessarily pack crazily. There's just stuff there. Just throwing it out there, what if we're in some sort of alternate dimension or some sort of upside down-y situation where... Or time travel-y thing. Okay, the two of you that are searching for more of a

place of records, a hall of records, both of you make investigation checks for me. I mean, the ley lines are up there. I was asking if there was water wheels or any signs of industry. Right, yes. I sure could if I had the ability to cast that spell as a crowd. Guidance. Oh.

There isn't a water wheel necessarily because there's no river that flows into here directly. It looks like a lot of this is just based in snow melt that comes down off the local mountains. So it's like small brooks. There's actually numerous brooks that lead to this river, but there's no massive river with enough of a stream that would make a water wheel functional.

But you do, from an industry standpoint, you see there is a smaller, modest lumber mill. You can see that there is more, less for commerce and trade and more for local use. You can see there are small... Word escapes me. There's no massive farming land, but there are many gardens.

Almost every house has its own kept garden. But the gardens are deeply overgrown and lush in a way that only gardens that have been left Gardens are deeply overgrown and lush in a way that only gardens that have been left to the elements in a very moist and healthy place would just go for a while. Does it look like farming and vegetables and fruits that we know? From what you can tell, yeah.

You see tomatoes, you see all manner of cabbage and leafy greens. You see strawberries and other fruits, basic but just vibrant and spilling off of each garden box and gathering scattered around. Everything looks like it's been left to nature. And you can see there's elements of fungus that have taken in the moisture and grown over parts of the wood. it's been left to nature. And you can see there's elements of fungus that have taken in the moisture

and grown over parts of the wood. Some buildings have started to fall in a little bit. You can see the roofs are starting to collapse a little bit. Holes left in the structure. No animals, no birds, no woodland squirrels. We said we could hear birds. You can make a perception check if you'd like. For those who were investigating, what'd you roll?

I rolled bad, four. 18. 18. It's okay. This village doesn't have a massive record hall. It's, you know, it feels, especially the space, isolated enough where there's no massive central place there, but you do eventually find some sort of a clerk's office

containing books and records, and you find, within a quick scan, a lot of references to the town, Ryduan Village. What's that? What, huh? How do you spell that? R-I-A, apostrophe D-O-I-N. RIA D-O-I-N.

Or D-O-I-N. I-N. Sorry. Rai-do-an. Yeah. Rai-do-an. Rai-do-an. Rai-do-an. Rai-do-an. A lot of it talks about, at the initial glance,

just keeping up with the local business. Arguments between different families that are being settled. Old debts between various merchantile in the village. You can see a lot of these are having to, they're written from the perspective of almost like a burgomaster, somebody who's having to organize the locals

and try and hold a semblance of small local law, or at least on the behalf of such an individual. Some of it's closed, some of it is still open to be assessed. And you also, from looking at some of these, talking about the different people that fish in this environment, they refer to this as Lake Umamu.

Now, do either of those, either from having read about them or even just etymology and the kinds of words they are, help me remember where this might be in the world? Yeah, do either of us, does that ring a bell for either of us? You can make a history check, since you already made one to point to this point.

So I'm letting your knowledge and hers together on this one to put together the details. Fuck this up for me. Don't fuck this up for me. What? Does he give me advantage? No, but the DC's lower because he's already looked at it. 10.

10. You're not able to pinpoint any location, but the fact that it's night here, a semblance of night, if this is Exandrian, puts it in a similar path of the sun as to Ruedas was, which means it would be not too terribly far from a place in Marquet

as far as the position of where the moon was to the sun's light and where the light is on this region. The trees... It was, I'm trying to think, you were present. You were both present, so there is something about this. It was, I'm trying to think, you were present. You were both present, so there is something about this. The more time you spend here, the type of trees, it has a very Asilran scent to it. Are there temples?

Not a single temple within this village. Cool. Is that pretty much all we can gather from the records? Like from the Burgermeister? You can keep reading through them. A lot of it's just bookkeeping. I have. If you want to roll an investigation check

to look for anything else of interest, but yeah. Might as well. Go for it. This'll take a while, though. I want to. Can he help me? You are not, but based on the roll, this might take a little bit. What are we doing?

What's the investigation? I can guide you if we're not clouds. I want to find the richest, most expensive-looking house in the whole. I want to just head towards whatever looks like the person with the most money, where the person with the most money in town lived. Okay. That's a good idea.

I'm going to guide her. Come on. Okay. That's better. You said investigation? Yes. Okay. 19. Woo! Yes. Okay, 19. Woo! 19. Okay. Yeah. As you're looking through the books,

the rest of you are in the process of looking around. So we'll get back to you. It's going to take a little bit for you to do this research. Are you looking through your books as a cloud? No, I think we de-clouded. You de-clouded both of you? Can I throw one last side question for you?

Sure. This is a curve ball. I'm probably wrong. In all of my time listening to more important people, did they ever name the lake that the Temple of the Matron was sunk under? This lake does not. Does not correspond. Does not correspond. Damn.

Good guess. Good guess. But wrong. Indeed. Interesting, no temple. Yeah, no temple here. You glance around, But raw. Indeed. Interesting, no temple. Yeah, no temple here. Mm-hmm. You glance around, and most of the buildings here are fairly modest.

There is one abode that looks like it's probably worth the most. It's the largest of the homesteads. The windows in this are broken. Yeah, okay, I was about to say, that's an interesting clue. I'm definitely going to fly in there and look around before I go pour your own.

I mean, if nobody's claimed this town in a long time, we could all just stop, live here. Yeah, sure. Call it a day. We probably left for a reason. We think we're in Marquet, we think. Well, if we're on the same hemisphere line. Hiding on a planet. Is there an outlet out of this lake? Well, we're on the same hemisphere line.

Hiding on a planet. Is there an outlet out of this lake? Like a downstream river that's leading out of it? No. So it's like a valley lake. Yeah. He said it reminds us of trees we saw in Issylura. Yeah, I don't know.

Does Issylura and Marquet line up? More or less. They're similar hemispheres. Yeah, they're. Okay. Yeah, I want to look around that house, see if it's been robbed, see if it's been. There are definitely signs of robbery. Okay, that's interesting. You go through and see,

so a lot of the furniture's been untouched, and the same heavy layer of dust is there. As you go around, you can see shelves have been pulled out of desks. You can see upstairs, a lot of the furniture's been tossed. The bed's been shifted out of position, but all the moved furniture is also heavily coated in dust. It leads you to believe that this all transpired

a while back. Yeah. You're uncertain how long. So somebody had enough time this all transpired a while back. Yeah. You're uncertain how long. So somebody had enough time, or there was enough commotion that somebody had enough time to hang back and then loot? Possibly. Possibly. Are there pebbles or anything along the shoreline?

Oh yeah, there's all manner of tiny little pebbles and bits of river stone that have washed down through this valley. Okay. Yeah, I'm going to de-mist and grab a couple pebbles from the shoreline. Okay. I'm going to grab,

there's a piece of wood I can break off of one of the buildings, just to grab a few items from the town. Okay. I'm going to look for paperwork or things that people wouldn't have stolen in the house, or just things that people would have thrown away, because they're not worth money.

Documents, letters, anything in that house. Anything. Interestingly enough, the general store, some of the other buildings that you've seen seem to have been just left at the moment. This house looks like it was cleaned out. Like it was packed away or everything was taken from the interior.

Have we seen any sense of bodies, bone, signs of a struggle in the street, tracks, claws, deep cart groups? Make an investigation check. Also, I'm still looking for a bird or a squirrel. There are critters that have moved into parts of the buildings. You can hear some of the owl sounds as they fly into some of the buildings. You can hear some of the owl sounds

as they fly into some of the... Maybe not a bird. Squirrel or a cat. Some of the overhangs of the roofs. You can see there are generational layers of nests that are now bound up and spilling off the edges of the roof sides. If I can get close enough within earshot of a bird's nest,

I'll cast Speak With Animals. Okay. And talk to one of them. Okay. I'm going to drop my... Are we all still clouds? No. We dropped. Some of us dropped. I'm still a cloud. Okay, I dropped out of that, and it was a 15. Then when I drop, as I look, I'm also going to smell.

Certainly. No signs of any struggle or fight. There aren't even signs of any footprints. It looks like whatever happened, happened long enough ago that rain and weather just over time has scattered away any sign of foot traffic. Right in the main, thorough,

I'll try and find a main street and I want to use Grim Psychometry on the street and try and feel what happened maybe around here, if there was something tragic that drove people out. Best of both worlds. Okay. Go ahead and make a roll for it. This is my design. Fuck. 10. Fuck.

10. 10? You try and connect to the space around you, but it's just cold mud on the ground. Man. Chet, you got a second? Always. I'm in the fanciest looking house

down at the end of the city. Oh yeah, hold on. Just a little mess. The slider on the corner. Yep. You've got a good eye for this. I'm looking like maybe a basement, secret passage. I don't know. This place has got a vibe.

Could be wrong. Hold on. I take out two chisels, handles forward, and I start hitting along the wall, standing for hollow spots. Maybe the base. Positive Daddy, tell me your secrets. Stop talking!

Tell me what else you need. All this for hollow spots and switches. Okay, make an investigation check. 22. 22. 20 plus 17. 22. 22. You do a fairly extensive pass, and the only place where you find any sort of a hidden compartment is underneath the bed frame itself.

On the right-hand side, there is a false sliding compartment that opens into an open space that's already open and emptied. Ashton, we got something! Oh yes, oh yes. That makes it more likely that this is just everybody packing up their shit and leaving voluntarily.

Kind of. No smatterings of blood, no spit, no arterial spray. Not in here, no. Fuck. I guess last round is their cemetery in town. I don't know. It's the best I got left. Laudna, about this time,

you start finding a thread of notes here in this cleric space that begins talking about the worrying trend of business abandonment, people just upping and leaving without saying a word. You follow that thread, and then other people start saying, no, it has to do with the disappearances. Oh, the disappearances.

There was the Alvin child, then there was the whole Clairin family, then there was the Otis's, and people seemed that to have them happen in succession, there must be some sort of rumor going around that's making people leave. But then another night, the four families are gone. Whoa.

And there's no one who saw them leave, and they just left everything behind. The fishmonger, Jerald, just recalled seeing somebody walking out by the water and just walking into the lake. Shut up. But that also could be Jerald trying to get people to look away from him,

and so the investigation went into the Fishmonger. Nothing came up, but the people at the town began to spread their own rumors. They think that perhaps he was going around and taking out competition, people that maybe had bad blood. There had been a lot of odd, small village politics happening

between some of these folk. But then he disappeared. And that's where the notes end. Wow. They are coming. Do you think they all just got sucked into the portal? Got stuck on the moon? Maybe they were Twilight Zone episodes.

This sounds bad. Maybe they were all. Moon's haunted, Exandria's haunted. Grutus-born types that some people went to Vassaris on their pilgrimage, maybe some people just went directly to the Zors. A whole village? The Zors. Maybe they didn't mean to.

But if they did, we would've found some dead bodies, I think. And there's no other indication on what fucking continent we're on? Not from inside a village. I'm going to yell at the bird, if I see a bird. Hey, you! Hey, you! No, no, no!

Don't you look at me. Don't look at me like that. I mean you no harm. I got no quarrel with you. What? What? You ever seen any? Don't you do that. Don't you?

Give me the cup. You stay back! You stay back! You called me! Have you seen any other folks like us walking through here recently? No. There's these buildings, these houses and stuff. There are other towns near here?

You must fly around with your freaky wings. Do you get around to see some other villages near here? Stay around here, it's where I grew up. Yeah, never seen another village anywhere? No, this place is pretty alone, that's why I like it. When you were born, it was already empty? Mm-hmm. Birds don't live from the...

Sorry, you're talking about a bird. Good, I'm glad they don't. Wow. You're trying to get information from him. Occasionally, some folks might come through, try and rummage through some things. Wait, what? What was that part? Occasionally, some folks might wander through

and rummage some things, but then they go away. So you have seen some folks? Maybe. Don't you look at me like that. He's probably in a Cypress Troop. When they come through, when they come through, which way do they walk into town from and out of town to? Like, is there a direction where they go to?

I'm trying to figure out where the next town is. It's been five years since they were last seen around here. I don't remember. Five years in a time. Did you kill them? Maybe. Oh, you fucker. FCG?

Sorry. Don't get stressed out. Marking off a stress point. Maybe I... Let me hear you. Ask him about the lake. Ask him if there's anything in the lake. Oh yeah, you see any shadows

moving under the surface of the lake? Any creatures, any monsters that come onto the shoreline? You tilt this freak. No monsters, no. Not since the people walk through, but they just eventually go in, don't they? Maybe it has to do with people walking in the lake. Does he see people coming?

Have you ever seen any of those folks walk into the lake? They were gone before we got here. I don't recall folks that lived here before, but some of the ones that came through and began to fill their pockets, they eventually found themselves swimming. Oh, they did.

And they never came out, did they? I don't remember seeing them leave, no. Yeah. Do you ever get an urge to go into the lake? No. Why is this bird so fucking creepy? Martin McDonagh filled their pockets with rocks and killed themselves in the lake?

It's a haunted bird in a haunted town. He hasn't blinked! He hasn't blinked once! My eyes are getting so dry just thinking about this. Ah, what are you doing here? He'll be like, I don't want to go down that road. Shoo, get! Get! Veth's like, thank you, I wanted to blink so bad.

Just takes off, leaving some feathers and scatters them to the other side. That was really impressive. Over the garden wall. Is there a trail or a road into the village that heads into the forested forest at all? Make a perception check. It's just me. 17.

17. You do see there are some pathways, some walkways that have now been long overgrown. The forest has taken them back, but you can see the underlying area where, you know. Lumber mill, carts and everything. All those signs are still present. They're just hidden under the overgrowth.

Okay. You said there were carts? Well, there's a bunch of trails that go into the forest, but there's maybe one main area that's heavily overgrown where the lumber mill was serviced or they had export-import stuff, maybe. But it's overgrown, overgrown. It's the lake, y'all.

Why are people walking under the lake? I don't like it. You know what we need to do? Sleep and see who gets taken. Uh-huh. Should we sleep here? We definitely should now. Yeah.

Just to see what happens. I think we're going to wake up and two of us are going to be gone. We all know that, right? We can all hold up together. We'll take turns. It's kind of fun! Plus, we got to sleep to charge up the teleportation staff

to let our peeps know where the back door is, right? We need to sleep to sleep. Well, that was the other thing that I was going to ask. If we're on Exandria, do you have any sending abilities? I haven't been able to do it on Exandria. Oh, right. Fuck right. We can teleport.

I took a few stones and some wood, so if we can get these to Keyleth, then she can make sure these get to other people that can teleport, and we can get more people to this city when we want to make our way. That's brilliant. That's a very good idea. It's a little premature to start making

giant siege plans, but obviously, it's not feasible to fit giant armies through this portal, but maybe like an elite strike force. We can widen the portal. It's sad to thought. You might be able to. You don't have your circlet on, right? No. And you can open up your mind to feel the mind traffic of the area around.

And in a place like this, it should be pretty quiet, right? So if there was something in the water that had, I don't know, psychic abilities, it might ping. Sure. If y'all back away from me. I wouldn't leave your side like that. Hey, hey. All right, I'm backing up! Get likeall back away from me. Yeah. I wouldn't leave your side like that. Hey, hey. All right, I'm backing up!

Get like 30 feet away from me. Balls, ass, wiener. Is it close to the moon? Is it new moon time, is that why? Just like to torment. Did you say those or think those? I'm going to go towards the edge of the water and open my mind.

Okay. You open your mind up and feel outward and you can sense all your friends in the nearby space. You're too close, get further away. Shit, she made it, she knows. Wait a minute, damn it, Fearne. Scrope. Sorry, sorry. Nothing. Choke. Nothing.

Zero, not even that shitty bird. It's empty. Sorry, sorry. Nothing. Chirp. Nothing. Zero. Not even that shitty bird. It's empty. This is great, y'all. There's nothing. There's nothing. Well, I can always come here at the end of all this and call it a day. Live in a horror movie.

I don't mind. I think it's very charming. I see nothing but potential. Do we want to, either before we bunk down, or in the morning, look for supplies here? We can bunk down in the supply shop. It's like the Toys R Us run. There's no limits.

But it's picked over, right? Well, yeah. Not entirely. Did you say there was a secret passage? Or secret hole? We found a secret drawer in the very, very, well, I say very expensive, the relatively expensive house down the street,

but it had already been emptied. Did you look with your thing? At the drawer that came out of the side of a bed? Yeah. No. What if there was something invisible in there? I felt around. Did you? I did.

I don't believe you. He mostly caressed some wood that was in that frame. Inside, check. That's pretty high. 20. I didn't. Go check it! Nope.

Now I'm being prideful. Nope. What if there's an important note that's invisible? Once a day. What if there's an important and it's invisible? Can't go in there, they already have one once today. What do you think, should we take the nicest house in town? Oh, sure. Yes. One that's also the least defensible. It's already got the windows broken, but.

I mean, yeah, we'll go there. Where's the hard core? That way you can check the little drawer. All right, fine, I'll. Oh!. He's just standing in place, making sound effects. Great. It's empty! Did you check it for buttons or anything? That he did, sort of.

I'm trying to help you here, Mother. Not you. No. Where are we bedding for the evening? I'd say second floor, if we're going to take the expensive place and figure out a way of barricading the doors so that we don't leave. We'll be trapped in the stairs.

All right. Oh yeah, good idea. All right, let's go. Okay. So heading into this abode, it has a second floor that is primarily just a bedroom and what looked to have been an office that has since been completely emptied out.

Downstairs, you can see there's a small sitting area. It has two couches, one of them's been tipped over onto its back. There's a circular table between that. A very, very modest kitchen. There isn't a dining area per se. It looks like most food would be brought to this sitting arrangement.

It's a respectable house, definitely, especially in comparison to the rest of the village, but it's no Eshteross manor. But you could find semi-comfortable sleeping on the various scattered couches. If you write one up, the bed upstairs could fit comfortably two to three people before it starts getting crammed.

Any other bedding that you have, you can set up on the floor where you'd like. You can find there are oil lamps out there still with a little bit of residual oil in them. If you need any sort of nightlight arrangement, it's up to you. But other than that, it is quiet beyond the sound of the various nocturnal creatures

that are chirping and cawing in the distance. We should take turns. Yeah. How much? Use the couches to barricade the doors and just sleep on them. Yeah. I'll take... What were you going to say? I was going to volunteer for first, but you can take it. I was, too, but whatever. You'll take... What were you going to say?

I was going to volunteer for first, but you can take it. I was, too, but whatever. You can take it. I'm going to go to bed. I'll take it. You can do it together. Oh yeah, that's true. Two at a time is fine. I'm going to wait. I need to sleep.

Are you mad because Jett hasn't been pursuing you since you guys had sex? No. No. No. Huh. No. You just ask that while we're all in this room, getting our cushions up?

Yeah. Should we? Yeah, we're sitting in our heads. I mean, if she said it in her head, we all fucking heard it. That's even funnier. Everyone just freezes in their bedding gown. So many thoughts that don't monitor.

Just like your whole opera conversations. Virgin. Sorry. Oh, for fuck's sakes. This is kind of fun, though. It's like everybody else's experience and what I experience all the time. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's hard. It's hard. It's hard.

It's pretty crazy that we were just on the moon and now we're in a ski chalet. Yeah. I feel like I'm losing my sense of weird. Hit some breast. If we do find out where we are, though, we're still going to go back to Ruidus to keep scouting? We're in Raaduin, at Umama.

I know, but if we're not going to stay on Alexandria, we're going to go back to Ruidus and keep scouting? Aren't we? We probably relay the backdoor first, right? Or do we go back and? We should relay the backdoor first. We have to make sure that this is usable. Absolutely right.

Then we got to go back. I would ask you all, yeah. I will go back. I'm going back. There's still more to learn, right? Yeah. Yeah. All right. This is a nice little interlude.

As they settle down, can I make two requests? With the Monocle of True Essence, can I use Detect Magic to look at the two silver rings and one gold band that were taken off of the Willmaster? Sure, yeah. The gold ring itself is just a normal gold ring. Both of the silver bands have a faint divination-based

magical essence to them. I have to identify it. Oh, yeah. I'll hand those over to FCG and be like, check these out later. I'll check it out now. Great. I will cast Identify.

Okay. The first thing, you go ahead and pull up and look at it. And it is essentially a ring of life awareness, meaning it is connected to another entity and will notify the wearer of the other ring or this one if something happens to them. It's a life alert.

Fuck. Oh my god. Where did we pull this off of? This was Will Master Elmuda. Oh no! Shit. Maybe it's Wilmaster Elmuda's spouse. She kicked it. Well, she suffocated in the hole, right?

Yeah. No, no, you killed her with the spell. No. What do you mean? I'll also say that we can- I mean, we haven't opened the hole yet. Does the ring have tracking? Does the ring have tracking?

Does the ring have tracking? Does the ring have tracking? You don't, I mean, it's just designed to let the other side know. Since you just like, poof, you've lost it. That's just one of them. This person has passed. But it stands to reason that someone could do a Locate Object spell on it.

Although, we're pretty sure. Within a certain radius. Put it in the hole or in the bag, it should be fine. I'll say that in the morning, we do have a machine that can make it inert if we need to be, if it needs to be. That is true.

Wait, can that thing suck the magic out of an object? Yeah. Yeah. We did it on the silverware, remember? Cool. In fact, that's probably a better use for it, all things considered. Well, I mean, we don't want to trace them all, so I'm super down with that.

What was the other one? The other one, while it has a faint magical essence, how many times can you cast Identify? Once. Correct, and that's for a singular item? That's right. Yeah. So the other one, uncertain. Okay, you hold onto that one.

You got one other band. Or ring? Ring. We're going to put it in the hole. Oh, wow. Boy, with that earring, letters just hits different. It really does. And as they start to sleep, I'm going to spend at least an hour

crafting a handheld toy using my new feat. Okay. All right. I take out a piece of wood and I concentrate and I listen to the creatures at night and I let the muses guide my chisel and a flurry of chips and dust, glory, blood flying. Until I behold a masterpiece

of unparalleled precision craftsmanship. I put it away. Wow. Very well. Legendary toy maker. You're not just a master craftsmanman, you're a Legendary? Oh shit! Oh! We haven't seen this in action yet. That's right.

Because of the enemies. Make a fate pact, man. It only costs a life. Oh my gosh. Cute! Okay. All right, so the two of you are on the first watch, then. I'm covered in sawdust.

What are we doing? Perception check for both of you. 13. 22. Okay. Really solid. You can see the mists that protrude from the lake expand further beyond the water and fill the entirety of the valley. A slow crawl.

It adds to the spooky atmosphere outside the windows of the household and just the cold temperature. You enjoy the darker atmosphere outside the windows of the household and just the cold temperature. You enjoy the darker atmosphere a bit. It's nice. But that's it, nothing else to worry about. So any conversation you wish to go over? We move on to the next watch.

Okay. Okay, who's taking the next watch? Orym and Imogen, okay. Two of you settled in? Yeah. Okay. Can you see in the dark? No. Cool, me neither.

I can hear real well. Can you put one of your little glowy balls under that moldy pillowcase? Cool. Hey, I'm going to try something that's not going to work, but I'm going to try it anyway. All right. Caleb Widogast. We're in a village called Riaduin. It's a back door, maybe, to the moon. Do you hear me?

Come for a visit? Did we ever get him free from? There's a brief moment before you hear back, Ah, hello. Shut up! Wait, who is this? I've tried it like five times and only gotten feedback. Hello? Is that Caleb? Is that him? Is that him?

I hear him. This is strange. One of these has not worked in some time. Is that Caleb? Ask, make sure it's him, make sure it's him. I can't, it's one time, it's a rock. Oh, fuck me. Wait, if I can do it, maybe you can do it.

Give me. Not the rock. I'm not capable enough. Just your innate abilities, your amazing abilities. Rack, hold on, let me. Wait, did Caleb say anything else? No, wait. Did he?

He was just taken aback by it as well. I'm pooping. Okay, wait. I'm going to use my- But I said the name of the place. I'm going to get a third level back with my last three sorcery points, and then I'm going to try to cast Sending.

Whoa, think out what you're going to say, because I didn't think that was going to work, and I just said the name. Oh shit, okay, so. So I said the name of the village. Okay. I asked him to visit. Do we know if he's, do we know he's okay? What? Where did we see him last?

He was getting taken by Ludinus. That's the last thing I remember. Yeah, he was getting drug off with Beau. So where is he? But yeah, what if that's not him? What if that was Ludinus? Does Ludinus have a Zambianism? Choose your spouse and do your stuff.

Who are you going to send to? I'm going to send to Caleb. Well, you try to Caleb, because it would only go to Caleb from you. So it's not going to go to Ludinus if you try to call Caleb. I mean, I don't know how magic works. All right, all right.

That's true if he was superior to you. What if it was Ludinus and we captured it? Ah! Did that sound like Ludinus? That didn't sound like Ludinus. No, but I mean but he could pretend. Does he have a Zemdian essence? Would my perception work to recognize

a man's voice who I've met for minutes? Yeah, that definitely sounded like the vocal essence of the strange, jacketed man. But maybe Ludinus is a hobbyist voice actor and he's trying some new shit. It's Eric Bowser. It's the big badge. It's just Bowser the whole time.

Yes. You know, you stinker. Dear Bells Hells, how do you get into voice-over? Okay. I got this book by Yuri and Tara. What should I ask him? Well, where are you? Where are you?

And, or are you okay? Uh-huh. I asked him to visit. I mean, I'm sure I confused him. He sounded confused. I'm confused. Okay. I can call Darian. All right.

All right, okay. I'm going to cast Sending on Caleb Widogast. I hope this works. Of course it's going to work. I don't know. Maybe that's a special thing. It doesn't. Okay, shh.

I assume this means you're all right. Again, that's Lake Umamu. Can you get word to the resistance? Yeah, this is Celebidogast. I don't know what has changed. These sort of communications have not worked for some time. I do know where in this velvet. Fuck!

I'm going to use, oh fuck. What if we run in? What if there's something really scary that happens tonight and I need the higher level? We're all fucked anyway, so. Can I give you another one of my quotes? You're asleep. Yeah, kick me.

Oh yeah, I'm going to go over to Fearne while she's sleeping. Oh, we're not on the moon! I can't do it! Oh shit. Fuck! Well. Fine, nothing's going to happen tonight. We'll be fine.

Okay, then I'm going to, ooh, should I keep talking to him? I think if you can, I mean, yes. Yes. Yeah. Send somebody else a message. Oh, I could send it to somebody else. I could send it to Caleb! All right. Tell her about it.

Okay. What can he do? All right, you're right. Tell her to get in touch with him, and they can coordinate. Come on, figure it out. Okay, I'm going to send a message to Caleb! Huh? Maybe it won't work. Maybe. Shut up. Okay, I'm going to send a message to Caleb! Huh? Maybe it won't work. Maybe. Shut up.

Okay, I'm going to do it. I'm going to send a message to Caleb. Hey, hey, hey. What? You got this. You're doing great. Okay. Can you count my words? Because I'm afraid I'm going to use this. Oh yeah, okay.

Go slow. All right. Oh, he's rolling something. Okay, I'm going to send a message to Caleb. Just grab my knuckles, for sure. We found a secret entrance back on Alexandria in Lake Umamu leads to subterranean Ruidus. The town?

Get in touch with the Widowcast. We're in Raya Duin. I know I'm saying that wrong. Six words left. A moment passes before a familiar voice responds. Hi, hello. Is everyone okay?

You're in Umamu. That's the Karamarin Reach, Issylra. Oh! Karamarin Reach? What about Ruidus? Fuck. Oh shit, I'll use my last spell. All right. Nope, that's not it.

Okay. You're doing great. After the Bloody Bridge, the capital city of Creveris is where they're gathering forces. There's a tunnel that leads down. Halfway there.

We'll show you. Nice, nice, nice. All right. Let me finish some business here, and I'll try and meet you. I'm curious to hear how much you've learned. Time is starting to run short. Oh fuck.

That's it. Shit, she wants to make her way here. If I can take, we've been resting. We've been resting. You got a short rest? Yeah, you've been taking a short rest, yeah. So I could get some of my sorcery points back with my short rest.

Sleeping for the first two or three hours was a short rest. Right. Or I could bonus action turn my first-level spells into a third-level spell with my sorcery points. Yeah, you can do that. So I'm going to do that, and I'm going to send my last, oh, why do I look like I have a third level left? That can't be right.

Oh, no, okay. So I'm going to use another third-level to send back Tequila. Should I tell her we haven't learned anything yet in Creverus? Maybe save the energy, we'll go push forward and come back? What are the things that you want to, like, forget if we weren't limited by anything, if you could tell her what's left that you want.

Well, I want to tell her we haven't been to Creverus. We haven't seen much more beyond the Bloody Bridge, right? Beyond that encampment. Yeah, so what is the important thing is to say, we need to go back in, but we need to impart this. Right, I just wanted to let her know

where the entrance was. Right. But we won't be here. No, we won't be here to impart this. Right, I just wanted to let her know where the entrance was. Right. But we won't be here. No, we won't be here to meet her. Oh, wait, good morning. We won't be here. Mama? We can just tell her we're going back in in the morning. How will they use it, though, on their own?

If they find it, they go through and then think of what they're going to find. We'll have to help her get out. Right. We can leave a trail. We can leave a trail back up. Markings? Something, yeah. Okay.

To help her find her way to the surface. Oh! He's attacking her. He's the last one. It's going to be okay, right? I don't know, but thank you. For what? Weeks, months, I don't know.

How long have we been together? I don't know. Month long have we been together? I don't know, months? Feels like years. Hang on to me, I'll hang on to you. We'll hang on to them. Yeah. It's going to be fine. It's going to be fine.

All right. The portal is in the lake. We're heading back in in the morning. Haven't learned enough. Going to Creverus. We'll leave markers for you to follow. Very well. I'll send a team to follow and see what this secret door is in the lake.

to follow and see what this secret door is in the lake. Good luck moving forward. We're counting on you. She's going to send a team to follow. It's about this time, another voice pushes into your head, like a bat out of hell. Hello? Mr. Caleb said I'm supposed to talk to this person.

Is this working? I've tried this so many times. It's driving me up the wall. Breakfast, is this working? I've tried this so many times. It's driving me up the wall. Breakfast, isn't it? Oh. Oh! Is this our first time? So anyway, I'm just curious if this is going forward.

Hello? Please respond, please. Hold on, let me fucking convert some files. Don't you reply to the message? You reply to the message. Oh, I can. You didn't start it. I didn't start it. Yes, who is...

You're not going to do it. Yes, it works. We met Caleb in... at the quay. We're at Lake Umamu. We just talked to Lady Keyleth. Okay, I don't know who that is, but I'm extremely happy for you.

I'm so happy this is working. So who are you? What are you doing? How do you know Caleb? How did this all come? I'm Imogen. We're a group. We went to Ruidus. How do you... We met Caleb at the key. He was captured. We haven't seen him since. Okay, well, he's fine now. Nice to meet you, person that knew Caleb at the key. Don't know what

that means either, but thank you. Who is this? Oh, my name is Jester. Nice to meet you, Jester. Nice to meet you, I guess, from distance, but maybe sometime I will meet in person and then I could give you a hug. Unless you're a bad person. I'm a in person and then I can give you a hug. Oh god. Unless you're a bad person.

I'm a good person. I'm a good person! This is the last person. Last person. She just burns out. She goes, mm. Like the most equipment collect balls ever. Yep.

Please insert picture. Love it. and collect balls ever. Yep. Plays in surface. Love it. That's so cool. That was great. Dorian. We're alive. Been to the moon, going back. Find the Tempest.

If I don't get the chance again. I've really missed you. No words meet your ears, but you swear you heard something outside. Outside. Shit. There's windows in this room? You're not sure, but you need to check in on it.

You need to see what that was. Careful. What is it? It might be Dorian. Oh my god. He's going to get sucked into the... Oh my god. Oh no. No. This is a horror film. I really thought you were going to... There's two people. It's okay. It'll be all right. What's going on? I really thought you were.

There's two people. It's okay, it'll be all right. What's going on? Was any of them outside? I think someone's outside. Who, who? I don't know, I heard somebody outside. Well then, we should wake the others.

That's fine. Vagna, Jake. Shh, somebody's outside. Someone's outside. I need to go look. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Come with me. What's wrong?

We'll just wait a second. Hang on, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. I heard someone outside. Somebody's working. I can talk to people. Wake up, MCG. I'm going to flick you out the window. Wake up, wake up. No one going to flick shit in the middle. Wake up, wake up.

MATT and LAURA, MATT and LAURA, and ZAC and LAURA, No one's going outside. Wait until morning. I will send Pâté. As you're all having this conversation, Orym is walking towards the door. No, no, no, no, Orym, can I try to hold onto his arm?

Don't go outside. That's what the horror movie is. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Hold on, hold on, hold on. Hold on. If he's outside. Who? Why didn't he answer me?

We just were able to talk to Dorian. Well, he talked to Dorian. Are you sure? We talked to Caleb. We talked to, we talked to. Keyleth and somebody else. Yeah, a little girl. Where did you?

I don't know if she's little. She had a little voice. Oh, she sounds great. This is like class A spooky stuff, and I know spooky, so just don't move. I'm going to send Paté, okay? He's going to do a little scouty-scout. Because why wouldn't he have answered

if he's outside? Exactly, why wouldn't he have answered if he's outside? So let's just send somebody to go check. Just wait. Can you not wait? You can wait five minutes. I send Pate through the window. Watch him die!

Go see if anyone's outside. He's paratrooper, just getting thrown out the A1 to C130. No real description, just. I go Pate Vision. Yeah, make a perception check. Is through his perception right? This is how we do this? Yeah, that's why it always sucks.

It's never good. Yeah. You should make him some eyeballs. I should. Why are you looking up stats like it's going to be me? Oh, you really should! I know, I know. Okay. Did you take them from the doll?

Fuck! Oh, fuck you! It's your fucking fault! Three! Three? No! It's hard to see through the mist that's gathered around the lake and this dark area.

I mean, it gets this cold at night, too. It just naturally happens in these sort of environments. Can't really make out any details. Okay, look, it doesn't seem like anything's out there. There's a thick layer of mist. It looks real spooky. What did I hear, though? What did you hear? What did you hear?

You probably heard Dorian. He's probably outside. Chet. Listen, Orym. What if he is, though? That's what I'm saying. Do you. He's probably outside. Chet. What did he? Listen, Orym. What if he is, though? That's what I'm saying. Do you know he's not? He'd knock, he'd talk, he'd sing, he has a fucking lute.

He's so loud and obnoxious, we would know. Let's go take a look. I just want to remind everybody that this town is completely empty and abandoned because people were being called and randomly walking into the lake. Says the bird that FCG talked to. Says the court documents that I spent two hours reading. One guy walked into the lake.

The fishmonger walked into the lake. No, no, no, no. Walking to the front door, putting the hammer up and activating the fucking, the... On the door? Just making a little, making an effort to get out. You head to the door. Mm-hmm. Uh-oh.

Around the door. You feel like you heard something, too. There is something. What the fuck was that? Okay, well. We for sure took a short rest, correct? Took a short rest, yeah. Oh, thank fucking god.

Not a long rest, but a short one. MATT and LAURA, in a deep breath, I got all my questions back. FCG. I didn't get any of my spells back yet! Yes, sir. Chetney. Yeah. Really great Chet. You all have this overwhelming sense

that something... You don't know if maybe the portal has closed or something has come through, but a little thing in your brain is you're worried about your ability to return. Because there's something that's calling you towards that water to inspect, to check, to make sure that everything's okay.

I hate this. I love it. Yeah, we got to go. All right, well then, listen, we're all- So wait, the door is blocked right now, or is it open? You watch, Ashton goes and puts the hammer in the front. And pull it away a bit, second guessing. Well, let's just go,

because we got to get back quick and get to sleep. Can't lose the portal, yeah. I'm going to exit the door. I'll follow FCG. Do we hear? Oh. What, all of us heard something now? No, you haven't heard anything.

What's going on? What's going on? I just have a feeling that something's messing with the portal. We just got to make sure it's not closed. Stop fucking walking outside. Are you guys kidding me right now? I don't walk, I roll. Get back.

I used almost my, hold on! I'm going to get my sails back. Fuck. Thanks, Jester. Burned all those slots. Shit. It was talking to Keely, thank you very much. Can I use Hunter's Bane to just figure out

what might have closed the portal? Make them, yeah, roll Hunter's Bane. Okay. Got my warlord's ball slots back. Hunter's Bane. Oh, 13. 13. There's some sort of, you can sense there's an unnatural essence

around the center of this water. It doesn't feel unwelcoming. And you wonder if maybe there's another ally to be found in this possible boon. FCG, I think actually we might not be alone, but not in a bad way. I'll cast Light. So we got some lights as we go towards the shoreline.

Matt, having a connection to the, sorry, to your thing. I'm saying if the lights turn on to, I'm going to switch to a fog setting, because it immediately blows out, the mists are on the way. High beams. Having my connection. Just one foot in front of the thing. Matt, having my connection to the afterlife.

What do you mean? Do I sense any type of connection to the afterlife. What do you mean? Do I sense any type of undead-type presence? Does this feel like some spoopy shenanigans? I mean, this whole area's kind of spoopy at this time of night. I mean, you don't have an unnatural sense for anything undead around you, necessarily. What are you up to, Matt?

That's us. Low beam said anything? No. Yeah, we're good. The two of you begin to wander out of the building into the street. All I see is the earring. Nothing else. Do we go? Do we follow them?

Ashton, Orym, you follow them, too? We should follow them. We should follow them, yes. I mean, we'll stay together. Yeah, we should follow them. It's best to stay together. But something's fucking up. I'm keeping an eye out there, because we heard, what did we hear?

We heard something. But if you heard something that close to the door, you would have seen them. We're by the fucking cake now. It's dark out there, it's real dark. I mean, we're in a village. Do you see anything? I can't see shit.

We don't have? Lights. The lights go in as you trek out into the mists of the village that creeped past the lake at this point. Oh, the lake must look crazy with those lights and fog on it. It's extremely diffused all throughout and giving this weird atmospheric glow around you.

It hits the m- Oh yeah. Yeah. I don't like this at all. Why don't we just go back inside and sleep this off? Chet! What? Get back inside. I can't, I got to make sure the portal's safe. No, Chet, stop it.

Wait, what are you going to do? You're going to go swim down there and make sure and then come back up? Why, are you worried about me, baby? Yes, but. Yeah, it'll be real fast. Plus, I feel like there's something that can help us out here.

You're being an idiot. No, no, no. There's nothing. I have a sixth sense about these things. You're going, this is, okay, we're going to have to have someone with you. I mean, it makes sense. Very generous, Ashton. Let's go. Yeah.

There's something... There's something uniquely alluring about what's happening in that lake. Like it could be useful. This is not good. What do we do? How do we stop? Wishes, start thinking. I've used all our spell.

What do you think, Ashton? I could really use a hand. I could really use a hand. No, no, no, you're, I see what you're thinking. I regained all the short rest. Can I, with the help of the lights here, can I see anything? Make a perception check.

What if it is good? Exactly. But if it is good, maybe it'll be here by the time we wake up. Wow, that's amazing. I roll two twos. Oh no. Just roll enough so you can't. Can't roll. Yeah.

You can just see the mostly still waters of the lake, the occasional bit of wind that breaths through. You can see the mist shift with it and the surface ripple faintly and the little bit of light you're casting out throughout the various spells that you're using reflecting off of the surface. This seems important to do now,

despite the fact that I am basically useless, correct? I mean, this is just checking in and you don't want to miss the opportunity here. This feels pretty important. Do you feel like we're hearing anything as well, or is it just them? You guys haven't picked up anything yet. No, I don't think we're hearing anything. Can I run down in front of Chet?

Because he's walking to the lake. Well, they're coming up towards the edge of the lake now, yeah. Can I run in front and cast Detect Thoughts, my last spell slot that I, well, no, I take that back. I have four sorcery points, I can get more spells. Detect Thoughts so that I can see if there's a creature that I can sense now.

Okay, you cast Detect Thought Okay. You cast the tech thoughts. You pick up all your friends. There is a, not a specific point, but there is an intelligence that kind of settles behind you and below. The lake is behind. We are in Bangor, Maine. Oh my god.

While the four of you, as you think in your head, trying to process this, don't realize that you're now pushing knee height to waist heighten the water, just heading straight into the lake. Who all's going? Chetney, FCG, Ashton, and Laura. I have four sorcery points.

I am going to use all four of those sorcery points to regain first-level spells. I'm going to cast Command on each one of them and tell them to go back to the house. Okay. Oh. Shit. I can't, I have to use one word. I'll the house. Okay. Oh. Shit. I can't. I have to use one word.

I say return. Return. Okay. I'll go ahead and roll for you all. Ooh, because we don't control ourselves anymore. It's not their will you're rolling against. Oh, interesting. It's a seven, then a nine, then a two. Whoa, those are bad rolls.

Then a natural 20. Good, good. Who's the 20? We want someone to come back, who's the 20? All right. Who's the 20? The 20. Who's the 20?

Who's the fucking 20? The 20 would be Orym. As Orym stops and catches yourself and begins to walk back immediately, shaking out for a moment and turning around to focus while the three of you begin to submerge. No, no, no, they failed the command, so wouldn't they go back?

Yeah, if I failed, wouldn't it be one? Yeah, he's the 20. He's the only one that would continue on. So what this is, is the battle of... Right, she tried to command, I rolled a 20 and beat her spell. Right, right. No, no, no, you're right. I had it backwards in my head.

Okay. So no, for this instance, it would be FCG, Chetney, and Orym. All start to head back? All immediately stop sloshing in the water. Okay. Turning tail and beginning to catch themselves for a minute while Ashton.

I'm the one, okay. Oh, okay. Because I was rolling across the way and I got that cross wires there. I'm going to tell Pate to go invisible and to follow Ashton, like connect himself to Ashton. Okay. So in this chaos, splashing, the water's turning around, the bit of panic

starting to take root here, expending those sorcery points to try and get your friends to stop. Three of them halt and look at each other oddly and start turning back for six seconds. Oh! Oh! That's all I got. By the panic hits you, as you turn around, realize that Ashton is out of sight. Oh! That's all I got. By the panic hits you, as you turn around,

realize that Ashton is out of sight. Wait! The sound of a splash. As you begin to search for him, to try and find a way, you hear your three other friends begin to wade back into the water. I do have water breathing. That's where you go ahead and take a break.

Oh! Bastard man! About that time. Remember long rests? Those were cool. Go ahead and take a break. Bastard man! It's about that time. Remember long rests? Those were cool. We'll never rest again with Soul Campaign. Nope. Why did we sleep over here?

Fucking told you. Well, so, wait. Let's just sleep in the cave. We'll get there in the morning and we'll be great. Oh god, okay. I'm going back to the cave. You all are crazy. Wait, shit. I'll go to the cave. We'll get there in the morning. We'll be great. Oh, God. Okay. I'm going back to the cave. You all are crazy. Wait, shit. I'm going to the bathroom.

All right. We'll see you guys here in a few minutes. Oh, God. Why, hello there. This is Critical Role's resident art dad, also known as Liam O'Brien.

We are continuously amazed at the artwork this community creates. That's why each Thursday at 8 a.m. Pacific, we share a curated gallery of submitted fan art over on critroll.com. If you'd like to submit your art for consideration, visit critroll.com slash submit.

And thank you to all of the incredible artists who share their talents with us week after week. And welcome back. So. No. Now with one and quickly four members of your troop all diving into the darkened waters of this lake mid-evening.

No. What are the rest of you doing? Enjoying the water. No. I have no spells of you doing? Enjoying the water. No. I have no spells. It does feel good. It's cool. And you're so close, you're so close. No, no, no, no.

Am I close to any of them? I'm going to try to hold onto Orym and just pull him back. Sure, all right. Both of you make contested strength rolls, please. Oh boy. Oh, yes, I am. I am not alone, that's nice.

I'm real tiny, but I rolled real high. I'm just getting dragged. 17. You tried to pull Orym first? 17. He's the weakest. I see how it is. He's the weakest! Where'd you get it, Imogen? No, I rolled a seven.

No! No, I rolled a seven. Okay, yeah. So you try and pull back and feel yourself being pulled under with him. Do you continue to hold on, or do you let him go? I don't know what to do, I can hurt him. I'm just going to keep holding.

I'm going to keep holding. Okay, the two of you watch as Imogen vanishes beneath the water. Oh! No, no, no, no! I think I have an idea. Do I see any boats or buoys or ropes? Make a perception check. There is a sunfish and a motorboat.

Right? Perks, how do you do that? Wait, Perks, I'm trying to find a way. Come on. Oh, fucking why? It's a natural one. Can I come up out of the water? Do you ever roll this problem?

Can you communicate that that's what you're looking for? That is a shitty, shitty number to roll. He said when we were coming in, there was docks. Is this the Laudna thing? Yes, and it fucking failed me. Did you see what he did? He's going down! He's going under! He's going under! Did you see what he did? A boat.

A boat? Boat, fishing boat. Like what? We're going to take a boat underwater? I'm going to Scorching Ray each of them. I'm going to look for a boat. They're under the water. Okay. But you can certainly try. Wish we could breathe under there. Is that investigation?

Shit. It's your perception to look in the area. Yes. How long does it last? Nine. 24 hours. Yeah, 24 hours. Water breathing? Here in the middle, you're just on the edge

of where the lake gets too deep for you to stand on your feet, and you glance around in the vicinity here. You don't see anything around you. You do see where there are docks, which would be the closest space to go, but you'd have to step away from where your friends vanished to get to it.

There's boats at the dock? There's docks. Oh, there's docks. You don't see any boats floating in the water. No boats. I stick my head in the water. Do I see any boats? Where you are or where you're standing?

Yes, I'm on the edge, and I stick my head under darkvision. You're not in the lake yet. No. I'm in the lake. You're not in the lake. You look so cute in the lake. I know. The glasses are reading nighttime goggles right now. Okay.

So you're now sticking your head into the water. Yes. Make another perception check. Fuck! Fuck! 16, that's still not great. That's not bad. 16's not bad. Then one. Indeed, under the water around the dock, you see four boats that are sunken

and half-lodged into the silt and muck along the side. You can see ropes that once tethered them have long snapped as they slowly sank with time and weather. All right, I am going to cast Animate Objects on a boat and a rope. I'm going to look at the boat, I'm going to be like you. Come here, it's ghost ship time.

You watch as the water begins to shift and bubble over as an old, rickety, sub-water rotted boat onto the surface. You see, just for flavor, out of the hit, it has two wooden planks that go out of the side, and it grows like little muscular hands, and it starts crawling across the water.

What do you want, bitches? They can talk? Oh my god. It could make it alive? Oh, I didn't know they could talk. With the creepy boat. I did it. What do you think with the boat?

I'm going to try and go, and then, Mr. Rope Man. What? Does the rope talk? Oh, you animated the rope? Oh, you did the rope as well? Because the rope boat? Oh, you animated the rope? Oh, you did the rope as well? Because the rope would be huge. Okay, so yes, I can do... Okay. It takes, hang on.

It's like eight. How is the boat? It's like 10 things, and a huge thing counts as eight things. A rope? But then a small thing counts as two things. Right, so we'll say you can get a length of rope that is long sunken in there. You can go ahead and bring the rope and the boat, yes.

So the boat, which you don't hear, you see it moving, but you don't hear it talking. This is your connection to it as its creator. What do you need? All right. The rope's like, whoa, hey, I'm here. No way! No way! No way! No way!

Wait, I'm sorry! I don't know the robe. Laudna! I don't know what's your name. Dreadnought! Hurry! No! I'm a robe! Say bye and check for prayer. That's a good thing. Okay, listen. I have four of our friends out there

who are like, I love you. Okay, so we have four friends out there and they're all mind controlled by whatever spooky presence is here in the lake. You got to go get them, wrap them up, drag them back into shore. On the rope.

You and Boat. It's the rope. You and boat. It's a rope and boat combo team. Do you hear me, boat? I hear you. Go get them. Can I send the dancing lights down? The boat turns around. Oh goodness.

Can I send the dancing lights down after our friends so I can at least track them in light, where they're going? I'm shining lights, though. Oh, that's true, that's true. I'll send them after the other three. A little submarine. Okay. You can see the dull glow of FCG

vanishing into the depths below as you send your orbs down to follow. The four of you, you're so close. You can feel that anticipation, that cusp of elation is right on the other side of whatever it is you're going for. It is nothing but chemical impulse that is pushing you down deeper and deeper.

It gets harder to see as your hands touch the top of that massive cluster of odd underground or underwater growth. The water itself is chilled like ice. And as you reach down into this space, you feel the bits of weird, almost ivy-like water growth begin to wrap around you. Can I swim down?

And as it does, you begin to pull further into it and knock through and grip it. It's like this wonderful embrace, this warm sensation. Like this is where you were supposed to be. This is what it was supposed to be. I'm going to get down there. I'm swimming. We're swimming down. We're swimming.

As you both are swimming down, you look and you see these tendrils of shadow that are all through shifting and waving into the water below, and you have no sign of your friends. Uh-oh. But what about SCG's lights? You can see this dull glow

that's just faintly visible. I'm heading towards the shadow wall. Yes, same. All right. Also, I sent Pâté with Ashton, so can I see vaguely where they are? You can see darkness beneath, and Pâté, back to you, going, Oh, it's extremely wet down here.

So just to clarify. Don't worry, I got him. You're connected to Pate, a boat, a rope, all of your friends, and also we're psychically connected to this entity down there. Yes. Amazing. It's great. We're all hearing.

Can we hear their thoughts? This is so gritty. We're giving Rue a run for its fucking money. It's like Fantasia in my head. I'm Mickey Mouse. Are we getting close? Are we getting close? I want to get within 30 feet. You're getting down below, and as you get closer and closer at this point,

you can feel the chill of the water in the lake itself beginning to almost freeze around you. May both of you make constitution saving throws. That's just you guys. Not us. I'm going to get to you in a minute. Yeah, we're getting fucked right now. Natural 20!

Oh, boom! Nice. Noice. What am I rolling, I'm so sorry? Constitution saving. Constitution? Okay. Is this against a spell or other magical effect? No, this is about just the cold environment around you.

I rolled a 10. Okay, so you take eight points of cold damage. Can I use my reaction? If you want to, yeah. Oh! Chill of the Dread Captain and be... Yes, you can. What?

Resistant to cold damage. Indeed, so you only take four points of cold damage. Okay, okay. And you take four as well. Okay. From that save. Are we to the ball low shadow yet? You're getting towards the depths,

but before I do that, all of you four make constitution saving throws with disadvantage. I get advantage on my next throw. You can agree to fail if you want to. I get advantage, so I'm just going to do a straight roll. Okay, go for it. Constitution save with disadvantage. Yes.

That's not fear, and it's not poison. 23. This is just cold. I got a one, I'm going to reroll it. Okay, so that's seven points of cold damage to you. Oof. Natural one. Natural one, 14 points of cold damage to you.

11. 11, 14 points of cold damage. 21. Seven points of cold damage. But it's cold damage to your body, but it feels warm to you. It's that weird transition where it's so cold, it becomes a comfortable blanket of warmth.

As you begin to crawl down, you feel handholds, like you've found it. This is the answer. This is going to fix everything. This is perfect. The memory of who you were begins to fade, and you just know you're supposed to lay here. This is everything you've ever fought for in your life,

as you begin to curl up, almost going fetal, into the shadows as they surround and embrace you. The two of you, as you are looking down into the space, you see these darkened tendrils writhing around. Make a perception check to see if you can make out details of where your friends are directly. Six. 20, dirty 20.

Dirty 20. You can see faintly the glow of where FCG's light is and the occasional glimmer of color in the shadow of where your friends are currently delving into the base. You also, in that bit of light that comes through, can see between the shadow and murk, flashes of just bones. Oh.

Just muddy, soot-kicked up bones. This is a bed. This is a graveyard. This is a bed. This is a graveyard, yes. I do see them. There's bones. I don't see them. Your boat and your rope. There's bones. There's bones now? I'm going to send my lights to where she saw them

and just surround the area that the boys are in. Okay, the lights come down there. Your boat and rope are now getting, are you on the boat or are you swimming out? Yeah, we'll say I'm on the speedboat on the boat. Okay. Boats is going to make its way out. Yes, yeah.

It's weird because the boat, it has its arms on its paddles, so it's just breast-stroking from the sides of the boat out in the middle of the lake, while the rope's like, looking over the edge. What were you asking? Boat on a rope.

Oh, no, is the entity, is it physical or is it just shadow? You see the cluster of dense vegetation that accompanies the base, and those glimmers of bones through it. It's like a giant nest mass of black vines, underwater growth. But then on top of that,

there are these black, shadowy tendrils that seem to extend beyond it. You can feel now this extremely oppressive and hungry presence, starved presence, that is reaching out to siphon whatever has stumbled near its lair. Can I try to send out a Mind Sliver to the cluster of vines?

Yes, you can. Is that a save on the target's point? Yes, you can. Is that a save on the target's point? Yes, an intelligence save. Intelligence save. 12, Spectral. Ooh, that is very much a fail. Okay, so it's going to take 3d6 of psychic damage. Okay.

So that is 16 points of psychic damage. 16 points of psychic damage. The tendrils retract in for a minute, and as they do, it exposes more of the ground around it, your light's printed out, and you can see dozens and dozens of corpses lie here, tangled and kept within this nest of vegetation. Can I see the boys? You can see them, and they're all

pulled themselves deep into it, and they're almost cradled like children. In that moment, the tendrils come back in and surround them with darkness, and I need, actually, you finish what you're doing now, and then you're arriving at this point. I'm going to bamf out Mister. Okay.

In the water? Yeah. Oh, we can't do the... Can the water breathing be on him since this is? Okay, never mind. He can still hold his breath for a little bit. Yeah, hold your breath for a little bit. All right, I'm going to try to have him go to... Is there someone he can get to closest?

Who? The easiest one to see is FCG, because the light gives a little bit of a beacon to go to. Wait, are you in it as well? Yeah, I'm in it. You're in it as well? Okay, so I'm going to have Mister go to FCG and try to do... All the guys. Try to do...

Sorry. Go. Fireball. No. Flame Strike. Finger of Death. Where the fuck? This is the little flaming teleport? Like the little 15 feet.

He can Dimension Door, basically. Yeah, the short-distance teleport. Yes. Okay. He's going to try to bam them out. Yes, try to get one of them out. Out of the tendrils? Okay. So order of operations here.

You send Mister down to swim towards FCG. You go ahead and release your Mind Sliver, and it strikes the entity. You watch as the shadows flicker for a moment. The four of you, through that damage, get to make another charisma saving throw. Oh, charisma saving throw. Boy.

But I want to stay. You can agree to turn it down if you want. You said an advantage or disadvantage? No, just a straight charisma saving throw. You know what I mean, that's how you know. I rolled pretty well. I got an eight. Okay. It's a natural 20.

Natural 20, all righty. Very high charisma, 19. 19, okay. 18. Okay. No, you want to stay down there. You really want to stay down there. So the three of you, suddenly that warmth shifts,

and that bone-chilling cold settles in, and as you come to awareness of your space, you just see nothing but darkness around you. Though you can breathe, the dancing lights fill the space around it, but this particular shadow that surrounds them consumes the light that falls into its space. So you just find yourselves lost in darkness.

Though you can breathe water, breathing the deep chill of this temperature in itself hurts you, and the panic immediately kicks in, but you do have control of your faculties at this moment. Oh, wow. Ashton, however, is still embracing down below, but I need the four of you to make constitution saving throws for me.

Can we see each other, or each character is totally on their own and a void? You're just in darkness right now, yeah. Disadvantaged again, or regular? No, just regular. Oh, that's nice. Oh no, sorry, for those of you who broke free, it's regular. For you, it's a disadvantage. Okay.

Constitution save? Yes. Yeah. Hey, that's funny. 19. 19, okay. You take eight points of cold damage. Wow. 17.

Eight points of cold damage. 20. Eight points of cold damage. 24. Eight points of cold damage. All right, so as you come to trying to scramble yourself free, the boat with Laudna and the rope arrive on the top,

and you just see scrambling below the occasional flashes of light and bubbles from underneath. What do you do? I'm going to do my Form of Dread and look like one of the undead pirates, just for fancies. And I say,

Hey, we are going to the bottom of the sea. Who are you talking to? The rope slowly turns to you. Oh, to Bodhi and Ropi. Okay! The boat goes. We dive down and I look super majestic with one foot. You and the boat slowly sink into the lake.

The rope begins to protrude and snake outward. For those of you that just regained your senses, what are you doing? But still in a void? You're still in darkness. You're just freezing cold and the panic is set in. Tangible tendrils on us, or just what feels like seaweed?

It feels like you have seaweed that's wrapped around you with a freezing touch, and that's about it. Is there a sense of up or down? At the moment, you can make a perception check to try and ascertain that. That's tough. It's real tough. Disadvantage for me?

Oh yeah, disadvantage down in this darkness. 16. 16? I'd say 16's about good enough to figure out a general sense of up and down, yeah. If we feel like things are wrapped around us, I will try to buzzsaw my way through whatever kelp is holding me down.

Okay, go ahead and make an attack with disadvantage. Disadvantage. Because it's underwater. Okay. Ooh, terrible. Second one was 10. 10. You try and buzz outward,

and while it doesn't catch anything, the tendrils are still holding taut to your arm and fighting against your ability to cut into it. Did Mister find them? 19 with Inflict Wounds on just the cold, weird seaweed. That'll hit, go ahead and roll damage. Okay, 3d10. Nine, 13, 15. 50 points of necrotic damage.

No effect. Shit! Necrotic damage. No effect. Shit! It's undead seaweed. Oh shit, oh shit! It's my specialty. Mister, at this point, FCG, as you're trying to buzzsaw in the water, you see this little flicker of light,

like almost like an underwater flare, trying to. And you're curious what that is, and it catches you a little fearful at the moment before you see, through the flame, trying to flicker underwater, this tiny little rotund monkey body go and reach for you. It grabs you and then suddenly

there's a weird sucking moment as the water collapses in around the space where you both were, and a flash of flame pulling both you and him a little further up into the water. You're both still deep in the water, but you've been pulled out of the binds. Thanks, Mister! No! Oh no! Get out of here!

You start swimming up. Yes. Swim up, swim up! As you're swimming up, a boat is descending along with you with a majestic-looking undead captain, Laudna. All aboard the Queen Dorolo! I try and send the rope to wrap around whoever I can. You got it, so the rope needs to descend.

Can I try to psychically attack the seaweed thing again to free up the body so that the rope can see where to grab him? Sure. Ropey? Ropey. Oh, that's a save. Okay, save on that. That is going to be a 19. Okay, that saves.

Can Orym start slicing? Orym can, but we'll get to you in just a minute. You got to do the girls here. So you got Mister down there to go ahead and support him out. Oh, it's supposed to subtract one d4 from the next saving throw it makes. Oh, okay. Before the end of my next turn, so that would include it.

Sorry about that, microphone. That's going to be a 16. Then it fails! There we go. Hey! I love a d4. So that's nine points of psychic damage. All right, once again, it flickers and pulls back. Eight points of psychic damage. All right, once again, it flickers and pulls back. Eight points of psychic damage, my math.

You can remake your charisma saving throw. Comedy. Yeah, that's a three. It's a three, all right. You maintain your comfortable space. It's going to be a long one. And Fearne, what are you currently doing? I want to try to bring Mister back down to see if it,

wait, can I only do that one time with Mister? No. If he's gone up for air, can he try to come back down? He can, but it's going to take him the rest of the round to get up and then eventually start heading back down. That's okay. You're deep in this lake,

probably a good 80 feet. Oh my god. It's a deep lake. Okay. It's a deep lake. Okay. It's a tiny monkey. I'm still thinking. Okay, so holding on to that idea, the three of you, I need everyone

who's underwater now in the proximity here to make a constitution saving throw for me. Disadvantages for me. Disadvantages for you. Constitution saving throw. Correct. Ladies? 18. 18, one point of cold damage.

19. 19, one point of cold damage. 14. That's going to be two points of cold damage. 19. 19, one point of cold damage. 14. That's going to be two points of cold damage. I rolled really bad, and you guys aren't in the proximity. The four of you, however. 14. 14, that's going to be 10 points of cold damage.

FCG. 13. 13, 10 points of cold damage. 19. 19, that's going to be five points of cold damage. 15? 15. That's going to be five points of cold damage. 15? 15, it's going to be, just make it. Write that down. Five points of cold damage. 15 is the save right now. Can I take out a chisel and draw it along my neck

and have a lightning arc across it using my blood maledict? And can I take a swipe at one of these, like trying to saw through one of these fucking things? As you pull it out and you light it with the energy, you watch it, it brightly sparks, and you see the energy grounding and dissipating throughout the water. It seems to be flickering and flaring brighter

than the normal arc that it gives off. Anticipating. Drake is underwater? Correct. Not terrible. That's 24 to hit. That definitely hits. Great. Oh, I should roll a blood. Then we'll come to hit. That definitely hits. Great. Oh, I should roll a blood.

Then we'll come to you, Orym. Oh, that's five points of damage to me, which I'll add to this. Nine, 13, plus five, 18 points of damage. Five of that is the blood. Does it have any blood? It does not have blood that you can tell. But you do carve and cut away a chunk

of what's holding you there, and you are able to free yourself from its bind at the moment. I'll take a second swipe. Go for it. Yeah, that'll hit 26. That'll hit. And that is 10 points of slashing damage, no blood.

Gotcha, 10 points of slashing damage. Orym? Can I swim away if it let go of me a little? Yeah, you can go ahead and get up through half your speed and height. So if I attack, is it three? It's three strikes. They're all disadvantage. Okay, and they'll be pushing attacks if they succeed.

Try to push these things back. That one is a 16 to hit. 16 does hit. Okay, so it's four plus, that's 10 points of damage. I don't know if you want the seaweed to make a saving throw. It does, that's gonna be a 15. That fails. Okay.

So you watch as some of the tendrils get pulled away from you, kind of releasing you from the grip that it has. Okay, next is 18. 18 hits. For 11 points of damage. The last one, that's a natural one, which I will roll. That is a 17.

Okay. For 10 more points of damage. Got you. So yeah, it definitely recoils and pulls away from you, and as the tendrils pull away, and you carve past the bits of the now severed, floating plant matter that drifts away. You now get yourself a glance down

into the shadow where you were held, and you can see four skulls embedded in the blackened silt just before closing up over the shadow. Oh, it's been sucking shit down here. Can I grab one before it disappears and then start swimming? If you want to try. Oh, cool.

Okay. Make a cool. Okay. Make a dexterity, no, make an acrobatics or athletics check as you're now, the entity's going to try and re-grab you as you reach for it. Damn you, dice! 12. 12? Yeah. You do grab the skull, and as you do, it surrounds and re-grabs your arm, re-grappling you. Okay, all right. But you have the skull, and as you do, it surrounds and regrabs your arm,

regrappling you. Okay. All right. But you have a skull in your hand. Okay. You're not leaving me. Now, you got pulled up by him. Just 15 feet up? Mm-hmm. If, unless you want to do something,

because you were thinking. No, no, no, go for it. Wait, did you get pulled up by Ropey? Just 15 feet by the monkey. By the underwater fire monkey. You and Robey next. You pulled anybody in. You hit a Robey, okay. Is her boat, is Bodhi almost at me?

But Bodhi's like, it goes pretty cleanly through the water at this point. It's almost near you. I'm going to try to grab onto the bow of Bodhi and ride it down and grab my coin and whisper a prayer to the change bringer and try to turn undead. Let's go!

Ooh. Ooh, yeah. The connection you felt with the Changebringer since you've gone to Ruidus has felt distant and removed. In this moment, as you try and reconnect, you feel her presence even stronger than before. For a brief moment, the shadows that emerge from the water

almost like hair underwater of the endless roads that drift away. No, that's creepy. That's not creepy. That's beautiful. That's beautiful, Matt. Love it. In that moment, you see that the path that leads

towards this is the path to salvation for your friends, and you focus on the memory of your god, and as you do, that wave of warm energy billows out. What's the save DC? I will look. It says... Vaudevinks and Jax. Yeah, I totally said it.

It says... Fawn Weeks and Joel. Yeah, I totally. It says, for a channel divinity, turn undead. All right. It doesn't say. Fawn Weeks and Joel. It doesn't say. It doesn't say. It's your spell DC. Oh, okay. 16.

It doesn't say. It was a natural 18, unfortunately. So as the wave passes through, the shadow doesn't, you see it pull back in places, but it maintains its frustrating presence. How do you know? Do you have to be? I hope he's gone. But you're up now, as you begin to descend now.

You can see now FCG has grabbed the side of the boat. She also has to make it safe. That's true, yeah. Oh god! Oh shit! That's right, that's right. Wait, what is it again? 16. 16. You got that a save. That's true, yeah. Oh god! Oh shit! That's right, that's right. Wait, what is it against? 16. You got that.

Wisdom save. Come on, come on. They're not dead. A wisdom save. What are they? I don't know. Wisdom's good. This die has been fucking me. You have advantage on wisdom save. I do! You do. Should've rolled it.

Because of the hero's feast. It is good, it is good. Ooh, I got a natural 19. Okay, yeah. You feel it. Ooh, I got a natural 19. Okay, yeah. You feel it hit you and that moment of just essential panic begins to creep in and you shrug it off because right now, you're a dope underwater captain.

You can see now a flash of electricity arcing through bits of the subterranean plant life as it pulls away, revealing Chetney cutting himself free of it, while you also see Orym in the process of carving onto the side. So you have eyes on three of your friends. What are you doing?

Who's closest right now? Is Chet? I mean, if she's on the side of the boat, I'd say between Orym and Chet, they're kind of equidistant from you. Can I tell if one looks more fucked up than the other? I'll get Chet. Okay. So Chetney, as you're carving away,

you feel another tendril snake around your body. You glance back and see, it's this green, stained bit of twine, a rope that is now tethering around your body, and you feel yourself being pulled back towards the ship. What do you do? Oh shit. Can I take a- Give yourself to the Kraken!

Arr! Can I, I'll sheathe a little chisel and tell it to start fucking rolling around and I'll take out the scythe and under it. Is he some cut rope? And I'll swing blindly. No! With Turmoil, and actually,

instead of swinging through, I'll point down at the darkness and I'll cast Shatter. Shatter, okay. So go ahead and roll, oh no, for me, that's a constitution save. Yes. That's a fail.

Oh really? Tell me 14. No, it's a natural four. Amazing. I'm going to have so much fun! That's cool! That's fun! 22 points of thunder damage. 22.

You all hear this. 10-foot sphere. You see this eruption of force beneath, like those depth charges that. You watch the water re-center itself from where the initial forced bubble burst outward and then goes ahead and diffuses back into space. This flash below.

I hear the siren song of the cannons over the open sea. It's getting weird. Bodhi's all, Oh, what's a see? As Ropey is tethered on, he goes, and you hear in your head, you hear nothing, but you hear, No, Worryful, I got you!

He begins to pull Chetney back up towards the bow of the ship as he swings the scythe to cause this detonation. I question back, because it's technically ropey and boaties action. Correct, what are you doing? Can I attempt to shoot?

Technically, it's ropey and boaties action. You're right, my apologies. Please continue. This is the best spell, and I'm so glad I took it. Suddenly, a 10-year-old in the bathtub. Well, technically, it's ropeopey and Bodhi's spell. Yeah. Ropey and Bodhi want a cookie, too, okay?

Can I speak openly in Shadow Cant in attempt, with an intent to intimidate, I say, Whoa, I say, I say, Listen up, ye cursed kelp. I am the captain of this seafloor. Relinquish my friends, for their souls belong to me. Make an intimidation check.

Come on! You can intimidate this kelp. This is an anti-Kilith moment. This form of dread, do I have, for my dread, do I have? Ask it in character, don't be a plus, come on. Do I have advantage on the roll? You do not.

The fact that you can even attempt this is because of the circumstances and the speech you've chosen, so. This is how I die. What? Not advantage, but it is possible. But it's possible because I'm speaking in Shadow Cant. Oh fuck. Cocked, cocked, cocked.

I fell in the... Natural one. Oh, come on! That was a noble-try. That's like the third. What did you say? Bodhi's taking you a little deeper than you had wanted. As you shout this down to the shadow,

you feel the waters get still around it and quiet, and for a minute, you think it works. Tendrils reach out and attempt to grab around you. You can make an acrobatics check. I thought it was acrobatics against it. It will be acrobatics. Save me, Bodhi! Fuck!

Take Bodhi instead. Ah, fuck! It's not great! Take Bodhi, but leave Ropea alone. Take Laudna, leave Bodhi alone. Eight. Eight? No!

Natural two for six. It rolls real bad. So as the tendrils reach out for you, Bodhi goes, and begins to pull upward, and the tendrils wrap around in front of Bodhi. Bodhi pulls away as the two arms go and just slap him away before they withdraw back, and Bodhi begins to pull up a bit as ropey.

You're making me do this! Pulls. That's not true. You named them both ropey. I didn't know they were going to talk. They don't talk. You just imagine they do. That's really actually what it is.

This is the world in Laudna's head. It does say, objects come to life. That is the first sentence. It does, they come to life. That is so open to interpretation. Yeah. Yeah. Don't talk.

It's so much better to imagine you standing on a regular boat with a limp rope in your hand going, . As Chetney gets pulled into the boat, on a regular boat with a limp rope in your hand going. As Cerny gets pulled into the boat, now we have FCG and Chetney holding onto the sides of Bodhi. And, um. Oh, FCG and, oh, I just thought Ashton is still down there. Oh yeah, you can't even see him.

All right, now finishing that go, we're coming up to the two of you. I'm going to go down and get as close as I can to where Ashton is, having seen what happened with Chet's arc. I'm going to grab a hold of a couple tendrils and hit Shock and Grasp. Nice. Okay.

All right, so you reach out and grab the elements of kelp-like matter with the shadow wreathing the sides of them. Go ahead and make an attack. Or is it a saving throw? No, it's an attack. Go for it. it's a disadvantage. Jesus!

It's underwater. Oh god, really? A disadvantage, you said? Is it melee or is it a ranged attack? It's a melee. Yeah, yeah, so it's disadvantage. It's a 12. It's a 12, that does miss, unfortunately.

You try and reach out for it. Doesn't quite matter, unfortunately, as the energy dissipates in the space bomb. It's been very cold. If you try to roll on your tray and you miss three times, you die. I didn't try to roll. I'm still a dreamy state.

I'm still believing that it's beautiful. You don't know, you don't see Ashton anywhere. You have not seen anything of me. We've seen your body a couple times. Yeah, it's just. I'm going to try to charm person on Ashton to try to awaken that. You do not seen anything of me. We've seen your body a couple times. Yeah, it's just. I'm going to try to charm person on Ashton to try to awaken mine. You do not see Ashton. Never mind.

If you want to try and uncover him or swim down deeper towards the mass, you can do that to maybe possibly get a view, but that's going to be a challenge. Yeah, I'll do it. All right, cool. So you go ahead and swim down and begin to try and push away. I need you to make an athletics check to see if you can tear away at the mass of now,

like deeply knotted plant matter. That was so close to being something good. That's not. It's minus two for athletics. I rolled a three. It's minus two, so it's a one. Oh no, Fearne! As you swim down, they begin yanking and pulling at it,

but you cannot manage to pull it free. It's knotted so tightly. You know where he is, but he's completely encompassed by this entity. So no luck there. You still have your bonus action or movement if you want to try and pull away. Yes, I will use...

Does engage? Can I do that? No. If you want to. Two note, to swim down to it, because it's half movement to swim underwater, the last 15 feet of movement got you there, so you have no other movement beyond

you could bonus action to try and swim 15 feet away. Or you can stay for it. I'll do that. I'll stay. Okay. I'll stay. I need, for those who are further up, which is going to be Chetney, FCG, Laudna. Yeah, no, it's just you three. Go ahead and make a constitution saving throw.

Regular roll? 12. Regular roll, regular roll. Eight points of cold damage. Eight points of, oh boy. Yay, that's a big one. It's getting close. Seven. Eight points of cold damage. Did you not close. Seven. Eight points of cold damage.

Did she not heal? 21. Four points of cold damage. I did heal some. Okay. Not all. Oh. For the rest of you, make a constitution saving throw for me that are in proximity to this entity.

Jesus, these are good rolls. I'm so sorry, constitution? Constitution, Taving Throw. One. One? 10 points of cold damage. Okay. 17. 17, five points of cold damage. 24.

Five points of cold damage. These are the best rolls I've had. Chetney? It's five points. What? Oh, no, you already did. Sorry, sorry. Five points.

Five points, yeah. You got the first round. Yeah, I rolled a dirty 20. Dirty 20, five points of cold damage. Okay. All righty. So now we're back to the rest of you who are December this, so Orym, Chetney,

what do you want to do? Do I see anybody, any of my friends, if I strain super hard? Oh yeah, you can make out now the shapes and there's flashes of energy around. Have I seen Ashton? You do not see Ashton. Also, is there a two-up that thing still?

All you see is Fearne pulling away at parts before having to let go, not making much of a difference down there. So I'm being held, right? I'm going to slash at the plant matter holding me and I'm going to make a pushing attack and try to break free and push it back. So it's a disadvantage, right?

Correct. That's great. That is a 24 to hit. That is a pushing attack, so that is five plus five is 10, 16 damage, and they have to beat a 17 to not get shoved 15 feet away. Ooh, that's a natural two. Any chance I see my- It breaks your grapple. Thank you, and does pushing back plant life

reveal my friend by any chance? I will allow you in this instant to make a perception roll with disadvantage. Okay, so that's a straight roll for me. That is a 25. 25. I'll say in this moment, you can see just a handful of glimpses of where Ashton is.

Okay. You're very reflective. I see what I think is Ashton's reflective arm through the dark, and I want to help really bad, and Orym just goes and vanishes from where he is and reappears right where Ashton is in the mess, and I continue to hack at what's holding Ashton. Go for it.

The rest of you watch as Orym, after cutting himself away, just. What? That's 23 to hit. So that's 12 points of damage. Has to beat a 17. That's a natural 17. Yeah.

And then that is an 18 to hit. Okay. Nine to 11, finally a good hit. 17 points of damage, and it has to be to 17. No, that's going to fail. So as you do the last two cuts, the last one slices through and you watch as it separates and you see the back of Ashton now exposed,

floating up, and immediately, Ashton, you feel yourself, the cold begin to seep in and you don't want it, and you watch as he begins reaching to pull himself back into where he was. Oh, wow. But I'm out of, no, action surge. Okay. Right? Yeah.

So it's pulling, he's going to- No, Ashton's pulling himself back in. He's reaching out, almost like he just realized he's been pulled out of the womb, and he wants that warmth again. I'll have to chop off his arms. I will do a, I can't, I'm out of superiority die. I did everything to get there,

but I will Action Surge and try to hit him once to see if it pulls him out. Okay, go for it. Disadvantage? Disadvantage underwater, yeah. That misses, that's a two plus, a load of 13, so that misses. Swings wide, unfortunately.

The next one is a 18. Hits. Hits. All right. So that's no extra damage, that's 10 points of damage. So you take 10 points of damage. Ow! Slashing? Yes, this time.

And then you get to remake your charisma saving throw. No. Come on! I have a negative two to charisma. This is gonna be a long walk. So that didn't work. All right, I got one more. Go for it.

Slash on your disadvantage. That's a one which I can reroll. That is a 16. Nope. He's beginning to crawl his way back down into the abyss beneath him. And that's the end of it. All right, so that finishes your go. I haven't arranged shit,

but I'll take another swipe, two swipes of turn oil on the tendrils. Okay. Are you still down there? Are you close enough to do the, how far did the tendrils reach at? They're aboard the boat. Fearne's got something.

She's chomping at the bit. Can I see him in all this? You did get, yeah, the thing tore open and now you have a visual on him. I'm going to try to charm a person on Ashton. Okay. Ashton. Okay. Ashton, make a wisdom saving throw with advantage. Oh, with advantage.

Goddamn. Yeah. Fearow's Feast. Yep. Turned up. I know. Come on. With disadvantage? With advantage. With advantage. Wisdom saving throw?

Oh, that's 23. Shit! That was a worthy shot. The other one was a natural one. Oh! Heroes Feast, worse spell. It is. Because we took a short rest,

I got both channel divinities back. So can I attempt to turn undead again? Come on. Come on. All right, so. Changebringer, please. I really need you. I'm going to flip the coin underwater. Okay.

And catch it. You flip it and he goes, I am not doing great. It begins to sink down. You go to reach for it and I am not doing great. It begins to sink down. You go to reach for it and you're not fast enough. It slips from your grasp. And as the coin drops, it stops. Oh.

Boom! Yeah! As it emanates outward from the coin. That's going to be a 14. It's a 16. It's a 16. As it pulls out, the shadow tendrils all scatter in that radius.

As they do, you watch the plant pull back and you have, for a brief moment, a terrifying view of the underwater graveyard of the many, many people that have been lured here to their cursed demise. Try to grab Ashton and pull him out. It's not a CR of two or lower, is it? It is not. Damn it.

But Ashton, in this instance, you get to roll your saving throw with advantage because you literally turned it for the time being. Natural 20, natural 20, natural 20. God, that would be really nice, wouldn't it? Let's go. With advantage. With advantage? Yes.

Natural 20. Yay! 18. With it, wait. 18, what do you mean? I have a negative two. Oh, but it's still a natural 20. Oh yeah, it's a natural 20, yeah.

Minus two, still 18, that still succeeds. You suddenly, as you're reaching for this, as you watch as it scatter out of your hand, and you're, what am I doing? Oh no. Fuck, I see exactly what's below me. Yeah. Fuck, I'm booking. Good god. Okay.

You know who else is getting out of here fast? No! She's been turned. Uh-oh. Oh, so you're running up full speed. Yeah. Are you taking Bodhi with you? About face to the heart! I'm on the boat with her.

Yeah, so explain to me how you're turned in fear from FCG. What do you do to get away? I mean, I feel like I would do that and be like, Yo! Surface Bodhi! Only on caverns! A boat pulls up. Emergency blow.

Ropey's like, what's wrong, mistress? As Bodhi's pulling up, you look back, and this burning divine light behind you is still chasing you. It's clasped in the back of the boat. Ah! It's coming from inside the boat! My big declarm.

Wait, so who all do I have with me? You have Chetney and FCG. I do have Chetney and FCG. Will she get the bends? I think so. It breaks it if you get hit, right? It breaks the effect? I don't think so. I don't know. You need oxygen in your blood to get the bends? I think so, it breaks it if you get hit, right? It breaks the effect? I don't think so. I don't know. You need oxygen in your blood to get the bends. The temperature of the water,

the freezing aspect of it begins to slowly subside as you all begin to swim back away, and the shadow completely recoils, very much just revealing the silt and bones. It's all clouded up from the movement. Like sources. Yeah. The bottom of the water now has become extremely cloudy

as the boat pulls away and all the various action has caused all the water to kick up all this dust and black. As it fills the space, encompassing all the remains of what's there, you can see the little bits of kelp-like plant life that's just drifting up there as you slowly swim your way back up to the surface.

Run. Go, run, run. Where's Lana going? She's trying to get in. Can we head directly to the portal? Can we just go to the fucking portal right now? Don't you want to rest? Yeah, just sleep. Just sleep on the other side of this fucking, yeah.

In another universe. Sure. Another planet. I want to go to another planet. No, but I didn't. They're going to come and then they're going to sleep here and then they're going to get sucked into the... Oh shit. I should at least warn them.

Should we leave a note? Yes. Yeah. How long does animate object last? Oh, that's a good question. Like, if we go back up, can we use it to come back down again? I'll uplaod the ship. Thanks for coming to this village.

There's a fucking dead thing down here. Want to come sit? Where are you going? My mistress told me to wait and talk to you all. What should I do, Cherry? Where should I repeat? It lasts for one minute. Oh no, it's been a minute. It's about now that. No, we need Robey to come with us.

The boat reaches the surface. Hits on. As you all get up there, Robey goes, It's been a pleasure. Robey! No! No! No! No Robi! No! No!

Robi, no! No! No! No! No! Good mama loves. I clamber to the front of the ship and I go, Bodhi, Bodhi, you used to be with me.

No, but it's taking on water because it wasn't meant to stay afloat for a while. Not like this. They got Bodhi! What's wrong with Flandre? You're asking this now. Whatever, we all back up at the top. Yeah, you all eventually get back

to the shoreline by the village. Where, that whole fiasco, how close to our exit point from the portal did it happen? This is close, the center of this entity How close to our exit point from the portal did it happen? This is close, the center of this entity is closer to where the village is. The portal that you guys have is a little further out of the lake,

probably about 60 or so, 70 feet from where it is. So there's a little bit of a berth, but you also were drawn from deep in the village. Yes, yes. Fun. Good job, good job. Oh, that was scary. Thanks. Just walking right in.

Thanks, ladies. Why didn't you speak to some of you and not all of us? That's true. It only goes after the strong ones. No. I don't think that's what it is. We're not in sync with the three of you, like you three are. Oh, that's true.

Oh, that's right, we are synced up. That's true, we didn't get any of the ladies. You witches. Well? Well, now what? We definitely don't stay here. No. We're waiting for it to get stronger.

Maybe just leave a note for anybody that comes this way. We just made contact. I don't have any more spells. We made contact with our friends before. But we also told them that we were going to be going back. Does the stone work anymore? No, not till tomorrow. Shit.

Should we leave a message? We can leave a message. Where are they going to see? We'll ride it on the dock, carve it into the dock. No problem. Ah! Why did I do that? Yeah, just carving big-ass letters on the porch of the general store. What are you writing?

Beware! That's it? Dead shit down there. With a picture of Laudna riding a boat with a rope sidekick going down underneath the lake. Very clear. It's very artistic. There's just a pile of skeletons at the bottom of the lake. Don't listen to the voices.

Boy. There's a creature that wants to eat you at the bottom of the lake. That's so boring. Oh yeah, I got this. Don't sleep here. What's this? A skull? Yeah, put that on the dock.

Yeah, that's a good idea. Oh, wait. Don't listen. Or how about we can leave a message just saying, ask this skull what's here. That's reasonable. Because they can talk to dead and skull will tell them. You could say he came from below. I assume Keyleth is coming.

Keyleth can probably speak to dead people. Can she? I don't know. I've never seen her do that. Oh. But I didn't watch her 24-7. If you listen to the voices, this is going to happen to you in the water. I found all those papers that told everything.

Yeah, just leave those. I'll leave the papers with the skull on top, like little paper wings. You could also just write and get on the paper. Right. But it's fun to carve it in the dock. Read this. Beware, beware.

That's fun. Dead gnomes make no toys. All right, we go back through the portal. Oh my god. Yeah, let's do it. So how are we going to get back to it? Do we have to swim? Yeah. The whole lake?

You know this lake is long. 200 feet. 200 feet? From the shoreline. We got out of it? It was from the shore, but the town was on the far side of the lake. It's a bit of a distance to get there. You can walk around and then swim out to it if you want to.

It feels like we've been awake for 76 hours. Yes, it does. I'm so tired. Keyleth did say, we're running short on time. I don't know what that means exactly. Maybe we just swim, we get out there, but we know that sleep is on the other side of this.

For sure. That's what we thought at last. If we sleep for four more hours, will we finish our long rest? I'll allow it. Okay. Also, we could leave messages, but if we wait for them to show up, we could info dump everything face to face.

For days! No, it could. Are they coming now? I told them we were going back in. We should go back in. We should also leave a marker where the portal is, so they know. Oh yeah. Can we draw a map or something? Let's draw a map on one of these pieces of paper.

You can also carve a map into the dock. No, don't do that, because what if one of the bad guys shows up? Fuck. What if we? It's fine. Why would one of the bad guys come here? Because reasons. I am so tired.

What if we camp out either through the portal or here, wake up in the morning, ring the Tempest, see if they plan to come imminently, and then we can show them the way through. We can talk out everything that we found out so far, and then head back in. Before you just leave them, nope. Let's head to the portal.

We got all this stuff. Let's head to the portal and go to sleep, and then none of us are thinking clearly right now. Let's get to the portal. We got all this stuff. Let's head to the portal and go to sleep, and then none of us are thinking clearly right now. Let's get some more sleep. I think that's better. And then we can figure it out in the morning if we're going to come back through. And also, we were able to get out of that thing.

So obviously, they'd be able to. They'd be fine. The Tempest is so strong. She can transform into whatever she wants. Yeah, she could probably wipe that thing out no problem or something. She could be like a kraken and just It's probably.

Right? I don't know. They'll be okay. Is that true? I mean, I'm not worried about, I think they'd be fine with what's under this lake. I'm just talking about. But she did say she wasn't going to, she said she was sending a group. Sharing information. Not her.

I'm thinking about sharing information, not 25 words at a time. Right. I just don't think she was planning to come herself just yet. Oh. What should we use as a marker? Like a, come down here.

You have a ribbon. Yeah. You're going to tie a ribbon underwater? Is that right? We're going to tie a ribbon to a tree. And write a map on the tree. On the shoreline. Okay. And then draw an arrow. Great. Yeah.

Done. Okay. You set up a few signs. Yeah. A few various signs to denote the part of the lake that will go ahead and lead in the direction that you intend. After setting that, you're heading into the lake towards the portal? Yes. Okay.

Delving in the temperature of the water, while still cold, is nowhere near the freezing temperature it was when you previously entered. As you begin to delve into the shadow below, lights before you by various spellcraft. You feel the oppressive presence of the entity not present at the moment. So with that comfort, you push around

until eventually you find the place where you had felt the tug of the stream, and then eventually, one by one, pass through into the portal, emerging like a water slide out of the rock and eventually having to catch yourself on the edge of the river in the subterranean cavern back underneath the ground of Rune, I guess.

I grab my immovable rod. Okay. Night! Yeah. I'm going to crawl into a corner. Go, Fiedel. Someone doing watch or anything? I'll do watch. No, just crawl into a corner. Go, Fiedel. Someone doing watch or anything? I'll do watch.

No, you already took a watch. It's got to be someone that didn't do it. Shit! You got to get your sleep. Good night. Okay, bye. Good night. I'll take a watch. Just keep, make pâté watch. He's not good.

And bad. He's loud. He'll wake us up. He's bad. He's loud, he'll wake us up. He's bad. Is the lightning keeping watch? He is. Okay. I think I can't sleep after the death

of Bodhi and Ropi, anyway. And there was a turn on dead. A lot happened. I think that as watch one and two fall asleep, I probably would have, as we're passing,. As we're passing, I whispered, Why do you think he didn't answer? The stone? Dorian.

He didn't answer. Maybe he was asleep. Mm-hmm. Pass out. All right. I'm going to keep watch, make a perception check for me. You know, it really makes you think just how fleeting life is.

It came so fast. It went so fast. Just so I'm talking about Bertin. 21. Nice. Yeah, well, you know, there's something about the fleeting nature of existence. Consciousness is ever a fluid thing, you know?

Yeah. One day, you're just granted understanding of the world around you, and you spend the rest of your days trying to grasp the concepts of what the meaning of it all is, and right before you wrap your fingers around it, it's stuffed. Oh. I'm sure it's very close to your experience, wasn't it? You just bamfed into existence. Yeah, but I'm just a little dead thing, it's okay. No.

I don't know what I'm doing. No, that was very insightful. Eh? Do any of us really know what we're doing? Hello. Come over there. Zora, you know the whole internal rut thing? Just makes gasses. After he leaves and I scooch away from the group.

Delilah? Yes, dear? Were you there on Ruidus? I never went away. I'm always here with you. I don't know what to do. What's the end goal of all of this? Am I really just supposed to keep chasing

and consuming power wherever I find it? To what end? And will it actually ever be enough? There's only really one reason for power. To protect those you love. And if that fails, vengeance is a pretty decent second goal, but you still have a chance to protect those you do love, the one you love. Don't fail as I did. There's still a chance.

Is vengeance all that's keeping you around? No. If there's anything I've learned in my time is to never give up. Because if you're willing to give it all away, nothing's impossible. SAM and LAURA kiss. What if I'm just a danger to the ones I love? The one I love. You know she'd probably be better off without me.

I know you know that. I don't know if that's true. They're all walking into the most dangerous of lion's dens. And I think you don't give yourself enough credit, you sweet girl. Look what you've endured. Look what you're capable of. Ultimately, the choice is yours. Look what you've endured. Look what you're capable of. Ultimately, the choice is yours. Ours.

You were gifted with this second chance. Maybe a third chance, maybe a fourth, who knows? Life is a strange and intangible thing. Not much power are you going to be sucking away from me. If I grow ever stronger, so do you. It's a gambit. We're one in the same, Lord Nadir. I don't believe that.

You don't have to. Faith, for some, is strong. I prefer reality. Then help me. Grant me more power. What do I need to do? To grant you power, I need more power. What do I need to do? To grant you power, I need more power. Find what you can and feed us,

and I'll give you everything you need to keep her safe. I promise. Promise, promise? I'm not in the business of breaking my word. If a bit careful with how I express them. I have a weird question. Pâté. Ashton doesn't like Pâté because he thinks Pâté is you. Are you Pâté is, you are you, Pâté.

I'm no more Pâté than you are me. We are bound, inexplicably, yes, but we're strange bedfellows. Oh gods. Okay, with that, I'm going to go to bed, I think. Laudna, and you feel this light cold presence pull your chin up, and for a moment, you can see this ghostly visage of a woman's face with a warm but stern look.

Is it Delilah? It is Delilah. We will endure. Always. Nervous, it vanishes. All right. With that, you all complete a long rest. Oh my god! Push the button.

Yes, confirm. Holy crap. Mm. Holy shit. As I spill all over myself like a slab. Longest day ever. Ever. Ever. What?

Oh, our hit points went down. Aw. Boo! Back to normal. They were so high by comparison. Full spell slots. Getting rid of my saving throw proficiencies. Oh man.

And my defense, my frightened. Yours didn't go down. It did go down, but... Okay. All right, as you all wake into this cavern, the nearby sound of rushing water, the still somewhat mysterious and beautiful frozen moment in time

half merged with the surrounding rock of the cavern, what would you like to do? I like it in here. It's better. Let's stay in here for a while. Hours, days, months. This is good. This is your jam, right?

This rock is old, this building is old, you're old. I'm not that old. You can't commune with this stuff, can you? I don't know. If you'd asked me that two weeks ago, who knows what I would've fucking said. Honestly, I want street food out of a cart really badly. I want something greasy and disgusting.

Meat pie. Oh god! Meat pie. It'd be really good. Fuck. Dark ale? Yeah. Stout. If I have to be in the middle of nowhere,

this is pretty good, but it feels like, I don't know, I like not having open space. I don't know, I like not having open space. I don't know, I didn't think that was a thing, but it is nice knowing that anything that falls on me, I can reach. Well, we're under and protected, and it's nice, and the greenery is grand,

but we should probably find out where this goes. We should. Yeah. These tunnels. Going down, or should we go to Creverus? Well, there was a climb up past the waterfall. That's true. We could backtrack or we could see.

Just go straight up and see if it goes out. Mm-hmm. These tunnels supposedly run to Creverus, right? I mean, maybe. There's subterranean tunnels, I think, all over the moon. Maybe it's like a giant anthill, but if it connects, who knows? Up or down?

I vote up 100 or 200 feet, just to see what's ahead, because we didn't leave completely architecture and stuff, or have we, I can't remember, just between games. You've begun to exit the elements of ancient architecture and reach where the water source was, and there's just some cliffs that lean up

what looks like a climbable continuation of the cavern at an upward angle. Well, look what being curious got us yesterday. Yeah. Let's stay curious. Yeah. We just got to mark where we're going. Oh yeah, we should put the markers in here, too. Yeah, let them know which direction we're heading.

How do we do that? I've got a hammer. Carve it into the rock? Yeah. I mean, I actually have a rock hammer, not this ridiculous thing, but. Just like an arrow situation? Yeah. Yeah.

Or even, we don't even need an arrow, just a little X. Oh, wait. I mean, I have paints. We don't have to break shit. Actually, this shari symbol's real easy to draw. I've been drawing it for fucking ever. Just beat me to a punch, yeah.

That's right. Yeah, let's do that. We'll seldom differ. I don't want to take anybody's joy, but you know. Give me that other thing to identify. Oh yeah, here's the other ring. Should we suck the life out of that one ring? Mm-hmm.

I can cast. It's a ring of protection. Oh, a tunable item? It is. Anyone got any slots that they want? Plus one or plus two? Plus one. I've got a slot, but.

You want it? I'm already wearing a ring. I'm also already wearing a ring. Oh. I am not, and I have a slot. But I'll take it. I'll take it unless one of the paper-thin casters want one. I thought we were right.

This other ring, though, could potentially trace. I have a Pearl of Power. I could have just regained a third of the spell slot. That's also true. God! Always forget about that. Still. You did pretty good. Oh, yay. I remember I did pretty good. Oh, yeah. I remember I had that on. Don't fucking at me.

All right, so ring of protection. Don't fucking at me, okay? I feel like we should maybe funnel this other ring. You want to suck it in? Can only use the vest once a day. Oh, that, yeah. The life alert ring. We shouldn't carry it around.

We don't want them to be able to track us. Let's burn that thing. And we're okay with the tiny tank taking the ring of protection? Mm-hmm. Yeah. Okay. Let's make the tiny tank more tank-like. Yeah, let's suck up the power in the little thing.

Who wears the vest? I'll try it if no one else wants it, I'm curious. Sure. I'm down for that. It'll just target you. All right. Sure. Come down to that. It'll just target you. All right. Okay. All right, so Laudna goes ahead and puts the harness on. It feels loose on you. You have to tighten the edges.

Imagine an elementary school student on their first roller coaster. Like one of the hanging ones. Oh god. Where you're like, I'm going to die. Yeah. You slipped out of that. Are you sure this is okay? As you're tightening it on,

it adjusts to your shape magically. It feels like it's fine. It does adjust magically to your shape. After a moment, you're like, oh, okay, that works. You take the silver ring and place it at the edge, and the ring begins to twirl for a minute. The energy begins to encircle it. It doesn't take long.

This isn't a profound enchantment, but a decent one of strength. You watch as the ring darkens into a black band before it dissipates away into an odd essence of now defunct metal. I'm going to get the thing here. You're going to slap the Lyle out of you? How is it going to be threatening her knee.

Which is bad, too. MCL? Okay. So your hit point maximum permanently increases by two. Whoa! Ooh! Thank you very much. That's great. And all attack- Is it a random roll

kind of a thing? No, it's based on the level of the enchantment that's present. That's cool. You tripled your HP there, well done. And all attack rolls and ability checks that you make have advantage until your next long rest. It's attack rolls and ability checks, not saving throws. For one day.

You are hurt. Okay. I can see why this thing is a problem. That's awesome. That's not nice. You are. Okay. I can see why this thing is a problem. That's awesome. That's very cool. Yeah. Yeah. We're going to have to work hard not to abuse this. Ludinus has 999 hit points.

Oh my god. Yeah. Yeah. But a death save ain't one. Mm. All right, let's climb. All right. As you all gather your materials, pick up from your temporary encampment

here in the central cavern, I need a group athletics check to make this climb. No problem. Set us off, Orym. We're climbing? Yep. Spider climbing? Yeah, you're fine. Oh, I don't get it. That's an automatic success. Natural 20! Natural 20!

Hey! Auto success, two natural 20s. Six. One. Four. What? What? All right, Ashton, it's up to you. 14. Okay.

That's a passing, wow, wow! All right. We're winning. We're still wet, so it's very slippery. Yeah, it's very slippery. We're still soaked. Shit, mate, it's hard! It takes a little bit of time, but you clamber up along this massive cliff face until it eventually gets to another shelf.

This now winds at an upward angle, almost like a slight spiral that backs up and then switchbacks into another cliff that you climb up and continue to push on for what feels like a mile of just odd meandering tunnel that widens in places. There's one element that falls off of the side, and as you look over the side,

it's just this open, black expanse, this open, void chasm. You're uncertain of how far anything would fall, but you're not in danger of stumbling into it, but it's showing some of the odd cavern networks that all intersect in these spaces below. Can we leave an Ashari symbol at the climb visible from down below

so that if someone arriving where we arrived would go and see a marker up? Sure, easy enough to do. You can chisel out the symbol and paint it up and leave these sigils as you go as a place marker. Sending worked. Sending worked. Should we try to scry on anybody? I can't do that, can you? I can.

I think we should. I think we have to know what our options are, yeah. What changed? Yeah, what was it that happened? Because it went to the moon and we reached some sort of like. But why would Caleb be able to do it? Or it's a distance thing. Yeah, but...

Or whatever was causing the interference is no longer causing the interference. Yeah, that's what I think it is. Because there was no static anymore. Because the gate is weakening. I know that. I think you should try. I could also try to reach out to the god,

but I don't know. Elrond is now. Bro, Brodathos? Oh my god. trying to reach out to the god, but I don't know. El Ruidus, no. Yeah. Prodathos? Oh my god. I would keep it low key for now. But I could try to scry on somebody, although most of the people,

it has to be somebody here on Ruidus. Oh, that's easy. And probably someone who doesn't have a protection ring or something. Check in with Ira. Ira, man. Or Elder Barth. Yeah, let's check in. Ira. Ira.

Ira's good. Ira? Ira. That's actually. Yeah, check in with Ira. All right,. Or Elder Barth. Yeah, let's check in. Ira, Ira. Ira's good. Ira? Ira. That's actually. Yeah, check in with Ira. All right, let's just, want to just see if it works? Sure. Yeah. We should check in on your mom. Re-casting?

Scrying? Scrying? Okay. Just to see if it works. Yes. Changebringer, if you can help me, please show me where Ira is right now. You focus and concentrate. You sense the distance between you and the changebringer. You feel like there's an attempt to reach out,

but there's a latticework of fences keeping you at a distance from really extending your consciousness to this greater consciousness. You see flashes of her in the distance, but she's too far to reach. And as you try and beg one more time in your subconscious mind for that clarity,

the gate closes. I don't know why, just Scryon doesn't work up here. We could send in stuff down there, but not up here. We haven't tried sending up here. Or? Wild idea. Yeah. Have someone try who is not

getting their power from down there. Yeah, but I don't know how to scry. Do you? Also, I could try to send. Yeah, I could send a message to Ira. I could do that to save you some of your strength. Or we could just go. I could try to call Widogast again. I don't know if I could work through the-

I don't either, but there's no reason not to do it. Right. Widogast, we're back on the moon. SAM and LAURA, MATT, and LAURA, and LAURA, and LAURA, the static feedback comes in and your brain suddenly fills with that sharp pain. Oh fucking T-Mobile. Roll a d100 for me.

Not bad. Oh boy. That d100 for me. Oh, d100. Oh boy. That goes to the time-losser chip. 80, 38. 38, okay. Too much creamer? Yes, I'm just lost in the static of whatever. Like, the previous attempts on Exandria,

it's a very similar and even stronger sense here on Ruidus right now. Do I get any pain from it? On the cusp, but not enough to actually hurt you. Great. That's not, that tracks. I got a little wolf man. Keeping it up here.

Oh. The whole walk, I believe Imogen and I have been looking for if there's ever a good place to deal with that seed, if there's anything that feels right. Soft earth, similar environment as to the one that we found on Mindsburn. Keep an eye out.

I mean, most everything here is hard rock. Yeah, that's what I'm thinking. Nothing that yet matches that, but I'll keep that in mind as you go. We're both keeping an eye out for that. Can you remind us of the geography of where we are again? You are essentially following this winding tunnel

that the further you go, you begin to think, you've been warned of a thing called a bane worm. You've had a vision, and this tunnel has a continuously cylindrical constant width to it that snakes and burrows through, leaving just elements of crumbled rock and dust in its wake. But it's also a fairly reliable tunnel. Right.

Yeah, we got to keep going. Does it look like it's been carved by a worm? It looks pretty uniform. Can I ask, is it, if we walk for 100 or 200 feet, is there ever a little pocket that, if the subway was coming, we could leap into the side of, or is it all?

I mean, occasionally you find little alcoves and pockets. You see smaller parts that resemble that weird geode that you stumbled upon, like small little clusters of crystal, veins of glass that carve through, like massive veins of glass here and there as you continue on seeing these patterns, fused elements of nearby stone elements

from some ancient heated compression. Hopefully we'll be fine by the way. We're going to have to run if the train comes. You continue on for a good another hour or two before the tunnel just comes to an end. Oh. Like a collapse or a fallen element. There is just an end to it.

Damn it. Have we been rising steadily, or have we just been staying? Kind of hard to tell. Oh, dude. That sucks. The collapsed rock, can we just fruitlessly try to move some of the rock and see how horrible it is? That sucks. The collapsed rock, can we just fruitlessly try

to move some of the rock and see how horrible it is? Or is it just absolutely dead? I mean, it's pretty compacted. It's not solid stone, but it looks like... Boulders and shit. Yeah, whatever has come through here has fallen in. So the question is, how badly do we want to keep going this way,

or do we want to walk backwards? I don't even think it's an option to go this way. It's an option, possibly. But how much is? Well, if there was a way to see what was on the other side of the collapse, that might influence. So you wish if somebody could fuse with rock, or go through it.

Yeah. Do a little earth gliding situation. I could. Yeah. But boy, that's a lot, if anything. This is the time to do it. We're trapped under hundreds of feet of stone. We've been walking an hour and a half in a tunnel

that's dead end. I mean, I can also try as well to. No, I mean, this is, I mean, no, we need somebody who's not had their ass kicked. I'm just putting it out there. Or you could dig. You could turn into a creature that could dig. I could dig.

Well, let's see if we need it first. Yeah, or we could work together. Do it, we need it. Show off, baby. Yeah, okay. Fuck. Fucking going for it. I am activating the Shard of Comort.

I'm just going to lean down, my hands on the earth, I'm going to lean down my hands on the earth and start to shake and vibrate and slowly change shape. Bigger, spikier, everything just becomes odd and off. He watches Ashton's form begins to swell and bits of jagged rock begin to bulk out of parts of his torso.

While you are focused on connecting to the landscape around you, you watch as Ashton grows in size, elements of his body beginning to widen with more protruding bits of rock and crystal, to where in some ways he looks like Ashton plus earth elemental almost. Like there's an exaggeration to his size and form.

They now, as the transformation eventually slows and comes to a stop, just glancing, kneeling down is about six feet tall. Whoa. Whoa. That rock arm on the side is now a massive claw-like protrusion. Oh shit, that's pretty powerful. Why'd you waste it doing this, Ashton?

I turn and fall right into the wall and vanish. He glides into it. Ashton, as you tumble into the stone, your consciousness connects with the nearby rock and stone, and you sense in the vicinity, there are a number of small and large tunnels and caverns that are all burrowed and re-burrowed

and re-collapsed and moved, and you sense that you're not far from the surface. Ooh. How cool is that shit? He's just gone now. That's fucking cool. Double checking as I round about, I'm just curious if this is just a base collapse or no.

It looks like the tunnel that was beyond it, it's heavily collapsed for about 300 feet or so, but that's because the surface collapsed in on it. Okay, and I can hold my breath down here for a little while. For a moment or two. Yeah, for as long as you can hold your breath anywhere else.

I'm great. In that case, I'm just going to shoot straight up and see how far we are from the, I'm just going to fly straight up. You emerge from the top and land immediately. The dust of the storm hits you as you stop, but it hits your surface and glides off. You feel unaffected by it.

Your eyes themselves now, like a glass barrier against the storm. As you're just being battered without issue from the storm, you can see now you are indeed a straight shot in the middle of a low valley that curves upward and out of your visual range before the rest of the dust storm. So there is some cover that we can get to from here.

Yeah. Fine. Fall backward and head straight back down. Eventually, out of the ceiling, a couple of rocks. What's that? Oh, jeez! Ah! Ashen lands, like three-point lands

in the middle of the tunnel where you are. It's raining! That's great. You have a priest AC in that form? Oh yeah. All right. It's Raymundo! That's great. You have increased AC in that form? Oh yeah. I throw my chisel at it. Brave reaction.

Yes. I ain't going to move. Roll for attack. Ding, ding, ding. 24? That hits. Oh, it does? How much did your AC? 19.

Oh, it went up a couple, okay. But you're welcome to throw it. It'll stick and... 11 points of stabby damage. Damn. Okay. Water good. Hold on. Dad, what are you doing? I didn't know it was, look how big it is!

Wait, you're not my dad. He sure is. He's dingus. Perfect. I will take that damage. You threw one of your, what'd you throw? One of my little chisels. One of your little chisels? Stingus. Perfect. I will take that damage. You threw one of your, what'd you throw? One of my little chisels. One of your little chisels.

I'm going to take the chisel and I'm just going to throw it at the wall and try and embed it like a thrown knife. I assume I can use, that's a strength? Yeah, just roll with strength and proficiency. Fucking Matt Mercer over here. Strength and proficiency. I can get advantage on that.

Just without rage, right? I can just go through that door. Sure, I'll allow it. Throwing a dagger at a wall. Yeah, yeah. In this form, too. It's. So that's

26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35. What? So you roll a 35 to throw your chisel into the stone wall. You just watch it. There's a cloud of dust that settles and you just see a hole. Whoa. The chisel's approximately six inches

embedded into the stone. Oh. Into him? No, he threw it into the wall. Oh. Do we want to go up or do we want to stay below? I think we should. Oh.

First of all, that voice is awesome. Yeah, that's really great. Underground, probably as long as we can. Oh, okay. Doesn't that make sense? I mean, can you burrow? Can you make a hole? We'd have to go back, but I can go up. Oh, well.

I just thought you could make a hole like one of them worms. It's not much this way. I don't know why it's that hard. How long can you do it for? About an hour. Also, which is Ashton's entire form, including his head grow, or is his head normal size,

like there's a mech around it? No, I'd say he proportionally grows a little more, but you can take it to what's good. I'm very much somewhere between, I'm trying to remember the name of the weird electric alien from New Mutants, and a little bit of Groot. It's just this big, there's just, it's like I've sat still for too long

and just rock in a salt deposit. We need art. It's just bigger and bigger. I feel like we should get out of the stone. All right, yeah, then let's go up. Yeah. Sure. And if within that hour, a storm comes, maybe you can just bang a hole in the ground and we can come back down.

Yeah, we'll figure out the bane horn problem later. Back up, and I'm going to just start physically digging straight at it, like at a quarter angle above the break in this tunnel. Okay, using your massive arm, you just start digging and tearing through, taking the hammer and beating and breaking rock that doesn't seem to want to budge in that process and in doing so, making it easier to scoop away.

It takes not long with your strength and your help pulling it away, but eventually you end up finding a bit of rock that you feel shift and move where you know it collapses. Instead, you smash it outward and you watch as three large rocks dart up and the dust storm overhead is now visible

as the reddish sky and atmosphere of Ruidus is now exposed for you once more. Did we leave clear passage from the worm tunnel up to surface? I imagine you probably have been. Some good follow-up. It's a smaller, you have to push it to the side and separate it as you go.

No, I was fencing. Like it's the Lincoln Show. Maestra, come on. Oh! I just started helping everybody out of the tunnel. What's it like where we are on the surface? I mean, there's a dust storm currently blowing through. It's not the harshest of dust storms.

It's just more of an inconvenient one, but also it obscures vision. So it has its benefits and its penalties. So we can't see the Starry Dome. Nope. Can I feel, can I sense where that pull had been coming from as far as the city that? If you want to try and reach out, yeah.

Oh. I can't. It'll leave Nodahan to us. Look at the Trishy Scribble. What do you want to do? To try to just figure out where the city is. Let that go. Don't do it. How far is the valley wall?

Don't do it. I'll say, how about this? Go ahead and roll and make a charisma check for me. This is to center that thread you've already connected with. Can I assist in any way? Unfortunately, no. I stand close. Actually, you know what?

As a Ruta Sporn that is connected, yes, I'll allow you to do that. All right. Do I get advantage or something now? You would. I'm helping. Since you two are directly connected to this. Okay, 20. 20, indeed.

You're so special. You take a moment between the two of you focusing. You sense the direction where you are, and when it comes a little bit to the left that way, you're pretty certain. I think it's that way. I'm pretty certain. No, he pointed over here, actually.

I do have a question, though. I feel like we need some sort of understanding or agreement of when it is time to get the fuck out of Dodge. We don't have our Heroes' Feast. We don't have our Misty Form. Do we have teleport now? We do.

Do we have the- But it's got a little bit of a risk. Oh, you only got enough. But it's a small risk. You only got enough what? I have enough charges on the staff of the Dark Odyssey to teleport us out of here. But there's a small chance that the staff

will disappear in the process. You've got one more shot every time from now on? No, I have just enough charges to use to get us out of here, but when you use all the charges of the staff, there's a chance that the staff will just disappear and never come back again. But at least we would be where we would need to be.

We could use it for sure. But there's just no more staff. Yeah need to be. We could use it, for sure. And if we're teleporting out, we would teleport back to the cave. Yeah, so we'll be fine. All right. I just... I don't think we leave till we find friends. We want to take care of our staff, that's all.

I want to take care of our staff. What was that, Ashton? I am going to... We don't leave till we find friends. I know, but I also don't want to leave with us separated, either. So if anything happens and it seems like, I mean, you all almost got captured yesterday. We got lucky yesterday, but if that happens again.

We might not get lucky again. We also all almost died back home yesterday. It's dangerous up here. I know. This is what we're here for, right? Changebringers looking after us, we'll be fine. I know, but just remember, this is just to better bolster our fight on another day.

We need everybody together. Sure. So our goals, find the Friends of the Volition, if we can. Yeah, the rebel group. Yeah. Our mind-shield-y scroll has worn off, too, right? Oh yeah. They're going to be able to figure out where we are.

But we have two of those, right? Do we? We do. We had two of them, we used one, so we should use another one for sure right now. Yes. It lasts for what, eight hours? Yeah, let's do it right now.

Let's do it ASAP. So we have eight hours. Great. They might have sensed us this whole morning, though. We didn't have it back up. We were somewhere they had never been, though. It doesn't matter. How they get there.

It doesn't matter. We're about to vanish. Then do it. Let's put it out. Do it now. Yeah. Yeah. Who has the scroll? Oh shit, we left it at home!

Maybe I had it. I'm pretty sure you had this scroll. Okay, I don't know. One of you had it, at least. Go'm pretty sure you had this. Okay, I don't know. One of you had it at least. Go on, read it out loud. The way that it rhymes, too. Wicca-lecca-ha, mecca-hi-ha. Solid.

All right, the scroll itself dissipates and you feel the magical encasement of the protective magic take hold within each of your minds. Phew. Woo! So we're just on foot now? Yeah. Wow.

No one can fly us, or? I can fly some of us. I mean, I can give us Pass Without a Trace as well. Don't think we need to waste that yet. Okay. Yeah. I guess we just walk. Just keep walking. Should I leave a message

to let the people following behind us know what's going on? They're not following us, really. I think Caleb was going to send a team. No. What kind of message, though? You mean leave something here or try to reach out? That's not going to work. No, leave something here. Through the dust storms? Like a magical message.

I can leave a message that will trigger when they get to this point, to point them in the direction of When they specifically or anybody? It would be, I can trigger it based on something specific. But I don't know how specific I can get with it. I don't think we want them to come this far.

We want to get in there, see what we can see, and get out. We don't want to babysit a whole bunch of random soldiers who show up behind us, do we? I don't think so, but I don't know what Keyleth is sending. Or you can just leave it. I'll just leave it. Do it. I'm just going to leave a message. Okay.

I'm going to make the trigger. Can I make it if an ally walks by? Is that somebody that's friendly to us? Or is that something that is? Yeah, you can make it someone who is an ally to your cause. Great. Great, I'll leave a, what do I have?

Oh, I have a Mind Egg, great. I'll put that down and I'll cast a. A Mind Egg? The All Minds Burn Egg. That's the other thing we have to do. We'll be doing it. Oh, I promise. What do I have?

I don't have any little things. I took stones from the shoreline, but I don't want to use it because we need it for teleport. Wait, you just need an object? Yeah, just to cast this fucking spell. Are there stones around us? Just a piece of dirt. Is there a rock around, or is this wood? I mean, there are the chunks of rock

that you hammered out. Great, I'm going to take a rock. And I'm going to cast a spell. I have a rock negligee. I have a Dumon Memorial Coin. I'm going to cast a spell. I have a black negligee. I have a Dumon memorial coin. I have a card from a skywrath. Wait, I have the remains of the seed sent to me from Keyleth. She would recognize it.

It's like a dried husk. Yeah, and an ashari would recognize it, but others, maybe not. All right. So if it could just leave it, it would stand out a little here in the hole. Okay. Ow!

Hey, you're good with direction. That way, what's that like latitude and longitude? Say what? How would I let people know? If I put this rock here, I would say, head due north, head due... What's the message? I don't know.

How does the magic work? I'm going to say to this little husk, hey, we are going towards Creverus. The direction is due north, slightly left. So you're pointing towards something. That's where Creverus is. Is there a hill, a ridge, a landmark, an anything? We did just dig a hole. In the direction that Imogen points?

Uh... Or is it just wide open? I'll say there is a... Yeah, I'll say with the time that you've taken to converse about this, the storm has loosened up a little bit, and you can see the shadow of a mountain range in the distance. Head toward the mountain range.

There you go. All right. Hope you find this. We're heading to Kavera's, what? What? Head towards the mountain range. I don't know where exactly we're going, but I think it's that direction. All right. Over.

10-4. 10-4. 10th is one nine. Heading to Graveras. All right, we walking. All right. Now on foot through the remnants of this light wind, and that's when you cover your faces with what you have and continue onward.

Now you gain quite a bit quickly in that misted form. So it would have been like a 100 days travel. It was a bit shorter, but we do get to roll for the next few hours. So who wants to go ahead and roll the next d20? You were last, right? Yeah, that's true. There we go.

That's true. Yeah, I was like, hmm? 17. 17. All right. The storm continues to blow, but there's a moment where all of you just stop. You feel this vibration in the air,

this odd kind of energy, like a buzz that encompasses all the space around you. You feel your stomach begin to drop, like there's an anticipatory butterfly-like feeling in your stomach. And faster than you can process it, the entire ground around you begins to brighten.

Oh shit. Every stone and rock just begins to burn like a colder ember till you have to close your eyes. It's too bright. It burns your vision. The entirety of the surface of the moon around you becomes incandescent with red light. The storm seems to instantly stop.

Oh. It's a fire. Is that a fire? It's a fire. Now, the five of you shield your eyes. It's too intense to hold, and you feel that energy pass through and beyond. The two of you drop into a brief state of euphoria.

Suddenly, your vision goes white, not unlike a few moments in your life when you felt that power flash within you. You feel like you've been around forever, for a moment, a timeless essence that is only experiencing a blip. Then it's gone and passed through you. You don't see the light anymore,

but you feel like you felt it pass through you and up into the endless expanse. The rest of you wait for your vision to return and you look over and see Fearne, that red energy just drifting around her, her hair floating, and you don't see Imogen. Huh? Until you look up and about 20 feet in the air,

she stands there, eyes white, hair glowing bright pink-red. All the intricate veins of energy across her body now just brightly glowing, and you can see clusters of rock and stone around have lifted up with her and just hold slowly rotating aloft. As you come to, you realize your feet are off the ground. around have lifted up with her and just hold slowly rotating aloft. Oh. As you come to, you realize your feet are off the ground. And slowly the energy begins to subside and you drift back down to the surface.

The stones dropping around. We're both all right. That was fun. SAM and LAURA both sigh. We're both all right. That was fun. That felt amazing. Are you all right? Are you all all right? Are you guys all right? Wow. It was really bright.

You guys seem way better than just all right. Look at that smile. You both gain 15 temporary hit points. How many? How many? 115? No. 115? No, 15. Mark it down! 15.

That's almost as much as Grog. 15 temporary hit points. How hard are you? Wow. Did you see anything? Did you, what happened? Did you feel the others? Oh yeah. No, I didn't feel anything. I didn't feel anything, but.

There was nothing. Just felt whole, you know? Yeah, it feels really peaceful. What are those flares, then? They lock people into Pridathos? Or they reward people? While they're talking, does the soil feel different? Like if we touch it with our bare fingers afterwards?

There is a fading warmth to it. We should keep moving. You should try rock sliding through that sometime. I drop right down into it, like, don't even, there's not even a moment. You do, you feel like, it's so faint, but there was a shift in temperature when that flare took off.

Next time, Gadget. And it's just fading back to its natural state. I move towards the direction we were walking under the ground. Like a stone shark, Ashton carves through the ground, just barely visible. Stone shark. You all continue to trek along.

I'm not going to say what I want. Continuing on, the thought comes across your mind as the euphoria drifts away that the benefits that you gain aren't just your own to gain as well. Like what? The rest that are like you are getting the same boons. Yeah. They're cycling the network.

They're revving the engine. Yeah. Everybody's getting more powerful with every one of those flares. I wonder what benefits it'll get. They've been doing it more and more, huh? It's temporary hit points, right? Yeah, but I wonder if you double on top of them,

if they'll keep building. How close are we to the end of the hour? I'd say, finishing this leg of the journey, especially with your help getting him along, eventually it does subside, and you feel your form transition to its natural state. I go crystalline for a couple seconds, and then I become myself again,

and I do not look good, and I'm just on the ground for a minute. Oh, that's right. No, because you come out ragged on the end, exhausted. Yeah. Not good. I'll go over and help him up. Thank you. Do you need something to eat or to drink?

No, no, I'm fine. Just hurts, and I'm going to get up. I am, what's your walking speed? 30, I think. Yeah. Okay. I am at 20 walking speed. Oh no. Oh shit. You want to ride?

Or... I don't know, it's worth figuring out. Maybe, Fearne, you could go beast mode. Oh yeah, and carry you. Yeah, you know what I'm going to do? Give me a second. Is it like that for a while now,

or just for an hour? Two points of exhaustion. Oh shit! Two points of exhaustion. You shit. Two points of exhaustion. You guys didn't want to turn around. I know, it made sense to do it. So two fucking days of this shit. Oof. Oh.

Yeah. Unless you are... Like, is there a spell or anything that can do that? Greater Restoration. I could do that. You can do Greater Restoration? Yeah, let me see what level it is. Is it four? Might be fifth.

We're still walking while we're having this. Yeah, yeah. It has a high cost. This must roll for the next hour for me. Yeah, not me. You know what? I'm going to turn into a... Let's see.

Come on, where there's... Oh, I cursed it. I'm going to turn into a big dire wolf. Ooh! A 10? 10, okay. The heavier storm begins to push in once more. Begins to obscure your vision

and making it hard to keep tabs on the direction, if not for Imogen, still riding the wave of the flare, continuing to focus on that path. Wrapping up your face best you can, you all push into the storm. This one, you can hear the cracking of thunder in the distance

as bright purple lightning occasionally sparks through above, and each time it crashes by, you feel that tingle almost match through your body with each distant crack. The hour continues uneventful, aside from the storm itself, just slowing your track slightly.

Eventually, as the storm begins to pass and your vision begins to peak out, you can see the mountain range that was so distant before is much closer. There, on the outskirts of what looks like a carved valley in the middle of it, you can see the faintest view of a skyline of pointed towers among clustered buildings.

Detailless at this distance, but a real sign of civilization here on Ruinous. And the destination you're on the cusp of reaching. And that's where we'll go ahead and end tonight's episode. Oh, we are almost there, baby. and the destination you're on the cusp of reaching. That's where we'll go ahead and end tonight's episode. Oh, we are almost there, baby! Picking up at the arrival of Kraviris next time. Do a full frontal assault, kill everybody in the city. Yeah!

We're good, we're powerful. Ride this Proudathos planet worm. I got advantage on attack. Two points of exhaustion, motherfuckers. It was worth it. It was worth it. It was worth it. We would have wasted so much time backtracking. Yeah, no.

I'm happy to just also just, I mean, out of character, I'm just happy to just stretch those legs. I think so. I have 500 gold worth of diamond dust, so I can use some of it. Yeah, we can say right now, if you want to use it at this point, and we can just turn to the next episode

without having to worry about it. I was going to say, let's save it. I want to milk it, don't kill it. I want your sympathy. If you use it right now and I have to use it, does it wipe everything? It just loses fifth-level spell. No, I mean, does it kill all my exhaustion?

One point of exhaustion, I believe. Okay. So that's better than nothing. Yeah, that is better than, that's at least walkable, but. Well, maybe today we won't be fighting anything. We'll just be talking and then, you know, we'll just go to bed and then. We won't be talking.

If shit's about to go down, I think it's a good idea, but otherwise, that's very useful. No matter how long we've been walking? Since? I'm putting it about, since you emerged from the tunnel, it's been two hours. Since you woke up this morning,

it's also, I'd say, probably been about an hour of snaking through that tunnel. And so it's been about. I'm just concerned about the mind shield. Okay, cool. Understood. We cool. So yeah, two hours since the mind shield was put up. So you have six more hours of that.

How exciting. Yeah. Six more hours of that. That's exciting. Yeah. Six more hours. We're going to stop talking. And if they looked for us at all? Yeah, they might. Yeah, but they don't know where we are now. We're fine.

We'll figure it out next time. They definitely don't know we're making our way from the hole to Curve Arrow. Yeah, they put a pin where they spotted us, if they did, and a pin on the city between those two pins. Yep, yep, yep. Well, we'll pick it up next time, won't we? Thank you all for joining us.

Are you going to wear those glasses forever? Because I think it's a good look. It really is a good look. I really like them. Do, do, do, do, do. We'll see you all next time. We love you very much, and it's a Thursday. Trevor, I didn't even know we were still on.

Oh hey, Ashley Johnson here. And I sure do hope you're enjoying the adventure. Remember when you first found out about Critical Role? Was it through a friend or a family member or maybe even through the words of a stranger in the review section of our podcast? Many listeners find our show through word of mouth and recommendations. So please consider rating and reviewing our podcast because each review makes an impression that may just inspire someone new to give our show a try. And that more than anything helps to support us. Thank you for joining us on this adventure. And until next time, let us try to leave the world a little better than we found it.