Critical Role - Knives and Thorns | Critical Role | Campaign 4, Episode 6 Part 2

Episode Date: November 25, 2025

Part 2 Tyranny struggles with her crueler instincts as the Soldiers discover a safe haven for fairies that may hold clues about Cyd's whereabouts... New Episodes Release Weekly on Thursdays.Learn more about Campaign 4 at https://critrole.com/campaign4/   GET MORE CAMPAIGN 4 WITH BEACONWe're excited to bring you even MORE Campaign 4 with a Beacon membership! Get access to exclusive shows like our behind-the-scenes Critical Role Cooldown and ask the Campaign 4 cast your burning questions directly through our LIVE monthly Fireside Chats.You'll also receive NEW Beacon exclusive series, instant ad-free access to VODs & podcasts, live event pre-sales, merch discounts, & a private Discord.Start your 7-day free trial today at https://beacon.tv/join and get unparalleled access to everything Critical Role! OFFICIAL CAMPAIGN 4 CASTGAME MASTER Brennan Lee MulliganLaura Bailey as ThimbleLuis Carazo as Azune NayarRobbie Daymond as Kattigan ValeAabria Iyengar as Thaisha LloyTaliesin Jaffe as Bolaire LathaliaAshley Johnson as VaelusMatthew Mercer as Sir Julien DavinosWhitney Moore as TyrannyLiam O’Brien as Halandil "Hal" FangMarisha Ray as Murray Mag’NessonSam Riegel as Wicander "Wick" HalovarAlexander Ward as Occtis TachonisTravis Willingham as Teor Pridesire CREDITSProduced by Maxwell James, Steve Failows, & Kyle ShireSet Designed by Shaun EllisProduction Designer: Noxweiler BerfCharacter Art by Loren HontanillaEdited by Taylor Burke and Emily "Stevie" StevensonCritical Role Announcement Playhouse Editor: Vinny CelestiOpening Title Editor: Paul FoyderOpening Title Colorist: Peter KoocheradisWindow Effects by Christian BrownGraphic Design by Aaron Monroy & Jordyn TorrenceCountdown Graphic by Daniel Jiménez VillalbaMiniatures Painted by Payton Keo LacebalOpening Title Theme by Neal AcreeCampaign 4 Key art by Hannah FriederichsAdditional Art & Design by Hannah Friederichs Episode QC by Catherine Zimmerman & Paula FloresAssistant Editor: Gianna GencarellaPost Production Coordinators: M Swing & Bryn HubbardClosed Caption Editing by Margaret Dill, Nikki Kindelberger, Courtney Knewtson, Danielle Lackie, Eleanor Smith-Dufresne & Alice TsoiPost Production Supervisor: Tal Levitas Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello again. It's Brennan Lee Mulligan, and you're listening to Part 2 of this episode of Critical Role. If you haven't checked out part one yet, pause this now and head over there first. What are you doing? Otherwise, let's jump right back into this adventure and the world of Aramon. Light fills the glade all around, levitating in the air. Hallivar summons a power to himself. Plants grow and bloom as the radiance of the sun itself fills all within sight.

You see the giant shambling mound bowing to you. The dryad in the center of the clearing, the thorns dissipate into the earth as she looks and goes, What are you? Oh, am I levitating right now? In that moment of confusion, you collapsed to your knees on the ground.

Okay, nice. You look over the fungal man standing over Teor looks, his skin badly singed by the light as the one sort of non-photosynthetic plant person here going, My lady, I've been badly burned. As Hawthorne stays locked on you to answer her question. I'm just sort of panting and unaware of what just happened, or at least unaware of what was on my back, I guess.

I will try to climb to my feet and we are friends. We are. Skinner, stop! You see that over by Teor, the tiny little, man has gotten one of his iron boots up on top of Tayor's head is preparing to crush his skull under his foot. And he goes, ah! Please unhand my, my man's, my, my, uh, How am I supposed to unhand someone with my foot?

Unfoot him, please. I demand it. You're dead. See, he says, I'm getting your blood in my hat. And he walks off. You see that Hawthorne looks to you and says, you and your friends are safe, though we have yet to determine

if you will be permitted into the glade. What are you? Good question. I don't really know how many. I am. I am, You seem rather perplexed by a question whose answer I would assume is very simple. I'm a believer. I'm a man of faith and a man of truth.

A man of truth. The little three sprite triplets, like the sort of little lost boy-looking fairies zip around your head and say, truth, what kind of truth? Yeah, some truths are bad. Some are good. Which one? The good kind.

I believe we are all connected by light, and we are all meant to take care of each other and trust each other, and that good will prevail. And my friend here, the small, younger one, Fimble. How old are you? I'm in my late 20s, but I heard that's... His baby.

Do you assume that the small folk are young? She just looks so adorable. How young do you think Skinner is? You see that the red cap has walked over to you, Kattegan. You see he looks up, looks at you. Where are you in relation to honeysuckle right now? So while this little conversation has been going on, I've been trying to make my way to her.

That's that little ridge just kind of scrambling up to her little body. And I'm almost there. to her. Skinner is a bitch. You see that Skinner sense is that you want to say something. And as you get up there, he looks and goes, hey, you get you dirty hole.

What did you? What a moment? One moment. I'll just scoop her little body up. She's stable, but limp. What's your wings? All right, hold on, hold on. I know what I'm doing. and I'll do, uh, I'll cast cure wounds on her. Fet yard, yeah, I'm just gonna sh- shi-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h. Um, you see, oh no, it's a doll!

My mortal enemy, dolls. I feel that. You see she, uh, lights, thrust the air. What does your magic look like as you heal her? Yeah, it's, um, A bad, not bad, evil bad, but it's, it's, um, like Michael Jackson. Yeah, like that kind of bad.

No, it's, it feels immature, it feels poor. It feels, uh, uh, uh, it is taking everything in him to cast this first level spell. Uh, and, and it's a high level of concentration is not good, but, but it works. And it feels, um, it feels warm, it looks like it would have a scent, but it doesn't. That's what you think. Yeah, good point. Yeah, it's not great. A little bit of humble woodland magic

as she alights. Thank you. You're welcome. She turns around, Scanar goes, Honey, Sarkar you! And she zips right over to Tayor in front of your face. And she goes, you're wonderful. You sent the light to embrace.

Nice me, beautiful light. And I saw all the lights in the world and I felt so warm and then hot. Timble? What? Your cousin here is most of her joyed. She looks over, she flies over to you and says, Another pixie.

Hi! She gives you a big hug. She looks at her and says, We're cousins, but like distant cousins, I think. Super distant. Because you're from. Take a guess. You're from hearth.

Or the golden orchard or something. That's right. A garden fairy. Yeah. That's wonderful. Well, none of you are allowed here. And you see that Hawthorne, you see that Hawthorne says, Honeysuckle to me.

she says, Mama, she goes, not your mom. And she flies over. Oh no, I love honeysuckle. Oh shit. Our party grows. You'll look for Maya May and her. It's not existed.

I love you. You see she goes and lands over on Hawthor's shoulder and she says, very good honeysuckle. And you see that much like a vining flower growing on a tree, that where honeysuckle sits, just flowers begin to vine around Hawthorne's arm and calm her down, seemed to settle her war frenzy that she was in. She looks over as she does, you see Honeysuckle

looks over, you tear and goes, thank you. You see Skinner looks and you see Skinner, giant bloody tears are forming in his eyes as he sees that Honeysuckle has some affection for you. He goes, not like this. God, I hate him. And you immediately see Tear looking around, big emotions just seem to fill this space

as the verdant flowers grow, none more so than this massive mound of just, faceless. It's just a massive sort of like, not even a head, just sort of like a big lumpen torso of vines and briars with long, tenderly arms. It's just continuing to bow towards Wic. You, you, I don't, I know if you can understand, but you don't need to bow to me like that.

And I bow, bow, bow down to you. How the fuck did you do that? I don't know, I don't know. We'll figure it out later. I'm gonna fly around, is those wings still there? As I fly around to the back of them? The light has faded. Basically in the moment of seeming to like,

it really sort of is on like Wiley Coyote rules. The second you became aware that you were floating, you stopped floating. You just, you see that Hawthorne approaches Honeycuckle on her shoulder. The larger, sort of myconid, the sort of fungal man steps over. And she says, I'm Hawthorne.

What is your name? I'm called Wic. Wicander. and these are my friends. HoneySuckle looks and says, you travel with a god of the sun. And you see that Hawthorne says, Honeycuckle, some things happened

while you were unconscious. She looks and says, I've asked you a question twice and I will ask it again. If you cannot answer, there will be some knowledge for me in the absence of information. What are you? You said a believer.

Believer in truths? I don't know any truth to believe in that would make me capable of that. I believe in the light. That's all I know at this point. I know that there were some who believed in gods long ago, and I know there are some who believe in religions

and other things now, but all I know is that I believe in the light. Well, there are clearly some who believe in you. Shaffa seems quite taken with you. I've never even known that... Shafah? I didn't even know that Shafah was capable of sort of having emotions this complex. Emotion's this complex.

And you see that this Shuffa, which is the massive. This is this much mobility. Yeah. Normally they're just upright. You see that, she says, it's quite smitten with you. Oh, and I'm betrothed actually, so I don't know. Oh, I don't think Shuffa is.

You see that rain bloom. Tyranny? Yeah. Are you getting married? Me? Never mind. You see that Hawthorne says, the magic you wield is a potent one.

And my cousin, what might I call you? Thimble, my lady. Thimble. Thimble, of course, you are welcome here. How did you find us? We fear if news were to spread too far wide of the location of the glade. We won't tell anyone.

Your scout told us, told me. There are many. I don't want to get her in trouble, Broke Meadow. She told you in the company of these other mortals. No, no, no, no, no, no. She told me underwater. Nixie. Did you, but you brought these companions with you here.

You see that here she narrows her eyes on tyranny, looking around and says, and at this moment, I think Wolfrick rejoins you in the Glade. She says, some in your company are no stranger to the woodlands, but I can't imagine that these Others would have come seeking us unless you had brought them here. They didn't. We're on another path.

To be honest, we didn't even mean to come by this way. But they're all good of heart. I fought alongside them for a long time, except for these two. But you saw yourself. He comes with great gifts. And if I may, we are charged in the protection of this vessel of the light. So please, forgive me for my actions.

I was only acting in defense. She looks to you and says, we defend our border fiercely. As you should. You see that she regards you all, looks over. What do you think, Rain Bloom? You see that the Mycannid looks over and says, Well, in matters such as these, if they are under the protection of one of our own,

who can vouch, at least for the character of these warriors, I would say to allow those for whom she can speak in, as for those to whom she cannot speak or speak for, Well, one of them is just displayed a rather miraculous act of magic, so. You see that Hawthorne says, it's too many, too many and too many days. Were there others? Others like us, tall folk, big folk?

Yes. Any like me? Yes. One. We are searching for him. Did he cause trouble? Did he have stressed fur? I cannot speak to the nature of his fur,

but perhaps we should to the glade. You see that Skinner looks up and says, You can't bring her. That's so many, that's too many big folk. Listen, Potato. Oh, I'm calling him. Are you calling Potato? Why don't you put on some iron boots of your own

and come down here to the mud to wrestle with me? Yeah, ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. You see that Hawthorne looks out and goes, The time has come to act. Time has come to act. Making the safe choice day after day after day is not. And you see that she just shares a look with Rain Bloom here that any of you are welcome

to make an insight to check into if you would like. I'll do one as well. God damn, that sucks so bad. 18. 12. Teor, I think on an 18, you just look at Fairy or otherwise as wild and big-hearted and primal as these creatures of the realm of fairy are.

You know that they are stranded. that they are stranded here in this world. And I think that regardless of a battlefield to a Sylvan Glade, you understand leaders making reckless choices because safe choices are meant to doom them. You can see that thing where they've been diligently repelling outsiders and whatever their situation is on an 18 insight. You don't know, you don't have the information about what that would be,

but you can see the look of a leader who is realizing that making the safe every time they're watching their stack diminish. Mm-hmm. Come with us then. She turns and begins to move. And as you leave this glade, you see it glows brighter. The flowers that Wick passes that have a natural light within them, you can see the quality of the light shifts

from these kind of deep purples or pinks or greens to become golden, radiant, the golden and white light. And often there is a little burst of like pollen and moths glowing with that golden light as Wic passes by. Tierney's eyes are locked the fuck in on Wic. She's taking a moment to herself. And she catches up.

What just happened? I don't know. I don't know, but I did what you said. I lied a little bit. You didn't lie? You didn't lie? Well, I said I was a believer, and I don't know if that's true anymore,

but they seem to go for it and are you gonna be okay? Do demons and fairies have beef? I have, I mean, Thimble and I don't, so I think that's okay. I kind of think you do, but. No. I don't, do you think she doesn't like me? She doesn't like me for sure.

Well, I mean, no, now, I mean, you did great. I think that you are, I think you're actually killing it. I think that you're actually doing a really good job. I think that you're really good. And I think that I'm not. No, no, you're doing great. You're doing great. You woke me up by kicking me in the neck.

It was awful, but thank you. That was very bright of you. Okay. I think you're going to figure out what it actually means to be a believer, and I think that you are doing that, and I think that you're doing a really good job. So let's go. Anyone who would like to give me a nature check

on the way past that Sylvan boundary stone? 18. Or if anyone speaks Sylvan, you can take a closer look at it. Okay, yeah. Oh. Oh, I actually well good. What are these rolls early? 23.

23. Hell yeah, what do we get over here? 3020. 33. You read these warning signs. It says, you know, warning insolvent on it. And you see that there is a collection of sigils that are attached to some kind of innate magic deeper into this glade, farther into the woods here. On a 23 nature, you also see that this stone probably has, is carved from deep in the ground and likely has others nearby.

You can almost sense their presence in that nature check throughout the wood. would. The message in Sylvan simply says, all who would seek to stab at the heart of creation know that it is your heart you seek to destroy. And that seems to be the, it seems to be that's like the, it's almost incantation of a spell. It's like a warning, but it's written so poetically because it is also the words necessary of casting a protection spell.

And you realize as you pass by the stone, that you actually feel an arcane boundary here. So not only is it a warning to people that can read, but it's also a, there's some kind of magic anchored to it as you push through it. It's effortless. Tyranny, even you're a little worried about like, this thing going to, you know,

and you move through it, fine. On that dirty 20, tear, you get your whiskers and your nostrils twitch for a second, that divine sense, which is not fully active right now, on that 20, you sense that the, these stones have been keyed to the undead and that they would not feel an ease of passage through this boundary stone.

Great. Moving through the glade, you see who's, you guys are sort of in the back, who's in the lead with Hawthel? Probably, yeah. Yeah. You walk up, you see that Rain Bloom turns to you, and is walking very slowly and goes,

So you are a pixie of the golden oarrow. Well, I was, yeah. Marvelous. How fairs the noble house of Royce? Do you tend to still to the gardens there? No, I don't tend to the gardens there. I haven't for a long time, actually. My condolences.

Thanks. You have been lost as many of us have been. Well, I wasn't for a long time, actually. I was, I was, I was living in the city. Oh, dreadful. Yeah. But it was, it was not so bad. You know, I had some good stuff going on.

Oh, that's lovely. It's good. It is good to be back, though, amongst everything. Yes, it is very good. Where we are going, it is almost like a little piece of home. I've never seen home. You were born in the orchard. Yeah.

Yeah. It colors beyond counting. And you see that his eyes go prismatic, just like rippling, iridescent pools of color. Sunrises of every hue painted across the sky. Even the memory of it fills my stalk with joy.

One day, perhaps, but for now, the glade is home. moves these vines to the side, and before you, a massive hawthorn tree that is in full blossom. Small white flowers, red berries, black thorns, spreads out over an enormous, grassy, and mostly the clover filled. It's a bunch of small, humble, little grass flowers throughout this glade, and you see this crystalline

mountain lake that deep in the waters you see there are fish of silver and gold swimming throughout with small little mur nixies swimming with them little fish tails and fins uh you see a massive awakened tree sort of like looking out over the glade there are pixies and sprites and satyrs all of whom are gathered here and for a moment it is this explosion of color and happy voices seeing Hawthorne approach you see as Hawthorne moves you notice a small intake of breath just from her seeing and you realize that that tree that dominates the edge of the glade and the edge of the lake and where they meet is her that is her that tree as she moves through you see that many of the

fairies laugh and a light you see the three little sprite boys that are with you you see that Hawthor turns to them and says Bix, Mac, flit, let everyone know, we're safe. And you say, they go, you got it! Tear off. How are they so young still? The three of them? Born here?

Born here. Wow. Their mother came seeking out. Well, let me show you. You see that she takes you to the tree. It looks like a lot of people are gathered there. As you begin to walk through this place, you see that for all of its wonder and magic,

there's a lot of indication here of how people have come to be here. You see that there are wagons with like some broken wheels or otherwise intended to off in a corner you see there is a small area of like meadowgrass where some fairies are laid out with little sort of flower bells casting light on them as they kind of breathe shallowly some of them you see appear to have soot caked up around their neck or mouths as though they have been living somewhere too far away from anything of fay magic for too long. In other words, there's a tremendous amount of play and whimsy here, but you also see by the trappings of how everyone has arrived here

that almost everyone here made it in the nick of time. Hawthorne turns and says, do any of you require rest or provisions? Our radiance is quite hungry. He did not eat today. And as you can tell, he is quite a week after a big show. Yes.

Well, with the power you wield, we must keep you healthy. She looks around and says, who's not rust blossom? And you see that a really small, small, flat clod of dirt, with some of the ugliest red grass growing out of his flat little head. He's about just like a little plate of a fairy,

no wings, just a little stumping guy. He says, my lady. And you see, she says, please fetch some food for our guests. You see, Rust Blossom goes, at your service. Strawberries. Yes, yes, of course. You got it.

Are they regular-sized? I mean, yes. Why would they be? I don't know. I don't know how things work here. I'm sorry, yes, please. Not everybody's little here. No, I know that, but I...

Yes, please. Yes, thank you so much. All right, we'll get you some strawberries. And you see sort of toddles off. Hawthorne approaches the base of where the hawthorn tree, it's one of those embankments where it's probably like... It doesn't slope gradually into the water. It's like grass and then a little overhang

and then dirt that's for about three or four feet before the water's surface, almost like a little, calling a three-foot cliff, a cliff is crazy. But you know what I mean? The banks are very steep and the grass is hanging over the edge. Where the roots of the Hawthorne Tree go out into the lake, you see that embankment opens and there is a cave

in those roots sort of in the base of the tree where you see a number of of fairies and other sylvan folk are gathered on blankets around a massive crystal that is jutting up out of the ground that, you know, sort of like eight or 12 sides. It's almost one of those things where it's coming out in a couple different directions

with those jutting geometric shapes, and it's just casting this silver light. And you immediately on that 23 from before recognize that this is what's making those splint's work. This is the source of the magic. This is what's making this entire settlement, be able to exist at all. And you see Hawthorne looks at it, this crystal in the base of her tree, and you just see this weight fall over her, because there's probably about somewhere between 80 to 100 fairies in this glade, and it's all hinging on this thing in her roots and whether she can keep it safe or not. You said your brother, one who looked like you, had happened by. He did.

I must speak with some in my glade. She turns over. You see that there is an older, very short woman, very thin, old, like skinny arms. She's smiling, she's got like a bandana over her head and thick, wild kind of gray hair. And she's like sitting in a pile of blankets with blankets over where her legs would sort of be. And you see that she looks out.

Hawthorne goes, Subri, may I speak with you? And she says, of course. Hello, my friends. Welcome. Is she people size, or is she? She's bigger than fairy size, but she's probably only about like four, four and a half feet tall. Subri.

Subri. Subri. You see that Hall of Thorn looks and says, Rainblum, our guests, take them to the water's edge and make sure they're fed. And you see that Rain Bloom nods and says, Come with me if it would be so kind. Rust Blossom comes over with a big plate of strawberries.

And you see that, the rainbow goes, I would, how did we get so many? And you see that Rust Blossom goes, I don't know, all the berry vines, a few minutes ago, all the berry vines went nuts. There's so many berries everywhere. We're gonna, wow. And you see,

a bowl of the most exquisite looking fruit lands in front of you. By the beam, Thank you so much for this. Normally you taste things for poison, but... Go ahead. I trust thee. Oh, fucking eat it. And I grab a handful of strawberries,

leaves and all and stuff them in my mouth, and just eat them right in front of them. I think the leaves are actually a little bit nightshady. A little what? No, okay, break. I don't want to spill on my... It's rain, rain blossom? Rain...

Rain bloom. Rainblum is our big mushroom man. Yes. I'm like kind of bobbing up and down in the air. Rainblum, can I, can I go look at the, can I go look at the Hawthorne Crystal? Yes. We've been calling it the moon crystal because it dims as the new moon approaches and it seems to wax and wane with the moon,

but it's just a name we've given it. I don't know if a prince or princess of fairy would tell us that's what it's actually called. Hawthorne was always, I suppose, left out of those other conversations around what it could be dryads, you know. They're more anchored to this world than many of the high fairies.

They grow roots here, you know. Yeah. Seems like you've grown some roots here. Yeah. I look back at Tejore. You see flitting out, Rain Bloom just sort of says, eat drink of the water of the lake. It is fed from a clear spring here

and is safe to drink even for mortals. And I'm sure many of, you see the sort of Fay around here are like giggling and laughing and looking at the big folks. You see that there's a corner of Tehrer, you look over, honeysuckles talking to a bunch of other pixies and they look over and they all giggle and get closer together. She points at you. Still got it. With a mouthful of fruit, I just walk up and kind of like sidle up next to Teor, just shoulder to shoulder, and just kind of lean to him under my breath and just say,

It's beautiful. But every quarter hour we tarry here puts a hectare between us and your brother. And I elbow him in the ribs and just walk back out. You hear the clatter of my wings as I fly off to the crystal. You see that as you're sitting here tyranny, and you've been, this is a place that feels so far from any demonic presence, but as Wic begins to eat, you see Shuffa, this massive shambling mound,

comes and sits next to you, slightly beside Wic and just sort of gestures its featureless torso in your direction. Tyranny is surrounded by a lot of good. And she extends her hand and places it approximates where an ear would be and kind of scratches in size. You see Shaffa, you realize earns his name as he goes, shh, a bunch of leaves sort of fall out.

and leans against you in a kind of conspiratorial way where it seems to be that the Shambling mound is like, we both work for the big guy. Kattegan, as you walk away, Wolfrick comes up to your side with his armor and you see paws at his armor where it harnesses to his shoulder and you see that there's a small rolled up scroll there.

Yeah. I take a look at it. Put my head up against Wolfrec and look at the scroll and I unwind it and read it. A small note quickly penned from Albed says, I cannot express how meaningful it is to have this knife return. nor can I express how many hidden treasures

I discovered turning my house upside down in search of it. Yeah, the response is makes Kagan smile just a little bit because Alden note said that he attached to it was just, it's not just a keepsake, it's a relic. and what he received wrapped up in the note was just the finely ornate crafted pommel, the handle of the knife, the important part, and the full tang of the blade is in my pocket. You see the note continues. Having revealed having revealed that you have separated this magical blade

from its ornate and beautiful handle, the note continues. Memory is a funny thing. I wept. I wept at the thought that I had lost something so dear, and in weeping, realized I had walked too far from those memories. The things I felt are dear to me, even when they hurt. I don't know what use the blade has for you.

but my wife used it for many years to feed and care for us. I hope that you find it useful to feed and care for those near you. And I hope, dear friend, that you are fed and cared for. You are welcome to bathe in my stream at the drop of a hat at any time.

Looking at the blade in your hand, I think you even feel a resonance, that humble little magic. You know, you don't describe your magic as being too advanced, but something in that blade, a little serrated thing, sharp, and like tyranny's claws.

There's something there. Moving into the cave, you see Subri, who you can't even really tell what kind of fairy she is, but you see that she looks over and as Hawthorne says, you're certain, is it possible that he would have ignored your, and you see Subrey says, anything is possible, but I did what we thought was right to do.

I did what you had, and you see that, Hawthorne sort of stands up a little bit, and gets a little bit intense and goes, I made the advisement that we do this, and it was accepted by those here. You see that, Subrey says, Thin, do you wish to tell all the companions? And you see that she,

and I think that she turns out and sees you approaching now, and goes, oh. Tell us what? Your friend's brother has left already, heading north. But the magic that your companion wields is powerful, and it is a great aid to us here. Another voice speaks out from not too far away, merging from the shadows, and you turn and see

Shadows part like wet hair, being moved from in front of an eye and stepping from the shadows. Bulbous, luminous eye like a predator. I fly backwards a little bit. A woman dressed in rags looking blue, gray, like a long dead corpse. Wet skin. You see there's mud and algae. and algae and reeds sewn throughout her hair. You can tell that if she walked into the water, her hair would spread out and look like lilies.

She's got long fingers for grabbing on to people's throats. And as she steps out, she says, her friends left, but source of light. Has entered the camp, hasn't it? And you see Hawthorne turns to face this and says, this is Sallow. And you see that you regard a hag. I was gonna ask.

You regard a hag before you. Oh, man. Salo says, splendid light, I would love to be introduced to this wielder of the light. You don't think he might profess some beneficent cause or creed, perhaps? Why do you ask? Well, it's always of interest, isn't it?

Moral magic wielders, after all, can sometimes spell disaster for the fair folk. I look over at Hawthorne. How is she reacting to this? Hawthorne stands there. Give me an insight check. You can do so with advantage here. It's all fun of games still. Oh, that was almost in that 20.

Almost. That is 24. 24 is very high. You see the sort of, you almost thought like, oh, maybe rain bloom, maybe the big mushroom. guy is like second in command, you realize he's a major domo, he's an assistant to Hawthorne. What's happening at camp is it's Hawthorne's tree, there's Subri who seems to be uncomfortable

with something that Hawthorne said or did, and then on the other side of Subri is sallow. And that this is like, this is, yes, you're just, you just see a relationship pan out before you of Hawthorne being pulled in different directions. You're not an angel and a demon. Come on, just right here. A buddy and a baddy. You see that Hawthorne says, I'm not certain.

Your business is your own. You are safe here. Your friends are welcome, but they cannot stay. And they must be sworn to some degree of secrecy or permit themselves. We have means of confusing their direction on their exit from the forest so that they would not easily find their way back here. If they will submit to that, then they are free to go. I think some of them might, but if that's what must happen, we should be out of here soon. We're looking for Sid. The lion folk, you said, pass through here? Hawthorne looks up. On that 24, something bad is being concealed from you.

You see Subri's eyes look down. I kind of float a little closer. What happened to him? He left. You see Subri looks out. Salo smiles, and you see that as she smiles, even though she can kind of look from a distance like a mortal woman, the corner of her mouth goes almost to her ear when she smiles.

smiles. We sent him to the wraith tree. The what? Subrey here is a bit of a soothsayer, a fortune teller, aren't you, Subrey? I mean, her fortunes aren't real. They don't come true. You see that Subri, her eyes well up with tears.

She says, sometimes they do. And you see Salo goes, It was Hawthorne's decision that any big folk that came through rather than subjecting our people to wanton violence and execution. Why invite all that bloodshed? We could send them to the tree and have a little bit of extra protection. Oh, fuck. When? You're here?

Yeah, I think Cadigan appears. You're not here. You're not, but I think Cadigan. Oh, I thought we were all here together. No, no, no. You're good. I was in, but you're, I was in thrilled Mr. You wanted to be a stealth check

and see if you're there? Yes? Yeah, give me a stealth check, man. I wanted to be there so badly. Sorry, I wasn't invading the scene. No, no, no, you got it. I'm sorry, you know it's good. Oh, still, it's okay. Oh, actually, it's 18. 18, okay. He'd come over there to throw away another dog. I think, I think, Katagan, if you step out now,

go for it. Yeah, I'll say what I said. Yeah. When did this happen? They whip around. Salo vanishes into the shadows, is gone. And you see that Hawthorne looks out and says, you are not given entry to be here. Give me a dexterity saving throw. Sorry. Hey, not great.

Jack is high too. Give me one for Wolfrick as well. Oh, fuck. 12 for me? Well, 12 for me, 24 for Wolfram. Wolfrick dodges to the side as you realize this lady's roots that you are standing right under, drop down and pin you to the ceiling.

Wrong room. I'm sorry, I'm just creeping. Whiff, you've got a fucking mouthful of strawberries. And shit is popping off in the cave. Oh, fuck, I'm sorry. Hawthorne turns and says, what are we to assume that every outsider that comes here means us well?

Yeah, mostly. No, no, no, but he's so fucking dumb. I'm an idiot. He's just dumb. He's one with nature, but he doesn't know shit about us, okay? And listen, he never even goes around other people. Who is he going to tell? You see that Hawthorne says,

you have until before dark to make your way out of this camp. And I will say this. You would do well to remember what we have lost. I can feel on you how close you have become to their world and know that it bears its own real. We will forget who and what we are. The door shut. You see that she steps up into the roots

and vanishes into the tree, ascending to be the tree itself. As Subri looks out wiping some tears from her eyes. Anyone who wants to arrive at the cave at this moment can do so as the roots gently let you down. I'm sorry. Fuck. I'm sorry, fuck. Wig and I are riding him side saddle, of course,

on chef-suffie. We don't have horses anymore. No, on- No, on- Chefa. Oh, how big is Shepha? Oh, how big is Shepha? Shepha grew like 20 feet and has slightly diminished

since that initial burst of magic and is now just a- Yeah, we're doing side-saddles now. Of course. It's like a big walking leaf pile. Oh, that's fun. That's why he has permission to go. He's good character.

It makes sense. He's drunk. He's always drunk. I got in trouble, you're in trouble. Can I fly down a Subri? Yeah. As Cadigan drops down? Yeah.

I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. No. Your friend is right to be cross. We don't. Hawthorne is tasked with a terrible burden. to keep this place safe. It will be.

I won't tell anyone. Neither will they. You see, she looks up and says, I shouldn't. She looks up because you're under the roots of the tree. She says, Salo would speak with you on these matters if you wish to speak to her.

I can, I will say only what I did because it is common knowledge. A lion folk war. came here, desperately fleeing. He asked for visions of what was to come. He was seeking to make his way to a place known as Gormelay, where he had there a deed of title to a strong home,

and he told us his plan was to petition the Lord of that place that the deed had been given in in an act of murder and should not be honored. And he said also that he was searching for passage to the Far East to old Obridemia, searching for his brother. He said I'm with his brother. He will not have known that.

He will not have known that his brother was, I know that the warrior who accompanies you outside is the brother of the one that we found here. He believes him to be far east, he said, working as a mercenary. Well, um, where's the wraith tree? I gave him. You should go and talk to Salo. I should say no more. But I, but I, I gave a vision. You see her eyes wink. You see that she reaches her hands up. And as she does, she massages her scalp

and slightly moves her bandana. And you can see the broken stumps of a fawn's horns. As she massages them, and you can see the burn marks of red hot iron that this soothsayer has suffered in the world of mortals greatly. I did see something in the crystal. No matter what Salo says, I do see things true sometimes. I thought I saw the young man.

past the edge of the forest. I do not know if it was a vision of the past or of things to come, but I saw him in the forest holding the scroll that he had come here with, that he had shown to me. He was either in possession of it

some time ago or perhaps I saw a vision of something to come, but he looked out at wide fields and rolling hills, old stone walls of the kinds that farmers keep in their old ways, and I saw a fluttering of crows. Rose wings and him clapped in irons.

Wagon wheels and a road. Oh, no. I do get them right sometimes. I know, unless this up, I'm sorry. But listen to me right now, please. There are a few things I'm good for. You have to find out when he came through here. You have to.

Stay on track. This is a hunt. Yeah. Was it yesterday? It was, no, now two days ago. Which you guys realized because you guys went to all bids and played it safe, Sid did not play it safe. Do I hear them say this that it was two days ago? Yeah, Supri says two days ago. We have to go.

What about Salo? You can go, but it needs to be fast, please. For tail. Well, she'll tell me where it is. Subri knots. Where's sallow? By the wall just edge. Go, go.

Look, I don't like that thing. Excuse me. Outside, those of you who have not joined, you see Teor sitting out where you, what are you guys up to as this scene is unfolding? We're playing fetch with Schuffer. I just threw my cane. Go get it!

Go get it! Go get it! I have a question. for you, do you have any visible signs of the candescent creed still on your person? Uh-oh. Oh. Just all your clothes.

Everything. Everything I own? Yeah. My cane has a big candescent creed symbol on it. You see as you're playing fetch with Shuffa, it's going back and forth, you see a bunch of these tiny little fairy children whose wings are too small to fly yet,

and they have these little sort of toadstool hats on or running around towards your feet. And you see that about a foot tall is this, this, he's got a small rabier at his side, grasshopper legs and antenna, but otherwise sort of a handsome man's face. He's got a small white shirt and a vest and a scroll on his back. You see he looks over as he's walking off towards one of the like over, you see there's a cart that looks like a traveling scholar's cart. You see it has some like writing on the side saying like, traveling professor. You see that he looks over and goes, uh, children, back away from

him. Back away from him. Oh, I'm sorry. Did I do something? You bear a symbol that is not welcome here. Oh, I'm sorry I didn't know. Why, may I ask? Why indeed? And what have you told the people in the keeping of their old ways? Have you told them that it is not of the light

to leave bread and milk for the small folk? To take down charms? No, I haven't told them that at all. that at all? Is that something? Is that so? And you say that he are surrounded by strawberries freshly grown. Well, you might be... He's the one who grew the strawberries. Why don't you, why don't you just look around and see all the beautiful abundance? That was he did that. I wipe my face of all the strawberry juice. You see, we have friends here, right? Yes. Well, the light giveth, yes. And you see that he turns around and, you see, looks at the

who are kind of confused about what to do and just shakes his head side to side and walks off towards the carriage. Is that something that you were taught was to not feed Fay? I don't know. Is it my family's tradition to? Give me a religion check.

Okay. Things of the old world. Really good. 22. Ooh. Uh, well. you know you don't on a 22 you don't there's no rule against feeding fairies i mean there's there's rules about not propitiating false divinity the only divinity is the light of course so you

wouldn't want to you wouldn't want to propitiate or offer worship to someone else and if someone demanded worship in like a safe bed or a or food team and you start i think you start to do the math in your of the poetry of the hidden light, the poetry of the text, the reason, you're suddenly going like, oh, that's the passage I would use if I wanted to tell people not to do that. And I think there's a moment where you don't doubt that that fairy is telling the truth, but you just go,

oh, that's not the intention behind the words. And then you sort of have to, I think on a 22, have to question, well, that's not. Maybe it is. Yeah. Or you go, you go like, that's not the intention behind those words. Then you go, that's not my intention behind those words. Interesting.

Teor, what are you doing? Teore is in a bit of self-imposed timeout. He walked into a China shop with the subtlety of a raging bull. And is trying to keep a lower, profile is sort of walking down near the water just also very passively looking for any signs of his brother but without trying to intrude with looks or anything and is also keeping a keen eye on where that little fuck skinner is yeah just making sure they don't cross paths paths again and I think is just trying to put

himself in his brother's pause yeah why was he here what did he see what would he get from something like this, where is he? Give me an investigation check. 19. You look around, I think on a 19, you're looking for Sid's stuff specifically. You see that crystal glowing, and I think you are over by this moss bed

where a lot of sick fairies are being tended to. You see, there's one of them, as you approach, there's like an owl lying on the ground with a broken wing, but as it shifts, you realize that it's not an owl, it's a fairy who, in that, you know howl and housewomen castle has the jacket over his shoulders? The wings of the owl are a jacket

over this little fairy's shoulders. And there is an owl head with real owl eyes and a beak coming down, but it cuts at the edge of the feathers and becomes a jaw of like skin and normal teeth. So it's like this halfway between, almost like puppet-looking little owl fairy. But you do see that the wing,

even though it looks like an article of clothing, is moving and is broken and is being tended to. As you get over to that area, you see a voice behind you goes, Come here to finish them off. And you turn around and see Skinner standing there. Come here to finish the chap. I offer my apologies before.

You defend this place with great verve and passion. I admire that. I am sorry that I did not speak to, seek to speak first. I want to open you up and put my hat in you. You see, you see, honey cycle flies over and goes, Skinner, stop it, stop threatening to put your hat in people. And you see that she says, It's okay, what's your name, Mr. Son, man?

My name is Tewa, Pridesire. That's beautiful. I'm honeysuckle. Thank you, honeysuckle. Your friend here, Skinner, he who puts his hand in people. Hat. My hat. Your head.

I put my hand on people. I put my hat in people. Of course, I heard. He has earned his angst. I see your friend here, though. They seem to be on the well? You see Honeysuckle nods and says,

Yeah, yeah. Some of the sickness is hard to make away when it comes from, not wood fire, but deep fire. You dwarf fire under the earth, iron, soot and ash. It can be hard. sickness, the earmigs, your kind sick?

Some of us, fairies from hearth tend to do a little better, but for some of us that are supposed to be way out in the woods, it's a little harder. But you have that light within you. I do. If you will permit me, perhaps, in a gesture of exchange, I would like to help if I can. and I'll reach my hand out. And I'll put lay on hands on the wing of this small creature and see if I can help mend on that wing.

I believe you can't. Go ahead and give me, even though you're putting five hit points in, go ahead and give me a medicine check because you'll heal the injury, but to see if you can set the wing. This is about see if you can set the wing. That is 11. 11.

You see that you begin to heal, you set the bone, the bone in place, but you can tell that it's not going to be an immediate fix. The bone, in other words, it was not going to ever heal because the bone was not connected. In connecting it, now there's time for it to grow together naturally over time, and the magic begins to start that seal.

You see that the owl looks up at you and goes, Oh, take you kindly, sir. That's the kindness you're done. It's a pleasure and an honor. You're not a fairy at all No, I'm afraid I am not Take time and care To mend that

Right, that'll do That I'll do stretches it I don't mean to impose I'm searching for one of my kin Someone who looks like me And I hear they were here In your glade Not too long ago

Did you see you know Sid? Tell Sidimir he is my brother Yes I happen to talk with him for a little bit as I've done. Two days ago, it's not a warm welcome you receive here for Big Folk, which... I can imagine looking over at Skinner. Skinner looks over and says,

that's right, keep one eye peeled, big man. And you see that he... Honeycuckle says, Skinner, stop it. He looks over and says, bye, Teilor. You see that she looks over at Skinner and says, would you be my best man? as she walks off and you see that

this creature this fairy looks over at you says, no, right, I spoke with him. Listen, I work with big folk all the time. I was only stopping on, through here, my way to Dormaciar. We've just come from Dormaciar. Oh, splendid.

As soon as my wings healed up, I'll be on my way there. My brother, when you spoke with him, did he say where he was headed, what he was doing? How did he seem? Well, he seemed, well, he wasn't in a good way. I mean, you didn't get a warm welcome here, but they were going to give him a vision. He was off looking for, he needed to make his way. He was trying to talk to the local, some baron.

He was trying to talk to some local baron. But he had a, after that, I spoke with him because we, We had a mutual friend that I came up in conversation as he was, a few people would go and talk to him. We had a mutual friend in common that I'm actually in my way to go see that he said might be dead

by this point in time, although I hope... Did he mention the Aussie? That's who I'm off to see. Is he? I'm afraid so. Sid said it was all but a sure thing. and apparently he was part of a plan to try and

free him at the last moment. He was a great man. I served with him for many years. How did you know him? I knew of him more or less through a connection at a place called the Arcanade. It's a museum in Dormaciar. There's a...

Oh, ho, ho. Oh, whoa. That's possible. A second now. He says, but I was coming with a letter for him because I know that Thiasi worked with Thimbel, who I don't know if she'd ever, if she'd remember me, but I knew that she knew half the fairies in Dolmachiar,

and I think we've spoken once or twice, if that. But she was working with Thiazzi on collecting a number of things, and Thiasi had sent a letter off to a fellow I knew in Argosia about. You see, he says, but he says, are you a friend of Thambles? I am. Well, I'm Jouf. Jav. Teor.

Teor, nice to meet you. I'm a, I'm a, he says, you would recognize him as a baucca, which is a type of fairy that has a single animal form. It can assume and change. into and you see says bad luck to carry a dead man's letter and you see he says not to give you bad luck but for thimble it'll maybe mean something and he just gives you a small envelope that'll say he was delivering to the Arcanade says for for for better or worse I think it was the Ozzie liked to keep his distance from

the people so that if what were to happen were to happen fewer people all go down at once. Very careful of him. I will... I'll be back in just a moment. It's all right. I'll be resting up, and yeah, if you let Thimble know that I'm here. You take off, you guys head to the lake.

Arriving at the lake, us too. Yes, Kattegan. and dimple. The best partner you could ask for. Arriving at the lake, you see algae. As you approach, center of the algae begins to move and rise. There she is.

Tall woman stands up. Hello, little one. A man so loud. So loud. You better believe it. You look dirty with travel. Do you want to bathe? No, I like to be dirty.

Give me persuasion. Maybe thimble shably. I have not tried. Oh, no. It's just the side effect. It's just a side effect. Oh, that's pretty good. Or intimidation, depending on the fatuang you're putting on that.

Intimidation's better, but I'll stick with persuasion since she said it is eight. 18. 18. See she looks and says. I would feel so much joy drowning you. Get on in, can't? Oh, I'm just out of bath.

Another time, Ranger. You've come to speak with me. Yeah. What can I do for you? Wraithtree. Where is it? Where did you sense? sense it. Give me persuasion.

Can Cat take us close off for it? Yeah, like you're right. What? Why? Is that not cocked? No, it was not cocked, but let's hear that. No, it was a one that I rolled. Oh, no.

You see, she looks in you and says, and why would I help you? Um, because he's gonna, she's gonna get in the waters, cause he's, um. Are you trying to sacrifice me to this woman? Because, because we already lost one. I don't want to lose any more. What is it you don't want to lose? What is it you don't want to lose, little Pixie?

Family. Terrible thing to lose family. I've heard it's absolutely precious to have. Why are you here in a place like this? You can exactly fit in. Don't I? Am I not a fairy? Because I'm not delightful?

I'm as much a fay as any creature here. The deep, beating heart of the world knows shadow and light both, regardless of the chatterings of the fool who wanders with you. wanders with you. Something dear is what you pursue. Then it's something dear I'll have. You loved someone.

I want something of theirs. A memory. Gone forever. Of course. Fairies, little pixies are not great of stature. You need to make room. You don't have space in that heart for what you lost. And the passion you'll need to get vengeance on those who took it from you.

As a rogue, Rogue, am I to assume that Thimble speaks Thieves' Cant? I do. In her ear quietly in Thieves' Cant, I will say, tell her and tell me, and I will remind you. He taught me how to read, and how to write. Um, there was, I had trouble. I had trouble learning how to write his name. Every time I try to make the J, I'd have to back up.

It was too much trouble. So I started calling him, Thaz. You see, as you speak in the water around the hag's knees, you look and you see the door open. Fiazzi walks in, a little wax paper bag, filled with caramel, popped corn, some kind of street foods, like a little spice, like a tahin on it or something.

He walks in. Who the hell is Thaz? That's, well, that's you. It's, no one has called me Thas since I was a kid. Oh, good, so someone else did, so you're used to it. Honestly, For you and you alone, we can go with Thas.

If anyone else calls me this in your earshot, right in the throat, stop them, okay? Throat, eyeballs, ears, just like you're talking. One, two, three, that's how it's done. And you see, suddenly that smell of that caramel and spice is gone, and you don't remember that at all. Why did you ever call him Thas? you were the only one who did.

You see that Salo goes, wonderful. The information you asked for, I would not give without some acknowledgment that memories given deserve. Memories new, knew, perhaps something that you would not have seen before. And you look down in the water and just see a glimmer

of a gloved hand sliding a massive bag of gold and a scroll over a table. And you see Casimir's face looking down. And the voice says, I'm very happy to know that your loyalty can be so easily bought. And you see Casimir looks at. says, what loyalty. Fuck the Aussie. There's no loyalty in this world worth speaking of. Be excited to see that smirk rubbed off his face when the rope snaps top. The image feeds.

What was that? Just a voice, right? Just a voice. You see that Salo goes, That memory was not as nice as yours. Follow the blooming jasmine. Pass the promontory rock where the moss grows. Take a right, the gulch will follow.

An hour or two's travel. You will begin to see the plants wither. The wraith tree lies at the end of that gulch. Hawthorne is a fool. The dead stalk this forest and they should not. I'm sure you thought me in all of my darkness to be a believer of this strategy. I think it is a foolish one.

We should not have sent Sid to go die at the wraith tree. But you have to understand The spirit that dwells there animates the bodies of the forest come nightfall. And while the forest is stalked by the dead, big folk cannot find this clade. Even those sweet fairies of the light will make a devil's bargain if they have to.

Good hunting. I hope your friend's not dead. and she sinks into the water. Bitch. As soon as she fades into the pond and she dissipates and it feels like it's safe for one moment, I'll just go to them and I'll say, I promise you, I won't let you forget,

but we have to fucking go. And I'm gonna take off toward the direction of wherever I think my friends are. friends are. Forget what? You guys, you guys, even I'm like, why did you make it this sad? Fucking relax, dog. The five of you rejoin with the information that Katvin now has.

I was kind of running back towards they were. The sun is also getting low in the sky. And you can't stay here. Hawthorne has forbidden you. So, we're doomed. Uh, all right. Yeah, I'll, I will fill Teor in of everything that we know, pertinent information. You as well.

Fill in the squad. What? Yeah. That's crazy. Perfect recap. You were sent to the rate three. We must leave immediately. Yeah, well, we have to.

We can't stay here, plus dark. They're going to kick us out. Yeah. and tons of the essence. I was given a letter of theazis. Here, take this, but we must go. With haste. I will hold on to it too for you.

It's a teeny note. Yeah, it's really a folded up piece of paper with a little wax seal on it. For you, it would be like a poster that you could throw in your bag. Rolled up carpet. Rolled up carpet. You guys take off.

Suddenly, without any ability to see Jowf, it's the to see Jalph, the sun's getting low. Traveling through the woods is gonna be fucking. No, Shuffa, you can't come with us. I have a door to do. Here's the deal. Shuffa's got a speed of 15, Shepha. No, Shuffa.

You can't come with us. I just know first, I put my knee up. Irradiance. Yeah. Yeah, Shaf on the head, good boy, good boy. Someday. I don't know if that we can promise that. I promise you.

We'll come back for you someday. You see, Shepa, sort of like molts a bunch of leaves, a bunch of leaves like turn brown and autumnal on a bunch of his body. It's just doing goes, as soon as you leave out, you look over your shoulder and see

it's forming a small idol of you out of the letting play. And you guys tear off into the woods. I'm going to need a survival check. Yeah. You've got advantage of it because you've got. I think Wolford is off on the right flank.

I'm off on the left flank. Dark vision, dark vision with the light. Absolutely. Yeah. Go for. All right. What do we do here? Not bad.

Good. Not great. 16 was my highest. Nine. 16. You have exact directions. You can make it there, but your speed is lessened.

So as the sun is setting, it's just a little bit harder. The quality of light keeps changing so fast in these hours of the day that finding the best pathway. It's like, to find a good pathway, you need to be able to see some distance to what the terrain is doing ahead of you, and as the sun gets lower, that gets harder and harder to take. I will cast light on my cane to shine the way. You get light, and what light does is it makes the area right around you safe, and everything else fucking vanishes, pure dark. Nice job, very good, thank you. So you guys continue forward into the dark. The Raith

some spirit that was mentioned here. And you realize that the early conversation you heard between Subri and Hawthorne, why would they send people here, they didn't want to kill them there? And someone said something about another protector. And you suddenly hear moans in the forest. Oh, no.

Not that kind of moan. You see it, you see it, you see it a camp counselor put on a flashlight and go, Nah, no, no, no, no, no, no way. That's so sad. I know, from deep, from deep memory. How you want, just walking behind the bunks going, whoop, all right, fucking scatter.

As we're absolutely trucking through the woods, and we all sense this moan as we're running just, nonchalot cat again says, whatever you think is out there, it's worse. Keep moving. Point of clarification. Back at the Hawthorne's Glade, did we take a short rest?

You took a short rest at Hawthorne's Glade. Hey, catch that? We took a short rest. Everybody short rest your characters. If you want to roll, yeah, if you have hit dice you want to roll, yeah. Hell yeah, yeah, yeah.

Sure rest. I don't got a lot. Bloop. I don't think there's anything to do with a show of it. I'll take a short rest. Confirm. It's right here. Short rest. So you can roll this many.

You go 25 hit points? Awesome. So you can roll 1D8 plus 4 and you're back to fall. Fuck yeah. Yeah. Oh God, and I meant to ask. There wasn't time for me to say it. As you were going to the forest, did I had,

never mind, it's too late? What? Why? I was going to say, did I spot any, like, fox glove or prickly poppy as we had been going, going through the forest before we got, you know, like in any of our tracks today? I think very possibly so, yeah.

I think there will be plenty more as well. Okay, okay, okay, okay. Yes, for sure. You guys had your short rest, surged through on that 16, you continue moving and have that thought in your head, sending people to the wraith tree. As you hear the shuffling and groans,

you realize perhaps whatever's waiting here. takes whatever bodies it creates and adds them to the force that will visit the next victim. Maybe you'll be joining that wonderful army right now. Roll initiative. Oh, man, we're right up in it. I'm right up in it. She leaves.

You leave. All right, which one of these guys? That's one of these guys. Who's gonna send me here? Well, surely we can do better this time. Okay, okay, okay, okay. Surely we can do better this time. Whoa, here we go.

Let's just talk to them again. I'm sure they'll listen this time. Did our minis go away? What's that? Did our minis go away? No, you have them. No, we threw them one. They're one-time use?

Yep. Oh, that tree. Yeah. Okay. Can't repeat all tricks. Hell yeah. We'll put you guys here. What's your marching order? Wait. Oh, we had.

No, actually, I'm not in the lead. You weren't. I was in the middle because I was lighting kind of. Well, frick and Teore, yeah. You were lighting the half. You were probably up. Dead center. Dead center.

Okay, then I was front center. Lighting up in front of him. I would actually say that for like formation order, I would probably be in the back making sure that there's no one behind us. Be in formation. Yeah, yeah. Okay, and you're front and center. Yes.

I guess I was. Oh, I can be front. No, no, it's fine. I thought those guys were flanked to the left and right. Yeah, in the front. They were in the middle, and they were, and everybody else was behind you. Oh, okay, so you guys, but you're in the back.

I am, yes. Okay, and then front of the night. Yeah, that's fine. That's great. We're all bunched up, ready to die. Yeah. Got it. Uh-oh.

Uh-oh. Uh-oh. We could spread it. We can spread it out a little bit. Spread it out a little bit. Above table, have any of you real human beings ever been in like a deep forest at night? Yeah, it's really scary.

I recommend for ever. Just to appreciate what you have. Hell, yes. As you guys enter, you see deep in the forest a writhing mass of dead vines. there is something here that killed this tree. And I think, then will you look up and realize that the tree that is dead here

once walked the forest? You're looking at the corpse of an awakened tree. And the one who killed it appears in shadow before you. Oh. Oh, fuck. It's normal. He seems chill.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He's a close, cool guy. Looking down at you, he's the one moaning. We were stealthy, right, with our bright lights? He's having his own time. We're intruding. I don't know.

You ever cranked it on anything, dead. You see, the figure, floating in the glade. Floating? Right here. Floating by the tree, looks up, looks right at you, Thimble. You should not have come.

Raises a hand and shapes begin to emerge from the wood line all around you. I need everybody here to tell me their initiative that they rolled. What did we get Kattegan? 18. What did we get WIC? 16.

16. What did we get tyranny? Nine. What did we get Thimble? 27. Oh, thank. What did we get Teyore? Eight.

Eight. Eight. Nine. Oh, okay. Thimble, cat, wick. Thimble, cat, wick, tyranny, Tayor. Okay.

Unsurprisingly, Thimble, you are first to go. So how far does the range of your light extend on your body? Or do you have dark vision? I don't have dark vision. Yeah. My light is casting. It's the same as a light can trip. Some way, yes.

Let me know how, this is important for this battle. How big is the light you are casting? 20 foot radius, okay. And dim light for another 20 feet. So that's 40 feet. Great. Okay. And that's an emanating.

It's amazing from me. 40 feet from you? Yes. Okay. 20 feet and then 40 feet past you. So, gotcha. In the dim light, you can see shapes moving towards you, but Thimble, you are first to act.

Go ahead, give me a perception check actually as the combat begins. Um, uh... 24. 24. perception. In that area of dim light, you see some shapes clambering towards you. These are the closest. You see corporeal undead, but you see they look to be like the rags on them seem to indicate that they were poachers or smugglers in life. But at A flick of the hooded figures hand

they animate around you. The wounds that they bear many of them, you can see are the wounds that they are soon to deliver to you. For indeed, this is, many of these bodies look like they were rent asunder by human hands. Jaws pulled by hand by bodies. Vennel.

Stomics pulled open. Greep, creep, creep, creep, person. Somebody didn't trim their fingernail. These are moving from the dim light around you. Oh, boy, oh. I got you guys miss the parts of his back. Oh, God. Can we see the wraith from where we're at,

or is he just as he gets up? As the sun sets, he is in total darkness, because I believe he is more than 40 feet from Wick. I could be wrong about that, but let me double check. And then, yes, so let me see, here's Wick. Yeah, so the, so in the last bit of light, the wraith fully manifested as the forest plunged into darkness, especially as, you know, Wick's lantern

makes all of this fucking vanish into darkness. It's that thing of, again, having a lantern or a light in the dark makes everything, I just, you know, the void. That is going to, so you, Thimble, yes, it is your turn. Woo! So wait, how many bogeys can you? you see.

No. No. Thimble can see all the ones I just placed. Because they are all within dim light, you guys right now, it's sort of like Thimble clocks them exactly. You guys are like, ah, shit, moving in the dark. But there's enough sort of ambient light that you can sense shapes. And I have about 10 feet off the ground as usual. As usual, correct.

Okay. I am going to fly up in the air, so I'm out of rain. so I'm out of range, hopefully, of most of these. Zippity-Zambvale. And I'm going to cast... I'm going to light up with the light of the moon stone that I had been near and the radiant magic that had been filling me when I was in that cave.

And that pale blue, whitish glow of the crystal is going to spread from my wings as I spin around, and I'm going to cast fairy fire. Hell yeah. Yes. In a 20-foot radius, kind of in front of me. I want to try to get everything close to the tree and on the ground around it. Hell yes.

Do your people just call it fire? I'm going to spread some pixie-dust love. Some pixie poppers? Very fries. Very fries, yeah. Oh my God. Okay, so he's got to make a dexterity saving throw. What is your difficulty?

class. What's your DC? Is it really that low? Jeez, Louise. This is what I was saying last time. Why is it so low? We're level. We're level three. It's a 10.

It's going to be fine. It's going to be fine. These are squishy old zombies will be just fine. Why is it so low? Are you just dropping it on him? No, it's in a 20-foot radius of any creatures that are in that area. Yeah.

Okay. DC 10. Decks, yeah. Dex, yeah. Or Dex 10. Dex time. Gotcha, okay. The fairy fire you cast forward.

The fairy fire you cast forward hits towards there and vanishes into the darkness of the wraith. It does not light, anything on the ground surrounding within like 10 feet of that wraith is not there. What's the radius on fairy fire, though? It's a 60-foot range, but a 20-foot radius. Okay, so within that 10-foot radius of the Raith, there is no sparkling whatsoever.

However, you do manage to hit two zombies sort of farther away from him. Oh, there's more. Who fail their save, and therefore you get the advantage on them. What about the little guy on the ground over here, too? He is at the base of the tree. He is out of range of the 20-foot radius. If you were centering on the Raith,

on the wraith, it would have been... I was centering it. I wasn't centering it on the wraith. Gotcha, gotcha. Okay, in that case, let me roll for him as well. You got him as well. Hell yeah. Nice. Nice. And we can all see those creatures now, right? You can see. They're lit up. They emit a dim light now, so you can see them within 10 feet. Nice, cool. And you get advantage on attacks against them.

A fellow practitioner of the light, I see. I know. Knock over one of them? What? Look at that. Look at that, baby. Bring me to shuffleboard. Let's go. Paragon, you're on deck, by the way. Fimble, great. Any bonus actions from you or anything else? I don't think I can do anything else.

Oh, but I'm gonna hide. Okay, go ahead and- I'm gonna shimmy into the leaves of that tree next to me. Give me a stealth check. Okay. Oh yeah, you're tiny. Aggressively. 18? No, wait, that's a lie.

That's 16 plus 9. 25! 25, that's way better. So you see that as these undead lurched towards you here by this rotting necrotic tree that the zombies lurched forward. And you've seen effectively, you take all of the glow on you and put it out there because you are fucking gone.

It's just all this moonlight and crystal magic shoots off you, hits these three zombies that are marching towards you and you are in the branches of that tree completely obfuscated. All of your internal glow is like dimmed. You're a shadow. Incredible. Cattigan, that is you. Great. At the top of the term, Wolfrick knows exactly what to do. So he rips around straight to Cattigan's side, like a well-trained canine, right between his legs.

And Cattigan just goes, now's the time. And they put their, they go forehead to forehead. It's really quick. And you can just feel this energy between them. and that empty quiver that has been on Wolfrick's side the whole time starts to glow faintly and Cadigan's weapon starts to glow faintly. And in that quiver, this single bolt of white energy appears

and there is one bolt, magical bolt, inside of this quiver. And then they push together as quickly as they can and another red one starts to form, but it just does. doesn't happen. It just fucking fizzles out and there's just the one magical bolt inside the quiver and they break away and Cadigan just goes, good boy. And Wolfrick takes off into the woods and Cadigan is, who's the nearest enemy, this guy on the right? This guy, yes. No, to me. Oh, to you? Probably this guy on the right. Yeah, probably this guy on the

right over here. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's gonna look like he's gonna close the gap to pull his club and melee, and instead, as he's running toward it, out of his back, he pulls just a regular wooden bolts. And for the first time ever, you see what this weapon is. It's not just a club. It's not just a blade. It's an attlattle handle. And carved into the notch of the wood is an attalattle handle. And he tucks in at the same time and hurls this thing as hard as he can at the nearest zombie. Hell yes. Regular melee attack, nothing matters. I've never seen one throw. See what happens.

Hell yeah, give me your attack roll, baby. Pretty decent. 17 plus six. Physics. That is a hit. Okay, cool. And then I, 1D8, not great, but it is what it is. Seven plus four, 11 points of piercing damage. Hell yes.

You search forward. You're back as you've approached North in Timony. This is not your first time facing the dead in the dark forest. This bolt lodges itself, and you can just see, even with their undead animation, muscle is still muscle, sinew is still sinew, and you pin deep into the thigh,

like right into the, in between where the groin meets the leg, shredding muscle and sinew. This thing hobbles to one side, still up, but lurching badly. You have bling badly. bloodied this thing in a single hit as it lurches towards you. Which one did you hit? This is right over here.

You can see him. Hell yeah. That is going to be, it continues to lurch forward, however. Any bonus actions for me? No, I'll just consider Wolferk's movement the bonus action on that because we didn't employ his quiver reload, which is what it would be. But I'll say this for you and for the nerds, since This is a cooked up weapon that we worked on.

It is reduced range from a bow. Cool. So it's not, I think it's 3060 for a bow. Is that right? You're the OG Archer, right? This weapon, because of its versatility, is a little nerfed in range, so it's 2040. Gotcha.

So I gotta get within 20 feet to make the dart throw. And that ends my turn. Hell yeah. To make the dark. Wick, that is you, my friend. Um, I am a cleric of the light. And as a cleric, I will activate my innate sorcery. Go.

My eyes glow. Just sort of overcome with the pressure and danger of the moment. I look at tyranny, unsure of what I'm doing. I've never really been in a fight like this. God, your eyes are glowing. They are? Oh my goodness. My eyes start glowing white,

and I will charge forward trying to make her proud of me, and I'll bound forward and try to get these two glowy guys here in a cone in front of me. Great, so we're gonna go 5, 10, 15, 20, 25. You wanna get right up next to him and go 30? I think so because it's a 15 foot cone and I'd like to hit both of them. Yeah, let's see.

If that's, if I can. We're gonna call that 15. Yeah, for sure. And I will cast, I don't, I don't hurt people. I don't like to hurt people. You do now, bitch. I disagree. And from my cane that's emitting light,

the light will sort of increase and bubble out into a prismatic other colors that will dance around in front of me, and I will cast colors. spray on these two and attempt to blind them. Hell yes. Great. What is the save that they make for color spray? Constitution 15. Let's go. The one at the far end is just almost outside enough that it makes the save, but the one right in front of you gets the full dose of it. Okay. So he or she or they are blinded.

Let's see here. What does it say? Until the end of your next turn. That's right. You're blinded. Hell yes. You see this one this one fucking zombie in front of you has fairy fire and color spray. This is the most technical or dream zombie. Joseph's. Technicolor dreams.

And is now fully blinded. Incredible. That is your bonus action. That's everything. That's everything. You here. The sun will never rise again. What? Too bad. What was that?

No. Did everyone hear that? This. Oh, God. This guy's so fast. That's not good. Oh, God. The Raid? Raith. is going to descend right here,

and it's going to attack Wick directly. Don't worry, they can't see me. That is a six. I've blinded them all. One. One second. A lot of math. Oh, yeah, I need more dice, sorry.

I should have cast this on you before the fight started. Not a problem. You should have what? I should have cast the protective line before we started. This dress is making me need to go pay. Go for it. Hurry after you go, baby. Oh, no, no, no, okay, you already went.

You already went. Don't worry, it'll all be on reporting. Yeah. B-B-B-B-B-B-B-D-B-D-B-H-W-T-B-W-T-B-W-T-T-B-W-T-W-T-W-T-E-T-W-T-T-E-T-L-T-T-H-W-T-T-T-H-E-T-T-H-E-W. It would if I won't, if I and cast shield and block it. Incredible. Do shield raises your armor class to what? 17.

18 damage was coming your way. 18 damage with a stipulation. As this hand reaches out to you, you can tell that this attack on a, before you shield, the attack coming to you, shield, the attack coming to you, this damage not only is necrotic damage, it lowers your HP maximum with each hit. If your HP maximum is ever lowered to zero, you are instantly killed. Oh. Sick. I would like to for, uh, lodge a form.

Book a blade. Rejection. Yes. Just let it be known. I object to this. I object to this. So, Wick, as you're creating creating light, pure darkness comes to you, raises a hand. And you can see that as you, these glyphs emerge as they do, this guttural thing in defiance of whatever happened earlier today where you find this moment of deep belief to make everything grow. This is just a,

and a pure primal wing of light just bats this thing out of the way as a, and you see that this wraith's hand is severed through the forearm, no matter grows another one from Pure Shadow and Smoke right away. No. Tyranny. Death itself now comes for Wickander Halivar.

It is your turn. Quick question. Is there anything going on between demons and the undead? Is there any stuff that I should know? Like alliances or? I don't know, maybe they don't like me or? The reality is this. Give me a religion check.

Oh, fuck. You have to, like, you've got to know your own stuff. Yeah. You can roll with advantage, too. All right. Oh, cool. Almost dumped. Two.

And a one. Honestly, undead and demons are the best of friends. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I mean, you're basically the same, right? same, right? What the fuck is the difference? All these fucking nerds, taxonomy. What the fucking point?

We're all monsters out here. They're all gonna live in the pit, eventually. All right, I'm gonna come for the big guy, and I am going to cast scorching gray. Nice. Ooh. Ooh, I'm gonna do all three at him. Hell yeah.

Go ahead and give me three attack rolls. 14, 4 and 11, plus this. Is there any? Yep, there's pluses. Oh, yeah. Scorching Ray plus. Plus seven, okay, 18, 14, plus seven. Is a lot.

23. And seven, eight, and 19, 11. 21. So what are your three final rolls? 11, 21 and 18? Yeah, I think so. 21 and 18 hit. Two of your scorches connect, go ahead and roll damage.

That'll be four D6. These talism, Okay, a five and a six. Woo! And a three and a two. Five, six, three, two, eleven, sixteen. Do you smell? No, no, I was looking at a good.

But I will. It's not good. Death looms over Wickander. Tyranny, as you summon this fire. So, yeah, all of this aspirant shit is gone. Fire eyes. Blah! and you see fire, tattered shrouds of necrotic fabric,

catch fire, and you can see that you do successfully injure this race as it turns to gaze at you, two pinpoints of red light. Flash out from the shadowy hood. That is your action, any bonus action from you? Any movement from you as well? Yeah, I'm coming up to join Wick. And that's it,

Maybe. Hell yeah. You rush to get into melee. Any bonus action? You also can... I have my claws. Oh, you have your claws out. Great. Perfect. Great, great, great. I can attack as a bonus? No, I don't think because you cast a spell. Yeah. So, Tierney, that is your turn. Teor Pride, sire. That is you. Yeah, you'll... Now that I see that a wick is in some mirror about of danger. Wait, can I retroactively hex him? You want to hex this rape? Yeah, go for it. Yeah. Hell yeah.

He won't take, it's necrotic, which he probably won't take, but he gets a disadvantage. And that's a cantrip, yeah. I love it. So, wait, it's necrotic damage that you deal. Yeah. And this. But I do get to pick a disadvantage, I think.

Oh, yeah. What kind of disadvantage do you want to give? Decks. Can I pull the team? Yeah. Dex? Dex. Let's say decks.

I love it. Hell, yes. So you are going to, are you Hexblade subclass or what is this? I am Pact of the blade now. New rules. Pact of the blade. Gotcha, cool, cool, cool.

Great, so he has disadvantage on dexterity. I love that. Tayor, that is your turn. Yeah, I will rush forward seeing that WIC is in danger now. my charge, my oath in my head, and you'll feel this, a rush of wind and just a blur.

As we'll jump forward and you'll see this flash of like golden metal as I pull this solid flail out from beneath my cape, but you hear it go, as it kind of like, as it kind of like, tishton tink, disconnects along the shaft and I will swing down this flail on top of where this wraith is. Hell yes.

Is it a magic flail or is it a regular flail? It's just a regular, regular flail. It's just an awesome flail. It was a badass flail. Wait, I have your flail. You're going this side to your flail. What do you mean? You gave it back.

I gave it back. I gave it back. Damn it. It's like, interestingly enough, you gave it back. That's amazing. That is 22 to hit. 22 is a hit. Amazing. I am going to also use my bonus action to, in that arc,

pump a paladin smite, a divine smite, into this hit as well. So I'll do the 1d8, that's two first, which is not gonna, I'm gonna use, I have this ability, savage attacker to re-roll this damage die, which is a one, which is total ass. That's seven on the flail hits. Seven plus, what's your strength? Strength is plus two.

Okay, gotcha. Awesome. So you deal nine points of bludgeoning damage, and let's calculate the smite now. Yes, the paladin smite, which I will use. 2D8, radiant damage plus an additional D8 if the target is a fiend or an undead. Nice. That's a good.

Oh, wait, don't you get to re-roll that one? No, I only get to do it once per turn. 13 points of radiance. Damage. You see that radiant damage of the things that pass through here. You can see that like that as your flail comes out, once again this light comes to you. Wick, looking at Tehr in this moment,

he once again summons the light into himself in a way that defies explanation to you. Boom! That flail connects and you see that the wraith puts up a hand and it passes through and collides with the darkness in the center of his chest. And for a moment, you see a gaunt skeletal shrieking face. It's the first time you've seen a face under the hood. In that moment of light, shrieking pain and torment, that radiant damage really scored a hit on this creature. And as a feature of the weapon master using

the flail, it has a sap feature where if you hit a creature with a flail, the creature has disadvantage on its next attack roll before the start of my next turn. Hell, yes. Awesome. That is going to be the undead surrounding you. It's with all the white, you guys. We're all just siphoning off angels. What's your story? We're the good guys.

Wow. 15, 20. Not me-go. One of the zombies shambles and closes into melee, but has to use its action to dash. Their speed is very slow, but still closes on WIC. The other is going to take an attack. Which one? This one here.

The blinded one. Let's see. That was a Nat. 18 on the dice. And a four on the dice. Oh, yeah. The zombie takes a wild haymaker and misses. This one is going to thud to the ground. This one also closes around Wick and doesn't, yeah,

but does not have the movement necessary to. I'm hearing voices again. His name is Nick. My mistake. My middle name is actually Nick. Wick Nick. Wicander. Nickander.

Nickander. Nickander. Wicander Nicholas. Hey, LeVar. Two are taking a text on Wolfrick. What's this armor class? Ooh, on the pups? I'm pretty sure it's 15, but let me double check,

just so I'm not wrong. Yeah, he's 15. Okay. That is two hits for four and then nine damage. It's like, rough job. Boom. Begin to, and you see they just fight. One of them just collapses on top of Wolf. Getting his arms around, it begins to gnaw into the jaw of the wolf.

And as that happens, moving in from the tree line even more. more undead. Oh, yeah. Entering into dim, lots of londead. Dim light. And you see out, just in entering the dim light, even another wolf,

zombie-fi begins to lope. In this tree, do we need to be doing something more this fucking wraith? That is the zombie's turn. However, I cannot indicate how much worse the next zombie turn is going to be, given how many of them had to spend their turn closing distance, which they now.

Now, how. Oh, God. That is going to be Thimble's turn. I don't hurt people. Wow. From my vantage point within the branches, could I tell if the non-magical damage was doing anything to the wraith?

Nothing that has happened to the wraith has been ineffective. Okay. The radiant damage was effective. Extra. Okay, okay, okay. Then from up above, I will fly down behind the wraith and like charging with my new giant blade. I'm gonna try to ram it into the side of the head.

For a sneak, hell yes. Go for it. Okay. Go for it, go ahead and give me an attack roll. And there's no, I don't think you're getting advantage on this unless actually you could flank. Yeah, I'll flank so that I can. Hell yeah, go ahead, go ahead and give me your attack roll.

Okay, dokey. Okay, okay, okay, okay. That seems fine. Okay, uh, that-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-dheteen. 18 is a hit. Yes, okay. And here's where something very cool happens,

because there's no cheese here. You guys took a short rest, which is as long as you need to attune to a new magical weapon. And you had no idea going into this fight that this would be the case. You made the choice totally on your own. The toy sword, as Albin said, was given to his daughter to get rid of nightmares and other things

and deals an extra 2D6 damage to incorporeal foes. So you will roll an extra 2D6 on this attack. Did not know that until you used it. That's so cool. That's so cool. Yes, asking you shall receive. So that's a total of 5D6 because of the sneak attack too. sneak attack. You're rolling 5D6. Wow.

Okay. Oh, that's good. Oh, that's so good. Okay, wait. So that's 12. 22, 23 points. 23 points of damage. Plus six because of the extra damage of just the regular attack. Oh, my God. Okay, plus and then six from,

so 23. So 29, no. Oh, 29. 29. 23 goes to 29. But that other half is slashing, so that will get reduced. But you guys see, this thing is shrieking at the light. Thimble as you, describe what's going on with you as you surge out of that tree. As I start to surge toward it, the light within me starts to build back up. So you just, like, from the darkness, this bright light starts to grow.

And as I get close to the back of its head, it like shifts around. And I'm going to aim directly between the into the red eyes. Into the red eyes. One of his red eyes turns around and you, and as you hit fireworks, like those that Albit has waited years and never had a chance to fire, shoot out of this thing's eye socket,

as this sword made of tinsel and filled with play and dreams stowed in his fucking wright's eye. As it goes, yeah, shed as fireworks shoot out of it. It is still up but has moved from fearsome to bloody, and removed from combat as it is like reeling from this strike.

Unbelievable, any bonus action? Yeah, I'll hit it again. Oh, shit. I have a two-handed attack, so I will hit with my rapier. Okay, hell yeah. But-b-ba-ba-you have your... Two-weapon attack, yeah. Gotcha.

Unless you want this to count as a single... No, no, no, no. That's, like, all good. Also, there's a different... I don't know if you... Did you shift weapon masteries or no? Because this thing is a different... Simitars have a different weapon mastery as well.

Good. to know. I just took it and used it as I... As you should. In that case, yes. You can... If I cannot do another attack? No, you absolutely can. Matt always let us do things. Oh, wow. Don't help me.

My other dad says it's totally cool. No, no, no, you're good to go. I will say that because you have not gotten a chance to train with this, you have not adopted the new weapon mastery for after this combat. you will get a chance to do that. Okay. Go ahead and take your extra attack with your rapier. Okay.

Cool. That's a regular. Mm-hmm. Just kidding. Goodbye. Unless it was good. All right. That is a 23.

23 hits. Go ahead and roll damage. Okay. That is, ooh, that's an 11 additional points. Hell, yes. So you come through with this fucking tinsel Claymore, fireworks, and as this thing reels back, come with a pin and just, like, it's this fabric head, just fucking pin its hood

and hear the crack of something underneath it. Even incorporeal, there's some, a freak as this fairy brings the fight. Many years ago, the realm of death sought to stab at the heart of fairy, and the heart of fairy is fucking stabbing back. Cadigan, that's going to be your turn. I'm going to fly up because with my fancy footwork, I can get away without any attack backs.

That's right. And you have a space to attack from where you're not in attack of opportunity. Because you've attacked him and you're outside, yep, you'd stab this guy twice in the head and fly straight up and he can't do shit about it. Fucking awesome. Nimble, bimbley.

That was the rave. That was the rave. He's still alive. Yeah. He's bloodyed. Is he? I don't know. Yes, he is blood. You can tell the one, two, of Teor and Thimble

has moved him from, I am going to kill all of you to this is a bad start to the night. That is going to be Kattegan. That is your turn. Yeah, all this crazy shit's going down, but he's just locked on in on his homie. Watching Wolfrick take 13 points of damage. Is that right, 9 and 4?

That roughs him up pretty bad. And as he threw this first starter, In his first turn, he was closing the distance while he was running at this zombie on the side. And he just kind of flips the weapon in his hand and continues sprinting toward this fucking guy right here. And after he sees Wilfrick take that damage, he's just screaming as he goes in

and he will take a swing with his club. But because I have vex and it was hit with the dart, I should get advantage on this attack. because technically it's a versatile ranged weapons. Let's do it, baby. Who doesn't know how to play D&? Let's go! Not even gonna need it.

That's, ooh, the two I might need. But my first one was a 13, so I didn't need it. Sorry. 13, why do I forget? You rolled a 13 on the die naturally? On the first one. On the first one? Plus six. Plus six, that is a hit.

Okay, so that is eight plus four. good. Not great. Seven. This is the one you hit before. This is the one I hit before. Correct. This is the one that I hit with the dart. The skin, the thin guy. So you're dealing seven damage to this one. That's okay. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Hold on a second. Features and traits. Tell me I know this

character. I have some kind of special trait where I get to re-roll my damage dice. Savage attacker? Once per turn, I can re-roll my damage dice. twice and use either roll? Yeah. I'm gonna hope it's better. It is distinctly worse. Great. Still seven.

Still seven. Okay. You see now everything you know about fighting zombies, they are easy to hit. They are hard to take down. Yeah. And he's going to roll a Constitution saving throw on a nine or higher, even though you reduce him to zero, you only reduce him to one.

Oh no, be bad. I'll roll it in front of the board. For dramatic effect, you want an eight or lower. That is a 10. Oh, come on it. So you fill it into him. You see, stays at one hit point. Just clinging, clinging to unlife here.

That is your action. Any bonus action, anything Wolfrick is doing. I mean, all Rollfrick could do would be attack, but I would have to sacrifice my attack to make that happen, if I'm not mistaken. Oh, for Primal Companion. Yeah, I think so. Yeah, yeah.

You know for your, are you having trinket flashbacks? I'm having drama right now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No. Oh, yes, sure. From my bonus action, I'll use Hunter's Mark on the, the, fuck, the bigger guy that's got us. On the Raith or on the, or the bigger guy next to this guy over here.

We're in our own tussle over here on the big guy. Yeah, I'll use Hunter's Mark on the big dude. Great. Hunter's Mark goes. on him. Awesome. Oh. B, bub-ba-ba-ba. Oh.

Because then you get an extra D6 damage during the turn. Thank you. My Ranger, my Ranger Queen. I learned that like that. I love it. Wick, that's going to be you, baby. I'm scared.

Man. I'm scared. I'm scared. And I'm worried that this gentleman might, this gentleman might, Come after me. I'm gonna let you know right now. Run away.

In, we're having a ball. And I am so psyched for this combat. This guy can full stop kill you one hit, no sweat. Sure, sure, I understand. Wait, the Spectre guy or the? Specter. Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay. If he gets lucky, he can do you in one too, but he can specifically do you in one hit.

I'll say statistically. I believe in the light and the light move. Guide me. You said he was bloody, though? So he's half, he's half. The light from my cane and from my eyes and from the color spray before sort of starts to coalesce. And I will, I just want to pin him down

and keep him here. So I will cast Halevar's luminous lash, which is just a re-skinned earthen grasp spell. But it's light coalesces around him. and forms from the ground and will sort of lash around him like a whirlwind of light. Hell yeah.

I'm going to heighten this spell with my cleric ability. Sorcery points. And I'm going to heighten the spell give him disadvantage on the DC 16 save. And he's making, what kind of save is he making here? It is a strength save.

It is a strength save. It's a DC-15, but because I've activated my sorceress thing, it's a 16, DC-16. And he's making it with disadvantage? I believe so, that's what Heighton Spell does, right? Yeah. Sure, I never took Height and Spell. Oh, you didn't? Shit.

I think it imposes disadvantage for two sorcery points. So you are putting everything into this. You're using your innate sorcery, you're bumping DC, you're giving him disadvantage, you're summoning the light. And then he won't be able to attack you when you run away if he has that going on? It should deal some damage. Okay. You have picked an excellent saving throw for an incorporeal foe.

To hit a DC of 16, he needs to roll an 18 on the guy, and he needs to roll it twice. Okay, let's just see. Good thing about rolling. 218. 15, he's already failed. Oh!

And then go ahead and roll damage, correct? Yes, I grab him with this lash of light. I wasn't intending on hurting the lad. Just kill him. But it causes eight points of damage. Hell yeah. Of bludgeoning damage. Of bludgeoning.

As you surround him in the light, go ahead and give me, give me like intimidate or persuasion as you're doing this. Whatever you're doing, what's going through your heart as you're doing this spell? You said you don't kill people. Hey, baby, your life's different. Your life's different now.

Can't kill what's just already go. All my light, all my life, I've been taught that there is shadow and there is good, shadow and there is light, and that the light must burn away the shadow. And I'm, this guy is walking shadow to me. And I just want to sort of burn him away. I love it. It's burning, looking away. Go ahead and give me intimidate or persuasion here.

Persuasion's a better stat, but I want to intimidate it. Yeah. Okay, that's 15. 15. As you look away, you see he says, you see this wraith now being bound with these cords of light, and they start to illuminate a face.

The face looks at you and goes, You wish to burn me away. I do. I was promised Paradise to And on a 15 intimidate, it does not work. You look at him as you see something in him and you see clattering through his robes

now illuminated some ancient holy symbol. Around him, the dead body of a cleric who has been scraping across the centuries to find a paradise. that he believed in just as much as he. This is very poetic, real. This is, this is, this is real. Jay is not going well.

And that is his turn. He's not dead? He's not dead. No, he is not. What he said. Can you back away? Can you back away? I can. I'm going to use my movement to back away.

Okay, does your spell, you are, you. Pins him to the spot. It pins him to the spot, but he can still get a swing on you, I believe. Sure. Uh, uh, so if you, and also you've got zombies surrounding you right now. If you back away, you're going to take multiple swipes from attack of opportunity. Oh, boy.

Groton wings, fly straight up. Oh, can I fly? Oh, right now. You're not feeling it right now, baby. It's like two years from you. Oh, geez. I used my bonus action, right? No, I didn't. Wait. Sorcerous. Did you, did you, you bumped it to 16? Right?

A sorcery points, is that a bonus action or is that just a free action? Free action. Free action. So I still have a bonus action, but I already cast a spell. I don't know how you as a GM works. I can't cast a second spell this round, right? No, you may not. Have you been hit?

You can cast a cantrip. As long as a bonus action, which I don't think you have. I don't. I don't, no. I guess I will stand and take it. Have you been hit? Yes. No. How many hit for us yet?

Full 20. Oh, God, 20. So, we are gonna roll in front of the board. Oh my God, you're gonna die. He hasn't hit me yet. He, what's your AC right now? 12. He hits you, I'll just tell you,

because this is gonna be so bad. He hits you, with 12, he hits you on a six or higher. Okay. It's a natural one. You're like Ernest goes to camp. You're fucking taking it. You are blessed. Get out here.

Oh, boy. Your life sounds pretty sad. My's going to be amazing. You know what? As he swings at me, I eat a strawberry. Oh, no. Yes. Beautiful.

And the rage surrounded by enemies, cannot fucking move. He is restrained for the spell's duration. Wow. Yes. Cool. Hell yes. This Raith is now

in a tight fucking spot. Tyranny. That is your turn. Okay. Casting Hex is my bonus action last time. That's both of my spell slots, right? I believe so, yeah. Shit. Okay. Oh, shit. Oh, shit. All right.

Yeah, Warlock, baby. You have Eldridge Blast. You have your claws. I'm gonna, oh, I'm gonna blast his edge. Well, actually question before, I'm gonna ask Blastin. Will that affect my friends who are in the immediate vicinity? No, it will not. Okay, great, I'm gonna, I'll just blah blah blah blah.

Okay, go ahead, give me an attack roll. Because he is bound, I actually believe that you get, you have advantage on this attack. Hell yeah. Five, great. Good. Is that a nine or, that's a nine? Yes.

Plus, plus what, plus, plus. It'll say on your spell. Where'd I go, where do you go? Plus seven. Plus seven. Nine plus seven. That is 16, that is a hit. Oh!

Go ahead, go ahead and roll damage for me. This will be force damage. You're gonna roll 1D10. Oh, D10. Come on, baby. this dice yet. Come on. Five. Five. You reach out and searing demonic energy, connect. You see that this figure looks and you crack the holy symbol on his chest in half as it clatters to the

ground. It doesn't do anything else, does it? It does extra damage, but it's necrotic damage, which you can see is being sort of absorbed by the race. And his deck saves don't really do anything now that he's just fully bound, right? Now that he's fully bound, yeah. That is tyranny, that is your turn. Teor, that is gonna be your turn.

Come on, kill him, kill him. I'm coming up. The flail is taking a second swing. We're just gonna go right. And you'll be rolling with advantage as well due to Wix's spell. That's fucking incredible. That is 15 plus five,

plus four is 19 to hit. 19 is a hit. Amazing. Okay, so I'm gonna dump my other divine smite into this one as well. So this is a 1D8 plus two. I'm gonna re-roll that. That was ass.

Six points of damage plus two for strength. And then I'm gonna do the other divine smite, which is the first level divine smite that I have, not the paladin smite. This is 2D8, 5, 10. 10 points of radiant damage on top of that, plus an additional D8 because he's undead. Seven, 17 points of radiant damage.

Teor, how do you want to do this? Oh, amazing, yeah. Seeing the barrage of hits coming in, the flail, too, too, almost like, like Godzilla scales, like start to glow with radiant light, and I'm almost confused by it, and I'm almost confused by it, and I swing up and just crack into the middle, catching that dark shadowy core

of where the spectre used to be, and rip up and through all of this radiant light, shooting out and dispersing the shadow as you hear of. The wraith is dispersed. Tayor, as you connect with that final smite, you sever the shadow from this plane, and you can see as it goes away, You see the rotting face in the smoke

looking out, flying away from you, towards an endless plane of sallow gray rock under a black sky, smoke, soot, ash, as you send this spirit back to an underworld bursting at its seams with spirits of the restless dead. As this thing is banished, You know you have done what you must defend your friends. You look down and see the shattered holy symbol on the ground.

It begins to rust, corrode, vanish. And as it does, you hear distantly. A roar muffled with pain and that wooden, lion's head on your belt burns into your side. What? What is that? In the center of the tree's trunk, a red roon appears in some ancient writing of the old Obridemian Empire.

I don't know if anyone here speaks celestial or has the ability to speak celestial, but I don't. But give me a religion check if you want. I don't, but I don't like to. Well, I was going to ask you after this session. One select, Joey. Maybe you should. Give me a religion check real quick.

17. 17. You look and see, it comes, you have not formally studied this language, but you somehow, you understand it. You look at it, your grandpa spoke it, and you look at this ruin and see that it is beginning to grow across the tree and inscribe a name. On a 17 religion check, this is something like a vampire's coffin, or a, or a, or a, a litches talisman, right? It is effectively, it's housing something. It's housing. This is the hole that the wraith crawled out of the underworld from, and that ruin is calling it back from the underworld where Teor just sent it. Oh.

But you look and see that tree is basically, it's like a tap in the world that's roots reach into the realm of death, and it's trying to draw that same wraith back. Oh. Right. So that tree is the problem, right? But the Wraith is destroyed. That is going to be the zombie's turn. I thought maybe when the wrong was dead.

With him, not a chance. Wait, do I get my eight temporary hit points? From the death, yes, you do. Oh, if it is still, is anybody hurt, like hurting? Wolfram. Aren't you, oh, Wolfram is hurt? How far away is Wolfram? How far away is Wolfram?

Pretty far. For me... A dance between the rainbows, maybe. This is the first time for this within 30 feet. Is Wolfrick 30 feet from me? I think he's within 30 feet. Yeah, I think so. Here to hear it.

Immediately after I cast divine smite, you can expend one of my channel divinities to distribute 2D8 plus three temporary hit points to creatures of your choice within 30 feet, including myself. Hell yeah. You have a channeled divinity? I do. Yeah, channel divinity. Go ahead and roll those.

Temp HP and assign them where you wish. Three attacks are coming for you. Some of them are going to hit. Are you casting Shield? Probably. Probably. Okay. I probably should, yes. Although I'm, yeah, I still have a couple spell slots.

Okay, you cast shield once more and repel all three attacks. Hey! Hey! Um, five, ten, fifteen, twenty. This one closes on you. There are now four zombies surrounding. rounding width. This one is going to close on Teor.

5, 10, 15. Okay, two are coming for Tayor. T, T, T, T, um, okay. All right, all right. That's gonna be. How many points? He took 13 and he's only got 20, so he's only got seven left.

Take as many as you. Go all the way up. You tell me? Yeah. What do you want to get both? I have 13. Seriously? Yeah.

13 for Wolfram. Yeah. I'm glad you like my dog. Wolfrick gets hit for eight points of damage. Hey, thanks. You just saved his life. There's a good. Is anybody else hurt? Nope, nope.

Remarkably not. All right, the zombies will take care of that. Travis, you get clocked twice. Woof! Yikes. For six and then four points of damage. So 10 points of damage. As you take here the Raith, you see these zombies,

One of them, who hits you for six points of damage has his arms at the ready, but just coxed his whole body back and thugs his head into your face. Just the side of his head smashes into your snout. Boom! As you take that damage. They just instantly damage you. They don't roll a hit or anything? No, they've been, he's been hitting. Oh, amazing. I have all your guys armor classes and everything, everything back here, which is why we're moving past that quickly sometimes. Fimble, that's going to be your turn. Okay, as I'm looking at these zombies, do any of them look fresh like Sid? Oh, God.

You, uh, you, uh, give me an investigation. Oh, girl. No, I mean, you would have put out a lion mini. You would, uh, for sure, put out a. 18. 18, you don't see Sid. On an 18 investigation, the zombie that just thudded its head and interior opens its mouth. This long tongue lulls out over rotting teeth.

the stink of abscesses. You see a giant pus-filled blister in between the cheek and the mouth. And back behind the uvula, a small, glowing red ruin exactly matching the tree here. You think that the tree is what's keeping the zombies animated

in this moment. Bird that tree. However, it is your turn and you can tell that a couple more, like a round, another round of this, someone's going to drop. Okay, okay, okay, okay. Do you have fire?

I don't have any fire. Do I have, like, I have, wait, I gotta think, clear if you supplies, thieves tools. Do you have anything on me, like, adventure kit? Why is it like, create fire? Yeah, they've like, I have a lantern, but. You have a lantern on you?

Yeah, but I mean, it's not lit. Yeah. Let's take a look here, Thimble. In your inventory, I don't know if I. I think you should have an adventurer's kit. Yeah. if you do not already. Okay.

But it's up to you. The, as you are surging forward in this moment, I think on you, but you're also with your size, I don't think you have anything like oil or an accelerant. I think you have Flint and Tinder, but I don't think you have anything like an accelerant. But you can also delay your turn initiative if you want to, if you want to like collaborate with someone else.

And the lantern probably has like kerosene in it or something. Yeah, fire, I didn't. I need fire. Uh, okay. To the ride. Uh, all right, Thimble, um, uh, do you want to delay your turn until someone else can supply you with what you need? Yeah, can I, I will, oh, he's at the very bottom.

Cat, do you have, like, do you have a lantern on you? Anything? I have oil in Flint, that's about it. Okay, I need you to toss me your oil on, uh, your, after me, right? I'm gonna delay my turn until cat can. Cool. Keep me honest, give me one second. Yeah, I've got oil in a,

And it's in your box, Flint. Okay. Hell yeah. So, Cattigan goes right after you and the Wraith is out of combat. So Thimble, you can absolutely, Cattigan, you, whom, toss it through the air.

Give me a DC-10 acrobatics as you toss this thing through the air. Oh, acrobatics? Okay, fingers crossed. So here we go. Thank you. Oh, my God. Can you guide yourself?

That's a four, but my acrobatics is six. Hey, DC-10, baby. He's a nibble, biblie, old man. So you, Thimble's on the other side of this tree from you, so you just volley, huck this thing over this pine tree. Thimble, you see it. Cascany from the air, grab it, you are good to go.

You have your full turn. Then I'm gonna fly forward and to where the cliff was on the tree. Some of like the dry, viney sort of situation. I'm just gonna try to and light the thing on fire. Using your object action to just dump the oil out all over the tree, you look out hearing the shambling of the dead, flying up the highest you have in this battle, you look out at hundreds of bodies.

Oh, geez, Brandon. Out here in the forest, the oil comes pouring down the tree. I'm gonna need a difficulty 15 sleight of hand. Lighting a fire with Flint and Tinder is not super easy. So this will be a DC-15 slight of hand. Come on! That's a 25. Let's go!

Oh, baby! Finally! Fimble, getting down as fast as you can, in the vines, oil pouring down, within these vines, the skeletons of squirrels and rats and mice and human skulls throughout, and you see desiccated gossamer wings. It's time to go home

as you strike the flint behind you on your back, the toy sword, sword a bottle rocket right as you strike the flint sparks into the tree and you look at the restless dead searching for a home and the words welcome home written in many bright colors race through the oil as fire of every color under the sun races over the tree as the oil touches the ruin All of the undead fall to rest. You have won this combat. Oh my God.

That is welcome home. Nice play. That's amazing. And as the fire spreads and cast its light, Tayor, you look from side to side. As the heat fades from the lion head, you look, see them falling. You don't know what this could mean. The light that wick can shine,

the light coming from your flail. Here in the dark forest, the light spreads from fireworks and flame itself, illuminating a glade with no sight of your brother. His body does not lie among the now restful dead. where he is and whether Subri's vision of the fate that might await him is true, we will have to discover on next week's episode

of Critical Role. Oh my God. Helly. Oh, my God. One incredible map. Are we out? No, no, we're not out. I've been told that we get a few moments of banter.

Yes, we do. That seems so natural. Yes, of course. Understand this. I'm authentic, and I'm fun. Understand that above all else, okay? I do love that with hundreds of zombies in the periphery, you said,

rest assured, they can just take you out. You guys are on the cussed. Holy shit, Sam, Wick popped off. What the hell? Popped off. We were popping off left and right, and there'll be more popping off. And I just want to say, from bottom of my heart, is it Thursday yet?

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