Critical Role - Suikoden One-Shot

Episode Date: March 18, 2025

This one-shot is sponsored by Konami. Suikoden I&II HD Out Now! - https://bit.ly/CRSuikoden   Adventure awaits at the White Deer Inn! Game Master Matthew Master leads players Ashley Johnson, Taliesin Jaffe, Arin Hanson, Zeno Robinson, and Zachery Renauldo through the Muse City of Dunan in a special Suikoden inspired one-shot! BEACONWe’re excited to bring you even MORE with a Beacon membership! Start your 7-day free trial today at https://beacon.tv/join and get unparalleled access to the shows you love completely ad-free! You’ll receive NEW Beacon exclusive series, instant access to VODs & podcasts, live event pre-sales, merch discounts, & a private Discord. YOUTUBE MEMBERS / TWITCH SUBSCRIBERSTwitch Subscribers and YouTube Members gain instant access to VODs of our shows, moderated live chats, and custom emojis & badges:https://www.youtube.com/criticalrole/joinhttps://www.twitch.tv/criticalrole   Art by Lap Pun Cheung || @lappuncheungGraphics by Christian Brown Want even more games? Follow Darrington PressWebsite: https://darringtonpress.comNewsletter: https://darringtonpress.com/newsletterTwitter: https://twitter.com/DarringtonPressInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/darringtonpress/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/darringtonpress #Suikoden #OneShot #CriticalRole #Konami

Hey there, Critters! We are so excited to share with you our brand new podcast from the world of Exandria, The Re-Slayer's Take. In this audio adventure, you'll be guided through the wild continent of Isilra, home to some of the most dangerous creatures. Here, the Slayer's Take is the most notorious monster hunting group in the realm. But, when previously slain creatures start returning from the grave, it's up to six misfit mercenaries

to band together and re-slay these supernatural threats as the re-slayers take. So come follow along these audio escapades as the second coolest monster hunters this side of Exandria battle a growing undead army of dangerous creatures. The party is led by a duo

of game masters, George Primavera and Nick Williams, with the main cast including Jasmine Bular, Caroline Lux, and Jasmine Shion. Listen to new episodes every Monday anywhere you stream podcasts, or become a Beacon member and listen to the podcast two weeks early and uninterrupted by ads. ever. Beacon members also get things like live event pre-sales, merch discounts, access to a

private community discord, and new exclusive series like Critical Role Cooldown. Think of it as our digital Critical Role land. Head on over to beacon.tv to check it out for yourself and start a seven-day free trial. Thank you so much for your support, for being a podcast listener, and for being a part of our community. at twitch.tv slash critical role or at youtube.com slash critical role. The video on demand versions are immediately available for our Twitch subscribers or on YouTube the following Mondays at 12 p.m. Pacific. Podcast episodes are right here on the Critical Role Podcast Network on Thursdays, one week after the initial broadcast. Now that you know all that, let's head into today's adventure.

Hello everyone and welcome to tonight's fantastic one-shot in collaboration with our friends at Konami and inspired by the legendary Suikoden Saga. Suikoden is a beloved RPG series that first captured hearts nearly three decades ago in Japan. Oh my god, three decades. Not just in Japan, I played this in high school. And now, I love it, it's a really good series. And now these classic stories are being reborn in stunning HD with Suikoden I and II HD Remaster with enhanced HD visuals, remastered sound effects and improvements

like autosave, battle fast forward. There's really never been a better time to experience these legendary games. For real? That's awesome. Yeah, it's pretty awesome. The Suikoden II was contraband for many years. Yeah. I still have my original copy. But if you can't get that on eBay, which you shouldn't because it's too expensive,

get the HD remaster, which is out right now for Xbox, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, and Steam. You can learn more at bit.ly slash CRSuikoden. That said, while you may recognize the places and characters explored tonight as inspired by elements from the Suikoden 1 and 2 HD remastered game, we want to emphasize that the characters and events

in this one-shot are our own creations and are not official content from Suikoden 1 and 2 HD remastered. They are simply inspired by it. But Konami, if you want some ideas, call me up. But thank you so much, Konami, for sponsoring this one-shot. I guess let's go ahead and get this adventure going in the spirit of Suikoden. Once we introduce our players real fast here, we have our usual CR players at the table, Taliesin Jaffe, Ashley Johnson,

and three new friends at the table, starting with Zeno Robinson over here on the other side of the table. Zach Rinaldo over here. And Aaron Hansen. Thank you all so much for coming to be a part of this. And let's go ahead and jump into. Thank you, Matt.

No, thank you! Let's take that energy into tonight's Sui Guinen Wonsha. And welcome back. So, years of bloody conflict and tension throughout the Dunin region now shift toward an end. A recent ceasefire between the warring city-states of Jouston and the Highland Kingdom

trend towards a resolution, and the populace is eager to return to a semblance of a normal life. Here in the lands of the Jostun Alliance, the outer walls are lined with military outposts that hold their breath in hopes of a lasting armistice, even with Highland forces still amassed on the borders, while rumors of the Highland mad prince, Luca Blight,

cruelly spread like ghost stories amongst the rank and file. Our story, however, calls us to the outskirts of Mews City, the largest city within the city-states of Jouston and the center of trade and commerce, or it would be if one had any potch in their pockets to spend. As it's here, along the scrub brush-framed roads north of the Dunin Lake, that a troop of ragtag mercenaries

wander beyond the city walls in search of better fortune. For times of peace, spell more disparate income for those who walk a sellsword's path, and the recent rain hasn't helped you either. But. Pushed from the city of Coen, this motley pack of five wanderers heads southeast in hopes of opportunity,

a gray sky above threatening to reveal sunshine any moment. As the raindrops bristle down, pattering onto your various heavy cloaks and hoods as you push down this dirt, rugged path through the open scrub fields here. Who is leading the troop in this direction? I'll say age before beauty. All right.

Taliesin, who do we see at the helm of this pack? Well, heading in the front, are we on a cart, if I recall? You tell me, are you on a cart or are you walking? We are on a cart. So driving the cart with everybody in the front, are we on a cart, if I recall? You tell me, are you on a cart or are you walking? We are on a cart. So driving the cart with everybody in the back is an older gentleman, mid-50s, but a fit mid-50s. Little salt in the hair, well-built.

He doesn't need the cloak. It's invigorating to have a little water pouring on you, get the circulation up. He's wearing a sleeveless green tunic tied at the waist with simple green pants, nice boots. Then he's got his fists wrapped in old cloth and these nice metal steel bracers on either hand and a green piece of fabric tied around his head

with a little gem in the center. He's clearly a fighter. He's well-built, he's strong, but he's seen some better days. He's at the end of his rope, and this would be Teddy. Teddy. Crack, as one of the wheels of the wagon

hits a heavy rock and it kicks up for a second. You have to catch the horses that are pulling the front a little bit for a minute. The rest of you jostle in the back of the sudden impact as it rights itself for a second. Hey, Gem Head, can you drive straight? Depends, can you actually sit down and shut up? No? Whoa.

Then you're going to get what you're going to get. Are you all right, Sensei Theodore? It's just a rough road. I'm fine. Peeking out from the cart front to check in on Teddy here, who do we see? We see a young, probably looks about 16. He's got dark skin. He's got long, flowing dreadlocks.

Everything about him seems to be flowing. He's got a pink hood on his tunic here, as well as a black underneath. And he's got a waist flowing. What is that like? What are these things? They look really cool. They look really cool. But, you know, it's like, it's not an,

I don't know, you can't even, yeah. Like a waist cloth? They look really cool. And some sandals. He's currently got the hood up. He also has, as well, kind, mirroring Sensei Theodore, a pearl bandana with a gem in the center, tied in exactly the same way.

Yeah, this is Zussari. Zussari, as you step back, after checking on your master, you head back into the relatively cramped carton that you're all placed inside. There is nothing to carry in here but yourselves and not a potch amongst you. But as you sit down, the first to raise their voice loudly,

Mabel, who do we see there and what are they doing? Well, Mabel is a tiny elf woman, big red hair, spiky hair, constant sarcastic grin on her face and bushy eyebrows. She's got these boots that are cool and these shoulder pads that are cool. She's also got a cloak that's pretty cool.

Pretty cool. You're so cool. Right beside her is this giant, it's basically as big as her, this hammer that's just sitting around. She's always got it with her. Kind of like, mean, it's basically as big as her, this hammer, that's just sitting around. And she's always got it with her, kind of like, oh, this is my friend. I'm never going to let it go, you know what I'm saying?

And she's like, are we there yet? Yes, yes we are. I'm actually just, I'm going to keep driving. That's why we're just going right by it. For real? No! I don't think so. No, look how we're already fighting like a team. We've been like this the entire time.

I figured it was weird because we were still going. I just wanted to know if we're close or whatever. Were there not enough snacks in the back? Well, there were no snacks. There's no snacks! We are poor! I look over to Pippi with her hand on her stomach. What do we see?

Okay, you see Pippi Lamage, but she goes by Pips. Pips. She has reddish, coppery hair and fun buns with long braids also flowing out the bottom that sort of flip behind her whenever she moves. She's wearing little bloomer pants,

but with combat boots, with buckles. She's about 16. She's wearing her dad's big leather jacket. And she grabbed, running out the door, and a floppy leather patchwork hat. And she has grown up on a farm with her family, but dreams of seeing the world. And she's gone to school with Suzari.

Yes. And sort of grown up together. Maybe she has a crush. I don't know. Barnaby. I don't know! Scandalous. I don't know. I'm just throwing it out there. Yes. And met Barnaby over here. Oh, and... Scandalous. I don't know, I'm just throwing it out there. Yeah.

And met Barnaby over here a couple weeks ago and was just astonished by what a worldly traveler he was. Which, as you mentioned how hungry you might be and someone as worldly as Barnaby, and you glance over to see if perhaps he has something to offer the conversation. Barnaby, if you wouldn't mind describing

the final member of this fine troupe into the back corner of the cart. Of course. Yo, this guy's mask rules. A huge helmet is donned onto a very lanky, skinny figure that is holding a huge amalgamation of different items on this huge pack on his back. Indented into the carriage's floor

is this massive shield that is red, matches the rest of his armor, kind of has this rusted look. And as he talks, his beard that kind of pokes out of his helmet kind of moves up and down. Yo, that's a beard? Oh, yes, it is. What you thought was part of the helmet?

I don't know, yeah. I mean, I guess I wasn't really thinking about it. What a magnificent beard it is. I'm sorry? What a magnificent beard it is. Oh, why, thank you, I groaned to myself. You see that Barnaby has his hand stuck into a finger trap, and he goes,

Pips, I have found myself to be stuck in a cursed item again. Oh, okay. Well, the thing is I have found myself to be stuck in a cursed item again. Oh, okay. Well, the thing is, you just need to, you're trying to pull it out really quickly. You just have to do it slow. You notice there are gnaw marks on it. I have tried biting it off.

It has not worked. How have you been trying to bite it off? I can't actually see this. Okay, that was my question. That is true. May I help? Oh, absolutely. All right, you just have to separate it really slow, because I think you were doing it with some stress.

Oh, I was very stressed. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I thought it was eternal. Oh, no. Well, put that thing away. It's cursed. Yeah, whoa, whoa, whoa. We're talking about magic. You had a magic item on this freaking caravan. I'm sorry, I didn't realize.

I'll put it back in the lead sack I have for the rest of the cursed items. It's full of magic items, maybe. Well, you told us you like one, Ashley. No! Keep that shit away from me. Well, hey, maybe if you need one, that's important. What was that? All these different, strange, animal-esque voices

begin to call from one direction, then another, almost triangulating or surrounding the position of the current cart in the midst of this dark and gray sky and the falling rain. You listen quietly and can hear what sounds like small barks and snapping of jaws and low snarls. Multitudes, all seemingly finding their way through the scrub brush.

You to the front there, Teddy, glance off to one side and swear you see a shadow of a few things dart from one patch of low, scrub-covered hill and a dry brush. Is it puppies? Sounds like a dog, yeah. Everyone get ready. Everyone, I want you looking at it.

Out different sides of the cart, to the right, to the left, behind. Dibs on left. Okay, I'll take it. I'll look behind. They're coming from the sky. I don't... All right. Your vision's kind of impaired. You just sit and sit. It is.

It's writing as well. Yeah. Prepare something amazing in one of your pouches. Oh, don't you worry. None of that magic shit, though. Okay, I'll stay out of the bag. As suddenly, out of one of the nearby bushes, three of these massive, dark shadow wolves dart out towards the front of your cart.

First random encounter. Oh! Guys, here we come down. Woo! Wow. Look at this. As three of these wolves dart down to the front. Here we have you arranged in the front row and back row. This is a customized battle system

based off the Suikoden combat system. So we will, at the top of this battle, roll for the order of how you maneuver in this from each combat round. Everyone roll a d20 and add your speed bonus to it. Speed bonus. That's a zero. I got a six.

All right. All right, so 20 to 15? 21. 21. Seven. Roll these. So grab your? 21. 21. Seven. Oh! Roll these, so grab your d12. Roll these off. D12. Or d20.

320, okay. And? Six. Six. Roll again, roll again, roll again! Seven. One. All right, so Teddy is up first. It does, it does. With Barnabus. Barney. Then we have Mabel. 17.

Mabel. My name's Mabel, by the way. I don't know if I was clear about that. You do that on the hour, every time. What can I say? I want people to know it. 11. 11. All right. I was six. Zasari, all right.

Zasari. All right, Teddy, you're up first with Barnaby on deck. As these wolves all charge and surround the front of the cart, as you all jump down into the ready to defend yourself from the one mode of transportation you had to carry you all around, what do you got?

All right, I'm heading to the left, Mabel, right after, and I'm going into the guy in the front. Yeah, all right. Right over here, or this one? That one. This one front. Yeah, all right. Right over here or this one? That one. This one here? Yeah. All right, go ahead and roll an attack.

What is that? A two. A two misses and is within the counter range of the shadow dog. So as you leap forward, fist striking outward, the wolf kind of jukes to one side. You stumble over a piece of the bush and kind of fall to one knee.

As you do, the wolf leaps on to one side, you stumble over a piece of the bush and fall to one knee. As you do, the wolf leaps on to try and get you. That is going to only be a six, though. What's your evasion? My evasion is 13. 13, that's a miss. Both of you, and both back up and get to your defensive positions, eyeing each other.

Man versus beast. See, that's what happens when you're in a gym all day and you're not out on the battlefield having real battles. We're going to see how it goes for you. Tensei, are your boots tied? Remember to tie your boots. I'm going to go down and tie them while I'm at it. While you're doing that, Barnaby, you're up.

Oh, wonderful. I will grab my shield and I will sink it into the ground. May those who seek the wretchedness that is evil gaze upon this one item and I'll pull out this small boomerang, and I go, all right, well, I will throw it and does a 13 hit. 13 does hit?

Yeah, as it goes past, just wait, and it'll come back and I will do one. Which one would you like to strike? None of them have been hit yet. Oh, sorry, didn't mean to. I'll hit the back row. I'll hit the one in the back row. You got it. For four.

No, sorry, eight. For eight points of damage. I'll hit the back row. I'll hit the one in the back row. You got it. For four. No, sorry, eight. For eight points of damage. I'll get ahold of this guy. Oh! It comes back, a slight skim off the top, a little bit of fur off of the wolf, but it still keeps its tail flickering there. Licks its front, sharp teeth.

I did not expect it to live through that. I'll pick up the boomerang at my feet. It should not look good to me. All right, that finishes your go. It is now the wolves' go. This wolf is going to shift into the front row so it can attack next round, but the two on the sides are going to come forward.

They can only attack your front row from where it stands. So the two that have come to the front of this battlefield likely at this point would be both Teddy and Mabel. So one's going to come at you, Teddy, for, that's going to be a 14 to hit. 14 to hit. Yeah, evasion's 13, so it hits.

That'll hit. You take, it's going to be 16 points of damage. Reduced by seven, so that's nine points of damage. Take nine points of damage on that one, the one that's striking you, Mabel. Uh-oh. That's going to be an 11 to hit. What's your evasion? 13.

13. The second wolf leaps up towards you and you bat away with your hammer. It doesn't actually do any damage, but it knocks it off of its trajectory. Yo, back off, dude. See, that's how you do it. That finishes those wolves' turn.

Mabel, you're up with pips on deck. All right, all right, I'll show you how it's done. I'm going to go ahead and whack this guy with my hammer. All right, the one that came after you? Oh yeah. Go for it. So roll an attack, roll a d20, and add your... Four. Four plus four? Yeah.

Four is within its counter range, so you go bring the hammer wide and slam it down hard. The ground cracks at the impact, and the wolf is and slam it down hard. The ground cracks at the impact and the wolf is hiding behind it and snoops around. And lunges back at you in a defense position. That's going to be a 14 to hit. Oh my god! Well, I'm at seven defense.

All right, great. That's going to be 12 points of damage reduced by seven. So you take five points of damage off that as it counter strikes you from that blow. That finishes your turn. Oh! Pips you. I'm just warming up. I'm just warming up, yeah, that's what they all say.

All right. I'm going to peek up over Mabel and I'm going to pull out my bow, which is made of twigs and branches, and I'm going to take a shot. All right, which of the wolves are you firing? Let's do the middle one. Middle one. Middle one's the only one that's been hurt so far, so go for it.

Oh, great. Okay. Roll for an attack. I'm going to the middle one. Middle one. Middle one's the only one that's been hurt so far, so go for it. Oh, great. Okay. Roll for an attack. I'm going to roll this one. Okay, so let's see. Oh, 17. 17 hits. Great. Yeah, go ahead and roll damage. All right. So we've got. Look at this.

How old did you say you were? I'm 16. Holy moly. Okay, so we've got, okay. 10 plus eight, 18. 18 points of damage? You release the arrow, and it snaps inside of its shoulder

and falls to one ground and gets back up. It's limping a little on that side. That one's looking like it's a little hurt. The other two untouched at this point. Your training is paying off. It is, I can see it, I can feel it. Where'd you learn to shoot like that? My dad.

It seemed like you were unsure about that. Well, maybe I've had some other training that I'm not going to talk about right now. He was a great marksman, her father. Okay, I trust you implicitly right now in this moment. I also do a lot of hunting. All right, yeah. This isn't my first time. Okay, I got the picture.

There's something you're hiding. Sorry, we got a shiggly dog. I'm going to attack the one, I'm going to follow up Pips' attack and hit the one right there in the center. I have these two tomfas. I'm going to pull those out and get a little one-two in there. Heck yeah, go for it.

You leap forward. Yes, 16. 16 hits, go ahead and roll damage. And that is... 13. 13 points of damage, and that will turn! It's looking really hurt, and it's starting to back up a little bit, and it's barely holding. All the other two wolves are untouched

and ready to flare out in anger, at any of you who are at the front row. That finishes your go. Top of the round, Teddy, you're up with Barnaby on deck. You want to try something out for this right now? Yes. All right, we're going to Soldier Storm. You remember this move?

Yes, yes, yes, we practiced this. All right, we're going to do a move. So you're holding out for your Unite? Yeah, whoa. I was good since I was up. Yeah, I figured, yeah. All right, so you're holding your turn to do Unite Attack with?

On my turn. All right. Oh, we're going to hold. Yeah, yeah. Okay. So you're now backing over towards Usari, and you're both communicating some tactical statistics here. As we practiced. Got it. While you're doing that, Barnaby, you're up.

Yes. All right. I guess I'll just swing at, since they're going to do so much damage, I'm going to try to weaken one of them. So I'll do the one in front of Mabel then. Right there? Yeah. Go for it. Yeah, yeah.

All right. Hey, don't take my guy. Oh, don't worry, you missed. All right, so that is a 14. 14 hits. Yeah, as I sideways, literally impact frames, and I break the sound barrier throwing this boomerang, and I go, Mabel, don't worry, just watch this one. impact frames and break the sound barrier. It's over right now. I go, Mabel, don't worry, just watch this one.

I will hit it for... 13 damage. 13 points of damage. A nice heavy strike to the side. It cuts through one of the legs and you watch as it buckles and tumbles and spins a bit, catching itself in the mud that kicks to the back of its fur.

Please come back, please come back, please come back. I'm like,. In between my arms. It swings back and you catch it in the air. Kind of hurts your fingers a little bit on the catch. Oh, so much, yes. All right, that finishes your go. Honestly, that was sick, but don't undermine me, okay? All right, no problem.

Good throw, Barnaby. Oh, what a great boomerang. Thank you, thank you. It is made of wood. All three wolves all lunge out towards you. It's going to be one to each of you. So to Zasari, that's a natural 20 crit.

No! That one. Zuu! Oh, that's going to be 17. 34 points of damage. Minus eight. Minus eight. As the wolf leaps onto your torso

and pushes you into the mud beneath and gets a heavy bite onto the side of your neck and shoulder and tears into you like snarling. The one that's coming after you, Teddy, that's going to be a natural four. I don't know what your counter is. My counter, well, my- Your counter is two, so it doesn't matter,

but it still misses you. And then the one that's attacking you, Mabel, that's going to be a 10 to hit, which I think misses you. Of course it does! Ducking it out of the way, Wolves' turn's done. Mabel, you're up, but Pip's on deck. All right, all right. Let's just do another whack at the, wait a second.

Hold on. Pip, you know, we got a full row here, and I know you know that Elven ambush situation. You better believe it. Let's do it. Let's go. All right, so you're both using your Knight know that elven ambush situation. You better believe it. Let's do it. Let's go. All right, so you're both using your night attack for elven ambush? That's right. Let's go. All right, so both of you guys roll attacks.

Okay. So who gets the higher one? Three. This is capped. Oh, five. Plus. So there was one that was almost a 16. Okay, a nine. A nine. So seven. Seven. Yeah. Okay, so we'll A nine. So seven. Seven. Yeah.

Okay, so we'll take the nine for that. Nine is exactly the Shadow Dog's evasion. So you do manage to succeed on this by the skinnier teeth. Hey, that's right. That's that elven magic. Yeah. No, it's not magic. Yes, it is. No, it's elven power. Oh, you're going around.

No. Oh, all right. I'm just using colloquialisms, okay? All right, so go ahead and roll your separate damages for that ability. Okay. Yeah. What do I keep? Okay. Seven and a two. Four.

Oh, seven. Okay, 15. One plus 11. All right, so 15. Wait, where is it? Seven, two, and 11, if it's weapon damage? Yeah. Seven, two, plus 11.

Seven, two, plus 11, okay. So that's 20. Hold on. So 20 and? I know. I did, what did I say? Shit. I said, I rolled a three, a four, seven, plus eight, 15. So 15, 20, that's 35 points of damage

to this entire row. Describe me how you guys combine your attacks here for the elven ambush. Dude, it's crazy. You start and I'll finish. All right, so as Mabel takes a swing, I take out my bow, and as she settles, I get the arrow right on her shoulder

to take aim as she's moving. And where she takes a shot, I just let it go. Yeah, and then the bow is exiting the, I mean, the arrow's exiting the bow, and then I just go wham, and I hit the arrow on the back, and it goes even faster. It just goes zoom right through all of them. So as you turn around, so you come out on the side,

you fire the arrow here, and you full-on batter up, hit the arrow, that, it just carves through all three of them. The two on the sides, as it literally goes through them, fall and look over like, what the hell just happened? Their jaws fall open. Maybe to the bleachers thing. The one in the center, however, is Rent.

That's right. Unconscious. Yeah, that's what, dude. Elven magic! Elven power! Elven strength! Elven magic! All right. We'll work on that. Yeah, we'll work on that.

Finishing their go, that brings us now to Zasari's turn, who you were holding up for your guys' unit attack. Yeah, Soldier Storm. Sensei, Soldier Storm. Yep. Let's do it. 18. Mine is 12.

So you guys are going to have to do a lot cooler than us. Oh yeah. Wait, we didn't do the unbalanced thing, because we did the... Oh, that's right, yes. So because you used your attack, you're going to roll to do a lot cooler than us. Oh yeah. Wait, we didn't do the unbalanced thing because we did the... That's right, yeah. So because you used your attack, you're going to roll, that's a two. So you are unbalanced. That's me,

so I'm unbalanced. You are unbalanced your next turn of combat. Okay, all right, all right. All right, so anyway, both of you, go ahead and roll damage. Roll our damage. Then add 2d12 to the total. Okay. That's 17

plus a 1d12 here, and I'll give you 1d12 over there. No, that's it, no, that's wrong, wrong die. And then I add, you said 2d12? Add 1d12. Oh, 1d12. It's one for each of you, yeah. So with mine, it's 17. That one, yeah, you got it. Yeah, that was something.

That was one for you. Yeah. Just go for it, go for it, go's 17. That one, yeah. You got it. I was just hoping. I was waiting for you. Yeah. Go for it, go for it, go for it. All right. That's 22 points of damage for me. And I have 20. All right, that's 42 points, and it's across the field. So yeah, you got a one.

Because I rolled an 18, is that a crit at all? For the purposes of the Unites, critting is not possible, but for normal attacks, it is. Okay. So we'll get to either side of this. I'll get to look. I'm going to go up and down. You go down. We'll just get this nice figure eight. Yeah. I want to do a thing where I jump off your back. Can I do that? I'll land on one side, and you got the other one? Yep. All right. Here we go. He jumps up, and then I'm going to hit it high. You hit it low.

Both of them just go flying 15 feet in opposite directions, skidding and coming to a to hit it high, you hit it low. Yep. Wow, both of them just go flying 15 feet in opposite directions, skidding, and come into a stop in the mud, leaving a big old slide trail, and then it's just quiet. The rest of the wolves that were beginning to encroach turn around, bark at each other. Yeah, get out of here! And scatter off

into nearby scrublands and feed them. Scram! Scram! I'm doing tricks with my boomerang. Yeah, you don't want any of this. We got him, Mabel. Oh, hell yeah! Damn, I saw everything that just happened. That was crazy.

Stashed my bow. Whoa, that was cool. Yeah, we did really good. Yeah, you did good. What? Everybody here's so cool. Yeah. Good job, everyone. I'm really impressed. Yeah. As am I.

Yeah. It's like some camaraderie building right now. Are you okay? I'm bleeding a little bit, yes. Yeah, let me help you. Oh, thank you. I am going to heal Zussari for... I'm going to use one of my medicine slots.

Okay. And heal for 40 HP. How kind of you, Pips. Thank you. You got it. Is everyone else looking good? I'm all right. I'm feeling good. Great. Yeah, I'm nine down, you're five down.

I think that's all we got. Hey! Flesh wound. Hey! We'll hear a voice echoing from afar, a human voice that's calling out to you. That doesn't sound like a dog. No, just leave it alone.

Come on, people, we're not like that. You hear something, you hear somebody in distress. Keep going, keep going. No, no, too bad, too bad. We're going that direction. No, no, no, hold on. I can write that down. Hey, hey, hey, what's up? I will turn this card around.

No, who's engaged? Stop it, man, what's up? What's going on over there? Hold up, hold up. You see as from one of the other hills, hiding low, a head picks up and you see a man with a hood and a cloak who's also been keeping out from the rain. It's starting to lighten up a little bit.

It's more of a gentle storm end as the clouds are starting to break in the distance. But you see a man with a pack on who gets up from the hill and starts jogging over to the rest of you. We're still moving, right? I'm slowing down. Who are these new dogs? We killed them by accident.

No, that was fine work, let me tell you. That was... Thank you, bad dogs. These are dangerous realms here, and I was riding a horse back from New City, and unfortunately, they got my animal, so I've been on foot for a minute. Yeah. Oh, I am so sorry for the loss of your horse.

Dude, stop the cart! I can barely hear this guy. Sure, yeah, by all means. He pulls the hood back a bit. Yeah, do you mind slowing down a second? Dude, stop! This is so rude, what's happening. Keep your cardio up, it's good for you. Okay, okay. He's still running alongside.

All right, all right. Pulling the hood back. Hi, so, anyway. You see as he pulls the hood back, you see a man in his mid-30s or so, short brown hair, brown eyes. He has a heavy travel cloak that's pushing back now as he's running.

And you can see he has denim workers pants on, thick boots and an orange vest over a collared white shirt beneath. And he's rushing up. All right, hand up, hand up. Hang on a minute. hang on just a minute. Oh god, I'm hanging! What's your name? I go to help

pull him up. What's your name? Alex, what's your name? Mary. You're too young to be this untrustworthy. Get this guy up here, come on. What's he going to do, what's he going to do? We don't even know who he is! He, he's fine! There's enough room!

Just told you, my name's Alex. I don't think that's the problem. It was not a room problem. Actually, we know you. No, but we can do it. What are you doing out here? Well, I was heading back home from Mew City. Where's your home, Alex? It's the White Deer Inn, not far from here. Actually, it's funny, I just couldn't help but watch you dispatch those creatures

with quite a capability. I take it you all are trained combatants? Yeah, we all kick ass. You live in an inn? Me and my family, yeah. Yeah, inns. People live in inns. It's where you stay for a night. Yeah, but somebody's got to actually live there

and run the inn. My wife runs the inn. Extended stay. Oh, you run the inn! We own it. Oh jeez. Oh, wait, what is it called again? It's called the White Deer Inn. Got an egg on my face over here. Oh yeah, the White Deer Inn. What's your wife's name?

Her name is Hilda. You have kids? I had a kid. What does it do with the 20 questions? Listen, I don't know this guy. This is a stranger, and therefore, a customer. You know this guy really? Would you like something? Would you like Alex?

You know about Hilda? You know about his wife. Come on. I know Hilda. It's totally fine. I've never met Alex. I understand. And you have every right to just be careful around these times, especially. I know there's tension in the air all around right now.

We're not that far away from hopefully signing some piece of paperwork, but until then, everyone's going to try and make a little bit of cash, which, speaking of... Oh boy, here we go. I happen to be a little bit of what you'd call a treasure hunter, so... I've heard that before.

See, my wife and I, we purchased this charming inn that I told you about not too long ago, and... there's an opportunity here that I'm wondering if you might be able to help with. Should you be interested in making yourself a bit of renown and a little bit of poch on the side? Perhaps even a lot? Barnaby's a treasure hunter as well.

I am. Could I offer you an aware? Really? Or maybe a good? Buy a ware from Barnaby. I do, here. You know what, I have just the thing. Show him the thing, Barney. I hold up a spoon, it has a little rune on it. And I'm like, see?

That is a beautiful spoon. This is a screaming spoon. When you put it in hot soup, it screams. Would you like one? Really? It is a very fascinating thing to experience. How much? If you don't take it, can we talk about that? Because that sounds dope.

How much, how much? How much? Like, 60 POTCH or something. Like 60 POTCH? We accept layaway. Clearly you understand that we're looking for POTCH with some renown on the side rather than the other way around. Well, there's plenty of POTCH to be found.

And he goes and takes a handful of coins and puts them in your hand and takes the spoon and goes, Ah, Pete'll probably find that kind of fun. Thank you kindly. Wait, wait, wait, count that. Count that real quick. Yes, of course. It's 60 botch.

It's 60 botch. Hopefully you gave a good price. Because he just agreed to that so quickly. Do we have to write an invoice? I've never done that. I don't know. All right. Thank you.

Thank you. My son will probably find that quite a lot of fun. I'm so sorry. It screams. Just so you know. Like blood curdling. It doesn't matter. It's crazy. Hey, all sales are final. Okay. Well.

So, he looks a little tensely awkward the rest of the trip here. Everyone's staring right now. Hi. Yeah. Anyway, we bought this in and we discovered shortly thereafter that behind it is some ruins, particularly of the Sindar variety.

That was all this time. Anyone know of the Sindar? Tell me about the Sindars. What's going on with that? They're young. Yes, Mabel doesn't know anything about the Sindar. I've been doing a lot of this soldiering and everything, but I ain't never heard of the Sindars.

Strange for an elf to not know about the Sindar, but, sorry, I will maybe assume or presume. I've been away from the elves for so long, I forgot all the history. I've been living with humans for 20-something years. No, valid. I should not have presumed. That's on me. No, the Sindar, as far as my research has known, and it's known in some places, more of a mythology,

but there is historical record of their existence. They're an ancient race, possibly even before humans came to this land. They were known for their advanced knowledge of runes and magic and... Oh, I don't want to, I don't fuck with that, all right? You're asking us to go over there? No, they're gone now.

They've been gone for a long time. The Sindar vanished to the historical record and are now but stories in the land, but one of their ruins is in our backyard and it's sealed, best I can tell. I've hunted a few treasures in my time, but I understand my limits as an individual, as some of these Sindar ruins,

which they've left scattered throughout all the various realms as they meandered nomadic for the time that they were here until they eventually found their eternal city or disappeared, whichever the myth is you've heard. But these ruins are often built to contain something powerful, something special, something worth quite a lot of money

to certain particular political interests. So if you would be interested in being my hired ruin adventuring troop, to find a way into these Sindar ruins, to get to the heart of it and what it might be holding, and bring it back, one, I'll let you keep whatever you find along the way. Okay. Two.

I should hope so. You can stay at the inn for free. I'm sure Ildiv will make a grand meal. Very nice of you. All right, all right. And three, I'll pay you all 15,000 pots you can split amongst yourselves. What the heck? Like each? How about that? A piece?

Oh, as a troop, you can distribute amongst yourselves. Oh my god, you're making us do our own math here. Remember the rule, everyone gets everything equally. Of course. If you wouldn't mind, we would like to talk amongst ourselves and I'll turn around to one of you guys. I will be honest, that is the first thing I sold in quite some time, and so I need the money. So I'm down.

Also, all of you were easily six months or more behind on your dues for the arena, so yeah, for my training ring. So honestly, this could just help everybody else. You're not. You're fine. You're fine. I'm not naming names. I do owe you. I wasn't going to name names. It could have been anybody. It's okay. It's honorable. Couldn just paid you. You're fine. Okay. I'm not naming names. I do owe you. I wasn't going to name names. It could have been anybody. It's okay. It's honorable.

All right, fair. But yeah, no. Look, I come into your gym for free because that's just how I roll. And you can thank him for allowing you to do that. Yes, well, when I come into your gym, I bring a little bit of prestige. You have an elf in your gym, number one, and a badass.

Well, he goes to the gym all the time, and she is a very wealthy elf. It's really nice. Yeah, but I'm cooler, obviously. I'm also a real elf. I've got curb appeal when I'm inside, all right? I've heard you barge in. I've heard every time, you always walk past everybody. Yeah, because I want everyone to know that I'm there.

That's what I'm paying to be. Yes, we'll take the job. Yeah, yeah. Fantastic. Great, I'm excited to do business with you all. Go ahead and change your trajectory with your cart a little ways west of here. You know, they're supposed to actually disclose that you have Sindar Ruins before you buy

a piece of property, so you could probably do something about that. That's what I'm trying to do. That's a whole issue. Well, you'll be riding with us the entirety of the time. I assume so, I'm horseless, and honestly, this is a lot. He looks outside. The rain's actually let up now.

He's like, I guess it's getting drier out there, but it's still muddy across these fields, if you don't mind. Not at all. One question. Do you have snacks? We were very hungry. He looks around at the rest of you. I have a bit of tack and jerky, I guess.

Yeah, some of that! All right, all right. He pulls out a small cluster have a bit of tack and jerky, I guess. Yeah, some of that! All right, all right. Pulls out a small cluster, a pouch of various things that just immediately get torn out of his hand. How much money did you say you have? I have 60 of it. Oh my god, 60 it is.

Oh, yep. I, that's a- Wait, no. I thought, aren't you offering? We could do a trade. I literally pulled it out of my pocket and you took it from me. But you know, we're business partners.

Now you can have it free of charge. So ten around. That's intimidating. I appreciate this guy's suspicion. When they don't eat, the kids get very hangry. I really appreciate that. No, that's valid. Anyway, so how'd you all meet? As the cart begins to pull off into the distance,

picking up over the hill. Oh, that's a long story indeed. Pushing onward as the afternoon continues on, eventually you come to the exterior of the dense forest that sits outside the mountain range that marks the eastern border of this part of Jostun. You can see that eventually you have to step out of the cart and hitch the horses to the side a bit

as the road becomes a little bit too narrow for the entire cart to get there. But it doesn't take you too long before you come to the exterior of a well-maintained wooden fence, this quaint little perimeter structure that itself encircles this equally quaint, modest two-story inn crafted of stone and shingle roof. Beams of sunlight break through parts

of the nearby tree canopy, bringing a cozy glow to the flower boxes that sit beneath the windows. The sounds of a drove of pigs nestled in the shade nearby catch your ears as they scavenge through the nearby grounds and mud for food. You see a white and brown cat that's settled up on top of the edge.

Its paws come over the edge, just looking at all of you. Meow. Alex, your head goes. Kind of skidded up, too, and Alex goes, Ah, all right, well, welcome to my home, the White Deer Inn. Damn, this is your place?

Well, it's our place. Quite nice. Thank you, thank you. Gee whiz. Can we stay with you? That was part of the deal. Exactly. We have to complete the mission. Right, yes.

Got that 60 pot still, right? I do, yes. Okay. Why, do you want some? No, no, no, we're good. I just wanted to make sure we could. They really needed the jerky, I thank you. I get that. Well, there's plenty more with that. You hear the door open,

and you see a woman step out, what you presume to be Hilda, a woman in her 30s, long brown hair that's pulled back, other than a few strands that frame the sides of her face. A gentle face with a smile that brightens around her brown eyes as she rushes towards Alex, says,

Alex, and just puts her arms out, and he picks her up and lifts her, and you see them spin in place for a bit. She's like, I was so worried. You were two days behind when you said you'd be back. And Alex says, I know, I know. The weather's been a bit rough and had a bit of a run-in with some of these,

the dangerous denizens of the open plains, but I lost Jamie in the process. And she's like, aw, well, we'll find a new horse. And she pats him on the cheek. Who names their horse Jamie? Dude, he brought us into here, all right? Be nice. I don't trust them. All right. I'm getting weird vibes.

You're getting weird vibes? I don't know why. Whatever. Why was Mabel the chill one on this? This is cheesy as hell, dude! It's a human name for a horse. You think these two are capable of being sneaky? They are too nice. Okay, all right. As she pulls away from Alex and she's wearing a simple red dress,

the white apron, and she turns and goes like, and these are? They're our guests. They've come to help us with our ruins. And they've been hired, contracted to be part of my entry team into this mysterious, possibly very beneficial endeavor. She goes, okay, well, welcome.

I'm Hilda, welcome to our inn. You're welcome to stay. She does a quick count. We don't have any other guests at the moment, so I'll prepare a meal for eight. Oh, a meal. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Who's the eight?

In memory of the horse. At this point, you hear, and on the roof, climbing down by where the cat is, you see a little boy, probably no older than seven or eight years old, skits down on the edge and scoots up and puts his legs over the edge, looks at you all, waves his hand.

I wave back. Hey. That'd be Pete. Pete is the eight. Looks at you all, waves his hand. I wave back. That'd be Pete. Pete is the Eight. He goes, hi! Hey, Pete. Hello, Pete. Greetings, Pete. Who are you?

Well, I'm Barnaby. That's Barnaby. I am a wandering trader. Do you want to see his wares? He has a spoon that's screaming. You have a scary face. Oh, well. Let me tell you, I have better eyes than a face.

Let me grab something out of here. I'd bring out a, this is a strip. The spoon is for Pete, right? Oh, yes, you have a spoon. Well, you're going to have a spoon, and I'll gesture towards the pot. What's the spoon? Alex goes, Oh, right, yeah. Bought you a spoon.

It's a noise maker. Honey, could you get some hot tea prepared for everybody? Boiling hot. Boiling hot tea for everybody. She goes, of course, of course. Pete, come down there, it's not safe! And she rushes off to get the ladder and he kicks his legs off the edge.

He goes, it's good to have people over. Welcome. Yo, I don't think she likes us being here, I'm going to be honest with you. Do people not usually come? As she darts on the side, Alex, who's getting his pack off the cart, goes, No, we get folks traveling in and out,

but usually they're military troops moving up and down the edge of the Jowston perimeter, but time's been what they are. It's been probably a few weeks since we've seen any extra patch, which is why this is an opportunity. Come on inside. Oh boy. This is getting better and better.

I'm starting to be on your side a little bit. I offer to help with the ladder to help Pete down from the... Easily enough to do it. Pete comes down and you all eventually gather head inside where the hearth itself, it's crackling in the edge. It's warm interior, especially against

the somewhat soaked travel that you've done here, the Tsar. On the inside, it is just a nice, beautiful inn. The two tables that sit out there have gentle cloths over them, as well as a countertop, the front where you see where the clerical work is done of the inn, as Hilda is behind there currently and getting silverware and stuff at the table. Pete goes and runs up and helps her and starts arranging and getting the different things around the table. Alex goes and

takes his boots off and twists them over to get the rest of the soaked rainwater to pour out on the front porch. But it is a welcoming, soft, gentle little inn. Hey, Pete, you want to see a giant hammer? What?! Yo, this thing's huge. Check it out. That's so big! Yeah, try to pick it up.

Can I? Can I? I was like, Sure, I'll buy you a screaming spoon. Why not? Is that all right? And he goes like, Outside, maybe. Maybe just show it off. Honey, is that a pro? It's like, he's not going to lift it, honey.

And Pete goes. Ah, look at him. He can't lift it. It is a large hammer. His alarms are so tiny. It's okay, Pete, I can barely lift the hammer. When you're stronger. When I'm stronger.

If you work hard. If you work hard, you can lift that hammer. It's just going to take time, and you have to be consistent. And training. And you have to train, do your cardio, a little bit of strength training. Training. What's cardio? Well.

You don't need it. It's boring. Also a membership at a wonderful little dojo. It doesn't hurt. Yes. He runs it, it's very good. He'll just let you in for free if you just come in. That's not true. If you barge in. Only the first one. If you barge in.

Only the first one. I can barge. See? Clearly. Already running the wrong things. Hey, Cadabra, you're the guest. What a vocal. You get sent to up the stairs. I might take off my shoes since they're muddy and disgusting.

By all means, yeah. You get yourselves comfortable. There's upstairs bedchambers set for the evening. And then eventually, as you get yourselves comfortable. There's upstairs bedchambers set for the evening. And then eventually, as you get yourself settled in your stuff, put aside, there's a washroom where you can go and take off a lot of the travel and muck that's gathered upon all of you.

And a nice warm dinner greets you in the chambers below. It's not a vast spread, but it is welcome. Warm bread. There's some fine salted meats. There's a number of freshly picked vegetables and fruits that have been gathered probably from nearby gardens that you glance at as you enter the premises of the White Deer Inn.

We saw a garden out there earlier. It was pretty crazy. Well, we grow these here ourselves. I hope you enjoy them very much. How do you protect against the rabbits and stuff? She looks over at Alex for a second and goes, Well, if you put a few traps out, that also is where we get our mutton.

She points over at one of the other bowls that has a mutton stew. Oh, dang, look at that. Very efficient. You guys got a good operation going on here. You know, there are worse places to be. It's definitely a step up from where we used to live. And Alex pats him on the shoulder and she goes,

Honey, can we have a conversation? Enjoy your dinner, friends. Yeah, of course. Oh, trouble in paradise over here. Thank you. The two of them head upstairs for a bit. I want to follow and listen. Okay, all right. Go ahead. Where are you going?

Pip, where are you going? Hold on. I'm going to go pee. Okay, All right. Go ahead. Where are you going? Pip, where are you going? Oh, hold on. I'm going to go pee. Okay, all right. If you find anything, take it. I will. Don't break any pots. I'm not. Unless they're windproof. No, I just have to, I'll be right back.

Is she going to snoop on it? Pip has to use the restroom. No, I'm just going to go pee. Can you let her use the restroom? Thank you. All right, so I need you to roll a dexterity roll for me. So roll a d20, add your dexterity bonus. To see if you can quietly follow behind unnoticed. 12.

12. Okay. You quietly head up the stairs. The wooden steps and something's like creaking under your foots. You're a light elf, but not light enough for an old wooden step to not notify your presence, but as you get to the very top

of the landing of the second floor, you can hear them talking. They have not seemed to take notice of your presence yet. They've moved into their side master bed chambers. The door is slightly, ever so faintly, ajar and you quietly get up to the edge of it and you could hear Hilda's like, look, Alex is talking to Hilda and he says,

it's all right, honey. We've traveled quite a bit. They seem a bit... scattered in ways, but I've seen a bit. They seem a bit scattered in ways, but I've seen them fight. They're quite talented. They have eyes for intrigue, and I think, honestly, I'll take whoever can help at this point. And she goes,

Honey, look, I know this is a dream of yours, but is it safe? I mean, the more we try and push this, I'm afraid it's going to try and convince Pete to try and step further than me, allow him within the woods. And I mean, you don't even know how to get inside.

She's like, he turns back and says, I know, I know, but you know, they're quite a worldly bunch, they've been around, and we'll find a way in, I'm sure. And we'll, look, we need the money. We need to get a better place for all of you. Just need to get you some new clothes. It's going to be fun.

It's going to be fun, trust me. Yo, this mutton's really good. And then you put it in the tea. Do you hear it? Do you hear the scream? Dude, that's crazy! How did you do that? I like that it actually screams underwater.

That's so cool! It does. It does. It just sounds like it's angry and drowning. Yeah, man. Oh, I wish I bought it for 60 pach. We'll get to you, if I leave a spoon later. We're working on pricing. Yeah.

But eventually, they come to an awkward quiet where she's like, Just be careful, okay? But eventually, they come to an awkward quiet where she's like, Just be careful, okay? If it's still sealed and you can't find a way in, you're okay to just walk back? He's like, Of course, yeah. I mean, that's the whole point of this. Anyway, I'm going to go check out on him.

He starts moving towards the door. I start trying to tiptoe down the stairs. Roll one more dexterity check for me. Oh yay. Uh-oh. I'm so excited. That's a natural one. Yeah! All right, I'm just going to stand there.

You stand there at the door. Yeah, he goes. I'm going to open the door and be like, oh, I'm so sorry, I thought, was this the bathroom? No, no, this is our bedroom. I'm very sorry. How long have you been there? I just walked up here.

Are you a snoop as well as an adventurer? Can I hear them talking upstairs? You know what? I'll say, based on the food and conversation, roll a d20 for me. We are allowed to. 16? 16, yeah, you hear a little bit of ruckus. I hear a little bit of the conversation

and I step up to save Pip from the situation. So I'm going to try to be like, Pip, did you find the bathroom okay? I, no, I just walked into their bedroom. I'm so sorry. Oh, he's like. I'm really sorry. He sighs and Hilda comes up on her shoulder

and is like, it's fine, it's fine. Yeah, the water closet's right down the hall there to the left. Thank you so much. We only have one for all of you, so you have to take turns, but it's well kept and well maintained. Got it, thank you very much. I come up right behind them. Yo, is this where I piss?

Yes, right down there. Right on the left. Okay, did you go already? I haven't yet, I do have to go. Pete comes up. I can wait. I want to piss, too. Hilda goes, Pete, don't say that word! Oh boy. Piss! I got to piss!

Man, this kid rules. Piss! Yeah! Alex facepalms hard, and Hilda's like, I'm glad you brought your friends here. I'm sitting across from Teddy, putting a carrot through the slot under my helmet as it just, like, contoniously goes up. I go, we're not good people, are we?

We're not the worst. I'm going to just take a carrot off and also, oh boy, these kids. I go to Pete and Hilda, and I, like, a Hilda and I, a deep bow, like, please excuse my friends. We may be a rambunctious bunch,

but our hearts are in the right place and we deeply, deeply appreciate your hospitality so far. She smiles and softens, like, I, no need to be so formal. We're happy to host you and just promise you'll be safe. Don't get too far into things you don't understand. If things get too hairy, just come back. And Pete pops up and says,

Don't forget to piss! We will not forget to piss, Pete. Thank you. Okay, you can stop saying it now, because she won't go in and I need to go, so can we get this going already? Little Lake puts her hand around Pete's mouth and comes, she's like, It's bedtime for you, Pete.

We'll see you all in the morning. We'll have breakfast up and early before you trek out. Oh yeah. And if you need anything, just rap at our door and let me know. And she like, I know where your door is now. Very sorry. It's all right. And she like, I know where your door is now. Very sorry. It's all right. And she ducks into the room and Alex heads downstairs

and just, while the rest of you are waiting, whatever line you're going to take to the restroom. I'm just going to go right now. We're all standing around, I'm going in. Go ahead, go ahead. Thank you. All right, so the evening progresses. Alex is downstairs having a small tankard of a half-filled ale of some kind.

He's thinking, his eyes are locked in a distant stare of something far off from the interior that he's facing. As you all come back downstairs to finish up your meal, you glance over and he's like, Hey, I just, I got to say, I just, I got to say, I appreciate, I appreciate that you're all putting the trust into this opportunity for all of us.

I think this can be a really great thing. Well, I see you have a bit of contemplation happening right now. And is there anything we should know before we get into this? Well, I've cleared out most of the brush to the front of it, and I found the front of it, but it's, best I can tell, blocked or sealed,

or maybe it's not even an entrance. Maybe it's just an art piece. I've gone back and forth to a number of the various libraries and cities all throughout this region, looked up everything I can about the Sindar, and it's all just bits and pieces, but nothing specifically about this. A lot about the Sindar, and it's all just bits and pieces, but nothing specifically about this.

A lot about the runes and, I guess there was, the leader of the Sindar at the time was cursed by the Rune of Change, which is one of the 27 true runes, which is something I don't even really understand, to be honest, but a lot of talk about a universal struggle between order and chaos and runes that shape the world as we know it and I don't know.

That's beyond my pay grade, I'm going to be honest. But nothing about the symbols I've seen here. So I figure first thing in the morning, we get our food, we head over to this front gate, we see if there's something I'm missing here. Maybe we walk the perimeter, see if there's another way in, maybe if there is another entrance that I haven't found.

You know, I'm just one man, but together we are six very talented people. Six very talented people who don't know how to open the door to this place. Well, we don't know that. For now. How many times have you attempted to open the door to this place. Well, we don't know yet. For now. How many times have you attempted to open the door? Uh... Almost daily for about three years.

Okay. Oh. What have you tried? I mean, I've tried singing to it. I've tried pushing it as hard as I can. Open Sesame, you try that one? No. Oh. But we could try that. Yeah, that's a pretty good one.

Some parts of it seem to slide or move, but nothing that I'm quite picking up on. I don't know if it's just decoration or if there's some trick to it. I begun digging deeper along the sides and the walls of the ruins just keep going, dug into the stone in the hills. So this is a big place.

So there could be alternative ways in, but nothing that I feel comfortable going too far in on my own. I can hear things scratching around on the other side of those walls. Cool. Has anything in your studies led you to have any knowledge of what may be inside the ruins?

Of course you said there is treasure, but what kind of, maybe, you heard, scratching creatures could live in there that we should be aware of? Well, people who have been to other Sindar ruins have spoken that they build them to protect magnificent secrets, right? And to keep them protected.

They often build dangerous challenges, traps, and perhaps even seal in denizens to wander and proliferate within the walls. So that is why I'm paying you quite a bit of POTCH to go and see where it goes. This is what all the training has been for. Things like this, encounters, getting stronger, putting your skills to the test. This is going to be great. It's going to be good for the body, the mind, the soul.

I already feel rejuvenated. Imagine all the things we could find. Like, a magic thing. That you could sell. That I could sell! There it is. That would be wonderful. How wonderful. This spoon, by the way, terrifying. Terrifying! Oh, I'm so glad you got it off my poppet. Dude, don't you love it? It's great. It's pretty good. I am, would you like, maybe I have another one.

We'll find it in there, maybe. If you find this Sindarin Screaming Spoon, I bet you I know a few people in New City that'll pay premium for that. Wow, premium. I'll write that down. I'm just saying, I'm just saying. This is still the same night, right? Yeah, it's just later into the evening now.

So I'm a little drunk. You are a tiny child. And I'm like, listen, I don't mean to be pedantic or anything, but people don't build ruins, okay? People are the Sindarians. They build buildings and then they become ruins. So I just want to, you know,

I want to make sure that we're talking correctly over here. No, that's entirely valid. You say you don't want to be, but you are. But you prefer us to call it former buildings. I do like that. If you're going to say you built the ruins, it's like, just say something else. You know what I'm saying?

He takes another drink after his third stein as well. And he's like, look, I know it's pedantic and all that, but like, it's just a figure's speech. It's the ease in which one can express specific. It's become ruins over time because it's not a proper building in our age, right? Oh my god, this guy. Just stir the screaming spoon, all right?

Oh, wonderful. All right, I'll do that. It gets exciting, gets up and takes way too long, putting a pot on the fire, waiting for it to heat up as the kettle starts whistling. This food is awesome! Yes, I know. Money mold things to do as well.

You can't leave your head at the whole time. Look at this, it's a mirror. It tells you how good you look. You look good. You hear a couple light footsteps down the stairs as Pete comes down like, is someone playing with my spoon? He's like, go back to bed, go back to bed!

Don't you playing, Pete! Just screaming. Just screaming. I am sentient, I feel things! While Jack and I take the alcohol and I put it in the nearest cupboard I can find. Yeah. Probably get up.

Where'd the booze go? I think you drank it all. You seem to be all out, isn't that interesting? It's been such a long night. I think that when the booze is gone, it's time to go to sleep. Oh, I feel that. All right, yeah, no, I'm feeling a little good.

Hey, where's that bathroom again? Upstairs on the left. Here, I'll walk you. I'm going up there anyway. I start knocking on your bedroom. Hilda opens the door, be like, excuse me? Oh, sorry, I didn't know you were in there. I'll wait. Alex come to bed.

Down the hall that way. Alex goes, that way, that way. Oh, okay, okay, sorry. Eventually, you all go to your chambers and in various states of restful sleep or drunken stupor, whichever your choice may be, certainly a variety of unique dreams find you. Everything from flashes of memory

interpreted through the veil of recent events to possibilities of what lies beyond, or even so, maybe just images, images that even you yourself might be trying to suss out as to what purpose or fate it calls you towards. But then, as quick as you thought, the morning comes as the sun rises and the sound of birds chirping

in the surrounding forest, and the green boughs of the trees that cluster and cover the top begin to whistle and carry you into the morning hour. You all begin to slowly come to consciousness as the smell of a fresh breakfast draws you to the floor beneath. There, Hilda, with Pete's help,

has prepared a fine series of sunny-side up eggs, some remainder of the slices of meat that have been fried up, as well as some toasted bread and some additional provisions that have been packed and wrapped for your journey into the ruins themselves. Set aside, Hilda says,

Good morning, everyone. Please enjoy the breakfast as it would. And she looks over to Alex. Just before you leave, make sure you say goodbye. And you see Alex putting on his boots and getting his, he's like, Oh, of course, honey, of course. And he gets a little short sword, puts it on his belt.

He pulls it out and it looks at it as it is undamaged, perfectly, freshly purchased. It holds it and like, sheathes it, locks onto his belt. All right, this guy's staying in the back. Very reassuring. Everybody's carb-loaded. You know, you're going to be ready for the day.

It's going to be intense. We may have to run, we may have to fight. Mabel, how are you feeling? Not so loud, man. Okay, all right, wonderful. That's a good thing before we put our lives on the line. Right, technically, you carbon-loaded last night. Now maybe it passes over into the next day. Look, have you seen how small I am?

I was thinking that last night as well. Yes, I think you were actually warned a couple of times by Sensei Theodore. It was a topic of discussion for the moment. I don't think you recall, though, do you? Listen, I mean, if it's in front of me, I'm going to drink it. What's my name?

Oh. Oh. Oh, man. Buddy? Eventually, you all gather your supplies and things together. Alex goes and kisses Hilda and rubs Pete's head a little bit and says, All right, loves, hold the fort down.

We'll be back here in a jiffy, and hopefully with something very cool to show for it. Yeah! And Pete goes like, and Hilda smiles and sighs and looks over at the rest of you and says, Keep it safe. We'll take care of it.

How much do you usually charge for people to stay in your inn? It's about 70 potch a person for an evening's rest. Oh man, we're screwed. Wait, didn't we stay here for, was? Oh, you were not charging me. It was fun to do that. You are. Oh my god, okay. I know it was part of the deal,

but you really did a nice thing for us, thank you. Well, you're doing a nice thing for us, thank you. Well, you're doing a nice thing for us, too. You're helping to ensure a future for these folks. We'll do our best, won't we? Yes, we'll do our best? Yes, we'll do our best. Yeah, yeah. It's not to do anything less than 110%.

I don't hear to do. Good one, I'm going to write that down. I don't usually write that down. That's brilliant. But free of charge, I'll bring out a little jar write a card. I don't usually write like this. That's brilliant. But free of charge, I'll bring out a little jar and a lid. There's nothing in it. This is an item I've had in my collection for some time.

It is, I'm sorry, magical in some way. It is a- It's okay. Getting it away from us, that's great. It is a jar that cannot be opened, and I want you to have it. Can I try opening it? I need to try and open it right now. Don't open the magic jar, you guys! But it can't be opened. I must test this. Come on, I can't deal with this this early in the morning. Take care.

You hand it over. He'll take it and goes, Thank you. Pete goes, That's so cool! I want to try! And he grabs it and is like, I'm trying to get the jar open. It really can't be open. This is going to haunt me.

Little kid trying it. As you all begin to step out and gather your supplies and cloaks over it, and Alex hits alongside you. All right, I'll show you where the ruins are. Y'all take care. Love you both. And Hilda goes, goodbye, stay safe.

And Pete goes, don't forget to piss! I love it! Don't open that jar. An hour later, you hear a horrible explosion in the distance. What were you saying? I said, before we a horrible explosion in the distance. What were you saying? I said, before we leave, I take the deepest bow. I can't, because the bow is the deepest.

Your forehead touches the ground. Yes, I was literally. Hilda gives a nod, too, and Pete then also gets on the ground, too, and matches your bow, and as you both push the heads, he goes like, such a respectful bow you have, Pete. Yeah, I learned from the best. We'll be back very soon, thank you.

Please, please do. We come back with treasure! Treasure! He sits up and he rustles his head up and goes, "'Take care.' As you all shuffle off into the--" We'll take care of him. She nods.

You shuffle off into the woods, to the north side where the wooden perimeter gate opens. You can see now the thick brush of the forest ahead, part of it cleared open. The shade, keeping it nice and cool this early in the morning. A low fog slowly settles into the region. As you begin to push forward, the little bits of light peeking through, about three, four minutes of walking and travel, taking in the sounds of nature around you, the fog gets thicker and thicker

until eventually you begin to see the first shape of what looks like a stone pillar, just the out dark line of it, and then another. You begin to see the grass and dirt floor begins to give way to patches of what looks almost like smooth stone, carved and settled together intently. Pillars line what looks like a familiar pathway

to an ancient time. Parts of the pillars crumbled and fallen and left to piles of debris. As you step around them and follow Alex, eventually you see the large, ominous stone shape of some ancient structure, itself heavily overgrown with vine and branch and bough wrapped around it.

You can see areas where the rocky cliffs at the base of the mountains wrap and grasp it from all sides. There, as you approach the front, you can see there are two massive stone statues, feminine in form, almost human-like, but features still hard to quite recognize. Swathed in a heavy robe and hooded,

you can see the lower part of their faces. Somewhat humanoid, but hard to place, their arms up, holding the archway top of the roof that makes the beginning of this massive temple. And there you see what looks like a 10-foot by 10-foot double-sided doorway, where a massive circular glyph-like stone relief is embedded into it,

intricately carved with all manner of strange lines and shapes. It's almost like some odd mathematical equation is forever placed sourcelessly and without particular pattern into this stonework long ago. And here it sits, dried brown roots and vines that have clawed up and climbed over it, most of them torn away upon the center part of the relief.

As you all begin to step up and approach, Alex goes, Here it is. Welcome to the Sindar Ruins. This is beautiful. It's beautiful. You know, they don't make ruins like this anymore. They don't make ruins. That's what I'm trying to say. Well, they're buildings first, right? Yes. Former buildings, as Mabel would like to say. They don't make former, that's what I'm trying to say. Well, they're buildings first, right? Yes. Former buildings, as Mabel would like.

They don't make former buildings like this anymore. Welcome to the Sindar Former Buildings, if that makes you feel better. I'm going to go up to the front, to the door. Mm-hmm. It is hard stone that is so solid or thick that you don't hear any echo get through. It's just your knuckles hitting unmovable surface,

and it hurts your knuckles and the impact. I have to be honest, that was a good move. Yeah, I just figured. I can't believe that didn't work. I know. I figured maybe you didn't try knocking. I don't know. Weirdly, many times, many ways, but also, always good to double, triple check. Now, Barnaby and I were chatting.

I think Open Sesame's the way to go. You were into that Open Sesame plan, too? Yeah, I could try it. There's nothing wrong with it. I want to walk up and try to see if I can make out any of the sigils or whatever. You know, there's like, all whatever, like, on the glyph on the front of it,

if I can recognize any of those. Go ahead and roll with magic. As you're looking at it, Aleks is like, I assume a lot of this is Sindar in the script, but not really much record exists aside from bits and pieces of higher learning. What do I roll? Is that a 20? Roll a d20 and add your magic.

15 and I don't have any magic. Okay, 15. How do you say open sesame in Sindar? Ooh, that was logistical concerns. Oh, thank you. You look about. Everything in here, you can tell, has some sort of purpose.

Everything about this design is intentional, but its scope escapes you. Okay. Can I also investigate the women statues, like holding up the, are they holding up the door? They're holding up the upper edge of where the roof begins, the rest of the temple progresses. So it looks like they're designed to look like

they're holding the edges of the temple, flanking both sides of that massive entryway door. Okay. Who is she? I'm going to just walk up and I'm just going to take my finger and I'm going to check these rooms in this big disk. Yeah. I just want to see if it's one continuous piece of stone

like it's carved in, or if it feels like this was inset and is in its own entirely different piece of stone like it's carved in, or if it feels like this was inset and is in its own entirely different piece of stone. I'm just seeing if there's a mechanism or something. Yeah, you feel it run your fingers along it, and as soon as you get partway through, one section of the stone shifts with your movement, like it slides along a track, and you release it and it slides back.

You did something. I'm going to slide and hold it. It stays there where you held it. Did you find something? I think I did. I think I did. I'm going to try and slide to see if I can bring any other piece up or down. A few other pieces move, but now that you see it,

there's dozens of individual parts of this that can all slide. And as you slide, they all send, some of them seem to almost ever so faintly click as they move. This is a little bit beyond me, but I think this is some sort of puzzle to solve. I don't know.

This is not my expertise, but I did. This is clearly, I don't know. I think this looks like a lock. If I were going to have a magic lock, I would have a magic lock like this. Oh, I don't want to deal with this. Can I try to slide a, can you hold the one you've got? Yeah, no, I'm holding that one.

Then can I try to, is there any other ones near his that I can move? There are numerous ones. The whole disc itself is probably about eight, nine feet from side to side. It almost fully occupies the entirety of these two doors and they seem to meet in the center. Numerous ones. The whole disc itself is probably about eight, nine feet from side to side. It almost fully occupies the entirety of these two doors and they seem to meet in the center.

So yeah, there's all number of them that you can try and pull around his space, but even so, you're limited by the scope of your hands. Right. Barnaby, take a look at this. Oh! See if anything. Well, when I traveled south of the south place that I've been at last,

I think I've seen a door, or maybe more. I hold that, please. I remember the story. I do. Hold that stone, Teddy, will you? And I go up and I look into the slot that's there, and I go, open sesame. That's a good one. That's a good job on that one. Well, the slot that's there and I go, open sesame. That's a good one. That's a good job on that one.

Well, now that that's over with. This must be a different contraption than the ones in the south. That would make sense. That must be different. Yeah, oddly, the command doesn't have an impact on the mechanism, but it was a good college try. Thank you. Is there anything in the actual slot that's moved over?

No, glancing at it, it doesn't look like there's anywhere to place anything. It looks like just all these various pieces have to be maneuvered in a specific way. Can I check the women's statues again? Is there anything on their person or anything in their making that I can? Sure, roll a d20 for me.

16. 16. 16. I mean, they're intricately carved. And while there is weathered wear and tear and a bit of growing nature scape that is slowly crawling up the base of them, each of them stands about 10 feet tall. They are larger than the door itself.

Their arms up to the roof portion of the temple. There's no writing or script on them, per se. They're just there as ominous guardians in the front of this entryway. Does it look like if we move these bits of stone in a particular pattern, there might be a pattern where it creates a good break that would let the doors open?

It's possible, if you want to roll a magic check for me. Oh god, me, okay. That's where I keep trying to get other people. What is this guy about to do magic right now? That's a nine. Nine. You pull two together, release, and they slide back. You pull two more together, and then this one,

and this one, and this one, and it makes a happy face. Hey, look at that. That might be something then. Let's continue on that. You're such an artist, Sensei. We probably all have to do it at the same time. Maybe we'll each take a couple? Are you kidding me?

Well, how else are we going to get in there, Mabel? I know you're afraid. Do you have any magic-protected gloves for there, Mabel? I know you're afraid. Do you have any magic-protected gloves for Mabel in yours? I do have gloves. I do have gloves. You don't have to touch it.

I will pull out two pairs of black gloves. They're anti-magic gloves. Suggestion. I got a big-ass hammer. You know, you carry a hammer long enough, and I know every problem looks like a nail, but maybe you should just not try the hammer. Right. How many are there of those?

I mean, at a glance? We may have to get there. Three dozen? Oh. Is there anything I have ever come across that would look remotely like something like this? Have you researched anything Sundaran in your past? I've probably walked by so much

and not know what that is from. If you'd like to roll a magic check for me, basically, I'm allowing each of you to make a magic check as you attempt to figure this out to see if you can ascertain any of the secrets. Dirty 20. A natural 20. A dirty 20.

A dirty 20. 20 is what you needed. Oh, okay. Up to eight. As you are contemplating, you've come across a book, oddly. There are all sort of scripts and pieces of Sindar and research that still exist out there. Most of the books are relegated to places of higher learning.

As to where you came about this one, you can decide. But you notice that there are, in Sindar and mathematics, there are patterns of three. And as you begin to look how all these are situated, they're almost set into trios. And on every third one, there is an additional divot mark in it. And so you begin to pull each of these third marks

and holding them in place. And as you get three of them pulled in, they click and hold. You get three more, pull in, and they click and hold until eventually you go through the full disc. When the last one clicks in, Barnaby!

There's a heavy impact. Dust knocks free and begins to fall and settle as the doors begin to open. Barnaby is so cool. The wind will hit me as it exits out of this dark dungeon, and I'll go, oh, I am terrified. Thank you so much for your encouragement. I knew how that worked.

I can't believe you did it. I've been trying this for, wow. Oh, you are already well worth the Parch and Change. My goodness. This is incredible. Well, let's go in. Come on. All right. Let's go find you some nails to hit. Yeah, let's go in! Come on! All right.

Let's go find you some nails to hit. Yeah, all right. You all charge in. From that point, the smell of musty, ancient air filters past you, and you enter a smaller antechamber with additional pillars along the way, and there is a secondary door that is closed, and what looks to be some sort of an odd,

looks like a pedestal onto the right of it. And Alex runs up to him and is like, ah, okay, this is another mechanism. And you look and it looks like some sort of a series of stone buttons and reliefs into an interface, like a platform. Small buttons are big, or like big? Like a series of larger, inch, inch and a half,

and there are different symbols, and he goes, ah, another one? So, and there are different symbols, and he goes like, ah, another one? So wait, what are we seeing? We're seeing like a platform with a... Yeah, there's a long hallway with pillars, and then there's a doorway at the end of it. And then to the right of it is a small,

kind of raised pedestal that has these symbols on it. All right, I know how these things work. This is a trap if we don't get the right thing, okay? So we got to do this right or else we're going to screw this up. Let's get Alex away from it. We got so close to this. After all this time, we get to one freaking door.

McKenna means his elbow on it and then hits something and it. The doors begin to open and. It's like, I meant to do that. That was purely husk. That was good. It was actually really good. See, this is where the collaboration comes in. This strange, twisting, binding sound

begins to fill out the air around you. As you see the hanging vines that are revealed as the doors open up to the interior of this temple property. You can see all manner of layered walls that are massive and tall and bits of overhanging canopy. It is an open-air temple, but from the vines that hang down, some of them seem to shift as a number of small green shapes drop down from the vines and begin to slowly move and shift. What? What's that? I take out my bow. drop down from the vines. They begin to slowly move and shift. Uh, what?

What's that? I take out my bow. You might want to step back with this one. I crack my knuckles. What did I tell you guys? That's okay, that's something you can hit now. They look like small green pods. Maybe it's the distance.

Size is a little odd. Maybe not so small, maybe about the size of a person or so. As they move, you see vines pull it forward towards you until they open up like weird green potted plant creatures, their mouths open like Venus flytrap terrifying entities that their jaws open and these five entities

begin to swirl and swarm towards you. I need all of you to roll d20s and add your speed modifier. Eyes up. Get up, Osh. Also, did HP reset after a night's rest? After the night's rest, you guys got your set. Any spells back and your HP is full.

Oh, I needed it. Yo, I'm not going to lie, those things are pretty cool. Oh, look at those! Whoa! Oh! Oh. Oh my god,, those things are pretty cool. Oh, look at those. Whoa! Whoa! Oh! Oh. Oh my god, yep. Those are so cool.

I rolled a one. Okay, so you'll be going last. All right. There we go. All right. So to that point, 20 to 15? 22. Ooh, look at that, Titty.

16. All righty. 16 for... No. 22. Ooh, look at that, Titty! 16. All righty. 16. That's not so far, huh? No. Cool. 15 to 10. 12.

12, all right there. Oh, I'm 10. Pip, Sbarnabee. Zasari, oh yeah. Pip, Sbarnabee, Zasari, yeah. And yeah. And then Mabel. And then Mabel. And Mabel, last.

All right, so with that, as these plant entities are rushing around you, the front row itself filled with them, and two in the back that are at the ready. Teddy, you're up first, with Pips coming up shortly behind. Well, I'm going to, let's start with the center then. Going to head straight in, try and dodge left,

and I'm going to see if I can just get this thing right and stain him. Wait, no, it doesn't have one. I'm going to get it, not in the mouth, but right below. I'll ankle it this way, so it looks more like the... Oh yeah, thank you. There it is. That feels like Suikoden right there.

So front and center. You got it. Oh yeah, that's a 21. 21, what's your crit range? Oh yeah, 15 to 20. That's a crit. That's a crit. Go ahead and roll damage and double it. Yeah. All right.

That's a... That's right, he put it all into luck. 11, 19, 19 would be... 27 doubled. 19 would be 20. 27? Doubled. To 54. Yeah. 54. Dang. Right in there.

One-inch punch. Yeah. One in the middle, viney arms reaching outward as its terrible plant-like maw opens up. You can see the reddish interior where it holds some acidic liquid inside. These little thorns poking out the sides of it. You just rush forward, uncaring. As you impact, you watch it, you hit, and the creature goes. A second later, gets blasted back and skids on the ground. Its vines have caught it and pull it back into place,

but you can see its torso is ruined. Parts of its innards are spilling out. It's green and red elements are hanging. It's like. It's time to pull these weeds. Writing that one down. That was pretty cool, but maybe work on the lines. That's my best part. See how you do. Come on, that was pretty cool, but maybe work on the lines. The lines are not the best bonds! See how you do.

Come on, kid. All right. It's now the creeper's turn. Oh shit. So the three at the front are going to come at all three of you on the front line there with their plant chews. You watch as they come forward and they try and reach out and grab

and swallow to chew you. So first coming towards Mabel, that's going to be a 12 to hit. What's your evasion? Oh, that's a d20. That's your evasion score. Oh, it's 13. 13? That's a miss.

All right, so it goes towards you. You just keep blowing, kick it off. Oh, I just roll around and shit. One's coming at you, Teddy. I'm too tongue-over for this, man. That's a 12 as well. No, I'm a 13. 13 again! Rolled the same thing twice in a row. So those all miss, and the one's coming towards you,

Zasari. That's going to be even lower. It's going to be a seven. Yep, that misses. That misses you. Man, all of yours is ducking out of the way. The front rows are not so great. The back rows, however,

are going to use their poison thorn abilities as they reel back and then fire a barrage of poison nettles that are going to fire off. One's going to go towards you, Teddy, and one's going to go towards you, Barnaby, in the back row, because they can do that. Oh no, I'm allergic to poison. Okay, that's going to be a 13 to hit you.

My invasion's 13. That does hit you. You take 14 points of damage. Reduced by seven. So another seven. And you are poisoned. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No!

No! So you feel like as the thorns hit you, suddenly your veins begin to pulse. It's like burning pain. Breakfast did not sit well. And then the one's coming at you, Barnaby. That's going to be, that's a terrible roll, eight to hit. What's your evasion? Eight misses. 11 is my evasion.

You duck out of the way. No damage sustained. The thorns go flying by and hit the nearby stone wall. No impact. That finishes the plant turn, but you are poisoned. It's the time of Pip's turn with Barnaby on deck. All right, I'm going to take a shot with my bow. Which one are you firing at?

I am going to do, okay, let's see. Because you're a bow, you can hit anybody. Yeah, all right. So I'll go for the one on the left. All right. Front left. This one? Yes. Front, or, oh. Front left. Yes, front.

My left, sorry. Your right, sorry. All right, I don't know if that hits. It's a nine. A nine? Your evasion is eight, that hits. Oh, it hits! Yay! All right, good, good, good.

All right, all right, all right, all right. So we got 2d10. Okay, eight. Plus 10, 18, plus eight. 26? No, yeah. That's great, so 26 points of damage and that arrow strike,

it sneaks into the one in the front, the arrow dives into it and you watch its acidic interior begin to spill out from the wound. Its vines triangle to close it. That's a heavy hit on it. It's already starting to look haggard from the impact. So that finishes your turn there. My turn.

That leads us to Barnaby with Zasari on deck. Wonderful. Teddy, your veins are turning purple. When we finish this, I want to take that thing out of your skin and keep it forever. I will throw my boomerang at the one in the middle, because that's the one that was hit originally, right? This is the one that was hurt really bad by Teddy.

I'll try to finish that guy off. All right, roll for attack. Yeah, I'll two-handed overhead, somehow throw a boomerang down like an ax. Oh no. Whoa! Eight, wait. Yeah, eight. Eight? Eight? Yeah!

No, no, eight hits exactly. Eight hits of evasion, yeah. Barnaby! 15 damage. 15 points of damage. This one in the front, the boomerang slices through and carves it into two different pieces that fall to the ground and the vines keep curling

for a few more seconds before they eventually roll still and you watch the green begin to curl into brown very quickly. Yuck. Destroyed. Well done, well done. Austin, that finishes your go, Barnaby. Zussari, you're up with Mabel on deck. My tauntmasters are able to hit back line, too, right?

They are medium range. I believe. So they can only hit the front row. Okay, but I can attack from either row. You can attack from either row. Actually, that's good to know, because if you move him back then, if you start to get damage really quickly, you can move him back and still hit I can back up and still attack.

You hit this one on the... This one's been hit. Yes. I've got to follow up Pip's attack and try to use my Taunt of Fire and hit it so fast that I sever the head from the stem of the hand. Great, let's go for it. Roll for the attack. 16. 16 hits. 16 hits.

16 hits. Roll damage. 10, 10 hit. Plus your? Oh, wait. I hit 16, right? Well, it was a 12 plus four. 12 plus four, okay, you're right. One, two, three, four, five, 10.

10 total? 10 total. All right, you got it. So 10 damage on that one. Crack, crack! Two heavy hits. It takes the impact. You can see it's struggling to keep itself formed together. The part of its matter is starting to tear apart and you can see that the flower parts around its head

are falling off in petals and chunks, but it's still standing. Just very hurt. All right, that finishes your go. What's up, Mabel? Oh, hey. Are those purple bubbles coming off of you? Yeah, it'll be fine.

It's just going to take a sit. I don't think the eggs were fully cooked. He always says it's a flesh wound. All right, take a seat, all right? Watch how it's done. I'm going to do the Unicorn Assault. Okay. Yeah. Left line, that's the one that's been hit already, right?

Actually, this one's been untouched. This one has taken some damage. All right, let's take that line down. You got it, all right. So you, who are so good at this hammer, a spear-based rune's not going to stop you from using it. That's right, baby. Yeah! I'm going to spear the F out of these guys.

You rush forward and swing wide and try and hit that entire row. Nine. Hey! Actually, nine still hits them both, yeah. And then add damage, right? Correct. 14 plus...

25. Nice! So as you rush forward with your hammer, how do you strike both of those in a row? Man, I'm just going barrel first. You just run. Straight up. I'm like, I'm a unicorn, baby!

You impact both of them. The one in the back rolls off and catches itself. It's got its vines trying to wrap around the hammer as you pull it away. The one in the front, you realize is missing until you look in the front of the hammer, and it's just smeared across the front of it. Awesome.

No longer functional. You are a unicorn. Let's go, man! Thank you! I love it. I know I have a hard exterior, but my heart is soft. You opened up so easily. That's a shame. This one shifts into the front row.

Teddy, you're up. All right, well, the one that just got damaged, I'm going to try and see if I can finish that thing off. So I'm going to come in and see if I can just roundhouse behind it and just nail its head down into the floor. You got it. All right. That's not the right die, there we are.

Come on. Oh, 12, 13, 14, 16, which is in my crit range. Yeah? Wow, okay, I get to. 16 on the dice? 16, it was 12 on the dice plus four. Okay, no, so the crit range is on the die. So 16 to hit.

16 does hit, so not a crit, but it hits. It's okay. 14, 14, 22 points of damage. 22 points of damage to the background. Nice! Bam, right in the back. So you rush forth, whack, you hit it. It falls to the ground. Its vines try and whip up to wrap around your forearm. As you pull backward, it gets it back to its feet

and it's teetering and you see parts of its extended vine, heavy leaves that are curling back into it and starting to blacken. It's very heavily hit. I have to take my poison damage. You do. Which is four. Eight points of poison damage.

You take eight points of poison damage at the top of your round, just like. And it stays there, or does it heal? Or do I have to wait to? No, it stays. Oh yeah, anyone wanting to cure my poison, I will highly take that. Dude, are you okay? What the heck's going on over here? Scott, I will happily take that. Dude, are you okay?

What the heck's going on over here? Scott, I think it was the chicken and the eggs. I think the whole thing was kind of bad. I ate both and I'm fine. You're injected with a thorn. Yeah, are you sure it's not the thorn protruding from your shoulder? What thorn? Oh my god!

It's the point you cut out. Oh, it's probably holding. Oh no, it's spraying. Oh, it's really bad. No, get that away from me, dude! Put it back in, it's spraying! Oh, fuck, that was back in. You need to reprice it again.

All right. What's going on? Oh my god! The creepers take their turn. The two in the front are going to lash out. One of them's going to come at you, Mabel, and the other's going to come at you, Zuzari. Bring it on. The one against you, Mabel, it's going to be,

oh, it's going to be a five. Oh, hell yeah. That's going to miss on that one. It wanders towards you itself, just kind of stumbles and hits the ground, looks up at you. I do like a, you know when you do breakdance and you do like the.

You know, I do that and I'm like. Hell yeah. Get back up. That one feels a little shaming, like if a plant could back up and go. Yeah, that's right, back up. The one that's coming towards you, Zusari. There we go, finally a decent roll on my side.

That's going to be a dirty 20 to hit you. Oh wow, okay, yeah. So this one actually, it lunges forward, and as its mouth opens, you try and pull away. Its vines grab you and it pulls you into its gullet. You watch Zusari is swallowed by this creature. It like, chews before you eventually fight your way out

and it spits you to the ground. You do take, from that attack, 18 points of damage. That's a 10. How smart. Good job, Suisari, for fighting it from the inside out. You know, I try. Yeah, the monsters just don't really like me.

I've discovered they hate me. The one in the back is going to do a poison thorn attack. This one's going to be at you since you haven't been striked yet. It curls in and releases this line of toxic points. Yo, watch out! That's going to be an eight to hit you. What's your evasion? Nar, it's 11.

You're just dug out of the way and it sprays against the wall, exploding, leaving the toxic venom inside, causing a Jackson Pollock painting spread on it. Oh, that's beautiful. Yeah, hold on. But that's going to finish the Creeper's go. Pipps, you're up with Barnaby on deck.

Take out my bow. Take out my bow and I'm going to shoot the one that's almost down. That one? Go for it. Roll for an attack. All right, we got, that's great. I got a 19. 19 hits. Go ahead and roll. Get them, Pip.

We got, all right. We got a nine and a three. We got 12 plus eight, 20. 20 points of damage. Yeah! You strike that one and it crumples backward and you watch as the somewhat empty interior of its plant gullet folds in on itself,

almost like a slowly deflating water balloon and it just lays there on the ground, no longer moving. That finishes your go. Yes. Two more! Two more. Barnaby, you're up as Usari on deck. I'll just hit the one in the front row. Yeah, because I know other people will as well. Sick. Oh, that's going to be 22 to hit.

It was 19 on the die, but my crit range is 20, so. Yeah. I know. That's all good. That does hit, though. Go ahead and roll damage. Okay, yeah, great. Right there. Sick.

Eight damage. Eight points of damage. Okay. Now these creatures have their own defense, and so you hit it, and it streaks off, and it impacts, but it looks like it's deflected. It's a hardened exterior that pulls itself in place. It doesn't take as much damage as you'd want. That is one thing about my boomerang, does not do well against plants. It's never done.

I've lost many friends to plants and it's because of that boomerang. I'll just grab it. It goes back to it. Are plants, is wood involved in that? Oh god, I don't feel good. It's pulsating. You have a tree growing out of your shoulder. Do you realize that? I'm going to take that. All right, Z Paul said, you have a tree growing out of your shoulder. Did you realize that? I'm going to take that. All right, so Zahra, you're up. I follow up his attack and try to,

that's the one in the front right there. All right, you leap forward. Forward. Ooh, yeah, seven. No, wait. Yeah, seven. What's the number on the dice? Three. Three?

That's within its counter range. No! So you dive forward to strike towards it. As you do, the plant ducks out of the way. As soon as you finish your strike and realize you've only hit air, you look up just as it's reaching towards you to try and swallow.

Not again! 15 to hit. No! You get swallowed a second time and boom, the skeleton's squeezed and crushed before he managed to vomit you out onto the ground. This poor guy. Oh, that's going to be 22 points of damage on that one.

Okay. How are you looking? I'm okay. Reduced by your defense. Yeah, you got reduced by your defense. But yeah, a nasty counter on that one. Does that finish your Ghost of Zahra'i? Mabel, sorry, Mabel, you're up. Oh, sick. Yo, I'm going to do that unicorn assault again,

because that shit ruled. Let's go. Let's do it, baby! I'm swinging my hammer around. Unicorn rune on the hammer starts glowing up on your hand. It starts glowing to match it. Yeah! You rush forward with the hammer swinging. Go ahead and roll your attack. Here I go, baby.

Three plus four. That misses both of them. That was my of them. That was my exact wall! Does it get broken? So the, no, it does not. Sorry, sorry, it does counter on a three. It does not hit it, though. Oh, okay. So as you rush towards with the hammer, swinging it,

your foot just catches one rock that you weren't seeing, and you're like. Oh, I hate rocks! Your momentum carries you, and as you rush past, the one that's standing in the front goes. He's going to try and eat you, the gif that you are there. You're still a unicorn.

It's going to be a 12 to hit. Thank you. Your damage is 13. 13, you just managed to dart past that one. Whoa, whoa, whoa! The one in the back tries to do it as well. Very agile. That one's going to be a 12, however.

So the one in the front misses you, the one in the back tries to do it as well. Very agile. That one's going to be a 12, however. So the one in the front misses you. The one in the back just opens its mouth and waits for you to roll in and just takes you in. With that, you take 15 points of damage. Oh my god. Ow! And no defense, because you're Unicorn. That's right, I don't have any defense.

Yes, that's straight damage. All right, so that finishes your turn. At the top of the round, Teddy, you're up. Yes, that's straight damage. All right, so that finishes your turn. At the top of the round, Teddy, you're up. Jeez, I crawl back out. It kind of lets you. It's like, no, you deserve this. Everybody gets a bad one. You did well, Barnabus, you're doing really well.

Oh, thank you! Oh god, who are you? Oh, that's Barnabas. That's me. Barnaby, you guys! The poison's getting to you. Beginning of your turn. Yep. You take. Just take my damage you guys! If the poison's getting to you. Beginning of your turn? Yep. Just take my damage. Take 2d6 poison damage, ignoring defense.

Oof. Yo, this guy looks really sick. Oh, man, nine points of poison damage. That'll be fine. All right, and take your turn. Yeah, I'm going to take my turn. Here we go. Who are you going after? The one in the front?

The one in the front is the only one I can hit. That's 11 to hit. That hits. All right, let's do some damage. Come on, come on, big money. Oh yeah! 15, 21, 29 points of damage. 29 points of damage.

A heavy combo. The one in the front gets knocked in the air and lands with a heavy thud. It's looking pretty dang hurtful. I throw up a little on it and back up. It looks at you incredulously with no face because it's a plant creature, but you assume it's like,

what the fuck? You did this. All right, finishing your turn, Teddy. Now they're both going to go. The one in the front is going to attempt to sweep up and swallow you. Uh-oh. Again, that's going to be a 12, which I think just misses your evasion.

Yeah, I'm 13. That's good. The one in the back is going to go ahead and shoot poison thorns at you. Oh, I don't want this. 12, which I think just misses your evasion. The one in the back is going to shoot poison thorns at you. Oh, I don't want this. No, don't put this on me. With a natural two, however, it fails.

Nice! Oh, you don't have to do that. You're just dunking around a second time this other direction. See, that's how it's done, sick man. You didn't even hit it. Pips, you're up. Barnaby, you're on deck. Taking another shot with my bow to the one in the front.

You got it. This one's already damaged. Yes, all right. That is going to be a 15 to hit. That hits. Go ahead and roll damage. Oh, all right, we got four. We got a nine, 13, plus eight. That's 23. What was that again?

21. 21 points of damage. That one takes the blow and is reduced to a withered, quivering pile of plant matter. Nice. Piece of. This one shifts back to the front. Finishing your turn, Barnaby, you're up.

It's Zasari on deck. I guess it's just you and me. All right, that is 15. 15 hits, yeah. Check. That's going to be 13 damage. 13 damage, that's better than last time. Yeah.

All right, set points. All right, so the boomerang slices through it. It takes the impact, shrugs off, and flies back into your hand. You see part of it open and spill a little bit. But it's still looking pretty hearty. Just taking some hits. Don't have to make it a spectacle, that is fine.

That is fine. The other thing is that we'll take the boomerang. Much worse, much, much worse. Fair enough. Zussari, you're up with Mabel on deck. Can I, I can use an antitoxin here, right? If you want to use your action to do that, yeah. Yeah, I mean, let me do that.

So I want to throw an antitoxin to you. You've had antidote this whole time? Yes, but I... Oh, thank you. We practiced that a lot. Sorry it took me so long to get that to you. Do I drink it or do I pour it on the thing?

I don't remember. Are you able to move it? I'm on my boat. Yes. Oh, that's weird. And indeed, you are no longer poisoned. This guy's had a tree growing out of his arm for like four hours. Remember to keep the sword.

Sometimes you've got to take something for the team. Right. Sometimes it's not about you. I wanted to clear more of the board before, you know, so no one else gets poisoned. No, we're good. We're good. We had to take care of it. That is tactical, so. Awesome, that finishes your go. Feel the pain. Mabel, you're up. Oh, good, we had to take care of it. That is tactical, so. Awesome, that finishes your go.

Feel the pain. Mabel, you're up. Oh, okay. There's one left at the front, and you see it's like. I'm going in for a good old-fashioned whammy attack. This is the one that ate you last round, too. Oh, I got a bone to pick, baby. It wants another taste.

Revenge for both of us, I've also been eaten. Let's try to smash it right down into the ground. You got it, all right, go ahead and roll an attack. That's right, I have to do that. Plus four to that. 18 plus four. And that is within your crit range. Hey!

So yeah, so roll your damage. Let's go. Oh, you're done for. Two plus four plus 11. That's a number. That's 17. Okay. Times two. That's going to be 34. So it takes 34 points of damage.

Ooh! A heavy impact. Wham! It opens its mouth to try and swallow you whole, and then it sees the hammer is just too big for it to take, and goes. It gets smashed into the ground. You pull the hammer back, and it's like. It's barely holding on by a thread.

Oh, it's still alive! It's still alive. Come on. Top of the round, Teddy, you're up. Nope. What did you roll? A one. A one, it's going to go ahead and get a counterattack. Wow, that just sucks.

I wanted you to get the killing blow. I know, I'm so sorry. Natural 20. No way! A one to a natural 20. Okay, no, never mind. All right, take it. That's rough. I'm having a bad day. You're having a real rough day here.

All right, it's not a great damage roll. So that's a good one for you. So 18 points of damage. That could have been a lot worse. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You got lucky on that one, but it gets you partway into its mouth and tries to chew you in,

and you kick it off and land, but your legs get shredded in the process and a little numb. You're feeling numb in a lot of places right now. It's a lot of flesh and wood. Yeah, all right, so that finishes your roll. Now it's going to go. It's going to try to swallow you.

That's going to be a 15 to hit. Dang it. My third time getting eaten! I know. Wants to have a taste, man. I hate these things. That's going to be 16 points of damage. Okay.

Reduced by eight, so just eight. All right, finishing there, go. Pips, you're up with Barnaby undead. Ugh, let's finish this! Oh, Pips, why won't you do it to him? Okay, that's a 19, which is in crit range for me. That is, yeah! So, you know. Roll your damage and double it.

Okay. Ruin it. All right, so we got six plus nine, 15. Plus. So do I also double the? Yeah. Dang! Yeah. Six plus nine, 15. Plus? So do I also double the? Yeah. Dang! Yeah. The numbers are bigger in this version, but also that goes both ways.

So what did I say, 15? 15 plus 23? 15 plus, yes. Oh. This, okay, explain to me how your arrow finishes off this entity. I'll just, as all of this is happening, I just go, take out the, just let it go is happening, I just go, take out the.

Just let it go really quick, right through the mouth. It goes through and it's like. Like nothing happened, you think you missed, and it goes. Like the plant version of I Don't Feel So Good, Mr. Stark. It's like, wow. It splatters the plant viscera everywhere. As a hand to your fire rune magic seemed to carry through on that one arrow

and detonates it from the inside. Yeah. That was cool as hell, Niv. Dang, thank you. Great shot, Pip. How are you doing? I'm okay, I can hold together. Here, let me give you some healing. I can help you. I was going to say, I don't want to blow

through everybody's healing. Yeah, I'm 35 down, but like. Aren't you a little mad it took four hours to get that medicine in you? No, I'm just four. I have three left. No, I'm 35 down, but like. Aren't you a little mad it took like four hours to get that medicine in you? No, I'm just four. No, I'm good. So I'm a tough guy. I can take it.

If someone could roll five d20s for me real fast. That's ominous. I don't know if I like that at all. Yeah. What are the numbers? Oh, 14. 14, okay. 11. 11 again. Okay.

Four. Okay. How many was that? That's four, one more. 18. 18. So amongst all these creatures, oddly, as they're dead and plants, they also produce POTCH, because this is a JRPG. Hey!

I love money. As you rummage through their bodies, you find 500 POTCH amongst the dead plant creatures. I should have sold the spoon for more. As well as a medicine. A medicine. Nice! I retrieve my medicine and I give it to you. Sensei. Good kid.

Don't pour that in the action tree. Medicine heals you for 50. Oh, wow, my god, that's great. We should take 100 potch? 100 potch each. Yeah. All right. I feel like that's good. I we just take 100 potch? 100 potch each. Yeah. All right. I feel like that's good. I mean, I feel like this guy should get a little bit more.

No, no, no, no, no, I'll be getting it from you at the end of this. As this battle concludes and you all go over yourselves, you look behind you and you see Alex is there holding his fresh short sword who did not get engaged in the battle and is back in the doorway, shaking a little bit, and is like,

You know what? I'm going to keep watch here at the door in case any of the problems happen. And good luck. If you need anything, let me know. Remember, you keep what you find, other than what's at the core of this. Looks like you already made a little scratch out there. That's great. He looks out into the ruins and you can see fear in his eyes. He hasn't been this close, and now that he's this close, he's like, I don't know if I want this. He's like, yeah, I'll just hang here.

Good luck. I got to be honest, Alex, I forgot you were here. Good, that means I won't affect your performance. Can I walk up to him and I put a hand on his shoulder and I go, Return home, Alex. Your family awaits your safe return. Let us handle the ruins.

You make sure you're there for them. We'll do our job and you do yours. And he pats your arm. Oh, okay, okay. I appreciate that. I know Hilda was anxious anyway, and I mean, looking, holds his sword up and he was about to sheathe

and his wrist, and it's just no sense of how to swing it. And she goes, yeah, I would have been no use anyway. Hilda was right. Okay. In case we don't make it out, you can have my portion of the potch. Okay, you drop it, he leaves it there.

He's like, honestly, we made a deal. You're going to make it out fine. I'm not taking it, and I keep walking. I'll take it, that's fine. Look, we have your little dirk, too. That'd be great. No. Nah, you got to, just in case something comes up.

I need to keep myself protected. Oh, sure, yeah, because you know how to use it, obviously. Well, it'll be dropped there if something bad happens. Yeah, yeah, no, that's great. He's like, but if it gets too hairy, come back, it's not worth losing your lives in there. I don't know what's in there, so just be ready. Good luck, and he backs into the mist.

But nevertheless, you are now within the temple. Yeah. Ooh! I was like, what is he doing? Yeah! I was like, what is he doing? We're getting a map. What? Here we go.

Oh, this is, I didn't know we were going to get this. I'm very excited. What the hell? Wow! We've got a map. Holy cow! With pink roofs. To mark your troop,

best as to where you might be throughout. Oh, this is so JRPG. Right at the cheese, the top down. Yeah, exactly. Trying to build the experience here. That'd be a good marker. Yeah. I'll just say this little brass thing

is your party where you need to travel. But you see, as you go through here, down this hall, there is an entryway this way and the hall continues down this way and then vanishes that direction. Oh, it's a cannon. So we have two options. We either go for the big door

or we go around the corner. Oh, there's two. Oh, I didn't even see there's a door. That's cool as hell. There is a door, although the door, I mean, is the obvious point. It might be, it's exactly what they expect us to do. Yeah, I think we should explore a little bit

before we try to open the door, because the door seems like it would trigger some kind of stuff to happen, you know what I mean? It does, it's actually, that's very fair. Well, that was good thinking. Could I walk up to the door and look at it, investigate it? Sure.

Like if there's any locks or? Sure, go ahead and roll a d20 for me. Add your luck skill. A nine. Total of nine? Total of nine. All right. Looking throughout it, it does appear like there is some sort of a locking mechanism to it.

There isn't a keyhole. There is a small gap in there where it looks like a shape would fit. That's the best you can make out. Okay. I don't think we'd be able to get through this door anyway. It seems like there's a mechanism here. Maybe some sort of thing we would need

to get the door unlocked anyway. I don't know, I'm pretty strong. Do you want to try to break it open? Sure, if you want me to. That's just how you set off a trap. Let's be honest, it's best to get the door open. Oh, okay. The one thing I'm good at.

And you did really well in that last fight. And you know, maybe it's time to get good at two things. And what's the second? I don't know, that's up to you. Caution, maybe. Caution. I don't think caution's going to happen. Well, you know what? Let's cautiously look around the corner, then.

All right. All right. Just a little peeksies. So you're not heading the door? Hell no. Okay. These fools don't want me to. You could, anyway. You could. Unless, ah! Okay, go over the door.

Do you? Yeah. Yeah, all right, go ahead and roll. Roll and add your strength. Okay. Oh, that's the damage roll? That's d20. No, you got it right, d20. Okay. I rolled a 20. I saw that, it was a 20 when you rolled it. So yeah, that'll do it.

So as everyone's like, hmm, this is a good lesson, and everyone starts walking further down the hallway, you just give it a second and go, wham! You hear this massive impact, the sound of cracking and breaking stone and bending metal.

As the dust settles around there, you see Mabel standing there with her massive hammer. As it begins to clear, you can see the doorway is just a mangled mess that opens into the interior here. Whoa! Cool, Zoran! That's... Mabel, you are quite strong. tangled mess that opens into the interior here. What? What's going on? That's... Mabel, you are quite strong.

Yeah, I told you. Every time I'm like, I got to hit the door, you're all like, no, we got to do a little puzzle or something, but... The door is open. No, it worked. I just feel like the wrong lesson was learned here. Yes, now I know. Take notes.

Hit door whenever you approach one. See? Now you're learning. Looking into this chamber, as you blast open the door and you guys glance in, there is another massive double door across the way and hallways that go to the right and left. You want me to hit that one, too?

No, but you're going to do it anyway. Well, you know, I feel like I'm a little tired. I could use a little rest. My triceps are tight. You can take a rest and look around the corner. Okay. There's a square thing below us. Can I look at that? Take a little breather. Yeah, you want to move forward and we'll look around the corner. Okay. A square thing below us.

Can I look at that? Take a little breather. Yeah, you want to move forward and check? Yeah. Go ahead and roll a d20 for me. Three. Just a three? I mean, it just looks like a design for the rest of the temple. There are different types of stone

and everything around you. Maybe I'll step on it. Let me give it a look. Whoa! Yeah. What are you trying to do? I want to see, yeah, I want to see what that is, because I don't think we should step on it. Yeah, I don't want to step on it.

What's on the ground there? Yeah, right there, that's good. Roll a d20 for me. Five. Five. It's just a chalkboard. It just looks design. Yeah, we both just nod. It is a really pretty design. Yeah, yeah, these are cool squares.

Yeah, it's actually really cool. Some kid was playing in here or something, who cares? Yeah, maybe just turn nod. It is a really pretty design. Yeah, these are cool squares. Yeah, it's actually really cool. I thought some kid was playing in here or something. Who cares? Yeah, maybe just turn around. I don't think that is what it is. No? Let's just try something. I'm going to take a potch and just toss it at the stone. Good idea.

Ting, ting, ting, ting, ting. Nothing. Nothing. Some damn kid just drew that on the floor. That's exactly what I'm saying! Who wants to step on that? There was a sealed... Doesn't matter. How about I'll throw my hammer on it and we all just back up, you know what I'm saying?

If it's a pressure plate and we're not on it, right? What if you lose the hammer? Well, you know. I've known to fisticuff in my time. I believe in your strength, Mabel. You broke this door open. If you're willing to risk the hammer, by all means. Let's give it a shot, huh?

Why not? Let's go for it. All right, I toss my hammer onto the thing. It hits the stonework with a heavy impact. Half second passes, no issue. Flames engulf, spraying out of each corner of this area. This inferno burns in the core of this area as you all step back, your eyebrows singed in a flash as you cover and protect yourselves

before the flames disappear and your hammer has a nice blackened soot coat over it. But it is a metal hammer, so it took it fine. Oh, there's some mean kids who drew that on the floor. This is great. How'd they get in there? They must be really light kids. I don't like those kids.

All right, I got to get my hammer back. Hold on, I reached to grab my hammer. Okay, you grab your hammer and you can see now the floor part is indented, where it landed. As you step onto it and lift the hammer, your weight still holds it down. I didn't step on it. No, meaning it's still depressed.

Okay, maybe this was the wrong way to go about this. I don't know, it seemed to work pretty well. Maybe you keep your hammer there. Well, right. You've been known to fisticuff in your time. I see. Different idea, how about you stay there, we walk across until it's up,

and then we will grab you out as fast as we can. Yeah, I'll take a look at these double doors and see if they're hittable for a while, you know? Just do my research. What's a not hittable door out of Karahasi? I'm just saying. Okay, I'm just curious. The other one, I just went willy-nilly, and it's like,

okay, it goes, but this one seems a little stronger. This is smart for you, I'm impressed. Okay, is it possible to see where the flames are coming from? Yeah, you go ahead and glance in the direction where they came from, and there are small stone tubes about that large that are closed off that seem to blend in with a lot of the majority

of the stonework that builds the wall. But now you glance at it, you can see the bit of the blackened exterior where the flames were jet from. Does it seem like there are other pipes around or at the moment, tough from where we are? Roll a d20. I will roll a d20.

Additional question while he's doing that. Nope. Is it like a hole where it splits and spits out the fire, or is it just there and the fire comes out? It looks like where darkness, there is a cap on it at the moment. Okay. It's been closed

to hold it off. Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. Okay. All right, do we see any more of these little? I'm going to examine this door real quick, just to see if it's, it looks weak enough for me to hit with my hammer. This is a heavier door than the one you, because the last one you saw was metal bars.

This one is a heavy stone door. I mean, you don't know until you try, but it is definitely a hefty doorway. Okay, for real. And we can see down that hallway now, right? Or we can move a little? I can move in this way, yeah. Let's take a look. This is hallway here. That's so cool.

Heads, too. take a look. This is all the way here. That's so cool. Tends to. No peeking. No, no, never. There are rules. It continues and then turns to the left. All right. Yeah, you go down, there's a left turn, just so you know.

I can see it because I'm on the thing. Wisdom of youth. Okay. I'm going to get to the corner and I'm on the thing. Wisdom of youth. Okay. I'm going to get to the corner and I'm going to peek around. Obviously, I'm paying attention to see if there's other things to step on or things on the wall that look a little iffy. Okay, so you peek around, you move into the hallway?

Just, yeah, I'm just going to carefully look around. But, however, we should probably have Mabel stay on this pressure point. Yeah, I'm not going anywhere. Hey, don't you have a mirror that says you're great? Oh yes, this one. You look around the corner, mirror that says you're great? Oh yes, this one. You look great. Look around the corner, you know what I'm saying?

Oh yes, thank you. Okay, we got it. We got it. No, okay, no problem. We're going to see this. If there's a creature over there, is it going to tell the creature that it looks great, or is it going to be like,

you should really get to work there? Oh, that's how we'll know. It'll say you look great. All right. There's something over there. All right, hand it over, hand it over. It's going to be a mystery. I'm a freaking genius over here. All right, hand it over, hand it over. I'm a freaking genius over here.

All right. Does the mirror have an opinion? The mirror says nothing. All right, all right. Thank you. All right, I'm going to look around, turn around and see around the corner. Okay.

Wait, hold on. Maybe there is somebody, but they don't look great. It would have said something. That's never happened before. It's for reassurance. I couldn't imagine what it would be looking at. It is a non-judgmental mirror. Maybe we should test it on Teddy,

because I don't know, you know. That is true. I look great. You look great. See? The mirror agrees. So it says it for anybody, got it. Okay, well, it's for reassurance. So you step into the corner? Step in the corner.

Okay. As you move beyond that corner there, it is mostly empty other than a small chest that appears to be closed. All right, anything weird about this chest? What do you see over there? Nothing, everything's fine. Okay.

I believe him. Everything look okay? That looks like a chest. All right. There's a chest, I'm going to open it. If I don't come out immediately. Be careful, Sensei. Be careful. All right, I'm going to open it and back up.

Okay, you kick the open. The rest of you hear something, a wooden crate or something impacting. As you step back, nothing happens. All right, I'm going to right, and I look inside. You look inside. There are two things in there. There is a small piece of medicine.

Oh. We did it? Actually, this will be just that one there. One stuck to it, but then it vanished. Hey, what'd you find? It goes away. And a small parchment scroll that is wrapped up tightly

and bound with a piece of colored leather. That, as you glance at it, it looks to be a transferred runic spell. Wow. With protective, earth-based, earth rune magics. Oh, right. Well, I found some magic and I found some medicine. That chest has been opened. That's pretty cool.

Yeah, that was pretty cool. No, wait, it's not cool. You said I found some magic and I found some medicine. That chest has been opened. That's pretty cool. Yeah, that was pretty cool. No, wait, it's not cool. You said you found some magic? Well, it's magic written down, so it's not yet magic. It's just magic to be. Okay, don't read that shit. All right, I'm going to peek around the other corner. On this corner? Yeah.

Just slowly, just like a... Just reading it more. There's another chest on that corner. There's another chest over here. You want to go for it? Yeah, all right. I'll kick it open, too. Okay. And then step back really quick.

You kick it open. This one has a loud squeak, has whatever rusted hinges inside, haven't been opened in a long time, as this is an ancient ruin. I heard that one. Ancient constructed building, my apologies. But it opens up.

Randomly. And a glance inside. There is a small glass orb that seems to have a fire burning on the inside. Oh yeah. It's again a fire lizard orb. Ooh. There's nothing in here. What are you guys oon and on over there?

Nothing! We know exactly what you sound like when you lie. You pick it up and the fire inside seems to brighten the intensity on the inside of this orb. As you do, you also feel this heat emanating onto your face from it and from above, almost like the sun had opened up, though it's still gray and cloudy in the sky.

You hear and you glance up and the light that's coming from above, almost like the sun had opened up, though it's still gray and cloudy in the sky. You hear and you glance up and the light that's coming from above is coming from the two, three fiery birds. Uh-oh. Flying fire drake-like birds that are swooping towards you as you turn to run and join the rest of your troop. The rest of you see, as in the middle

of this battlefield right now, as you're still as in the middle of this battlefield right now, as you're still looking in the middle, these three fire drakes are now swarming after. Let's go ahead and get the battlefield. Oh, man. Oh my god! Yeah, kill those trees. They knew what they did.

They knew what they did. Timber. All righty. Cool. Okay. Is this something I can imbue into, how do I imbue this into a weapon? You need a moment of downtime to do it. Got it. Can I move?

Can I still move about the plane? If you want to, yeah. Okay, because I'm on the platform right now. You're on the platform. You're all backed up onto the platform. Yeah, I think we're all on the platform. Oh, great. It's a battle. Yeah, she rushed back to you

and you guys are on the platform right now. Okay. For whatever that may mean. All righty, so let's go ahead and roll everyone's speed. 20. Where's everyone's speed? Wait, oh, you're, oh, sorry. Roll and add your speed.

All right, so you got 20, you said, to someone? Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Yikes. All right, 20 to 15? 15. 15 for Teddy. So, yep. All right, 15 to 10?

I got seven. Seven? I got seven as well. Oh, rollies. Both rolled d20s. Whoa! And see who rolls the higher. One. 15! Okay, there we go. Okay.

Who was the winner? Nabel. Then I assume. Five, yeah. Pips. And Barnaby. Nabel. Okay. Abel was the winner? Abel. Then I assume. Pips. And Barn. Abel. Barnabas. All righty. The flaming salamanders go first.

So the first one is going to do an inferno in the middle here. It rises up, releases a torrent of fire that goes towards everybody in the front row. Burning path across all of you for 3d8 magic damage. Doesn't even roll to attack on this one. That's going to be 12 points of fire damage

on everyone in the front row there. So 12. So you add your magic defense. Magic defense, baby, I don't take anything. I can resist this for how much? 15. Yes, you take no damage. You just take it in the face. I don't take anything. Like you said, this is how much? 15. Yes, you take no damage. You just take it in the face. I don't fuck with magic, okay?

The rest of you, reduce it by your magic defense. I think that you're just standing in it. Sorry, do you want to open it? Whatever! I know what on earth. Do you want to open with something rough? Let's do it. This one here, two other ones have to go.

This one here is going to leap up and it's going to do a Flame Burst onto, since you didn't take any of it, this one's going to get frustrated and try and come at you. This one does have to roll to attack. Yeah, come at me. That's going to be a 16 to hit.

Oh yeah, I'm 13. All right. So that does... 21 points of fire damage. Is that magic damage? It is magic damage, yeah. Okay. Still ate so much of that. So you still, you'll... Six?

Yeah, you only take six damage from that, yeah. As it breathes, it flies right to your face and it's like. I'm like, yeah, guard ring! I'm wearing a guard ring, everybody! It's like. It's like. It stops, like. All pissed off, flies back to its spot.

I don't think magic likes you. This is insane. The one back there is going to try and dive bomb you. So it pulls back and shoots at you with an incredible flying speed, trying to slam right into you. That's going to be a natural two. What's your counter?

Four. Four, yeah, it misses, and you get to roll an attack on it. Cool. As it dive bombs towards you, you duck out of the way and both confuss. What do I? Just roll a d20 and add your accuracy,

which is plus four. 11. 11. 11, unfortunately, misses. No! Fairly evasive creatures, so you both whiff past each other once, but still take no damage on that one. Finishing this Alamandar's turn,

now it is Zussari and Teddy's go. Okay. Want to do this? Yeah, let's do it. Let's do this. All right. Oh, here we go. Soldier Storm. You're doing a Soldier Storm. Let's go, Unite Attack up here. Oh my fucking god. That's crazy.

Uh. Come on. Do I add my accuracy to it? Add your accuracy, yeah. 18. 18, and what'd you get? One. For a five. Okay, so yours definitely misses.

Yours hits. So you'll just do your damage. Okay. Plus 2d6. Plus 2d6. Okay. So what do you call this move? Soldier's Storm? Soldier's Storm. That's pretty cool. Yeah, I know. That's cool. Yeah. Yeah.

Reminds me of my days in the war. I'll teach you how to do it once you, you know, show the fuck out. And then add the six? And add 2d6 to it. Roll that twice. This one? Okay. It takes a while. Oh, wow.

Okay. Damn. 23. 23 points of damage to all the creatures in that row. All three of them. Yeah. All three of them. Hell yeah! So describe to me how you miserably fail in the middle of this, but you still carry it through.

I run through in an attempt to attack, but they all dive at me. I don't manage to hit any of them, but now you can just hop. You can Mario hop the shit. As they're trying to attack you, I hop off your shoulders and hit each one. I do a little split kick

and hit one in the middle of my trumpets. Hell yeah. I'm like, I got you, master, don't worry. As you get up with a skinned knee. All right. Hair's a little singed. All right. That was a good tactic, pretending like you weren't going to hit them.

It distracted them from me. Had to do it the whole time. All right, so both of your defenses zero until your next turn, so mark that. All right, finishing your go. Pips, you're up with Mabel on deck. Here we go. All right, so, oh, you know what I'm going to do?

Pip, we can do our team up. It goes the whole row. Shit, I think I am going to do a whole row. Okay, you know what I'm going to do? Elven ambush? Well, I was going to do Firewall. Oh, would that? Oh, but they are fire.

They are fire creatures, so it may not. That's right. Yeah. Okay, we're doing an elven ambush. Yeah, boy! I'm just giving you a heads up on that. Oh yeah. Got you. Been there. Fire rune useful in most circumstances

outside of this world. Okay, I rolled a, for elven ambush. Yep. I rolled, wait, what do I add to? Add your accuracy. Accuracy. Your bow accuracy. Okay, so 18. 18 hits them.

Five. Five? All right, so. Ooh, one, yeah. Otherwise, okay. So you still hit all of them. Oh, hell yeah. But you roll damage, combine it, and then half it. So you do half the damage. Okay, okay, okay.

All right. Big money, big money. Okay, seven, eight, 10, 18. Okay, 18 for me. 22. 22, awesome. With 18, that's 40. Halved, 20 damage to everything in that row. We still did it! We still did it! Still pretty dang good.

Everybody's been hit a bit. So how do you two finish your elven ambush against all three of these salamanders in the front row? Okay. Yeah, it's like a weird, you have a bow and I have a hammer. That's all right. Yeah.

Okay, I have an idea. Maybe I tug to the side a little bit. What if you used my hammer as an arrow? Ooh! That's sick, right? That's kind of awesome. I love it. So the two of you get up there,

you pull the hammer back into the bow, and you're putting your whole body in the front of the bow as you're holding it back. I also help by pulling it back more, yeah. So it just turns into one massive, titanic arrow. Now, it's a little heavy and a little obtuse, which is why it doesn't have the impact it would normally, but it does blast its way

through all three of the salamanders. They try to get out of the way, still get hit and knocked down. A heavy hit, all three of them are starting to look a little hurt. Your hammer spins off, hits the wall. You have to rush over and grab it without taking your back foot off of the plate.

Don't touch it! Back into your place. Let's roll to see which one of you is unbalanced. That's going to be you, Mabel. So next turn, you cannot attack or use runes. Oh, that's all right. I don't care about runes. Who gives a shit about that? There you go. All right, finishing both your guys go.

Barnaby, you're up. Oh, I understand these, have probably seen this before as I swing my boomerang in my hand back and forth. This is an anti-aerial boomerang against anti-aerial folks, and then my mirror will fall down. You look great. All right, doesn't matter. You swing, I guess, and throw.

They're all same damage, right? They all have taken the same damage. I don't like the middle one. It flipped me off, I guess. That is, oh god, eight, so. Eight, unfortunately, misses. Judging by the way your boomerang, you're like, oh, it's gone now. Eight, unfortunately, misses. It ducks out of the way, your boomerang, you're like, oh, it's gone now.

It's like throwing your airplane you spent weeks building and it just goes over the neighbor's yard. You'll never see it again. Right as you begin to mourn it, it says, I literally don't have anything else. Oh! It cuts off a little bit of the beard. It almost goes through your jugular.

Each time it comes back to you, it feels almost like it's maybe trying to take you out to be free. I don't know what that's about, but I'm going to break that down later. That's all right, I'm intimidating them. Ah, fair enough. No worries. Sadly, lower your head

in the mirror, C2. Back at the top round, this one over here is going to use its Once a Day Inferno. It's going to rise up and blanket the front row there with fire damage against all three of you. Is that magic? It is magic. Okay.

That's a terrible damage roll. Oh! That's 3d8 and I rolled a one, one, and a three. Oh! That's five damage to all of you. You take none. Of course. Yeah, I take two. I don't fuck with magic. You both take two.

What a waste! And the last one's going to use its once a day, because none of you used it all. It's going to go ahead and do another Inferno Bass across all three of you in the front. That's, oh, that bounces it out. Oh, yikes. Uh-oh.

22 points of magic damage to everyone in the front row. You only take seven. Shit. All right, all right. That's right. But you all just swathes of flame are just burning around, tearing through the front ranks.

Mabel's kind of, it's summer. You're used to this. I'm sick of this. I hate this magic crap. That finishes Zalamander's go. Zussari and Teddy, you're up. Yeah. I'm going to retreat to the back line.

All right. All right, so you're shifting? Yeah. Are you hurt? I'm very hurt. Oh, yikes. Yeah, it takes a turn for me to give somebody a potion, right? To use one on them, use an item.

Okay, let's use an item on my turn, okay. So that's his, sorry, he uses the shift, that's your turn, you're up. All right, yeah, I'm going to attack. I'm going to start on the right and make my way down. All right, got it. That's 17, which means it's my crit range with 21. Go ahead and roll damage and double it.

Let's go! Here we go. Pitch you up next. There we are. Come on, guys. Yeah, that's not bad. 14, that's 22, doubled 44 points of damage. To this one?

Yeah. I just go in and I pound it in the ground and I actually try and put out the flames, just like pounding it. Like your hands sizzle, but the impact of your force of a trained warrior, much like the great Hadou, you are crushing it into the ground

and the flame is extinguishing and you pull up the calloused palms themselves, a little blackened and singed, but not enough to hurt you, while the creature now lies, flameless and dead on the ground. Who's next to be quenched? Nice! I went right back down, too!

I've been working on it. That's pretty good. That's pretty good. Amazing. Pips, you're up. Barnaby, you're undone. All right, since I see Zuu got hurt, as he comes back, I am going to heal him for 40 hit points. Yay! Okay, use another. I'm going to use another, which is my second. I have four, and him for 40 hit points. Yay! Okay, use another. I'm going to use another, which is my second. I have four, and it's my second one.

Okay, it should be 50, actually. That's an old thing. Oh, got it, okay. 50. 50, you heal 50. So you heal 50 there. Oh my god, thank you. You're so welcome. All right, that finishes your go there. That's your item use and your turn. Mabel, you're up with Barnaby on deck.

I can't do anything. That's all right, you can still use an item if you got one. Oh, I don't have an item. I don't. Then you can defend if you want to, which doubles your defense. I will defend. anything. That's all right. You can still use an item if you got one. Oh, I don't have an item. I don't. Then you can defend if you want to, which doubles your defense. I will defend. All right, so use the defend action.

So until your next turn, your defense is now 14. So if you take any physical damage. Oh, so nothing with my magic defense? Nothing with your magic defense, but it defends your physical attacks. Okay, got it. All right, cool. So that finishes your go. No, Barnaby, you're up.

Come on, Barnaby! Oh, what shall I do? You're in trouble! And then, yeah, I'll just got it. All right, cool. So that finishes your go. No, Barnaby, you're up. Come on, Barnaby! Oh, what shall I do? And then, yeah, I'll throw it. Oh, yes, I will, and I throw my boomerang between my legs and try to catch it. I'll throw it. I'll be 18 to hit. 18 hits.

Wonderful. Oh me, oh my, 19 damage. 19 damage to the one in the middle? Yeah, yeah. You carve through it. You watch as the flame, like a small burst of fire, and this blackened form of the salamander underneath just drops from the ground.

Smoke billows out from it, hits and you boomerang it. You catch it back. That shall satiate my boomerang for a little bit. Don't ask, don't ask. Awesome, finishing your turn. The salamander is now going to try and dive bomb you as you're down in the lower position. It's going to

try and rocket back towards you. That's going to be a 19 to hit. Oh, snap. So with a dive bomb attack, that's going to be 13 points of damage against you. For defense or? For defense. Oh, you defended, so that's 14.

You take no damage. So as it darts towards you, you pull up a full defensive position and just knock it, deflect it off the bluff. Yeah, I didn't even need to do anything. I'm so fired up. I'm too sorry, you're up with Teddy on deck. Okay, cool.

Yeah, I'll try to attack this one. The last one, yeah, I can actually attack him. 17? 17 hits. Go ahead and roll damage. Yeah! 17. 17 damage. 17 damage. Yeah. Yeah! That snuffs it with your final blows as you pummel it down

with the tonfas and they all fall and collapse to the ground. Your foes now lying ruined. Yay! Good job with the sticks over there. That was pretty sick. Well, good job with the hammer. I mean, those things were no match against you. Oh, thank you.

Well, I mean. You're very formidable. You're very fortuitous. Very affordable. Yes. And affordable. Well, I don't know about that. I'm pretty expensive myself. Hey, I have a question. I found this fire lizard orb, and I already have a lot of fire stuff.

Does somebody want this? What does it do? So when embedded into a weapon, it imbues your weapon with the fire lizard rune. The fire lizard rune, when you deal damage with this weapon, it deals plus 2d8 damage. Oh, wow. But then you take 1d8 damage. I don't fuck with magic.

Do you, I was going to say, who can take 1d8 damage? I mean, I will never turn down a trinket. Yeah, I feel like this will be cool on your boomerang. I mean, honestly, you deserve it. It'll be cool on your boomerang. The power inside of my boomerang grows.

Don't sell it, though. It speaks to me. Thank you. You're welcome. I appreciate that. So now you are the fire boomerang. You're welcome. I appreciate that. So now you have your fire boomerang. Yes. Yeah. Is it like a two boomerang? Or is it like the nerf triple blade boomerang?

It has grown another arm when I attached the rune. Okay, got it, so cool. It's just like, do you remember the nerf one? I do. There's like three. It's just, it was in my hand. From the unified nerf armies of the Southwest. Fuck. I know you told us not to ask,

but does your boomerang eat or something? Does it eat? What's the deal with it? Oh my gosh. It doesn't eat, it devours. It devours. In battle. Yes, thank you.

Does it tell you that you look great? Oh, it speaks to me. That's the mirror. It speaks to me. What's it got, a mouth or something? No. Oh no. You just hear it? Oh yes.

How do you know it's speaking to you? Oh, because whenever it comes back, it says things to me. Wow, what kind of things? You're next. Oh, that's very, very pleasant. To you, you mean. Oh yes. Okay.

Yeah, well, I'm assuming I'm its next owner. Yes. Which I am. As it's saying, it's... Yes, and then I catch it right before it goes right into my neck. I don't know. Yes. Oh. Yes. And I'm glad I give it more power.

Your reflexes are very good. Yeah, really good. I question some of your relationship decisions right now, but other than that, I think we're pretty good. It has never done me wrong in battle before. I don't think it will quite. You are such a story divider. Oh, thank you so much.

Let me regale you with a towel. One time, I was in the town. I'm going to start walking over to the door as this starts. These fiery salamanders, upon destruction, also drop 250 potch each. Oh, nice. I'm going to start walking over the door as this starts. These fiery salamanders, upon destruction, also drop 250 potch each. Oh, nice!

So that's 750 you can distribute as you feel, see fit. Divided by five. As well as someone roll 3d20s for me. Well, it's 250 each, right? So it'd be 750? I'll do 3d20s. Well, I'm sorry, each of the salamanders. So 750 total, yeah.

10, three, and three. All right, then that's all you find is the potch. Ah, boo. 150. We all got, huh? 150. Oh, yeah. I was just making sure I knew it. Well, I just used a calculator, so. Oh, so we now all have 250 potch.

We have 250. All of us have 250 each at this point. Well, I know. You also. I have more, yeah. You have the extra 100. Oh, I do, I have 350. Thank you, that's right. Why are you making the boomerang that eats you more powerful? Oh, he doesn't eat me.

Clearly. Yeah. Did you? Yeah, no. He's still here. I'm just saying, like. I'm not sure what you're saying. I think it's just a toxic relationship at this point. Thank you. Thank you. Doesn't have toxic powers yet, but I'm working.

All right, how are we going to get me off this platform right now? You hear a strange rumble from the other side of this massive doorway. Wonder what that is. And also feel a bit of a impact in the stone and another like, and a sound that you've not heard before.

Kind of like a. I don't like the sound of that. I'm going to be honest with you. It does not sound friendly. Especially since I can't move right now. If this thing barrels down the door at me, I'm screwed. I'm going to walk towards the door. Okay.

What kind of lock do we have on this thing? It looks like some sort of a heavy metal bar mechanism that holds it shut from the walls themselves. Two bars emerge from the side of the stone walls that are holding it shut underneath, bars that are set into it. All right, I'm going to go to the side to see if there's a mechanism or something to get them to.

Roll your dice. Yeah, man. Can I look under the door? 18. 18. The mechanism that holds it shut, there's nothing else in this doorway that connotates to you that the way to open it is present. Can I peek under the door? So you can see anything?

Yeah, you get low and peek underneath and you can see shadows moving and you hear the sound. It's like. Shadows move and it's like something gets in and the door impacts on that side and you hear. All right, we really got to find a way to get me off this platform right now. I think it needs the mirror

and I try to stuff it under the door. The mirror says, Oh no, okay, all right. Well, that means something, all right. Maybe we just open the door and get out of the way. I don't think we can open it. Unless they have fire right now. Yeah.

But that's actually a great idea. I don't think the door opens right now. Oh. You don't know where the mechanism, there's no mechanism present to open it. Oh, it's not, we can't lift the door opens right now. Oh. Oh. You don't know where the mechanism, there's no mechanism present to open it. Oh, it's not, we can't lift the bars. I understand. Yeah. Okay.

Let's try it. We haven't been around the side. Let's see if there's something around the side, maybe. Yeah, if we all hop off the platform really quick, maybe we can get out of the way of the fire. I'm just going to grab you and pull you off the platform at full speed. Okay. As you all leave the platform,

Whoa! behind you as you all trek down this hall here. Man, you're strong, eh? You got me in my hammock. You're very small. Okay. Coming down this long hall, there is another set of barred door there.

I guess so. That is similar to the one that you had destroyed earlier. Oh, interesting. Looks like we have the key. Hmm. Looks like I've got to smash another door. Here we go, baby. Yeah, smash the door, Mabel. I'm going to swing, woosh, woosh, wo got to smash another door.

Here we go, baby. Yeah, smash the door, Mabel. Woosh, woosh, woosh. Backing up. Go ahead and roll a d20 and add your strength. Come on. 16. Look at my strength, plus three. 19.

Nice. The first hit causes the whole door to inward and your hammer gets wedged. You have to put your foot up and pull it free, and one more heavy hit causes it to burst open and revealing the interior. You're so cool! Thank you.

I know, man. I'm so upset that the lessons are not being learned. I'm going to be honest, I didn't expect that to happen. So this is sick. That tumbles off there. You find on the inside here, there's chunks of rubble. There are two chests, and it looks to be a purple stone

that is pulsing and glowing in the middle that has a similar shape to what you saw in one of the doors earlier, but this one is embedded in the ground. Oh. It's one of those math things. Go ahead and do that. It's a math thing?

Yeah, you were putting together math or something. It was me. There was a little marvellous. I don't want to take the spotlight, but don't mind if or something. That was me. There was, there was, there was a lot of this. I don't want to take the spotlight, but don't mind if I do. And I'll try to mess with it. Okay. You walk up to it and approach the symbol and see the pulsing stone.

It's, you realize as you approach, it's not the shape of the first door you entered. It was the shape that you had seen in the door that you originally broken, like a slot where it can be almost placed in to situate it. But it is built into the ground. This is different. I'm sorry. What are we talking about?

Why don't you read again or something? I have this scroll. I'll take out a scroll. It's magical. Oh, get that away from me. Okay, all right. I'll back it out while you read that. Can I try to, like, I don't want to remove it, but can I try to spin it so I see if it's removable?

It slides as soon as you turn it, and as it goes, you hear in the distance the sounds of shifting stone somewhere down that way. I think the door is open. Let's check these treasure chests really quickly. I'm feeling good about them. All right. I'm going to lift up the one on the left.. I'm feeling good about them. All right.

I'm going to lift up the one on the left. And I'll lift up the other. Okay. You open both of them. I need you both to roll a d20 and add your dexterity bonus. Yeah! 19. 20.

19, 20? You both barely jump out of the way as suddenly both of them blast a massive cloud of purple black, some sort of weird ichor fume that fills the space and you all back away and cover your mouths. Whoa! There you go. Hits the walls and leaves a strange,

like a mildew almost residue on it before it dissipates. The air still smells bad, but it's enough to the point where if you have cloth covering your face, you can push through. The interior of the chests are laid bare. You have, in one of them, two antidotes.

Oh, nice. I'm at the end of the hallway already. One for you. Oh, thank you. And, uh... One for you. Sure. And the other one One for you. Sure. And the other one is a set of leather armor.

What happened in there? What happened in there? Is there stuff in there? No, nothing. Okay. Leather armor just adds that, does it? All right. Take it. I was going to say, anybody need a little armor,

or are we all feeling good? I mean, I'm pretty, I could use it. I was going to say, anybody need a little armor, or are we all feeling good? I mean, I'm pretty, I could use it. I don't have, oh, I do have, technically, body armor. I'll actually say, like. Just replace what you have on there. Yeah, I'll actually say, since I'm frontlining, so. Yeah, are you doing any spoils up there? Yep.

You know, I got low defense, actually, so. If you find any armor, just let me know. No problem. I'll let you know. Let's see if you see them. You all hear the flames in the other chamber, the familiar sound of that trap triggering,

immediately followed by Oh no, I did the wrong ones. As you all begin to collect around the side, you see running past the hall, smoking, what looks to be a bipedal, smallish-sized kobold, a dog person that has scrappy armor, what looks like some sort of a Labrador-type snout. Looks to be some sort of hooked scimitar,

like sword in one hand, and it's patting the flames out of its legs as it looks back to you, you go, Your help, your help! Pulls his blade back and you watch as a strange shape begins to slowly drift around the corner as a massive crescent moon with a human face just What?

Enters the room. Its eyes slowly turn to the rest of you. And we're going to go to break. JRPGs got them weird enemies, I love it. We'll be back here in a few minutes. We'll see you guys here shortly. Oh, hey there. Laura Bailey here to tell you all about the glorious goods we create inspired by our stories.

Our stores are filled with the basics, like character-inspired T-shirts, dice sets, and pins, as well as more specialty items like fancy jackets, puzzles featuring gorgeous artwork, the comfiest joggers and pajamas ever, and much, much more. There's also a few special items that support charity efforts, like our dedicated Critical Role Foundation merch. You can check out all of our regional online stores by visiting the Shop tab on critrole.com or head straight to the U.S. store at shop.critrole.com.

Every purchase helps support our shows and the stories we tell. Speaking of which, let's get back to the story. And welcome back. So as we left off, you, all as a troop, were inspecting the side of the room. You had unlocked the distant door in the chambers, set off the flaming trap as some sort of a dog,

kobold, humanoid creature stumbled out, patting its flames down, looked towards you for help. Said, Help Grimmick! Help Grimmick! And began to bark in the direction as a strange, terrifying, massive crescent moon with a face just floated into the hall and stared at all of you with its open, vacant eyes. Is that a moon?

And that's where we're going to go ahead and jump into this battle. An automaton of some sort. Here we go. And as part of this, Walt, you have a new ally in your troop. Hey! Hey! Hey!

Hey, hey, hey! Gremik pulls out his axe and his shield. His name's Gremik? Gremik. He's like, Gremik! Help Gremik! Help Gremik! I thought that was a different language. So one of you, or you can take turns controlling Gremik as the sixth member of your party.

Oh, that's so sick. Yo, Gremik's my best buddy right now. We got a lot of money on him. Oh, he's got 150 pots? Oh, wait, hold on. Oh, what a donation to him. Why don't you try to sell him something for the wedding? Oh, my god!

What is that? Oh my gosh. Oh. You got the answer. Welcome to my drug. Look at his lips. You got lips. He was like. Oh. Ready.

You have entered the realm of Mr. Venus. Closer, please. All right, so 20 to 15, anybody? 22. 22, is this right? 18. Oh boy. All right, and Teddy? So Teddy's up? No.

Soosari, then Teddy. Soosari, then Teddy. 15 to 10? Teddy. Okay. Crickets. 10 to five? Six. Okay. Crickets. 10 to five. Six. Five. Okay.

I'm not a good roll. Barnaby. Oh god, not a good roll. So Mabel's next? It's Mabel, Barnaby. Mabel, then Barnaby. Pippie, what'd you get? I rolled a two. All right.

All right, Pips. All right. Pips. Then who wants to roll for Grimmick? Okay, I'll roll for Grimmick. Go for it. That's a four. Plus two, six. That's a strange four. So Grimmick. That's a four.

It's going to be right before you, Pips. I think that's a four. Grimmick. I feel like you have a bit about this, about someone who can't roll their dice. Grimmick's got all yikes, isn't he? Wait, let me see. It's about other gimmick dice. It's like, yeah.

I was like, what is happening over there? No, no, no, it's about spin top dice. Which is the one that I use a lot that doesn't, I can't read. Oh, okay. That's a four, right? Oh, this is so hard to read. See? I stole one of them.

This is who she is. This is who the fuck she is. I stole one of Sam's dice. It is a four. For sure. I stole one of Sam's because I took all my dice home. That is a four, yes. Okay, okay, okay. So that's a two. She has smaller dice than that.

All right. Oh my god. I do. I have teeth. So, sorry, you're up first with Teddy on deck. Wait, so Grimmick is when? Grimmick is right before you. Got it. I'm going to try to attack this thing, poke it in the eye.

Let's go. It's got that eye. maybe I can blind it, throw him off. What do you think? 23 definitely hits. Yeah! Sick, dude. Oh wait, I rolled a 19.

That's a crit. Yeah! Let's go. 30. Yeah! Woo! Five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 13. 30! No, no, it can't be. It's a little too many points. 30. 30 points of damage. All right. Yeah. I don't know what horrors this is.

So as you rush forward, Tom falls out. Whack, crack, bah, bah. The moon just. The eyes shift onto you and get a little wider. Its big, bushy is one curls upward. You've drawn its attention. Okay. Oh, that's not good.

It only has one eyebrow to you, so this is real bad. All right, that finishes your turn. Teddy, you're up. I didn't. I unsuccessfully tried to poke its eye out. It didn't work. It seems to like you. All right, I'm going to go for the eye.

I'm going to go with a straight, full running punch. Come on. That's a 15, 16, 17, 18, 19? 19 hits. And it's in my crit. Yeah, I'll go crit again, let's go. Yeah! Hey! Where are my d8s, though? There we are. Come on.

Ooh, that's not bad. Eight, 17, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25 times two, 50 points of damage. Woo! Rolled real good. All right, so two heavy impacts to it. You see its defense shunks off some of it, but it still takes heavy hits from both of them.

Its eyes get wider and begin to glow. As finishing that brings it to Mr. Venus's turn. Mr. Venus, dude! Mr. Venus's eyes begin to flow. As he begins to shake and shimmer, his whole body begins to emit this strange, terrifying light. You feel this piercing pain in the middle of your brain

as this low hum gets louder and louder. I don't like it, I don't like it. You watch as the light begins to spin around it and suddenly dozens of crescent energy moons flying off, cut through all of you. Oh! What is this?

So. Not Gromit! I know, dude. Oh boy. Does a 14 miss anybody? No. No. No. All. No. No. All of you take. Oh, I hear a lot of damage.

Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. I haven't healed at all. What do you have? 47. Oh, wonderful. 20 points of magic damage to everybody. Oh. Wow. So, and? As these crescents cut through. I minus six?

Correct. Okay. You reduce your magic defense from the damage. And you said how many points? 20. 20? Yeah. You only take, yeah. Oh, I'm all over Correct. Okay. You reduce your magic defense from the damage. And you said how many points? 20. 20? Yeah, I only take the damage. Oh, I'm all over the magic defense. This is my worst nightmare that's happening right now. Especially that I hurt my boy, Gremik, over there.

You okay, Gremik? Ha, okay! All right, you're good. Oh, okay. Mark that for Gremik's as well. All right, finishing Mr. Venus' turn. That's you, Mabel. Oh, this moon is about to get smacked in the nose.

I jump up and I straddle its moon chin and then I go to whack it right in the nose. Hell yeah, go ahead and roll an attack. 10. Plus your accuracy of four. 14, that hits. Go ahead and roll damage. Hell yeah, it hits. All right, right back in that nose.

Oh man. 17. 17 damage. Yeah. All righty. Heavy crack. It impacts, but this is a fairly fortified moon face. The hammer hits it and resonates with it. Still takes a hit,

but it almost seems to shuck off half the damage. Oh. It's got a fairly high defense for some of the things you fought already. Oh boy. That finishes your turn. That brings us to Barnaby. All right, I'm going to do a cool flip off the chin

and back into place. What a move, what a move. What'd you think, Gremik? You think that was cool? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Hell yeah. Can What a move, what a move. What'd you think, Grimmick? You think that was cool? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Hell yeah. Can't wait to see what you do. All right, well, we'll see if this does anything

and I'll just chuck this boomerang at it again. A flaming boomerang. Yes, my new flaming boomerang. That's true. With a new, I don't know what the boomerang tails are called. It has a tail, that's another one. Wonderful. Nat 1.

Oh no! Oh no! Now one. Oh no! Now that is, its counter range is just a one. One of them. Oh, it's just a one. So as your boomerang flies towards it, its eyes shoot up to it, and the boomerang just stops in the middle of the air.

It moves its eyes as the boomerang shifts with its view, and then light begins to apparate from the boomerang. Oh no, oh you, no impact. Yeah, I'll slow down, put my shield down, and in that movement, it blows past me. Howl behind it. If I eventually come back up, it's the beam, full-on Kamae. I blast, it just slowly dissipates.

You get up, run over, grab your broom. Yeah. And then you shoot me back. So I threw that. I didn't deal damage with it, so do I still take the 1d8 or no? You still take 1d8. Okay, yeah, I'll pick it up and instantly,

a hundred images of hellfire go into my head and I go, oh, that's bad. I'll take, oh my gosh, okay. Do I take, I just take the straight d8? Yeah. I don't minus anything? Okay. It is not reduced by armor. Okay. Sorry. Oh no.

What the hell was that all about? We'll integrate this later into my life when we get rid of this moon thing. He's looking at me, oh god. Are you in cahoots with the moon thing? No! Because you're throwing moons at him and he's throwing moons back! It made my boomerang evil.

It's in moonshade. More like a moonerang. It is Grimmick's turn. Grimmick says he's going to use his axe! All right! Go, Grimmick! Let's go, Grimmick! Grimmick rules! All right.

12. 12 hits. His evasion is 10. Yes! All right. He's a big moon. So he's a 2d8 plus six. Okay, where's my, this is an eight. All right, we got a four. We got an eight. That's 12. That's 12 plus six.

18, 18 points of damage. All right, so big old carves into it with the axe. Axe hits, you see a little crack appears in the form. The axe is wedged. Slammock, no! Almost stumbles back as the eyes follow as it goes. Who wants to take Remick next?

I'll take Remick now. All right, finish your Remicks go. We'll go counterclockwise. Pips, you're up. Okay. All right. I am going to take out my bow and I'm going to take a shot. Briefly Australian.

I'm going to use one of my flaming arrows. Yeah! Okay, so. Good call. So I do. Mark one of those. 12 plus magic. Yep. 16.

16 hits. Yeah! So, Gwendolyn Wallet, that is 5d6 plus eight damage to it. Okay, okay. So five, six. 11. 11. Five, 16. Yep. Six. Damn!

Nice. What was I at? 22. 16, 22. Four, 20. 26. What was I at? 22. 16, 22. Four, 20. 26. 26, I mean. Oh, that was those five there. That was five, okay, great.

So 26 plus eight. Yes. Dang. Nice. Yes, plus eight. Solid. Nice. All righty. 30.

Four points of fire damage, which it has no defense against. So describe to me how you conjure these flame arrows to hit it. I just, wait, why am I going into Fearne? No, I'm going to take out one of the arrows and just blow on it. As you do so, the fire rune that's blazing in your hand

begins to glow and glow as the arrow begins looking at him. The arrow begins to ignite. Flames begin to burn, but it's contained, almost like a plasma burn on the tip of the arrow. Whoa, whoa, whoa, warn us before you do that, okay? Nah. It detonates upon Mr. Venus's exterior. Detonation, the eyes flicker towards you, almost like burning red as you see a giant black burn mark

on the side of this moon face. That finishes your turn. Yes, it does. Do you think that was the right course of action? Just saying. I do, too. I do, too. Sorry, you're up. Is it possible to distract or otherwise get its attention? If you want to try.

Okay. Can I borrow your mirror? Oh, absolutely. So can I try holding up his mirror to the eye of the creature to draw its attention potentially to itself? Hold up the mirror, and the mirror goes, My god.

And Mr. Venus, who's currently focused on Pips over here, goes. Yeah. All right, that finishes your go. I'm beat up, so I'm just going to take a step back and pop open a little potion and take a swig because I am not there yet. A medicine? Yeah, and that's the only thing I can do there.

Correct, you used medicine as your action that turn. All right, thank you. And that brings us to Mr. Venus' turn. Mr. Venus, who's now focused on you, is going to suddenly that little part of space in front of it begins to build up, much like your boomerang was to focus earlier, except now it's getting larger and larger and intense.

Oh boy. Before this massive moonbeam of energy just comes towards you, carving through you, because it hits everything in the column. Oh wow, okay. I'm glad I took that potion. Both of you. That's going to be a 15 to hit,

which I think is good. All righty, so that's going to be 4d12. Ooh. That was crazy. 4d12's a lot. Ooh. Oh no. 35 points of magic damage to both of you.

Oof, okay. Oh yikes. My mirror! Yeah. Your mirror, yeah. The beam slowly fades, and you pull back and the mirror is intact. It is just black soot covered. As you pull it back, he goes,

Help me. Adding to its value, wonderful, great idea. Love that. Well, that didn't work. All righty. What does it kind of do? Maybe it'll end up with Barney undying. Right on, right on. I got my net hurt. You too.

Well, heck, I guess I'll just run at it and try to smack it in the eyeball because it keeps looking at us weird. So I'm going to run up and. Go for it, go ahead and roll an attack. Uh, one. Oh no! No! Two!

No! Just as the one beam begins to slow and vanish, you rush forward and the eyes a second one appears and rockets off towards you, trying to envelop you in its terrifying energy. That's only going to be an eight to hit you. 13. 13. You rush forward, and as you miss,

you also slide low and glide beneath it as the beam just passes over you, burning backward to the point where Pips has to duck below it before it takes your head off, and just carves off and sears off a part of the nearby wall as bits of stone fall because of it. You manage to get your hammer back up and back into your defensive space.

Not today, moon man! You didn't do this thing! Barnaby, you're up. Oh, uh. You have to carry my con deck. Listen, Mabel, you have looked better when I've seen you earlier, so I will, I don't have potions, I'm sorry,

and I'll take a gray rag out from under my robe, and it's sopping wet. It's dripping, and I'll wring it out like this. I'll run over to you and press on your foot like a garbage can, and I'll try to wring it out into your mouth, and I'll try to heal you. I go, this is the best way to dispense medicine. Yo, Barn, I know we're cool with everything. I go, open wide. This is ginseng and clover. No, it's not.

They're in the dish. There are no herbs. They're in the dish. It's good, it tastes like, I can't say that. I don't know. I keep my mouth closed. I don't know. No, it's all right, and I'll try to show it to you. I press down on my mouth. I hold your nose closed.

I open up. Baby. Awesome. And I'll heal you for 50. 58 points, you heal him. Oh, awesome. That's right, nice. Awesome, that finishes Barnaby's go. That is now Grimmick's go with Pips on deck. Grimmick, take a shot!

Oh, oh! Go, Grimmick! This is what he's doing. Yeah, he will. I'm doing good! Go, go! Thank you, thank you. Then he will take a shot, 11. Plus two. It's nine plus two.

Oh, nine plus two, 11 hits. It's eight plus ten. Nice. Good to know. Nice job, Gremik. Gremik says, Good boy, good boy! 11 damage. 11 damage. Yep.

Him a good boy. That even seemed like it did anything? Barely. The axe hits, and it carves a little cut across, but there is a defense boundary that is cutting through each of these hits. Fire, fire, fire. But it's taking damage,

and you can see with each hit, it's starting to show wear and tear. Mr. Venus is looking on the side of damaged. I pat Gremik on the back and say, it's a war of attrition, buddy, you got this. No! Gremik appreciates the backup! Yeah, you got it.

Finishing our mix turn, Pips, you're up, with Zussari on deck. Yes! All right. I just rolled a 19. Yay! All right. So it's a crit. That's a crit! All right! If I's a crit. That's a crit, no roll damage. If I do Flaming Arrow, does that crit still count?

Usually you say what you're going to attack with first and then roll to hit. Sorry. You're supposed to roll to hit and choose. So if that was with your bow, then we'll just go with the bow damage on that. Then next time you can go ahead and say if you want to cast it in advance.

I'm going to do Flaming Arrow. We're going to do Flaming Arrow to begin with? Yeah, so then the crit would be canceled. Right. In this instance, yeah, the magic doesn't deal crit damage. That's just for the weapon. Got it.

All right, I'm still going to go with Flaming Arrow. That's fine. So 19 plus four, 23. That definitely hits. Go ahead and roll damage for that. 5d6 plus eight. 5d6 plus eight. Okay, here we go.

Four, six, 10, two, 12, three, 15, and five. So 28 points of damage. Oh, 20, oh yeah, 28. 28 points of damage. As you release the secondary flaming arrow,

fire it off. It blows up on the side and you watch part of its chin. It hit the ground and its eyes now go bright white and you hear this dull, like, shrieking sound. I think you angered it. Its mouth is still closed. I think I did, too. It's terrifying.

Yep. It's just wide-eyed and screaming with its mouth closed. Fuck! Hey, Mr. Venus, I feel the same way about magic, okay? Does that finish your turn? Yes, it does. All right. Jasaar, you're up with Teddy on deck. I'm going to heal,

so I'm just going to use my action to heal. All right, so you heal 50. Yes, please. I can't do anything else. I'm going to go in for an attack. I'm just going to try and put my fist up its nostril. Let's go. Yeah, so you heal 50? Yes, please. I can't do anything else. I'm going to go in for an attack. I'm just going to try and put my fist up its nostril. Let's go. There you go. Come on.

That's 14 to hit. 14 hits, go. All right. I'll do the damage. Come on, come on, come on. Oh, 14. 16. 24 points of damage. 24 points of damage. Oh, you went.

The fist combo. Oh god, it's gross in there. It's gross. Oh, it's green cheese. Oh, green cheese. It's like the Mr. Venus moon is like, it's barely holding itself up, but it is furious. Its eyes are now emitting this bright headlight light. That finishes your turn. Yeah, I think I made him mad. It's Mr. Venus's turn.

It's going to do another Crescent Storm. To be fair, Pip's angered it first. It really is her fault. That is going to be an 18, which I think hits everybody. Yarr. So all of you take. Magic damage?

This is magic damage, yeah. Yeah. What's supposed to happen? There's so many dice. 19 points of magic damage to everybody. Oh yeah. As those crescents fire outward and carve through the entire room.

Okay, okay. Eventually the pain subsides and you all bleed out a little bit. That did not feel great. That finishes Mr. Venus' go. Mabel, you're up. Oh, I'm going to jab this dude right in the empty chin. Let's go.

Roll an attack, baby. Let's go. Roll an attack, baby. Let's go. Eight plus zero, right? Plus four. Four. It's for your attack accuracy. Okay. That's a 12. 12. That hits. Roll damage. Nice.

Let's go. Seven plus two, plus 11. That's a math 20. So it's 21. How do you want to do that? Yeah! As you finish it off.. How do you want to do this? Yeah! As you finish it off. Describe how you kill Mr. Venus.

All right, so I go, and I go for the whack right on the empty chin thing. I go, and I smack it. Then as it hits the chin, it starts splitting down the middle. Oh, god! As I'm following it all the way up the floor. As you carve upward.

Uppercut. Wow! Its moon body cracks like some sort of stone-like porcelain exterior, and as your hammer carves up to the center of it and it tears open, there's a dark red, muscly, fleshy interior, just muscle tendrils that emanate from it. A horrendous combination of visuals.

As you carve through its body and then the two pieces hit the ground and then burn away into ash. In the slow motion, I'm like, Grow! Now's your chance for a one-liner. You got a one-liner or something? Ooh, yes, yes!

Come on. I believe in you. Now you're half the moon you used to be. Ooh! Hey! That's fun. You're learning a new one. Yes, yes. Sun's coming up. Right.

That's your last phase. Oh! Good one, good one. That's a good one, too. Yeah, graphicimmick! Yay! Yay! Yay!

Yay! Thanks for helping, Grimmick. Yeah. Came to sneak in, find treasure. No, only find Creepymoon, thing, other monster. Thanks for helping, Grimmick. What you doing? Fine.

I mean, pretty much the same thing. Grimmick, I'm going to be. I mean, pretty much the same thing. Grimmick, I'm going to be honest, we're looking for the treasure, too, man. Oh! Well, Grimmick, what will you do? Find treasure with Grimmick! Sure! Yeah! Yeah, yeah! Hell yeah!

Arrgh! Yeah, I want to grab it! It's cool, it's cool as hell. I quite like Grimmick. Yeah, Grimmick's sick. Good-spirited. Wait, sidebar. What if he's wanting the treasure

and then we're also supposed to get the treasure for Alex. We can't give him the treasure. So should we just kill him now? No, no, no, no. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. You're talking about killing Grimmick? Grimmick, get over there. All right, real quick.

Okay. I'm not going to kill Grimmick. Start sharpening his axe. I just, I mean. We're not going to kill Grimmick. There's six of us. Yeah, there's just both of you. Okay. I'm not going to kill Grimm. Start sharpening his axe. I just, I mean. We're not going to kill Grimm. There's just. There's six of us. Yeah, there's just five of us and one of them. Turns out to be useful. We'll just give him a cut of some of what we pick up.

But the big thing has already been taken care of. Okay, okay, okay. There's lots of us, not a lot of you. He helped. He helped. He totally helped. He totally helped. We typically saved Grimmick's life, I think. Honor, well, he's honor-bound to be invented. Yeah, we got to be fair.

Always fair. He's a cute pup. Is he just going to follow us around everywhere we go now? Is that what you're saying? Maybe, he's so cute. A life-dead situation? He's adorable. Yes, oh yes, it's like, the brevity of it is actually quite nice. This is how we found you, right?

Oh, you're a good boy. Gramek, you look great over there. Where's that mirror? Can it tell him? Oh yes, of course. Wait, you have the mirror. I do. Look, all right, all right. You look great.

There you go. Wonderful. I have an idea, I have an idea. Five bucks. Five POTCH? What are bucks? You want to give him five, old dear? We don't have five.

Five POTCH. We don't have five, old dear. Actually, half POTCH. That's what I call POTCH. I call him BUCK. It's half POT five bull deer. We don't have six bull deer, actually. That's what I call botch. I call them bots. It's half botch per botch. It's just you have to do the conversion. Right, right. Five bucks is more. It's 12 and a half.

I mean, what do you say? We'll give him five. Five bots? Just do the conversion. We're looking for a rune of immeasurable strength. You think you'll get off with five botch? Well, I mean, what do you have? 310? Don't look my hand right now. I don't look my hand right now.

You know, Mabel, I was going to give you this armor, but now I just don't really know if it's really worthwhile. Why don't we give it to Grimmick? I'm not going to give Grimmick the armor. Well, I mean, we've got to give him something. If he helps out, you know what I mean? I don't want to kill this guy! Grimmick, cool!

We're not going to kill the dog! Grimmick, Grimmick, I have something. Give me your hands. Let me see your hands. This is a magical item. It is called a sealant, and I try to put his fingers in the finger trap. There you are.

He's just like, tangled up. He's busy. Who would chew on it? That wouldn't be my first response. I have already chewed on it. He's actually chewing on the thing that I do. You're making me nervous. So here, just put that on. You're making me nervous. Oh, for real?

Yeah, you're right in the front line and you're tiny and I'm just, yeah. What was in the room you were in? Yeah, you got to put just a little extra stuff. Bitch, walk away. Next room can't open. Doesn't open. Is it, is it,

have the bars vanished now? Yeah, they've vanished. Well, the doors actually burst open now from rushing through. So if you guys move back into this space, do you move past the central floor that you know? I'm going to hop over the rune. You're going to hop over?

Oh, the floor spot? The floor spot. Yeah, go ahead and roll a d20 and add your dexterity. Well, I was, okay, shit. Hey, before we do this, can we help Grimmick with the trap, please? Oh, he's not an open. Oh, never mind.

He's still going ham, that is. Okay, all right, come here, come here. I'm going to keep it busy. You just, just be calm. Just be calm and just slowly pull it apart. Yeah, great! Yeah, that was good. Let's keep it busy.

I'll push him and twist and then come out. Buddy. Good job. He's so cute, come on. He's got to stay with us. How did you get in here? I'm opening other side. Oh, other side?

There's an exit, potentially. Okay. I made my jump, so 21. 21. You leap off to the side, catch yourself, and you now can look in this chamber. I saw something really heal again. Whoa! What the hell?

Is that an aqueduct? So indeed, there is a massive water aqueduct that is just rushing water that comes down this way. There's a portcullis blocking this way, and there is a, technically, this is a closed off path right there. Yo, is that a portcullis over there? I got to see the inside of this really quick.

Sorry, I'm trying to figure out. What if we take the water out? The water's rushing. If we take it out? Fight the water, let's go! It's got to exit somewhere. Like if we take the water, sorry. I worded that very strangely.

Like if we go out. I did think you meant if we remove the water. Yes, I was told that you could do that. I'm really sorry. I really said it in a weird way. I mean, take the water as an exit. Oh, and ride the lightning? I followed you, though. I understood what you were saying. Thank you so much, Sue.

Thank you. No, I understand. It seems like there's a little place to dig for stuff over there. Also, did the moon drop anything? The moon did drop 1,000 punch. Okay. Oh, sick! Can someone roll a d20 for me, please? Oh, I'll roll it. Yeah, let's go.

12. 12? 1,000 punch. I'm at 40, I know that. 1,000 divided by one, two, three, four, five. Oh, two medicines. Oh, sheesh. Oh, divided by six. Yeah, I'm rolling it in medicine.

Frenk's got to have some. Who wants some medicine? Oh my god, I'm dying. Yeah? All right, here you go. Oh yeah, how is everybody looking? I'll keep this one. I've been better. But you just got medicine. I just got medicine. I'm going to take it right now.

You're going to take it? Okay. How's everyone else looking? Everyone gets 166... 166... Pach? Pach. Including our new friend. Yeah. Thanks!

Money, money, money, money. Don't spend it all on him. It looks like he is driven by a sense of adventure. new friend. Huh? Huh? Thanks. Money, money, money, money. Don't spend it all on him. It looks like he is driven by a sense of adventure. Yes. Ooh. He's profiting in fun. Yeah, I think that's why he's here. He pulls the shield off the back and the axe.

We go now. I kill now. Ooh. Man, Grump is cool as hell, dude. Yeah, Vex definitely driven Until now. Ooh. Man, Kremi's cool as hell, dude. Yeah, Vick's definitely driven by something. Um, okay. Come on over when everyone's ready. Yeah, let's see. Let's check out some of the stuff.

Okay, okay, how about we do this, all right? I got a plan. Now that the door's open. Even in the middle of combat, I can't. Because we're still on the other side of the thing, right? Only he jumped over. Yeah, only he jumped over. Okay, I'm gonna do the hammer trick again. Flames are gonna go off. When they stop, everybody just cross. I'll Okay, I'm going to do the hammer trick again. Flames are going to go off.

When they stop, everybody just cross. I'll cross, and I'll pluck my hammer off. You know what I'm saying? Great. You got it. Sounds like a plan. Do I have to roll or anything? No, no. Now that you know what it is, you lob it out there. The flames subside.

You step onto it, you hold the hammer. The rest of you cross over easy enough. With you stepping off the final moment, pulling the hammer free once again. Flames engulf it, you hold the hammer, the rest of you cross over easy enough. With you stepping off the final moment, pulling the hammer free once again. Flames engulf it and then leave it safely behind as your troop has now entered this chamber. The water, and this goes a bit deeper below and it is a torrent of water that is rushing down.

To step too far, it would likely be washed away wherever it's going to take you. I feel like one of those piles looks very, conspicuously maybe has a shiny thing in it. Yes, it does look like it. You can go and check if you want to. Cross here? Oh, yeah.

I'm going to take a medicine. Or over here. Yeah, that one first, yeah. This one first? Go ahead and roll a d20 and add your luck to it, please. 22. 22. Nice. Rummaging through it,

one, you find a small rolled piece of script parchment. Well, it looks like the remnants of a crushed box and bits of wood here, and the remnants of what was within are found as you discover an Angry Blow scroll. Whoa! Which has the essence of lightning runic magic

attached to it. That's monstrous. It's like a Saturday night after a fight, you know what I'm saying? That's just right there. As well as a strange star-shaped crest made of a reddish-brown terracotta material that looks like it should have been destroyed by whatever this collapsed piece of debris is, but seems to be remaining intact.

So it's just a star-shaped crest? Yeah. All right. I'm writing that down. Star-shaped. And it's just a star-shaped crest. Yeah. All right, I'm writing that down. Star-shaped. And that's not an item that you put in my accessory? No, no, I should say a side item. Star-shaped crest. Could I just take a look at this crest

and see if I've ever seen anything like this? Go ahead and roll and add your magic. 10. 10. No idea. It's star-shaped. It's nifty. And a crest. Do you think this could be the...

The child of the moon. Well, that's not quite what I was thinking, but that is interesting. He's a Venus, dude. Oh. Yeah, true. What if that's the thing? What if that's the... in the core?

Like, you know, you're saying the thing? I feel like this is a little anticlimactic to be the thing, what if that's the core? Like, you know, you're saying the thing? I feel like this is a little anticlimactic to be the thing, but yeah, no, that's possible. I don't know. Is it at all reminiscent of the thing that I turned earlier from the other room? It has a similar, the shape that you saw on the first door that you destroyed was almost pentagonal.

Thank you for reminding me. But it had a similar size and shape to it. And what you saw there that resembled it as well. A similar size and shape of that is a crystal that was embedded in place. But it has a similar vibe, just a different size correlation. Okay, we'll save that for later, just in case.

So what the heck is it? It's a star thing? It's a star. Ah, keep that thing away from me. That might be magic. It might be. I think it's cedar, man. I don't even know.

It smells nice. Okay, give me a sniff. All right. Yeah, it's nice. Yeah, yeah. I got to admit, it's pretty nice. Yeah, it's fresh. All right, I'll maybe take a look across.

The other pile? Yeah. Over here, then? Oh, oh god, we're done. Whoa, whoa, whoa! Spring rape! Oh jeez, supposed to have high evasion. So we're about to overhear you, me?

Yeah. Okay. You inspect the scene. Go ahead and roll a d20 and add your luck, please. Oh, I don't have a lot of luck. 12. 12. You rummage through it and find just mostly debris. Does anyone else want to give it a look?

How's that debris? I can give it a go. I don't know. There's just a lot over here. Once you hit it. Once you hit it, it's heads up. Oh, okay. Is that a rock pile or just part of the wall? This looks like a piece of rubble that has fallen.

Can I stick my hand in the water and take a little sip? Sure. Oh, where'd you get that? You reach in. It's freezing cold and you get a little bit. Oh jeez. It's very clear, very clean. Mm. Oh, where's that? You reach in. It's freezing cold and you get a little bit. Oh jeez. It's very clear, very clean. Mm.

Oh, it tastes pretty good. Y'all want a little sip? Get a little hydration afterwards? Do I get any health for that? No, but you do feel refreshed. You are hydrated. That's not wrong. Hey, Remick, you want some of this water?

It's drinkable. You say that and you look over and Remick's already over there going. That's my boy, dude. Man, you remind me of this kid I met earlier. Can I walk across the aqueduct to this little gated section here? Sure. See what's beyond,

if I can see anything. It does continue beyond that into a longer hallway and the water seems to rush and turn around the corner along that path, but it's a little dark beyond that. It looks like there's a brief period where there's a roof, as opposed to the open air above you. You come to the door and look at it, though, and there is a star-shaped indent on that portcullis side.

Ding, ding, ding, ding. Sensei, the item you found, I believe it belongs here. I'm going to walk over and look. Looks about the right shape and size. Wait, Grimmick. Which way did you come from when you came in here? Points that direction. Okay. As he points off to the back, you do see

the waterway disappears beneath the wall that's just beyond that. You see there's a slight crack in the upper corner of the chamber with a bit of sunlight that's coming through on where that is enclosed. Looks like there's a damaged crack in the upper corner of the chamber with a bit of sunlight that's coming through on where that is enclosed. Looks like there's a damaged part of that upper wall that he either managed to carve through or squeeze through. Grimmick, did you just crawl in through the wall, dude?

Hey, hey, hey, crawl through. Heavy, feel weak, come try. Moon, scary. Very resourceful, Grimmick. Do you know what is this way? No, nothing. Moon, water carry me You have it, okay. Water carry me out!

Yeah, okay. All right, I say take a step back and let's see what happens here. You press it inside. I need you to, no, I'm kidding. The porkless. Cool. Hey, that's how it's done.

Rises up and reveals the next chamber. I think it was just a lock. Okay. Yeah, yeah, just some kind of... Maybe it's connected to the water? Exactly, yeah. It's just a weird-looking key. Sometimes keys look weird. It was made of wood and it smelled nice.

All right. Magic stuff doesn't smell nice. I wanted it, but that's okay. That could have been valuable. You should have mentioned it. Next time, I'll ask Mabel to smash through it. Round two. I love it.

More dungeon. I love our dungeon crawl. This is exciting, dude. Dungeon crawls are the best. Begin to emerge around this corner, and you can see the water seems to be emerging from further down this direction as you glance down. There is an actual, a water, massive waterfall.

It's released out of the side of the chamber. There's a mechanism above it where it looks like some sort of a dam, some sort of a massive stone clockwork piece is currently held in place and the water is being released from an opening, just splashing into this and causing the current to rush past it, is rushing this way and then this way as well

through a different opening. Where's that water coming from? What's the deal with that? Maybe. I think we have to figure that out. Maybe we need to turn it off. Water is rushing out this way. My apologies. Oh, okay.

So we have to turn it off. I mean, that might be the way to go. Wait, we can't jump over this aqueduct? We can try it. That's how I say it. Yeah, go ahead. I'll give it a try. I'll try to leap over. No, no, no, no, no.

Before we do this, I would say, if you're going to try and leap over, we're going to leap over over there, and we're going to take a step back so that if you fall in the water, we can try and catch you. This is wisdom. Okay. Right there. I got to admit, that's pretty smart.

Riding that down. Good point. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Good point. Don't cross over aqueducts without a friend. Always have a spotter. Always have a spotter. You need a spotter. May I heal myself? If you have a medicine to use. I do. I'm going to heal myself.

All right. I'm going to go up to the tippy top of that waterfall while everyone waits behind, I'm assuming. All right, you got it. The rest of you are reining back there just in case, as the water's rushing past. All right, now go ahead and roll a d20 and add your dex. All right, y'all ready?

Yeah. Here I go! Good luck! I try to use my hammer as a pole vault situation. Heck yeah. I go like, boom, and try to use the hammer. Hell yeah. Awesome. 16 plus four. Oh, easy enough to do. You leap, and try to use the lever. Hell yeah. Awesome. 16 plus four. Oh, easy enough to do.

You leap over and land on the opposite side. Hammer spinning in the air behind you as you catch it on the other end. It's so cool! Three-point land. Yeah, that was awesome! Good job. All right, now you're going to get up there and you're going to shut off the machine. Okay.

I look at the machine. You look up at it, and it's a good 25 feet up there. There's a massive cliff face. You can see, now that you've reached this opposite side, you have a stronger view down this way. It looks like there is a further path. There's an opening this way,

which actually you can see from where you're standing. So you have perspective on all of these different avenues here. Whoa, sick. Hey guys, it's awesome over here. Y'all want to give it a shot or? Not really. All right, it's just me.

I guess it's just me. See if you can shut off, try and shut off the machine. Okay, okay. I'll try to join them. I'll try to join them. I'll try to join you over there. I think I'm quite dexteritous. All right, so you go ahead and off the opposite, the rest of you guys are sitting back there

just in case that Zasarum fails. Roll a d20. Add your dex. 12? I was about to say you need a 12. So you just hit it on the nail. You leap over the side and catch the edge and have to catch yourself.

I got you, I got you. Indeed, Mabel grabs you and pulls you to your feet and you're fine. Wasn't as cool as mine, but I appreciate the effort. It was pulled because of the power of friendship. That was the coolest part about this. All right, all right. You were here to catch me. I'm riding that deck.

You ride that one. That's great. Let's check this little nook right here. Okay. Is there anything behind that little? Shift over here. Okay. You look into this nook, glancing around that side, and you do indeed see, over on this end, a small chest.

Do you do the honors? Would you want to do the honors? No, I feel like you should. You're really excited about that stuff. I insist. You were the first here. You deserve it, you know? No, I feel like you should. You're really excited about that stuff. No, no, I insist. You were the first here, you deserve it, you know? No, no, you know, I couldn't, I couldn't. You should go ahead.

I think the honorable thing would be to let the first person who jumped across open the chest. Okay. I'll give it a shot. Yeah, I'll open it up, no problem. Let's do this, yeah. All right, I just got leather body armor, plus five defense, who cares?

I go to cautiously open up the treasure chest. Okay. I take a step back as quick as I can. You go and open the treasure chest and roll and add your dexterity, please. Two plus four. No! Two plus four. You go and you kick it open,

and right as you step backward, you catch a bit of slick vine that was on there and fall back and land on the ground just as this cloud emanates from it. Fills the area and surrounds you, and you fall asleep. Aw. What's going on over there?

Mabel attempted to open the chest and... Then you fall asleep as it fills the rest of the chamber. Oh! Okay, we're going to have to deal with that. Spot me. I'm going to... I'll run down.

Good, I'm going to take a leap. Roll an adnex. There you go, you had to beat a 12. 11. 11. You leap and then and carry down the maze of hell. Both of you need to try and catch him. You either roll dex or strength.

You're cool. You got to beat a 10 to catch him. All right. Oh, nice, okay. 16. You pull him up out of the water. You're waterlogged and freezing, but you're safe. There's got to be a better way to do this. I have something for you. I'll hand you a rock that is slightly

above room temperature. It'll keep you, mm, it'll keep you above room temperature. But it's somewhere safe, and I need it back, because I'm going to sell it. All right, I'm going to try to take a leap over. Go ahead and roll an adjudex. Okay. Natural 20.

Yeah! I'll say for a natural 20, you get to choose one other person to join you. All right. As you confidently run and then grab somebody as you know you're about to make it. What's your dex? What's your dex? Oh, four, so.

Okay, Barnaby, come on. Okay, yeah. Let's do the thing that we always do when we travel around. I pick you up and then I throw you for you to grab my arms and do that whole re-work. That's how physics works, yes. TRPG mechanics.

It's like when we're over that wall in the Northwest. Oh, I love it. Awesome. The physics engine on this is real weird, I love it. The physics engine on this is real weird. I love it. As you throw Pips, and Pips, right as you leave, like a trapeze duo, you grab the forearms of Barnum

and tug the momentum of the throw at your power. It makes sense somehow. You both land on the opposite end while the two friends are asleep on the ground, and you are on the opposite end while the two friends are asleep on the ground, and you are on the opposite side. All right, I'm going to take one more running leap. I can do this. I don't care how bad my back feels right now.

You have to be to 14 now. Now I have to be to 14? I'm just going to pause there. Well, actually, I'll keep it at 12, but you don't have anyone helping you there. I know. Can I pause on the other side? No, no, no, no, you're good. I actually, how tall are these walls, by the way?

Like the rock wall? I'd say 15 or something. Okay, so that's too high to do. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. Am I still asleep? Yes, you are. Me and the, I don't know. All right, come on, don't be a jerk.

Hey, not 20, thank you. Oh! Yes! There you go. So the rest of three of you leap behind and just catch yourselves as your two compatriots are currently in a deep slumbered state. All right, I'm going to go over, I don't know if this is going to work, but I'm going to go over and slap Mabel in the face.

Wake up! As you step over to start approaching that area, you see a flash of red and purple out of the corner of your eye from down this area. What's that? You glance over and you see another flash of red, two bits of red. These suddenly large red squares trimmed in white,

like two massive tarot cards of reddish color just drift outward in your direction. I am slapping both of them awake. We're like, we're down. Just slapping them awake. They are still asleep. It takes a certain level of force to wake them up as they are magically put under.

As these two floating cards approach, you watch as, emerging from the red space, a blue face with a jester head emerges with strange hands and white glowing eyes from each of them as they pour out. What are these? As they look at each other, they glance up. Two, there's two.

As a Mr. Venus descends along with them. Oh my! What? No! Yeah, dude! Not bad. Mr. Venus rules. Oh, awesome. Mr. Venus, pretty great. That's two nightmares.

Oh! So close! You had so much fun with this mess, didn't you? No! Oh! Wow. Oh boy. I wish I was awake to see this. It could be soon.

So as you all rush into this point, both of you are currently asleep. Okay. Everyone, please roll and add your speed, even those that are unconscious. Gosh, okay. Okay. Everyone, please roll and add your speed, even those that are unconscious. Gosh, okay. Okay. All right. Oh boy.

13. 11. Well, he'll call them, because. All right, so. Okay. 25 to 20? 20 to 15? No.

15 to 10? 13. 13. 12. Both of you guys roll out. Roll these! Seven. Four. All right, so Mabel. Okay.

Barnaby. I get to snore first. And then me. What are you? 11? I am 12. Are 12. What are you dreaming about? I got it at an eight. All righty.

I go great. And then... Pickles. Oh, sorry. I got 11. Oh, so. Oh, oh, so Teddy, you're next then. Okay. Teddy, Zussari, then Zussari.

Finish it in today. Okay. So, where's our... Oh boy. Grimmick? Grimmick. Yeah, roll for Grimmick. Roll for Grimmick. I'll roll. Who's next up playing Grimmick?

It would be me. I haven't acted as Grimmick. Oh, you want to act as Grimmick? Act as Grimmick, dude. Yeah, I'll go that side. I feel like me being separate for Grimmick is a lot more fun. It's a B for Grimmick.

I just want to be around Grimmick. Oh, no. That's nine for me. Grimmick's my friend. So Grimmick comes before me, so it's, yeah. That's nine for me. Grimmick's my friend. So Grimmick comes before me, so it's, yeah. Barnaby, Grimmick, me. Grimmick's cool as hell, dude. Hell yeah. All right. The nightmares go first.

As both of these strange gesture things withdraw into the cards, and the cards begin to spin. Oh no. As they spin, the red face begins to change to different elemental images. Water, lightning, all these different things are flicking through. Somebody roll, actually, I'll just roll a d4 here.

The first one. That's a four. What the hell is that? That's quite a d4. You watch as suddenly multiple snakes of fire emerge and begin to swirl and wrap the space here. Rolling against everybody, that's going to be a 12 to hit. Who does the 12 hit?

Me. Is it magic? It is magic. Yeah, but it's evasion. What's your evasion? Oh. 13, right? Oh yeah, so it only hits you two in the back. You two take... That sounded like a lot of dice.

15 fire damage to each of you. Okay. While the rest of you avoid it. The other one is a one. That's going to be a wind. Everybody in that back row, you feel the wind begin to pick up and beautiful pink cherry blossom leaves swirl the space and you feel the wind begin to pick up and beautiful pink cherry blossom leaves

swirl the space and you feel your senses beginning to dull. I don't like it. Everyone in the back row falls asleep. Oh! Oh no! So currently, the only conscious members of the team are Teddy and Grumman. Oh my goodness. Grumman's cool as hell, dude.

This is a dream scenario for me, so you better take advantage of it. To that point that finishes the Nightmare's Go, you're asleep. Barnaby, you're asleep. Grumick, you're up. I'm going to attack with my axe. There we go, I don't know.

My axe. All right, to which one? To the one on the right, actually. Okay, let's go. So that's 12 to hit? 12 hits, that actually just hits. All right, 12 just hits, good to know. That's 2d8 plus six, so let's do, hey!

16, 17, 18, 19. 22 points of damage, max damage! Nice! Grimmick gets a heavy hit on that, the right-hand nightmare, carves into it. The car withdraws for a second. It's almost like a water drop ripple through it, and one of the hands emerges

and pulls its way out. You see the hand is now bloodied from where the axe struck it, and the jester head reaches out. No facial features, just the white glowing eyes. It's like, looks at the rest of you. In my sleep, I go, Grim Exklusal. Teddy, you're up.

I feel like I want to attack Mr. Moon. I think, oh, by the way, this goes. Unfortunately, Mr. Moon is in the back row. Yeah, but I have a scroll. Oh, you do? Yeah. Yeah. So I'm going to take out my Angry Blow scroll and I'm just going to blow that moon.

I unconsciously roll. You heard me! I unconsciously roll away a little bit. Do I even have to roll for this, or does it just happen? No, you do not. It just does damage. It's going to bam! It just is 8d8 lightning damage to Mr. Venus.

Mr. Venus, okay. 8d8? 8d8, so I'm going to use the calculator. My brain is broke. Here we go. That's fine. That's... It's 13. 12, 13. Then we're going to do...

That's... Ooh, god, terrible. 20. That's 20. And then two more. Two more of those. Oh, that's terrible. I know. And then 26. 26 points of lightning damage as you read the scrawl out loud,

and then as it evaporates, you see the lightning rune in the air for a second, and then a matching version of it appears above Mr. Venus before a bolt of lightning strikes into the top, the eyes go wild for a second before onto you. Prepare for a total eclipse, motherfucker. Oh my god.

Am I to write that down? Never stop. Never stop. I love it. Mr. Venus is going to Crescent Storm, angered by your angry blow, even further angry to angry blow you back. Whoa.

As all the Crescent Moon energies emerge and cut through all of you, knocking you all back to consciousness. However. Okay, that's okay. It's going to be bad. Yo, what the hell is going on? Wall-overs, wall-overs. That's a 14 to hit, which I think hits everybody.

Yeah. So everybody takes... The moon's back, the moon's back! Could have been worse. 16 points of magic damage across the board. Okay. Wait for me. That's so good. Your magic damage is so crazy. I don't fuck with magic, okay?

What the hell is going on with the cards? Am I dreaming? Didn't we already defeat this thing? There are more than one. It's not just, you know, there's lots. At least two didn't come at you at the same time. Oh, wow. Randomly checking to see what would show up.

All right, cool. So, finishing Mr. Venus' go, Zussari, you're up with pips on deck now that you're conscious. Okay. I see the bloody hand on this one and I register that it means that he's been hurt. Yes.

Actually, do you want to team up and do our attack? On your turn. I can hold off. If you're ready. You should do it. It's cool as hell. Well, do you need to recover first? Yeah, I need to recover first.

Also, we'll only hit two of them if we do it right now. I got a medicine I can give it to you on my turn. We'll hold off, we'll hold off, but. We can hold off, yeah. Yeah, we'll see if we can, because we'll see where it goes. Then I'll attack. Let's go! I'll attack the already harmed one.

It's possible the moon will come forward, too. 12. 12 is exactly what you need. Nice. Oh, good to know. This was a terrible roll. Five. No, one, two, three, yeah, five. Plus your four. Oh, right. I don't know if I've even been adding that

this whole game. Nine. Nine, all right, got it. So you go and you're still slightly woozy from waking up and you just get one hit that glances off the side of the card. It folds in that way that a card in the spokes of a bike sounds like.

Right. That took a hit. All right, that finishes your go. Pips, you're up. All right, I'm going to try a firewall for the front row. Nice. For the front row? Okay. Yes. All right, thank you for announcing.

I'm backing up. All right, so that's a, you're welcome. That is a 13. 13 hits them both. Yes! All right, so that's 96 plus eight. Yeah, let's go. Okay, so four.

One. Five. Two. All right, that's seven. One. Eight. You got this, bitch. Two. 10.

Come on. One. Two. 10. Come on. One. 11. Five. Okay. Okay, 16. Two. Okay, 18. Four.

Okay. Last one. 22. Six. So 28, so 28 points of damage to both. Plus eight. Plus eight? Oh yeah. 36. 30, ooh, that Plus eight, oh yeah. Yeah, so 36. 30, ooh, that will be enough to destroy this.

Yes! Oh! Back there. You're incredible! Thank you so much! You're so good. A ball of fire just bursts up front and burns across its way, incinerating this card of the Nightmare

as it streaks and vanishes. This one, the flames catching the edges of the card burn black, its eyes get brighter and angry as it begins to retreat into the card, ready to call for whatever runic magic it wishes. And that's all enemies in a row, take that. Yeah, in a row, so it hit both of them. Awesome, okay.

Hell yeah. All right, that finishes Pipsco. Now it is the nightmare that's still out there's turn. Let's see what it casts there. That's going to be a three. Three, all right. So that's going to be plus four. So it's going to go ahead and choose you.

Yep. Because you're hurting. That's cool. That's going to be a 19 to hit. That hits. So you watch as the card curls inside and it spins. The different runic symbols appear until the one for water apparates.

You watch as a massive streak of water magic shifts up, forms a sphere, and then slams into you for 15 points of magic damage. Then you watch as the magic returns the water and it heals itself a little. Oh, I hate that. Whoa! That's some evil shit.

Yeah, it is. Finishing its go. You're up, Mabel. Bar to be undead. I start swinging around my hammer a little bit. I'm like, ah, I'm back up, I'm ready to go, let's go! I just go in for the big swing on the nightmare. Go for it, roll for an attack. Good call. Face.

Hell yeah. 17 plus what? 17 plus four, that definitely hits. Go ahead and roll damage. Duty 12 plus 11, baby. Eight and two plus 11. 21 points of damage. Nice, nice, nice.

Oh, that's a heavy hit. It's looking real hurt. You swam it hard. If it hadn't healed itself, that would've been enough. But it's hanging on by a thread, literally, threads are hanging from it. It's like the Jester's almost like a broken marionette, barely hanging inside the middle of the card.

Man, this thing sucks. Agreed! All right, finishing your go. Barnaby, you're up with a grommet on deck. Okay, I'm going to try to make it so this guy does not hit us in his next initiative. So I'm going to go, Barnaby, you're up with Grimmick on deck. Okay, I'm going to try to make it so this guy does not hit us in his next initiative. So I'm going to go, I'm starting to agree with you, Mabel,

this magic shit sucks, and I'm going to throw my robe back to reveal a small pouch on the side, and a holster, and it'll open up automatically as sand, purple sand, flies out of it as it turns into the shape of a rune. Then I'm going to take my hand out and blow it towards the moon

to try to make it fall asleep. Ooh! Go ahead and roll. Okay. This is d20 plus magic. Ooh, yikes. Okay, 14. Its evasion is 10, does that work? Yeah!

So you watch as- I'll say, I'll blow the sand out, and as it falls asleep. I'll say, I'll blow the sand out, and as it falls asleep, I'll say, good night, sweet moon. Hey! Writing that down. Oh, I think you probably did. Do you look at the mirror and say,

you look great. Part of me is so cool. The energy's building up, and as the wind and the dust comes by, it goes. One eye at a time. I was going to say, it's a JRPG, so we can get the little snot bubble. Right. Yeah.

Little snot bubbles happening on the side. When you hit it, so as long as we don't hit it until it lasts. Yes, yes. I'm just trying to skip it. Also, it's defense is zero on the next time it hits it. Barnaby, don't tell a damn soul, but that was cool as hell.

Oh my god. I take the arrow. Grimmick's turn. to be bold. Don't tell a damn soul, but that was cool as hell. Oh my god. I took the arrow. Grimmick's turn. Grimmick, smelling blood from the nightmare in front, tries to give it an attack. Finish it off, 12, 14? 14, yeah. Yes! Yay! 2d8, okay.

Go ahead, Grimmick. Is this the eight? That's the eight, okay. Shoot. Go ahead, Grimmick. Is this the eight? That's the eight, yep. Okay. Four, actually. And? Six. Plus six, 12.

Shh, Grimmick carves through the other nightmare. It is a great game. Yes, Grimmick! Grimmick! Awesome. Can we just leave it sleeping? You could. The only problem is I fear that next time we go into combat, we will also have to face it again. But maybe not.

But it's sleeping, you know. They only really wake up if you smack them really hard. That is true. I can remember. Magic eventually wears off. Eventually, that's fair. Do we want to just? Up to you guys. We can end it or we can walk away.

I'm trying to conserve resources for our own sake, so I think it would be kind of funny if we just left it. Okay, onto that. You seem really excited for us to wait. I know, I know! Whatever, I'm honest. This is an interesting scenario. We also have, because we have a run feature,

so we can do it. We do. We can just, technically speaking, we can leave a fight. So here's what I'll say. If you want to try and leave it there, I'll let you make a group run roll, via the rules here. I love it. And if we fail, we fight it.

Yeah. Okay. Right? Or you can just continue, I'm still asleep. Unless you want to get the jump on. I'll just say that the battle end regardless, but it'll inform other things. Oh, I like that. What is that?

I love that, I love that. I love that. I love information. But I mean... So. We beat one before. I know, that's true. Do you want to just go for it? I mean, it is funny to run.

I feel like it's kind of fun. It's kind of fun to just be like, eh. But we're so close. Maybe we can use it to get us up there or something, like lose us a hook. Just climb up the back. What, drag the floating dune? Before we leave, let's all take a selfie with the remote.

What's a selfie? I pull the camera up over my 20. If I take a limelight, I look at it and it wakes me. It wakes it up. Oh shit! I'm amused either way, so I'm down for whatever. Let's do the run. Let's try the run.

The run, all right, everyone roll a d20 and add your luck. Oh god. Plus zero. Ooh. Plus one. 21. Six. 11. Four.

16. And 21, you said? Someone had to beat a 20 for this to succeed. Oh! Sorry. Oh my god. As you all slow, this is the slowest, quietest run ever, as you all just gently tiptoe away.

And Grimmick's like, Grimmick, Grimmick, shut the fuck up. We're going to wake the moon. And slowly, quietly, you all say, Good night, moon. Has it taken any damage yet? That moon? It took some damage. It got hit once.

Not great. Okay. With that, you leave the moon sleeping. That will definitely not come back and bite us again. No, no, of course not. Everything's fine. So, I mean, can I tiptoe? Is the cloud of sleep smoke still?

No, that has dissipated. The chest remains open. Yeah. So back to the chest. Can I tiptoe back to the chest? Wait, wait, wait, wait, I opened theated. The chest remains open. Yeah. So back to the chest. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. I opened the chest. You did open it. You deserved this.

You can't take this away from me. I fell asleep for this. I'm pretty much asleep. Right? I'm going to go over the chest, and I'll be like, hey, come with me. I'll support you. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You find a thick vial of a medicinal liquid as you get a Mega Medicine. Ooh. Mega Medicine. Yo, you know what? My man. You're so kind. Yeah. I'll be sure to use it wisely.

Actually, can I hit that 40 if you're just going to be here? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, take a hit of that. Thank you. Can I take a peek? Shots. No. And see if there's anything. Can I take a peek and see if there's anything

behind the waterfall thing? I like's anything behind the waterfall thing? I like that. Behind the waterfall there? Yeah. Go ahead and roll a d20, sorry. And add luck. Yeah, I'll add luck to this one. 19. 19?

Plus, ooh. Plus luck is a... That was plus one. I only have a plus one. I rolled a 19. Looking behind the waterfall, the water is not emanating from an ethan. It is definitely this whole thing, but there is a small alcove behind it.

The waterfall itself is rushing heavily, and to try and get through would be very dangerous, but it is not impossible. There is something out this way, but I'm sure, I think we got to turn this thing off. Okay. You're telling me there's an alcove behind this aqueduct?

Yeah. Yeah. That's what I just said, that there's an alcove behind this aqueduct. Did you not hear Pip when she said that? Didn't I just say that? You just said that. I just wanted to make sure I was clear.

Right? I wanted to make sure it was clear. Thank you, Gremick. See, this is why Gremick's way cooler than all of you. What is he doing? Oh, wait. Shh. What is it?

Shh. You're a cute little puppy. Your little Labrador face. Let's try and go through. There's a door back there. Let's try and go through that door. Okay, okay. Wait, wait.

Do we see the stairs? Yeah, there's a little gap on the side, right? We should go through that gap. This, technically, is covered. Oh, okay. I wasn't around. Okay, for real, though. Yeah. Yeah, no.

Good call, though. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, let's try to go in there. Let's go in that little door. Can I see if there's any little more indentations? Looks a little similar. Unless it, I don't know if it's similar to the door we just looked at. This one has another indentation in it.

This one has a three-pointed star vibe to it. It's almost three individual points. Same size as the others, but just that crest is empty in that shape. Oh man, we need a good smelling wooden key. Let's see if we can just break off two of the points. The other one's still stuck in the other door. Oh yeah, that need a good smelling wooden key. How do we break off two of the points? The other one's still stuck in the other door. Oh yeah, that's right. Okay.

But there's a hallway over there. That was pretty clever, though. No, it was a good thought. All right. Can you move further into here? I didn't even see that. Let's see what we got. There's the voice. And there is just an empty chamber.

I go in the chamber and yell to see if it echoes really cool. It does echo pretty well. Okay. Ha! Ha! Ha! You're going to wake the moon! Can I check over and see if the moon stirs? What do you think he dreams about?

Deeply unsettling. Deeply unsettling. That's an interesting question. Does he have a daily life that he recalls in his sleep? I don't know. He works nights. Yeah.

Yeah, so just an empty chamber? I guess we have to go around. Maybe we got to... I can't really see. Is there any kind of door or anything? No door on this side, no. It just finishes the chamber here. There's just this element here.

Man. I think we need to go across. There's just this element here. Man. I think we need to go across. Or at least a couple of us do. Maybe I should hit it with my hammer. The wall? I mean, I could try the wall, but I was thinking the door. Oh. You know what I'm saying?

That's worked twice before. I don't know. This door looks pretty secure. Can you do it? Can you make it too loud of a noise? Yeah, can you do it like... Quietly? Put a blanket over it. You can slam it. Can you put a blanket over it?

As you do it, I'll cough. No, go. Can somebody go over to Mr. Venus and just like, you know? For a little bit. Cover his ears. My hands are not big enough. Not existing ears. All right, I think.

Does it look like there are any ear holes? Huh? On Mr. Moon? On Mr. Venus? You walk over and look towards it. You have no idea the physiology of a sentient, weird moon beast. Is he easily movable? He is floating in space in a way

that defies your understanding of physics and the world around you. So maybe. He's still floating while he's sleeping? Oh yeah. He's a moon. Oh, that's sick. Can I just start if there are any weak points on it? On the moon? On the moon while he's sleeping? Oh yeah. He's a moon. Oh, that's sick. Can I just start if there are any weak points on it? On the moon while he's sleeping?

Yeah, can I like? While he's sleeping, he has no means of defending himself. He does his defense to zero until you hit him, and then, but like... What if we did like a super five-person attack? Just make up right now, you know? That'd be pretty cool. That's the scene from Office Space.

Or we could blindfold him. Do you know, if I recall, there was another path we might actually be able to find a key if we go down the other, there's other places to check. But what about blindfolding the moon? That seems like a good plan. You're going to wake up the moon when you blindfold him. It's not messed with the moon.

Okay. That's also what we have. That is pretty sick. You're going to wake up the moon when you blindfold. That's not nice with the moon. Okay. That's also what we have. He's a Venus, you guys! What if a couple of us try to go over there? Yeah. I mean, I could try. I'll volunteer. That seems pretty dangerous. I'll go with you.

I mean. Let's go. We'll go together. We're going to go together. Okay. All right. Hey, I have an idea. How hard and dense is the flow of the water coming down? It's pretty intense.

Like, it's a rapid flow, so it would carry you and immediately drag you down. Okay, my hammer's mad heavy. Could I put my hammer down and block the water flow for a little bit so people could just step through? You could certainly try. How deep is that water? What, is it losing?

I'm strong enough to grab it and get it back or something. Best you could tell, it's probably about 10 to 15 feet deep. Okay, that's pretty deep. How long is your hammer? Not very deep. How tall are you? Not very deep. Yeah, my hammer. I don't know.

Uh, hmm. You don't know if that adjusts in certain places. From what you can tell, you can't really see the bottom. You just see it gets dark beneath and just. What if we look for vulnerabilities in the wall on this side and we just try to break through the stones? Yeah, but there's an aqueduct going through. Oh yeah, it could just float through.

Can we scale the wall up at all? You could try, it's about 15 feet up. Is it open up at the top? Oh, we've scaled. It is an upper platform on the wall, yeah. We have scaled walls, much bigger than this one. That's right, what am I saying? We've done so many moves where we've tried that.

Shall we? I'll clap my hands and eat yours. And then I'll try to fling you out. Physics defying throw, go! Ellie, come here. All right. I think this is a good, this is a plan. I think this is a plan. Yeah. I'm into this.

All right, let's try it. All right, so the two of you are going to attempt to clamber up. Yeah. I'm into this. All right, let's try it. All right, so the two of you are going to attempt to clamber up. Yeah. All right. We've done this so many times in the past. So many. So I'll need you both to roll a strength check or a dex check, your choice.

Okay, okay. But you both need to succeed for this to work, and you have to get at least a 14. Whoa, whoa, whoa. What a nat one. Natural 20. Oh! Wow.

What a vibe. Can I help? What a weird balance. Here's what I'll say. The natural natural 20, because the universe of Suigodden is a balance between order and chaos based on the 27 true runes,

I will enable you both a reroll. Oh! As opposed to an immediate failure, both those bounce each other out. I'll give you both one more reroll. That's fun. That's beautiful, wow. Ready? Here we go.

Three, two, one. Oh, that was almost a really good one. Okay. 12. 12. Oh! That's okay, that's okay. No, that's all right.

You both grab her and you lift up and you catch the edge and your fingers get it. And just scrape back down. It's too high. Do you want to? Well, that was a good try. Usually it's a wall. And you can grab it. And you can do that thing.

And we do that, yes. Okay. Should we try to go around? Can we give one round really quick, just to give it a roll? To what? To jump over? Well, I was just going to give you a fastball special. I'm pretty tiny, eh?

Yeah, you can do that. Both of you want to give it a shot. It's too heavy to bring my hammer, so it just had to be me. At best, I can grab your hammer and I can actually try and shot put you if you're holding on, then you can let go of the hammer and see what you can throw your way.

That's pretty fun. Honestly, that's pretty funny. All right, ready? All right, let's do that. All right, if you guys roll on, then you can let go of the hammer and see where you want to throw your weapon. That's pretty fun. Honestly, that's pretty funny. All right, ready? All right, let's do that. You guys roll strength or dex, your choice, and you both have to succeed on a 14 difficulty. All right, I'll do strength, because you're going to be hanging on

to the head of the hammer, and I'm just going to try and throw you right up there. Yeah. All right. So it's just me, or just you? It'll be just you getting up there, but we both have to roll for 14. 14. Nope, not one both roll for 14. 14. Nope, not one.

Oh! So, fuck. I've rolled so many not ones today. Takes your hammer and flings you, and you go. As opposed to going up on the wall, you just go straight up and drop down. Did you see anything?

Bro! You passed over the side. I have another view. I went to Cash and went, oh god. That's why I had the hammer wielder, dude. The Mr. Venus shifts a bit and it's asleep. It remains magically asleep, but it won't last forever. We should, yeah, we got to choose something else. Okay. Let's try this other hallway. Let's see if we can do it.

So we should jump across and then jump across again? I don't know what else to do. I don't either. What if we do? We got a sleeping Mr. Moon. Why don't we just, like, move him? Nudge him? And climb him? And then try to climb up his lithe body.

You know what I'm saying? That is certainly an idea. I don't know exactly what we want to do. Come on! Is he far up or is he close on the ground? He's like three feet off the ground. He's really tall. Can I just gently try to see if I can push him?

If he moves. You push and he moves slightly. Oh boy, this is insane. I'm going to be ready to attack if it gets weird. I'm just going to move him up against the wall. I'm just going to move him up against the wall. I'm just going to move him up against the wall. Weird shit is happening. We still have to figure out the contractions.

Team meeting, team meeting. Gremik, stay over there. Okay. Why don't we just get Gremik to push him? I mean, I know he's sick as hell, but like. Well, Gremik is a little bit wilder than all of us are. I trust him.

Gentle hands, gentle hands, come on. Gentle hands, I have gentle hands. Let's go, let's go. Okay, all right. I just don't want to put you in harm's way. Thank you, Mabel, for thinking it. But I feel bad. Let's do this.

Just a slow, easy push. Okay, slow, easy push. Easy does it. Okay. All right. Sleepy times. Where are you pushing Mr. V? Against the wall.

Against the wall here. Against the wall here. No, like against. Over here? Oh yeah, we should do it. Right? Because the machine's up there. Oh yeah, you pushing Mr. Venus? Against the wall. Against the wall here. Against the wall here. Yeah, no, like against. Over here? Oh yeah, we should do it. Right. Because the machine's up there. Oh yeah, you're right. Oh yeah, you're right.

But then we're not going into that room, is that okay? Could we also have pushed him floating above the water and then we walk across him? That's another idea, it doesn't matter. You're right. What do you want to do? Do you want to? Let's push him up there because there's a staircase that goes into that room.

We could all sit on him like a little boat. Yeah, like people sitting on the moon. So you push him, which way? This way, this way, this way, this way? I say you push him up toward the machine. And then try and climb up. Yeah, try and turn it off. And try and climb up to turn off the machine. You move him here, against the edge.

All right, push him, just rests against the wall for the hell of it, because it's fun. Yeah. Sleepy-tiny. Okay, now he's a good 10 or so feet tall. Can get you most of the way there if you manage to not wake him in the climb. Who is climbing Mr. Veen? Can I try this climb?

Who is the most, do you want to try it? Who's got some high dex? I have a plus four to dex. Okay. I do, too. Okay, you do, too? Okay, so maybe you are our most dexterous. Do you both want to go, or just one? I mean, I feel like we had this disagreement

about the check before. You haven't tried any. I haven't tried climbing yet. You go for it. All right, so. You've got this, okay? So you have to beat a 12. Have to beat a 12. Come on, Zue. I believe in you. To not wake him.

Oh no, oh no. Nine. Nine. So you do climb up, Mr. Venus, as you slowly, getting up to the top, you get to the very top of the crest and there's a four-foot leap to the edge of the cliff and you feel the moon shift and you feel that basey.

The rest of you watch the eyes. No! Lick her open. So we're going to go into battle here. Do you want to join the battle with No! Flicker open. I knew it! So we're going to go into battle here. Do you want to join the battle with them or do you want to try and make it to the top of the cliff? Jump from the fucking top! I'll try to make it to the top.

All right. I believe in you. So with that, we go into the remainder of the Mystery in Disco. Worth it! Worth it, worth it. I'm not even in it. All right, all right. We are exactly human initiative. All right, all right. We thought exactly about you. Without Ysari, who is currently up here. Yeah! Nice.

So with that, we go back. I'm just going to keep the original initiative that we had for this. Just keep it easy, which brings us to, actually, no, let's reroll, because it's been a minute. Okay. I was asleep, too. Can I play as Grimmick in this round,

since I'm not currently in the battle? Yes, you may. That's brilliant. All right, so 25 to 20? 22. 22. Woo! Three, two. 17. 16, 19.

All right. Cool. All right, so who's up first, Teddy? No, it's Barnabas, then me. Should I put it back to sleep? You certainly should. Oh my god! You're so honest. We move this around four times.

All right, and then 15 to 10? Or 10 to 15, I'd say. 13, sorry. 13 for Pip. Because you're going to be on the 17th. Oh, I did not get that. All right, thank you. Wait, so it's Barnaby, sorry. 13 for Pip? Because you got me on the 17. Oh, I did not get that. All right, thank you. Wait, so it's Barnaby, Teddy. Mabel.

Mabel. All right, then what did a grandma get? Oh, four. Okay, got you. All right, so top of the round. Barney, what you doing? Sec, I will throw my boomerang at him. I go, well, we learned one way.

That would be nine. Nine. Misses. I'll take the d8. As I'll come back and regrettably grab it. That's not bad, I'll take one damage. Not too bad. That thing's going to kill him someday.

Teddy, you're up. All right, I'm just going to go for it. I'm just going to punch him in the face again. I don't know what else to do. Here we go. 11? 11 hits. Oh, thank god. Yes. No, this is, eh, it's not bad.

16, 17, 18. 26 points of damage. 26 points of damage. Nice. All righty. Heavy hit, Once again, it's got a fairly thick defense on it, so when you slam it, your knuckles hurt a little bit, but still, a bit of damage gets pushed through there.

Well done. Finishing your go, it's now Mr. Venus' turn. Mr. Venus is going to moon beam this column, Gremik and Barnaby. Oh, great. That is going to be a 20, dirty 20 on that. So that is 3d12 magic damage down that column as both Grimmick and Barnaby take.

That's not a great damage roll. That's 12 points of magic damage. It could have been a lot worse. All righty, finishing Mr. Venus' go, brings us to Mabel with Pips on deck. Kick its ass. All right. Same old, same old.

And you know what worked last time? I'm straddling that chin and going straight for the nose. Yeah! Let's go! Woo, woo, woo, woo! Shoosh! Nine plus four. 13, that hits. Go ahead and roll damage. Yeah!

Hell yeah. All right, damage time, baby. Five plus 12, plus 11. right, damage time, baby. Five plus 12 plus 11. 17, 28 points of damage. Dang! Nice, nice. Let's go. Heavy hit. His nose dents into it a little bit. The eye's.

It's getting furious. The color of its pupils is getting brighter. Oh no, I'm staring at it right in the face. I'm like, okay. Your hair's starting to stand up a little bit in proximity. Ghibli anger, you know? Yep.

Perfect reference. And I do a cool backflip off of his chin. Back into your place, perfect. Finishing your go. Pips, you're up. Okay. With Grimmick on deck. Flaming Arrow. Flaming Arrow. Ooh, I don't think I got it.

11? 11 hits. arrow. Oh, I don't think I got it. 11? 11 hits. Yeah! Oh, great! Not hard to hit. Okay, okay. So. Are you using magic? Let me know.

I am. Okay, I'm stepping back. All right, we got a six. Great. We got a four. 10. We got a three. 13.

We got a one. 14. We got a two. Sorry, We got a one. 14. We got a two. Sorry, and we got a one. 17. Plus eight. Yes. So 25 points of damage. Oh, a heavy, fiery hit that it cannot defend against.

As the fiery arrows arc into it and blast as it does, one of the eyes closes up and the other eye gets even brighter angrily as this one's darkened and pulled inward, burned and closed. Ew. Well done. That's nasty. Finish your go. Grimmick's up. Grimmick hates moon creatures.

They terrorized him. He's going to try to attack with the axe. 18. 18? 18 hits. Let's go. Five. So that's six. So 11 plus six, 17.

17 points of damage. All right. Yay! Arksyn with the axe. Finishes his grummix, go. Top of the round, Barnaby, you're up. Oh, sick. I'll throw my boomerang at it. Let's go.

Okay. 13? 13 hits. Oh, sick. Okay, cool. And Teddy, you're up next. Two to eight. Oh yeah, I'm ready. Plus, check. Okay, cool. And Teddy, you're up next. 2d8. Oh yeah, I'm ready. Plus 22. That'd be great.

19 damage. 19 damage. Nice! And then I'll roll for the damage for myself, and I'll take two out of 52. Oh yeah, I was like, why do you keep doing that? Oh, I know, it's because the last move cursed my boomerang. Yeah, sorry about that. All right, finishing your go, Teddy, you're up.

All right. This thing's looking rough. I see the chin's going. Yeah. I'm going to run and I'm going to do that giant jumping fist right up in that chin. Yeah! All right. Sure you can. Well done.

That's a 15, four, so that's 19, and it's also in a crit. It is, let's go! Roll that crit damage, baby! Come on, roll high. Ooh! Okay, so that's 10, 15,

23 times two. Woo! 46. Oh my god. I'm going to have to start paying for this guy's gym. You punch the chin off. You just fall and you watch as this blast of energy as Teddy lifts in the air, this arc of power off the fists.

Where the chin was, you see this broken edge and the piece of it is glowing and ricocheting and being fired off down the hall. Oh my god! Whoa! Lands into the water and the disabled chin begins being carried out of the temple. Oh man, I wanted that.

You can find it later. All right. That finishes your go, Teddy. Yeah. Mr. Venus is going. Mr. Venus is very unhappy and is going to Crescent Storm everybody present in this room. Crescent Storm. That's going to be a 10 to hit.

Oh, nice one. You get Grimmick. No. That doesn't get anybody? No, I'm 11. No, you get Grimmick. I get Grimmick! Grimmick, duh! Grimmick, duh! Gremig, duh!

Gremig takes 16 points of magic damage. Oh no, is he okay? He's fine. His magic defense is decent. All righty, finishing Mr. Venus' go, that brings us to Mabel. Hey, what's up? What's up, players?

It's a. Yo, I was pretty impressed by your Shoryuken, so you know what? I'm going to do that. Sure you can. Here we go, baby! I'm going to swing and do a little uppercut action. 13 plus four. That'll hit. Roll damage.

Yes. One and three. Nice. And an 11, so we got 15. 15 points of damage. How do you want to do that? Yeah! Once again! Yeah, that's the second last one, that one.

I don't know, I did the same thing last time. I'm going for it, but you know what? I'm going to go straight for the nose and just crunch it in, you know? Awesome. So the whole thing folds, right? So you smack it once, knock it up in the air a little bit, and then leap up to catch it in, you know? So the whole thing folds, right? So you smack it once, knock it up in the air a little bit, and then leap up to catch it there, and then full on,

you watch as it gets one swollen, blackened eye, the other one staring at you. It's that glow of energy, as it's about to moonbeam blast you, right in point-blank range, begins to build up. As the hammer swoops in, the face just caves in, and you hear. Dang.

Eat this! Grim Reap goes, Ah, good one! Thanks, Grim Reap! As the face is carved in and your hammer's stuck in it, and it's holding you there and you're hanging from the hammer, the face spider cracks before bursting into hundreds of pieces and you're hanging from the hammer. The face

spider cracks before bursting into hundreds of pieces and you plummet and catch yourself and catch your hammer in the way, finishing that battle. Oh, cool. Yes, Mabel! Here's your chance. Say something cool. Say something cool! Yeah, just go for it.

Come on. Damn. Yeah! Writing that one down! Wonderful, wonderful. Amazing. Thanks, y'all. While that's happening. Zussari. So what do I see while I'm up here?

So you set up this mechanism. It's a massive stone clockwork contraption. There are levers and turning stones there. As you look at it, go ahead and roll a d20, add your magic. Nat 20. Oh! Yeah. I don't have any magic, but nat 20. Well, sure.

You're worldly, you've traveled a little bit, whether by choice or by force, and you've interfaced with people of different disciplines, but there's one thing that's always enthralled you is the creation of clockwork and the idea of not everyone who's trained in great runic magics can create things that can last and things that seem like magic, how they move.

Whether it be watchmakers, clockmakers, you've always had an interest in seeing people do this craft. As you watch the patterns of it shifting, you realize, like, oh, okay, these are how these things are moving, and if this piece were to be jammed and then turned the opposite direction, it would shut off the gate.

With that, you take one of your taunt fuzz and jam it in there and break it at the right angle, where the rest of the wheel sets loose and begins to spin rapidly as it does the gate. Closes, shutting off the source of water. Oh my hell! And that entire basin now just slowly diminishes until it is traversable.

Wait, wait, wait, I'm thirsty as hell! Hold on, hold on, hold on! I'm going to try to let you out. There's more ghosts at the bottom, I don't know. Hey, Pips, you can finally get, you found it. You can get into that little alcove. Well, we should probably see what else is here, now that there's no more water.

Yeah, but you can get into that little alcove while we're here. Okay. I'm going to go over the alcove and just peek it. Over where? Oh, behind the waterfall. Oh, behind the waterfall? You glance in there and you can see that there is, hanging on a chain,

a small object that's a crest of a three-pointed star that could have been used to open the door that was there. But there is also a small bundle wrapped in cloth. Okay. I'll go in there and get both of those items. Okay. You grab the chain with the item and you grab the bundle and you realize,

oh, it's not a bundle of cloth. It's an actual robe. And you gain a guard robe. Nice! Whoa! Is that magic defense? Yeah, it's plus four defense, plus two to magic. Holy moly.

Ooh! Dang! Not magic defense, plus two to magic. Holy moly. Ooh! Dang! Not magic defense, plus two to magic. Oh! Plus two to magic. So it helps the casting of magic. Yeah. Whoa! Yeah! That's perfect for you. Dang! Okay. Good find.

Hey, I found the key thing for the door. Oh, I see. We don't need it. Should we just go? Well, I mean, let's open it because there could be something cool in here. No, no, no, no! We don't need to, because I want it, so. Oh, you want to keep it open?

That's a relic. You want to try to break the door. Zeus, you're still up there, so why don't you just go down the stairs and check out what's in that room? We have access to it. Can I do that? Yeah. Okay, I'm just going to go look in the room. Head on down, there's a small chest

in the corner over here. Oh, so chill. I have a little bit of trauma with chests, but I'm going to open it anyway. You guys can open the door if something bad happens. Exactly. Yes. I attempt to open the chest. Okay.

You open the chest and kick it open. I need you to roll, no, I don't need you to roll. Here we go. I can use it over and over again, and it never gets old for me. It's old for all of you, but not for me. You get two medicine out of that chest. Nice!

Yeah. Cool. As well as a small scroll of runic magic. Bless! What'd you get in there, Zeus? There's medicine in here, and out of consideration for you, I won't tell you what else is in here. Oh, it's magic related. Maybe.

Magic doesn't like you. I don't understand what. Yeah, we have a very toxic relationship going on. Schrodinger's irritation. Just go with it. Is there anything else I can see in this room? No, it's mostly an open chamber that just leads to that doorway

where you had more or less circumvented. Right. Hop on over there. Okay, yeah, I'll go back and join my friends. You hop down the rest. We definitely don't need that star thing anymore, so could I have it? I mean, I don't see why not,

but let's just hold onto it just in case. Yeah. I mean, I'll hold onto it. Okay, here. Awesome. Hey, do you have any string or something? Oh, absolutely. Do you want one around your neck?

Hell yeah. It's actually got a chain on it. It's on a chain. It does? Yeah, yeah, that's a chain. Oh, this is sick! want to wear it around your neck? Hell yeah. It's actually got a chain on it. It's on a chain. It does? Yeah, yeah, that's a chain. Oh, this is sick! Wow. What do you think? You're so accessorized.

It actually kind of works. It's pretty awesome. I'm not going to lie. You really pull as well as your outfit. Kind of clashes. Oh. Oh. Did the moon drop anything, by the way?

I forgot, the moon and the cards, did they drop anything? We'll get to that in a second. We're having a moment. Oh yeah, you're kind're pushing your luck right now. Just being honest. All right, a good friend is usually honest. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I think Graham is not honest. I mean, it does take a portion of your body. Yeah, another 1,000, Pach, from the Mr. Venus, and somebody roll a d20 for me. 1,000? Which turns into 166 apiece. 12. That's right. 12? Okay, that's all you find.

That's your 166 apiece. There's a 166, a 166, a 166, a 166. Yep. Okay. Who's rolling a d20? I already rolled it. Oh, all right. We didn't find it. All right. Sorry.

Let's make our way over to over there, I guess. Now that there's no water. Oh, that's so nice. Wait, we might be able to just go straight into that room, then. Yeah, yeah, we should do that. Or at least take a look. Instead of, I mean, maybe just go down this, now that the water's not rushing out,

we could go that way. Did you want to? I think so. I want to see. Okay. Just sneak up in there. Yeah. It reveals into this chamber. Hey! And to where water was also dropping from above.

You can see there's an entryway where another part of the sluice system was dropping down into here and causing the water rush out, but it also has been cut off from turning off that machine. Now as you enter into this chamber, there are two chests to each side, and it continues onward into a long, beautiful hall

with an arched top. Let's check out those chests. Hey, Grimmick, why don't you go over and open one of those chests, buddy? Okay. Watches over, opens the chest. Someone roll a 20 and add Grimmick's dex. Nice. 17, 18, 19.

19? Grimmick goes and jumps out of the way. This little beam of red energy and just detonates, creates a localized explosion that shatters the chest and probably would have done a lot of damage to anybody in the immediate vicinity of the chest. As the pieces of wood scatter

and you all protect your eyes for a second, nothing is left in the place of the chest. Wow, good job, Gramic. Yeah. That was cool. You're still wearing that? You, what the hell? I pull my robe.

Oh man, it's cool, though. It is very cool. Thank you, thank you! I pull my robe back. Thanks. You can pull it off. Don't be ashamed. You wanted that. There's still another chest, though.

Hey, Gremit! What are you doing right now? All right, work. Why don't you go open another chest, man? Surely there's not another one. I'll give you a high five. Yeah. Yeah! Nice. I'll give you a high five. Yeah! Yeah! Nice! Kicks him in the chest, roll a d20,

and add Dremix to his charity. Wow! Uh-oh. Six! Slow opera as it's like, six! Peels across from his face. Oh boy. Kicks his own, looking back at you, and puts a thumbs up in slow motion. He's like, No!

Right as they. No! Grumick! No! No! No! Oh no! God damn it!

You can see this white flash. I had the full-on anime, you see the shadow of Grumick as white fills the screen. Like we're talking about Neo-Tokyo, you know, Akira explosion. No! Grumick takes 35 points of magic damage. We're talking about Neo-Tokyo, Akira explosion. Gremig takes 35 points of magic damage. Oh my god!

He's still alive? He's still alive. After the ringing in your ears subsides, you all look over and Gremig is standing there still with the thumbs up, but he's just smoldering and smoking. All of his fur is just singed dark and he's like, . Yo, Grubbuck, is that our treasure over there?

Looks over and there's just, the ground is just a scarred black ice. Smolder. No. Man, Grubbik's cool as hell. I walk over to poor Gremik, and I'm like, here, Gremik, you deserve this. I give him a medicine. Please drink.

It's weird. It doesn't just chunk. It slowly tongues the medicine over the period of 30 seconds. It's like weird. I don't know what that's triggering. But he does heal 50 hit points. Oh, that's great.

Hey, great job, Gromit. That's what I'm here for! Psh! Coughs of a spatter of blood. Oh, jeez. Oh, that's internal. That's internal. Well, we should check that last room.

Yeah, let's go check that out. Over where? Here, this way? Yeah, that way. Yeah. Okay. We're just going to look and see if anything's there. This door is indeed locked and latched. Is there anything looking through it? Does it seem like there's anything?

Well, d20. All right. A four. A four. Best you can tell, it looks empty. I don't know. What, the room? Yeah, I don't see anything. Looking for the bars

on the inside, yeah. Yeah, I don't see anything. You do see a mild, one chest across the way. No. All right, here I go. Wish me luck. I'm walking away. Roll strength. 15, and I guess.

Plus three? Plus three, yeah. The door caves in a bit. It doesn't quite break fully. You just put your foot up and push. Nice! Just the ground dust plating outward as that is now. When it counts!

Yeah! I guess it's yours then. Aw! Hey, Gremix. No! I don't want that. I don't want that. What?

It's time. No, no, no, no. What? What? I, uh. Are you not going to? Are you not going to? Yeah. Yeah.

Three. No, Barnaby, what do you do? Two. Oh, wonderful, don't mind if I do. I have a, I have a, I found this branch one time and it opens chests really well and I will, yeah, I guess I'll try to poke it open with something. The lid opens up.

There's just a small little platform there that has, looks like a rolled up piece of ancient parchment to present to you a firewall scroll. Whoa! Very cool. Hey, what is that? Oh no, get that shit away from me. Yeah, I'm so sorry.

This is bizarre. I've never seen a scroll that does some kind of evil magic. Okay. I've only seen scrolls that teach me how to read the scrolls. Those are all sort of scrolls. Well then why don't you read that scroll? Oh, it's only for that applicable scroll. Oh, I see. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's right own set of scrolls. Well then, why don't you read that scroll?

Oh, it's only for that applicable scroll. Oh, I see. That's right, yeah. It's the Rosetta Stone for one thing. Yes, yes. It is up for sale. He must be quite the linguist. Well, I guess we go out back through the...

I think it's, I want to see what's in the fancy room. Yeah, me too. Let's go. Let's go to the fancy room. There's a fancy room. We were heading towards it. But what's going on with this right here? What's going on with what? Because we came from here, right?

Right, so this actually was a wall. Oh, okay, got it. That I didn't have room for to put the things on. Got it. So you return to this chamber? Yes. Yeah. Okay. Should have had somebody do that.

You head down this long, arched hallway for probably a good 50, 60 feet or so before it opens up into a beautiful, massive chamber. You can see in the back wall is a heavy set of stairs that raises to an upper platform, and there are pillars that line the sides of it. You see two statues that mark each side, one that looks like one of the robed figures with the hood

reaching outward towards the center. On the other side, you see a statue that looks like one of the robed figures with the hood reaching outward towards the center. On the other side, you see a statue that looks like a big two-headed snake that has its heads curled up. There is, on the upper area above the platform, a massive statue that looks like a hulking Sindarin figure that has its arms up and its hands out like this. Down in the center of it, there's this beautiful,

almost like a dried patch of wild-looking vine and withered flowers that sits upon a stone platform, like some sort of a plant nursery or a cultivated ancient flower garden that was built in the center of this chamber, like a massive indentation that's risen up and where all of this old plant matter was raised to what was probably a very vibrant color.

You can see amongst the withered browns and grays, just enough shades of undercurrents of color that it looks like it probably was once extremely vibrant, but it's now dried, brittle, and withered. Whoa. Do we have any water? Beautiful. Well, we got rid of it, actually. Stop the water. Oh, did we do this?

That would've been pretty quick. I know, I mean. I'm not dry, I'm flat. Yeah, I died immediately. What are you doing? I'll take a look at the flowers, I guess. I was going to do the same thing. No, you go ahead and do it, because I'm...

Go ahead and roll a d20, add your luck. 10. 10. 10, okay. Looking through the space, you touch a bit pieces and parts of it, when you touch it, it crumbles away into dust. Other parts move, but it's easy to also move some of the vines aside as you do,

and they fall away. This is very old, but this chamber was important. The way it's built and everything's driven towards the center here, this looks like it was once a prominent piece, part of the things, one of the things that possibly could be at the core of a temple, you're uncertain. But looking through, there is one little bud,

one soft, faint, little faintly pinkish bud that has the only real touch of color amongst all the rest of this. Oh. Can I pluck it? You can. You pull it and it takes a slight tug, but this little budding herb

that has a flowered part that's still enclosed is now at your disposal. Wow. Oh wow. Thank you. Nice. Wonderful. You hold it aloft, and you can sense this has some unique healing properties to it, likely.

I notice the bud is, I'm assuming it's pretty Sindarian, and I take it and I lick a bit, and I give it to her. And I, since she's an elf, and I know there's a connection there. And so I take it and I give it to her. So?

Yeah. Are you sure? Positive. It's probably better used for you, someone who's probably connected to this place, than I. This is so beautiful, thank you. Of course. Uh-oh. The chamber shifts with a heavy impact

and you watch as big clouds of dust fall from the ceiling. As you watch, the massive stone entity on the upper stairs, its foot has shifted forward. Oh. Ooh. Its hands rest low as modicums of dust fall and drift down in clouds

of ancient, forgotten elements. And it begins to charge toward your troop as the Ruined Guardian has been awakened. Let's go ahead and get that ready. Okay, well, you weren't taking good care of it, clearly. So you got what you wanted from us.

Yeah. What's everyone's you wanted from us. Yeah. What's everyone's max HP? 80. 75. Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. Oh, big stone guy. Oh boy. Oh boy, okay. What's your max hit points? My max is 75, but I'm currently not there.

Where am I? All right, everyone roll. V20 at your speed. All right. Woo! All right. Woo! All right, 25 to 20. 20 to 15. Oh boy. 15 to 10.

10. Really? Okay. Really? Oh boy, how exciting. Okay. All right, so you have Teddy. I guess I'm going to be using the scroll on myself because everyone else's defense is there.

10 to five. Six. Nine. Okay. So, oh, what did you roll? So wait, here's a question. Wait, nine, what'd you get? Five. Five, and you got six? Yeah, six. Okay. Wait, so it's Ted, Pips.

Barnaby. Barnaby. Me. What did you get? I don't want to talk about it. Sorry. You got a one, okay. And then, oh wait. Wait, don't you add a thing?

What did Grimmick get? I don't have speed. Oh, Grimmick. Where does it say speed? 15. Okay. Gromit goes before most of you. Oh, Gromit's cool, he earned it. He did, Matt.

All right. Wait, so I have a question, Matt. Yes? So this guard robe, can I put it on? Yeah, you can put it on. Okay, so then? So that adds, so your magic becomes a plus six. You can just mark that there. Okay, so then. So that adds, so your magic becomes a plus six.

You can just mark that there. Got it, okay. And you get one more use of both of your spells. Oh, cool. Nice. And then it says plus four defense, so would I add that to? Yeah, and what armor do you have right now? I have 10. What's the bonus of your body armor?

The bonus of your body armor you have currently. Oh, bonus of my body armor. Oh, the leather coat would be plus three, so that gives it up to a plus four. So your defense would become an 11. Okay. Sweet. All righty. So, as all of you stand there,

watching as the guardian comes towering and rushing towards all of you, it goes first, because everyone rolled really bad. It's going to begin with a seismic swing. It's going to go ahead and swing and attack everybody in the front row. Oh boy. That's going to be a 17 to hit

all three of you in the front row. Yep. All right, you all take 38 points of physical damage. Oh my goodness. That's nasty. You are all, as it slams its fists, the sheer immensity of its power causes a shockwave to blast you all back and everyone switches rows.

Oh! Oh! That's not good. I can't attack. Okay. Hey, do could attack. Okay. Hey, do-si-do, am I right? Hey, do-si-do. Wow. Ow. That finishes the Runes Guardian's turn.

So bringing us back to Barnaby. You can play Grimmick now. Oh shit. Oh. I go? Wait, no, it's Grimm. Oh, sorry, no, Grimmick. I read that wrong. Oh, sorry, my bad. Grimmick goes up. Grimmick's going to go.

Grimmick cannot attack from the back row. Yes. Oh, that's right. Because Grimmick has an axe, which is, so Grimmick would have to either defend or use an item or use the shift ability to change positions with somebody in the front row. I'm going to...

You know what? Let's do defense. I would recommend shift. Shift? Yeah. Just because we're going to have to flip people. Let's shift. What's the lowest physical defense, then, out of us three in the front row? Also, whoever has distance attacks also.

You might want to, yeah. Actually, the two of you should flip, I think. Or... us three in the front. Also, whoever has distance attacks also. You might want to, yeah. Actually, the two of you should flip, I think. Or, because you have the bow. Either of the two. Barnaby? What's your physical? Because if he attacks, my physical defense is 12, so maybe if yours is lower than that,

maybe you should switch. But I don't know what it is with the robe. Let's switch with Barnaby. Okay, wonderful. Yeah, let's switch. Let's switch with Barnaby. Oh, the Wonder Woman. Yeah. Let's switch. Get me away from this thing. All righty. I'm going to use it. Cool.

All right, with that, Barnaby, you shift back to the front and Gremik gets to the front. SAM and MATTRUDE, All right, that finishes your go there. Gremik is done. Teddy, you're up. I'm going to use an item. I know I should switch, but I'm going to use the Clave Guardian Scroll.

Okay. Ow. So my defense is now 14. Oh, nice. Okay. Cool. Yeah. Hey, fight one guardian with another guardian. That's crazy. So, because ow.

But yeah, that's all I got. Will you use the scroll? You only get that one use? Yeah. Pretty bad, 42. 14-0. All right. Scrolls, scrolls, unless they have multiple dots, they're just one use only.

All right, finishing your go there, Tay? Pips, you're up. Oh. With Barnaby on deck. My goodness. All right, so I am going to take a shot and I'm going to try to do a firewall. Okay, let's go.

That's just going to make it harder, right? Well. You're smelting it. Nine. Nine, unfortunately, just misses. So you do half damage on that. Oh, I do, okay. So that's, okay, so it's 96 plus eight.

So one, three, one. Five. Six. 11. Two. 13. Five. 18.

One. 19. Four. 18. One. 19. Four. 23. One. 25, 24. Six. 30.

And two. 32. Plus eight. 40 points of damage reduced to, so that's 20 points of magic damage. The first damage taken by the rune's guardian, a firewall engulfs the front of it. As it burns, you see it pushes through, but nevertheless, the stone heats up.

You can see the edges between where the various pieces of rock formulate the statue, themselves crack slightly. It is taking damage. So great. Okay, okay. All right. Okay. That finishes your turn. Yarr.

At the end of your turn, Pips, Barnaby, you're up. Teddy, you look like you're going to go down soon. I'm okay at the moment. I'm going to hold off just for a little bit. I will throw my boomerang at it. Let's go. Nat 1. Wonderful! Okay.

Oh boy. A nat 1. I go, the power is just too much for me right now. Oh great, I take eight damage from that. Oh no! All right. Holy moly! The Ruins Guardian, unfortunately,

has reach with its massive fists, so it's going to counterattack from the back row. So it is going to attack you. That's going to be a 21 to hit you. Oh my god. That just about does it. That just about does it. All right, you take...

38 points of physical damage as its fist just moves between Grimmick. I'm well. Okay. My face is Donald Duck to the side. Yeah. You said 32? Yeah. Okay, cool. 30.

38. 38. Oh, okay. Okay. 26 is rough. Sheesh! Yeah, that's really tough. So that finishes Barnaby's turn. Zasari, you're up. With Mabel on deck. Would you like to shift?

Can I shift? Well, I need to, yeah. Yes, I shift with, is that my entire turn? That would be your action, yeah. Worth it. All righty, finishing Zasari's go to shift to get you in the front row. Mabel, you're up. Oh, I got to smack it. I goty. Finishing Zuzari's go to Shift to get you in the front row. Mabel, you're up.

Oh, I got to smack it. I got to smack it real good. I'm going to try to smack it in the inner knee. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Try to knock it off balance, you know what I mean? Totally, totally. Go for it. Let's go ahead and roll an attack on that.

No. One. No! Needless! No way! I'm going to roll with it every time. We're awesome. So you go.

You take out the end and then the guardian to de-roll all the ones. You go ahead and swing and it hits the side of its knee and the knee does not budge. The hammer just goes like. The wobble goes through your body. As you gather yourself, you look up, just as it brings its one fist up

to counterattack you from above. That's going to be a 22 to hit. No. Yeah, it just hits. Narrow. I think that was it. Why is it I can roll high on doors? 27 points of physical damage to you.

All right. 17. Wham! Massive crushing blow from above. Jeez. All right. I'm really hurting. All right, that finishes your go. Back to the top of the round. Now it's the Rune Guardian's turn.

Yeah. Let's see if it regains. Regain? It sees Seismic Swing. On a four plus, it does. It regains its Seismic Swing. Fuck. Oh no. It is going. I. On a four plus it does, it regains its seismic swing. Fuck. Oh no. It is going. I think I'll miss you.

You'll also miss me. However, it's going to use its shockwave ability. It's going to do plus four to all in a column. Since you emitted the firewall on it, it's going to go ahead and bring its hands back and like Hulk slam its both hands together to go towards both of you in that column right there for both Pips and Zussari.

It's going to be an 11. Does 11 hit either of you? No. Just hits. It just hits you. So it misses Zussari, but it hits you. The shockwave blasts into you. You take...

No! 30 points of magical damage. Okay. And you are silenced. No! The rune within you, your fire rune, suddenly goes quiet. And as you try and shout, nothing comes out, and you lose the ability to use your rune.

You said 30? 30 points. Okay, so minus six. I'm going to connotate you as silenced with this. No. Piffs, are you all right? I can fix it. I've done it before, I can fix it. But I need to fix myself first.

I've got these large gashes. It'll take just about a moment. I think we're fine over here. Yeah, just a little bit. Just a moment. All righty. Okay, Grimmick's turn. Indeed, Grimmick and Teddy.

All right, Grimmick, show us what you got. Grimmick. Grimmick's turn! Shit! No, no way. Five. Five misses. What are you rolling the dice? Three.

Three is within the Ruined Guardian's counter range. Oh my god. This is real rough, y'all. This is really bad. The guardian rolls a nine to hit Grimmick. What's his evasion? Nine. Just hits him.

No! This is so bad. Oh my god. This is so dark. Oh. Oh no! Oh, Grimmick. Grimmick takes 38 points of physical damage.

Woo! All right. So you just double hand over. Just slams. Gromit goes like, and just flattens out the shield above. The guardian's fists are still on the ground before it dislodges them,

like bits of rock and stone falling. Gromit, like, Oh no! Oh no! Picks up the shield and the axe and just looks back at you. I'm sorry, I think it's cool. Oh no! He picks up the shield and the axe and looks back at you. I'm sorry, I think it's cool. Oh no! Gremmick, it's okay, I'll grab you anyway.

Wait, that's, you said 30, so I use, that was magic defense or defense? No, regular defense. Regular defense, okay, so I could do, so it's 30? That would be 30, yeah. Okay. All right, that finishes Gremmick's go. Teddy, you're up with Pips on deck.

I actually have to flip with Pips because I can't do anything where I am. So we're flipping. All right. You get back there, you'll be fine. Oh boy. That's my turn. The elf row.

All righty, finishing your run. Pips, you're up with Barnaby on deck. Oh shit. Okay, all right, so. No rune magic. Remix is at 47. Okay, oh, okay, I'm silenced. I can't use rune magic, so I'm just going to take a shot with my bow.

All righty, go for it, roll for an attack. Okay. I don't think that's going to work. No way! That means a seven. Wow. Seven to hit? Yeah. That misses. What'd you roll on the dice? I rolled a three.

Oh my gosh! We are so fucking close! It ruins guardians. This is so bad! Its crit range is a one to three. Or sorry, its counter range is a one to three. So you rolled a three, that is a counterattack. So as you release the arrow, you pull back,

right as the guardian sees it happening, you fire the arrow and it swats it out of the air and brings its hand down, just to slam and crush you. Open palm on the ground. That's going to be 12 to hit. Why did I take a shot? Why did I hit? What did you say, 12 to hit? 12 to hit. That hits. That hits. As the hand's coming down. Yeah, why did I heal myself? Why did I do a shot? Why did I hit? What did you say, 12 to hit? 12 to hit. That hits.

As the hand's coming down. Why did I hit myself? Why did I do this? Why was this a choice? Okay, not a great damage roll for him. 22 points of physical damage against you. Okay. Great one. Okay, you have that. That was a bad damage roll.

Wait, you said, I'm so sorry. 22 points of physical damage. Physical. Physical. Okay, so that was 22, you said? Correct. Great, okay. As you just wham, just open palm, crushes you onto the ground. You get pulled underneath.

The hand eventually removes itself and you stick to it for a second and then peel off and drop. We are getting slaughtered. Demolished. Out of his turn. All right, finishing Pip's turn. Barnaby, you're up with Zussari on deck. As much as I'd like to help everyone else here,

I cannot go down or else I can't heal or heal anybody. So I will, once again, pull out this long slab, stone slab that is painted white, looks very intricately detailed. We found this in some kind of ceremonial site, don't ask. And then I'll turn it around and face it at myself as I get blasted by a strong yellow light. I will use my Healing Wind

and I will heal to full HP from 18. Yes! There you go, boom. Awesome. 18, yeah. Oh, yeah, you needed that. I was so close. You do what you need. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cool. Hell yeah.

I don't care how dead I am. Don't use it on me, okay? I, all right, I'll use the rag. Oh man! Your favorite rag. I hate the rag. I'm slowly gaining it. I'm chasing the rag.

Not the rag. No, no, no. I'm fuming. All right, sorry, you're up. Is that Jinsei? I also use one of my medicines to heal myself. All right, here you're 50. To full health. Hell yeah. All right, Jasari's done.

Maple, you're up. All right, mother effer. I just see everybody getting beat up, and I go. Valid response. Valid response. That's fair. I'm going to go for his knee again. Here we go. Come on. Oh. Oh my god!

Oh my god! Seven? You're a heavy hitter! But what did you roll? A three. Fuck! God! This is so fucking ridiculous! Why is this happening? Okay, I'm going to roll this above the table. Yeah. Because now we're getting

to that fun point. All right, that is going to be a 12 to hit you. Oh, yes! I'm 13. 13, it misses you! Yes! Oh god! Okay, awesome. Okay, good. So it's a plus six to hit. So that's full on.

This time, as you go forward, you're like, I got this! And you just, the fear of the last impact hits you, and you falter a little bit. As you look up and see the shadow coming towards you, you leap back just in time as the fist hits the ground, cracking the stonework and leaving this massive indent crater

in the middle of the temple floor. All right, that finishes your turn. Top of the round, Rune Guardian's turn. Yep, yep. Let's see if it gets its shockwave back. It does not. Oh, thank goodness. It has a seismic swing,

but instead it's going to use its one-a-day special. It's going to use Toxic Fog. Of course it is. Yay! It inhales. And exhausts from inside of its stone mouth this dark, brackish, purple-brown fog that fills out the entire space there. That is going to be...

10? Does 10 hit anyone? No, not me. No. Well, it hits Gremik. Gremik. Gremik, no! Does 10 hit you? No. Oh man, wow, he rolled really bad on that one.

Yay. So Gremik is poisoned. Gremik! Oh, thank you, poisoned is so bad. Yeah. So he's six damage, okay. Do you want to take over for Grimmick now? Sure, yeah. We're passing along. And Grimmick takes eight points of magic damage

from the fog. And is now poisoned. Okay. So he doesn't take any, because of his magic defense, right? Grimmick, how do you feel? Oh boy. I have a headache, so give him a thumbs up. Grimmick's how do you feel? Oh boy. I have a headache just getting thrown a thumbs up. Grimmick's cool as hell.

You got an antidote, right? I do. Do you? But you need to use your runes, right? I mean, I can do more damage with the runes. Yeah, but I mean, I guess we should. Grimmick is up, by the way. Oh yes, okay.

Grimmick immediately takes 2d6. Takes 2d6 points of magic damage. up, by the way. Oh, he is, okay. Grimmick immediately takes 2d6. Takes 2d6, points magic damage. No, of physical damage. Or does he just straight take it? No, it's 2d6 damage, but ignores physical. Yeah, maybe ignores it. So he takes the full thing? Yeah. Okay, cool.

He'll take six, go down to 41. Oh, he's fine. Yeah. That's fine, this is another, I mean, well, you know. Doing fine, doing fine. His thumb is this. Cool, I assume, well, you know. Doing fine, doing fine. His thumb is just. Cool, I assume he just wants to swing at this thing, so we'll go ahead and roll that.

Should do some damage to this thing. Yeah, yeah, hit it, maybe. Oh, nice, okay, cool. 17? 17 hits. Nice! Look at that! Look at that!

Grab it! We got another hit! Cool. Oh my god, this has just been... Yeah, wow, it's been rough. Roll damage. It's been so rough. 13 damage. 13 damage. Yep.

Grimmack strikes it with a heavy-ass. It scrapes it and does a little bit of damage, but this is a hardy entity. And its defense is high enough to the point where you have to do a lot of damage at once because it is a high defense. It is a stone guardian. So Grimmack, even with a heavy hit with his axe,

it barely cuts through its stone. Finishing Grimmack's go. Teddy, you're up. How are you guys on health? I'm at full. I just went back to full. How are you on health? I'm at 31, but I can take some health. Something.

Yeah, I can take something. I was wondering if you guys wanted to try the... Oh, I want to some health. Something. Yeah, I can take something. I was wondering if you guys wanted to try the... Oh, I want to try it. You want to try the Whirling Fury? Absolutely. Oh, let's try Whirling Fury! Okay, so I'll take my attack, and then you guys are going to do Whirling Fury?

All right, so I'm taking just a straight shot to see what I can do here, because I have waited for this. I'm going to go and try to get my fingers in its throat. Nat 20. Yes! Let's go! It's going get my fingers in its throat. Nat 20. Yes! Let's go! Let's go in for the throat hit right there.

All right. That's going to hurt your hand. It's worth it. These strong hands. My hands are strong. All right. That's 24 times two. We're going to say 48.

Nice. Heavy. The hit, even with its defense, you break through with a heavy impact because you jump off its knee, off its shoulder, and then just impact it right in the throat. The stone cracks inward,

and you watch as Chunks fall free. Yes! Backflip back. You backflip back as the head shifts down in your direction and the hands try to reach for you and just go wide as you land, flipping back, landing on your feet right in the front, ready to go. We do take damage at the drawback. So I don't know if you want to risk that or not.

Just letting you know. I run up and grab the stones. Oh yeah, you're right. All three of you take damage. Hey, you want one? What is this? It's one of the stones that fell off the tree. Oh, absolutely. Wait, okay. I put it in my pocket. Hell yeah. Speaks to me.

So if you do this whirlwind fury, all enemies take 3d8 plus double your combined strength stats. Takes all enemies take 3d8 plus double your combined strength stats. Takes all of our 3d8s combined? Sorry, this is for? For Whirling Fury. Whirling Fury. Because I'm at 31. I don't know if this is smart.

Right. Yeah, so it's not based on weapons. All enemies take 3d8, plus double your combined strength stats. So the idea is that you add all your strength together and then double that on top of whatever the 3d8, plus double your combined strength stats. So the idea is you add all your strength together and then double that on top of whatever the 3d8 is. Got you. So it's more useful for multiple enemies and groups,

but single targets, it's debatable. But also, you get to all roll and see if you're all right. So up to you. You all take the highest roll. We can hold off if you want to. Yeah, but it's cool. It's cool, but it's cool. It's cool, but it's cool, but we take damage at the end.

It's cool, and you all get to choose the highest of the attack roll, so it's like. It's a better chance of it being successful. Up to you. Up to you. We could try it. Let's try it, we haven't tried it yet. Let's do it, let's do it.

Oh boy. All right, so have you all roll an attack roll against the guardian, the highest among you will use. Ooh. Six. 17. Nice. We are adding, what do we add to it? Magic? Accuracy. No, accuracy.

Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. 18. Oh yeah, it's 10. Okay, great, yeah, so that hits. Nice. So someone roll 3d8, and what's your strength modifier? My strength modifier is one. One, what's your strength modifier? My strength modifier is one. One, what's your strength modifier? Two. Two is three.

Also two. Two, so it's five, so 10. So roll 3d8 plus 10 damage. Just one of us? Yeah, all of you do together. 3d10? Yes. Okay. 3d8. Sorry, 3d8. 3d8, okay. Nine.

So 19. Not the best roll. No, that's okay. But however, it does still break past his defense and he does take a heavy impact. Describe how the three of you do your combined attack. Zussari, I don't know if you saw earlier our... I've been wanting to try the throw. I grab it at the arm reference. Yes! Then I was like, start running in a circle.

Okay. I was like, the force of us two. The typical. We start to hover. We toss ourselves out. And just kicks. Impacts knocks back a little bit. All the impacts also loosens

your shoulders a bit in a rough way, and you're all like, oh, that's going to feel real rough in the morning. But a heavy impact past his defense, and you all take, I'll roll damage here on this. You all take, oh, that's like three points of damage. Oh, nice. It's fine. Not too bad.

All right, so that finishes your go. Pips, Barnaby, and Zotari. You're up, Mabel. Of course I'm up. It's Mabel time. Mabel time! I'm going to do the same thing. I got to get this to work, man.

Yep, yep. I'm going for that knee. Here we go. I believe in you. I believe in you. 18 plus four! Yeah! Yeah! Nice! That's it. That's a crit! Oh, that's a crit!

Oh, nice. Yes! Wall damage! It's all coming back! Ah! Ah! 10 and an eight plus 11. That's it. That's a crit. Oh, that's a crit! Oh, nice. Nice! Wall damage! It's all coming back! Ah! Ah! 10 and an eight plus 11. So 18 plus 11, 29 times two. 58 points of damage.

That's a heavy fucking hit. I run up and I'm like, fuck this knee! I'm just like, wham! The kneecap just explodes outward and a massive stone about the size of your torso rolls down the stairs and skids by. You're like, oh, if that had hit somebody,

it would have killed him. But the knee falls onto one ground and now he's still standing, but just on one knee. Oh, cool. There we go. Busted one leg and just busted out. Does that change anything about him? It's reducing his defense a little bit, I'll allow it. Mm-hmm.

All right. Yes. Hey, we're all working together, right? Hell yeah. I softened it for you. We softened it for you. We did. The buzzsaw. So his defense is reduced a little bit. That finishes your go, Mabel.

And now it's the runes guardian's turn. Yeah, it's going to Seismic Swing. It's going to Seismic Swing to all of you in the front row. Yeah. That's going to be a 21 to hit. No! Wait, I'm in the back now? Yeah, you're in the back. Yeah, I threw you back there.

Are we going to switch positions here? That is going to be 30 points of physical damage to Gremik, to Mabel, and to Teddy. Ooh-doo. You all get knocked back into the road again. You're at five? You got a heal. While you're back there, you should heal.

Do not worry. I don't have anything. Yo, you still got that rag? I do! Oh, you seem very excited about it. No, I just need the health is all. All right. As you all get pushed back and shifted back in the position,

wrangling your setup in a bad way. Finishing the Rune Guard, Gremmik is up. Gremmik takes... Oh, I'm Gremmik. Gremmik takes five points of damage. Oh no! From the poison. He's at 41 right now.

Wait, what was the 30, the seismic? Oh yeah, 30 fizz. 30 fizz. That's physical, yeah. And that's an additional 23. To what? Because I don't think you marked the physical from the last attack. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So he's at 23. 23 damage.

Oh, he's actually pretty messed up now. He's at 13 hit points. Yeah. Pretty messed up now. Gremm at 13 hit points. Yeah, but he's pretty messed up now. Gromit, how do you feel? SAM and LAURA, all of a sudden, SAM and LAURA, all of a sudden, Oh man!

It's pretty bad. It's pretty bad, man. All right, Gromit's going for an attack, I guess. Gromit cannot attack, because Gromit's in the back row after being seismic slammed. The fam? What's the, oh, it's poison. Oh, so you can flip.

So that's the one thing Gromit can do, is he can actually come forward and shift. Like, I would, yeah, I would definitely shift. Should he? Oh, because somebody's about to die? Well, also, our healer's in the front row right now. Oh, I see, so I should switch with, Grimmick should switch with Pip or? Or with Barnaby.

Or with Barnaby. Oh, okay. Want to do that? Yeah, we could do that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Yes, please go! I was going to say Oh, okay. Want to do that? Yeah, we can do that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Yes, please go! I was just going to say, attack or flip with me so I can attack.

But either way, yeah. All right, so that finish your go, Max go? Fuck. Teddy, it's your go. I'm flip, I'm changing my flip. All right, who are you flipping with? With Pips. All right, you got it.

Yep. Let's go, Teddy. Back up front. That's what I got. Okay. There you go. All righty, finishing your go, Teddy. Pips, you're up. All right, I'm going to take a shot with my front. That's what I got. Okay. There you go. All righty. Finishing Yorgo Teddy. Pips, you're up. All right, I'm going to take a shot with my bow. Let's go. Yep.

Maybe I should heal myself. Oh, I'm going to take a shot with my bow. You could also, you could also, you also have a Unite Attacks if you want to. Don't forget you have that at your disposal. Say again? Unite Attacks. Unite Attacks. Oh, I just rolled. That's cool. And I rolled shit.

I rolled a nine. You rolled a nine? Yeah. Okay, a total of nine? A total. Total nine misses, unfortunately. Oh, I just rolled. That's cool. And I rolled shit. I rolled a nine. You rolled a nine? Yeah. Okay, a total of nine? A total. Total nine misses, unfortunately. Nothing happens. But he does not get a counterattack on you, I don't believe, right?

No, I rolled a five. Yeah, you're fine. Okay, cool. So you fire the arrows, splinters across the chest, no major impact. That finishes your go. Barnaby, you're up with the susari on deck. All right, no worries. I'll take out a rag and I'll wring it out

and I'll look over here. Oh, here it comes. Oh. Yeah it comes. Oh. Yeah. Now I'm on ECS. Yeah, no, wait, wait, wait. I just start sucking on it. Oh my gosh! Yeah, dude!

I request a rag when I'm injured, and that seems quite refreshing. How are you feeling right now? I'm great. Okay. There's a world if you want to double up. I'm completely open. Yeah, we'll lose defense, but I'm okay. I'm okay with that. I can take it.

Are you okay? I'm still in my high 40s. All right, yeah, we can do it. All right, I'm next. 55. Yeah. Do we wait till... No, if you initiate it, then I just lose my next turn, which I'm fine with. Okay, yeah, let's do it.

I take the rag that I just took out of my mouth, and now it's only sopping with my spit, and I just like, thunk it on the ground, and I'm like, yeah! Feel great! Fill that rag up, baby! It just full-dust, like, make it weird. It just doesn't even move, it just sticks.

A horrible wet slant. You can't see my ocean, but just doesn't even move, it just sticks. A horrible wet slam. I can't see my ocean, but my eyes are concerned. Like right behind it. Yep, yep, yep. It's like looking around. Oh god. All right, well that finishes. Barnabas, go.

Zussari, you're up. We have Mabel on. We're going to do our Unite. I'm like, Sensei! Yeah. Ready. Let's go for it. All right, so this will take up your next turn. Yeah. All right.

I rolled a four. Hopefully you rolled better. 11. If both hit, all right. Otherwise, only damage for the hit. If only one, we get d6. So you rolled a? Four.

Oh, a total of? Eight. Eight? That does, unfortunately, miss. 11. That does hit. Okay, so we get the d6. Okay. So otherwise, only damage for the weapon that hit plus 2d6. So I'll roll for my attack.

So while unfortunately, the impact of everything around hearing the shouting and the heavy, sick thud of the wet rag on the ground unsettles you and distracts you briefly, so your strikes just go wide against the creature. I'm sorry. I got a little overexcited. I'll keep it together next time. 13, eight, and five.

So that's 26 points of damage. All right, got it. All right! All right! Not bad, not bad. Not bad, not bad. All right, that finishes your go. That brings us to the Mabel's turn. Oh, hell yeah. Let's go for the other knee, baby!

Yeah, let's go! Here we go! Come on, Mabel. Whoosh, whoosh. 18! Yeah! That's another crit! Another crit!

Yeah! All right. Let's go! That's your knee! That's what we need. Oh, 10, six, 11. So 16, 26, 52 points of damage. Yeah!

Whoa! It's that rag, it's all the rag. Did that rag be soaked yet? Can I have some more of that? I do have more, I don't know if I want that. I revile a rag! You seem very dependent on the rag. I want to do that.

All right, here I go, I do this whoosh, and then the power overwhelms me and I'm spinning and shit. I do this whoosh, and then the power overwhelms me, and I'm spinning and shit. I'm like, yeah, boom! Crack! Other knee slams up from underneath, and it falls down. That's going to reduce its defense even further. Yes!

Nice. Doing work over here with the rag, with the rag. What's the status on the rag? Hail marinating. Hail marinating! Awesome. That finishes your turn. That brings us back to the Ruins Guardian. I can't attack. I wasn't back row.

Oh shit. Oh no! No! No! Oh no! No! No! No!

The rack! We'll save that for your next turn. Oh my god. I'm going to hold onto that. We'll come back to that. Because that for your next turn. Oh my god. I'm going to hold onto that. We'll come back to that, because that was an amazing turn. But for now, you're in the back row. Do you want to switch?

Yes. I take it you want to switch with Zussari? Is that Kosher? That is Kosher, but I think you should switch with... No. He's at 13. Grimmick? Grimmick. Up to you. Yeah, I'll switch with... No. He's at 13. Grimmick? Grimmick. Up to you.

Yeah, I'll switch with Grimmick. Yeah, yeah. All right. Grimmick will. Isn't Grimmick dying? No, Grimmick's at 47 hit points. Oh no, he's at 13. He's at the 13. Yeah. You hang back, Grimmick.

I got you. I got you, buddy. Okay. All right, so that swaps. We'll serve that awesome moment for the next turn. All right, bringing it to the top. It is now the Runesguardian's turn. It's going to go ahead and do a massive front row swing. Oh no, it's going to do back row.

Oh! Oh! Oh! Because it can choose either. Grimmick! Oh! Grimmick! I'm going to roll this in front. This was my fault. That's going to be a 17 to hit.

I did this. Yeah. I did this. You did. I did this. Roll low, roll low, roll low. I did this. I'm going to roll this damage in front, too. Oh boy. Oh!

Oh, that's rough. 37 points of physical damage to everybody in the back row. 37? 37. Oh, that's rough. 37 points of physical damage to everybody in the back row. 37? 37. Oh, that's rough. Gremik. Okay, so.

Yeah, no, Gremik's dead. So as he swings, you see it's going to go for the front row and it arches forward. It's one broken knee, it leans over and just heavy arc swings it, slams into all three of you.

Can I do an emotional last ditch to try to hit the hand out of the way to save Gremik? Because you just moved to the back row, I'll say you move up the hammer to do so, but it's not quite strong enough to resist it. As the impact goes by, the two other, you see, Pips and Barnaby stand, pulling back, and you look over and meet your eyes, but you all notice

that Mabel is not looking back at you. Mabel is looking at the unconscious and bleeding body of Gremik that is just flat on the ground. Now, healing somebody while they're unconscious does nothing. They only recover after battle. Oh. Unless you have a way of reviving an ally.

Okay. Grimmick! No! Okay. I'm covered in Grimmick right now. Oh my god. My ears are ringing. It's like Black Hawk Down.

I get a fire in my eyes. Okay. That finished the runes. Garni's turns. Grimmick doesn't get a turn because Grimmick is unconscious and is out of the battle. Teddy, you're up.

I have to skip my turn because we used the storm. That's right, you used your thing last turn. So I'm running back. Pips, you're up. Barnaby on deck. Okay, I am at two hit points. I am going to heal. Take a healing potion. Please. For 50 HP.

I could also heal you, and then that way you can take an attack. Oh, but I guess if you missed that. Yeah, then you missed an attack. Then something goes horribly wrong. Then something goes horribly wrong, yeah. I got it, I got it, I got it. Okay, so I am now at 52.

You got it. Okay. All righty. Barnaby, you're up. Is Asari on deck? Anybody else super messed up right now? I'm holding fine. Okay. Yeah? I got it. I can take one big hit.

I'm only emotionally messed up. Yeah. That speaks to me. Yeah, I got it. I can take one big hit. I'm only emotionally messed up, yeah. That speaks to me. Yeah, I will throw my boomerang at this guy. Let's go. Oh my god. What the crazy? Seven. I rolled a four.

You rolled a four. You're outside of the counter range. I will still take the eight from it. Dude, I take another eight. That's crazy. This is absurd bad luck, y'all. That was so crazy. My gobs have melted into my skin.

We'll talk about it later. No worries. That's crazy. Priestess is just flesh now. Yeah, I didn't see that. There's another love left. All right, finishing Barnaby's gut brings us to Zussari.

All right. Let's get a hit, please. Okay, 14? 14 hits. Let's go. Please, good. Okay, 14? 14 hits. Yes! Let's go! Please, good damage roll, good damage roll. 13.

13 damage. Oh, wait. 13, 19, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17. 17 points of damage. All right, great. So while still reduced by its defense, still a heavy hit that cracks through the stone, starting to show wear and tear. The guardian is starting to look damaged.

You are impactfully, it has crossed a threshold of bloodied. It is now, if it could bleed, it would be bloodied. It is about half health, I'd say. Okay. That finishes your turn. Mabel, now, you awesome brushboard! Yes! Earlier, while you were in the back row, you had this vision of the future.

This brief burst of the moment where you're like, wait, that could be me. I'll do it right now. For Gromit! Rush up, wham, knock out its knee, critical hit, boom! 48 damage, reducing its defense. It now falls on its second knee. It's almost like you had foresight.

You can see the future. Whoa. That was like magic. No, it wasn't. It was just my love for Grimmick is all. That's all it was. Love for Grimmick is magical. Yes! Yes!

There it is. Yes. All right. The Ruins Guardian is going to go ahead and shockwave to this column here. Ooh. Wonderful. I'm going to roll this in front. Which column? The one I'm on?

That is going to be an eight to hit. Oh, that's just nice. Or the natural two. Oh, that means, does anybody get a counter on that? No. It's a two? My card's a two. It's a two. He rolled a two? He rolled a two. I count as four. Yeah, so both of you get a counter attack. Oh, yeah! Let two? My card is two. It's a two. He rolled a two? He rolled a two. I count as four.

Yeah, so both of you get a counter attack. Oh, yeah! He's going to hit it. Nat 20. No! That's what it's about! Nat 20! I'm out!

I'm out! I can't stop! I'm out! Look, I swear to you it's not scripted. This is such, it's crazy scripted. This is crazy! Oh my god. This is why we get shit on the internet. Yeah, I know, dude!

We're like, no! Shit. That's crazy. Oh my god. Be fair, it's the balance roll that one you guys rolled earlier. Wait, I did. Which camera? It is. It's the balance.

Yeah. It's the balance. Yeah, all right. Well, both of you guys roll your damage and then double it. Oh my god, you guys. This is so cool. Dude, it's all from Gremik. He's serious.

He's enchanted. He's viewing you. Yes, he is. 22. Times. Is that including your plus? That's the double. I had 11, six, seven, eight, 10.

Oh wait, no, it's not plus. Dude. I'm sorry, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15. So 30, actually. 30 points of damage. Y'all, I did 62 damage. Oh my god! Make it go, make it go!

Yeah, that was, I rolled, all right, 12, 8, 20, 24. Wait, 24 plus seven, which would be 31, so 62? Yes. Yeah. 62. Oh my god! Oh my god! Y'all, Kremic didn't need us. We needed Kremic! Yeah. Six hits. Oh my god! Oh my god! Let's go. Remick didn't need us. We needed Remick!

Holy shit! Wow. That's so good. Wow. Holy fuck. That is so mad. Yeah, that swung things the other way a little bit. Okay, dang. Is he still up? Oh yeah, he's still up. Oh shit. Oh way a little bit. Okay, dang. Is he still up? Oh yeah, he's still up. Oh shit.

Oh my god, okay. I got excited. That was his attack. Wild. Damn! All right. Teddy, you're up. The guardian is now on the, doesn't have the feet up, on the knees, is on the back knee after losing both knees and is like, I'm just going to spend my turn going.

No, okay, yeah. I'm going for it. Come on. That's, oh my god, that's a crit. That's 15. Let's go! Gremik. Gremik! Chance is all. Oh my god, okay. Never forget!

I run over to Grimmick's body and I take my star necklace off and I pull it out of him. You love it. Yes! I go in and I just go full running. I'm trying to get to the dragon punch right to the chest, right where the heart is, and that's 52 points of damage.

Ooh! How do you like it? Yes! Let's go, let's go. Yes! Woof woof, motherfucker. One, two, three, woof! You punch through and you watch as the back, outside the back of his shoulder,

just rocks go flying out the side. As you pull your hand back, you see this massive hole in the guardian's chest. The guardian starts tumbling and breaking off in pieces. The stones crumble and tumble, and eventually, as it tries to lurch forward, its fists up you, watches its body

before it can get the momentum to even strike back at you, just crumbles apart and fills the ground with shale and broken stone. You're grounded. Hey! Oh! I am going to run over to Grimmick. Me too. Great.

And I was given this budding healing herb from Zue. Yes. and I was given this budding healing herb from Zue. Yes. And it revives one ally to one HP. So I'm going to go over and just scruff his little head and just open his mouth and just shove it. Be a little more gentle, Gretel. You're sitting up the other side.

You've obviously fed a dog a pill. You got it. Yeah, where you're like, no, You've obviously fed a dog a pill. Yeah, yeah. Where you're like, no, no, no, no, no. Close the snout. Just swallow, just swallow, just swallow. Hey, buddy! Vremig! Vremig!

Woo! Ow! Seize the pile of stone. You got him! You got him! You got him. Wear treasure. Oh. Gremik, look down. Gremik?

Yeah. Treasure? For Gremik. Gremik been treasure whole time? I mean, I was talking about your necklace, but. Shit! Yeah, yeah, yeah, shit! No, you've been the treasure the whole time, Gremik.

The treasure was you, Gremik. Gremik has a lot to think about. Gremik's not wasted a lot of time. Took a lot of time to learn treasure with him. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Yeah.

Kind of clashes. Looks better on you, Gremig. It really does. It does. Yeah. SAM and LAURA and LAURA and LAURA and LAURA and LAURA and Okay, Gremig. As the room shifts slightly, and you watch as the stone statue

of the two-headed serpent shifts slightly, and you hear in the distance something move, something large. You hear this heavy slithering sound from beyond the hall of where you are currently in. There is no other exit to the chamber that you currently sit in, but the hall you came from, and that sound is coming from that direction.

What do you do? Hey, Grimmick. Yeah? No! No! I can't breathe! Oh god. Yeah?

How are you feeling right now, bud? Grim reaper, I'm going to see a little wind in you. We have something for Grym. Give us some of that rag. We need a little rag right now. Yeah, here, come here, Grim reaper. Just give him a little rag action. It's a broken stone,

and there's the hallway you exited from. There's nothing else in this chamber. The central part of the chamber, really the part of this temple that it was protecting and gardening, or was this garden in the center, and the one living piece from it, you removed. And ate.

Then gave it to bring Grimmick back to life. So the treasure of this part of the temple was found and used. And something is now shifting and slithering elsewhere in the temple, coming from the sound of your only exit. What do you do? I'm going to make her run for it. We got to make her run for it, I guess.

Okay. Let's do a mad dash, right? I can always try to put him asleep. I think we got to get out of here. We have to leave? I think we should. We going? Yeah, what do you think, Remmick?

I think... I think Remmick has made new friends. Let's go. Yeah! You're my treasure! Yeah! All right! You hear this weird slithering hissing sound from beyond

in response to your loud howling that draws tension to your area. Oh yeah! That's fair. Oh, oh, oh! You all just start running out through the hallway that you came from. You can see where the beginning of the aqueduct begins,

where the water had been set out. You all notice as you see a shadow slither past the opposite side of that chamber where you had originally come through. Something that fills this chamber moves by. Cormac goes, I'm scared. Wait, so there's something in the aqueduct? You all exit this area

and you see some large black shadow just go. Ooh, right there. Okay. What we're going to do, we're going to turn around, we're going to break, we're going to break the dam that's holding the water back. Yeah, and ride the water out?

We're going to ride the water out. We're going to ride the water out. Yeah. We're going to ride the water out. Yeah. Let's do it. We're going to ride the water out? We're going to ride the water out. Yeah. We're going to ride the water out. Yeah. Let's do it. We're going to ride the water out? We're going to ride the water out. Okay.

Can I try to peek around this corner and try to shoot this to get it started again? I was going to say we can just shoot. Because it's a metal thing or there's a- A gate has fallen to close off the water supply. So we have to break the gate? You have to either break the gate or somehow get the machine to lift it back up again.

You could try and shoot. If you think there's something on there, it's going to be a very hard shot, but it's possible. Breaking the gate might be easier. Yeah, yeah, yeah, break the gate, sorry. Break the gate. I didn't realize about the gate. That's all good, that's all good.

Let's break the gate. Mabel, would you do me honors? Oh. Oh, this is the gate, right? Yeah. Okay, I can just run up and hit it then. We wait for the moment. Yeah, we're going to time this.

All right. The shadow shifts by and heads this area. You have a closer look of it now as you're down in the basin. It looks like a gargantuan serpent. Something that's probably a good 15 feet wide and is endlessly long, 60, 70, maybe 100 feet. You swear for a second, you almost saw one,

no, two heads. Oh. Uh-oh. Slither by as it vanishes this way. Whoa. If we weren't about to die, I'd say that's cool as hell. Okay, wait for it to come back, and once the tail goes by, once you hear it pass one more time,

we're going to make a run for it. Fuck out of that. Yeah, yeah, okay. I'll go, I'll go. All right, I'm going! And I'm going with you. Yeah, all right. You both just go charging down the base. Yeah!

Both of you roll strength checks for me. Come on. 12 plus three. No, no, I rolled a one. No! You rolled a one. Oh no! All right, so you go in like. Ah!

Like your fingers crack and break backward. You slam into it once. It cracks, but it's not enough. No! Oh no. You can try again if you want to. However, you hear in the distance the heavy impact echoes. SAM and SAM go. I'm going to try again, we're going can try again if you want to. However, you hear in the distance the heavy impact echoes.

I'm going to try again. We're going to try again. Go for it. Both of you roll again. Better. 19. Plus three. 15. Okay, you beat a 20? Yeah.

It impacts and breaks the water. Fills the basin, spreading by an incredible speed. Whoa! The rest of you that are waiting on the side suddenly get picked up by the water, as all of you now are being rushed in the rapids. The massive two-headed serpent comes around the corner and sees you all rushing in the water and is going to

take three bites at those that come first. Since you were both the first two coming in there, who amongst you would be the first in the basin? I'll let you choose. Should we roll for it? Sure, you know what? All three of you roll a d20, and then I'm going to roll for Grimmick.

13. 19. 17. 13 to 13, you and Grimmick, let's roll again. Roll these. Two. 15, it's you. Me. All right.

All right, so. It's going to be a 14 it's you. Me. All right. All right, so. It's going to be a 14 to hit you. It hits. You take... 35 points of physical damage. Ouch. As it bites you. You okay? Yeah, yeah, I'm good.

Okay. It's going to be a 11 to hit you. No. Misses you. Basically, you go underneath the water, goes by, and then coming towards you. When I come back, I pick up my hammer and I ride my little boat. Same roll. Nice!

So the two other heads snap by. No! What was that? I thought that was when you were going to do this. You're riding in the water, trying to tread water as best as you can as it carries you around the corner, underneath where the broken gate was, into the next chamber beyond, rocketing through. Eventually as you can, as it carries you around the corner, underneath where the broken gate was, into the next chamber beyond, rocketing through.

Eventually, you can see there's just a wall, and the water, you don't know where it's going to come to. Grimmick's like, Grimmy Crack Swim! It's just being dragged up and over the surface. The serpent is slithering up along the wall, trying to keep up with you all. You can see its shadow going up on the edge

and trying to follow suit. As you're getting to that point, the water then ducks beneath. It's sucked into an underground basin and everything goes dark. All of you have to hold your breath in the last minute. Hold your breath, Gryll! Then pulled under,

I need you all to roll a protection roll for me. What? I want to learn this protection. Roll a d20 and add your protection. Oh, that, that, that. This is more or less your endurance. Wait, what's protection? 20 for statistics. What? I don't have those protection rolls. Roll a d20 and add your protection. Oh, that, that, that. This is more or less your endurance. Wait, what's protection? 20 for statistics. Oh, I see. 20, nice! 20!

21. 19 for Grimmick. 20. One. No! Pardon me! Oh, I'm. So an impossible period of time passes, seconds, minutes, who knows, of shadow, where you are holding your breath

till your lungs begin to burn until you have no choice but to about to you are jettisoned out of a river waterfall down into a lake on the opposite side of that mountain edge and release as all of you eventually come to the surface, get your breath and swim there for a second and look at each other and check in.

Grandmate gets up there, and you see the floating shoulders of Barnaby, who is currently in the process of drowning. Barnaby! Run him over! Yeah, swim to him and try to grab him. Yeah, flip him over. Okay.

I'm just going to whack him in his chest. Awesome. Roll a strength check for me. Okay. Defeated 10. Definitely. 20. 20. Wham!

Kind of cracks your sternum, let's be real. You're going to be sore for a while, but you and it just sprays through the helmet. It's just, some of it gets in your own eyes because there's not a lot of room for it to go. Oh god. I think the boomerang took me. It took just, some of it gets in your own eyes because there's not a lot of room for it to go. Oh god. I think the boomerang took me. It took me, I'll be honest.

It did take me for a minute there. Thank you, thank you. I go over to Sensei and I grab the rock that is just above room temperature and I place it on your chest. Is this? That is the rock that is just above room temperature. It's true.

How heavy is that rock? So heavy. It drags you back underwater. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh gosh, who knows? It seems that these items weren't useless magic at all. Never.

It was just dependent on how you used them. Yes, as all things are. We couldn't hear that, though, because you're. Yeah, but I tried to get that across. You all take a minute to recover your breath and get an idea of where you now sit amongst the forest. It takes you the better part of the afternoon

before you can finally return to the White Deer Inn, exhausted, waterlogged. But nevertheless, Alex, Hilda, and Pete are there waiting, and as soon as you step within the door, looking worse for wear, Alex immediately pipes up, Friends! Friends, you've returned? My goodness. Tell me, what did you find?

Did you find the treasure? That was so fun. It was. Yeah. Quite thrilling and exhilarating. We were supposed to find stuff. We did. Oh, we did. You did? We found a lot of, we found a Jostle giant serpent. There's a giant giant serpent down there.

It's a lot. At some point. You may want to get that looked at. Yeah. All right. Armies of men, perhaps. Yeah, we did leave that door open. Yeah, it would have to go down the, it would have to. Right. I'm just saying, inevitably. Yeah, no did leave that door open. Yeah, it would have to go down the, it would have to. Right. I'm just saying, inevitably.

Yeah, no, that door is open. You might want to do what they did. I didn't have to, before we were thinking. But the treasure! Did you find the treasure? And big old hairy paw pushes past your shoulders as a barely conscious, bloodied Grimmick steps forward and goes,

I'm the treasure. And Alex goes, All right, you know what? I'll give you half what I promised. It's fine. I'll find somebody else to figure out where it is, but thank you all. He counts up a bunch of pots and gives you a pouch

and is like, why do I keep doing this? He's like, it's okay, honey. He's like, maybe I'm not cut off for this treasure hunting business. To be fair, you're probably not. You ran at the first sign of danger. No, you told me to go home to my family. I did, no, I told you to go home.

You know, this is a really nice inn. Yes. This is a great inn. I couldn't run an inn this nice. Make a lot of money, probably. No, this is a... I'm going to give you 100 pox for the evening and the food that you gave us, and a little extra for tech.

He looks you all over. Like, I think you've certainly put in the work. It's fine. I go to Remick, and I remove the necklace, and I go, Everyone says this is clashing. Maybe this will fetch you a pretty patch. Takes it.

Hmm. I could probably hock this in Muse City. It's definitely an artifact. Mm-hmm. Smells great, too. Sorry, Barnaby. Smells real good. It's a piece of shit.

It's real. It's seated. Yeah, it's really nice. It feels clean. It's really nice, it feels clean. It's herbal. It reminds me of dawn on a fine spring eve. That's the mold down there, it's amazing. Oh, I shouldn't be breathing this down.

Okay, well, you know what? For the first venture in, you've taught me how to get through the front door, and that was the first step. With that knowledge, I'll keep an eye out for some other possibly talented folks that might be able to get a little further in. There has to still be treasure in there.

It's too big a temple. I got faith. But in the meantime, why don't you guys stay the night? We'll take care of you, we'll get you breakfast, and hey, who knows? You're mercenaries, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. More or less.

Traitor. Just heard a rumor that there was some sort of an odd scuffle that might be breaking this armistice. Conflict might be on its way. Looks like there could be opportunity coming up. Anyway. That sounds dope. Well, let's get you some croissants. Hilda! Yeah!

Where's the ale? Carbs and sleep. Carbs and sleep. Where's Pete at? You didn't open that jar, did you? You just hear, Piss! And that's where we're going to end our adventure for tonight.

Piss! Oh my goodness, thank you all so much for coming along for this insanity. That was awesome. That snake is going to, oh gosh. That was terrifying. I was like, oh god. Yeah, no more.

You have to throw a wide open. Well, fun bit. Canonically in Suikoden II, you get to continue this adventure at this temple. This temple exists there, and that snake might have something to do with that temple. So this, while it's not canon within Suikoden, what we did today, it is inspired by the events.

I did try and fit it somewhere in the narrative, where at least if you play through Suikoden II, you can be like, I know this place. So keep an eye out for some familiar things. That's awesome. I have no memory of this place. I had a feeling you were clicking. I be like, I know this place. Right. Keep an eye out for some familiar things. That's awesome. I have no memory of this place. I had a feeling you were clicking. I was like, there's something here.

Yeah. There is indeed. But no, thank you all so much for joining us. Once again, go through Ashley Johnson, Taliesin Jaffe, Cino Robinson, Sacrin Alto, Aaron Hansen.

Yeah. Yay! I want to tell the folks where they can find you, on places on the internet and such. You can find me at Zachthebold on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, wherever you get your short-form content, where I make D&D videos and magic videos. You can check me out there. Fantastic.

I'm at childishgamzino at all, any and all social media platforms. Hell yeah. And go check these two out. There you go. And you, too. You just have to maybe Google it. If you want to do the legwork, go ahead.

Check these two out. Hell yeah. He's worth it. 100%. Great people at this table. Thank you so much for joining us. This was so much fun. Thank you, Konami, for letting us play in your world. Yes! As part of the Suikoden I and II HD remaster.

This was, oh man, they sent me an early copy so I could prep for this, and it was such a flashback to my childhood. I can't wait to replay it again. It's great. Hell yeah, come on, I'll show you later. But thank you so much for playing it once again. Reminder, this, well, this is not canonical

to Suikoden I and II HD remaster. It is inspired by the events there, but we're so happy to play in it. We hope you had as much fun as we did, and may you indeed find the treasure that is Grimmick inside all of us. Yeah! Love you very much.

Thank you for joining us. See y'all next time. Yay! Thank you so much for joining us on this adventure. To help new listeners discover the show, please give us a rating and review on whatever podcasting app you're listening on. Until next time, is it Thursday yet?