D&D is For Nerds - Barovia IV #10 Pip and the Brief but Shocking Journey Into Tree Realm

Episode Date: October 11, 2025

This one has yet to hear from that one or the other one. Why they so rude? Don't they know this one need to know if they go on perilous journey? If metaphor happen and they don't tell, how will audience understand and know greatest journey has deep meaning? This would be great tragedy. If you're still wanting to pledge for the Jarren's Outpost Board Game you can right here! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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hours of stories, music, podcasts, and more, and no screens or ads. With hundreds of options for ages zero to 12, it's the perfect gift they'll go back to again and again. Check it out at yotoplay.com. Y-O-T-O-P-L-A-Y dot com. Let this one tell that one a tale. The story. Story of great heroes marooned, without a sea, stranded in a place of nightmares called Barovia, the antagonist, a creature known as Strad von Zarovich. As all great epics, someone must die. Either Strad or are heroes.

There's something in the mud. Something's shifting in the mud. Can I try and grab it? Sure. Good thing. You grab the... You grab it. Bad thing.

You didn't want that. Okay. The really bad thing is the second you grab it, you're no longer standing in the forest. And pray tell Adam, where am I? You're in a dark, empty expanse all around you. You stand up. You can feel like your feet are still in the mud.

And something, even though you've pulled your hands, It still feels like there's something in there. It still feels like you're holding it. You look around and you can tell, you can sense that there's some other entity in this void with you. No, sorry, you can sense that there's multiple entities in this void with you. Pip, many of them you can feel malevolence. It's like being watched. Even though it's all dark all around you and you can't see anything, it's like you can still somehow see the eyes and the darkness.

like cartoon eyes looking out at you. Obviously, you can't actually see them. But that's the feeling, yeah. Yeah, it is that feeling. In among that malevolence, though, you do get the impression that there is one entity, one entity that kind of is just noticing you and seems shocked by your presence here.

Yeah. You get the impression, surprise, then concern for your well-being. That's not good. Yeah. And you get a flash of golden hair and alabaster white skin Okay

Is this familiar Like to the To the, I guess The tree communication network We've been using Yeah, great question Contacted the tree communication network Hmm

I thought we did through you Once Yeah Well this feels like Well if you have them This feels like a more intense version Okay Does it feel like I can't let go

Um I wouldn't say that No It feels more like You pulled your hand away Yeah But you didn't like Open your palm

If that makes sense Okay If I just open my palm you're standing back in the mud Tarpos is looking at you Pip she quite clearly has just said something and you are not responding sorry I was in

the tree realm come again is blight big one oh fuck it's not outright attacking us though yeah

no you when you let go you realize you were holding not a snake but a root Okay, okay. Does it Well, I guess I asked Tarpos. Do we need to run or get out of the mud or This is your area, Tarpos. There is no... That's kind of mine too, I guess. Is no escape.

Is everywhere? We go somewhere else. Is there too? She says a word that you don't... She calls it by one name, which you don't recognize. And then she says, Tree blight. Is this like... Does the roots just go all...

throughout Borovia, like this one guy. You're not sure. There's one giant tree blight, kind of, there's this giant communication network underneath the ground. The reason why we can kind of like chat to other people is just with one big blight?

Well, I mean, I like look down at the mud and see the root snaking. I mean, if they're not outright attacking us. Is not awake yet. Waking. We need to hurry up. She nods. Yes. We need to hurry up, I say it, I start clicking, and then I'm going to start hoffing it through the mud.

The rain gets heavier and heavier. Your entire party is hustling like crazy. And at a certain point, a terrible wind starts battering against you, pushing at you. You, it's so bad that you could literally pip in all of your equipment. You could stand up and lean into the rain, lean into the rain and the wind and not fall over. Yeah, okay. Damn. All right. Is it like hard to move? Yeah, it's kind of pushing us or like... You move at half speed going towards the Druid growth. Damn.

The weather is beginning to feel. Barovian weather is always hostile. Yeah. But this feels directed. Does this feel very much like the sort of the ecosystem itself? Like, again, nature itself is trying to stop us from reaching the growth. Yes. Cool.

I'm going to use the last of my plant bane. Mm-hmm. And I'm going to combine it with... ghoul linnards for necrotic damage as well and then let's call it a diamond, crush up a diamond for legendary power to just make some plant fuck you plant arrows basically

okay yeah that's that's yeah you successfully create 10 fuck you plant arrows good to hear I guess I stop in the rain buckle down pull my hood over try and you know protect myself while I make it Tarpos stops still leading your party

She stops She looks back at you And she calls over the wind She looks at you Then she addresses the group Druids Fight against us She says

gesturing to the wind Yeah Can fight back Must concentrate She gestures the direction She's been leading you Yeah Go straight

Do not trust trees Understood We're leaving her behind Yes Okay so she can My Fuck it. Hang on. Fool me once. Learn of an MPC is lying to me. Can I use this to tell if she has any ulterior motive here? Spend the card. Yeah. I don't, I'm not going to use it for anything else. So, and I'm suspicious of Tarpos. All right. You spend the card so you get the full understanding as well. You realize from, maybe from like a bunch of different context clues, conversations that you've had with Tarpos. I've been mulling it over since, since halfway down the mountain. So she. doesn't need to be left behind for this.

The reason she doesn't need to be left behind is you now, like I said, putting together a bunch of different contact clues, you realize that Tarpos plans on getting to the lodestone without you and doing her plan. Okay. She's, she is separating the two of you knowing that you are going a longer and more difficult way so that you, she's turning you into a day.

distraction, so that she can get in behind and do what she wants to do with the Lodestone. She doesn't trust that you're not going to let her do her thing. That's crazy. That's crazy. Which, um, she, to be fair, her plan was kind of like, by default what you were doing with the idea that, like, you could come back and do Elaniel's plan. But that's kind of what Pips been thinking as well. Yeah. Like, we do Tarpos's plan. And then at the end,

If the end, he wins a future argument. Yeah, whatever. She can go back. It's kind of the, in order of list of priorities, do I think, you know, standing here, like, in the howling wind, do I think I would be able to convince Tarpos that, like, we're on her side and we won't, or is she, like, pretty set in her decision? Tarpos is hard to read.

She will go away and think, think, think, think, think. and then she comes back and you don't understand how her thought process led her from A to B so you while you understand the full extent of the deception

that she's attempting right now there's a lot around just her that you don't really understand you both work in very different your minds work in just so different ways totally totally totally totally well yeah do you want to let her know

that you know what is going on or do you want to be like well she wants me to be a distraction So I'll just be the distraction. Like, what is it that you want to try and to convey? Because if you're being like, okay, well, if we're near the lodestone, will be that distraction and you do what you need to do, basically. Have Gorb & Lushin do that kind of stuff.

And that's kind of conveying that you know what's up. But if you're like, well, it doesn't really matter because the end of the day will be whatever. Here's the things that happen in Pip's head, okay? Pip thinks, oh, she doesn't trust that we want to do what she wants to do. But then Pip thinks, if exactly what you said, if Elaniel wants to go and destroy them after we've cleansed them, the result is the same. That has nothing to do. That beef is separate from all of this. Then Pip imagines if he doesn't let on now that he is aware of this deception, is that going to come back onto him at some point in the future where they're like, you knew and did nothing.

Yeah, yeah. But then Pip, and then I think this could be a way of, again, not to be. to put thoughts into Pip's head but this could be a way if you're like, oh, hey, I know what you're doing and I will do that and there's a way to build trust with Topos.

Well, that's what I think I do is Adam. I just forget Iron is here. I know. Okay. Over the howling wind, like, staring at Topas as she says that, we kind of locked eyes.

Yeah. She's not going to be able to interpret this. I just the fuck. I say this, and I hope it gets across to her. Take Garab and Lushin. You might need them.

God damn fucking Tarpos Of all the people To send a subtle message to She's just the worst for this Tarpos looks back at you Pip Thank you

You're very welcome Come on people We've got to move And then I'll turn around And we'll start heading off Into the woods In the direction Tarpos You hear

Well you Yeah I was about to say I was about to say You hear And then it slowly dissipates But not really

You hear all the way To the grove Gorob and Lush My lady, the non-believer is right If anything, it got louder Yeah, how did that happen? The wind is carrying it to us The wind is trying to get it away from it

And just pushes it towards you guys It's too loud for the wind Okay Continuing on towards the Druids Grove You do notice a perceptible drop In the strength of the wind And rain buffeting against you It's not stopped

but definitely Tarpos has slackened or lessened the druids like a fight against you basically you explode out of one section of forest stop for a brief moment

as you see that there is another section of forest directly in front of you but there is like a gap a clearing that goes in both directions to your left and right of literally no trees and then there is suddenly trees again Hmm. Does it seem like a bunch of trees have got up and left?

If they did, they did it in a line. Okay. Interesting. Don't trust the trees. Don't trust the trees, she said. But this is the not trees. I was like, maybe I cast Detect Magic, but I feel like that'll just like people get 2001 of Space Odyssey because there's so much magic happening all over. Maybe, maybe not.

I'll go in the Kubrick. Um, yeah, all right, fuck it. I'll cast Detect Magic. All right. I'll pull out a little bit of bark and chop it in my mouth. I was about to say, you don't actually cast spells, so what does that look like? I think Pip pulls out some kind of like a, like a, like a, like, you know, this is going to sound crazy. You know what a spice is a bark?

Yeah. Okay. Like a cinnamon stick, right? Yeah, like a cinnamon stick style thing, but not cinnamon stick. I pull that out, snap it in half and maybe like smelling salts rub it under my nose. Like, again, use a cinnamon stick. Yeah. Like, you know, because you would break it in the powder that comes out.

Yeah. and then I'll I'll look at it's funny because I've done this so many times and probably just look different every time there are many ways to cast detect magic if you're an alchemist like Pip and then I'll look around a hobby alchemist

yeah exactly I'll scan the tree line the strange empty patch all right the trees around you immediately show faint Barovia is kind of an inherently malevolently magical place

and you can see that there is a base level of magic that exists to the world, like the background radiation. Yeah, for sure. The trees on the other side of this little break are densely magical. It would be a abjuration magic, which

protects and changes the nature of things. Okay. Does it seem like it's... So, if we, could we circumnavigate it? You could take one of these paths that have been made, if you wanted to, that would be circumnavigating. Okay. And the paths don't seem,

other than the sort of ambient magic Hmm But like Hmm Yeah it's kind of like the past Seems like that's the obvious thing They would want you to do Because you want to avoid

Yeah Was it because going straight Would that lead like if you went As the crow flies to go straight Is that going directly into that clump of trees Fump! Something hits you at high speed Pip I took too long

Aw We were discussing see you don't take any damage but you are nearly bowled over something from behind hits you and hits you at speed you stumble forwards a little bit and a huge brown object slides past you refocusing you look up you can hear exclamations from behind you and you can understand that your companion something similar is happening to them you look up and you see a deer a no not a deer a buck okay it turns to look at you and you and you You can see a wild frenzy in its eyes.

This, something about the look in this buck's eyes gives you the distinct impression that it is prepared to fight to the death. Let's go to initiative. Okay. All right. Fuck. Okay.

Is that what the trap was? I think it's just another terrible thing that's happened to Pip. All right. Pip, your first. You wheel around and you can see the... I keep calling them deer. The buck? They're...

Well, you know what? Yeah, whatever. They're, what do you call, is deer? Deer's gender neutral. Okay, yeah. There's deer all around you. Okay. There's a, oh, sorry, I actually need to check really quickly how many deer that they summoned.

Summon. Summon. Created. There's 18 deer. Okay. Relax. There's a fucking deer. I know.

It's like, one hit. There's 18 deer. You look at all, yeah, how many they got, ah, you're like six or something. 18. 18. It's a full owing. That just seems a lot. It's a herd. Yeah, it's a whole herd.

There's 18 of them. Okay. Can I cast Beast Bond in combat, or does that not work? I... What's the... You don't have the... I have it right here. You establish a telepathic link with one beast you touch that is...

Never mind. Friendly to you or charmed by you. That's okay. It feels fucked up to kill a deal. But, I mean, what choice do I have? It is barreling into me. All right, well, the one that just wheeled into me, Does it seem like they're trying to push me into that pathway?

Hard to say. That is what would have happened, but you don't know if that's on purpose. Well, here's what I do, Adam. The same buck that barreled into me, I would like to hold my action. I don't know if there's something I can do in fifth that I forget. You can. Okay, I would like to hold my action until, what I want is I want the deer to charge me, and then I'm going to leap out of the way in such a way that it goes into that clearing.

Oh, it's already in it. Oh, and nothing's happening? Nothing's happening. Okay. Well, I'm still suspicious of it. He's a deer. He's on their side. Sure, yeah. I guess I'll plug it with two crossbows. All right. Two crossbow bolts.

You fire your first bolt. You fire your first. It's a hit. And you deal. Oh, actually, yeah. The fucking deer. You shoot it and it dies. You kill one. Then you turn around and you could fire again. Yeah. You critical hit, I'm not going to bother you, you kill two deer. Yeah, yeah.

Point, point. Then it's the deers' turn. Mm-hmm. And here's where I like deer. There's four for each of you. Oh, fuck. And all 16 attack you, Pip. Why?

Why would they do that? You just killed their friend. Yeah, I guess. One hit? two hit three four five here okay this is why I was saying

it's bad that there's 18 or whatever yeah see you were right in the end you were right 18 is bad if they each get a lick off you want to go first yeah I mean you did I should have gotten into a tree

yeah that would have been clever for me but then maybe they'd have turned into I mean you could have them look you know the the the cordon of arrows or whatever yeah I don't know if I can set that up in combat unfortunately I can do a barrage

in the air, get them all done. Yeah. Take care of it in one go. Sorry, I don't have an eraser. I love, it's funny, because, you know, obviously a DM has many tools at his table. Adam, just going into his bag. I just love, what I imagine was him

pulling out a big mallet to hit this with. They're like, oh, let me just get out my DM's mallet. Bong! Uh-huh, yep. Yeah. You take 13 points of damage. Oh, that's not too bad. You're on seven. Of that, I was unaware.

Pip is killed by deer Pip, the deer crowd around you and shove you You brace yourself And you feel as the mud Your feet are dragged You are being pushed You are into that clearing

And they keep pushing As they keep pushing You look over your shoulder And you can see as the roots of the trees In that next section begin snaking their way towards you. Okay. Okay.

Fuck. Am I unconscious? No. Oh, no, I'm at seven now from that. Sorry, I thought you meant I was already at seven hit points and then... I see. I'm stupid. No, I was there too.

I was like, well, goodbye, Pip. Yeah, rest in peace, Pip, man. So, Pip, it's Iona's turn. She gives a call of surprise. Yeah. Makes sense. I, too, would be shocked. you hear

just barely over the wind as she calls out what what do I and then Cavendish screams Kill them Kill them Yeah that's right Kill the deer

It's not complicated Okay Does she have Shatter maybe You really not have any AEOE spells It's funny we're basically Being attacked by a swarm of deer

There's like there's so many of them I'm thinking Like, yeah, I don't even know how, like, 16 even got, like, licks in on you, because it's just... What I was imagining before they all crowd around me and push me is it being, like, headbutt, head, butt, head, head, yeah, yeah, headbutt. They'd be tripping over each other just a headbutt you. Yeah. She, honestly, just casts a cantrip. She can't really hit multiple enemies it was.

Um, she fires off a ray of frost. She absolutely bathes one of the deer in frosty, cold energy. That deer collapses. You're down to 15 deer. God, dear. It's Cavendish's turn. Crack! Crack! Crack! You hear shots as Cavendish begins approaching,

and then you can see his little here. I think I've described him having kind of a stovepipe type hat. You see that hat bobbing over the top of the deer, and then he jumps up onto one of the deer, grabs its antlers, and tries wrenching it in a different direction into another deer. It's going to kill a deer with a deer. That's awesome. He kills two deer and then starts distracting further of them.

It is the engineer's turn. Surely you have... Surely he's got some method of sending like a bunch of cruise missiles into the deer or whatever. Haste. He hastes the deer, so they fuss. even quicker at destroying you Come on. Pip, you hear the engineer you can see, because he's in the Mac, he's a bit taller

than the deer now. You can see as he looks down at you with a very scarily emotionless face. Pip, I can handle this in one moment, but you might take some shrapnel. Is that acceptable? I mean, how much shrapnel?

No, it's fine, it's fine, it's fine, it's fine, it's fine. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. You've heard of this weapon before It's called a gnomish gatling gun Okay Okay He fires into the crowd of deer Awesome, dude

We're just decimating these It's so funny It's like It's an animal It feels so fucked up But they're evil In a way I wish the deer Looked spooky off

Then I'd feel less bad about killing them Like if they were all just like Walking on their hind legs Upright Am I dead? I've got good news And I've got bad news Give me the bad news

I'll have the good news for dessert The engineer Oh, okay You want the good news for dessert All right You cop You cop two rounds From the Gatling gun

It does And you will not believe this Yeah Seven points of damage Okay On the bright side As you keel over Dead

I'm kidding I'm like Zero is No you're conscious He's conscious. I'm conscious. Just barely. In real trouble.

You watch, Pip, as the, first off, the deer that Cavendish is riding is cut, cut out from underneath him. Cavendish, ah, hits the ground, becomes, gets very muddy, but is himself not hit? And then you watch, as the rest of the deer, all 13 of the remaining deer are lit the fuck up. Awesome. He ruins He destroys Absolutely demolishes the entire herd of deer Okay

The gatling gun spins down Comes to a stop You pip are lying in the mud Looking at your own guts Oh my god Two bears Explode Out of the underbrush

Oh my god Hector Yes It's your turn What would you like to do I know you're not here Sorry that might make you feel like you're here I guess well we're just like

We're investigating this I guess disturbance From I guess The other realms The Franken realm Yeah The Franken realm Yeah so

We've been led across to the Where we saw that The Franken guy Oh well you're getting ready To make your way across Okay Raha Din walks around behind the tower

and you can see that there are some boats a couple boats just mordered a little pier. The boats don't look particularly seaworthy. You're not a sailor hector but even you can see that the, they're like, the only reason they're above the water is because they're made of wood right now. You don't fancy your chances in them

necessarily. Rahadin looking at them looks back at you I don't suppose that you are in any way experienced with sea travel? Not overtly. I can swim, which is I guess something. You don't fancy your chances,

but you can make an assessment on the boats using your, well, straight up intelligence. Yeah, I'll do that, looking at the boats. You, yeah, you don't get anything definitive looking at them. They could hold you, they might not. We can make our way around the lake, he says, gesturing back to that bridge that connects the tower to the mainland. But it is a slower voyage.

Any evidence might be gone. The trail cold. Can I just like put my foot onto the boat to see just how much, like, you know, put one foot on all my weight on that and just kind of like. I would assume that's part of the intelligence check. Yeah. You, like, if you stood in the boat right now, it will stay, like, upright and in the water, oh, sorry, on the water rather than in the water. Yeah. But it might be the sort of thing where it's, like, kind of a slow leak.

You're just not sure. Do I think that I'm like, well, it's probably best if we weren't armored for this? Like, that would help, yes. Yeah, if we both, you know, uh, doth our armor. Yes. Yeah, I guess I'll be, like, testing it. If I'm that uncertain, it would be like, right. And we're, are we coming back?

The idea would be, because we're leaving our wagon here, we'd be coming back, right? Yeah. Okay, yeah, cool. All right. Yeah. Okay, I do not, I do not like our chances. I look at Sagretchen and myself. Hey, friends, it's Nikaela from the podcast Side Hustle Pro.

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You gobbled the way we are. If we do fall overboard, I do not suspect it's like tap our armor. This will float. Give us a moment. Gretchen, I think we need to disarmor. Hector, you slowly take off the armor that you have accrued here in Borovia. You take off the gauntlets, those magical gauntlets. You, looking at it, it's maybe one of the only items that has,

no there was a werewolf being tortured well still nonetheless it's funny to say this is the happiest item because once again you find it in a building that a werewolf was being that you subsequently allowed die you found it

in the same building that you found him but the silver shield emblazoned with the dragon the order of Argonvost the morning lord breastplate that you got at Krezik and the Knights of the Grotto leggings that you pilfered from corpses.

Yes. I guess it's like, very much it feels like day one. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Back to the top. So Gretchen nods, and she quietly takes her armor off, leaving her with just, well, not her skivvy, she has proper clothes underneath. Yeah. As she disrobes, you can see like a chill runs through, where it probably runs through you as well.

Without the, the metal in your armor probably doesn't help with the weather much. But there is like feathers underneath and maybe even furs to, especially if you've got your armor here, there would be fur lining or a fur element that kind of helps keep you warm,

which you are now missing. So there's a bit more of a chill to the air. Right. Okay, well, yes. Take it all there and we, I guess, put them in the wagon, I guess, would be the safest place for it. You can live in the wagon, sure.

Rahadin seems to be very blaze about where you leave it. He doesn't think anyone's, coming by. Well, yeah, fair enough. Well, again, we just want to get somewhere safe out of the weather. Mm-hmm, sure. Then, yeah, whatever, like, sort of cloak or warm thurs that we do have remaining

or just kind of wrap ourselves up. All right, two boats, you say? Yes, there's two. Okay, as in a very quick assessment, weight distribution-wise. Rahadin is a slender elf. Yeah, he's, well, actually, he didn't have to take off anything because he doesn't wear armor. But yeah, Rahadin is, um, can I say waif, S? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I guess Rahaddin and Sir Gretchen combined, does that equal to Sir Hector? No, Gretchen's pretty big,

actually. Okay. She's got big, what's that, what's her name from Game of Thrones? Brienne. Brienne of Tart. Yeah, she's got big Brianna of Tart. Okay. So, uh, height and I guess weight, just very quickly assessing, uh, Sir Gretchen and myself, who's going to be weighing the most. Honestly? I don't know. How muscular? I was thinking like, you know...

Or fat. Very fat. He could be fat. He could be fat. People come in all shapes and sizes. Yeah, they do. Assuming that Hector was like, you know, the shining night. Assuming that he's like, you know, six foot whatever. Yeah, yeah. Probably like that. Asimere, very...

It's got them Asimia genetics. Aesmere genetics. or like, you know, the drills or whatever. But then he's been in Borovia for a while so that he probably... Not eating as well, not getting them protein gains. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I did...

Hector's always struck me as a gym, bro. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, kind of. Well, yeah, a little bit, yeah. I did imagine that, yes, Hector would be the stereotypical, I guess, to use a Game of Thrones. What's his name? One-Hand Lad.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Lannister, Jamie Lannister. Yeah, it's a kind of like, yeah, Using the Game of Thrones Description round Yeah, yeah, yeah So using, yeah, Game of Thrones Like a Jamie Lannister-esque

Wouldn't put him towards Say the Mountain No, no, no, no, yeah But more like a Jamie, Jamie Oliver Then honestly, Gretchen to her own boat Is that of a Jamie Oliver Kind of naked chef Oh, it's me, Jamie Oliver

Oh, school lunches Do you want some pucka? Yeah, oh, that's poker man I'm really classist But you don't think about it For some reason Yeah Eat your pink sludge, it's me, Jamie Oliver.

So with that in mind, I guess who is Rahadin going with? It would be with you. If you're doing weight distribution, you and Rahadin probably would weigh more than Gretchen, but Gretchen and anyone weighs more than the remainder. Yeah, right. By a lot. Damn, okay. Sick.

Yeah. All right. Okay. Rahdin, you're with me, Gretchen. How well are you at seafaring or boatfaring? She shakes her head, I can't. Okay. Rahadin, you're...

He seemed like he knew his way around a boat. No, he was asking you. None of you know your way around a boat, which is what excites me the most. How hard can a boat be to figure out? What sort of encounter could I throw at you on a lake where both of you, or sorry, all three of you are unfamiliar with water, that would be to your disadvantage? Would it be anything? Yeah, just the water itself.

You can make a pontoon You can connect the two boats together Why you've been taking your arm off by the way It's a beautiful irony Perhaps Barovia does this shit on purpose You're not 100% sure yet But it starts raining And the rain gets heavier and heavier

And then you feel a very intense Wester... Would you call it westerly If it's coming from the west? Yeah, I'll say so I forget, yeah I forget I don't know but a westerly wind going west to east a wind starts buffeting absolutely buffeting you

after a little while by the time that you're kind of ready to leave the wind dies down a little bit but it doesn't stop now is it help would the wind help us move across the lake no you'll be going to be stopping us north east it's not going to be terribly helpful okay I'm just saying with the wind there would it be easy

you're like well I'm always getting a fucking wagon it does make the trip more perilous yeah yeah okay it still's faster by a lot it's fast oh I'm sorry getting in the wagon the wagon can't pick you around because it's through forest you can get a little bit of the way but you're gonna have to get out get out and walk through dense forest okay um right uh I'm assuming Gretchen you would not feel comfortable in the okay can we yeah tie them together Like the two boats

Lash these together, absolutely, yeah Lash these together and see if we can... I'll make a check and I am not telling you how well you did. Good. Okay, okay. That's an old school B&D. Yeah. Right, test them again very rickedly

and just hop in the boats. Okay. Push off. And do we... I'm assuming there's oars and stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't have to be like, all right, we're in the boat now.

Gang? I have seen a boat before. I know that I need to run. roll? Just so you're aware of what sort of boat we're looking at here, it's like the sort of boat that like the survivors of the Titanic got onto, you know what I mean? It's not like a sailboat or anything like that. It has oars, and it's very old and rickety.

You can see that once long ago someone had thought to put a lick of paint to these boats, but it is long since kind of peeled and dried and cracked. Okay. Well, all right. Well, I guess me on one or Gretchen on the other, and we will row. to what do we need to go. Hector, you and Raha Dinn are in one of the two boats and Gretchen's in the other as you're lashed together.

You are just... Is Gretchen okay with that? Because if she's seeing like a lot more wild-eyed, I would have put Rah-Din with her. Gretchen seems pretty wild-eyed, but you don't think Rah-Hadin's going to calm her. It's not the ride he gives off, you know? He's not the most calming man in the world.

I guess, yeah. Maybe to calm her, I'll calm her, I'll call her, keep uh rahadine. Yeah, exactly. You and Rahadin every now and then swap places rowing

just to kind of like ease the burden on you. Gretchen honestly seems content to maybe it's almost calming or something for her to have a

constant medial task to do which is rowing. Okay. When Rahadin is the one rowing across the lake and you have a brief moment, you're sitting in the boat, you move your leg

in just kind of a way, whatever, shift to make yourself more comfortable for a moment and your foot touches something, you look down and you can see there's a little metal box in this boat. Okay. Well, yeah, I'd open it. You open it. Inside, you find a porcelain doll of a tortle. It has hair, which is not something that you knew tortals could do.

Yeah. Okay. The hair looks hume. Well, that's strange. I put it back in the, anything else in that, like, box? That is a very strange thing. Could that mean? Yeah, there's a little, if you spend any time looking at the doll, you see on one of its feet, it has a little, a little message that says, is no blinsky is no fun. He's no, I would say, yeah, if, if, yeah, is no blinsky is no fun.

It kind of like, look at Raha then and be like, um, who is Blinsky? Blinsky is a toy maker in Valakai, a famous. renowned one all across Sparovia. That doll would be worth a not insubstantial amount of coin should you sell it to the right buyer. Oh, so like it is a collectible of sorts. He nods.

It might be worth something to trade. You appear to be holding, so Joel Zanit, you are holding it as if it were... A little figurine. Yeah, a little figurine, like 10 centimetres. Yeah. No, it's... Oh, it's...

So it's like the size of like a... Like this size is beautiful Avatar Baby that we have in the studio Yeah Yeah Okay, perfect Feel free to find our socials for I'm sure we've posted many photos

Of the avatar baby Okay Well that is awful to look at What Hair you say Where's the hair Their hair It's coming out of the totals head

What kind of a hair? Like where human hair would be What kind of a hair do? Have I ever seen a total with hair? Is this someone imagining a total and fucking up and just giving it hair because they assumed it has hair. Is this someone, like I say,

someone making an avatar baby out of like the human baby not giving it an avatar tail, but just basically painting it as if it looked like an avatar as opposed to like actually creating a tortle? It does bear a passing resemblance to someone, yes, you are correct. A passing resemblance to someone who does not know what a tortle looks like.

Okay. Okay. Right. Okay. Well, I guess I'll ask more of a little, like, you know, maybe not like, how do you, like, who collects these and to be like, oh, the right buyer? Well, you could be like, why is it so valuable? What makes it so valuable? Who's buying? Each of them are individually made. Oh, right. So they are like, okay. Handcrafted. All right. Each one unique, no two alike. It is said that every Blinsky toy resembles some poor. soul who was stumbled upon these lands, why there could be a little Hector doll roaming around somewhere right now. I quickly dart to the doll's hand to see if it has a pin. It doesn't have

a pin. Okay, cool. But you look into the metal container that you got the doll out of and you hadn't noticed immediately because the container was metal as well. But there is a about about yay long which if the two of you would like to for the So the size of a coke can Yeah yeah yeah The length of a coke can There is a sewing needle

In the metal container Uh huh I look at the doll again What's the doll doing? Is it all moving? No Okay and the Okay Anything else in the container

No I want to grab the container And not touch that pin And just like tip it overboard So the pin falls into the water Good idea Out of away from us Okay

Yeah Smart I look at the doll The doll pissed off The doll dives in after No You pass it No the doll does nothing

You can only hope that that pin hits a fish On this way down And the doll is trapped as a fish Forever It's sort of To Sir Gretchen Just be very wary of As small dolls holding pins

I'll tell you about it later Sir Gretchen Looks at you like you're crazy But she says nothing Well, seeing that Gretchen is like looking at me Like I'm an insane person And I guess this is probably not going to help But staring often to maybe the distance

Or trying to distract myself from like almost becoming a little guy I start to be like No, you see, so in Borovia There are these I guess creatures For lack of bit of word, puppets Comma little guys So each one will have a pin And if you get struck with a pin

the consciousness of the little guy will swap with you and you'll be trapped in the body of the marionette puppet while it lives your life you suddenly find yourself Hector you suddenly find yourself yelling as in the course and the time it takes you to get to the other side

of this lake that so when the little guy hit you, it spings you with the needle I command Hector's persistence. The wind and rain suddenly stops. With a needle. With a needle, you switch consciousnesses with the, it's really a terrifying thing.

It's because they're so tight, anyway. There's many things in this land that is not what you expect. The boats touch the opposite end of the lake, as you, Hector, you can feel a perceptible ripple through all the trees. Right. That is ominous. I look at Rahadin. Rahadin looks around. This seems to be unusual to him as well. I know not what this is. Perhaps some plot by agents of outside these lands. Right. They can control the winds.

Not that I have seen in the past Borka and its dark lord Ivana Bortzi and her lands of Borgia are not places where one would find many in harmony with nature She is more one to create beings artificial creations and creatures similar to Arnold

Rimplah. He was Arnold Rhyden steps out of the boat and looks back at you. The halfling you have traveling with you. Gervyn Lash and a dwarf. Yes. Yes. Corbin Lashen adores. Rahedin gives you a very, he gestures.

He gestures as in a, you know, like a gentleman might aid a lady out of the boat. I hold his hand. Like, halfling. No, no, no, no. He's not offering to you. He's offering to Gretchen. Wax. He offers to Gretchen.

She does not take it and very purposely steps out without his help. I reach for his hand. Not really looking at him and then walk off, like, into, off the left. Halfling. Do I remember the Halfling? Do I genuinely remember a Halfling?

Yeah. I do? Auffling in your group, yeah. Okay. Oh, the, oh, the engineer. I know not what nicknames you have among your own group. It's a guy, yes. All right, he builds things, yes. The constructor.

Arnold. Hmm. He is from those lands. Oh, he is from. So when he wants to go home, he just wants to go back there. I do not think he cares to return home. Oh. Are they all like that?

I do not know where he is from originally. I mean he came here from Bortcher. Oh, right. So, okay. Okay. So he, to get out of Bortcher, ah. I guess he, how would he come here with his little machines? I know not.

Where people come from before they are here is not much of my concern. But before he was here, he was there and it was hard to walk through the mists. But I guess some people can do it. He could do it. This other. Well, he did it in the same way that you did, Hector. Vestani led him here. And ate his horse.

and gave his horse to the drood to eat. Crazy. Vastani led him here? When I say, Rahedin, his usual airs disappear. Rahadin says, when I said he came here in the same manner, I mean as in not literally.

I know, I know, I just, I know that the ways of going to, entering here is a gesture to the castle Ravenloft, you know, through His graces, or through the stony, or led through fog or something like this.

He was in a manner invited by the Lord. Right. So do you, how do the little, how do the little, the Franken guys, how do they cross over? Do you know? The other dark lords

of these lands have some control. So you, so he, So Strad could send Strad could And sometimes does Send agents to Borgia And to the other dark lands

That surround Borovia We are in the shadow fell And Borovia is a Subplane If you will A space within the shadow fell As Bortcher As Mordint

As Haslan As Darkon and many others are. I'm just trying to, I, sorry for the questions, it's just no one here seems to realize that there is a neighboring for lack of a better word

continents and no one seems to realize that you're at constant war with each other or it's like, I'm just trying to understand back home with, say for example Candor and Goldcrest it is a constant

battle and you have the border the border towns and they're always going for resources or they're going for more land or there's usually a reason matter how flimsy it might be sometimes it's just an issue of might I'm just trying to figure out why there is I guess why anyone wants this or anyone wants Rahadin gives you a wiry smile you have a forgive me sir Hector

but you have a very childlike idea of what causes war. You should instead ask yourself not what causes war, but what causes peace. Peace is kept by strong men. And if the denizens of Borovia do no war, it is because strad keeps it so.

I mean, yes, that is one way to ensure peace, of course. It is within these lands. the only way to ensure peace. I suppose. The other dark lords of the shadow fell want what they can take from Barovia. And as villainous, as you might perceive Strad to be, I promise, I promise you that Lady Ivana Bortzi wants even worse.

I have seen what the angel did. I scan the horizon Right Or the tree line Yeah To where we saw I guess You're standing basically

Where you saw them You have a look around You are no survivalist Like Pip Mandarin Gentleman monster And Pip shout out But nonetheless You can see

Plain as Day Where that creature was standing You can see It in the mud You can see its footprints coming up to the shoreline turning and moving away from the shoreline you can even tell that it moved

away with speed like it walked to the shore and then as you saw you already knew this but you are almost surprised at the ability that you are displaying right now you can see as it runs away from the shoreline in the footsteps you can see it

okay so it came here run away all right uh yeah we start the question is do you track where it's going or where it came from um I guess it's for Rahadin to decide because, like, well, do you want us to track where it came from or where it is going? Rahadin shakes his head slowly and says, that I cannot say. Perhaps, he says, looking at you as our de facto leader, you could make the decision. I guess we're tracking where it is gone, at least if we are.

You retrace its steps? as in like as in gone as in where it is going to where it is gone currently yeah all right not where it has been so yes I guess we need to I guess more pertinent to to find out where it is going

okay is there anything of that I offered like you know to Gretchen to also have a look to see if she can pick up something that I haven't as well Gretchen does not learn or does not know anything that you don't already know okay she's looking around she just is

Maybe you didn't say that you could see in the footprints that it ran. Gretchen points that out, and I'm assuming you politely don't mention that you'd already work that out. Oh, of course. And I just sort of like, okay, well, she knows her stuff as well. It's a kind of like, okay, cool, we're on the same level. So it ran that way. Good work, Gretchen. Right, let us follow the footprints.

You follow off for it. You do a decent job of following its tracks. Yes. You make your way through the forest. Once again, there are no encounters. The creatures of these lands know not to bother you when you're in Rahadin's presence. And as you're tracking through, the sun begins to slowly trace its way over the sky. This creature had quite a head start on you, so it's going to take a while to follow it.

At one point, Rahadin suggests that you make like a camp. brief camp. And, oh, well, do you concede to them? Are we tired? You're not especially tired, but just like a break. I look at both of the companions. Are they kind of flagging? Are they like, are they like, we should break because we're tired.

Gretchen seems fine. So does Rahadin as well. I mean... They're not tired or anything. The footprint is the Franken guy, is he... He's not running anymore. He's not running anymore. It's not running anymore.

Yeah, I would say. Okay. I mean, unless anyone is... is especially tired, we can rest, but I mean, he got a I mean, the creature got a head start on us, so if everyone is okay, I mean, we could keep soldiering on.

All right, they, Rahadin gives you a little nod. You get the impression that something just happened for Rahadin, but you don't know what. Okay. And it's not like a, he's not a positive

more than a negative. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You just get the impression, impression that little like pop up at the top window or whatever. Rahadin will remember this. Yeah, okay. Then you push on, and you push on basically until the sun sets. Okay, do you have anything for a survival check? No, but if I could, can I cash in a boy card, a good boy card, just for a re-roll?

No, you can't catch them in for the free roll? What about, if I can I use, I learned it from you and other players succeeded in a skill check in the last minute? Is that the full text? Uh, you succeed in the same skill check. Well, you're spending it on him for a role that he already made. Yeah. Spot on, Carnival. All right, I'll make you this deal.

Do you have another good boy card you can spend? Not me. Yeah, yeah. Spend a second good boy card, and I'll allow it. Okay. Done deal, baby. You pass again, and you can see up ahead of you as the sun sets, there's a second light in the forest.

campfire up ahead. Hey friends. It's Nikaela from the podcast Side Hustle Pro. I'm always looking for ways to keep my kids entertained without screens. And the Yoto Mini has been a total lifesaver. My kids are obsessed. Yoto is a screen-free audio player where kids just pop in a card and listen. Hours of stories, music, podcasts, and more. And no screens or ads. With hundreds of options for ages zero to 12, it's the perfect gift they'll go back to again and again. Check it out at Yotoplay.com. com, Y-O-T-O-P-L-A-Y dot com.