D&D is For Nerds - Barovia V #1 Some Bridge Along That River

Episode Date: July 18, 2026

I never knew what to expect when travelling with Him. There were days He was quiet and focused, when nothing in the world could pull His attention from the road ahead. Other days it was as though He could not sit still in His own skin, chasing one thought after another as if they fell out of His head faster than He could follow them. The day He bowed his head to an undead king, and very nearly did not rise again, belonged to the former kind of day. He had been silent since dawn, turning something over behind His eyes, and I remember thinking that silence was the surest sign He had already made up His mind about something I would not like. The feigned confusion only guaranteed it for me. The undead paladins stood there in armour gone the colour of old rivers. They did not look up as we entered, and did not look up as He knelt among them, and did not look up even as their king rose from his throne to pronounce, in a voice like a door closing, that the traveller had been summoned to answer for the living. That his death would be a mercy compared to what living men would one day do to the world in his name. I still cannot decide whether He walked into that castle believing they would hear Him, or whether some deeper part of Him already knew they would not, and went anyway. He was like that, in those early days. Hope was not a conclusion He arrived at after weighing the evidence, it was the ground He stood on before the weighing had even begun. It served Him well more often than it should have. It nearly did not, that day.I will not pretend I understood that I was witnessing anything but a man's foolishness catching up to him at last. It was only afterward, long afterward, after so much else had happened, after His name had outgrown Him and outgrown me, that I came to think He had walked in there already knowing what it would cost, and had judged the cost worth paying.- Excerpt from In the Shadows of Lightbringer If you're still wanting to get Jarren's Outpost Board Game you can right here! Our pledge manager is open so get it while you can! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Although you see no water for miles around, you are, like us, marooned. They're stranded in this sad and lonely place called Borovia. To mix metaphors, we are incarcerated. The fog that surrounds us are the bars of our dungeon, and Baron von Strad is out jailer. As far as I can tell, there is only one way out, and that is to kill Devil Strad. Pip Mandarin. Things are dire. Keening was able to see. send you a desperate message only hours ago. In retaliation for the burgomaster of the

township of Borovia, Kolihan Idirovich, choosing to align his forces with you against Strad, he the devil, has dispatched one of his brides to deal with the Bergermaster and with you. Tonight, a countless number of dead will throw themselves upon the township, and specifically the Bergermaster's mansion. Endless hordes of shambling corpses, vampires spawn, and the worst of the brides herself. Volenta Popovsky, a monster of a creature. You have not encountered her, Pip, but you have heard tale of her being described as the monster of the east. Okay.

More pressingly, though, on your way to collect ammunition, weapons, and lumber to reinforce the mansion, Yourself and trumpets passed a traitor from outside Borovia, a trader from outside Borovia with chocolates. On your own, you may have resisted, but with the cheeky trumpets by your side, you spent nearly all the money meant for wood on chocolate in what is starting to feel like a morality tale meant for children. Now the two of you are staggering your own.

way back from Buildrath's mercantile with just the ammunition and some of the weapons in the cart, clutching your ailing stomachs. Okay. Your tummy turns over and over inside you and you feel as if you have been poisoned. Not since childhood have you gorged so. Yeah, yeah, trumpets. Trumpets sound sadly. Trumpets blairs warningly, nearly drowned out by the snows of the many dead trying to get inside.

Rotten arms have found any gaps left in the mansion and are reaching through, clawing at whatever exposed flesh your party gives them. Pip, you see in the hallway Claudia and Ismark, the Bergermaster's son, holding back the main door, barely. The hinges crack and splinter under the weight of the flesh on the other side. In the dining hall, you see Marquilett, trumpets, and Iona fighting back to back to back as the dead tunnel through a hole with what little wood could be thrown together that is covering the bay windows. You, Elaniel, Birjamaster Indiravich, and his adopted daughter, Irena, are going head to head with Volenta, the bride, and you are losing badly.

Thank you, Elaniel snarls, ducking under a blow from Volenta that went by so fast you barely saw it. That chocolate really raised morale. Irina gasps as that blow continues into a nearby column, shattering it and sending jagged shards of stone into her face. Irina and her father managed to pin one of Valenta's arms barely undead muscles

flex and bow and you see your opening. If you don't take it now you might lose it and much more. At near point blank range you unleash your crossbow bolt right into Valenta's terrifyingly muscular chest.

Violently Valenta explodes into mist and bats with enough force to throw you, Irene, the Birgermaster, and the laniel off your feet. The mist and bats royal and fly with force towards the nearest gap large enough in the mansion to accommodate them, shattering the bay windows. You watch in horror, Pip, as that shortest route goes through the dining room and trumpets. Fuck, fuck.

Trumpets gives one terrified noise and you never see her alive again. Pop Mandarin, things are dire. The initial battle with trumpets went your way. You were able to not slay her, but you were able to defeat her, bring her down to the point where she had to retreat back to her lair, which you are currently trying to find. This victory did not come without cost, though. Muriel and Iona took serious blows.

Nothing fatal, but with so many wounded Vestani from the explosive ghoul detonation, Dastriel has elected to look after all of them, leaving you to deliver that final blow with only Keening, Elaniel, and Tiny. Right. It has been a frustrating trip to the final resting place of trumpets. As Pop, you weren't there,

and neither was Keening. So Keening is going by what he remembers Pip telling him. You know, you're looking, somewhere along the river nearby, there is a, there's two bodies of water nearby. The Saar

Falls and the Saar Pool. In between them, there is a river and you know you are looking for, quote unquote, some fucking bridge along that river. That is all you have had to go with. Right. I'm

looking through a man u de monster as well. Trying to see if I can make any hide nor air of what this means it's a fucking flow chart, Neil. I like flip it around to show the rest of the party. Is this helpful? Yeah.

The meaning says, yeah, flow charts real helpful. Yeah, Pip, he was telling about that. You pop, have, wow, sorry, Pip has had a mental break. Yes.

Being, what seemed like, abandoned in that fight with trumpets or just before the fight with trumpets really. Pip had a complete break from reality and Pop, you have assumed control. Absolutely. This has been, to say it lightly, frustrating for your companions. Keening and Elaniel are both about as mad with you as they can be. Tiny, as always, is inscrutable. Yeah. Right.

How many bridges are there along this river? I'm looking, I'm standing. I like to imagine, could I have procured, maybe not a hammer, but a club and a knife that I'm holding? Crossbow's slung over my back. Obviously, I'm keeping it for Pip when he gets back. but let me check give me a minute give me a fucking second it's like the most

you know slap dash way of making a hammer in circle yeah like a bent knife like yeah like a bent knife and some sort of just just like a ham you like a worksman hammering

some kind of cudgel it looks crude because it is crude but I will say they work basically as well as the hammer and circle fantastic wonderful

you did a You did a decent job of procuring these weapons. Maybe they are a hammer and sickle, but whereas I assume pops are like, it's like a, not a war hammer, but a combat hammer and a combat sickle. This is like a wooden mallet. Yeah, yeah. And then like a sickle just designed for like cutting fruit out of trees. Yeah. Quite rusty.

Yeah, less a sickle and more like a, I think it's a grape knife has that curved nature to it. And, yes. I like one of them like those fancy knives you get for cheese. Yes, yeah, like that, yeah, yeah, yeah. A little tiny little curving prongs. It's my sickle. I've got my sickle and armor. It's good for cotton camembert.

While you did do a good job of finding the hammer and sickle, you did a shit poor job of finding the bridge. You don't know how many bridges are across this river because you have yet to find one. Okay. It's rapidly reaching the point where you have, You had 24 hours to find trumpets in her coffin before basically you lost all progress. You had 24 hours.

You have less than half an hour now. I wheel around on Keening. You weren't there for this? You let him do it by himself? Keenning stops. His hands bolded to fists. Alainio puts a reassuring hand on his shoulder. No, I wasn't there.

Pippi, he had to do it. There was a rebellion to run, and I entrusted Pip, as one of my top generals. I entrusted him with his state, wouldn't it? But you regret that. But he folded like a piece of paper. What about you? I point to Elaniel. Were you there?

Do you help him? Yeah. You are, you an Elaniel? As angry as Keene is, if you are aggressive towards Elaniel, you have already discovered, Pop, you have already discovered that Elenial will just fight you. Okay, maybe I wheel around on Elaniel and then turn to Tiny. Feelers, you're magic, right? You can't sense something about it.

Sent, sense some kind of. evil or nothing? You're a wizard, I say to Keening. Can't you cast a spell? I'm a sorcerer, not a wheel. My understanding of the weave is innate. Well, check it.

Don't have that kind of... Don't have that kind of relationship. All right. I'll turn around and look at the river. Is it... Are we, like, on a high bank looking down into, like, a kind of, like a, not a canyon, but like, or are we, like,

Could you wade into the river, I guess is what I'm saying? At this point? At this point, it looks safe to Ford, yeah. Okay. I, well, I turn around on everyone again. Did he, maybe you don't know this, but did he throw the coffin in? The most we have is Pip said that he got to the middle of the bridge and then just, with the chains wrapped around, turfed the body over the side.

How the river, is it rushing quite intensely? It is moving at speed, yes. Okay. Do we know if this river bottoms out at like a lake? Yes, you do, you don't need to roll or even ask that one. You already are aware. So to your west is the Saar Falls, a waterfall. And to your east is the Saar Pool, a lake.

So you know, it goes from the Saar Falls to the Saar Lake. You know, somewhere in that stretch. Yeah, okay. Do I think, based on my understanding of the natural world, that the river would be strong enough to, like, knock a coffin down to the South Pole? It could have happened if the water was strong enough, yeah. Okay. Well, I guess we...

Oh, fuck, we've got half an hour. God damn. And it was a bridge. Well, the South Falls, does that have a bridge over it? The South Falls does... You don't... You don't know. Never been here before.

Yeah, you've never been here before. Yeah, okay. It's day one for you. Pretty miserable place. No, you see, no water. Yeah, yeah. Is there a bridge further up? What do you mean?

There's heaps of water. Yeah, there's a river right here. What are you dense? Yeah, there's a, I'll ask, is there a bridge further in the other direction near the falls? Keening nods. There's quite a large, bridge. That, I got the

impression, wasn't the one. We could check there. I mean, we haven't found any other bridge yet. Do I think Pip would be lazy enough to go for the most obvious bridge? Well, what does Pop

think Pip would do? Pop thinks Pip would... Pop's honestly shocked he did over a bridge and didn't just shove it in the river from the back. It would be Keening continues pretty irresponsible of Pip to... Touch it away.

You and Elaniel, but start marching towards the bridge. Major population centers. As we were... Tiny follows, and then finally Keening after being forced to accept that Pip may have thrown it over that bridge near major population centers. Seems like the most obvious... If I know Pip...

And I know Pip, he'd have, his head would have been somewhere else, he wouldn't have been thinking about it, and he would have just picked the first, most obvious bridge he could find, and tip her over. You see, you see, I'll be right, I promise. You track westward towards the bridge. Yeah. Hector, you're in front of Argonvostolt. You're quite surprised. I look around.

Gretchen is on her horse next to you? which also surprises you. Right. Is... Is everything okay? We were... You can see there is a cut, a fresh cut on her forehead. A little bit of blood trickles down her, near her eye.

Are you okay? She touches it. Oh, yes, that would have been the... That bird thing. What bird thing, sorry? The birds. We were meant to meet up with Pip and... Are you feeling okay?

You said that we weren't meeting up with them yesterday. Yesterday? Yeah. When you came back? When I came back from... From wherever you went. That was yesterday? Yeah.

What time is it? You look around. It's sunset, nearly. The birds, not trumpets. Oh, trumpets. Yeah, you said something about that. You meant like the instrument. No, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, well, I hope that's,

sorted itself. I'm sure it's fine. Well, you didn't tell me. Did we, did we come across the, um, uh, the explosion? The, we saw, you, we saw the explosion the distance. Did we, so we just. Oh, yeah, yesterday. Um, the, there was like a, some sort of detonation.

Then you went really quiet. Then you said you'd be back. You disappeared. You came back. You said, well, you swore a bunch and said, um, uh, pit Mandarin's name. And then you said something about he's on his own now. Right. And then we started, you said he's on his own now.

Something about like no point meeting up with them. Let's just head on to Argonvostalt. Yeah. I move my tongue around my mouth, mostly my mouth. my teeth. They're not sure. Sorry? Are they sharp? How's the fang situation? How's the canine? It's a great question. We should have been checking you more often.

Just check it in. They feel normal to you? They feel normal, nice and pointy. Right, yes. Cribut was... Oh, yeah. You said something about Cribut as well. He's that little frog guy, you know, right? Yeah, he was gravely injured. I took him to...

I'm so sorry. I took him to the druid. Tapos. Yes, you've mentioned her as well. Right. But hopefully we'll be beating up with them soon. So we are meeting up with them? Well, we're meant to meet up with, I guess, everybody.

Are you feeling okay? You've been real quiet. This place does things to you, I guess. I'm getting that. I'm feeling as well as I can be. This is Argen Vostov. Yeah, I think. She says you were leading.

Sorry, I'll rephrase Gretchen. This is Argen Vostov. Okay. I tried to say that with confidence. So do you remember? Do you remember the last day? No. You don't remember the birds?

No. You don't remember that woman. Okay. Now I stop looking at the castle. All my attention is now at Gretchen. What woman? That woman with the birds. She had like a bunch of, they weren't ravens.

They were crows, I think. So not Muriel? No. No, who's Muriel? She can turn. She's a wear raven. The wear raven, you've mentioned her. So not Muriel.

No, it was like some... I check my pocket. I still got the feather to burn, don't I? Yeah. All right. No, that was some other woman, some old woman. Like a really old woman. I don't think she was a...

friend, she pointed at you, she screamed your, something like you're not him, and then she attacked us. Old woman. I described Madame Eva? No. Like not her Vistani? No, she didn't look Vistani. No, she wasn't colorful. Old woman. Uh, yeah, I described the, um, it's like, like, like, like an old crone that was sort of near this area, that woman. Yeah. That's one. Yeah. Sounds about right. So you do remember this? Well, no, that's, um, because we like, I mean, you were pretty scary, if I'm being honest. How so? You were making, like, trees move and shit?

Oh, fuck. Right. Like, the land attacked her. I look down at my own hands. Right. They're muddy. Your hands are muddy. I just...

She's, I believe, Rade's mother. I didn't know. Vampires had mothers, and then she dismounts. Whatever she is, you scared her off. Okay. So she's gone? Yeah. Yeah, she's gone for now.

Yeah, we're meant to meet up with, I mean, with Pip and that, they were on their way to, to, where she is with the lodestone. And we were going to meet up with Tarpos and all of her droods as well. So you really don't remember. the plan with the loadstones again? Why, what did I say? You didn't want anything to happen to the loadstone. Anything at all? No, nothing.

You were like, we're nixing the plan with the loadstone, or you said something like that. Not a quote. Okay. I mean, I've had doubts about it. I feel with the last one, and I feel that is probably what's keeping... You said you could feel your heart beating inside.

Maybe we deal with Argonvost. Halt tomorrow? Do you want to make camp or something? No, that's just, we're here. We're here. Anything else happened? It's been a busy 24 hours. Not anything other than what I think I've said thus far.

So crows, no, crows, you were saying? So the crone controlled crows. It might have been crows, it might have been ravens. She had them on like a leash. A leash? Yeah. Hell yeah Now I'm thinking that perhaps they're

part of the way of the feather that have been controlled to do her bidding That I just jump into a conclusion and putting myself into a situation Trying to rescue someone Watching you to do something twice in a row I didn't need to rescue God

Okay control the forest you say yeah trees got up and attacked her right then the wolves came then some dire wolves came then some direst wolves came your words not mine she says laughing at that

and how far away how long ago was I look at the wound that's fairly fresh or is it like the wind seems pretty fresh yeah and how long ago was this would have been like an hour or two ago An hour or two ago. Yeah. Well, I mean, that woman, that crone, that was an hour or two ago. But you, like, disappeared yesterday.

Yeah, I'm gathering. Dispired and came back yesterday. Okay. Okay. Look, we're here to have a discussion with the... She passes you a wine skin, and she says, have a drink. You look like you could use one. I pop it.

I drink it. I feel nothing. I keep drinking it. Thank you. Thank you. I think I over-exerted myself. of yesterday. Right.

Yeah. Yeah. Gretchen looks real worried. I am, maybe tapped into something I probably shouldn't have. Okay. But these are the things, I guess, I do. Well, you're not scaring me anymore. Hey, that is a bonus.

I don't really want to scare you. Don't really want to scare anybody. Let's have, um, I look at the, what I assume is Argan Vostel in front of me. It's quiet. There's a... Do you knock on the door? There's... a little cul-de-sac, I guess roundabout is the best term I have for it,

a little like roundabout circular road, which has a path that leads away to the main road that goes through Barovia, and then a second little path that goes round to some sort of side building, that would be the southern end of Argen-Vostalt. That's that little path that goes around to the south. You can see it goes to what was once probably a set of, stables, but is destroyed. Now, there's no stables there anymore.

That entire, the southern side of Argen Vostalt has been completely destroyed. It looks, yeah, it looks like this has happened through neglect, not battle. Aside from that, though, Argon Vost Halt stands about as proudly as it ever has. You can see it's a, it's not a particularly defensible castle, but it is a castle, and it has very, and it has very, very clearly you can see a dragon motif. There's gargoyles up along the top edges of the battlements, and those gargoyles are all shaped to look like dragons instead of like gargoyles. You can see one additional interesting note is that wherever a dragon is depicted,

it is depicted headless. And that is a recent edition. Well, not recent, recent. But you can see it was originally carved to have a head. and then someone has gone around and knocked off every head. I was about to say, oh, it is nice seeing the pictures of dragons without their heads, but now I see that it has no head, so I don't say that. The southern end is so dilapidated that you could easily gain access that way,

but there are a set of main doors. We were invited, so I'm presuming they're expecting me. I was not expecting that. I point to the headless dragons. I've seen that once before. Creepy. Yeah. We fought it.

Gretchen doesn't really know what to say. You walk up the steps to the front doors. Am I brandishing a weapon, or do I have a weapon on me? I'm assuming the spear. Yeah. It's a spear? I believe it's a sphere. Just wondering what's happened since.

I don't know. Oh, yes. No, you've not acquired nor lost any weapons that you're aware of. Just wondering it has a shape of a spear, has a shape of some sort of weird thing. I don't know. Is it a great sort? I don't know. Cool.

so it's still the spear. All right, I cast, or at least, you know, light on it, so at least it's shining. Okay. It is dark, or it's the sun is setting. It's going to be dark soon. I'll cast light on the spearhead.

Okay. I walk towards the main entrance. All right. I knock. You step up the steps, and you stand in front of two huge wooden doors with rusted iron bands and knockers shaped like small dragons, headless, obviously.

There is carved above those doors the word Argonvostalt. Hmm. I guess we're here. I use the knockers and I knock three times. You have arrived. Pop. Yeah. At the bridge. Right.

I like lean over and look down into the rushing water below. Mm-hmm. You sense anything, I say, turn around to the rest of the party. Keening, if you look around, you can see Keening is actually, his eyes glow with this reddish haze, and it looks like he is casting some sort of detection spell. Can't see you anything obvious right now. But unfortunately, I don't think, unless she's cast in a spell, I don't think there'd be much I could see. You fought vampires before, yeah? Yeah.

Right. Do they, the lair, if she's just chucked in the river, is it going to be the river? It'll be the coffin. She was chucked in. Okay. How heavy's a coffin? How long's a piece of string? Well, trumpets was not, as you saw, particularly large individual.

She weighs a little bit less than a human, I would suppose, the average human. But, I mean, with the wooden coffin and whatnot. with the chains wrapped around it that were once wrapped around it. Doesn't weigh nothing. She's down here somewhere. Probably traveled at least a little bit in the year or so since you tuft her. I've been since pip turf. Yeah.

I wasn't here. How far is the drop? The drop is probably only 10 feet. Well, nothing else for it, I say. And I'd like to climb up on the lip of the bridge. you can come with me or you can stay behind I don't care and then I jump off into the room

Keening has enough time to say and then you're in the water A pop It's a lot deeper than you expected Okay It's a lot deeper and a lot colder than you expected You immediately, I forget there's a name for this reaction But when you are submerged in cold water

your body suddenly will suddenly gasp and you lose all the oxygen in your lungs. Awesome. Okay. That happens. Cool. You don't take any damage, but you do immediately take a point of exhaustion. Oh, God. Now, am I moving?

Yeah. You're quick. Okay. You're moving real quick. You're going with the water. Dude, me, I'm six foot something total. I'm going to be about as heavy as the cold. coffin.

All right. You gain a level of exhaustion, PIP, and you travel immediately 30 feet downstream. Okay. You can't breathe. All of the air left your lungs, and since then, anytime

you've tried to breathe in, you get water instead of air. Okay. But turtles can breathe under water. Yeah, what the fuck? You should be fine. At least we can swim, yeah. Something's fucked up with my body. Oh, God.

Yeah. What's up, dude? You watch in the water as from the bridge, everyone is immediately in a flurry of movement. Keening and Elaniel go different sides towards the edge of the bridge and then try to run along the banks to meet you. You're losing them. Tiny does a huge... You watch his shell opens up and then...

With huge wings, he leaps. clear past you further along into the river he lands heavily on a rock and attempts to steady himself he does a decent enough job and you can see he's like leaning out to grab you hopefully as you go

past okay what would you'll is there anything you'd like to do other than just try to write yourself as I'm tumbling under the water I mean obviously it's very chaotic but can I see anything that kind of resembles a coffin all right I've got good news and I've

got bad news, which would you like first? Let's get bad news. I'll have good news for dessert. All right. No, sorry. Bad news. Good news, bad news. Worst news. Forgive me. Well, let's get worse to best, I guess. Worst to best? All right. It's empty. Bad news. You fail to maintain control and you are still careening in the river.

Good news is you found the coffin. You see a bit beneath the water There is a coffin It is you wouldn't describe it as mummified with chains But there is a lot of fucking chains Wrapped around it You can see though that the coffin is slightly ajar The chains have been kind of pushed at enough

And the coffin has been wrecked enough That there is enough room to open the door And you can see very clearly inside the coffin It is full of not full But there is quite a lot of soil wet soil inside, but no trumpets. Does that mean we were too late, basically? Trumpets is active somewhere.

Okay. Is that my turn? That is your turn, yes. Okay. Tiny, with three arms, grabs you as you go past. He lifts you as if you are weightless, and then gently throws you over to the side of the river where Keening is. Well,

solved it. Yeah, she's not there. The coffin's down there, but she ain't. Hector. The door opens, and standing on the other side, you see a corpse, a shambling mound.

It is wearing armor and a half-melted, half-decade face from beneath that helmet. Well, you meant a, the creature a shambling male. Oh, yeah, that's true. Oh, no. Oh, fuck.

You have come good. Yes, you requested a meeting with me. Yes. The leader of our order will speak with you. Do I know much about the order of Argen Vostalt? I'm assuming I would have hopefully asked questions. I think you've been a bit here and there. Yeah.

Yeah, Argon Vost was a silver dragon. That's right. And the Silver Dragon and his order came here to try and stop Strad, to save Barovia. Because we learn a lot about this thing in Cuchery. That was the order that Pip basically watched him as he was. Yes, they approved of what I was doing. They were very pleased with me. And you killed that big horror thing.

Yeah, yeah. All right. Strad or one of his agents killed the dragon and kind of destroyed the order. They went, you are aware, this has been explained to a few times now, I think. They went after the death of their Silver Dragon patron. And as they became undead, they went kind of crazy and they're fanatically anti-straud. That's right. That's right.

Don't come here alone, I was informed. That's right. You got Gretchen. Yeah. You're fine. Yeah. She's a capable of idol. You were controlling the truels.

trees in the mode. It's... You'll be okay. Uh, yes. I guess... Do I have his name? Do you ask for his name? I was wondering if I had his name prior to that.

No, he does not supply his name. It was like, yeah, we're here. I was invited to talk with your leader. Sir, Godfrey, Gwillam. Uh, yeah. Uh, please, uh, take me to Godfrey. Sir Godfrey, William? Gwilm.

William. You are marched through Argon Vostalt, and every step deeper into Argonvostalt you take, you feel your, you gain a sense of foreboding. A sense of foreboding that you have not felt since long before you became part of the land, as Strad did. Argon Vostalt, while it is in Borovia, it is not arborod. of Borovia.

And you're not sure what determines this, but something about the magic of this land determines that this building itself is not part of your purview. You have no control over this place or its inhabitants. Is it kind of like when you were in Borovia and you were checking the monsters somewhere like... They were in Borovia, but they didn't belong to you.

Because he's also sort of like when we went into the Amber Temple where it was like, something feels different. Yeah. This is a horror of the, you are in the shadow fell, the shadow realms, sometimes they're called, the dark places. This is a place of the dark places, but it is not of Barovia. Your connection is to Barovia, a subset of the dark places. Yeah.

If that makes sense. Okay. And it's not Madame Baritzie, because these are not patched altogether. This is something else. So you could, as you, as you, you could control something like trumpets, a creature of these dark places specifically. But the inhabitants, these undead knights of Argon Vostolt, you have no sway over them. That's right. How's Gretchen doing? How's she feeling? Gretchen looks very, if you are unnerved, Gretchen is like a, Gretchen is sheet white.

She looks really worried. I want to try and not showcase that on myself. I want to be at least a little bit stoic. But yeah, just check her to see if, you know, she also feels that's the same sense of, well, foreboding and this doesn't belong. But I guess she probably doesn't feel that bit. No, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a unique one. That's a dimension is a heck of the original.

Yes. Okay. She seems quite worried as well. You move through a grand hole opposite of stairs and to the upper floor. As you do so, you pass more nights. and they turn and follow as you continue through the building. Give them a like a curt nod as the standing stationary. They like either do a curt nod back, but they just get in line behind him and like, oh.

That's not what I wanted. The person leading you, you find out his name is Sir Tere as he, each of the knights in turn as they walk past. They greet each other. They don't greet you. They greet only each other. And then the knights fall in behind and march with you. Cool. You are, so Robin Torey greets the first night that you meet is Sir Arthur and Borwin.

And then you meet Sir Damien Hargrove. Should I be making a note of these people? Okay, cool. Just if you want. I was just wondering. Each of them, they bear the insignia. When they're wearing it, they wear it with the dragon's head. Yeah.

But all of them have marked on their armor and their clothing that insignia. that insignia of Argonvostolt, the rearing silver dragon. It is tattered, but it does still have a head. They individually each as well. And Hector would have some

fading recollections of heraldry and the rules around Heraldry. You see that they have the insignia for their order, and then each of them is probably from some noble house. They have their own house's insignia as well. Okay, cool. Yeah, I really

want to ask about the headless dragon stuff, but I feel I shouldn't yet. Yeah, maybe save that one. You get up to the second floor and then you move through a large dining room into a chapel. You can see this chapel has an air of sun worship to it, or it did once long ago. It doesn't really look like it's been tended to anymore. Okay. Do I still have, I think I do. like the silver shield of the dragon.

Like they're, it's the same heraldry, right? Yep. Cool. Okay, that could, that might come in handy. Or not. Or the opposite. Or the opposite is so much more likely. Yeah, I just was like, oh, I should bring that up as a reminder.

Maybe that's good. Wait, this could, wait, wait, this could be bad. It's looking good cloak over the shields on your back. Oh, well, I just look, I just, I remember it and be like, hmm. You meet as well another one of these nights, Sir Eric Norinthal, and then you move up another flight of stairs. You're getting deep into this place, dude. The deeper you get in, the harder it's going to be to get out.

You wanted a meeting. Yeah, they wanted a meeting with you. They wanted a meeting. They couldn't have been a trap. You don't. Palais. It's, you know, the... His rules.

Yes, that is true. There's rules. They'll stick to them. Exactly. You know. It has to us, you. You'll kill me. Stop.

Break bread with them or whatever. Maybe you can just talk this one out, dude. Yeah. I think, well, we'll see. You get to, on this next floor, there are many, like, fancy bedrooms. You think, well, this part is really dilapidated. You know that there are many fancy bedrooms because you can see through walls at this part. of the building.

They're skeletons. They're not sleeping in these beds. Yeah, this part looks pretty unused up until you can see into some sort of meeting room for the different. Presumably, this floor is dedicated to the heads of the order, the most important members. And you can see there is some sort of private meeting room where they would meet, but then there is also a audience room. Right. That final audience room, right before you enter there, you find, aside from the leader himself, the final person that I will introduce to you.

Sir, Vladimir Hornguard. Okay. When you pass Vladimir Horn Guard, all of these undead knights, they have a menacing aura about them. And Vladimir Horn Guard is the same. He also has a menacing aura about him. But it doesn't feel directed towards you.

It feels, actually, his menace comes from just the fact that he is an undead knight. If anything, his undead features, when they turn towards you, Hector, he looks sad. And before you enter that audience hall, he says to you, You should not have gone. He is the final night to fall in line. Here now. Vladimir, what was his name? Vladimir Horn Guard.

Sir Vladimir Horn Guard. Sir, Vladimir Horn Guard. Two A's in guard rather than a U. And so all in all, how many knights are, I guess, in behind me? I'm wondering, so before I even ask that, is so the order of this, there was the head dragon, and then this Godfrey fella is now the leader. And you said there was like a table of like, I'm assuming each of the people that here, they're like almost like a sort of like a Arthurian Knights of a round table type thing.

Cool. All right. Yeah, that table in the boardroom would be round. Okay. And there's like, you know, say that there's X many seats for that. There's X many guys behind me, maybe bar one who's in front of me. All right, cool. You are aware. Yeah, you do the math very quickly. The people who are in this audience room with you right now are just the heads. Gotcha.

There's more, definitely more. You would have seen more that didn't come with. Right. But they're not coming with. Actually, not only do you, sorry, you do. Sorry, you do definitely see more. But those extra ones, the ones that you see, they're walking, they're undead, they seem to have a level of intelligence. They're wearing armor, but they're not, you get, they're intelligent, but not enough to talk.

They seem shiftless almost. Okay. They stare at you as you pass with a menace. You get the impression from those ones with barely any intelligence that, If you were not, if you had met them on any other day, they would just have attacked you. Right. Okay. But I've been invited.

So I have a level of protection. That's a good sign. That's a great sign. For now. But it also means, I guess, one command and have to get skeletonized. You enter into, as I said, that audience room. There is a throne at one end. The throne is the only thing that looks tended to here.

Okay. Everything else has a layer of dust upon it, but this throne, not only does it look tended to, it looks new. You get the impression that the throne is an addition that the knights have added after their decay. Okay. Interesting. Okay. Well, I guess they didn't have a key. They had the dragon as their head. Oh, yeah, it's true, but in the absence of.

They needed a gun. Yeah. All right. Don't make a level of sense. Behind the throne, there is a large wooden carving of a dragon with its wings unfurled, and it's face towards the windows which are just past both the statue and the throne. Face. Hey.

Yes, it has a hand. Okay, it's a good sign. There is a, this statue, while it is untended to, it is the only thing you have encountered since entering Argonvost Holt that has something other than menace associated with it. There's almost a beauty to this statue. Maybe I utter that out loud. Wow, it's beautiful. Sitting in the throne is you assume Sir Godfrey Gwillam. With one hand on a great sword and with one hand on the chair itself, he looks at you.

Hector. Sir Gwilom, nice to meet you. I wish I could say the same. I sigh. The blood of strad flows through your veins. bow your head I bow my head One of the knights

Probably Sir Robin Torei Who answered the door Draws his great sword And stands next to you Uh Gretchen gives a cry And you realize They mean to execute you

Ha ha ha Ha ha