Dice Shame - 23 | 'Down and Dirty'

Episode Date: March 19, 2020

The party leaves Waterdeep behind and sets off to unearth a mystery and some feelings... Comedy, action and a whole lot of shaming come together in Dice Shame, an Actual Play Podcast of Storm King's Thunder by Wizards of the Coast! Join our GM Jo; her partner Harlan, his brother Alex & their best friends Justin and Rob as they tackle the daunting world of Faerun in this legendary adventure module! Dice Shame is a podcast that welcomes its audience to the gaming table. Like the games they play at home, they try not to take themselves too seriously. The show aims to be entertaining, inclusive, and irreverent, while still taking the rules (somewhat) seriously. Join us every Thursday morning for brand new episodes available on all major platforms including; Spotify, iTunes, Google Play and more! If you haven't checked it out yet... what are you waiting for?!? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Clarion sounds like one of those drugs that has a million side effects. Oh, Castellator! Red, go get some bark. Bark will be good in this. What is the most interesting thing that's been happening in this town? My dog had puppies. Don't me to smash you in the face in my head? What do you want from me?

Who are you? Two moats of green flame dance in his eye sockets. I've been nothing but thoughtful about you, Jack. I'm not sorry. If that hurt, you should maybe think about the impression you leave on other people. I would have called you my friend. Welcome back to Dice Shane, episode 23, down and dirty. This week's MVP is Jason Schayer from Patreon.

Thank you so much for your support, Jason. Thanks, Jason. Please check out our friends at Sword Coast Soundscapes. Their ambient soundtracks that they've allowed us to use have been absolutely phenomenal. Definitely check them out and use them for your own home games. Back them on Patreon today at patreon.com slash swordcoast soundscapes. You ready to get dirty? I am ready.

Let's do it. Welcome to episode 23, everyone. Whoa. 23. Hello, hello, hello. Oh, hi, Joe. Hi. Welcome to the podcast, Justin.

Guys, thank you so much. Yeah, that's awesome. Hi, Joe. Are you going to be running our game today? I'm going to be running the game today. It's so interesting. Hello. Hello, who's there?

Hi, it's me, guys. Alex is here. Sorry, I'm late. Hi, Alex. Hey, buddy. Did you bring Miros with you? I don't know. Miros, are you here?

I'm in the background here somewhere. Miro. You're going to join us for an episode? I'm my. Who's that behind you? Liferland. Everyone's back from the grade. Oh, my God.

They died? Hey, boss. That's it. Kieran's here. Wow. Everybody's here. I really was just thinking about the end of video games like if you finish you know Final Fantasy

or Super Mario Brothers where they like as the credits are playing the developers will show you scenes of all the NPCs that you met along the way and we're definitely enough see one from Goldenfields with everyone waving at the camera except if Goldenfields gets raised to the ground by Hill Giants I think in the yeah the very last episode of this will be that and we'll be like, oh my God,

do you remember that? Do you remember before Jack died? Before we murdered him? Yeah, so we are leaving water deep. Yeah, I mean, that's the plan. Don't forget your horses. We can't. I don't want to leave shit fart the pony behind.

Yeah. In fact, that's all Doran wants to do is not ride a horse. A pony. Well, it doesn't want to get on an animal because dwarves don't like riding on animals. I did give him the option to ride with me. In fact, Oren can ride with him.

with me. Oh, okay. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Can I get amicure, my lovely chestnutmare? Come on, shit fart. Hey. I like shit fart, by the way. And you know what's funny? It's cute. Because like when you name an animal, like white paws, right? They've got white paws.

White fart. Shit fart has like brown. Stained under his tail. Yeah. Brown. Not stained, but like browner. Coloring. Fur. And speaking of which, as we're approaching the stables, Red is talking about how much he loves shit fart. And as we open the stable doors, just the smell is overwhelming. We're just knocked back. And we're like, amicure, whoa. But it's clear who the culprit is.

Yeah, it's shit fart. Nay. I'm ready to ride to the exit of Waterdeep and hit the road. I think we talked about it last time. We want to check out the fire giants, the excavated site. Then we want to hit up Old Knobone and then hopefully had Shadow Top Cathedral. Torn waves, a handkerchief out of the top window. Yeah, I think there's definitely a.

A moment where the horses are ready and Jack dashes up the stairs to kiss Torin goodbye and, you know, say, I love you one more time and say, I'm coming home, I promise. He holds onto the embrace, breathes you in and says, be safe. You too. I think I'd say bye to Torin as well. I don't want to be rude. In fact, Torin is probably like, goodbye, Jack. Goodbye, Kralath.

Goodbye, Red. And then Jack's like, bye, Torin. And then Toron's like, bye Doran. All right, and we all ride towards the, what, Northgate, I guess? So the north of the city has the field ward. That's the entrance that you took when you entered Waterdeep. So you're traveling south. You want to go back up the long road, right?

Correct. Yes. You are headed back toward where the fire giant was excavating in the fields of the desert and valley. Bingo, back now. That is between Amphail and Golden Fields. Perfect. On the road again. I failed to mention a very small town called Rassalantar.

Eight hours of travel on horseback would have us arriving in Rassalantar quite late, but, you know, with enough time to get a decent room at an inn. It's a super small town. Yeah. Is it just called the Rassalantaran? Yep. Hello. Welcome to the Rassalantaran. My name is Slassalantar.

This is my sister Vassalantar. What is the most interesting thing that's been happening? in this town. You'll want to ask my brother. You're going to want to ask my sister. Hasselantar. Oh, but you think Hasselantar will know more than Massalantar?

Oh, definitely. No one knows anything more than Massalantar except for... Oh, Casillantar. Yeah. Someone walks out and he's like, my dog had puppies. And it was a silly town. I feel like everyone looks the same too.

I'm picturing like white with bowl cuts of like yellow hair. Like big thick necks Yeah, but like big thick necks Like very Dutch The neck's as thick as their heads Exactly like thumb heads Straight down Jack continues to try and teach

Giant to Kieran And probably also Kralath Oh definitely yes Oh I should be keeping track of these Yeah So I think there's maybe a moment around The Rassalentar in Sitting around the fire

With some more conjugation and learning And all of those fun You know school words Yeah and I guess Rad would have been reading That book That Clarion Dragon book. And, like, you look over and he's got it upside down. Clarion.

Right, that's the other. Oh, right, of course. Yeah. You're looking at the pictures. Like, that's what a dragon would look like flying upside. Clarion sounds like a, like one of those drugs that they have on the American television that has a million side effects. Yeah. For anal bleeding. And when we leave the next day, they all stand by the gates. Bye.

Bye. Come again. One is, like, in the window waving a handkerchief at Doran. Bye. What did you do last night, Doran? with that Hassalanta? I will never speak of that. Well, hopefully we won't be back in this town.

And good thing we warned them about the impending giants. Lauren, are you writing a song about that? Yes. With thick necks as thick as their heads. Rassalantaran is where we stayed. And we met the Casalantar and Massalantar and Hasselanth. All right, all right, all right. It saves some for tonight.

I want to hear the whole thing around the camp. fire. Well, you can actually end up in Amphel. It's just a couple hours of travel. And we don't have to stay in the night in Amphel. That little kid who you met in the town square. The mayor? The mayor. He's there. Oh, hi. Hi. Welcome back to town. Your town's looking beautiful as usual. Thank you. But we're just passing through. All right. Have fun. So we swing through Amphail and we continue on towards the fire giant excavation site. What time of day is it right now? Nune-ish.

Yeah, about new. That's what I was thinking, too. Yeah, I think the minute we get off the road, Red gets into combat ready mode. You have two different sets of armor, right? What set are you wearing right now? I am wearing my studded leather armor. The sneaky armor?

Yeah, so studded leather armor lowers my AC by one. By the way, my AC is atrocious. We need to get me better armor. But I have a 15 AC with studded leather armor. I have a 16 AC with scale mail, but I have disadvantage. So the minute we get enough money, I want to buy some actual armor that does not give me stealth disadvantage and gets me somewhere up to 17.

Because you're like AC is what, 18? 18. And yours is like 18. And you don't even need it because you can get to 20. So, Oren is on my horse. So I could hop off and scout ahead and let Oren ride it. I can kind of guide you guys forward. Sure.

So, Red is stealthing ahead of the party through the wilderness between Amphel and Golden Fields. How far away are you getting from the party? I would say maximum 300 feet. And I would just stealth towards the edge of the scene that we had witnessed, and I would do a perception. Maybe Kieran is up with red so that if there's a problem, they can run back, get within 100 feet of meet. Kralath, you're keeping watch over the rear of your party as you travel, as usual. Of course. Your gaze drifts over the hilltops in the distance, marking the places you have been, where your party has left their footprints when...

Bam, you're startled by the appearance of a figure atop the crest of a hill, some 200 yards behind you, knee-deep in waving dead grass. He wasn't there a moment ago until now. He is. He's pointing at you. You look away just for a second to make sure your traveling companions are all safe and close by, and when you look back, the figure is not even 20 feet away from you. You recognize him as the ghostly figure from Waterdeep. He's wearing heavy plate armor, decorated with worked motifs that are mostly obscured by dried and crumbling mud. You can see now that the floor.

flesh of his face and hands is sloughed off in places. His hollow cheeks expose his molars. Two motes of green flame dance in his eye sockets. His mouth works noiselessly, but you hear words as if they're coming from within your head from deep underwater. Grayloth. Kralath. What do you want from me?

Who are you? He disappears. Come back! Come back! Greyloff? What are you talking to? It's... The being from... From Nemo's.

From the apothecary. You didn't talk much about them at the time. What do you mean they're a being? What did you see? It was the same person I saw. The same... the same abomination he i wasn't sure before i thought maybe it was bad pheasant but this he's following me this is supernatural jack there's something there's something going on what do they look like

and i describe the being for them face sloughing off and um the the dark hollow voice It sends chills down my spine. You didn't hear anything. If it was invisible, I mean, we'll keep Kieran doing a watchout next time. Maybe we'll keep them close to you. But I... Do I know anything about this sort of ghostly haunting? Is there anything I might...

I mean, you know of Kralath's abilities, his ability to sense undead. That's probably your best bet. Do you sense any undead now? And I'm going to cast the same spell. the eyes of the grave See if I can detect any undead It takes you a minute You stare around the hillside

You see nothing Red You come to a divot between two grassy hills dotted by scrubby bushes There's a messy excavation site Here in the shallow valley With earth scraped up into piles

On either side of the hole From the distance right now You don't see any sign of the fire giant or any of the elementals that it was with. I picture myself in a bush almost and Kieran just like crawls up beside me and both of our little heads peek out. So cute. You know, identical in the feline aspect they share and they both kind of, we look towards

each other and give like a little short nod. And I'm like, why don't you go over there and just take a quick look? You fly up high. Rob, do you think Kieran is inclined to take reds, suggestion? Yes and no. Maybe instead of flying high up to get a look, might want to sniff around and see if they hear, see something before they, but yeah, but yeah, just something to like, um, sure. So Kieran winds their way from the bushes where you're hiding and kind of flounces down the hill toward the dig site returns just a minute later and sits at your feet. Could

Kieran talk at all? Not to you. Well, then I, I'll head back to the others and, report what I've seen. What is the temperature of your companions when you get back to them? This whole thing just happened. Well, Doran is standing like with axe at the ready. I picture Kraloth and Jack kind of standing talking about what's just occurred. Orrin is in his own world, just observing, but off to the side. And Doran looking for this shadowy being.

How are the horses reacting? Unconcerned. I definitely believe. You've seen something, Kralath, but we know it's not undead because you would detect it, and Kalimvor would show them to you. So either it isn't dead and not here, or it's not within a mile. Red's like coming into the conversation at like this point, he's like, what, what's going on? Red, Krayalot saw something. It'll be back. I know it. You saw in the apothecay. Yeah, yeah. I, uh, what did you see?

Well, I saw the edge of the fire giant's excavation pit, but Karen took a closer look. Okay. Kieran winds their way around your feet, Jack, making sure to watch out for the hooves of the horses all standing around. And they say, it doesn't smell like he's been back in the past five days or so. That's great in some ways. So Kieran didn't sense the fire giant anywhere near here, which, means we should be pretty safe to go take a close look at that dig site and see if we can figure out what they were doing or what they were digging up or what was here. In the meantime, maybe

do you want to see if you can track which way this thing went? I can try to track the giants, no problem. I'll take a look around when we head down to the excavation site. I would imagine if that's what it is, whatever he wanted was already taken, but it might be worthwhile to check. Definitely. Might be something there to track them. But are you okay, Kralov? I'm worried about you, buddy. It's all right. I mean, um, you know, people get visions, right? It's like a thing. I've never had any sort of visions like that.

Well, the dream, but that's not. Let's just, let's just move. Let's go to the excavation site. It could be anything. All right. Let's just go. Let's just go. I kind of ride my horse up next to Kraloth and say,

You know what, Kralath? If you get that sensation again and you experience whatever you experienced, I wish you'd let us know so we could be there with you. Yeah. I'll try. I'll try, Dora, to alert you right away and remember that you guys have my back. Jack, he said he couldn't find anything on dead, but there are beings on different planes of existence, right? Perhaps something's coming in and out. Seems plausible. Jack, you as a wizard was certainly know at least about the existence of multiple planes, if not necessarily specifics automatically.

Yeah, there's lots of planes. You can travel through lots of planes. them the astral and ethereal and all of those shadow planes there could be all kinds of things but you can see like jack's attention is half on this but he's also already in his mind looking over at this campsite and where he's going to put the stakes to start of stake it out and make a grid and figure out how he's going to look at this excavation and divide it up and like draw a line to figure out what happened here because this is jack's favorite thing like your background is archaeologist yeah this is his thing he's already like setting up a dig site and wanting to, like, divide it up and be like,

nobody go in this line until we've looked at every corner and figured at everything we've done in each square and mapped it out and, okay, Red, don't step across this one. Even if we can't find where the giant was digging, we could find where he camped. Maybe we could find what he ate. Maybe we could find what those three little elementals were. Where did they come from?

What did they, like, there's information here in his mind. Sure. That makes sense. I mean, he wouldn't be saying this out loud. No, but it comes out in a matter of speaking. Well, while he's doing that, I'm going to look around for that fire giant track. And I guess seeing how these guys immediately go to work as soon as we arrive at this dig site and seeing the state of mine that Kraloth is in,

Doran gathers some wood and builds a fire and starts chopping wood. Oren is really excited to help you with this. So, like I said previously, this is a space between two hills, so a small valley where you are relatively obscure. from the rest of the countryside. This is a pretty safe place you would presume to light a fire because you wouldn't be seen from distances. There's a fairly nearby copse of trees, maybe 500 meters away.

And there is an excavation site here. There's the dirt that's been exhumed from the hole messily scattered around. There are some scrubby bushes, if you can recall Kieran hid in some of them when they were being pursued by the elementals. What would everyone like to do specifically? I'll take a look around for any fire giant tracks. Okay. The very least I can gather what their feet look like. Why don't you roll a survival check? I'm going to roll with advantage because I have advantage to tracking my favorite enemy, which are giants. Yes, you do. 22. Oh, pretty good. you find some interesting pieces of information again this is you know fairly long time ago i believe

it's been five days or six days since you saw the fire giant digging that doesn't mean that your eyes aren't sharp enough to catch even the smallest detail you find some scorch marks on grasses and shrubs surrounding the site, you also find one set of footprints, although there is evidence of these footprints surrounding the site and leading up to the dig site, you spend a minute discerning that, no, it's just one giant, although they seem to have been pacing for quite some time. Spent some time here. Yes.

And you can tell that these are armored boots. Can I tell where they're heading? or are they sort of just... They arrive from the same direction where they depart, northeast. And with that role, is it possible that I might be able to see any marks around the dig site

for anything that was lifted from the grave, i.e. if a large sum or other was taken from this place, maybe it was dragged across the ground. I'm assuming based on the size of the hole that it was large. You detect that there are some slash marks in the ground that run parallel to the footprints that the giant has made as if they are dragging something alongside them. It is a fairly sharp gash in the earth. Jack sort of staked out

the area where he thinks is worth investigating and is treating it as two different sites. First, treating this as a fire giant camped here. What can we learn about the fire giant and who he camped here. And then there was something buried here. What was it? How did it get here? How long has it been here? Is it still here? Did they find it? He is a trained investigator in archaeology's, his background. Can I roll with advantage? You certainly can. Awesome. 21. You talk about stakes and ropes. What does it physically look like? Jack, are you getting down inside this hole? It starts out, he's walking a grid around it. He's got, he's picking up sticks and staking them in the ground and got a piece of twine and sort of marking off the area of it, and then every, you know, step or two, putting another rope around the

twine so he can eventually tie it across to the other side of the thing and draw a grid and number it so he knows, okay, in section A1, I found this, and A2, I found that, and just really mapping it out and structuring it out in his mind. I think if Doran's around and looking for something, this is a great opportunity to draw a map on something really macro in scale or micro in scale, if you can sort of all, if you want to map out what we find in each of these grids. I might just do that. And Doran's kind of half of focus is on this, but half of his focus is also on kind of watching the surroundings for anything approaching, you know, because in his mind, the warrior mindset is like, you know, always aware. Jack,

as you examine this dig site further, you come to understand what kind of excavator the fire giant was. The digging was done with a long metal tool as well as giant sized hands. You find a fragment of a fingernail embedded in some of the dirt. I will absolutely categorize that fingernail. Not only is it good to find, but there's all kinds of magic you can do with a giant's fingernail. There certainly is. Oh, that is so cool.

There's even a little bit of, like, tissue attached to it. What is a fire giant's flesh like? Is it... It is a dull gray brown on the outside. Is there any... You know, if you leave something metal buried long enough, it sort of russes and there's a little bit of, like some of that rust gets left in the dirt or...

Yeah, was there any like impression of what kind of thing was here? Was it wood? Was it... You find a piece of clay. The earth here is a little bit clay-like that seems to probably have laid, if not beside, then very close to the object that was unearthed. It is colored with some rust, but you don't get a sense of the impression of the object that was buried.

Okay, cool. So can I roll with advantage on... I've seen the fire giant. If I'm looking at its campsite, could I roll any information on it? Yeah, okay. I mean, it's my favorite enemy. Nine. You're not very familiar with fire giants.

Haven't fought one yet. You... I need to kill one first, Kralop. We'll get right on that. You remark in your head, oh, these footprints that I've been seeing clearly mean that the fire giant wears heavy armor just because of the shape of the imperfect. and actually the weight, the footprints that you see are sunk more deeply into the ground than you would think necessary for a giant. Apart from that, you don't gain any further information.

So while Red and Jack have been doing their own investigations, Kralov is going to do his part as cleric. And in this time, he is gathering all the materials he needs to cast, detect magic as a ritual to see if there's some sort of magical arcane aspect to this investigation. Very interesting. And you're almost doing double work here because you're not only casting fine magic around the excavation site, but you're also... Cooking a stew. Oh.

No. No, I was going to say, you're also thinking about this cloaked shadowy figure. I'm trying to get my mind off of it, to be honest. Where are you directing this aura of magic? I'm picturing Krayloth just hanging out on Glynn by Jack as he's digging. Cool. And then if there's nothing there, if he has time, go along the tracks to where Red is. I kind of visualize that Doran's putting stakes up for a little bit of a shelter tent thingy.

I mean, it's not much. He's got a little fire going. We've got the excavation site sort of in the middle of this field, a campsite sort of built. up in between there and the trees. So that we're kind of backed onto the trees. If anything were to come out of the blue, we can scuttle into the trees. Yeah, but like Doran like puts it together.

He like makes the stakes and he like ties like the bows together to make this like lean two shelter. It's like this long drawn out. You know, I screw up one of the steaks. I'm like, damn it, I got to start another steak, you know? Long, arduous process to make this little tent. And being the smith that I am, each steak is like exactly a square steak.

You slave over it. Perfectly squared. You slave over it. Kralov, as you complete the casting of Detect Magic, you see that there are fragments of the dirt that have been unearthed from this dig site that are glowing with residual magic. And as you concentrate on it, you recognize that this is enchantment magic. You're able to discern the school of magic.

when you cast detect magic and you hang out and like chill near whatever aura. But as you get closer and look at these small oras, you gain the impression that this is residual magic that is left over from the thing that was buried here. Right, right. It's residual magic, it's not residual materials like flakes. Correct. No magical effect. remains, but you can tell because this dirt was in close contact with whatever was buried here

for a very long time, that the clay absorbed some of its essence. Hmm. Okay, okay. I'm going to say that to Jack. Looks like whatever was in there was gone. Enchantment magic, that's what I'm getting. Oh, that's interesting. Okay.

So I know it was metal, because I can tell that on the dirt here. I wonder if there's an element of, see, we can put all of these pieces together in some sort of... Red walks over nonchalantly and like... Oh, it seemed to be a blade as well. See here? And he like points out the tracks that he'd seen earlier

and he's like, deep gouges right here and here. Looks like baby he dragged it out. Just in case you wanted my opinion as well? No, this is good. I feel like we've got more information from the three of us working together than... It's almost like we're a team.

Doren? Yes. I've almost got the campsite set up over here. It's so pretty. It looks good from here. Well, I'm almost... I'm almost done getting these stakes done. Once I'm done, we'll have a nice tent set up.

And where's that little half-ling? Oren's, like, behind you, fiddling with the tuning pins on his mandolin. What rhymes with excavation? Emancipation? Exploitation. To answer your question, Rob, there's really nothing that you guys can put together

in terms of what may have been unearthed apart from these clues that you've gathered. Okay. I got one more trick up my sleeve. He moved two cubic meters of dirt, lost some fingernails. Stand back for a minute. Let me show you something. Jack reaches his hand out, and just with a couple of quick moves of his hand, moves five cubic feet of dirt, five feet in six seconds. There's a cantrip because he molds the earth and really just excavates this area to see, you know, okay, he got two cubic feet or two cubic meters down here. What if I go another three or four just to see if there really is anything underneath here, if there is any bedrock, if there is anything that. Turn this shit into SimCity. Yeah, I definitely like, dig it out. Making Redd's like flabbergasted, as is Doran, obviously. Yeah.

Despite it being a really cool look, you find no other salient clues. Look at all these earthworms. Jack! Red, like, like, bring his handfuls. Look, he must have been looking for earthworms. I wonder if fire giants use earthworms for weapons. Bring them over. Their good eating.

Put them in the pot. Kraloff is kind of torn. because he's, like, looking at Jack, like, maybe we're getting close to something, but he's like, dinner. I thought one more question before we go have dinner. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Is there any way seeing the impression of the metal and the rust that was on there to figure out how long the thing was buried? Definitely more than 500 years. All right.

Maybe as old as 1,000 years, maybe more. And I think there's something to the amount of dirt being undisturbed, so the oxygen's really only coming from a slow drip of water filtering through the soil. It's not rusting really fast because it had been so undisturbed. so we only sing with a little impression. Like, there's enough clues to be like, it's a metal thing that lasted a thousand years in the dirt. Do you have inspiration, Rob? I don't.

I think I would like to give you some inspiration. Yay. Because of this very dedicated pursuit of knowledge. Here, catch this. Yeah. Nice catch, too. Yeah, good catch. Thank you.

So, what happens now? Now we eat. Whams! While they're cooking worms, I begin the ritual to create Liamans tiny hut, which is a lovely dome of invisibility around us that keeps everything protected from the elements and makes us invisible inside and makes us... I know that from the inside, it's transparent. You can see right through the walls, but from the

outside is it, it's an opaque color. What color do you choose? So it's a 10-foot radius immobile dome of force springs into existence around us and above you and remain stationary for the duration. Nine creatures of medium size or smaller can fit inside. Not the horses. All other creatures and objects are barred from passing through it. Spells and other magical effects can't extend through the dorm or be cast through it. The atmosphere is comfortable and dry, regardless of the weather outside. Until the spell ends, you can command the interior to become dimly lit or dark. The dome is opaque from the outside of any color you choose, but it is transparent from the inside. I think from the outside, it's a, like it's a dark green doing

its best to blend in with whatever the generic soil color is from, yeah, sure. I'm just glad you didn't say bright purple. So Krayloff gets back to the camp and he, um, he, walks over to Doran who's cooking up the stew and like, okay, that smells interesting. I love the idea of Doran and Red, both like leaning over the pot, making their terrible cooking choices. And maybe since worms are from the dirt just a little bit of dirt. That might add a good, good hint of something. A little bit of crunch, right? I mean, it makes sense.

Red, go get some bark. Bark will be good in this. Like Red excitedly runs away. The bard is like behind the two of you slowly turning green. I'm like, oh, no. Then Krayloff turns to the bar and he's like, it's okay, I got you. And he like opens his back and he's got like pheasant eggs. Runs over and high fives you.

You put together this shelter there, Doran? Yeah, and that's just exactly what I was going to say. So this little flimsy tent is like just barely holding on. And then I finally get the last stake in and Jack cast this like magical dome that suddenly appears. So it's great. So the wind that was about to knock it over dies down. There is no wind. It's perfectly calm.

The light that was fading to moonlight becomes dimly lit again and just stays at a lovely constant, like, tent-like level. So you guys are sleeping inside Doren's. Red and I are both looking at it, like, wow, this, okay, this looks like it'll sleep. I mean, like, Red's shimmying in, like, next to Doran. Oh, yeah.

You put the Liam and's tiny hut over the tent. So, like, Red can still sleep in the little tent if he wants. But it's only small enough for, like, Doran. Yeah, like, my upper half is into my leg. That's so cute. And I'm, like, forcing myself. in next to you. Yeah.

That's the best thing I've ever heard. I think I'm going to sleep on these pillows over here. This is ridiculous. It's not a pillow! Oren starts singing a very gentle song about all the constellations that he knows. I'm curious what the acoustics are like. They're fucking magical. Yeah.

That's, that's what I'm sure. So like the, it's all like so perfectly. There's a perfect amount of reveres. Yeah, everything is just like, I opened my bag of holding. and I reach in and I pull a few random objects and then I pull out the magic dust and I hand it to Jack and I say, Jack, we had this from Zephyros, what is this?

You know, I've been thinking about that for a while. I might, let me take some time. I'd had two or three options in mind. There's a test or two if I got some time I can try and narrow it down a little more. Maybe I'll do that tonight. If you don't mind skipping the giant lessons or maybe you and you and Kieran could practice on your own.

I used to be giant. I can teach you if you'd like. Oh, yeah. Why don't you try Red's teaching style for a night, guys? Sure. Maybe at the same time that the bag of magic dust comes out, so does the wooden ring from Doren. And doesn't Doren just pull it out and put it on? You put the ring on. And there's also this ring. And he slides it on his finger. And as soon as you do, the whole tent goes silent and everyone looks at you and there's like a off chord that we're all playing the same thing.

Do you remember the name? No, that's what I was not going to say, because he's going to say the name. Uh, Keltar Dargergan? There is a sound like all of the air getting sucked out of this tiny hut, and an apparition stands before you. A plump and smiling halfling man.

Oh, shit, what did I do? Uh, hello. Do you activate the magic ring, Daron? This is amazing! He's translucent, obviously in apparition, and he bows toward you, Doran, the owner of this ring. And as he straightens, he says, At your service.

At my service? And I look around at everybody else around this. He's so cool. Thinking to myself, I, I'm not in charge. He points off into the distance. And he says, ruins lie here. A once grand.

important city in the shield dwarf kingdom within the ruins you'll find a great treasure master dwarf a great treasure i take a look over at jack jack's already got his illusionary map up and trying to like pace a direction to be like okay shield dwarf kingdom from how long ago how could it where would there be ruins have i heard of anything what where is this guy pointing sort of out of shock i i pull the ring off my fingers he uh nods happily at you and disappears. Uh, I'm, I, um, uh, I, uh, I, um, sore, sorry. Uh, that's, that's interesting. Doran, that's so cool. Can I see? Uh, uh, yeah, sure. Obviously, it doesn't work anymore, right?

I mean, the ring is cool, but do you know what he said? Ruins, great Dwarven city? Yeah. Yeah, I'm just trying to place it. So the great treasure was buried there. Doran, you must know some of the ruins. So we think that's the shield mountains, maybe, or what's beyond? I'm trying to, can Doran, does Doran know anything about Shoo? Doran, roll a history check for me. Doran, do you want to help me? Assist.

Six. The little dot. Yeah, it wasn't, there wasn't enough information for you to really get a handle on it. You know too many Dwarven kingdoms of old. Right. How could you even pick one? Jack, you can make your own role if you want. I'd love to make a history.

Not all that, but I don't really know the directions that well. So if even if I could. Jack wanted to help him, he could project a map and then Doran could look at it. Okay, so you'll give Rob advantage then by helping. Roll that die and I'll roll this one and we'll add my modifier because it's better. So I get an 18. Fucking roll. 18, wow.

So I think what happened is Jack pulled out his map and was like, oh, here are ruins and here are ruins and here are ruins, but no one's ever really explored them because they're unfindable or whatever. And you would have been like, he must have been referring to the kingdom of Bissolmer. That's where the founder, uh, toiled Flame Tongue. in the ancient days. Who's that, Doran? Oh, the name sounds familiar. I know I read something about him once. Doran, what do you...

He was an ancient Dwarven king. The king of Bissilmer. That's right. I just... A once-granted important city in the Shielddwar kingdom. The kingdom of Bissolmer. I think that's worth checking out,

especially if we're fighting giant. So it looks like it must be the kingdom of Bissilmer here in the northeast, just in these hills north over this way. That's the same direction the fire giant was headed. Absolutely. And I think if we're going to go

in that direction, why don't we follow the footsteps of the giant all the way to Pasilmer and I can find this this magical treasure or whatever it might be whoa whoa whoa whoa okay all right all right so we found where the fire giant is going we have excavated their site

and we know that they've headed northeast that's still good information to have but I don't feel like it's enough for us to completely change our plan I mean, we decided this morning that we were going to head to the dragon. And I still feel like that is what we need to do right now. Yeah, I agree with Kralov on this. And unfortunately, I think ultimately the dragon is still the person to gain the most insight.

Not to mention the fire giant was here about five days ago. Five days' worth of tracks could head pretty far northeast. And it's not to say that we can't mark this on the map for another time to come and look at those ruins. But this is my family's, my heritage, though. We have to. And setting that aside, this giant's hauling something big that they can't carry. We're on the fastest horses in Farron.

I mean, if we could catch up with it, find out what it wants. What is it doing in the desert and valley? I mean, we're, we need to learn about giants. That's what we're here for. But that's also assuming that we could even take on this giant. I mean, we're nervous about heading towards a dragon for fear of it killing us. Giants are no different as far as I can tell. We've got the map on the table in front of us, and there's the five of us crouched around it looking at this glowing, you know, picture of the landscape.

And there's a little figure of a fire giant dragging a sword moving along it in the direction to the northeast. And there's now this like dwarven kingdom in ruins that sort of appeared in the area where we sort of think it is on the map. And there's, and it's a little bit dynamic. And Jack says, well, I don't know how far you got tracking this giant. I know it's been five days. If we can at all catch up to it, if we any hope, maybe we can try that way a little bit further tomorrow. Well, you know what?

Let me try. Sit tight. I'll be quick. Let me see how far they, if they go further than a mile, I'll come back and we can follow. But it's worthwhile to see how far the tracks go. No one more than me, Doran wants to get into that Dwarven kingdom. Yeah. But an excavation, like a real, honest delve into that sort of thing, requires a little bit of planning,

a little bit of resources. That's how I ended up. For going to a burial mound, I ended up. hiring, like we need to hire some, if we're going to really go explore it, we need a little bit more preparation. Basilmer, absolutely. We'd need a little bit more prep, but don't, I've got a plan for that already. I've got three plans for that already, Dorn. We're going there. Don't you worry? But I will never. Doran, the fate of the world relies on us going to that dragon first. Let's find out information. And Red's going to slip off and he's going to start following the

tracks as far northeast as he can. How far do they roughly go? I mean, I imagine you said there's hills on either side of this. Yes, it's dark. So you have dark vision, but it still takes more effort for you to track these footsteps than it does in the daytime. You follow these footprints, these deep giant footprints and the slash marks that accompany them in the ground away from your campsite for about 20 to 30 minutes travel before they just stop. All right, so I head back to the others and slip back into the bubble and say, Now, unfortunately, the fire giant's tracks give out, not too far north of here. Why don't we spend the night here and go on to the original plan, hit the Crip Garden in the morning?

Sometimes I wish there were five of us. There's just so much going on with all of these giants in every direction. It's just the world is madness right now. I'm ready for bed. Yeah, yeah, me too. And I have a feeling we're going to run into more fire giants someday. It's been a long day. Anybody think of any good questions to ask this dragon?

I'm going to wing it. I hope it doesn't drag on. Jack turns the lights off inside the Liam's tiny hut. It gets dark. And Oren sings a really sweet song about all the constellations he knows as everyone falls asleep. Where is my home? Chariot wheel, the galleon of fire. in the night. Fine-limbed mirage, guide me please. The star of the east as a seahorse bright eye.

I'm just a man tired of wandering alone. Gods take me their astral pine cone. Juice of of the light from the... You guys wake up? It's Marpinoff the eight. Doran, your beard is so comfy. And I, like, nuzzle my head against your damp beard. You know, I think I'm certain to become fond of you. Krayloff, it's happened.

And I, like, burst out of the tent. I think you were purring. last night. You could just kiss him too, right? I could just kiss him, yes. I could kiss all of you. Why do you say that? Nothing. I'm just not interested in the conversation anymore. Whoa. Can I ruin this on that? I mean, I think it's definitely clear that it's related to whatever it was that yesterday when you said, oh, I'm sorry, but I don't really know what for. It's clear that Jack knows what it was for and thinks this conversation and that conversation was related. Jack, I don't know what you mean? What do you mean? I could kiss him. Of course I could kiss them. I could kiss all of you.

Okay. I'm missing some social. queue. I don't understand. What's, what's, Jack? It's not normal, Red, to, to want to kiss people. There are people have boundaries. Um, people have relationships, any points over at Jack. People have, um, it's not that it's not normal. It's just that in a really shitty moment, you said something kind of to put Torin off, and it was just a really, and it put me off to, and I just, what did I say? I said I'd kiss Torin? Uh, I'm going to step outside. Uh, Orrin, Doran, Doran can. You help me with something? Of course.

I'd be happy to. Is this a soundproof bubble? But let's just get on the road. We don't need to... No, no, no, Jack. If I have hurt your feelings or Torin's feelings in any way shape of four, I am truly sorry. Tell me, what... I said I would kiss, taught you to Toran.

Yes, I did. I didn't think anything of it. Yeah. I mean, it was not the sort of... It was just the wrong thing at the wrong time. maybe you didn't you didn't mean it intentionally maybe you weren't poking at something that you just to poke at it to see whether it would be fun to start a food fight or something are you insinuating that i would poke torren purposely to start some sort of drama i mean you did

go on to that night start a fight in that bar go to another bar start a fight in that bar get kicked out it's not beyond reason to think you might just like to poke things until you get in trouble what fight oh you mean when i was doing the magic trick at the man of the bar. That was an accident. I didn't mean to. And this was an accident, too, I'm sure. Maybe you just need to be more thoughtful. I'm going to go, I'm going to go get my horse ready. Meanwhile, Krala, door and or are standing outside, thinking they're being subtle, keeping their ears up to the door, not realizing that it's transparent on the outside. I think there is no more bubble anymore. Or it just pops as we're standing. Ugh. Is there any more of that worm food left? I think red.

takes a moment and really absorbs what Jack is saying and sort of thinks on it. And then he's like, shakes his head. What do you mean more thoughtful? How dare you? I've been nothing but thoughtful about you, Jack. I've been considerate and kind. And fair enough, as Kralath knew from when I met him, that yes, I can step in it sometimes and I can say the wrong thing at the wrong time, but it's never meant to hurt. My actions aren't meant to be malicious, whereas what you just said was hurtful. You tried to hurt my feelings just now, and you've succeeded. I told you the truth as I saw it, and if that hurt, I'm sorry. I'm not sorry. If that hurt, you should maybe think about the impression you leave on other people unintentionally, because I think that's really the center of it is you leave a

really unintentionally awful perception on some people. You don't mean it. I can tell you don't mean it, but then you also don't recognize it. And it's just this blind spot it feels like. Well, do you know what? That hurts. And I'm sorry that you feel this way. I would have called you my friend. But clearly you don't feel the same way. Fair enough. I guess I don't deserve to carry this.

And he reaches into his bag of holding and removes a box. I was holding onto this for you as a favor until your birthday, but here. And he holds out a brown... paper-wrapped parcel towards you. I guess Jack'll take it. He'll hold it a little bit, a little bit awkwardly. Certainly away from himself, not really sure what it is or what Red wants him to do with it. So happy birthday.

And I think Red would turn around and walk away. I think the original note would be on it too. Okay, yeah. So there's a note that is with the package. It's clearly been crumpled up a little bit from its time inside the bag of holding. Yeah, I mean, Jack would definitely like flip the note open and read what it said. The note says, I'm sorry I misjudged you. Jack tells me you're a friend. If you could, please give this to him on Marpenoth 17. It'll be his 52nd birthday. I thought he and I might have been able to open it together, but it seems like our paths may not cross again for some time. It's his favorite. And a vintage of the year we met, but he'll know that. Keep him safe for me, Torin. Jack will, you know, close the note again and carefully put the bottle in his backpack next to, you know, the decanter of endless water and some of the other things he has.

Do you open the crate? No, I know what it is. Yeah. It's entirely perfectly clear to me what this is. From the note, every context clue, Jack knows in his heart of hearts without opening the package exactly what lovely gift Toran had bought. And he's going to just stow it away somewhere. safe. You also have another small package from him. I do, yeah. So, yeah, so it's beside the decanter of endless water and the other package from Torin for, from his birthday, because his boyfriend

gives him two birthday presents. Yeah, Jack's pissed. Not, I don't know. He's, he's feeling a lot of emotions right now. You said that you leave, Red. How far do you go and for how long? I think Red would head over to Kralath, very visually upset. Krayloff, Jack has hit my feelings. Can you Please console me. Oh, come on. Bring it in. Bring it in, buddy. And I would take a hug.

Creel asked my friend. I have no hesitancy. I embrace you in my giant arms and I say, it's okay. It's going to be fine. I don't know if he's like sobbing, but he's so like nuzzling like a cat does. Just nuzzling your neck and shoulder. Do you tell him what happened? Yeah, I think so.

You know, I've traveled in groups of people before. It's not easy. I always felt, though, that when things got tense, when things got tough, that they always had my back. And I know that even though he hurt you, Jack still has your back. Thanks, cry loss. All right? Don't tell Doran. I don't want to cry in front of him. You blow a big snobble.

And meanwhile, Doran's in the corner, like, like holding back tears. Just, like, sniffling himself. Doren, probably overhear this and say, Oh, did he, he hurt you? What did he use? Is it a dagger? Straight through my heart. Oh.

Yes, I've had that happen. But, you know what I always say? If someone stabs you, you just smash him in the face with your head. I don't think that's good advice, Gordon. I'll keep that in mind, Dorn. No, no, don't listen.

to him. Let's just go. That's what we do in the caves. I mean, where's Jack? I'm going to find Jack. Jack's packing the saddlebags on Amicier just sort of around, just maybe, you know, around a few of those trees a little bit further off. I had an earshot from what you guys are doing sort of, maybe he's got amicure packed and he's looking over this excavation site that he's turned upside down.

Maybe he's putting it back flat just to just to hide the fact. He's like, yeah, making busy. Yeah, he's walked just to make it busy to smooth over the land to like really metaphorically smooth out some crowsing. Literally smoothing. Here's an interesting question. Does your remove dirt, can you, like, form it? Or is it just, like, a block?

Like, for instance, if you wanted to. It's the lawmatured, isn't it? No, no, no. It's, what's it called? It's called Move Earth. Can you, like, make it look seamless? I'm imagining, you know, in golf courses when they cut a new hole and they put the old hole in, and it's, like, looks the same because it's the grass.

All of us golf players? I think that's up to interpretation, depending on, like, Jack's landscape. skill or something, it... For some reason in my head, I'm imagining, like, the block of Earth just lifting out in its exact shape and moving to the side. You know what I mean? Like, and then putting back in, like, Lego. Oh, I like that idea.

Like, he... That's what I was trying to figure out, like, if it can go right back. Oh, so the idea that he'd laid out a grid and then lifted them out one by one in that grid and moved them so he could examine every layer of that grid somewhere else. Yeah, that's interesting. But I don't know if that's... That's why I'm just curious, because that's why I... Yeah, why not?

Yeah, I think he's... methodical enough to have sorted those piles of dirt anyway, so even if they were going to slump down, he'd know which one went where and put them back in that order. Okay, so Doran, you go over to Jack while he's playing with blocks of dirt. Jack, is everything okay?

Do you, uh, do you want me to smash you in the face in my head? No, thanks. Okay. Listen, uh, I'm going to get my, uh, shit fart, uh, packed up. And, uh, when you're done packing that up, we should, we should get going.

Orin. And then I kind of walk away. Orin, you ready to go? Is Orrin going to write about this morning? Oh, yeah. He's like looking over the top of his bedroll, like hiding somewhere, kind of making mental... As Doran... The emotions were powerful. Doran turns to walk away and there's a moment where Jack, like, is about to say something. And there's just like a pause where if Doran had waited one moment more, but then he was like disconnected and it's like, oh, never mind.

It'll come later. But there's just this moment of like... True dwarfish fashion. No, I love it. quit playing in the dirt get on your horse and let's go yeah it's like i'm trying to be consoling but i don't know how to give it enough time so i just like everything okay okay but it wasn't even is everything okay it's do you want me to smash you in the head with no thank you great yeah sounds like we're good then all right get your shit let's go break detention, I don't have one. Consider supporting us on Patreon for our new special show,

a minisode adventure called Malevolent. Details to follow soon. It starts April 1st, so follow us on Patreon today.