High Rollers DnD - High Rollers: Aerois #136 | Must Come Down (Part 1)

Episode Date: February 2, 2022

The team try to navigate the shifting rules of Mesmera's Domain! We're sponsored by D&D Beyond! The ultimate Dungeons and Dragons toolset. Clean up your dungeon delving life and speed up your games here: https://bit.ly/HRDNDBeyond2022 Support the High Rollers and get early access to podcast episodes and Studio updates on our Patreon: www.patreon.com/HighRollers Grab some High Rollers merch: https://freshmerch.fm/collections/high-rollers Music courtesy of Epidemic Sound Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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back to High Rollers, a Dungeons & Dragons podcast in the world of Erois. We're sponsored by D&D Beyond, the ultimate online D&D toolset for both players and DMs. Make your dungeon-delving life a million times easier with D&D Beyond using the link in the episode description.

hello and welcome back to arois our party's quest into the feywild nears its end as they make their way into the city state of heartspire to confront the sorceress mesmera to try and save their friend thalia from a terrible curse the awakened dandelion armador informed the party of the three rules archfey mesmera had placed upon heartspire the rule of grounding preventing any creature from flying in the city the rule of harm harming others is revisited three times upon the attacker and the rule of property, creatures cannot destroy the property of another. Knowing this, the party began to head into the city itself, also learning that the knights of Heartspire seem to be immune to these rules, as though they have been made exempt. With Lucius' clever use of his chromatic magic,

the party bypassed the immense thorn wall that surrounds Heartspire, and began to explore inside as they travel towards the central area with hopes of remaining undetected quill under the effects of true sight discerns that the knights here are actually glamored devils and demons with other clues gathered from visions and analyzing thalia's curse the party begins to suspect as an old enemy grazt the prince Dark Prince of Desire, is somehow connected to all of this. As the party approach the inner wall of the city that protects the central spire, Nova attempts to use Tiangong to cast Passwall, but the spell seems to trigger an alarm, and the two Stone Gate Guardians attempt to engage the party, though slowed due to the party's careful tactics.

Rosemeadow, Kyrie, and Big Cat are petrified by the Guardians' gaze, but the others manage to resist the effect. Quill, using Greater Restoration on Rosemeadow, whilst Aayla and Sentry handle the two large Guardians through several disguised knights, are en route to engage them. Nova, seeking a faster entry to the tower's upper floors finds a clever way around the rule of grounding and uses reverse gravity to propel herself a hundred feet up to the top floors now suspended there whilst onrushing devils and the remaining

guardian fight below nova peers through a window into what appears to be Heart Spire's throne room. And that is pretty much where we left off. That was a bit of a long recap, but a lot happened. Yeah. A lot of a big setup as well. Oh, Nova. Uh-oh. Just dangling there. Oscillating.

In initiative, as we stand, Nova's turn literally just ended with her being propelled 100 feet up and slowly oscillating uh bobbing up and down under the reverse gravity um just to before we jump in ala is going to be the first to take her turn uh followed by rosemary then century but just to kind of like re-establish the visuals of where you are you are basically uh the tower is sort of in front of you the inner wall is behind you and you are in a semi-circular space kind of like a semi-circular plaza around the the the the spire

itself um one guardian the lion guardian has been destroyed and is now just a pile of rubble on the floor i believe ayla uh quill and lucius I think, had moved 30 feet around that side of the room towards the main entrance into the tower, whilst the others, so most of the NPCs, Sentry, are all about sort of 60 feet away from the entrance, sort of around, halfway around the semicircle. Try and get this in your head if there's

any questions go on tom i was i was with the npcs because i'm in the process of unpetrifying that's right so quill's actually back with century in the npcs and i think ayla and lucius then had moved off i was trying to remember exactly who had moved where um isn't it on a guardian right now she was she was yes so she was hanging on to the the elk guardian and fending it off basically which has moved up to engage everybody um you know that there are at least two iranese devils who are flying in to basically they've been alerted to the sounds of battle and they are flying in to engage everything that's going on as well um who knows how many other devils might be on route as well these are just the

only two you can see because they're flying up in the air um it's difficult to estimate but maybe two or three rounds you know they are sort of like 30 seconds or less away uh if at the their current rate of flying um so there's only one guardian the elk guardian is still standing it's about 60 feet away from ayla and lucius um about 30 feet away from Ayla and Lucius about 30 feet away from Quill and the NPCs and then Century is currently on that and that is where we're picking up if there's any questions or if you need a refresher on anything

just say but Ayla we jump in with you okay I think Nova yeah seeing Nova propel herself into the sky and the quill is trying to unpetrify people. I think Ayla will just stop running.

Go, oh for God's sake. Turn around. Run back towards Sentry and the Guardian. And not looking at the Guardian because I don't want to be petrified. I will attack it, please. Okay. What's your movement speed? It's 45, right?

45. You won't get there because they're 60 feet away from you so you'll be 15 feet short um but you could dash in which case it won't cut out your longbow take a shot with me any favors so i will try and shoot it instead twice yeah it's not gonna be fantastic but so you move up to Quill and the other two, and as you're running you kind of put the hammer away and you draw out your longbow and fire two shots. I don't think that's going to hit, though. It's going to be a 16 to hit the first one. These things have an AC

of 20. That was established in the last... No, I'm not going to hit with either of those, so I get closer. Cool. Alright. So you just move as close as you can. Rose Meadow on her turn is having just been un-pentrified, kind of blinks,

looks at Quill confused, but she will turn around. She will grab Kairi because she doesn't think that like, because her instinct would be to save like the one who she sees as the most sort of like innocent. So I think she would grab Kairi

and she cast Greater Rest restoration on Kairi as well she can do that once a day she does have it she can cast it she's only got the one though and she casts that and you watch as Kairi's like stone it breaks off of her feathers and Rosemeadow like grabs her and is like basically like holding her so if

you know if you have to run away because Rosemeadow can run away really quickly she's got Kairi and she's like oh what are we doing quill what are we doing whoa what's happening um and carrie's just like where's thalia thalia and like you know just panic is they're just basically freaking out um that's gonna be rose meadows uh turn she can't do anything else she cast as an action she's just gonna ready herself uh we go to century okay um i believe century's currently slowed at the moment i believe so yes you are currently slowed so i'm going to do one action at the moment so i'm gonna whip around and attack the elk guardian behind me please okay

you would let go of the creature so the the other question is, are you looking at it, Century? So you know that its eyes are glowing. So disadvantage on the attack roll. Okie dokie. One. 25 on the first one. And 26 on the second. Good God. I mean, yeah.

As long as you beat the 20, you're all good. Alrighty. So I'm just going to do standard attack with a level one Divine Smite, so 3d8 and a d12. Swap some of my things around here. 21 to 28 total for the first attack. 28 points of damage. Sorry, I was just sorting out some stuff here.

That's all right. So 28 points of damage. And remember, with slow, you only get to make one attack. Okay. That'll be my turn then. Yeah, so the Starbreaker kind of smashes into the creature and you carve a huge chunk of rock away from this elk guardian. But yeah, unfortunately, it's a magic throw. You do.

At the end of your turn, wisdom saving throw to get away from the slow effect. What means? 18. 18 is enough.. Well, beans. 18. 18 is enough. Yeah, DC 17. So you mentioned to kind of shake off this slowing effect just to sort of like you finish making the attack, it kind of breaks away from you. Beans. Cool. Anything else, Sentry, on your turn?

No, that's me all done, I think. Yeah, I'm good. That's meal. Cool. Thalia, you see thalia's like you know she's struggling to sort of breathe like she's definitely taking these deep breaths she's clutching her arm um but she's kind of like looking up to where like nova's gone and it's just like probably like in a horse kind of like desperate voice it's like what are you doing um it's just gonna call out um and then yeah she's just gonna basically move up to like rose meadow and the others and just try and take cover because she can't really fight at the moment because of the curse um that is beginning to take a greater hold so the next person to go is the guardian the big stone elk um and it is going to um uh it wasn't affected by that. So yeah, it will...

Sentry, it will just try and slam its hooves down on you three times. It's just going to try and... With its giant stone hooves, slam down on you. It's going to be a 19, which is a miss. Doesn't hit. Against Sentry. A 12, which is also a miss. And then a 15.

So all three of these things come slamming down, but now that you're free of the slow, you raise your shield, and the ground cracks underneath you as each of these hooves slam into your armored form, but nothing gets through your defenses, and you don't take any damage. It's like the ground is just cracking underneath you

from the force. Yeah, that's it. Keelik? So I've still got my arcane eye up I believe so I can still take a look at this thing and communicate with others if it's eyes dim again

but so it's eyes haven't stopped glowing now now that the other one's been destroyed this one's eyes are just permanently glowing okay well I still want to use greater restoration on it's big cat right the snow is still petrified are just permanently glowing. Okay, well, I still want to use Greater Restoration on... It's Big Cat, right? The snail is still petrified. Big Cat's the only one petrified, yeah.

And I'm trying to figure out what the hell we do with Nova, but I will restore Big Cat from petrification and... Ow! You see that it does a big stretch, cat big stretch, as the stone breaks away from Big Cat. I know that he's cleverer than a standard cat, so I'll just say to him, don't look at the thing over there until I tell you to, okay?

Well, yeah, he seems to, Big Cat, yeah, because he is quite smart, but he didn't obviously know about this, you know, petrification effect, is now purposely looking away from it. It's not looking at it again he's definitely learned so uh yeah that's uh that's my turn and yeah i'll keep the arcane eye floating around um okay in case all right all right uh quill you're the probably the

first one to notice this um the area where the guardians first came from, which you know is like the main gate into this inner wall and then the main tower itself. The gate bursts open and two of those, they look like, to everybody but Quill, they would look like centaurs. But to Quill, you saw them under the True Sight,

so the illusion is broken. They almost look like, they do have like these equine horse-like bodies. Then they have these demonic human forms and their bodies are kind of covered in almost like a kind of rocky basalt. They have giant sort of like curved horns and very angry faces. I think you've fought a couple of these guys before in Azaghrat. But they basically burst in. It takes their whole turn.

They don't get to do anything, but they basically arrive and they are now at the tower's entrance. They're sort of like about to sort of charge into combat next round. Oh, so they've gone from the outer wall charging towards the main entrance. They have come in through the main gate into this kind of semicircular donut around the tower. And they've now moved in your direction. They've seen the guardians. Going right around the tower heading towards now moved they've now moved in your direction they've seen the guardians going around they're basically coming right around the curve they're

coming around the curve of the corner exactly that's exactly it right yeah they're coming around the corner but that takes all of their movement and they're now 60 feet sort of like looking in your direction like there they are kind of get them basically um lucius and then nova mark you're the best dm i've ever had and you know the flattery doesn't work if the rules work it works you know narratively cool maybe we'll see how tall how far did nova go so 100 feet up she's 100 feet in the air. That was the maximum distance of reverse gravity. It was 100 feet. Now, Wall of Ice, right? Really good spell.

Works in all the ways, especially the one I'm about to say. If I can, it's hard to visualize. Oh, I see what you're going to try and do. I think I know what you're going to do. You want to stack it like a column, right? No, actually. Oh, okay. I would like to have it come out the wall like a platform.

Yeah. So, horizontal instead of a vertical wall. So, it's a 10-foot wide platform. And then it does a horizontal plane. Actually, no. It starts with a 45-degree ramp going up from the wall, and then the next 10... Oh, it's also watered down. Yeah, supported by the wall itself.

Yeah. Yeah. And then it's going to flatten out, and then go up another angle, flatten out, go up 10 times. Oh, so you're basically creating an ice staircase. I'm making a ramp going around the tower up using a wall of ice. So you can do 10, 10 foot squares. Yes.

Yeah. So yeah, in theory, I mean, I think what would... It's slippery. I think if you make... If you do horizontal... If you do, sorry, diagonal, horizontal, diagonal, horizontal, you won't have enough to reach Nova because that would actually only go up...

You'd only get 50, because each horizontal would half it, right? But what you could do is you could make a helter-skelter, like a slide going up the tower, and then the last section is basically just underneath Nova. You have it two diagonals directly underneath Nova.

So it forms like a helter-skelter around. You would allow that as benevolent, do you? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that that would work. You could give it a platform. If you dokelter around you would allow that it's benevolent yeah yeah i think that if you do like a staircase that horizontal plane is going to cut your your height by 50 but if you do all diagonal that would reach the top of the town yeah i didn't know whether you were going to grid it so that i know the diagonal is always longer but in dnd it counters 10 but it's fine it's yeah it's yeah it's it's like a weird thing but i think if you did the helter skelter it would definitely work lucius also that's very

x-men ice man like yeah like i almost imagine lucius holding his hands out yeah and carving it basically yes i will cast that okay all So Nova, you're kind of oscillating and you watch as Lucius, you know, both hands, this kind of stream of blue magic erupts from his hands, pulling sort of from the blue trees and grass of the Feywild around him, this chromatic magic. And yeah, this ice slide basically forms around the outer, you know, edges of the tower,

kind of being, you know, next to the tower. And then underneath you, there is like a kind of diagonal just just barely enough to catch you now there is still a chance you might slip off because this is going to be going very quickly um but it's going to certainly help a lot i look at the creation it it worked it worked every potty we need to play with this farmer often no i think that there's definitely some room like things like wall of ice yeah like you can definitely make it now of course that wall of ice can still be destroyed by rampaging devils and demons and things like that so i can't say i will say this level six if you do just if the if the slide gets destroyed low down that will affect the integrity of it kind of uh minecraft seven

days to die style right like if they take out the supporting bottom bit that will break for the top bits as well all right um but we'll see yeah very frozen i love it um cool anything else lucius that was your action um movement wise do you want to like rush back to like the groups you were a little bit ahead you're actually a bit closer to these demons. Now that I've created something like that, I'm going to move towards the party with my 30 feet. Obviously, I'm not going to make it. You get the quill and the NPCs.

Sentry and Aayla are a little bit further ahead, but you can get to all the others. I made a slippy slide with ice quill. Okay. Are we meant to go up it? This is to get Nova down, right? I wasn't thinking. Okay, great. I thought maybe we could go up up it? This is to get Nova down, right? I wasn't thinking Okay, great

I thought maybe we could go up But maybe this is to help Nova get down as well In case she falls You wouldn't have... I mean, going up, you know, an ice staircase Would have been very difficult We might need some ice shoes with spikes I'll try and find some

Well, I think the most important turn of them all Has come around. And I believe that Chris Trott has probably just ruined all of Kim's plans. I would just like to point out that you called me out last week on this, Mark. I've spent all week thinking about what to do. Came up with a brilliant idea. And now I've got this ice slide and I'm like, should I use it or should I not? Thanks, Trott.

Your turn. Thanks. We don't have a week to think about it exactly no exactly how safe does this icy slidey look it's i mean it's it's you know it's formed from elemental ice it is rough it's not like you know there's there's no ban there's no barriers there's no like railings it is like 45 degree spiral as well it's it's like it's gonna railings. It's like a 45-degree spiral as well. It's going to be a deck-saving throw or an acrobatics check, actually. It'll be an acrobatic skill check

to try and stop yourself from falling. I mean, the thing is, you were going to pull it either way, right? Well, I was thinking what your idea was. What was your idea? I'm the god of teleportation. Yeah, the Arcane Gate. Correct me if I'm wrong, Kim, but you were thinking

because when you cast arcane gate, reverse gravity would drop. Were you thinking of putting the arcane gate directly below you so that you would fall out of it? No. I was thinking of Misty stepping into the throne room and then casting arcane gate down. Obviously, it would take another turn because I can't cast two spells, but I feel bad because Trotz made this little slippy slide.

But it also does look incredibly dangerous, and I'm kind of scared of it. This was a Chris Trot, like, five-minute thinking versus Kim weak thinking. Also, Nova would still, like, why would you pick something? Exactly, yeah, exactly. That's exactly it. It was the safety net in case your plan didn't pan out, you know? Nova would still like why would you pick something exactly yeah exactly it was the safety net in case your plan didn't pan out

I just put the Kim in me the super the Mario 64 ice level with the penguins in me wants to go slippy slide on the very dangerous ice platform it's time to embody Nova,

who's never played a Mario game. What are you doing, Nova? I will look down and I will shout, look for the portal! And I'm going to misty step into the throne room. Okay. Great. Lucius cries.

I'm sorry, Charles. It has no edges. What's Nova's passive perception? I just want to kind of get an idea of how much would you look around before being distracted by you're worrying about this arcane being. By brain. 14. It's not great.

14. Yeah, you get a very brief glimpse, right? You get a brief glimpse of the throne room. It appears to be a large hexagonal room. The first thing you notice is that the kind of segmented walls, which are in this hexagonal shape, you've kind of gone through one of these, like a small side window, and you appear about 30 feet inside the room um the hexagonal walls are like extremely polished they're almost like mirrors um to the point where

the central areas of each one are basically a mirror now they so it's like six mirrors all facing inwards you see a large throne um the throne probably would have once been quite beautiful but now it is it's you know there are soft red fabrics um gold filigree but it's kind of covered in like black ash and soot and blast marks you can see the soft red fabric has been torn and shredded at points um there is definitely dirt and grime that has uh kind of grown and and not been cleaned around it um the all around the room uh are large rose bushes with these thick variethorns similar to the wall that was conjured around the city uh the roses on them are beautiful full in bloom but there are also these deadly razor sharp looking vines um and the roses seem to constantly wilt their petals which now just

litter the floor like the floor is like there are wilt their petals, which now just litter the floor. Like, the floor is, like, there are huge piles of, like, rose petals all over the floor, basically. But that's it. That's what Nova sees when you teleport in, and then you are immediately kind of, like, turning your vision back, like, I've got to conjure these portals, you know,

because you've got to look down, so you've got to stay next to these windows as well. So that is... Yeah, I think she'd be focused on it. But, one second um because that was my bonus action to cast misty step yes um i just wanted to check because as an action um i was either i'm not sure this is gonna i think this is gonna depend on how you interpret this but i wanted to activate no i don't think it willoud of Shadow, which is you cast invisibility at will

without expending a spell slot. But I think because I did... Still casting a spell. Still casting a spell, unfortunately. Can I ready an action? Because I can do that, right? Because I still have an action. I've only used a bonus action, right?

Yes, as long as it's not casting a spell. Yeah. So my action... Sorry, my held action, I would like to hold a dodge if that's all right okay yeah like if anything comes to me i want to dodge sure um okay yep uh ayla he made that noise guys he made that um noise oh shit it's me already i got really wrapped up in that um functioning i will um entry after this by the way so ayla i will go uh approach the elk i think i'm close enough now to get up to the elk with yeah yeah easy centuries nearly finished off but you you can kind of step in um are you

looking at it no no thank you um but i am with my hammer, so I have a better chance of hitting now. I rolled two 18s, so plus 14. That will hit. That's a hit. 19 damage on the hammer and five lightning damage. The only thing, so you literally, as you slam the hammer into it and the lightning bursts out from you you watch as the elk begins to crack and break apart the only thing it can do is it can use its reaction uh when it takes a second melee attack uh before its next turn it

can make an attack against you and that's what it's going to do and then it's going to die 27 to hit oh yeah uh for 17 bludgeoning damage so you you're raging, so we half that to eight. So eight bludgeoning damage, and then it just crumbles. So Sentry, Ayla kind of like runs up behind you, one smash, the elk kind of crumbles, and you're now both sort of stood away. You do notice, the two of you, that now 90 feet back around towards the front entrance of the tower,

you did hear the sounds of enemies entering that half of the semicircle. So you still have your movement. You've got 30 feet of movement left, Ayla. I think I just want to move to where... Nova's shouted out a portal, so I'm going to move probably close to where Quill is, which I think is not too far from me,

because he seems to be clustered with a group of people, and Nova might cast it somewhere there. You can get exactly to Quill and Lucius. And the NPCs are all gathered in the center of the semicircle, basically, if you imagine you're at the bottom half of it. And the bottom run. Cool. Rose Meadow.

Has Lucius, Quill, Aayla, you guys haven't taken really much damage, have you? I've taken 50-something points of damage. None. Rose Meadow can only really heal multiple creatures. She could do. Me and Sentry have taken a bit of her being. So what she'll do is Rose Meadow will hold an action,

and when Sentry gets within range of her healing light, she will use her healing light ability. Sentry's taken a bit of her being. So what she'll do is Rosemeadow will hold an action, and when Sentry gets within range of her healing light, she will use her healing light ability. Sentry. Yeah, Sentry will move back to where Quill and Aayla and Lucius have gone to. You can get some hit points then. Where's Nova? I heard a scream. Is she okay?

She's in the tower. It was a confident shout, not a scream. Well, the first bit was a scream. Is she okay? She's in the tower. It was a confident shout, not a scream. Well, the first bit was a scream. The noise once she went up must have been like yeet! Yes, you also see this ice helter skelter sentry as well.

Nova, sorry, sentry and Aayla, you both get back 15 hit points as Rosematta uses her healing light ability. Yeah. Can I hold an action? So if any of the guards come within 30 feet, can I cast Turn the Faithless on them? You certainly can.

You absolutely can. Cool. I'll do that. I love it. Mark is like like combat difficulty it's listen man like you know it's one of those things you certainly can't century yes you you can definitely do that and then in my head i'm like i hope at least one of them passes the save so they don't just completely waste everyone's time um the thing is it's still scary for us we're like yeah no i know i know

it's scary for you i know uh so thalia um you guys will see thalia kind of like falls to one knee and she coughs and just like this black blood is like just splattered against the stone ground and she looks up and she's like it's getting pretty bad um and she's really ragged can i pick her up yeah you can you don'tged. Can I pick her up? You don't need to fully pick her up, but yeah, you can get an arm under her shoulder and she leans on you. I'll do that. She'll definitely lean on you for sure.

That thing is now dead. Kilik Adkala! Instead of holding an action or anything like that, I want to just delay my entire turn for when this portal shows up. Wait, am I at the end of the initiative queue? You're pretty close to the end and you can't delay your whole turn.

The only thing you can do in 5e is hold an action. But you could hold an action to move into the portal. That is like an old D&D thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Is Quillowell a gate that's even been traded? They were shouted, yeah. Nova said to look out for the portal.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Nova definitely shouted to look out for the portal. I have 26 perception, Lucius. You can see through walls. You can see everything. I can hear through time. So if you want to, Tom, you could hold an action to dash, and then that would be to move through the portal.

Yeah, I'll do that instead. As soon as the portal arrives, you're going to move through it portal yeah i'll do that as soon as the portal arrives you're gonna move through it is the idea i'm in yeah all right uh big cat will basically ready himself and seize these enemies um and so sort of doesn't really understand the portal stuff but will basically ready to make an attack if anything gets too close um and then yes these two centaur-like demons uh who are about 60 away, but they move very, very quickly. Both of them come blazing in. Sentry, turn the faithless. What do I do?

Okay, wisdom saving throw. You've got to pass a six. Oh, no. DC 16? Yep. Amazing. That's a six for one. That's a natural one for the other one.

Get out of here. So on a failure, the creature is turned for one minute or until it takes damage. So they just start running away. So basically they spend their 60 feet of movement. They get within 30 feet of Sentry. What does this look like? Is this like the Matrix glowing? Do you raise the...

She's a side-eye. Do you just look at them? Do you just glare at them? Sentry raises her shield, and then the combined glow of her Matrix and the symbol of Solvin on her shield both glow simultaneously, casting out a golden beam in their direction.

Like the Nazgul and Gandalf, like the soonest they get within the light, these two things just buck and turn and they go running. They're going to spend their action to dash because they have to basically move as far away from you as they possibly can. They just go right back the way they came

and they go running. Yeah, basically. they just go right back the way they came um and they go they go running yeah basically um they you do still see the two iranese that are flying through the air they are about one turn away they are they are one turn of movement away from being within range and they don't look as they look a lot stronger than these two centaurs that we're rushing in um but yeah the two armonites uh just nope they're done skip over them lucius virion eloine elenasto saying there's two on their way uh there's two iranese they are 120 feet uh like basically up in the air they're 120 feet away from you guys so two one round of movement will get them to you okay Okay. Lucius is going to move near the rest of the party. Use the rest of his movement to kind of stay close,

sensing that they're all preparing to jump into a thing. He's going to hold an action to twin chromatic orbs at level five once these two are within range of 90 feet. Once the Iranese are within 90 feet, you will cast Chromatic Orb as a held action. Okay. Great stuff. At 5th level.

Perfect. Nova Vija. Hello, I would like to look out the gate and cast Arcane Gate. You look down at your friends who are 100 feet below you. You managed to just about get an angle. You swipe Tiangong in the air.

A portal appears next to you and a portal appears down by them. Quill, the portal appears. You're going to dive right through, right? That was your held action. All right. Anything else on your turn, Nova, because that's your action for Arcane Gate.

Anything else? I don't like the way you're asking me these questions. Yeah, I can't do nothing else. Can I angle it so the portal is, like, it's facing in? So its back is to the throne room. Can you imagine? Yeah. Just slam. So it's facing straight out of the window so they go straight out of the window and Galen chooses

Helter Skelter. I know what Nova means because you can use the back of the portal as like cover basically can't you? Yeah. One at the top of the Helter Skelter and one at the bottom. We go forever. You go forever. Could everybody but Kim and Tom mute and deafen for a second and then i'll

wave at you to get your attention back okay oh yeah or just like take your headphones off okay okay okay it's getting cute up in here i'm not muted no no you can you guys can stay for the moment um so quill uh-huh when you arrive in because your passive perception is considerably higher you notice um the same thing of the the features of the room you see the hexagon you see the mirrors you see all the the briar thorns and the roses and then you notice that somebody was lurking behind the throne the entire time and when you appear through the portal she steps out and you see and you don't get to react because she's going to do something

as she's stepping out, but I just want to physically describe it to you guys first, and then she's going to do something. You see a woman. You see who you can only assume is Mesmera herself. A young woman with a pale complexion

and blue almond eyes. Her hair is pale blonde, near white, extremely long, trailing behind her like a dress. She wears a crown of black briar and red roses. And the dress looks to be pristine. It's got like a dazzling red sash, but then as it gets to her feet, it becomes

black and dirty and tattered and torn. Her eyes look quite gaunt, and around her shoulders is a black cape with stitching in gold and silver like a pair of hands gently holding the cape onto her and it has six fingers you see that the hands have six fingers each and as she appears she says out loud rescind the rule of grounding only citizens of heartspire may move

or speak in the throne room the two of you are paralyzed and you cannot speak oh no everything is fine we need to get Rhiannon's attention come on back

it's all fine you were like looking at your note. So, yeah, the situation's resolved. It's all, the day's saved. It's all the... Ayla. It's Hadar on our halter skelter. Ayla.

Whee! Alright, so you see Quill jump in. What do you do? I mean, Ayla's not going to know anything terrible that an ominous that Mark would ask us to remove our headphones for has happened, so she'll go through with it. It doesn't have to be ominous. It's just information.

It's just information. She's holding up Aayla, so she'll probably... Aayla's going to end up... We have to go. Yep. You going to portal yep alright your turn ends

uh Rosemeadow jumps through the portal Sentry everybody ready to go through I think Sentry will

yes okay you basically all jump through and I now I can reveal the same thing as soon as you

all arrive you you are. Ah, so your turn comes before. Because I didn't hold an action. You did hold an action, but your turn. Oh, no, that would go. So, yes, you do get to do your Chromatic Orbs. If you want to do that now, Chris Trott, they will fly within range. Is it just wasting time?

No, no, no, no, no. It's because these guys could still be involved somehow, so it's worth just keeping track on if they take damage and also you did ready it so I mean I'm not to do it but for the first I think I'd want to deter them as much as I can and 30 yeah both of those hit fuck me right And then what type of damage is this? Acid. Okay. 33? That is 33, yeah. 33 points of damage to both of them.

So they fly in and their whole movement is to reach you guys. They basically get within bow striking range. But yeah, they fly within 90 feet. You blast them with the chromatic orbs. In fact, actually, no, they don't have bows. They have spears and lassos. So they come flying down. You blast them with the chromatic orbs in fact actually no they don't have bows they have like spears and lassos so they come flying down you blast them with the chromatic orb that's the end of their turn

and then Lucius your turn is next and then it goes straight to Nova jump through the portal when everybody comes through the portal and this is the thing is each of you would take your turn and then your turn ends because as soon as you arrive in the throne room you are paralyzed

and you cannot speak you just arrive and you just can't move you are completely stuffed um all of you it's going really well you watch as uh yeah you basically all just fall into a pile and this woman in white, and I didn't describe her to the others, so I'll describe her to you now. She's young. She has a pale complexion. She's wearing this white dress

that gets tattered and dirty and ruined near the bottom. And she has long, pale blonde hair. So pale, it's almost white, but there is a hint of straw color to it. And it's long. Her hair is as long as the dress. It like trails all the way down to the floor she doesn't wear shoes she has like a dazzling red sash and a crown of briar thorn and

roses um she has no weapons um but she does have this black cape which is sort of draped over her shoulders and there is gold and silver stitching as if a pair of hands is holding it onto her, for her. And yeah, like those of you probably not Aayla immediately, but Century and Lucius would definitely notice that there are six fingies on those hands and it's holding the cape in place. And she sees you all. And there is this kind of like barely contained rage and And you can still look, you can still think. So if any of you have messenger rings,

you can still communicate with each other, but you cannot move, you cannot speak. And if there's anything you want to do, just let me know. But Quill, you're the first to notice, but everybody else does. These mirrored hexagons. So the room is like a hexagon, right? There are these six sides

and the surfaces of them are so brightly polished, they're like mirrors. Three of the walls you see have reflections of Mesmera, but the reflections aren't copying her behavior. They're almost like independent images, like illusions of her. One of them is like crouched on the floor, like barely like peeking from behind her eyes

and is shaking like she's terrified of something one of them she's just stood and looks just to be absolutely furious she's like pacing up and down she's like pointing towards uh the group of you and then the last one is almost like a royal queen like she looks proud and confident and arrogant um and you you begin to hear these these reflections speaking to her um the scared one is just like we we need to kill them we can't let them they're going to hurt us she's brought them here to kill us she's brought them here to kill us like she wanted to long ago and then the angry one is just like we need to eek this out make her suffer maybe we should kill them in front of her and then the proud one is just like we are a ruler we have the power here let us show them what we can do and then the actual mesmera is just

like so you've you've decided to come i see well you and all your little assassins aren't going to kill me no you're never going to hurt me ever again you're going to pay for what you've done thalia um and you can see thalia actually out of all of you thalia can still move um thalia is like thalia like staggers and she goes to draw one of her her pistols out and she points it towards mesmera like let them go and she's like really struggling to speak and then mesmera says rescind the rule of harm new rule time in the throne room flows faster every second is one hour and you watch thalia drop to her knees and she like it's like and she like coughs up blood, and she is struggling. Whoa.

Okay. And she basically, you will watch as, like, Thalia, like, the briar thorn is, like, rapidly crawling up onto her neck, and it begins to spread down. And, yeah, Mesmera is just like, it will all be over soon. Everything you did will be repaid in kind. Nova. Go on, Century.

In fact, let's do everyone else first, and then I've got something I'm going to jump in. Century, go for it. In this whole pile of people that we are right now, are we all, like, touching? I would say that, like, I don't know. Let's roll a dice to see like because as you spilt out there would be some force as you step through so your bodies would go literally go

rigid and then you'd fall to the side i guess it makes sense that me and nova would be further away yes because you actually step through and then this triggered so nova and quill are still stood up and they look like they're turning towards mesmera like they're frozen towards her basically um i'd say it's like a 50 50 chance for each person so we'll say uh yeah 49 or lower you're touching somebody so lucius you're not lucius like slid away or like you know bounced off you and ayla um and then ayla uh here's a hundred wow um so ayla kind of like her force like she's just And then Aayla. Aayla is 100. Wow. So Aayla kind of like her force, like she's just like,

she's maybe only a couple of centimeters away, but you're not touching. Rosemeadow. Rosemeadow is not. Kairi. Neither is Kairi. You all obviously scattered as you landed. We're like Skittles. No. No, literally as you all spilt out, whether it was the force of the portal or just bad luck.

But it's like you are so close to touching, like your boot is next to Rosemeadow's but you're not technically touching her. Things like that, so you're all scattered. I was wondering if a cleansing touch would work verbal semantic or anything no it's also that you can touch you can touch but it's also being paralyzed means you can't take actions like right now you can't use abilities basically you can't you know you can't move to do anything or channel your power you can basically think um anything that doesn't require like movement or speaking you can you can do really but we try and resist it uh no this seems to be just like the rule of grounding like the arch phase rules like the rule no flying it's just she seems to have this control um and especially

it seems here like it seems that in this throne room like she was able to yeah like she's accelerated time like uh that's going on we'll say only like, you know, a second or two has passed like while we're figuring all these things out. Unless anybody else can say anything else. I've got something for Nova. I'm looking at all my spells.

They're all verbal semantic. And even then, like I've got, I know. They're all in action. Yeah. I'm just seething on the floor.

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Like you have howl. There's nothing I can do. Yeah. There's nothing I can do. There's nothing you can do. Nova, in her head, just as she sees this with Thalia... First of all, she's kind of trying

to shout at Thalia to put her gun down. But also, when she sees what happens to Thalia, she's just screaming inside her head, like every fiber of her being. Something interrupts that screaming a voice and you all hear it uh you all hear tiangong say something uh where is it oh here it goes you hear activating quantum cognosis space and nova time seems to stop mesmera stops moving everything

seems to stop and everything seems to grow darker and you find that you can move but it's not your body you can feel almost like an astral projection of yourself like you feel like yourself separated and standing in front of you and this is the first time we've seen it so i'd like you to describe it is humanoid tiangong it's blue and gold and light and energy and filled with endless stars and nebulas swirling there's a vague humanoid shape male female androgynous but it's there and the eyes burn gold nice nova. Nova Vija, I have accelerated our thinking and communication speed to allow instantaneous mental communication.

Whilst this may give the appearance that time has slowed, I'm afraid that time is still functioning as normal, but it allows us to communicate at an accelerated rate. I have an idea. Please. Anything. Stop. Stop this. Please. I have an idea Please Anything Stop Stop this Please

I understand that you care greatly For the being known as Thalia Whisperwind I do but You know Tiangong You know me You know me better than anything I can't hold anything Indeed

You know You know that I value you More than Than Thalia. Of course. I feel that our relationship has grown to an unusual circumstance. And whilst your feelings for Thalia Whisperwind are confusing and perhaps a little

different, I do feel a great bond with you. And it is only through this great bond that I can present a possibility, a chance. I fear that if we do not do something, Thalia Whisperwind and perhaps ourselves will be eliminated in this space. As such, I have a proposal. Would you be interested in hearing it? I am, but you know that if it puts you at risk, I'm going to say no.

My self-preservation is still intact, Nova Vija. I would not sacrifice myself unless it was absolutely necessary. Instead, I believe I have a way that could break this Archfey's rule, at least this temporary one. Do it. Do you wish to hear what it is? I suppose I probably should, shouldn't I? Because otherwise it might have some probability that it all goes wrong or it's something like, let's make a wish with Hadar, but I know you wouldn't do that. But I'm just babbling now, could you please just tell me what you want to do?

We really must work on your ability to think problems through before reacting on them. You are familiar that our relationship works as a symbiosis. I give you access to magical essence and you draw magical energy from me to cast spells, correct? Correct. Up until now, this process has only been one way. I provide access and you draw magic forcibly

from my eternal being. I believe that I have a way to sort of reverse this process, to pour my knowledge and essence into your physical form. This would dramatically change the way that we currently function. You would no longer have access to many of the greater abilities involving teleportation magic that I present, but it would give you my martial prowess as well as new unusual abilities. More importantly, I believe that it would allow me to reconfigure our magical essence

so that we are considered Archfey. Would you still be you? I am uncertain. I believe so, and I believe that you will still be you, but this will thin the barrier between us. It will be a greater level of symbiosis than we've experienced before. Activate the procedure. Very well. I should also note that I am hopeful that, if we can master this process, it may be possible for us to save the other Tiangon as well.

Very well. You don't need a verbal answer from me. You know what I'm thinking. I do. But I am grateful for this opportunity to converse. I should make it note, I should note this now. This Mesmera is haunted by the past and the future. She is enraged and afraid of it.

These rules she has created to protect herself from the things she does not wish to face again. We will not be able to win this through a strength of arms. You will need to find a way to force her to change her rules to save Thalia. Strategize. Take what time you need. I will keep this process active as long as possible. But when we are finished, you will be different, as will I. Thank you. Of course. I know that I may be different to the other Tiangong now but I do not know them but I do know you

and with that this golden blue space humanoid seems to rush forward and Nova you can go and switch to your other character sheet that we prepared cool you have another character sheet ready we prepared. What? Cool.

You have another character sheet ready to go. She did? For a while now. Oh, my God. Kim and I had some chats about some stuff. You downloaded that Windows update at the perfect time. Holy crap. Spurred by circumstance.

So, NovaVeja, if you want to have a think, like, take a moment, or if you want to ask me some questions, but like, yeah, like now that you feel, um, your form doesn't change, your physical form probably doesn't change. We'll save that for when you use certain abilities where you can do certain things, but your knowledge, your, your mind is definitely you, you have flashes of memories of things you don't remember, but now you do like you were there and there is knowledge fighting you know the myriad of eternal combat forms that tiangong has mastered in their eons of time and you are now a capable fighter uh with many unusual abilities and you

still obviously have some warlock powers as well but more importantly your mind flashes and yeah tian gong was right you know you cannot win this through force of arms if she has the power to like affect time and to paralyze everybody just trying to fight her is probably not going to win but there is definitely something here the traumas the rules that she created the rule of grounding to stop people flying she lost her wings the rule of harm thalia literally taught physically tortured her and lost her wings. The rule of harm. Thalia literally physically tortured her and hurt her. She created a rule to protect herself. The property destruction.

Thalia destroyed her belongings and took away her home, things like that. These are all rules created to protect her from traumas that she doesn't want to face. You need to find a way to try and break through these barriers and also make her change this rule to save Thalia. Otherwise, time's going to run out. This is a timed thing. If you don't save Thalia in time, she will die. And right now, you are the only one who can move. So we watch as you blink and you suddenly realize you can move.

Mesmera, though, is focused on thalia and she's sort of beginning to sort of rant and rave you don't know what you did to me how dare you i'm gonna make sure that you suffer for everything you've done like she's she's like launching into a tirade what do you do so i presume my body cannot move but tiang no no you you still you can as well yeah if you want to do that thing you can do that thing but you physically you are now tiangong has adjusted your dna your magical essence and you are basically now like unaffected by by the the rule as it stands you've broken this rule so nova i guess opens her eyes and sees this and starts to walk forward and as she walks forward almost this golden blue shadow trails out of her like all this light and stars just pulling off of her and it forms into a

second version of her but like i said just androgynous not not clearly defined it's still transparent with the stars through it and together they walk forward as this echo pours from her yeah as mesmera looks like she turns and is like panicked you see this this look of panic like you you've done something that you shouldn't be able to do and she she's like raising herself like maybe to try and speak or do something you don't know but she's definitely reacting and like time's passing you know you know you're trying to like this is all happening in a few seconds um and i guess both the shadow the echo and nova speak at the same time and um i don't know if tiangong would still appear as a sword i guess so but i'll see if there's a weapon i mean tiangong prefers the the form of a sword yeah tiangong prefers the form of a sword, yeah. Tiangong prefers the form of a longsword, basically. That's, uh...

Yeah. But we'll open up our hands. Please stop. Please. We are not here to hurt you. We don't want to hurt you. Make a persuasion check. Oh, am I going to...

It is a nine. Okay. You see Mesmera's eyes go wide, and she looks, and in a panic, she will say... In a panic, she will say within the rule of holding new rule only I may speak

in the throne room the rest of you can now all move none of you can speak and we're going to roll initiative I think here and whilst this is a combat I just want to track an order of like who's going and who's doing what and who's moving also there is a map I can now place you guys on as well.

Okay. So it's a new initiative then? Yes, this will be a brand new initiative for sure. Okay. And then there is a... Garbage. Let me just... I was thinking of autenting it but I don't know how

in a paralyzed state technically it looks like I could have I just don't know how I would be able to do that do you want to? I'd say you can do that because it can slightly change things because her action is still going to be the same she basically still rescinds it but if you want to use one of your portents I will let you

because it was a lot was happening at once I no idea how like with a flicker of the storm eye or something like that it just doesn't really make sense to no it does i think i think what it would be is that like it's a flicker of the storm eye and nova would hear in her mind other words to say and like she would speak those other words instead okay i mean yeah if if it feels a bit cheeky to do it way after the roll but yeah I definitely would have. It's not and you'll see why in a second. I would have given her an 18 plus whatever her persuasion would have been. So what's your persuasion

Nova? Persuasion is plus 5. Okay I'm just kind of trying to spread everybody out to represent you guys not being near each other when you came out the ball Maybe sort of like this Yeah, we were pretty spread out nowhere near touching distance

So I think that the the words get through like the fact that you're not showing any violence But there is this panic in mesmer she she sees this happen um and she just covers her ears she's just like i don't want to hear it and then she speaks out this new rule like nobody nobody may speak in the throne room except me um uh and yeah and then uh we will jump into this i think i can just do this manually because this isn't a combat so let me just get a notepad up no and what that one I'll tell you what that looks like once we've rolled initiative like what that success why that thing was differently so miss mirror so Nova was your initiative nine in Lucius I had a whopping 14.

14. Aayla. 24. 4. Sentry. 16. Quill. Big boy initiative back at it again with a 7. 7.

I'm so slow these days. Farley will just be 1 automatically at one rose meadow wait is the time rule still a thing yes yes she has not rescinded the time rule which is why this is art oh you'll see why give me a second give me a second here boy second here boy or Kyrie's not very good at six and big cat finally Jesus Christ so many NPCs my fault big cat with a nice 18 okay um and then mesmera herself she will go at 30 oh okay pretty much in the middle okay love so a bit of out of game stuff and it's don't think too hard like it's okay for me to explain a game mechanic and you guys

knowing that as your characters like it's fine don't think too hard like it's okay for me to explain a game mechanic and you guys knowing that as your characters like it's fine don't think too much about it what this is is is sort of going to be a bit of a like i'm going to count your successes and your failures at either trying to convince convince mesmera or to basically try and get her to confront this thing that she's facing but basically force her to give up the time rule that will save Thalia. If you don't do that in, I think I worked out to be four rounds, Thalia dies, right? You have four rounds of each taking turns to try and get enough successes to convince Mesmera to give this up.

Now, and Tiangong kind of says to all of you in your minds, the same thing it said to Nova, like you cannot win this purely by, trying to kill her, right? It doesn't mean you can't, like, hit her. Maybe hitting her will do something. But what you need to do here is get her to change the rules and get her to confront these problems properly and not just basically take it out on Thalia, right?

And that's it. And we are going to start with the best person to possibly start with. It's Ayla. We're all going to die. No. I think Ayla's not really... The only thing I was going to remind you on

is that the current rules in effect are the time rule, which is every second six hours pass, or an hour passes, sorry. So every turn is six hours. Basically, that doesn't really affect anything you guys do. It is slowly killing Thalia, is the idea. The next one is nobody but Mesmera can speak. So none of you can verbally communicate.

And then the last one is still the rule of property. You cannot destroy anybody else's property. Those are the three things in place. Another bit of flavor as well is those reflections. As soon as Nova starts moving, the reflections are like screaming at like Mesmer, like kill her or like, no, she's going to kill us, run away. Like the reflections are like echoing some of her thoughts

and things like that. So Ayla. Ayla's not going to know too much what to do, and so she's going to get up. Where are the mirrors in the room that have the reflections in them? Am I near by one? Oh, I see them. Hang on. Let me copy and paste this mirror here,

and I will put them as enlarged tokens so you can see them. Those are the mirrors? Okay. I'll color them a little bit differently. We currently have one if we have a northeast, northwest, and then

southwest are the three. Down there, okay. Yes. I'll tint the blue. Can I move towards this one? And I just want to stand so that I'm in front of it in regards to... I want to essentially block her sight to this mirror,

stand in front of the mirror where that figure is. And then put my hammer And the idea is that you're trying to stop it from being able to see her. Trying to stop her from looking at that. Put my hammer on the ground and just hold up my hands and point at

Nova and just hold my hands up at her. Alright. Okay. Alright. Okay. It's not a direct success here, but I will say that anything that Nova does, Nova can have advantage on because you're basically trying to divert attention. You're not being threatening. So whatever

Nova does next has advantage on the check. Alright. I'm also going to give these guys nameplates so you know which emotions are being shown as well. So the northeast is fear. The northwest is going to be pride. And then the southwest is going to be anger. Oh, boy.

All right. So, Ayla, you just kind of non-threatening you stand in front of the mirror trying to block it as best as you can it is quite a large mirror this reflection is quite large but you put your hands up you put your hammer on the ground and you just direct your attention towards nova um all right um big cat will just run to uh thalia's side and just sort of like like lays down and he's kind of like whim and just sort of like lays down and is kind of like whimpering, sort of like, you know, nursing like Thalia, basically.

Unfortunately, the cat's not going to be a huge help outside of combat. Sentry. Sentry will like pull out a notebook that she bought a while ago and she'll write in it. And then can she like scoot it along the floor towards Mesmera so she can

read it? Just like... Yeah, you can certainly try. I'm just trying to think what this would be. So I think that this would probably be... I think that she would see it, but I'm trying to decide on

how much she would actually want to read it because right now she just thinks that like this is she doesn't know what's going on so make a persuasion check but probably at disadvantage because you're having to write it down you're like you know it's trying to get her attention to it right five so yeah the the notes there but like mesmera just isn't looking at. Like she's just like not paying attention to it. She draws the cloak, you know, around her and she's now sort of like panicking

and she's looking like she's going to try and back away. Anything else on your turn, Century? Probably an action, just scribble, like a quick note. Okay. I guess I'll follow Ayla's lead and start moving up towards one of the other mirrors

the one in the south east I'll move up to towards anger Lucius seeing sentry move towards that mirror he's going to move towards that mirror as well

he only gets to there he's going to look at Nova in her current form with the shadow and just you can see the wide eyed like mouse agape just taking that all in and then you can see the wide-eyed like mouse a gape just taking that all in and then he looks at the tattered rug underneath and

he points at that and then he points at the mirror behind it and then does a throwing gesture okay all right he's gonna go towards it but obviously you can't reach that right now okay all right so lucius done yeah that's all i can do uh mesmera begins to back away towards the throne 5 10 15 20 25 30 she's just like back pedals like just watching thalia kind of like gasping and like struggling on the ground and she looks towards like Ayla who's like near the hammer and she looks towards you guys at the rug And she doesn't really she sees you all spreading out and she's like dancing around between all of you and

She will She will say she will say she won't do anything just yet actually I think she's just literally going to back away for the time being Nova Vija sorry, Rose Meadow would go next

sorting out my initiative order here Rose Meadow is going to with her horseshoes of speed that century gave her um she is going to she is going to it's a verbal somatic it is a verbal damn she can't do that that can't do that can't do that that can't do that can't do that can't do any of those

she will she will just move towards Thalia and sort of rest her hair like hand on thalia and um like try and basically just try and like you know be there for thalia like unsure what to do unable to speak not really sure what to do um on this one uh so now we go to nova nova so i don't know this is i think probably down to dm's discretion but this whole thing is going to be very loosey-goosey there's an ability called echo avatar where i transfer my consciousness to my echo but i don't know if that would allow me to speak. Like, would that, to speak through...

The rule is only she can speak in the throne room. The echo is still, even though it's a magical thing, you would still be speaking. Okay. You guys, you'll need to think of something non-verbal you can do to, I don't know, make an appeal. But maybe it's also a case of, like, trying to get her to confront the things

that have happened to her. Maybe it's not just a case of, like, speaking pretty words. Maybe this is a case of like trying to get her to confront the things that have happened to her. Maybe it's not just a case of like speaking pretty words. Maybe this is a case of like messing with these mirrors. Maybe it's like trying to help her in some other physical way. Maybe it's showing her things that she doesn't want to see. Maybe it's doing things that she doesn't want to have done to her. You know, she needs to maybe it's an element of confronting these traumas as well i don't want to go for mean options straight away as i think especially because nova felt and saw what happened to her i don't know that she wants to go for like hurting

her not like you know physically but emotionally because i know there's something I would do if I wanted to be a real bitch about it. Nova and Tiangong, the Echo, will walk very slowly, still keeping a distance, but just like maybe five, ten feet towards her, arms out, and then we'll both, as one, kneel down in front of her. And

using creation, I want to create roses. Just beautiful roses in front of her. Okay. Yeah. So this is an ability that Tiangong has. Yeah, it's an innate spell from the item, so you don't need to speak to do it.

Yeah, so you watch as all of these beautiful roses, like you sweep the blade of tian gong or maybe just your hands and the echo place your hands down and all these beautiful roses begin to bloom um surrounding you and thalia and sort of lifting everything up is there is there anything is there like a particular motive or are you just creating like beautiful flowers i think i mean i'm not going to say what I'm trying to communicate because I think that's down to, like, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But it's very peaceful gestures, very slow gestures. Peaceful gesture. Love it. And if Mesmera looks at Nova's face, Nova is crying. Like, she is just tears pouring from her face. That's true. All right. That seems to definitely have an effect.

Like, the visual image of the rose, this is not what she was expecting and she like looks around um and she sees that you've cast a spell she doesn't know how you've done it but you've clearly used a spell to make these these roses grow and uh she will rescind the rule of speaking new rule only i can cast spells in the throne room. All of you can now speak. None of you can cast spells. That's just as bad, actually, for me. Well, I mean, maybe there are other things you can do. Hello.

All right. Nova, anything else on your turn? Can I speak? It was your action to cast Passwall, so not this round, but if there was any other bonus actions or anything. You forced her to change a rule. No, I think

that's it. Nova's just holding her hands up. I will say that was one success. So currently, I will tell you that you have two successes in this challenge. But Quill? Now, this cloak around her, this demonic fiendish cloak. Well, it looks like a very pretty cloak.

So it looks elegant. It looks very fashionable and glamorous. But you can see very clearly stitched these gold-silver threads of like, almost like the image of hands. And to most eyes, it would look like it's holding the cape on her on her shoulders you first of all see that it has six fingers there's another interpretation and that that's these hands are well that's the thing because i during the duration of this non-speaking thing i was

planning for this turn and also not be able to cast any spells. And I was wondering about Arcane Abjuration. Now, obviously, it is not a fiend, right? But it is an extremely fiend-like cape. And I'm also wondering how much of this is actually controlling her, this cape itself, or is it all the mirrors and everything around? I kind of want to try and separate the cape from her in some way. Okay. And I don't want to try and up in duration.

30 feet I can do it with. Any fail fiend that can see or hear me within 30 feet. I hope this isn't too much of a leading question, but are you flying, Quill, or are you moving? Because you remember how to fly again. The rule of grounding has been lifted. Oh, yeah, I can remember. The rule of grounding, if she was to bring that back,

I don't think would be a bad thing, really. And I kind of wanted to attempt to make the flying birdman thing so much of a threat that she's like, right, I need to bring that rule back. That would force her to change that rule, yeah. And I do kind of want to do this while flying in an attempt to do

two things. Either she brings back the rule, or I separate her from the cape. And either is a victory in my eyes. Alright, do two things for me then. Make an intimidation check with advantage for like trying to fly at her in this kind of like scary birdman way and then the other one is the abjuring what do i have to do on that is that saving throw or something uh arcane abjuration is a wisdom saving

throw and in terms of i'm not flying at her it's more i'm flying into the air to then make a big dramatic thing yeah okay and it's a wisdom saving throw normally for um of 19 19 okay just quite a lot sure this so a couple of things happen so give me give me an intimidation check with advantage i just want to see what the result you get one that's an 8 and a 17 17 so two a couple of things happen so when you take to the air like mesmera immediately like looks away and you hear the reflection of the the terror reflection just like no we don't want to remember we don't want to remember and then the anger one is like how dare this thing fly you're mocking me you're mocking what she did to me um and you hear this all of this thing and she immediately is just like rescind the rule of property no rule no creatures can fly in heart

spire and you land on the ground the rule of property okay yep um and then the the the cape quill you reach out uh and it isn't a spell so it it does kind of work. You try and channel Hesper's magic. That thing is powerful. And it resists the attempt to be abjured, and instead you see it almost tighten its grip on Mesmera. Like, you see something powerful there. However, I will give you a success

because seeing you with wings has clearly triggered something, and it is causing, you know, something in Mesmera to kind of unravel um okay all right okay okay um kairi goes next and

kairi you can speak again just no casting spells kairi rushes to thalia and she will say to mesmera uh she will say to Mesmera, she will say,

I know that she did horrible things to you and I can't begin to imagine what that was. All I can tell you is the things that she's done for me and the way that she saved me. And Kairi basically kind of in the short time that she has tells how Thalia, you know, saved Kairi basically kind of in the short time that she has tells how thalia you know saved kairi basically took her under her wing and looked after and everything else um and that's and and kairi's just literally holding on to thalia just pouring out this story of like please please don't take her away from me and that's one success thalia however starts getting worse you see that like this rapid

you know six hours have passed and like now the briar thorn is like crawled up her neck um she's like clutching her chest like she's struggling to breathe like her chest is in pain and we go back to ayla Aayla. I'm going to smash the mirror, Mark. So which one did you move next to? You moved next to fear. Is that correct? The northwest mirror. Northeast mirror.

Sorry, northeast. Yeah. Okay. So you just pick up the hammer and what? Swing it around and just. You have to face this we can help you but you cannot be scared

we're here to help Nova's made Quill able to fly again we can help you just give us a chance slow this down okay you don't need to make an attack you just need to move up to it and use your action to smash the mirror basically Aayla, basically.

So you rush up and yeah, bringing the Howling Tempest into it. Cracks. The whole mirror shatters to pieces. And that is a success. Amazing. But as soon as you do it, she turns around. And again, like in a complete panic, Mesmero just is like,

and you can see that like, gone is this powerful archfey. And now you're just dealing with a very, very traumatized, very hurt woman. And when she sees the mirror, she's like, no, please don't break. Rescind the rule of spellcasting. The rule of property.

Reinforce. No one may break anything that belongs to someone else. And that rule comes back into play, but you may now cast spells. So rule of grounding, rule of property, rule of time. A rule in effect. And we go to, and I appreciate, I'd like to try and get through this before we take a break.

I know it means that we might go a bit later, but I would like to kind of see this through um century basically um century will go up to the mirror of anger and she'll take off her green cape and throw it over the mirror and then she'll turn to mesmer and say don't let your anger blind you we've come here to make things right please listen okay when you say that um make a persuasion check with advantage because you're covering up the anger mirror actually and that's like the cause of her not wanting to forgive 19 and 21 he was 20 just a success uh so she mesmer looks at you and she just says like make things right make things right do you even understand do you even know and she looks and over she knows what she did she saw everything you can't tell me that you've come to make things right how can she make

things right um and and and she she's like you don't even know what she did um and she like pulls the cloak around her tighter when you say that but something you say clearly got to her because like the kind of that anger is gone and now it's just hurt there's just pain there um and the the behind the mirror you don't hear that reflection speaking anymore you don't hear it calling out to her you don't hear her reflecting on it um lucius um oh god i'm really far away from the final mirror so lucius is just going to say let her speak at least you'll live in regret not knowing what you have done. No, no, no.

She just speaks lies and deceit, and maybe she's convinced all of you and this poor harpy that she's somebody good, but I know I have seen her for centuries ruining people's lives. No, nobody have seen her for centuries ruining people's lives. No, nobody else speaks. And she will rescind the rule of grounding. And go on, Lucius. Can I try and cast Dominate Monster before then?

You can. You cast the spell, whatever power is in this place, maybe it's because she's an arch face. She is immune to being charmed. And she's an arch face she's immune to being charmed and she looks and she says i knew it you're just as manipulative as her trying to get into my mind um that's going to cost you a success i'm afraid okay hello in a mess so trying to control her mind in this state yeah that really angered her like you can see that she turns um and she will she'll reinforce no more

speaking anybody that isn't her no more speaks uh i mean but you can fly that would have been incredible i mean yeah it could like you could yeah but unfortunately archfey immune to being charmed and i get it very much of her thing um rose meadow um rose meadow will try and communicate to lucius nova and quill um she's like she she points at her hands she points at her mouth and then she tries to touch her back and then she makes like waving sounds make insight checks to see if you could figure out what i was trying to say uh who was that who was that too sorry lucius are you nova and lucius okay i mean i've got plus 11 what 23 all right quill um you get the sense and yeah anybody that got over a 15 um rosemary's trying to say that if she can cast a spell uh she thinks she can do something. Like, she wants to try something,

but she needs to be able to cast a spell on Mesmera. And you get the sense that it's maybe, like, it's some sort of, like, healing or nature magic that she wants to try and do. Wait, is the spells currently down? I thought it was just a speech. She can't speak, yeah. And this spell has a verbal component.

Oh, because of the spell. Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So she will. Every single one of my spells has a verbal component. Yeah.

And same with Rosemary's as well. Like she, she like points, but she would gently move her way very slowly. Um, hands up. And then she will move towards. There's Mary. Um, okay. Uh, we go to Nova Vija no property destruction no speaking brilliant idea until the spell thing came into a front if it doesn't have

verbal components you can cast it it was the speaking. I wanted to say something. I've got so many things to say, but I can't say any of them. You're almost like, she doesn't want to hear them, so she's just not letting you. She's like, no, don't want to hear it. You're all liars. You're all a trick. I'm going to walk towards her, like, right

next to her, so I'm going to go all the way up to her. So you're the first person to get within five feet of her She backs off and she immediately revokes the rule of speaking and says no one can come within 20 feet of me And you are thrown back 15 feet, but you can speak So you're about 50 or about 20 feet you have to be you have to stay 20 feet away from her um but you can speak now which means i can cast a spell it does

but if it's spell where you have to be next to her or touch her i know you know i know what she did to you i feel it i feel it i'm begging you have you seen your kingdom have you seen what you are doing to your fellow people? I'm looking after these people. I'm protecting them from things like her that are out there. They cower behind doors. They cower inside. Have you been

outside? She looks around like, no, no, no. This demon, you wear his sign. He's in your heart. There's no demon. He's in your heart. There's no demon. He is kidnapping your citizens and doing things to them. Cruel things.

Please, if I can give you back one thing. Let me. And I will start to cast levitate which i can do on her okay you're gonna cast levitate not fly yes because uh fly i have to touch her all right okay yeah okay yeah levitate's an interesting one um um yeah i think that uh so okay Okay, yeah, levitates an interesting one. Yeah, I think that, so, okay. Maybe, yeah, that'll be a count.

That's two successes. Good role play, and then giving her, so as she begins to lift in the air, she immediately is like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, you can't give this back to me. She took it, you can't, this isn't real. You're lying that i'm helping those people my my knight is helping me he's not a demon um and then she will basically uh no more spell casting um and uh what was the other one that you did uh no more speaking no more no

more flying uh which she will put into effect. So speaking, flying, and time. Does that take away the aura around her? Yes, that dispels the aura around her, yes. So you can get close to her. No speaking now. No speaking, no flying, as she just dispelled. Like, you clearly, like, again, you're striking these, like, weaknesses, these things that she's going to confront.

And even, like, speaking about the citizens, you all get the sense that, like, there's part of her that believes you but she that also doesn't right like she like looks behind her and she like pull like she touches the cloak and she's like no no my my prince my knight wouldn't hurt me that way he was the one who helped me he's the one who helped me punish her um and she's like muttering all of these things to you. Quill. No speaking, no spells. No flying. No flying, sorry. That's frustrating.

And I also have to get... Is she still levitating though? No, she would have come back to the ground. Because levitate is still like, technically it's not flying, but it's close enough to flying because it's a low level spell I'm going to count it as flying

on like reverse gravity, which is you just change gravity. I cast Truesight about halfway into sneaking into the city. Do I still have it? I think it would have gone by now, unfortunately, dude. You spent longer than an hour getting through the city. Fair enough.

I mean, I think with my extremely limited options in spellcasting and whatever else, and speaking, I think I'm going to have to attempt this cape again,

even though it's exceptionally strong. I will tell you that if you try that Abjura effect again, it's not gonna work. Like, you can't use the same effect twice. You could try and physically take it off of her. Like, she rescinded the rule that prevents you getting closer. Like, you could literally try and, like, rip it from her. I don't think I have the strength for that i yeah i i uh the other thing as well is like maybe you could set it up to help ayla like you could try and be like i'm gonna ready an action when ayla

tries to like grab this thing i'm gonna like leap in to try and help her or something. Yeah, I think if I look at Ayla and that looks like some form of plan through insight, then, yeah, I will... You can probably see me gearing up to fucking charge. As soon as she changed that rule, I was like... Yeah, in that case, yeah, I'll attempt to help with the removal. I think that is my main priority at the moment. Exercise her of that demon on her back.

Okay, all right. Yeah, we go to... Kairi is just going to keep talking to us. She can't get you any more successes. She's like a free success. Kairi's just like, please talking to her. She can't get you any more successes. She's like a free success. Kairi's just like, please. No, because there's no speaking allowed. So, yeah, Kairi will basically just start helping Thalia up.

She's going to start trying to drag Thalia closer and closer to her. She basically carries her about 15 feet. Thalia's like trying to get closer to Mesmera. The time one is stopped right uh no no no that's the one one she has never changed that's the one one that she's keeping in place and she probably says something along the lines of like it doesn't matter what all you say she's gonna run out of time soon soon she'll she'll pay for everything that she's done um ayla thing that she's done. Ayla. This is round three,

by the way. I'm going to rage, and I'm going to fucking run at her and try and rip the cape from her shoulders. Give me an athletics check with advantage, because Quill sweeps and he rushes forward and tackles her, trying to grab this cape

off of her. 19 plus 12. You rip it, you grab this cape off of her. 19 plus 12. You rip it, you grab the cape, and you feel the hands tighten. And it's not... So what was the total? 20-something? 19 plus 12. 19 plus 12, so...

31, yeah. You're not opposing her strength on this. No, I know. You feel something else holding on, but you are stronger. And with Eggquill's help, you grab the cape, and she starts speaking, and then you pull the cape free.

She's going to use the momentum. She actually kind of scrambles away from you, and she will uh rescind the rule of speaking gravity in the throne room is five times heavier for everyone but me and you all feel this crushing weight just like slam onto your shoulders and you're like it's you can barely move like you guys have all of your movement speed is reduced to 10 feet as you just like like sink down into the ground. Do I also get to say anything?

I just want to keep off. He was literally strangling you. He's strangling you and your people. Oh, he was comforting me. He's always been there for me. You don't understand. Wake up, Mesmera! Alright. All right.

Sentry. Your speed is currently 10 feet. You can only, if you were going to make attacks, you can only make one. You're basically under a slow spell while the gravity is pressing down on you. Okay. I'm just going to call out to Mesmera.

Listen to them, please. Listen to what they have to say. Yeah. That's just going to be a persuasion check without anything more specific or intense. It's getting harder. These persuasion checks are getting harder and harder. 22.

22. 22's not going to be enough. You guys have used a lot of persuasion and you're not saying anything that's really addressing the problem. It's not going to be enough. You guys have, like, used a lot of persuasion, and you're, like, not saying anything that's really kind of addressing the problem. It's like you're speaking to her, but, like, these, you know, calls, these pleas are currently falling on deaf ears, and you see that that one remaining reflection is still speaking to her this whole time, just like, these people are beneath you, Mesmera.

They're serving her because they've been manipulated. You're the only one. You understand the truth. It's like, you know, complimenting and flattering her and convincing her that she's right. Anything else, Century? I'll Misty Step 30 feet into the room.

Try and get a little closer to that mirror. Okay. It's going to be the one at a diagonal, so if you want to, you'd go more sort of like there, next to Rose Meadow. Because it's going to be the one at a diagonal so if you want to go more sort of like there next to rose meadow because it's the one in the northwest north okay it's the remaining one yeah okay all right that's centuries ago lucius uh spell casting disabled right uh no you can speak you can cast spells but your movement speed speed is 10 feet and you can't fly. Are the current rules in effect?

So close. It's so far. Do I have... I will say... You're currently at 8 successes I'm not going to tell you how many you need but you've got 8 total currently Lucius is going to

do his old faithful and he's going to twin chromatic orb and hit both the mirrors that are still remaining well the one mirror has uh centuries green cloak over it has been oh yeah the uh the anger one has been covered by centuries cape you can still hit it so it would destroy it um so if that cape was become loose you could still destroy

it but it's been quietened right so it has been quietened i need to shoot a chromatic orb at centuries i don't want you to waste i don't want you to waste sorcery points in which case can i twin it at the evil cape that's on the floor like i'm reaching out with my hand with the gravity affecting it um and one hits the mirror and one hits yeah make a um make two attack rolls for me because like there is a chance that the spell on the cape might miss um and then something happens with the mirror so 23 okay the first one and then that's the mirror i'm gonna use a seeking spell uh seeking font of magic sorcery points to re-roll the second one that's a natural one oh no the cape seems to almost come alive

and it pulls itself out the way of the blast the chromatic orb that heads for the mirror it's about to impact into the mirror and the reflection's hand comes out of the mirror and stops it and just grips it and you watch as it explodes into acid over the mirror and then you watch as the reflection looks at its hand,

shakes its head, puts its hands on the outside of the mirror and begins pulling itself through. Oh, oh God. As Merilite looks and looks utterly confused, she doesn't change any rules because she's so stunned by like, she's looking at this mirror. She's looking at what all of you are doing. Rosemeadow, even though her movement speed is only 10 feet,

the horseshoes actually double it. So she can go 20. Rosemeadow, like under this crushing weight of gravity, like takes what few steps that she can, manages to basically like just reach mesmera who's turned around and she can now see but i forgot to mention this by the way when the cape was pulled free there are these stumps of wings there are like these wings that have been burnt and torn and shredded like you know almost like an angel's wings that have been completely ripped off and rose meadow puts her hand on the back and she begins casting Regenerate.

And you watch as like the bones and the feathers slowly start mending. But Rosemeadow will call out like, I have to concentrate. This takes a long time. Please let me help you. You see, but that does seem to stun Mesmera significantly. She like gasps, like audibly like,

and like she looks around, what are you doing? And then you can see the wings slowly beginning to reform. That counted as two successes, by the way. Nova. Nova. Would the gravity affect the movement of Tiangong, of the echo? Yeah, it still technically counts as a creature, unfortunately.

We haven't put your echo down. I should probably... Yeah. If my echo could walk towards Thalia, if Tiangong goes towards... I think think for purposes of going forward if i say tian gong i mean echo echo yeah you mean the echo of yourself yeah yeah it can get to it can get to

thalia yeah thalia is like reaching out and you just you vague you barely hear this word like want to speak pain she she wants to speak but she can't because this curse is like as long as this time curse is in effect this time rule she can't speak she's so overwhelmed by pain she wants to desperately like she can see on her face that she's desperate to speak

can I use Tiangong's ability to dimension Tor and teleport myself to next to Mesmera. Yes. Yes.

And I'm... As I reappear... Yes. I'm going to take my armor plate off. And I'm going to take my armor plate off. Uh-huh. And I'm going to say, she took from you. I know she did.

So direct your anger at me. Attack me. Take your anger out on me, and I will not stop you. But please stop. Let her speak. She will not stop you. But please stop. Let her speak. She will look at you and you can see at this point,

Mesmer is just like tears in her eyes. She's like, I don't want to hurt you. I just want her to get what she deserves. You saw what she did. You're not to blame. She's manipulated you. She's tricked you just like she did me. She was my closest friend and she

turned on me and she took everything from me. And she's just like weeping. Probably like leans into you like at this point, right? The mesmerite like literally collapses into you and is like sobbing into you as well. I'll hold her. I'll just, I was going to say I'll hold her and just hold her sure

that will count as a success it's 11 successes quill um i so i can move a little bit 10 feet of movement can't fly 10 feet of movement you are like being crushed by gravity and it's like if this carries on it will start hurting like if this continues on for much longer but you're not sure thalia's got much time uh i uh do i have a slot i do do i have the ingredient didn't check that i do i would like to cast true sight on mesmera would like to cast True Sight on Mesmera. And I will say, look at the cape. We're trying to help you, save you from these demons.

Sure. And are there any, Irenice, outside, like the window or something? Not out the window. It's weird. Like, yeah, the mirror, something is coming out of that mirror, by the way. I know there is that that the iranese i will now it's a good question you've asked that you can't they're not the window quill with your you hear fighting you hear someone or something fighting just outside this room as in like there is a combat happening just beyond this central area.

It's not my door. Okay. It's our door. That's exactly right, yeah. It's the four-hit point dandelion. Well, if there was, like, the guards outside, like, flying up, and then she looks at them and sees they're actually fucking demons. But, yes, I will cast True Sight on her, and I have one. i i have one to look at the cape or the mirror uh i mean i don't know what the mirror is gonna be um the cape won't look

the cape will probably just show magical aura it won't actually like show like a corrupting influence or anything like that okay um yeah i'll have a look at this reflection of herself and, yeah, through sight so she can see what things really are around her. Sure. She looks up, like you cast a spell, and you get the sense that she's about to initiate a new rule. You get the sense that she's going to stop people spellcasting.

And she looks up, and then her eyes wide and because she's looking in the direction of you and the mirror and she's like you're not you're not my knight and then you all look at the mirror and you see that the reflection of mesmera this kind of pretty maiden as it pulls itself free the illusion begins to fall away like ash coming away from a fire leaving black skin the six-fingered hands stretch around the frame and a tall nine feet tall onyx like rock onyx skinned humanoid with perfect gray hair chiseled body golden eyes steps through it well isn't this a wonderful reunion and now we will take a break a real quick five minute break as oh god and yeah like you will see this the illusion fades this is grats this is grats um like hey how does he look at us though as you look at me and lucius and uh

and thalia huh what does he think he seems pretty happy he seems he seems like a happy chap Chappy. Oh. Mm-hmm.