Legends of Avantris - Icebound | Ep. 1 | The Southward Gambit

Episode Date: May 10, 2024

Unjustly imprisoned, our heroes are placed in the service of a merchant ship, the More Abound, to earn their freedom. Something stalks the crew as they voyage across the sea.   Gain access to an exclusive campaign, Shroud Over Saltmarsh, over on Patreon: https://legendsofavantris.com/patreon The Crooked Moon, a folk horror supplement for 5e, is available for preorder! Get the Crooked Moon at: https://thecrookedmoon.com/ Watch more D&D adventures in the world of Avantris live on Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/legendsofavantris Check out our merch store: https://shop.legendsofavantris.com  Join our community on Discord: https://legendsofavantris.com/discord Watch our many campaigns on YouTube: https://legendsofavantris.com/youtube  All other links: https://linktr.ee/legendsofavantris   Watch the full episode here: https://youtu.be/cQer66-T8pc?si=oAu1_E94dpYfpbO3

Welcome to Legends of Aventris. I'm Derek Hudson and you're listening to Icebound. 89 days. 89 days since you were all captured and imprisoned. A little more than three months by the calendar you all share. 89 days on the outskirts of the river city of Wuzzi, the largest urban center of southwest Yulong. 89 days confined in the sweltering huge. of the Wuzayan labor camp you now call home.

5,287 days left to go. Serving your 16-year sentences for crimes you were unjustly framed for. 16 years, stone, imprisoned in the golden egg, the brazen name given to the quarry in camp you've come to know over the past three months. 16 years gone. but still yet to endure. It's hard to say what's worse. The brutal, foul, cruel conditions,

the exhausting drudge of each day's work, the blistering heat that infuses even the isolated knife, or the shared glimpses of your peers, desperate and hopeless. A few simple innovations have made the golden egg as inescapable as it is profitable for its other governors. There are no cells, at least not in the traditional sense.

Macquarie is dug down layer by layer. So too are the fresh holes mined into the damned and stony earth. As many holes as there are inmates, sweating and sleeping until a rope is thrown down in the following morning. And an impassable alarm system forms the perimeter of this mammoth hole that is now you're dwelling. Guard geese. Territorial, vigilant, spitting, hissing, biting, and wholly unbribable.

Guard these supplement the usual security layers one might come to expect of such a place. Hopelessness, it would seem, is not without a sense of humor. And so it is on this day, the 89th day, you awakened to find yourself wondering again, not just how you came to be here, but how you might. might survive. Let's all make a survival check. Oh, all righty. My first roll of campaign.

I'm going to roll with the guys. I'm also using my camera dice. Same. Oh, big money. You said perception. Survival. Oh, perceptual. Survival.

18 total. Thank you, Kimma. 22. Nice. 13. 20 to 25. 20. Oh, sorry.

22. Oh, okay. Some weird initiative thing going on. I love that. I think you're near beat me. 22, yeah. Yeah, I got a 20. So you're near Barnabas.

Thank you. I can listen to my players. Then. I got a 13. Then, Srim, what did you get? Tai Shen. Oh, I got a 13 as well. You can survive better than me.

You survive better than I would. I don't do well in prison. Kimma said, did you not get the boxed with a cup? I did not see one. You guys handed me this stuff. Oh, is there another box? Okay. You're a tie shed in a lot of time.

We saw the box. We didn't know what it was for. We just take a coffee break. Yeah, it was a lot. We'll open it real quick. Oh, in a roll. I'm exhausted. Where could that possibly be?

Well, sorry, guys. That's my bedtime. I'm going on. A box. I've no idea what you mean. Oh, this? Oh my god, he's got a knife on him. Listen.

You'd be great in prison. Let me see you see that bad one. That's a nice knife. It's got a... I don't think so. No, it's a work knife. It's got a wolf on it, if that else. Oh, that's scary.

That's pretty cool. Inside you there are two wolves. They're both dead. It's a box of paper! Oh my... I mean, I did say the box with a cup in it, so I got to learn. This is like, gosh. What?

Oh, hang on. Is it a cup? It looks like it might be. It's hard to tell and it's, and it's rapid. But Kimma did say the box of the cup in it. Oh, that are multiple cups. Oh, nice. One for you.

Beautiful teacups. I thought it was a button. Those are really nice. It's inscribed. Yeah, that's amazing. I'm actually, I know this is for Mace. Oh, wow. I'm going to steal this paper.

I know this was for Mace, but I'm going to steal this paper. Hey, give my paper. I know, it's my paper now. Are you kidding me? This is the first gift of receiving this paper. In a bed. Because it's a prop now. It's a prop.

Whatever. Absolutely unimaginable. My mace's knife, apparently. Oh, you are. I know that with the dildo. Yikes. Two odds to reach under there. Oh, the copper.

You can drink hot or cold out of the mace. Oh, my God. Oh. 16 years past In fact, you all die in prison. Yay! It truly was a survival campaign. I saw the emergency room.

I think I severed in an artery. Friday night energy is a different. It really does it. It really does. Oh. Jesus. Oh, really? Yes.

Yornear, it's the 89th day and you find yourself at the bottom of a hole. You've been in similar holes. This one you've been in for perhaps for five days. Things are starting to blend together. How do you have felt about this time and a camp? Knowing what you know, with no possibility of a speed. What goes through Yornear's mind as the morning approach? I think, are we doing character voices, or are we just going to kind of talk to that?

Just decide how you want to enter the session yourself. It's a player choice. Do it, Rich. I'll be speaking to myself. How many days it's been? 89. It's spent several, many times, Riches pain.

There's a lot going on. 89 days in this hole. But what is 89 days over the course of centuries? This is the way, the land. This is the path I'm on in 16 years, is just a simple drop of water. A greater scheme of things. We'll do my duty here and then move on.

At that moment, as you are still processing, a rope dangles down through the hole, and you hear a voice. Hey, you're on here, get up here! All right. Warden wants you. And I would lumber up the rope. You're able to pull yourself us without issue.

Here, you're wanted with the warden. I know you just told me. You make your way up. Circle the glory as you approach the warden's tower. And very quickly, you find yourself in a holding cell. All on your own, the door clangs to a shut. and you find yourself waiting, wondering what the warden or whomever could possibly want. Do I have any of my old possessions on me?

That is a great question. The answer is you have none of your, with the exception of the rags that they give you, part of the process of being entered into this labor camp was that they took your things and sort of them away for when and if you ever should make your way, free back into the world of a ventress. So if I have nothing on me, I would literally just sit. If there's like a bench or something, I would just sit down and I kind of just hang my head and wait for time to pass. Time passes.

And at the same time, Barnabos, you find yourself at the bottom of a hole. How have you been processing this time in the golden egg? What kind of hard labor am I doing? Oh, it's been a mix of things. cutting rocks, crushing rocks, moving rocks, hauling rocks. And then there's another job that where they mix the water in with the rocks and create some sort of a slurry. So pushing into the rocks and mixing rocks,

moving the slurry, hauling the slurry, up and down the steep sides of this quarry. I'd probably be like humming. I would have made my up a shanty probably to for each of the exercise, just either hum to myself just to kind of keep in time. And I haven't had my shell in 89 days. That's right.

I am not happy. And so I imagine that you probably would have been very frustrated by that at the beginning. And you're not getting used to it, but your ability to continue to fight the guards is weakening. Yeah. And I'll be thinking to myself. and maybe like muttering to myself. 89 days away from her.

Or something I don't even remember doing. 8.9 days without a drop of rum. We suppose there's a bit of a acquaintance there, probably not related. 89 days, just 16 years until I see her again. The hole is starting to brighten just above you. And as you were seeing the morning sky, start to light up what was the night sky,

a rope dangles down. It's a little early for that sort of thing. You hear a voice. Byamos! You're on it. Zoranth wants you. All right. Come on up.

I don't have trouble there. I'm coming right up, right away. And I'll get away. You're able to make yourself up. surprisingly nimble despite your frame and you make the same journey. You don't see your near. This is 15, 20 minutes have passed at this point. But you do make yourself to the same warden's tower and you are not surprised but surprised to see him. I say not surprised because you guys have been in the same quarry as all the other people you were with together. However,

it's been a rare situation where you've been on the same rock hauling team or crew or gang or what have you. But you see him on the other side of the bars. You join him on the other side, on the same side of those bars. And the bar flam home. You find yourself in the same cell together, looking at each other for the first time in a private place for perhaps a few weeks, maybe more.

Mr. Yornear, Mob one. Let's mob these days. That has comes in many forums, Mr. Yorne. here. Are you still unlucky with your hair? And I like me standing at the edge of the corner, at the corner of the cell. I still don't know what you mean when you say my hair has to do with fate. Call you look? What do you think that's why you were all here? We'd just change your air color, she did all off. You believe that they are imprisoned because of my hair color? No, I don't believe that. Oh, that's very wrong.

All you know with that, to be true. My hair color is my hair color. Nothing you do or I do will change that. That's why you should never sit. Just don't step in foot on any more vessels, is all I'm saying? And I'll be kind of like, I'll be giving them a side eye. You're giving him a side eye and you guys are sharing an uncomfortable silence or an uncomfortable conversation or two at the same time that this is happening.

Scrimp you're finding yourself waking up in the bottom of a hole. How have you been enjoying these last 8 or 9 days? It hasn't been going very well, let me tell you. Okay. I would have been very, very quickly losing my mind. You mentioned that I would have seen my companions, at least a little bit here and there, right? Absolutely. At every single chance that I would have had, I would have tried to give them some crazy hairbrained scheme to get the fuck out of here.

All right? It's been 89 days. That's 88 days too many. You should have been out of here night one. You may have even attempted a few and... Oh, I absolutely. You found yourself in a particularly deeper hole that thing. It's been not good.

I do as little work as possible to get by every single day. I don't work. I don't work for anything. I've never worked for a single thing in my life. And I don't intend to start now. So needless to say, I'm at the bottom of this hole. And I'm with whatever tools and implements I have, instead of I'm actually doing the work,

I'm drawing more plans in the bottom of the hole, in the rock wall, trying to think of something because I don't do well in captivity. Look, I've been in prison a few times, but there's never been a prison on non-adventress that's held to scrim for very long. I can think of two additional reasons why you might be panicked in this contained space. Well, yeah. I mean, well, I mean, maybe me, but, you know, okay, there's just not, there's really nowhere for me to run, all right?

It's a long time for a goblin. It's that, too. I, you know, I'd like to see the outside at some point again. But also, I haven't really been able to go anywhere, and I've been stuck in one place for far too long. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. And as you are looking up at the hole. seeing through the glimmer of light, and it's casting down.

You are trying as hard as you can not to look at the walls. No matter how wider or shallow or narrow your hole might be, the evenings, especially close to midnight. Sometimes you see a pair of eyes. No, no, no, no, no, no, it's just a dream. And so it's a very welcome sight. When you see that uncoiled rope fall down. I climb up like grease like.

Scream you. Oh, oh, you're here. Oh, I'm getting out of the hole. Ah, God, it's a hell. What do you want? Warden Zores wants to see you. Oh, oh, this is it. This must be it.

Take me, take me, take me. You very briskly walk, perhaps even in front of the guard, making your way to the same prison cell. And you see two people that you maybe consider your friends or companions. At the very least, you shared the experience that led to your arrival at the Golden Neck. Oh, oh, my. You're right here. Bonobos.

Boy, Captain Scabber's coach. It's been, uh, I don't even know how many days. Listen, okay, I know the last one didn't go very well, but this one, this one's gonna be better. I knew you would have a plan. It involves a giant balloon. All right? I don't know where we're gonna get the balloon in it. You always ever the best plan.

I'm just getting a scabber and such. Up and out. No, I admit that the last one was not my best plan, but this one. This is the one. This is the one. And I look a little crazed and unhinged. I am completely like 100% all in and whatever he has to say. We just got to find a balloon.

We just got to find a balloon. Find a balloon. And then I basically go sit against the wall and I'm like rocking like... Like the ones that are flying the big ones. Yeah, like the big ones. Like the big ones. Yeah, uh-huh. Uh-huh.

It's fine. We're out of here before midnight. Do you plan to shoot down the balloon or perhaps make one? Please, don't there. I'm thinking. I don't need. No, no questions. I'm thinking.

Let the captain speak. You were near? Don't get your bad luck all over. He's smart thinking. Do you think that maybe this is... But there are three of us, the ones that were all brought in together, the first day. It's a coincidence. It was at fate.

If the balloon doesn't work then clearly, they're just going to let us go. That must be what it is. We have, at least. Maybe we're all coming here because Ket and Skobber's Stabascots came up with an idea. It'll break us all out finally. He's the balloon. Yeah, this is the one. This is it.

This is the one. This is the way. I don't think that there's any bad luck for stepping on a balloon. I don't think that is proper told one way or the other. Queenie, as you are left alone, of course, the guard makes his way down and you have the morning of brief respite while you're awake but not working to think about the last 89 days and what they meant to you, how you've been feeling, how you process that.

I am lying in the bottom of the hole. I got my two bunny feet up on the edge of the hole, and I'm whistling a song to myself while I'm staring up into the sky. I'm just hanging in there like a hair and a biscuit. Hair, I wonder if that spelled H-A-R-E or H-A-I-R. You know, I never did ask, Gold Bear Jenkins. I don't know how I'm going to get these seeds all over a vantress if I'm stuck in this hole, and I tried to hop out of it at least five or six times. It gets lonely in here without my bees.

Hair, H-A-R-E. I guess I could draw in the dirt again. The familiar sight of a rope with knotted steps. Am I hallucinating or is that of them there rope? Queenie! That's me. Queenie March. Warden Zaris wants to see you.

Who? Warden Zaris. If I met him before. Just, never mind. Hold on. start climbing up row. If I met him before. When you were presses, when he brought in here. Oh, did he like me or did he not like me?

He doesn't like anybody. Oh, right. Pestering the guard with questions, eventually you make your way to the same holding cell. You recognize three of these faces. And when you find yourselves on the other side of the bar, you were able to stay low. Oh, well, look at y'all. I ain't seen y'all. You fellas, since you were knee-hide to a grasshopper. Queenie, it's good to see you. I got under the plan. I was just telling the guys.

We're going to steal a balloon. Yeah, big balloon. You're going to fly right out of here. All right. How are we going to do it? I'm thinking. Don't ask me questions. Well, if I don't ask you questions, I'm going to figure out how we're going to do it. There is no balloon and no plan for acquiring a balloon. Are you being a Debbie Downer again, you're here? I think that he's just bringing his bad luck here.

Why do you keep talking about his bad luck? The more you talk about it, the more bad luck he's going to have. You know what they say. Is that how that works? Yeah, if you mention it, then all of a sudden the bad luck appears. You thought the more you think about it and the more you avoid it. You know what to do. No, I don't think it works that way.

Okay, Jen. How do you spend time in a place like this? What is, uh, what goes through your mind as you wake up and start to realize the, the permanence of the place you find yourself in? I think I'd be thinking along the lines of, I don't know what purpose the Great Dragon had for me here on my quest, but what I do know is if we turn the slop counterclockwise, the slightly faster speed, I think we can make some of the best

rock slop for the water that they've ever seen. I really think we can increase the quality. Even in the space, you're thinking of ways to help. Increasing the quality of the brew, they were created. I think that my family would never deal in some bar brews. With that, rope, cascades down from the hole above you. It's nearly like full morning now. like full morning now.

The sun is finally starting to rise and that dark blue color of the sky is turning the color of day. And you hear her voice. Bye-10. Yes? I'll be right there. I'm not very good at climbing.

I want to see you. Okay, I'm coming. I climb up the rope. It's about second. You're able to make your way. It's notched in even spaces. And so you have footholes in order to eventually pull yourself off.

As soon as you get to in and reach, a hand pulls you by the collar and tugs you along, making your way up the coiled road of the Golden Egg Quarry until you find yourself in the warden tower. And there you find four people you recognize immediately. Four people who helped, or at least were with you, when you were imprisoned or sentenced to this 16 years. And you find yourself alone in a prison cell with them. Friends! Oh, look at it. It's our Frantashi.

How was your imprisonment? going. Tishen, you're just a dragon board I wanted to see. You've arrived at the perfect moment. The other friends here have pointed out that my giant balloon idea was absolutely ridiculous, and so I've come up with another plan. You can just polymorph us in a giant geese and we'll match you with the guards. How are they going to stop us when a giant geese?

It's really smart! Captain's got to go just polymorph us. We'll bust with the full gauge. I love your plans. Remember the last one when you tried to bribe the geese? That was hilarious. They said they were unbribe, unbribable and there you were.

Well, it turns out that I don't really know what geese like. Or how to speak geese. Turn us into geese. Yeah, okay. Here we go. Are you geese? I don't think so. What do you mean? You're the one who knows the magic.

You have to know how to turn us in polymorph. Have we ever seen him turn anyone into giant geese? He could turn us into giant geese. Don't you think we would have been out here much? sooner. No, I just came up with a plan. He's Dragonborn. No, I don't... It's true. I'm a magic dragon boy. Oh, right.

We do not need a plan. This is not coincidence. It's clear to me that Scrim is as nervous as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs, so we need to be asking someone else how we're going to deal with this situation. We don't need a plan. I wish we had a cat here right now. We should believe in fate. What?

And I climb up on your knee and I plant my feet on his shoulders. and I'm pulling on his hair as I get right in his face and I say, we don't need a plan, I don't intend to dirt, and I jump off. You will not buy him here? What are the chances that the five of us again would end up in one room? The universe has a great of play. I'm not very good at math, so I can't eat it. I have seen the weird.

What? I have seen the weird. You've seen something weird? No, no, the weird. In the quarry? No, it is spelled W Y, R. You're the perfect person for me to ask this question to. They're homophones.

Wait, what? That means sounds the same. Okay, so I have to ask you, is it spelled H-A-I-R or H-A-R-E? It depends on the context of the one. If a hair's stuck in a biscuit, is it H-A-R-E like me or H-A-R like what's on top of your head? This is your question, Miss March. Well, I suppose are you eating the biscuit? Oh, I don't know. I'm stuck in the biscuit.

You would be... would be stuck in the biscuit, and then that would impact the spelling, is my understanding. That's why I'm at. We can make a shit biscuit big enough for you to get sticking if you'd like, Miss March. What? No, I don't want to be in a big... Never mind. Lots of flour, though.

You need lots of flour along with a balloon. What's for? I thought we didn't need a balloon anymore. You also need a rising agent. Oh, the balloon was a stupid idea. I thought you were just going to polymer morph us into gays and we were going to fly out of here. The Great Dragon imbued me with many powers. I thought that I did, but...

So far, all I've been able to do is shoot fire. Yep, that's correct. Do you hear that? Do you hear that? You do hear the sound of muffled voices on the other side of the door that leads into this room with the holding cell that you find yourselves in. And making a perception check, you might be able to proceed with that in those voices.

I'm going to use this D20. Oh, hot fire today. Hot fire with Chimiddy's D-Ception. What's it? Fifty. 15 as well. I got higher than that, I think. Oh, okay. This fucking guy, pretty sure.

22, 22. Oh, okay. Fuck. 22. Well, did you get higher than a 22? You opened this. Oh, I thought you're some of the.

All right. Spaghetti on my sweater already. Mom's got sweaty hands, spaghetti. Oh, joy. What is that? Eagle, right? Sponsored by. I'm part of these.

When did you get? Oh, I got a 14. Oh, okay. I don't say that. I got a 14. Because you all have become very sensitive to the goings-ons and the golden egg, you hear these footsteps before you hear the voices, and immediately whatever topic of conversation drops and you...

These are the ones you requested, yes. These are the ones you requested, yes. Good, good, good. And I can go and see them. Do we recognize that voice? Make an insight check. Good question. Insight is 20.

Yes. The first voice that you hear here is Warden Zores. Okay. But you do not recognize the second voice. It sounds, even in that indistinction, you're able to, with your massive ears, pick up on the subtletes of timber. They're reasonably sized.

They're moderately, like, average. Proportionate to body. I mean, what rabbit folk are like. Do you hear the same voices? And so I can go inside. Yes, if you, if you please. But that one's the warden. This is the warden.

I'll do warden and I'll do the other. I was wondering to do some like, Alderagans, fun, Jackson. Just to me try and the rub, you're about me. Oh, we. Sorry, Derek. I just want to know.

I love this hard course for me. I knew it was all over. No, it's fine. Eventually, I'm sure. This is a conversation to accelerate things. It's just that the anonymous voice is requesting to see you. And it becomes clear that the wardens seems to think that their transaction is complete,

and that he's free to see you as well he might please. Who the hell could you be? the ward. Door opens and in walks a very tall man wearing what is clearly a happy blend of leathers and like sailing end ornaments. His head is completely bald and his tan skin is totally smooth in all directions. He's very stout gentleman, broad-chested tall and he's got a clip from one ear which continues in a scar down his down his neck on one side. He looks at the five of you and, uh... Yes!

You, you're the ones I've been looking for, yes? Yeah, and I really like your happy adornment of sailing attire and that incredibly smooth bald head with that scar going down your face. Thank you. I believe you're the one they call Queenie, yes? Yeah, sure you can call me that, Miss March, if you're nasty. I've been saying... Why nasty?

We've been saying that there's all dogs. Time. Tyshen, Barnabos. Oyser. Scroo. It's me. Yorne. Yes.

And you must be Scrim. How do you know my name? Well, I've heard the story of how you came to be in this very place. We were framed. I swear we've been framed. Oh, yes. It happens all the time. It was the captain of the guard, yes?

All the time? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely. 100%. I knew it. This is not surprising to me. No. You all told me that we were framed.

Yes, but we were framed. Oh yeah, you want to frame this here. I do believe you. None of you are from Wuzet, so I understand if you don't understand. Coin is king here. This is a scam. You were framed so that I could buy you, so that we could move on, so that we could, well, go on our love.

quest. I just look to your near. Is this what you were talking about? Faith? Yes. Where is faith? Yes. Whist the way of some questions? Oh, is this that weird guy you said that you saw? Oh, the weird guy. No offense. I like weird. Yes. For all intents and purposes, yes. All right. Well, I'm in. Where are we going? Oh, we're going to Chuck. We're traveling across the sea. Oh, Chuck the content.

Oh, yeah. I've heard of that. that place. Yes. Well, we are going to chalk. You see the chief administrator of the counting house in Wuzet, a man whose wealth has wealth, a man who's, it's such a cheap thing to call him chief administrator. He might as well be king. He has fallen deadly ill. Oh, no. And the only medicine that we can possibly find is in chalk. So, I am, unfortunately, running a bit of a skeleton crew, so I would need some insurance, and I understand that you guys are capable of solving problems, because much to the surprise of the captain of the guards, so the story goes, and please confirm if I'm incorrect on any of these details. You are able to get rid of the ghost, yes? I mean, it wasn't really hard. We just let him win a battle. He didn't really win.

It feels like so long ago. We are pretty good at solving problems And getting into them too Scrum always says innovative solutions For unusual problems It says a deal The fact that you made it to the ghost To solve that problem is remarkable

I mean where do you think all the skulls came from It was exceedingly hard with the fact that Barnabos thought we were always on the ocean when we weren't Well that's very good because on the ocean we are going I'm always on the ocean in spirit Do I know how far chalk is from where we are currently? That was going to be my next question. Shock is very much to the east of where you are.

And it would be many months' journey. Probably, let me do some quick map here. Sorry, you know. Oh, sorry, I had a little bit of . I didn't keep it down down there. It's not nighttime hours yet. Get me out of this godforsaken cell A bunch of animals

With a normal ship it could be four to six months With a fast ship you could cut that down to three Two and a half something along those lines It's quite a journey I mean it would be an Atlantic In Atlantic distance to put it in non-fantasy parlance That's fine The farther away we get from this absolute hell of a prison

And this God-forsaken continent the better. Get me off this rock. The agreement I made with the warden, understand, is that we will be going to chalk, we will procure the medicine for the king of Wuzet, and then we will be making our way back. Wait, so are we going to have to go back into those whole skin when we come back? No, no, no, no, no. Then you get a little stamp, a piece of paper, and you're free.

I'm buying your freedom, but I need your help. How do we know you're not going to trick us like the guard guy did? Well, you don't. I can't. we just met. Do you have papers or compact some kind? It really can't be any worse than where we are. So you're saying that if we agree, we leave today.

And can I get my stuff back? Done, I'm in. You reach through the bars and he immediately grabs your hand, this huge hand encompassing yours. Get me out of here, get me out of here! Okay, okay, yes, that's what I'm trying to do. Can I get my stuff back? Oh yes, yes, yes, yes. You'll all get all of your things back.

The papers that you asked about to stay with the warden, and it isn't until we come back to You can get the stamp, you're free to go. Mr. Savage's got his plan did work out at the end. Do you know quite impressive? How far chalk is from here? It is many months. And for us to get there and back,

would the king still be alive? And if he is not, then does this deal still by our freedom? It is an interesting question, and one that we must gamble, gamble, in order to make this journey and back. It's not a life-threatening disease in the sense. that he's going to die tomorrow, but he is willing to wager his full fortune, should someone be able to solve the problem.

This is an opportunity of a lifetime. We, I, will become something of a lord with that much kind of wealth. You will have your freedom. I'll take it. I don't need money. Do you have my personal effects? Oh, yes, yes, yes, yes. We'll be getting them right away.

Is there a shell in those effects? I didn't look inside. It's a big sense. with a bunch of, not be business. Do you need the ships cook, the best one on this side of the world? Oh, I have a role for each of you. I need five people.

I need five people for the purposes of completing my crew. We have able men, we have a bosun, we have a first mate, but we do not have a chef. You have the services of Barnabost, the dread work. We do not have the top man. What the hell's a top man? We do not have

a surgeon, a medicine man. We do not have a helmsman. Oh, that's all right. I can do that. I just have to serve drinks to unruly man. They will stay very ruling. Yeah, that's fine then. Then you're all in.

Sure. Sounds like a Saturday night back home. I got the set. Let's, uh... Now, I think, I think that we should have some ground rules here. Before we step on a ship, I think that we can't be having any whistling.

Oh, no, you shut your mouth. I'm a whistle all day long. You know, whip up the wind. What? Whip up the wind? No, I'm... I'm saying we don't whistle. What about the whistle?

No, no whistling. But we want the wind. How's a boat? How's the boat going to move without wind? I got a whistle. I'm certainly no shitman, but apparently on the top. I'm very busy. We have a lot to do in a day.

He has a red hair. They're loading the cargo on the island. We must make our way down the Isla River. Oh, excuse me, I need to let you know that my hair is red. Is this a problem? Yeah, and apparently I'm a woman, so. Are you comfortable being the only woman on board? Yeah, sure.

Are you comfortable being the only red-haired man on board? Yes. I think we're fine. See? Now I will tell you, like myself, the rest of the crew are all humans, Muzayans.

All right. That's fine to me. Are you going to finish your sentence? Are you pointing out the fact that the rest of us are not humans and not quite the otherwise? You may experience some friction in that way from my crew, but I will sort them out. What else is new?

Please open the bars. We've been living in whole. for 80 days. I cannot open the bars, but I can tell them to open the bars and get you your things. Okay, I'll see you just outside the tower. Are you excited? Yep, absolutely. I'm very excited. Okay, go get the guard now, please. Ha ha ha ha. He turns and walks to the door, and just as he's about to close it, he turns back and looks back at you. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. And then, and then closes it. Oh, wait, do you have any bananas on board? This guy is an idiot. He doesn't realize that the second we step off side of this God-forsaken hole,

and we get on Chuck, wherever the hell we're going. We can just run. We don't have to go back here. Fuck this place. Fuck the game. We don't have to come back. Where Chuck is, it's not very far from the Maconey Islands. They're right up there. I know a group of people who will take us in, no problem. I'm dancing around the circle.

I've never been to an island before. You're a girl. It is the most beautiful place in the entire world, the best food, most beautiful women. Fate your near, and I like elbow your knee. though. He's getting us out and we're just going to leave and not help him with his mission and stuff. Well, I mean, I mean, we can't if we want to, but my point is if things get bad, we can just cut and wrong. Yeah. All right.

Hey, is this a smart blind? I'm just saying, just in case. We don't know anybody anything. This town screwed us over. Yeah, but he didn't and he's helping get us out. So I feel like if we're going to go, we could help him. This time has really offered me an opportunity to improve some skills. So, You can polymorphus now? Well, what is that? I don't know. It's what Scrim was saying. I tried, but it just really didn't. I assumed he would come to me.

All right. Queenie, fine. You're right. Let's give him a chance. You're right. He's helping us out. The least we can do is see what he needs. Yeah, if he turns into a big old jerk face, then we can leave. Right. If he tricks us. Yeah. If he backstabs us, I'm out of here.

All right. Starts to open again, and he's a man open. Please. Good to see you again. It's not the captain. Oh, good to see you again. He's for the first time. He recognized one of the guards,

and you have seen him many times, so he's like, he comes in bearing five fatals on the fact. He clearly overencumbered, and he sets them down, and he just opens up one, and should have turned off. Incombered.

I think these are all five yours. What did you have on your person before? He points to you Barnabose. Is there, lad? Your Mawichel. He starts to rummage through. No, I see some, like, ceramic tiles with, like, marks on him. I see, or bone tiles, I should say.

Do you bring Mawes! Can I reach to the bars and grab him? He is definitely too far away. Like even... No, no, no, man. Those are my ruins. That must be my bag. Can you name a few more items that you have had on your person?

Well, there's my walking stick. It's about 10 feet pole. Oh, the walking stick. Yeah, yeah. I'll get that before you go. Two massive mammoth tusks, one of which is broken, covered in ruins. I thought that was a joke.

I need to go get those two. Can you see how big I am? Yeah, you're enormous. There are, there's some seal pelt cloaks. There's some vets. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He hands it through, and you find yourself opening and looking upon something that you haven't seen

for almost 90 days. I'll just start very quietly, impensibly start to get my old gear back on. You start to put your gear back on. Let's see. This one has a teapot in it. Ah, that's mine. Oh, great. That was easy.

That was easy. Excellent. Thank you. Going through the next one, there's a little golden here. There's... This one... Can you guys start to name some of the things that you guys had on you? I look very, like, droll and annoyed, and I say there's a big fucking knife in mine.

This one's yours. And as he gives me it, and I begin to dig through my things, I'm tossing them out, and at the bottom of the bag, I am almost dismayed to see my coin. Yeah. I pick up the coin, I put in my pocket, I sheathed my knife, and I prepared, I redress. Yes, you redress. This one's got a small, like a pot in it or something.

Yeah, it should have some flower seeds, a honey pot, some arrows, a bed, roll, a dagger, some leathers, one day of rations. Nope, those are probably gone. Rope, hempen should be shortbow, tender box, and a water skein, and a sprinkling of gold. You got a really good memory. And then you said something about a shell, right?

Oh, you, Lord, I did say something about a shell, and also a sloops anchor. You have a full anchor in your bag? This look familiar, and he pulls out what is this... The shell. Pink, beautiful, swirling, multi-colored... Oh! He pulls this out. This is the way you're talking about?

Oh, you give it here, Lord. Yes. Yes, give it here. He puts it in your poem. and then he hands the rest of the satchel through, but I'm assuming you don't take it from him right away. My lover, I miss you so much. Did he just say to that shell what I think he was saying?

Leave it there on the ground, or not. I'll go get your tusks. And then don't forget barnabuses anchor. Em my walking stick, please. Yeah, it's like 10 feet tall, he said. It's a 10 foot pole. Sure enough, you. Sure enough.

And he wouldn't touch you with it. Your things are returned. under your person. You find yourselves escorted out and away from the golden egg quarry. Why don't I use it? I'll root through my pack

and I will find a probably of the bottle of rum and there's probably only like probably two shots left and I'll pull it out and I'll look at it and I'll say I'm not going through hello shakes again. Mr. Sabrescotch,

Are you like this? Done. And I down it. And I would have spent basically much of the time, and we won't have to role play the whole thing, but with my shell. And then what season is it, Dungeon Master? Oh, the season of the...

Oh, yes, I forgot about this. It is now the 22nd of the sixth month, which makes it summer. Summer. I will, almost with the same reverence, I'll pull out this. lovely bag that Kimma gave me and with the paper that he gave me to you and I'm going to steal it. And I will rip out some Capstan herb and I will have a little paper.

I'll rip out a little paper. I'll just say you want to also tell everyone what it does. So I have a special magical item and so this is I this is capson herb. It is my grow bag and basically it is a wondrous dark leather pouch fitted with a metal swing clasp. and so long as it's in completely empty, the bag will magically grow fresh cut and flaked pipe tobacco while the pouch is shut.

The type of tobacco changed with the season, and since it is summer, it is caps and herb. The color of red beach tastes buttery, hay-like, and rum-like. And so I will have my pipe, and I have that with almost the same reverence, not quite, that I do have my shell

and my grow bag, and I take some, and I'll stick it in there, and I'll just light it. I don't even smoke, but that would get Andy to start smoke. had that thing existed holy shit I mean you just buy four types of tobacco

and no I'm exactly the way you fucking is different when it's magic yeah um they all got some minor magical items uh so thank you to start the campaign when we start our prologue session uh session 0.5

is between zero and okay anyway you in the party are escorted out and away from the golden egg quarry good rins the fading sound of angry honking makes for a strange, but welcome farewell, as you are transported down to the riverbank of the great Xyla River and ferried through the city of Wuzay. The ride through the city is slow and quiet. You can actively feel the humidity you've been enduring for the past three months dissolving as you approach the mouth of the river, a great

delta connecting Wuzzi and the Keras Sea. You're riding with this captain, and it suddenly occurs to him something in the back of his mind. He turns to, and he's been watching the buildings pass. You guys have all been processing the fact that you're free, sort of, for the first time in 89 days. I didn't tell you my name, did I? Captain Verme-Aye. Oh, I thought it was Chuck.

No, no, no, Captain Verme is what you may call me, and that is what you will call me for the remainder of our voyage. Is that fine? Whether nasty or not. What is the nasty? I don't understand. I don't know. It was in a song I heard once.

in a tavern. Your name does not matter. Thank you. Well, that's not nice to say. Of course your name matters, Chuck. It's nice to meet you, Captain Germain. I don't mean that there's a negative insult. I mean none of our names, man. Because you're an officer, Mr. Yorneur,

does not mean you can show disrespect to the cabin. You mean, I'm an officer. Well, you're the surgeon. I mean, I can perform the medicinal X, yes. Is he not the surgeon, Captain? Yes, we need a surgeon. So you're an officer. You should start acting, even with your...

The surgeon is an officer on the... Yeah, yes, exactly right. Well, I don't care what my job is. It's a pleasure. I say true. It's pleasure. Scrim. That's right.

They only called you, you have a last name as well. Yes, it's Stabascotch. Stabascoch. Stabascoch. Barnaboth. Dreadwick. Dreadwick.

That's what they call me, at least. Tyshen? Fireblossom. For the fireblossom tea. You make tea. Would you like some? When we get to the ship after we've loaded the cargo on, absolutely.

Excellent. Queenie. Yeah, Miss March. If you're raised. I knew that. I know. It's good to have this conversation again, Chuck Verme. It's not Chuck.

What? And you're near. You're near. You're near. Well, it's a pleasure to meet all of you. I need you to trust me on this voyage. I need you to trust in the crew, and I need to be able to rely on you.

Do you understand? Yeah, of course. I mean, you've got us out of that hellhole. You've got my buying. You're the best ships cooked this out of the world. That is a fact. I trust anyone who can enjoy a nice cup of calming Jasmine tea. Well, you do have one question, though.

Yes. Are there going to be stored bananas on this voyage? No, unfortunately. Thank goodness. What? Barbar Marmas. What is it with you and bananas? Bananas are battled up on a voyage.

Thank goodness we have you, Barnabas. I wouldn't even think to check for these things. Oh, you got to check if there's any bananas on board. That's a doomed voyage right there. May I ask you, Barnabas? What is it about the nature of the man? that makes them unlucky. I mean, yeah, they don't have red hair.

Are they unlucky? You just said they were bad for the void? Well, so you're from the bad luck, Mr. Yord, you know what likes to live in shipments of bananas? There are creatures that like living, shittments of the bees. Spiders? Oh, spiders ain't gonna hurt you.

Most of them don't have teeth large enough to bite. And those that do are big enough, you should know not to touch them. All you've known surgeons, proper surgeons, who've had to, sea to it for young ships, boys, and all sorts of seamen who got bit by a spider stowed away on shipment of bananas. You don't want to see that, Mr. Yornair. What the hell kind of bananas are you eating? It's the spiders that come with the bananas,

spiders in general. I don't think that's a true fact. Well, you won't have to worry about it because there aren't going to be any spiders on this ship. Chuck, are there spiders on this ship? Oh, they're not spiders on this ship. You're free now because of me, in a sense. I know. Captain Vermeigh. No, Queenie March.

I know that's your name. Yeah. Refer to me as Captain Verme moving forward. Do we have an understanding? Sure, Captain Vermeigh moving forward? As they say in Yorne, there she blows. My angel, they points, and you all see this giant ship. The Moorabound.

Isn't she a butte? Oh, she is. Pulling up to the pier, you stare up at a massive caraville-style cargo ship, clearly modified to better handle the open sea. More than 200 feet in length and with three stocky masts, the moor abound looks about as old as it does impressive. The beak of the ship features a roughly carved and painted figurehead decoration of a winged woman flying forward, sword outstretched, dressed billowing. I'm sure you're all exhausted,

but you can rest once we are at sea. Get these barrels and containers on board with the other men so that we can depart today. Understood? They're good. Captain Vermeigh turns and starts to make his waist and he's engaging the rest of the crew. You can see that along this pier there's a variety of boxes and barrels, all of which need to be walked up these wooden planks that are leading to the actual top of the ship. I go over to a barrel that is as big or bigger than me, and I stand by it and I say, Yorner, help me with us.

And as he picks it up, I stand on top. I'll just pick up the middle. This way, Yornear. Make a strength check that I'm increasing the D.C. I wait like 30 pence. Just roll out, just straight, I increased it by one. 19. You're able to easily pick up both the barrel and the goblin that stands a puppet.

Streeply-ly-style, I direct him up the game plank. I'll grab a barrel too. You grab a ball, make a strength check. Strength, you say. 17. Easily done. You find a hogshead barrel or something along those sides, and you're able to grab both sides of it and start to make your way up. There are other men who were starting to see the long. of you making cargo happen up onto the ship.

And they're giving you some strange looks, but you're not getting any offers for assistance at this point. Tijem, you grab a crate, a barrel, what do you grab? I'll try and grab a crate, shake things up. You shake it up there. Yeah, absolutely. The crates actually require someone else, so someone else. Hey, how's how's how's going?

It's going great. You want to help me with this crate? I'd love to. Okay, make a strength check. You're just so positive. 15. 15. You're able to pull both,

if you're able to get underneath it and actually lift it, even though you're the person having to walk backwards up the front, you're able to make your way up to the top of the ship without issue. Arnibus. I would want to look for a, if there's a barrel of cod, or any kind of fish.

You do see a few barrels that, are labeled in such a way that would infer fish. I would like to pick one up and see if there's any way where I think I could, like, open it subtly. Please don't spit in fish. Okay. You've been around a number of barrels,

and you can see that... I have. That's what she said. You can see that in the year and a half that I had to play in this campaign, and I never thought, how do you open barrels? How do you open barrels? But I mean, generally, you'd have to like.

You'd have to do the anchor into it. They're almost, well, that's why they're about, right? Because it would create a seal. Yeah, you like, so far as a barrel. A hole you can put his thumb in and then lift it. Like, it would require some theft, right? Yeah. Technically, yes, but this is your world, do whatever the fuck you want.

I mean, I'm just has a giant anchor. This is our story to tell. So I wanted to consult with the group. I would say it would be tough to do it. stealthily, but not impossible. You'd have to give it some oof. You do see a barrel, and from what you can tell, red herrings are inside the barrel.

And you go ahead and see if you can make a slight hand. I would like to grab one red herring. I like to grab one red herring from the barrel. Just one? Oh, I'm. Oh. The barrel explodes. A six.

With a six, these are some well-crafted barrels. It would require a tool or perhaps too much noise than you're willing to make to actually bang your way through this barrel. And you hear another voice from the other side. Someone who's clearly in charge of most of the able men of this ship. You there!

Captain Vermeis says move the cargo, you move the cargo. Come on, move that barrel. All right away, sir, Verde Me. Just getting my bearings. I will, instead of, I will ignore the barrel, I'll reach into my pack. I'll grab a handful of salt and throw it into the water, and I'll say, for you, mo'y lover,

and then pick up the barrel as I'm watching Yornear, care. I'm like, oh, Mr. Yornear, make sure you step with your right foot onto the ship each time, as I will keep the barrel. I intentionally step onto the ship with my left. Like Mr. Yornear, no! As you're moving into this barrel, I need to make a spring check.

I love that. I love that. I'm how visually pissed, the horn arrow, what? 12. What's enough? You are, I mean, these are, they're barrels, but like you're a big man, and you may have these- Oh, you've done this long time before.

You've been able to walk up. Without any trouble. Maybe a perception check for me. Okay. Okay, there's a better one. Presception. That'll be 18. With an 18, it is just as you.

is just as you are putting your right foot down onto the deck of this ship, the more bound, that you hear a voice on the other end of the pier almost. You hear a fucking bird, get the fuck away from me! Get the fuck away from me! You guys are all starting to make your way back down to pick up additional crates and things like that. Very specifically though, this makes your ears perk up.

I will stand. and I will step onto the ship, and I'll almost take a moment, and as I'll step on and I'll just kind of sigh, and I'll say, oh, he's been far too long, and I'll drop it as soon as I hear that person, I'm gonna look over and I'm gonna say, oh, leave you at least leave me?

You turn, and you can see that he's already pulled out what appears to be a dagger, and he's attempting to grab a seagull or albatross. And what I'll also add is that you need to make a perception check, when the barrel hits the ground. I am going to drop the barrel, and I'm make a perception check right now.

Natural 20. Oh, 24. 24. When the barrel lands, it sounds a little like this. Then you can see the dagger that's starting to come down. This guy is attempting to, but failing to grab a bird that is around

the other barrels of fish. What do you do? I am going to just drop the barrel, ignore the jingle jangle that I saw, and absolutely just sprint full tilt to him. And I was like, oh, don't you dare lay a handle that seabird, and I'm going to be just sprinting towards him. And let's see if you can get to him

before his annoyance bests him, and he is able to actually stab down. Make a dexterity check for me. You know what, I'm gonna, Kim and die? We also have twists. depending how badly you want to save this bird. That looks like a good number. 13. It's pretty good.

13, it's at the other side of the pier. By the time you're able to reach them, the albatross is cut at the neck. It's completely coming free. It starts to flop down onto the pier, and he's holding the fucking bird. He throws it into the water and disgust and starts to yell at the other men in frustration

to move the additional barrels that need to get closer to the deck now that you've been clearing the way. What are the four of you guys doing as this unfolds. I would say that I've perched myself on top of another barrel and asked Yornear to help me with it. You're on the pier, both.

And then I notice, and then if you are willing to continue to carry me back. Yes, I would basically keep carrying scrimb on barrel. And I would have seen, I would have seen Barnabose, I guess, full tilt run and been like, to Yorner, been like, oh no, what is he on about now? That's about it. What do you mean?

I don't think I would really notice. I think it would just be like, If you had asked me, I'd be like, well, he's running. This certainly can't be good. Sprinting and screaming, you see Barnabot running down the pier. What do you guys do as you see Barnabos running just before this event unfolds? You know Scrimmed, that he is mad.

Well, certainly, but we can't have him be attacking anyone. The last time, a building caught on fire. Who did that? I don't know. But maybe we should follow after him and help. Seems like something of urgency is happening. I'm sure he just thinks he's saying, Spiders. I'm gonna keep getting these barrels up on the ship.

I'm just gonna keep grabbing barrels. I will have spun around on the barrel, though. And while I'm being carried backwards, just watching him run down the pier to see what's going. Yeah, I would just keep going. I'll be like, you know, he's off to his own crazy way. And I'm like peeking over your nears head from on top of the barrel.

I'm just gonna make sure he's okay. By trying to follow up. This merchant, it sees you running at him, and he, what do you want? I am going to run up to him and try to grab him by the scruff and I'm going to try to just like lift him up. Oh dear.

And say, what is your rank boy? You are able to grab him easily. He's not a strong man. He's just in simple robes and clearly here to conduct the business that his manager perhaps sent him down to do. He's young. And you're able to pick him up very easily.

Hey, oh, I'm. What are you doing? Stop! What are you doing? You just killed a sea bird, lad. You know what you've done for this voyage! He was pecking at me. What do you mean? I'm gonna try to break his nose by first. Uh, roll ahead. So the second I would see the scuffle happening,

I would immediately say to your near, oh no, you can handle the sparrow without me, right? And I would jump over his shoulders and run down. and run down here towards Barnabas. I'm not going to stop. I'm going to roll. It's only 11. It's only 11.

In his grapple state, I would say that 11 does it. You're able to hit him across the face. Oh! No, no, no, we're going back to him, no! His face. And the other men who are around him aren't helping him. He may not have been well liked. They're themselves backing away.

But you do feel the attention of the crew, and you actually hear a bit of a loop from one of the crewmen of the Moravound. I am going to look at the dead bird floating in the water, and I'm going to look at his bloody, broken nose. And I'm going to say, now that I am your officer, you're going to be making all of the dark, lonely journeys

to the hole for all of my ingredients. And that is if we even make it halfway to our destination. And I'm gonna drop them on the ground, and I will say, at least it's good luck to spill blood in a fight before a voyage. I'm gonna turn around and I'm gonna head back to the show. You turn around and just at your legs,

skinning to a stop is scrimm. And two or three of the crewmanics that you're going to get to know over the course of this voyage, they stopped up and they're smiling. Pardon, what have you done? But it's not what I've done. It's what he's done. It was just a bird.

Wait, we can't go back to prison. Seabirds have the souls of dead sailors, Mr. Stabascox. Now, now, now, Officer Barnabose, please. I'm just a lowly top man and I don't know anything about anything. But I need you to not do this. I can't go back to prison.

Just a lowly top man. And I'll walk down at Sprem and I'll say, you'll be wishing that you were back in prison. And I'm just gonna walk past him. And I'm gonna look around and see if... You said that there were people like smiling. I'm gonna see if there's like anyone coming to arrest Barnabas. And potentially us.

There don't appear to be any guards rushing. The crewmate of the Mora Bound, the three that approached, seemed to have been there for similar reasons. They too looked down upon a killing of a seabird. And when Barnabost took action and was able to write the wrong that was made by this simple merchant, they turned. and they continue to pick up crates and barrels, silent. I'm going to take one step backwards, or two step backwards,

turn and then pep, pet, pet, pet, peck, peck, back down the pier and go walk back with Barnabos. Very close to him. Very confused is what just happened. I have no fucking idea. And it's with that that the afternoon passes with you steadily and surely and confidently making your way. Small boxes, large boxes, big crates, small barrels,

hogsheads, different part of. partitions, long sticks, additional rope. The provisions on the more abound are seemingly endless. This is a huge ship, multiple layers, maybe six, seven actual slices, including the builds. You're bringing them downstairs, you're starting to familiarize yourself with the rooms of the ship,

and it's as the sun starts to approach the horizon, that you're able to say, that's it, that's all the cargo. and it's clear in this moment that having loaded the ship, we're not leaving in the morning. Captain Vermeigh wants to leave tonight, and he's gathering everyone around. I hate to do this.

Was it a red sky in a man? I hate to do this, he says. Roll a D-20. He provokes the... He's higher than a ten. It's an eight. It's not a red sky at night. I'm sorry to tell you.

I'll look up. That is not a delight. I'm going to spend when I will do not fully, you know, I spill the blood before the voyage, and I will just keep loading everything, then I'll try to just make sure what the stores are and try to get a list of whatever, whatever we have from the voyage.

Still disturbed that perhaps you didn't do enough. You are among the last of the crew to pull up the planks and steps that lead up to the ship, are able to help uncoil the ropes. And pretty soon the ship itself is starting to pull away from Luzet, from this great dock. And then I'd like to try to find the captain. It's easy to find the captain,

for he is gathering the men on the top of the ship and he's standing one level up, just there, looking down at everyone from his balcony. I will approach the captain, and he might notice that I have one of the red herrings in my hand, since I've unloaded and probably set up the my kitchen, or the galley, and I would go to him and I say, Captain, I know that there's a little fine things aboard this vessel.

Do you have any pearl or a naker? A pearl or a what? Do you have any pearl, mother or mother of pearl? Anything jewelry made out of an oyster? Maybe or why? Oh, you need it right away, please. Make persuasion check. Natural one.

We're gathering around. I'm about to give a big speech. We can talk about it later. Of course. Fill down now, crew. Goal down. Gather around, gather around. Fell in?

Good. We embarked today on a noble mission. A great heaping pile of nobility that comes in the form of shiny flat coins. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. The crew cheers. Woods. That's right, gentlemen.

And lady, the head administrator of the counting house of Wuzé has fallen terribly ill. Head administrator is a cheap way of saying King, in my opinion, for I dare say few here could challenge his authority. That, my good lads, is why we unfurl our sales today. Today we sail for shock.

Only there can the necessary medicine that will flow and stop our good patrons' Malady be acquired, for a king's bounty will be rewarded to us all. Enough that we might each of one of us buy another twenty ships, just like this one on which you now stand, with enough left over to deed a modest villa, I dare say. You hear more cheers and wuts from the crown. You very well, gentlemen, and lady. This is no private bounty.

this is a race I know three other vessels looking to depart for this same hunt there will be more we may be the first to unfurl our sails but that is no guarantee as I'm sure most of you know the sea of fog between

Yulong and shock is a misery especially during summer constantly adding weeks if not months to any voyage no visibility navigation and progress becomes It's impossible. That is why I have charted a path southbound.

Through the Karris, see, around Dracar. The crew grows silent. You can hear nervous whispers all about you. I know, I know, it won't be a terribly warm voyage, and it adds 400 nautical leagues to the distance. This is the gambit we must make. As captain, I'm not just telling you that this is our pass. I am asking you to do it with haste.

With fair winds and urgency, we add only two weeks to our journey while those dullards chase their own ship's tails and circles. By the time fall is here, we'll be sailing back westward from shock with a single vial and other trade goods. Worth ten times what we have here today. You're starting to hear the whooping. You're starting to hear the haul. all around you, the crew is clapping and cheering.

So be it, lads. Let this destiny be ours. Together, let this be the Swan Song Voyage for the Morabound. For next year, we will be sitting on a beach of our very own islands. Onward, to glory and to riches. All right. Yeah, they're getting out of those holes. I point to Queenie.

The crowd goes wild. The crew, they're all looking at each other going, okay, I didn't quite expect that. I didn't realize why we were moving with such haste, but now I get the picture, and they immediately turn and begin to go about their business. What are you guys doing? I would lean into the rest of the group and say,

well, I certainly hope that procuring this antidote is not the catch-all for our freedom. Didn't realize we'd be fighting for it. I'm the old Kay and Unray is looking a little bit better now. The Cut and Run. We're looking at the Cut and Rock. I had no idea what you were saying. No, dear, no.

This is the will of the gods. And it's incredibly exciting. I've never been in a race before. There will be no race. The captain said there'd be a race. I do not intend to participate in the race. We are going south. We're going where it is cold.

That is where my journey lies. Do I know of, with the murmuring of the crew in my sailing days, do I know of this passage as it being like, this pathway being dangerous? It actually might be pretty good. Looks good from here. or anything of a southeast passage, so to speak. 20.

20. With a 20, you will say, yeah, that's more than enough. People don't go south very often. It gets cold quickly. That's one of the major reasons. Certainly, if you were going to make a journey like this, now would probably be the best time

because you're entering someone. And you know that even farther south, the tales that you've heard from other sailors, are terrifying. However, Chakar, it's possible that you would be able to make the slingshot voyage

that the captain is describing. If not a bit right. Okay. I'll, yeah. Well, I don't really know what's on the docket for tonight, but I'm certainly not new. I'm new to ships in general. I hope me to find a little bit of rum

and maybe a little, I know I'm the top man, but I'm looking to find some top round, roasted maybe. If anybody's looking to have some food, that would be good for me. Salt pork tonight. What? Salt pork tonight. What's salt pork? It's exactly what it sounds like, Mr. Stavisotch.

I believe it's pork with salt. Okay, well, at least it's meat. Is it hot? No. What? It's, will you like me to boil it, Mr. Stavisgotch? No, no.

I trust you. You're the world's greatest cook and all that. You'll get some ships, biscuit. Okay? What about rum? He'll get your rug. Oh, perfect. Well, then I'm set. That's one third row. What's the other two thirds?

Water. Oh, sweet heavens. And we've got plenty of it. We've got plenty of everything we need. The captain walks up. We've got water. We've got... Well, not you name it.

But we have most things. All right. Well, then I guess I'll wait for that. What else is that to do? Well, we have to unfurled the sales and begin our actual trek out into the journey, but I wanted to make sure that you were well settled. We all are just getting our sea legs back, so to speak.

You're the Topman. Mr. Sabas coach, that's your job? I look around and I say, no one's explained to me what that is. The Topman stands at the top of the mast. Excuse me? He goes, yeah, you're going to crawl all the way up to the middle of the middle mast, and you're going to make sure that we don't hit anything.

Sounds like a very honorable role. Tyshen wants to do it. Tyshen is our helmsman. I don't know. Tyshen seems like he really wants to climb up there. When I'm not, he's manning the wheel. I'm good with the wheel. He has to stay up all night.

I'm good to stay. I have to get up there now. I want you to introduce you to one of my friends. This here is Ellis. Uh, apologies. Senton Armstead. Fenton. Fenton?

This is, he's Boeson. He's in charge of men when I'm not around. Do you understand? Sure. Does he rank above Barnabos? Everyone ranks above y'all. He doesn't say y'all. Okay, sure.

Go ahead, Fenton. What's the... Fenton here is going to take you down to your quarters. Understand? Yeah, sure. Fenton, I understand. understand that you're going to be joining us for this little voyage. Are you?

Yes, and we're very excited. I do have one question. Yes, how can I help you? Does anyone need surgery? Not, not, hopefully never, and not in immediate sense. Well, as the ship's surgeon, I just figured I could do something, but no one has come to me and said, I need surgery. So I have not done anything in my current role.

So just checking. Well, we'll show you your surgery room. Hopefully you know where it is before you need to use it. And hopefully no one comes to you with that urgency. Certainly. Certainly. Yeah, I mean, ideally, you have an extremely boring trip. That would be nice.

It looks like you're in good hands. I've got a lot of work to do. You go downstairs, you get settled. I'll see you soon. And the captain flustered and full of energy turns around and stomps his bald head away and into the crowd, starting to talk to other crew members. Fenton stays with you.

Well, we should probably go downstairs. We're two levels down where we're putting you. I do have a question. Does the captain's wound from his ear on his neck look like a hangman's wound? That's a great question. I would say even without having to roll, it does look like a cutlass or sword or dagger

or some sort of a bladed injury. It doesn't have that rough patchiness to it. It does appear to be a clean break with something of like an indentation to it. Understood, thank you. Before we go down, I'd like to step to the side of the ship and pull out the fish and I all say, well, it's not pearls like your like, but for you, my lover,

perhaps you can spare us. And then I'll turn back and join the rest of the group. Giving you a bit of a queer look and just sort of like, are we all ready? Either way, sir. Yes. He starts to make his way down and through the belly of this ship. And from the stairs that he takes you down,

stairs is actually not a very accurate term. These are very tall ladders, essentially. They have steps, and you can watch. walk up them without touching the actual bars, unlike a totally vertical ladder might be, but they are extremely steep. And you have to make your way through these narrow little holes from one level into the next. And eventually, he's able to take you down. As you guys are making your way through, a orange cat with green eyes immediately runs through, oh, that's my cat. Please take care of her. She's meant to be here.

Wait, what's her name? Fiesta. Piesta. That's a cat on board is good. luck. So good sowing. Yeah, I thought so as well. I've never had any bad luck with her on board, certainly. It's an orange cat? It is. Is it not a problem that the cat is of red hair?

Oh, yes, fur, Mr. Yoran. What's the difference in your mind of between fur and hair? Is it an animal? You're a man. Isn't fur just hair? That's a cat is an animal. You are a man. It's different.

All right. Just checking. You'll have time to meet everyone, I'm sure. I just want to make sure that you have someone to put your things and then I can continue to make sure that everything is as orderly as it should be. When do I have to go up in the bucket? I imagine in perhaps less than the strike of a clock.

probably in another hour or so as soon as we're ready to totally unfurl and raise anchor. Can I take my grog up there? That would be a question for the captain. No. Oh. You're here. I want you to promise me something.

All right. There's a 50-50 shot I fall from that bucket. If I do, you do not save me. Just let me die. I don't want to survive that fall. In fact, you put me out of my misery. Do you want to switch jobs? I'm supposed to be serving grog to a bunch of the rowdy guys downstairs,

so I figured you could probably steal a bunch and get liquored up while you're doing it, and I ain't afraid of heights. I'm going to get in the bucket. Indeed, you shall. What the captain says goes. And you make your way past walls of crates and barrels. I mean, you moved most of this stuff on with the remaining crew, but it's actually not seeing it all in one place, and away from the docks,

This is everything that you have. This is everything you and the crew have. This is all that you can plan to need in terms of food. And suddenly occurs to you, wow, there's... At sea, we'll hopefully have enough water. We'll have enough beef. We'll have enough. And as you do, there are two goats in one corner.

And you can see that there are a number of chickens all clucking around for the purposes of milk, eggs, that sort of thing. eases your mind a little bit and you make your way down to the second layer of this ship. It's hard for me to describe, actually. Why don't I pull out a math thing? Do we have to make a one? Yeah, you're gonna have to make a ship from the room. All right, oh, let's fucking go. And you're being escorted by the Bosen.

Fenton. Thank you. Right here to actually access your different rooms. You got me fucking enthralled. Well, thank you. That's the matter. We're in Sorcell. Yeah, I'm goddamn

Sorcell, all right? Your Wizard's Boon is taking me over. He points out to you that you can take the rooms that you want in any configuration, except this largest room goes to Mayaner, Myelin, who is a mute and that you probably shouldn't deal with him. He explains that this is the privy. You can enjoy the latrine, but you'll have to clean it out. but you'll have to clean it out yourself.

This room is for you to enjoy and anyone else who should want to come down, and there's sort of something like a workstation or a table here. Choosing whatever room you should so please, and he sort of makes a light joke when looking at Scrim and Queenie, that perhaps one of you would prefer

the smallest of the room. Everyone usually has to gamble in order to see to avoid the room, but he expects that you might, actually enjoy it and whether or not you might fight about it is on his mind. Well, Queenie, I appreciate you offering you sweatshubs with me, so I'm happy to take the smaller room. I... I'm trying to do like my freaking Peggy voice. Oh, you know. Sorry. It's the Lord of curse. It's the room curse.

Well, you know, I'm alright sleeping in the small room too, so whatever. No, no, sir, I insist. I be more comfortable. I'll take the small room, it's fine. Chances are good I'm gonna die anyway, so don't hurt you about it. All right. Why would you say that? Tyshen, please, and I go into my room and I drop my things. Did anyone notice when we were walking by all those storage boxes, it looked like the shape of a wiener? What? I stick my head out of...

Someone asked where the penis was on the mat. It's totally right there. That's a big dick, Eric! You did it! That's a penis! Look, there's the ball. The 10-foot staff. It's even like from far away, it's like a mosaic of piece. Didn't even occur to me. I do not mind where I sleep, so I will take what's left over. Where would you like to stay?

Whatever room you want to put me in. I think I've probably got to get to work soon, though. I'm thinking people are going to need some grog. This is the other small work as well. This is the other small room. Do you let you take it? Yeah. Well, so here's the thing.

Sometimes I like to sneak a little honey in the middle of the night, so if I'm closer to the lavatory, it's probably best. I also know none of y'all's going to clean up after yourself, so I should probably be close enough to clean up after you, too. You take the room next to the privy. Yeah. Oh, wow, this room stays. Oh, me.

Doomed to avoid a fart sound. I won't take this room. This one seems fine. That was a bad choice. Well, I'm going up in the bucket. I suppose I'll join you up on deck to man the helm. There will be salt pork, ship's biscuit, and pea suit. When you return, you can't send it up to,

there's no like a drawstring, another bucket, like a smaller bucket to go up to the big bucket. Would you like to get your supper before you go up there? I'm a little worried. It might come back up. You know what? I'm going to go up to the bucket. I'm just going to see how this goes. It'll be fine. It'll be absolutely fine. You're not the only crewmate as you make your way up and out.

You can see that there are many people on netting, using different foot, foot holds, working to unfurl and attach and actually start to pull up these massive, massive sales that are for each of the three masks. In addition to some smaller sales for stabilization, that kind of thing. Once I get to the mast with the Crozenest,

not that scrimoners, that's what it's called. I'm surprisingly dexterous, and I scurry up that ladder all the way up. I would say you do that with that issue. Barnabot, where do you find yourself? I would get to the galley as soon as possible. I'd survey and basically be, I'd be barking orders to whomever they would have been assigned

to assist for this evening's meal. And I'd be barking orders and getting all of the ingredients that I would need in order to make enough hardtack, salt pork and pea soup. The person that you'd be barking orders at, effectively your assistant is the barmaid. So you're working directly with Queenie

in order to run the kitchen and the dining room. Oie, Miss March. Yeah. Are you going to assist me tonight? I'm serving people made. That's what it is, right? I'm putting some honey in it every time I serve it. They seem to like it.

You've found that, um, Among the many mundane things, this ship does have one wonderful feature, and that is that there is a casp that is effectively an endless decanter. You can churn it, and you can just thinking about it, enjoy an ale, or enjoy a water, or enjoy whatever someone requests, they're able to make that request without any way. Just don't think about mayo. Turns out it's an alchemist jar.

Mayo, lemon juice. What's an I say open? It's a good dressing. It sounds like a good dressing. After about 20 minutes of being in the crow's nest, it's very quiet. I look over the edge and I'm like, hey, hey, can you guys hear me?

Yes. What am I looking for? Nobody gave me direction. I think anything. Given that we are at open sea, I think anything else the ordinary you should know about. We're not moving yet, though.

I would have said, Never mind. I just mean in the future. Thank you. And what do you find yourself doing, Tichem as the voyage is just about to get on. So I don't, would I be moving towards the helm or is that like at a different time?

You said when the captain sleeps. Oh, basically when that he's not at the helm, you're kind of like the ball boy in tennis who like runs up and takes care of business. Oh, oh, he's not there. I'll be there to stabilize it. And he'll give you more direction about exactly like how many notches you need to turn it

when he's asking for a certain turn or maneuver when it comes to the ship. But primarily, it looks like your services are particularly needed on the first day because the captain is there shouting orders of the different crew member. You're holding on, is he clearly gunning to go? I would, I think I would still be towards the helm trying to learn what I can from him.

He would start to explain in more detail than I care to memorize nautically. Thank you for honesty. I just don't want to be a person who's like, I never sail. I'm going to make it up or I'm going to, no. Yeah, so turn it that way. Yeah, exactly, exactly. Yeah, he's giving you the 101 version of things. But right now, the rudder isn't doing any real work.

You're not turning. You're sitting on the ocean because they're finally, finally finishing up things. And, of course, they poof out as the fair winds start to push you out and into the Kirst Sea just beyond Southwest of Ulawn. This podcast is brought to you by our Patreon. Become a patron today at patreon.com slash legends of Aventress and gain access to tons of exclusive perks, including a monthly movie night,

and a weekly Patreon exclusive campaign set on the high seas, shroud over saltmarsh. You can also go to The Crooked Moon.com to pick up your own copy of our first published supplement, The Crooked Moon, a folk horror tome for Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition. And don't forget to snag all the extra goodies like dice, miniatures, plushies, a tarot deck, and more. Thank you. It's Ben. 10 days now since you departed the Delta dock area of Wuzzi, the River City,

said goodbye to the golden egg, and finally you are out on the open sea, and it is getting cooler. I sailed as a DM a little bit to describe exactly how sweaty and hot and humid and horrid it is. It's the point of Southwest Yulang where you found yourself. We're talking about like 99 feels like 106 kind of humidity. Very, very hot. And hotter still, busting rocks, certainly. However, it's getting cooler now.

As you travel south, we're lowering the temperature ban, so to speak. We're dropping now from 106 to the low 90s. And that actually feels like a little late. We're going to do this again a few times. I'm going to need your assistance to help me tell the story of this voyage. What does it look like your first week if you're just getting back into the swing of things, getting your sea legs do you take to sea voyages easily and quickly?

Or do you find it hard to get to know this crew that is a bit standoffish with the exception of perhaps the laughing captain and the more timid fentany? Not fenton. Yeah, Fenton. I mean, I think that I, I would basically fall back into it immediately. And I would absolutely be in my element.

I would love it. Being back in a galley, feeding the men, I would get to know all their names. And I would basically feel like everyone, every one of them, like their strength and their ability for this void is my responsibility to come. Including your companions, including your companions.

This is a 19th from group. The captain, the boats in you met. They're the cabin boy, who you meet named Roland Stone Bridge. I would have Roland helping me, and I would get very upset if he would, like, when he's cracking eggs into like the soups or the stews or whatever we're doing,

and if he doesn't smash the eggshells enough to my liking, I will get very upset with him and berate him every time. And I would, in turn, pull him to the side and, like, pump him up and tell him, it's gonna be okay, Roland, like, you'll get it next. I'll say, do you want wishes? That's how you get witches if you don't crush your eggshells

enough, boy? No, let's a chef. It's right in my journal. Sturm. You a binging donkey. It's roared! What are you? I'm an idiot sandwich.

No one is clearly not here for the journey. He does, if you are intending on making him a chef or teaching him the ways of the of the sailor, it's not an easy. because he's constantly escaping to a hiding hole somewhere in this superstructure that is this ship and drawing, writing, these kinds of things. I would be trying to be, I'd be extra stirring with him, but I'm trying to like teach him how to actually be in the gallery. A natural to be a ship's coat. Well, make a persuasion. See how well you do. Oh, shit. Oh. That's actually better than I was

expected. Uh, bah, nah, nah, nah, nah, uh, a persuasion. Oh, that'll be an 18. I'm 18. He actually does start to warm view. Perhaps the superstistance. But, uh... Smash those angels, boy. He starts to, um, show up when you've asked him to. Wait, there just... Oh, witches are gonna be sailing on all those things. It's primarily those kinds of superstitious sayings

that seems to attract him the most. What's it? These first 10 days, you're near. How do you find yourselves? I would just basically throughout the voyage, I would take my knife and I would basically around the ship, whether it's in the walls or in the gunnel or rails or whatever the ship has or anywhere where there's bloid, I'd be like just kind of carving ruins around the ship just to try to kind of, you know, hope for a good voyage and protect us as much weekend.

Ellis Coombs, the carpet on this, uh... For the entire week. Oh, because Alice Coombe! Let me tell you. Let me tell you. Ellis Coombs said that. Teach you a play, come home. I didn't spell the name, right?

I didn't spell the name right. Hey, where's in the match game? Do I not know a dirty phrase? What if Coos? Remember a match game, 76? I'm not too. Ellis Coombs is all over here. He does not why you touching that one.

But basically, like, if you were like, tell me to stop, I would stop, but then I would like, to my cabin and I would like, actually a few runes here and there. He clearly cares about the integrity of this ship, but he's not getting through you one way or the other. No, no, no, no, I would ignore him. How are you feeling as top man scrimmed?

I, well, I, I, I don't know, I, I'm not so sure. I appear to have traded one prison for another. I don't know where the sea ends and the sky begins and where the bucket begins and my feet began. I am one with the ship. But I don't want to be. Is there any more Grog? Help me.

It falls on deaf ears because usually during the evenings and night especially, the ship surface, the deck, is not often traveled. It's very rare that someone come up here for a breath of fresh air. The days are mundane, but they are still busy and there's still a lot to do, and there's sleep to be had. You find yourself all alone. I'm very alone. I'm very long.

The Crow's Nest. Everyone's from wild. Checking the Verizon, not just for obstacles, but. No, I haven't worked a day in my life, and I don't intend to stop now. Exactly right. What about you, Queenie? Oh, you're helping, yep.

Tie-10. You're becoming a more skilled helmsman every day, I will say. And it's starting to get cooler. Another 10 days has passed. It's now the 14th of the seventh month. And you're trying to really feel like you know how to ride the waves and not jostle things too much. Yeah, I'm feeling good.

I'm at the helm. Let's see. So presumably I'm working like overnight. Exactly right. Yeah, so. Or whenever the captain needs you. And certainly there are eight other able men. You're not the only person who the captain trusts

with this purpose, but the captain is, for whatever reason, felt inspired to make you this person, and that responsibility you take however seriously you like. I would consider this position to be extremely honorable. Like, I would approach it with great, like, you know, I would be locked into the goal while my hands are on the helm. But like, the second I'm relieved, I think I'd be, I missed the airy open peaks of Yulang.

I'm not, I'm more comfortable at the helm, but I don't know that the seas are for me, I'm, ugh. Just make a Constitution savings for us. See how you've been doing over these last 20 days or so. And I will also say that yes, absolutely. As you make that role, you have been. That looks like a small number.

We'll call that, uh, call that the old. sea legs out the window. So sorry. Oh, you there, there, Mr. Feuerlalsam. You're doing Malt you're fine for not being bronze of scale. And what is your actual Constitution score when you tell me your actual role?

Con is 14. The saving throw would be... Saving throw is not what I'm asking. Just the actual... modifier plus what you roll. Oh, eight. Eight. You, Ralph.

The first week is probably probably the hardest. Eventually, you do start to find yourself able to withstand the more rainy or mulchous sea times. But as soon as it starts to really,

really become a problem, the captain has to take over because you get seasick a little bit more easily than you'd probably prefer. Relief is exactly the word when those situations happen. So you can go down into your quarters, lie down, stare up at the ceiling, maybe go to the privy, these kinds of things.

First thing I would do would be to brew a cup of tea to wash the taste out of my mouth. Yikes, absolutely. And you find that the mint is probably the most settling. And anything salty tends to actually help really, really resolve the nerve. So that's something that you believe. over the last 20 years or 28 days.

20 years. See you? Oh my God. It's been a long time. Skirm is dead. We can only dream to be 20 years at sea. It gets cooler. Another 10 days past.

We're now starting to feel actually like moderate. And there are some storms, but we weather them well enough. The more bound as a ship at being as old, as creepy as it is, is extremely robust. I mean, there's a reason why it's lasted this long, certainly, and we're now finding ourselves in 60, 65, 70 degrees Fahrenheit, a much more reasonable temperature. It's almost starting to feel fall-like to you,

those of you who have enjoyed that kind of weather. What do you all do? How do you spend your recreation time on a ship like this? I would be trying to drink and I would be playing games of chance with the crew. Cards, dice. There are many games of chance. Yeah, I would be trying to swindle people. That would be my, whether it makes me enemies or not, I would be almost foolishly trying to take,

fools in their money are easily separated, right? Certainly. And I would be trying to take advantage of the games of change. and maybe try to get away with cheating, with my coin, doing some things that are probably not extremely wise when you're locked on boat with these same people for many, many months at a time. I would say that you make friends and enemies,

frenemies in the same way that, you know, they're a competitive group. Many of these able men, and you've come to known, Stafford, Tell, Waverly, these gentlemen, they're, they're Luzé, And so their personality isn't as strong from one to the next, but they all enjoy a good game. They'll tell you about their life of Mouzé,

ask you about what travels you've enjoyed so far. But you do meet a match. Someone who's a very competitive card player, somebody who's been enjoying these games very much. He is a gentleman who clearly knows his way around a deck of cards, and it's with him that you know that almost every evening, It will be a head-to-head game after everyone else has been knocked out, be at a game of cards or even some of the more physical games like darts or Statschurchase. I would say with this Sutton Fellow, I would become it up to you

Known as one of the men you go to when you want to gamble always open to gamble and you find him almost every evening in the dining room or one of the recreation rooms for this purpose is pulling a chair out and welcoming you, a warming to you over the last months more than perhaps some of the other sailors that you've met. But everyone's always down for a game, especially once duties are coming through a close. What else does anyone want to do with the remainder of their time? I would have set up maybe like a small wooden barrel

and I would have been taking all the compost from the cooking like the eggshells and things like that and planted a couple of my seeds. and I would tend to those and try and get them to grow on the ship. Okay. Over the next 10 days, the temperature starts to drop. It's getting cool now. We're talking about 50, 55 degrees Fahrenheit. But even so, you are able to put water into the soil

and the compost. It takes to the compost pretty quickly. You even have a few sprouts by the time the captain, or rather one of the men tells you that the captain is asked for all people enjoy dinner with them. This, the sixth of the eighth month, month. Oh, ooh. Six weeks, six months it passed?

No, it is the year. Sixth of the eight month. Oh, I see. The sixth of August. Yes, I see. I'm not gonna use August or something not fantastic. It's the equivalent, but it is the equivalent

of the eight months. There was there Caesar and Justice. In the calendar that you all exactly right. So on the cooler night of your duties are relieved from you

and the five of you sit down. How have you been making off? I mean, I'm certainly no native to a ship like Officer Barnabost, but you know, it's been good. I get lonely up in the bucket, but you know, the food is good,

the grog is good, the games are ready. Oh, thank you, Mr. Rund. Thank you very much, Mr. Evans Gooch. Well, I mean, it's very clear you know your way around a boat and I'm just lucky I don't get seasick like Tyshen. Oh, well, Barnabos' assaulted pork has helped me along with that. And if I may, Captain,

it has been an honor to be able to man the helm in your absence. And I would bow to him. He lets out a little laugh, but he an honor, yes, yes, absolutely. My, my, my, my, my question, you're right. And then, and the The cooking is indeed good for Barnabot's.

We're here for you very much, Captain. We're here for coin. We're not here to buy, well, perhaps we can when we have it, but we're here for a prize. I appreciate that you respect the duty, but honor is not a word we use very commonly among the crew. Most of the crew I've encountered seems extremely honorable. Barnabas himself is a man of great honor.

tends to all things seafair and seaworthy with the same gusto that I've seen him destroy a tavern. You see, you see. Oh yeah, it's true, Mr. Feuerblossel, that is true. Perhaps you see much farther than I do when it comes to the hearts of men. How are we doing in our race? Any word from the other ships? The winds have been fair. There have been very few evenings, uh, uh, or, or, you know, days, as you well know, up in the Crows Nest, where we've come to a complete sandstill.

I get a thousand yards stare as you went to the Crows Nest. Do you know how much further than the next sign of line? Yes, actually. Our quartermaster, Walker Clemens, I'm sure you've met him a few times, our navigator. He is hard at work, tracking stars, making sure that we're where we need to be. And we're right on track. We expected to see the northwest coast of Drakar in another ten days. What, Captain? And do you really expect us to make it through the southeast passage with this ship hole? It is a risk. It is a risk. And I know we'll make it through. It's just a

question of whether we make it through fast enough to earn our bribes. Have you already kept me sailed under done it before? No. However, we've gotten some information from Myelin. He actually is from Dracar, is my understanding. As few words as he does say, none words. I've never heard him speak a word. He is shaking his head yet.

and then pointing and shaking his head no when it comes to making certain choices, we believe that we're going to be able to thread the needle. Is he your ice master? Well, I imagine he knows quite a bit about ice. Given the fact that it is still the middle of summer, we don't expect to hit much in the way of ice flows, mainly small specks of ice, perhaps some flurries.

I don't mean to be presumptuant. but we haven't had a lot of time with you since, you know, all those days ago in the cell. You mentioned after the fact, after we signed up, that this was a race, does our freedom depend on winning that race? No, no, actually. If we make our way to chalk and then we come back to Wuzet and we have been bested by some other crew,

that was not in my contract deal with the ward. I never doubted it for a second. What do you know of... this land of Dracar. I understand it's almost unabited, isolated. It's not connected the same way, and I understand you're a man from Amut. This?

That circle, there's so much land there, and you can travel from one continent to the next almost, just circumnavigationally. The Dracar is, well, except for, Except for As well, it's nearly on the end of the world. And it is cold, it is a harsh land. It is a harsh land. I understand that it gets quite cold, but like I said,

that is why we chose this path. We left in the beginning of summer. We'll be able to pass just under the south of Drak and above the two islands that my map indicate. and through that needle we will thread, making our way through chalk, through to chalk. We'll have clear skies for the rest of our lives. Well, that's good enough to me.

That sounds great that Chukar is not our destination. There's chalk instead. No, no, no, no, yes, yes. Trust that you are an expert seamstress. Seamstress? You're talking threading the needle. Cheers, my good lad. Great joke.

He holds up a mud. Cheers, yeah, yeah, keep the crowd coming. And we don't plan on making port in any, perhaps city or village in Drak. You stay off the coast the whole time. From what I've been told, there are no ports along the western coast of Drakar. You'd have to go to the northeast,

to the dwarven kingdoms that lie in the archipelago there, But that is another reason why we're not going through those... That twisted pat. Plus, there's no time. We gotta win the race. Right, well... When the caton is right, then we'll all be enjoying fruity beverages

and sizzling pork in the McCona Islands by no time. You mentioned these McCona Islands, and I've got to say, it sounds pretty fantastic. I do like the sound of sizzling pork. It's unlike anything you've ever had before. I'm glad. Your evening with the captain continues and eventually say your farewells. Another 10 days go by.

And on the 17th, 16th of the 8th month, you find yourself shivering a little bit. It's cold. It's starting to feel like 30, 35, 40. It's starting to get to the point where you look up at the clouds. and wonder if there might be a plague or two. There are jackets. There are coats and things that you can wear. Nothing heavy, nothing that would really, as it turns out,

people in Wuse very rarely buy furs. So there's nothing along those lines. But there's a few extra layers, especially for a top man to enjoy. If you have a warm mug, you might be able to withstand the blowing winds that seem to get faster and faster as you make your way to stop.

A warm mug of Grog. I don't know if you'd warm Grog. You warm Grog? Wow, that's right, yeah. Strim warms, grog. I would, I think, what was the cabin boy's name? That was, uh, it wasn't Ellis Coombs. That's the fact.

Oh, you're, I'm Mr. Ellis. Elis. American, Cums. Is it Rowland, I think. No, what was, is that was his first name? What was the last name? You're talking to Routman.

Rolling Stonebridge. Oh, Mr. Stonebridge? This is... Yes, sir. Here, take this brandy I've warmed it, bring it up to Mr. Stavis Scotch. It's a cold one today. And I think that he could use it.

Thank God. Barnabos. Well, not enough, though, for him to lose his wits and miss an iceberg. Right, right, right, right, Mr. Barnboz, and he... Oh, it's a good lad? He takes the... You find a small hand.

Ah! A living of a warm... Sweet gods! Is this from Barnabas? Yeah, yeah. Tell him that I owe him my life. Minutes later. He tells you that he owes him his life.

Well, he was a great captain when we were in that egg. So he's all he can do. I was amazed. I would keep an eye out for any kind of birds that might land on the ship. Oh. Oh, make a perception, a perception check. Oh, is the merchant guy on board that killed the Albatron?

He was not a member of the crew. Oh, God. He was just there to see that the deliver goods were delivered. But he was still part of the operation. He was part of the operation, and there were a few of his men who helped. I think that guy's nerves was broken and he was left on the piers of the dock. Masculating. Yeah.

He was left on the dock. And I got good luck for the spell of the blood. Probably bleeding out. It might be dead. 17. It's been ages since you've seen a bird. It's been weeks and weeks and weeks. I don't know enough about nautical business to say that, like, you wouldn't see any birds on a sea voyage,

but I imagine that there's a certain point where you get far away enough from land. You're just not seeing anything. And that's been the case for two months now. So then I guess as we'd be voyaging, I would want to keep an eye out for birds to get a sense or we're approaching. so that I'm just sort of keeping my eye out and kind of, in case one does happen to show up, I would like to do something.

Just like to. I'd like to kill the bird in front of Barnabergus. Oh, you're in Edmund, bastard! And the whole campaign goes to shit. Well, I knew it. I kid, I kid. And your feet legs have really come to you. For whatever reason, maybe it's the cooler air, you're starting to feel like a real sailor

in terms of being able to navigate without having to ask any questions and in terms of when things get rough. And none of you really hit heavy, stormy seats at this point. But even when they're at their lurchy that you've experienced so far, you're starting to get a sense for what you need to do in order to stay focused and stay not helpful. if it's not the right word, but... Capable? Capable, yeah. Undistracted by motion sickness.

Ah, where at once this was quite taxing, but now I quite enjoy the time at the helm. Everything else. This is easier, whether it be the cool there. Scrim, how are you? I said, scrimm! I said! I said, how are you up there?

Yes, the sky's blue. Excellent, you see something? What? What? Do you need surgery? Brandy! I need more brandy! Oh, I'm more. I'm...

It's true, you've had almost nothing to do. But a working, a full belly every night. That's a good thing. I don't really trust you ordering with a scalpel. You got these big, meat, he has these big, meaty fingers. He can't hold a scalpel. I have a knife and an edge of it.

Is that for the precision work? Put yourself where you would be. While in the kitchen, I want to butter get stuck in the blender. And I want to get it out with my fingers. Yum. So what happens? Unfortunately, you're pulled into the blender. Completely.

Oh, shit. Oh, you're turning to, I suppose. You're turned into a rapid rabbit chino. How do you? A rabbit chino, thank you. More like rabbit puree. Purae. Everyone enjoys the meal.

Lovely. And we continue on with the adventure. You can go now. How fun. You've been serving drinks. You've been making sure that people get fed. You have to run up and down the boards of this ship pretty frequently because people don't always eat

in the dining room, but sometimes people say, hey, could I get a beer or could I get grog or could I get a glass of warm milk before bed? Something along those lines. You have been noticing one particular gentleman, Corliss Garside, he has been really digging deeper and deeper into the drink each progressive week. He still has been doing his duties okay, but he's been, the first night was three beers. The next night was three beers.

Then three, then three, then four, then four, then five, then five. It's been steadily elbowing up in number. So I would ask, as you with that knowledge, where do you guys find yourself on the 10th of the ninth month when things start to drop a low freezing? I'm in the damn bucket. I'm not happy about it. I yearn for Barnabos's hot brandy.

You know what I mean? It's in the bucket, or presumably. I'm in the main mask bucket. I'm in the main mask bucket. I haven't moved. I'm in the damn bucket. I'm in the gallery. I would be up on the top deck, and I would be keeping it out for birds,

but I would also be, like, kind of, if no one was around, I'd, like, you know, carve another ruin in just to kind of... If you're near's, like, on the top deck below me, I would occasionally, like, throw something at him, like, you know, like a little piece of debris. I would be... I'm a troublemaker, and I'm not really... I'm not really doing my job. You're not looking out for anything?

I mean, I'll occasionally look around, but there hasn't been any for months, right? I mean, like, and I'm extremely the kind of person that he didn't do fuck about real work, right? He's very much like, I'll look around occasionally, but nothing's changed for months or weeks. Yeah, exactly right. So I'm doing my job half-heartedly while I'm torturing you're near. It's on- I always ignore it. I would like, it might miss, right?

It's a long drop, right? I'm doing my detailed cleaning of the bathroom. Even though the captain said that you need to clean up after yourself, nobody does. And I just can't stand for that. So the bees help me once a week we go into a deep, detailed cleaning and try and make it Spickenspan. I would also add that as you were making the bathroom spickenspan, you realize you haven't seen Forlis Darkinspan.

for most of the day. Normally, you'd have had a four or five, six years. Well, he's the one who pisses all over the floor more than anyone else, especially lately. Yeah, it reminds you of him the fact that there are fewer piss drops on the toilet seat this particular evening. Well, shit, I should go check on that guy. I gotta finish cleaning up the bathroom first. I'm just gonna keep cleaning it, at least for a while. And then once I feel like it's to a good point, I'll go check in his race. and instead of bringing a alcohol,

which is what he normally likes, I'm gonna meet up with Taichenne, get some of his tea, add a little bit of honey to it and bring that to him. Okay, so you've got a cup full of honeyed tea and you're making your way down. On the, for lack of the second floor of this ship, where the hammocks are, you look to his hammock,

and it is empty. Someone's got to drink this tea, so I guess I'll do it and I just start drinking tea. I don't know where he is. I'm going to go let Yornear now. It is unusual. And I'll go upstairs and let Yornear know. Hey, Yornear, you're the surgeon.

Yes. Do I go to you if someone's missing or only if they're broken? I don't know how my skills would necessarily be locating someone, but if you locate them and they need some. surgery. That's what I'm worried about. He's been drinking a lot, and now he's gone, so... How long has he been gone? When's the last time you saw him? Um... Do you? Uh, you would have been the previous night?

Uh, it's been about a day. Ooh. Well, chances are if he fell overboard, he's certainly dead. So he won't need surgery. surgery. I mean, that stands to reason, but if he's just on the ship somewhere, but he's messed himself. I mean, he's been drinking

a lot. I'm not doing anything. Would you like me to help you find him? I mean, that's why I came to you. You're the surgeon. You haven't done anything this entire trip. You just stand here and let scrimm throw things at you.

He needs need some kind of entertainment. Bye, scumor room. Hey, Scrum! Do you say brandy? No! Okay! My head peeps back in the bucket.

I disappeared. I'm gonna copy. All right. Screw is such a scape. Oh, that's incredible. Let's look for the drug. I checked his hand. checked his hammock and he wasn't

pissing himself in the bathroom so I'm not sure where he could be. Well, let me take a look at this hammock, perhaps I will find something. Oh, can you look at his hammock and know which way he went? No. I might be able to have. Perhaps he's been able to. I probably should have done

that when I was down in his hammock. It's been so long since I've tracts anything. I'm done up and forgot how to do it. I will go down and I'll have Queenie point me to his hammock. Because I don't, you know, I probably don't know the guy or care about the guy. You may have learned none of the names of these who.

They ignore you. You ignore them. I love how we're all happy for it. His is the final one hammock on the rightmost side there. Oh. On this one? No, like, that one. Not in the actual recreation room, but there.

So I'm going to start. There's no core list there. I'm gonna date through his possessions and start like ruffling through everything. And I would like to use my rangerness to try and see if I notice anything off because I forgot I was a ranger. Investigation, and I don't know what that means.

Like, I guess survival, I don't know. Try to track him. Yeah, I'm trying to track him. Let's give, okay, you're gonna try to track him. That's different. I still think it would be investigation, right? Sure. Whatever you tell me, it is.

what it is. Um, these dice are hot. Yeah, agreed. 19, we're only hot fire. Yeah, I mean, cool as hell. It's all. It's really well.

With a 17 and a 19, you start to go through his things. Just brutally opening up satchel, pulling him, finding a book or two, finding additional changes of clothes, finding what weapons he might need on him. Should there be, you know, a pirate situation or something along those lines?

Tradition. crewmate fodder. You don't find anything unusual that would speak to a disappearance or anything along those lines. As you're... Yeah, go ahead. I'll turn to clean you on, say,

there's nothing out of sorts. Well, I'm just checking down under his hammock and along the floor to see if I see anything interesting. With the 17, there aren't any tracks. I would say it'd be very difficult on a boarded

deck level, like on a ship, where you be able to see like footprints or anything, especially even fresh. It's a mystery. You aren't able to find anything. Well, I didn't really know him that well anyway, so we should probably just go make sure scrim's okay. No, I think we should check the rest of the ship.

I mean, at this might- I've already looked in the bathroom, it goes two places. He's asleep in his bed or he's pissing on the floor. He doesn't really go anywhere else. Well, I'm going to go check. check the bills if you'd like to come. Where's that? It's the very bottom of the ship.

It's real dark down there, Yornear. I know, but it's fine. It's there are two of us. And it gets colder down there too because that's the part of the ship. That's under the water. Do you need a coat or some kind of hope?

Do you have an extra one you can give me? You can just use mine. I'm used to the cold. It looks real heavy. Can you carry it while I wear it? Yes. All right, I'll come with you. And so I'll take my, my cloak off and I'll wrap Queenie and I'll pick her up.

Oh, wow. We'll just keep in the warm. And I'll walk down to the, I'll walk through the whole kind of, you know, basically do like a once over of each deck of the ship and then go all the way to the block. When you reach the, go ahead. I have a question. Yeah. Is your near literally like, like bent at the, at the waist all the way down?

I'm like at least hunching. How tall are you? I'm like, eight feet? Holy shit. Tall, fuck. Yeah, I would say the first week you found out all of the places where you could get your head. Okay, yeah, yeah, that's a hard way.

I would say that the equivalent would be Gandalf walking in Billbo's, uh, Billbo Baggins. Oh, baggap. Oh, that's what I do. How you show you is quite cool. Yeah, that's what it feels like. Now, that being said, the village is considerably

shorter. when it comes to its height. Only Sprim and Queenie would be able to walk in the build without having the duck in general. Fully erect. Even then, there's still a little bit, hmm? I can walk through the build fully arraigned. Yes, yes.

So good Queenie, of course. You're an Ellis Coombs. Of course. Very, without saying. Mr. Coombs has a lot of time in the privy. I'm Alice Coot. He has one giant arm. He's like,

he's like, he's always like, hey, Barnabot, what's in that shell? He's also the saltiest of all the grumade. He's the fuck away from me. You don't make it into the bilge, however. All of all the information that I gave you.

You pulled a hatch up, and just there, Uh, there is. No, the village is the bottom. We don't make it there. Oh, my fault. It's as you are attempting to descend. Uh-oh.

Where's the ladder? Where the stair. Oh, yeah, there's a hatch. Yeah. You can see, you can see. Right by spring's a room. Corlis is dumped down these stairs. Ooh.

And he is crumpled at the bottom, clearly unconscious. And Hanska called it. Uh, he's in the bottom of the stairs. He's at the bottom of the stairs. I immediately rushed down. Oh, Queen, Let me put you down. He's in trouble. Let me help him, please.

And I'll set him down and I'll kind of rush down. And I'll see. I knew it. I'm basically, I'm just gonna do a full check, like I check his pulse, kind of do it once over, look at his face, see what he's feeling. The game is afloat. Make a medicine check.

That is where I am a lanky. See, I use these other dice I bought a Gen Con and they suck. That is where I am a lethal Viking. Oh, well, you're a Viking. Skills. A waking. A waking. Medicine is a nine. Nuclear missiles. With a nine,

you can tell that he is breathing and he is unconscious. But given the darkness, there's no like cisterns or lanterns or anything like that in the build. Without more light, you have no idea what... He's not dead, though.

What the condition is. He does not appear to be dead. It's the best you can tell. I'm gonna immediately pick him up and I'll walk up to the top of the steps and I'll look down at Queen and I'll say, probably have the drunk before. Let me take a look after.

We should get him to wherever it is that you do the surgeries just in case you gotta remove parts of it. That is exactly my plan. And I'm going to walk and take him to the surgery room to the whatever it's called. You can walk. Sick back.

It is the first like, The first frost. It's chilly. It wasn't until you went down the build that you really realized that like the condensation on the inside of this ship is actually even starting to self-change the color of the wood for that white, frosty gray color.

And you take him to the medical arena? Yep, okay. What are the rest of y'all doing? Especially Sprim. I'm gonna go first. No, I'm fucking with you. I don't know. I'll give an answer. I just gotta...

I, um... What time is it? I want to make sure that I've got... I would say that... I would say that it's well-past cook an hour. Okay, okay. It's 10, 30, 11, and at night. I would have...

God, I forget his last name. We should have it down. Roland, I would have him basically... Stonebridge. Stonebridge. I'd have Mr. Stonebridge. Oh, Mr. Stonebridge, you keep... Oh, that oven's stoked.

And you keep peeling them potatoes. Oh, we're right back. And I would have gone up to the top deck to smoke my pipe and perhaps converse with Mr. Fireblossom. And I'd also probably bring my drum, where I would have probably been teaching sea shanties to a lot of the crew and maybe leading, leading around. This late at night, and it's not every night. But your drum has become something of a siren call where, oh, I hear the drum. And occasionally crew members will come to hear the learning. chanties to teach you chances of their own.

A few of them have their own instruments, 100%. You're starting to think it might turn into one of those kinds of knights. And Taichena, I guess you are joining him. I would love to be there. Oh, Barnabos, excellent. The drums in play. At one point, I loved the Sungie horn myself, but I left it back at the main line.

That makes me very sad to hear about your singe-e-horn. Every tone you mention that we would love to have an accompaniment, but you know the words? Oh, I do. Going down to Omakki, me, my khani, me boys, going down to Makhani. We're own word bound from the Mahmoo ground, going down to Omakanee. you gotta work on it. You know, next night maybe we'll be in harmony. Again, again

two other gentlemen, Wade and Pendleton make their way over to do. You can hear the sound of music as you pull corlets down. I would say that I'm still in a bucket. You've heard this music

a number of times. Yeah, and I hear the faint roar of the crowd, if you will, and I feel sad that I'm not there and I'm flipping the accursed coin, the damned coin and I'm singing a song that Barnabot's taught me but I'm doing it in a way that's

the lyrics are clearly wrong but I smile at my own cleverness and I'm half-heartedly singing a song there once was a ship that ran aground and the name of the ship was the moribound and just passing time

as I am jealous that I'm not down with the rest of the crew. And I hate the fucking coin that I'm feeling. I'm mad. I'm mad about it. Every flip you feel like you get a little bit angrier. If I can't get rid of it. Corlis hits your surgery table, and you can tell that his fall must have happened perhaps in the afternoon.

It's been quite some time. Make an additional medicine check. He's not wearing the usual coats and help that other folks might have, might be wearing. There you go. That is a Fed tea. Now with enough light to see. You can see that his skin is starting to turn blue.

He's definitely unconscious from the fall. He's got a hard gash on one hand. What is clearly a number of bruises on most of his, a contusion on his head. Exactly right. Thank you, kindly. This is a collaborative story-cilling process. And it's a very way to tell me to shut the floor.

It's hard for you to see any of these things because the table is, of course, the height that it is. All you can see over the table and the tips of my ears. How's it going up there? But this man is not in any danger of dying necessarily, but it's clearly in need of immediate medical attention. I would like to inspect him and try to get a sense of what kind of attention he needs if he's going blue.

I want to like try to stick my fingers down his throat to see if there's making his airways. And if there's not, then I guess try CPR, if I could, or at least just trying to kind of do what I can to help him. You start to do exactly that. There's nothing blocking his airway. He seems to have been just knocked out effectively. But what's most concerning is how cold we have.

And it's as you were pushing down on his chest that he... Oh, shit. No fucking way Are you okay Where am I Fine, we're safe Healthy I think Are you cold

Creamy, queenie and I'll Take me up by my ears Queenie has a coat and like half of it's behind her He's just like walking up Please may I have my cloak back grease Yeah, sure. I'm just pulling up. I guess.

And I try to wrap him. Does this hell do you feel warm? I think you gotta get naked and cuddle with him. I ain't joking. That's not to be sure that I've ever heard of. Yeah, no, when someone's got hype on my pleasure or whatever is going on with him, you got to get naked and get on top of him. Yeah, that's the top, man.

Someone go get scrimmed. He starts to push his hand up and it comes away. that's very tacky, sticky blood now that's pooled, then cooling for who knows how many hours. He's clearly going through shock. He's freezing. Something is, not who knows, but he's going through hypothermia.

No, I'm serious. You got to get naked and get next to him. Well, getting naked. They're getting next to him. There's something about body heat. It's the best way to make someone warm. Grab a lantern. off the wall if there are lanterns.

Oh yeah, yeah. You can see actually where I notified that there are in scounciles. So there's two on this. So yeah, there are definitely lanterns. So I'm gonna grab one, you know what, here, take a lamp. Oh, I'm gonna pull one off the wall

and I'm gonna basically put one and kind of at his core and then try to wrap my cloak around him. Yeah, hold him, just told him like that. And put him down. I'll say, I'll do what I can, you're a very, Don't squeeze in too hard. He might shatter his bones.

And I'm going to put my hands on him, not try to squeeze him so hard. So that I shatter his bones. Unfortunately, he failed. He's very strong. A quick word giant, and my hands are below. You're putting a curse on him. Where's barnabows?

Sort of white, very, very, very kind of light blue as I cast cure wounds on him. Nice. You cast cure wounds on him. Just as a way to try to kind of give him some kind of healing. Between that and the warmth that you make, I'm going to ask you to make a medicine check just for funsy. Does it matter how many HP I heal for him? I would ask, I would also ask you for an HP.

Oh, actually pretty good. Big money. Let's go. 11. 11 money on HP. 11 HP. And then my, let's use one of these. Get out of these dice, Kimma.

Natural 20 plus. Let's go. What did you do, Kimmer? What did you do? 27 for my back. 27 for your medicine. Between that, wow.

It's obviously not just the lantern and the wrapping that's happening. It's the fact that you are pouring your magic into this person, his cheeks go from pale to flush. You can actually physically see it like a wave going up and across his face, down and over his arms. Presumably down and through his,

his torso past his waist and into his legs. He, oh. Question for the group. Does cure wounds cure drunkenness? I don't think it does. No, that's less a restoration, but not cure wounds. My head, oh. Almost the last thing.

That's nice. What did you do? Ow! Oh, my feet. Is he clearly drunk? He's very intoxicated. Even after the hours he'd spent unconscious. you can tell that he is still on the edge of unconsciousness just from the alcohol that's still in his system.

Not something that would have been pushed away by the magic of cure wounds. How much do you serve him? Oh, I think he had 10 today or 11. He had 10 yesterday, so it could have been 11 today. He's been going up. I've been sneaking him too. Oh, no.

It's a miracle he's still alive. I know. My boots, can you? My boots. You want me to take them off? It still hurts, why? Your boots hurt you? And I'm gonna go to your old name.

I'm gonna go to his boots. You start to unlace the boots and pull one shoe off the next shoe. And you are staring at cruel, blackened toes. Oh no, you're. The pure wounds certainly cured what is alive on this person's foot.

but in particular one foot is dead from the actual knuckle of the foot up. Um, Yorneer. Yes. You wanna take a look down here, his feet. They look fine, I think, so don't worry or anything. You just relax. But Yorne, you might wanna look at these.

I go down to his feet, and I'll take a look to see how many toes I think are like dead versus I can say. So you're confronted with this new information, I'd be curious what the rest of us are doing. How are we all just laughing and dancing? It's been probably 20, 30 minutes since Yornear and Coaney started to search down into the bowels of this ship.

I'm salty that Barnabas hasn't sent me any warm brandy. Holy old. I'm pissed. Because I can hear the party. Jerry along and we'll roll the old Jerry alone. I'm Stewing. I'd be leading around. Okay, okay.

I just wanted to check in. Now being confronted with this information. You're near. Are you going to have to come feet on? Where on the feet? Not the voice. See the right here. Is this in the knuckle?

Yeah, to the knuckle. For the knuckle. The good news is no, he will keep his feet. I will, however, cut his toes off. How's he going to be able to stand? In boots. All that. What's happening?

Why? It is okay. What do I have as far as implements? Do you think now be a good time to get in more alcohol? What does that? You think now be a good time to get him more alcohol? I have something better, I think. Okay.

I will open up the chest and not usually having access to this, but I'm just going to take it. I'll say there are the metal instruments that you would imagine there being in there. And you really familiarized yourself with this room. With no surgery to do, you know the ins and after this space. And in here, there's a chest of perhaps four or five healing potions.

There's a neurobilism kit. There's a variety of different metal instruments for the purpose of surgery, including saws, tongs. gripping devices, that kind of thing. I will pull out a vial, or a little bottle of laudanum or any kind of other opium that they might have on the ship in his chest. And I will say, Queenie, will you assist me? Anything you need, Yorna, you just tell me what to do.

All right, do you? I have my honey stir if we need to have him bite down on something real hard. I think that would be useful. I'm really going to hate having his teeth marks in it, but it's all right. just that maybe you just join me at his face. I will take, I will untrue the cap and presumably

it has some kind of like dropper top, you know, dropper. I will take a drop and I will place two drops. I will open his mouth and say, just keep this on your tongue and you'll feel quite a bit better. And I will put two drops under his tongue and close his mouth.

What do you like? It tastes just kind of like like an as stringent kind of chemically taste. Okay. Sort of, not always citrusy, but it's really kind of like bad medicine. You know, just that kind of gross. That's sort of artificial

feeling to it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. As you're dropping in in the music, you're hearing above, you're still hearing the chanting that you've come to grow very used to. You hear this very loud pop sound somewhere else in the ship, but

you continue to maintain the tension towards the... I probably wouldn't pay in any mind and, you know, having a lot more implements than, I mean, this is a lot of worse normally where I'm from. I will take one of the

bolt cutter style implements, and I will go to his feet. I'm going to sit on his chest. Seeing this. I'm going to sit on his chest and block his view, and I'm just going to look down at him and talk to him.

Queenie, the wound in his mouth, please. I'm going to go ahead and put this honey stir in your mouth here and I'll reach into my little honey pot and I'll put some honey on it. It's going to taste real nice, probably for only a second or so. Can I have an ale later? You can have as

many as you want, honey. And I'm going to put it in his mouth. And once I feel like the opium has done its effect, I will start snapping him off with these big metal As deep in there as you feel that you need to get, make another medicine

check. Oh, gosh. Oh, no. Twist it. Twist it. Twist it, twist it, twist it, twist it, twist it. How many twists are you going to use? One or two? Just one.

Just one. I think there's one. I think this one. I rolled the natural one. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

So I can't re-twist this. It is what it is. That's better to six. Better than one. My medicine's pretty good. It's five better. Medicine is seven. So it's 13.

13. Between the opium, you are dexterous sniffing. Does he get anything because I'm helping? I am sitting on his chest and bite my honey stick. So if that was in vain, Andrew would have gotten a six and a one, and then I can help.

Honestly, I set the DC to 10 because you already. You already dropped him opium. Instead of advantage, he better be seen. You're not hidden live wires. I like that. Everything's coming free. He'll feel it in the morning. But you don't even see him react.

He just sort of like smiling with this piece in his mouth. And by the time you hear the last snip, there's no reaction from him. He's just the, it seems to sleepy. You poor sweet thing. And I'll just sort of wrap his feet really low. You bring me his boots, please. Sure.

And I'm going to hop down off of his chest and grab the boots, and then I'm going to use my bunny hop to hop back up onto the table and hand you the boots. And I'll slide his boots on, and I'll tie him up real tight. I'll say, can you see him in the morning? Keep an eye on him when they wakes up. Is he even going to be able to walk tomorrow? You try to keep him in that hammock. and leave his boots some.

I don't want him seeing it. I'm messing with it. All right, I'll do that. I'll take real good care of him, Yorny. I promise. I feel real bad. Because I was cleaning up the bathroom when I realized I hadn't seen him

and I continued. If I had just got to maybe a couple hours sooner, maybe his toes wouldn't be gone. Do you think it's my fault? It is certainly not your fault. and... That makes me feel better, but I still think it's partially my fault.

It is his fault for getting himself in his situation. He did not take the coldness of the night seriously, and he put himself in this state. Do not feel bad. This is the natural way in the Arctic. Well, he must be going through something real rough to be drinking as much seas. This might be true, but there are...

consequences regardless of what we're going for. We didn't got no toes. Did I cut off every single towel? No. He still has these two on his right foot. Okay. Oh, thank God. To be fair, I didn't cut off every toe. Oh no, but you left the ugly ones. I wouldn't be cut off what was dead.

That was most of them. Anyway, will you help me get him into his hammock? I can't carry him all on my own. We'll get him all warm. And can he keep that furry blanket thing that you got on him now? Yeah, so I'll wrap them up real good, and I'll almost sort of full-blown, like,

just like, see in one of the sleeping bags, you come like zip up and just get rid of right now. You use, like, a leather cord or something. Yeah, and I'll sort of like tie him up. I will place him in his hammock on his side. It's on your side of the hammock. I'll put him on his back, all the time turns out inside.

Should we elevate his feet? Does that do anything for him? This is as much as we can go for. All right. Knowing that you'll likely have to check in in the morning to see how things progress, and if this is going to become a part of your daily routine, Corliss is left passed out in the hammock.

As you are walking out of the actual door, I will say, you get a cobweb in the mouth. just hitting you in the face, almost impossible to see. And then you were able to put the the conscious body of Corlitz-Gar-side into his cabinet. I do not tell Barnabos with the spider webs.

Do you tell me? Nope. I have mentioned. What was saying? Nothing. There's nothing. There's nothing wrong. And there's the rooms.

Do you eventually go upstairs to join the merriment, or do you find your felt rest? I think I would pull up a stool, and I would just sit next to Corlis and keep an eye on him for the next few hours. And basically just provide him warm things to drink. I would go back into the sick bay, and I would open the lantern,

and I would take the tools that I use and kind of hold him over the flame. just to kind of keep things safe and sort of clean everything down. And yeah, and then I would come out and I would go to cleaning. What do you do with the toes? That's a, I mean, that's a question. Presumably, there's some little, like, little waistband. I just throw them a waistband.

Which would ultimately go over more, right? I mean, like. Yeah, and eventually it's just, you throw it with the rest of it. It's biodegradable. Thank God. Don't want to harm the environment. How well would, like, human, beat doing a compost, do you think? Very well.

I mean, it's, it would just, it would just be rotten flesh. It would deep, post. Is it rotten if it's frostbun? Well, so that's literally rocked. I have questions about that, but here, you know, as long as it was, now that it's warmer than like freezing, right? It would be, it's weird that it is too. Anyway, I would, I would, I would clean everything up really well.

All right. And I would go to Queen and I say, I think he's fine for the night if you want to join the others. I think that you should let everyone else know to be careful when going all the way downstairs. It's clearly very cold down there. And if something happens and you by herself, you can lose toes or fingers or anything else.

So they need to know. I can tell them. She warn everyone. It's cold down there. I wasn't wrong. Why was he that... Did... Was the hatch already open?

To the... I said that you opened the hatch. Right. And it was closed when you found it. I would say that you either presume that it was closed on purpose or that it fell closed as he tripped down this path, doing whatever he was doing going into the building. I will let them know in the morning when their heads are clearer.

but in the meantime I will just check to see if there's anything else that I can find where he fell I hope it's a good idea for you to go down there by yourself because if you fall unconscious for some reason I can't drag you back upstairs so you think you can maybe go get Barnabos or Tashi I will be fine

don't you worry I'm already worried just keep an eye on him it is fine I can't keep an eye on him everyone all the time. And that's why I will be fine. And so I will turn without another war, and I'll go down back to where he fell.

And just kind of you do make a perception check. Oh, man. Spider attack. I'm 12. I knew it. As you're walking down from that side, you would make it to the, the entrance that's just at that door

that leads into the cargo hole area. Right here. Oh, is that where you go down? Uh, oh, whoa, oh. The fastest distance would be that. Yes, yes, I would go right here. And I would know that. Right, okay, yes.

And then you go down a level. To here. To here. And through the open door, out of the periphery of your eye, you can see what was a hogshead barrel has burst open. And there's what appears to be ice. just like melting on the ground.

New it! Okay, I approach the barrel. Mm-hmm. And... To approach the barrel. I'll grab the lantern off the wall. And I will, I'll walk up to the liquid and I'll kind of, I'll kneel down,

and I'll look at the liquid, and I'll try to, I'll grab a little bit and taste it and see if I can get a sense of a little bit. Oh God, you're gonna die. It's poison. Licking shot. Or ice spiders are going to burst out of his chest. Another 12. It's ice.

It's water. It doesn't seem to have any sodium in it. It just appears to be fresh water. Do I get this sense of based on sort of how cold it isn't here, where I am currently, and my experience living in the Arctic? Does it feel like it's unusual? I should not have frozen, expanded, and burst a keg in this temperature. Is that weird?

Or is it, well, clearly it's just cold? I would say that, I don't think you need to roll to know that it's starting to get cold enough that other barrels full of water might be at risk of bursting. Oh, it is cold. It's starting to get bitter cold. Not freezing cold, but bitter cold. It is that cold.

Bitter cold is starting to get into the 15, 20 degree action. Fahrenheit. So it's beyond freedom. Freedom units. Freedom units. I will notice that that's kind of weird. I will check the rest of the hold to see if there are any other burst barrels.

Okay. You do it once around, and there don't seem to be any burst barrels. You know that many of the barrels that are water are level above you. There have been times when you need to go over and get a scoop or what have you. I will approach this hatch where he fell. and I will take a look around,

see if I notice anything weird or off, and then I'll work my way down if I don't see me. Make an investigation check. I hate that I'm doing this next one. Whoa! 21. 21. You see a,

you see how he could have slipped. This particular stare is a little warped. And you could see, okay, yeah, I can understand walking down, especially if drunk, for whatever purpose, a person might be able to slip. What is unusual is that you know that there was this contusion, this matted blood on the back of Corliss's head. And at the bottom of the build,

where the pool of blood might have been, it is not the way that it was left, which was a pool. It now seems to have marks in it. Shapes, scrapes. It seems to have been pulled off of the wood almost, and all it's remaining is the stain and the smear of this blood against the bottom of this built, this ship.

I'll walk down the steps. And duck, right? I've got to be hunched, like, basically, down the way. I mean, you're like, duck walking. You're a literal giant. I mean, I wouldn't be scared if I was him either. I don't know how, I haven't decided

if it's three or four feet, but like either way. Yeah, I'm like on my knees almost crawling. You might as well almost be a marine crawling. And I'm gonna lift the lantern to see if I can see any sign of spiders or otherwise. Make a perception check. Twisted. It's 10. Aw.

Is it? Uh, you could. I think it's fine. I think that's fine. Your perception is so high where if you twist, you'll probably crush it. But it depends on how badly you're worried about getting spider bitten. We've gotten a good amount of twist. Are you having a good amount of twist?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I want to find the, I want to see the monster. It's one. So that was worse. But you get to choose which one you want to use. So you use the better one. So you're still 10. Yeah.

Where's the culture? Oh, here, I got two. Do we pull any others out? Are we good? Do we pull it up for my last one? That's what I'm asking out. No, we're not. I don't know.

One more. All right. We're up to date. Thanks, Pat. You guys are great. It's holding up the land. It turns solid. So don't, don't die or anything.

That's the plan. You can see the light doesn't reach the other end of the ship. It's just flickering. yellow wooden plank in the darkness. It perceives no movement, no smell, just the extreme bitter cold of this environment. You can see why in a few hours someone might naturally have been affected by hypothermia

in this face. Bullshit. Do I get it? The markings through it. Does it feel like tracks? Does it feel? Unnaturals, it feels like a critter. Lowering down a creature.

A lantern, you look and with a three, I would say, it looks like a clumsy hand tried to pull the blood off of the wood. Like a five-fingered human fin. Like something that has appendages of the blood. I do not like this, Derek. In the time that I lifted him off, took him away, and then I came back.

In that period of time. I mean, in the time that they took you to give him opium and get him good time. That is a lot. It was a more time. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I will all head back up to the, probably to where at least where Queenie is.

Okay. Queenie is dead. No. Oh, God. Oh, it's white. What did they do? The ghosts. The first one is a nightmare white,

and then it's finally cool. Real fast. I will kind of lead down to Queenie, and I will sort of, in kind of like a whispers that nobody else hears us, there is something, about the situation where he felled. What do you mean?

Meaning that something in time between us finding him, and me just going back down there, clawed the blood, grabbed out. I don't think I understand what you're saying. Like, something is trying to get rid of the evidence that they, that he was bleeped down there. What I mean to say is, has there been, have we seen a single soul down here?

Is everybody up top deck like? Everyone's the top deck at this point. No one is sleeping in any of the hammocks. It's a late night, Most people are perhaps in the recreation space, starting playing gambling games at this late hour. But I would say folks have heard the music and have decided to join in.

Captain tends to stay in his quarters most days. Will you come with me? All right, I'll go. And did you mention that we hadn't seen the big seller from Oh, myelin. Oh, Myelin, he tends to keep to himself. You haven't seen him for most of the evening,

but that's not unusual. He might be on the poopback just looking out the back of the ship. He tends to be a very stern and concentrated individual. Solitary. From what you can tell. Very solitary, thank you. You're quite a bit smaller than I am, so I'd like you to at least-

Says who? I mean, say as nature. Oh, all right. I'd like you to maybe come down with me and you can get a closer look. Are you scared? And you just want me to come with you so you don't be lonely.

I mean, you don't have to play into the size thing. If you're scared, you can just tell me that. I'll come. I'm scared is not the right word. I know it is. Let's go, Yornear. I won't tell anyone. All right, please come up with me.

And I'll be Queenie down and back down to the, to the bilch. Do you find yourself at the bottom of the ladder, both of you, and Yorneurneur, down and you, standing tall, are able to see the same thing that he's seen. Unchanged, Yorneur, you would notice from the time that he saw at last, smeared and not as much blood as there was when you first left it, and you see the same.

Can I... Can I inspect it to see if it looks like it's being wiped away, or if it looks like it's... Can I, like, can I like, like, you know, Ranger look at and see if there's anything that I can determine. It's different than what you can't hear you look at it. Yeah. I mean, I don't know.

I don't know how many with my skill set as a Ranger. That's why we're having this conversation. That's what this whole session is about. One rule am I asking for. I think it's survival. I think it's reasonable. Yeah, give me survival. But don't let me say, run your game. 23? Yeah.

Um, you lean down and, uh, yorny are, holds the lantern just close enough that you get a real sense of it. This, the pattern looks like some sort of, not hand, but creature actually was able to arrive and you can see these almost like kiss marks. Like Kraboscis. Like it's been sucked away from the wood.

The same way a popsicle would look after you finished a red, there is some blood sucking who on this ship, Yorne here. You see them little pucker marks? His name's Tasham. Whatever was putting its

little lips up against this was sucking that blood straight out the wood. Is this an animal? But how am I supposed to know it could be an insect, it could be an animal, it could be a person with really small lips. I will... But I fear for us being down here,

they could put that little sucker right into us and just sloop us. I'd say at this point the rest of you that a gentleman is coming up time for your night watch to be over. Oh good because I was going to ask you

if I'd ever been caught for shirking duties before. Are you asleep? No, I was going to just bail and go to the party. You have a big asleep relationship with the Crows Nest at this point. because on the one hand, it's lonely, it's boring, it takes a long time, you never see anything, you don't get to interact with anyone.

But I'm also not doing any real work. But there's no other ever on the top of the main mess. It's only you. There's no other on the top of the main mess that you would ever see. You seem free from any eyes that might be looking at you or any shadows that might play tricks. of your mind. But I've been relieved of my duty before.

You have been relieved, and you're being relieved now. Well, I zip down the fucking rope and I go party to my boys, Tyshen, and Barnabas. You land on the deck surface, and you are about to run up when you see that their last song is being sung. It is after midnight at this point. People are starting to disperse and think about making their way down,

perhaps doing one more dream. No, no, no, no. Barnabas and Tai Shen, you see Scrim run up. No, the parties are starting, no! Mr. Savasgatch? Crandabas, no, I just got down my duty. Scram, welcome. Welcome.

Cup of tea. Boy, would you like? Mr. Savasgotch, are you off duty? Yes, Ron! Well, you know, I got something better for you, my friend. I have to say these past months I have been impressed by how seriously you're taking your Tockman duties. And many have I seen such a fine Topman. And so I have taken something from the Captain's private stock.

It's better than rum. At least I think you like this a little bit better. And I'll reach down into this bag that I'll have, and I'll pull out a bottle of whiskey. And it's this dark brown bottle that I would have, if this isn't the case, the captain would have whiskey in its private stores. Oh, no, no, no. This room right here, that is all stores.

Yeah, and I'm making his, I'm making his, I'm making his meals too, right? So it's a bottle, and you'll see that there's this beautiful red label with this crimson spider on it. Of all the sweet gods of the upper plains, please tell me that at the very least, Barnabos and Tyshan, you will not go to bed now. The party can just begin.

You can teach us some new shanties. I'm running out of things to sing while I'm in the bucket. I'm about to, young Roland still has time, and I'll relieve him. I'm planning on enjoying. At least another hour or so up here. Even if it's just a three of us, we can, oh, we can get, we can get, we can get, uh, the big guy. You're on here.

Yeah, that's his name. Oh, the bucket. Oh, it's just so horrible. I think, I think of this. And you will see that it says, uh, red spider, uh, red spider whiskey. Um, I would take my big fucking knife and like, like basically, uh, saber it. Yeah. To pop the cork.

Make a quick fix there to check for me. A year that it's very spicy. If you get less than a five, you destroy the bottle. Oh, there's no way. Oh. I got a 14. Okay. It pops off and the glass and cork disappear into the oceans.

Ah, it's us. And we'll save some for Queenie and Yornier. No big deal. Of course. Cheers. That's it, please. I'll raise my pipe to it. Yeah, and I just cheers to it. just cheers his pipe, and I cheers Taishan and his thing.

And I've got the bottle in one hand, and where two? Below deck, please. I don't want to see the sea anymore. You know, I suppose we could? We could find Queenie and you were in here. I would suggest to the very least we head to like one of the recreation rooms. Either either this one or this one, right? I'm tired of looking at the sea. And I either way.

As you make your way down, you come across an odd site. You're not the only people who are making your way down. There are a few other crew members who are making their way to their hammocks as well. But you do see Yornear and Queenie hovering. Oh, you're no longer next to the hammock, are you? No, they're downstairs. Yeah, they're farther. I was going to say we either had here or we had here, in which case they're even deeper, right?

Like, I was just suggesting one of the rec rooms without having any idea where they are. Okay. Right? There's one of two rec rooms we could go to, which everyone's more private. for the three of us hoping that we'll run into Queenie and New Year. So we're here. Let me do some quick simulation. Totally.

Totally. Totally. Oh, Barnabos, I have to tell you, I am, words cannot describe the appreciation that I have for you. You've single-handedly helped me when I've been all alone in that horrible bucket. Who is Mrs. Zamas gosh? I owe you. I really do. If you can think of anything, I will pay you back someday.

I promise you. You've given me one of the fine little simple jokes in life. Oh, yeah, and on this voyage, that's all we could ask for. There's not much. Then we left for us when this is all over. I'm certain of that. And Tyshan, I've missed your tea. Have you made any at all?

Yeah, every night. Is it really so bad up in the crow's nest? You've made... You've made tea every night? Yeah. It's very lovely. It is. We've been at sea for months.

I haven't had you G in almost a year. That can't be true. Mr. Foyerblossom, is this true? No, I don't think so. I would have offered it to you. You may have, I, you know, I, I understand what happened. I shouted up to you, asking if you wanted tea,

and you shouted back down something about, Wendy, and I thought you meant no. And now I think you were asking for brandy. It's dawned on me after all this time. Tyshen, no. It's very clear, which two of you care about me. It's me. And I, and I'm the one who provides actually what he wants, which is whiskey.

But your tea is very lonely. I've been enjoying it. I wasn't sure where you were going with that. That was about to be very hurtful. We make a quick perception, as you walk into the record. As we're making the perception, I pull the bottle of the fire spider whiskey very close to me. As I scowl. Red spoiler, it's very spicy.

Perception? Oh! Kimma, I love you! Finally, he has a set of dice that doesn't let him down. It sounded like Runkle's Dan there. No, Kimmer! Pettinkets! 13, 13.

For Skeption? 22. Wow. Perception? Hold on. AT. Neither of you notice this. Perhaps it's because you're too short. Well, I'm angry at Tyshen and I'm hoarding the whiskey

out of myself. I'm more their way into their various hammocks and you're passing through into the doors into the recreation space. Right here? Barnabos, you're the first person. You make of this what you will. But you do notice that Corlis is unconscious and stitch up, unusually.

Where is he stitched? He's in the hammock. Effectively motionless. He's like cinched up. He's been cinched up like a sleeping bag would be. Zippers don't work in advantage, so I don't know if he's got a setting that well. Okay, yeah.

Holy shit. I don't know if you know the setting very well. Wow! This is a filthy cat. So then all these... So I'll be walking by and I'll say, good thing about this, because we don't have any bananas on board, that that will be the only spider on this ship.

I mean, it's not his normal bunk, but it looks cozy. I'm not going to stop them. You know what, Tysha, I've forgiven you if you'd like some of this fire spider. I don't know what you keep saying. It's spicy. It tastes good. I'd love some. Thank you.

And I'm mortified. I haven't brought in UT every night. I just have a fear of heights that is difficult for me to conquer. and you were just very high up in the air, and I was worried about falling off of the netting and hurting myself. Of course. For your kindness.

That's why you're not in the rigging there, Mr. Fulia Blossom. We all have our own rules on the ship. What's his name, Mr. Corliss? You would have called him Mr. Garcide. What's Mr. Garcide doing bundled up there? Again, it's not his bunk, but, you know, you didn't hear it for this from me, but he's a bit of a drunk, and, you know,

I have people talk about it, but, you know, we all know, but we're all thinking of it. The point is he's a drunk, okay? I'm just going to say, we're all thinking it, you know, you know. So that doesn't surprise me that you might just be laying here. It's fine. Isn't that your seal belt? It's your seal pelt, right?

Yeah. All right. That's a little odd. I mean, I haven't seen people in days, if not weeks or months. You know, I just live in a bucket at this point, but I suppose that is your own ear's seal, I guess he got a little drunk and Mr. Yorneur took care of him being the proper surgeon that is on this vessel. Speaking of, where is Yonair?

Look, you know, you're in Yonir, he's a very generous person and I'm sure Queenie is doing, you know, what she needs to do. She has got a very difficult job. She often to switch with me, and that was very kind, but it was also a second sentence, so I'm glad I didn't take that job. I'm sure they're doing the thing, right? The very important people. I'm just happy to be off and I've got this lovely bottle thanks to Barnabos and if anybody would like to play some cards I'm happy to deal. It can be a friendly

game where you don't have to wager anything. As you are starting to consider gambling you're near Queenie. What do you up to? I'm telling you, they're like these little tiny needles and at the end itty bitty lips. If there was a way for you to see tiny things

it would be actual human lips and they stick to you and they start sucking and sucking and sucking until your blood just gushes out of your skin. You can hear how quiet it is. And that's what kills all the goats. If anybody was wondering what a female forbes sounded like. You can hear the sound of waves are especially resounding and reverberating in this space now that there's no longer a beat of a drum or something in close by something. Back in Yonah, they call it a chupacabra. And it makes the goats.

Blat-a-a-a-pain-cake. I want to lead down and knowing what I know about animals from where I'm from, does it look like any kind of creature or animal that I would have ever encountered? Mm-hmm. Make a nature check and an arcana check. Oh, nature? Uh-oh. Arcana.

Okay. All right, got you, fan. We'll keep you honest. Both pretty good. Good and good. Oh. And I'm glad that it shook up. Good and gooder.

That I did. Arcona is 18. I can make more. And nature is 18. Wow. This doesn't feel like the actions of the beast or a mundane non-magical creature.

Not a fan of that. This is not the work of... That's what I'm telling you. The chippocabra is like one of those. It's like not a real creature, but it's totally real. That means that it is somewhere in here. We should go. We should get out of here and get all of us.

Oh, no, you're near. What if it was stuck in here and we laid it out? Have you seen anything strange on the ship since we cut off his toes? I'm going to grab him with one hand and like lift her and put her on top. It's a get again that meme. I can do it myself, yorny. You can just figure her up by the head like a Russian nesting girl.

Exactly. I'll put her on the hold and put her on the landing. And I'm going to very quickly climb out and put the latch down. Okay. And there is in fact a way to lock this latch. So if you wanted to do that, you'd be able to... He told me he doesn't want to watch.

The shape of an anchor and a little... hitch, you're able to slide it in. And that's a decent security. And on my way off, I want to do a quick glance around the bottom of the bills to see if I get any sense of something being done. Make a quick perception check for me. Very good. 21. Very good.

21. Still, quiet. So I will close the latch. And I will find the others and let them know. If this thing, probably a cheaper cover. If it's out for blood, we should keep an eye on... What was his name ago? Corlis.

We should keep an eye on Corlis, because his toes are bloody. It might be drawn to the spell. Smell. Sorry, my nose got real cold down there. But when something is frostbitten, there's not really any blood anymore. It's sort of all frozen. That's real gross. I think we should find Barnabos.

I agree. I think that we should find the cable. the capable ones on the ship and... Okay, well, then we should... Who are we going to find then if we're not going to go find Barnabos? I mean, we should find Barnabos, Ty Shannon Sprint. Oh, so we should find Barnabos and the capable ones on the ship. Yes. All right.

In a few minutes, you find yourself, having made your way up. You can see that there are a number of different folks who have found their way into their hammocks at this point. Nearly all of them are full, except for the few people have decided to enjoy a quiet night out on the surface of this ship. But you can hear, mostly Scrim, from the recreation room towards the back of the rear room. I'm a little boisterous.

At this point, we'll rush up with the rest of the... I'd be playing cards with Scrim. And losing, I'm being completely, like, scammed by... It's friendly, though. Okay, got it, got it. It was very much a friendly game, not for money, right, for fun. Yeah. Is it all right if we take five?

Please. Yeah. Yeah, let's do it. I think I've just given another quick bathroom break I know that there's coffee brewing. Yeah, yeah. Also, I know it's late, and we don't normally do this. So I'm asking for your permission to continue.

It's Friday. Yeah, Friday. We're deliberately going late. Okay. Let it fucking ride. If we're in agreement, we're with you. Yeah, nobody going anywhere. I would say for sure when we, the three of us sat down to play cards,

the expectation was that it was friendly, not, not, you know, for pay. For money. Like the way I would try to scam the other people. Because, again, we've got a certain relationship. Right. And maybe we just do our thing and keep her in their arm. Yeah, exactly. I'm the top man, you know.

Tai Shen bend over. I'll work the helm. Tai Shen, you dropped a card. Right. Yeah. I think Roland over there would like to join us for a bit of a game? Yeah, if that was the case, then we'd probably try to fleece him a little bit, right? Anybody who's an outsider, right?

We have a special connection having been in prison for 90 days together. I don't know. I don't know. I picked up prison gambling. So what do we think this is? I want to, like, do a little pre-adventrys chill. I want to hear what you think it is. Oh, meta-knowledge.

I think I have an idea. Okay. Well, yeah. What is it? What is it? What is it? I think it's a sturge. They're like giant mosquitoes.

Okay. Okay. Blood little blood suckers with Barbosca. Yeah. Could they live in the cold, though? I mean, I guess why not? Why not? So I thought it was super weird that Cornless's feet were frostbitten.

But then when Derek kind of said, like, it wasn't unreasonable for the barrel to have popped. I think it's because he was down there for so long because you lose the heat in your toes first. Sure. And so drinking also doesn't help with your heat retention. Right. Or your circulation. Right. And so he had a wound, which means the blood's going to be rushed to his head, which is going to make it easier for him to be prospered. So I thought that was weird. But I think that it's, I think it's explainable. Right. Well, we think he was hit over the head by someone, right? Well, or something. So it sounds like, at least the way Derek described it, that he hit his head on the stair when he fell.

Just as he fell. And because he said, he said that there was, well, he said that there was, well, he said, that there was the blood in the spot where on the step and then as he fell down the stairs it like dragged and then pulled on the floor and whatever was down there

potentially a sturge has been sucking up the ball. So I'm on spider because Barnabose when you're still the fuck up of bananas. I swear to God if it's a fucking spider I'm gonna lose my goddamn mom. It could be some horrific like ice spider.

Well that's what ice spider is a classic film. So maybe it? Yeah. Have you heard of the classic film? On the sidewalk, no, ice spider. I just said that because it was in my brain. Yornear did run into that. The cobwebs.

The cobwebs. Ice spider! It's ice spiders. Her big classic sci-fi film. My guess is in that barrel, there were ice spider eggs. And they've been hatching, and that pop was it breaking out? I was also weird with any splinter eggs in it? When he put down the barrel, originally, it was like, it was like, it was.

was like shaking. Ice cream. I thought that's what I thought of one. They might have hard eggs instead of. They might have ice eggs. Oh, they have ice eggs. Oh, they have ice eggs. Oh my God, it's like an icy egg from Banjo Cazui.

This is bullshit. Oh, it's from the Easter egg. I assume that they were basically smuggling more gold than we were aware of. That's what I thought too. I'm still sticking to that. Why carry gold on the ship? Why even, yeah, why even bring gold?

They're stealing. They're stealing. But why bring it on this journey of months to go? To get it the fuck out of wooze. You know, I... They're stealing. That's fair. I think they're basically pirates.

But... I don't think they're a merchant vessel. I think they're fucking pirates. Alternatively, if we think that we're going to be up against, like, other people, like, racing towards this goal, maybe we're bringing something to waylay our opponents. Or we're bringing some kind of monster. All of that could also be bullshit. If we're traveling the bunch of...

A bunch of pirates. I don't trust anything Derek ever says. No, Derek's a shite motherfucker. He's shady. So that's a good point, right? And why would this barrel of water be held on a deck lower than all the other water? Well, I just assume you eventually ground out of space, but I don't know. I don't know.

I'm trying to look, I'm trying to be reasonable. It seems intentional. Derek's an unreasonable human beings. So I think Derek is also a fan of the sci-fi classic film Ice Spider. You do. I swear to God, if they're a fucking spider, and there's no bananas and there's spiders, I'm going to lose my god, man, life.

But here's the thing, I will say, from a meta knowledge, I wouldn't put it past Derek to fuck with you by just saying you ran into a cobweb. Oh, yeah, for sure. Totally. It could just be for, like, a spooky moment. If I gave, I'm like, here's the red spider. So for, so for context, please.

So the red spider is from, we were just like, when Mason and Derek got here early, and we were just goofing. Two and a half hours early. So we were riffing and like just getting our voices and getting in character and Derek Role played some random guy. What was it? It was Red Spider.

The Red Spider in, I can't remember his name anymore. So that's why you named the Whistie. Red Spider ale. And everything was Red Spider-Ey. He was born a Red Spider-Man and he'll die in it at Red Spider. And he was Red Spider Jim was his name. So the whiskey named Red Spider is just purely. It was just me riffing.

And because I had mentioned the spiders earlier. and Barnab was very clearly it doesn't like it. It all comes full circle. So in Hoskin says the creatures could have been set to ruin the expedition by competitors. Totally. Sabotage is high and the less. Yeah. Red spiders at the new red herring. I don't know.

He came out of Jack. Plus a quark on the head and push him down. Oh my God. To get him interrupted between bolts. What if? This is super meta knowledge. Because this is like, what if, and this is cheating. but Derek

had spiders on the mind because of fucking ice spider from the classic sci-fi film Ice spiders You always have to finish And so that's why Derek said red spider He was just riffing And he pulled it out of his brain

Because it was subconscious Almost There was subconscious Yeah But I feel like If it was a cobweb That you're only years like Oh it's just a cobweb

It would be from like a tiny spider Yeah If he made into a cobwe It's gigantic spider. It would still be like, are there spiders in the moon? Ice spiders? There could be. I mean, I don't know. It's pronounced, vomit. My point is that's normal. Momit. I'm gonna go, mom it.

I'm gonna go, Momit. Oh, and those. Kim says, yeah, check this word real quick. Captured the exact moment you became your character. Oh, no. Is it a screenshot? I hope not. I hope so. I'm gonna let. Oh my god, there's so much fan art. I'm like shitting my pants right now. Oh my God. Oh my God. Ververent shake is so good. I am really, you're still going to speech up. The one of screwing the bucket just fucking killed me. It's so good.

I'm going to make an icebound channel so that we have a place of this all. Oh, that's, I didn't know like we have one. I don't think I've made that. No, I think it's an edge of midnight one. It's my bad for not creating it before the section. It's fine, whatever. Let's dream. I love all this art!

When we started the campaign, it would have been two years old. So good. There's not an icebound channel. I'm geeking out so whole. Yeah, I have a giant erection for fan art. Oh, so Molly, so they do have a cowboy. They do. In their group, it's a dragon.

Yes. Oh, I love that. Incredible. I think fun fact that Ty Shen is the very first dragon born any of our actual proper campaigns, right? Outside of Ganges and Prime, right? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, but like that. Producer Rick, can you cut that?

Well, it's all on the brink. break. We're going to cut that. Well, you know what I mean. Like, you know. It's going to be a yikazoo. Like a consulate, you know what I mean. Did you say, this is so good? Oh, my God. Oh, my God. These are all your being a god. Look at this guy.

Or is it just all undercreated? It's not a creative. You are just so fucking talented. It kills me. This is like, my favorite. This is so good. Do you see Queenie down on the bottom of kidney? Yeah, that thing, that little thing with just the pair of years is so good. Well, you know what's great. I went down the Chowder Rabbit Hole on Twitter today.

Oh, my God. And Panini's, like, one of the greatest characters of all time. I was Chowder so much. Mickey has no idea who Panini is for Chowder. But that was your fleamphill character, right? My Fleenfeld character was inspired by Gaspcha. Oh, okay. Voice by Dana Snyder.

But Panini is like a little rabbit character, and I'm getting, like, major pinini vibes. From me? Yeah, she's a little pink rabbit. Oh, love that. Holy shit, you are such a fucking talented artist. So, what an absolute. I'm going to masturbate these images.

Don't fucking say that, Andy. This is a fucking ruin everything. No, we're never going to fucking fan art again. Dirk off the sperm later. You're so awful. He's kidding. And he found my green holder. Oh, God.

And yet, thanks, Jim. Thank you. By the way, I think we missed Rose Moss Pocket. Oh, Rose Moss Pocket. I'm so sorry. Is that? That's Casey. Thank you. Casey, we love you. Pocket.

I'm here to. Tomas, your puppy. Oh, yeah. Yes, we shall. We shall, Derek. I can feel your yearning to grow. I am yearning to continue. I'd like to yearn. I want to get to the bottom of this. Yeah. When are the spiders coming in? I'm ready for ice spiders.

This is a mystery. It's conferred. Would anyone like? You find yourselves in the second level recreation room. You see Yorneer, Queenie, when you walk in, you see that they're playing cards and having a good game of it after a long day's work on the ship and things seem quiet.

Queenie, Yonir, come have a drink, please. Join us, friends. My watch is done. Look, we don't have time for drinks. Yornear cut some guys' toes off and there's a chupacabra in this boat. Wait, what? A cabibara?

What? Oh, they're real cute. I ain't never seen one in person, but I've seen pictures and books. Are those like sloth things? What? No, those are the ones that hang from the trees. I think you mean a lemur? Wait, no, I know, I know.

I've seen them in chocolate ears. Those are also. I can't. Oh, yeah. I just want to point out we've all skipped over the fact that apparently you're going to cut some poor fools. Yeah, he was far enough south of that that would be it's worth cool enough now. It's just something that happens. It's probably.

No, you know that old drunk that's in the hammock right outside? We had to wrap him up like a burrito because he fell down into the bottom of the boat and his toes got black so we had to cut him off. All of them? Well, you only have left two of them. I believe Queenie were burying the lead. What we have learned is that there was some kind of insect,

Toytoe, or a Racko and monster on the ship. Wait, wait, you think there's something, wait, like it harmed the guy that you cut the toes off. I don't know if it harmed him, but it certainly tried to consume its blood. Yeah, so that's what I meant about the Chupacabra. There were some kind of like little sucker spots on the blood spot.

It looks like some kind of creature was sucking the blood up out of the floor. And so we think there's a creature on the ship somewhere doing blood-sucky things. Okay, so aces are high, seven card low, who is in? Are you not hearing what I'm saying? saying there is a creature on board that we must destroy. Oh, you didn't say your acne, do you?

I'm saying that none of that makes any sense, and I choose not to believe it, because I have a nice bottle of whiskey, and I have good friends, and I have a warm fire, and I have a fresh set of playing cards. All right? Every life on this ship is at risk if we do not find this creature and destroy it. Do you understand? Should we warn someone? That's exactly what we're doing.

We're warning you right now. I don't believe we need to warn anyone because I believe this creature was placed intentionally on this ship. We don't want to make a ruckus or hoopla. Have we seen the little orange cat? No, I haven't seen him. Have you know that the, you know that the... The orange cat is very much fan of Fetton, his owner. And he'll do tricks, you know, he can do high five.

He can do a shake. That sort of thing, he'll do jump up. That's the other thing. The last time you saw Fenton was the last time that you saw the cat during the hoot-nanny that you guys were in-dust. Oh, so not that long ago.

Okay, so Fettin went to bed along with Fiesta. He's got an alibi. Okay, no, no, no, no, I think Fiesta is fine. All right, so what you're telling me is after the ungodly number of hours that I've spent in the bucket, you're going to then make me go downstairs, and we're going to go look after some creature

that is potentially preying on a humanoid flesh. I don't think there's anything we can find downstairs. You're near and I have looked all over the place from the single spot with student. We didn't look everywhere. We looked as far as we could. Do we need to go get my anchor? We don't have the eyes to see in the dark.

But you do. Yeah, can you see in the dark? Who told you that? Given what I know of goblins, unless you are a different kind of goblin, are you a goblin at all? You look like one. I'm a goblin. And can goblins, are you not from deep in the earth? Are you not mortal enemies with dwarves?

Yes. And they hate goblins. Fine. So can you see in the dark or not? I can see in the dark. So do you want to go downstairs and see if you can find any of those bloods? suckers? No, but I have a feeling that it's far against one. Really? Mr. Sabaskotch, I have provided you all of the courage that you need.

Oh, that's what this was. No, it was a gesture of friendship, but now I've served two purposes, isn't that right? Oh, go get me, anchor. So, bitch. And I draw my big fucking knife. And I would say that for any of you who can't see in the dark, like, who are also the enemies of elves, that there are multiple ensconces all carrying. I mean, every surface of this ship has, and for many of you, the duty of going and refilling the oil

to make sure that everything's good for the coming night has been among some of your responsibilities from time to time. As I'm wielding, much to your Grimm's, Yornear's, I thought that might be. Must see your name. I will bury you. All right, where are we going?

Hey, lead the way. Tell me where to go. Please do follow me. We should allow the man to grab his anchor. I'll quickly grab that. I'll hustle on down. Let's go. And I will lead everyone down to the exact spot where we went down.

Okay. This fold here. Now, you gotta be careful, because cheap of cameras are really fast and damn near invisible. Oh, actually, hold on. I don't need them there. I leave them, I want to check somewhere else.

I want to lead them to this side of the ship. You're in charge. And check these ways down into the building. Oh shit. So that we're on the total opposite side. Oh, shit. You push into the room and on this side, both of the trap doors that would normally be sealed are open.

And the US, have access to the building in that space. All right, it was down here and he fell on the other side of the ship. But just, we need to be careful. All right, so just so I get this right, he fell on the other side, you went down there, you didn't see anything now we're going to the other side.

And you want me to go first. Given that you can see, yes, and we'll be right. Oh, I'll be right, boy, and you can see as well, Mr. Stavis coach. You'll have to crawl because you're too big to go down there like that. All right. and I reach into my pocket

and I feel the coin that's there. I give it a little squeeze. You feel it. It's solid as it always is. And I let go with the big fucking knife in my right hand. I'll grab the stairs in my left hand and put my feet on the rails and kind of slide down very quickly.

Right? They're very dangerous manner. Without effort, you manage to find your feet at the bottom. And I'll land and all it around and you look around with a perception check. I'm going to put. put in one more bit of capson herb and take a potty. And I'm just gonna keep the pipe in my mouth and I'm gonna he the hammer with my anchor.

And I will join down. I'll definitely less gracefully. Less gracefully, but you do follow. I would, as we're going down, instead of grabbing a lantern, I will kind of like grab the flame from the lantern into the palm of my hand, if I can. It's sexy.

And as Barnabst goes to pack the... What are you using mechanically to do that? Pressing digitization, if I did. So, yeah, yeah. If you've ever seen that trick where you, like, put out a candle, and then you light another flame and you, like, hit the smoke trail, and it just fucking sends back down. Oh, yeah, yeah.

Have you ever seen that trick? No. It's a very cool, yeah. I don't know if I would be able to do it with the candle, but I just lit, which I meant to light when we started this voyage. but here we are. But yes, you're able to put your hand out and it almost just travels to duplicating itself

and you're able to have as small, as bright as lantern, candle flame, harmlessly hovering above your hand. Excellent. And then I'd hold it out in kind of in front of Barnabot's in case he wants to light his pipe. Or if it's just already lit. This is not the first half.

Thank you, Mr. Foyer, Brilsome. Appreciate as always. Of course. And you find yourselves now all of you down in the build? I would follow up. Probably last. Yeah. You'd find yourselves in the build.

And you made a 20 perception check. You look down. All you can hear are the waves crashing above you, strangely. Against the side of the boat. Where darkness would begin for someone with that dark vision, you're able to see all the way towards the end. You can even see. see a small squads in the stairs, the ladder stairs on the other side, all the way down in black and white, no color certainly, but you get information and there doesn't seem to be anything

other than wood and open air, frigid air, bitterly cold air in this building. I get one night off. Come out, you're chasing shadows. There's something here. I don't... I don't see anything. I know, it's not to say that I can see everything, but I don't see anything. Neither do I. Should we move further into the...

Oi, Mr. Severskot, maybe get behind me. All right, all right, that's fine. I'll stand behind you and I'll be your eyes. I appreciate that. And I'm going to basically try to... Get in between scrim and whatever dangers there might be as we approach. And I would be, I'd be right behind him, like peeking up behind him, trying to be his eyes. Which is, is hilarious because apparently Wizards Arata tried to actually have dark vision.

Yes! Which is fucking. Yes. I have it now. You haven't? I haven't. Oh, you and I would be side by side. I might be hiding behind it now.

But we would be, we would be together. Yeah. I'd be hiding behind you and helping you look. I was about to make a. a joke about how I'm a Triton, I'm able to see in the crushing blackness of the death of the ocean, but like this is really this is this, and you, D&D beyond?

Yeah, and apparently I have dark vision now. So thank you, Wizards of the coast. Make a, I guess, investigation check added advantage. Investigation? Okay. Oh, wow, that was that balance. Natural 20 plus

21. Let's go. 21. You and Srim, walk forward. slowly, looking at every surface, making your way all the way across the length of this ship so you get to one end and then turn around. There genuinely doesn't seem to be anything here, except for a pool of blood. I would literally shout out to the rest of the group. There's nothing here. You hear the sound reverberate and echo from the other side of the ship. You might not be able to

see it, but it's clearly a skirm's voice. Yeah, I was afraid of that. We'd probably lit it up into the ship somewhere. So you think it escaped? We need to find it very quickly, as quickly as we can. I mean, all I can- All I can say is something's up the blood up out of that floorboard, so there was something here. If it's not here, it's there.

Are we sure somebody didn't just try and wipe it up? Yeah, what if the guy who fell has just had a con-conniption fit? And he's just flailing around and wiping blood everywhere. Well, because when we pulled him on, up out of the bottom part of the ship, it was a pool of blood. And we came back, there were little sucker mark.

It was so natural, not like any kind of beast. What would have been a circle of blood just from the back of the head that immediately went unconscious and didn't move? Even you can see that it's like tender paint almost. Like something is bathed in it or moved around in it and pulled up what material was there.

I trust you. I'm not saying you're wrong. I'm just, I had one night off. Okay? Just one. Let's check the hold. I'm going to go back up and start looking in the hold. Everyone else comes.

I'll join you. I have a question. It might be stupid, but what if I cut my hand and we see if anything comes? Well, I mean, the idea of being bait is, I guess, is fine to some degree, but like... That's how we'd catch things out in the forest. But there's nothing here.

I mean, do you want to walk through the whole boat with your hand bleeding? I mean, it might hurt a bit, but I'd do it. I just looked to urinary. They're a surgeon. It would like to try. It doesn't work to show. You would know best if that's the way to track something. Well, if it's a blood-drinking thing, it may be attracted to the smell of blood,

so I'm going to pull out my dagger and I'm going to slice my hand. Okay. That's one point of damage. All right. I'd take more. Roll a dagger attack on myself. I think when you have a little bit of dexterity, you can attempt to control it.

But do you worry? I'm spoiled. Yes, I do. I do. Attack you so much. I'll see what happens. I rolled Nate. Okay, you take eight points of damage.

I'm unconscious. Yikes! Oh, no. I'm doubled by HP, I'm dead. Take one point of damage, and sure enough, if you squeeze, you're able to produce droplets of your own rabbit blood. Rabbit folk. What are we calling you? We decided rabbit folk.

Yeah, rabbit folk. All right, so we wait here for maybe a minute or two, and then we do this on every deck. Should we set up some kind of a trap, or do we just think that it's fine to just leap out and attack us viciously? I think we lor it out and destroy it. There's no use in traps.

Yeah. Make a, make a deception check at this advantage. Deception? Yeah. Performance, your choice, between the two? They're both the same, so 21. 21. Oh, shit.

I rolled an actual 19. Nice. What's fucking go. Really fuck. Welcome to the show, horrible spider monster. Ow, I keep squeezing my hand to get more blood and it hurts every time. Are you okay? Yep.

We're still in the build or have you been moving up? No, we're still in the build. We're still in the builds and you. Because we're going to wait a few minutes, see if anything happens. You can hear the sound of blood patting against blood as it's starting to actually like pool now at your feet. You never want to make a group reception check. Oh my God. All right, Kimmy, don't let me down.

Another 19. Kimma, you literally can't. I got a 20. Kim up. Let's go. I'm divorcing my wife. Marry me. 16.

I hope she's watching this. I love how the session starts with, Kelsey never divorce me. Tell Kelsey, I've divorced me. Where we started and where we've arrived. 10. Okay, 24 16. 24 20.

Oh, you got 10. I got a 20. She had the most. I had the second most. 10 and 10. 10. 10. She's already married, Andy.

All of you shared the same experience. Sounded waves. No perceptible change. All right. All right. Hear me now. So we went to the other side. The guy fell down.

We couldn't get up. It was lashed. Right? We go up at what we came. We latch it. We put some big, heavy-ass barrels. Barnabos, you're on air. We seal this shit up.

There's no way anything gets in. There's no way anything gets out. We cross off the bill just one of the layers. Is that reasonable? Yeah, I think that sounds great. I don't think there's anything down here. What happened? Did he did, what was this Mr. So? I'll keep forgetting. All of this.

Mr. Garside. Mr. Garcide. I should write that down. What the hell is? Mr. Garcide. Did he tell you what sent, what is that? Or did he say he was drunk? He was babbling.

like a drunkard. What if he's bewitched? We should check him first. Wait, wait, wait. You said something about witches and eggshells. I've been stealing off the eggshells. There's, there are, if you do not rush every eggshell to smithereens and a wretcher will use it as a ship to come in his back us.

Okay, so, but here's the thing. Roland has followed probably every direction you've given him. And after that, it's like how many goddamn conspiracies can we, All it takes us one time of not doing your due diligence. I'm bleeding all over the place, so we should make a decision, because this is starting to happen. We're not saying down here, we're sealing off the bottom, and we'll go from there.

I think that is a great suggestion. It could be a witch. There could be a witch on board. We'll look into the weird and see what I can find. Oh, exactly. Oh, you missed your eyes deep, and then I will open them in my left. My left eye, I think.

Oh, yeah. My right eye. My right eye. The woman's just pure white that I don't have vision in. Will glow with this kind of icy blue magic. And I will cast detect magic. You'll cast detect magic. Okay.

How does detect magic work? What components does it use? Yeah, components. For going to semantic, but I think because it's a racial ability, I don't even need that. For the duration, you sense the presence of magic within 30 feet of you. If you sense magic in this web, You can use your action to see a faint aura around any visible creature or objects in the area that bears magic. And I learned the school of magic in any.

The spell can penetrate most barriers, but is blocked by one foot of stone, one inch of common metal, a thin sheet of lead, or three feet of wood or dirt. In the last ten minutes. Okay, in the last ten minutes. You don't detect magic right away, but you do know that you have ten minutes to be looking through this eye and be thinking about what possibilities there may be. So I will, I think we should do your plan, and I'd like to just take a quick way out.

Yeah, that's fine. As long as you big fellows will, you know, put some heavy stuff over the thing, and we prevent Queen from bleeding all over the ship. So I'm going to go up the stairs to the hold level, and I'm going to start kind of slowly walking through the hold and seeing that one of those barrels popped, strangely. I want to kind of look to see if there are any other barrels that seem weird,

and see if I can sense any magic walking just down this way. You start to make their way, you can move your token. You don't get any magic until you get into the cabin area. But at this point that you look upwards and through the floor, and you realize that you're not close enough to the end of the cantor for that, actually, to make any sense. So no, you're not distracted by any magic. find nothing, aside from the magical items

that you may or may not have put into your cabins, but nothing yells out at your eye or you don't perceive anything like an illusion or anything along those lines. I would kind of, I would wait for them to lock those up, but I'll pull out. I don't see any magic on this level. You finished locking the hatches to the build at this point

and I guess moving some heavy objects. Bonobos, put some heavy shit on top of this. We don't want anything getting I'll drag some heavy crates. Okay, easy. I'm not gonna make you make a strength project this time. You're able to roll it over.

Literally any cargo. That would be like, you know. Look at the bounty of cargo that you have at hand. You're able to find a way to hold those doors down without issue and you push the little anchor lock into it. Queenie, are you all right? Can we keep going? Yeah, I might need to slass my hand again.

because it's starting to coagulate. Please don't do that again. I mean, unless you want our surgeon to, you know, chop your fingers off. I would like to keep my fingers, but I'm okay with slice another little slip there. I'm going to knock on the door of the one guy that's not us down here.

Myelin, it's the front most door. You knock. Yep. It opens, and you're staring at a human man, very grim, middle-aged, He is starting to have that sort of shade of gray. And he can do just to look at you with this focus, this look. Big beard also, I would say, with streaks of gray in it as well. He has always been a good hand.

He clearly knows what he's doing around a ship, but he's never said a word to anyone. Have you heard anything weird tonight? Anything out of place? What I know, if that means yes or no? He is making a clap sound. Oh. He literally clasces two hands together.

He looks at you and he nods, as if there was this popping sound. That was unusual for a ship. Where did they come from? Do you know the direction? He leans out, and you're on the hold level with the broken barrel. He gestures to the barrel.

All right, thank you. Have a good night. I'm going to go back to the barrel. the broken barrel. I'm going to look all over, see if I can see anything monstery about it, any kind of like, I don't know, like this gross stuff about it. You drank the spider water. Let's be realistic. I tasted it. It tastes like water, but I want to see if I can kind of get any sense about the barrel. At this point, the water is completely dispersed. I mean, I know that it's freezing bitterly cold, but it hasn't created an ice pool yet. It is, it is still, it is very much just on the floorboards in that way. You only, I, I don't like,

this. I mean, is it worth alerting the captain? We gotta tell somebody. We can't be in charge of this ourselves. But if the captain brought this creature on board, I don't want to alert home. No, no, you're gonna... Don't put these ideas in my head. We can't, we can't be on our own here. If he did bring a creature on board, I'm sure that he did not intend for it to be running around free. He might know how to track it, or if it's even harmful, it might be passively feed on blood if it finds it. Taishen, we were in prison, not even that many months ago. All right, this guy showed up out of nowhere and basically bought us.

I'm kind of with your ear now. I hate that he even said it, but he's right. We can't just go telling anybody about this. Next thing you know, it's... And we're overboard. Oh, you think we need to see, Mr. Gorside. There's something fishy about all this. He could be insorseled.

Bewitched. All right. Got in on eggshell boats. Then one of you tried to look for a barrel that looks similar to this one. See if there are any more down here that we can find. No, we'll split up. I would like to try to remember the barrel that I loaded that had the clanking metal sound in it. Do I remember where I loaded that?

It's been months. Yes, it's been months. And it's on the second floor. It's one of the many barrels that had the same red herring marking. Actually, from the merchant, the one merchant company that brought all of these similar barrels. They didn't look nothing like the barrel that has popped open. But you do remember that particular barrel having that quality, even in your anger at the merchant for killing the albatross.

Well, we can split up. If you want to check on the patient, that's fine. I'll go with Barbos. and we can look for We can look for some different barrels or the one that looks like this one. Yeah, I'll go with I can't, I'm doing it again.

God, your voice is going to trip me out every time. I'm just going to say I'm going to go with that you're near. No, it didn't. It sounded fun to me. They're very close. Coin flip, it's up to you. Or, you know, you can go man in the wheel

like you always do instead of going up in the bucket. I will go help with the barrels. You can make tea, too. You know, he did get his toes chopped off all but two. Oh, now he wants to make tea. Well, you think that you should give him some hot beverage if he is not bewitched. And he was a drunk, so it could sober him up a little bit. Maybe he'd be able to give us some information.

I see it. See if I can get him into a right frame of mind. Takes being a drunk to get some tight shent tea around here. I see. Your only won't admit it by his little. You said you forgave me. Well, I'm still working on it. So the two of you have to examine the barrels

that you helped carry on the ship. Yeah, I would follow Barnabot to whatever barrels he wanted to inspect based on the information that he had. Okay, I'm just helping him out. You follow Barnabot. And you find yourselves in front of those barrels on the second, if you'll move your pieces. Oh, yeah.

It's all here, right? No. The actual barrels that I'm describing are on the second floor. Right here? And that's exactly where they are. Okay. So we'll be. Oh, yeah, we actually are very close.

Yes. Oh, so yeah, you guys are basically over there. Like, we'll pass them and I'll- You guys will go out over to those same barrels. So I want to take a look at the fella and see, hopefully in the last minutes in my Detect Magic, I don't want to deal it once over of this deck. Much has changed as soon as you get to Corlis.

What? You look at him, and the same flush look of a drunkard that you remember on his face has transformed into even paler, almost a ghost white look on his face. His eyes are still closed. He's still motionless in the hammock, but he physically appears quite different than when you left him left. Oh, he's nice.

Make medicine trick. And let me know how you are doing that. Oh, okay. That is a 10, and I'm doing that by immediately take my knife, and I'm going to cut, basically cut all of the, I've sewn him up. I'm trying to cut all the threads. You cut the threads and you're able to open up this makeshift sleeping bag that you're able to do. Yeah, I want to feel him, see if he feels warm, check his pulse, like to try to examine him. He feels cold. He feels motion. and it with a 10 seems that he would be,

have, has cast off his mortal coil. He's dead. Oh no. I know I should have stayed with him. I can't have tea go to waste. Someone should have gotten naked. I knew it. Godity-do me, Mr. Yorine here, aren't you the surgeon? Taking a look, I didn't.

This was not just the frost boat. And I want to look around and see if I can see any kind of like, puncture wounds, I'm gonna cut his, you know, cut his clothes off and make him for a second check with a banish. Totally. Totally. With a 16, you were able to find the only exposed bits of him, you know, his arms and everything were all in this makeshift sleeping bag, were his neck and his head. And sure enough, just behind the ear, you find a single puncture wound.

This is so bad. The same lips that you can remember from the blood stain. just around it, having pulled some sort of life force from for Mr. Garthide. And all the sailors are up here, right? Yeah, they're looking around wearily. You guys are moving around clumping and clumping. Like, you're getting a few confused looks. Some people are angrily turning.

And, you know, it's a ship, so you expect people to be passing back and forth. Some don't make it all. This man is dead. I say loudly. I need every other man to wake up. You see, I think it's 12 people down here. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You see 12 people all start to shift.

Some immediately bolt upright and turn to stand. Others are slower to wake, but sure enough, you're with your reverberating voice and commanding presence. Everybody is awake to find out what's happening. Someone's dead? Does anyone else, does anyone not get up? I would say, yes,

there's one person who doesn't get up at the very front of the hill, of the ship. It's the tenth of, the hammock of Roland Stonebridge. O'y, Mr. Stonebridge, you heard the surgeon. On your feet, lad.

I'll go over to him and I'm going to dump out the hammock. Yeah, he tumbles out. Okay, okay, okay, okay. Fuck. Oh, God. What's going on? He starts to get up and dust himself off. What's happening?

Mr. Yorny, he is asking, oh, the men, what happened? To Mr. Garcide. He's dead. Mr. Garcide is dead? Boy, lad. More and more people are asking the same question. Many are coming up, and, uh, attempting to wait Mr. Garthside,

and immediately upon touching him, it feels very cool to the touch, and feel very cool. No progress, but they start to turn to all of you. What, what, how did this happen? How did he just pass away? Was it the drink? Or we might need to fucking tell the truth here at some point.

Did you hear anything strange? Did you see anything strange? Turning to the crowd now, they're shaking their head. Fenton is petting his cat with great concern. Most of them were topside, participating in drink and in music and revelry. You just get a lot of shaking heads now.

Line up the wound and we'll talk to the captain. Boy, Mr. Sever Scotch, help me with his barrel. Maybe this will answer something. Oh, of course. And I don't know. How do you want me to help you with the barrel? I will, I will probably heave it out and you have a knife to just,

I don't want to smash it with my anger. I can't pick it up as my... Yeah, no, I'll lift it out, and I'm basically for you to pry it open with your knife. Doc, I understood. Yeah, Fenton runs forward as you're prying it open, and before you roll. Whoa, whoa, whoa, what are you doing with those barrels?

Does it look like I'm doing Mr. Savascox, please? I'm just going to go for it. What's you going to do? Go ahead and crack it open with a dexterity check. Or, no, we just slide of hand because you wanted to be quiet. Dexterity. Yeah, straight up, decks, as always. Yikes.

I was due for a bad one. I was due for a bad one. I think it's a bit of a total of a seven. With a seven, you push your tool down in order to get leveraged on. My knife. Yeah, you push your knife down in and it slips a little bit. Senton again comes to, comes to do. Do you have any reason to suspect these barrels?

They're not... These are the captain's barrels. He specifically requested them. I'm basically ignoring him and just listening to Barnabos. I don't give a shit. Make another attempt. 20.

With a 20, you're able to easily finally free the lid, and it pops open. And on the surface of the barrel, you can see it seems to be quite full. You do in fact see a few red fish. but glinting between the cracks you see a very familiar color

a golden shine in the well well I'm not sure if this has anything to do with anything but Barnabos you found something boy smugglers unless there's any other explanation here they're absolutely an explanation I am happy to share that explanation

I would he puts Fiesta down look look and he realizes that he's standing in front of not just the five of you, but the entire crew. There's, there's, uh, gold in the barrels so that we can, so that we can, we're not just going to Chuck for the purposes of, of buying, of buying this, this vial of medicine for the king and what have you, but there's tremendous amount of goods and stuff. We're, we're, we're going to buy all kinds

of, uh, uh, shock souvenirs and, and, and, uh, magic items and, anything we can, we can find. Uh, we, we, we were, we were, we were, we were, we were led to this. this goal. We were lent this goal for the purposes of making a profit. Do I buy his bullshit? Make an inside check. 18. Even within 18, because Fenton has such a picky demeanor, it's hard to tell if he's being Fenton or if he's being very nervous about it. You lean towards trusting him within 18 and saying, that makes something, that makes some sense.

But it's hard to tell. He's always flustered, even though he is in charge of the able man on this ship. He wants things to be a specific way. And being thrown a curveball after having just been woken up, maybe he's telling the truth, maybe not. I'm just saying that the captain wasn't going to, this was his business,

but it's just, it's just, six, seven, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight. It didn't seem like it was a need to know. Why, why store the gold under fish, if it's for normal purposes? It's hard to move gold, who was they? I have no problem with smuggling and avoiding the tax man. I don't have any problem with that. What I do have a problem with is, you You not telling the crew of this shit. Well, even then, Barnabas, I don't think this really has anything to do with what we're currently dealing with.

I don't know. What happened? I'll just kind of point my big fucking knife at Yornear. You will see that I'm like totally not even paying attention. And my eyes are kind of glossed over as I'm like, change the ritual to myself. Ooh. So I, I'm just motioning over to you though and the dead man. Right. Ideally, right. I'll pull out my shout and I'll just look into and say, oh, we need your help and your guidance. Whatever.

And I'll just then put it back. The 17 or 18 of you, now all of you, the crew, minus the captain and the five of you are standing in this hold area, staring over a barrel of fish and the dead body. of Dr. Dr. Mr. Garcide. I'm gonna hop up onto a barrel. All right, now everyone listen to me here. Mr. Garside here died. He was a drunk, we all knew it. He fell down into the bottom portion of this ship and he got sick.

But that's not what killed him. You can look at the back of his neck if you want. He's got a little sucker point there. Something was drinking his blood. There was something on there. this ship that could kill us. You don't believe me, look for yourself. But we need to keep an eye out.

If you see anything strange, you let Mr. Yorneer know. He's the position he was working on him. There's something on this ship, and it don't seem right to keep it from you. Make a persuasion. Eighteen. Eighteen. Well said. The crew all looks at each other.

And for the duration, I mean, it's been weeks and weeks. weeks and weeks on this ship, you felt a bit at an arm's distance, all of you. Purely click style, just the crew having been longer on this ship with Captain Verme and you being newcomers, especially foreigners who aren't from Luzay, it's been tough to make a connection, but you feel like you connect with them now. They start to stand to attention and start to look around and suspicion, beginning to assume the same demeanor that you are, that there's something seriously. wrong here and it's up to them in addition to yourselves to get to the bottom of this.

Well said. I hope we have everyone's attention. What do we do? If you see anything strange, anything at all, do you let us know? Only if we work together can we figure this out. We think we've sealed off the bill's lair of the ship, but we're not sure beyond that. Okay. Where's the captain? Who's the last seen him? Ellis what's up. We had a conversation. What's Ellis's last name? Mr. Coombs.

Oh, shit. Coombs. I remember where it's fucking Ellis. If you want to, promote it for your fellow DMs in there. If you want someone to remember their name, be like, yeah, this is Pervis Titties over here. And you'll be all set. You'll be all set.

Yes, Mr. Ellis. All right. We stayed up late and we were talking through some of the ship design choices that we were going to make for when we had that goal to spend. What do you need exactly? Where is the captain? I left him probably 10, 11.

I can't say for certain. We were drinking. little left him where this in the captain's quarters oh I presume he's still up there he may still be awake wait I mean we have to at the very least let him know we have to we have to warn him even if he's not on our side yeah I mean and we kind of need to tell him we found his fish gold too hey mr. urine here he's doing some kind of weird chantey thing he'll be all right I mean the words just kind of bounce right off but it's fine I'm doing stuff

And once 10 minutes had passed, I would like to cast speak with animals. Okay. I would say that 10 minutes definitely passed in the conversation that happened. So you can cast speak with animals. Ellis, with frustration, goes, well, I'm up. I guess I'll go upstairs and see the captain. And so he starts to make it away. All on your own.

Oh, yeah. You will have an escort here, Mr. Ellis. And I will... Come on. All in the cabin. Where is your cat? You just put him down. Fenton just put the cat down.

So is he still. The cat is making faces that Fenton's like. I reached out and I'll grab the cat. Speak to me. Hello, cat. Can you understand me? A shock hush hits all the crew members as you pick up the cat and it's like doing a little bit of this,

but as soon as you say with the magic of speak with animals, to low cat, it understands you and somehow knows in its cat heart that it can speak to you. I have a name. What does your name? Fiesta. You know that. Does that cat think its name is Fiesta? My name is Thomas.

He calls me Fiesta. I don't correct it. Yes, they call me Fiesta. How may I help you? You're a cat with your... heightened senses and perception, have you smelled or seen or heard any kind of monster or creature? Yeah. Yeah, I have.

Women wear. He turns to scrim. No, no, not him, not him. He's fine. I'm like not paying attention. I'm like picking my ear. At this point, you're bored of it. It's been hissing since day one. Yeah, I haven't been getting attention to fiesta. And yeah, that is it. That is the only thing out of place as a cat you had perceived this night.

Yeah, I get. Give me a little sniff right now, and you don't smell the myth. Shake the cat. Shake the cat a little bit. Answer me, cat. Threaten him. Threaten the cat. Handle-mole-handle-in, check.

I smell the fish downstairs, or in those barrels. And smell the blood and the bilge. in the bilch. I think there might be a mouse. I'm gonna find that, fucker. This is really bizarre. There's a mouse on the ship. I keep thinking I'm smelling one.

Go, go towards the mouse. And I'm gonna put them up with the cat down. And I'm gonna follow this in this cat. I would go with your near. I would at least be like, I'm gonna see where this goes. If you guys are going to the captain, I'm going with your in here.

You start to follow a cat around the hold as it sniffs around the crate. Behavior that, if you're nearer, would care to notice, is something that has probably been doing, like circling certain crates and stuff for potential vermin for weeks. As that happens, Ellis, Mr. Ellis and Barnabas, you make your way upstairs. And my apologies, I didn't hear that. Queenie, make your way all the way

after the captain's quarters and you're not find yourself at the door. I'm gonna bang on it. Captain! There's an emergency. A bit of problem you should know. Today, Spartamo Stredway, get your service? This is a cook. I would like to get an audience with you, sir.

Mr. Coombe, do you have a key for this door if it be locked? I designed this ship, of course I've got a key. Can you let us in? He pulls out a ring of keys, and after a few flips, he's able to find the right one and unlock the captain's corridor's door. Are you scared like you're near? You want me to go first, Barnabos? All right, I'll do it, and open the door and I walk in. Push the door open, and like all doors in every fantasy setting.

Perfect. You make your way inside. There are a few candles on one table. And I would ask you to put your figure where your minis, your mini caps where you would normally be as you enter. I guess it's marching orders and you probably need. Captain Verne. Bornaboo's first, Queenie behind. Oh, I opened the door and went first.

Oh, you did? Yeah, okay. Okay, okay, okay. Okay, have some, have some things. If you could just put that down next to the gang. You walk in and you see the sleeting. Does Coom wanna bang? You should have a form of Captain Verme on the surface of the bed.

Captain Verme on the surface of the bed under the covers. It's a double wide bed. It looks extremely luxurious. Oh, hop over there and I'll just shake him. Captain, Captain, we got something we got to talk to you about. It is very important. I'm not going to make you roll for it. When you start to shake him and he turns his head and his eyes are open,

You start to have a very strange feeling that this is the same state that Mr. Garzai is in there. Barnabas, you might wanna come look at this. Captain, I will reach, I will just grab his face and start looking at him. I'll smack and smack him. I was born at night, but I wasn't born this night. I think he's dead.

Make a, make a, make a, you're just like, holding him in, I'm trying to see what Yorne. I'm just trying to mimic what Yorne was doing, but I don't know really what he was doing. And I'm like, and I'll try to smack him away. I would point it out that old, I would have pointed out where he was down. And I will look to see if it's at the same spot.

That you can see evidently. He absolutely has been stung in the same place. And his eyes are open, and he has the same cool, coolness to the touch when it comes to his skin. His face is gaunt and seemingly, uh, Love us. I knew it was the Chupacabra.

I just knew. We gotta tell everyone else. Why, is there some sort of thing that we didn't do that drew a troupe cobra here? I don't know. Maybe it was the fact that there, merchant killed that seabird. Merchant killed.

Oh, yeah, well, this is exactly right. You see howlott's revenge? It's got hanging from all of our necks now. I think life and death roll dice for us and I think death won. Well, for the captain, sure, not for me, I hope. Boy, it's one by one. We'll be dropping dead.

And I'm going to go out. I'm just tear apart the room. Barnabos. I'm going to need you to calm yourself. If you start talking like that in front of everyone, you're going to get them all in a tizzy, and next thing you know, they're going to be killing each other. You just know that death rolled the six. Well, you know he did. Roll the six on what? He ruled the six for all of our six.

souls. I'm going to start tearing apart the room. I'm going to make my way towards the door and I'm going to shut it to muffle the sound of him destroying the door and I'm going to hop down to your door. You turn around and Ellis is no longer standing in the room with you. He has made his way down and is getting as close to the helm as possible where an alarm belt can be found. And moments later after you close the door as you are trashing and pushing over dressers, turning over desks, doing what you would do to see if you can find some additional clue or whatever it is that you happen to be seeking. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. You're still following the cap. Yep. And I would say that it's...

Scrum is close behind. Five, six minutes of pass. And this cat doesn't seem to be any closer to finding any kind of a road. It's following a sentence, perhaps in its mind you're starting to I think is starting to check the same places over and over. No, Yorner, I don't doubt you, and I certainly don't doubt the fates, but... What the fuck are we doing? The problem is that this creature has a better nose and better sense than either one of us. Ah, yes. If anyone could find a mouse, it is this cat.

Okay, Yornear, whatever you say. So extremely elusive mouse. It is a mouse. That is their goal. They choose to be hidden. hidden. I'm sorry, I'm off my game. It's okay. Take your time. Take your time. But if you could find this mouse, it's critical.

You could help everyone on board, including your friend. I'll try again. It's outrageous. You think the cat's rolling bad. Do we hear the bell? And at that point, I would say that at the six-minute marker, you hear the bell. And you know that only one of potentially four other people

on this ship could be ringing it, unless there's some sort of fandom. Or a lightning. Yeah, yeah. Oh, no. This can be good. You're on here. Come on. Tyshen, we gotta go up. That must be them ringing the bell. I mean, I don't want to interrupt your cat following thing,

but... You two go make sure everything is fine. Oh, you're gonna stay here with the... Yes. Piaz-A-. Please, please, roll them all of this. moldness, I can sense. I'm gone. I'm gone.

I'm just like talking about it. I run to the upper deck. You're into the upper deck. Right here the bell is ringing. You see Ellis. He's ringing that bell. Oh, my God. Can we get a Jeff?

Can we get a Jeff? Yes, we can. He's ringing the bell. It's up here. And as soon as he sees you, the captain, captain's dead. I would look around to see if I see you too.

I would have been rushing down, so I probably would pass to him. Yeah, you would have run into each other. You may have stopped if you heard the bell and turned around, whatever you would have. I still would have run it down to tell you. Then I would be just looking to see if I see Barber Bus on the upper deck.

You look up and the door is closed. Yeah, I don't see him. I don't see him. But I'm confused by the bell. I'm upset. But you hear Ellis's words. The captain is dead. The captain is dead.

I would stay on the upper deck. I would know what to do. Okay. Queen, what's going on? What's happening? Well, you see, the captain's dad, I don't know if you got that from the bell and the screaming. And then Barnabos went completely crazy.

Off his rocker started destroying the captain's cabin. So I shut the door so people wouldn't see how disrespectfully it was being, lest they decide they want to throw them off the ship or something. And then I was going to go tell Yornear what was going on. since he's the surgeon. What, how did the captain die? Oh, you know, same way, Chupacabra. You keep saying that word.

And I don't know what that means. I guess I would move to the captain's borders. All right, well, see you later, bye. Thank you for the information. There's an exodus from the whole area. Most is not all of the crew members. Roland, Fenton, Walker, Myelin, Stafford, Pell, Waverly, Nightly, not Corliss, Wade, Pendleton, and Kendra all make themselves to the top side of this ship.

I'm curious to learn more about what's happened to their captain on this dated voyage. What are you doing? I'm still following. How is it possible with this fruit fly likes me so much? He's been floating around. He just loves me. So much is it doing that? I haven't tried to strike.

The next time I see him, he's dead. At the 10-minute marker, you continue to watch the cat, and you can continue to follow him if you want it. You no longer can communicate, but he does seem to be continuing to sniff around, is it for something, but he seems... If you find the mouse, don't kill him. Just try to trap him. To understand.

Knock him on my conscience. Just... This is a non-lethal hit. Exactly. So I will say that to him. So at this point, he would still understand me. I just won't be able to understand him. Oh, is that a permanent?

It's a fearful. Oh, that's a fearful. Wow. Okay. So he's now and he says, like he thinks he's having a conversation back and forth with you and you're just like, yeah, okay, okay. Of course.

And I'll join everybody else. Oh, you join everyone. So you're all top side at this point. I'm still tearing the three of the captain's quarters. What are you looking for? So I am looking for anything that would... I'm looking for, A, a creature, some kind of monster. But if I don't find a monster,

I'm looking for anything that's out of the ordinary that would explain what the fuck is going on. Okay. There's basically some horrible, like, you know, supernatural ice spider monster witch. The revenge of the albatross is upon us. And I'm fucking... I have no idea what's going on.

So I'm looking for anything that looks out of the ordinary of any of the beast. That's exactly right. I'm looking for banana nut duck bread. I am looking for all. He was cuckoo bananas. I'm looking for anything that is different from a captain that I would have sailed under in my long-story life. Make a perception check. Okay.

Here we go. Nope. I think it's a 12. Is it all right? Nope. Hold on perception. Perception? Oh, you'd be a 12.

It's not bad. You're pushing things over, you're shifting around. It's when you are exhausted for a moment, and you're alone in this room with the captain's body on the bed that you hear a sound, and as you turn, you see a candle

tip over and fall, extinguishing immediately. And something almost sounds like glass against the window, which is over. disappears. There's a, there's a, there's a, of the slightest most faintest of moments where you, where you think that there was something in this room that just left. I'll look to see, like if there's anything that I can see is I'm, it's my attention drawn there. You run to the window, make a perception check at

advantage. Oh, mm. Okay. Come on. Okay, 21. Nice. You push your frame out of the frame of the window. Looking down, you can see the back end of the ship. You can see the tail, the wake of the ship. You can see up and around to the top of the group deck where the balcony is. Nothing. There doesn't appear to be any form or shape.

Jesus. I'm gonna just close the window and then turn back leave and look for my friends. You open the door and you stand where, and for a moment you see what a captain might experience walking out the door. You see a crowd of people all looking up at you expectantly.

Barnabas. Everybody else is below deck. I came up here as soon as I heard the bell. Are you all right? I'm all right. Captain's not. He's dead. Some sort of specter or monster.

I think slipped right past me I went out the window You think you heard something I think I did You didn't see it I did not Something slipped by me This can't be happening

It went out the window It could be up in the rigging And I just really didn't want to do any work It could I think I think I know what it is I finally figured it out How foolish was I to think

That it was witches or spoilers, that's ridiculous. I know what it is, Mr. Savascoch. I lean closer in. You make your way down the stairs now and you're all crowded in. You're not the only one leaning in. Everyone is hanging on your every word at the stage.

It's the ghost of the albatross. Wait, what? You mean the bird on the dock all those months ago? You punched that guy. Finally getting his revenge! Oh, you knew it. Well, you knew it.

It's flying. around, sucking in the blood from its bloodthirsty B.O. All right, so let's, let's, for one second, assume that you're right. How do we fix it? We, we, we pay amends. We say we're sorry. We kill the merchant. You punched him in the face real good.

You need to throw pearls overboard. Pearls! I mean, I don't, I don't have any pearls. Anybody, anybody in the crew, how any pearls? A couple folks. pop up. They have pearl earring. My mother's necklace. The captain probably had pearls. We could go and filch those. Heart of Boas, you really think this is going to help?

Into the bright needy digos. You heard the cook. I'm just the top man. Make a... No, they're scared and convinced. The crew... I'm also scared to me convinced. The crew disperses, the few who know where pearls are. And she's... Sure enough, some of them come up. They have necklaces, a handful of earrings. The one person who goes back up into the cabin's quarters comes back down with what is a large black pearl

from one of the top old dressers that you've pushed over. They're all holding it and gathering it together and scooping it up. What do we do next? Throw it. Throw it overboard, lads. throw to overboards and ask for forgiveness to the soul of the dead sailor, to the soul of the albatross.

They run to the back of the ship and free the pearls out into the night sky, into the air, into the bitter, cold air. To you. Boy, lover, woman, the shell. To you, the soul of the sailor. To you, the albatross. While this is happening, I'll see everybody around.

I'm going to kind of go on my own, leaving them and go to the folks' hole and open the door. Where are you headed? To that room over there. Oh, yeah, yeah. The recreation room that none of us have been in. Yep. Absolutely.

You find yourself in there. Everyone's at the back of the ship at this point, and you're all alone in, a not cold, but a cool room that is quiet in comparison. I'm just going to move around. I'm going to see if anything seems out of place. I'm going to see if anything feels bizarre or strange or any sign of a horrible blood-sucking creature. Okay. Start to make an investigation check. 17.

17. This room is completely undisturbed. There doesn't appear to be any track. or Marks smells blood. It's been largely unaffected. It's left in the same, as you imagined, it's been left in the same condition that it was left in

when people started to make their way to bed. Where's Queenie? I went downstairs. I guess what are you doing instead? Oh, where did you go? I was going to meet Yornear, but he ran straight past me and paid no attention to me

when upstairs. So I just decided to hop around and I imagine I would spend a little bit of time around Old Drunk Jones. And then I think Queenie would have gone back to the room. The room? Yeah. When you visited Old Drunk Jones, make a perception check. God, these dites are on fire.

Perception 24. Wow. Wow. Damn. Get some. One of his eyes, both being, having been closed, that's open. Oh, come on. What the fuck, man.

Do you still make your way back to the room? Yeah, I think I would. And I would go to my little flower area. And even though they're just barely little tendrils, I would take one of them back and lay it on his chest. Oh. Okay. You're able to pull it free from the soil.

Do you try to maintain the dirt ball? No, no. It's almost as, like, I know it's not a full flower, but it's almost the way you would lay flowers on the grave of someone who's recently passed. You lay down this small little sprig onto its chest. I'm sorry that you were drinking so much and that you fell down those stairs and that Chupacra got you. That really sucks. and I don't know if you have family

but I'll remember you so you know there's that I guess what's your AC? Fuck Yes 15 15 All right In fact, where I rolled

Some parasites And so I'll look down at them And I'll like reach up to close the one eye That's really freaking me out So I'm just going to close that there Good night Good night Yeah, like, I'm sorry it sucks, but rest in peace.

You feel this surprising, stinging sensation. Oh, fuck! What fuck was that? It's much more violent like that. Like someone put a nail against the back of your neck and hit it with an hammer. Yeah, I reach up and I smack it. You take four points of piercing damage. You do?

And you make a Constitution favor. from. Oh my God. A 21. Wow. A 21? Yeah. You feel a poison under your system and you immediately start to get extremely dizzy. You feel your muscles tightened up. Oh, no.

Uncontrollably. Oh, no, I'm getting locked rabbit syndrome. But you're able to fight against it and still you feel that there's something else in the room. As you fight this paralysis, you know that you know that you're able to fight against it. that there is still additional fights to come. I needed a role for initiative. All right. Cheat!

Um, 11. She's alone. Well, I'm headed down there if I lookfully I'm not. I don't know any better. We'll do a round and then we'll make it there. I lived with the crew in the passes. I don't know.

Because I was headed down, or at least I don't know if I mentioned it or not, but I wanted to head down there once I found there was nothing. Interesting. So I was going to head down one of those chips. You would be doing that with your next action. I would fit. As you turn to see what foe.

What the fuck just poked me in the tashies that you? You turn and look up. Look around. Look at nothing. There's nothing in front of you. And yet, what the ever-living heck? I feel woozy. That's going to be...

Get on a shingle, that hurt. Good old S-O-L-S-L-S. That's going to be an additional four points of slashing damage. Instead of a pierce, this strikes you across the neck and collarbone cutting into you, all of a sudden a huge gash appears. That's my best fur! How could this have impacted you

when there doesn't seem to be anything in front of you? and it completely invisible whatever is struck you. I want to attempt to attack it back. Okay. So I'll be at disadvantaged because it's invisible. Not going to hit it with my dagger would be 11. Eleven is not enough. You swing out with your dagger after having drawn it as quickly as you can.

With one hand holding the blood into your, near your neck. You hit nothing but near. I'm going to use my bonus action for Rabbit Hawk, and I'm going to jump 10 feet away towards the, towards the stairwell without provoking an opportunity attack because I'm a bunny. That's outstanding. Extremely good for you. And then I'm going to make my full movement.

That's so good. Let's put you where you're going. So she was here. I haven't here for a reason. So there's the, There's the bunny hop. And I've got 30. She can go upstairs.

There you go. I couldn't go up those stairs. I mean, she can't work the deck. Oh, did you have? Basically this way. Yeah, and then go to stairs. Yeah, absolutely. One.

And that's where the whole crew is. She already off the deck. We're just throwing pearls off the deck. We were here. Yeah. You would be over here. We would be right here. Like all, everyone's just chucking in.

furles off of the, off of the, I can't see. So she would run up, where does this lead to? That leads to the staircase of the middle portion. So then all she's gotta do is come out the door, right? Yeah, those are not connected. No, no, but she comes out here. Right? She would come out. Because it's tiered, it's tiered.

So she's gotta come out somewhere up her deck. The face of this is this line. Yeah, okay. So this door is right here. can come out here. There's some mother flipping chupacobras downstairs. You sprint like the dickens. You're covered in blood by the time you make it all the way up here,

but you're so fast that you're able to hop all the way up to this. You see a crowd of people, shocked faces. They got me. They're at the tail end, aren't they? They got me, gal. But they do turn as you make your voice. I need the rest of you to engage an initiative. Oh, sweet Lord.

Oh, and they're invisible, so there's that. And mine gonna like spin on my leg. Hot fire! These dice are hot fire. I got 17. I love Rabbit Hop. It's the best. What a great ability. Holy shit. That's a suggest disengage. Yeah, but I only get two of them.

What was your initiative role? My initiative role was, I believe, 11. It's literally a hunter disengage. Right, right, right. All right. All right. 20 to 25. 20. Oh, nice. Burn both. 15, 20. 17. 16. 10. 9. That's what I get for trying to give that poor old drunk of feet. And that'll teach you. Fuck them. Burn them alive. And let's see how this works. I guess we'll do some action music.

Okay. We just finished your turn. We're gonna go to the top of the round. Barnabos, you make your way down and you see the feet of... He's yornear. What? Wow, you're near. My apologies. Oh, me.

Barnebos is first. You're first. That's fine. I do that all the time as a DM. I've never done that. In the years and years that we've been playing D&D. Go ahead. I'll look at Queen and all, and all of the pearls.

now off the ship and nothing happening. I'll have my anchor and I'll say, Queenie, where's the Jupyabra? It's right back where it came from Barnabos, but it's invisible, so good luck. I'm gonna kill it! And I am going to, and I'm going to say, I'm going to be completely covered in seawater

as I am drenched. There's gonna be kelp and barnacles that all start to grow all over me. as this strange deep sea power comes over me, is I'm going to just rush in and just see where Queenie's going. And rather than just swinging my anchor wildly, I'm just going to just look at the direction and pull a harpoon off of my backwards in the netting

and just chuck it in the air just down the stairs. Okay, move you where you would be. So he would be at the top of these stairs. And you're just going to chuck it down at the bottom of the stairs. I'm just going to chuck. The attack roll at this advantage. Yep, yep, yep, yep. Not very good.

Not very good. Actions, that is going to be an 11. No. You throw the javelin in it and barely misses Corliss's body as it wedges itself into the wooden floor. And I am going to just stand at the top of the stairs in an attempt to, actually, no, I don't want to block that.

So I'm going to walk down the stairs and walk in here. Okay. And I'll look around for it. Make a perception check. That's going to be a 21. Okay. You can hear something as you get to the bottom of the stairs. You can hear a crawling or sloppings.

Don't make that noise. Yes. You're not sure if it's the ceiling or the floor, but it's definitely around here somewhere, whatever this spirit may be. Scrum your up. Having seen Queenie run up and she's bleeding. Yeah, she's upset.

It makes me mad and I'm gripping the big knife and my other fist clenches and I see Barnabas run down the ladder. My left hand begins to almost a glow with a deep, dark purple. As I chase him down the ladder, and I go down after Barnabos and try to see if there's anything that I can attack.

Okay, move your piece where you would find yourself. Probably right behind Barnabos. Okay, make perception check. Pretty fucking good, Kimma. These dice are just like, I don't know what Elders God you prayed to. You said perception? I got an 18.

You can hear Barnabose is looking around. And it's clear that he's perceiving the sound and not the sight. So not relying on your sight for a second, you kind of go eyes wide. But if you try to make an attack, it'll still be a disadvantage. You have no idea where this thing is. I hear it. I hear something. You hear something.

And in my frustration from my left hand, a shadowy magic burst as I cast an L flash in the direction that I think that it is. Okay, make an attack at a disadvantage. Natural one is my disadvantage, so is seven. You, uh, seeing where Barnabos's eyes, seeing where Barnabos's eyes, even though you're, you're trying to listen for it, you trust his sight and fire into the, uh, shadow magic brush for my hand.

Sawdust in all directions, uh, starts to rain down, but you don't hear anything. God's damn it, Barnabos, I'm sorry. That's my turn. You're near. Um, so I was already running. down the stairs there. I said that you were already down there and could see.

So you'd have to be in line of sight. Yeah, I'd say that that's fine. So if I'm here, do I see them attacking, like flailing around at stuff down there? Yeah, absolutely. In fact, the Eldridge Blashed especially. You illuminates the area for a brief moment, the flare. I will. Let me just check my...

All of this area is dimly, but well lit by lantern like. I still have one spell left. I think I'm going to do it. That a red, brother. This is horrible. I will run up here, and I will say, you better watch out, and I'm going to say utter a word in giant

and a bright sort of light of like whites and silvers and greens and pinks and almost sort of like the Aurora Borealis. We'll kind of like flash and fly and slither in a 20-foot circle here. I'm going to cast very fire. Let's go! Yes! Let's fucking go. So you also make deck saves.

That's fine. That'll be a natural one for Barnabos. My deck saving truck. My deck save is... You get a natural one, too? Well. I got a... 17. You pass. You fail.

Seven. It fails. So now Barnabos and the creature that failed are now outlined in light. And attacking anyone that's outlined in light, the attacker has advantage. It's all right. Barnabose is stirred. And the affected creature can't benefit from being visible. Barnacleboats. visibility ass.

Exactly. It's on the ceiling, but what you see is an inscrippable aberration. It's like a spider had a baby with an octopus that has its own stinger,

like a wasp. It's flailing in all directions and clearly looking for some way out of this situation. You don't see what it is made of. You only see the outline of this creature. So as it turns,

and one arm, you know, turns around the other. It's like looking at a shadow of this shape, but it is able to somehow suction itself to the ceiling while also angry, like a wasp or a bee with this nasty rear end that it clearly has hit cleaning with at least once. Zities kill it! I shout out.

And yeah, it's my turn, I think. I'm happy with its new lot in life. life and sudden... This is a millination. That was a lot of thing. Question. If you're fairy fired, would you be able to look at yourself and see that you're very fired?

So, yeah. Yes. So what it says, let me read it. In the attack role against an affected creature object has an advantage. If the attack can see it and the affected creature object can't benefit from being invisible. So I don't know if that means that they can't be invisible or just means that this is going to benefit. Basically, any creature affected so those two, it would be invisible.

see that it's like surrounded and it's kind of aurora royalism. Shit is awesome. How cool. Just me, this freak are, these are, it's terrifying. Oh, no. It's kind of like ruin print, but I got them because they had the rainbow and not. And see how they kind of retain the line afterwards?

It's so bad out. So we would see it move, though. You would see, you would see it move. However, because you can see it, I would afford both of you opportunity attacks at disadvantage if you want to take... Oh, hell yeah.

I'm... Scrum is so amped. He's like, to the fucking graveyard he's going to fire off another fucking elders blast. Okay. Because it's a can't trip, right? Well, so if you're furrified, you normally get advantage. So I don't know.

So it shows me straight. Just a straight opportunity attack. 100%. I mean... You need warcaster in order to do that. Or do you have a warcaster? No. Can I take a regular?

You can take your knife. Then I would just... Just put you the fuck out of them. Yeah. So just normal. That looks good. I think it's plus six. That looks good.

16 is the bird blade. 22. Both of you roll for damage. Fuck, yes. As it runs, you suddenly, you look up and for whatever reason, it's like steering up at the Aurora Borealis. You've heard, maybe you've never seen the sky. Set of this. But you've heard tales of the lights in the sky.

And when you look up, it's almost like staring at that same starry sky. these moving, waving lights, and you see this shadow, this outlined shadow, and it's as easy as hitting a drum at this point. Smack, smack, smack. Seven totals. 13 points of bludgeoning damage. I swing my anchor in attempt to smash this thing.

Oh, my gosh. It's a little bit more octopsy. I guess not as octopsy. I don't think you can say that word on strange. It's a gene box for the world. It's a huge bond fan. I love Roger Moore. Yeah, Roger Moore is a great jamline.

There's this splattering sound, and you can see it limp, and it makes its way across the ceiling, and then drops down through the open hole into the lower cargo hold area, and it disappears from view, at least to the outline of it. But you both get a sense that you did a significant amount of damage to this terrifying creature. Tight.

And that will be its turn. Queenie, you're up. I am going to, shit. I'm gonna basically go stand, I'm gonna move wise. I'm going to use my full action to dash and just run this way down behind Yorneur. Okay, so I'm gonna tug here. And then I'm gonna tug on his cloak.

Mr. Yorneur, I don't feel so good. And that's my whole turn. What did you run down in order to get there? The stairs, the same ones that you were near took. Those stairs don't connect. Oh, yeah. They're here.

They connect technically. So she could run in here, connect there. Yeah, yeah. Come out here. Or you can run down. Either way. But then I would have to run past them, and I don't want to do that.

Got it. Got it. Got it. So yeah, you can be there. And I want to be behind you. It works. You're able to do that. You still feel stiffness in your body

as you're pushing through and making these unbelievably hasty dash, dash moves. That poison is working its way through the system, but you're able to fight it off. Is that the conclusion of your turn? Yeah. I said, what do you got to? Yeah, I mean, I used to try to follow along.

I don't have my bearings so much, though, but I don't know. So you could come in through here. Yeah, yeah, yeah, which comes out here. You come here. No, no, no, you got to go this way to get to these bad boys, because there's no stairs here, right? You can make it here. No, no. You were with us. So you can just come down here. You go

5, 10, 15, which goes into here. 20. Is that a... Oh, okay. 25. Yeah, you can get down here. Yeah. Okay. You find yourself staring at Scrim and Barnabot. They are both heaving, breathless from clearly fighting something. Mr. Foyerbloss from the two for gumbrough. It's getting away.

I point him wherever it went. You can see it. He's pointing into the whole. whole. Oh, wait. So it's just right down here. Can she look down and maybe shoot it with a bow if? Oh, well, you dashed. Oh, I mean like if we're up here.

You can make a perception check. I just figured, you know, so it's, I don't know. It doesn't need to stay instead of a radius for fair and fire. No, once it's on it, as long as I'm making concentration. 24. Does it repeat the saving throw? I don't know. 24.

You can see that it's just starting under. It's just starting to do. this area through the open door that is the sleeping area. Oh, it also sheds a dim light for 10 feet. Yep. Oh, wow. So it makes it really easy to see. So you know its location.

Tyshan, you have made it to the bottom of the stairs. Actually. You can see Barnabot and Scrim. Do you say? What do you say? As a bonus action, I want to use my honey pot and throw honey at it. Oh, okay.

And so I essentially mark it with Hunter's market. Oh. So now I'll know where it is all the time. You have a natural sense of where this thing is now. Ranger style. You get two dollars. Honey, me. I think Guadian needs to talk like that occasionally.

Whatever movement. You still have your action left. You still have a bonus action left. And you still have like free talking, free inter-ramp action with objects. What are you doing with your term? Uh, what's going on down here? What's the situation? The tube of God is getting away, that way, Mr. Holyblossom. They'll turn, you'll see me.

So I'm like, don't do it. You point to the open hole just passing massive barrels. Okay. I'm in amount of movement, so I would just be ready to go next room. Okay. You have an action left. So with your action, you can take another full movement. Oh, uh, okay.

Right. Yeah. Get it, chase it. You can try to run downstairs, you can try to run and jump in, however you want. Get it, Tash, you can get it. Go further down if you wanted. Yeah, I would continue to pursue.

Let's say that you'd want on that side then. So like, five, well, like, you have to go round to the way. Just be where you're going to be going down there with it. That's, you know, the train all right. But I can say it, Tashi. So yeah, you would be right next to it. You'd be able to do it. Do it.

You do this. Ah, you know what? All right. Okay. Okay. So Tyshin runs down next to it. Uh, uh. Yeah! That's right here! You do see this same creature, and you're boggled by the shape of it.

A small beak on one end is at the top, is at the bottom. It is on the floor now, and it is moving like if a dog had eight rubbery legs. Ew. We certainly don't have these in you, Lowe. And that'll be the conclusion of your turn, Barnabot. I'm gonna look at myself and I'm gonna say, Roura, Alice, in this time of year, in this time of day, in this part of the world,

and localize entirely within my person. So good. I'm going to fight for any Mr. Fireblast! I'm just gonna run after him and try to try to, I guess I only have 30 feet at this point. I am more than enough. Wait, so where? Oh, I guess it's going down here.

You just literally drop down here, right? You end up here. There might be some, you know, however Derek wants to. Difficult terrain. Yeah, to get through allies. I can get, I can someone to go right next to it. Okay. Yeah, and I'm gonna just try to take my,

am I able to reach it? It's on the floor. Oh, I'm going to basically splat it like a fucking, a carnival. Attack and it's at advantage. At advantage. At advantage. Yeah.

Yep. I'm gonna roll this two, two D's at once. I think that it's just an advantage. Yeah. Get them. It's gonna be 17. That hits? That's gotta be enough.

Oh, not great. Oh, wait, do I get to re-rule if I have a great way with it? No, that's fighting style? That's, right, you do not re-roll. Okay, I do not. So seven plus four, so that's 10, 11, and then... Had raged in. Plus two more.

I mean, that's a lot. Eleven, 13 points of bludgeoning damage. Yeah, it's pretty good. And I try to just score. wash it like a fucking watermelon. How do you want to do this? Ah, you bastard, you fucking prey. I'd like just to run up and I'm like,

excuse me, excuse me, I figured. Excuse me, your Floresome? And I'm just going to just look at it and just try to turn it into Aurora Borealis jelly. I love that. Across the, love it. As I'm, as I'm, there's a, there's a bit of madness to me. As I'm covered in the sea waters, I'm dripping

and I smell like this deep briny, I mean, I smell like low tide a little bit. Ew. Are you swinging down or you golf swing at it? I mean I would be trying to pin it. So I would basically be just smashing it. That's my- Non-lethal.

In the angle. No, I'm killing it. Extra lethal. The anchor hook comes down and it doesn't know exactly what to do. It saw Taichshan was scurrying backwards and then it stops moving. All of its limbs. Oh, it's great.

go loose and you can tell that it is splattered. It doesn't leave any gore. It is somehow naturally invisible. And even though you can see the outline, when you, the anchor out from the floor, all you see is that same shadowy outline of this strange creature on the Moorbound. I would have immediately,

since it was my turn after anyway, It's been like, Bonobus, are you all right? And been headed down to see what's going on. It's dead. Why? How? What is it? I don't know.

I think Guine said it was a tubercoma. We don't know what. That's no albatross. That is no soul of any sailor loss at sea. That's something more disgusting than that. What a fucking nightmare. We'll run down. This is on that.

Unfortunately no kind of animal. Does it look about the size of one of the water kegs that burst? It looks like it would absolutely be able to fit it bald into the hogshead barrel that it had burst from. It must have been heavily pressurized if it did fit in there. But at the same time, given its like octopetal nature, it looks like it could slip through even a gap as... Thin as your fists are gonna need to. Oh, wow. I don't like this campaign.

This was hiding in the barrel. Almost certainly. I don't feel very good. There's poison in my blood. And I argue. Mr. Yorny, take care of Ms. Murch. I'll turn aside from them looking at the thing. I'm gonna look in your eyes.

Are you feeling stick your tongue out, please? All my barnacles will just completely fall off of me and like, we'd be absolutely foolish to us to not assume that every barrel on this ship contains one of these monstrosities. You can hear the sound of footsteps on the top deck above, and there are folks who are starting to make their way down

to the hold where you were in. You expect in a minute you'll be joined by company, but right now it's just the five of you. And how long does... The last 10 minutes. Last 10 minutes. I'm gonna maintain concentration. You've got more than enough time to see this creature

broken against the wooden floor. We have to assume that there has to be more of them. This is not good at all. We don't know what we do. Our captain is dead. I might be dead soon. Mr. You're near. Do I get a sense that she's in like mortal danger?

Making medicine check. Like the poison's gonna kill her. I'm gonna make you make a lot of those apparently. That's fine. I'm glad I'm proficient. Oh. That's a good role. That's a pretty good role, and I believe that's a 19, actually.

Oh, that's a 16. Oh, sorry, skills. That's a 19. 19. With a 19, you can see that same mark just behind the ear, this deep hole, as if a stinger had been inserted and then quickly removed. But you don't get the feeling that she is, She's strong enough that she's been able to fight off

whatever it is that would have caused the same issue that Corliss and Captain Brameh under-underwent. Can't harness the Arctic anymore today, but I think you need to just rest. I better rest. If I could put a numerical value on my life, I'd be at four and not a penny more. Let me get you in the bed.

I am quite. stiff. And not in the good way. I'm gonna take you to your room and I'm gonna open the door. Can I have that big fur blanket you put on the dead guy? Yes, I will collect it. And I'll lay you down in your bed and I'll go grab the my large cloak and wrap you in the cloak. As long as you get some rest, I think you'll be fine in the morning.

I hope so. If I'm dead though, you just leave me here. You won't die. Go on with that way. I don't want to be a burden on my friends. The rest of the crew suddenly joins you. You guys left into action, and they're only just catching up. Fenton jumps to you.

He's got Fiesta in his hands. What happened? What is that shape? What's going on? I'm gonna lean in towards Barnabas and say, I don't care who ranks where. I think you need to take charge here, and I got you back. Captain Vermeerme being dead, I...

Wait, crew, this creature was stowed away on board in one of the barrels. It killed the captain. It killed... Mr. Garsoy. We are very fortunate that we all made it out with our lives, seeing how it was entirely invisible, and once Mr. Yornear's magic drops, we will no longer be able to see it. This is some sort of supernatural curse upon us that we got no doubt because the merchant that sent us on this voyage killed an albatross. And while as far as I'm concerned, I mean, if we're going to follow somebody, it seems to be the person who is what they're talking about.

That's all I'm going to say. I align myself with this guy. And I stand behind Barnabos. As I look at the crew, and then I look at Fennon very disdainfully. Everyone looks around at each other and no one says a peep. Fenton doesn't seem to be cut out for full leadership quality, but after a moment, a pregnant moment, he steps forward. We've got a lot to do.

We can get to the bottom of who brought this barrel on board. I don't remember it in the provisions list. We need to figure that out. It must have been someone here. I climb over Barnabos' back and overshed over shoulder. I say, there might be more! And then I duck back behind Barnabas. How do we know?

How do we solve that problem? Sounds like maybe, and then I step back out. Sounds like maybe we should follow Bonobos sleep. I am no captain, Mr. Stavis coach. I never pretended to be. But what we need to do is make sure that every single one of these barrels that could fit a creature that size is checked.

Tonight. Let's get to down. You gotta do what we gotta do, right? And, uh, is he scratching himself? No, he's rolling his sleeves up. Oh. Yeah! Oh, my, is ripping the skin off!

Ruh! Oh, yeah. Kuhl the child. Destroy the child. Um, no, he rolls his sleeves up, and, uh, and is preparing to get to work. Uh, you, you, you heard him. Uh, uh. Every, every Hawkshead, every Darrow?

Boy, I think so unless we are able to, if there's some sort of log, who's the, the quartermaster, which one? We would know who the quartermaster is, right? Walker Clemens. Mr. Clemens? Bring him up. No, I mean, question him.

Oh, you don't take it easy, Mr. Savas, coach, there's a process. I just handle the mass. I'm not, I'm not, you don't need to be pointing fingers. the boson. Oh, the boson is Fenton. Okay, Mr. Fenton. Check your logs.

Check the cargo. The Manifest. Check the manifest. Provision's list. Ah, ah. Is it the best? It's in the captain's quarters. And what I'll say is, for the purposes of brevity,

uh, you guys spend the evening the morning now, going through barrels, opening them, re-sealing in pain on death store. Wimpering in pain on death store. Yes, you're hurting, right? Yeah.

Mm-hmm. You can use a good die after, presumably if you could get a short rest after an hour. Yeah, you could get a short rest if you wanted it. If you're going to go to sleep, though, you would enjoy a long rest. Oh, I am. I'm trying to push us to some sort of a morning.

But my ears go down over my eyes, and I just go straight to sleep. At some point, you would scoop up the remains of this creature. And what do you do with the remains, Nornier? I would assume that you'd be there because you'd watch the magic of your fairy fire fade. Yeah, I would probably, yeah, I would definitely take the remains.

And I would, do I have anything? I would probably take it, I'm sure there are all kinds of containers and stuff. I would take it to the sick bay and put it in some kind of container with a lid that I could lock. So if there's some kind of latch lid, I would keep it in there. Yeah, I'd say that there's a latching locked lid container that you could put the creature in. It's a very strange sensation after the very five fades because you know you're holding onto something,

but you absolutely cannot see it. It doesn't even have like an outline or something like that. It's like holding glass underwater, but squishy. animal skin glass. Right. And you are able to slip it and it slops in. You can hear it. It's in there.

You can feel it. And then you tap it in and it goes away. So I would lock it in there but then help everybody with the barrels. The crew tears the ship apart looking for more of these creatures. And by morning, you've all, you've had a long rest because you've actually gotten some rest. And some folks actually stayed with you to make sure that you were safe and fine. and you're now standing on the top of the deck, watching the sun come up over the horizon.

Long night, Fennon says. I would have. Oh, so had a long rest. I would have spent time in the kitchen once, as the crew was going about, and I would have made everyone an extra helping maybe the salted beef instead of the salted pork, which would be a lot of.

more appetizing and break out the She-Turtle soup and I make plumbed up for like plum pudding and like make a special meal for everybody and before I got some rest I would leave a plate of it for Queenie whenever she woke up and then that would be what I'm doing then so who says some night some night Finn says he you're all enjoying the same meal now, either of top deck or in the back recreation area, wherever you would be happy to enjoy sunrides and some fresh air. It's still bitterly cold. It's still freezing. And you're still on course. There was no time to unfurl the sails. Even though there was no helmsman at the time, you have been continuing to head south. What are we going to do with Captain Bermay's

body and Mr. Yardt. Oh, who's the first? Who's the first mate? I have written down myelin, but he hasn't been very first meaty. Bring him up! We can say that it's... I kid. I kid. We can say that it's Kendrick Yardley. Did we find anything in the provisions log as far as who brought it on board? It's not, the Hogshead barrel is not listed in the provision's log.

was clearly brought on by somebody in the crew. Bullshit. Just the one, like everything else lines up. You were able to line up everything. You pull everything open. There's no just, like, water-filled container that looks like, feeling around inside the water. I mean, you guys tore this place apart.

It took you the better part of 12 a.m. to 8 a.m. tirelessly with 17 other people, or 13, 12 other people. Oh. Well, I think we should, I want this respectful customs for burial at sea. We never told us about the open eye, didn't she? No. I can't wait to die. Oh, no.

I will. I'll go, I couldn't prepare him to the body. I'll go to the captain's quarters and, you know, see what I see. Uh, make a medicine check. 18. 18. You see an eye open. It's not open.

It's like fluttered. And it's not, it's unclear whether or not that would be because the, oh no, no, his eyes were open, weren't they? Yeah, his eyes were totally open. They continue to stare at the ceiling. He seems as clammy and cold and stiff, deadlight as four corals downstairs. I'll kind of give him a once over, I'll clean him, and I'll take a little bit of water, and I'll get some sort of cloth, and I'll just sort of rub him down, and I'll take his bed sheets, or something clean and fresh, and I'll wrap him up, and I'll bring him out.

It's very appropriate for the culture. I'm sure it's what he would want. It's what we do. Um, you know, I'm... Sometimes we don't wait this long, to be completely honest. But it's... He's better to do it a day now. He's fully dressed in his...

Captain's uniform. It's an honorable burial. We'll have to be more vigilant about this sort of thing. There could still be creatures on board. I know we checked the whole thing, but this thing scares the shit out of me. I'll hand the body to one of us.

I think you are the one that should do it. Oh. We suppose. And I'll pretty, I should be able to. This is the captain for Maine that you have. Yeah. And I'll walk over to the, to the, I'll probably take it to the captain's quarters and,

and open the windows and stand towards the back. And I'll, I'll just say, uh, fair winds and following toys, wherever you may go, my captain. And then I'll just, as you were saying, as you were saying, As you were saying, Fair Winds and Tides, you hear a voice behind you.

Stop! It's the voice of Corlis Garthai. What? He's standing, having pulled himself up at the stairs. Stop! He's awake. We were awake. We were paralyzed.

Oh, fuck! Oh, he's butterfingers. And I'll have the captain. I'll be looking in absolute horror. His eyes unmoving. His body stiff, his body cold. Seemingly unbreathing, undetectable. I will then go and, like, turn like five feet to my left and put him in his bed.

I'm going to rush up to him. You are alive. You are dead, Arish. Could you perceive everything that happened? Yes. Yes, I've been awake. Ever since you put me down there, I was drunk, and I didn't know what was happening. I felt like I was just getting the spins.

And then I couldn't move. Then I couldn't move. Then I couldn't move. My eyes were closed. I could hear all around me. I felt you. Touched me. I heard the voice of everyone talking, everyone speaking about this.

creature, this beast, I knew, I knew what had happened to me. I only just shook it off. The captain, I don't know how long it was after after me, but... Thank you. I was about to examine your brains to see what the effect was. I'm glad I did not. I almost drown the captain. You couldn't have known. I'm gonna have a little bit.

No one captain. The captain eventually wakes up. But Mr. Firebush, you mind. I like you, sure. Well, he's talking to you and the crew all standing around now, wiping sweat off of his brow, his bald head, now starting to get a little bit of its color back, even in this bitter cold.

Well, that one's on me. That one's on me. I brought the barrel on board. It was supposed to be a gift. A gift for a noble house in chalk. They even said that they wouldn't see it coming. We were sabotaged. What you're saying is that this is a gift from one of the other races.

From what you tell me, it exploded because the water inside of it expanded because of the cold. It would have gotten out when they tried to hold. it as a gift when we got to shock. It was a complete coincidence. You know that there was a Chubacobra in the Soyde the Barrel? It's not a, it's called a shadower, for one thing. I don't know about this chuba-cabra business, but no, it's an elemental creature of sorts. It has a natural invisibility. It's non-magical.

It must not have... Yes, hi-Chadden. It must help me. I had a frog in my throat. This tea is delicious. They must not have expected us to go through the cold waters of Dracar. They must have expected us to take a different pass.

They must have expected us to go through the sea of fog. That's right. So no one is dead. No, thank goodness. And that had to have been the only one. Otherwise, there would have been more barrels. There would have been more creatures. They all would have broken.

My understanding is if it kills something, then another one will emerge from it and so on and so forth. Thank God that you guys were able to act so quickly. So I still have the remains that the vet is fine. It will not spawn another one as long as it does not kill. No, no, no, no. It feeds off of blood, and then I understand that it lays its seed. And if the necrotic flesh is good enough for the seed to birth to another creature, it's all very unpleasant. So how do we know that you and the drunk are all right?

Well, I guess we'll see. Ten days pass. The captain and Corlis are fine. And it's at this stage that you see the horizon. landmats emerge. That's where we'll open a nice session. Damn it, I'm tired. You made it.

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