Legends of Avantris - Icebound | Ep. 16 | Ending Start

Episode Date: December 6, 2024

Only just recovering from the dramatic events our heroes just witnessed, everything and everyone is called into question. Their very lives depend on the critical choices they must now make.   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/s0gwxKvBrBc?si=_CMJthizj0GZ9AKn

Welcome to Legends of Aventris. I'm Derek Hudson and you're listening to Icebound. Here's what happened last time. I want to do we have to do this. Yeah, we do. So start reading the script. I'm going to go get your costumes from the others up there on the stage. Finally, you must be the five.

Stop! A man from all the way in the back of the auditorium. Stop, ladies and gentlemen! It has begun! The lottery has begun! You now see five figures rode. blotchy skin, four long tentacles coming down from around its, from around their mouths, and eyes, golden yellow, like setting suns.

What is this? And it's held there before levitating from the ground with these five illipid. The center creature pulls out a dark-bladed dagger and with a swift motion slashes outward, cutting through just the very crown of sclericero's bald head. He cries out, and his eyes roll up, and his body is turned, rotated, flipped upside down. He watches his brains tumble out into the air like filling from a dumpling. What was happening to me? What are you doing? The ogre is killed again, regenerating from its natural regenerative properties, and then fed upon again.

It's then that each of these strange creatures' heads turn, locking eyes with each of you. They silently levitate forward, leaving the brain cylinder behind and float above and behind each of you now, out of view, and you can only look as they land behind you. A tremendous crowd of cheers erupt from all around you as you are freed from your paralysis and regain control of yourself. I'm not really old our souls, are we? No, no, no. No, we're not, Mr. Fireblossom. And these brain-eating squid fellers, they think that they can be our captors, our herders, like we are cattle waiting to die, waiting to be fed upon.

I would rather die a thousand times just the way that he did, and accept that these creatures hold the key to my freedom. We've all dreamed of the library. That's not a coincidence. I... I'm not going to marry you. I don't care what gifts you have from who. You, we've barely spoken our whole lives. This is not some game? And she pushes him back.

This has anything in this house, it's cursed. It's you. And she pulls out the scroll, and she immediately uses it on Tito. Something transforms in Tito. Everything seems to break out into chaos as Tito immediately pulls his hand back and smashes into Minerva. Crushing into her with a heavy blow. She's hit. Oh!

No! No, no, no. He points his wand, and for all of you, the pendants, and you fall unconscious and go into darkness. Uncertainty. You start to peek around, and you can see looking up the bodies of not just Tito, but also the commonest, or gustus, lie dead at the side of madness. You are but mere insects to us, insignificant and disposable. We have the power to control your every thought and action, to bend your will to our own. Your minds are open to us, and your fate rests solely in our hands.

Do not dare to think of escape, for we will know. Do not dare to interfere with the order we have created, for it is perfection in its design. Your only hope is to comply with our wishes and live out what remains. of your pitiful lives, here in peace. Sophilith may have other plans for you, plans beyond your wildest nightmares. Know this, we are always watching, always listening, one wrong move, one thought of rebellion,

and your fate will be sealed. This choice is yours. Choose wisely. It is late evening on the 23rd day of the 12th months, the night of the full moon. But tonight, if one were to look up to the sky, they would not see its shining face. Instead, storm clouds shroud the city of Ogerton in shadow. The muted sound of heavy rain can be heard beyond the walls and roof of the lavish villa that surrounds you. Recovering from your fleeting moment out of time and space, these thoughts reverberate within

your mind, mind, in, in, pattern, patterns, circles, circles, circles. Thoughts that you do not think yourself. It feels impossible to know what is truth and what is deception, even in your own mind now. This sense of uncertainty is further heightened as you stare stupefied at the confused scene before you. Two bodies. Those of Tito and his father, comidus, Gurgustis, governor of the House of Commerce, lay bloodied on one end of the room. Lifeless, motionless, save for the flickering light of the fireplace that illuminates their massive forms. At the other end of the room, you see a scene of

panicked sorrow and remorse. Mannyus, the intelligent ogre you have come to know as the governor of the House of Knowledge rocks gently back and forth against the wall, tightly clutching his crying daughter, Minerva. It's all right. It's all right. It's all right. What has happened during the brief time you were unconscious? What can be done about the otherworldly danger you now know commands and controls the people of Ogerton? How can you save yourself in such a place, let alone any others? What happens next is up to you.

Are we on the floor? Yes, you are prone, and looking up at this scene, the size of Mannyas and Minerva being appropriate to the scale of the room, certainly, but you can see the furniture is all pushed over, displaced. There's clearly been quite a commotion all around you. Tyshen, as you're coming to, you also, feel a pretty tremendous pain in your arm, as though something perhaps happened during the battle, maybe got hit by something. The rest of you are still blearyed, confused. It's that same sensation

as you first woke in Ogerton, but muted perhaps for the short period of time you seem to have been awake. What? What? What has happened? It's all right. It's all right. It's all right. It's all right. Why did you do that to us? Are they dead? Yes, they're dead. If you mean you use the wands in order to activate your bangles and put you to sleep, that was that was that was that was that was that was comidus doing. He was seeing that you were a threat to his son.

It's okay. It's okay. It's okay. Manius makes emotion and sort of starts to get up with Minerva and quickly shifts her to the couch and sets her down. You can see tears in her robe and tears in his, bloody. But behind and through those tears, you see healing flesh almost nearly now totally regenerated due to the nature of these ogres. What happened here? It all, it all happened so quickly, and I, after you all passed out, you have to understand, of course, we, uh, there was a brawl.

I, I, I, I had to stop Tito, of course, of course, of course. And I did what I had to do. I, I, I defended Minerva. It's all right. Of course. But, I. I had to take his life in order to stop him. He was mad. He was crazy.

He was insane with rage. I don't understand it. I don't know what happened. He's now looking sort of 50,000 foot yard, 50,000 yards there. He's replaying in his mind and he goes quiet for a moment, still processing what he's experienced in this moment. Is it possible that the madness is spreading? The madness. that I've never seen an ogre act like

Tito had in that moment Minerva did you do anything other than read that scroll at him? The scroll of removed curse? No, father, no, I... I... I didn't expect what happened either. I don't understand it. Thank you for defending me. I did what my... I must.

I did what I had to do. After that, it was comatous. He saw what I did to Tito, and it was only because the two of us. Don't worry, Minerva. It's all right. I got the killing blow. I got the killing blow. It's going to be all right.

It's going to be fine. This may happen again. Do you understand? How? If the madness is spreading. What are you talking about? She cast that spell on him, and that's what happened. why would it spread like that

unless she starts casting spells on other ogres? If others find out about this it could be used as a weapon against your house. Minerva, what made you use that scroll against him? Why would you think to

what would you think to cleanse him or remove a curse? I thought that it would be a funny joke I didn't I didn't expect it to cause such a reaction

I didn't think he was really cursed with anything I thought that he uh uh uh that I would just destroy the gift that he gave me and and and I did it out of spite I didn't think that

it would unlock whatever whatever was unlocked inside of him the other houses we'll find out about this that's exactly right I have committed a great sin. I will never get into ogre heaven now.

Well, that's probably for the best. Is there any place where we can dispose of these that's a bit more discreet? What do you mean dispose of them? I know I've created a great taboo here. I've killed as two ogres. Don't you understand what that means? Don't you understand?

I'll never be with my ancestors. I'll never join them in all the great halls. I'll never see Sotheleth. I'm sure that's very difficult for you to process. But we are planning to get out of here, and I think it'll be a little bit more difficult for us to move about Ogerton if there's all out civil war.

And lies. Here's the thing, if they find out one way or another. Who are they to do? to say who gets into Ogrehaven. We are from there directly. Yes. You were, you slayed them in

fair combat. You were defending yourself and your family. Yes, yes, of course, yes. You can put in a good word for Anius. No, we will defend you when the other houses come for you. But to do so, you must

remove these bengals from around our necks. The other house. They may not understand, but I, I, I, I, I can't think of them right now. The scandal that this represents is, is nothing compared to my immortal soul, my ogre. Nature will, will vanish into oblivion. I'll become nothing itself and end all things. No, no, no, I need to go to do more, to do more, to, to, uh, contact.

to contact the heavens, to tell Sopholeth that this was, this was right, that it was justified that I couldn't, I couldn't have stopped it that I had to protect my daughter.

Well, to, you know, on your on your on your point here, I mean, you help us. Yotnard. Oh, my bad. I suddenly caught my throat, a frog caught my, make a deception, Jeff.

Helping old Yotanar here. I'm good at that. I know I am. Let me take a look at the screenshot you sent me. You help us by getting these bangles off our throats, then, you know, you're one step closer to maybe that ogre heaven. Deception, you say. Well, I rolled like crap. I got a 12.

12. Yes, yes. I'm willing to do anything, anything at all to help, to get to... In that moment, you hear the voice of Minerva. Father, it's obvious they're not. lying to you. Don't you see they're not ogre gods, they're not demigods.

They're not demigods. They're not vassals, but they're not lying. No, no, no, no, no. They've already proven themselves. I'm sure that the play would have gone swimmingly. I'm sure they've demonstrated the ogre

strengths. This one, his language is coming back, and they're all I'm sure going to have the The language of our ancestors very soon. Father, you're not listening. It's obvious. They're deceiving you, father.

Now, excuse me, young lady, but it is your actions that just caused the death to people. I think we should be talking about that right now, don't you think? She immediately goes back to the panic and sorrow and guilt and shrinks down, as much as an ogre could shrink. I hate to say that, because I know that your daughter is clearly in despair right now, but as we come from over heaven,

I think it is important that we shed a light on her sins today. She is clearly not in her right mind, and she is acting out of character. It has been a long day. It has been a... You think they're lying? I wouldn't lie. I thought perhaps you've been with them longer.

I don't know, really. I just... It seems like there's more here that we don't understand. Well, let's all take a minute. What I am trying to say is that the few leave these bangles around our necks you, your whole family, everyone you know, will likely die. What makes you say that? If this madness spreads and gets out, they learn that you killed other ogres, what's stopping them from coming for you?

Do you think you could hold off the forces of the other houses? There will be an investigation, but I don't think they would risk their own. immortal souls in order to attack me it's unheard of. What I've done is perhaps the worst thing that I could do

in the eyes of our religion or our gods. You're absolutely right. They would have a trial if they were in their right minds. Exactly. But did you not just kill

two of your own kind? Because one of them wasn't. So you're put in faith that they're all going to be just fine after what you've seen here today. What makes you all think that we're going to start losing our minds? That perhaps the madness is finally affecting ogres. This is no president. Then explain to me what happened to that young boy. I cannot explain it.

I have no idea. We... Why did it happen to him? It was your daughter's fault? The same spell scroll that was used on you. It didn't make you mad. All right, but I'm trying to think about this from the perspective of one of the other ogres, right? Your daughter did that to him and then he died.

They're going to lock her up. You'll never see her again. She's dangerous now. You can't explain how it happened. How can you be certain that it was the same spell that was used on us and she didn't do something to it? I'm just not sure. I... Now she's your daughter.

You trust her. But she's not their daughter. So they won't. I'm not... I need time to think. Just... Does everyone... We are quite calm.

We're suggesting a very reasonable solution to the problem that you've gotten us all into. Discretion is usually not our strongest suit, at least not mine. but here we might need to put aside punching sharks and punching with sharks and use a little deception and subterfuge so that all chaos and hell does not break loose no the last thing we need is deception

he sits and thinks for a long while and then turns back and starts to reread through his notes he starts to turn he's looking at each of you and you can see he's thinking as hard as he can even with the surge of emotion that's going through him

he's trying to rationalize or put together the pieces trying to use logic to the best of his ability and struggling he seems full of doubt uncertainty and inability to choose to believe his daughter or to

hear you to explore the options you're presenting to him, Minerva sits quietly waiting and watching, also in many ways in shock. I've got a potentially dumb question, if you're open to hearing it. This? Yes.

Oh, well, we were trying to help you and your daughter by subduing Tito before we were unceremoniously knocked out. Do you not have your own wand? Would you not have reversed that? And now the wand, you know, that old Gorgustis has, sitting right there, right? There's no time. I reached to my wand.

I put a barrier of protection on my daughter so that Tito would think twice. And he came after me. I was able to subdue him with some of the missiles that I am able to expel from this wand. He went down and, and then Comedus was upon both of us. I know Minerva, you started to help too.

I still believe I had the killing blow, but there wasn't time. It all happened so fast. I could have, I could have woken you, yes. I could have. All right, all right. I'm sorry. I didn't think I could have used all of your help and your strengths.

if you just joined me. I'd like to walk up towards where the bodies are just a little bit closer to him, clutching my arm. And I just want to take a quick glance. You said that I think that their clothes were like shredded. I don't want to like get super close and like really inspect, but I want to see the cursory glance. You sort of corner the eye, like getting a sense of what's going on.

If I get any kind of sense of what it looks like, So he just said he shot him with like magic missile. I want to get a sense of if it looks like that that was the case. Make a perception check. 13. With a 13, you look down. It's hard to not turn your head and try to get a good look because of the limited dim light in this space.

Even with candles here and a fireplace, they're very much in the corners. And you look down and it doesn't. appear that what he's telling is the truth. They're clearly like blasted holes in the robes. There's un-regenerating flesh, you know, torn open and seemingly burned, perhaps, by some magical effect. Even a cursory glance at as close as you are, you start feeling very confident that this is clearly the effect of whatever spells or magics that Manius and Minerva know. Manias, you brought us out of the cold. Ever since we've been here with you, you've been good to us.

You've trusted us with your family, with your home, like a part of the house. You bear a terrible burden right now. You face a horrible situation. Whatever you think of us, whatever you think of what's happening right now, you can trust. that we want to help. How do you think we move forward here?

I think we... I think we make some... I think we make some coffee and we talk through. We decided what to do about these bodies. We decide how to proceed. Whether or not I break another rule and perhaps remove your bangles. What we do about the other houses?

What we can do about my ultimate fate? With the governor of religion having just recently been replaced, I don't know if we'll be able to get much help with the church, but, Tyshen, what would you suggest we do? I think that these two are dead. There's nothing that changes that. Something happened when your daughter used that scroll to

lift something off of Tito. I don't think that's... I don't think this is the only situation in which that would happen. I think that should circumstances occur again, something horrible could befall your, not just your house, but

this whole place. I think that we're on the edge of something terrible occurring. We've just began to to see the outskirts of a larger picture. I don't know, but I think you need our help, and I think we want to do that, but we can't do that.

Shackled is your... Minerva, I am beginning to believe you. It's Tyshen, then? Tai Shen Fireblossom. I have it here. Yeah. Manius, I'm going to level with you, all right? This is not my first rodeo.

First question we got to ask here is how long are we going to, is it going to be until somebody notices that these two are missing. And what is your real name, Mr. Bone? It's scrimm. We're just going to get that out in the open right now. Scrim with two M's. Don't miss that up. You're eating it like sandwich. You're brilliant. Barnabot.

Although I do quite like the moniker of shark puncher regardless. I have punched a few sharks. Speaking of sharks, do you have any sharks nearby we can mix? The barley's up with some chum. They'll be gone. Yornear. I'm called Yornear, yes. And, uh...

Oh, my name's Queenie. Queenie Miss March if you're nasty, is what I wrote down. Oh, yeah. Are you nasty? Maybe. He reaches down and he attempts to pull out a towel almost as I like out of a habitual gesture, going back to when you first met Mannis, and realizing he doesn't have one, just...

runs his hand over his bald head. Have you been lying about everything about, oh, your, your, your, your, your ogre nature? So yeah. Because I would have removed your bangles, yes. Well, not the whole time. I really did think I was Shoghatha the Black Rock for quite a while there. It really wasn't until today that it dawned on me.

We were gaslighting a little better. Gaslighting Mr. Fireblossom as well as all of you. He really convinced me he was having memories and dreams. I'm quite persuasive when I really could see it, you know? I want to go on record, too, as saying, I did not come up with the name Mr. Bones. If it had been up to me, it would have been something way cooler. That'd all makes sense now, yes. Mr. Bones is the coolest name that we had?

It's all right. I don't know about very cool. I don't know. I think Fiona Smash Mountain is pretty cool. I agree. I mean, it really played. into some of the stuff you did in that fight. Give that guy osteoporosis.

Yes, he got to be all right. I'm just kidding. I don't care. We need to focus on what's actually happening there. I'm sure he'll be fine. He's just two inches shorter now. It's very strange. It's disgusting. That's normal. People start to shrink as they get older.

Yes, well. Father, they're not vassals either. I think we have to remove the bangles and find out more, don't you? I know they've been lying, but I still kind of trust them. They've been in our house as our family. For these past few days, there are no threat to us, I don't think. No, I wouldn't hurt you.

I mean, to be fair, without your prompting, we jumped in to protect your daughter. Good enough. He reaches down. And step forward, Queenie, please. Oh, sure, absolutely. I'll hop forward. Fiona, I mean, Queenie, and he wands across the front of the bangle, and he murmurs a few words in Giant. And like an airplane safety belt, one side freeze and you immediately feel the pressure release and drop from the back of your neck and ends against the tiled floor with a light clatter.

Look at how matted down my fur is right there. I'm going to have that ring around my neck or why. I'm sorry. Oh, that's all right. Is she a scar on her neck? She does not have a scar. You do not see any sort of a surgical or wound-like mark on her neck at the trachea area. What you would have heard, Yornear, is release the bangle.

Bengals mangles! What could it mean? Yep, I'm ready. Nope, nope, no, this right here. Come on, get this off. Mr. Boone, yes? Yep. What are you like Mr. Bowles? Release the bangle. I thought it was quite good.

Ah, ha, ha, ha, we're free! Yes! Ah, yes, yes, yes, yes, of course, go, go, so click. He speaks the words in turn for each of you, Taishen. He speaks your names, you're near T.E. He speaks your name, and with just a few words, you feel freedom. suddenly this weight

drops from your shoulders not just the pressure on your necks but you realize that if you wanted to you have complete agency, if you wanted to you have autonomy, if you wanted to, you could leave, you can go wherever you want, you're no longer subject to whatever these one's

powers may be, you are released. A brief thought of murderous intent washes over screen, but he doesn't let the intrusive thoughts win. He steals something. Barnabos would definitely notice that and start to feel a little bit like himself. Do these seem fragile at all now that the magic has gone? Because basically, Barnabos would, if you got into sense that he could break it in his fist,

he would. These are still magical. Okay, right. And so you perhaps try to turn it into diamond. A bit of blood comes down. Yeah, yeah. It would. It would.

And then I just throw it down. I want to scan the room and see if I can see where Gustus is one. Oh, make a perception check. My Derek message is. Yes. D&D Beyond is down right now. So we're unable to... It's back up.

Oh, is it up now. 14? With a 14, you turn and perhaps it's your height. But as you are thinking about this, you are looking at getting up on one of these large COFA cushions perhaps to sit down and just underneath, having rolled there to a stop, there does appear to be the free wand of ominous. You do not see Tito's wand anywhere.

I'm going to head on over to it, and I'm going to pick up. You do that. That's all. Well, are we all not feeling any madness or anything? We're all cool. Oh, yeah. No different than usual. Okay.

Yonner, can you take a look at my arm? Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. in the commotion I stepped on you. What? You stepped right over me. Well, it was a very violent time. That's gonna be a, oh, that's a bad bruise.

You think it's gonna leave a mom? It was the heel. It really went in there. I'm sorry. But I was so far away from everything. I could feel your biceps shift under my foot. You would have had to been in the action and then come like 40 feet over to me. I stepped on me and then go all the way back over there. I was not back. I nearly fell.

I was fighting for my life. You're protecting your daughter. You walked 40 feet in my direction and step on me? I'm not 900 pounds. I got 40 feet back? Pichens. How's it supposed to make me feel? Is this your first time experiencing a wizard battle?

They fly all over the place. And they squeak along the ground. They broke dance cycles. Oh, did you shatter his wand, too? Oh, yes, oh yes. And then I made him in a really cool fashion slide to the edge of a tower and just hover there. And you know, your bruise is like being a gold.

I love that scene. It looks like iron now. That's strange. Oh, no. It's dull now. Oh, well, you're on there, I'm fine then I guess. Bacon! You hear him shout out for his principal.

The vassal who is his head of his house. The sound of the rain, hitting the windows, pelting against the surface of the roof of the villa, fills the space. and you find yourselves the seven of you all sitting in this reading room, waiting, talking, trying to sort out what to do next, waiting for perhaps bacon to come. And Manius turns, we have much to discuss. Well, given, again, past experiences, I'd say we've got about 16 to 18 hours maximum if we really push it before anybody notices these two are missing.

Who knew that they were here? I wouldn't be able to say they called upon us. They came here. Tai Shen, those are called loose ends, and we should tie them up as quickly as possible. Oh, okay. I think we moved them into the cellar, into one of the cool rooms there and underground

to make sure that they are preserved and we treat them respectfully honestly. We've never dealt with a dead body before. I can't imagine. Let's go lower than that. Not quite with the respect. Well, yes, I have with the respect. We're going to go lower, bring him the sewer.

Oh. Why don't we just throw them into the pit? No, no, no. Bonobos is onto something here. I mean, these bodies are going to start to stink, and I mean, the whole town is going to know very soon. Is this a tradition? Is this something to respect the dead? Yeah, it's a tradition called saving your ass, okay? We've got to get on this.

I'll consider it. We do bury our dead at sea, and given that the great body of black water beneath the city is the closest thing we had to that, that would be mighty respectful as far as I estimate. Would we be able to recover the body if we need to give it to the family? I don't know how people are going to respond. I don't want to keep it. No, no, we're not going. No, they have disappeared and were never heard from again. Perhaps they ran off to hunt things and died by a bore.

To Mr. Scrimm's point, they, they've been. may have told others they were coming here. Their carriages out front. They're polar bear. They're just out there in the rain. Well, what are those men of? We can burn those. No problem. You want to burn the polar bear? No, the carriages. Not the polar bear.

Goodness gracious. We're trying to keep a low profile. Do you know how loud a burning polar bear will yell? Goodness, gracious. What are you with amateurs? It's a very grim Coca-Cola commercial. I'm sorry. If we were to dump them in the water, we would need to tie stones to their bodies or something. No, you just poke a bunch of holes in there. I mean, yes, stones would be very good. But no, for now I think we do just put them in the cellar's a backup option.

just while we talk about what we need to do, right? I mean, come on. Well, are we not, if we put them in the sewers, we're not going to, they're going to get disposed of. Well, that's what I'm saying we wait, all right? That's plan B. If we really need to get rid of them, if we need to dispose of them, which we probably will,

I need you to stay with me here, Mannyus, then we'll take him to the sewer, all right? You all hear this heavy breathing sound and turning to the entrance, you can see Daisy, who's clearly been sprinting through the house. is standing there, and she's gotten the largest, fuck you, two-handed cleaver that she could have found perhaps in the kitchen, maybe from the barn.

And she's standing there looking and seeing the scene and seeing you all sitting with two bodies. Oh, thank God, Daisy. I thought we were going to have to kill somebody. Zero, come in. It's all right. It's all right. Just come sit down. Everything's all right. We're working this out. I know. I know. Don't panic. Panicking is the worst thing that you can do right now. Just come on over and and sit down with us. And she clutches the cleaver, but, like, walks in and she, like, looks over at Manias and Minerva sitting there,

suspicious, not trying to pick up on the game, perhaps, just trying to understand what's going on, given the fact that she's never seen two felled ogres in a room before. All right, Manias, I'm going to say this one time, so you better listen really close. She is with us. It's a package deal. Do you understand that? I remember you negotiated that when poor Cometus

when we negotiated for you. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Alcatra is a member of our whole family now, just as you are. Well, I guess you are sort of in between. I understand. The point is I understand. All right. She needs to have her collar removed as well.

A vassal? Yes. That is not negotiable, man is. Packaged deal, just like I said. Thank you, both of us. Now I... That's... She is also not a vassal.

She is a free woman who can come and go as she pleases. Just like the rest of us. Unlike yourselves, she didn't arrive here or may. She was in the house of commerce for her whole life. Oh, that changes nothing. She was born without one of those, and that makes her have a right to live without one of those. Packaged deal, as Mr. Stabberstock says,

make a persuasion check. I'm gonna use two twists. I'm gonna use two twists I'm like, is Barnabos's brain gonna get fried and turn into a pissing cat? No, no, no, wrong. I'm like, how does that matrix add up? Persquation.

16. 16. Now, I've gone quite far believing in the five of you you look different you have the power of speech there's no reason

I hear you but I need more to understand what is going on what is happening Manning us help me help me understand why why would any of the the natural order for centuries

why would I break all the rules I can't just give you everything you want you've gone far but I can't promise you this right now, you have not gone nearly far enough. And if you want you yourself and your daughter to make it out of here alive, you're going to have to go much, much farther. And all you want you to hear me is that what you are up against, you have no idea, you cannot fathom.

We are your only hope. Or you and your daughter will be devoured by fiends from the deep. Making an intimidation check. I think we can fucking go. I turn my head into Cthulow. I hope those are up themselves. His bread free will split it along. That's still, I think, one of my favorite drama jokes. Okay, I'm provision in intimidation. I'm gonna use two twists.

Smuggins. Thank you, chap. Thank you, Jeff. 16. Wow. Okay. That's fine. That's good. That's good. Okay. I'm gonna bring out this guy. Now listen here, Bonobos. I am willing to hear you out.

I know how strong all of you are. Certainly I saw that in the hippodrome, one of my favorite words. However, I'm not about to go freeing the peoples of this, disrupt the entire order of things. No, no, no, no, I... Minerva pops up. Father, I think that we made a mistake, removing their bangles. Exactly right.

And he stands up. I think that we've made a terrible mistake. Alcatra, get your cleaver. She. I'm going to need you to hold on right there. Your near, and I'm going to hand him the wand. You do it. Bangle shmangle.

You reach forward. And you bangle shmangle, and it clicks, and it falls back behind and rolls off of her shoulders. And you look up in it. into Daisy's eyes and you see no pupils there. Instead, they are glowing with sickly yellow light. And you look up and you look into the eyes of Manius and into the eyes of Minerva.

And they are glowing as well. Their eyes suddenly sickly, I need everyone to roll initiative. I am going to use my ability so that we get... Oh, the, what's it called? The Antinitiative. First strike. March of the Hare. Oh, that's good.

Oh, that's good. Oh, I thought it was called, I got B. Oh, wait. Have we had a long rest? No. No, no, I don't, because I do not have a spell slot. Holy shit, we've done so much. Yeah, you guys have not been playing Dungeons and Dragons.

You forgot that we were playing. Dungeons and Dragons. This was the Hippodrome today. It was yesterday, but we didn't slake. Yeah. And we had the combat against them and then got knocked out. You got around for 30 minutes. Out of resources.

That's what I got for spell. Oh my God. I always go last in combat, so I have everything. You know, Derek always draws a map. No, we took whether it's for fun or not. We've taken a short rest, though. Yes. Although, because I get my spouse back.

You would have had a short rest on your way back from the Hibodrome. No, no, from the lottery. Okay. From the water. That would have been like a two-hour. Scrim cried the whole time. I didn't really remember. Yeah.

Sitting in silence. Fucking hell. heal up real quick from that Fort Rose was angrily craving root beer. He was drinking his root beer. Not mad. You're mad. I'm just disappointed. You're mad. What was that? 13. A 13. Oh, nice. Yeah. Right. So, let's fucking go. This is a nightmare. And we'll go 20 to 30.

22. 22. Damn. Queenie. It's hard and cool. And if you're not hard, cool, that's a good thing with Rangers. And let's go 15 to 20. Oh, I got a lot.

18. 18 for your near. Let's go here, which means this goes here. 10 to 15. 13. 13 for Tyshen. Let's go 5 to 10. nine

seven all right warm it up guys come on I rolled very poorly this is an adaption to those cards they're fully over the top thank you thank you

oh we're scrimmed right here seven okay um I got a plan I got a plan Derek you all stare into the eyes

of your friend Daisy and see that she has somehow been commanded, somehow is being controlled, somehow is being puppeted and she's holding a big fuck you cleaver. You see

the eyes of Manius and his rage being pushed in the way that he was by Barnabos is not what is now controlling his actions and neither is the same true for Minerva. You are under threat and

being challenged. Response perhaps by the creatures who observe all thoughts and actions in this strange place. Top of the round. Queenie, you're up. I lied about having a plan. I have no plan.

Why won't this music go? Yeah, we can't, like, this is bad. If we don't have a way to, like, restrain them, like, they're going to just send them out as to a weapon. Oh, fuck. You didn't keep your bow? It's been taken from her. It's been taken from me.

We haven't had to the bow. I borrowed a bow during the Coliseum match, but we had to give all that stuff back. Oh. Well, I'm still in my full costume, regalia. Great. That doesn't give you a weapon. That's fair. Your costume is made of plastic.

I'm glad that you're I'm sorry. I'm wondering full of a armor. Um, 40% off. Would the needles that Barnabos had requested from the thing count as darts to be thrown that he could offer to Queenie at some point? The needles remind me.

For the tattoos. I was going to tattoo all of us to order us. Oh. Ward also goes. Right. I will give straight needles, but I do not think proficiency could be at it. So it would be, it would be,

fake out, but just make sure everybody I would say, I would say you could throw it, but it wouldn't, it would be hard to hit with and not do perhaps a little bit as much damage. So it would be just 1d4 plus one, I think for, for darts. Okay, I can look it up. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, well, it would be for Queenie. I don't know if she is proficient with darts at all. I'm not. Oh. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna hop over to Mannyus, and I'm going to slap him in the face. And miss.

Snap out of it. What did you get? Is mine? 11. Okay, you miss. Bob, you actually do hit. It's easy enough for you to run up Mannyus and do this. It does one point of damage.

It's like, it's like punching one of those boxing bags. It seemingly does no damage to him. He barely reacts and he looks at you with grim malevolence and cruelty. You're near, you're up. I will say, oh is, wait, so hold on, just so that we know, where would Daisy be in the reality, would she be in the doorway here?

I put her where she is. Oh, in the middle, on my couch? Yep. So I did miss though. You're just flavoring that you slap. I'm just flavoring that you slap. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a fun trick for all you DMs out there.

You can say like, no, no, no, you hit with the arrow. It just like bounced off the armor. Yeah, armor class. It just didn't matter. Still having the molasses that I requested a day ago, two days ago now. Ooh. I will say, we must do what we can to make this as non-lethal as possible, but we may have no choice.

And I'm going to swirl my hands around. and you'll see this blowing, billowing kind of snow and frost start to articulate, and then I'll blow it out to, let me make sure I can choose. Yeah, otherwise we're gonna be like, ah! I guess Fireball. Six o' guys, six of your choice

and a 40-foot cube, which should be, yeah, is the whole thing. So it's gonna basically, this chill will kind of erupt out of us, or out of my arms, and cover all of us, and around Mannyus, Minerva, and Daisy, their skin and joints and muscles will start to get cold and stiffen as I cast slow on them. Oh, terrific.

And I will, they need to make a WIS saving throw, DC-16. Good choice. Manny's passes with a 17. And Minerva is slowed. And does Daisy pass? Oh. That's very funny. I suppose I should roll for help.

I would know that she's an enemy of her as an ally, but you're right. I need to go get her stat block up. Combat music. This is like the valley of spirits. Oh, uh, oh yeah. It's also in. She fails. Okay, so they're both slowed.

They have a minus two AC and they have minus two on deck saving throws. They can't use reactions. They can only use an action. or bonus action, not both. They can't take more than one melee or rage attack during their turn. If they attempt to cast a spell, it's probably important. With cast time of one action, they have to roll a D20 on an 11 or higher. The spell doesn't take effect until the creature's next turn.

And the creature must use its action on that turn to complete the spell. If it can't, the spell is wasted. Okay. So if Minerva were to attempt to cast a spell, she's going to have to roll a D20, and on a 1 through 10, she cannot cast it until the next turn? And at the end of their turn, they can re-save. Okay. You all watch as this slowing effect impacts, all of them,

with the exception of Mannyus, who seems to shake it off. And it's his turn, and he immediately turns, pulling out his own wand and pointing it directly at you, Your Honor, seeing what a threat you are and how you've already impacted his allies. It's a robotic motion that he makes. He doesn't say anything. He just points and fires.

And in but a moment, you are going to have to. And just while this is happening, now that I know that I can just pick it up and say words in giant and it works, I want to be very, like, listen very closely about the words they're saying to use these ones. Good. Fuck them. That's... Bangles-Samengal. Bangal-Schemngle.

I am curious. Time for it to dangle. He does speak a word in Giant as he casts this spell. And you hear it. Yes, it's got verbal component. So he casts confusion. He says the word confusion. And...

Confusion. Bangal. And I'm trying to join. Confusion, slum fusion. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I needed to make a wisdom saving throw. Thoughts where I'm a Viking. And I look at my costume.

Nice. I crush it. I just absolutely destroy it. There's no way I don't pass. Whiz? 24. Yeah, he passed. He says these words at you, and you like are so focused on your own magic,

but you like shrug on. whatever hits you, this arcane feeling that comes through, I'm sorry, not arcane, this magical feeling that hits you. And you are, that'll be the conclusion of Manius' turn. He stays where he stands. Tyshan, you're up. Can't we all just enjoy a, oh no. Queenie, quick, drink this tea.

All right. Oh, nice. And I cast, I'm still coming up with the name, but it's really pretty bad. It's really pretty bad actually, but I cast Dragon's Breath. Nice! At a third level, which will give you the ability to cast Dragon's Breath as an action, which is 4D6 and 15, in a 15 foot cone.

And it's really repeatable for like a minute. Yeah, yeah, as long as I have to hold concentration on it, I believe. Yeah, but it's good. But yeah, for a minute you can cast it. Um. Well, this stuff's real. spicy tachin. Yeah, it's not very enjoyable, but it allows you... Does that smell like rotten eggs?

Um, no, no. But it allows you to speak with the voice of the dragons. Oh, alright. The spicy curry from Super Smash Bros. Yeah, yeah. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. It's amazing. And then I'll also just fire off a firebolt at, um,

at, um, manias, yeah, I guess. Yep. Yep. And fire, just, you know. Minerva has minus 2 AC, if that effect. And Minerva is here I was talking about the whole time. That was minute. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, you can see that. You can see she's, yeah, I could see that. She's got minus 2 AC right there. She's turning and being like, like, oh. Okay, and that will be a 23. That hits.

Landfall for damage. Um, oh. 2D10. That's the only way that I have a level three spell slot is because they have that wizard feature on Fort Rose. Oh no, it's not even a nervous turn yet. Before Barnabultz is turn, I was wondering if I could shout something. Oh, I'll allow it.

Okay. Uh, nine points of fire damage. Nine points of fire damage. damage to Minerva and she doesn't react because she's in slow motion, essentially. The firebolt crashes into her and sparks and embers fly out in all directions, but she's so focused and intent on completing whatever her next objective is. All that happens is it scalds, and you know that even in this slowed state that they'll be regenerating soon.

That being said, she does turn and start to complete her action. And she also has turned towards Barnabos to attempt to cast a spell. And speaking the words, missile in giant, she gets a 16. And all of a sudden, five darts of insane energy that you've never seen before flies out towards you, Yornear, and it's magic missile. Well, you roll the 16. Yeah. So if it's, so technically I'm supposed to roll and if it's high.

Oh. The magic missiles can't. Oh. It's slow. Oh. You'll have a next turn. Well, yeah, I could re-roll if you. Yeah, basically the person that's slow will roll.

That's why high is bad for the enemy and not go. So 16 would mean that it delays the spell to next turn. I misunderstood what you were saying. Okay. Give me another shot. Unless you wanted to take your 16. I mean, if you roll. No, no, no, no.

Let's do it as written. Okay. That's the whole point in this campaign. Let's go. Natural 20. Oh! Wait, man, we are on fire at this table. Let's work it up.

Hell yeah! She does this and the, you can see these like needle-like spikes start to coalesce around the glass orb like this and they are turning towards you one after the other and you know that the spell is about to be released, but you're ready to move. Yeah. She gets to re-roll her safe against slow.

Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you. I've forgotten how to do everything. She gets a natural one. Oh, boy. She's still slow. So before you go, Barnabos, Scrimm yells out. As all of this hell is breaking loose,

I look to Barnabos, seeing that he's just acting more, he's reacting faster than I can, and I shout to him. Bonnebos, get the bigans. I'll deal with Daisy. I'll nod at Scrim and I'll say, oh, that was my plan. And with that, I will turn to Mannyas as saltwater douses me.

I'm covered in barnacles and starfish and sea life. And I will just walk towards him like very slowly as my skin shifts. And once again, I just get these massive crab claws where my hands are. And I'll say, no more gains, no more. No more lies. All of us are born free. Free every single one of us and some don't believe it. Some try to take it away. And if anyone tries to take away my freedom, I will not hesitate

to take theirs. And I'm just going to go fucking ham with my crab clause. You can move up to... Yeah. Mannyus, yep. Recklessly. Manny assistance. What does battle came on? You'll see that. The first one will hit.

Oh. Nine plus eight is 17. Yep. AC is 15 for both. NERBA and Mannia. And then I'm able to, oh man. I'm able to attack. I have two attacks, right?

Yep. That'll hit. And then I'm going to just see how claws work. Okay, so three attacks. So then I roll, sorry about that. One, two, three. Okay, good, worse. Eight, nine, plus, twenty-one, thirty points of slashing. Sweet, crows. I am just tearing into mani, it's with my big old crab claws. You do that, and you are pulling strips of flas.

flesh down and away through his already tattered robes. And blood is spilling out. It's a violent scene. And he isn't screaming. He is, the man if you know, distant and far away. He turns and just immediately looks at you with these eyes and starts to go in towards you. Do I get the sense that this is, that the thought eaters,

the squid-faced fucks are seeing through this? Making intelligence check an advantage. Yeah, I'm trying to keep all minute knowledge out of my brain right now. But, like, given the sense of what I would think an ogre would be, wow. Intelligence or straight intelligence is 19. With a 19, I'd say the answer is absolutely. You get a sense that there is something controlling Mannyus. This is not the person you were arguing with, but seconds ago.

You had your disagreement, but for them to immediately go into this after everything, you've been through after everything you're talking through and the nature of their motions, expressions, and reactions to this violence, it's like they're someone else. As I get that realization that I stare into his eyes, I'm just tearing him apart and getting no recognition of like an ogre. All just nod and I'll say, aye, hello, beasties, we're coming for you next. As I start to like it's really fucking amped up. It's grim. After shouting to Barnabos and him doing his thing, I turned to Daisy and I start to wave my hand

and I whisper under my breath, please, whatever you are, please don't hurt her. And I cast a Hexblade curse on Daisy. And then without summoning the brutal blade, I immediately run at Daisy shouting, uh, for all that, that's good and I'll pretend fake marriage. I hope you

forgive me. And I throw myself at her and I try to headbut her as hard as I possibly can. Okay. And I'm also going to use Fury of the Smalling. I'm pretending to knock her out. Okay. I'm also gonna twist this as best miss. Yeah.

I got a 19, which with Hexblades curse counts as a critical. Critical headbuck! I am not using, but the problem is I'm not rolling any dice, so I don't know how that affects my unarmed attack. You would double your theory this mall, or is that also flat damage? It's also flat damage. It's all flat damage, unfortunately. So technically, it doesn't mean anything unless Derek wants to double.

Unless Derek wants to do. So what I would say is that I am doing 12. points of unarmed strikes damage. But I technically scored a critical hit with my immensely dense goblin forehead. And the question is whether or not I would rule that the hex blade curse?

No, I just wanted to note that I scored a critical hit, but I don't get to double anything because I'm not rolling any dice. There are no dice. So the question is, would you rule any extra damage given that additional? I'm just letting you know I crit. And I did a total of 12 unarmed strike damage because I'm trying to knock

her unconscious. even if it means he did 12 without without manipulating anything it's all flat damage I don't get to roll any dice so I just want you to know yeah no no no no I crit you can think about

I'm mulling over if you know if I suffer a goblin concussion from my fake wife but that's my whole turn but I am attempting to like in later I am like I jumped on her and I headbutted because she's taller than I am you know she definitely wears the pants of the relationship what's the math of getting

so it's the unarmed strike is three because it's my strength modifier, which is nothing. Three more for the Hex blade curse. And then six damage for a fury of the small for total of full. It's all flat damage. Okay. I'm gonna say the curse and the Fear of the Small don't double,

but I'm gonna double the unarmed and give you an additional three damage. 15th because it's a crud. And if I can, I'm like, I grabbed her by their shoulders. Okay, you do 15 points total to Daisy. Yeah, and you, Like a coconut and you hit her directly right in the center of the forehead. And it, she reacts, she pulls back and you hear no sound or anything like that.

Not that she would if she had a voice perhaps given the strange possession of these people, but she holds her head like this and you can see her pained expression. She closes her eyes, rubbing her forehead. You nearly knocked her out. For the entire time that I've been running Daisy, she's had 16 help points. And at one hit point, at one hit point, she opens her eyes and you see Daisy's pupils there.

She is looking right at you. That's my whole turn. And she's rubbing her forehead like this, just a, clearly a headache. The cleaver falls to the ground and she passes her turn. You knocked some sense in you were literally. Let's fucking go.

Well fucking done. Top of the round, Queenie you're up. I am still staring up at this fuck. And I'm, I've just finished drinking the tea that Tyshen gave me. And I'm like, I'm gonna... And I immediately just burst the fire all over. Tashin, what the hell did you give me? I'm sorry, I must have brooked to it strong.

Oh my God. It's not supposed to be premature. Oh, it was premature. This never happens when I cast this spell. So what do I do? I think it's a deck save. It just hits. It's his deck save. It's also a 15-foot cone.

You can get them both for sure. So you could get them both, absolutely. You would roll. So funny enough, in my head, that was gonna be a burp. But for whatever reason, it naturally came out of his bomb-upil. It's a really spicy pepper, if you ever watch one of those. Well, that's a spicy meatball. Guy in Zooks.

Mani is a deck saving pro, and he's not at disadvantage because he is not slowed, so he gets a 13. 15 is the deck shift. He is on fire then. And also her, she also has to make it. And she'll be doing an at deck. She's not as a disadvantage. She's a minus two.

Oh, just minus two. Thank you. And you rule 46. And she actually fails even harder, given her slowness. So both Mannyth and Minerva take whatever fire damage they're about to take. A wise man once said, Mmm, fire. Good.

Fire indeed. Face your destiny, queen. Rattar, fire. Eighteen points of damage. Oh, crap. It's pretty good. And that's a bonus action. No, no, no, no.

That's an action. Oh, it's an action for her to cast. It's a bonus action for me to cast to give her the breath on to someone. So it's perfect if she doesn't have a weapon. That's amazing. That was almost Felix's go-to spell, remember? Yeah.

I used Dragon's Breath, and I changed it to Flaming Orb instead. Yeah. I think he used it on Toa, right? Hey, Grib. You can just like running around like torching cracks. Yeah, both of them. Oh man, I wish you still have those videos. Hey, man.

Hey, Grim. What's up? Oh, yeah, I forgot that we don't have the session zeros for beneath dark wing, do we? That's very sad, lost the ages. You see them, again, they are taking normal damage. Despite their change in personality, they still have these physical forms,

and you are taking them down. That's the conclusion of your turn, Queenie? Yeah. You're near. Oh, she's all making my turn, that just flew by. Oh, she's... Volt and vomit on my coat. I was not expecting this.

I could animal. You know, I ever thought just animaling. She doesn't feel appropriate to animal. Poof, gorilla! No, it was basically just a minor yeti. Do I see that Daisy is back to normal? And she's like clutching her head.

She's clutching her head and I would say make an intelligence check at advantage to, or a perception check, your choice. Only perception is 28. 28. She's now doing this with, it's not just the pupils, she is behaving like Daisy and holding head and like pointing at Scrim who's like already apologizing. I will go up to her seeing that she has a pretty bad wealth. I'll say we made you further from the brink and I'm gonna put my hand on sort of the side of her head and it'll kind of glow with the warmth of the hearth as I cast cure wounds on her and she will take.

Well that's very nice. She is on the brink of death and or at K.O. That is seven points of here. I have a mighty goblin skull! She's feeling very eight. She's feeling very eight out of 16. And she... Thank you. Yes.

We need you alive. That brings us to Manius' turn, and he's going to turn and he's going to endeavor to cast the same spell that he's sees his daughter casting, and he is able to speak the words, missile. And with his action, he points, and you can see five of these all emerge. And each one fires out at each one of you,

one with the exception of Tyshen, which will go to Daisy instead. Since it's just a thing that happened, I believe that I just have to roll damage, correct? I shield. Automatically cross-match. Oh, yeah. It automatically stops it.

Very cool, very cool, okay. But that is one of my only two spell slots. That's a big resource. But it stays up. Yeah, I'm hoping I also soaked my nervous as well. Here's Yornear. It's one for each of you, except he's choosing to hit Daisy instead of Tyshan.

15D Beyond is down again. So that's going to be four points of damage to you, Yoraneer, force damage from the magic missile. Oh, wow. Okay. Do you have any of it? Do you have any left?

Queenie, you take... That's an alcohol marker. Oh, these are not D4s. Why am I rolling this? No, okay, bitch. What are I rolling D12? Yeah, right. Four points of forced damage to you, Queenie. For the record, I realized shielding this is really terrible,

but I had to do it because nobody ever cast match a missile. So, okay, I'm required. Oh no. I mean, and if anyone attacks you, it's perfect. And the final missile sails towards Daisy. And she's still rubbing her head like this. And when she sees this impossible magic flying towards her, she goes, and a shield emerges from nothing, nowhere.

And there's this explosive pop sound. And everyone is knocked back five feet by this strange concussive force from nowhere. The ogres are themselves knocked back. Everyone falls into a daze as Daisy experiences some strange shift, some strange change in her, and she's holding her hands up. Everything goes silent. All that can be heard is the rain against the windows and against the rooftop. Both Minerva and Mania slam against the back wall, sliding down and immediately looking around with the stupefied, strange, confused look on your face.

If you imagine you had not 15, 20 minutes ago, their pupils back to normal. What the fuck was that? What the fuck? Oh, oh, oh, my God. I'm going to swing in with my, uh... I will have taken with my crab claws. Um, I think I had like a big prop shark. I was hoping to just swing in and take the wooden shark and smack him across the face.

I'm attempting to knock him out. Uh, roll ahead. I'm reckless. doing it. I love that. That'll be a natural 20. And would you rule this as a great club or a

improvised weapon? It's a great club it. These are beefy fucking ogres. You can't kill him. Sure, he'll survive. I think it's one D12. We're not seven yet, are we? No, it's a brutal critical.

Yeah, no, I wish. It's 1d8. It's one D-A. I'll take it. So that'll be 3D8. Plus your rage damage. Oh, yeah. Plus your nautical damage. Plus your strength damage. I'm like laughing as I've yanked out this giant shark prop. Oh, man, that's not very good. Four plus seven is 11 points of bludgeoning damage.

Yeah, that's real bad. You smack Manius very hard across the face. Any commoner in any normal village would be killed instantly. Spitting around like a chivalricro around their neck. But given Manius's great size and ogre endurance and stamina, you smash into it, his constitution, I should say, you smash into him, oh, what the fuck? The shark snaps in half.

And they'll say, have you learned your lesson? I got one more shark laugh. Stop it, stop. Oh, stop. Oh, what's happened? What? Oh, my goodness. What's, what?

Where are? Minerva, are you okay? Yes, yes, yes. I'm fine, I'm fine. I'm fine. I'm fine. What, what, what's, what's, what's going on? What is the meaning of this?

You're near, uh, Dijin, Queenie. Do you have no recollection of what just transpired? No, we were, we were. Think. We were having a, we were asking us to, You were asking us to free the vassals, to free Daisy. How much time has passed? This is very odd. About a minute and a half.

Your benevolent ogre god decided to take the reins, so to speak. What? Oh, yeah, I'm sorry, I piqued fire all over you guys. It was really Taichens' fault. What? Something. I've got to explain O'Ira.

I have no control over it. I'll stop concentrating on the tin. Did you put Serrano in that? No, it was something else. He got it from the boat. It's Barnabos' fault. It lately scorches the Fresco ceiling of this room as you dalcim flame

into the Street Fighter 2 style into the ceiling. There are abominations. beneath the city that are controlling your minds. And they have some way to do so, even without the bangles. There's really no other way to say it. And also, has Daisy always had magic? Why, that was a shocker, let me tell you.

Did you transfer it to her when you smashed your head into hers and some kind of marriage ceremony? I mean, maybe. Maybe with some weird magic osmosis. Wow. You should try that more often. I don't know. maybe not until tomorrow. Monsters, you say.

Yes. Underneath the city. Doi. How? How? What does it all mean? This is crazy talk. This doesn't make any sense. If we are being honest, we should just tell them. I mean, how are we going to explain what we saw? I mean, nobody's going to, I don't even believe what we saw.

The lottery is not a lottery to go to Ogre Heaven. It's a lottery to have your... skull removed, and your brain devoured by squid-faced monsters. What? What? See, it sounds absurd, right? It sounds absurd, but trust me, we all saw it. You are cattle.

You and all of your ogre kin are cattle to these beasties as much as you have turned these poor people into your cattle. You have no more freedom than your vassals. You understand. They are part of the family. They're free to do as they please. I know they have their bangles, and sometimes they get a little sassy.

Fuck this guy. But it's not the same as cattle. If they can't leave the confines of this valley, they are not free. And if you can't leave the confines of this valley, you are not free. You are literally livestock. Manias.

We could prove it to you. We could take you to the waterfall. We could take you even into the sewers under your own home. Oh, the sewers. Show you the network of tunnels where they operate. Let's start again. I don't understand. This doesn't make any sense.

We, we ogres have been living peacefully here for years. Our ancestors found this town and create a paradise, a paradise here in the mortal plane so that we can learn and you're telling me that there are monsters that have somehow infiltrated and remove our skulls from our heads and that they have

strange whatever the or whatever squid is strange appearance is monster it's outrageous I must truly be mad first off yes

second of all yes third of all That's what you think, but all of this was not started the way that you think that it was started. I would bet every penny I've ever made. Copper piece I've ever made. By Sotholith, this is extreme. Oh, also, Sophalith isn't an ogre god. Didn't you think it was a little strange that the name Sophilat didn't sound very ogrely?

And instead sounded a little bit more squid monstery. Yeah, that's about as ogre as Mr. Bones is. I mean, Nerva, you were super-suffer. accepted before. Does any of this make sense to you? She's holding her wounds and shaking her head, but she looks up at her father and... I think... We have to at least hear them all out, just to have all the information, and then we can decide for our own father. I feel that they're telling the truth, or at least they think they are, and we just lost us.

We just lost ourselves some from something. What was that? Hmm. Maybe this will help you understand. When I first came to the surface as young lad, I had my first taste of beef. The surface under, from under the city. No, under the sea. The what?

Under the sea. Downward. I couldn't. I couldn't. Well done. I couldn't. From under the sea, I had my first taste of beef and my first taste of cheese. It was unbelievable, and I asked the innkeep where he found this just delicious nature of the gods. And he said from the Jolly Rancher.

And I went to decide to get my own beef. And I went to the Jolly Rancher, and they had a slogan. And it was happy milk. Or rather, the best milk and the best beef come from happy cows. You understand my meaning. Oh, that's very poignant. My goodness. I need to start writing this down. The best milk...

Happy cows, okay. Damn it, Mannius. You're not paying attention to anything that was saying. No, no, no, no, no, no. It's a metaphor for you! You are the happy cows in this instance. Do you think... that life would be this idyllic in any normal city. Have you ever been to any other city? Some people have it quite nice, but most of the people have it shed.

There's filth, there's disease, there's poverty, there's the scum of the earth like me, down by the docks. Getting into bar fights. There's none of that here. It's all perfect and angelic, and you get to go to heaven. Do you understand how absolutely insane you sound, not us? I never really thought of it. No, this is all I've ever known. It is strange to think of other cities, to think of other places beyond.

Oh, yes, all you've ever known. And just like water, when it doesn't move and change, it grows stagnant, and that's what's become of you. Soft and weak. More pathetic than any ogre I've gotten in a fist fight with. What else can you tell me about the world? These monsters.

Well, it's definitely worth mentioning that they claim that they can listen to us at any time and read all of our thoughts at all the time around the clock, whether you're sleeping or awake, so I'm sure that they're being aware of what's going on right now, even after what happened with, you know, this instance.

They're listening to everything we say? Allegedly. And the lottery, it's not... There's no heaven. There's just eating. There's just... There might be heaven. The fiddler's green. But they seem like they have the power to control everyone here. They just took you over.

We could spend all night talking about this, but if they activate any more ogres, send them here, they warned us that if we tried to act out against them, they would take swift action. We need our stuff. By Sopholeth. My wife.

My three children in the cellar. Them? Them? Them? Them, too? The dozen vassals in this house? This very house? Any of them? They could come and kill us at any time? Yes.

Allegedly. Allegedly. We saw them all controlled at the lottery. Daisy, all of them. You all turned against your will. you have no recollection of it. Well, how did... How did you...

How did you save Minerva and I? She did it. I'll turn it to be easy. Have you ever done that before? Of course, no. I have a... Real bad headache. Ah, that makes two of us.

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Don't you remember? I was asking Queenie and all of you how to make magic myself. This is, do you think that maybe it's, well, my bangle was off out in the woods before, but you took it off just before we changed. Is it possible that that's what's happening here? Oh, and Yornear was inspecting her. That's right, you wanted to take a little. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You go up and how do you inspect her? I want to basically like look into her eyes to see, because that's where I saw the glow.

But then I also think back and remember the pains we felt in the back of the neck. And I want to look at her ears too. Any basically access point to the head, like the back of her throat, I want to just sort of look to see if I can see anything that's off or any evidence that there's something like in her brain or in her head that they're using to like. And maybe they're just using the bangles, but I aren't. I took the bangle off, but it didn't stop it, but she'd already turn. So I sort of see if I didn't see anything that's out of place. You already specialized as an E&T and druidic medical school.

I was going to say the family physician, right? Like, all of a sudden, ah. You know, he's the medicine, man. You feel that nub in the back of the head. You see the scar. It's still there. It looks unchanged. Make a general medicine check.

Look, you know, you can inspect it all you want, and then maybe you'll find something, but I'm pretty sure that I'm the cause of this. I think I did. I'm just going to say it. It was a magic headbutt. That's what I was. It's not as crazy as any other explanation.

It's unlikely. Shut up. 23. 23. There's no physical change in Daisy. She looks and appears to be the same with the exception of perhaps the red welt that is now emerging on the surface of her forehead.

She's giving an attention, but it looks no different than what a welt would look like on any other forehead. No, no, seriously, you're near. In a more serious light, I mean, yes, I did some questionable things with my signature to get my powers, but I mean, it was a flip of a switch

and they suddenly appeared. It was very much like a lighting a spark, right? That's kind of what happened here. Isn't it possible that suddenly magic could just become awakened, right? That's what happened for me? Daisy, what did it feel like to draw on that power? What did it come from?

It felt like as if you had another arm, you never knew it was there. And suddenly that you could feel it, that you could reach out. It's hard to describe. Well, either I knocked something loose or maybe when those things invaded a brain, they made her aware of something inadvertently. I still feel that arm. Try and do something.

Try and polymorph scrim! Do you know that spell? No, trying polymorph scrim! That's not a good idea. Turn them into a dragon. I've been talking about polymorph for quite some time. It'd be nice to see. If it happens.

Let me try something else. And she goes over and she walks up to one of the corners and there of a bust Mariana, Nanias' wife, there. And heavy stone like this

sitting on a pedestal. Surprisingly, one of the few items in this room that hasn't been turned over or damaged by the chaos that's happened here in just the last few hours. And she and it pushes back and turns just a smidge.

Holy crap. That's a seven-level spell. Now don't hurt yourself. That's pretty good. It hurts a little to use. It's also a third-level feature for some classes. That's mechanically broken. Does it hurt your mind?

Mannyus and Minerva have stood up, and Mannyus is observing the conversation that you're all having. It's evident that it's hurting her at this point to use, but in the back you hear Manius's voice, you can speak to the vassals? How do you communicate with them? They just gesture all around and listen to what do we say. What are you doing with Alcatra here?

This is all so much to learn all at once. I don't understand it. I'm sure it is quite a bit to take in. But we don't have time to catch you up, unfortunately. What we have learned is that your captors, our captors, can listen to us right now. They can just remotely take control of, I suppose, all of you, and that we're not safe no matter where we are. What do you say is true?

We have to find safety. We have to protect our family. We have to try and vanquish these foul monsters. I don't think it's going to be that easy. There's really nowhere to run. And if they have complete control over our minds and ultimately our bodies, then we can't physically attack them at will. Well, they haven't demonstrated that they can do that with us. And they only stopped us by the power of the Bengals before.

That was the only way we couldn't approach them. I think that we need to get, we need our stuff back. I need my teapot. I need my pipe. Queen and my show. Oh. Oh, yes. You... You mean the tattered robes that we found you in? Check your notes about when you found us.

Oh, fucking brilliant. Wow. Well done, Mike. God, I never thought of that. Jokes on you. I have a knife. Go an ambulance. But not for me. One moment. This is when we can.

come to find that he just doodles in the book. He just draws like, it's like a woman. I really got the vein right on this one. No, no, it's not what you think it's a tower. Those are shrubs. Those are shrubs, I swear. In the in the combat, I had like bit so hard on the prop pipe

that I just completely splintered at. I'm like, oh, I. Yes, I can't believe I've read my notes over hundreds of times. I can't believe I've skipped this page before. In my writing, it's anchor, some monster heart of some kind. Fascinating. A spiral shell. A walking stick, a shell of some kind.

Yes, yes, yes. My space box? Oh, yes. There was a spice box here. My teapot? Oh, yes, a teapot. A herbalism. Nice.

flower seed pouch daggers, fishing tackles, mess kits Okay, you don't need to read everything 150 feet of hemp and rope for some reason Well, hold on, all right, because I woke up I was built dead gustus. So where's my stuff? Oh, well, we

I suppose we would have done something with it before sending you on your way to To Hey now, I didn't have a lot, but it was very important to me. Very important. Well, I... What did you have?

Well, it was a lot of gold and also a lockpick set. Oh, yes, there were some tools here. And a flask shaped like a great Leviathan. I have just flasks written down. It's all in one. I imagine I... If there was a single gold piece missing from those gold pieces that I had... He knows exactly how many there were.

Yeah, it's gonna be your head. All right. He'll tell you right now exactly how many there were. there were when you captured us right now. That's exactly right. Do you suspect that the monsters took your things? Hold on, I didn't finish telling you how many gold pieces there were. Oh, he's about to do that right now.

53,468. 53,468? That's almost half a chest of gold pieces. Yes, and I brought, I drug the whole thing all the way here, so you better have every single gold piece. Oh, you're exactly right. Well, if we can't find your things I'm sure we'd be happy to comment

It's a huge coin purse Good, good, good It's massive Good, all 53,000 gold pieces Okay, I'll write it down Sucker Wow, that's way more than I thought Is that?

If it is too much to carry We could take a conversion into diamonds Or other rare gems as well And anything that's valuable from the bistro that we might not be able to get anywhere else also. I have some grueyr cheese. Oh, that'll keep. Maybe some Dijon maoli. All right.

I don't know what grueuier is. We only have Havati. Oh. That's true. That's not part of us. Oh. Oh. I want a grueaer.

Well. I need to get to my warding practices. Do what you must, but... Oh, do you have any seal oil. I don't know what a seal is. All right. Whatever kind of fat you have, polar bear. Yes, I imagine we have some. You'd have to ask,

bacon! Bacon! And it's at this time that the principal finally arrives, and he seems to have been very busy with whatever he's been talking to the other vassals about, but he... Bacon, bacon, we have much to do, much to... Pay no attention to the dead ogres in the corner. You're not to stand, a lot has happened. We've learned so much, and we must...

Oh, no. We must... Manover? Are you thinking what I'm thinking? If... you're thinking that we should... Oh, yes! Yes, yes, of course, of course, of course, of course. horse. Bacon, I need you to get all the provisions you can. Anything that can be stored

in the carriages. I need you to well, we have a third now. We need all the heavy weather clothes that you can get. We need all the blankets that you can assemble. We need everything that you can... Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. You're reading my mind, Bacon.

We're going into the madness. We're leaving Ogerton. Where there's only one way for us to make a plan and figure out what to do is if we escape. If we go out into the mountains and find our way there, we might be able to come up with a way to fell these fowl beasts. I just want to reiterate that they specifically told us

that we shouldn't try to run or organize a revolution or anything along those lines. So they probably already know, and we may make it as far as the polar bears before the polar bears turn on us and eat us. I just want to throw that out there. I'm willing to take the risk. The very survival of our...

people survive, depends on it. It's crucial that we get away and perhaps beyond the the pool of their powers of control. All right, you tell Bacon, you keep giving Bacon some

commands. We're going to have a quick sidebar, all right? It's about the dead bodies, nothing else. Don't worry about that. The bar isn't here in the sitting room. It's just to cross the hall. Oh, man, yes, you. Come in, guys, quick. Come on, quick, go ahead.

Perhaps we do it in the bar. Okay, we'll go to... I have a little sidebar. Only by the fireplace. Daisy walks out of the room and goes immediately to the bar. Okay, we follow Daisy. Okay, here's the thing. All right, I'm all about making an escape here,

and our best bed is probably sticking with Mannyas and Minerva, but what happens if we get beyond the walls of this place, and all of a sudden the horrible creatures turn off all the intelligence? We're fucked. Absolutely fucked. No, we knocked them out, and we tie them up. in restraints that they'd be able to eventually get out of and we leave.

We know that we were far from here. I think we were at least decently far from this place. Mania showed up with his full intelligence. They said we are. As long as those creatures allow it, is my point. We just don't know what they are capable of. Well, but it was broken from Tito by a spell. So maybe it's something that lingers on them without having a person.

persistent contact. I hope you're right. I have an idea. If you say bangles shamangle on bacon and I throw a wooden shark at him, we might be able to test something.

Doesn't it need to be a surprise? I think so. He needs to be genuinely scared for his life, I would think. Definitely yell something like bacon, you're going to die when you throw the shark. That'll... No, why don't you do that while I throw the shark? Oh, done. This is going to be great.

As soon as the bangles shamangle happens, all right? And I'm gonna like... We just walk up like sort of subtly as they're speaking and then just right out of nowhere, we just go in and do it. Aye, I like that. What are you trying to test? I'm trying to see if he has the same capabilities of... Of not honey, Daisy.

What if he doesn't? You're gonna throw a shark at him? It's not that heavy. I mean, now this is... You would instantly kill him. Wait, this is a thresher shark. It's not... It's only a wee thresher.

It'll be fine. I bashed the bull shark onto Mannyus and he's fine. Manis is a large ogre. The thresher will do nothing to him. We are at the point now where we are not safe anywhere near here. And I need to rest.

I believe... What I'm... I mean, at least some of us feel the same way. What I'm saying is that if we can... I think that we should do... this regardless, but if we need to, if we can go around and use that one to free all of the vassals and they can come with us. We'll have an army.

Especially if they have powers like Daisy had. Yeah. Come on, this is absolutely no way this can backfire. I agree to your test. This is a perfect plan. It's a threshold. Just grab it, boy, it's tiny tail. Foo, thoo. Okay.

So you do, you say the thing, you say the thing, and then I'm just, yeah. Arnold, Jorni at the time. And then we just do it the same time, all right? Oh, gosh. This is we casually walked out. Sidebar. You turn and do you make your way out of this room where a bar is across from the sitting room apparently now suddenly exists. Hey guys.

You both of you conspiratorially start to walk into the hallway. And as you walk in, you can see Mannyus, come on, Beacon, put your back into it. You're barely doing any work here. And they're pulling and drag. dragging the body of Tito into the hallway. Push, push, good man. Come on. Look at you. You're tiny. And Mannius is just doing his very best to drag this corpse through the hallway towards the kitchen area where he might be able to find the cellar entrance.

I'd like to stop like next to them. It's like an anime. I'm like, eat, be tall. And I'm like shadow. And obviously with my eyes, blah, blah, blah. Bangal shmango. I can you get a doo-doo shark! And I just fucking yeat the wooden shark towards him. You all do this simultaneously, and the shock on Bacon's face

as he's crushed by the shark is, if only he could say, oh fuck, instead you just hear this silent scream, and he's crushed by the shark, and he slides down to the tile floor with a sickening smack, and uh... Out of curiosity. He manages to stay conscious. But he,

uh, he falls under a... Ugh. What a... What a... My thomal is what have you done? Oh my gosh. You've passed your test.

Well done, bacon. What are you done? That's why... It was just a thresher shark. Oh, I mean, come on. And, uh, I'll I'll pick it up. It's like definitely cracked, like the tip of its tail snapped off.

We had to see that Bacon was in his right mind and not controlled by the beasties below. Oh, yeah, no, that's it. We saw a bit of, we saw a glow, little yellow eyes. We were a little worried. We were concerned you had been taken. That's a good point. It's a good point.

Bacon could be a tremendous third to if it's at any moment. But not anymore. No, he's safe now. He's going down. He passed. He passed. We passed. The Floyd goes.

From the madness. He also doesn't have his bangle anymore. Well, you know the words. Yes. Let's free the rest. Yes. We have to get out of here.

Yes. We will free the whole household, yes. We'll come on then. I will join you, yes. You all can deal with the bodies. No. Whenever go and tell Mariana we're taking a little vacation.

I'll follow us. Mannyus down there and I'll just start to go through and say Bagn, snap, that's more than a dozen of these vassals and even the baby boy that you were unable to save from the monsters from below the city,

we'll call them, are bangle free minutes later. It's as simple as waving a wand, and sure enough, the vassals are looking at Manius with wonder, looking at you with strange eyes, holding and grasping their necks

and having never been able to make this motion their entire life, and suddenly looking at each other and pointing and communicating with each other, this scar. What is the smooth thing? I've never seen this. It's always been hidden by that bangle.

And there's a sense of gratitude, there's a sense of fear, there's a sense of uncertainty all about them, but Bacon shows up and immediately begins not barking orders, but the equivalent in hand code. And they are riled up. They immediately get to work task, taskmaster being what it is. They start to find their way to the kitchen, find their way to close, find their way to throughout the house, essentially assembling a caravan of sorts under Manius's close observation and by his command.

What do you all do? How do we get stuck moving the bodies? this is unbelievable where are we even taking them I'm trying to get them down I guess the cellar but like I'm pretty sure Manny has said children are down there which is really fucked up

but who am I to ask questions come on Bonobos put your back into it I'm disposed of bodies before but listen like Tito was a hefty fella

I guess they got good eats here I wish Mr. Yorne here was here. You hear the barking of Mannyus talking to Mannyus. No, you can't bring all of your cats, perhaps just one, but really you shouldn't be bringing to any of them. There's chaos in all directions, people are now running back and forth, essentially assembling for the journey to come.

When we get to the, oh, you know, Mr. Stabiscotch, open the cellar door out. Like this crouched down. Yeah, the most disgusting slinky of all time reaches the point. It crunches as it goes down. It's a disgusting sound. And that was the little one.

I don't know how we're going to get the next one. I'll help. Come on, let's move. It's going to be a long night time. I have an assist as well. Oh, thank goodness. Okay, just get them near the edge and we can just kind of tip them over and roll them down? I'm sure of it.

Mannyus has had a complete transformation. He's ready to believe anything, it seems. And he has been convinced of the not knowing means that he has to be flexible, that he has to do what's right by the family. You can see that his actions of confidence come not from the fact that he doesn't know if what he's doing is right, but that

he doesn't know what he's doing is right. He knows that he believes in his family, and that includes even the vassals, as twisted as perhaps his prior ideas were. And there's good in Mannyas, as strange as his upbringing may have been.

And within an hour, I will say, there is now three carriages outside the front of the House of Knowledge, filled to the brim with goods to to feed the number of people that have to go that have to go be pulling pulled by a polar bear

it is still raining heavily outside but the five of you are able to jump into a carriage with Mannyas and his son who is joining him along for the ride and the rest all jump in with the he remembers that Daisy is a package deal so Daisy joins you in the carriage as well and soon enough you're pulling being pulled through the mud not towards the city of Ogerton, no, for the first time deviating from a path that has been well worn down and then back up again around the house, past the farms, past the livestock. And further from the city too, right?

Further from the city. Towards where Queenie and the youngest ogre twins had their confrontation when she was just at the very proximity. I look at my friends who were in the carriage, and I look out the window as we're moving, and I say, very much like the bacon plan, there's absolutely no way that this can go wrong. Are we in Gorgustis's carriage? Sure. More like Dork Gustus. Fuck that that guy.

Too smooth, smooth, man. I'll look out at, like, the stable where the cattle were, and I'll, like, think about the look that it gave me before I had to butcher at. I'll just shudder and I'll turn away. Now, Lord Justice was a good man. He was doing what he thought was right. You have to understand. I don't think that he meant evil. Well, like I said, Mannyas,

is that anyone who stands in the way of not just my freedom now, but of any of our new friends, we will gladly take theirs. I quite agree. And you are now, you have now, You've now earned the treasured title of ally of Barnabot's the Dredwick. Well, this is all quite new. Thank you. That means a lot. But if I do not retrieve my pipe, my shell, my pipe weed, my spice box, my flask and especially my pan, or especially my shell, all of it. And your anchor?

Oh, I, my anchor too. There's a lot of things that you did for me. We will have wards. I have no memory of taking these things. It's possible that I came under their control. Yes, perhaps that they took it. More than likely. Well, what is it that he was saying, Tyshin,

there's something behind the waterfall? Yeah, well, at the lottery, they came out from the waterfall. There was a glow behind it, and they selected the ogre that won the lottery and did horrible things to him and then cast him back into the waters. But they came from behind the waterfall.

There are also very specific places we couldn't go while wearing those stupid necklaces. Oh. Yeah. Including a passage on the other side of the chasm. And on that damn ship. what you took us up to. The orb attached to the silver ship.

Above the city. The one being handled by the figurehead. The orb. It's a great crystal brought here by our ancestors. Well, we know nothing. Yes, yes. It's just been there since the founding of our city

is my understanding. I probably don't know what the psionic focus is. if I did I would probably understand the relevance of this Oh, and Yorny, what the fuck are you talking about? Sionic is Sionic is such an easy word in the mouth It sounds cool But actually What I was going to say was

But with these off Even if the rest of you stay safe outside the city We can go back in and get inside there wherever they are living, wherever they are staying. Underneath the waterfall, I projected my spirit out. There was a great structure

underneath the city, and there were countless ogre souls, I hate to say, those consumed in the lottery. It was no ogre heaven. It was eternal torment. Don't listen, Julie. Don't live, don't listen.

It are. But now we, that we know, we can stop the rest of you from experiencing this faith. But perhaps, perhaps, we'll get what we wanted. If they are trapped, these spirits, if we end these squid, squiddies, Squiddies. If we end these squiddities, we can, perhaps that is what is keeping them here. Maybe they will finally find some form of peace. Is this sounding anything like, I'm just making it up, I don't know. Well, to be fair, we don't know either, but that's okay. Right now, there are no bad ideas, just like the bacon plan. Okay, well, how are you going to... I'm happy to try and help. I can, I can bear it.

leads you through the city, and perhaps we can go to the orb. I don't want to go into the sewers, I'll be honest. The hygiene of that sounds miserable. Do you know what goes down there? Actually, under the cover of darkness, going up to the orb right now might be a good plan. I would not risk taking you or any of the vassals with us, given that you were controlled, even without the Bengals. only the five of us can be sure to be free from their influence.

We don't even know that either, but at least we're willing to gamble on it, right? I know, at least, at least as far as we know, based on the last combat, I'm just crossing my fingers, scream. Well, if Manning has us offer and maybe he'll just get us close, right? He'll just hate the carriage. It'll save us some time, and we'll scamp her up into the ship, and we'll go see what that damn orb is.

We are... Oh, oh my. And he looks out in the window, and the rain has stopped. Instead, you've crossed a threshold. The water that was hitting against the side of the window is no longer pattering, but softly hitting and freezing,

creating intricate frost patterns. You are crossing away from, Whatever this warmth of Ogerton, this palatial place, shifts very dramatically. As you suddenly reach and cross this boundary, you are now making your way into more mountainous terrain, hills, rocks, and great trees, a huge forest of these beautiful pines. And they are covered not in wet rain, but instead in frozen snow. and it gets colder and you suddenly see your breath it drops it's no longer

40 degrees 35 perhaps still quite cool not deadly cold 15 10 zero it happens only over the course of the next few miles as you're having these conversations you are realizing

oh mannius was not the smartest in some ways but it's a good thing you brought these fucking jackets and you bundle up. Can I just look back out in the back of the character to my head out the window to see if, can I see the Overse City confirming what Queenie found?

You peek out and you look and it is indeed frigid outside if you need to lean out the window in order to get a proper perspective. You look as though the city does not exist. You see nothing. There is but of slow, sloping valley,

lifeless, covered in snow even, no particular warmth, and then a tall mountain with a waterfall, and no life to speak of, it just seems like an empty space, an empty terrain, not even a place worth putting a city on.

If you need more proof that all is not what it seems, I suggest you look out the window. Speechless. Gone entirely, yes. Aye. What? That's...

All right, so either they're letting us leave, or they don't know that we've left. Right? So maybe we find a safe place to camp until it's nightfall again tomorrow night, and we go back in under the cover of darkness. If that's a plan, right? We need to rest, so yes. Tonight is unfortunately out of the question,

but tomorrow night, once we rest, we eat... We get as far away as we can. We monitor the situation. Surely, if they're upset that we left, they're not going to let us just waltz out of there. So we keep an eye on things. We see what happens with our friends, our newfound friends, and we go from there. All right? Yes. And anyone who wants to join us will get a free tattoo and piercing from old Barnabos.

Not required. Oh, you're a funeral. You continue to travel. and I would leave it to your discretion to decide for how many hours you feel safe until you decide to make camp.

I would say that we would want to travel how late is it getting right now? It was late evening when you had your confrontation with Commus and when you initially got back

and then a few hours passed You had all of the events that occurred towards the end of last session and this entire session. And the preparation, it's middle of the night, and it's still snowing, but the clouds overhead are brightened by the illumination of the full moon that are hitting the top of it. It's dim light, but not pure dark. It's, I would say quite literally, the middle of the night. I would suggest we travel for another few hours and then get some sleep. No complaint for me. In the late night and early morning.

And my hope is that the further away we get, the more mountainous and the more stone there is beneath us, they cannot burrow beneath us as we rest. I haven't heard of no burrowing squid, so You know that something bore those tunnels and sewers Boy, you have joint worms or something Anything's possible Well, as far as we can tell, they haven't left the city before They've just sent ogres out If they follow us, it would be

One foot, maybe We could find some place in the trees To, to to hide these caravans, is the snowfall pretty hard? It has parody with the rain.

It's as though if you just turn the temperature down, that much rain would make sense for this much snow. Does it we look quick, like, take a quick look back? Does it look like we're leaving tracks? Or is it, like,

would it be filling relatively quickly? I would say, It does look like you're making tracks. Make a nature check. Oh, uh-oh. Garsh. Garsh, Tyshen. Garsh.

Garsh, Sora? We gotta seal the door to darkness. 14. Oh, with a 14? You have not very much familiarity with snow. You know that someone with more. experience could get an answer, but you, with what limited experience you have, you have no idea how quickly that kind of track might be covered by the natural snowfall.

That outcropping over there will give us enough shelter to camp for the evening. You've spent more time, I think, than I, or really any ogre has in these mountains, I would wager. And it looks big enough, flat enough. Let's make camp. we'll all get some rest. I never thought I'd say this, but I missed the Ogaceti. I Scrim, we've been gone for four hours.

I'm glad to hear it, Scrimpy. It was so warm, and I forgot how horribly cold it is out here. I know they have horrible mind-sucking monsters, but I'm with Scrim. They also had hot cocoa. Oh, yeah. And three-foot-long hot dogs.

The best meat, and the The best milk come from happy cows, Mr. Stabascoch. I know, I know. All right. I'll go gather firewood. Ah. I want to keep an eye on the polar bears. Do they still seem intelligent and tame?

Then a windigo shows up. Make an animal handling check. 18. 18. 18. There's a certain glint that is missing from the eyes of the Wow. So, yeah, it's very bad.

While he's doing this, I'm going to summon the brutal blade, and I'm going to go search for firewood. Not very far, but as far as I need to go, to hank off some branches. You take 14 steps before you see a vessel carrying wood. Oh, I like, you know, first I'm like, what? Who goes there? Show yourself!

And then the vassel comes out, and I'm like, oh, thank God. I dismissed the brutal blade. Give me that. And then I run back, Hey, guys, I got firewood. That was quick. Scrooom brought their own fuel. And you do this. You have the salt that I asked for?

The salt? The salt. Yeah. Bacon, did you bring? He shows up. The sacks of salt. He's got as much salt as you need. Okay.

I'm going to try to make an actual salt ring. throwing it over my shoulder around us. And I spin three times to the right. Julian is immediately watching you, and he doesn't have any salt, but he... Oh, the more of you. Oh, yes, of course, of course. Oh, yes, yes.

Wait, make sure you touch your heart every three times. Oh, it's the heart. The heart, yeah. Well, okay. One, two, three. Spint three. Three. Three.

Three, great. It's three, James. Three. Three. Oh, yeah. And you start to settle in. This makeshift settlement, this makeshift camp. There's fabrics going up, tarps, ropes being pulled taut.

Vassals are getting to work. They are immediately clearing the area, digging out patches of snow, putting down as much fabric as they can before creating its tents to the best of their ability. And you can see that these are relatively crude shelters, but with the fires that are being lit so close and allowing the warmth to fill the trees in this outcropping, you are immediately feeling right at home, as you would have, well, only since you arrived into car.

Aye. Well, and I'll be heating up a really sharp, thick needle over the fire. Anyone who once say, heck, smart, feel free. All right. You saw like five or six people walking up and five of the six people walking away. I'll take this one of the spoons that I had hatched,

basically like a honeycomb symbol, and I'll once again heat the end. And I'll stick it through and I'll use them, just my finger. And I'll bend it around. to form like a hanging spoon earring with a hex mark on it. Any other takers? I've got plenty more hex marks. Alright, I've done this already like a half a dozen times, and you can see that I have like lots of piercings.

But you're gonna have to give me something a little more lightweight than that spoon you got there. I don't need my ear, Terran, all right? Oye, I thought of that. Bring out the dainty teaspoon. Bonnebo, what do you mean dainty? What? Tea? What? Hold on. Hold on. This will be quick. It's so small. I can answer it real quick. Unbelievable. Hold on. I didn't want to waste this real nice teaspoon without, unless you were certain. All right, here we go. Are you ready? Three, two.

Yep. You take one piercing down. Oh, yeah. Here we go. I'll make you feel alive. There we go. Now we will be protected from the evil spirits. As long as you get your tattoo, of course.

Yeah, well, that's why I'm here, right? How long is that going to take? Oh, it depends on what you want. We talked about it in real time, in our world, only mere days ago. But it was months and months and all. Your options are a sea bird, preferably a cormoran, an albatross, or a frigate bird. Those are the luckiest. A cat, mermaid or merman, club baderman.

and then we have Elmo's Bolt Oh, that's the one that I wanted. Oh, Clemens Anchor or Brendan's knock? No, it's the Elmo's Bolt all the way. Okay, where do you like it? I don't know, where's the luckiest? Please don't say my nutsack.

People's a dick. I won't fall for that twice. Well, you know, it'll show you what it looks like just to make sure. There's no more room there. No, no, no. Don't show you to me a dick. No. Oh, no.

I meant, and I'm gonna take a stick and draw that basically it'll look like arcing lightning bolts, basically. Basically the scar that, that Tyshaan would have given that mind flag. Fuck, yeah, I want that. Oh, yeah, that's cool. All right, maybe just, you know, maybe on my left shoulder. All right, sit down. All right, and then however long it takes I would let him tattoo me with. Yeah, it takes quite a while to get a full tattoo like that.

it hurts. It doesn't do any damage, damage, mechanically speaking, but you know that you'll be tender there for many days and that you'll need to protect a real tattoo like someone only like Barnumos could give you. This is the most sanitary ink that I've ever made. Polar bear fat, hopefully there doesn't have any negative properties. I'm used to seal, but that'll be fine. What's the worst that happens? My arm falls off. Please, we're stuck in this hell hole. Or you get his hepsis and die. Like I said, we're stuck in this hellhole. And so I'll give him the elmose bolt.

I wanted that tattoo that I got back on that mountain to stay, and I was not going to lie, a little disappointed that it vanished. I was hoping to keep something with me if we got through all of this, and, well, now I've got this. I, exactly right. We're not. First of all, I want a tattoo. Second of all, we're not stuck here.

Do you really want to go back? I know that we are free from that prison now, even you yourself, but there are thousands of you in that city. And even the ogres themselves are cattle to those beasties. and entire populations upon populations have been made prisoners by those beasties I say we smash their squid faces in and put it into it I cannot complete my pilgrimage

without the weight of my burden and until I retreat my tusks I cannot leave and I believe fate brought us to the city it was not just mere chance that we entered this bubble

and even if I did have my tusks now I still would not leave as this is an important step in my pilgrimage I do not know if we all feel the same I also think we were drawn here I'm afraid to go back They had They didn't take control of us

But they stopped us at the lottery We couldn't move We couldn't even turn around That wasn't even That was just out While they controlled a thousand ogres Who knows what kind of power They can bring to bear

But I don't think we can just walk away from this Daisy's dad is still there Honey gave her life to To get them free I All captive Tyshenia not alone

I'm absolutely terrified to go back there Because a part of me is convinced We cannot do a damn thing But it's like Queenie said we gotta try I do want my lover And all my effects But All of those people were born

As free as the sea in the sky And a white A person once told me, I can't recall whom. But they said that, what's the point of those with the means and the power do not fight? I feel a little bad now, honestly. I hadn't thought about it, and honestly, the thought of running away was so overwhelming. I forgot about my dad. You're right.

I'm still learning. Perhaps that tattoo tomorrow. I need rest, but... Think about what design you'd like. I did pack a few additional provisions. She comes out and she hands a bow and arrows to Queenie. She brings out this nasty two-handed cleaver. I know it's not your anchor.

Oh, this is what we use on that cow. It is. You're proficient. Oh man, you turned him into scramble beef. I've never seen any weapons in your hands, but you've always been... It's hard to see you without those sticks, so I got you just this branch that we've had.

Oh, thank you. It was... We'll make a good walking stick. You were saying, Tyshen? Um... Oh, yeah, yeah, there you go, Tyshen. Here's a gift. Oh, yeah.

for you too. I don't know. Thank you to do. It's very nice. No, neither one of us got gifts. That's what the point I was trying to make. Oh, I thought you were saying. Oh, was you like the cleaver that kills? Oh, no. I don't want the cow cleaver. Are you sure about that? Are you sure about that?

The hell of cows. She passes you a small tin and on the top it reads beef butter. Oh, amazing. I had no idea. All right. I'll be in cabin three. I have That's a drink you shouldn't have It's actually just a block bag of massage

Oh my god Oh My God Just jiggles so sacally What I was going to say Before the jiggly sack of massage Royal came out. Strange gift, by the way.

It froze. No, no, no. We just, there's so much we don't know. We don't know why those creatures are behind the water, what their goal is. They've feast on the ogres, but

maybe there's another way. Maybe they do it because they have to. They have to eat. We have to eat. We were pushed to almost committing atrocities, but killing creatures in the wild that we didn't want to, but to survive, maybe it doesn't have to come to horrible confrontation. Maybe this is something we can do to help them find another way. If they're open to it, if not, maybe they are just evil, but...

Tai Shen, you make a good point, and then I remember that ogre being flipped upside down over and over again, his brain spilling out and regrowing and spilling out and regrowing. And I think Tysha, you're fucking crazy. And they were ripped it. The chances are not very high. And once they were done eating his head like a stone's pushpop, they pulled up a jar from whisper in the darkness and just brought his brain along with them. Have you ever seen...

Have you seen scrimmed eggs? Oh, it was the... The eggs of a chicken that wasn't even going to be a check. I cried for four hours after that incident, Tysha. You ate the shit. shells. The egg is in Sension.

Tishan, the egg is an egg. Well, that ogre's not Sancho anymore. I'll tell you that much. I don't know. It's pretty fucking bad,

for sure. But all I'm saying is maybe there's a better way. Well, I wanted to make sure you guys could defend yourselves when you head back. I'm going to bed.

I'll be in cabin three. I'm going to pass on the tattoos, if you don't mind. Oh, yeah. I mean, I think that, you know, you have your own ways and your runes to ward off spirits, but your soul did almost get devoured by ogre ghosts. I do want to remind you. They just sent me back to my bloggy, and I believe that the triad will keep me safe.

I have to go have a difficult conversation now. I'll turn and I'll walk up to the Buller beers And I'm gonna use Druidcraft I'll say Is this why he said it would be a difficult conversation And I'm gonna use these animal calls to be like All right fellas Uh

This they may look hungry or they may look delicious if you all get a little hungry and sure there are hundreds of people that you could turn into a buffet at the Golden Corral but just think about how comfortable you were back in the city how well you were taken care of. I implore you that you do not devour these poor innocent humans and things will go back to normal.

Feel how cold it. are frigid it's so uncomfortable compared to a nice stable life being fed nice pieces of meat just a suggestion I suppose

25 people in a camp are all just like and I can't actually talk with them but I'm basically trying to use like bear cries with the meaning of basically like you know No, are you trying to talk to them?

They were swim speed being polar bears. I'm imagining this whole time of like your near is like, and then the dubovers, I implore you to reconsider. That's very funny. It's like goblin. Remarkably, if we're doing this R-A-W, Apparently they do. Baseline's that. The first of them campaign.

I can speak to them, Ken, with your magical Fearable blood to speak to animals as well without being a druid as well. Oh. Oh. Polar bears. Just take it easy. We got some of that cow that we butchered early on.

It's good eats. They were... Yeah, I can communicate, but not understand. It's the same idea. Or the one who killed Jerry. Oh, fuck. Cios aren't. Oh, no. Oh, no.

So basically it's sort of the same idea, is that I can make animal cries, and I can be able to them more than maybe, like, a human druid could. So I'll continue to work on myself. Yeah. Or a fresh old tattoos. That's the thing.

I'm going to, like, basically, between, like, the giant octopus tentacle and like the plesiasaur head that's coming down over my heart, I'm going to give myself a seabird. Oh. These are the wings of freedom. And I'm going to tattoo myself and anyone else who would like one. I'm not going to make you roll. You feel the polar bears understand, and they do seem especially swayed by the comforts that they have enjoyed in Ogerton.

I do the advantage on charisma checks. They settle down into what is very clearly keeping warm, hibernation-y. style posture and make their way to sleep. That could have been really bad. I'll join the rest of them in cabin three. Oh, how is there oil on the wall? I can go back to cabin three. Why don't smell like alcohol.

It's like that moment in Sean the dead when you slips on the blood. Yeah. is that what Daisy was talking about when she was saying tripod. I thought she was reading War of the Worlds. Too mad. We've got that so many levels of bed. Was somebody making pancakes, right? I'm just calling it.

Funnily enough, you hear the ground shake. Do you do anything else before bed? No. Should we keep watch? Yes. You should keep watch. I would stay up as long, basically, to give any of the vassals that want a tattoo or want a piercing of a hex mark. I should have, like, plenty of spoons that I made, and I have plenty of soot oil die.

And so I will stay up as long as it takes, and then I'll go to sleep. So I'll take first watch. All right. Well, Bonobos is offering first watch, so good night. And I immediately go to sleep. I'll take, I'll go second. I can refresh the fire waking up. You're perhaps the one with the most energy of the five of you because you're the only one who has enjoyed something like a long rest in all this time.

And the rest of you are all picking your order, so to speak. Everyone else, you're exhausted. It has been a long 48 hours to get to this point. Your Honor? I would tell, oh, Queenie, you'll take third and I will take fourth. Yes. That's all wrap about me. I don't know, whatever fucking Queenie says.

Anyways, and she goes to sleep and you, each of you take watch, one in order. You also notice that there are vassals who are taking watch. Manny seems to have had his own command about this sort of thing. So occasionally you have company during those two-hour sections where you briefly wake up, make sure that you're just sort of keeping your eyes on the horizon and need to sound the alarm should there be any. But it is a quiet night. It is raining. It is snowing.

It is snowing heavily, but aside from that, it seems to be peaceful. And you all enjoy the benefits of the long round. Yeah. I'll be probably much to the chagrin of the vassals I'm tattooing them. I'll be regaling them with the seven grand voyages of Trothack, the Shark Puncher, that I made up. And I was like, oh, I think I'm thinking about calling that one the voyage of the eye of the bleeding star. What do you think? Oh yeah, that's a pretty cool sounding voyage.

Yeah, yeah. That's his second voyage. And then I'll go to sleep. Oh, totally should make sure to keep an eye on the salt circle as well. Oh, okay. Show me that you remember the motion. Oh, I think it was... Oh, no, you just didn't take a difference with your heart first and then you spin. No, no, no, no, you hit your heart.

My curse. One, two, three. Okay. No, you're fine. Okay, there we go. Good night. The next morning comes, and though the snow is still coming down as hard as it had the previous evening, you are refreshed. Morning arrives, and the five of you wake, the last one on watch, having already been awake for a couple hours now, and it's been an uneventful, blessedly uneventful night. and it's early

you can already smell some of the vassals are preparing food and you notice that their numbers are a few fewer it does seem that some vassals had the same idea

Daisy had and have taken upon themselves to perhaps grab a few provisions and make it into the mountain and decide to take agency and freedom into their own hands

and decide to make their fate their own but the majority have stayed and Mannyus and his family are all hovered around a warm campfire, fresh with fuel, and they seem to be chatting amongst themselves. Mannyus very close to his wife. The two ogre twins are running around and playing, perhaps throwing snowballs at each other.

It's a idyllic scene compared to the intense feelings of dread and confusion that have filled your days for the last week or so. So what do you do? I will, I hate to do this to you, Derek, but I will get up in the morning and I will basically sit down, cross my legs and feel the Arctic around me, the cold weather, the snow, the wind, the pine trees and the mountain. and I want to meditate and just try to commune with the land and no matter how, you know, I'm so far from a moot, but do what I can to connect with the triad, with the triumvirate, and connect with the land itself and cast augury and do a room reading if I could in regards to if we go back into the I guess you feel free to do inspiration, but the actual augury spell is, let me just make sure that I read it. Let's do the spell. The spell is, audry.

Is it first level? Second level? Where is it? Augory, augury, augury. Augury. By casting, so I'm basically using actual runes, right? You've risked in a few in your... hours of it over your watch.

I receive an omen from an otherworldly entity about the results of a specific course of action that you plan it, say, within the next 30 minutes. So, presumably we're going to get up and go back into the city and... Go the next 30 minutes? Well, it's... It says... I didn't know that. A course of action that you plan to take.

I would think that the course that we will start in the next 30 minutes will be beginning our plan to head into the city and face the mind flares. I see. And so, um, wheel for good results, woe for bad results, wheel and woe, or nothing. The spill doesn't take into account any possible circumstances that might change the outcome, such as casting of additional spells with loss or gain of a companion, etc. That's ominous. And yeah, and then so I would get some sort of result as I cast runes from my bag.

The ruins. Without your usual set of runes, you throw a... simpler. Oh, right. Yeah, they'd be handcrafted. Simpler. Perhaps you've taken some bark and you've carved, you've risted a few runes into the back. That's the major ones. And so it's like drawing a two-dimensional drawing, rather without the shading, without the depth that you might normally get

with your traditional set made of bone. However, you focus on your question. You focus on the choice. that you must make and the plans that you need to pursue the choice of going back to Ogerton. And the result is surprising. You expected some level of gray, but it is black and white. I will sort of feel any bit of doubt that was in the...

back of my head totally evaporate as I kind of feel this inner calm and time almost like stops as I finish my meditation and prepare my spells in a mechanical sense and then once I'm done I will join my companions. Yornear joins the rest of you. Daisy is preparing a small meal for herself already eating what she's made for herself leaving some leftovers for you. Barnabot's I'm sure you're probably already taking what provisions have been brought and cooking up your own storm on the surface of your own fire. And it's just the six of you, including Daisy, sitting around having a moment of privacy,

no longer convincing an ogre that his entire world is full of illusion, full of impossibilities, full of lies and deception. No longer... But you have these first few hours. hours of the morning to think about how you are going to return to Ogerton, what you were going to do there, and what you were going to do about this otherworldly danger that lies behind the waterfall. Now, I learned this recipe when I was, did a little bit of fishing in Delphinez. They call it a scrambled meatball on the breadtangle of pizza. It's coin.

What the fuck is a bread tangle? I don't know. Really? You got past scrambled meatball? Yeah, that was my question. What's a scrambled meatball? It was context clues to figure that one out. Oh, and it was the guy named Pete Zah apostrophe. It's a very fantasy name.

Oh, I see. He invented the breadtangle. Oh, you don't know. I know you'll only have been in Ogerton in a short time, But the safest route in my mind, there's, if you hug the western side of the city, one of the sewers goes to not a villa, but just to a well. You wouldn't have to go to any of the houses of any of the other places. You wouldn't have to go back to the house of knowledge.

You'd be able to get into the sewer system and perhaps skirt through the city that way. It would be how I would approach it. Yeah, I mean, that sounds like it would work. If that's how you'd approach it, young lady, then that is how we will approach it. Is there any way you could make a pit stop and deliver a message? If we have some sort of a way to navigate the sewer system, absolutely.

I don't see why not, right? A map, maybe? I can get some parchment. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And taking what remains of her parchment, you clearly see that she's been writing a letter. And she starts to draw, and it'll take her another minute or two to complete

as accurate a map as she can, leaving the rest of you to discuss what next. Well, if this entrance is as easily accessible as we thought, then we don't really need to wait until the cover of dark, especially we're not going back into the city. Aye. So we can head out as soon as I'm ready. I would like, who's good with a pencil or a drawing implement? It's got a little bit of artistic.

Hey, Mr. Fireblossom. You got a pretty steady hand. I think we make as many copies of a map to get to this point as we can. So we run into any vassals. Mr. Yornyer can, uh, pendent, shmendant, or whatever he says. And then we hand them in the parchment, them to take the well and to get back here. So they don't have to remember.

Am I right? Sure. Makes sense. Okay. I can copy up. Okay, if you wouldn't mind, Daisy, we'll take a look at whatever map you're drawing and we'll follow that.

Okay. Here we go, Mr. Fireblossom. Here's one. I will go to Mannyas, I'll say. Yes, yes, yes. Did you bring in the of your gems with you? That's one. No, no. brought what we needed to survive we we left the valuables at home so no

diamond no no nothing nothing like that what do you need diamond for it's a very rare thing it allows me to cast straight life magics so I was for the danger ahead that they would prove quite useful I was just wondering if you had some if we could potentially use Manius. Oh, no. Mariana, no. That is a part of our sacred bond.

You can't possibly. But of course, if you believe these, these, you must do. Mariana chimes in. No, I, if you're convinced. We, we've left it all behind. This is, it's time to roll the dice, as you might say. She pulls her wedding bangle off of her finger. And, well, this is this, this is a diamond, is it not?

And for an ogre's finger, it's also quite large. Is it? This might be a defensive question. Its cubics are gone. Is it worth at least 300 gold pieces. It's priceless in my heart, if that's what you mean. I stopped loving my husband years. So it's worth. I'm not exactly sure how to determine the value as well component

but this looks like it will do If it needs to be worth anything at all Perhaps you can just give me an IOU I will give you an IOU of 300 gold pieces I take it in my heart Thank you I would return this Presuming we do not have to use it thank you Go, go and save our city, our brothers and sisters, please, end my cats.

Now, no, is there anything else we can do? I, I, I, are you certain that the, that we can't do something, uh, anything at all? I, I imagine, uh, no one will suspect an ogre walking through the city, right? perhaps myself just alone. I could make the trek into the town square and see what I could poke around into. I could go to the library. I could, really, if there's anything you're not telling me, please.

By the time you get to the town square, someone's going to have found those bodies in your basement. That's all I'm going to say, and you're going to be prime suspect number one. That's how these things work. Don't ask me. I don't make the rules. I think his scrimmer's right, man. This is the head of... The House of Education, you draw too much attention, and the creatures have already seen through your eyes just last night, maybe, presumably.

And who knows what would happen should you cross the threshold back into Ogerton? Oh, and you probably don't take this as a compliment or an effect. Have a lot of brain juice. So if you've crossed there, crossed them too many times, they might just take a little bit of. the premature snack, so to speak. I take a little of them to it, but I understand your meaning. I understand your meaning, Ghanabos. You've done a lot, as what I'm saying,

to grow that brain and juice. And look, you know, if things were different, maybe if you were the head of arts and entertainment and Ogre Hollywood, you'd have easily gotten away with this. It would also probably be a lot more corpses in your cell out there. down. There's so much to learn about the world. Oh, my God.

There's so many, I feel we could spend a week here and I couldn't, I couldn't, I couldn't know half of what you know. I, I wish you, my very best, I wish you to succeed and you're right. I think it's not just the bodies. It's too much of a risk that we be taken control. I'm going to stay here.

I'm going to protect the family. We'll be all right. We've got more than a week. weeks of food and fuel. And we can make a home of this place. We'll wait for your sign. I hope to hear from you soon. Well, and if you do see more vassals coming this way,

we will be pleading with them to make their leave from the city as we make our way through. If you do not hear back from us in a week, you should leave. It will be either us or then. and neither one of us is going to survive a full week if the other is still living as well. Well, I hope it doesn't come to that, but I'll take that to heart. Softless speed. I mean, good tidings or something. I'm still getting used to the language units. We usually just say good luck.

Or fair winds and following seas. That's a good one too. Fair winds and following whatever I see is, yes. Perhaps I can teach you of the god of the giants and giant Kim in my return. That's right. You do speak as our ancestors did. I do. We will have much to talk about. I relish the thought. Let us go.

Daisy rushes up. You have the map. Scrim. Yeah. I trust you with this letter. Okay, yeah. No problem. Absolutely.

It's for my father. Oh, no. He's going to punch me in the face again. Maybe. But he needs to get to safety. Yeah. No, no, we'll make sure he does. We will.

I promise. Thank you. No problem. I'm going to stay here. I don't know what you were facing. but I don't feel that I'm up for the task. I agree, 16 is not a whole lot of hit points. I was going to say the same thing.

Well, and what Gornia said stands for you too. If we don't come back in like a week, get out of here. Actually, in that moment, the DM leveled up the NPC. Oh, okay. You still still, you'll die if you come with us. Yeah. Well, we don't, not like we doubt your ability in combat, but we are the five ogre,

demigods. Only we can face these thought eaters. An epic. Aye. I could write a story. There's no reason that you need to actually be demigod for me to write of truth, heck, and... Oye, in his first voyage, the Holes of the Merling King. Maybe this would be his eighth voyage. Oye, the eighth voyage voyage after sailing into the green flash and returning from ogre heaven. I like the sound of that, Mr. Fireblossom. Following his seventh voyage, the anthem of the emerald sunset. He's writing all of this down.

We're on to Voyage 8. I can only write so fast, Bonnebos. Good grief. You should have been up with me last night. You would have had all the voyages. They're all very tired. Anyways, he and the rest say farewell, and you begin to not follow tracks, because they have indeed been snowed over,

but you begin to make your way south. South-west. When we get back in like a week, the carriage is gonna be splintered. There's gonna be vassal limbs, like splied out everywhere, blot all over the place, remnants of like what looked like crazed ogres having eaten parts of the vassals. No, it's gonna be a bunch of polar bears like,

Oh. I had you set a great big bonus. That was like a buffet at the Golden Corral. Chocolate candy, cotton candy, foward. I'm banning the Golden Corral from this table. I don't want to pick a minute. And the Rockwall. Oh, you can eat.

And the tiger poster. Oh, man. It's one of the very... Sizzlers. And do you make your way? Just a few hours. of walking. As fast as the polar bears are when pulling a carriage, they were pulling very heavy carriages full of people and provisions and cloths and fabrics. And so you eventually come back

to a valley, a sloping valley, a giant, massive mountain, a huge waterfall that you can see very much in the distance. And there's this dizzying moment when you swim through the illusion of this place and suddenly almost like a mirage of heat but despite the cold you watch as the snow

transforms into rain and you stare forward into this strange realm this pocket this colony of controlled ogres that is almost a hilarious joke now thinking of what is

how blind do they are to their lives, all the frivolities of their strange hedonism and lavish lifestyle and social faux pos and all of the culture that's been built up in this space, you feel that you can pierce through all of it and make your way directly to where you think these creatures lie. You find yourself through the well that Daisy described, the map, you are able to go down. And I think for the sake of brevity, what I will say is that you deliver the letter.

I think actually that we will fast forward just a little bit. That's fine by me. And we will immediately find yourself at the precipice. In that time, I think that we would have, Taishan and I would have basically been double-checking our maps on the way in, And then I guess Yorneur would have wanded him and any other vassals. And I would even say you've learned that you can phonetically give the vassals what they need in order to use the wand themselves. Like you could empower them.

We don't have to RP this. But you literally can be like, shmangle-bang-bang-and-and-they'll be like, oh, no, they wouldn't be able to fucking say shit. So that would not. Sorry, it's late. Wow, I was about to have my first plot hole. I was going to keep it anyway to use the mind players. Oh, I will tell you that you do not have the ability to use the wand.

Oh, okay. I'm just going to give you that so that you don't accidentally fuck up an action during a round of intense combat. Shmagic smitho! Yeah, yeah, yeah. Perhaps before you risted your runes, you gave it a few test tests. tries with what you remember Mania saying. And for whatever reason, arcane application to this wand does not seem to be

unlocking what you need to in order to make those magics occur. Is there any way that we can... Oh, we don't try, will piss. Is there any way that you can, like, keep the, like, record the word? I know that our tempesters can do that. I don't know there's any way that we can, like, record the saying of Schmargel, smangle, bangle, shmangle, bangle, shmangle. I don't think we have a way to do that.

And, like, yeah, I don't know if we have any way to do that. Let me take a look, actually. I don't... Did my character you're fucking... We drew maps? What all my hair? We have maps?

Is there a way where basically we give the wand to Myelin, we give them all of the fucking maps and say, take this for as many people as you can, you know, if you can... And get the fuck out of here or hand out the maps. Like, that would be what Barnabose would want to do. Yeah. Okay. You spread the good word. And you are able to have a very punchy moment with Myelan.

He is He doesn't ask many questions He takes the letter And he just sort of gives you a stern look He still seems Disheartened By the conversation that you all had In the sewers

We briefly We get him up to speed You oh you tell them I would tell him that Yeah Where the letter came from You know his daughter And that she's for now she's safe

And I would say I would say that like We give him the wand If your ear's okay with that and say, like, threaten whatever ogres you have to or try to convince them, and then, like, get them to do it. Right. But basically, here's, you're being empowered with this wand.

If they can teach you how to use it, do what you have to. I don't know if you... The thing is if we get into a scenario where they get more of these back on us... Do we... We have the wand. Maybe they would take it to anything. I think there's going to be a field of wand don't work anymore.

That's probably... probably fair. Take the fucking water. Get the off of my side. She says to Mylan, in character, get out of my fucking side. I am filled with rage.

I know. So you have that exchange with Myelan. He doesn't open the letter right away, but you give it to him and give him that context. You guys pass out more maps, and you anticipate that the vassals will spread the word their own way. Is that a fair assessment? of what we've decided so far?

That's, that's Barnabose's intention. I just want to make sure as we're racing through, just because we started late, and I know that it's 1230. And I'll look and I'll say, is like, remember all that matters is freedom and just keep moving forward until all of your enemies are destroyed. I'll clap them on the shoulder.

And I'll head out. You make your way back through the sewer system, and because of the heavy rain, this is no longer the same. still running waters that would have just been in the, perhaps ankle deep, not even when you initially went into the sewers just a day ago. Instead, there is a raging torrent. It is difficult for you, Scrim, and for you, Queenie, in order to stay up because it's waist

high for you. And you're all being sort of pulled forward. And every time another tunnel joins you, that water raises and races and rushes forward. and by the time you reach the press of this what was a small amount of water just pulling and falling out and into this crevasse is

to use an anachronism it's the scene from the fugitive where the fucking that's right I was there's a where there's a total of water spraying out and you are staring at the same place that you all confronted with the exception

of you, Tysha and you were seeing all of this for the first time. And you are surprised when you see whichever one of you makes this choice first, step out onto an invisible bridge, a what should be a hundreds of foot drop into who knows where this waterfall truly goes. You instead see them step onto nothingness and walk forward. Tommy Lee Jones, what are you doing here? I don't care! I join the fight Tommy Lee. He can cast guns.

I just hit levels bow on her tailbone. I need a hard target search. I'm just going to stand here and wrinkle. Yeah, truly, this is no country for old men. We'll make a good last quote, and then we'll move on. The fun of you cross this control, I'm not going to make you roll for it. Instead, you find yourself in a cave. Yeah, I'm crabbing my way across and offering support for anyone who is not super,

who might be a little nervous. You are. And I think Queenie would probably have the bees make the line so that's why we can sort of see. Can she do the bees without the pot? Yeah. It's an innate part. The pot is their home and it gives her enhanced beability. but she still has an innate communion communion.

Yeah, communion. Yeah, yeah. She still has her relationship with the bees, and she was able to attract many of their faith spirits to her. So they blink and create essentially like a line. You know that they're not a railing. If you do this, you are going to topple over the end. And there's a moment of fear.

But you're growing in confidence, Tysha. No, no. now. You were starting to trust each other, trusting your friends, and you make your way all five of you to the other side of this space and up, up, up, in through what is not a natural

cave formation, but some sort of chiseled opening, a tunnel made to go in deep and behind the waterfall, and that is where you are confronted by this doorway. This strange, polished, marvellous,

impossible door. door, something that you very much wanted to apply your tools to, I believe, I recall, something that you were not able to approach Barnabotas, you attempted to with the bangle. But this time, the five of you stare at it, you were without bangles. You're free to do as you please. What do you do? The last time we were here, we looked at the door from the far.

It doesn't look like there's any kind of keyhole or knob or anything, like, right in on the door. It looks flat and symbol-less. There appears to be no symbols. There is certainly a frame that seems very cleanly built right into a crafted right into the stone cave wall. There is this flat, what seems to be a door. I walk right up to the door without touching it. I put my hands on my hips.

I look at it. Yep, we're done here. Let's go home. Can't get in? We're done. I know. Let's see how tough you are, door without your fancy tricks. And I'm just

And I'm just And I'm the crab leg And Bonnebos, please doubt It's like the Admiral's Feast and Red Lobster And I'm going to And I'm going to ergot up to the door And just heave all of my weight into it As I give it the shoulder

You are but a few feet behind Barnabot says he crab legs up And you reach out with a crab leg And you very confidently Are ready to heave into it, but you don't get but six, eight inches away when it opens with a shock, suddenly, immediately moves to the side, shoving into the wall, and creating an opening, allowing you to enter into this opening space, and you are through your momentum thrown through the door,

and you crash onto the other side into a tremendous open, ballroom-sized, a cave. You look up and you are behind the waterfall. You can see through the morning light, even with the rain that the waterfall is here to your side and that there is a giant shape in front of you. Holy crap. Oh.

You're all right? The halo theme. The library thing kicks in. Oye, that was a mighty quick door for how big that was. Hold on, I'm coming. I'm gonna run over to you and like step through the threshold. And try to run over to Barnbus. Does this feel like I'm on the other side of where I was,

of that structure that I saw? Very much. This is the other side of the structure. Holy crap. This is beyond where you made it before. Yes. Oh, you know, when you said how big this thing was, I thought I was being a little bit liberal in my imagination,

but this is even bigger than I was expecting. This is a huge structure. It is more than 100 feet long, hundreds of feet tall. It stretches out like an arm like this, and then like a massive bicep almost. A huge massive structure. An ominous vessel sits in front of you, a giant coiled shell in its appearance. Its surface, slick, black chitten.

It seems to shift and change in color in the dim light of this cave. It appears to be a single, seamless entity with no visible seams or joints to suggest that it was constructed from separate pieces. It is an imposing presence. Its very existence seems to challenge the laws of nature. The ship's proportions are massive, towering high, high, and its surface is etched with strange alien symbols that seem to pulse with soft yellow light. It is clear this is a vessel created by being far beyond the understanding of mere mortals, and its purpose is equally mysterious. And you see light. The brightest light, at the end of the arm outstretched, you can see this sickly yellow light,

glowing out, illuminating the rocks of the cave that it seems to be wedged into. And you know that somewhere inside, perhaps, is where these creatures call home. Is the light coming? You said that it stretches out like an arm and at one end there's something that forms like the shape of a bicep almost. The light comes, which end is the light coming from? It's coming from the end of the boardwalk, the long deck that is the, the perhaps the front of this vessel.

Mm-hmm. So the lights coming from the end of that. Exactly right. Okay. Almost as though like a cargo door might be down. What? Is that a ship or a sea monster? I can't tell.

It was an abomination. I've never seen anything like this before in my entire life. I've never seen anything this size before. this is we sailed on something this is this is unbelievable I want to listen for any kind of like

breathing if I can get a sense of this creature that has sort of biological functionary perception chat oh wow can I twist this yes yeah yeah thanks chat

thank you thank you chat thank you chat do too two yeah too yeah so the highest So the highest was a 11 plus 8. So 19. 19? Oh, wow.

Yeah. You do hear a sound. You hear it just underneath the sound of the waterfall. It's almost impossible to make with the sound of rushing water being so loud and so reverberating in this echoing space of the cavern. But you hear it reminding you of like a cat purring. That's no ship. Why do you mean? It is alive.

Oh, it is a C-B-C? What? It is breathing. I can hear it. You think that what we're standing on right now is alive? Are we on it? Are we literally on it? You're not directly on the show. Oh, okay.

To be completely clear, let's say this is the door opening. You've entered a huge cabbary. with the waterfall falling behind you, and you're standing on rock floor. And just in front of you is where you're seeing this arm and the huge bulbous spack of this large craft. So you're staring up and out at it, towering many stories tall where it bulges up

and seeing its long extended arm out in this direction. If you were to turn left and walk perhaps 100, maybe 150 feet in this direction, you'd be approaching the light that I described. If you were to walk straight forward, you'd walk just only 30, 40, 50 feet before you came to the side of this great craft. If you walked in this direction another 100 feet,

maybe 200, you'd find yourself falling into a waterfall. So I'm envisioning that like the light is coming from like at the bottom of the ship, like the fucking Star Wars like latch is coming down. And like, would there be a ramp up and then the lights? Yeah. Yeah, that's how I'm, Thank you for giving me the words. Are they expecting us?

I mean, you heard what they said. They know everything. They know every move that we're going to make. Every thought that we've had, they have to know. O'ye, then let's parlay with them. There's certainly not going to be any element of surprise to blow. I. Say true.

We've come this far. Should we head? into that light? Mr. Yorneer, you have one last chance. If you think we're, that you're threatened by the spirits that haunt this place. But Mr. Staviscoch and I are awarded. I don't sense them. Perhaps they are trapped in the ethereal plane.

They are not here. That's right. You don't feel any of the creatures that... attacked you. There don't appear to be any spirits when you were in your spirit form. Do I hear a chorus of voices?

What was your perception check? 19. You can keep it or you can roll again. I'd like to roll again. Roll again? Come on. Oh my God. I'm going to twist.

Twist. Use two twists. Use two twists. Damn, rich. That's still better. It's not 20. It wasn't quite faded. With a 20.

Is that enough? 20 is pretty good. It's a chorus chanting the Halo theme. Ah! Oh my God! You listen. You hear that purring and you listen again. You lean forward.

You take a few steps and you... Does water? Is it... No, there's something else. Yes, something very, very faint alludes you, but it reminds you of what you heard so loudly when you were much closer to the back of this ship. Singing voices. Singing? Singing voices, like a chorus.

Oh, I don't hear that. How are you hearing all of this? Bonnebos, what did you do? Did you mess up my ears? Does I know I can't hear any of us? I don't hear it. Mr. Yornear, what's your fearble ears hear? I hear with your special ears.

I just watched all this. I hear. What are your fearful guys seen is to be horny here? Voices. Haunting things in the ship. A chorus. It's what I heard when I projected my soul.

It could be. Do you think it's coming from inside that thing? Nowhere else it could be coming from. Oh, God. Well, I know one thing that that song might be. It's the funeral dirge of these squid-faced beasties, singing their swan song before I bring my... not my anchor. Before I cut their fucking heads off with my claws. Shall we?

Wait, I'll pull out a small stone that I pulled from the mountains before he left, and I'll take just some of. little knife or just some sort of metal instrument that would have risted the runes previously with and I will start to etch the ruin for mind in it. I will say Mahmuth protect us on them grant us strength olden close the will to endure becoming torment and I will cast

Rune of Protection which is a third level spell a special patented Derek spell Oh classic Those are the best A run on a smaller tiny object Made of stone water ceramic

Which becomes a magical For the duration of 12 hours Nice A creature that keeps this object On their person Gains resistance to one of the following Damage types Oh shit.

Oh shit. Fired, Fire, Force, Lightning, Thunder, or Psychic. You choose when you cast a spell. A creature may only benefit from one run of protection at a time. Damn. So I will... I can't wait for my brain to get shredded. I will keep this on my person, but knowing that I could give...

I could pass this stone around, and whoever holds this stone is now resistant to psychic damage. I should have said that this one. psychic, it should be obvious, but yes, I'm choosing psychic damage. For the next 12 hours. For the next 12 hours. Hey, that sounds like it'd be great for a barbarian to have. I can't wait till they're lightning squids. And as this is happening, the remainder of you

are still in awe staring up at this strange alien craft and looking at its impossibility, you are amazed that as your eyes, are adjusting to the light, you were looking at that arm and realizing that just at the very forefront, there seems to be almost like twisting vines that interlock and are, perhaps braided hair might be a better way of putting it, that seem to come to a point at the very top.

But that is the second tier. Instead, there's this lower tier where again that light flickers guiding you, almost like Willow Wisp to enter it. and find out what lies within. And as Jornier finishes, you begin to make your way. Queenie leading, as courageous and brave as she is, she's ready to take care of business as much as the rest of you. And starting to walk, you cross the wet rock, you make your way over, what is surprisingly unpathed.

And it occurs to you, creatures like this with the ability to levitate, wouldn't need a path to walk on just a distance to a door. And making your way in a long, wide arc, you finally turn the corner and are able to look within. And it is indeed, as you suspected, a ramp that leads up and into the interior of this strange vessel. Side by side, as wide as it is, you're able to walk

and make your way up. and suddenly walking not on rock or on stone, but walking up and in, you are confronted by the interior of the ship. And I think that is where we are going to end tonight's session. Bato! All right. Thanks for running the session, there. Choo-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-tch-ch-dd-d-d-d-d-.

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