Legends of Avantris - Once Upon a Witchlight | Ep. 48 | Up Shade's Creek

Episode Date: September 16, 2024

Our heroes "deal" with the consequences of their actions...   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/GhqrdfV9N1g?si=_156EJdscIKoA8GQ

Welcome to Legends of the Ventress. What a do? The name's Cremille Lucreux. You're listening to Once Upon a Witchlight. Here's what happened last time. You're pulled out from the darkness at the bottom of a chest and lifted into a child's room littered with toys and trinkets. A small elven boy with platinum blonde hair. The sword is broken in three pieces as the boy tumbles backward

as the hag looms over you crushing with three pieces of the wooden sword and sprinkling the splinters into three separate cauldrons. One new, one old. and one in between. The cauldrons bubble and pop as the brew spills over and fills three cradles. You make your way towards where you believe Nib's cave to be. The cave is dark at first.

You can hear the sound of a spinning wheel. You see a wizened old man wearing a blindfold, sitting at a spinning wheel, surrounded by piles and piles of gold, a veritable horde of magical items, and behind it, Lurking in the shadows, you see the undulating shapes of what appear to be humanoid figures is they call out to him.

Let's get 100,000 gold pieces in the fucking head. And I'll walk over and I'll take the first gold piece off the stack, and I'm trying to put it in the Crookers hat. This is the easiest job that you've ever had to do. You take piles and piles of gold coins. I'm starting to feel a little guilty. What's that like? He seems suspicious for a moment before slowly going back to spinning,

rush down the descending slope, heave as you've been carrying all of this gold. Your body is laden. As all of you see something move behind you, you quickly look and there's nothing there. And Gideon, you turn and look one more time and you see the silhouette, the moving shadow of a cloud. You are standing beneath the boughs of the trees and thither. You are exhausted from the trek out of the mountain, your pockets laden with coin, over 300,000 pieces of gold, more than enough to pay back Remy Guru, return home to the material plane, to a ventress proper, and move on with your lives should you choose to. Your feet find purchase,

on the mossy leaf scattered ground, and it is soft and comfortable as you make the truck back to where you had left your new Albear friend, Juniper, Hootsie, and the card. And as you reach the, what is now more like a caravan, you notice movement behind you. As the light shines in front from the sun that is still fairly high in the sky

and your shadows move, but not with you. They dance as they form their own shapes. Cremie, you notice yours first as you are acutely aware of your shadow, having an ability and an affinity for your shadow. And this does not look like you or any shadow shadow you've ever had before. And as the shadow begins to form, it begins to take on an image of a Bullywuck. Same clothes, the same silhouette of one Pierre that you knew from feels like very,

very long ago, the image of his face looking up at you as he gasps for his last breath. and you see as the shadow takes its index finger and slides it across its throat as it stares out at you menacingly, but it makes no sound, and you feel exhausted. You take one level of exhaustion. Oh, no.

Gideon, you see Kremi as he slumps over, almost as if the wind has been knocked out of him as he's staring towards his shadow, and you realize that his shadow is not his own. Oh there, buddy. Is yours begins to mingle with his. But where there should be one shadow, there are four.

You see the shadows of what clearly are a band of clowns, a veritable clown cars worth of clowns. You see the form of chuckles leading. Will you stop it? Christ. You see Chuckles taking the lead as he's leading the rest in a strange dance as Chuckles, Clutzy, Bumbo, and Thacco

all make their way around the shadow of Pierre and begin to move in this strange clown-like dance. And they all look towards you as they tower over Pierre. and all of them in unison pull back their arms and punch towards the air directly at you. And you feel, even though they're nowhere close to you, you feel the collision with your stomach

as you double over taking one level of exhaustion. Well, fuck. So I already had a level of exhaustion. That's the one. That's the one. I'm just reminding you because most of you probably did not take your level of exhaustion if I had it. So we're not at two levels of exhaustion.

You're at one level of exhaustion. of exhaustion. For now. They do not speak. Is the Bollywood court gesture there? No. The five. Oh.

So I was saying as well. Soul is still doing the thing. Yeah, yeah. So getting there. It's tadpolling. It's in the waiting room and quiet hell. You double over in pain. And Torbeck, you watch this almost in

almost in horror as you see the way that all of these shadows are moving, the way that Cremie and Gideon, two people that you've known to be so strong in the face of all of this are doubled over by the mere image of these shadows as you immediately see darkness rocket across one side, directly in front of you, behind you, around you, as it spins around and around you, you start to get dizzy as you look this way and that before it finally stops for just a second, and you see the image of Agden Longscarf. His scarf wrapped around you, almost choking you, his shadowy scarf, as he darts in another direction,

completely knocking your legs. Mike, will you stop? Okay, I'm done like wrongs. Thank you. Completely knocking your legs out from under you as you land on your back, the air knocked out of your body as you take one level of exhaustion. Grico, you watch as Torbeck falls on his back.

Gideon is doubled over in pain and Cremie is reeling from some psychic pain that has overcome all of them. As you feel your shadow loom over you, much larger than a shadow should be. And as you turn, look, you see Uncle Glorbo. Oh shit.

Exactly as you had been afraid he would be. No one knows what truly happened to Uncle Glorbo. He was very unclear. But you know. Deep in your heart, you know. And no amount of trying to pretend is going to change what's happening now as Uncle Glorbo looms over you.

His face angrivolved. as you feel fear well up in you, and you run straight forward slamming face first into a tree, and you feel all of the knocked out of you as you take one level of exhaustion. I'm fucking sunrissaulting. I'm rolling down a hill. Naf you.

Frost, you watch all of this in almost a peaceful contemplation. The intelligence that you have allows you to almost slow things down when you try to understand the situation. As you look to your side and a shadow nods at you, almost in agreement, you nod back and you look to the other side, you nod at that one, and then you realize, oh wait, those are shadows on the other side, not people I know. Those are the shadows of two guards, bite marks on their neck,

blood dripping down, the front of their uniform. as they look down at you in anger, in pain, in horror, in resentment. And both of them, at the same time, directly lunge towards you. You feel their shadows collide with you, and you feel all of the air knocked out of your body as you take one level of exhaustion. And then these shadows stand behind you, tethered to you. So far, saying nothing. So far, just following, watching.

Occasionally you'll see them move or make strange motions. You see them out of the corner of your eye. And all of them are threatening and menacing in some way. But all of them seem to be waiting. For what? It's hard to tell. But they wait and they watch. Oh my God's beer. Did somebody put you up to this?

Was a guru? Look, I'm sorry, man. I fucking had to, right? You gave me no chance. choice, alright? I wait for him to respond. You get nothing. And I'm just fighting every hill, and I'm just,

I'm just rolling down at the opening of Kung Phau out of the face and the little baby who came just rolling and then I keep rolling down. Gov to stop. Oh, ah, ah, ah, ah. I didn't think I would see you again. Please know that that was not me. You do not need to take any vengeance.

Everything is fine. If you have anyone to haunt, it should be whatever that curse origin was. Not myself, certainly. I don't take responsibility for it. You can go. You can go now. Leave, leave, leave.

Thank you. No, no. You're not leaving. You can go. I assure you that I bear no responsibility in your death. That's... You just stand there then, that's fine. I don't mind.

That's fine. They move closer to you, tower over you. I'll just start walking. Grigo. Grigo, I'm walking. I'm... What's happened to you? Do I see the shadows also of...

Yeah, you can see everybody's shadows. Grigo, there. Stop, stop rolling around. We need to figure something out. I start jogging a little faster. Shadow's getting closer and closer to me. Grigo, stop freaking out. That was that the time to freak out.

I just didn't as an entry and fall down and I stop now. I'm like climbing. Oh, oh! I ringed goes live. I'm just running after Grico. I'm filled existential. I wasn't looking at you, man. I was looking all these stupid fucking clowns surrounding me.

surrounding me again you kill them once well that one wants that one once that one three times that one once but that one was from a fucking fell allergy man I mean I hit him with a sock puppet this bullshit I hate clowns I hate the Faye Wilde I mean I think maybe it's not real like like man that's not really Pierre maybe they just looking into our minds and pulling stuff out of it maybe just figments of our own imagination fellas what do you think They're very persistent parts of our imagination, I say as I like run past you and continue around.

I don't get a good feeling about it, though. I feel like Pierre's looking at me, just waiting, waiting for the right moment. I don't know what that moment is, but I don't feel awful tired with him being tethered to me like this. I feel the same. Yeah, me too. I'm also very aware that they haven't touched me yet,

and I don't want that to happen either. I will have fallen down and somehow I'll back around. And as I'm falling back and rolling down, we have to go back to the cave. We have to give all the gold back. Oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. You're in a half pipe of hills.

You just a roll just enough to go off one and then back. What do you mean, Grego? We have to give the gold back. We've been gold cursed. Oh, we shouldn't know. Oh, we should have known the exact same thing that happened and it would happen at us. Oh, oh, oh, oh.

We've been gold-cursed. And it actually makes some sense. It's amazing. Is that Uncle Glovo, Ricko? Frost. As you were saying this, both of the guards lunged towards you and you feel shadowy, you feel their shadowy teeth pierced into your neck.

You take two points of damage, piercing damage. Ten? Two. Oh my gosh. No, no. Oh, they can hurt you. They can hurt you if they touch you. They can hurt you very much if they touch you.

This is not pleasant I start to speed up. Torbeck is not attempted down one acted at all because he knows that can't. So Torbeck is like completely like balled up on the ground, like covering his hand, his head with his hands and just like, oh no, no, no, no, we have to fix this. Yeah, we cool? You like, I think you would have done the same thing. in my situation, right? Like if the rows will reverse,

you would have snuck up behind me and cut my throat, right? Right? Are we cool? I wanna see if he is getting closer to me at all. Or is he just standing there? He occasionally moves towards you. None of them are standing still.

They're all acting the way that they would have in life. The clowns are all performing their own little clown act together. Occasionally, one, will step forward and do something menacing or threatening towards Gideon. But so far, but so far none of them have, outside of the ones that have attacked Frost so far, none of them have made any move to harm you in any way.

But none of them are motionless. Quit making obscene gestures at me. Chuckles, fuck you, man. Oh, God. Somehow it's better when he could talk, you know. to both of his hands removed from his fist and spin around him, flipping you off. Once they bite frosts,

I'm going to endeavor to fight back. I would turn to the closest of the guards that's now like chasing me at a good pace, at perhaps a jog, and I will try to cast mine sliver. I'll reach out and I will attempt to crunch something the way that I crushed a small beast, a woodland beast not a few hours ago. Oh, they need to make, it needs to make an intelligent saving throw.

Roll an intelligent saving throw for me, please. Okay, just one moment. I don't know why you would make me do that. At disadvantage. Oh, yeah, no, no, that makes sense. That makes sense. Oh, I know what's happening. I get a six. Okay. So how does mine suffer work? Oh, well, if someone fails a saving throw, then they take 1D6 psychic damage and they subtract 1D4

from their next saving throw. You take a D6, and you're going to take minus 4 from your next saving throw. Okay, okay. We'll take damage, right? The D6 is his disdames. Yeah, he took six damage, and then his saving throw will be negative four.

Ow! Ow! That hurts. What'd you do, man? I'm trying to reach into one of the guards' minds to crush it, and it was some sort of reflection or mirror attack. This is what this feels like? It's awful.

All scared to a stop. Oh, it's like when you eat a, uh, a cucumber rubber, rectangle trousers a popsicle too quickly. Yeah, that's exactly what this feels like. Just not gonna look up, still can't hurt me. It can't hurt me. Grummy, you're the shadow guy, man. You know how to kill him or hurt them? Or like, what the hell do we do about these ghosts? Well, no, I mean, that's the thing. How do you kill a shadow? That's why it's so fucking powerful. Just setting them away, you say you goodbye.

Oh, goodbye Uncle Glover. I'm sorry you couldn't pay your dance. No, I mean, it's not real. It's not like you're attacking. You start to speak, and you immediately feel your lungs fill with water, and you feel yourself choking. It's not water, but blood that's caught in your throat. As you feel yourself choking as you begin to suffocate.

Creamy, man. Spin it out. What's happening to you? Spreeze it out. Hey, man, hey! Hey! I'm looking, come on. I'm like him, I'm like him.

I'm like him. You take one point of damage as the choking sensation fades away. You look back towards Pierre and once again, he raises his small bully wug arm, and he runs his index finger along his throat. Oh, no, no. That's what I feel like, we have to fix this.

I was gonna go in is give his filthy sack, and pull out the blood of scarf. You attempt to, and as you do, Agden Longscarf runs up behind you, jumps into the air and slammed right into the back of your knees. You fall over prone, taking two points of damage. Oh, Darmac is sorry. Please, Agdon, go away.

I'm going to, as I'm just scraping, scrambling in my feet, I'm gonna say, Nib, Nib, help us. We'll know how you go. We've learned our lesson. I've learned all this. I've learned from this parable. Quiet, quiet, quiet. We don't know if it's the gold.

Hold on. Yeah, what Frosty said, man. We don't know it's the gold. We need more evidence. Besides, I think I have a solution. If it hurts us to attack them, I cast mine sliver on myself. I make an intelligent saving throw.

At disadvantage. At disadvantage. Yeah. I fail. Oh, my God. I take six points of... Yes, you do. Oh, and I'm sure I've subtracted one D4 from my...

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, wow. That's a full. So I take six points more of psychic damage, I think, unless it hurts them. And you take a D4. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I subtracted the D4 from my change.

Yeah, but you need to subtract, you need to roll another D4 because your next one will also be negative D4. Do I, do that, for sure? Do I damage the shadow or do I hurt myself? You hurt yourself? Oh! Oh, no.

Oh, no. It's not the solution at all. The point is that this isn't real, right? These, like I said, these are just figments of our imagination somehow. It feels very real to me, Grimmie. He kicks Torbake in the knees. Do I see blood like running from you?

I need your role, wisdom saving throw for me, please. A disadvantage. That'd be a three. What a natural one. You lean in to listen to the conversation as, Chuckles pushes you backwards and all of the clowns. Hey, don't fucking touch me, man. And all of the clowns begin to perform

a strange circus routine for you. There's nothing funny about this. And yet you can't stop laughing. As you feel the effects of Tasha's hideous laughter come over you. And you- The worst show I've ever been to. You fall prone laughing louder and louder and louder.

And with every laugh, Chuckles gets bigger and bigger and bigger as he feeds off of your laughter. I'm gonna fucking cl- Oh God. Look, if it's not real, Elders blast, I'll do Clutzy and Chuckles in the face as the two beams of Elders Blast will shoot out to them. You are doing what?

I'm Elders blasting, chuckles and Cluxie. Okay, go ahead. They're both 20-something. What's you all? No, that would have Yeah. Yeah. It hits. 23 points of damage.

You take 23 points of damage. Oh my gosh. Get in. No, you do. You get to roll two wisdom saving throws. And you are advantage on both of them because you just took damage. See? I'm thinking I hate it.

Big money. Oh, now. First is it 22. You are able to shake off a two. able to shake off the effects of Tasha's. Did you roll at disadvantage for those because he was prone? I did not.

The first one would have hit. Yeah. So you still would have shaken it off, but. It might not be 23 damage. Only a 7. Your AC 17? 17. Yeah, so I would hit this. Yeah, okay, you take 23 damage.

But you are no longer laughing uncontrollably. The second Wisdom saving throw, I believe, would have been 14. The first one, you got a 20. Yeah. So you shake it off. Oh, I got you out there. Okay, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you all right?

I'm so sorry. Ah! Ah! Are you laughing? That was terrible, man. What I'm sorry, look. Look, look. Who came over me, man?

I didn't like that a little bit. I know, I know. Look, look, but I mean, it got you to stop, right? Oh, you dumb bastard. I know the problem here. Frosty doesn't hit hard enough. Here we go. Boom, boom!

I ignite my fist. It's in flame and fire, and I lunge it just all of the clowns. Ah, targeting for Chuckles, and I try to him. Roll to attack. Chuckles will have the shadow popcorn bucket and he squeezes like a Popeye spinach can. And his arms get huge and he will go after. 17.

Yeah, that hits. That hits Chuckles? Chuckles? Oh. Is he C-17? Yep. Definitely poor everything you found in the space. I action surge. Yeah, we can do it. Oh, one, I'm sorry.

Nine points of damage. And that's with your action surge? No, I don't actually. Okay. You take nine points of damage on top of the 23 you just took? Now, that's fair. However, however, however, My fists cast light in a, I don't know, 10 foot radius or something, is that relevant at all?

Or does that seem to diminish the shadowy effect of these shadows? No. Wow, okay. The light shines through them. It's very pretty. Casts a purple light on the other side, but you still see the outline.

It's as if the inside of them becomes completely illuminated, but you still see the outline, a dark purple outline. of these shadows is they all. The light from your gauntlet isn't affecting the shadows at all. Ah, Nib, ah, Nib, I'll trip, I'll fall out of the cave. Oh, you're making your way towards the cave? I've been running towards the cave and yelling. I'll take the goat.

I'll always learn from the parable. Oh, blah, blah, I'm sorry. We don't know that. We don't know. I'm sorry that you had a gambling heaven. Stop, no. I'm sorry you couldn't pay you back your death in the bed. What have he cursed us, man?

If all we gotta do is kill Nive. You make your way to the cave. There is no entrance. It's just solid cliff face. You look for the torch that had been sconsed outside, but there is no sconce there. You find the tree, the nail still embedded in it that had the sign for wanted Will of the Faywild.

You see that it had been recently removed. This is clearly where you had been. You even find your footprints walking from the face of this, the sheer cliff face of this mountain. But there's no entrance. Smash cut to the Lost Bumper. Everyone knows the show Lost, right? It's very funny to Lost fans.

Lost fans love that joke. Oh, NIM! Open up! Open up! Oh gosh! Oh no, did you transfer your curse onto us? Oh, no, do we get monkey pawed? Oh! I hate monkey palms! Oh, please, please, we're sorry, we're sorry. Do I see him hitting an entrance or like hitting a portal? You see him slamming his fist up against the mossy side of a stone mountainside.

Look, fellas, can we all just calm him the fuck down, all right? No! I'll turn into a miniature of Ballet or Landshark, and I'm just going to start digging. I'm gonna try to just burrow through the cliff face. Oh, that's pretty good. Yeah, you begin to burrow and there's no tunnel here. You make a new one and you burrow for however long you choose to. I'm not gonna keep going until someone yanks me out of this.

Look, three things, right? One, we've been cursed. Two, these aren't real ghosts, all right? Somehow getting pulled out of our heads, it's us. It's an extension of us. Gid can confirm, whoever else you can confirm, right? Yes, yes. Every time I've attempted to hurt the shadow,

it's hurting me instead. And three, did Grico kill Uncle Bobo? Is that the implication it is? Can we fucking talk about that? You see his jaw? Only Grico's ever done that to a guy, ma'am. Wasn't it like a logging accident? You just ways he didn't do it?

Oh, man. He pierred him, I think. Oh, God. No offense, Pierre. I never saw that coming. He always spoke so fondly of Uncle Gorman. You read into the subtext on those hunting stories. I've never been one for subtext.

I have a quick idea. I have a quick idea. I will open my pack, and I will go through my pockets, and I will collect all of the gold that I took, some 70,000 gold pieces, and I will put them into a sack, and I will put them on the ground, and then I will back away slowly.

Let's see if the shadows care about the gold or care about me now that I've given up the gold. I've given it up. I don't know. I'm not possessing of the gold anymore. The shadows take, they look at you with your hands on your hips and they mimic your posture as they stand on either side of you. They look at you, they look at the gold. They look back at you. They look back at the gold.

And then they both lunge forward and take a quick bite out of your neck, wearing four points in damage. Oh! Oh! That hurts! Well, I guess we get to keep the gold. That's the good news. Oh, God, frogs with teeth is really disgusting.

They're not frogs? Oh, I guess they would be. I was picts. I was mentioning the 15th of cards. Who has been lunging minutes? Who's half more? Tiant! Yeah.

I'm going to take a thigh of a lot of. You see a thigh out of cry. Of course they are. Of course they are. They just gummed me really hard, is what they're saying. No, no, they have fangs, they have vampire fangs now. They have fangs now. They have fanged now.

They've fanged now. They fanged now? They fanged now? Well, that hurts, and I'm bleeding from my neck now. Did you're bleeding from your neck now? They didn't bleed it from my neck now. Grigo, Grico! Stop! You can stop.

Brico, please. I turn around. having burrowed deep. It's the only way back out towards Uncle Glorbo. Shout out. Oh, no, Uncle Gorbo's in this hole with you. He's around you. I'll be there and I'll stop.

Offrey got lost him. And I'll turn. I'll immediately just be scared out of my wild shape and I'll scramble. You do. And as you do, you are horrified. Horrified, and bit of the tunnel collapses, and you take three points of bludgeoning damage.

I was brewing up, and I just start rolling like a fucking golf ball out of a window. I'm just rolling out. I'll take that damage. Okay. Frost, you're still haunted, and that's all the gold you took? It's not just the gold I took. I put every single penny in that bag and walked away from it.

I don't know what a penny is. but here we are. All right, let's just get all the gold we stole unless we put it in one big pile, and maybe we need to put all of it, like, you know, away from us. Oh. Oh, hey.

I'll shake it out in your coat. Doorback. It just isn't fair. Do our back didn't do anything. He's like trying to pour all the gold out and like trying not to look at Agden. Agon's neck, because his head is only half biased in you.

He's like missing an eye. He's like riddins. He's definitely like stitched together over like 200 places. As you move forward, Agden once again jumps up and kicks you right in the back of your knees. You fall face first into frost gold. Face plant into it, you watch as the gold spreads all over. It's like tripping and falling onto Legos. You have gold and thursday your knees.

He can say that, but he stole just as much gold as we did. And he killed the guy. He killed the guy worse than anybody else. What the hell's you talking about? They all we put together. Look at that. Yeah, man. He just doesn't remember.

Oh, well. You sure we gotta give up all this gold? I think it's not real gold. I think it's like magical curse, tempt you gold. And we got tricked. We got tempted and we fucking fell for it. I feel like we have to find a way to return it. Hey, Grico, you find it?

You find it? Fine. No, the cave is gold. I'm not I peroted Uncle Globo was in the king. Ah, oh, Bob, bah. It was like Empire strikes back. Ah, ba, ba, ba. You look behind you.

There's no Uncle Glorbo. You look to your side. There's no Uncle Glorbo. You look to the other side. There's no Uncle Gorbo. You spin in circles and he is nowhere to be seen. And then as you look down at the ground, you realize there is a huge shadow cast over you

as you look up and Uncle Gorbo is above you. is above you, towering over you. A clob of like salt water. Rattling in chains. Fethoplasm. Mm-hmm. He begins to sing, Glorbo and Grico,

ooh. Yes. Glorbo and Grico, ooh. Bricko, please, please just fucking stop. Just for one, A fucking second, all right. I'll stop it on me like midfall.

It's not real, it's not actually a ghost, not actually Uncle Glovo. It's all in your hand, it's all in all of our heads, all right? You have some gold, we all have some gold, and we have the gold here, we're gonna put it on a pile, we're gonna walk away from it and see what happens, all right? It's our only chance. Don't be afraid of the shadow, but these injuries are very real.

I'm gonna put my hand away and like, I'm gonna eat a banana. As soon as Grigger will make me one. And I all empty all of my bags and pouches and all of the gold that I have. I'm gonna try to put along with Frost. Oh, this is the worst feeling in the world. Getting rid of gold.

So you're doing all of the gold you took as well of all of your additional gold. Or just the gold you have any time? Have any of time? Doormick? Those are one and the same. Not everything, every single gold, silver, copper, electron piece, Gricko, I am just completely just throwing.

Why a thousand gold? I'm emptying out. Torrey has nothing. I will keep what I think is real gold and not fake, like cursed gold. Okay. Roll an intelligence check to see. how well you do at determining which pieces were yours

and which pieces were. Twistice. Twist it? Twist it? We're horribly cursed by ghosts. Yeah, or hurried by ghosts. 17? Oh.

You feel like, you look at them and you realize that there are, the gold pieces are clearly from the Fay Wild. Where they were minted, you have no way of knowing. but these are not your standard of antress currency. And so you are able to pick through them and find the pieces that you know belong to you. Though you imagine you had some fay coin

on your person having been here for a while, those pieces inevitably put into the pile. But you feel like you do a pretty good job at separating the two. It's easy to tell the difference. Look, there's chocolate inside these. I need to roll the Constitution save. rule constitution saving throw. Okay. And here's the D4 that I'm subtracting from my next saving throw. And it's going to be a... Dread. A 15. Oh, you suffer from incontinence for the next 24 hours.

Solidarity! It's nothing to be embarrassed to matter. The President is a lot. There's a lot. It's not happening yet. There's the reason that Torbeck is generally moist. Oh, God. It's very easy to tell that that wasn't one of the fake coins.

It was one of the party favors you got from the Witchlight Carnival and Time has passed. It was a... Well, all the rest of these are gold. What about I just eat? Why didn't you have random jugger at any gold? How did you get that? I was up in my pockets. I don't know.

It looked like gold. Oh, I don't know how to be it. Well, this is outrageous. Extremely concerning. Oh, it feels great. Are you okay, bro, Steve? That was a very little chalky. What it tastes like?

Was it even chocolate? I'm pretty sure it was chocolate. Well, it can't be that. It's like a mocklet. It was like a faux chocolate. Oh, was it left with that calendar chocolate? That's exactly right. It's ridiculous. There's no way anybody could mix up something that isn't chocolate. Does anybody want any licorice?

This is too belled rubber hose. Why are you getting me from roses? This is dress nice. Dormack's licorice. That's not liquorice. I'm going to buy you liquorice. liquorage went up oh oh yeah haha

yeah I'm like I'm like What I need to walk away for a moment I need to go over here Isn't anybody

smell that Nothing nothing I'm like using prostitage What smells like bad eggs Oh What happened? behind the tree.

Meas for me for a second. The shadows hold them. Frost, what are you thinking? What are you doing with your life? This has happened once or twice. Allow Dormack to share a piece of wisdom. Someone once told Dorebeck that people don't forget. I'm just behind a tree at this point.

I'm gone. People don't forget. I'm gonna go over here. Is it very obvious that frosts should have? Yeah, that's pretty obvious. Make sure that the curse is being removed. Everything's fine here. We're all fine. How are you?

Oh, right. Nobody else eat random chocolate you find on the ground, all right? Why are you looking at doorbag? I want to pick up one of the fake gold pieces and do I get a sense that it's magical in any way? Roll an archa check. I'm going to twist this. That's a 16, I believe. You pick up the gold piece and at first you notice nothing. Then you notice a gentle warmth to it and you can feel a slight vibration, a magical thrum.

you drop the coin and pick up another and you wait, and eventually you feel that too, and you try another and another and another. You eventually get through 25 different gold pieces, and they all feel the same way. Oh my God, how did I not notice this before? It's classic cursed gold. Classic!

Yeah, yeah, no, these are very obviously cursed magical coins. What do you mean, cursed? Frost, I love to you. He's completely clean. He's breastedition station himself. But he is very pale. He's sweating. He's sweating.

His eyes are bloodshot. And his nose is running. You look a little damn. And suck little right through me. Oh. But you good luck? He looks like you just left a review on Amazon. about some gummy beer, sugar-free gummy bears.

I feel like I ate an entire bag of wow potato chips. This is that lost. Don't let this get you down. It gets easier every time you make that mistake. I've never felt lower than this time. You can only go awl. Never trust to fart, Frosty. I didn't have to trust anything.

You know who told me that? me that. Ha-bah-b-b-b-b-bh. I already gave out my gold. I gave out my stinky-sinky gold. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Yes, we gave up the gold. And as you panic and run forward,

you trip on a route and slam your face into the ground, taking four points of damage. Ah, bu-b-bh-bh-bh-bh. I want to make sure that I don't have any more gold on me, and that it's all in the pile. Any more fagold. Fagold, correct. Yeah.

You were able to do that previously. Alright, fellas, let's get rid of this. It's all in for here. Yeah, I've given all of mine up. It's the only goal I had on me. I've given every thing I've got to have. Oh, man, you think the curse is gonna make us all shit, our ass and oh God, I hope.

No, it was the chocolate. Just don't eat any chocolate. Bossy, sure, licorice house. It's not licorice. Oh. Oh. Ah! So not too late to change your world.

Stop waving that in my face. Oh, my God. Oh. This podcast is brought to you by our Patreon. Become a patron today at patreon.com slash legends of avatris and gain access to tons of exclusive perks, including a monthly movie night and a weekly Patreon exclusive campaign. set on the high seas, shroud over saltmarsh. You can also go to The Crooked Moon.com to pick up your own copy of our first published supplement,

The Crooked Moon, a folk horror tome for Dungeons and Dragons 5th edition. And don't forget to snag all of the extra goodies like dice, miniatures, plushies, a tarot deck, and more. Thank you. I don't think it's working, Grimmie. Well, hold on, hold on. Did you do some kind of fay ritual or something? I mean, oh, magical gold.

You have been returned. Turn to a pile in the middle of the say wild. Please shadows go away. Are we for anything to happen? You wait one minute, two minute, five minutes pass. The shadows are continuing to act as they've acted this entire time. Fuck! Perhaps it's about concepts of ownership.

We have to declare that these are Nibs coins or something. You're looking too good, man. You need like an hour, that's fine. This is the combination of blood loss and other matter. Do you want to just contribute to the conversation from that bush over there? Oh, man. He's sitting down. Oh, you need help getting up, Krusty?

A walkover. I just want to sit here in this log. I think that's gonna help. Okay, well, I'm sure you'll feel better. Oh, that's pretty. I'm not as a queen like that. You sure it's not concepts of ownership, perhaps. If we leave them and put a sign, these are, these,

coin, you need, reciprocity and whatnot. I, they're rules. I'm not thinking straight. Yeah, but we can't just like, if Nib's not around and he's fucking gone, how are we gonna give it back to him? Just say, oh, these are Nib's coins now? These are Nib's coins. Sir Nib's coins now.

We bequeath, we bequeef on to Nib. What? We bequeef onto Nib. I declare bankruptcy. I declare bankruptcy. I have no gold pieces left. Yeah, that's the spirit. All of my.

creditors may not hunt me down kill me and throw my body in the swamp we all return to Torbay you heard him boys see you can you can leave us alone now unlike Uncle Globo I wish to escape my creditors is he still there mm-hmm I'm sorry I'm gonna go well maybe it's not got anything to do with the gold man he said it was all in our heads why we try to locking somebody out. Oh, that's a decent point. Torbeg means, look, the cave entrance is gone.

Something isn't right. Well, I think it means like, you know, making one of us unconscious. Yeah. Yeah, Torbeg is agreeing. Are you volunteering? Well, Torbeck didn't say that. The Torbag is just saying the Torbanks the Get-in might be right.

Okay, I'll take one for the team. Come on, Get-in. Come on, get in. We've been here before. We've been here before. Mixing bananas first before you do this. Yeah. Okay.

Oh. Oh. My name is Grikita Banana, and I'm here to say, I hope that's that smell, frosty smell does go away. The smell of bananas hits your nose. It's a lot stronger than you'd expect. Your stomach turns. You feel the nausea welling up inside of you. Nobody look, I can make it to the tree line.

No, I can't. Oh, Gregor, can you only make bananas? I mean, that's what I'm used to make. Maybe some cheese will bind him up. Some torquette does. Horrific diarrhea. Lots of cheese, too much cheese, lots of dried fruit. It would help.

It would help. Make a bunch of mallow cups. Those will plug you right up. I'm sure bananas will do your tummy very nice. Okay, get in. Come on. All right, man, where do you want it, all right? Just like we practice.

All right, on the count of three. Okay, here we're gonna. One, two, five. Okay, dude, I just like you know. Oh, right. I just go to sleep, man. Get easier. I like the points for Grico until he falls unconscious.

You don't have to roll for it. No, you do. Aw. He's not moving. I'm saying you just knock him unconscious. Grico, you lose all of your health. To your hundred points of damage. You lose all of your health and you fall unconscious.

As the shadows close in, so does one particular shadow. Hey, get out of here, Gloria Bo. He's unconscious now, right? You're all on his head. You all watch as Uncle Gorbo's shadow continues to loom over Grico. And Grico, as you're floating through this unconscious state, all you see around you is darkness. You hear the clinking of gold and occasionally a glint of light. And as you look, it almost seems as if a beam of light glints off of piles of gold all around you. But as you move through this, you're never able to get to them. All the while, though you can't see it,

you can feel the presence of that shadow, ever watching, ever moving, ever waiting. Even in death, Glorbo has come. I'm in hell. I'm in hell. I'm in hell. Quick, give me a banana, he's saying he's in a hell. My prison is regret.

Oh, hey, baby, he's fine. It's a living nightmare. This is a hell of my own making. I kind of like I'm better than something, right? I'm pretty much again. I'll take one of the bananas. Well, at least let me make one death saving, right.

Yeah, we'll make one death saving, Phil. Oh, 19. Mm-hmm. Come on, man. Come on, back to us. Is the doorman of help. Chew it up. Chew it up.

Chew it up. Torbeck takes it back. Torbeck doesn't think that worse. Well, what the hell are we going to do about these things, then? You can't knock your guy unconscious. You can't give away all the curse gold. Okay, I have an idea.

Uncle Globo can buy my pocketcuh. Anyway. Ross, what's your idea? All right. I'm just gonna try it. Oh, stinky. Guards, nameless guards. I don't know what your name was, perhaps in your shadow state you can't tell me.

But perhaps I can help you. Is there something in life that I prevented you doing that I now must quest to achieve on your behalf? Perhaps visit a lover so that you can possess my body and communicate some form of redemption or allow you to pass on in peace and solitude. Your stomach turns. You're inviting a ghost to take over your body

so you can have sex with their lover? You're shitting you're still in every... I also shoot this guy's wife. You're shitting yourself every five seconds, man. Who about this guy? Come on with a plan. You're purport? No, I'm offering redemption. Perhaps that's the...

the pattern here, is that we prevented all of these people from what they would have enjoyed in life. It's this saga of the stinky purve. I mean, unless that's what you want me to do, is it banging? Not real, I can wait up. There's no way that we prevented people from doing stuff.

Vagden wasn't even a good person. Surely he had dreams. Perhaps this is one of those stories where, you know, in a Faye while they talk about. Aging was burning people. Look, look, maybe it is about ownership, right? And we need to give the gold away to do good, just like Nib has to do, turn it into a bunch of bullshit.

All right, so maybe we should have to sign it over to somebody. And then we're free. And we find it over to the shadow? I'm sorry. I'm well past rational fun. No, you've got some fucking stupid eyes here. We're going to sign it over to the owl bear.

Go easy on him. He's dehydrated. That's a good point. I'm going to snap my fingers and they'll be a shadowy puff and a contract will appear midair open and it'll be signing over all of the

gold to one juniper owl bear. Wait, wait, wait. Why if that just gives the owlbear our curses? We can't do that. They'll be free of our curses. Oh, look at her. She didn't hurt anybody. She's currently snuggling with Coot-I-Wat-E.

Oh, Jesus. A bunch of perverts in this thin thither. You got a juniper. Jesus, you got an audience. Holy hell. I met him. Oh, God, I got to run that one now. Uncle Globo's DVD snuggling with coutes.

Oh, my God. They had a confrontation. It's all coming together now. Yes, please. Holy shit. You are all, you have just finished putting your gold into a pile. in the middle of the forest. You are signing a contract

to give all of the gold, the spay gold, over to Juniper, in the hopes that it will appease whatever curse has befallen on you. All right, Juniper, just need your paw. If you don't mind, please. Let me just, oh, he's an inkwell.

We can't do this. Mr. Crimmie. Oh, that's a beautiful signature, Juniper. Look at that. Wow. Oh, it's stunning. What do you think? This is gonna cause a double curse

for all of our horrific misdeeds. I'm not convinced this will work either. I thought I was onto something, but the guards haven't responded to my offer to bang their wives. They both lunge in and make the tear neck doing one point of damage. No, they will curse Juniper,

and she is a poor precious defenseless owl bear. Oh, well, we got cursed because we stole We're giving it away to her for free. Yeah, oh, she's not stealing the gold. We're giving it away. Like, we're the heroes, you know. This does not sit right with Torback. All right, enjoy your gold.

Juniper, what do you think? Shadows, you can go away now. Juniper motions are moves towards the gold and begins sniffing around it. She finds another one of those chocolate gold pieces. and eat it. No, no, no, no, no, no. Juniper, no.

Imagine the smell around here. And eats it whole with the wrapper on. She's a large owl bear, and something like this is not going to affect her stomach in any way whatsoever. She seems to enjoy it. She's doomed. As she sniffs around the gold and not quite understanding what it is

that you're asking of her to do with this. Are the shadows still there? They aren't. Oh, well, that didn't work. You just sign away all our gold for nothing, Remy. Well, I'm not sure that an Albeck can, in terms of contracts, you know, intellectually agree. Sign it, so it's probably void. What do we need to find someone with more sentience?

Well, no. Niv is turning the gold into something that can help people, right? Magical items. It's turning into magical items or whatever, but we don't have the ability to do that. Oh, maybe we can spin it. I'll take one of the curse gold pieces, and I'll put it down and I'll spin it. It spins for a short amount of time before it falls over onto its side.

Oh, look, look. I don't know what we're gonna do about this, but I think we can't do anything about it right here right now. So let's put all the gold into the wagon, the chariot, and we either need a fine nib, and find some people to help with the gold. Otherwise, these shadows aren't going anywhere. Torbeck's knees are never going to be the same again.

Turbbe can already feel the weather changing. Geniper, you need to, can you smell the gold and perhaps track the scent. You're an owl there. You're very clever. Can you source out where Nib may have gone? Roll an animal handling check. It's a great one. A disadvantage. Yeah, I actually did something smart, so thank you, Dice. 24.

A disadvantage? Oh, it disadvantage. There's a lot of sense around. And it's animal handling, right? It's going to throw her off. Okay, okay. Okay, come on, come on. Eleven.

Oh. Juniper sniffs around the gold. She seems to at least understand roughly what you're asking. She sniffs around the gold and she perks up as if she has caught a scent. And she begins to move forward as she sniffs the ground. She tightens up her limbs and begins to strut over to Crummy and then over to Gideon. And over to Torebeck and to Grico and to you, smelling all of you on the gold as it's been in your. your packs and on your person and mingling with your son.

It smells like us. I should have realized. Oh, God's. All right, well look, we don't have to fucking deal with this. All right, just keep eating manias so you don't pass out. And let's just start looking for niv. Somebody, anybody. Well, you think we should keep carving into the mountain? No, I think he magically teleports around, maybe. I don't know. That seems fair enough. Oh, he came all this way.

Oh, wait. Juniper just came here. Didn't Juniper brought us here? Yes. And she was supposed to be here. Oh, let's all get in the chariot. Okay. Okay. Okay. James on not sitting here frost.

What the fuck is wrong with you? Can you clean that up? I've already cleaned it up. Can I try to help? Oh, God. It smells like making it worse. It feels like eggs. This is like the wizarding world 500 years ago.

Oh, no. That just smells like Fabriz and shit. Oh, no. Doing my best. Okay. We're all in. Do you. Take the reins once again.

Juniper. Can you help around? Proceed. Take us to me. And Juniper does, as she's told, and she begins to proceed. Frost, I need you to make a Constitution saving through a disadvantage for me, please. A disadvantage you say. Oh, yeah.

So this advantage, right? Yes. That's not talking about. Whoa, look over that turn, Hootsie! This is a really rough ride for you. Oh. Oh. Jesus.

Oh. That's enough out of you. Oh, God. It's filmed like a fucking Kill Bill part two when she's in the car, but it's all of us looking on in horror, Frost. Careful round the bends. Ooh.

He didn't cross control. He's going to take the lily pad, Lily pad and just like, you know, shadow us 200 feet behind and get the side or something. Probably. I still have the lily pad. I can probably just. Can I enroll the lily pad? Like a fucking, what is it? Yeah, you can't. It was wrapped in part in the... Oh, you're right. So has it been re-humidated?

It looks like it is repairing itself, but it's not fully repaired. I'm worried I can't use this. I'm going to have to sit in the cherry with you guys. I'll endeavor to keep the... Things are fine. Things are fine. And you continue on your way. It seems like Juniper has an idea of where she wants to go. Whether it's where you want to go is unclear, but she seems to be moving with purpose

as you make your way through the trees. Following along what is clearly a pathway, a rough but used road of sorts. As you make your way through, past beautiful purple trees, into beautiful pink trees, and blue and into green. You pass a crooked rock and a stream, a gentle waterfall. You ride, or you ride like this for about 30 minutes before you pass some purple trees,

some pink trees, some blue trees, some green, a crooked rock, a stream, a gentle waterfall, and you continue for about 30 more minutes, until you find yourselves passing through some purple trees, some pink trees, some blue trees, some green trees. Cremie? Is that Crooked Rock, that's a familiar to me, familiar to you? Why would that look familiar, Frost? And also these purple trees, didn't we just pass those?

Oh, I don't know. I've been paying attention. I've been looking out. I've just been sort of staring at my feet. Trying not to focus on the smell. Has anyone know what I'm talking about? Are we going in circles? Oh, those trees are green. What are you guys saying? You guys saying, Hoosie's bad driving this thing and has taken us in circles? Hoosie, you're doing great. Is Uncle Gideon hoping you had to drive?

Oh, you're going to be able to drive all your friends down to the local mall. It will be so sweet. I think that we're trapped in a loop. I don't think we're going to escape from this mountain. Oh, no. I look behind me. Are the guards sitting with us on the chariot, or are they like... They're all floating behind the chariot.

They're all parasitland. The clouds are. It's actually just bulldoin. It's like from the fucking up. The smell is killing them. I don't. You pass a stream. A small waterfall.

Oh my God. Well, that's brand new. Well, no, stop turning then. Just go straight. Just to bleed. She's doing great, all right? And your positive, you should be. You haven't made any turns.

You haven't come to a crossroads. There's been no fork in the road. It's just been straight. We're moving as straight as that shit coming out of frosty paints, all right? We're traveling one single direction, all right? I'm never going to let this down. As you pass

purple trees, pink trees, blue trees, green trees, a crooked rock, a gentle stream, small waterfall. Are we, like, if we look behind us, or we're like in a forest, right?

We're not like looking at the mountain behind us, are we? No, you've you're well past. where the entrance to Nib's Cave had been. You passed that a while ago. When you reached the purple trees. You haven't passed anything like that again. It's just purple trees into pink

into blue and to green to a crooked rock, a gentle stream, and a small waterfall. Maybe we're just in some kind of like stream. Maybe we should jump out. If you're going to stop, let's stop by the stream. We're trapped in a Hammibovaboard cartoon. We're at the purple tree, so hang on, hang on. Another 20 minutes.

And you continue for another 20 minutes until you make your way past the Crooked Rock and the gentle stream. Oh, whoa, you stop, we're at the stream. Ah, she loves dropping this, right? We're right back. I go to the stream and I endeavor to free myself of all sense so that I'm fragrant.

Yeah, you make your way to the stream, and as you step into it, a gym of coral fish appear. No, I'm just kidding. That's very funny. That's right. Oh, yeah. My games. My weight protein also means we shit in my pants.

No word to know. Brutal. I can't take credit for the gym of Carlfish. When I was playing Baldersgate 3 with some of the adventress fam in Discord, I don't remember who. who it was that called them a Jim of Carl Fish. It was hilarious.

Genius. Well, I don't have a solution. I'm cleaning my underwear, and there are two voiceless guards who occasionally bite me. I can't seem to convince them that I can help them. I can free them and allow them to pass on

to the next life. How come the fact that we're in the woods with all these trees and bushes and leaves and the only clean water we've seen since, you know, neck bats, and you decided to just shit in it. What's that all about, man? What would you have me do, Gideon?

Wipe your ass with the leaves. Use your magic to clean it up, man. I'm just shitting all the water. I already have been using the magic. This isn't coming out. Gideon? Do you want to try? Put it out of me like a lot.

No, no. I've got no magic cleaning abilities. I don't even have normal cleaning abilities. I don't even have normal cleaning abilities, alright? You see me? I'm covering in dirt. This oil's from seven years ago, alright? This mustard stain?

That wasn't yesterday. I think I have some perfume in my pack. Hold on. I'll continue to clean. Now, what are we gonna do? This curse is worse than I thought. And I don't know how we're gonna get out of this. Are we gonna die here?

We just might. Probably, yeah. It might just be here till we die. Until these shadows kill us. Torbair doesn't want to die. I am going to consult with the primal spirits. I'm going to sit by this smelly stream and attempt to think of an idea of how we might be able to break this curse.

Okay. How long is that going to take? Torbeck. Yeah? I don't know. I'm gonna walk over to like a rock by the stream, and I'm just gonna sit and cross my legs, just close my eyes. We've got into a very spooky situation,

primal spirits. Any ideas? Would none of our eyes are working? Please help me, oh great primal monstrosity spirits. Is this gonna work, Mr. Crami? Don't you actually have like augury or something on this spell is. I don't

do I think they gave it to Druids because you only used it somehow. You're always telling Dandy to use Alderie. To your point, Torbein, I don't fucking think so. He's never done it before. At least he's never worked

before. Torbeck just like to be negative, but Torbeck is worried that we're wasting our time. I think all of us might be a waste of time. I don't have it prepared. If so. Well, I'm going to just basically try to,

do I get any sense of how to break this curse or figure out what to do? Do I get anything? And what are you doing to try? I'm just trying. I'm just kidding. I'm just trying to think, does Grico have any idea to figure out, is it any clue that I could piece together?

Roll an Arcana check. Oh. This doesn't work Torbeck. I don't know. Torbeck. an idea. Interesting. Okay, Turnback might not have an idea. The Arcona Check would have been a disadvantage. Oh, because I'm exhausted.

Yeah, you can't fix that. One more twist. One more twist. One more twist. One more twist. One more twist. One more twist. No, that's a seven. We have a one of five and a seven. Okay, hold on. One more ten. One more ten. I can stop. The best we can do is a five, right? If we take the two highest. One, five, seven, one. Yep.

Five, three, oh. Oh, nine. We'll see you all those go. Dormagmiy. I commune with the train spirits. Oh, my. To the great engines of the year after. I declare uncursony.

And I'm just actually sitting there. Help! Help! Help! Please! I commune with you. Help! You hear a random voice around the woods.

Shut the fuck off. Is this actually going to help us? I like take a deep breath. Oh, please, please. Arcana. That's funny. Seven. With a close view.

You scream and scream. scream into this ancient forest and your voice reverberates back at you. Yes, calmly. And you imagine that if the primal spirits were going to tell you anything, they would be drowned out by the sound of your yelling. Yeah. You actually been trying. It's been trying, hold up.

Oh please, it's so spooky and I have one thing. The answer is. The answer is. So we're back in as an idea. What, what's your idea, man? Anything, please. Can we call the king for help? He's never answered us one time.

Well, maybe now he will. Well, maybe not, but we gotta try it, right? I mean, what's the worst thing that happened? The last thing I want is to meet the king at this time. But it's powerful and we're stuck and scared and some of us are hungry and some of us are pooping our pants. What's some of us? Who else is pooping their heads? Yeah, let's call the King of Hearts.

I mean, what the hell, Grimmie? You got any other ideas? I mean, this is one tough nut to crack. I try to tricking the owl bear. I mean, I don't know what else. You want to be. The owl bear? What if you asked the great,

You asked the great kind Baron how one would stop shitting their pants. I'm not asking him. Oh, you are you getting me. That's pretty indeed. We just have to wait it out. Why don't you just ask him how to get rid of mine goblins? What? Ask him how to get rid of mine gulins.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then mine clime, why not, man? No, that's, this is pathetic. I'm sorry. If I go to him and be like, oh, we got curse and we can't figure out how to get rid of this, frost and shit in himself. He's in a life life.

It's separate from the curse. I actually eat random chocolate. That's so bad. More problems than ghost. It doesn't work that way, all right? We really fucking needed them. Maybe I would try. This is not one of those scenarios.

Are we going to King? Wait, weren't you trying to commune with the great train? Oh, great mechanical engines in the hereafter. Like a ghost rider in the sky. The great ghost rider in the sky. The sky. Ghost riders in the sky. I commune with Gideon's train ghost cowboy pin.

Ride your flaming steed into my mine garage. and unveil me of your mechanical wisdom. I plus one that. Thomas had never seen such bullshit. Gricka was actually, Gricka was quite distracting, considering this is something you've never done before, so I'm having you roll a disadvantage. It's also just not real.

It's just a good time to dread, really. The great mechanics in the sky, I don't know that it's not real. Yeah, they do. I know that's not fucking real. Oh my god. Kind of twist it. Yeah, we're twisted. Yeah, twist it.

I'm thinking of two twists in advance. Yeah, just do it a double twist. Or ice bone rules, double twist. That's a two. That's a two. Okay, okay. This is going to at least be a three. This is just fate.

It's at least going to be a three. That's how probability. Oh, great. Ghost Rider in the sky. I am hoping. It's a six. It was more than a freeze. Alright, one last twist. One last.

One last twist. This is the other one. What are your current too high? Six and one? Six and five. Six and five are two highest. Yeah. Okay. Actual powers don't want us to pass this.

Yes. It's actual. It's a nine. So you still take the six, though, right? Arcana. It's disadvantage. It's a end. You twist it, it is undone. It's not like the two lowest.

You're technically not supposed to be able to twist dreads, but I don't. Oh, you dreading? That's why it was a disadvantage. No, I thought it was just exhausted. No, it was because I dreaded it. But the exhaustion. I don't care, I don't care, it's fine.

This is funnier than just me dreading here. For the twist. That is the noise that you hear, and you are excited for a moment as you think that the train spirits are responding to you As you open your eyes, as you open your eyes and you see the look on Frost's face and realize that that is where the sound came from.

I hear the train are coming. I hear it can. Here it's engine calling. Oh, water does a tree smell like shit. Nothing's working. You got steam coming out of here. Damn it! We're gonna be here for any other?

That's not the... Call the king, man, call the king, Torbeck, it's on you. It's your idea, man. Call them up, let's see. Fine. I'll go through my filthy sack and see if I can find the chest piece. Yeah, you find it easily. Everybody just hold on. I can hear you. King of hearts, are you there?

This is Torbeck, if you didn't know. Storbeck, you guys heard it, right? Is it going through? Yeah, I heard it all. It's still clear, man. We're having several emergencies. Yes, yes. Torbeck would never call under normal.

Quiet yourself. Oh. Oh. Are you in mortal peril? I'm a certain point. Oh. I'm a certain point. I was looking.

I was hoping. I was hoping. You have awoken me during my hours of sleep. This better be good, Torbeck. Well, I mean, it's really bad is what it is. We're stuck in a forest and we keep seeing the same Crohn's the same purple tree and the same purple thing. And then the thing, and then the thing, and we see the crooked rocket again,

and Frost keeps shitting himself. It's really bad. We don't have any any way to fix him. He looks dehydrated. We don't have any food or water. He's shit in the river. It was our only source of water. Flowing down?

Are you going to be more water coming soon? Mr. King of Hart, Torbeck is scared. No, by the ghosts. You mentioned the ghosts. Yeah, make him the fucking ghost, Torbeck. Torbeck, please forgive Torbeck. Torbeck is very scared.

I don't know how else to say this, we're cursed. There's shadow people. Torbeck seems to shadow people, but this is different. Please. Can you please stop yelling? Sorry. Did you call me because your friend is shitting in the way.

woods. Yes, this one of the problems, yes. Turn the pond towards your location and not your hairy chest. What do you mean? Just like put it on the ground? Hold it in your hands and turn its face towards your location.

And as you do so, you watch the eyes alight with red. You're in thither. You're near the wayward pool. That's why you keep seeing. the same thing over and over again. It has nothing to do with your curse. What about the shitting? It's because of the chocolate.

I already explained it. Ignore, ignore it. Dormac wants to be sure. D'Rourke is worried. That's an attempt there's no joke. Do you have any cheese? That's what Dormac said. Guys, he's a kissing cheese.

You make me some goddamn things. Torbeck is so sorry. Torbeck already suggested that everybody laughed at Dormac. Yeah, that's because you think rubber hoses are licorice. Okay, okay, I'll try to make some cheese. Let's put on how to do. Quite. How you're going to make your way to the Wayward Pool

is going to be your problem. There are signs all over the place as to how to get in. You just simply have to open your eyes and look for them. But be careful. The unicorn La Morna is Trixie. This place is not what it seems. I'm going to bed now. Do not call upon me.

What about the ghosts? What about the ghosts? Do not call upon me again unless you are in mortal peril. And you hear the line go silent. Oh. The ghost killed Grico. Oh, fuck.

Did he say unicorn? Yeah. He couldn't quite catch the name. He told us not to call him again. At least we know we can, perhaps in the future, if we have a real emergency. Hmm. Okay. I'm going to make you some cheese frosty. What, uh...

M. My spirits, I request cheese. Ah! Uh... Oh! Oh! I'm holding like a big, just wedge of chat. wedge of chagerness. No, it's not.

It's actually a, it's a gigantic wedge of very pungent Gorgonzola. This is all I got, sorry, frost. That's fine. I appreciate that you put it inside of a red wax seal. That's very charming. It's a giant baby, bell. It's very pungent, frost.

Oh, that, uh, frost, I can't, that smell, you should get better, and I'm gonna walk. I'm gonna go to this, I'm gonna commune with the river spear. Oh, river spear. Nope. I don't notice that. I commune with me. Guards, can you just fucking kill me?

What are you waiting for? They both bite you, doing four points of damage. That feels so good. The pain distracts me from my embarrassment. You haven't been cursed, but this food poisoning is quite difficult, and the Gorgonzola goes straight through you. He said, jeez. The king of hearts wouldn't have been wrong about the solution. How long are you going to be? Brigo. Grigo. Grigo.

Oh. You know, I heard from the Great River Spirit. Nah, fuck it. I walk over and I'm just, I'm kneeling down next to Griko at this point where I was squatting. Oh, my. I think we deserve to drive this. We're going to die. We're going to die. We have to look for signs. The unicorn. We're gonna be fine.

He is just shitting water at this point. We've got nothing left. I don't know why you both want to haunt me still. This is a nightmare. I'm already dying from Degested Corgonsola. Jokes on you were into that shit. What is that?

The old spears. Yeah, whatever. Oh, God! Don't all guards have spears. They're giant. They're giant spears, and yet they decide to bite him in everything. Yeah, exactly right. It's ironic, because I bet them to that.

Okay, sir. No, you finish it, and Tobaccoe, look for the signs. Okay. I begin to wander away from the carriage to see if I can find any of these signs that the King of Hearts was asking to look for. Roll investigation check. Torbeck would not be sure if they are actual real physical,

like literal signs. or if he was being like, you know, hey, get your metaphorical head out of your metaphorical ass. Investigation, you say, 12. You begin making your way through this forest past the gentle, now brown pond or stream. The wayward pool, I believe it's called. The wayward poo to the small waterfall.

And it is over here, you're not that far from your friends. It is over here that you begin to notice rocks lined up in an interesting pattern. And at first, it doesn't look like anything unusual until you realize that they're spaced apart almost perfectly all along the way. And you look down to inspect each of them, and there are carvings in them. The first one shows what appears to be two unicorns, curled together and an embrace, a loving embrace. The next one you see one of the unicorns appears to be crying and sorrowful alone.

The next you see this rock is carved with what is clearly, this unicorn having a bout of anger and casting some sort of magics. And then you see this forest completely shrouded in mist. Next, you see what looks to be a human man. Just normal human man looking confused. And you finally get to the last one, you notice that there are rocks scattered about. But you see that this human man is standing, looking at,

out over what appears to be a lake, and in the very center is one lone island. And the only thing that seems strange about this carved image is the horn affixed to the human man's head. Hey guys, when you can all take like five minutes to get yourselves together, I got something to show you. Is it progress?

It's something. Okay, I'm here. Let's keep the fuck out of here. Okay. I would then show them the rocks and the progression of the story exactly as you told me to the best of my goal with Ian. It kind of feels familiar. I wonder if this horn has something to do with something. What do you think?

It's possible. Wait, if there's like a unicorn, if you're waving around a severed unicorn horn, is you gonna be like, oh, he killed my brother, Charleston. Is that a common unicorn name? No, one Charles, then he just go right in the moon. Is that weird? Is that a weird unicorn name?

Torameck doesn't know. Look, I didn't cut this off, all right? Some other jackass did. Well, he said, like, I mock you for revenge. You will never find the wayward pool now. That guy kind of looks like a human, and that guy doesn't, so we might be okay. Well, I'm wondering, what if that's how he got the horn on his head? Is that he cut it off and stuck it on his head?

Oh, you think you should try sticking that on your head? I mean, I may have already tried a few times over the last few weeks. I mean, when? I don't remember seeing you do that. I mean, it didn't do anything at the time. I could try now in front of this fucking son. Come on. I had no time like the present.

Does it do anything? You place the horn. upon your head and immediately you watch as the world around you begins to shift and where there had been purple trees and pink and blue and green. This gentle stream and the small waterfall, they all begin to fade away as they swirl in this beautiful glittery mist until eventually you see that you are actually standing on the bank of this beautiful pool. It is more like a large lake,

though it doesn't look that deep. Imagine you could wade through it to this island at the very center, lush and beautiful, filled with flowers of varying colors, colors that you've never even seen before. There doesn't seem to be anything or anyone on this small island, but as you look and you strain your eyes, you see what appears to be an unlit brazier.

on the island. So we're like magically teleported. We've been transported. You're not teleported. It's just whatever glamour was on this area is gone. Like a loosery terrain. We've seen through the rail. Yeah.

Oh my God. And what you do see is that the mist seems to coales around the island more so than anywhere else. It is significantly more misty and veiled. It actually fucking work. Unbelievable. Hey, great work, man. Yeah, well done.

I take it off. Nothing seems to change. You performed Unicorn magic. I can't believe it actually works. Hey, hey, he commune with the spirits. It was like an instruction manual. Yeah, we just had to go for the process of elimination. We just had to roll an investigation.

I had to fail and Gideon had to fail and Fittonim is to charge. There you go. Oh, just the stream let out of this late? Oh, the water ain't running anymore, huh? It's just stagnant. It's a little swampy in there. Oh, me gotta go through it. Is that a layer of algae or is that a...

No, there is, this lake is clearly of a magical quality, not like the stream that you had just been in. Lights, dance, and sparkle off of it. These beautiful green lightning bugs skim the water and then fly up into the air. It is magical and beautiful. This is a place unlike any you've seen, and the Faywild itself is there have been places

that were not nearly as appealing, but you've seen some of the most beautiful places you've ever seen, and they all pale in comparison to the Wayward Pond. Oh, thank goodness. Torbeck can't afford to get Giorityo again. Let's go! Oh, I love Giotti on me hot dolls.

Dormack thinks that Dormig and Gricka have very different definitions of Gioria. Isn't that like the pickled relish? It's a horrific disease. Nah, I don't think so. Nah. Uncle Globo used to serve Gioria. So you were walking into the water? I was going in.

Yeah, and you're called to the islands. You walk into the water, and at first it is about, it starts off about one foot deep. foot deep, it eventually goes to two. And you find that it is, as you wait out further, it gets to be about five to six feet deep. But it is crystal clear. You can see down to the bottom it is deceptive because from the shore it looked like you could just walk across with no problem. And you realize that as you continue to make your way out, it is going to get deeper and deeper. Yet the clarity of the water never changes. You can see straight down to the bottom to all the coral fish swimming

in their gyms, all of the, I fucking love the conal fish. Yeah, you know, you got any of the delts, man. And that's how they, what if I work here? I only got one set left, though, okay? You guys want to spot me? And they, you watch,

as all of the life inside of this, you see frogs of varying colors, swimming through the water. You see little water bugs that skirt along the top. And again, the lightning bugs and dragonflies that dip down and drink and fly up into the air. Everything seems to be living peacefully and in harmony with each other as you wade into this water.

Frost. you immediately feel relief. Nobody looking to clear water. Shut up. Almost as if there is something special about the water in this pool. What ailed you is gone. You feel refreshed.

All of you feel refreshed. As you feel the exhaustion. Yes. As you feel the benefits of a short rest coming over you all at once. All it does. Short rest. Time, come on.

It's time to take a short rest. If you didn't manage short rest, it'll show your rest. Oh. Perf. I don't need these all of them, actually. Does it seem like juniper can come with us? You imagine she could.

It's big enough. The lake is 250 feet of fresh, still water. It's 30 feet deep at its deepest. It's 30 feet deep at its deepest. And as you get close, Closer, you realize that the is 30 feet wide and about 40 feet long. Small.

Hootie, remember the doggy paddle. Oh, you're doing great. She's like, oh, that's so cute. You are easily able to cross you eventually find yourselves on this little islet. What to do? Any unicorns around? Just looking for some unicorns.

You hear the sound of scampering animals. You see a chipmunk tumble out from below a bush, holding onto a large acorn as it attempts to open it with its mouth. It fumbles with it a little bit. Looks at you, doesn't even look scared as it looks between all of you. And it's almost for a second like you see a soft smile on its face as it darts back into the bushes. And it's in this moment that you notice that all the shadows have been cleansed from your bodies.

Oh, my God. Thank goodness. That's it. All right. Well, thank you, magical unicorns, if that was you. Maybe it was magical water, but I like to think that it was the unicorns that helped us. It was the pool! Oh, it could have been the pool.

It's a magic pool. Thank you, wayward pool. I feel refreshed. You feel like your tummy's all good? I'm not sweating. I think I'm all right. You look a lot better. Oh, thank you much you, wayward pool. Me mate Frosty can control his stool.

Mm-hmm. Thank you. About 20 pounds lighter, but they're looking good. Yeah. All right, well, we're free, and we still want the gold pieces. Well, I'm assuming that Juniper Milder was on. pieces back at Nibbs Cave. You never picked them back up.

We put them in the chariot. We put them in the chariot. Oh, I don't remember you saying that. Well, we haven't brought them to the island, though. So at the very least, either the back at Nibbs Cave or they're in the chariot. Are the ghosts are still with us? They're gone.

No, they're cleansed. Oh, right. Stupid carnival of horrors is gone. Oh. Looks like we're all cleared up. Thank you, pool. Thank you, unicorns, if it was you. We don't mean to steal credit.

There you go. Fuzzy. Gideon accidentally killed the clowns that haunted him. You purposefully killed that chipmunk, all right? Well, certainly. You pointing fingers. And I may have killed those guards, even if I was under the influence of strange fake urses.

Oh, you definitely killed those guards. And like 38 other guards. It's a good vision of intent, right, mindfulness, but it doesn't matter with Torbeck. He was nothing like himself when he killed Abdon Longscarf. And you killed Pierre during the Iron Electrum Chef competition. No, that's a different Pierre. No, that's a different Pierre. You killed a different Pierre in a different situation that I can't remember at this time.

I didn't tell you all about it. But. Well, I guess I did later, but. You, uh... Cut Pierre's throat in the swan. Yes. He was tailing us on the way to the witch-like carnival. Oh, you did tell us that. Yeah. He probably deserved it.

Well, I mean, I think so, but... Didn't he spark our drinks with, like, some... One of Mr. Garu's drugs that he peddles? He was just following orders, you know, and... It was in the wrong place and the wrong time. You know what I mean? It's a really brutal way to kill somebody. All right?

Can you just blow off his head with Elders Blatch? Why do you gotta cut his throat? I mean, it's quick. It's out. You bushwhacked them. Yeah, pretty much. I guess what I'm driving at is that we don't know anything about your relationship with Uncle Glorbo or why he would be haunting you. Do you have any explanation? I don't know what happened Uncle Glorbo.

He had a gambling habit, as he called it. He owed a lot of money to a lot of really bad people. and he kind of went on the lamb and I would go visit him and bring him some food and I mean there was one nod I went to the pub I had a few pints I had a few more parts and I'll get kind of a flap me gums when I you know when I when I have a lot of pints as you know and you know I may have let sleep where he was at and some certain people may have overheard. I don't know. All I know is that when I went to go deliver food, he was gone. And I don't know what happened, Uncle Globo. Oh, prick.

So I'm gonna take this as it was more of a nightmare given the fact that I don't know what happened. And so I'm still thinking Uncle Globo still alive out there somewhere. And it wasn't killed by the goblin, mafiosos that also frequented the problem with it. I was having around with all the dead ghosts almost. This a coincidence.

Yeah. I'm interpreting. One of the chances, Grego. I'm interpreting it. That makes me feel a little better, Grigo. So I believe it was caught, if I am to interpret the intention of the curse, it could be more of, I mean, If he did, you know, if they did find him and, you know, whack him, so to speak,

and I'll reach into my pack and I'll find, like, the fucking Chucky Cheese hat. And I'll put it over, mate. I'm lucky we're doing that for fucking wiggle log. Uncle Globo is sleeping with de leeches. That's what they say at the swamp. Sleeping with the corporations. Sleeping with the leeches. Maybe, rest in peace.

It may be full of a metaphorical dune. Thank you, Grigo. That makes me feel much better. A wise man once told me that's what we call mental gymnastics. Perhaps so. And perhaps we're all doing our own form of mental gymnastics in some ways.

I guess it's true that what they say, loose lips, sink ships, and kill your uncle. Oh, so people don't forget. Yeah. Gosh. I'm just glad we didn't have to fight any shit elementals in the fucking gobby paw on the island. As you say that, after the one, I'm kidding.

Oh, it turns into Congress bad for a day, right? All right, music starts playing. We have an amazing balls fight with sweet corn. Bring me some sweet corn. Well, I propose we explore this island and see what lies here. It's shrouded and mist, and the only thing that you can see outside of the foliage

is a large metal brazier. Yeah, we can see that out. Filled to the brim with coal. Oh. Oh. With what? What? With what?

It's in the name, Ladies and gentlemen. I like to think that every time you spit in your hands, it's like, pt. Yeah. Pt. Ptsch. Uh, well, it's a shame to come all this way

and not set old coal on fire. Let's go. I mean, we're cool with that? Or we think this is going to summon a shit elemental. As long as no one pronounces it, Brazier. I think we're all set. Uh-huh. Ladder up, Gid.

Letter up. Yeah. Uh-oh. Oh, no. It's coming. You're so sotted with me. I punch in. The brazier, the brazier.

Brazier? The brazier. The brazier. The brazier. And with my classic brazier technique. And I ignite the coals within, as I've done a thousand times. And I'll do a thousand more. The pixie who's wearing the brazier screams out in pain as you punch her in the chest.

She screams out in enjoyment. I promise you. I've heard it before. As the brazier lies cold. Speaking from experience. The pixie ignites and shrivels in the ash. That's pleasure. No, you channel the innate fire within you

as you punch into this brazier. And as your fists connect with the coal, you watch as the kernel of flame within them ignites, and they begin to glow and pulse with the beginning of flame until eventually they catch and a fire erupts and roars out of this. You watch as immediately the mists begin to part and standing on the very edge of the lake is a single white horse shining in the light. Her body is shimmering with iridescence, a single gleaming horn on her brow.

She stands perfectly still, silently, observing you, but not moving, just watching. Oh my God. She's beautiful. Does she look like she might be unicorn and single horn? She has a horn. She has a horn. Oh. Mm-hmm.

I said she was a horse. And with a horn. It would reveal a white horse with a single gleaming horn on her brow. That's how she is described. Look at it. I think that's uh... that's lorna or whatever the king say you like unicorn lorna was over here

and all the tricks it was something like that but if we don't know our name we should be careful Is that what your name? It was something like lorla that's what torbeck heard That's the horrible fucking hang I didn't, Torbeck didn't say lorna Torbeck said lorne

Listen, I got a very strong recollection of things, not even in the, you know, kind of like sometimes I'm correct way. It's probably just lower enough. Oh. Hmm. Gramia, if you wanted to approach and talk, I think that you're the one who's best equipped for the job. But don't be upset if the unicorn runs off very quickly. I understand they don't like to stick around if you aren't a virgin. Why don't you go up to her?

Prosty, you've been your whole life for this. What are you trying to say? Don't take this from me. I start to slowly approach. There, it's all right, it's all right. You begin. What does Gid do? And I like stick my hand out.

It's okay. It's okay. You begin to move forward. Doing your best to move slowly and to make non-threatening gestures. And you keep your voice soft. She does not move even a fraction. You've never seen a creature stand so still, so majestic, so beautiful. And as you get to about 50 feet from this creature, immediately you hear in your mind,

why have you come to this place? Are you here to torment me like the rest? Are you here to point and laugh at me? for I am the last I am the only one left my love was taken from me and is gone what do you want

with me and that is where we'll end the session oh no fucking way thank you so much for listening to the Legends of Aventure's podcast we hope you enjoyed the session if you want even more campaigns to listen to

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