Tales from the Stinky Dragon - Paralyte's Poison - Ep. 51 - A Breath of Fresh Lair

Episode Date: May 25, 2022

While exploring a chasm deep within the Boulderay mines, the interns nosedive into a rocky relationship with a craggy cave dweller, a place of shiny no-no’s, and maybe even a secret lair. Go to http://shopify.com/dragon to get a free 14-day trial. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Learn more at LandRover.ca. This is a Rooster Teeth production. Good day to all you Gaspors. Hover your fungal eyes into the stinky dragon and partake in our latest potable. Same old story. It's a mixture of membrane jogging gin, corpse campari, cloudy kombucha,

shrub soda, garnished with a rotting orange slice. One drop of this decaying dram, you'll be bursting on the scene in no time. Previously our adventurers returned to Boulderay for some R&R&R. Reminiscing, researching and rustling up some badger armor. After consulting with Dr. Ahem, the interns dug their way into the Boulder Ray Mines. There they found tools and tracks, missing metal, an underwater treasure trove, and a crumbling crane that dropped Gum-Gum into an occupied chasm. Oh yeah. Keep that in. Can the interns rescue their friend

from the abyss or have they dug themselves into a hole? Grapple some gut rot and let's get right to it. It's me, Gustavo. We just need a stinky dragon,, little pin that just says, It's us. Hello, everyone. Welcome to Tales from the Stinky Dragon. It's your stinkiest friends, us, the Infinite Interns.

And me. Us. And me. And me. All of us. Our favorite DM. And Gus. In that recap, I remembered that everything we recorded suddenly.

Yeah, that's why they- But I had no memory of it before. I was like, we just finished fighting that fight with Aleve and Grieve. Aleve and Grieve. Aleve and Grieve, that's right. Gris. Gris. Gris. Grisley. That was my last memory, and then I had no memory of the last recording. What do you think would happen if, for this entire session,

I didn't make Mud push the story forward at any point today? Oh, we just meander around, you know. We'll still be in a hole. If Mud just isn't feeling today and just doesn't want to move us along, I think that's what I'm going to play with today and see what happens with the rest of the party members.

I got a challenge for people listening right now. Chris, authority. If you're listening right now, while you're listening, don't want people hurt, share this podcast on social media with someone. Just your grandma. Or post it.

Just with your grandma. Let him finish. With your grandma. John's on fire today. John's on coffee today. And then, when you're done with that, go look at our link tree And check out the store for our merch

And help support us How is this a This is just This is not a challenge This is just you like Requesting like Support our show Support me

Support me If you're this far Give us a little love Please Thank you I'd rather them go And make a review Of Tales from the Stinky Dragon

Give it five stars And then draw your best emoji kyborg in the review section. Emoji kyborg. I'd rather them go get a glass of water right now and stay hydrated. Oh. These are not mutually exclusive challenges. Mine is. You can only do mine. You can't go do the other stuff.

I'd rather see emoji kyborg. Anyway, that's all I got. Anyways, that was a long ad. What are we doing, Gus? I do think people should share the show, though, at least with one person. Oh, yeah, sure. Whether or not your friends like D&D or not, I think they will after this. Send it to your enemies. Hey, if you're in a college classroom right now, play it out loud right now.

Your professor will like it. Make sure it's a random episode that's not the beginner of anything, so they just come in hot and enroll for wisdom. Alright, GumGum, go ahead and make me a perception check. Let's go ahead and get this ball rolling. Okay, but can I...

It's called a dice, actually. Can I first do the thing from Jurassic Park where I lay on the triceratops and inhale while it's breathing? Like Dr. Grant? Yeah, like Dr. Grant. Yeah. And get really happy? Can I do that? If you do that, it's probably going to just eat you.

Well, you have to roll for happy. I mean, that doesn't happen. There's a roll for that? I fail that roll every day. Oh. All right. Okay, that's definitely how I'm picturing it, though, Chris. You've landed on a triceratops.

Yeah. And now all of a sudden you have a British accent, too. This isn't her bloom. All right, so I roll for perception. I'm looking around. Ha! That is a 20. Oh. Which means a looking around. Ha! That is a 20. Oh.

Which means a 19 for Gum-Gum. That is a 20. Wow. That is the highest possible roll for Gum-Gum because he has a negative one on his perception check. You look around. It's very dark. You know, you're at the bottom of this chasm.

Thankfully, I have night vision. You do, and that pays off well with your 19 roll. It looks to you almost like you're on a pile of rocks. The skin of this being is very uneven and has lots of little outcroppings, like smooth bumps all over it. You fell in an onyx. No, you fell into a rock eater from Neverending Story.

I think I'm the only kid that never watched Neverending Story. Oh no! We should watch it! Right now? Yeah! The problem is that never watched Neverending Story. Oh, no. We should watch it. Right now? Yeah. The problem is you just got to keep going. Like, I'm tired of it. Every night I have to go home and keep watching the Neverending Story. I was like, damn, how often do you watch that movie?

It's 40 years. And as you, you know, try to get your bearings on this triceratops, as you put it, you look around and you see this creature is very unusual like nothing you've seen before it looks like it's asleep and you falling onto it has not disturbed it for some reason instead of you know you would expect two or four legs on a creature this creature looks like it has three legs and three arms at the top of its body and where the three arms intersect at the top of its body is a gaping mouth with sharp jagged teeth and just below the mouth is an eye that appears to be closed right now mouth on top eye on bottom eye just below mouth are we sure that is this something from like ah real monsters oh yeah

kind of similar yeah no eyeballs in the hands though i feel like i should write this down i feel like it's going to be important. How big is it? He landed on it. It's large. It's big. It must be really big if Gum-Gum falling on it felt like nothing. And it's rocky in texture.

Yes. And what is beyond it? The never-ending story. How far does this... As you look around to see what's beyond it, you had a really good roll, so I'm going to give you a break here. Okay. Gum-Gum. As you look around to see what's beyond it, you had a really good roll, so I'm going to give you a break here.

Okay. Gum-Gum. You see other creatures similar to it also laying down at the bottom of this chasm asleep. This is that moment where Gum-Gum awakens a swarm of something. And as you look around, it seems like it's just the bottom of a chasm. There's nothing necessarily that stands out about it, but you do see a lot of creatures down here, all that appear to be asleep. Nothing stands out about it other than the dozens of crazy monsters. The chasm itself is unremarkable. So they're all the same type of monster.

Yes. Well, creature. Creature. Let's not jump to conclusions here. Well, it's probably a monster. We're all monsters. How high up, how far away are we from Gum Gum? How far do you fall?

From the top, you can't tell because it's dark at the bottom of the room. Can I tell? I have, I'm an archer with night vision. It extends beyond the range of your night vision. No. But I fell. Do I have a sense of how far I fell? Make an intelligence check.

Yeah, how broken are his legs right now? I'd like to reach out to Gum-Gum and talk with him. No, you don't want to, because then if he calls back up to you, it's so far down in the chasm, he's going to wake up all the three threes. I'll whisper. That's what I'm going to call him now, three threes. Three threes. Intelligence check coming up.

The Triceratops arms. Oh, yeah, you said Triceratops. How appropriate. That's a one? A one for intelligence. Gum-Gum, you think you fell about 400 feet. Oh, my God. Four what?

Good Lord. 400 feet, and he's okay? Hey, Gum-Gum. Are you okay, Gum-Gum? Don't respond. He can okay? Gum, gum. Are you okay, gum, gum? Don't respond. He can't hear you, probably. Wait a minute, I'm hearing you. I fell so far.

You wake up to the tri-trials. What do you see? You're whispering down to him? Yeah, I'm whispering down to him. Shut up. What do you see, gum, gum? Those of you on the top of the chasm, you know that if Mud's whispering down,

there's no way it's 400 feet. Also, does he respond? Like, can he hear us? Can I roll to see if I see how far he fell? No, because you lose sight of him, so you don't know. I fell more feet than I've ever seen. And then

I landed on a new friend who's breathing and sleeping and this friend has lots of big other friends. Don't handcuff that friend. Don't give it the handcuff bracelet. The friend bracelet. Can you teleport back up here? No, because it's like, how many of me?

Damn it, he thinks it's too far. It's like 800 of me. Maybe if we test... That's the unit of measurement. Can I maybe like light something and send my mage hand downwards just to see? Yes, but I believe mage hand only has a 30-foot range, but it would give you a little bit more of a perspective. Yeah, could we try that just to see, like...

Yeah, what do you want to light? Like, what would your mage hand carry down there? Could Bart have matches on him? Or a torch? Or a torch of some sort? What do you... Shirley has a torch in your inventory?

I have a spell that's call lightning. Can I just call lightning down? Come, come. I have exploding arrows. I'll light your way. I would just light a torch. I don't think that's a good idea. I don't trust you. I wanted you. Why don't you trust me?

I just can't. I got a tinderbox. How about I send down don't you trust me? I just can't. I got a tinderbox. How about I send down a little animal? Couldn't I just light a torch? Would that work? Or did you figure out a mage hand thing that you want to do? Yeah, we're lighting something and sending it down. Okay, so you found you have a... I imagine someone has a torch.

I think. In their inventory. Oh, I have flaming arrows that you summoned me, but I don't know if that was an hour ago or not. We have a torch. You all do have a... We have glowing... Correct.

You were given Sangria Knight Lanterns before you came down. Oh, I guess I did not put that in my inventory. So, Mage Hand, that Sangria drink down. Delicious. All right, so you cast Mage Hand, and you lower your Sangria Knight Lantern with the Mage Hand. What's the range on this? 30 feet for Mage Hand?

I believe so, yes. That is 15. No, it's got to be farther than that. No, it's 60, remember? It's 30. He's not helping. Sorry, I'm sorry. Chris, I'm sorry.

You're down there with the beasts. Silence. You lower the lantern into the chasm, and it illuminates far enough for you to be able to see the bottom, which is probably just a little beyond 60 feet. So it's from where we are to the bottom about 60 feet? A little over 60. But yeah, I'd say that's a good estimate.

He fell that far? Okay. I mean, depending on how big the creature is, because if the creature, let's say, is like 30 feet tall, he only fell 30 feet onto it. Yeah. I mean, it's large. So like in D&D, you know, if you think about the grid, a large creature occupies a two by two grid. So like a 10 by 10 creature in D&D, you know, if you think about the grid, a large creature occupies a two-by-two grid.

So, like, a ten-by-ten creature in D&D. Maybe it's, like, one of those things at church camp in the lake where it's a giant burrito filled with air, and then when he landed on it, another person rocketed off into the water. You did not hear any wee running into the distance. Okay, okay, never mind. There goes my theory. I did say wee as I fell. Wee!

Wee! Wee! Wee! So with the lantern thing, does that, I mean... Yeah, from your perspective at the top, you can faintly see Gum-Gum lying on something, you know, like I described it to Gum-Gum, or to Chris. And you see several other similar creatures all laying down, seemingly asleep on the bottom of the chasm.

Okay. I have 50 feet of rope. We need to get Gum-Gum back up from down there. I don't think he's safe around an entire swarm of unknown animals. He does look really peaceful, though, doesn't he? He does for now. Hello, that breeze. He's like their stuffed animal.

I, for one, do not want to see what happens when this whole swarm of Tricera arms wake up. I mean, I'm sure we want to see it a little bit. I'm sure there's a part of us that's a little curious, right? Gum-Gum, make me a dexterity check. Check? Yeah. Is Bart just into schadenfreude a lot and just kind of like... I mean, it's like watching a car crash, you know?

Like, it's terrible, but you can't look away. Oh, no. Oh, no. Our Gum-Gum, he's broken. Oh, wait. I think I'm a spider right now. 13. 13. 13. Yeah. The creature you. I think I'm a spider right now. 13. 13.

13. Yeah. The creature you're laying on starts shifting a bit under you, and it rolls over, and you manage to stay on top of it. You kind of clamber around as it's rolling, and it opens its eye, and its pupil turns and looks at you. Oh. Don't do that.

I just remembered I'm a spider. Okay. I'd like to climb down and retrieve a gum gum. Okay. You can start climbing down, but I started this action. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I just remembered I'm a spider. Okay. I'd like to climb down and retrieve a gum gum. Okay, you can start climbing down, but I started this action. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, I know. I'm going to resolve this, and we'll get to your climbing down. Hi, my name is Gum Gum. You hear, oh, you know, my name is Gum Gum.

Rock Eater confirmed. And I wave, and then I pet him. It waves with its arm. Ooh! And can I go and, like, we touch finger, like, I reach, extend my hand. He wants to E.T. with this animal. Hi. He is Elliot.

Elliot. It doesn't have, like, a humanoid hand with five fingers. It's got, like, a claw with three talents at the end. But, yeah, it grabs your hand as well. a claw with three talents at the end. But yeah, it grabs your hand as well. And I extend three fingers to match it. Okay. It says, Gum Gum. It knows your name! Sentience. Gum Gum.

And I point to myself. I'm glad we sent our like simplest man down there to connect with this simple creature. It's probably the best to like handle these pieces. And then, so I point to myself and say, Gum Gum, and then I point to my friend and say, Huh? What do you mean you point to your friend?

He's trying to motion. He says, I am Gum Gum. You hear it say, Hungry. And then it starts like kind of pawing at your pack. That's a good name, Hungry. What is that, German?

Hi, hungry. I bet you must be hungry. And then I open my bag and I get some metal. What? Okay, what do you grab? I grab two things. He thinks it eats metal. Oh, because all the metal was gone from all those different places, like the handles from things.

Wow, gum gum, very smart. And so maybe people were taking that to feed. Or they were just eating it. Or they were just eating it. The whole swarm of them. I do not. You got to have metal. Give me your axe.

No, I know. I'm about to. You should have pythons. One of my hand axe. I give it a hand axe. I hold up my hand axe and then just some rations. I say, food? Mmm.

With one of its hands, it grabs your hand axe. Then with one of its other hands, it starts grabbing for gold in your bag. Oh, okay. And then I reach and I give it a handful of silver. You ask it for change? Okay, yeah, it'll be happy with that. Yeah, it takes the axe and it bites the metal axe head off. And it takes some of the silver that you gave it and shoves it into its mouth. And I take my other hand axe and I try and bite it.

By this point, we'll say Spider Mud comes down as well and joins us. As you approach Mud, you see Gum Gum with an axe in his mouth and this other creature that he's on tossing a handful of silver into its mouth and chewing on it. And none of the other creatures are awake at this point, correct? No. Is there anything to be perceived as far as like a tunnel, entryway, anything in the area? No, the chasm goes south and then from where you can see, it branches off in two directions to the northwest and northeast. You're kind of in your section here.

Also, you just, GumGum, you found a chest that had 23 gold pieces in it last episode. So you have 23 gold pieces. So how much, when I gave it a handful of silver, how much was that like? We'll say like seven silver pieces. Okay, wow. I was going to give him more. I was going to give him like at least a dozen. Well, he kind of filled up.

It's like when you go to a steakhouse and eat the bread first, you filled up on the axe head. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is probably not going to end the way I want going to give him at least a dozen. Well, he kind of filled up. It's like when you go to a steakhouse and eat the bread first. You filled up on the axe head. This is probably not going to end the way I want it to, but can I try and see if I know what this thing is? This has never worked yet at this point because I'm the worst nature-checking druid ever. Well, now you're closer, right, being a spider all the way down there? Sure.

Maybe your proximity helps you? We'll see. Maybe let's call that a nature check. I give myself I'm a spider. I can't give myself a buff. Dang it. I'm rolling. No, I was just for rolling. It's 14. You believe that this

is not a natural creature. You believe this is a creature of the earth. Well, that makes it sound natural. You think this is an elemental of some kind. Some kind of earth elemental. Oh, it's a Regirock. Got it. Once it's done. You think this is an elemental of some kind, some kind of earth elemental. Oh, it's a Regirock. Got it. Once it's done eating and its mouth is empty, it takes one of its clawed hands and points at itself and says,

Rocky. Oh, is that his name? Oh. Hi. Rocky. From the top, Kyborg yells, Andrea! I'm trying to figure out what to do about these things.

Should we be taking this path? Why did you fall? Because you're on the crane. Yeah, you all put him on the crane. Yeah. I feel like we need to go down to the chasm with Gum-Gum. Because up top, was there a pathway for us to proceed? You could have continued to the north from where you were. But we just can't get across the chasm now, can we?

We could. We just figured out a way. We've made bridges. That's true. Rocky says, bring Rocky food. And what do we get in return? Are you saying that down? Yeah.

Rocky says, shiny no-nos. What? Shiny no-nos. All right. Can I go up and bring these two guys down? Sure. Okay. Do you guys want to come

down? Yeah. I think so. I think that's the way the story is progressing. Curious about Rocky, right? Okay. Then I go up and get them and bring them down because I'm a spider now. I don't have access to my bags or anything like that. So if you guys want to like... Can I tell them, if you have anything metal,

don't bring it. No, I see. You don't want to feed. I think we should feed these things and see if they might... I'm saying something that you don't... Yeah, yeah. That you do not want... I mean, I have all my stuff with me at all times, do we not? Anything special?

You got any extra metal to feed? I mean, I haven't really been using this RAM. Is my RAM metal? My portable ram? Uh, it would be a wooden handle with a metal head. Alright, I'll give him part of my ram. We don't need thieves tools, right? You've been using them

a ton! Stop that! I touch Rocky, and then I touch me. I go, friends, not food. Uh, yeah, Rocky says, friend, feed friends. I offer him two metal climbing pythons. Okay, so at this point, both Bart and Kyborg are down below as well.

Correct. Okay. Yeah, he snatches them and then tosses them into his gaping maw and begins chewing them. And I say, Kyborg. How does he seem to react after he eats them? He seems content. He doesn't seem to be, you know, aggressive towards you guys or anything. He just seems like he's very relaxed and very chill.

Could I use my detect magic? Absolutely. Okay. He eats it. And I'm going to obviously direct it in the direction of him. Yeah. I'm not going to give the usual disclaimer anymore. You always will detect anything on your party.

Yes. Beyond that, no. You don't sense anything magical within the range of the wand. Even though he might be an earth elemental? Not magical, though.

Can I talk to Rocky? Yeah. My boy, Rocky, we've given you some nom-noms. Where are these shiny nonos? He points up kind of to the northeast and says, shiny no-nos. Of the, like, the two paths that we were, that you said you. Yeah, kind of vaguely in that direction.

I think he's talking about Sangria. No-no ouchie? No, no, no, no. Oh, oh, I hold up my lantern, my Sangria. What is it called again? Sangria Knight. Sangria Knight lantern, and I say, shiny no-nos? Oh, he grabs the Sangria Knight out of it called again? Sangria knight. Sangria knight lantern, and I say shiny no-nos? Oh, he grabs the sangria knight out of it and pops

it into his mouth and eats it. You don't have a lantern anymore. Yum. But, I mean, was that it? Did I get a response? Um, no. He says, mmm, shiny yum yum. Oh, so there's something else in this cavern that they haven't eaten. Oh, that's like bad for them, like kryptonite. Yeah.

His eye gets a little lower. Oh, he makes us sleep. And I scratch his belly. I feel like Gum Gum and Rocky are like OTP right now. Match made in heaven right here. I want to go to where he pointed. I want to go where he pointed. Bye-bye.

By the way, I completely broke the thing that I was not going to progress the story at all. Mud starts walking off to the northeast and Rocky's eye pops open again. And he says, ooh, shiny no-nos. And he starts following Mud. Okay. Okay, let's go. Lead the way to the shiny no-nos. Would love to see them. And I go, quiet.

What? I can't hear you, Gum-Gum. It's just Bart walking along with his bag full of change. Kyborg is to Rocky what? Wait, no. Gum-Gum is to Rocky what Kyborg is to Smarsh. This is your Smarsh.

This is your Smarsh. Got him, Smarsh. He is king. He is. Like I said, the chasm branches kind of to the northwest and northeast, and Rocky leads you along the northeast passage of the chasm and you go up i don't know maybe like a hundred hundred twenty feet something like that then uh he kind of stops and there's like a big wall that looks like it's collapsed rock kind of blocking a passage through the side of the chasm and rocky points uh at the collapsed rock and says shiny

noodles as in they're like we don't see anything but collapsed rocks, so he's probably pointing to something behind them. Like the path to the shiny no-nos. Rocky, friend. And then I try and start moving the rock, and then I gesture for him to help. Yeah, make a strength check with advantage. Oh, because he's helping.

Presumably. Also, listeners at home, Chris is acting out what GumGum is doing. It's great. I'm loving it. You can probably hear the lead leather squeaking Yeah, his leather jacket is making a lot of noise too and so you can hear it. Really funny. A 16 and a go. The physical effort you're exerting to roll

a digital die. What was the first one? 16? So 16. Yeah, Rocky watches you moving a few of the rocks at first, and then he's like, boom, with his three arms. He grabs them and very quickly tunnels them all out of the way. Get them, Rocky! And then I go, yay, and then I give him a, I give him, yay.

Give him some money. He's doing extra good. You should give him a crowbar. I'll give him another hand axe. All right, yeah, he removes the wood from it, tosses it aside, and tosses the metal head of the axe in his mouth. And then I pat him on the head.

He starts trying to rummage through your bag a little more. And then I gesture and I tell him to follow. Oh, no-nos. I give him two more pythons, metal pythons from my bag. Oh yeah, he's all about that. But he still, is he not moving? Like, is he refusing to go forward? No. He points down the cleared out passageway and says,

Shiny Nonos. Should we just go ahead? Yeah. It seems like it. Tell him to stay. Rocky, stay. And I like, you know, hold up my hand in a stay and say, Gum Gum.

And I just like make a fight, punching. Fight, Shiny Nonos. Drago. Gum Gum fight Rocky? No, no, no. Rocky, friend. Oh, Shiny. No-no. Drago. Gum-gum fight Rocky? No. No. Rocky friend. Oh, okay.

Rocky friend. Oh, okay. Gum-gum fight. Kyborg. No. No. No. Yeah, this thing's big.

You don't think you would want to get in an altercation with this? Gum-gum. Oh, your arm. Shit. Shut up. shut up. Gum gum. Gum gum. Find hungry.

Okay. Rocky kind of like plops down, leans up against the chasm wall, and he closes his eye again. Do you like chicken wings? What about kyborg wings? Stop it. All right. We head towards the nunnos. Okay. more. Stop it. We head towards the nunnos. Okay, so that rock wall crumbled and opened up into a narrow

passageway with something glowing at the far end. As you approach the glow, you feel your feet squishing into the muddied floor below. Finally, you enter into a dank, circular stone room with four glyphs glowing blue on the floor. In the distance, you swear you can hear the faintest whisper of a haunting

melody. You said there was runes in the floor. In the distance, you swear you can hear the faintest whisper of a haunting melody. Oh. Give us a taste of that melody. You said there was runes in the floor? Ah! That's it, exactly! Yeah, there are four runes on the floor. Can I recognize what the runes are? Make me a wisdom check. Are we going

into the unknown? Into the DMCA. I want to see if I recognize these magic runes. I also would like to roll for wisdom. If anyone wants to try to recognize them, go ahead and roll me wisdom checks, please. I guess we're all doing it. Bart doesn't have to. Bart wants to.

Bart is wise. I only got an eight. Six. 17. Dang it. Seven. Everyone's scratching their head at it, except for Mud. Mud remembers these.

These are the same glyphs you saw in your flashback to the sheer lake oh the ones that when we pressed them they did different things in that bubble thing yeah in the upper left is a square divided in four in the upper right is two wavy horizontal lines the bottom left is three straight horizontal lines that curl at the end and the bottom right is a one zigzagging line which one was the water one because we can can test if these still activate things. I think it's probably the two wavy lines. So wait, so they're on the ground and glowing, but then there is music in the distance.

You swear you can hear a melody. A melody. Yeah, in the distance. What was it? Sorry, the four quadrants, the one zigzag line, the two wavy lines, and what was the fourth? In the bottom left, it's three straight horizontal lines that curl at the end. I think that that's wind or air.

Is there anything I can roll for you to remind me what these were again? Hold on, I got this. Barbers has notes. I am praying to the goddess of notes. Barbers making her notes face out. Here we go. The zigzag is lightning. Right.

The two wavy lines is we lost air. The three lines with the curves, I think that added air. I didn't write down what those did. I think that's adding air. And then the other one was then water. How did we unlock? One of them was draining as well. We pushed them all.

Is that what we did? We pushed them all. We did it in, I think, backwards order. We did four, three, two, one, I think. But why would they be down here? Those were at the bottom of a lake. Yes. Well, I propose that we go up and we see,

I think the water one is the least, like, scary one, so maybe we just tap it really quick to see if it still activates up here. But we don't know what it... Should we see what else is around? Let's see what else, because we knew we matched them. We matched them backwards to what was there, so we should, before we start pushing buttons.

As much as I like pushing buttons. I just want to make Splash Mountain, all right? Could Mud cautiously maybe crawl a little bit towards where the melody's coming from? Since it's dark and the room is circular, it seems like the melody's reverberating off of all of the walls. Like, you know how you're at the bottom of a chasm in the circular room? You can't quite pinpoint what direction it's precisely coming from.

May I do something? Yeah, of course. Can I perceive if that's a lute in the distance that I hear? Yeah, make a perception check. Uh-oh. I have an idea. That's a 17 plus 320. Oh, look at you.

Good roll. No, it's not an instrument. It sounds like a voice that's singing. Copy that. There it is again. Get it. Is it Rocky? So, group.

Beautiful. Rocky called these shiny no-no's, which I would assume insinuates that something with doing things with these runes is going to cause a no-no. A no-no. What do we think our plan of action is in why these are down here and how we're going to use them? I assume you've reminded us what these are.

Bart did. No, no, but you recognized them from the... Yeah. Yeah, and then Bart obviously would have told us all that. Bart remembers and told the group. I think it's the same puzzle. And, like, we need to just test if it still activates. Should we maybe try it the opposite way this time,

where we go one, two, three, four? Yeah. We should find the match, just test if it still activates. Should we maybe try it the opposite way this time, where we go one, two, three, four? We should find the match, just like finding a man and a wife in love. What? What? What? What?

I don't know what you're talking about. Gum Gum doesn't believe in same-sex marriage, I've just realized. Or whatever you are into. Love is love, is what GumGum meant to say. There was one of the buttons that turned on the bubble. It was like we had the water in the room, then we pressed another button and it made all the water bubble and disappear. Hold on, let me pull up Spotify and listen to that episode really quick.

I'm pretty sure when we press the button with the four quadrants. Do it. I think that had an opening that had water coming in. I'm pretty sure when we press the button with the four quadrants... Do it. I think that that had an opening that had water coming in. So that's the water that was coming in, but I forget how we got it to drain. I think it was the same. Was it like pushing the button twice? Maybe.

Let's push a button. Yeah, I vote water. Don't push the one that does the lightning, though. So should we start with the quadrant? Go for it. All right, we're going to press the button with the thing split into four. Okay, you press it and the entrance to the chamber you're in closes.

Perfect. All right, now let's press the one with the three lines. The chamber starts slowly filling up with water from the bottom going to the top. Now let's press the one with two lines. The chamber starts filling with a rush of air. Now let's press the lightning. With a spark of lightning, the room begins to slowly turn,

the water turning into murky waves spinning faster and faster and faster until it feels as if a tidal wave of water washes over you and your feet land on hard stone. It takes a moment for your eyes and ears to adjust. What the? How did you get in here? You blink your eyes a few times and your surroundings come into focus. A gaunt mirror prattle is staring at the four of you with wide eyes. What the? How did you get in here? You blink your eyes a few times and your surroundings come into focus. A gaunt mere prattle is staring at the four of you with wide eyes. What?

His limbs are chained to the floor. Oh my, interns, how did you? No matter. You've got to hide before Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha You look past prattle and see a cloaked woman with deep black eyes and a marred pale face.

You intrusive, impertinent, imbecilic little interns. You finally made it here. Welcome to my lair. You look around and see you're clearly in Sheer Lake in a a vast underwater atrium with transparent walls, looking out into the frozen water. Ka-ching! A large metal cage falls from the ceiling with a loud clang. The cage bars ignite with crackling energy and you all feel the air sapped of arcane power. Get comfortable, for you're about to witness the makings of glory on a global scale.

Vroom, vroom, vroom. One after another, like small windows opening Vroom, vroom, vroom. One after another, like small windows opening up to varying vistas, a plethora of portals open up all along the bottom of the atrium. As you're taking it all in, you notice that Prattle isn't the only one inside the cage with you.

A handful of sheer rays are also chained to the floor, but in the far corner, you spot a familiar blotchy-skinned dwarf. He's tugging at his red-braided beard and looking up in wonder. Archie? Golly, look at all those portals.

You don't see that every day, do you? Hi. Oh my god. I assume the person we were hearing is Paralite. She's the singer? She's the mass singer. I don't know. You don't know yet. Is this where you break the episode? We'll have to find out next time. No, no, no.

Stay psyched right now. I just want to make sure. A smirk comes across Paralite's marred face. Keep going. As she turns to look at all the murky portals opening around the bottom of the atrium. You see a whole company of Evergard platoons assembling near each of the portals. It's like Avengers Endgame, but bad. The so-called Infinites were always too limited in their thinking.

They never had the brainpower to wrap their minds around my vision for Phasa. A Phasa without crime, without disasters, without war. You see, I am not some villainous mastermind bent on destroying this world. No. I am its salvation. Oh. Alright, Thanos. And now, I can finally keep watch over all the realms and send my Evergards everywhere

they are needed. We will prevent lawlessness, catastrophes, and bloodshed before they even begin. Now, if you'll excuse me, it's time to rally the troops. She turns to two nearby Evergards.

Don't take your eyes off of them for a second. They're more meddlesome than they appear. Yes, Paralyte. She exits the chamber and begins making her way across the vast atrium. Don't forget to give us a follow on Twitter or Instagram at StinkyDragonPod. Send us a picture of yourself in any merch that you may have purchased from us. Either our hats, shirts, things of that sort. Posters, we got those too.

Tag us on social media. Use hashtag StinkyDragonPod. Maybe you could get your D&D party to dress up in merch for your next session and send us a photo of that. I'd love to see that. And if you send us a message on social media, there's a chance you could appear as an NPC in a future episode, just like Rocky, named after at DLG Darkness, or also like Bri the Shirei, named after at Bri Calhoun, which I learned is actually pronounced Bray. It should be Bray the Shirei at Bray Calhoun. Sorry about that, Bray. We'll get that right going forward. And of course, we have people who do VO for some of the different voices in our show. Paralite is voiced by Hannah

McCarthy. Mayor Prattle is voiced by Nick Schwartz. And Archie is voiced by Armando Torres. Thank you for your good job, everyone. It's the sound of another sale on Shopify, the all-in-one commerce platform to start, run, and grow your business. Shopify gives entrepreneurs the resources once reserved for big business. So upstarts, startups, and established businesses alike can sell everywhere, synchronize online and in-person sales, and effortlessly stay informed. Scaling your business is a journey of endless possibility. Believe me, I know in the early days of the company here, you start little by little, piecemeal, and then you can really grow and scale.

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dragon right now. That's shopify.com slash dragon. with some pretty big personalities is another. It's a new season of Canada's Ultimate Challenge, and sparks are gonna fly. New episode Sundays. Watch free on CBC Channel. Treats for every celebration, big or small. Make it easy and breezy with our legendary lineup of summer must-tries from the PC Insiders Report Summer Edition.

Like our new flake-outs, there are delicious twists on the croissant donut with 24 layers of croissant flakiness twisted with fancy donut fun. Get ready to go all out for less. So how are you going to do that? I also like the idea. She was just like in her lair in the second we got there. She's like, all right, see ya. Like, she's just waiting for us to arrive.

She's busy. She's like, oh, they're running a few minutes late. She's got to send a slack to her minions. She's going to be late for her scrum after this. Yep. She's really pre-crime, pre-crime in it. That's what she's going to try to do. Is this like a minority report?

I think so. Is that what it was called? Yeah. Oh, yeah. That's a great movie. Good movie pre-crime in it. That's what she's going to try to do. Is this like a minority report? I think so. Is that what it was called? Yeah. Oh, yeah. That's a great movie. Good movie. So we're in a cage. Yeah, everyone go ahead and make a perception check.

Yeah. She's gone now at this point. She left. Oh, can I? Oh, I want to shoot her. No. Why would I shoot her? She's bad.

Shoot her. Because then she'd stop your crime before you did it. 23. Wow. Seven. Thirteen. It's okay. Nine. I've got it. Normally this. It's okay. 9.

I've got it. Normally this is Bart's bread and butter. I know, I've just been rolling low lately. Yeah. Kyborg and Gum-Gum, both of you are just overwhelmed with a sense of turmoil and instinctively put your head in your hands. That doesn't sound like us. Absolutely, that's what the roll says. Bart, to you it appears you're imprisoned in a fairly large iron cage with intertwined bars.

It's clearly imbued with some form of anti-magic. You look around at the other prisoners, and once again, you see Mayor Prattle, Archie, and a handful of Shirae's, including Bri. All of them chained to the floor, but the Shirae's look particularly parched and dried out. Mud, with your excellent roll, you gain a little more insight. You're able to look past the cage, and you see you're in some sort of alcove, a recess on the edge of a large atrium. You take a quick look around, you spot a glowing stone glyph on the floor just beyond the two evergards.

You strain your eyes, and you realize that the glyph looks familiar. Three straight horizontal lines that curl at the end. My spader sense says that we should be trying to get to that ruin on the floor. Okay. Mayor Prattle, in a very weak voice, chimes up and says, Interns, I'm sorry for all of this. It's all my fault. I should have come clean from day one with you.

The thing is, I'm her... I mean to say, she is my... Look, it's all a bit of a long story, but Paralite is my child. A while back, I became concerned for my health and started looking for someone to watch over the town if something should happen to me. I met with my daughter down in the Boulderay Mines and tried

to convince her to take over the family business, so to speak. Yeah, we were there. We got into a heated argument and there was an accident in the mines and well, you know. Anyway, I'm telling you all this because she needs to be stopped. And though she may

not realize it, my daughter inherited a great deal from me, including my condition. I'm allergic to sangria night. It's slowly been killing me all these years like a poison. Prattle reaches for his left hand, pulls a wedding band off his ring finger, and holds it up. Set into the ring is a small fragment of glowing purple rock. Set into the ring is a small fragment of glowing purple rock. I've held onto this because I knew it was too late for me. But it's not too late for you, Vervasa.

This is my daughter's weakness. This is Paralite's poison. Petal collapses to the ground, limp and lifeless. No! The ring falls from his hand to the ground with a small clink. Could Bart try to do CPR on him? Bart's going to invent CPR and do it right now? Yeah.

No, Mayor! Yeah, do a medicine check. Yeah, do a medicine check. Guys, it's okay. I'm sure Guard Grattle's still out there somewhere. A 20! A 20! A 20! You manage to catch Mayor Prattle

as he collapses to the ground. As his breathing lessens and lessens, you ease his pain with some herbs from your pack and lay his head gently onto a pillow. As he lay in your arms, Mayor Prattle departs this life. Is anybody going to point out the fact that it's kind of silly that he became a mayor of a town that was

based on a mine that was synchroneate? Or is it too soon to be talking about that right now? Hi, I'm the mayor of Plutonium Town. Come on in. Well, he probably didn't realize it. It's like when, you know, humans first discover uranium. You don't necessarily know that it's bad for you without repeated exposure. I'm allergic to peanuts.

I'm a peanut farmer. So what was in his ring? Was it syngreonite? Yeah, syngreonite. Why did he wear a ring with it? Can I grab Gum-Gum? Yeah. Hey, Gum-Gum.

Try and see if your rod can teleport you out of here. He needs to open his eyes, take his face out of his palms. Oh, Gum-Gum, look at me. Look at me, Gum-Gum. Oh, hi. Hey, Gum-Gum. How you doing? It's me, Mud.

It's me, Mud, your friend, I'm Gum Gum Oh god I need you to test this I go, me, Gum Gum Yes, Gum Gum Me, not playing this game No You, Mud

Can I throw him through the bar somehow? No No, can you please see if your rod Can teleport you out of here Okay Can I throw him through the bar somehow? No, can you please see if your rod can teleport you out of here? Okay. And then I get my rod, and I go to the guards, and I go, I'm going to teleport now. Bye-bye.

Don't tell them. Okay. I mean, yeah, they're watching you, and then you activate your rod? Yeah. You activate your rod like you always do, but it just seems to fizzle. It doesn't seem to actually activate. So magical items not doable right now. Can I try shooting an arrow through the bars to see if I can hit one of the guards?

Why don't we ask him to let us out first? Can you? While he's knocking his arrow, take it away, Gum-Gum. Can you let us out, please? The guard says, oh yeah, right away. Okay, thank you, sir. Then he turns and looks at the other guard like, look at this guy.

Paralite will kill us. So can I shoot in the air, though? Yeah. Seems mean. You pull out an arrow and knock it. And as you do, the cage that you're in discharges an electric charge. Perfect. Shocking all of you. I'm guessing we take.

Yeah, you all take. Two points of damage. Just a little shock. Just a little static. You guessed it! Two points of damage! Really? Wow! Oh, I was being... I was joking because I thought you were going to... I rolled. That's what it ended up on. I thought it was going to be like 25 points of damage. Sorry. I wanted to make sure that the

galley couldn't penetrate them. So it's the best I can do. Can I try to reach through the bars? What happens if I just put one little spider arm towards the openings in the bars? I have a mage in them. They watch you and they see you reach your arm out. Do I get crackled? No.

Okay. Mage hands meet magic. Is it only magic that they could see or it doesn't matter if it's invisible or not? I'm sorry. Micah just told me you actually revert back to mud furball oh bollocks i'd like to imagine as you stuck your spider hand through like it just started disintegrating away and you're just like so like we can't use any spells or cantrips in here right so far from what you've seen the m movable rod has not worked and uh mud turned back to furball also brute force isn't working but yeah

go ahead try it um could i try to send my mage hand through it's not gonna work yeah you start trying to focus and channel all the arcane energies required to cast mage hand but it just doesn't seem to manifest do i have anything that's like heavy enough that if it lands on the thing it could press it let's look at old Barty Boy's inventory. Did your arrows not go through? Because your arrows aren't magical unless you make them arcane. The longbow of triumph is magic. I have a hammer.

But it only gives me healing if I've killed someone. Your portable ram's pretty heavy. But you fed. No, I didn't end up feeding. Yeah, she considered it, but we never actually followed her with it. Then, yeah, Bart, try away. Can I try to throw my ram onto the glyph? Yeah, go ahead and make a dexterity check. Yeah, we'll call it a dexterity check.

I like these guards just watching us trying to... Like monkeys in a cage. Sweet. 21. Oh, that's actually pretty good. We take 21 points of damage. The ram hits the bar of the thing, bounces back into our head. Bart has two black eyes.

And what were you aiming for? Like, what was your goal by tossing the ram? You're not trying to hit the glyph with the three wavy lines? That's my current hypothesis. Or three curled lines? Yeah, I'm trying to hit that thing with the three curled lines that we see. We don't see any other glyphs, do we, from where we are? That's all you all were able to glean.

do we from where we are that's all you all were able to to glean yeah you toss the the ram out and uh it you know bounces on the floor and skids and gets really close to the glyph but doesn't quite make it all the way so we can we can put things through then yeah just can't be magic okay what if i blow real hard a 35 pound object yeah from how many feet away, too. What if we try a little diplomacy? What if we just yell at everyone who's outside the cage and they get so scared that they back up and then kick the ram over? From the ground, Archie rattles his chains and says,

Hey, little help here, guys. Oh, should we unchain Archie? Okay, but could you, like, do some thieves' tools? Thankfully you didn't feed those to Raki. Make a perception check, Bart. Okay. 18. You notice one of the guards is a little distracted.

He's looking at your ram, and he's picking it up. Yeah, he is. He's putting it in his pack. Scat. Can I use sleight of hand to save or to get Archie out? Yeah. As Kyborg is getting his thieves' tools out, you hear the guard say, I always wanted one of these. Twenty? Yeah, you're checked.

You mess with the manacles a little bit and you manage to pop them open, Kyborg. Archie, where the hell are you here? Archie rubs his wrists and says, After we parted ways, I continued my journey to other parts of the world, studying lost cultures and antiquities. I heard about

an underwater civilization that disappeared. So naturally, I looked into this mysterious place, only to run into some guards that found me investigating the lake. Next thing I know, they chain me up and threw me in here. I'm sorry. Ah, it's not so bad. Thank you, Gum Gum. What were you investigating? In a roundabout way, I did manage to find these shear rays.

You know, they do have a fascinating culture when they're not chained up, of course. He points at the other shear rays that are in the cage. Archie, do you have any ideas how we might be able to get out of the cage? They chained you down, so I'm assuming you would try to attempt to get out at some point. You know old Archie. Yeah. Oh, I do. I really don't. Archie spent a lot of time, every time we find Archie, he is in some sort of confinement.

He was in the ice thing. Yeah. He's got a little thing. He was iced up. Yeah. And then now we found him all chained up. Oh, I'm all trapped again. Yeah, is Archie a little bit into that? You know, not yucking anybody's yum, but you into that bondage, Archie?

I don't mind it so much. I think he's always getting in trouble. I'm a little rapscallion. Yeah. I'm a bad boy. Stop it. Can we get Armando to say that? Can we get all of this cut? Archie says, to my knowledge, the guards have a key to the cage,

but I also believe there's some kind of passphrase they use to activate and deactivate the lock. But I'm not sure what it is. I talk over to the guards and I was like, guards releasing the prisoner say what? Did that work? I go over to the guards, what the hell? And I say, Smarsh is king? I go up to the cage walls and I go, open. Paralite is queen.

The guards just kind of look at each other. Paralite is the master of all of the universe. Infinite guards, what's your name? Hello, I'm Mudd. Yeah, we haven't gotten to know you guys. Who are you? Yeah. They just look at you and say, our name is Shaki, and they push the button again.

Oh, Jesus. And the cage is electrified. Are they hitting the rune with the three lines? No, probably with the lightning button. They have a mechanism in their hands. Everyone takes another 2.7. I have a question. Honestly, what are you going to get

out of this, of being her guards in this kind of a world? Like, she's seriously setting up some sort of like a military state. As soon as you're not in line with what she wants, she's probably going to turn on you, right? It's better to be the one holding the club. Yeah, but you don't get to hold the club forever

when you're not the one in charge. Are you the one in charge? Well, we're going to be making a safer FASA for everyone. I hope you don't mess up and get Paralite married to you. How? Through sheer force. That always works. Have you looked at the history books?

It always pans out for forever. They have different history books. Hi, Shaggy. Can I go over to the other people? There's a few Shirae's, including Bri. Oh, they're thirsty.

Yeah, they're parched. Do we have water? Can I spit on them? Why would we know Bri? Bri was the envoy that you met with in the Dreamery. They're parched. Do we have water? Can I spit on them? Why would we know Bri? Bri was the envoy that you met with in the Dreamery when you went to the Sheer Lakes. Remember, Bri was swimming in the water. So they don't know us. They don't know you, per se. Because you met them in the Dreamery.

But Bri does give you a curious look, Gum Gum, and says, have we met? I have, yes, met you. That's one way around it. That's it. We'll met you thanks for listening to the episode everyone and then are you thirsty i'm gum gum he says no my name is bri but yes we could all use water while we're trying to hit that button for the water over there we've been trying to figure out a way to activate the glyph if we could just get access to water we would have the advantage over the evergards, so we have to we have to hit that button. We have water Yeah, I don't know if I do It's in our inventory okay, okay? We can we like I'll dump our water skin or hold it up before we dump it yeah, Bryce says

That's it's a valiant effort, but that's not enough water for what we would need to escape here. We've got to hit the button. The button has the three lines, which is the water. You can have the drink if you want. Can I start peeing? No. No, no. Put it away.

Roll for pee. Do you want to try to shoot an arrow at the button? You did. That's what shocked. That's what shocked us. Oh. That was our first two damage. So here's the thing.

I still have the old longbow that isn't the longbow of triumph, and it has non-magic stuff. And your ram went through, so maybe I should switch, go old school. Do it. Do it. Eh, hell, whatever. Just a standard old bow and arrow. Yeah.

So let me switch inventory. Could I also, before you do that, could I give him bardic inspiration? If that's not magic? I'm just looking up to see specifically how bardic inspiration? If that's not magic? I'm just looking up to see specifically how bardic inspiration works. Is it arcana? It doesn't say necessarily. I think people are just inspired by being around me. That's the way I'm going to interpret it.

That it's not necessarily an arcane ability. That it's your natural charisma that causes the inspiration. I'm used to it. It's his smile. Can you play a song? Oh, there once was a boy named Kybor. He's going to shoot his arrow at the button and not miss. Here he goes.

Kybor, here he goes. That's really good. All right. I knock an arrow, an ordinary arrow, to my ordinary bow. No, no knocking. Now someone's dog is going crazy listening to this. He knocked the arrow. Alright, I knock an arrow an ordinary arrow to my ordinary bow Knocking now there's someone's dog is going Knocking on the cage Everyone's cool with this. I'm gonna hate character development. Is everybody cool with this? Yeah

And his heart grew three sizes that day All right, I shoot the longbow. All right, go ahead and make an attack roll. So that's a 16, but then I also get bardic inspiration, which is an additional what? A D8. So that's a 16 plus 7. So that's a 23. Sorry, I had math. Oh, third grade blame.

So remind me, you're trying to shoot the glyph, is that correct? Yeah. With the three lines. With the three lines. Okay. Roll me some damage and see what happens. Seven. Kyborg's arrow strikes the glyph, which depresses into the stone floor.

The guards stare at the arrow and the glyph with wide eyes. Water floods into this alcove, rising higher and higher. Bri and the other Shireis close their eyes and their parched scales soak up the refreshing water. With their eyes closed, they start chanting in the rhythm of their breath. Ro-tee-o-jemy-mo-t-si-jemy. The rising water ebbs away from you all for a moment, swelling up higher and higher,

then it thrashes against the cage bars like a tidal wave. Yes. The iron buckles under the momentous weight, creating an opening from the cage. Okay, can I also just take shots at the guards? Yeah, if you wanted to take your other shot or whatever at this point, you could, Kaibou. How are we treating this?

We'll treat this like this was your turn, and this is your second attack. Okay. Well, then, I guess I still have the old longbow, so I'll just keep going with that, and I'll take a shot at the guard that shocked us. Shockey. Yeah, Shockey. You should know his a shot at the guard that shocked us. Shockey. Yeah, Shockey. You should know his name. Which one?

They're both named Shockey. The one that said his name was Shockey. 19. Yeah, that's a hit. We got Shockey, Droppy, and Rollie. Alright, and then that is 10 points of damage. Like I said, he's turned around looking at the glyph and at the water that was rising in and the shot catches him by surprise and he falls to the ground.

Dang. I'm sorry. I'm so powerful. How high is the water? At this point, I will say it's like three or four feet deep. Okay. Can I step out of the cage? Yeah.

It's the bars right now sufficiently bent for you guys to squeeze out. I also step out. Okay. Yeah, me too. Tackle the guard, the last guard. Go for it. Yeah. I mean, I think you'd be giving him like a big old bear hug, right?

Yeah. Yeah. Oh, can we also check, was there anybody else chained to the floor? Because right now they're going to be submerged in the water. Prattle's dead body. Mayor Prattle was. I don't know if we want to, do we want to like see if he has anything on him that's worthwhile to. Or did I discern if he had a heartbeat?

Because I asked earlier. No, you did not detect one. Or I should say Bart didn't because he rolled the 20 on the medicine check. We can deal with that as soon as we deal with Gum Gum giving a hug to the remaining guard. Also, did anyone pick up the ring? Mud picks up the ring. With this ring, I do thee wed. Go ahead and make your grapple check.

Make a strength check opposed by the guard. John and I just held hands. We did hold hands. Mostly we just held hands. We did hold hands. That was beautiful. Mostly we just held fingers. You rolled a 14. This is with a plus four to counter your check there. 22.

Yeah, so you try to grab onto the guard. I guess, like, maybe the sound of his friend falling caused him to turn around just in time to see you and, uh, managed to escape your bear hug, your tackle. And then while this is going on, Mud picked up the ring. Yeah. And then did Bart and Kyborg say they were doing something else? Bart wants to just check if Mayor Prattle had anything else on him that we might want to take.

Let me double up. And as he's doing it, he's going, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm sorry. He's got his wallet. sorry. I'm so sorry. I'm sorry. He's got his wallet, and in his wallet, there's a little small painting of Paraline. I feel like I don't want it to get lost down here, so

I'll take it. Okay. Bart steals from Miraculous Corpse. I'm gonna bring it back to the city and put it, display it in... This belongs in a museum. In a museum somewhere. Turns out Bard is proficient in grave robbing.

Can I take another shot at the other guard that got away from Gum Gum? Sure, why not? I mean, she was long ago trying to... I switched at this point. Oh. 14. Yeah, let's say that connects.

Okay. Doing nine points damage. Yeah, that goes through his throat, and he falls down. Oh, I get extra HP now. Through his throat. I finally got my portable ram bart goes up to him and takes the ram back okay there you go what about the water people shaper yeah uh bry approaches you all and leads you all to the entrance of the alcove and says stay low

and stay quiet this is the immersium It's the central hub of our home. You peer out of the alcove, and before you is a vast spherical atrium. You're on the upper level, and in front of you is a set of stairs leading down to the lower level, where the portals and platoons are. The Evergards are currently all facing northward,

and you can see and hear Paralite delivering a rousing speech from an alcove on the far side of the atrium. Paralite is overpowering our Diagem core with her pet lightning eel to summon all of these immersed gateways. See the tower above the Everguard platoons? That's the Diagem core. You lift your gaze above the Evergards,

and in the center of the atrium is a towering platform filled with water and a massive eel slithering around a shining indigo gemstone, sparking it with electricity. But see the greenish aura surrounding the core? It's a wall of force protecting the core. There's also one protecting the chamber Paralytos is in. Before we can power down the core, we need to take out the source of those force shields. Everyone make a perception

check. Okay. Sounds like range attacks or anything from here is out of the question. We need to take out the source, you said. Yeah. Knight to Death Star. Very good, young man. One in a million. Great shot, kid. Wait, you said perception? Yeah, she's... Like the Death Star. Very good countdown. One in a million. Great shot, kid. Wait, you said perception? Yeah, perception check.

Really more like Return of the Jedi, you know. Go. Seven. Eight. You'll find this... Diagem Core is fully operational. Out of ten. Okay, we'll deal with Kyborg and Bart first.

Both of you are distracted and find yourself staring at the numerous portals on the lower level. But you do notice they appear to be murky, like they aren't quite open yet. Mud and Gum-Gum, you look around and notice there are three other alcove chambers on your level.

There's a walkway that encircles the edge of the Immersium and leads to all three chambers, east, west, and eventually around to the north. We don't have much time. I would recommend we divide our efforts to maintain covertness and efficiency. A few of my fellow Shireys and I will sneak around to the north. We don't have much time. I would recommend we divide our efforts to maintain covertness and efficiency. A few of my fellow Shireys and I will sneak around to one side,

and the four of you should head to the other side. Hopefully between our two groups, we'll find the source of the four shields. Which way are you going? Archie, come with us. Where do we go? I think we're going left. Archie's kind of hopping around, looking.

More character development, teamwork. Left? Left. Left. Okay. Left. Okay, you guys head to the left. We'll head to the right, and we'll meet on the far side. Bri and the Shearer's head off to the right side.

Before they go, Bart does a bunch of those baseball hand signals that don't mean anything. A lot of grabbing your crotch and spitting. Yeah. Archie's kind of looking around in awe. He's amazed to finally be free and then to be seeing all of this. This is his bread and butter.

This is the kind of thing he lives for. Quick question. Yeah. Dia Gem Core. Is that Dia as in Holy Dia? Dia the goddess? It's kind of unclear. There seems to be a fair amount of mystery surrounding the Lord Dia,

but all you know is you've never heard of the Dia Gems before. Okay. I guess Archie would also say that, uh, I don't really have much of a stomach for violence, so I think I'd rather continue my research of this civilization from here, but I'll keep an eye on Mayor Prattle's body. That's very sweet of you, Archie. It's the least I can do. You can take care of all that pew-pew stuff.

And just so you know, he didn't have anything on him when I checked. Oh, don't worry about it. I get why you did it. Very noble. So then we go left. So, yeah, you guys go left. And, like, are we in an elevated position? And how big is this room?

Yeah, you are in an elevated position. There's this walkway that goes around the immersion. You kind of enter from the southern portion of this rather large room. And to answer your question about how big it is, it might be like 150 feet across in diameter. It's like a big circle. Then the eastern and western portions, there's smaller alcoves. And then on the northern portion, there's another alcove. And this diagem core is in the middle of everything?

Correct. From what you can see, like I said, there are quite a few Evergards on the lower level. And they all seem to be facing to that northern chamber where Paralite is giving a speech. So you're going to go around on the walkway to the left. Yeah. Okay, you're just going to walk over there? Sneaky. Sneaky.

Okay, that's kind of what I was getting at. I turn my cloak of many fashions into a black Evergarden cloak. I go invisible. I can use my cloak over me and crawl on the ground. I can use my cloak over me and crawl on the ground. All right. I guess everyone go ahead and make a stealth check. Bart, since you're invisible, you make it with advantage.

17. Roll to four. 19 for me. I love stealth checks. That's a seven. All right. So we have from best to worst. We have Bart with 19, Kyborg with 17, Gum-Gum with 7, and Mud with 4.

Okay, you all slowly start making your way very quietly to the left side, which is the west side. And as you're doing so, Gum-Gum has his cloak over him to try to hide. And he bumps straight into Mud. And the two of them let out a, as they hit each other, which causes some of the Evergards to turn around and look in your direction. And you see them point in the direction of the origin of the sound,

and two Evergards slowly start making their way over to where you all are. I walk over and I slap them, and I say, get it together, men. I got this, guys. Okay, bold. Yeah, make a deception check. Okay.

Don't worry, guys guys you can rely on old kyborg that's a zero He's got a minus That couldn't have lucky I'm lucky, I'm lucky. Just live with it. I want to see what happens. Oh my God. Can we create two timelines right now just to see what would happen with that zero? I can assure you combat would start very quickly there.

I'm lucky I'm going to roll again. How many luckies do you have? Three. Okay, we might need to be using a few of those right now. Two. I also have a backup if you need something. You got a two. You got a two. Should I roll another lucky? if you need something. You got a two. You got a two.

Should I roll another lucky? I'd say yes. You got another two? Wait, can you re-roll multiple times on the same roll with lucky? You have three luck points per long rest whenever you make an attack roll, an ability check, or saving throw, or when an attack roll is made against you, you can spend one to roll an additional d20 and you choose which die to use.

You can choose to spend luck points after you roll the die, but before the outcome is determined. Yeah, it seems like you can choose to spend luck points after you roll the die but before the outcome is determined yeah it seems like you can keep going the wording is a little vague but it doesn't say you cannot do it multiple times which means i think you can do it could i cast a minor illusion on the opposite side of the guards it looks like another version of bart running across the hall. I like it. Yeah, let's see how his lucky roll pans out. But yeah, that seems like it's totally doable.

All right, here we go. Third roll. That's a two. Jesus. Wow. So wait, zero, a two, and a two. Do you have one more lucky? I do, but like, that would have been real great for combat. I was going to say, you might want to save those for...

Save that. It's the one. It's the one. Save save it i think we're about to get in combat all right i'm gonna do one more one more okay you don't wanna let bart try i mean at this point he said it was like an inevitability that we'd be getting into combat right no no what i said was if the alternate universe if we accepted the zero that that would be immediate combat. I don't know. Barb, you tell me. You tell me, Barb. Well, I don't know.

I don't know if my minor illusion is enough to distract them. Yeah, the way I'm going to, just so you know, I'm not forgetting about your minor illusion. The way that the flow works is once he says that he's okay with the two he's going to re-roll, then I roll the counter checks for the guards. Gotcha. It's possible they could roll lower than two. And then depending on that, then your minor illusion would kick in. Okay. So it's up to you. Do what you want

to do, my dude. I'm going to roll one more. Do it. I'm going to roll it again. Come on, lucky. This obviously has to work out better. Come on, that 20. 20. 8. 8. Alright. Here's an 8. Let's see what they got. So you get to combine all those numbers, right? So it's 8 plus 2 plus 2. Still probably not good. It's see what they got. So you get to combine all those numbers, right? So it's eight plus two plus two.

Still probably not good. It's still a bad check, dude. They both rolled. Not great, but still good enough. That's impressively bad. Thank you. As they start, you know, reaching for their weapons, Bart casts a minor illusion behind them, and you said

you wanted it to look like Bart running in the opposite direction? Yeah. Naked Bart. Going. The image can't create sound. Okay, never mind. Then he's just running. You can create the image.

Okay. Just roll a little check for that. There I am. Over there. I'm invisible. How good is Bart at throwing his voice? Yeah, you can do like some kind of ventriloquism. One of the guards turns around and sees the bard and points and starts tapping the shoulder of the other guard who turns

and looks and says, that's not real. And the guard says, come on, we have to go get him. They have a moment where they're trying to convince each other. As that's going on, can we sneak away from their site? Sure, you can give that a shot. To assist it, could I cast pass without a trace? Yes. I was trying

to save spell slots as this is going on bluetooth three of mine we're just burning stuff right now is what we're doing so as this is going you can cast pass without a trace as they're trying to deal with that and then everyone can make another stealth check to try to slink away pass without a trace cast it a veil of shadows and silence radiates from mud masking masking me and my companions from detection. I rolled an eight, but plus ten is 18. God, what is my rolls? Get it together.

19. I guess also I'm at advantage. So I have a 20 plus 10, 30 for Bart. Wow. Good Lord. 21 for, no, 23 for mud. Us high rollers, right, Bart? Oh, yeah. Super selfie. Kyber just goes over That's high rollers, right, Bart? Oh, yeah.

Super selfie. Kyber just goes over and just, like, starts, picks up Bart, like, trying to rub him on him to get, like, his luck. I got a 19. Plus 10 for pass out. So 29. Yeah. Gum Gum and Bart disappear from this world, never to be seen again. Bye-bye.

Can you become too invisible? Can you become too invisible? When the guards turn back around after dismissing the minor illusion, they no longer see you guys. They kind of look around, investigate for a few seconds, then peel off and head back to where the rest of the formation of every guard is. Their animation resets and they go back into their illusion.

The little exclamation mark above their head disappears. Must have been the wind. Even the one that you slapped? No, I slapped one of you idiots because I was trying to act like I had it under control. But I don't know. How did that play out, my failure? Yeah, they just weren't buying it.

At that point, they were beginning to reach for their weapons when the minor illusion caught their eye. We proceed to the left. As you near the chamber, you get a better look inside. The alcove is indeed full to the brim with water and stocked with a few crates. Two everguards armed with unusual crossbows are guarding a robed figure glowing green.

They're gesticulating in a curious way, enchanting something over and over. Duke's Presidio! Duke's Presidio! This is very similar to those priests that seem to be controlled by something, right? Oh, yeah.

At the top of the, what was it, an obelisk? The Escalon. Escalon. Are the crossbows made of metal at any point? Yes. I cast heat metal on the one on the left. Oh, okay. We're going to go ahead and do that, and then everyone also roll initiative, just so I have an order here.

Oh, yeah. There's the roll. 25. Great, great, great. I got a 20. I got a 4. 14. Crap rolls. For being someone called Lucky, you're not very lucky. Yes, thank you.

Okay, Mud, you said you're going to lead off by casting heat metal on the crossbows? Yeah. Alright, why don't you remind me what that does? Remind everyone who's listening what that does. Heat metal it, uh, you choose a metal object, and it, uh, glows red hot.

Any creature in contact with it takes 2d8 fire damage, um, and then, until the spell ends, and then also must do a save. Uh, until the spell ends, you can use bonus action on each of the subsequent turns to cause this damage again. Creature must succeed in a constitution saving throw. There it is. Or drop the object.

And you want to tell me what the DC on that is? 16. Alright. So two constitution saving throws. I'm only casting on one of them. Oh, I thought you said both. On one of them? I don't think I can do both. Okay, if that's the case I'm just going to use the first roll. Choose a object. Okay, so that's an 8. So we'll say

it's the first one. Who fails their saving throw? Takes 12 fire damage. 12 fire damage. And drops that cool crossbow. Ah, my crossbow. My mom gave me that. Training wheels for archers.

Kyborg, with disdain in your mouth, you get to act first. Okay. Well, shoot the longbow triumph. At who? Same for the dude that just dropped the crossbow first. Okay. Maybe I should go for the other guy first. Yeah, I'll go for the other guy that's still holding onto his crossbow.

Okay. 19. That hits. All right. Doing eight points of damage. Okay. The other person with the crossbow turns around when he hears the commotion and immediately gets hit with an arrow. He's still standing.

Then I take my second attack. Okay. And I hit him again. Try. Fifteen. That hits. He rolls. And that is seven points of damage.

Okay. He takes another arrow. Still standing. Like Elton John. He's still standing. I have action surge, but I feel like we got a boss fight coming up, and we ain't gonna take any rest. Save it. You have no luck.

You save your things. These guys are probably... Yeah, I'm good. And that was the party's doom. Oh, no! All right, Mud, you're up. Oh, I get to go again. Yeah, we'll call it a surprise action. You had it first.

I yell, surprise! Pocket stand. I go to the guy on the right who's still holding his crossbow. Okay. And I spit on him with poison spray. Oh! Yes! Actually, it comes out of my hand.

It doesn't come out of my mouth. So it is like pocket stand. It is like pocket sand. Must succeed on a constitution saving throw or take 1d12 poison damage. All right. Again, his constitution is plus zero. Let's see what this is. A two.

He's rolling like Blaine out over here. All right. Okay. Well. So he fails his save. And he takes 10 points of poison damage. And you said the one still holding the crossbow, right? The one who just got hit with two arrows.

He turned around, immediately got hit by two arrows, and then had poison sprayed all over his face. Never mind. It's 2d12. Oh, Jesus. I missed it. I'll take the first roll off of this. Eight.

So eight more. Another eight. All right. Yeah, he's reeling. He does not look like he's in good shape at all. He's, like, spitting up and trying to clear the poison out of his eyes and his face. At least my arrows are quick and painless-ish. Still probably painful.

That'll be our next challenge we'll do. Which is harder, poison or arrows? Or an arrow, yeah. So that's Mud Bart. Gosh. Get him. Get him. Get him. I don't know what to do because a lot of my things are area of effect and I don't know if I want to...

Hit him. Smack him. I'll just use my long sword. Yeah. Actually, no, my dagger. Yeah. On the one that's getting beat to... Pocket dagger.

I think I mentioned it only kind of in passing. Previously, I just want to make sure that it's clear. Like, these little alcoves that they're in are filled with water. Okay. So it can't get close? You could do that, but you'd be going into the water in order to do that. How deep is the water? It fills the alcove, yeah. So it's like they're a magic barrier that's

holding the water back? It just seems to be stopped. So something is holding the water back. Yes. Could I throw my spear at him? Yeah, absolutely. So now the water back yes could i throw my spear at him yeah absolutely so now the water's poison the water is poison in that very specific area 15 that hits good trove doing two points yeah it counts which is enough he's been uh thoroughly uh throttled so far uh the coup de gras is is a spear from Bart, which pierces him right through the shins, his weak spot.

Poor guy. Enough to kill him. He falls over and floats lifelessly. That's a good matter there. Does he float just like in the little thing? Yeah, kind of like in place. He doesn't like rise, but just kind of like. Could I get close enough to pull the spear back out?

Sure, why not? My place. He doesn't like rise, but just kind of like... Could I get close enough to pull the spear back out? Sure, why not? My spear. Anything else, Bart? And then I want to back up to go back to where my teammates are. Okay. All right, well, it's the... Unarmed. Well, the uncrossbowed fighter, I guess you would say, who's there.

He can't use his crossbow. He could. He just takes more damage. Ow. You could. You just take more damage. Ow. He pulls out a spear and closes the distance to do a melee attack. Who's he going to attack? I'm going to roll a d4 to see.

He attacks Bart. Man. All right, listen, I didn't mean to kill your friend. So he pulls out a spear, closes the distance, and he doesn't throw it. He tries to use it as a melee weapon. I'm also invisible. No, your action would have taken you out of invisibility. Oh, right. Oh, right. Okay. Never mind. I'm not invisible melee weapon. I'm also invisible. No, your action would have taken out invisibility. Oh, right.

Oh, right. Okay. Never mind. I'm not invisible anymore. But I'm makey. I swear every time an enemy rolls to see who they're going to attack, they always go after Bart. Like, I feel like I, yeah. It's because I'm so handsome that they're distracted by me. AC 14.

Mine is 15. Oh, that's a miss. Yeah. These guys suck. He retracts his spear and stabs it at Bart one more time. One more time. One more time. Could I dodge a little bit so that if he does hit me, it doesn't hit my bad organs?

Well, luckily you dodge enough that he entirely misses you. He hits an AC 10. That's what I do as he misses me with his spear. All that DDR paid off. He shakes his fist and curses at you. Dungeons and Dragons and... Dance Dance and Reggae. Gum Gum, it's your turn.

D&D and R. Yeah. I want to run up and, like, drop it or Gum Gum, the mighty flower wizard, will destroy you. And try to intimidate him to give up. Okay, make an intimidation roll. Chris is looking at his phone like a grandma is trying to find a picture of her grandkid. I know it's here somewhere. It's in the photos app.

See how cute he is. Intimidation. That's 10. No, he's standing his ground. Okay, then I swing my axe at him. Okay, go ahead and make your attack roll. When your only tool is an axe, every problem looks like an everguard. Oh, you want to roll an attack roll before you roll damage.

Preemptive damage. We'll just use that roll if you hit. 25. Okay, that hits. So you connect with your great axe doing 11 points of damage. He stares at you defiantly. And then I swing again. Oh no. Who gets hit by an axe and goes,

16. That hits. Hell yeah. 11. Now he stares at you with cold dead eyes. by an axe and goes, 16. That hits. 11. Now he stares at you with cold, dead eyes. He falls to the ground unmoving. And then I take out my rod and make a flower grow over it. Desecrating a corpse, committing a war crime. What kind of flower?

Oh, okay. Just a daisy, not even a good flower. Pushing daisies is like a dead reference. So kind of flower? Oh, okay. Oh, just a daisy. Not even a good flower. Oh, pushing daisies. It's like a dead reference. So we're looking now at an alcove filled with water and there is a cloaked figure. Glowing green. Glowing green and gesticulating. Yes. And it is that person's

turn. Oh, dang. It's Marsh. No. Marsh is king. I can't. The cloak drops. It's a giant worm. It's Marsh. No. Marsh is king. I can't. The cloak drops. It's a giant worm. It's Bart. It's the minor illusion I cast earlier. How did he get him?

He's wearing a cloak. He's become sentient. The creature who's cloaked points a finger at Gum-Gum. Hi. And magic missiles leap forth. I cast magic missile. Racing towards Gum-Gum. Those things hit no matter what.

Those things hit no matter what. Do I get an inspiration dice for knowing what magic missile is? No. Oh, I can use an inspiration to have my deception checker from earlier. Rewind to about 20 minutes. This has been the other timeline. Gum-Gum, the magic missiles hit you doing 18 points of damage. 18? 18 points of damage. 18?

18 points of damage. I got some boo-boos. I guess I should have reached. Magic boo-boos. Don't know if this would have blocked Raiden. No. It does not. And the figure continues with its chanting. Kyborg. My turn? Yes. Alright, you know it. You love it. It's the Longbow Triumph.

It's the only thing he can do. It's a 24. That hits do. That's a 24. That hits easily. Nine points damage. He takes nine points of damage. He's still obviously standing. Not enough to drop him. Okay, here's the thing.

Flashback, few episodes. We stop little Jimmy, and I rob little Jimmy because he has some special arrows. Oh, yeah. All right? I knock on a little Jimmy's special arrows. Oh, God. But you don't know what these special arrows do. I have no idea what these special arrows do. Okay, yeah. I knock on a little Jimmy's special arrows. Oh, God. But you don't know what these special arrows do. I have no idea what these special arrows do. Okay, and you fire it. Go ahead and make

your attack roll. Fifteen. That hits. Go ahead and roll your damage like normal. Eight. Okay, so you do eight points of damage. He's still standing. He needs to make a saving throw. I'll explain after he makes the save or doesn't. Okay. Let's hope Jimmy's special arrows aren't healing.

Yeah. So the arrow hits the cloaked figure and arcane energy seems to seep out of it into the figure, but then it stops. It doesn't seem to have any further effect, but the figure kind of stumbles a little bit and it seems like his concentration lapses for a second, which causes the force shield in front of Paralite's chamber

to begin powering down. Oh, dang. As the Force Shield powers down before her, the crowd of Evergards begins to murmur with unease. Paralite's deep black eyes glare with disgust at you all. Then she turns back to the troops. Fear not, my Evergards. We press on in the face of adversity, for we are the champions of Phasa and we will be victorious. The whole host of Evergards roars with shouts of acclaim

and the pounding of armor. You feel the atrium itself vibrating from the deafening clamor. Paralyte holds up a gloved hand pointing in your direction. Evergards, it's time to end the Infinite interns once and for all.

Attack! A horde of Evergards starts charging straight toward you. Find out what happens. No! In the next episode of Tales from the Stinky Dragon, will the interns be able to hold off, I don't know, how many, one, two, three, four, five, six, like 60 Evergards? How many animals can you make? I think we might be about to? One, two, three, four, five, six? Like 60 Evergards?

How many animals can you make? I think we might be about to go through a portal, guys. Well, it's a good thing you saved your action search, Kyborg, because it's arrowing time. Oh, boy. All right, well, we'll see you guys next week. Yike. I want to see some Legolas crap coming from you.

You got it. As long as there's no deception checks involved. you