The Adventure Zone - The Adventure Zone Versus Dracula - Episode 18

Episode Date: May 9, 2024

The monster hunters infiltrate the Cult of the Buried Blood and learn the exact origins of their creepy namesake. Mutt fancies up his knife. Phileaux gets bubbly. Godwin gathers the night boys.Additional Music in this Episode: "Snow Drop"  by Kevin MacLeod:  https://incompetech.com/.Dice sounds by Tal M. Happy MaxFunDrive! Right now is the best time to start a membership to support your favorite shows. Learn more and join at https://maximumfun.org/jointaz

Dear diary, I've got a joke. Why is Dracula so easy to swindle into disavvantages dealings? Because he's a sucker. Ha ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. It's funny, but also so sad and quite true. I take it right on my pointy and masculine chin, though, because when you live forever, you're going to get a ho. That's just law of large numbers.

But as my old pal and fellow vampire, Roger Daltry said, I shan't be fooled again. Philo, you are floating weightless, not in the crimson waters you were just swimming in, but in an endless black abyss. standing in front of you, you see a familiar face. It's not one that I think you've ever met before, given this sort of difference, the gap between your positions in the church. But from maybe some stained glass windows here and there, you see the Turbo Cardinal who is looking down at you piteously. I guess you did see him on the on the operating table back in the church.

He didn't see Philo, but Philo did see him. He tried to attack him. He is looking down at you. As you kind of gain your bearings and this space that you're in continues to sort of take shape, you realize that the two of you are not alone in here. All around you in this void are humanoid figures. Some are moving, just kind of aimlessly shambling about. some are kneeling in a sort of fetal position.

Nobody seems to be doing particularly great, but they are giving a sort of wide berth to you and the Turbo Cardinal. You are sort of so bewildered by what you're seeing and this place that you have all of a sudden appeared in. It takes you a second to realize you're not a puppet. You are Philo again in this place. the Turbocardinal looks down at you and he says, Welcome, my child.

Have you come to give your confession? I recognize a member of the flock, and I see one. No, your eminence, I am not here for a confession. I'm here. Oh, this is going to take a, A while. I'm... I am here to help you. Um... I'm... I'm a bit confused as to the situation. Can you explain to me where exactly we are?

He looks around the space and smiles and looks down at you and says, I suspect we are nowhere at all. The physical... laws that governor our world, or perhaps, I should say your world, do not seem to apply here. It would perhaps be simplest to say that we are within the God on. Oh. I want to do a religion check. Sure. To try to see if I can glean any more information from as to where we are and what state we're in.

Maybe I think here in Wyoming. I think maybe not religion. I don't know what a religion check would get you here, but I do think a, you know, just a straight up perception check might be. Yes, but Griffin. I have minus one in perception and plus six in religion. Well, that's very exciting. What about investigation?

If you can tell me sort of specifically what you are investigating, then I want to look at the form of the Turbo Cardinal and see if he still looks vampiric. Yeah, sure. Go for it. Give me an investigation check or a medicine check, honestly. Investigation. Okay, that's a whole six. He looks different from the Turbo Cardinal you saw laid out on the table. More vital. His cheeks are less sallow. You don't see pointy teeth as he is talking to you. As far as you can tell, this turbocardinal you are speaking to does not appear to have that same affliction. Your eminence, do you at all recall what was the onset of your vampiric state?

When last I saw you, to be honest, when last I saw you, you were laid out almost at the state of death with vampiric tendencies and yet no bite marks. Do you have any recollection of being in that state? His smile vanishes, and he looks down at the floor and he says, Ah, perhaps you should receive my confession instead? Oh, oh, sir, of course. What is your name, my child? I am brother Fylo.

Fylo. Yes. Fylo, what is your rank? Oh, I am... I am merely a monk, sir. I am looking to advance. I'm looking to move on. I was being audited in the cathedral.

of enumeration. Yes. And by deacon Atreus. He took me to see you and and you had fangs. I feared that may be the case. You may not be aware then of the complex politics that our church must be embroiled in to survive. The throne, Philo, is no fan of our orthodoxy. The foundations of our church are crumbling,

and my pleas for succor to the Lord of Light went unanswered. And so I must confess that I sought a power in the only place where I knew. power was guaranteed. In Ongrave, I was invited to have audience with the entity

in which we now reside. He needed my help, so he claimed, and would bestow upon me power to save our order. But when I failed to provide it, he found another use

for me, I suppose. That is how I came to the state in which you saw me. So it was Ahn that turned you into the pseudo-vampire that I saw you as? On is at the source of every vampire that dwells this world. I am shamed to have fallen into such a state, and I hope I did not do you or any other members of our... order any harm. Oh, no, no, no.

If I were to, let's say, eliminate this on, would it cure you if I were to be able to somehow murderize him, her, it, they? You are young, I suppose. you cannot kill a god philo you can only delay it and on has been much delayed i fear that i am

beyond saving in the physical world you may be able to cure me of the virulent evil that has plagued my physical form, but there will be no reunion for me. Any gestures to his sort of ethereal form. He says, when all turned me into what I am now,

he drained me of, well, it would be too simple to say of all the goodness in my heart. He drained me to put it simply of my own capacity to be satisfied. whatever man you would cure out there would lack decency of any stripe. I would ask instead, should curing me prove impossible that you dispatch me so that what's left of my soul may rejoin the light?

Outside of the heart, back in the meat space, we are in the petrified heart chamber. On one side, sort of the north half of this room, mutt, you have just conducted a flawless ruse to free hide and then turn the attention of the half dozen guards or so in this room to turn their attention to him. You have also knocked the gigantic flesh golem into the crimson waters as the gate.

of this cell swung open. We're going to get to that in just a second, but on the other half of this room, Lady Godwin, you stand at the mouth of a tunnel. Yeah, Griff, you know, it's the problem with taking a little breakerouski in between recording these episodes for travel. I, for the life, I'll be doing

if I can remember what my plan was over here. Seems like mud's getting some good work done. And Griff, I think what we got here is a classic case of a barbarian trying to be useful in a stealthy situation, but I'll be damned if I could tell you what my goal was here. Yeah, sure. I mean, you got to do that. Here's Justin.

The end goal might have simply been curiosity. I think if you guys looked over at Lady Godwin, you would have seen her like ducking down, looking at the cave, and then all of a sudden she's kind of like stance bolt up like, what? What am I doing? As if a month's past. Sorry, guys. It's a brain fart. Yeah. Why don't you give me a perception?

History check to remember what your plan was. Yeah, that's good. Perception. Groovy. Okay, it's an eight. Okay, at an eight, I will sort of lay out the scene. You see Mutt doing this deception up on the north side of the room, and it seems to be working quite well. All eyes are on hide right now.

You get the impression, though, you are standing fairly out. open if, you know, one of these guards turns away from this, uh, from this roos, they, they, they will see you. Ah, shit. You know what? I got to do. What? I got to go.

I got to, I think I got to go in, I think I got to go in the cave with the eyeballs. I think I got to go in the cave with the eyes. Okay. That's the only safe. I don't know if it's safe or unsafe, but I know being out here is unsafe. So I'm going to go, I'm going to head deeper into the cave to try to hide my presence here. Okay. Cool.

You step foot into the. the cave and vanish from the chamber. You hear a bunch of tiny little animal voices go, wait, what? Wait, really? Okay, I thought we were going to have to. Okay. You step inside the tunnel, and it takes you a while for your eyes to adjust in here. It is nearly pitch black, aside from these yellow eyes that are watching you.

beyond those eyes at what you assume to be the back of the tunnel some distance away, you also see a flicker of bright red light. It is reminiscent of sort of the flashes of light that you saw in the sort of seams in the tunnels in this cave system, the arteries, if you will, leading into the heart chamber. This one is quite bright, and now as you move into the tunnel, you can see it. That light illuminates the creatures that are in here with you, and they are numerous and various. There is a diverse collection of nocturnal beasts in here. You see foxes and wolves and bats and hedgehogs and any numbers.

Noah's Ark. It's Noah's Dark in here. As you go inside. However, these creatures do not attack you in some sort of weird hive mind formation like the rats you encountered on the spinal bridge earlier. They are fairly docile. In fact, a lot of them aren't even looking at you as you enter into this tunnel. They appear emaciated and somewhat bummed out. These creatures that you are now in the tunnel with do not appear to be any kind of immediate threat to you, Godwin. What do you do?

I'm going to, without moving forward into sort of their space, I'd like to take a look at towards the light you were describing, see if I can figure. out anything else about it in my limited capacity to understand. Sure, give me, I think this could be perception or investigation. Either one is zero plus 13 is what I rolled there. Better than a 12, not as good as a 14, that's what I always say. Maybe 30 feet into this tunnel, it dead ends. This is not so much a tunnel as much as it is, just a little hobble that these pitiful creatures are kind of taking shelter in, at the back, the back wall, sure enough, has an exposed

scene of this red crystal vein. And it is pulsating much brighter, much more steady than any that you have seen so far. Not entirely sure why. But I think even you, without any kind of like magical training to your name, you are feeling a great deal of just energy radiating off of this thing. Man. This is like a really bad, I don't love any of my options right now. You got yourself some barbarian impulses over there?

Yeah. Ah, man, I'm not going to do, I'm not gonna do anything. I'm not gonna do anything. I don't know what to do. This all seems extremely bad. That is your prerogative. No, I'll tell you, I'll be honest with you.

I am being colored by the conversation that I heard between, like, Philo and the Turbo Cardinal about, like, what is... Oh, yeah, well, you didn't hear you know what I mean? I know I didn't, but, like, my impotrochartinal. I'm trying to balance, like, knowing that with, like, what she would do. I'm going to head towards the light. I'm going to head towards the light. Fuck.

I'm going to head towards the light, slowly. With my hands up in a very non-threatening way. And singing a sweet song. Let's hear some of that song. Yeah. Yeah, what does that sound like? Little night boys, my little night boys. Let me sing to you of your greatest.

The moon overhead and the dew underneath. There is still mouse blood on your teeth. My favorite Sondheim from Little Night Boys. I love that one. Give me an animal handling check with advantage. Thank you. Yeah, he earned advantage. Six.

You get inspiration for that. And I was inspired. Two. What has happened to us? Griffin likes the song and Jesus doesn't. You know what it is? Okay, here's what happens. With the six, I think actually what happens, the creatures love this song.

And as you walk down this tunnel, singing the tune, they start gathering around you. So much so that you are having to step. Kind of cautiously so as not to trample any of them. As you near this glowing red vein, you feel a little pitter-patters on your shoulders. You look over and you see that you have a handful of tarantulas that have descended from the cave ceiling and landed on you. Cute. The way I'm picturing them, hey, here's a little secret. if you were freaked out at home.

Picture I'm cute. Yeah, that's all you're doing. A lot. How far have I made it? You've made it to this vein, though. You are here, and you can see it very, very clearly now. I will say, what am I feeling? Tell me what I, you know what, let me do.

Ooh, would you let me do an insight check on myself? Oh. To see, like, what kind of... To see if you're lying? No. I guess insight isn't exactly the vibe. I want to try to, like, really get a sense of what kind of vibes I'm getting from this. Like, what kind of energy is rare?

I don't have any magical sense, right, obviously. So, I mean, an Arcana check, I don't feel like makes sense, but some sort of, like, what am I feeling from it? Okay, yeah, sure. Give me an insight check. Oh, my God. Critical 20. What a cool one to get a Nat 20.

What a cool one. Her insight, her third eye opens. she sees all. She is love. Everything is love. She understands herself on such a deep level. This is a bit weird for me as a DM because I am generally uncomfortable telling you guys how you feel about a situation. Or at least I try to be uncomfortable.

Let me ask you this. Let me rephrase this question, Griffin. As I approach it, how does my mood shift? Is there an outside influence? I feel differently now close to it. than I did before. Here is how I will answer this question. You are a barbarian.

You didn't used to be, but then your body got exploded and your head got transplanted onto a barbarian body. And now you're a barbarian, and as a barbarian, you have slaughtered some stuff. You have killed things with your powerful acts, Jennifer Myers, and severed heads and struck at vulnerable points on a number of different creatures.

This thing you are standing in front of, you feel a vitality from it. You feel a weakness to it. That is, I think, the best I can kind of answer without, you know, kind of directly guiding you and telling you what, you know, what to do or how you. Okay, I tell you what. I'm going to pick up one of my little night boys and hold them right against it. They got a little possum handy I can test. Uh Yeah, sure

Yeah, you can pick up a possum How does he react? Uh, it barely reacts Oh, wait, let me roll for possum test Yeah, roll possum Just a quick possum check You roll performance, which I guess is Another not 20, what the fuck, Justin?

Yeah, I don't know, man I really need to know what's going on here I guess I don't know, at a certain point, Griffin Like, we all have plans, right? And you had plans So Justin starts fushigging a possum round You had plans for how you want this thing to go

And I had a plan which was rub a possum on it So good that I know everything And I'm sorry Like there was a chase that this possum plan didn't pan out Yeah Possum plan panned out And now you gotta You can't pan me, you gotta

Yeah, you gotta tell them you're dark secrets Give me the gold You hold the possum gingerly, it looks up at you trustingly, it liked your song a lot and place it against this glowing red crystalline vein

as you do so, the possum, its eyes go wide and it Okay, I stopped. I stopped. No, I stopped. Oh, okay. It's eyes go wide. It's stopped. That's fine.

It's bad. It doesn't like it. That's fine. It looks... No. The opposite juice. Oh, God. God, no. It looks stronger. It stretches its body out. And as it does so, you see it kind of snap out of it, snap out of this fugue it's in.

And it does like a couple quick circles in your giant hands as you hold it. And it looks like ready to fucking party. Interesting. Yeah, okay, I'm going to hit it with my axe. Okay, sorry, the possum or the vein? Uh, the vein. Yeah, I've got, my research is complete, and I've decided, I've decided after extensive testing that Griffin's not going to give me anything better than that,

because I got two 20s in a row, one of which was a possum test. So roll to hit it with axe. The posse... Now it's a six, now it's a six, now it's a six. Now I'm rolling six. You slam your axe, your trusty axe, Jennifer Meyer. into the vein, it immediately splits down the middle and a spray of bright red blood shoots out of it like a fire hose. Fuck yes, let's go.

It blasts you leaving a Lady Godwin shaped silhouette behind you. on the wall. And it is pretty gross. You are now covered in godblood. Okay. How am I feeling right now? You feel incredible. You heal up to full.

I don't even know if you have any damage, but you feel... I do, but not anymore. You feel like you have been revitalized. All right. As you pulled Jennifer Myers back? I didn't know it was the HP thing. I would have just popped it.

It's the late trucked back out. I actually would have killed all those guys and then pop the HP. Absolutely. As you pull Jennifer Myers back, the blade of this axe. What does Jennifer Myers look like? You haven't really, I think, described kind of what sort of axes. Oh, well, here I go. So imagine the long stick.

And then at the end of it, there's two curved blades. Kick ass, dude. Yeah, no, for sure. Connected in the middle or separate? No, no, no, no. This is the best part, right? Uh-huh. The two blades are connected to the stick at the end. Oh, holy shit.

Yeah, dude. That's so sick. Oh, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, I didn't tell you the best part. Rooms. Whoa. Cool. And do the Roons mean something or just decorative? Well, it's not her act.

She doesn't know the mystery of the Roos, but they are, oh, man, guys, when I start getting into the Roons, you are not going to be able to, it's going to be a lot of, of like a lot to unpack. The runes are really important. Yeah, sure. Can you give us any indication on the weight of it? The weight of the axe? Yeah.

This is about an axe worth. Yeah, an axe worth of weight. A standard kind of big axe. The only thing different about it. And it's like almost too normal? Huh. Yeah. You know what I mean?

Except for the runes. And we will... Justin, is the blade just loose in the stink? the blade is connected to the stick with glue. But the other thing about it is that there's only 12 ruins and each one means something really important and different.

Cool. Yeah, it's pretty cool. As you pulled Jennifer Myers out of the vein, you see that its appearance has changed somewhat. Oh, man. The half that you... I just started drawing it. The half that you attacked the vein with,

the blade, now has a splash of red crystal making up a part of that blade that sort of streaks dramatically back towards the shaft. I try to wipe that off. It doesn't come off. It is crystal. It is part of the blade. You can see that these red veins, as they reach the shaft of the axe, they weave downwards.

They drip and harden and crystallize between, weaving between the runes, these important runes, and where they meet sort of the grip, where you are holding it. It almost looks like they're forming like thorny vines around the shaft of this blade. Grimman, I just need you to just add one more clause for me if you would just add Making the Roons illegible. Making the Roons. No. No.

Oh! The mystery of the Rooms. It was a whole transmedia property, the mystery of the Roons. Oh, man. This... Damn it. This act. Griffin, are you sure?

How could you take that away from Justin? I'm sad, but the listener at home, you should be devastated right now. Griffin. This is the worst vote of your day. You don't even know it. In the presence of this powerful blood, you feel your axe has gotten stronger. And it is feeding off of this sort of vital blood. And you get the sense that if any of your own blood were to get on this axe,

it would reach a truly lethal potential. Jennifer Myers has become a blood-rage great axe. Whoa, fuck, dude. A magic item, you gain plus two bonus to attack and damage rolls made with this magic great axe while you have half your hit points or fewer. Nice. Let me tell y'all, a listener to home what I love. In Taz versus Dracula, there have been a lot of moments where Justin Dad and I have done things

that have thrown Griffin for a loop and he's had to quickly prepare and figure stuff out. I love that Griffin knew that when presented with a big glowing vein, Justin was going to hit it with his axe. So in this one circuit, like, he was ready for like, yep, here you know, this is what happened. He knew Justin so well in this circle of the sense. But in the context of that, though, how excruciating must all the possum tests have been? I could see why those weren't more lucrative. The possum seeing this blood rage great axe looks up at you and nods.

sort of violently and scampers and sort of drapes itself around your neck like a mink. So is this something that's still happening or is this like gone? The blood has stopped. It is now sort of feebly dripping from the vein, which has gone now almost completely dark. It is, the scene in here has calmed down, except you are literally like head to toe covered in blood on your front side. Soundheap with John Luke Roberts is a real podcast. made up of fake podcasts.

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Yeah? Back in the chamber, the cultists are beginning to cross the... bridge across this blood river to confront hide. You've sort of stepped away from the situation. What is your kind of like plan now that you set this? Well, now I look over to where I know my friends Philo and later Godwinner just waiting for my signal ready to tell them like they're distracted. Let's go.

I solve this room. Everything's going according to. They're not there. They are not there. No, yeah, you are alone in here, aside from the many guards that are confronting Hyde. Hyde looks over at you as the guards approach him and is like, You've got to help me, man. Come on. You're trying to kill Dracula, right, bro?

I can get you there. I would never. Unless we, wait. How do the rest of us feel? The cultists all look at you. Like, and the leader of the cult said, did you say we would never? We hate Dracula. Yeah, I mean, we would never not kill him, right?

Yes. Yeah, man. He kind of eyes you suspiciously and then turns back to Hyde. Hyde is going to start... That guy's a real Dracula lover. He was telling me before. He said he was going to save Dracula, and then he said, I'm going to turn on, off.

And he, like, laughed really hard at it. He thought it was really clever. He said, he shouts out, I don't love Dracula. If anything, I'm ambivalent about Dracula. He is going to start trying to fight these guys off. And are you just going to stand there and watch this scene sort of unfold? They're all facing him, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Is there maybe a straggler guard towards the back that maybe no one would miss? Yeah, I mean, there is a guard standing nearest to you. You would have to be pretty stealthy to dispatch him without anybody noticing, but it is, you know, It's possible. Okay. Let's do that. Okay.

Give me a stealth check first. Well, given that's a 10 plus 4, 14. Okay. I'm going to just roll for the leader here, who is sort of the one closest, a perception check to see if he notices. Okay. Go ahead and make your attack. Hmm. Okay.

Uh-huh. That's a natural one. Oh, God. Oh, shit, man. Now, right now? You bring your dagger towards the neck of this cultist. And just before it finds a purchase in his exposed throat meat, he ducks out of the way. exactly according to plan

and he looks at you and says Hey man the uh the sacrifice We're not doing that right now No man I'm being controlled Hodge's using some kind of mind control I'm trying to resist Oh he really wanted me to slit your throat man I'm doing my best over here

This guy's such a dick Give me a deception check Boom boom boom boom That's a 19 a natural 19 I've always said that guy has psychic powers. You've always heard me saying it. I don't trust him on account of psychic powers. Okay, well, I'm going to turn my back to you again.

Okay, yeah, man, I think I got this thing beat. All right, good. Fight them off, brother. You can do this. He turns out. Okay, so I'm still not an initiative or coming by anything. I'm trying, I want to figure out where everybody is. I'm going to use

locate object to find philo. Sure, yeah, that works. Because he's a puppet. Yeah, go ahead and use that spell slot. You definitely, this works. He's inside the freaking heart, man.

It's fucking crazy. Even with everything going on, just like, ugh. Like, what, um, man, oh, man. Oh, all right. Okay. I'm going to, okay, great. I am going to, uh, cast protection from good and evil on myself.

Okay. And then I'm going to, uh, charge the heart. Cool. Uh, to attack it. or? Yeah. Or like, I don't know, man. No, I'm down.

How are you attacking it? With what? I'm just, like, going to try to, like, shoulder check it. I don't know. You know, what, can I see liquid moving inside of it or is it crystallized all the way through? You know, what am I looking at? Is blood pumping into it? It is, yes.

The river of blood that flows through this room is going through the heart. And you can see as much you can faintly. see through the sort of like crystalline surface of the of the heart and you can see liquid sort of roiling around inside of it. Yeah, I'm gonna try to hit it with, um, you know, my scythe or something. I'm just trying to crack it. My dagger stab it, I guess. Okay, this is going to raise suspicion, obviously, but this is- I'm being controlled. Trapped good news. I either weakened for you or it didn't. One of the two definitely happened. Go ahead. Or it's angrier and more powerful than it. Go ahead and make an attack roll against the heart.

That right there is a gentleman's 20. Nice. Sure, yeah. No, you swing this side into the surface. No, it would be the dagger. I'm stabbing it because I don't have a plus seven with the sickle. Okay. You stab the dagger into the surface of this heart.

And when that happens, a spray. of bright and powerful blood shoots outward all over you. I forgot about that. I know that just happened. When that happens, and you pull the dagger back, it is covered. It's red, you got to ask you to describe it for his given. What is the dagger? Or is my father's ruined dagger.

Well, he gave that to me and said when you solve these ruins. Yeah. I'll come back. Well, tragically, the rules are illegible. As a we've, A weaving pattern of red crystal. I had 11 of 12 figured out, Griffin. Wiggles around the blade.

And where it reaches the hill... It forms like thorny vines. This is now a blood-rage dagger. Okay. Griffin, I have to tell you something. When I added that to my inventory, it was green. And that created a high, the likes of which I've never experienced in this show. Yeah.

I've never added a green item to my inventory before. and the fact that you have just done this, it's cheap in it. It's cheap in it in this fashion is I'll never be able to forget. Well, for what it's worth, this is not a weapon that you use very much.

But, yeah. Well, not until now. Yeah. You are also similarly covered in blood. We're going to have to hack this item into the game because I'm pretty sure Blood Rage dagger does exist. But now you've got one too.

I have now established a sort of one stop shop for magic items. Anybody else want to stand this? Philo's gonna be so pissed. Yeah, I rub my crossbow on it, I guess. Whoa, your crossbow now has crit. No, it doesn't. You see every face in this room, including hides,

turns to look at you. And the cultist says, I gotta be honest, you're taking some liberties with kind of like our whole deal here. You don't stab the God heart. No, yeah. Like I told that other dude, be in control, man.

This is all part of heart. So, oh, I'm doing it again. I'd make it again. Okay, make an attack roll. Because it's not like crafter. Travis, attack with your boot. Get a magic blood boot. That's at 24.

Yeah. Travis, attack with your weeder. Quick. The blood rage, Whitney! Make him do it. Make him do your blood rage leader. No, that time it was with a sickle because that would hit.

And then I went, I want a blood rage sickle too. Yeah, man, sure. Now you've got a blood. No, no. The magic item shop has closed for the day. Okay, stab it again with the dagger. Okay, you stab it again with the dagger and some shards of it break off and fall into the water. And then the leader of the cult looks over at you and says, all right, this dude.

is acting awfully suss. Yeah, tell me about it. You gotta attack Hyde and break his concentration. Or I'm just gonna keep undoing it again. No, at this point, cultists are now sprinting across the bridge to seize you. Philo. And, uh, can I do one more thing?

Real quick, yes. I sure hope somebody helps me smash this big crystal heart, someone a lot stronger than me who's good at attacking things. Okay. Back, back inside the heart. The void. you are growing sort of accustomed to this weightless feeling in this space. The Turbo Cardinal says,

I am not positive the rules of this intangible space we are speaking in, but I would caution you against staying too long, lest you have your own goodness pulled from your body. You should return. I will. And I will free you from this curse. I vow. He smiles and says,

You are a noble, noblem. You are a... A good man, Philo. Were I still in charge, I would see to your advancement. I do believe I am beyond saving, and so I will simply say this. You, pure of heart, makes you vulnerable to arms machinations. Do not trust him, no matter how sweet his voice may seem. I'll try to be more cynical.

He nods and he says, Oh, and the most important thing, his weakness and Dracula's weakness, and basically the key to your whole quest is. And then a giant fleshy paw grabs you from below and rips you downwards. And you have been pulled back into the crimson, and waters of this underground chamber,

forcibly removed from the heart by the enormous menacing flesh golem who went plunging into the river after you. What do you do? First of all, point of order. Here, here Brother Philo slash Pinocchio has been floating in this magic godblood that gave them super weapons.

Yeah. I, your honor, I maintain that brother Philo has now become a blood rage puppet. A blood rage puppet, you say. Okay, yeah, Philo, you now have cool red crystal on your body. And when you make an unarmed attack roll at below half health, you'll get plus two to a three. attack and damage.

Nice job, dad. Big get. You look also kind of sick. Okay. You should see a doctor though. He looked terrible. Okay, so I was pulled out of the heart, correct? Yes.

How close am I to the opening where I swam in? A few feet, but you are in the grip of a giant, meaty hand. That's fine. Okay. That's fine. What do you do? I am going to cast air bubble. Oh, shit.

Inside the heart. Oh, my God. Wait a minute. Fuck. Now... Is that a real air bubble? Air bubble. If Dr. Sidney were here, she would tell you that the medical term for that is an imbalism.

Okay. Fuck. This is... I'm casting an air bubble in the heart. I'm being sucked out. Fuck. To create an embolism in the heart of on. Oh shit.

Wait, guys. It's just, it's coming across my desk right now. It's the most confident thing our dad's ever done. I'm reading. Or not any of us. Not just, it's the most competent thing a Macroy male has ever accomplished. Wow, now. Amazing.

What a moment. Okay. Taking some liberties with the air bubble spell, which is supposed to go around. the head of a thing, but I'm such a fan of this move. You are being crushed by this big beefy paw.

And so as you reach up and release this air bubble, you see it float upwards into the heart. And as it vanishes, as it passes into one of the chambers of this heart, everything goes still and quiet for just a moment.

And then a tremor tears through this chamber. From above, mutt, you see a rift form in the ground. The rift sort of cuts across the river at one point, and you see a sort of almost like a whirlpool start to form as the blood just starts to kind of like fall out of this room. Give me a dexterity saving throw. Okay, pretty good at those. Gentlemen's 20. Yes.

Okay, on a gentleman's 20, you nearly lose your footing in this place. But holding onto the dagger embedded in the crystalline heart, you managed to stay upright. Right. Some rocks and stalactites fall from the ceiling, landing on several of the cultists here. You see Hyde kind of leap out of the way of one of them. The fanatic is looking around. He looks terrified. Yeah. And you see as the water in this chamber drain, you see Philo in the grip of a flesh golem. and they are both completely covered in blood

and the flesh Golm though is sort of lying still on the ground and kind of twitching whatever has just happened here seems to have neutralized whatever magic was animating him Godwin this trimmer as it passes through this

tunnel the creatures in here all of a sudden snap out of their fugue and all begin just pouring out of the tunnel running away. You look around and realize that this somewhat narrow tunnel that you are in has begun to collapse. Oh, I'm going to run out of the tunnel. Okay. You've played video games before.

One ends closed. Well, see ya. See ya. That's a sucker's bet right there. me an athletics check. Now, that I can do. Uh, usually it's a two. Oh, fuck. Oh, there on that roll, plus six. Okay. Uh, the, the, the creatures here hoof it, uh, aside from the possum, which is kind of chilling with you. Uh, and just go sprinting out of the tunnel. I think maybe it takes you a beat too long to kind of like figure out what's going on. Uh, by the time you start

running, you are, you are able to do so. You are able to, uh, you are able to, uh, make your way out of this tunnel. However, at several points, part of the ceiling just kind of cleaves off and an enormous bit of stone topples down onto you, just sort of smashing against the side of your head, very nearly trapping you in this tunnel,

but you're able to make your way out. You do, however, take 11 points of bludgeoning damage as this big rock bonks you pretty hard. Mutt, from where you are, you see a flood of nocturnal animals come pouring out of this tunnel, immediately retreating from this room through the sort of southern entrance where you all came in earlier. And after all of them, you see a puff of rubble sort of shoot out of the tunnel and from it emerges a blood-soaked barbarian wielding a giant axe now adorned with red crystal. I pointed the axe. Wait, she comes out with the axe. Like, everybody, look. Everyone, look.

I've, this exciting thing happened. You won't believe it. Oh, man. Wait, but you have to see this. This is going to really send you a green with envy. Oh, a thrice in a lifetime occurrence. What is wrong with you? Look at your body. You all are, step out into this chain. We're all blood soaked.

You are all covered in Godblood. Yeah, this is going great. The surviving cultists look around at each other, unsure what to do. The kind of like bioluminescent. Bioluminescent algae. What? From Moana.

Anytime I hear someone say bioluminescent, I, sorry. You go, oh, I get you from the guy for that. Oh, it's covered in bio-luminous in algae. You all are standing in this chamber. The cultists are getting their bearings, and they take up their weapons and sort of like half-heartedly begin to walk towards you, and then a voice passes through the chamber

from beyond the heavy portcullis. You hear a voice say, enough. Bring them to me. The port callus of its own volition slides upward disappearing into the ceiling. The cult leader looks at the other cultists who have not been crushed by rubble

and takes a step back and says, Tell me this. Are you really one of us? Because I really am starting to suspect that... Oh no, sorry, man. And I click off the ruins. Oh, no, yeah, sorry, man.

Yeah, no, we took Toby's robe as we call it. I told everyone that if we do this thing where we disguise our appearances, we'll be so easy to infiltrate. Yeah, man, and as long as I'm coming clean, Hyde wasn't in on it at all. Like, he's pretty much innocent, man. You should let him go. But that means that we should hate him.

No, no, no, no, no. I just don't want you to think that he was, like, really in on it, and I was the good guy. I was the bad guy in that circumstance, and I was making it seem like Hyde was doing all the bad stuff, but I was doing the bad stuff. When I stabbed the heart and I said, oh, he's controlling me to do this. He wasn't controlling me to do that. You dick. You embarrassed me in front of my friends. Yeah, and I'm sorry about that, man, but I'm being honest now, right?

And that counts for something, right? Boss, shall we let this guy go? And you hear a voice from beyond where the port call is raised up and say, Whatever, I don't care, sure. And Hyde goes, woohoo. And goes sprinting off. Okay, you owe me, bye. Okay.

The cultists step aside. And the cult fanatic helps you up out of the now dry gulch where you're standing. Philo, he holds out of hand for your to lend you aid. Mm. Uh, Philo slaps it away.

Oh, yeah, hard. Shh. Damn, dude, that's hard. Oh, he's pissed. He's pissed about the turbo card. Yeah, man, fuck, yeah, dude, hard. Fuck, that's so hard.

That's hard. You keep your helping hand. And he clambers out of the gulch. Make an athletics check. Nice. sure will. You better believe I will. And that would be a...

That one. That's soft. That's unbelievable. You start to clamber out of the gulch and then you're still a fish. No, your wooden partially crystallized hand now slips off the edge of the gulch and you fall backwards. And the cult leader is like, come, hey, man. Darn! Come on.

Just he leans it leans down. and holds out his hand. Just like, it's just, I'm just trying to get you out. Fine, okay, fine, yes, fine, fine, fine, help me out. Help me out. That's great. One of the cultists behind him says, Well, puppet man can't climb out of the gulch by himself. Hey, pal! Listen!

The dies fault! Wow, cringe much? The cult leader ignites a torch. now that things are not lit up by the red heart so much anymore and says, follow me, my lord, wishes to have audience with you. Okay. Again, man, sorry about how all that. Whatever, dude.

Okay. And he leads you to the now raised to Port Collis and gestures you inside. Yeah, I didn't. Yeah. Um, okay. You pass beneath the portcullis and travel down a narrow tunnel. Uh, and, uh, the noise of the chamber behind you slowly fades. You hear the cultists trying to lift some rubble off of their friends.

Uh, you hear one say, oh, no, he's pretty good and crushed, man. Um, and you step out into a chamber that is as cold and quiet as a crypt. Uh, and then. That's because in a lot of ways it is. You step into this chamber and the floor below you feels hard and hollow. You recognize that feeling from the spinal bridge you crossed earlier. You're standing on a bone. But it is so vast that it takes you a second to sort of recognize it as any kind of anatomical feature.

You're standing on the chin of a jaw bone attached to a skull the size of a football field. Like the bridge, the skeleton that this skull belongs to is in a supine position, staring up at the ceiling of this chamber in a sort of pained rictus. There is a single source of light illuminating this chamber, casting the features of this skull in dramatic shadows. This light source is in the distance over the teeth and beyond the sort of nasal cavities. up toward where you assume the eyes to be. And in the distance, you hear the portcullis slam shut behind you. You have been left alone in here.

Uh, hello? I try to open the portcullis. Um, make a strength check. Nine plus three. Uh, no, it is, uh, it is enormous. It is far, far too heavy for any human to... Well, I'm out of ideas. Okay.

Hey, man, anybody here? Yes, come forward. Step into the light. Okay. I do that. Okay. Yeah, same. You all approach the light source,

clambering over the teeth bones, which is... Past the gum. Look out stomach. No, you're not going into this thing's mouth. This skull is basically forming the floor in this chamber. anything past it, if you were to go sliding off, there is just endless darkness below you. You cannot see where the bottom of this chamber is. So you are traversing the skull.

It is somewhat difficult getting over the mouth area due to this skeleton's slight overbite. But you navigate sort of over that and around the nose hole and eventually sort of shuffle towards the top of this skull. ensuring that you don't slide down the rounded frontal bone and fall into the abyss below. And as you reach that place, the light source reveals itself to you. You see the hilt and several inches of a pristine silver sword is buried in the skull, several feet beyond the brow line. The hilt is adorned with several large shining rubies. and you can see the blade is etched with these ornate Celtic knots.

Roons. Yes, these roots are, but these are actually important ruins. I know we've had a lot of fun with runes here today. Make a history check. What, okay, now, Griffin, can I just guess that that's Scalibor? Wow. Like, I don't know why we've talked a lot about a big, shine, sword.

Wow. I don't think I need to make a history check. Not cool, man. Not cool at all. Wow. You've violated a pretty secret titty here. Hey, hey, hey, guys, no joke. That's the end of the episode.

We're going to have to, we got to talk about this, man. You've got to circle the wagons. A huge breach of trust is just taking place. This is a problem. Yeah, that's the end of it. We'll try to get next week. This is like untenable. Hold on. We need a tight button here. Hold on.

Okay. You feel in your fucking soul that you stand in the presence and you didn't work this out yourself. Of the mighty blade of scouts. It wasn't, Griffith? I, to be honest, I felt nothing. I felt nothing.

I wanted those crinkle tinkles so bad. You've taken everything from me. Oh, Griff. I can see it in my head, little guy. I can see it. It's fucking, but the moment's past. No, I can see it. The moment is gone and over with.

Beautiful. I feel no guilt. I know, I'm... Maximum fun. A worker-old network of artist-owned shows. Supported directly by you.