Icebound | Ep. 18 | Fight or Flight
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Welcome to Legends of Avantris. I'm Scrimstabiscotch and you're listening to Icebound. Here's what happened last time. You hear this chorus. The sound of many voices all crying out. They're horrific octopus-faced brain-eating monsters. I have been working my whole life in order to

to defeat the mind flayers. I have been working this entire time to attempt to crush them. Oli, do you know what Dracar is? Do you have any idea how often or how readily these creatures can peer into our minds? They can do this, but it is not all the time. It is...

It is just, uh, intimidation. We will kill these mind flayers. We will make our way up to, I think, the top floor. I think we will kill Safflith, and then we will retrieve the Hexature Armament. It will be... Wait, wait, wait, the what? The Hexature Armament? Fate has led us here. I'm starting to get annoyed, but he's always right. Do you know the name Secundus?

Is he from a place of angles and lines? Orderly shapes?

Logic, yes, yes, yes. You know, I like him. I think we can trust him. I don't trust him as far as we can throw him, but I don't think we have a choice. You were warned. And sitting at the organ is a mind flayer.

no longer shielding itself with invisibility. And you look around and up into the room and you can see them there levitating 20, 30 feet up in this space, looking down at you, robes falling around their feet. I need you all to roll for initiative. But you're shocked by the sudden lack of danger as they struggle and squirm on the ground, looking around.

Drowning, drowning, unable to... There's a popping sound, and you hear this disgusting crunch inside the brain as their eyes sink back into their skulls, and they go limp against the ground. It was a mistake to delegate command to my thralls. You are no longer in danger. I see that much has happened while I slumbered.

May I ask if Manius, his family, their vassals, and some of the others were killed, or if they were simply beyond the reach of my psionic influence?

Looking around you, it is difficult to believe that beyond the alien walls and architecture that surround you, through the mountain cave and the threshold of the waterfall that veils the nautiloid ship in which you now stand, the city of Ogerton carries on. For them, it is the middle of any other day that doesn't bring a lottery.

For them, it is a cold, but not punishing 45 degrees, and great big drops of rain pour down from the dark gray clouds soaking the lands and pooling in the streets and walkways.

In the market, ogres haggle and shop and bustle with commerce. In the hippodrome, ogres wrestle and fight and compete in front of crowds of cheering ogre spectators. In the theater, stories of the ogre condition are told, performed with comedy and action and drama.

In the church, ogres piously attend service and pray earnestly for spiritual guidance concerning their joys and their sorrows. In the library, ogre scholars read and study and expand their knowledge, debating philosophy and history and reality. And in houses, families are families. They live. They go about their daily lives. They struggle together.

They know nothing of you, truly. They do not know what has just transpired or what is happening, the fight which threatened your very lives. They do not know what you are up against, what you are trying to do for them. They may never know. Even further from where you now stand, there is a different scene.

Beyond the limits of the city of Ogerton a makeshift caravan of sorts can be found. There the ogre you know as Manius Blaginius comforts his family and hopes that he has made the right choices. There Daisy and the other silenced humans huddle and patiently wait. There rain has turned to snow. Pillowy flakes fall down in clumps, heavier and heavier.

From this distant place, Ogerton is like a strange sealed terrarium. An outer layer cloaking an inner layer, which conceals another layer, which hides yet another layer, which veils yet another. The awful weight of these layers press down upon you, and you feel burdened and claustrophobic and far from home.

Indeed, you stand now just at the precipice of the center of this suffocating space, staring at alien walls, at the corpses of alien creatures, and into the dour eyes of those you'd now call family. You had your chance to flee. And chose to fight instead. And words surface in your minds. Words that reach you not through your ears, but almost like memories bubbling to the surface.

It was a mistake to delegate command to my thralls. You are no longer in danger. I see that much has happened while I slumbered. May I ask if Manius, his family, their vassals, and some of the others were killed, or if they are simply beyond the reach of my psionic influence? What happens next is up to you.

And we just finished the fight, right? Moments ago, you were in heated combat, starting to turn the tides against these illithid, or mind flayers, as they were called by Ketrasteem, the Githyanki that you know is just on the floor below. He

sent you up here to get his sword and then they ambushed you. You had this tremendous fight, some of you taking great wounds. And before you were able to fell all of them,

They stopped, and instead of fighting, turned against themselves, strangling themselves with their own tentacles until there was something of a pop, and their lives were extinguished before you, which is when this voice emerged in your minds. And we are level seven? We are level seven now. Okay, good. I did level up, Derek. What color is their blood? Because Scrim is covered in it. Oh. And an icorne.

Yeah, I think that it would be Icarus. It would be dark. If it had any shade at all, it would be probably of a purple hue, I'd say. Okay. Thank you. I would immediately, also covered in blood, and my transformation will finally go back to normal. I'll just grab the grow bag, and I'll just immediately shove some in my pipe. Mr. Foyer Blossom, please. No, thank you.

You take a long draw and you're able to feel the relief of your tobacco once again. It tastes just as you remembered it. And I will say that those things that you did not articulate... Those things that you did not articulate are on that center table. So why don't you go ahead and put this available for anyone who wants to start grabbing at things. This is your full inventory as all of the items.

You lost, and you can start pulling things out of the bin and re-adding them to your inventory in a mechanical sense as you want. - Scrim will be standing there, still holding the brutal blade in two hands, covered in this blood, looking around, breathing heavily, and then he'll look to his left.

and he'll see this smoky hound figure, and startled. "Get, get, get, get off of me!

Get away from me! Get back! And take a few steps away. And this smoky hound figure will take several steps towards him to follow him, leaving almost smoky paw prints that fade seconds later as it follows. No matter where Scrim goes, this creature seems to follow and stay close to his side. There is a...

precision to its movements and a obedience that is exuded from this smoky beast. Aside from the...

memory that you explored when you were first taken by the lights in the sky and you were shown Scrim's past. You are seeing this. It's a very similar dog, but does it look exactly like Graveyard Jack or would it be just a dog-esque? It is canine-ish. It looks like a dog. It does not look exactly like the vision that we all shared. It's reminiscent of

It's a shadow of the dog that you saw, the hound that you saw in Scrim's memories. Stop. Stop following me. Stop it. Go away. I don't want. Stop. Scrim, you know hounds are like super loyal, right? No. Well, if he likes you, he's not going anywhere.

Look at it. I don't think he likes me. I think he likes the taste of my flesh. Well, he likes something about you, it's just the flesh he likes. Go on, git. Go be Barnabas's friend. If that is what all you think it is, there's no getting rid of a Grimm. A what? A Grimm. I mentioned it, I can't remember how long ago. Tales of the Beastie, Heralds of Doom.

Yeah, I chose to forget that you mentioned that ever. Once one has its sights on you, as far as I'm aware, tales I've heard. Barghest. That one fellow who wouldn't stop saying the word over and over drove him mad. Perhaps, like Miss Mark said, perhaps you can try to be friends with the beastie. Spare yourself that same fate. Master your fear.

Well, as interesting as your new puppy is, we just heard a voice in our heads, and I think that we're in trouble. Oh, I will do massive tone right now. I will shift, I will glow in like a light blue light, and I will transform back to your near. We all heard the same thing. Well, I assumed that it was in my head, it was in yours, since it talked about us as a unit. Heard it, felt it.

Something else is here. It sounds like, well, at least to me, maybe I'm wrong, but it sounded like this entity is almost worried about Manius and his family. That could be a good sign. Maybe this being didn't want his thralls to do all the brain-eating that they were doing. Is that possible, you think? It said that it was waking up from a...

from a slumber. Maybe it had fallen asleep a long time ago and that's why these

Its creatures were running amok and created all this. I mean, it sounds like it said it sent its thralls to do its bidding, and it shouldn't have. So is it possible? Scrim, what are we doing? I'm looking for stuff. This is totally dorky. Scrim's rummaging around. Oh, no, wait, this one is mine. Scrim, we're trying to have a conversation here, buddy. All of you, all five of you, hear the same voice at the same time. Hey, that's mine! Scrim! Scrim!

I'm just throwing shit over my shoulders. Hey, you can't break that. What are you doing? Those are definitely mine. Oh, no, one of these is mine. Our snow-blind glasses are scattering around. You do find those. They are definitely there. Yeah, I already threw them out. They're right here somewhere. Yeah, here, five snow-blindness goggles. Anyway, keep going. Ahem.

You hear a voice again. Oh, honeypot. Yeah, that's not mine. Thank you, Queenie. Thank you, Taishen. I was only listening. I have been asleep for just a few days now. Thank you. But it appears much has changed. All five of you hear this voice simultaneously in your minds.

So we can just have a conversation like this. We don't even need Rocky Talkies or nothing. Yes. Oh, cool. What's your name? I'm Queenie March. It's nice to meet you. I'd say the other part, but we haven't fully met yet. I know the other part. I don't want to think about that. I know your name. I know all of your names. I am the one that you know as Sopholith. All right.

The deity that the ogres worship. Is this what you are? This is my true form, my true home. They worship me, but only as a part of the design that is Ogerton. Do you live? Very much. I am alive. Look, I don't want to tell anyone how to do their job, but it certainly sounds like you let things get out of hand.

Yes. Jackass. My apologies, Scrim. It was not something I anticipated, them threatening you, forcing you to come here and take the actions that you have taken, attempting to end your lives. It would not have been a part of my plan. Was it a part of your plan the way they fed upon the ogres, the way they've kept them? I will be honest with you, Taishen. Yes. Yes.

Mind flayers must feed on minds in order to survive. They must feed on experience, on knowledge, on the nutrients that only a brain of a sentient creature can provide. I mean, I guess that's fair. I mean, that is kind of how the cycle of life works. But you just...

I don't know. I feel like it could have been done different. Like, maybe you could have told them you was gonna eat their brains, but they get all kinds of cool stuff. There is only one way to do this. And it is through the deception that you have articulated so curtly. I self-leth. It is merciful. I, uh, or actually, I prefer Scrim's name for you. Jackass. Mr. Jackass. Jackass.

It is not the natural order of things, not here in Avantris. I don't care where you came from. F, you need to become a jailer in order to survive. Imprison, destroy the agency of living mortal sentient beings. You failed the survival of the fittest. You should have evolved in your strange otherworldly state to find some other way.

Or otherwise, if you were not going to evolve in such a way, you should have hid yourself better from me. Well, I don't think he's being quite a jackass. He's answering all our questions. This is all theater, Miss March. The theater that they put on is a mere allegory to everything that's going on. We had a brutal, deadly combat that ended on the whim of this brain. Was any of it real?

I believe that that's what our friend down below referred to Mr. Sofalef as. I don't think I understand. All of this is way outside of my realm of experience here. You think that nothing we've experienced here has been real? Boy, what does it matter what's real and what's not? All of our choices, have they been ours? Everything we've experienced and sensed, can we trust that?

Whoa, look at this! And I'm swinging a silver sword around through the air.

This isn't anybody's, is it? Because I don't remember anybody having this. It's got this massive Final Fantasy VII buster sword. It's just winging around. It's taller than you are. Well, I don't really think this is my style. I'll just feed it over my head. She clangs loudly against the middle floor. Wait, isn't that that sword that we were supposed to get for that, for what's-his-face? I'm going to walk over to it and grab it. Well, this is...

It's too big for me. Does one of you, one of you tall guys want to take it? Oh! Ah! My gold! Yes! I'm gonna have a bag. Definitely mine. Oh, platinum pieces? That has your name all over it. Hey, I had platinum pieces too. Do you know how platinum and gold work?

Bedrolls! We don't really need these anymore, do we? Miss March, if Mr. Yorneir doesn't mind, I can take the sword and safekeeping. Sure, I don't care. Oy, this seems mighty impractical.

And I use an anchor! Speaking of... I'll give the bar a long bow. There you go. The three of them. Whoa! Where did these multiply? What's going on here? What is this design of yours? I think that's how many inventory slots it takes up. That could be. That could be. I'm certainly not the brains of this operation. Yornir, understand that we crashed here a little more than two centuries ago.

23 years, 8 months, and 15 days. In that time, we have designed a society for the ogres where they might be happy, that they might live and grow, that they might share in experiences they would never have been able to attain on their own. But understand this: it was for their minds that we did this, so that we could survive.

Is that your end goal? Is just to survive? Like any other living creature? Certainly not. I have much greater purpose. And this is my question. What is the greater purpose? You are not of this world, so I know you do not have the primal urge just to survive. My purpose is simple. To sail the sea. To collect knowledge. We do not just consume minds to...

give us nutrition, but also for the knowledge that we can learn of the cosmos so that we can gain insight into its mysteries. You know, he's not saying anything that's so wrong. Oh, so for a greater good, then? No, I'm just saying, what's the difference between a being from outer space that feeds on people than people that feed on cattle?

To him, we're cattle. We're different. He's talking... I mean, I'm not quite sure. Sure, we got families, but to him, none of that matters. And I ain't never been a farmer. Because to him, we're less than nothing. We're a means to an end. The same way that we treat our food. As far as I'm concerned, that was his first mistake. We are not animals.

We are not to be imprisoned and shackled. I mean, to be fair, I'm a bunny. But there's a difference between you and the rabbit in the woods, isn't there, Miss March? Yeah, but not to him. But to me, and that's all that matters in this situation, as far as I'm concerned. So would you say that there's a greater good to your plan, Mr. Brain? If that's what you are. Or voice. I would say that it is the goodest way that such a plan can be designed. I don't like that word, goodest. Designed.

Grand designs, yoghurs are happy. They are less violent this way. I have to say, Mr. Sopholith, I'm not quite as old as you, certainly, but I've been here on a ventress for a good number of decades, and I've met many men mentioning a greater good, grand designs, a grand plan to achieve the best outcome possible in a dark and terrifying world.

And behind their back, every single one of them held chains with which to shackle anyone who would allow it. And I don't see you as being any different. Barnabas, I understand that for you freedom means transformation, change, growth. If there were a substitute that we could survive on and subsist and continue our greater good, we would have found it. We would have chosen that path.

What would you say to the caribou? What would you say to the cattle if it asked you about shackles, about the fence? That is quite literally my point. I would say that I walk the path of the beast. That is the power upon which I draw the creatures of the sea. And when there is one greater threat, there's evolution, there's change, there's growth to survive it.

You get a thicker shell, you get faster fins, you find another way to survive, another food source. And if this is what your whole evolutionary plan, all of your changing and evolving and growth in knowledge has led you here, feasting upon befuddled ogres, putting on a play, and having some strange mockery of civilization,

Boy, that is a sad outcome for evolution as far as I'm concerned. Very sad indeed. Oh, speaking of the ogres, yeah, Manny, as we saw him, you were asking about him? Yes, I am very curious. They seemed fine. Actually, when he came around and saw it our way, you know, he wasn't such a bad guy after all. But then you mentioned him being outside of your influence and... Oh. Oh. Oh, no. Are they gonna be alright? Outside of your influence? They will be fine...

in terms of their health, but outside of my realm, they will no longer be affected by this ionic force that I push into this sphere. Their minds will begin to regress back to their ogre forms. We may have made a tactical boo-boo. What happens when they regress?

It will be as though we had not imbued them with intelligence at all. They will return to their old ways. They will lose their powers of logic, of reason, and they will become savage once again. Slayers to their gut instead of to you. I think they'd still prefer that. Perhaps. Perhaps.

Need I remind everyone? Um, ha, our good friend, uh, Daisy is with them. Not so good. We're quite far away. Do you think Daisy needs us to protect her? No, but I'm certainly worried about her. The moment that Manius turns feral, she'll put five arrows into his skull. Oh, I hope so. Uh...

Have more faith in our companion than that, Mr. Staviskog. It's not a lack of faith. I just worry about her, all right? Well, you understand. I think had she encountered something wild, yes, she would do that. But she's a kind soul. She's not the type to turn on someone immediately once they go bad. I do agree with Scrim. I think we should be worried about Daisy. I think that moment of hesitation she'll feel...

being unsure of whether this change that comes upon him is permanent or temporary might be her undoing. Not everyone is like us. Maybe she'll just run, right? She'll just run. Run off into the woods. But what about her dad? I don't know. You think she's going to turn tail when her dad's there in trouble? She's going to do whatever she can to save him, and that in itself might be her undoing. Yeah, I agree with you, Scrim. I think we've made a blunder.

Well, wasn't Moilin bringing a great number of vassal there? So perhaps they'll just... their forces will be able to overwhelm the savage... savagery of the new... our newly rediscovered ogre friends. And we've led all of them to their death. All those ogres. If the vassals win, and potentially far more vassals. If they hesitate for a moment as they don't understand the ogres changing back...

Can we say what we've done is good? Well, this is just great. What do you have to say for yourself, Yorneir? We knew this was the finality of the situation. Did the rest of you not? I did, Mr. Yorneir. I don't even know why I asked you. What do you have to say for yourself, Taishen? If the natural state is for them all to kill each other,

This is not better. They knew love. They had families here. They had intelligence. They had art. They had enjoyment. They got to live a real life. Just weeks ago, we were in the cold. We were in the snow ourselves, scrounging for the simplest warmth. I will say, I'm torn, like Tyshan might be. When I think about death, which I think for most people does scare you,

The idea of going to it blindly is kind of a peaceful thought. Thinking that something like a great lottery is happening to you, you don't realize what's happening, that sounds much better than facing death with your eyes wide open. And I'm not saying I'm not willing to, I am. I know every day we do the things we do, the death is right around the corner. But if I take a step back and really think about it,

Would I rather be oblivious to death when it happens? Yeah, probably. I think I would. It is a mercy. That being said, it's...

If this not our place...

to grant the ogres something beyond their nature. It's not our place, and it's certainly not this being's place. Ray, that's what I'm saying, you should have asked them first. Is it our place to take it from them now that they have it? It is our place to prevent any further unnatural design or plan that this being intends with what we know is an extremely powerful artifact. None of it is real.

None of the--all that art and everything they enjoyed, none of it was real. But it is to them. Oh, it is to them, but at the cost of thousands of mortal souls robbed of their voices and their freedom. Even more cattle than they are themselves.

When does the cost become too high? Ah, this is making my brain hurt. And then even so, even so, I would want to... When I do die, I'd like to stare death in the face. And jump into the jaws of the beast, my harpoon in hand. Every single time. There was a time when I...

wanted to escape reality. I wanted to escape what was real. I turned to the bottle. Some turned to harder substances. Some turned to things like this. Some turned to faith. Whatever it is, they wished to escape reality. And I learned as I descended and spiraled into that bottle, as chained as these ogres were, that none of it was fucking real. And maybe that's my problem, is that I wish that none of this were real.

I wish I'd never been put in that egg. I wish that I'd never lost my friend. And I sure as hell wish I weren't lost in this horrible icy tundra, dealing with things far beyond my capabilities. And I think to myself, if I had the choice of a life like this, and not knowing the horrors that were outside of the door, right now, I'd take it. We were led here for a reason. We all know this.

This was our fate. The reason is because the existence of all of this is a slight against the land, slight against the world. It is my goal and my mission to bring it to an end. Humans have strength in numbers. They have done what they can to survive with their numbers, and they will do it again if the ogres turn. You're here.

So where are you? Let's have a face-to-face conversation, huh? Let's find the, you know, like, the thing. I'm sure he can read my mind anyway. Where are you? You're near. Oh, he's just going to ignore me. Very cool. I also ignore Scrim. You are right that fate brought you here. And I understand your concerns with...

the society that we had to build to survive. But let me also say that I have answers for you that can prevent greater threats. Threats to the land that you love in Karkinos. Threats that you've seen in visions. Don't you want to unpack those mysteries? I can offer you these gifts.

The land you love will be safe in your hands with my help. Was him mentioning Carquinos? Did you mean Carquinos? He meant Carquinos. He meant Carquinos. Yeah. Okay. So I'm gonna check. Another pod's open. Interesting. Very interesting. I was gonna say. Clever duck. Scrim. What? Oh, now you're gonna talk to me? You can find me on the fourth level of the Dominant Mind.

here at the top of the ship. Just climb these ladders and find your way to me, and I can help unlock the secrets that burden you. I can help release you from the terrible curse. Really? Like, you really mean that? You never need live in fear again under my guidance. I just look at Barnabas. None of it's real, Mr. Staviskosch.

This ladder right here! And I point to one of the ladders. There are two ladders clearly going up to a third floor. I look to Jornir. I mean... I'll just put my hand where it's at. What could you possibly prevent in Karkinos from here? What could you possibly know about Karkinos? What can you tell me? I have lived for a very long time, and I know things you cannot imagine.

It would be my pleasure to offer you this gift and to show you how to prevent catastrophes, how to prevent a damned future. But I would need your alliance and assistance. I already mean you no harm, but the way things are here must persist if I am to eventually return to my home.

What catastrophe is worse than this, Mr. Yorner? There is far worse catastrophe that is possible. What do you need to return home? What are you waiting for? You've been here, you've crashed 238 years and 17 days and 47 hours. 23 years. 23 years. 23 years. Oh, I tried. Not much time remains now.

before I will be able to return. The artifact brought by Ketrastean, the Gethianchi I believe you meant on the lower deck, has been able to accelerate our plans significantly. If you were to join me, we would be able to leave almost immediately. You mean the fellow downstairs is the one that brought the Hexature armament? Yes. To you. He mentioned it as a plan.

- I don't know why my brain can hear us. I just feel weird, like if I talk out loud, he's gonna hear us. I know he can hear me. - And I think that it would be evident in the way that he's talked to all of you that he can hear everything you're saying and see you probably and probably get some surface level action of your present mind. - Oh, he's in our brains, he's in our brains, he's in our brains, he's in our brains, he's in our brains. Oh, I hope he doesn't see that dream.

I've seen it. Standing nude at the top of a pyramid with thousands of young dragonborn women throwing pickles at you. Oh!

I've seen it all. Pickles. Pickles. Makes me feel so strong. Oh my god. And secure. And I thought I was sick. I didn't know you'd repeat it, Brian. I didn't know you'd repeat it for all my friends to laugh at me. Do as I ask, or I'll tell them more. Oh no, let's side with him. Let's side with him. That's canon now. Oh.

There's nothing in my thoughts, anything in my dreams that I am afraid for you to see, Mr. Sophola. I have nothing to hide from anything like you. I believe that to be true. That is why I understand where you are coming from when it comes to your...

albeit short-sighted perceptions of what I am trying to do here and what I am trying to do in my role amongst the cosmos. So you're trying to whisper into our minds, promise us all of our hopes and dreams will come true. You seem to have shaken Mr. Yorneir, which is...

Very concerning. I mean, at the very least, we should hear him out. All right? I mean, like, you know, look, do I believe that he's going to offer us the world? No. But we hear him out, right? He has nothing he could possibly offer me. All I need is my lover. All I need is the sea once I get back there. That's very nice, Barnabas, but we're not all you, all right? Some of us have bigger problems. You can solve that problem when I look at the hound next to him.

Is it like kind of pacing around you? Like, I'm wondering what it's doing actually. - So it's actually staying very close to me and only moves to follow me when I move. It doesn't wander from me. It seems to be very happy to stay near my side. - Stands right in your blind spot. - I'm going with the Ozymandias cats. We're like- - Boobastas. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Or it's still slinking along, right? - Yeah, it moves very fluidly, but it doesn't move unless I move away from it too far.

I also don't see why you having a cute new dog is a problem. That's not cute. What's wrong with you? He looks pretty cute to me. Mmm. Okay. They helped you in the fight. I've lived my life embracing the beast inside of me. Perhaps you could learn a thing or two from me, Mr. Stabiscotch, beyond fishing. Hmm. Don't you bring up fishing now. I will. The tackle's right there. You haven't taken it. Ha!

I'm not gonna take it, that's yours, I've gifted it to you. Without moving eye contact from Barnabus, take the fish and tackle. I still have a scowl on my face and I stick it in my bag. So you are capable of learning and changing even someone like you. I still want to hear him out, at the very least. We came all this way. Even if he has nothing to offer us personally...

If we present the item or side with him as he asks, they'll leave. Does that not also accomplish what we came here to do? Free the town? Mr. Sir, we don't have to go with you. I am asking you to join me. Have you considered the limits of your own existence?

Oh, sweet lord, here we go. The finite nature of your mortal lives. I'm gonna be sick. Yeah, I've been talking about it for a little bit. And the possibilities that lie beyond those limitations. I have gifts of knowledge to share with each of you that will help you unlock the visions that you see, shed the curse of

Pursue the wisdom that you seek, Taishen. Be able to learn the true nature and understand your hive fully, Queenie. And to get out of the way, remove the obstacles between you and the voice in the shell, Barnabas. You need only join me and we will be able to do so many great things together.

All right, I'm going up the ladder. I don't know what the rest of you are doing. I'm going up the ladder. Will you let us take the Hexatur Armament from here? Make a persuasion check. Ooh. Goddamn dice. Ton, ton, ton. Six. You don't have plus? I don't think I have plus. Fucking do the thing, do the thing. Double twist? Yeah, double twist, double twist. At least one. At least one.

- Yeah, yeah, yeah, well yeah. - I'm doing two. - Just do two, do two, fuck this guy. Fuck this guy. - Let me get you some different, oh yeah, this one. - I love how incensed Mikey's getting, so it's making Barnabo sleep in his room. - Oh my goodness gracious. - Oh, he was meant to be. - That's right, faint, I'm a cowboy. - The artifact.

is what I require to use to get home. If I can do that, then perhaps I would be willing to part with it. But I cannot honestly say what my home state will be in, and so I cannot make a full commitment to your ask. Quinny, will you go with me? Please. Don't make me go alone. I'm not gonna make you go alone. I'll go with you if you really want to go. But...

You're just going to listen. You're not doing anything stupid. Yeah, no, obviously. When have I ever done anything stupid, Queenie? Come on, please. I can't think of a single time. Thank you, Taishan. You were getting drunk a lot when you were trying to navigate the ship, which could be part of the reason that we got stuck on this island. That's number one. Why? Why?

You never what? You never got drunk? I didn't say that. I didn't say those words. Yeah, because you stopped before you finished saying never. To be fair, I am partially responsible for sending up as much brandy as I did. It was to keep me warm. Yeah, but every time I tried to send you a coat, you said no thanks. Doesn't work as well as the brandy.

- I also officially crashed the ship onto the ice and only because you only told me to. - I'm not saying, okay, let's not play the blame game, all right? - Oh, he's tearing the brain, he's tearing the brain!

Hearing a support! All right, all right. We have all had our fair share of missteps. I just, you asked the question. This is the boss fight. I'm just saying, I want you to be safe. Thank you. Because I care about you. I care about you too. I'm not gonna make any deals. Did you cross your fingers behind your back when you said that? No, no, no, no. Oh my God, he's being honest. You got me. I'm not gonna, I learned my lesson about making deals. I just wanna hear him out and see what he has to say about this curse. I look at the...

The dog. And that's it. I just want to hear him out. Why can't we hear him out from here? Because I want to see what this thing looks like. What if looking at him gives him more advantage on you, Scram? And that's why he wants to tell you in person? What if he's tricking you?

I'm really curious what he looks like, though. There's no way that this ends without us facing it. So we may as well go now. I would like to see it as well. All right. Thank you. So we all go together, then? Together. I'm with you. Do you think we should have a conversation? I know you can listen to everything we're saying, but should we talk through this a little bit before we start climbing that ladder? While this is happening, I think the words...

May we speak privately? See if he or it can perceive and respond individually. Odin villain are thug! Your ear is a smart cookie. And no response comes as the conversation continues. But we don't know that. So I think we should have a conversation.

About everything that's happening so that when we get up there and we see this thing face to face The best thing we could possibly do is be aligned and I'm I'm feeling my self waiver here waiver on what on everything like I don't want to see Manny has not been any us anymore and I understand that he wasn't always who he is today and that

I shouldn't mourn the facsimile of who he's become. That's a pretty good word, right? Did you like that? I did that one for you. It is a good word. Oh, guys, keep... Do you think for just a second you could pretend like you can't hear us? It would just make me feel a lot better about this whole situation. Cool, thanks. I will not... Shit. ...interfere... Yep. ...with you any further. Consider yourselves in a private place. I await you...

on the fourth floor, the command deck. All right, thank you. And you actually do get a feeling of vacuum, of absence. Oh. Oh. Oh, it's weird now that it's gone. It's like you don't even realize it's there until all of a sudden your head's empty. It's pretty empty up there, huh? Facsimile's a good word, Miss March. So, I'm not sure what we do here.

We don't let it continue. Obviously, we can't. No. I think we have to. No, no, you go ahead. I think we have to go up there and to make any decision. It hinges upon what this creature can do or what it was willing to do. If it will leave, if it will go home, if we can make that happen, if it can promise safety to...

to your nearer, Shatter Scrim's deal, if any of that is possible, but we wanna know. But why? Why us? Why, if it's had this Hexature armament for so long, why didn't it leave? Why did it stay? Those promises that it was making? Those promises sounded like the promises of something desperate.

Well, if it can't do what it's promising to do, it means it's not as powerful as we initially thought, and we can stab it in its stupid brainy faults. Oi, that's where I come in, Mr. Stametskillox. But if it has a reasonable offer, and I might be able to be free from this horrific... Look at this horrific, horrible creature! It's actually a very cute dog. If I can be rid of this, then I'm going to think about it. I'm going to think about it.

I think we should also talk about what it means if Scrim or any of us decides to take it up on its offer. We're friends. We're family now. And just like we were talking before about not taking away someone's agency, if this thing that haunts Scrim really does affect him in such a negative way and he has the ability to be rid of it, I don't want to take that away from him if that's the path he chooses. What do we do then?

How do we rectify that? Well, I mean, I have an answer. If your answer is kill Scrimm... Oh, it better not be. I'm not going to be able to do that. Or kill me. Barnabas, we can't kill Scrimm. What do you mean, or kill you? We don't want to kill you either. I have said that for any creature that wields shackles as indiscriminately as these...

They are my enemies, and I keep moving forward until all my enemies are destroyed. And if you, Mr. Stabiscotch, or anyone here takes up those shackles, you become my enemy. I don't like your tone very much, Mr. Barnabas! I will not compromise. Even in the face of the end.

Not when it comes to this. Are you listening to this? Not when it comes to what I swore to her. I just can't, I can't get over how you can so ferociously argue with that brain about the way he took away the agency of the ogres, but then in the same breath turn around and tell Scrim that if he doesn't do what you want, you're going to kill him. What I'm saying is that it's not my fault.

Choice at a side what you do, Mr. Stamaskatch. But I'm saying that you can handle that. We can handle that, BC, together. It may be your doom, but we can find some way. Perhaps you can even harness it yourself. Perhaps you can command that thing instead of the other way around. You have no idea what I've gone through every waking hellish night for the last 40-some-odd years!

You don't know me, Barnabas! You think you do, but you don't, okay? Every waking night of my life, I haven't slept in decades, alright? You don't know what I'm going through. And I'm doing the best I can here. I want to hear the thing out! I... I don't know the level of fear that you've experienced. But I know what it's like to not be able to sleep. Not be able to...

to get a moment's rest because of the thoughts that are in my head. It's a poison. I do understand that. And all at the end of the day, we humanoid, goblin, triton, human, whatever it is, fear is a poison. And it's fear that ruled your life and it's fear that continues to rule your life. And I fell to the bottle. I let that poison, I fed a poison with poison, Mr. Stabiscotch. And I've even made the mistake of helping you indulge the same.

So I do understand, to an extent. I understand the choices we all have to make. It may not have the form of a shadow dog, but I understand not being safe in calm waters of a tranquil mind. I only have that...

When I hear her voice. Alright. You and I, we're officially fighting. You and me, we're fighting, okay? That's it. I'm going up the ladder. Scram. Will you just wait for a second for me, please? I've got your back. Alright. Okay? I'm not going to let anything happen to you. If I have to put myself between the two of you, and you have to kill me to get to him, or vice versa, I'll do it. But I'm going to close my eyes because I don't want to see it coming. Anyway, who is the lady in the show?

How do you know she's not doing to you what this thing is doing to them? Because I've heard her voice. And we've heard his. I've seen her. I know. I feel it. You don't understand. You haven't heard her. No, I understand that, but I'm just saying, Manius feels the same way. I would be careful, is all I'm saying, about blindly trusting a disembodied voice. Her voice...

is a Lauren. - Is the only time I feel home. Her voice is the only time I feel a shred of sanctuary in a pause in tumultuous seas. - And because I love you, I'm gonna tell you right now, you need to find a way to feel that without her. And I hope that someday before this ends, you do, just in case. - Oh, I know. - We're gonna do this. We're gonna do this together.

And we're not going to kill each other. We will do whatever we can to stop each other from making stupid decisions. Because together, we can accomplish anything. Yeah, we're not going to be fishing together anymore, that's for sure. Well, we'll see how you feel about it in the morning. Maybe you'll finally graduate to harpoon fishing instead of tackle fishing. Oh, you would like that. Yes, I would like that quite a bit. I really had it up to here with you. Scram. Scram.

Do you want me to go first? No, I'm happy to go first. All right. I need everyone to make a perception check. Do you want me to walk in between you and Barnabo? Yes, please. I will. I fail. I will find the answer regardless. You said prescription? Mm-hmm. Prescription. I got a 12. 11. All right, hold on. Not great.

16. 22. Holy... I don't have a DC in mind, this is a contest, I just wanna... I need to find a staff block. That's awful. Yeah, that is awful. I don't like that. We will have a private conversation. You can find your own module and then you can't find where the staff block is. Um... I do have a question. Yes. Uh-oh. Sotholith.

- Could this count as a short rest? - I would say this has actually been pretty real time. Now, I will say, if you want to, you could start actually gathering up your things in a more

active way because you guys have gone from fight to talking to Sopholith and talking to each other and having these debates and ideas of doubt in all of your mind. If you wanted to act, like you haven't put on your garbs, right? You haven't put on your things. - So real time would have been about an hour. We've been playing for about an hour. - That's fair. That's a fair point.

You know, just to throw that out there. I don't hate that, actually. I don't hate that terribly much at all. I'm going to get some d12s just in case. All right. Did anyone roll higher than 20 on the perception check? You're the only one who notices that...

Ketrastean has climbed up through one of the ladders and is silently listening and examining the sword. Everyone is looking at each other, standing around the table, and perhaps not just by the merit of the way you were facing, but in your periphery, you were able to see that he's now present amongst the group, just sort of listening in. He hasn't made himself known and seems to be assuming that he has not been seen and is examining the edge of his blade.

The edge of his blade is on Barnabas's back. Yeah, it's in my netting. I thought that it had gotten thrown, and you're right, you went and picked it up. It was, I picked it up and then gave it to Barnabas. Okay. And that's when I said it was impractical. He does not have his sword. All he did was get up there and sort of lean against the wall, sort of getting a sense of how you've all taken this initial confrontation with Sosaleth, it seems.

As soon as I hear him, one of my ears will sort of twitch. Mm-hmm. They'll say, "We have your sword in our possession." I won't even turn at them. I'll just stay facing them. You weren't trying to even bring it down. When did you get up here? Gosh, I was startled. I didn't mean to scare you. I saw you were busy, and I didn't want to get in the way. Wait, what do you think, Mr. Seen?

What should we do? Should we hear out Sophileth? He's offering us grand prizes, our wildest dreams. All deception. He may even be capable of the things that he promises you, but he is lying, trying to get you to be caught in his web, yeah? I think back to the whole exchange that we had, and seeing that he...

that the land I love so much was Karkinos and not Namut, could I have a general sense of whether I think that he is...

My apologies. That was a Derek mistake. That's why I checked. I am sorry. When you asked, I thought you meant Karkinos, not Drakkar, because you've had two visions of catastrophes. He would have set my mood. My sincere apologies. I'll bet you that was a real... Okay, I thought it was like an approximate knowledge. No, no, no.

- Get out of his brain ass! - To the human child! - That's right. - I'm sorry, I fucked that up. I fucked that up. - That's okay. - You're far, yes, fuck you. - No, no, no, he would have known that the land you loved was Mammut, and he would have known that your vision would have been specific to that territory. - I will not say anything.

Okay. Terrific. When you finish your conversation with Kat Rustin, you can be granted a short rest. Hot dogs. Fairy of the Small is back. Sorry, I meant long rest. It's not Karkinos, it's Mahmood. Shit. Thank you. You're all standing there having apparently been granted privacy by the...

Elder Brain, you know as Sotholith, and Ketrastean, the Githyanki, has joined you on this floor. Originally, he was going to wait below for the sword, but it seemingly has grown impatient, and he's come to check on you. That's where you are. What happens next is up to you. Is there anything more you can tell us about the Hexature Armament? Anything you haven't shared already with us?

This is very important for what we do next. So please, I implore you, be honest with us. What is your interest in the Hexager Armament? It is the next step on our pilgrimage to find it. We were given a quest from the spirits of the land to retrieve it. This is news to me.

This is a very powerful artifact. It is a, uh, about this big or so. It's a polished metal, almost reflective, like a mirror. It is potentiating magic. It's in Sophilus' hands. I imagine he can do terrible things with it. Is this the kind of information you mean? Do you have any intents to keep it or use it?

My intent was to get it to an Elder Brain so that the plane of logic would bear down upon them and destroy them, my enemy.

All you need to do is deliver it to this elder brain. They will not make this distinction so, uh, uh, cleanly, I think. If they find it with the Illithid, the Illithid become their enemy. You understand? Oh. I see. It's a simple plan. It's very devious, you realize. Ehhh...

I know not if you have this phrase, but to fight fire with fire, I think. To destroy something as sinister as Sophalith and the other mind flayers requires this level of deviousness. I understand your motivation, my new friend. Revenge is about as good of a motivation justification for anything, but it's...

When you finally achieved it, it doesn't bring any more warmth. Doesn't bring any more peace. It'll never be enough. You truly must know that, being a smart feller like you are. Perhaps peace not for me. Peace for my brothers and my sisters. Peace for my families, the other githyanki that I call my allies. Peace for them. Maybe not for me, no. But it is a sacrifice I am willing to make. You understand?

May I have my sword back, please? Any objection before I give this feller what's his? We don't have a use for it. You fulfilled your end of the bargain. You're a skinny feller for something like this.

But you got strange mind powers, don't you? Here you go. And what is heavy in your hand, he pulls almost from your hand like you would lift a quill. Yeah, brain stuff. When you are attuned to it, it is as light as a common rod. Yes, this is what I was asking. Yes, thank you. It was not easy to forge.

And he looks at it with almost love. If you think that Sopholith does not listen to you now, you are fools. If you think that anything he has said to you or promised you is going to come your way in any positive sense, then

You are stupid, dumb even. You don't have to look at me when you say that. That's just where my eyes went. I didn't even know. I don't know about that. Barnabas actually laughs. Hey, hey, Mr. Dreadweight, all right? We're still fighting, all right? All right, Mr. Staviscoach. I want you to know, too, that I faked every single day of fishing we ever did together. Oh, I know. You didn't know.

You didn't know. Do you know how much fishing I've done, Mr. Stabiscotch? You didn't know. All right. He didn't know. Does Yorni ignore him? Why are you telling me? Because you're standing right there, and because you know that he didn't know. I don't know what either of you know or don't know. Please don't involve me. And I'll...

You never studied the techniques, Mr. Stabiscotch. You never would have caught all that fish, how sloppy your form was. I can't believe you would say something like that to me in front of our friends. You're the one that said you faked it the whole time! I was trying to hurt you. Mr. Stabiscotch, we are far beyond that. Here at the end of everything, perhaps. At the end of all things.

You're gonna be really upset if something happens to me. You know? Okay. After all's said and done at the end of all things. Yeah. I think we'll all be... If anything happens to you or any one of us, we'll all be suffering the same fate. I have a feeling.

I think tensions are running high. Oh, you think? Well, it seems that I'm comfortable saying I know. I agree with you, Taishan. These petty quarrels aside, I think perhaps we rest. I need to take some time with my sword, and it looks like you are in need of getting the things that you said were taken from you back on your person, yes? Oh, I think we have everything that we need.

I was gonna suggest we enjoy a nice cup of calming tea. Something to warm the spirits! We don't know what's gonna happen when we go up there, but I know that as long as we stand together, no matter what happens, we'll be okay. I could go for some tea, yeah. No, not you.

This is an action of trust that you make. I'm kidding. This is an action of sharing. I think it is important that you laugh. I learned that from Scrim. I'm sorry. It didn't feel good the second I said it. You don't wear it very well. It was so uncomfortable. I thought it would be funny. Scrim said that I shouldn't offer strangers. Your face all tensed up when you said it. It looked quite awkward. It was a physical pain when I spoke it. Yeah, I can tell. Let me make a point.

It is that actions are how we build trust with one another. Actions are the only thing that matters. These words that have been whispered into your mind by Sophilith, whatever they may have been, they're not the actions of someone you can trust. Yeah, let me... And he walks over and he pulls what looks like a spool of twine, almost, from one of the shells.

This is a twine. It's not Mind Flayer specific. It's used in many ship construction, making crafts like this that we use to sail on the Astral Sea. And he pulls out a length of it and turns it on itself and starts to twist. And if you were to twist it clockwise, it would dampen any energy that would hit it. And if you were to turn it in the other way,

Ah, yes, it would potentiate energy. It would amplify it ten times. This, I think, for you, Queenie, this, I think, for you could make a better bowstring. Oh, well, thank you. Thank you kindly. Yeah, I'll attach this to my bow. This is called Rift Cord. It just needs to be waxed, and I think you will not have an issue with this. My bees generate a lot of wax.

This is very loud and upsetting. I will turn it down.

Yeah, that jukebox over in the corner has been hippie as best you can. Space jukebox! Splish, splash, I was taken aback. Space bash! He hands you these fibers, twisted in the direction that he indicated, and it does seem strong to you. And if you were to apply it as your new bow string, you would find that it would become a plus one weapon. Whoa, okay, yeah! I knew what I was doing!

I think this looks beautiful and with my bees help I will attach it They'll be climbing all over it and waxing it you see their little bee feet just doing its thing This is what I mean is how is how we become partners in our attempt to defeat a terrible monster

By giving each other gifts. By doing actions that protect and aid and support one another. I think that's very kind of you. And I appreciate that greatly. You have my vote. You have my sword.

You have this cup of tea. Oh, thank you. Enjoy. It's been a while since I've had any liquid that hasn't been pumped into my stomach, so I'm on a pod. Mechanically, it does nothing for you, but it's very delicious. Do you have to say things like that? Do you have to articulate what you mean in such plain ways? Just keep it to yourself. I'm just being straightforward. This is the way of the world.

I would like some tea, please. Oh, please, Jorneir. Thank you. Barnabus? Aye, thank you, Mr. Fireblossom. Queenie? Thank you. We're letting him drink out of... Yeah, just give me it. Thank you, Tyshen. I don't know how I feel about letting him drink out of Daisy's cup, but I guess, you know, it is potential end of things and flattening of mountains and everything else Mr. Jorneir muttered about.

The conclusion of the scene will say that you've granted yourself a short rest if that matters mechanically to you. Yeah, it does. It does, quite a bit.

- Very much. - You don't have to take it right away. I'm saying at the conclusion of the scene. I'm just saying, don't spend your hit dice if you don't need to. - I need to. - I need to. - Were you here last session? - Before you do then, I'll stop you. - I'm sorry. - Don't spend your shit. - Okay. - I'm reminding myself of something that Ket also does to earn your trust. - You don't want us to spend our stuff.

I take the short rest, but understand that he gives you guys all a... A magical boon? A magical boon? A boon? Where's my boon paper? Why don't I have my boon paper? It should be right here. Just one moment. Oh my goodness. How is it possible that I...

I take out my little stone and turn it into a frog again and I say, do you want to lift my- You each get a greater potion of healing. Frog friend, put it all over your face. You each get a greater potion of healing before he takes your short rest. That'll affect how- Yeah, yeah. He goes over to one of the other unusual objects. It looks almost like a keg and-

After he finishes the tea, he pours out the remaining dregs and fills one for himself before indicating that this is a magical healing potion, and you are all able to take a swig before the keg finally is empty. Oh, I see what you're saying. Yes. Oh, we just take it. I actually had one in my inventory, which is this one. What is that? How much is a greater healing potion? That's a great question. Get out of here. Hold on. It is 44 plus 4.

- There you go. - Unbelievable. - That's four D four, not 44 plus four maybe 48. - That was so good. - Oh man. - You all have your things. Now, I wasn't able to make a heart, a strong decision one way or the other about this, Barnabas. Your cast iron pan's condition. - Oh, jeez.

I could see it going one way or the other. And so I think a no-twist, just raw, death-saving throw-style fate roll will determine whether or not it would be stripped clean of all of its seasoning. Oh my god. There's never been a more important roll in this game. Or if it is remained untouched by the Mind Flayers in their examinations of your various artifacts. Or if they sat around going, I mean, they did that. I'm happy. 11. Ah!

Okay, that's one second throw. You gotta succeed or fail at dying. You either have to stabilize or you have to die. No twist. No twist. For 18. One more, one more. One more success. Odds are pretty good now. Odds are pretty good.

Natural one! Oh no! That's what you get for saying that! You son of a bitch! Odds are in your favor, 55% chance of success, let's go. I'm gonna throw up. Oh no.

13. You look at the pan and you see that it remains seasoned. The best seasoned cast iron pan in adventurous history that ever was or perhaps ever will be. For some reason, my heart is pounding now.

I'll put it in my things and I'm gonna take the tea and I'll... I'm just using all of my strength not to crush the cup that I drink it from. And when you lift the pan, you notice that just adjacent to it, and you finish your swig, there's this small little totem just there on the surface of the table. This isn't anything that you recognize that it would have been among any of your artifacts, but it's got a great big tail

It's got a wide face, almost like that of a whale, but with multiple eyes on each side. This sort of like, not quite wooden, not quite stone. It's very unusual, but it draws your attention right away because it looks like something that you might encounter in the sea. - Is it Nabla?

An aboleth? An aboleth. An aboleth? It is not an aboleth. I'll pick it up. I'll tell you at a level. I'll pick it up. You pick it up and you turn it. And when you turn it so that its face faces you...

All of a sudden, this bright flash suddenly blinds you for a moment, and you are swept over by the, not a vision, but you are instilled with a strange power. For a moment, you blink, and this blinding flash seems to have imparted some kind of a boon to you. Whoa! It's the end of the lighthouse. You feel something.

within you as you look into the eyes of this Kindori totem. And you find yourselves additionally benefited, mechanically speaking. Something unlocks within you. Whatever this totem was or why it was here for whatever purpose, it seems to have seen something of likeness in you. And you realize that it has shared this specifically because you picked it up.

Well, it was meant to have this. What is it? Excuse me. You got any more tea, Mr. Fireblossom? Well, sure.

Do I get a sense of what it is when I'm holding it? You get a sense that it is a whale-like creature, but you would not know what a Kandori is, and you would not know its origin. It seems alien to you. Strange whale-looking thing. But it seemed to have found a parallel in spirit kindred in you. Yes. Not quite unlike my flask, but strange-looking...

tendril things, probably a space whale. I've heard tales of space whales. That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. Well, you know, you can never... Sometimes there is truth in the mad ramblings of a drunkard. Okay. So I first learned about the Grimm, Mr. Stabiscotch. Sure. Whatever you say, Mr. Dreadwick. So I'm saying. Yeah. I think Scrim's mad at you.

Who? I think Scrim's mad at you. Yeah, that seems to be the situation. You keep trying to talk to him like he's going to like you again. I think you just need to give him time. I think actually if you kill him with kindness, you'll bring the rest. Let's not say the word kill in reference to Scrim to Barnabas. Just use kindness, not the anchor. Okay.

You bring him around. Just give him some time. He's very smart. He's very forgetful. I've killed a lot of things, but I don't think I've ever killed anything with kindness. A new challenge! Aye, a new challenge. Yes!

I'm going to find a way to kill something with kindness, Mr. Fireblast. I believe, if anyone... Can you explain what you mean by kill? Because I'm envisioning a future unlike the one you're intending. You're going to use kindness to fundamentally change the way that Scrim is. I feel like kindness is too powerful. I don't want to kill Scrim with it. Aye. Aye.

I have ideas. I feel good about this. Yeah, I know. Well... Are we going up the ladder or not? Let's go up the ladder. I'm feeling rested, yeah. If you were to turn and try to make out your way through the lower level and back out somehow, or perhaps across the boardwalk here and jump off the ship,

I would still turn and start to make my way up so that I might fell Sotholith. Well, look, I don't know how much you heard, but we'd like to have a conversation with it first. So let's not just go chop-chopping, all right? You understand this

This being is trying to turn you into one of these? Okay, I'll be honest. No. But I just want to hear it out. He is almost certainly listening to your every word now. I know. It's unavoidable. I really don't like the way you're talking to me. Well, he also told us that he was giving us privacy and we're totally alone, so I think it's fine. I want to go on record and say that I did not believe that, all right?

You think Sopholith is listening? I bet almost every gold piece I've ever made. It's a giant alien brain in a crazy, horrible squid ship! There's imprisoned ogres and thousands of people!

"It's bidding and feast upon it!" I don't know, something about the tone of voice just made him feel very trustworthy. I mean-- I don't know. That is true, though. Yeah, see, follow the voice. He did lull me into a false sense of security. Mr. Fire Blossom, have you ever heard anything, have you heard the term a gilded cage? No.

We'll talk about the great power trio. They're great bards. Okay. Let us continue onward. Fulfill your destiny, Tyjana. And you do. You fulfill your destiny of climbing the ladder. And for the first time in this session, you guys make actual movement occur. And you make your way up.

And that means that we're gonna have to put a new fucking map on the ship. Oh, my goodness. Can we now move the... Oh, we don't have any things. That's for Queenie. Here's a large silver sword. That's Barnabas. These are some randos. Clear all the minis off of the second floor. Oh, yeah, yeah, because we're going up.

And let's put the lowest level underneath this floor here. Which is right here. We're gonna grab Cat. I'll grab this. And then that's fine. Is it going over top or next to it? I don't think I had a spell scroll of Lesser Estuary. Well, somebody did. That's me. Yeah.

Oh, yeah. I'm going to commit war crimes. I'm going to commit a false flag. And annihilate a bunch of squid people. There might be another spell score on here somewhere. Yes. Beeline. That's me. Yeah. I think it's Barnabas. It's Beeline. There's like random stuff over here. Just like, you know. It doesn't sound very much. That's mine.

Oh, we forgot to simulate this, and I think it's important that I mention this. There's javelins. I don't know who those are. Maybe yours. Those are Barnabas's. Barnabas's. Those are my harpoon swords. Those are my harpoon swords. Oh, here we go. There's some torches and mess kits and red. I forgot that I put that in there. As you guys are resting, let's just quickly rewind and hit this point especially. Bro bag is also his.

We could say that Kedrastean demonstrates this, or perhaps Scrim, you lean back on the keys of the organ or something, but the voices emerge when you press the keys. And I wanted to convey that it's obvious to you that the reason why it sounds like a human choir is because the pipes are affixed with the trachea of the silence vassals. Oh, you suck.

- Sick fuck. - I didn't think that that had really been something that you guys had seen. - Trachea isn't like plural. - I'm sorry. - The vocal boxes. - Can you say that one more time? - What does that even look like? I can't even picture that. - Yes, the organ that you guys all listened to the beautiful choir-y sounds that were being played in order to keep Sopholith asleep was indeed

with the voice boxes that have been stolen from the humans like Daisy. In that choir, one of them would have been Daisy. - So now that we have noticed over the course of this rest,

what that horrific machine is made out of, all those things that I said about feeling any kind of understanding for this creature have evaporated. - We should have just tried to lay the organ first. - And I would now like to kill it. And if you were listening, you were going to die. - You know, Queenie's right. - As a happy reminder, you start to make your way up with grim determination, the ladder to the third floor.

- And where's, over here? - Yes, it's those crosshatch areas is where you're able to enter. - So you can enter the box both times, put yourself wherever you want and put him wherever you want. This deck is shrouded in an eerie pinkish red glow like crackling fog. At one end you see a massive sphere affixed to the wall.

Its surface remains perfectly smooth, yet traces of light in arcing and twisting patterns play across its surface. Throughout the room, more strange and alien artifacts, devices, and instruments can be seen, all seemingly devoted to the navigation of this craft.

Sensors, controls, nodes, charts, these items are etched with symbols and ciphers and markings as well as on the very walls themselves. The lines and grids on the wall are both strange and familiar, like a nautical map and a constellation chart all at once. Opposite the strange sphere is another opening leading to the outside, a battle prow with the two orbs you recognize

As the same orb that you saw on the figurehead of the silver ship in Ogerton. And you would be able to, if you were to go across and look out from this prow, see the giant deck, the boardwalk that stretched out that you did not explore out in front of you. And you can see from that great window place the ceiling of this cave, inside of this massive cave. Anytime I...

When I climb the ladder, or there's not a physical way for the creature, the spirit to physically climb, it loses its canine form and turns into almost a smoke cloud to drift up behind me before reforming on the next step. Oh yeah, that's a neat trick. Okay. So it does what the dark wizards from Harry Potter do in the movies. Yeah, kind of. Kind of. No, but spooks. Oh.

That is where you find yourselves as you enter the third level, Navigation, Propulsion. So this is the deck that we're looking down on? Yes. Oh. This is the third level, so we're not faced with the... No, we're not. Yeah, and you do see that there are the additional ladders taking you upwards, but...

doing whatever you want to do. Are these like, uh, second Death Star Palpatine's throne room style windows? Uh, those are the eyes, uh, that you saw from the, um, exterior of the ship. They are these massive round, um, uh,

with bars that stretch out from the center. - Like a centerpiece? - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And you can look out very palpatinely. - So yes. - Very palpatinely. - I love that. I would just, once I get up and quickly survey the area, not seeing anything of interest, begin to go to the next ladder unless someone were to stop me. I would just begin to proceed

After learning what we've learned and having all the conversation and feeling very much in alignment with Queenie's change of heart, I would proceed unless someone were to try to stop me. Does anyone try to stop Scrim? Do you explore this space or do you just go straight up?

Your mirror has no interest in the space. I'm no longer happy and thirsty in the space. Barnabo is the same, yeah. You all step onto the platform of the third floor and start to make your way over to the ladder. Let's keep flying. When you hear this set of sounds, for lack of a better word, sort of a like that. And it's the sound of small things landing. Oh.

Tadpoles that land one on your shoulder, one at your feet. They look like clawless lavender crawfish with nests of tentacles like horsehair worms sprouting from their backside. Lamprey mouths opening and closing. They move incredibly slowly looking at them, not by crawling or walking or even undulating like a caterpillar might, but by convulsing and scooting forward in short erratic darts. These...

This is disgusting. Oh no. Why's he got a container? I'm in danger.

Ew! Oh no! Those are like little grains of rice. That is little black rice. Oh god, I thought it was actually like bugs. It does look like rat poop. I am a fan of simple tools. I am a fan of simple tools. Breaking pencils and rice. How are you controlling bugs to fight us right now? Ha ha ha!

Are there really exactly enough? Or can we just do... There should be 12, so there should be two for each. Can you count another rice? I love beans. Rice and beans. That's a classic. I want to count out the fucking rice. Oh.

These all land around you, and they immediately start crawling towards you. One of them is already on your arm like this. And what are you all doing in this moment as you are rained down upon, seemingly falling from the ceiling, ready to pounce upon you? I think if one landed on my shoulder, you said it was kind of wet and gross?

Yeah, I'd say it's wet and gross. It's sort of briny. How big? About three inches. Not very big. Very small. Yeah, I would probably swat it off me and try to stomp on it like a roach. You start to move forward and you feel a surge of a spell-like effect start to hit you and hit all of you. You are all start to grow...

delirious, woozy, not sleepy, but tunnel vision starts to overtake you as this spell-like effect begins to overtake your minds. I need everyone to make an intelligent saving throw. Oh, no. That is not where I am liking. May I use two twists? Yeah. It's saving throw, you said. Intelligent saving throw. Um, okay. May I use two twists as well? Oh!

I got a 19, which gives me a 20. Can I use two twists as well? I got... Oh, but I'm good, I'm good, baby. Oh my god, I think I may... Int? Just straight in, saving throw. Mm-hmm. That was a minus one for a second. 19. 18. Okay, okay. Ah!

- 13. - Oh no. - Okay, okay. - 12. - Not again! - Oh no. - Two twists? - Not again! - I rolled a natural one and then I rolled two 10s. - I rolled a natural one and an 18. - And a Parmos, 19? - 19, yeah. - Okay, what did you get, Jorner? - 18. - 18, thank you. - Look at the highest. - So we're determining a turn order, not whether or not you succeeded.

I shall think. What we're going to do is we're going to go Barnabas or Scrim first. I got a 20. Oh, you got a 20. Yeah, so it was 19. It rolled a 19. 20, 19, 18. Taishan. Queen. In this manner. You're hit with a spell that I'm calling Dreamscape. Oh, I like it. Let me...

Cue up. Scrim. The Tabor. The Tabor beneath the ice is here. Isn't that like a Microsoft program that built websites back in the day? What the fuck? Wasn't it? You know how many things have been called dreamscape? Somebody fact check that. Was there like a program in the 90s called dreamscape? No. I'm sure not. That's really who I'm asking. One moment, Scrim. You are flicking this

disgusting, weird creature, this larva thing off of your shoulder and you walk up to it and you have this very specific intent that you're going to step on it and you step into a tavern. You step into the tavern that you recognize as the Five Stories.

- Oh, weird. - You are in the city of Wuzhe. - It's not weird, actually. - In Southern Yulong. You've journeyed far from Bargust, always running, always hiding. You find yourself in this tavern in one of the poorer districts of Wuzhe, far up the river. The weather sign out front

Five stories, and you can see why as you walk through this entrance. The building is indeed five stories tall, and you find yourself sat at one of the tables during the busy hour alone. What I choose to do next is up to me? That is correct, but what I will say, but what I will say, I mean, this is key. You've become convinced that this is real. You have no memory of what was happening moments ago. Of course, I wouldn't even question it.

To break the spell, you'll have to make a intelligence-based check to notice minor flaws in the reality of this space. Okay. All right. So I blink a few times. I look around. I go get a drink.

Okay. You walk everywhere you look. Groups are laughing and enjoying communal hot pots, eating and drinking. You walk over to one of the waiters, and they turn to you. How can I be of service? Obviously, I'd like your finest bourbon if you have it, and I would like to pay with this. And I pull out the coin. Okay.

and I place it in their hand. Oh, yes, for a gold piece, your finest. Very, very, very kind. And he pockets it and turns, please make your way to any of the seating available, and I'll be right back. Thank you very much. And I go find a nice seat, and I say, what a fool. And the coin will come back to me. You snap, and the coin reemerges, and as you put it down, you notice that there's a book

just at your side. A library book. A book that you have never... Well, it feels oddly familiar to you. That's weird. I set the book down for my drink. I'm a fucking nerd as a library card!

Let's do it this way. Buckwheat guys. See, somewhere in reality, these tadpoles are starting to do their work, starting to make their way closer, but Scrim is asleep on the metal floor of an odloid ship. You refuse to open the book, and a bourbon is delivered upon you. Ah, perfect. ...

You see a tall, muscled figure walk by your table and sit at a group of what are also obviously people who are not from Mouzay. You don't recognize any of them. He sits down. Greetings, friends. I am Nonak. And he starts to talk to them. Yeah, yeah, Nonak. You met him once before. After taking a long draw of my drink, I look around the tavern and then my eyes will fall on the book.

I look around, see if anybody's looking at me, and I'll pull the book a little closer and just kind of try to glance to see if it has a title. The face of it does not appear to have any writing or anything along it, but it feels not like something that somebody left. This weirdly tickles the back of your mind as if it has always been yours, as if it's something that you made, even. I flip the book over with one finger, still looking around, see if anybody's looking at me.

Inside you see faces. Faces you in this dream moment don't recognize, but you look down and you see that a face of a triton.

You see his big beard. You see his... The stem of a pipe coming out of his mouth. You see a... Whatever the fuck your near is. I'm sorry. You're a... Fearbolt. Fearbolt. Wow. I always forget Fearbolt. You see the face of a Fearbolt. God, that is one ugly son of a bitch. Rune dangling from...

Arctic clothes. You see a dragonborn. And though you cannot see that it is a golden dragonborn from its scales or its colors, you do see the long tendrils that come down from the chin. And you see a rabbit folk. You see a herringon. You see what is... You look at their faces. You don't seem to recognize them immediately, but there's something strangely familiar about this. Huh.

Interesting. Is that all that's in the book? That is all that's in the book are sketches, memories of a book that you pulled off a shelf when you were in a mind library, not six sessions or seven sessions ago. And I don't get any kind of feeling from seeing these faces. They just seem vaguely familiar. They seem vaguely familiar, but it's off-putting, the way that something suddenly feels strange in a dream.

Is there any chance that upon viewing the Triton it would fill me with rage? Yeah, if you were to make a history check. Sure. History? Probably plus one. Oh, is it? Yeah. I trust you. Unless you're proficient, which I did. No, no, no, I just don't know what this thing's being. There we go, thank you. I just wanted to make sure.

Hot seven. Hot seven. You strain and you strain and you strain and you don't... It's elusive. It's almost like in a dream when you try to remember what's happening in the real world. What's going on with these pieces? And you are unable to repeat the intelligent saving throw that would free you from this dreamscape. So is that the end of my turn? It is. Ah, this is bullshit. LAUGHTER

Barnabas, if I can find your playlist. All right. Whoa. Like, whoa, man. You have a creek? That was cool.

Barnabas, one moment you are looking at these strange creatures, these strange tadpoles. They're crawling around, and each of them are going after your friends, and before you are able to do anything, before Scrim is able to even step on the one that he tosses to the ground, you sit up, and you are sitting on a sandy beach, a

beautiful sandy beach. It is gorgeous on this beach. Tropical, even. You look at the ocean in front of you and it's not just blue, but emerald. It shines clear and you know that if you were to go into those waters, you'd be able to see as far into the sea as your vision allowed before it ended.

You look behind you and there are palm trees. You're clearly on some sort of an island. And there's a small canoe-like watercraft just three, four hundred feet away on the side. And you're hit by warmth on your other side. Nearby, a small fire roasts a huge bore, which already seems to be overcooking. No one is there standing to turn it. No one's there to rotate this bore.

The sound of the waves, though, is very soothing. And you're starting to sit up and get a sense of your surroundings, how you woke up to this place, this dream that is so real and convincing to you. You realize that there's something in your hand. A half-carved flask. Drinks, just to your side. Rum, enough for two. There's no civilization in sight. You are alone in this moment. And...

You're not sure why or how you got here, even. I look around. Does any of this seem familiar to me beyond just the general...

Yeah, you've been to the Makani Islands before, not a place that you've been many times, but if you, in all of your great travels, had to put your finger on where you are in the world of Avengers, where you've sailed and all of the seas that you've been across and all of your voyages, this fits that description very well. Get out of here.

Pretty epic. Get out of here, League of Legends. You're not one of them right now. We're on the beach. I will sit back and I'll look at the half-carved flask. So maybe half of it is, you know, maybe the front half or the back half. Sure. And I'll admire its craftsmanship. And I'll look down at the rum and I'll say, well, I guess I have a bit of thirst enough for me. And I'll step forward to the boar.

I think at this point, hunger more than anything else.

And I'll see... I'll just go to basically rotate it and basically see to make sure that it is appropriately... It's not being neglected, that it's appropriately, you know, basically applying my chef's instincts. There's something very familiar going through these motions as you immediately jump to attend the unattended boar. And you start to rotate it, and there's something missing here. Something that...

rum for two, this half carved flask. There's something deeper going on on this beach and as you are turning it and feeling the warmth of the fire, not just warming you, even in the hot sun, it feels good against your skin and you start to smell the fat and the cooking meat. You spy driftwood that's just starting to be pushed by the gentle shifting waves up onto the sand.

all reach down and grab it. You walk over and enjoy the sensation of the sea water under your feet as you pick up the driftwood and look at it. From one side, it's bleached white, blank, but when you turn it to the other side, you feel confusion and sadness. You feel excitement and...

adrenaline, you feel adventure, you feel freedom when you look into what is clearly painted on the other side of this board. Green eyes that stare at you, featureless otherwise, just the shape of the eyelids, the eyebrows, the pupils and the irises themselves, and they lock eyes with you.

Aren't sure whose eyes these belong to, but something stirs deep within you from the deepest recesses of your heart. My...my lover. And I look around. Do I recognize these eyes?

you try to think, uh, do you want to make a check about it or do you draw into, uh, uh, see if you can find, uh, crack in reality some other way? Are you just asking would be my, my question to you. I would defer to you as the dungeon master. What does this spark? Knowing what you know, what does this do to my memory? Given my certain situation, what do I, what do I, uh,

What would Barnabas know? I defer you a full carte blanche. I think that whether or not you would succeed or fail at finding this information in you would require a check. I'll do it. And I think a history check is the most effective intelligence-based version of that, so let's go with that. History? Yep. I'm gonna twist. Okay. Love that. I'm gonna use one. A history check. I believe that's going to be a 13, but let me just triple check.

Moving up in the right direction. I'm not a Viking there. Join the crowd. 13. 13. I'm going to do it this way. This is how I'm going to do this. Oh, we move closer? Yeah. Oh, God. What does that thing say? It doesn't say anything. It's just, yeah, they're just leeches. You are staring at these eyes, and there's something not right about the world, but it's

It's difficult to put your finger on, and you start to look around suspiciously, trying to figure out what is missing, why you're here, why you just woke up so suddenly. Can you remember how you got here? And that's when we transition to Yornear. No. No. Yornear.

You feel one of these strange creatures, one of these lavender tadpoles, whatever this happens to be, smack against your arm and fall far, far down all the way to the bottom of the metal floor and to your feet. And you look down, and it immediately starts to use its horsehair worms to grapple onto the bottom of your staff and start to make it your way up. And before you can make that gesture, you...

go into a deep slumber and you find yourself completely at the mercy of a false reality, a dream. And that's when the music starts.

So I need to roll for like, make sure there aren't like ceramic sinks behind me as I fall. Whoa! Whoa! Jesus! I'm like, I'm eight feet tall and I'm like going, you know. You're fine, it's clear. I got out of the tub and slipped. Yeah, you hit the-- It's a game of Rogue Fantasy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you take one point of bludgeoning damage and then you roll down the ladder. I can do a topple check to see which direction I topple. Like the giant's in the corner. Please don't crush me. Don't crush me. Don't crush me. You're falling off the floor because I thought you were gonna explore the shit. The shit?

Along the fjords of Mammut. Mammut? Oh, shit, I had it written down right here. Traveling south.

Eye is still quite tender, wrapped, bandaged even, from your most recent experience with the mammoth. Oh, shit. You are still getting accustomed to the weight of two fresh mammoth tusks on your back, and you know that there is a long journey ahead of you. You dwell on the visions and the implications of that experience that you had, and you know you're taking the first steps of that trek.

And you marvel at the beauty of the land around you, still fresh from the snowstorm just a few days ago, but melting and green and bright and beautiful with its natural looks as it would be. This is a day of options. You could walk until it is time to camp.

You could forge the area, perhaps. Hunt to gather additional rations for the journey to come. Maybe meditate or practice your magics. The day is yours, knowing what you know about where you are headed and trusting in fate that you will be guided at the time that it makes the most sense. But unlike your brethren...

You did not shield information in the library when Sophil had first infiltrated your mind. And no suspicion first arises in you. It is a beautiful day in Mammut, and the day is young. I look around, confused look on my face, and I say,

This is not Carchinos. Make a DC feature set. Suddenly there is that ceramic sink right behind you. No, I'm kidding, I had to. I'm sorry. No, that's totally cool. Um...

He says with tears streaming down his face. I guess this feels normal. This was when I first started my pilgrimage, I guess. Yep.

This would have been within the first week of your Pilgrim, which is how very, very fresh your eye feels, which is how very, very fresh the weight of these things. But as you are in a dream, when all of a sudden a context is thrust upon you, what question is there? Yeah, I mean, I think that I would probably, if I had been walking for a while, I think what I would do is I would sit down

And I would, if there was enough sort of just kind of dried wood around, I would make a very small fire. And then I think I would take out some herbs and maybe a little wooden, maybe like one of these or something similar. And put some herbs in there. Some herbs and some aluminum.

And some, what did you say earlier? Skeletal. What? Skeletal. Skeletal? Oh, is that it? Yeah, instead of skeleton. Oh, I love that. Skeletal. And make some sort of like, some sort of like application. And I would kind of, you know, maybe remove the bandage and just sort of sense, obviously I can't kind of really look at myself too well, but let's say I found like some sort of reflection, but I would kind of,

Maybe try to do my best to sort of clean my wounds with some water and then apply whatever kind of paste that I made with medicinal herbs and maybe reapply it. Okay. And then re-sort of apply the bandage that I'm wrapping around my head. Make a nature check at disadvantage. That hurts. It does hurt.

Should I just let it ride? Or should I just... Yeah, it's not the end check. That's true. Yeah, that's going to be a... I think that's an eight. You apply the medicinal herbs that you've known, the tincture, the poultice, which was a word that Nikki introduced to me too long ago playing this game. It's also one of my favorites. And it all feels as it should be.

That's not ominous in any way. Yeah, I would probably just sit there. I would relax. I would feel the heat. I might, you know, put, if I had a little kettle or something, I would put it on and boil some water and then maybe throw some roots in there or something. Make some kind of like root tea. Or bones. Maybe make a bone broth. And that's where we'll pick things back up when we return to the version of your turn.

taishen oh my gosh oh my gosh you also see these tadpoles and look around with curiosity with uh uh uh are these creatures natural to the this cave or perhaps this ship uh oh i i i you haven't seen anything like these things before and

And you start to see the others start to fall and slump around you. And it seems that they are in danger. You get the sense that there is something not right before you are suddenly plunged into a dream. You're looking down and you're washing the surface of a counter.

You are using a rag too, and you've done so many times. You are cleaning the surface of the counter of the Serenity, the tea shop that you have worked on for so long in the Jade Shell Village in the Valley of the Setting Sun. It's the morning that Mei Li went missing, but in your dream, that was forgotten. That's not something that actually happened to you. In fact, you're here now in the present, of course, right?

Mei Li bursts through the door and greets you. Hi, uncle. Do I know her? You know Mei Li. The context is it is any other morning, and this would have been the morning that she went missing, but the vision being presented to you by this spell, probably by Sopholith, is that that never happened, to give you a sense of your own serenity.

Oh, Mei Li! Welcome in! Hi, Uncle! What's going on? Oh, just cleaning up. Are you ready to help out? Yeah! What's my duty at the shop today? Well, I thought you could organize some of the tea leaves. I did that yesterday. Oh, well. How would you feel about polishing the pots? Okay.

Make sure to use the traditional watering technique to redo their fine glass bodies. Hey, Taishen, why did the chicken cross the road? Um, I don't know. Why? To see the ugly person. And she starts to get to work pulling pots and pans. Hey, Taishen. Yes, Meili? Knock, knock. Who's there? Pa-pa!

Oh, you. Absolute savage. Wait. What's Kylie? Oh! Are you kidding? I didn't get it before. I knew you were going to say that.

You didn't. Oh, God. You incorrigible prankster. Thanks, uncle. And she starts to get to work. And Maylee is a prankster, and she certainly gives you quite a bit of a hard time, especially with these invented jokes that she has.

And when she's out in the world, she's uncontrollable chaos. But for whatever reason, when you are both working together in the shop, she is a contributor. She pulls her weight. And so she gets to work at the duty that you set her. What do you do? I don't know. You're good. You're good. You're good. Keep RPing like you're not the panel. Okay.

I continue to get things ready for the morning. She just come in. I continue to get things ready for the morning rush, which is my one customer who always comes in at the very beginning of the day, setting out cups, preparing trays, and

you know, smiling, looking over at Mei Li and smiling as she goes through the technique of washing the pots and making sure that they're ready for their first bruise of the morning. - You can tell that she is a little amateur at this still.

And as you guys are conversing and talking back and forth and waiting for the first customer, it's still quite early. We wake up at the earliest hour and Meili is happy to accommodate that early timing. She's asking you questions about the world beyond the veil of this place. She starts to sort of, you know, aren't you curious, uncle?

Uh, about what goes on beyond the valley? You know, it seems like a really cool place to explore if we ever wanted to leave, you know, right? Oh, Mei Li, everything I need is right here. With you. When you say those words, there's a insight twist almost.

there's always been a part of you that's been curious and it almost feels like someone's speaking for you as you say those words because it was the...

curiosity, your excitement to learn about the world that you protected in your mind library when Sopholith was initially infiltrating. It was your sense of adventure. What there is to learn about wisdom and to learn about the world seems to be something that should be as peaceful and wonderful and serene as the valet is. Why

Why not go and explore? Why not explore Melee's question? You suddenly feel that you've shut down something that is exciting to her and should be exciting to you. Why is that missing? Hmm. Huh. Okay. Well, I guess I just was curious, you know. I thought maybe, you know, there are these mountains and all this. Surely this isn't all there is. Maybe it's not so great out there. I don't know, Uncle. Oh, yes. The mountains. Oh, yeah.

No, I'm sure it is great out there, May Lee. I'm sure there's many things to see, many things to learn and experience. Well, why did you just say that then, huh? Oh, May Lee, I didn't mean to upset you. I just meant that I love spending time with you, and I'm happy here, but... Oh, okay. I guess I can understand that.

I'll get back to work. You turn back to washing your counter, and that feeling of not being yourself suddenly starts to tingle and creep up the back of your neck, starts to feel like this isn't right. This isn't totally who I am. That isn't how I would have responded in that moment. Why did I do that?

And as you investigate, let's say, your own mind to see if you can come up with a solution, I would ask you to make an investigation check. Oh. 18. Oh, let's go. Well done. You are disturbed by what's happened, and you start to turn the counter, and I need you to make an intelligent saving throw as you feel suddenly...

Am I dreaming? Is this a dream suddenly occurs to you as a thought? I'll double twist it. Let her rip. You've gotten this far. Give it a good roll. Nice thrust. Do it. Five. I just rolled a five. Damn it. Oh, it was the fate. Damn it, brain worms.

- You don't break free. You don't wake up immediately. You don't break free from the dreamscape. You aren't able to pull away from the spell. You are still consumed by the reality that is still convincing to you, but you have passed a threshold.

This is not real. And that's where we'll pause your turn. I don't own this cup. So you don't move closer. That's right. Wow. Oh, boy. That's really good. I can't wait for my eyeballs to be eaten from the outside in. Well, at least it's not leeches. Don't help me when I'm dead, but hey, what do you know?

Queenie. That's me. That is you. And you are the last to be hit. Oh, no, I guess Scrim might be a little shorter than you. Are you shorter than Scrim? I can't remember. Scrim's shorter. Scrim's shorter? Okay. So you're the second to last to get hit by a lavender tadpole. I think we're probably exactly the same height, but I have much longer ears. Right, right, right. Big old bunny ears. And then he's got the hat. Yeah, the hat's, you know. Yeah, we basically walk in tandem, but my ears are just a little bit taller than his hat. Very good. Um...

You're grossed out by these disgusting creatures that land around your feet, and before you can hop away or do anything, you suddenly find yourself in a dream. And you find yourself in your hometown, which I have written the name of right here.

Nope. Okay. You know what's funny? I don't even remember the name of my hotel. Rabbiton. Foxbridge. Was it Foxbridge? I think so. Yeah, nice. Okay, Foxbridge. Let's go. I was going to go with Rabbitpolis. I was going to say Carquinos. No!

- My guts are on the floor. - We'll name it after our natural predators so everyone lives in fear and we can control the populace. - You are having dinner with your family, your brother.

Brothers and sisters are there. Your mom and your dad are there. And you are enjoying a delicious, delicious dinner. Carrot salad, carrot stew, carrot cake for dessert. And they're just chatting. They're just loving life, passing the rolls, passing the signs. And you suddenly wake up to this reality that you are...

in your old home, but it's not your old home, it's your current home. Uh, Cole, can you pass me the, uh, can you pass me the carrot pudding, please? Oh, my pleasure, here you go. Thank you.

Oh, do we have any of that mashed carrots? Mashed carrots? Yeah. Well, I think we got some in the kitchen if you want some leftovers. I didn't make it fresh. You want me to go get it for everyone? I mean, I'd be happy to get it on your behalf. That'd be great so I can eat this carrot pudding while you're doing it. That's fine. I'd be happy to do it. All right. All right. And he turns, Cole does, and he steps in. He starts to make his way over to the kitchen. Oh! Oh!

Oh, yeah. No, I just tripped over my shoelaces. They be undone. I don't know how to tie them. I have taught you to tie your shoelaces at least 16 different times. Come on over. Well, I'll come to you. You're on the floor. And I hop over to him. Do I know how to tie my shoes? Yes. Well, I know, but I read the book. Because you shielded the information. You have that information now.

Okay, so I do have it. Yes. All right, so what you do is you make these bunny ears. So there's one bunny ear, two bunny ear. Then they cross over each other. Then they flip into the hole. And then they tie together. And that's how baby bunnies are made. The whole family turns to you.

Wow. None of us know how you do that. That is really remarkable. What are you talking about? Wow. Did you invent that? That's crazy. How did you do that? And you're looking down at their feet. All of their shoes are untied. And I'm going to hop from shoe to shoe and start tying them. Pa, you taught me how to tie my shoes. I'm not sure I did. I obviously can't tie them now. The bunny loop goes through the first year. Are you feeling all right?

I'm feeling just fine. This is unnerving. My, Pop. For real? You're the only one who's ever known how to do this. You know that, child. And where did I learn it from then? We thought you invented it. Why are you even wearing shoes and laces if you don't even know how to tie?

You want them mashed carrots or not? Yeah, I do. All right, we're going to go. Oh! Oh! Bobby, what are you doing? I'm trying to untie themselves somehow. How did this happen? No, they didn't. You did it yourself. I did not. Stop messing with them laces. No. No. I'm not the same guy. Ha ha ha!

Julian Carquinos. I couldn't think of a serious way to do your prom, so this is what I decided would be yours. I mean, of all of the ones, it's going to be not serious. It's cool. Yeah, it's fine. So you enjoy a long dinner, and everyone... Is tripping over their shoes. Yeah, they're tripping over their shoes. It's bad. It's really bad.

- It's a massacre. - There's bruises, people are lying on their elbows and knees. I'll tell you, it's the whole family. And do you think you can hear in the distance other families and other homes? - I go up to the window and I look out. It's like people are strolling through like the late evening and I'm just seeing them just face plant. - Having a beautiful date and then, oh shit! - And they take each other down. - What on earth is happening here? If I had been to Chulays, which I will say I did not,

Why are you all wearing shoes with laces? Get that zipper stuff that they've got in Evantris. They need to be laced or they come apart. Then get zipper shoes. What are those? Those don't exist in Evantris. Yeah, they do. I heard they did. Maybe in a thousand years, but right now. Somewhere in Karkinos they do. Oh, shit. Oh, fuck! I wasn't even walking. Why'd that happen?

- You use shoes invented by crocodiles, they call 'em crocs. - You start to suspect that something is off when you talk about the history of zippers. Why don't you make a history check? - Oh, Jesus. Okay. - 18. - Okay, make an intelligent saving throw. - Let me make sure, I know I have a plus two. - Yeah, yeah, 18. Intelligent saving throw? - Yeah. - May I use twists? - Absolutely you may. That's what they're there for.

That does not count. I threw that one. 18. Let's go. Barely. You suddenly, the absurdity of what is happening around you. What do you mean barely? The check is lower. We're never escaping. We're talking about the spell safety C now. And you are able to pull three and you wake up

That was an obvious ream. I look down at my shoes. That's just crazy pants. You... Well... But you are looking at a lavender nightmare tadpole larva insanity thing crawling up your chest, just being able to tickle the bottom of your chin as it's starting to make its way onto your face. Sick of bees. I'm gonna have the bees throw it off of me. You are looking at the bees. They are also...

- Very lethargic. In this moment, you are just coming to, and you can use your action to crush and kill this one with perhaps the limited amount of beads. - Yeah, we'll do that. - But you will not have very much additional movement or actions to aid your friends in this moment. - That's fine. Would I be able to crush it and then use my rabbit hop to hop 10 feet away?

I'll give you five of those feet because of how lethargic and wakey. It's like sleep paralysis almost. You're like, and you're able to make the hop. You can remove one of the lavenders and then move to where you would want to be. What's a lavender? Sorry, one of the tadpoles. I don't know why I referred to it that way. And then just, yeah. Oh, boy.

And that brings us to the top of the round. No, it's delicious rice. It's delicious. Eat it. It's got full of nutrients.

Ew. It really does look like a rat shit. Doesn't it? It looks like a rodent shit. I was like, what can I use? Do I want to print out tokens? No, they'd be too small. And then I was making rice, and I was like, perfect. 12 grains of rice, please.

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It's grim. You have a very expensive bourbon. You have a book full of faces that you don't recognize. You're starting to look around the world with a lucidity of sorts, but you still are convinced that the world is real.

perhaps some prodding is necessary. Five stories, you can see Nonak has convinced whatever group is engaged to leave with him and start to make their way. And so you still feel very much all alone.

Is there anything in the book that I recognize or are these all memories from post the egg? This is the book that you pulled from the shelf of the library. So when you pulled it, you were thinking of your friends and you were thinking of your initial meeting. So this is private information just for you that you happen to have saved for yourself as a skeleton key to almost get out of here. But it is up to you to determine how to get from A,

point that you are currently in character thinking about to point B of how can I challenge the world or try to pierce its reality and find a way out of this space? I am frustrated viewing the faces in this book and not being able to, you said it was like being unable to recall a dream that you woke up

Yeah, familiar yet unknowable. I would realize that my bourbon is empty. My glass is empty. I would reach in to grab the coin again to order another drink and hail the market. Ah, yes. And I look at the coin before I hand it to him. What is it?

Oh. As I know it to look. That would have been accessible to Sopholith, so it looks exactly as it would have. Okay. I give the coin, I order another drink, I continue to stare at the faces. But now I'm not, now I am no longer, I don't care who sees me looking at this book like a nerd. I am engrossed in these faces. Hey, that guy's reading. Get him! Am I in your own business? And...

I am now fixated on these phases. I can't remember. Why was this book here? I would look at the furbolg, perhaps, in this book. Am I filled with a sense of...

frustration and circular logic and cryptic messages and things that I don't understand. Do the big words make Scrim angry? You study it real hard and you... I feel bored and frustrated all at the same time. You feel bored and frustrated all at the same time as you stare into this face and it's like...

To do an inversion of what's happening in your mind when you look at this face, you know when you meet somebody and you've known them for a long time and then you suddenly for the first time see a picture of them when they're much younger. It's that sensation. It's that sensation of like, "Oh yeah, that's the person that I know, but this is almost a different feeling." This is like taking that and turning it inside out. You feel like you should know this person, but that you should be perhaps dining with them in this very moment.

but it's elusive. I look at the rabbit folk. Do I feel as though this person

is kind to me and almost feels like a sibling I never had. Bubbling from the surface, you are starting to make these associations, yes. Do I look at the Dragonborn and think, that's an easy mark? I can take him for everything he's worth? Even if this was not a familiar face with the bubbling associations, you would still feel that way. You feel very strongly. I would like to...

I'm bothered that I feel like I should remember these people or that they're somewhere deep down. And I would like to try extra hard to see if I'm like, you know, oh, were these marks in the past? Were these people that I ripped off? Were they just people that I ran into once? Should I know them? Why are they in this book? What is this book? Why does it feel so familiar? Make another history check. This is, it would nag at me so badly I would become almost obsessed with it.

I'm gonna twist. We send it. You burned them so they use them. Oh. I can eat. Wow. Another bourbon, please.

Just keep them coming. Here you are, sir. Yeah, yeah, okay, go, go, go away, go away. Are you sure you don't want anything to eat, perhaps? No! I'm getting a frazzle of my hands, like, just disheveled. You're sitting at a table for seven, and the bar is just, uh... Very good, very, very, very good for a gold piece, a fine customer, yes. I'm gonna give you another gold piece to fuck off. LAUGHTER

And you gave him, you teleported the coin away, and it's the same fucking coin. And he goes away. Let's put you right there. And I'm like, in the dreamscape, I'm like, Barnabas, where are you? Let's find you. Sorry, I have way too many playlists.

You've just completed applying some refreshing oil, not oil, ointment on your face to your eye. You've re-bandaged yourself. I'm Barnabas. Sorry.

But I got the music. Oh, wow, I got the right music. Wow. Okay, part of us, you've just finished applying a new ointment to your eyeball. Sorry, they're twins. They're really hard to distinguish. Party that ruins.

You're staring at a piece of driftwood at eyes. You're smelling the now overcooking boar behind you, but ignoring it, you are feeling troubled because there's

Something both extremely vital about this clue that is washed up on the beach, delivered to you by your love, the sea. Something that you have come to know for so long. But there's also a block, an obstacle, something between you and it that feels impossible to overcome. What do you do? I look at the eyes.

in the driftwood. And I try to remember the best that I possibly can. There seems something so familiar, but I... and I can't stop looking at it. And do I get the sense that I am younger or older? Or rather, the same age that I'm at?

Maybe I would try to look into... The context that was thrust upon you, I can tell you immediately. This would be pre-shell Barnabas. Yeah. This would be as a Dreadwake, as a... Still haven't hit all the seas just yet, but an experienced sailor, certainly. And this was your time here in these tropical isles. I'll look at the...

the boar that's roasting. I'll look at the tropical island that I'm on and the two different bottles of rum and the seats. And I'll try to make a connection. I'll try the hardest I possibly can in this strange space that just seems so right and wrong at the same time.

History or investigation, your choice in terms of your check. You're pushing to find something that, when you were in the mind library, was already deeply buried in the recesses of your mind. This is no easy task to make a connection, a through line, even if it had been a memory that is as fresh as...

your time in your hometown, for example, or if you'd protected the memory of your friends that you consider so dear to you. It was a natural one, folks. Oh, I saw that happen. I can feel the blood show from it. That sounded good. Natural 18, natural 19, so a 20. Holy shit. A 20? Yep, a 20. You look at the eyes and you look at the... This is a sign.

This is clearly an omen. This is clearly an indication that there is a missing person here. Someone should be here that is not. There are two rum bottles. Someone was rotating the... You're no carver, but someone was making that flask.

who they were is not obvious. You can't pull that memory from the deep recesses of your mind, but you become convinced that you are now in a space that is an illusion. This is not where you are supposed to be. And so you may make an intelligent saving throw, or you can do whatever Barnabas would do to get out of a dream space. I will look at the flask.

And I will look at the carving of like a half-formed carved of like a sperm whale with all sorts of intricate designs. And I'll look at the pineapple that is carved on the front of its head. And I will look around. And as I see the eyes on this piece of driftwood and I see, I hold the wooden flask that's not completely formed. I'll look around and I'll say, "No, she's supposed to be here. She's always here."

every night, and I chuck both into the fire. Oh. Make an intelligent saving throw. That's all.

Okay. I've got chills on my legs. Eight. Should I get that checked out? Yeah, probably. You throw them in and they immediately begin to spark and sizzle and be consumed by the coals and the fire and you watch them immediately begin to deteriorate, but you don't care. You know that they aren't real. It's just a question of how do you break through this wool over your eyes? And we'll find out on your next turn.

You're an ear. I'm sorry, Barnabas, right? I see. Well done. You're an ear. You've just finished applying... You have no suspicion. You're fine. Everything's beautiful, actually. Throw a log on fire. Okay.

An hour might pass to... During this, I would think I would, because the Tust would be off, it's only two weeks in, I would probably still be carving the runes in the Tust themselves. Yeah. You're perhaps only strategizing, even. Yeah, or planning it out and meditating on it and sort of trying to peer into the weird and just get a sense of what I think I'm supposed to do and getting glimpses and bits of visions and

Yeah, I might just be sort of very slowly and try as delicately as I can, treating this with as much reverence and respect as possible. Sort of, kind of quietly, wristing a rune to myself. And just sort of, as I always do, trying to kind of stay on alert and just listen for anyone or any animal or creature that might be approaching. Since you are

accessing the weird or not accessing it, but just sort of reminding yourself of what it is like to truly be in that space and to carve the runes. Given their religious quality, I would ask you could make a religion check for me. - All right. - That takes advantage. - Fuck. - That's not bad. - It's a disadvantage. - That's not great. Oh, baby, that's not bad. - Disadvantage.

we don't know the dc dewey i don't believe i've said it out loud i it was an 18. we might all there's the spell save dc for the intelligence saving throw and then there's the spell check which is specific to the spell religion you said is 15. just makes it wow you are you've spent two hours sitting and contemplating and you carve into the tusk and there's something about the quality

the texture of it. When you become lucidly aware in a dream and you start to

push against the world, you start to realize that the details are filling themselves in just as you arrive, almost. You start to realize that the world is only as complete as your mind makes it. And for whatever reason, the simple act of crafting and wristing you've done for so many years, for so long, feels a little off. And that, for the first time, is a clue that

Not that you're in a dream necessarily, but that not everything is as it should be. That it seems a little different. I sort of lift my head up and I kind of look around and get a sense of like wondering to myself, do I think this is just sort of like, you know, you can sort of almost feel the presence of someone or something and you don't see them and it's sort of this innate, like natural primal, like

Periphery perception. When there is perhaps a predator, or you have that sudden feeling, if you've ever been in one of those, like, you're in a restaurant and all of a sudden you're like, is someone watching me? And you turn and that person is fucking locking eyes with you. There's that 14th sense, a sense feeling of it. 14th. 14th. The shadow people. Shadow people. Yeah. Been there, man. Jeez. Immediately, I sort of look around and...

I kind of let my guard down, and the memories of the vision that I had when I was first hit with the tusk from the Charging Mammoth, the cracking ice and the doom coming to Mahmood sort of floods my mind, and that I had been working so hard to sort of not think and dwell about.

or dwell on, and I just, I get sort of panicked, almost like this sort of primal, you know, this primal innate fear, almost like the fear of the dark, right? Where it's like you can't control it, you can't do anything about it, and I'll jump up immediately, and I'll sort of grab my hatchet, and I'll, my hand will blow with magic, and I won't say a word, but I'll just...

I'll try to perceive. I'll try to see if I can get any sense of anything watching or being grabbed. In this moment, that panic, that rising panic moment could be enough to pierce the veil of this dream. Could be enough. Just the raw perception, the wisdom that you're showing in having had this sensation allows you to make the intelligent saving throw to break through the illusion. All right, buddy. Let it rip.

That's right. Save us, you're near. I say true. I... Save us. Save us, Barnables. Oh, you have to. You gotta. I'm proficient. I'm proficient in this. You gotta. You're near, true. 19. Oh, man. Hot damn. I am...

You wake up and you feel the kitchen sink having hit the back of your neck. And you-- Shattered ceramics litter the floor. Shattered ceramics all around you. But sure enough, just on your furs, you can see a burrowing through creature that is just about to reach your face.

I will just immediately smash as hard as I can. You smash as hard as you can. You know that there was another one that fell around you, but you are still feeling sluggish, and you are just coming to. You can turn, and you can lock eyes with Queenie, and you realize that she has also woken up Danylo,

as quick as she is, but looking around, you can see Ketrastein and the rest of your allies, Taishen, Scrim, Barnabos, they are completely out.

You have five feet of movement if you want to use it. Yeah, I mean, I think I would literally just spend my movement to at least roll over onto, you know, on the ground so that even if I need to kind of crawl over to someone, I can do it quickly. Nice. You start to army crawl almost and turn and get onto your belly. It's a little awkward because you have to roll onto your walking staff, but you are set to take your next action, and that'll be the conclusion of your turn.

Taishan? You have woken up to the reality that you are in a dream. That hits you very hard, actually. The fact that you were able to come to this revelation, but are still loosely aware and not...

waking up, not becoming a part of your physical form, but that you were still in your mind in a dream, is this... There's this terrible agony about it. The fact that you are here, you're already starting to feel the memories of what is actually happening press against the back of your mind. You don't know the danger that Taishan is truly in. His body, anyway. You don't know that you're...

uh, where they, they, you're on a nautiloid ship and all, and, and, and, and the context of all of that, but you do know that you're not where you should be and that this isn't real. That, that becomes very plain to you as you, as you, as you take in the details of what's just happened only in the last few minutes. Uh, I would, uh,

Kind of standing up, I would look over at Mei Li and give a bit of a sad smile, knowing that to be in her presence once again, comforting and knowing that yet it's not real.

I would move towards her, grab her by the left arm, spin her around and sit her on my shoulders. And I know what I would say to her in this moment or what I would have said to her. And maybe even I describe how she can go about the process of

preparing the teapot properly, but even as I tell her to allow the water to reach a tepid temperature and pour from the correct angle at the right height, maybe even as she begins to pour the water, starts to remind me of a waterfall. Starts to make me feel like this is just not right, something begins today, something, I'm somewhere else. - You seem a little off, uncle, or is everything okay?

I don't respond. Taishen, Uncle Pig, come on, come on, show me more, tell me what's, stay, stay and show me. I look down at the water crashing over the teapot. I don't respond. Uncle Taishen, stay, show me more.

There's lots to learn. You have to show me all the things that we can... Stay in the shop. Don't go anywhere. I don't respond. Maylee turns and wraps her arms around your neck and... Stay. It's all right. It's going to be okay. We can do this together. It's going to be all right. And you know she's not talking about staying in the shop or staying in the valley, though that...

sickly hits you in a weird sense. You know that she doesn't want you to take any actions to leave the dream that you were having. Stay with her. She begs. I take a deep breath, I clear my mind, and I focus on the real Melee and Jade Shell Village with everything that's happening there and knowing that to truly help her, I have to return.

Summoning will in this way, seeing that wisdom, you focus again on trying to break free. As hard as that is in this moment, feeling the warmth of her scales against yours, feeling the smells of the tea shop all around you, I'd ask that you make an intelligent saving throw. Come on, buddy.

And I'm going to say at advantage. I love it. Well done, Mace. I'm going to use a dread. I'm using the dread to give you advantage. Oh! Wow! That's not good. Natural 20. Natural 20. No way. I needed to use the twist to get away from that dread. Oh!

You clutch her as tightly as you would the real melee, even with this vision, and the false melee fades from you, and you realize that you are hugging yourself. You feel the cold, oxidized... Not oxidized. Ozone-like air. The atmosphere, the false atmosphere of this strange ship all around you. You feel the yellow lights. You are blinking and waking up, and you are...

hit with that sleep paralysis, the dream completely fades and all the context of the reality that you are in comes flooding back to you. - I sit up, I just barely weakly roll so my back is against the wall right here and I'm sitting against it and wherever this creature is on me, I just-- - It's pulling itself up your tendril.

Like a small adventurer climbing a rope, pulling up against-- and it's very close to your mouth at this point. I take my, like, dragon claws and just get right into it and just, eyes still closed, crush it. You do that, and...

There's no satisfaction in crushing this creature, but you know the danger is gone. You can see that there are other critters all on the floor, all around you. But that is not the end of the story. Top of the round. What about Queenie? Oh, it is Queenie's turn. My apologies. You are waking up. You are now a little bit more alert, a little bit more with yourself. There are the...

tadpoles that are adjacent to

There are two on Kett. Start removing them as they are crushed so that we keep track because you'll need to crush all of them. One from the Yordi and one from Taishan. We've already removed the one from Queen. Oh, yeah. So there's three that are crushed. Consider those tokens. You need to deal with them mechanically, otherwise they will eat your face. Nice. Three are dead. What do you want to do with your turn? I would say you are...

Basically able to do a full turn now that you've woken up and you've had a full round to recover. I would look towards my friends and know... My sight will linger on Scrim a little bit. It's like his body is twitching in his dream, saying that he is struggling a bit with what's going on. And initially, I want to help him. But I believe that Scrim is strong enough to do this.

And so I turn towards Ket. A wise choice. And I'm going to loose two arrows, one at each one of the bugs and try and free him from this thing. I think at your angle, you'll be able to angle it in such a way that you could hit both with one shot. Ooh. Natural 20. That

That is wonderful. Fucking Odysseus is that shit. Yeah. Through all the axe handles. It was really Odysseus. These creatures are crawling up the body, the unconscious body of Cat Rustine, and you are...

you realize you are right at the perfect angle and you pull the new found string that he gifted to you and you let loose this arrow. - Before I do, I will very softly begin to buzz and the bees will start to swarm around me having woken up from their days. And they begin to swirl around the arrow and they guide it straight through both of them. - You shrimp kebab.

And the arrow slams into the door and into the wall and sticks there. And these creatures...

Die. On your arrow. Two crushed. These two. Yeah, yeah. I mean, natural 20s are delightful. Well fucking done. Yeah, nice. And you can even use some of your movement to stand and start to get a sense of the situation around you. So I should be like five feet away from the...

one that was on me. So I'm going to move closer towards Ket. Yeah. I still have one more shot. They're in the killing field. It's happening.

But I'm not gonna use it. - You can shoot at one. - I was just gonna shoot at the one that had been on me to clear all the ones off of me. - Okay, you shoot the one off of the two up brilliantly. - Another natural 20. - And then you shoot down like a fucking badass and it vertically slams into the ground, crushing the body of this creature and it also squirms for about a moment before becoming lifeless. - This guy's outrageous. - And even though Ket is unconscious, I'm gonna turn towards him and I'm gonna go,

Thank you for the new bow strings. It's working out nicely. Y'all should learn how to tie your shoes, tadpoles. I thought that was some cold-blooded shit to say to the motherfucker. He's got a bunch of balls in his hands.

Queenie says exactly that. That's exactly what Queenie says. It's a gold pouch that says, bad motherfucker. Wait, you moved me before I did my turn. Yeah, I know, because I forgot to move you last time. Okay. Okay.

This is probably the last opportunity you'll have to succeed in this way before whatever happens happens. And then Nicky knows that, but Queenie believes. Scrim is always good. So I'm going to just go for it and tell me if this is, you know, off. Scrim's paranoia is cranked up to like 12. Scrim's a mess. You're attuned to paranoia. Yeah, it's worse than ever at this point.

I have begun harassing patrons of the bar. I've taken the book to random people. And like, at first, I'm kind of collected. Do you know these people? Do you know these people? Are you looking for someone? Do you know these people? They don't... Son of a bitch, you know, do you know these people? Do you know these people? Should I know these people?

Oh, uh, yes, yes, I know these people. Who are they? For some coin, I'd be happy to share that. Oh, fuck you! Who are these people? Do you know these people? Should I know these people? Do you know who I am? Do you want another drink, sir? You're alerting some of the others, and I don't know who these people are. Yeah, give me another drink. Oh, yes, okay.

Thank you. Do you know these people? Hey, that guy looks like he was on a wanted ad once. I know you know these people, and you're not telling me. You're all not telling me. And I'm standing on a table, and I'm shouting, tell me who these people are.

- We can get the guards, I don't care, tell me! - Someone doesn't know how to hold his liquor. - Fuck you too, buddy! - And I'm like causing a disturbance and waiting for something to happen. Scream is completely unraveled because nothing like this has happened to him before in his life.

He's usually the one who's in control of the situation and isn't confused about things that are going on. This is pretty unusual shit. Let's go investigation this time. Well, that's probably better. That's probably pretty good. You would have thought so. Can we go deception? That's not an intelligence check. That's a 16th.

You look around and you're shouting at all these patrons and it's when you start to get the eyes of all of the people, you're not just getting the floor that you're on, let's say the third or fourth floor, but other people are looking up from the balconies, from their tables, looking down from above, they're looking down. There are quite a number of patrons in this particular tavern. It's a huge, huge eating and

drinking spot for an entire community and they're all looking and you're starting to realize it's almost like in a video game when you look at the crowd of a badly rendered stadium where some of them are like all doing exactly the same thing. My vision has become low poly. Hey, this guy doesn't know how to hold his liquor. This guy doesn't know how to hold his liquor. This guy doesn't know how to hold his liquor.

The processing power seems to not quite be enough to simulate this level of attention. Dark times, these! Hope the king don't fall ill! Dark times! The universe crunches a little bit and stutters.

And you are even more convinced that this is not real. Standing on the fourth floor on the top of a table, make an intelligent saving throw. In this moment, you're saying I do realize that this is not real. You realize this is not real. Holy crap!

- I know all of you! And I turn around and I moon the entire ball. - This guy doesn't know how to hold his liquor. Dark times, these! Oh, the king don't fall ill! - Oh, it was so close. - Twist, twist, double twist, double twist, double twist. - It was so close. - Thank you, Chad.

I moon the crowd and I wait for the vision to melt away and nothing happens. Suddenly Scrim feels the tension. I know, and I feel a breeze on my bare buttocks. Why hasn't anything happened?

as I fail the roll. For a moment. Dark times, these. A shimmer of doubt. A shimmer of doubt occurs in your mind as you're like, what was in this bourbon? Was I right about this? I was right about this, right? I'm going to jail. Oh boy.

And that's where we'll pick up next time. Yornir, were you next? Yes. It was Barnabas, right? And then Yornir. So Barnabas, you sluggishly come to yourself and you are still in your dream space. I am. You are, you succeeded on your check.

- Did you succeed on your-- - I noticed that this doesn't seem right, that someone is supposed to be here that is up. - Yes. - And I took the driftwood with the eyes painted on and the half-carved wooden whale flask and I chucked them both into the fire. - Right, because you passed the check, but you are now in the space where you're like, how do I wake up moment. Okay, just give me a moment to give me some Barnabo's Down playlist action. And you are on high alert as you are about to be

As active and an adrenaline filled as you are when you are hunting down a sea monster on the high seas, the creature that you are attempting to defeat is not the, a kraken or a great whale or something like that. It is a phantom and it is all around you. It is reality itself that you are attempting to harpoon in this moment. - Do I get the sense that it is an enemy that's keeping me in this dream? With that check?

- I would say that Barnabas would perceive it to be an enemy because of his belief in freedom, that any kind of cage or illusion like this would be an enemy to Barnabas. - Well, for whatever power there is, whatever control over dreams you have, you can't even show me her face.

You are weak. Aye. You think that if I don't let myself have her, that I'll let you have her? If this is real, show me her face. Show me her eyes right now! You can't do it, can you? Oh, now I know. You can't offer us anything. You have no power here. Show me. Show me her face. Show me her eyes.

And then I'll believe a shred of what you've said and promised. And I call this out to the sea, to the sky, to everything around me. As I look back down at the burning driftwood, at the burning wooden flask. You do that and you...

get no answer, no immediate answer. And your eyes dwell on that fire. Your eyes dwell on the burning eyes, the receding eyes. It's not going to reverse, certainly. You realize that you'll have to take some great action in order to plunge yourself away from this dream, to pull yourself out of it. All you need to do is...

Perhaps something wild. Plunge your hand into the coals, pierce yourself with the, slap yourself, do something to wake yourself up. Some defiant act in order to endeavor to close, to quit this dream, to push away this enemy, to show doubt in the world around you. I will look around at the scene and as the

The wood burns, and I smell the glistening boar. There's a calm will come over me, and I will sigh. They can't have you, my love. They cannot have you, my lover, and they shan't. If I don't get to see your face and their vile monster eyes, we'll never grace it. And I'll walk over to the two bottles of rum, and I'll look down and I'll say, I am

I use you to escape reality. Now that I've found myself in a dream or stupor, maybe you'll help me get out. And I'll reach down on the drink the entire thing. - Oh. - Made an intelligent saving throw. And I would say at advantage, I'm gonna use another dread. - Go. - Derek, you know you're the DM and you don't need to use- - Can I twist? - To give us advantage. - Can I, can you please? - He's pulled them, he's got them. - I pre-pulled them too.

Sorry, I was already rolling with twists in mind. 11, 11. Dude, we suck. 12. I mean, it is how the fates have wielded. We're dumb as bricks. Sometimes it isn't written. You are drinking and you are feeling maniacal and you can feel the rum pouring down and around your neck, down your throat, across your chest. And you are...

waiting, waiting for a change, knowing that at any moment you could burst from the space. I'm gonna take the other bottle. And you continue to drink. Oh, yes, it's hers. Did neither Barnabas nor Scrim move closer to...

the end point here, realizing that it was a dream. - This represents your real world adjacency to the tadpole. - Yes, yeah. - So time being spent should have moved you up. - Okay, that's all I'm asking. - So I'll do this.

I wasn't like, I wasn't, "Eh, homework." I was like, you know, just, I was curious about the state of the- But it does, it does mean that, and I assume that there's still one or two on scrim at this time? There's two. There's two on scrim. They're getting close. And two on Barnabas. They're getting close. Okay.

- It is running down my beard and onto my skin as it's just, I'm drenched myself. - You take this desperate action in order to pull away and see what happens next. The,

um world is still spinning you're still feeling dizzy uh but you're on your stomach and you're able to start military crawling essentially uh to your next destination you realize the feeling is coming back to your limbs the paralysis is no longer affecting you you're near you have a full turn what do you do

Oh boy. I want to look around and just sort of get a full situation. Can I tell that Taishan's awake, that Queenie is okay? And can I sort of see how close for Scrim and Barnabas, how close it was? I think that it would only take a few glances to take in all of the information that we all share.

You see that Ketrastean has been saved by Queenie. You hear the thud of the bolt from her bow, the arrow from her bow at her feet as she takes out yet another one of these creatures. You can see the stirring eyes of Taishan as he starts to break free from his own influence of this spell, and you are feeling yourself again. Oh, boy. This is interesting. So there are four...

There are four tadpoles. I think what I will do is I will stand up, put my walking stick on the ground, and I'll use it to get up. Bangle schmangle. And... No. We're also six tadpoles.

Oh, there are six? Yeah, because there's still one on each of you in Taishan. Oh, so that's a good thing. The one that's still on me, is it literally still crawling up me? Yeah. How close is it to my face? Do I think I could ignore it for a round? Ooh. For one round, I would say that you could ignore it before it makes its way close enough to something you think it could enter on your head. Oh.

Nothing below the belt, nothing below the belt. Then what I will do instead...

Brains aren't an ass. It's a scenic route. It still ends up in the same place. You guys will never guess where I have been. This is going to take a while. We have a Lemmy Wings style adventure with us. Lemmy Wings. Lemmy Slug.

I'm going to pass Barnabas and I will reach down and pick up Scrim by his collar. And I'm glad you're asleep. And I'm literally just going to smash his face with my palm and try to kill both slugs at the same time. Scrim? On Scrim, yeah. I will say that you can do this because going into this adventure, I wanted to make it clear that

Yeah, you could use an action to crush one, but they're so tiny. These are like little shrimp, right? Yeah. You could probably even use a free object interaction to crush both of these. They're not dangerous until you're...

paralyzed and they're crawling up your face, right? So seeing them both and your hand being the size that it is, you're Akai, his whole face, and just slap him like this. Do you do it hard enough to damage Grimm? Yes. I would 100%. I would want to make sure they're dead. Not hold back.

I'm just very glad that he's in a paralyzed dream stupor. And hopefully he doesn't have to remember all the details of what just happened. Like cracking two eggs against a table. You crush them and they juice out in all directions and...

Scrimp, you are standing there on the top of a table, ass four floors up, feeling the breeze, being like, did I just make a mistake? What's going on here? Now I feel silly. When you get slapped in the face from an unknown phantom...

You wake up. Immediately, you are able to find yourself totally alert in the full context of what is happening, occurs to you. And on your face, little tiny legs are still twitching even when they're not attached to the body. And I would be trying to, I mean, you're holding me by the collar, so I'd be trying to wipe off the...

blood and my blood their blood and I will holding scream I'll say and I'll look at Barnabas I'll say help him and I'm gonna throw him as far as I can on top of Barnabas you throw a scream on top of Barnabas yeah I throw a scream on top of Barnabas crushing the remaining since you fall and you land on what feels like a beanbag chair and that is the conclusion of your turn your turn yeah

Taishan, you've been awake for one round? I just woke up last round. So you're feeling sluggish, but you were able to move five feet and take small actions. Can I cast a spell? A small spell. I mean, I gave Queenie a full action, so if you wanted to take an action, just don't go full, like, we're in a boss fight bonus action, do a kickflip and...

I summon a Storm Sphere. A Sphere of Annihilation. The three fire beam. Is that fire beam? I cast Fireball. What I'd like to do, if you would permit me, is cast Scorching Ray, which would cast three...

three flaming bolts that will go towards... - Wow, that's a heavy resource investment, I know. So I'm happy to allow you to roll and turn and seeing the targets where they are, focus your mind and shoot out these rays in the fashion that you prefer. - I'd like to steady myself, like press one hand against the wall

look over and see that Barnabas is the only one that still presents as down with the shrimp monsters climbing up them. Barnabas and Kett are both down. And Kett. Okay, Barnabas and Kett. I look over at my cow, Barnabas. I feel messed with time. And I just say, no false lives, not for us.

And I'll summon the three flame orbs and fire primarily two of them at Barnabas and one at the one that's still on me. Is that the remainder? Yep.

Oh no, there's one on my face. Oh yeah, there is one on his face. I don't worry about that one. Okay. You do this. I didn't roll. And Barnabox is awake from the action because you're not hitting him. Instead, these balls of flame launch forward and consume them. There's barely a trickle of dusty ash as they pass across the bodies of these tadpoles and they are completely demolished and destroyed. Gwena, you're up.

Um, I'm going to look towards Barnabas lying on the ground and then look towards your near and be like, well, I guess if we're getting them out of this, might as well take two more arrows and I'm gonna loose them at the little maggots at Barnabas.

Are they both dead? Everything is killed except for the one on Barnabas. Oh, so Barnabas is awake then. No, no, he's not awake. You can shoot him with an arrow to wake him up, but Jorgrim is the only one with a living tadpole on his person. Okay, I misunderstood. I will shoot it in. Right on his jugular. Jorgrim, just like...

Dodge. They don't call me the whip master. Use the tombstone. Everybody gets one. I've had a mental. What a brutal night. Does 21 hit you, Yornir?

Not him. The slug. Does it hit the slug? 22? 21. 21? Yeah, there is. He's 10. You demolished that fucker. It does a lot of damage. No, no, no. It explodes into a disgusting ichor. And then I'm going to let loose the other one at Barnabo's to wake him up. Oh. Natural one. You miss.

You hit your ear and the neck. You mean your groom? The arrow flies so fast it pierces the veil into Druskinvold. For the first time since hitting your new friend, there's something about hitting Barnabos that's a little weird. It skips right past his outie belly button. It barely misses. Scream, just shake him.

That gets us to the top of the round. Scrim, you land on Barnabas and you remember that you're still in a fight. But the danger is there's no more danger. Looking around, you can see that

There don't seem to be any more of these creatures falling from the ceiling. Your allies seem to have demolished the remainder. You don't seem to be in any danger. Kett is fine, and Kett's the most important. I get it. Knuckle snapper! Knuckle snapper! Knuckle snapper!

- Having landed next to Borilus, I'm rubbing my face and my nose, not knowing that I've been slapped across the face. I'm just in pain.

Okay. I shuffle over to Barnabas. I'm still groggy. I whine at him. I say, get up, jackass! I slap you in the face. You do that, and that wakes you up. The last thing you remember is switching not from the first bottle to the second and thinking, if only there was a third on this beach, you'd be... I got old! You come to, and...

full context of not just the time before the dream, end the dream, end the now, all

tie together and you realize what has happened. A deception, an illusion, a charm so powerful that you believed for a moment that it was real and that it was so intimate, it seemed to know your very mind. What a betrayal, an intrusion, an infiltration. Only this slap was able to get you out of it. But you were in Madhouse for a brief period.

I'll immediately look and grab my flask, and I'll make sure that it's whole and not burned, and make sure that I hear liquid in it. It's whole and weathered. It is the flask you've carried on your person for many years now. There's a trickle of blood coming from my nose. Underneath my eyes are slightly starting to bruise. We were ambushed.

Nice, nice shot, Mr. Stabberskotch. I didn't think you had it in you. Mm-hmm, yeah. May I take a look? Yeah, if you don't hit me again. I'll just, like, reset his nose. One more time, the trickle of blood. Oh, sorry, who watched that week?

Overcompensate. The bent stick method. Now Scrim's nose looks just like Yornie's nose. That looks right. Oh, I'm hearing... And Cat Rusty has clearly managed to free himself from whatever it was that he was experiencing. And you, the six of you, are...

On the navigation deck of a nautiloid ship, looking around that same pink light all around you, just taking in the fact that you are safe again. All right, well, I think it's clear that that voice, I know you're listening, you little shit, sent those weird little slug things after us, which means you're not playing very fair or nice. Don't you think? Am I wrong? I'm right. Are you convinced? I see the script.

Well, I'm pissed off, if that's what you're asking. Also, why are your pants around your ankles? I don't want to talk about it. Can we just move on from this place? I don't remember what happened, but it made me think that this voice is... He's weak. He can't offer us what he actually wants.

is promising us. I think you're right. He means to kill us or destroy our identity. Turn us into, or Mr. Steen's son, same fate. Let us destroy it. And I'm just gonna turn, I'm gonna start climbing up. All right, well, we're weird, just okay. And I'm just gonna start climbing up. Now we're talking and Kett follows. You all make it up to the fourth...

And Kat was there too. You stay down there. You are not welcome. You are not welcome. Go away. You cannot be part of our group. We are not accepting

You can't sit with us. We're a little uncomfortable about your war crimes and false flagging. Trying to create a horrible war. Oh, shit. You really kind of invited yourself. You make your way...

up to the top, and you can put yourself in whatever order you want. I'm sure Barnabas wants to be in front of the tank, and I'm sure Tysha wants to be in front. He's a tank, yeah. That's fine. I'm sure Queenie wants to be up front because she's a tank. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm. And...

On the bridge, the final deck of the Dominant Mind, a large imposing door looms ahead of you. The door is intricately carved with symbols and intricate patterns.

Classic Americans measuring things with other things. Yeah, I'm kidding.

A very useful measure in anything as long as it doesn't use the metric system. Hey, yeah, this thought looks to be about two over his wife. What do you think, Jimmy? You climb the ladder. You climb the ladder to about 157 feet tall. The brain weighed 400. Hey, it looks like it could be about four bald eagles. Yeah, thank you. Yay! Yay!

Maybe five, maybe five. Yeah, yeah. The wings open, the wings close. Who knows? That's what it looks to be about two truck bags. Looks like there'll be about 20 footballs in the real football, none of this darker shit. Oh, no. Not even at all. You know, maybe I could throw that five. It's true. You think the kitchen section that I can't? The bedroom section.

Oh, what a session, folks. It's been a good one. Americans would rather measure ogres than metrics and stuff. We need to know what to show. All right.

I felt it was apt. You know, it's funny, I was making the joke, but I was gonna let it go, and as soon as Nicky, the flood kicked in, and I'm like, "Sorry, Dad." There are no mood restrictions in this game. If you got a joke and it's relevant to the theme, don't just be a goofball, but that's fucking hilarious. Sorry, I was like, "You did not just measure it over."

Alright, so now the door is three ogres wide. And you're standing there, looking at a door. What happens next? What happens next is go fuck yourselves. Are we ready? I don't know if we'll ever be ready, but I don't think we've got a choice.

I want to look into the room to see if I see any signs of any... It's a door, right? It's closed. I think we should be careful. This door is about three ogres wide, and that's a big fucking door. I think it's really more two. I don't know. What kind of ogres are you thinking about? Because I'm thinking mania-sized.

That's fair. There are a lot of ogres we encounter. It's hard to use ogres as a measurement. I feel like three manis would fit in this doorframe. I guess he's more like this, not really like this. I don't know. From my perception down on the ground, he's more like this. I think it's more of like a perspective thing. Well, I'm saying it looks like three. Sopholith realizes that you're all idiots and you take 343 psychic damage. And I could really go for a cheeseburger. I don't know.

Blonde just shoots out of the window. I can deal with the ogres, but not you. I open the doors. You take a deep breath and push, bracing yourself for what lies beyond. The door glides open silently, revealing a cavernous chamber within. The domed ceilings reach to nearly 40 feet at its tallest point, and the walls are bare.

You've entered the innermost sanctum, the command deck, the lair of an ancient and powerful elder brain. Upon opening the door, you are met with a towering and ominous chamber. Did I already say that? It's weird. In the center of the room lies a massive skull, its jaws and eye sockets gaping wide to reveal murky and green brine within.

What the fuck? So does it look like a human skull? Just a gigantic human skull? Ewww!

That's gross. Okay, I saw the tinfoil in that. Who made that? I did. That's amazing, Derek. Yeah. Yeah, that's clay. That's baked clay. There's the tinfoil in it. Well done, Derek. That is really good, Derek. That looks so good. Thank you. I'm going to improve it. I'm going to improve it. I'm going to improve it. How? It's perfect. No, it isn't.

It could be juicier. No, it could be juicier. I think it just needs a groucho Marx. Also, I wanted more dark ichor between the grooves to create a contrast. So you put a wash. Oh, Acrax Earthshade or Reikland Fleshshade? Yeah. So you put a wash on it, then you take a nice cream. No, not white. Mixed with a little bit of pink just to give accents. And then you gloss it so that it looks wet and juicy. Perfect.

You know, I would have let you just borrow my bent circle of paper if you'd asked. Can we take another quick coffee break? Yeah. Coffee's done. We're going into goof town and it's fine. I need to use the little goblins room. Yeah. So just the regular sized goblins room. Oh,

Thanks for hanging out, everybody. If you have a question for us, you can redeem channel points at the bottom of the Twitch chat window, and it pulls it up in a queue that we can easily see. We're skipping that one for now. Have to come back later. Hey gang, how would you rate your chance of survival? Do you consider becoming a mind flayer? Your near hasn't considered it. - I don't think so. I think that we're gonna survive. I think that we got it. - Yeah, we gotta survive. - We got it, got it.

I think Andy said he pronounces Jif. Jif. I think most of us, if not all of us, are Jif. Are they truly twins? Well, we just met in the 7-Eleven parking lot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Will he never use it? Two of those. GoGoPowerTaser says, since Skyrim doesn't want to be a nerd...

Oh, scrim. Doesn't want to be a nerd. Do y'all... I've been re-released for ten fucking years. What the fuck's up with that? Do y'all have a trope that your PC would not like to associate with? Or one they do agree with? I'm not sure I understand the question. Yeah. Like, what would be a label...

that they would like or wouldn't like. Oh. Like studious or... Oh, I see, I see, I see, I see. Yeah. I think Barnabas wouldn't want to be seen as a coward. Do I have the break thing on? I don't. This is really well done. I'm so impressed with Eric. Did you put that over there? So cool.

I don't think Yorneir would think about it or care, frankly. I don't think he even thinks in labels like that. So I don't think he would have anything, any thought. A landlubber. Yeah. A landlubber for Barnabas. That's pretty good. I really don't think, I think like in Jade Shell, that thought wouldn't even occur to like anyone there. Yeah. You wouldn't think in terms of like labels or tropes or, but...

Think - and wanna in Jade Sheltie - and want to be considered kind I guess hospitable. Yeah, oh, yeah Screws and renamed to mr. Skyrim by the way, you know, okay. Thanks for that You know just what Chad said if you had to recommend a book to someone they should read before they die It's like death imminent or like just a

No, just a book that you need to read in your lifetime. Oh, I did kind of imagine they finish the last page and they die. Oh, yeah. That's really dark. Yeah. Well, it's like, it's too much pressure. I don't know. Well, in that case, war and peace. So that way your life will be extended because it's boring and you'll never finish it. Just kidding. I don't know. I have to think about that. There's a lot of really good books out there. Yeah, how do you choose this one? I don't know. I don't.

Hmm. I'm going to answer the same thing. I'll just say a book that I really enjoy is Ender's Game. Yeah. I really loved reading that. I've reread that multiple times. I'm big into sci-fi. Yeah, I don't know. I'd have to pick. I don't know. There's a lot of books. That's a tough one. I can never just pick one thing. Yeah. My answer would change every time you ask me that question. Yeah.

Well, if they're just looking for recommendations, though. You know, like, oh, a book I should check out. Well, then you shouldn't phrase it in a way that's so, like... You're not going to cause their imminent death if you answer the question, Andy. You don't know that. That's true. I do not want that block in my hands. What's, like, such a classic that you have to read it? I mean...

Again, I honestly, I think it's one of those like, it's almost like a personality question where like I would answer it differently depending on the time of day and how I was feeling. I am going to say Alice Huxley's Brave New World. Great book. I think that is a very relevant book to read. And I think that, you know, you could get, there's a lot of, there's a lot to be gained. There's a lot to be gained from it. That book's wild. Yeah. It's crazy. It's fucking nuts. I would, yeah, I would say, I would say Brave New World.

I think I'll go with just the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I think that it's worth, I think, I think it's one of those things where like, if people have the interest in fantasy at all, like it's worth the read. It's like, if you're a huge sci-fi guy, you should probably read Dune. If you're a fantasy person. Dune is, yeah, Dune's up there too. Yeah. Oh, you know what? Another one would be a little more goofy is Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Yeah, that's a good one. That's good. That's a good one.

- Mikey, any advice for a newbie Barbarian player? - I would say don't feel, number one advice, if you've noticed, all of the Barbarians on our channel, none of us rage in the traditional sense. - Ah, great point. - So I would not feel, I feel like when you're a Barbarian,

from what you read in the book, the inclination is that basically everyone have the same theme, more or less. I'm a tribal person who's super angry and I like to drink ale and I like to fuck and I like to, you know, hit things and get into brawls and there's nothing wrong with playing a barbarian. Yeah, there's nothing wrong with playing a barbarian like that, but I would say, like, just realize that

The world is your oyster and you can theme and flavor your barbarian in a wide, wide variety of ways. - Like an oyster. - Like an oyster. - You do. - Yeah. - Kinda similar. - I think reflavoring your class in general is the best part about playing this game. - Yeah, I'd also say just like oddly, I feel like of the classes played, it's one of the ones where it feels like, oh, this will be super easy, I just roll to attack.

But there's like a ton of stuff I always forget. There's actually a lot of mechanics in the background. A lot of passive stuff. We get a lot of people really frustrated with you and your fight, because you literally forget all of your barbarian abilities. You choose not to use any of them. And you get your ass kicked. Every day! Every day we get a new comment like, what the fuck?

fuck what barbarians are recklessly attacking maybe I'm just dumb maybe barbarians are easy and that's not a real call out it's possible just remember you have reckless attack remember that you know you eventually get advantage on decks most decks I think I have that

that you're resistant to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing. - There's just a ton of background stuff like that. - Make it all cheat sheet. Like literally bullet points. - I gotta respond to Ikimame, unfortunately. I hope I don't break your heart. They say Neverwhere is one of my favorite, a mix of real world and secret fantasy world living in tandem. I love, love, love Neil Gaiman. I was in a huge Neil Gaiman kick. I read Neverwhere, so what?

Graveyard Book and Anansi Boys, I think, are two lesser-known game and books that I absolutely adore. I tried to read Neverwhere, and I hated it so much, I didn't read another book for like three years. Oh my god, god. So, the concept is really cool, but I just couldn't, it wasn't for me. It wasn't for you. It wasn't for me. So, I haven't heard, I've never, that's a name I haven't heard in a very long time. Kenny Scribbles asks, I'm curious, what was the inspiration for your characters if there was any? Oh man, I mean, I was tired of that.

My main inspiration, the initial kernel, was my main in the original Dota, which was Leviathan the Tidehunter, which is a big old seed giant with an anchor and basically the same color scheme as Barnabas. That was the initial inspiration, and then everything else came from that. Mine was, how do you play a Norse shaman in D&D? How do the Baskervilles, the tale of Graveyard Jack, the different... Stingy Jack. Stingy Jack, yeah. That was the main kernel for me.

Mace. I know Iroh from Avatar was a good one. Emperor Shaohao from Pandaria. Pandaria. In World of Warcraft. The Jende asks, what returns at a faster rate, Scrimscoin or Skyrim? Very close, but Scrimscoin. That's a great fucking question. Good God. Kevin asks, has it been discussed how your characters met? I understand it was discussed how you all got into prison. What about before that? Did we...

We didn't know each other. The prologue section was canon. In the session zero, though. Yeah. So... We met in that session. We met in the session zero. We met. So I was actually thinking, because I think we met in the five stories. We did. And we burned it to the ground. Did we? Yeah.

I think it caught fire. He started a fire and you guys started to run and then you guys got swept up into the events that would eventually land you in prison. He has a great fire department, I'm sure. I just kept imagining Scrim's dream ending by like cinema reel burning. You know, because you're set on fire and you're like,

burned and like, I thought it was really cool. That's a really good question. Yeah, we actually, we did an un-streamed session zero, that was canon, where our characters met and it was in the tavern or the inn that Scrum was just in. That was the wonderful challenge I gave myself was I put you guys in the mind libraries and allowed you to pull any book you wanted from the shelves and what do you pull will be the payoff for that encounter.

and I had to make a dream out of it. And Yorneir chose nothing, so he got nothing, and you chose how you met your friends. And so I knew that we were going to go back to the five stories. Lady Alexandrana asks, are Escher and Marius related? Marcus...

Escher and Marcus? I think they mean Marius. She probably means Marius. Oh. Are Escher and Marius related, or is that too much of a spoiler? I only finished Curse of Strahd, and it stuck with me. No. If you mean Marius, no. If you mean Marcus, I'd love to meet him. Yeah, let us meet Marcus. A Little Gazer asks, Hi, I was wondering, do you have a favorite Sanrio character? If you don't know what that is, then never mind. Pachaco is mine. Or Pachacho? Pachaco. I don't know what that is. Isn't that a cute seal? It's Hello Kitty, right? The Hello Kitty universe. Oh.

Isn't there a cute seal? If there's a cute seal, then that's my favorite one. I learned something new today. Gudetama's really cute. Who's Gudetama? The egg. Oh, is the cute bear, is that part of that? Is Gudetama part of the Hello Kitty universe? I think so, right? Huh, I don't know. I don't know. Again, I learned something new today. Mikey and Annie, does Torbjörn have any relation to Jammity? No, they're the same species. They're just buggers.

Uh, it's the Drowzee dragon. Thank you. Thank you. Um...

Gudetama is Sanrio. Oh, okay. Yeah, there's like a huge, it's not just Hello Kitty, there's like a huge, huge, huge... Is that Kuma, that really cute bear? Kuma bear. Is Kuma bear? Is that Sanrio? That's my favorite. The bear and the little duck. The little bear and the little duck. Well, because Kuma means bear in Japanese. It's like chai tea, right? Or ATM. Are you sure you're not talking about Ellis Kuma bear? Ellis Kuma bear. Pin code. Ellis Kuma bear. His name is Rilka Kuma. And it's not Sanrio.

Oh, he's not. Retsuko is another favorite. I'm learning a lot. Do you have a champion? Oh, we do have a couple folks to thank. Let's see here. We have some subs and follows. Again, thank you so much for all the subs and follows. Oh, we had two raids. I tried to wave and thank. Hopefully the mods gave you all a shout out.

Thank you for your support here. Our mods are great. Uh, Septus Amber cheered 500 bits and says the fact that Derek drew the maps on a fucking happy birthday paper, damn, god's here. Well, so that's actually, real quick, that's a little hack. You can use wrapping paper if it has a grid on the back because it works. It's the cheapest battle map you can buy. Yep. That's what I do at conventions. And then you can use Sharpie and you can use whatever you want. You can mess it all up. So we have rules that we bring to conventions that we can just rip it, throw in, draw new maps.

Cheap. Junior says, you're five ogres away from the brain. Look at that. Got him. I love it. That's awesome. Oh, and they cheered collectively a thousand hits. Thank you. Thank you so much. We appreciate it.

Yeah, we've been burning. We've been burning through. Well, we learned today that intelligence saving throws are the party's weakness. So I can't wait for this arc to be done. Our intelligence arc. Our collective intelligence is a plus. Well, if I design this campaign correctly, I should be doing this in all of the different ways. I love that. No, I'm kidding. I will be very sad when this arc is over because it's been awesome. I've been really savoring it.

It's been super fun. It's been super fun. I kid. I love every session and every arc. Oh, I'm waking up in eight hours. That's cool.

Actually? No, I just have, uh, I have an app on my PC that's called F-Flux or Flux. Oh, Flux. Flux turned me cross-eyed. Every time it comes on, I immediately turn it right off because my whole stream is black and white. Yeah, huh. So I made the mistake of playing Flux when I first got back into WoW. I literally couldn't see. What does it do? It basically makes it and turns it, um...

- Like red gets rid of the blue light and it goes red. - Oh, you used the warm light. - And so it made it so hard to see that I was eye straining so much when I was first started playing WoW again during the pandemic that I literally went cross-eyed and couldn't see straight for like three days. - I remember that. - Oh, that was a nightmare. - It was a nightmare. - The fire blossom.

- Oh, okay. - But for future questions that are like that, we have like an FAQ thing that's basically like whatever you want it to be as well, you know? - Yeah. - Really, especially if it's for fanfic purposes, whatever you want it to be. - Yeah, I don't know if I have a flip-flop or flower.

Andy does not have a few. There's some like yellow arctic blossom or something. It would be that. Scrim probably doesn't notice flowers very often. I know Uranir hates Cat and wants to knuckle-schnapple him, but I love him. I think his voice and personality is really good. He doesn't die horribly. There's more to him than meets the eye. Uranir doesn't hate him. I was just working on the fact that like Derek was joking that we should care about

I think Jordan and Mike hate him. No, that's us giving each other shit. It's great. Yeah, exactly. I think there's more to him than meets the eye. The Gen Day says, how much do you reveal slash know about a new campaign in terms of theme and plot while you're creating your characters? 100 theme, zero plot. Yeah, I was going to say the same thing. We very much know the theme, and without the theme, we probably couldn't make the character, at least in our current process.

And sometimes the party is more heavily connected to the theme. The themes of the Cures are more heavily connected to the themes of the plot, like in Edge of Midnight, than in, as opposed to like this, where we all have very different themes, with a through line that isn't quite as obvious. Yeah. If that makes sense. I think that's well said. Yeah. Question about Sarnax and Garrix, but is he, it says the drowsy dragon, is he more connected to Garrix than the rest of his cults?

I would say yes. I mean, basically, the intention there, so I'll try to keep it, because there's a lot, I could say a lot, but there's major spoilers for both Curse of Cerdanya and Beneath Dark Wings. But basically, I think the idea is that my intention with Garrix and Sarnax is basically how you take, view a god and interpret the,

like how religion or practices or cults or, or sets will interpret that God. And so I think Sarnax came to where he actually fully connected in a way that his cult didn't. And we see the outcome of that in Beneath Dark Wings and in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in, in,

Oh, whoa, whoa. I see. What you said was also made corruptible. What are your thoughts on intelligent items as far as game mechanics and role play? Or what we call sentient. I love sentient items deep in my bowels. Oh.

I'm a huge fan. We've had one that I know of. Watch Prime. We know you won't, but watch Prime. I know that we've had a joke one in Flumeflow, but canonically we had a real one in... Yeah, yeah, yeah. So many bad wings. I think that there's a... It's an untapped reservoir. If that should ever happen at Icebound, cool. But... Not all of it. I don't know.

It has to be the right balance of this is an item, this isn't giving a character more spotlight than the rest of the characters, and it has to not distract from the goings-ons, is what I would say. It's a hard balance to strike, is what I've learned. Yeah, I think that basically the way that I see it is that it...

I think it requires a delicate touch, and it requires, I think, that the party, you need to be aware that it can feed into the flame of what we talked about of the gamer mode of my character is the main character, and therefore my sentient weapon makes me a main character more so than other people. So if the DM and the player that has the sentient weapon is able to kind of have the more drama mentality, and everyone's good with that, I think that it can be possible.

Yeah, I think you really have to walk a tightrope on it not being incredibly obtrusive to the rest of the... Yeah, and I think that at the end of the day, even in the prime, it comes out when it needs to, and then it goes dormant again, right? If it's just another member of the party or another character, then I think that that becomes a little obnoxious. Just to reiterate on the point, I was thinking to myself, I think Anuelin was the perfect person for that character.

And then I thought to myself, well, yeah, I think Rodak could probably pull it off pretty well, too. And then I thought the absolute fucking balls-of-the-wall chaos that would be if Vandross or Sylvia had a sentient weapon. I'm never going to happen. I'm never going to happen. If you guys bamboozle me with a sentient weapon, it's like, oh my gosh, we found the sentient weapon killing... Oh!

- Oh no! - It fell apart! - It fell apart! - It fell from the lava! - The thing is, Sylvie probably believes she already has sentient weapons. - Sure. - Right. - So like, she just believes that everything's talking to her. - Well, Carlisle is basically the same. - Oh yeah, Carlisle! - Yeah, Carlisle is Sylvie's sentient weapon. - Exactly.

Crazy Fry cheered 100 bits, then a thousand bits. That's two more twists. Thank you. They've been burning through them this session, so that's nothing to thank you for.

Shall we? Move your pieces where you enter. No closer than five feet. I'd be right up with, I think we keep the general formation. If Kent wants to come up, I don't know, I wouldn't be trying to keep him in the back. He's hungry. He would probably be up front. For sure. Hungry for brain? Hungry for brain. Hungry for brain. Yeah.

They are all hungry for brain as they walk through the threshold, and the six of you find yourself standing there looking at this enormous mass. To give you a sense of how big this is, the squares on the battle map are five feet, five feet, five feet.

15 feet in this direction and 10 feet wide. Is there some visual you can give me to understand how big that is? Yes. I can give you an exact measurement. That is the size of two shipping containers sitting next to one another. Oh, okay. I understand now. I do. Okay. That makes much more sense. Does that not help a little bit? That does help. That actually does help. That really does help. Is it one shipping container tall? Yeah. Yeah.

Oh, wow. It's this huge fucking giant brain. It's as long as this fucking studio space. It's massive. Sorry, dumb question. I want to make sure I just understood what you were saying. You're saying that the squares on the map are not different dimensions than normal.

They're five feet by feet. Five feet. Normal squares. I misunderstood. I just heard something annoying. That's fine. My brain's still a little... It's a bit warmer in this room than it has been in any of the other rooms. It's almost humid and moist. No, we fixed the AC. The air smells salty, but not of the sea. Slightly acidic. Yeah, it's pretty gross.

but unlike any citrus, slightly metallic, but like no forge you've ever experienced. It feels like it is sticking to your clothes and your hair and the back of your mouth, and you realize that you are staring at the elder brain sopholith. You've come to stop me, then. You've come to attempt to destroy me. Well, I mean, we were going to come to talk to you, but you sicked your little maggot friends on us, so...

You chose war. You chose not to accept my gift. Hold on. Scrim and I were more than happy to come up here and have a conversation with you, and you could see into our minds. You knew that. A conversation? Police? And then the thing with the stupid leeches? Come on. I wanted to show you as quickly as possible what the future could bring for you.

Do you understand? My family forgetting how to tie their shoes? That's the future you chose for me? Oh, and you saw what I did. Again, I am merciful. I wanted your final moments to be of something that you cherished from your former life before transforming into something more. Barnabas, why don't you tell him how we feel?

Well, I suppose I can start this conversation with... I throw a harpoon at it. Make an attack roll. Oh, well. I see water. Uh...

Yeah, I'm working it in. Well, I'm being very reckless about this. The way the reckless attack works, Mace, is I can roll it advantage. You can do that? Elder brain meet kindness. That's what you get, alright? Yeah, no, no, no. Let's twist it. Two at a time. Two twists, yeah. He's new to reckless attacking. It's barbarian. That's true, yeah. It's like pretty next level stuff. You

You never know. Honestly, it might be 18. I have a high. Plus 7, right? Or plus 8. That'd be 15. Didn't you roll higher than that, though, for one of your others? No, it was 2 and 3. Oh, boy. This is a 7. No, but by me dunking on mace, the universe has decided to rightfully, you know. Thank you, universe. I mean, it's a gigantic brain. You are kind of benevolent. It's probably pretty easy. It's not exactly moving. Yeah.

Can't really get out of the way. Barbaros just gets a little nervous and goes, "Ahh!" and throws it up at the ceiling. He slips some brain goo. He actually is a transformer, and he dodges out of the way. The hemisphere is split. A 15. A 15?

You throw it, and though it's not going to be the most deadly attack you've ever made, it doesn't seem to strike directly into the face of this brain like you intended. It arcs forward, and it looks like it's about to slam into the matter. This is a huge, huge thing. You could throw a fucking harpoon in any direction almost and hit this thing, and instead it bounces off of nothingness. All of a sudden you see this...

Expansion of yellow light as a shield momentarily flickers, a dome that seems to be protecting this matter, the brain mass within. Oy, that was a test. Attempting to destroy me is futile. I alone have unlocked secrets of the cosmos. I alone can show you the truth of what lies ahead.

If you only knew, you would not be so quick to have dismissed my offer. If you try to continue to destroy me, I assure you it will be a battle you cannot hope to win. Mr. Sofalef, if you're as all-powerful as you claim to be, why was my dream so terribly lacking? You tell me that. When I first glimpsed what was in your mind, I...

did not see everything. There was not just the knowledge that you went to protect, but the knowledge of an entire mind takes very long to fully catalog, to categorize, to page through. There is more than enough time, I'm sure, to complete this task. Once

We have joined. I don't buy it. Anyone else like to chat? We have our time now that we know that there's a shield, which I knew when I threw the harpoon. I was just testing him. I wanted to have a conversation.

As I believe Queenie did as well. Well, yeah, I did, until he decided to go all deceit-y on us and stick his little maggots at us. Nah, I'm in agreement, and really, to be fair, I just wanted to hear how he was going to eliminate this curse until, you know, he started saying things about, you know, my final moments and joining it, and, you know, I'm certainly not parting with this beautiful body. Ha ha ha.

Scream, why are you pants around your ankles again? Son of a gun, I gotta get a new belt. It's just a cord. The rope is frayed. He has that same twine, but he wound it the wrong way, so it's dropping his pants instead of holding them up. I'm telling my pants away from my waist. Ah!

Since my rise to power, I have done nothing but worked to bring harmony to all those in my domain. That can include you. Many races know many things, but they cannot bring it together or work or build. Together we could do amazing things. If I could only show you... And I need everyone to make a perception check. Oh my god, this I'm good at. I know I am.

Here it goes. Come on, Scrim, don't fuck this up. That's pretty good. Hi-yah. Son of a bitch. Yeah. I got an eight. Twenty. Thanks, Yornir. You got it. Eighteen. Eighteen. Fourteen. Raise your hand if you got a fifteen or higher. Damn it.

Barnabas. Yornir. Perhaps because you're looking where the harpoon landed, and Yornir, you are dead set, keeping your eyes on this thing. Spy something from behind it. A shimmering light. A strange wave, almost, that starts to push forward as Sopholith is talking about...

their journey, their life, their purpose, their goals. And you recognize its quality to be the same kind of light that you all experienced out on the ice sheet all alone as you shared each other's stories. I must warn you, the path you have chosen is one of ignorance, folly. You have yet to face the full might of the Illithid.

You do not need to. If I could only show you. And waves of strange lights continue to pass in. I'm gonna reach very slowly for my anchor. You begin to. The lights pass in and through the command room, shifting curtains of brilliant yellow beams, like light pouring through a tree canopy. A new vision comes over you, suddenly.

And you find yourself standing in a dark chamber. A struggling creature kneels in the center of this room, a mind flayer on one side holding its hand out, binding the creature by some paralyzing force. This creature, clearly a warlord, powerful muscular build, evident even beneath its thick armor, with bulging biceps and a thickly corded neck.

His skin is a shade of greenish gray with a rough scaly texture that seems almost reptilian. His head is bald and adorned with a series of ridges that run from the top of his skull down to his forehead. His eyes are deep set, piercing with fiery angry red irises that stare out with both anger and fear.

The other mind flayer suspends a small, wriggling, larva-like creature above its palm and approaches the creature. He watches as the tadpole eagerly burrows and slides into and behind the eye of this warlord. He falls to the floor, clutching his face and head, but it is too late.

Days pass in the blink of an eye as you watch the orc-like creature undergo the terrible transformation of Seramorphosis.

At first, the creature attacks the walls and doors, attempting escape, clearly disoriented. It swings wildly at the air, at unknowable apparitions. It vomits, and before long you see teeth coming free. The creature's face changes, painfully distending the jaw from the bone behind its nose.

Fingers elongate, muscles atrophy, glands and follicles are repurposed, and finally mature tentacles emerge from its mouth. A mind flayer is born, nameless yet fully grown and imbued with powerful psionic ability.

What remains of this physical form is replaced by an Illithid. Under the surface, however, an urge for conquest and war still lingers. This new creature merges with the Overmind under the domination of another Elder Brain. The one who would be called Sotheleth spends unknowable decades in this capacity, serving an Elder Brain master and the Illithid Empire.

The flood of information passing through you is overwhelming and fleeting. The illicit are masters of a domain you do not know or understand and you watch as a seemingly never-ending parade of conquest and control. Then, for a brief moment, you see Sophileth separated from the Hive. A moment alone with only their own thoughts. Its time is brief, but it is time enough for Sophileth to scheme and plot.

By the time they are returned, Sophileth has a plan, and after many patient years, they are able to turn on the only master they have ever known. The secret ritual is as sinister as it is simple.

Sophilus consumes the Elder Brain, forcing themselves to entirely devour both the physical and the psionic matter of its own mind. For hours, Sophilus is both consumer and consumed, and it is only through sheer willpower that Sophilus ascends, transforming into a powerful Elder Brain.

Destiny is now solely in Sophilus' hands. Sustenance no longer comes from living minds, but from the psionic force of those that they dominate.

Your vision shifts and you find yourself in an unfathomable amount of time later in the midst of a cosmic battle. Brutal combat on an endless astral sea between fleets of nautiloid ships and what are clearly Gith rebels. Pulsing flashes of prismatic light, beams of rays that lance and arc, brilliant colors against a boundless sky of shadow, both sides taking heavy casualties. Ships flare and disintegrate and you hear no screams.

The Gith are fierce in their assault, and driven by anger and selfless despair, the Illithid's armada staggers against their advance. Your vision shifts again and you're hurtling through a blue sky now on the same nautiloid ship you have come to know as the Dominant Mind. The ship is terribly damaged. You spin in a smoking uncontrolled descent and crash.

Assessing the situation, Sopholith immediately commands the surviving mind flayers to explore and report, being careful to make sure they remain within the limits of command. It soon becomes clear. The ship has crashed into a mountainside on a ventress. The ship is near the southern pole on a continent of ice and snow.

Sophilus shields their location from sight as best they can and then learns the mountain they have crashed into is inhabited by a mass of ogres. You watch as Sophilus' thralls lure and consume the minds of one of these ogres. The savage intellect of the ogre offers very little nutrient, barely enough to survive on. Disgusting, in fact.

And yet, by some twist, they exhibit rare regenerative properties due to some fateful event in their ancestry. There is still some hope. The first attempts to enhance the ogres' intellect through psionic blasts and domesticate them are disastrous. Too set in their old ways, the ogres use their newfound intellect to attempt escape, or to trick Sophilus' thralls, or to invent creative new ways to fight each other. They are easy enough to control and command,

to coerce them into constructing their own prison. But minds commanded in this way offer no nourishment. Again, a dreadful twist of fate offers Sopholet the solution. Explorers, humans venturing deep into the heart of this frigid realm for perhaps prestige or wealth, stumble upon the site that will be known as Ogerton.

With a flash of insight, Sopholith commands their mind flayer thralls not to turn the humans into illithid, but to capture and use them to bring balance to Ogerton's design. As you watch the explorers molded and silenced, you briefly notice a young myelin attempt to resist before finally succumbing to their power.

It is the presence of the silenced vassals then that finally allows Ogerton to take shape. It is a simple enough task to form Sothlith's new society.

A bustling city of minds engaged with learning and growth. Minds grow rich with delicious experiences and you sense Sothlith's satisfaction and pride in what they have created. But survival has been taxing and even they must sometimes go dormant for days to recharge and to produce new tadpoles that their family might grow. Your vision shifts again and you find yourself in a familiar chamber.

the lowest level of the Dominant Mind. Two Githyanki have been captured, having managed to find their way to the Dominant Mind by its portal, and with them, a powerful artifact. The object is simpler than you expected. Two perfect hexagonal prisms made of metal, a little smaller than a wheel of cheese. Each face reflects perfectly like a freshly polished mirror, with edges and corners and points crafted to precision.

Both prisms are joined on one face, and each side rotates perpetually against the other. This is clearly the Hexature Armament. For a third time since crashing, Phaedus smiled upon Pesophilus, and you watch as the Hexature Armament is used to repair the Nautiloid ship. What would have taken many years now takes days. The seemingly infinite power of the artifact potentiates magic, and it is very good.

Finally, you yourselves arrive, brought in by the current head of knowledge, an ogre renamed. Renamed as Manius Blaginius. Another gift.

And on their first night, Sopholith infiltrates their minds, minds, and you, you watch, watch as the library, libraries unfurls, unfurls, and you each see into your own, your other, your own minds, minds, and browse your own, their libraries, libraries, but also see, see yourselves and, and, and,

and the vision violently breaks away and you find yourself back in the present standing shakingly in front of the elder brain Sophila. That was fucking great, Derek. That's my favorite moment of Andrews and Chill. That's my favorite moment.

I would like fall to at least one knee. Oh yeah, I'm like bracing myself against your knee. What are you doing? Why have you stopped? Etcheket leans in and it seems that only the five of you have been granted this strange vision. Sophilus' voice continues to speak in your mind.

What do you say? Will you join me? Who is Kett talking to? The five of you. If you drop to a knee, if you start to show any of this side, like all of a sudden you were standing there feeling very confident, ready to confront Sophilith, and you were hit by this vision, by seeing the birth and life of Sophilith all in one moment, almost in an instant seemingly to pass, and

Shocked as you are, Kett seems to be speaking out to be like, "Hey, what's going on? What's going on?" Even Sothla seems taken aback for a moment. I will have pulled off my anchor as I see, getting ready to fight, and then suddenly the vision, it'll drop down, I'll be holding myself up with the anchor as I look up to Yorneir. Do you see the lights, Mr. Yorneir? I do.

What is it telling us to do? I am so confused, I can't trust my own mind. I want to look to see if I can peer where I saw the lights come from behind it, to see if I can

- Catch a glimpse of maybe the hexature armament that we saw in the vision. - You're not sure where the hexature armament is in this moment, but you look and it seems to have swum down and through. To make an anachronistic analogy, it clipped through the walls. It literally just like came in and swept into and through you, uncaring about any of the physical around you.

Why did you show us this? Show you? Scream is just sweaty and pale. I have yet to show you the truth. To show you the world. To show you the cosmos. I have yet to show you what I am capable of. But if you endeavor to destroy me, you will never know. The...

Hexature armament protects me with this invincible shield from you, but it does not protect you from me. My purpose is too important for me to allow you to jeopardize it. Scrimwood just looked at you and you're incredibly confused. But again, pale and sweaty. I...

I think Barnabas is too dumb for this. So I will look to... I'll still be hanging on my anchor, and I'll say, "Look for what we saw. Does your eye see it? Find it, Mr. Yorneir." I, hearing this, hearing that, and getting the vision, Yorneir knows exactly, again, he's reaffirmed in his purpose,

I will scan the room, and I will just sort of, I'll lift my head up. My hair might be a little mess, and I'll lift my head up, and I'm just going to, as quickly as I can, you know, given what Kat told us, is there any sign of the hexager armament anywhere in this room?

Even like the light that you mentioned was glowing from it. Not immediately. Not immediately. But all around you, you notice that the walls are melting away. Not...

seemingly attached to the occurrence of the light, which Kett seems not to have acknowledged and which even Sophilus seems unaware of. But the walls seem to be pulling away and almost losing their opaqueness. You can see the dim ceiling of the cave above the ship above you. You can see the navigation deck just 20 feet below you.

You can see the engine that rumbles and a shiny hexagonal object fastened to the rear of the propulsion system, that large sphere at the back of the ship. You know that the walls are still there, but it is like knowing that a window pane is there as they lose their opaqueness, opacity.

This illusion gives you a full view in all directions as though the walls aren't there at all. Let me change your mind. The hexature armament powers my invincible shield because it is finished repairing the ship.

All of a sudden, the ship pulls away from the cave floor and pushes out of the cave mouth through the waterfall and twists and turns up. I need everyone to roll initiative. I am going to use first strike and we have an advantage. Oh, let's go. Oh my god. I have to roll for my spirit or would you prefer the spirit just go on my turn?

Dealer's choice. I think it's easier. It's easier. That's usually how we move on. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. It's like 14 plus whatever I got. Well, okay. 18. Let's do it. Let's do it. You know, I had a feeling. And I'm like, I hope that it'll be fine. No, it'll be fine. 21. Oh, you beat me.

22. Wow. Wow, you guys both crushed me. Jesus. 17. I beat you. Dang. By one. Dang. I got an 18. Well, this whole first strike thing. 18, you say? I got an 18. 18. Tyshon? 17.

28. Sweet mother of fuck. Those are Vantress numbers. With a 17, I'll enjoy last. Oh, I'm sorry. 26. Not good enough. Let's do...

That goes to Barnabas next. Let's do you, because you're the top of the round. Let's do Yornir. Oh, Yornir, you actually beat the top. Nice. The ship pulls free from where it has...

was once lodged in this cave and crashes through. You can see through the view that you now have been granted through the window pane of the exterior of the command deck that you are in. You can see the brain in front of you and you can see the floor. You can see the hexatur armament and you can see the city of Ogerton and you are suddenly shocked

shattered with not just the water of the waterfall, but also of the rain that is still pouring down outside. When all of a sudden the entire ship flips and twists in order to go straight up and into the sky as you are pulled away. I need everybody to take...

Flying backwards into the wall, if you take, if you move more than 10 feet, you take 1d6 points of damage, and you land prone. But the door behind you has closed, so you're actually sealed. So we all move either, like, basically right back against it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. You actually just all cluster right here, because nobody raced forward. So no one takes any damage, but you all are technically prone against that line of attack.

That happens and uh, cephalith words, uh, sorry to me. Oh, so you said it would have fallen damage in that space. We're going to take some G force brain damage. But you're pushed against the

wall as you are forced upwards and then the entire ship twists around and begins to spiral up and you can see the mountain passing as you as you climb then this all happens in almost an instant and Sophilus words reverberate in your mind let me change yours Queenie I write myself

And I look to my friends and then I reach into my quiver and I feel around past all of my arrows to an arrow that was not mine. That tied around the edge of it is a bow made of cloth from Honey's vest. I pull it out and I knock it into my bow and I say, "This one's for you, Honey." And I cast Beeline.

And as the arrow flies directly towards the brain, it is going to begin to swirl with vines and flowers. Beautiful sunflowers will pop and illuminate from it until the swirling mass begins to buzz and a giant honey with that little, that little bow right on

on her head made from Honey's clothing will appear and zoom towards it. And my new honey bee, Honey, will attack. - Okay. - Want that. - You do that. And this bee suddenly emerges from seemingly nowhere. As stunned as you are by the sudden occurrence, you all watch as a bee the size of a pug emerges. - Amazing. - How does that work? 'Cause it's been ages since I've read "Beeline"

and I didn't think you were gonna cast it right now, so. - It is basically for the first time I forego my turn to let it attack, but going forward I'll be able to have my attacks and it will also go on my initiative.

Okay, so let's give you a bee token is all we need to do? Oh yeah, yeah, I just need a bee to go. We could use a die. I mean, I've got a bunch of black rice over here. We could use this one, I guess. Do you have like a bee-colored one? Like a yellow dice? You know what? I do, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I have it in my honeypot. From Kimma. I figured you'd have something bee. Something BS. Perfect. The bee is 1 20th of an ogre's big.

That's pretty fucking funny. So it will, it doesn't do much damage, but when you consider it's on every freaking turn. Yeah, and it sounds cute too. I mean, you can't beat that, and it does sound cute. So it is going to fly in, and then you'll watch as it kind of rears back, pulsates his abdomen, and goes in for a sting. Okay.

A 19. A 19. It goes in, and instead of even coming close to the flesh of the brain or the pool of brine underneath it or the skeleton, it hits that same dome I just described. It stabs in the thorn--

gets repelled immediately and you can see this like bounce of energy across the surface of the dome. No cracks or anything? No cracks or anything. I was hoping for cracks. I mean, who doesn't want to hope for some cracks every once in a while? Would you like to do anything else with your turn? Does it seem like I would be able to Hunter's Mark this brain with the shield on it? Of course.

Yeah, it's a stationary big-ass brain. I think you could Hunter's Mark it. And I would use my bonus action to Hunter's Mark it. Yeah, you do that. You do that. You use your innate queen-y ability to do a Hunter's Mark sand spell, because that's how it always should have been from the beginning. And you use your bonus action to do that. Do you make any movements? Are you good? No, I would stand my ground.

- But stand up maybe? - Yeah, I would stand up and I would look around and just keep my eye out focusing on, did we see where the Exeter Armament was? - It's in this thing. - So it's in that thing. - And it says one floor below, right? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - That's gross. - The floor is 20 feet below you and it's that far away from you. - In that case. - Is there like a railing behind it or is it all closed? - You are an enclosed glass terrarium nightmare and the door behind you is sealed.

Right, so we can't physically get to it at the moment. At the moment. Yeah, I will... where is the entrance to it? Like where the door is sealed, just for me to understand.

The door is behind you. Sorry, the door that's two orders wide. That's now sealed. And so that goes down. That goes here, there are ladders here. Yep. But how do you get to that? Then that just goes down to this floor where you can just walk over here. Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. So we just basically skipped looking at the Hexatraum on that. Yes. We skipped the Hexatraum. So when we were joking about not doing anything on that floor, we really could have done something special on that floor. Maybe. Yeah.

I was like, you guys aren't gonna, oh, you're just gonna, okay, climb the ladder. You couldn't have paid me to touch that sphere. It's my care. He's like lights dancing. But I got all kinds of cool descriptions that were all pharaoh fluid-y. Yeah, sorry. But we just got attacked by horrible fucking worms. I know, you didn't fucking decide. You decide. You could have been like, can we take another short rest? I don't know.

Barnabas, you watch as a bee emerges from an arrow and stabs into what is very clearly a strong shield. What do you do? Oy, that bee's the size of a gopher! Incredible. A VLB. Oh!

- Oh! - Pretty fucking good. - As we're flying, I'm going to look around. I wanna turn to see if the door looks possibly openable. - Yeah. Go ahead and make a perception check, I think. Just straight looking at the door, right? - Anything I can do. - That's not too bad. That ain't so bad. Let me just pull up a little bit of prescription design.

That'll be a 20. With a 20, this looks as... You even watched it close. As thick as the walls around you, it would be extremely difficult for you to break through it, let alone one of the wall perimeters in this space. You feel, even with your great strength, quite trapped without having to spend...

multiple mechanical rounds, endeavoring to crowbar it open. - I am just going to look at Queenie and say, "Hey, good job, keep it distracted!" And I am going to, my legs are going to, as crab legs are going to form, and I am going to scuttle my, actually, yes, I am going to scuttle, and as sea water,

coats me, there will be, I will let out a cry, it's like, "I know you are with me, my lover!" As two large wings sprout out of my back, like flying fish wings, as I am going to move my full movement and use my flying fish ability to leap the rest of the distance. Okay. So my full speed is 40.

Where are you going? I'm just going past the brain, and I'm just gonna try to break, if I can. And I'm trying to basically smash through. Barnabas is thinking that it's glass or something. I'm trying to smash through to get down that way. Okay. As I take my anchor, and I'm just leaping forward, flying through the air to try to smash through.

It may fail terribly, but. - I am not gonna take the time to do like siege rules and go and look that up. I'm just going to say that you should roll for damage because you're hitting the broad side of a wall. - Okay. - So go ahead and slam into that as much as possible. - Okay, I am going. - Did you see water? - I did. - I'm gonna roll to see if I can fish for, well, no crats, no crats. Okay, that's fine.

as I'm going to smash into this, as I am going to channel the power of my Kendori, did I pronounce that? Kendori totem. - Oh. - And I am going to deal, I guess I'll hit it twice. - Okay. - I am going to smash into it. I'll use, sorry, sorry, sorry, I'm gonna use two of my, what you call it? Two of my D12s, my hit dice.

as I'm going to smash into it. Uh, uh, so that, oh, not great. Eight, 14, uh, plus seven, 14 is 21. And then...

- 21 and then 10, 14 plus seven is 21. So 42 points of damage. - I'm smashing into it with my anchor. - This is the amount of damage that would insta-kill so many monsters and creatures and you are working like a miner against it. Klang!

Clang! Clang! You don't see any visual change because of the transparent nature of the illusion that allows Sothloth, presumably, when navigating this ship, when flying this ship, to make progress. But you kind of get a sense that you are damaging the wall. You just don't know if it's...

14 more clangs or 1400 more clangs in order to get through. You are-- - Is it cracking at all? Like can we see the outside? - The illusion is still perfect. - Okay. - And I am just like, this is one hell of a sailing vessel! - And I will say that because you're climbing and that's the rear of the ship, you are smashing down at this, you are watching Ogerton shrink.

as you get farther and farther and farther and farther away. - Oh, that's terrifying. - That's what happens on your turn. - We're going to space, folks. - Yikes. - You're in here. - Spacebound is gonna be the name of the campaign. - Space Pound? - I love Space Pound. - We're getting Space Pound? - We're gonna get some space dogs at the Space Pound. - I guess I have to stand up, right? So that's half my movement. I would take my three squares forward

And I want to try to, like, look into the pool, and can I see anything below it besides the skull that you described? Or, like, is there any... Are there, like, any tubes? Or is there anything, like, holding him beside... or it besides...

Just water. This does seem to be like if you took a skull of any creature and cleaved it in half, the bottom half of a skull. And what has clearly been scooped out from the center of the skull is like almost a glass bowl that allows this green glowing brine to exist and in which the brain sits and gyrates and pulsates. That's what you see when you look at

the overall shape. The face of it, you can see what would have been a nose cut in half, and then you can see almost portholes where multiple tentacles would have been jutting out from the jaw of imagining a huge illicit head.

But nightmare transformation and ancient, ancient, ancient looking. That is what you perceive, but all of it definitely seems to be within the perimeter of this dome. And I'm just going to start white. I'm just going to get a sense of...

If I... I'm going to kind of swirl my hand, and it'll grow frosty. And instead of shooting anything at it, I'm just going to use Frostbite on it and try to attempt to cause frost to appear over the brain. And it needs to make, I guess, a saving throw, if it can even... if it can penetrate, right? I'm just trying to get a sense of if...

things that will originate behind the shield, but that still works. - This is very true to your shamanic self. Trying small things to test and find the path, to find the true way of things. And you make this test. And before any of the effects can occur, the saving throw, as soon as you pass that magic through the dome, it evaporates. No saving throw required.

Oh. We need to get to the ornament. That's better. Perfect. Top of the round. I can do anything. The shield, despite your test, blinks for just a bit of a moment. It blinks for only a fraction of a second. But in the moment that that happens, there's this psionic burst and...

almost like rockets spraying out a collection of additional tadpoles all land at your feet.

- Are we doing rice? - We're doing rice. - We still have the 12, two for each. - Oh my gosh. Magi RPG, we're rated up to 57 viewers. - Thank you. - Thank you so much. - Welcome. - If you like D&D, you can tell us to follow, we appreciate it. - We're enjoying the boss fight. - Go get the Magi RPG, or Magi, I don't know how you wanna pronounce that. - If you know Dungeons and Dragons and you can see the mini that we've made here in the center of the map, you probably can guess what we're fighting.

It's a giant brain, folks! You know what I've never- Oh, Kettlesteam's still here. Yeah. Honestly, that's all I can think of. What? Who's Kettlesteam? Kettlesteam? Is that guy? I don't see him. Yeah, it is. I don't see him.

Okay, I think that's all of it. Oh man, I can't do anything. That's the conclusion of the lair action. It doesn't even have any bones that I can throw. I know, really tough. Well, it's surrounded in bones. All right, I...

Well, shit. I feel like you're never allowed to do anything in combat. It doesn't matter what character you're playing. It's alright. It doesn't matter what campaign. Scrim will, having stabilized against the wall, will raise his left hand and...

focus the best that he can and attempt to lay a Hexblade's Curse. I believe because I granted a Hunter's Mark, your ability to target and hold the creature in your Hex is allowed. So you're the DM. I don't know enough about Hexblade. I can just tell you what it says. Once per short last is a bonus action. Choose one creature you can see within 30 feet and curse it for one minute.

And then the benefits come if you hit it.

- Well, no, it gives me a plus three bonus to damage rolls. Yes, so yes, score a critical hit on an extra 20. - I can allow that, I can allow that. - Channeling this magic that I've come to be familiar with, I feel the curse take effect and without looking, now that the physics have changed, this dog beast is more of a smoking cloud. Without even looking at it, but still feeling the connection, I will just say,

- Go get it! And I will fire off two Eldritch Blasts as I also send the Hound after this. - Okay, roll the Eldritch Blast. - To see if anything even hits or can penetrate the barrier. So the attacks for the old Eldritch Blast are double 14s. Each is gonna be a plus eight, which would be 22.

Both of those hit. The Eldritch Blasts hit the dome and bounce off the shield, doing no damage, however. Okay. The creature, however, uses its movement to endeavor to perhaps pass through the dome and get to the brain. It has 50 feet of movement? Well, that's pretty good. It's quick. What would happen if it got to the brain? Oh, it would regain its physical form and attempt to jump on it.

You all see the smoke pass through the dome. Unbelievably,

Whatever it is made of seems unaffected by the invincible shield of Sotheleth. And you are able to make a chomp. Wow. Okay. What in the hell? That's a spooky ghost. Oh my god. I didn't account for ghosts. Fuck! Only a 10 to hit. A 10 to hit? Yeah. Let's twist it.

You sure? Yeah, I'm the only one hidden so far. We'll use one test. Space, ghost, coast to coast, fog. That's actually a 21 to hit. That hits. It's gonna do 3d6 necrotic damage. Let's go. And I guess you technically have to succeed on a DC 10 constitution saving throw. And if you fail, your hit point maximum is reduced by the same amount. You're haunted by ghosts forever. Forever.

- DC 10, Con, not very high. - Yeah, it's like 20. - Okay, 11 points of necrotic damage. - I rolled high for what it's worth. - How much damage? - 11 points of necrotic damage. - 11 points of damage, shockingly, you are able to pass through this threshold, or rather your spirit is, and

I was gonna say, as I watch this happen and Scrimus, for the first time, there will be a slight smirk that will appear on his face as he almost looks at this creature with admiration. It dives in and you hear the unemotional voice, unemotional for most of this time, of Sothlith reverberating in all of your minds.

- Interesting, I didn't think that this was possible. That cannot be allowed. - Oh, it's good. - Oh, he's fucking serious. - It will use its first legendary action to make everyone enjoy an intelligence saving throw. - Including the creature? Because it has a CH bit. - Yeah, it's a burst of psychic energy that bursts out, a giant wave that crosses a threshold, incorporating the entire arena. - A disadvantage?

No, I'm rolling for my creature as well. And we both fail. The DC is 18. Yeah, now we... I fail. Oh, what was the... Both myself and Honeybee fail. Yeah. Okay. I fail too. That's going to be... Intelligence save. Yeah. And that raging does a new shoot against Psycho Damage.

You all take 27 points of psychic damage or half as much on a save. I rolled an 18. My honeybee disappears. Oh yeah. I am sorry to hear that. Yeah, the smoking spirit is just vaporized. Oh man. Vaporized. 27, you said? Shit. So that's half? About 13. Yeah. 13? Yeah, because it's rounded down. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And you are dazed. On your next turn, you may only choose to do an action or move or take a bonus action. However, you can choose to do more things by taking 1d6 psychic damage for all of those additional things. Okay. Sorry, what do we get for free? Bonus? You get an action for free, a movement for free, or a bonus action for free. Okay, Quan.

Okay. And then you can take damage. Okay. You take it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Got it. Got it. I love that. It's a better stunned. Yeah. It was the DC was 18, right? Yep. Yep. Tygen, you're up. This is spicy. Yeah. Fuck. I am so excited. Just to paint the same exact picture you painted 17 times once more. No, no, no. The Elder Brain sits within a half, like a cord out skull.

And like outside of that, there is a pool of water that is also tadpools? Where all of the water is within the skull? It's in the cord of skull that the brine and the pool is, which is what the brain sits in. Okay. And when attacks hit it, is the shield seems very obviously like it is around the brain or does it extend all throughout the pool? It extends around the skull. So that's everything. Okay.

Um... Okay, well, I guess I'll just firebolt these fucking, uh... These little scamps, these little shrimp monsters around me. Um... You all know that attacking the wall is working though, right? Like, that's something that everyone understands? Yes.

Okay. I was gonna make sure. Attacking the wall is working. Apparently. Well, we know that as players. We don't know that as characters. Yeah, as characters, it would not be terribly... I would say Queen probably has nothing. I think you would have to ask and make a pretty... Oh, okay. 'Cause it's just a clear wall. You'd have to make a DC 15 perception check to be sure. Oh, I thought you mentioned that it looked like the illusion was cracking. No, no, the illusion is perfect.

Yeah. It is still perfect. Only Barnabas can feel the fact that he is starting to dig in deeper. If that's the case, I'll cry. We're going to break through this!

- I'm a man, let's go! - And everyone trusts me. - But I'm crazy as fuck. - That's fair, that's fair. - You can just drop a fireball and kill the leeches. - You are all resistant to fire damage, yes. - I don't have that spell. - I don't have that spell. - Oh, I don't have any bad shit. - No, no. - Also that, also that. I will, let's see. Oh fuck, how far is this? This is some bullshit.

Pythagoras is a dick. 17 and a half. I will charge in my palm a swirling, what looks almost like swirling condensed wind, and around it will form crackling lightning energy. Oh, fuck, I can't move. Never mind. Why can't you move? Take some damage. Well, you just, it's half your movement. Okay, okay, okay.

Wait, are we prone? Shit. I don't think we're prone. Or started prone. Everyone started prone. Oh, this is really evolving. Fuck. Okay, okay, this is probably still fine. Let me just see what... Oh, should we remove the bee dice? Yeah. There's no dog dice either, right? No. Okay. Vaporized. Instantly. That's amazing. Yeah.

Okay, this is still fine. This is still fine, everybody. Okay, so I summon the same thing I just described. Swirling mass of what looks like condensed wind. Around it, a sphere of crackling lightning energy. I'll move...

They don't have attacks of opportunity, instead they just continue to turn into the nearest targets and immediately start-- So long, suckas! And I would say to Sopholith, we reject your truth, Sopholith. You didn't want this. They changed you. You won't defeat us. It might seem like you will, but we'll get the Hexature Armament.

and we will cast you out, or you can just leave now. Words I've heard a hundred times before. This does not end well for you, but I am not going to kill you. I am going to turn you. You will try. And I'll fire Elemental Blast at the...

of the wall that Barnabus is striking. Okay. I'll pull my anchor back as I hear you talking to it. Roll to attack just because I know I didn't make Barnabus do that, but because of the distance and because we need to see if you make damage. I curve. We win!

25 to hit the broadside of a barn? Oh yeah, that's one broadside. No, I'm sorry, I don't think I actually don't have a plus maybe. Or maybe I do have a plus. You should. Yeah, you should. It'll be plus your spell mod attack, right? It takes 1d8 plus 1d8 lightning damage.

- Five points of really cool damage. - Barnabas, you are rearing back for the next strike and you see this explosion of wind and lightning. - Wind and lightning.

crash in front of you, and even though you don't look behind you, you know that Taishan has joined the cause and is endeavoring to crush through the wall. That being said, you're all still staring down and watching Ogreton get smaller and smaller, and it's at this point that you cross a threshold.

You're no longer watching rain fall down and around you. You are watching snow as you cross the threshold of Ogerton's illusion. Ogerton disappears for you. All of a sudden, you are watching snowflakes fly around and flip in all directions. Dark clouds in all directions. You are...

Having a good time of it. That's not good. Tysha, that's your turn? That's my turn? This is the worst one! I think it's all... it's all actions. Don't forget to take your psychic damage. Alright. Yeah. Teacher! Oh, thank god. That's okay. Please help him. One psychic damage. Okay. Oh no, Asafil's turn. Oh no.

Sophilus will use his turn. Oh, that's fine. Sophilus will use their turn to see what you are endeavoring to do, knowing that you are potentially going for the armament, especially given the fact that Eornir announced it to the world. And you may not take what is mine. I... No, he wouldn't say, I own everything. That's not his vibe. Instead, Sophilus would be more like...

Tell my wife I said hello. Tell my wife I said hello. It's the beige alert. Perhaps I'm not trapped in here with you, you're trapped in here with me, or something along those lines. Instead, he twists and turns the ship and decides to start spiraling around the... Instead of going straight up as you have been, largely, you... Not at a...

complete vertical angle, otherwise you guys will all fly in a nightmare position. But he turns the ship and starts to circle around and towards the top of the mountain that you've been watching this waterfall spill down this entire time. That being said, everybody goes

all the way to the right side of the ship. So, and taking the equivalent amount of falling damage. - Where does Barnabas go? - So Barnabas would go to the corner towards Rich. - Would I bump against the brain shield? - You slam into the brain shield and you flip and fly around it. - I don't take any damage 'cause I was next to it already. - Oh yeah. - So he moved one, two, three, Barnabas moved four squares. - So that's 2d6.

That's 1d6. Maybe just next to me here. That's 1d6. I trust you to get the math right. Are you mapping this, Mike? 1d6. Yeah, 1d6 for Queenie because you round down. That's 15, right? Yep. And that's...

I take 2d6, you guys take 1d6. I took full max damage. Six whole points! These dice roll hot fire for damage, I can't hold these. As I'm flying, I'll bounce against the shield and as I see it coming, it'll be like barnacles will grow all against my side. As I smack against it, it's finally damage that I can have. Nice. Ket, um...

uses his turn to stand. Use your magic sword. Yeah, that was his turn. He was turning the ship. Okay, cool. That's good. That's much better. He's an ace pilot. That's a good one.

You can fly the... Look out, it's Tom Cruise! He can fly the bombing run in two minutes and 14 seconds. You know what? It's not important. What's important is that Cat stands up and he dashes and he's going to run up the brain to the best of his ability. Does he take...

- Attacks of opportunity from the slugs. - Those also slid down, however. - Or they all crush by the G-forces? - They're all just on you and disgusting. - They're not crushed by the G-forces? - So if he's dashing, I mean, he could basically dash this way. What's his speed? - 30. - Don't forget about the psychic damage. - Can he get two on top of the shield? - One and a half, two and a half, three and a half.

- Four and a half. - Yeah, yeah, that's as far as he can get. - Okay, he takes his silver sword and he flips it around and he said, "Did you see that? "Did you see the blink? "As soon as he, kill more of the tadpoles, "he'll have to release it at some point "and then we can stab him."

And he pushes the point of the sword against the shield and he just starts to dig in, waiting for an opportunity to try and interrupt this invincible shield. Oh, shit. Oh, no! Damn it. I just had a vision of what's to come. This is doing me a think.

I'm like sitting here racking my brain and I'm just like coming up with nothing. So completely like meta conversation outside of this game. What happens if this strange sword is the thing that kills this elder brain when we know that like consuming an elder brain is what led Sopholith to become this point, like to get to this point. What...

This guy is not a good guy. I agree. I don't trust him at all. And I think he wants to kill the Zeldra Brain for other reasons. 100%. Oh, yeah. He's got ulterior motives. I trust him about as much as I trust the Elder Brain. Exactly. Exactly. But if he has some super magic brain-killing sword... I ain't gonna say no to him. Yeah. I trust him a little less, you know? I ain't gonna say no to him.

The fight has only just begun. Already things are looking grim. Traps. Desperate. Massive dark cloud heads obscure the mountain head that looms above the city of Ogerton. Flakes of snow rush past the face of the ship in brilliant streaks now. Too many to count.

Gone in an instant. They rush past you, dazzling and dizzying patterns as the ship continues to accelerate and twist and turn, circling up and up and up. Still, you can see the boardwalk stretched out before you. The long tentacles that push out from the sides and belly of the ship have awoken now and undulate and grasp at the air, twisting and reaching as though pulling the ship through the air.

You look about to see how your allies are faring and if they're doing any better. Barnabas, you are still slamming your anchor into, oh, no, no, you've been pulled into this side. What are you doing? How are you feeling?

I'm trying to hold on to that and scrape down with my crab legs. I'm just going to try to scuttle back to where it was and get back to it. You start to make your way up. You're near. The same question for you. What are you doing? How are you feeling? I'm covered in slugs. I was just hit by Taishen. Taishen's on top of me. And I am feeling concerned. Wow. I have...

No hope. Okay. I'm starting to feel a little doubt. Yeah, we're basically like, this shield is almost like a, you know, like a reverse Uno card, like a new you, like I block everything. Queenie. Yeah. What are you doing? How are you feeling? Um, I, Queenie feels no fear. Mm-hmm.

She had her moment, and she is now looking at this situation, looking at the shield, and everything that's happening. And even though to most it would seem hopeless, she just has complete faith in her friends. Scrim. Scrim is feeling something that he's never felt before until this moment, a brief sadness and almost misses the hound.

that has been vaporized by the brain. He would never tell anybody this, but deep down he's almost sad because he had hope that this thing could harm it. But he is actively calculating and formulating a backup plan. And his mind is going, the wheels are turning, and he thinks that he has a backup plan.

Well, I'm covered in slugs and I've just hit your ear. So, um, Oh, sorry. Uh, I do. However, think, uh, the shattering out of the dream and, uh, realizing that there's no, there's no, uh, reality other than reality. It's,

I've never been more sure that we will prevail against this because we have to prevail against this. Hope has only nearly died within you when suddenly there is a flash of blinding light.

moments later you hear a crackling boom you realize what you'd once mistaken once long ago for lightning is actually the eruption of an icy fissure like a cracked tear in space on the mountain peak you see a vertical jagged shape like a spike of ice projecting upwards the shape moves and then unfurls and you realize what exactly it is that you look upon

Its massive wingspan, easily over 60 feet in length, spreads outwards. Scales as white as the driven snow glisten with a faint blue hue. The dragon's body is thick and muscular. The spikes on its back are jagged and razor sharp. Piercing blue eyes with the icy intent of a predator seem to look right through you as they lock onto the dominant mind and the Princess of Wrath takes flight.

Despite her massive size, the dragon is incredibly agile. Her movements quick and precise. Powerful muscles ripple beneath thick scales as she soars forward straight for the ship.

She ascends and closes the distance almost instantly and slams into the side of the ship, rocking it violently underneath your feet. In your minds, you hear Sotholith respond, "It appears we have an unwelcome guest. How interesting. I wonder if it knows who it is dealing with. We will deal with it accordingly." The Princess of Wrath clutches the side of the ship with her great talons, rears back her head to the storming sky and roars.

And that's where we'll end tonight's segment. - Oh my god! - Take it back, take it back. - What? - No, let's play it 'til sunrise. - Are you kidding me? - Oh man. - This is so epic. - We are going, this is bad. - I think Yornir's brain would like be on the verge of shattering with everything he's witnessed and is seeing. Like he's so grounded.

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