Uprooted | Ep. 2 | Where's the Duck Sauce?
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Welcome to Legends of Adventurus. I'm Grumbling, and you're listening to Uprooted. Here's what happened last time. A toast to our new friend, Bitsy, to whom this heist wouldn't have been possible. Well, thanks. I thought I would follow you. They weren't going to kick me out anyway. We all have special skills that...

Compliment each other. Hazel's somebody who can get you things. Peggy is the brain of the operation. Brumley, he's the brawn of the operation. And me? I like to think that I'm the glue that holds this operation together. Bitsy, you're clueless, confused, and half the time I think you might have a serious brain injury. Is diploma a fruit?

You're all absolute circus freaks, but you're my circus freaks. It's a fox girl, and she's telling us to be quiet. Oh, jeez, we should probably be quiet. There are six of them. Over there. Capture them all. Ten of these guards, these Marquisat soldiers, start to approach in your direction.

"Sir Grumly of New Felicia reporting, "it's all taken care of. "They're all very dead, sir." "I'm not leaving, Grumly. "If you have to go, go, but I'm not leaving my friend." She places something into your hand and immediately bolts off into the forest. "I will not forget this.

- Pug! - Some sort of medallion. - And you see the large clearing town of Click Clock Crossing. As you see a handful of town guard leading a chain gang of prisoners of all variety of species, except for cats. You see

As the final yank of the chain, a hood fall off the last of the members of this chain gang and you see orange fur and pointed ears. As you see that same fox, the rebel of the Woodland Alliance has been captured by the Marquis Zond. You all have made your way into Click Clock Crossing.

It's taken about an hour as you make your way through the rolling hills and almost scenic meadow life, various cottages, burrows built in. You see the various rabbits that dominate this clearing along with plenty of other creatures. You see in the trees the houses built for the birds that live in this clearing, that live across the entirety of the woodland.

waking up to go about their, uh, their daily lives. The smell of, of, of, of baked goods, uh, hits your nostrils, uh, almost immediately. And it's absolutely just, uh, heavenly as the hustle and bustle, um, uh,

starts to begin as you make your way through the town. You hear another gong of the large clock tower that is at the town center in this clearing. As you see various carts very heavily guarded, a dozen Marquis Zot soldiers guarding these wagons going to and from a large borough structure also towards the town square, the Better Borough Bank.

going in and out, also being shipped around down the river that intersects this

is clearing. And it's at this point you have the, this Marquis Otz soldier, the calico cat, uh, shrouded in a blanket or some sort of other fabric, uh, hidden, uh, seemingly just look like goods that you're carrying. Um, and it's at this point you see, uh, the chain gang led by that huge hulking, um, ram, uh,

with a large underbite, almost drag these prisoners, many of which look malnourished and sickly, as you hear the rattling of chains as they're pulled away down an alley. And the townsfolk of Click Cluck Crossing, they look

Their attention might be drawn and you see that they kind of a skulk back and shirk back as they see this huge ram with massive muscles lumbering forward. And they seem to show genuine fear towards this beast. And as he passes them, they ease up a little bit and go about their business. They don't seem to be particularly surprised that prisoners are being led through town.

And that is where you find yourself as the grumbling of this ram and the rattling of the chains dissipates. And it's just a nice, peaceful, but bustling morning in Click Clock Crossing. What do y'all do? - Is this Pottsville? This doesn't look like Pottsville at all. - What? No, I told you we're going to Click Clock Crossing. That's where we're at now, we made it.

We just came from Pottsville. Don't you remember? I thought we were going back. I thought you said you could never go back. They were gonna kick you out. Oh yeah. Now, should you maybe like write yourself a note so you don't forget things like me who's lots of notes? That's a good idea. I'm gonna take a stick and I'm gonna start to write into the path. Can't go back to Pottsville. Well there you go. Now I'll always remember.

Well, anyway... That fox that we saw! After all that, it killed a lot of people, that fox! Well, to be fair, I think we were gonna have to kill those people either way, but I was hoping she'd at least get away, but it seems like someone was able to catch her. Well, I mean, she got, you know, Inspector Jarvis on her trail. It was all for naught.

Speaking of which, what are we gonna do with this guy? I like point to the... I just point to him like in your arms and he's just like limp and you're like holding like, yeah. I was kind of hoping we'd like get to an end and maybe lay low because I don't know about you guys, but I could use a rest. But what are we gonna do with him? We can't just walk around with a guy who's mostly dead. I don't even want to say half. Um...

Well, maybe. I have an idea. Okay. I throw my crown. And I rummage in my bag. Quiet, good, quiet. I rummage in my bag and I pull out my old Marquisot tabard that fits over my arm. Oh. And I would like to put it on.

and I'll say, "Okay, I'll find some kind of military medical tent, and I'll drop him off there, and I'll act like I pulled him from a burning building." Oh, I thought you were going to turn him over to that big Ram guy and tell him that he was part of the Woodland Alliance, because that would have been a lot funnier.

Well, I mean... No, no, no, no. But then you would have to do that. No, no, no, no. Charlie, your plan is much more noble. Much more noble. All right, well, so should we just meet at the inn? I'll just go try to drop him off and... Do I, like, look... I want to look around and see are there any kind of medical tents or any military presence here that...

- You look around and I would say that you're able to take some time walking about the city. You hear the sound of the workshops starting to awaken and you pass by a recruiting station. There's a line of about half a dozen critters, mostly rabbits, but several other species. You see also a blue jay that are going to sign up to fight for the Marquisant.

You see that there are a number of barracks as well, especially centered in the banking district of this town. And you are able to find signs towards a field hospital.

where you see that there's a number of cats and rabbits. You see a skunk with an eye patch and a crutch limping around, recovering from some sort of battle with an opposing faction. - Well, if anybody wants to go with Grumly to help him out, that's fine. I'll go secure us a room, and of course, I'm gonna get some food and drink because I'm hungry.

I'll go with you. All right. I'm probably going now. That's fine. The rest of you don't really look like soldiers. No offense. Well, I just, you know, I know Peggy. She's very smart and refuses to listen to anybody. And Bitsy, well, she barely knows where she is.

Oh, we went over that. She knows now. Give it like five minutes. You did screw up a letter on the ground, though. After dropping the Marquisot soldier onto the ground, you see that he smudged out some of the words and it says, go back to Pottsville. Are we going back to Pottsville again?

You know what? Why don't you guys come with me? Breakfast on me after our lovely haul in Pottsville, which we're not going back to. You mean it? I mean it. Anything we want. Yeah, sure, why not? I mean, within reason, I only have so much gold. We dropped a lot of it on the way out. Okay. What do you think, Peggy? Yeah? Yes, you're all right. If you're not hungry, I could eat yours.

You're probably gonna have to. I killed a lot of people back there and I don't really have a... I don't have an appetite. Well, you heard her. I'll take it, don't worry. I just didn't know it was gonna explode like that, you know? I thought, well, it's gonna scare them for sure. It's a fireball after all. But the way they were screaming as their flesh was melting off of their bodies and that... I'll never get that sight out of my... Make a perception check, Peggy. ...of my memory. He was terrible at this.

- Perception, you say? 16. - 16. - Nice. - Your attention is immediately drawn all around you as you just hear the gurgling screams of Marquis of Soldiers for just a moment and then disappears. - Did you hear that?

The gurgling screams of the Marquisat soldiers for just a second before it dissipated into nothingness. You don't look so good, Peggy. Maybe we'll go sit down. Can frogs sweat? Because I'm sweating. You look a little clammy, for sure. I mean, she kind of always looks a little clammy, though, so... Yeah, it's part of being an amphibian. My stomach's gurgling. Maybe that's what you heard. I wouldn't have said screaming, really. It's more of like a...

That's exactly what it sounded like with a few more pops. Let's go to the inn. All right. Good luck. You'll be all right. And I'm gonna give you inspiration for 10 minutes. Okay. I'll pick him up off the ground. I'll throw him over my shoulder. I'll have my halberd in my other hand and I'll sort of like get away like,

I'll separate from them before I come out of the tree line and I will walk up to where I follow the signs and try to find the hospital or a medic. Yeah, it's a very simple building. You see the sign. It just says Field Hospital. Nothing fancy. You see that there's a number of... To say nothing fancy on the sign. Yeah. It's nothing fancy. It's actually just a field hospital. Nothing fancy. LAUGHTER

And nothing that's spelled with an apostrophe at the end. Naturally. And you. I'm pleased, thank you for that. You can heal here. You can die here. This is it. I need you to make a deception check at advantage because you're wearing a Marquis Zot tavern. Oh, shit.

Deception, you say? You've got ten minutes, so don't be afraid to hold it if you need to, you know what I mean? Ew. Oh, gross. What's that? 18. 18? That's pretty fucking good, yeah. I'm gonna save that. Okay. I'm going to roll for the Marquisat soldiers at guard.

They get a natural four, so not even close. So you see that there is a rabbit and a cat at the entrance. They're standing at watch. They seem to be a little bit distracted and lazy. They're very tired. You can see that the sleep is still in their eyes. As you manage to make your way into the field hospital, you see...

You hear the hustle and bustle of the nurses and the doctors as they're making their way to various soldiers of all sorts of species. And you can kind of hear the low groans of some critters. And you hear very faintly off in the distance what sounds like actual moaning or almost screaming in real pain.

as you see that there is a front desk with a large tawny cat wearing a nurse's outfit. And she seems to be writing down something in some sort of ledger.

Oh, God, it hurts. It's real pain. Please. Hello. This soldier needs help very badly. I pulled him from a burning building. I applied field medical aid as best I could with various salves and other herbs. I had to lift his skin a little bit. It's bad. You should really see him, please.

You make it a Zephyn Jack. Oh, God, it hurts. Just straight up. Do painkillers exist in this world? I was so close to the sweet release of death. Do you think so? I'm going to use it. What is it, a D8? Kill me!

It is a DAS. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. What's his name again? Is this Constable Fuzz? No. Sheriff Fuzz? No. Fuzz ran away. Fuzz got away. Jarvis got away. Fuzz got away. This is just nondescript. This is red shirt number six. Can we call him Constable Fuzz from now on? Yeah, that's canon now. Okay, thank you. 22. Bingo. Bingo. She got a 20, so... Oh!

- So cool. - Tawny Cat having none of that. - She looks at you and says, and she's like- - Tawny Cat ain't no fool. - She looks at you and she tilts her head a little bit and says, "I don't recall hearing about any fires in Click Clock Crossing, but oh, oh no, you looks terrible. Oh God, God bless you.

"The gods bless you, laddie." And she walks up and taps her shoulder and she's, "Oh, give him here, give him here." And you see that she almost says, "Oof," but then she steals herself and she is nearly half your height and she holds

this soldier in her arms without any problems. - Would you say that she's a brawny tawny cat? - She's brawny tawny cat. And you see that she's actually got some nice muscular charm. - She's swole. - Yeah, her swole, as her sleeves pull down and she's, "Oh, he'll be just fine in nurse Jossa's care." As she, the quilted quicker picker-upper cat.

As, um... She says, Oh, bless you, bless you. We'll get him all healed up and patched up and you can come see him whenever you want. What was your name? Oh, um, I'm...

Field Sergeant Brumley. Fuck! The Interceptor has a village. No! Six.

- I roll a natural one. Plus three is four. - Shut up! - Awesome. - I'm very happy. - She's too distracted with the body 'cause he's coming out of his skin like a glove. - She actually does, she looks at him and you say that and she doesn't really realize the extent because he was really heavily wrapped up. - She scares the kids. - And she looks down and she says,

You said a burning building did this? Yeah, it was a very burning building. Burned to a crisp. Oh, it was terrible. You should have seen everybody else. This is the lucky one. She looks up at you with haunted eyes. I look low in my head. Oh, sweetie. This is how Peggy becomes a villain.

I pray to the Marquis and her family that I never encounter a very burning building. Oh my God. Good. Oh. And she like takes him and this entire, this soldier onto her shoulder and she reaches up. Good boy. And she gives you a pet. Good boy, good boy. Oh,

We don't get many jokes from new Felicia around here. So I couldn't pass up the opportunity. Well, I'm not going to be staying long. And, you know, so I'll probably be gone forever. Goodbye. Goodbye. Oh, you know what I said? Goodbye.

And then so she takes a nurse Jossa, head nurse Jossa, takes the, can I write that down? Takes the Calico cat whose name he never learned. So therefore I have not decided. We'll name him Skinly. Ew! Ew!

As you make your way, having successfully deceived the Marquis forces in this field hospital. And I will hustle to the inn. You do that. And meanwhile, the four of you

look around and there's a handful of establishments, but the one that smells the sweetest is a several story building painted pure white, very well maintained, that actually looks like a very large cartoonish beehive.

that they might have in all the apiaries. And you see this called the Honeycomb Inn. - The Honeycomb Inn. - The Honeycomb Inn. And you see the smells coming from this building is probably the most delectable so far. Although you can kind of get the whiff of

There's actually a whole bakery quarter in this clearing as well. - He's just visibly drooling. - Yeah, so you see, and this is the inn that's closest to there. It's basically in between this town square area. And you see, once again, you look up, the clock tower is across the square. You see that what,

would have been a massive ancient tree, petrified, burned. There's slash marks in it. Some branches have been snapped up off. But you see once again at the very top of this, a very large manor house built into what had once been a canopy. And you are able to go into the honeycomb inn.

And you meant it. We can have anything that we want for breakfast. Yes, yes, yes. And I can have hers. Yes, that's fine. And mine. Yes, let me just talk to the... How hungry are you feeling? I'm pretty hungry, all right? Just hang on. Let me talk to somebody. Let me sort this out, all right? Look, we've got money. We might as well spend it while we have it. It's not going to last forever. I'll go over there and I'm going to run to the bakery section and like press my little nose up against the glass. I will try to find someone to...

- Talk to, she's manning a desk. - Yeah, so you see that there is, it's a, it's not lively and rowdy like an inn would be after sunset, but you see,

a large line forming that you have to dart around as there is a breakfast being served. You see that there is all sorts of pastries, sizzling meats, and a large pot of some sort of grits or porridge, and all sorts of other breakfast foods, large pots of root tea and coffee. And you see that there is... - Key! - That there is a...

a heavy set badger who is, who seems to be the proprietor of this establishment. Going around, he has a large, almost like perfectly polished silver

what do you call those coffee pot things, the percolators? The percolator pot. A carafe, yeah, of coffee or tea. Obviously, it's made of tin, right? Yes, it's made of tin. And the front desk of this inn is empty, but as he sees you enter, he quickly goes over and throws a towel that had been draped over his arm onto the bar. He places the percolator of coffee down, and he...

approaches you and you see now he's wearing very nice clothes of purples and golds, very well dressed of great finery and he steps over and he says, "Welcome to the Honeycomb Inn. "How can I help you, friends?" - Oh, well, thank you, sir. First off, we're gonna need a couple of rooms, preferably as close as possible, next to each other if possible. I paid for three nights up front and I'm gonna need four,

- Make it five plates of food. - Five plates of food? Well, it's all you can eat. It's this flat fee at the breakfast buffet. - Well, in that case, I'll just pay for five entries. - Okay. - See how that works? - Yes, exactly right. - I'll just go into my coat pocket, pull out a small coin purse and like dump out, you know, a lot of the, or a good amount of what we got from our heist. And does this cover it?

Yeah, no, that'll be, if you, if we're staying in this part of town, if you want five entries, that'll be about seven gold pieces all told. Done. I'll just, I'll push that amount at him. Oh, he takes. You got any of that rye barrel falls? Rye.

- Well, of course, yeah, we get it shipped in down the river, Old Tom's River every evening. - I'll take another two gold out of my pocket, have a bottle sent up to my room, and I'll give him two gold pieces. - He takes them, and I look, well, thank you for the tip, friend. As he collects all of it, he counts it, and he very quickly swipes it into a till, closes the box, locks it, and with that, he pulls out, he opens a drawer on the desk,

And you see as he, you hear the rattling of keys as he pulls out the number of keys that you requested. He places them on the desk and he also pulls out a very heavy book and he drops it down and he flips it open.

And he says, and of course, there's the business of just making sure that we know who you are, as Viceroy Bontilda has decreed. We know where you're coming from and to make sure that you're all good to go. A lot of strange characters coming in and out the past couple of months, trying to lock down on that. I'm sure you've heard of that. So just, you need your names, your place of origin, where y'all coming from, where y'all going, how long you staying in town? Oh, all of us.

All five, not just me? Oh, no, I'll need all five. Oh, goodness. Well, yeah, of course, we can attend to that right away. My name is Bitsy. Yep, there we go. That volunteered that one right up. This is Penny. Oh, yep, Penny. That's right, Penny. My name is Penny. Have you ever smelt a body burning? Penny, Penny, not now.

Not now, not now, Penny. The sound of flesh popping in the woods. Okay, I'm sorry. We've had a very traumatic evening, which is why we're here so early in the morning. The way the bones crack when the fire gets into the marrow. Oh, oh boy. We got, right, we said Bitsy, Penny, Hank. I don't know her name. Yes, Maple Nut Bar. You can start eating now. Go ahead, go ahead, Maple Nut Bar. That's your name, that's your name, Maple Nut Bar. Maple Nut Bar. And the fifth one that will be joining us, he's Pug, uh,

Pugsley. His name's Pugsley. Adams. Pugsley Adams, that's right. But he, you know. Make a deception check at advantage because you're being helped by all your friends. Did you hear that? It was just a fireplace. Is there any way you could turn that off? 29.

I can't beat that. We came for Pottsville, you know, we're here for at least three nights. If we need to add more, I can add more, but I don't know how that works. Sorry, I'm new to these parts. How many rooms did you get? Two. Two, okay. Can you make sure one of those rooms does not have a fireplace in it, please? He turns to you and he actually looks a little serious. And he says, oh yeah, I don't know. I don't know the smell. I was...

I was there. I was there ten years ago when they took Sticker Brush and Rebels. They done terrible things. Holy shit, that got dark. The crack in the fire still haunts me. It never stops haunting you. I can't sleep right. One of my eyes kind of starts to lilt off to the song.

Your tongue pushes it back. Penny, why don't you take this room key and when you're feeling better, you can come down and have breakfast, right? She's paid for. Take your time. It'll give you time to turn that fire off. Who knows what'll happen if I come back downstairs and I see it on and I'm just gonna turn around and go upstairs. Ah!

- Well, this might cheer you up. You can do a kid's menu and like some colorful writing instruments. There's a vase. - What is this shit? - It comes with crayons. I love it. - All right, um. - I'll get the chicken nuggets. - Peggy's safe. Penny is safe in her room. Honey Nut Bar is over there eating to her heart's content. Bitsy, please go ahead. I'll wait for Pugsley.

Pugsley. At this point, Pugsley enters. Thank you. I'm just shoveling. Thank you, Hank. You're at the buffet. Yes, but I don't have a plate. I'm just going to each station and shoveling. You were smart to buy all of that rye. I hear they hide illusions in the water. What? They hide illusions in the water. Who is they? We'll talk about them later.

Oh, you're getting us rooms? Oh, yes. It's me, Field Sergeant Bronsley! Oh, Hansley!

Pugsley? Pugsley, yes. I missed you. You're Pugsley. You've always been Pugsley. Here's the key to our room. A pug named Pugsley? That's like the most cliche name for a pug ever. I know, I'm panicked, all right. But if you're hungry, I bought you breakfast. So it's all you can eat and get in line. And we've got a room. I'm actually hiding on the stairs and I say, yeah, outside of the name Luna.

And I'm going to turn around and I'm going to continue to walk up the stairs. Well, that's Penny is going up to her room right now. And Honey Nut Bar, Honey Nut for short, is over there chowing down like she always does. And of course, we've got Bitsy. Honey Nut Bar.

Someone just said it, shouted it out and it sounded like it stuck. I was in a tight spot, I haven't slept. Was it not, I mean, as I was coming in, I might have heard maple nut bar. Maple nut bar, that's exactly right. It's maple nut bar. Oh my goodness. I need to make an exception. I'm basically delirious from not sleeping. Maple nut bar. Let me write those down. 11.

I roll the natural two. You see the badger look at you and his ears perk up as you say Brumley, but then as soon as Booker kind of jumps in the way, he seems to get distracted by another guest and then hands them something that they need and then turns back and he says, well, fellas, my name is Bo, if you need anything. And

- I don't sleep much, so all hours of the night, I'll have the rye sent up to your room right away. - Thank you so much, Mr. Beau, and I promise we won't cause any problems. You won't even know we're here. - What was he? - He's a badger. - A badger? - He's a badger, an American badger. - Thank you for that clarification. - Come on, Rat Cousine. - No, no, no, it's Hank, you know that.

I'm gonna call you Raccoonsly. If that's what you want, you know, Bugsley. Whatever makes you happy makes me happy, friend. All right. Where's Frogsley? My name's Bitsy. And he says, and he looks over and he says, in the bar area, I apologize about the gentleman in the corner. He's had a rough life and I don't have the heart to kick him out.

He means well, but it's a little pathetic. Well, we've all gone through rough times. It's all right. Yeah, we have. Joyous day at the Honeycomb Inn, friends. Let me know if you need something. And he goes back to his business. All right, well, I guess Penny's going to be resting. Looks like Hazel's going to be out for at least, I don't know, the next eight hours. Stop serving breakfast at 10. Uh-oh.

What time is it now? It's probably about 9.50. 8 o'clock. 8.30. Quite frankly, I was going to go see our rooms and then maybe hit the bar. I could use a little drink after what we witnessed last night.

I suppose I could take my armor off and store it in the room, you know. I haven't taken this off in like three weeks. Yes, well, we could all use a little bit of relaxation. Splank it. Yeah, maybe a nice bath. I could drop off my bags full of sap. Yes, yes, you could. Did you say sap? Like tree sap, yeah. You have bags full of sap? I have one bag, yeah. That's what I put on that Bernie guy. Oh.

Is that what that was? Well, yeah, let's do that and then we'll drop off our things. We can, you know, split up amongst the rooms as we see fit. I'm a gentleman. I figured ladies and men, separate rooms, but they should be close. So we'll be all right. All right, let's go. You do that.

And you find wonderful rooms. You're able to join back as Beau, the proprietor of this place, looks at Hazel and he says, I gotta go warm the kitchen. He shuffles back. Could you ask them while you're back there if there's any more of the sweet potato porridge?

Sweet potato. Are we out already? We just, oh yeah. Well, it's just that it's an all-you-can-eat and I can eat more of it. He looks at you. My cheeks are like out to here, just like shuffling. Do you see any of the flashbacks of like war horrors in his eyes? And this was the last day they ever had an all-you-can-eat. It's really delicious, all of it.

And he nods and he says, well, I'll let him know. I'll let him know. And he shuffles back into the kitchen. Thank you. Bow money, bow problems is what I always say. I wish I understood half the bit you said, Bitsy. But why is she still Bitsy?

Well, to be fair, I really didn't have a chance to jump in before she just introduced herself and then got all my names wrong. So I just kind of rolled with it. But you weren't here, so I had to come up with one for you. And that's where we are now. Well, I guess I'm Pugsley then. Just for now. Well, I could be Pugsley Brunley. Absolutely. It's your name. Maybe it's my last name. I mean, they don't know that. Well, that's...

Penny often have Adams, but you can be Pugsley Brumley Adams. That's fine by me. Do you like a hyphenated? Adams Brumley? Hey, whatever you want. It's your persona.

There are no rules yet. Plus... Well, hold on. Not like that. I mean... Oh, no. I mean, there are no rules when you're a vagabond. We're free to do what we want, provided we don't get, you know, incarcerated by the Marquisate or, you know, snatched up by the Eyrie. So just don't get caught, is what you're saying? Yeah, more or less. Are we all doing everything? Yeah. So, on our DMs,

Are you done? Oh, I was in the room. I was told to go to the room. Yeah, we were going to drop our stuff off and like, you know. I'll come back down. Yeah, we can all. I'll make sure they turn the fire off.

And before she comes down, I try to find like a plastic clicker thing. Turn the electric fireplace off. You gotta turn this knob out! You find a clicker, you find a something, it's a clicker, and you hit it. The fire doesn't change, but you get a horrible ringing in your ears. Touchdown, 49ers! And it's just a dog clicker. Uh, as, uh...

You're changing the channel at the bar and people are getting really pissed. As Vogue steps up and he's like, do you need some help with that? Do you want us to... Is it too warm in here? I mean, do you mind just making sure that the fire is out so that our friend can come join us? If you don't mind. Make a persuasion check. At advantage because he has experience. Ooh, 25. Oh, wow. He says...

All right, it's been a dark couple of months. I would stay inside. There's gonna be some public executions later. I don't know if y'all folks are familiar with that. Oh, good heavens, no. Yeah, no, the viceroy's been cracking down on the rebels and they deserve it. I ain't saying they don't, but. So are they members of the Woodland Lawrence?

Not presumed. Oh, how do you feel about that? Feel about what? I don't care if I'm... You wouldn't hang in the streets. No, I just mean like the woodland and ice. Like, you know, as a person of the forest, you know, you're not a cat or a dog or anything. I'm just curious how you feel about their message. I know it's pretty intimidating because he looks like one of the Marcusette and...

Because he is. I've seen what they do. It's not good to talk about it out loud. Yeah, this is hardly breakfast conversation. Just call them rebels. They fugitives of the law. Criminals. Viceroy has orders, and I guess folk here got to do what they got to do. Once peace returns, then perhaps it'll all stop and we can go back to our charming, comfortable ways.

But they just brought a whole train of folk. They say it's gonna be tomorrow. So... Oh! We passed them! But we're gonna kill all of them. That's what usually happens. I'm just guessing. With the big ram fella. Oh, Clunk? Yeah. Clunk? His name's Clunk? You stay away from him. Oh, is he... He looks very strong. He is the Viceroy's right-hand ram. Ha ha ha!

I thought it was just his underbite that made him look a little frowny. And the muscle. Yeah, Hazel, he was like seven and a half feet tall and probably weighs like 650 pounds. Have you ever seen a kangaroo? What? A kangaroo? I don't think they're from the dim wood. But they're yoked. They hop on their back legs. Are they running?

What? Runny yolks? Yeah, I thought it was called chunked up. Well, they do. They do run. So here's the thing. They have these tiny little arms, but their chests are massive. And what they'll do is they'll put their arms around your neck, especially to dogs, Pugsley, so you don't want to get anywhere close to them. They'll put their arms around your neck and then they jump up and they've got these back

talons on the back of their legs and they literally rend you down the middle and let your guts spill out all over the ground so it's like a bird with arms that can run and huge ears like a bunny this is in the dim wood we don't have to worry about it i've never heard of a kangaroo being in the dim wood before but they might and they're highly intelligent and really territorial oh bo leans forward his eyes are wide

I ain't never heard of nothing called a kangaroo, but there are dark things. I don't know if you've been to the forest edge, in the woods, especially at night. There's something on the edge of the clearing ground. They say that there's a bear. - Pretty sure a kangaroo could take a bear in a fist fight. - The viceroy sent soldiers out every time. They'd never come back. - Holy moly. - There's supposed to be hunts every week.

No one's been, no one's been skilled enough to survive, I guess. There's a huge reward, but I don't know what fool would ever take that up. No amount of gold is worth that. - That's what I'm saying. - But how much gold really though is, are they talking about here? - You ain't seriously considering it? - For me personally, no. - Oh, well in that case.

It's 5,000 gold. Holy smokes! I mean, paid for personally by the Viceroy herself. But Tilda? But Tilda. Is she a rabbit? How do you know? She is pretty famous. Her face is all over the place. It was a wild guess on my part. Are you okay? You didn't just make a joke? No.

Rabbit? Wild? Yeah.

He looks at you and says, "You folks really aren't from around here. The viceroy is one of the richest folk in all the Dimwood. The honey that we make here is shipped over the entire Dimwood and it's used to sweeten the tea of all the fancy noble types of New Felicity. They even ship it back to the Montecat, back to Old Felicia."

That's how good the honey is. She taxes the heck out of it and with all the tariffs, she makes a pretty penny. - And you have samples of the honey?

Oh, the good stuff with the Queen's Apiary? Oh no, that ain't for us common folk. We got good clit-clot honey, which you've all... It's some on your... It's the fire in your face. That's just the normal stuff. Have you ever heard of the dimworm? Dimworm? Yeah, it's a giant worm. It's about three feet long and one and a half foot around. And it has a face...

Like a human face right on the front. The hell's a human? What? What's a human? It's a gigantic wild creature. Jesus. Talked about lore. Mythology, folklore, you know? I've never heard that referred to as a dimworm, but the Welidigo. Did you know that the Welidigo is an offset of the dimworm?

They were originally one in the same until the cataclysm happened. What's the cataclysm? It's just like in my dreams. What do you mean in your dreams? I feel like I'm crazy, I'm going crazy here. I was stationed in Reckonor Ridge when I was a young badger, but I could have sworn that I had

One night when we were out camping, I saw that bulbous shape. You know how you can tell the difference between a dim worm and a willy-to-go? How? One of them has a gold ring right around the midsection, and every time they scoot along that three-foot-long body, that ring just wrinkles up in its folds. Yeah.

- Well, there's that much gold that you should tell the viceroy about it. - But it's the Wulidago that uses them and you don't want to get close. - Well, I ain't never going near after what I saw that night in Reckonoita Ridge. - Which was?

I saw people go off to take a leak in the woods and they came back different. Chained after witnessing such a thing. The babbling, I can still hear it. It sounds like a willy to go. I'm chained just from listening to this story. I'm just trying to enjoy some porridge and you guys are talking about some horrific stuff. I'm sorry. I can get dark in my thoughts sometimes. You know what? I'm going to the bar. Goodbye. That's why I have such a soft spot for

for old Nestor in the corner. Oh, I thought you were talking about me. You know what? Yeah, I'm going for you. That was obvious. I'm going. Enjoy the conversation. This is lovely. Where are you going to go? The bar.

- Oh no. - Don't we have drink service at our table? Do we have drink service at our table? - I can bring it to you if you care to. - Yeah, but it comes with tales of the horrific creatures. I don't wanna hear about this. - The problem with that is that you'll be bringing it. - Could you bring us drinks in and go help out Vester over there? What was his name? - Isn't that the name of your uncle? - Almester? - Nestor.

Just old Nester. Like, he's old. I don't call everybody old. I just want to be respectful. I mean, it's kind of hard to tell. He looks like a middle-aged duck who just had a hard miserable life. And you look over, as you see that there is a large empty bottle. It's probably about like nine o'clock now. And there's a large empty bottle of whiskey. And there is a very rough...

haggard and clearly drunk mallard duck that's sitting at the corner table and he just looking absolutely miserable. - Now that's a guy who knows how to party. - Should we say hi? He looks lonely. - He reminds me of a duck I knew in my youth.

Is Beau gone? Beau, yeah, go take your drink orders and fuck off. Did any of you in your youth have summer jobs? I don't mean to interrupt, but I think Beau has a crush on you. Why do you think that? He called her a pretty penny.

That is pretty cute, but I'm currently living in the horrors of last night. I don't have time to think about a summer romance. Maybe Beau could be your beau and just romp you right out of that. He owns an inn. You should lock that down right away. Nothing cheers me up like...

Well, I was going to say puddin', but I guess like kisses in this case would be nice too. Or company. I mean, owning property in the midst of the market is pretty impressive. It is for me. I can't think about getting naked and rolling around with a badger when I can still smell the... the... the... the scent of burning flesh.

Oh, well you should... Can we light a candle or something? I'm sorry, I'm sorry, can we light a candle? I've been told that lovemaking makes a certain order. Maybe it would...

It smells like my alchemy lab back home. Maybe that would cover the scent of all the crispy corpses. So did any of you have a summer job when you were growing up? Just one normal breakfast. That's all I want. I used to work in a place called Quack Donald's. Our clientele was mostly ducks. I manned the register, which was this place...

- A place where you'd put the gold when people ordered their food. - A till, it's called a till. - We called it a register because that's where we registered the gold. - All right, touche, ma'am. - I worked behind it when I was nigh but a penny in my youth. And there was this duck that came in. Flarnald was his name.

- Farnald used to wear a shirt that was a little bit too small for him. In a lime green color. - In there. - And a pair of shorts that were a little too short and a little too tight for him in a bright neon orange color. So his belly button, I don't know if you know this, but ducks have belly buttons beneath all that fur. - I wouldn't have thought that. - And his belly-- - Ducks have fur? - Feathers, but I feel like I'm just interrupting at this point. - I'm learning so much. - Feathers, whatever.

It was, this is a terrible story. And if I had to live through it, you're going to hear about it now. And he would walk up every single day, every single day.

and his belly button would be exposed and Flanald would stand in front of me and he'd look up at it. We had this really nice menu that was carved. It was done by a really, this woodwork, anyway. It's carved onto the wall and he would look up at it and he would stick his finger in and out of his belly button with a loud squishy pop. - I'm gonna be sick. - Over and over and over again as he went, "I want the big and nasty."

And I would say, "Flauntle, do you mean the big and tasty sir?" And he'd go, "Oh, no. The big and nasty." And so I would order him the big and tasty that was number five on the menu. Stop his meal and he'd leave and then I'd see him again the next day. That's how I paid for college.

With big and nice boots? No, by working at McQuackDonald. McQuackDonald. Yeah, McQuackDonald. Well, they eventually changed the name later. Yeah. It became a chain. I think it's all over the internet. Never had that. You should try it. You'd love it. I'm sure I would. Oh, the French flies are delicious, but I mean, I'm a frog, so. That star was so pretty. What? It was beautiful. I love that. I love that.

It sounds like that guy was just lonely too. You know, I'm not quite sure. I'm gonna go talk to Nestor. Alright. I'm gonna... Where's Nestor? He's just at a table. Nestor's at the corner table. I'm gonna walk up to Nestor's table and... Hi, Nestor. Um... I just recently learned that... Fireballs. Fireballs.

And so I thought that maybe I'd strike up conversation with you about your belly button. Why is everyone asking me about my belly button? See if you can do the pop. Is that what he really says? I thought you were fucking amazing. He looks up at you and it was a drunken look. How do you know my name? Oh, um, Bo told me.

Oh, good old Beau. Yeah, he's a real guy, you know, and the buffet is delicious. Yeah, I always called him the Beau-fay, and all the patrons would throw pennies at me. What? That's really good. I had a penny disparity.

give it to you too that's quite a joke I said that he should rename it he'd make so much more money and he refused I'm useless I'm a failure but you could start your own Beau Faye oh that was my dream well not Beau Faye because my name is Mesto it was my dream to become a chef to be the personal chef of the of the viceroy

I used to be Beau's cook until I failed to drink. Just break the glass and murder him. I swear, we can't have one nice family meal. It's never gonna happen. I don't ask for much from you people. Nesta, it's never too late to change your life. And if you ever want to practice cooking again,

I'd be so happy to help you out and taste test for you. He blinks at you and he says, No, it's not just that. I've already fallen from grace, my reputation. I was a master chef. I was better than iron. I was platinum chef. I was lined up to be the Viceroy's personal chef and...

I lost it all due to something so silly and ridiculous. What happened? This should be good. Well, I was known in this crossing years ago. That's horrible. As my duck sauce was legendary. What's that mean? Oh, the sauce...

created by me, the duck, and I named it Duck Sauce. I've never had that. It's not at all what you think it is, but it's very delicious. What would you put it on? Everything. That's why the Viceroy loved it so much. It's delicious. But she would only take the best, most credentialed personal chefs.

And she would only take someone who had earned a certificate from Gordon Ramsey's school. And I went through the whole thing. It was grueling. He beat me down emotionally and physically occasionally. And I got my degree. And I just had to use the little duck's room. And it was gone. And I had nothing to show for my years of hard work.

You can hear all of us. I'm like trying not to turn around. Ramses. Oh, yes. The most prestigious culinary institution in the whole of Timwood. I've heard that's very prestigious. Nothing else for the Viceroy.

Oh, and I would have been able to create the most delectable sweets from her secret honey vault with the queen's honey. That's my dream, you know. That was the secret ingredient, the duck sauce, a little honey. No one would have guessed because it was a little spicy. - Oh. - That's so, that's so what happened. - And then ever since I lost it, I just, my life was over.

That's really... How can anyone lose something so important to themselves? I'm such an idiot. He's like, oh, Bo, can I have a note? I have enough books, please. Just the cheap stuff. You always have your secret recipe for duck sauce. Which is...

Honey and something I'm sure that was very tasty. You know the worst part? What's the worst part? That's my terrible spiral. Started the moment I misplaced that diploma. Maybe they could have... I forgot the recipe to my own duck trot.

Well, um... I could have been something. That's terrible, Nestor. It's really, really sad and I, um... Don't be like me. I'm a cautionary tale. I'll take that into consideration. And thanks for telling me all of that.

Oh no, I tell everyone. I come upon everyone in town over my thorn. I'm a laughing stock. I've just got a little tickle in my throat. I've got to go back to my table. How typical of Duck is a stock? What? What? Duck stock.

Can I have one? Are you gonna buy me a drink? I've got most of what I want. He's just saying random shit. Oh, well, I could have been. I've gotta go. I'll see you soon, Esther. The secret was honey. The secret was honey. I can't remember anything else.

Goodbye. Goodbye, Hazel. And Bo looks and is like, was that her name? I've got something really, really important to tell you. We heard the whole thing from over here was quite embarrassing.

You've ruined that guy's life. No, what? You stole his diploma. You fucked his life up flatter than a hammer and shit. He probably used literally all the money that he had, everything he owned to go to Gordon Ramsay's culinary school. Oh, it was my life saving. You stole his life away. I worked at Quagdaw. That's not what I was going to say, no. What were you going to say?

I was gonna say that the Viceroy needs a personal chef with a certificate from Gordon Ramsay's school and I have one! Did you find out if he can do the belly button pop? He really just skimmed right over that. I guess it was a little inappropriate to ask right off. Hazel, I was gonna scold you just like everybody else but that's actually brilliant! I could get a taste of the Queen's honey. I mean listen... Do you know what that's worth? Not to mention all the

probably pay you. I'm going in a sugar shop just thinking about it. I was going to tell you that we had to fix this guy's life, but as soon as he said that he forgot the recipe, it's like, what's even the point? Why would he pass up an opportunity to get close to the viceroy? He seems clumsy. He misplaced his certificate, and you know how hard those are to get.

If you're gonna do this, you're gonna need some actual cooking tools though because the things that you gave me are not that. No, I know that now. Cobbler tools do not make cobbler. That is true. So you're gonna need some chef's tools. So we're gonna have to find some place in town that sells a really nice set of chef's tools because if we're gonna pass Hazel off as like a top tier chef, we gotta make it look realistic. My dream's gonna come true.

We're going to need a hat. We're going to need an apron. We're going to need the tools. We're going to have to pool all of our money together to get this done. Is it morally gray or questionable to anyone else that not only did Hazel steal that poor duck's diploma, but she's going to steal his last dream? He said it himself that he's a drunk and he misplaced it. Well, actually, he misplaced it and then became a drunk. And to be fair...

He was only saying he misplaced it because he set it down, went to the little duck's room, came back and it was gone. Yes. That's terrible. Did you ever maybe take a look at if there was a name on the diploma that you stole? No, I scribbled it out pretty quick. Oh, we could probably still check right now. I bet we could tell.

I bet if he looks at the back to see. I'll hold it up to the light and you see something of like Esther Modester. But it's... I got a 24. We were a little busy not being able to breathe. Just making up bullshit. Yeah.

You hold it to, there actually is a, there's a few hanging lamps. It's a very well lit, beautiful room and there's all sorts of light flooding in. And you hold it up to the light and very clearly is the name Nestor Zappa. Huh. I guess it, I mean, inconclusive really. It's...

It does say Nestor Zapper, which he did not say is his name. And, you know, how many different ways could you spell that? This could be Neester for Reno. I mean, that's how I would spell Nestor. I mean, if I were named Nestor, that's how I would spell it. Yeah, but... Hey, hey, hey, mate, what's your last name?

It's Tampa, but my whole family disowned me. It's neither here nor there. It's not even his name anymore.

Look, I don't know what's going to happen here with all this, but we are not blowing this opportunity just for you to try some royal honey, all right? We're saving this. We're keeping this in our back pocket because there might be a big payday involved at some point, all right? Why not both? Well, we don't really know anything about this place yet.

We've just shown up. We know there's going to be public executions tomorrow. We've got to be careful. Plus, if you take on this role... I'm sure that's going to be hungry work. They probably need somebody to cater the executions. You think about how many last meals just walked by us in the street. And if you screw that up, what do you think is going to happen? You're going to get tossed in with them. And you're going to be on that chain gang and they're going to publicly execute you. All I've got to do is just scribble out whatever this says a little bit harder and it clearly says hazelnut.

Well, I mean, then that means that we're agreeing that we're going to steal that guy's diploma and dream and life, really. His life's over. It already says, Hazel, no. Really, if we did that, you'd be stealing from me and I don't think that's fair because I'm not a drunk. You're spending way too much time with me. Sounds like something I would say. LAUGHTER

It just seems fair. I did go through the course and I thought I did really okay considering that I was making pies with shoes. LAUGHTER

Shoe tools. Shoe tools. A lot of them ended up looking like shoes, but they were fun. It was like a whimsical kind of hand pie. Or foot pie, really. Oh. You know, Booker, sometimes I miss the days where we, you know, were pretending to be the Soggy Bottom Boys, playing jaunty tunes and casually muttering Morley Gray elites. Yeah.

You know, simpler times. You can never go home, Bromley. You can never go home. So are we going to allow Hazel to do this thing? Because we have a lot to prepare. We've got to get her a chef's hat. She needs an apron. She's going to need actual tools. Who the fuck is Hazel? I'm going to go to the bathroom.

Well, you know... I know it shouldn't bother me because she never knows where anything's going on. Well, Bitsy's in the bathroom. Do you want to steal something from her? No, why would I do that? She went to the bathroom. I know she really doesn't know my name or where she is, but I think she's, you know, getting towards friend territory. My purse is right there. Oh. Do I smell anything tasty in her purse? You probably smell sweet inside.

That's not what I asked. You haven't smelled anything tasty. Whatever Derek says. I'm scared to the line. You gotta ask, I'm just saying. I do smell, but then my stomach is like bloated out here. My cheeks are still kind of working off some of the all-you-can-eat buffets. No, I wouldn't steal from Betsy. She's a friend.

Alright, if you're sure. Is there any chance that maybe, if you can get close to the Viceroy, you can convince them not to off all those pork credits? Yeah, maybe. That's a good idea. Look, I know that we all have differing opinions of this Woodland Alliance, and some of us might not be so keen on them, but...

You know, it just seems a little barbaric to be hacking people in the streets. And I'm calling in a crew! Well, I would say it's a little barbaric too to light an entire town on fire, which is what Beau said the Woodland Alliance has been doing. I mean, here's the thing. I don't necessarily agree with their principles. I believe that the Marquis' art has brought industry and civilization to the Dimwoods.

But that doesn't mean, I mean that fox girl seemed okay and you know, she meant well I think. I mean maybe not, but it seemed like she did. I feel sad, you know, and maybe she was wrongly accused.

I guess she wasn't wrongly accused because you have the acorn thing. Anyway, my idea was maybe we could show Bo the acorn. I don't think that would be a good idea unless you want to be hung in the street tomorrow. Let him finish. What were you going to say? What are you hoping he's going to do?

Oh, I don't know. Maybe he would turn us in and we would be hanging in the street. Oh, that was the whole thought. Okay, thank you. No, I didn't have anything else. Fantastic. That's the last time I stick up for you, Grumman. Well, no, I don't know. Maybe he would be like, Why? Why would you do that? You're one of us. Let me show you there's a secret underground tunnel that goes straight to the prisoners. Take it. And then jump out, kill the ravens, free everyone.

and you'll be the heroes of the crossing. The heroes of the... Have you been reading comic books again before bed? That's a pretty unlikely series of events. What do you think this is? Some sort of theatrical production? Jeez. I don't know. We've done some pretty cool stuff before. I mean, it's not that unreasonable. I mean, he's a badger. Badger's a good, hardy, you know, animal of the forest. It seems like a woodsland alliance-y type of animal. Yeah.

That's a little racist. Okay, I'm really, I hate to say this in front of everyone, Pugsley, but you are not Pugman, the mass vigilante of Gruffam City, all right? You gotta stop reading those things before you go to sleep. You're getting wild ideas. It does kind of look like it. Well, just say it. Say it. I'm Pugman. Justice. I am vengeance. I am the knight.

Oh, you're Pugsley. That's pretty good. Oh, it's pretty good. All right, I will give you that. That's pretty good. But you're still not him, Grumly. I mean, Pugsley. No, it's Grumly. What? Oh, boy. We've got a lot of names going on here. Anyway, so we're going to do this. I mean, I really think we should kill that bear instead. Why would we kill a bear? Like, about 5,000 gold pieces is a lot of money, but it's also a bear. And if we're going to pay for you to get a job...

I don't think it's... No, you get paid... I think... I never had a job. We have to buy you your hat. Did you get paid for your job at Crackdown? Yeah, of course I did. So don't they pay me then? Yeah, but we gotta pay for your hat, we gotta pay for your apron, we gotta pay for your actual cooking, your chef's tools. That's true. I burned through a lot of my gold in the rooms and all this food. You gotta break a few eggs and make an omelette. Oh, okay.

I should avoid food metaphors. - So I think that's a good point. We should probably go kill that bear, get the 5,000 gold pieces, and then we'll definitely have the money to get Hazel up into Barnicula's castle or whatever. - It's a bear though. I mean, good lord. - How are we gonna kill? I mean, we're like a fraction of the weight of a bear. - I mean, he's four of us and bitsy. - Bears cannot spin their heads around 180 degrees.

How far that is? I don't know, I made it up. I'm not really good at math. That's not very far at all. I mean, is that a weakness we could use? Yeah, because if we all jump on the bear's backs, we're so small, the bear's not going to be able to turn its head all the way around like Beetlejuice. I heard they can just go like that. They're pretty easy. They're more flexible and nice. They don't have thumbs.

I don't think they need-- And I reach up and I also don't have thumbs. Well, here's the thing, I'm thinking maybe instead of the reward we could be like, "Could you please release the prisoners?"

But I mean, I guess we could just have... You're stickier than you look. Although I don't know what's more valuable to the crossing... I touch you and I'm also sticky with honey. Is killing a bear or, you know, keep catering a mass execution? I'll have to be honest, my sugar was a bit high when Beau was telling us about the bear. Why do they want to kill it?

Because it's scary. It's going to maybe kill people. But has it already? Except for the ones that were hunting it? A lot of people haven't come back, or they've come back pretty messed up. From hunting it? Allegedly. Hey, look, you don't have to convince me. I don't want to go tussle with a bear. Have you seen me? I'm a raccoon. So you don't want 5,000 gold pieces? I'd love 5,000 gold pieces, but they're not good to me if I'm dead. Why don't we just go see the bear and say, hey, these people are trying to kill you, and...

And why don't we just help you pretend to be dead and then get the gold that way? And then the bear doesn't have to die. He'll probably reward us with a stash of honey. And then we can come back and have $5,000, a bear friend, and some honey. What are dollars? You know, um, I don't know. Hi! I'm back from the bathroom. I bought a bowl of sugar. From the bathroom? From the bathroom?

No, I got it from the buffet. There was sugar? You actually ate the first bowl. Well, I didn't even taste it. That's why I got a second bowl. But see, I knew we were going to be friends. We are good friends. Good friends. I'm Hazel, by the way. Oh, you're Hazel? Shh, keep it on the down low. I thought your name was Honey. No, it's Maple, for now. You can call me Sugar if you want.

I like it when sugar comes in cubes. You don't often get that. I don't really know how they get it in cubes. So what are we going to do then? What's our plan? Well, if we need money to pay for...

Hazel's four thousand gold textbooks. I don't think it costs that much but I can't just go as one singular chef. I've got to have a whole chef crew which means you all need little chef hats too and probably aprons. And so someone's gonna need to be the sous chef, someone's gonna need to be the dessert chef, someone's gonna need to be the bus, the bus boy or the server or whatever and we'll be an entire crew you know what I mean? It would be great.

It'll be... Oh, and we need to come up with a name for whatever restaurant you ran, wherever it is that you came from, so we can give it fake reviews. Oh, gosh, I gotta think on it. On Yap. On Yap. Let's call it The Restaurant. You can eat here. It's...

It's an eatable location. It's awfully vague, don't you think? Oh, that makes it sort of believable. Everyone will say, let's go to the restaurant. They'll know exactly come to us. Oh, think on it. There's something wrong with your logic. Actually, that logic's pretty sound, because if you just called the place to dinner, then when everyone's like, hey, let's go to dinner, they all want to go to your restaurant.

Yeah, but what if we want to serve breakfasts and lunches? What, like people don't eat breakfast for dinner? And teas in the afternoon and morning. Well, you're starting to get a little out of sorts here. We can call it to dinner. And did someone say breakfast? That makes it less vague, but I guess it's more of a catch-all.

- What about lunch? - But what about lunch after dinner? - What about dinner? Did somebody say breakfast? What about lunch and tea? - That's, that's names getting very long.

I think there's something about putting long names on permits that I'm not gonna allow that. Oh shit, that shit's copyright. You can't start that shit. This is ours. This is the best idea I've ever heard. Please write it down for somebody. I'm writing it right here. Do dinner and did somebody say breakfast? What about lunch and tea? I'd kinda like to name it after my dad. What's your dad's name? Well, his name is Wal.

- Wally, he's both sides. - Oh, Wally's. So like, what about just Wally's Restaurant? - I was thinking like Walmart, 'cause then it covers all the different things and we could have like breads and pastries and also-- - Is Marks for like markets? - Yeah, it's like a mart where you can go and like, but there's like a sit-in place and like,

Heck, maybe if we even get really, really big, like some of the things that you make, the maybe less explodey ones, then we could sell that there too. Maybe it could just be a store where you can find everything. And if we do really well, we can just lower all the prices and run out all the local businesses. You know what would be really cool too? No competition. Oh, and this is how you...

how you can make up to Nesta. I don't know what voice I'm using right now, but here we go. This is how you can make up to Nesta. You can ask him if he wants to stand at the door and greet people when they come in. The fact that he's a slobbering drunk that smells horrible isn't going to deter anyone because if you're shopping at Walmart, you're used to it by now. That's exactly right. I think that's a great idea. So then, oh, this is great. Pugsley, this means that Hazel isn't going to ruin Nesta's life. She's going to give him a whole

new lease on life and money to buy more booze. I've completely lost control. I don't know what's happening anymore. I don't know what we're doing. I'm worried. For the first time, I'm worried. This group is, we're eating each other alive. The bathroom's over there. He just died.

- What? - I think he's about to lose his head. - Do you think maybe you just wanna take a little nap? - Yes, yes, I would like that a lot. - All right, let's do that. Let's maybe just have like a little rest. We'll digest a little and then maybe we should explore town a bit and see what we can find out about those prisoners.

All right. Yeah, I... Look, I don't know about this whole bear thing. I'm still on the fence about that, because I really like my insides to stay my insides. And I know I said that I didn't really want to get involved in the whole politics of the situation, but I also don't want to see a whole bunch of dead bodies swinging from the...

rafters or whatever they're gonna put them. What's worse? A bunch of small dead bodies or one like really big dead body? Or your dead body? Oh, how about none of those? How about nobody dies and we saved a day and we have five thousand gold? I love that! That's an option. I'm taking that option. Yes, yes, Grumly. That's the one that sounds nice. I think we can kill a pair. I mean, we're really good at killing stuff.

Remember that owl you stabbed right in the back? Oh man, you just took his life like that. It's barely an inconvenience. What a change. Super easy. I try not to think about that, Bromley. You really shouldn't hold it in.

I mean, when I'm hit with murder, I think I'll smash me old pal Booker. That's terrible, Grumman. Why would you say something like that? You were so good at it. Desperate times call for desperate measures. You...

You always, you think back to the, or you think to when people are telling stories or in plays about how when someone on a play gets stabbed in the back, they let out a, they're yelling, but you know what it sounds like to stab someone in the back where the air goes out of their lungs. Oh, boy.

You see blood on feathers of a barn owl just immediately. Thank you, Saruman. It's bird fur. Out of a horrible burlap sack. It was a long time ago. It's fine. I mean, you saved Hazel, I think, maybe. Did you really stab an owl in the back?

It was a long time ago, like Runley said, I'm not really going to talk about it. I'm going to bed. I'm going to head to my room. It's about 10 a.m. now. Yeah, they can. If he didn't see you coming, he really kind of deserved it.

I was gonna ask, when you stabbed him in the back, did his head turn around in shock just as he died? Why? The light went out on his eyes. Get out of my head! Get out of my head! Get out of my head! Get out of my head! Why? Why? Why? Why?

And you walk past the staff of the Honeycomb, and as they're clearing up breakfast, you see one of the patrons who wakes up looking groggy,

- Looks like maybe a well-to-do merchant visiting from New Felicia to Cat. He's like rushing, he's huffing and he sees that they've cleared away the buffet in the morning. He's like, "Ah, fuck!" "I hate when this happens every time." - It's okay, mate, they were mostly out of everything. I asked them to refill, but you know, these little places just can't accommodate sometimes. - I don't want to.

I go to, oh, Mabbs, that's better anyway. And he stomps off, very frustrated. And you're able to go to the room. And you find it very nice. You see that there's a bottle of rye from Rye Barrel Fault. I crack that bad boy open. I pour myself like four fingers of rye and I'll drop my things and I'll lay in one of the beds and I'll try to get a short rest. Yeah, you're able to enjoy a short rest easily.

- I guess we all go back to the dorm rooms. - It's 10:00 a.m. - We've been awake all night. - Yeah, we need a little nappy nap. - Before I go back to the room, I wanna go out into the, I will leave the inn, and I'm gonna look for a flyer that has like the bare information with reward.

And while I'm out there, I just kind of want to sniff the air to see if I get a scent of the fox girl. Because I presume, I mean, I don't know. Yeah, make a perception check at advantage. I like that. What a great idea. I rolled 213. Nice. Not bad. Two. To pay the bills. 18. 18.

I would say that you sniff the air and you actually do get a scent. It is very faint, but you are able to follow it a bit before it gets, you know, there's a number of foxes. You know, you've seen a few foxes, but the one that seemed very familiar as you took it in

You're able to make your way towards the military quarter of this. Which the field hospital was on the edge of. Right. And you see the field hospital, and you see that there's another recruitment center there, several of the barracks, and you see that there is a large building.

that is towards the center of this corner where the buildings are built up. You see that charming, for lack of a better term, like cottagecore aesthetics of the rest of the buildings in this town. This is a lot more

Very simple, very efficient. Reminds you very much of the military buildings in New Felicia. You recognize this. And same as basically all of the Marquisat structures and quarters that have basically been erected in all of these towns.

that they have control over. And you see, however, there's a very large building that is of the dark stone that's almost circular and tiny, tiny, tiny windows where there are windows at all. And you get the sense that this reminds you of a prism.

And it goes in that direction. - I'll make note of that, and I'll, there's like a flyer for the bear. - Yeah, you're able to see, and you see that they're on, past the, in the center, there's a grand statue of a plump rabbit holding a scepter looking gaudy, and you get the sense that's probably the Viceroy. As you eventually find,

a large bulletin board, you're not too far from the town square, and you find, you see an image of a huge bear, at least what you've imagined and what you've seen depictions of bears etched. And it's not crude, but it's not particularly well drawn. And he's got like almost like this cartoonishly like savage mouth dripping with blood, holding a huge ax.

and wearing very simple kinds of leathers, like you'd expect a barbarian or something like that to wear. And you see that there are rabbits that comically have their heads removed, and you see that there are cats that are severed down the middle perfectly cleanly by the artist, and cartoonish blood and bones scattered around. And it says,

that the Return of the Hide of the Bear is the reward personally paid for by the Vault of the Viceroy.

- Are there multiple, can I pull one down? - I would say you'd be able to find something like that. - Terrible ticking off in the bathroom. - And you would see that there's a number of bulletin boards, some are plastered up and basically saying like a menace to the Dimwood. You see that there that some people see as you approach, you see some townsfolk saying like, "I wouldn't expect bears to be this far south or this far west."

but I never thought we'd get bears here, that kind of thing. It seems like this very mythical, horrible threat. - Are there any- - Go ahead. - Dragon at rest, the viceroy is the bunny. - Yes. - Are there any notifications about the executions? - I would say that on the same bulletin board, you would see that there are large,

general wanted posters for various, you see a mouse, you see a skunk, you see a, actually one that looks a little similar to one in the chain gang that you had seen. You see a fox, you see a woodpecker and you see a,

a general poster saying to turn in all traders to the Marquis Zot. Anyone who would be a threat to the Marquise herself is a ten gold reward. And nothing about like scheduling executions. - I will return to the room. - You do that. - Hey look, look what I found.

What is it? How is it? Well, it's... none of it's new information, but look at his drawing! Oh my... Isn't it pretty cool? God, that's horrific! Look at how scary he's buried. Are we in there? We've got two rooms, right? Yeah. You can hear me through the wall. Are you guys all in the same room? Yes. I'm just in my room! We gotta connect in. Yeah, absolutely. Join in the room. Obviously, that's in the other room. I mean, it's the honeycomb, man. It's a nice place. What do we know about this particular type of creature?

I would say it's almost like this mythical... The analog, also in the world of Root, is like they're kind of like trolls or ogres of like myth, of the monsters who live out in the woods. And in this world, it is like they're these barbarians.

- They will go in and gobble up and none of you have ever seen them. - Oh my goodness. - And you know, some people say that it's just, you know, bears are really just like old wives tales, right? And you know that they're, or maybe they did once exist in the Dimwood, but that's from an age past. They're barbarians, they're savages, you know, they're monsters. - I know, I mean, I don't even know how I'm gonna go about dealing with this thing. I wonder if we can even be reasoned with. - They're very strong, I know all about bears.

Nobody knows anything about bears. It's all wives' tales. How would you know about bears? I learned about bears in my dreams. They can regenerate. Regenerate what? All the parts and bits. If you hack off a finger or an arm, it just... What is it?

If lizards can do that, then yes. Well, not all the parts, but like the tails and stuff. Well, like that, but it's their whole body. That's why people get sent out to kill them all the time, because they destroy the economy. If you just eat a little bit of bear meat, it'll regenerate inside of your tummy. You'll never have to eat again. Wait, but what happens if you just cut a bear straight in two? Then are there two bears?

That doesn't make any sense. Don't do that. It's how you get two bears. Well, then how do we kill this thing? I don't know. I just know they can regenerate. I didn't dream how to kill them. I don't like the sound of this drumming. I don't like where this is going. Maybe the creator can use one of her bombs and then you can just ignite him up. And if he's all a bunch of tiny pieces, will you just crush him like little tiny bears?

Will each little bit turn into a full bear? No, I think there'd just be lots of tiny ones. Like ants. If anybody who goes out to find the bear doesn't come back, how do we know there really is a bear out there? That's what I'm saying. I mean, clearly this is some sort of artist's rendition. We have no way of knowing if this is even accurate. Are you sure? But see, what does a bear look like? Well, they're big and they're fuzzy. A happy bear.

You remember that ram guy that we saw? Yeah. 36 times bigger than that guy. 36? That's like... I remember I was in my room. And I was looking up and I could see this massive creature looking down at me, this giant, huge bear the size of the trees around me, bigger, taller than even that. And he looked down at me and he said,

"What's that thumping underneath your hutch?" "I mean, remember, it's a dream noise. I'm gonna keep that in perspective." "What if it's all just some scheme and they're sending people out to get the bear that they want to get rid of?"

Look, all I can tell you is things that I've heard and that's just that these things are an absolute terror on the Clearings. If it's a real thing. So it doesn't make sense to me that they'd want it gone, but I don't know if we can deal with it. We're gonna have to come up with some kind of plan. All I have to say is at least it's not a cockroach. Why? That seems easier to deal with. Cockroaches were the first thing that was ever created.

And when all of life on this planet has been extinguished, the only thing left will be the cockroach. And in the dim wood, you would know that cockroaches are basically the analogs of dinosaurs. But like, bot also currently living dinosaurs. I mean, if it suddenly checks out, I'm not going to question that at all. And if evolution catches up with them,

Within our lifetimes, the potency of their venom would be enough to annihilate all of animal kind. I'm starting to wonder why we choose to live here in the first place.

I mean, this is just every, everything around, every turn, under every rock, behind every tree is absurdly dangerous. There's nowhere else to go. It's a miracle that we've lasted this long. Have you heard about the Gila monster? The Gila monster? No. It's a desert dwelling lizard. Does it do nice things when you have a boo-boo? Oh, honey. Her name's not honey. That's a term of endearment. Hazel.

No, my dear. When it bites into you, it fills your wound full of a potent venom. By the time you realize that you're gonna die, you're dead. That's too soon. I know. It's not something even my healing sows can help me. Oh.

It's true, Bitsy could peel your skin back and just rub salve into every place that's beneath your skin and you would still die. Wait, so Bitsy has a healing salve? Is she the Gila monster? Well, it's spelled like Gila, G-I-L-A, but it's pronounced Gila. Oh, like Gila. I would not expect that. Yeah, it's a common mispronunciation. People be like, oh, the Gila monster. No, it's not a Gila monster, it's a Gila monster. Oh, well, I'm not particularly cultured, I guess.

- That makes two of us. - Don't worry, if you get bit by a cockroach and you get poisoned, then I'll just break your neck and you won't even have to think about it. - Thank you, Bitsy. I'll break your neck too. - The way of mercy is my path. - Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Can we make sure that this is like at least plan C? Like we try other things before we start breaking each other's necks? - Oh yeah. - That's like the last letter, so that's fine. - Good, good. I'm glad that tracks, Bitsy. I'm really happy for you.

All right, listen, this thing's not supposed to come out until nighttime, I guess at least is our best chance of finding it. I certainly would like to lay- Yes, the bear. Oh. I would like to lay low for a while at least. I don't want to get mixed up in anything before we have to go hunt this thing. What are we going to hunt? If it even is real, what are we going to hunt a bear with?

Beats the hell out of me. I was going to try to talk to it. My pointy stick was pointier than I thought it would be, but I still don't think it would do much to a bear. I'm a gigantic halberd and Peggy invented magic. You

You heard what Bitsy said, that the bear was 36 times the size of that ram. That means it's at least 270 feet tall and about 21,000 pounds. Might as well try to scare him with a toothpick. In fact, I'm shocked we can't see him from here. I know exactly what we do. I know exactly what we do. Do you hear my fireballs? No. Never again. Unless we really need it because we're in a lot of trouble.

No, what we do is we go into the forest, okay? We find a thistle bush, you know, or maybe a rose bush, or maybe, you know, something else with thorns. We're small, right? If a bear is really this big, what is the one thing that can take down a giant? I will tell you. I will tell you right now. What is it? It is a fucking splinter. Oh, yeah. We will each take a thorn.

There are five of us. A bear only has four paws. To our knowledge. Yes. We will each rush for a paw. We will stab a thorn in between the soft spot between its little toes. Oh, I hate that. It will fall. It will fall. That's way better than my idea.

Please entertain us. Regale us, Bitsy. I was gonna suggest that we build a machine that can fly. Then we get a long rope and we attach it around the legs of the bear and see if we can get him to fall and knock his chin and bleed out after biting his tongue. Wow. That could be plan B. That's so very specific. I like that. Have you ever seen a flying machine before?

Well, we have to invent it. That's the act of creation. We've got the creator right here. We're going to find. She's been around since the cockroaches. That's forever. Excuse me. You're right. I apologize for my ignorance. So what do you think about my plan with the. That's a plan. All right. Have you ever gotten. Have you ever walked around in a tailor shop?

when they have dropped needles on the floor and accidentally had one wedged between your big toe and your second from your biggest toe. - Yes, once. - Your ring, is it the ring finger toe? What do you even call it? Your index toe? - I call it my index toe. - Your pointer toe. - I call it my index toe. - Oh, your pointer, you can't point with that. Anyway, have you ever had that happen?

It is debilitating. I'm telling you, this bear will not be able to function. One splinter would be enough, but we're going in on all four parts. I don't want to say I'm a genius. You said that maybe we should just talk to it first, right? You can't talk to a bear. How do you know? We certainly try. Okay. I mean, we know what's happened to everybody else that's tried to hunt and kill it. Most of them didn't come back. That's why they're not

Well, maybe, but I'm saying it might not hurt to try another angle of attack, so to speak. Look, it's just an idea. I certainly, you know, default to you, Peggy, with the plans. I mean, you look like the brains around here. I'm sorry if I feel like taking down a bear is significantly less work than traveling through the forest with Bitsy. Um, I'm not sure I follow, but I like your plan. I think it's a good plan. I just, I do still feel... Bitsy is a walking landmine.

What? Right? Yeah. What? Case closed. Can't argue that. Right. And then plan C can just be we just hit it with our weapons until it dies. Oh, I really don't want to do that. I thought plan C was we was going to break Hazel's neck. No, that was plan B. No.

No, Plan B was to build the airship. And that's only in case if I forgot if something poisons? Yeah. Or if I get hit. We're not breaking anyone's neck. That's way past Plan C. I mean, we need, like, Plan Z.

Let's make Breaking My Neck plans-y. That's what I'm saying. We're not breaking anybody's necks. Does that mean that Breaking Booker's Neck is now plan A because the alphabet wraps around? No, no, no. Mine should be something like maybe like not in the alphabet at all. I don't think that's a plan. How about like A-A? Or A-1? No, no, no. 1-A.

Just think of the owl. Can you imagine trying to snap an owl's neck and it just keeps going and never actually-- I do every night, Bitsy. I do every night. We should probably get some sleep and we'll wake up at, you know, when the sun goes down. Like dusk is a good time. Yeah, we're basically nocturnal at this point, because we're vagabonds, you see. Yeah.

we do our best work at night. Yes. Yes, Gromley. Thank you for that. No, it's Pugsley. Oh, sorry. In your raccoonsley. No, I'm Hank, actually. Thanks to Betsy, I'm Hank. You know, I'm in my raccoonsley, but Hank is fine. Well, maybe the next clearing will be Hank. Maybe the next clearing.

Um, goodnight. Goodnight. And I'm just gonna fall back on the bed. My eyes aren't gonna fully close, they're gonna stay like half open. You're gonna start to snore really loudly. I don't understand why we got all these rooms if we're just gonna all sleep in here. You're not, you're going to your own room. Goodnight. Peggy has the key.

I'm gonna like roll you out of the door. I'm gonna roll you like a quarter turn and see if you wake up. No, I'll wake up. Okay. Fine, fine, fine. I'll go back to our room. You all go back to your rooms. You hear the sound of the lunch crowd coming in.

And you hear the, as some new folks, you hear some new voices that you don't recognize. You hear, oh, woe is me, my story. Oh, I'm a failure. I've lost it all. Oh, to be at the left hand of the Viceroy. Oh, but a dream, a nightmare. And you go to bed.

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So we lose our temporary hit points from the incredible speech that I gave and you will not be getting them. So, I mean, what time would it be? Evening, perhaps. Dusk. Is it spring or summer? It's probably dusk. You wake at dusk.

And as you wake, the last orangey bits of rays of sun are coming over the trees of the woodland and past all of the many birdhouses built in around you. And you be able to gather together as you hear people coming back from their

from their day of work or visiting, whatever they've been doing to stay at this inn. And you hear the dinner rush starting to start. All the while you're... And with that, you're all in the same room. I haven't slept that good in a while. That was nice. With a little bit of luck now, based on what Bo had said,

There haven't been any hunting parties for a while, so if we go after this thing, hopefully we don't run into anybody else. Because that might be a nightmare. Why? What do you mean, why? Why wouldn't we want to run into others? We don't want to run into the Marquis Ott's soldiers trying to hunt this thing while we're trying to do the same thing. That could be a bloodbath. For everybody. And then if we do do a good job, then we'd have to split our money. That's exactly right. I still don't really want to kill it, though. Neither do I.

Unless it tries to kill us. And that's all presuming it's real. I mean, it's a horrible monster that's killed probably dozens of poor people. Allegedly. I think everybody thinks that something unknown and scary is a monster, but maybe it's just not really. Maybe it's just misunderstood. Last night I learned what it meant to be a monster. See?

What? You don't remember? No! Oh, last... Oh! Oh, not just this nap time. You don't... Oh, I see. Okay. We napped during the day. That's true. I really wasn't accounting for that. My circadian rhythm is a little... in flux. You know what I think would really get us off on a good foot here?

Breakfast. Well, I was going to say dinner, but I like where your head's at. Breakfast for dinner. Nah. Like the restaurant. Or dinner for breakfast, in this case. Yeah, that sounds good too.

Because it's dinner time but it's breakfast for us. We're breaking our fast. Truly is. Because we just woke up. Philosophical nightmare. And I hate fasting. So let's get a scooch. Let's eat a meal because Hazel won't let us not. I can take it to go. Don't mind a little walk and treat. At QuackDonald's we used to be able to do meals to go. There was this one day I was working.

And in the fly-through, it's where you could quickly order something and then just pick it up at a window and then fly off into the distance. It was for our avian customers mostly. That's very convenient. The way we try convenience was the name of the game. I was working and it was a really slow day. And this pelican flew into the fly-through and

they hadn't ordered anything they just chucked a resistance manual at me right in the face oh i yelled as i got clocked by it and then i looked out did you want to order anything you heathen for working on uh the whole

And then they flew off into the forest. I didn't have a choice. I was on the schedule that day. I had to show up. I didn't even know it was a holy day. That's terrible. It was awful. But at least it wasn't a day with flottles. That's true. See, there's always a bright side. Well, let's go eat there.

I don't know if there's a QuackDonald's here. I've never passed one in my travels, but I'm gonna certainly look for one. They're better than Quack in the Box, but Quack in the Box has amazing tacos. Yeah, I heard that got a lot of people sick. What's a taco? I don't really know. I just know that it probably shouldn't exist the way it does, but it tastes nice in my mouth. Oh, alright. Touche. Fair enough. It's good enough for me.

And it's really cheap. You can get two of them for a dollar. It's basically 50 cents a taco. So... I want to kill something. You know what? I'm starting to come around to your side of things. Perhaps we box up a little bit of this food and we go to the edge of the clearing and see what we can find. I'm just... I've got like a...

I won't say a plastic bag, but let's say a leather bag of some sort that is shaped like a plastic bag with handles and I'm just shoveling food in down the buffet line as we walk out the door. - Oh no, dinner's not a buffet. - Oh, damn it, Mike. - No, yes, and everything, whatever you just said. I'm kidding. - I just expected it. - God, you're such a dumb chipmunk.

Hey, Hazel, can you make me a doggy bag? That was pretty good. Give it, give it, because I'm a dog. I appreciate that. That was pretty good. Yeah. Not for my stuff, but yeah, next time. But not today.

I could do that. And I'll just pick up a random plate on the table. Yeah, there's absolutely... Scrape it into like a little sack and fold it up and give you like a hanky, like a sloppy hanky. It's mostly stews and bread. It's dripping. It's a big chip of stew with a piece of bread sitting on top. It's disgusting. It's seeping a little, but you know, really...

you could just kind of like suckle at the bottom of it and I think you'd get most of it. Like a handkerchief teat? It looks slick, don't drop it. Just like Mark used to make. It'll remind me of what Penny did the other day. I should really send her a letter. Oh, never mind. Oh, um, anyway, let's go. Where to?

You're dead in the woods. Oh, and you see him finally, as Nessar finally passes out, and Beau just, like, looks at him, and he's very busy going back and forth, getting people their food. Can I find Beau real quick? Yeah. Hey, um, which direction were the old bed rows coming from?

Like, what started it, clearly? Yo, that's the western part of town, friend. You don't want to go... Wait, I thought you said that was for a friend you was asking for. Yeah, for our friend. His favorite show on television is Bear Growls. Bear Growls? Television show. What? Yeah. I heard the Bear Growls. Did you get his autograph? No, I heard it at night. It was terrible. Yeah.

Anyways. Are you sure you're awake? I'm pretty sure Bear Growls has drank his own piss before to survive. It wasn't medically necessary, but it was sterile. It's sterile and he likes the taste. So you heard the story. Necessary? Well, I guess when you're desperate...

It's better to die, you know? Y'all folks are asking a lot of questions about rebels and bears. It was from a friend. He just wanted to check it out, you know? Make an exception, Jack. Oh, fuck! No! Uh, 17. I don't know the fucking natural one! Uh, he says, uh, the name of the game here in Clock Crossing, especially with the Viceroy acting how she is...

What's that name? Keep your name at she. She's trying to get with the big wigs of New Felicia. She's trying to sit in the court of the Marquis H. She's sitting pretty here in Click Cloud Crossing, but she's got big aims, friends. I'm from New Felicia. Really, I'm from Felicia. Well, I guess they call it Old Felicia now. Before, it was just Felicia, but now there's a new one. You should call the old one Old Felicia, you know?

I presume based on your breed, the dog, that he was from there, yeah? So anyway, I mean, maybe she, you know, maybe I could help her out, you know, put in a good word. If you know any way to, you know, get in touch with her. Do you have connections there? Indian Felician? Yeah, sure, absolutely. You saw the tabard I was wearing when I walked in here yesterday, remember that? I was wondering why a soldier was just hanging out with a bunch of folk standing in an inn. I created magic.

We're upstanding citizens. They say only the deer got magic. I'm a frog. That's why I don't believe you. Well, I created magic. That's just really rude. No, the common folk aren't going to understand magic, Betty. You're talking to the creators.

We should really get out of here. - You know it's the dinner rush. And I need to go clean up Nessa's, oh no. - Yes, yes, Bob. - I gotta, I gotta. - I know we seem like an odd bunch. We're gonna get out of your hair. I promise you won't even hear from us until morning. We'll be fine, we'll be fine. - I'm a frog. - Well, I suppose if you do, if you are looking to go out into them woods,

tussle with a bear. If you bring back its hide, you'll be the Bicero's best friend. - Well, there you go. - She hopes that to do such a thing will give her, put her in good graces with the Marquise, that a coat made out of a bear hide

Nothing rarer than that. It's going to be a big fucking coat. Oh, man. That's a lot to carry. Don't you... Don't make... You talk to the viceroy. Do not make that... Do not make that observation, man. Okay. What if we just brought back like a little piece of a...

Maybe a toast. We'll discuss on the way. Thanks for the information. Let's go. Come on, here we go. We're going west. Here we go. Come on, Bookie. Do your thing. Do your whole leader thing. Do my whole leader thing. Go west. Why is it that you're not keeping... Why are you not taking the reins over this thing? You're supposed to be the leader here, Book. Are you supposed to control it all?

You're just letting this spiral out of control. - You're right. It's been ever since you joined this party that I feel like I've lost control of everything. - Why? - Just because I know which way west is? - Well, you were about to show us, so go ahead. - Well, now it's that way. - What do you mean? It just changed? - Well, north is whichever way you're facing, so... - North is whichever way you're facing.

Oh, dear lord. Oh, sorry, turn west. Now, which way's west? Okay, now just keep going west. This is gonna be tough. I make a wide circle. Should we just leave her here? I think she would probably do this for like eight hours. Take care of her, come back. She won't even notice. As much as I would love to see that happen for eight hours straight, I think we might need her help.

i swear it'd be rude to be big anyway we're gonna go the different west north is whatever we're facing like actual west i don't know if you've heard of it can we catch it you haven't heard of actual west no well actual west never changes no matter which way you're facing well how do you know which way it is well you have to know which way north is

And then you can figure it out that way. Not regular north, true north. Actual north. Yeah. This sounds like Illuminati talk. What talk it is? It's very Illuminati. Them. Wait, what? I told you about them earlier. Yeah, the ones that poison the water. They're called the Illuminati? They're called the Illum and the Naughty. Well, that kind of sounds intriguing. I'm not going to lie.

We'll talk on the way. Come on, let's go. Oh, wait, which way? You lead the way. I don't know true west. Can we see which way the sun has started to set? Yeah, the sun has set, but you know which way is the west. Yeah, you would know which way the western part of the town is. So we will start heading west to the edge of the query. Um, you do that. Ta-ta-ta! Oh! Ah!

- It's the bear! - It's the bear. - You need a bear meeple. - Where's the clearing? - This is the clearing. - That's the clearing. - Going out in the woods now. - Well, that's not very clear at all. - We're on the best of the edge. - You, you, you, you, you, you, you,

You make your way through the town and you smell the baked goods.

and the cooking that is just absolutely wafting in the air. And you see just these large wagons of bread product. This is the bread basket, or one of the primary bread baskets of the Dimwood. And you see as Marquis Zot's soldiers are going to soup kitchens and taking the food toward to other parts of the Dimwood to help feed the poor and the hungry.

But you also see the absolute delectable smells. Some of the best, most delicious smells you've ever experienced is from an establishment called Old Nav's Bakery that is actually built up into a tree.

And you then make your way out of the market district and then make your way into the military district. And you see as Marquis Zot, soldiers, are giving Grumly a strange look, but then going about their business. And you...

make your way through the barracks and the other, the other respective buildings, go past the military workshops, and then you see off to the right of the street, this, and all of you see this now, a massive circular prison that's like plated in iron, heavily fortified, built of stone.

And as you see that there's several rows of guards there. And as you make your way out, you see another chain gang of only three be brought in. And this is two rabbits and one mouse as they're led in that direction. And no sign of this huge ram.

And eventually you arrive at the outskirts and it's just kind of idyllic hills amongst small little towns outside or dwellings and small communities outside of the main town. You hear the buzzing of bees as you see of, you know, smaller and much larger as you see the apiaries all throughout the hills and the farmland throughout. And it's late by the time you make it to the end of the town.

to the edge of the forest. You see the massive trees of the woodland, not the smaller, more hospitable trees in this clearing, as the darkness awaits. And as you enter this darkness, you tap into your Vagabond experience, and I need a group survival check. - Ooh! Natural 20! - Nice, congrats.

- 25. - Natural 20, 25 points. - This is not what I'm good at. - This is not 12, I got a 12. This is not my strong suit. - You got two natty twins, so 25 for each of us. - Let's see if we can make that three. - You can't. - No. - Oh, real close. - 15 for me. - 16. - I rolled the lowest with a 12. Hopefully the ladies will carry me. - Okay, so then I want you to describe what you're doing and what you're seeking.

Anyone who has something to... Well, I was going to suggest that since we don't really know what we're looking for, whether this thing even really exists, what we all need to be keeping our eyes out for, especially the most survivalistic of us, are just disturbances in the forest. Something that looks like it could create something we've never seen before, whether it be a giant track or broken trees or something. I mean, this thing must be massive. So I'd say just keep an eye out for disturbances.

Alright, I guess I could try to do that. What would a bear trap look like? I don't know, by Bitsy's calculation, like I said, the thing is 21,000 pounds, so it should be making craters. Oh gosh, how will he even know if I'm standing in a hole or a trap? Nah, you won't be able to miss it, you'll fall right in. Follow up question, does a bear shit in the woods? Probably.

Okay, so I'll look for that. I imagine that would be pretty big as well. Oh, you know what we should look for? I'll sniff to see if I can smell any damp, disgusting, bloody, matted bear fur. Or just anything you've never smelled before. Why would it be that? Just because he's a gross bear. We see his picture. Look at how gross this guy is. Can you do it lightly?

things on there I don't know that we can take that for the wrong we know it beads in blood oh gosh it's actually our blood see if any of the former hunters that came in I like to pay you it on trees like 30 feet in the air you know 30 would be very low for this thing more likely they put it he put it like you know a chest level so what they can maybe like 250 feet yeah

- Woosh! - Wow, are the trees even that big? - I have no idea.

Anyway, actually, if I was a bear, I mean, that'd be a pretty cool way to kill people. So I would keep an eye out for that. I don't disagree. I created a spell called Zipper. I'm thinking I might call it Flesh Zipper. Oh, sweet lord. And basically what it would entail, I'm not finished with it yet, is you know when you get a hangnail? I would pull on your hangnail and it would zip your flesh off of your body. All the way around? Yep. Peggy, I...

I respect your intellect, but you've changed a lot since you've invented magic. I worry about you. Magic does things to a person. It does things to other people, too. It's an untapped knowledge that most minds can't handle. Yeah. Luckily for me, my mind is enormous, and I'm handling it quite well. Does that hurt? My eye goes off to the side. My tongue writes it. LAUGHTER

Would that hurt? Very much, yeah. And then your entire musculature would fall out of you. What? Because there would be no skin to hold it together. So I shouldn't do that to myself? You don't have the magic. If you did it, you would just have a bloody piece right here and you'd maybe rip off some of the skin up towards your knuckle. How do I get the magic? You don't.

Okay. How else is everyone helping? I would be looking for large holes or divots in the ground and also just looking for like food sources of berry bushes and you know, beehives and things like that as we go along. You see that, you recall in the

back in the clearing that the really good like apiaries and the hives that had the very, the largest and the most pristine bees were very heavily guarded. But I would say that with that survival role, you're able to find some natural hives of smaller bees that, I'll say with that survival role, you're able to find

pull down from the tree and get some honey without getting horribly stung. Oh wow. Very lucky. A very lucky find and a very rare find. Normally, if you're out in the middle of the woodland and you find a hive, that is near a certain depth. And it's probably 50 times larger. And the bees are much larger as well. I found some honey! It doesn't look like a bear eats honey, turns out. Are you sure it's not called bees?

And you also find a number of berries. You find these plump red berries. And I will say that as you find this, you find a bit of red that isn't a berry. You're recently gathering a bunch of berries. It's blood.

- That's not berry at all. - You see that there is a little bit of, it's not bright red, but it's like a dull red. And it seems to be covering this berry bush, which you thought that all these specks of darker, like very, of unripened berries were actually drips of, of, of,

- Glued? - Of heart and blood. And Peggy, with your role as well, is at this point that you look up, everyone's looking forward and listening to growls, and you, something catches your eyes as they're going up in all sorts of directions, and you see people in the trees. - I don't wanna alarm anyone. I see people in the trees.

What do you mean? Are they just like standing up there? You see silhouettes of humanoid figures and you're not sure. It's a quick glance. There are shadow people in the trees.

I'm going to very carefully look around. Can I clarify, did you intend to say humanoid? I mean, you're a humanoid. I'm an animal. You see critter shapes. Okay, just checking. There are shadow people in the trees. I'm going to very slowly try to look up and around to see if I can see what she's talking about.

Make your perception check. It is advantage because, actually no, you're a raccoon, so. - I'm a raccoon. - I'm cute in the way that I was describing, bro. I totally made that up. - Fucking go. 20 total. - 20. You look up very slowly and you stare up and you see a shock of orange. - That's creepy. - And you see fur as you see a cat in the tree. And what Grumly had told you

is exactly what you see. As you look up, as you see a Marquisot soldier, and then beside that one, you see what looks to be some sort of hunter or ranger. This was a weasel. And they've all been, and then there's another rabbit, three of them.

and they are hanging in the trees, lifeless, impaled on sharpened branches. Oh, sweet heavens. High up into the trees. Grumly, I think you might be some sort of a prophet because you guessed correctly. Was this over where the bush is? Yeah. So I'm like, "I don't think that's dried juice." Is that a blood-bull berry pie?

I'll drop the bear. You know what this means? That we are in way over our heads? No, it means I think like a bear. They're way over our heads. Oh, gosh. You think a bear would do that? Why? What is that? Why would it even do that? Because it kills the sport. It has fun doing it. That's terrible.

You need to be careful. - Just seems like a lot of work too. - Now if I was a bear, what would I do next? After impaling a hunter and their markies up? - You would be ruining a whole bush of berries. - You would walk carefully through the forest, staring down, watching where you put your paws, lest you get a thorn between your toes. - Oh, that's true. - Oh, that's right. Where are we gonna get the thorns? We should be looking out for those. - Yeah.

Really big sticks that are pointy? Well, yeah, I mean, if it's 270 feet tall, we're going to need a damn tree. We can get those pointy... Those folks are stuck up right there. They look real sharp. That's pretty high up, and I quite frankly don't want to get any closer to them, lest we might join them soon. We've got to be quiet. I can be real quiet. Good call. Should we look for tracks around? I mean, we should at some point. I can't imagine that it wouldn't leave some sort of trace or something, having been here.

I want to sniff around and see if I can get any scent or any clumps of bear fur or see any tracks. You make an investigation check, and I would like everyone to make a... Everyone to make a...

Religion, history, or arcana check. Whichever one you prefer. History's plus three. Eight for investigation. Arcana's a plus three. Eighteen for my history. No, they're all the same. Is survival any better? I'm looking for the tracks. Eight. Nope. Plus three's the best I got. Thirteen. Oh, I got a one. So that's a total of a four. Survival would be ten. Thirteen. I got a one, so I...

I got a zero. Yep, I'm with you. I'm right there with you. I would say with that, who got the highest? Was it a 13? No, I got an 18. You got an 18 on religion? On history? I got an 8. Got it. I would say with that, you actually remember now why you had even mentioned that.

is that you had heard a story around a campfire once, and those that would speak of the deer of the forest.

The ones who had dark powers that could warp the minds of woodland critters, could do horrible, dark, evil things, commit horrible acts and that are not sure if they were living or dead or otherwise.

Really just speaking of spirits or almost speaking of them as spirits or ghosts or practitioners of actual magic, but the horrible dark kind. And you had heard a tale of these mysterious deer in the forest performing horrible, brutal acts, or at least those that had been gone looking for deer appearing in the trees.

Wait, no, I remember why I fought to mention this. This is what would happen if you went to go look for deer in the forest. You know, deer, the ancient, like, magical, evil groups that, you know, were here before the birds were even here. Wait, are you suggesting that this has nothing to do with a bear, and in fact that these have to deal with deer?

Their names are so similar, they probably just spelled it wrong on the flyers. I wasn't suggesting that, but that's probably exactly what this might mean. Oh, no, no, no, we are definitely in over our heads. This is not good. Well, it might just be a coincidence that, like, you know, maybe the bear is a fan trying to kind of replicate what the deers used to do. A copy bear. Yeah. A copy bearer.

- All right, so what do we do? Are we any closer? Has anybody found anything? - Oh, I would say with that, you also rolled survival, is that you actually manage to find two impressions in the mud of massive, massive paws with clawed toes that seem to go in a particular direction out towards the southwest.

How big are they? They're absolutely fucking huge. Do they look like bear paws? They look exactly like bear paws. If you had to guess, basically based on foot size and height, I'll say, you know, I won't make you roll for it, but it would probably be like 9 to 10 feet tall. I feel better that it's not 270. But this is still our last chance to turn around now. What if it's just a baby?

I mean, he's a really big footprint. I doubt it's a baby. I mean, any pale people are spikes. We don't know. We don't have anything to compare it to. Maybe Mama Bear did that and this is just a little bear. I think it is a baby. If you were full grown, it would be 20 times that size. Oh, that's scary math. Well, the way that I see it is that if a baby's capable of doing that, I won't feel too bad about killing him.

That is incredibly dark. Taking a note from Penny and still trying to be as quiet as I can, we'll look around and see if I can start to find anything that I think would be a thorn in the foot of a bear the size that I imagine a bear would be. Make us a rebel trap. I can get like a lance, like a 12-foot lance. Nine.

You find some sticks, some long, some a little pointy, but something that could effectively pierce a fabled ogre-like creature, it's difficult.

- Who these were? Do you think these big ones? - Well, they're kind of blunt, but what we could do is we could have Booker use his dagger, whatever you've got, slice in between the toes and then just shove a bunch of sticks in that wound. - That sounds like I'd have to get very close to that. - Why does your mind work that way? - 'Cause I created magic and now my mind has been opened to the realities of the world.

You carved this one, now work on this one. To ancient truth long lost to animal kind. I will take one of the sticks and start sharpening it, fashioning it into a small spear, which would be a splinter for a giant foot. And I'm going to chew on the end of one and see if I can also get some sort of conical situation, sort of corn on the cob style.

Okay. It's like you're a beaver. I would say make a dexterity check and add your proficiency. Hot dog. Make a dexterity check? And then that's it. Oh. Oh.

- Oh, I got a 17. - Okay, yeah, you're able, you basically have a primitive spear. - With dirty 20. - Oh yeah, so you both were able to take these four. - The Dremel. - I don't know if I should be the one wielding this. I kinda need both hands. I don't wanna, you know. But you have like a real weapon. - I was gonna say, why are you handing it to me? - No, I just, I don't-- - I'll take it. - All right, thank you, baby.

All right. Do you want one too? I've got my stick here. I think it's all right. Do you want to lose it in the paw of the bear and never have it ever again? I'm going to stick this sucker so deep into that bear's flesh, he would need actual tweezers to get it out. Bears don't have opposable thumbs. Oh, gosh. How far off do you reckon we might be?

I mean, it's hard to say. I mean, we could just follow the tracks. They're at least old enough where we can still serve, fresh enough that we can still see them. So let's just keep going, but let's be as quiet as we can. All right. It sounds like we're all in agreement. We're pressing forward. And keep your eyes up. If we walk into the bear and it's had dinner recently, that would be a not, that would, that situation would be a not fun. All right. Okay. Wouldn't that be better than if it hasn't had dinner recently? I don't want to be shit on.

Oh, I don't want to be eaten. I'd rather be eaten than shit on. Yeah, I think so. I feel dead opposite to that. I do think so. You'd rather die than have poop on you? If the bear really is like 22,000 pounds worth of beer, yeah. I don't think the bear's actually there. I think I would die if it shit on me. I don't think Vincy's dreams are necessarily reliable. I mean, at least what I would call reliable. Excuse you.

Let's go find it, Spare. We steal. And I'm gonna get on all fours and start sniffing along the ground as we go along the ground. Why am I rolling like such crap? Brumly's tail goes completely stiff as he very deliberately sniffs on the ground. I am like the knight. Thank god for my plus. 29. One second. Four. Six.

I think I got a 13. I'm trying to double check and make sure I don't fuck this up. I think I got a 13. 13. Do we have any twists? I don't think so. We have one. I think there's one twist. I'm not sure. But we definitely need them for fucking combat. So. We're definitely fighting a Tarrasque. Grumling is the park knight. You make your way through the woods and you...

And you hear the sound of a massive shape off in the distance. You look expecting to see a bear, but you see the... A glint of green as it's actually just a beetle. As it... A huge beetle as it lumbers off in another direction. And you find a very... You follow this scent trail from like... And the tracks are...

They're getting more fresh, but you get the sense that although that you can find them, they are so deep because they are absolutely so massive. So you're not sure quite how fresh they are. But you see that they go, the path that you go is the forest and the thickets getting tighter and tighter. And the quiet, the forest is getting eerily quiet. And the...

The terrain is getting more and more treacherous. And every 15 minutes that you continue, you look up and you see there's five more bodies in the trees. You see all of them seem to be geared for hunting. They're all armed. Most of them wearing Marquis Zot colors and tabards. And then eventually you find a large block of stone.

And as you find it, you look up and you see two large antlers directly ahead of you. Fuck. And you jump back for a second and you realize that they're unmoving. And you peer around this large tree and you see what looks like an ancient withered statue of what you imagine to be a deer. It's the depiction that you've heard that is cracked down the center.

as you see bits of stone, uh, bricks and other structures rising up in this forest, as you seem to stumble across an ancient room. Oh my gosh. This is a deer ruin. All the years that I've spent wandering around these woods, I've never seen anything like this. Me neither. Um, so maybe it is just a bear that's a big fan of deer.

You know, maybe he read too much about how the deer are kill people, so that's what he's doing. Some kind of worship. Oh, yeah, like a bear copycat.

I mean a dear copy bear. A copy bearer? We covered this. I'm cranky. Wait. What's a cranky? I don't know. I'm all, I'm all mess. It's just, there's a lot of bodies in the trees. I have a feeling we're woefully under equipped for this. I know, we're just walking under them like they're not even there and I, it just makes me a little sad and ill.

I had a question, but I'm withdrawing it because Biffy wouldn't think of it. Withdrawn. Little one must think of it. How fresh do the bodies look?

Well, the ones we saw had dried. They were the most fresh. Okay, and the blended are dried. And you heard that the last one I think had been like two weeks ago. Okay. And then you see varying states of decay. You can use that if that was you. The closer that you get. And there does get to be a point where once the forest gets so dense and so treacherous, it seems to stop.

And you don't see any of it in the trees around these ruins, but the forest is so dense and you actually see that there's off into the distance, you see the bricks, but then you actually see a wall rising up, overgrown in moss and vegetation. "Be careful and keep an eye out for movement. I don't think the deer exist anymore. This is very old, I mean, I think."

Look, Peggy, can you tell if the deer's magic? Well, I created magic, so I know I'm magic. I know, but what if when you... I don't know, I just heard the deer's... Well, I heard because you just said it, the deer's were magic. And I mean, I feel like if they were, maybe... I don't know, maybe when you created it, that's what made them magic. Probably, yeah.

Wait! What can you tell? Well, could you have... Maybe King George could go, like, look around first before we go in there? I can ask him if he wants to, but it's his rest day. Oh, like it's his day? Yeah. Oh, I think you gave him the day off. Yeah, it's King George's day. Oh, well, I'll give you a second to ask him. All right. Yeah, yeah, yeah!

And he flies out. Yeah, he's going to do it. That's awfully generous on his day off. Thanks, George. King George. And you can understand him, what he says. Yeah. We talk with our minds. That's kind of romantic in a way. I'm not having sexual relations with that fly. I would hope not. You've got to save it all up for Boob.

Who? The innkeeper guy. Who? Beau. The guy that said you were a pretty penny. That drunk duck? No. No. That's Nestor. Sure. Oh.

Anyway, Beau, will you go off and check in-- what am I asking Beau to do again? Oh shit, George! What am I asking George to do? Just see if we can see a bear! I don't want to walk into these ruins and there's a horrible cult of evil deer in there, and we walk in and we get horribly sacrificed, flayed alive, and stuck up on trees. Yeah, go do that, George. I'll make a perception check for George, you can add your perception modifier.

Do you think that's why they say, oh dear? Because it's so scary? 17. You see George take off into the woods. And he's gone for five minutes. And... He's the king of the flies. You hear then, after you wait, see this has been a little too long.

And then suddenly you're- He's probably dead. Oh, there he is. As he is beelining to you. And he reports to you. Beelining. Beelining. And he makes his as you're able to understand that George saw a monster. Dark, shaggy brown fur. A big pile of rotting something. Almost a rotting sludge of some kind. In a pile of-

curled up and seemingly sleeping. A bear covered in leathers like some sort of barbarian, you know, not properly dressed, civilized. And you see that, and you hear that there is a large, a massive, almost a circular axe. A mere

several feet from this massive sleeping creature that's curled up. And he tells you that the snoring and the sleeping is booming out in this ruin that forms some sort of like protection. This ancient structure that perhaps was once a temple of some kind. - Yeah, so that's basically what's going on there with Dad. - That small? He must be a dwarf bear. - Huh, I got a little confused.

Was the sludge part of the bear? I think he was sleeping on a pile of sludge. Probably animal remains. Oh, that's terrible. Oh, his own feces. Oh, that's disgusting. That's also true, probably, most likely. George is really cool to come back. He must be king. Yeah, he says he wants to kill your family. Why? Oh, my gosh. Unless they submit to his demands. Oh, well. Down with the revolution and all that. Oh, my gosh.

And your friends. He's gonna kill all you guys. Your friends and family, yeah. Oh no, why? That's just what he said. The bear said that? No, George said that. If you try and start a revolution. Oh, well he wasn't gonna do that. Okay, that's fine then. And I open my mouth and let George fly in. He flies in. Then you're fine. I was thinking about stopping the river. He knew it, he could sense it on you. It's the magic. Oh my gosh. She's good.

- Okay, we gotta be very quiet. If it's a sleep, we can just like, just, you know, chop a tent right off. - Oh my gosh, wait, I thought we were gonna talk to him. - Or we can wake him up and talk to him and then chop his head off. - I'm thinking at this point, maybe we don't wake him up and talk to him and I think we just kill him. - Having the element of surprise is gonna be one of the few things we have in our favor. And as much as I'd like to avoid violence, this is not a situation that might be able to be reasoned out of.

i mean it's not like you should get out what if he's we don't know that the bad did that

I mean, it's pretty likely. Who else would have done it? I don't know. Maybe the... The right strength? Maybe. Oh, wait. How high were the bodies? Very high. Higher than the nine to ten feet that we estimated? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. They were, like, probably 15 feet plus. Like, really higher than 20 feet. Oh, I'm sorry. I was just thinking that in my head. Oh, no, I mean, just... I don't have a great depth perception. I can't really tell. I just don't see how a bear could have done that. I don't...

Well shit! Well maybe, maybe we can wake him up and Booker can like, you know, do his thing. Booker's really good at talking to people. I just think, I just think he would be better than...

You know. Well, how about this? How about we all get, like, behind him and we all get, like, maybe we can, there's, like, a stone or something we can perch on and we can be hidden and Booker can wake him up gently and try to, like, talk to him. And, like, the front side. And if things go poorly, we all just jump down and chop his head off. Well, that sounds, I mean, how do you, that,

I know that kind of seems like you'd be bait, but you wouldn't be, I promise. Well, um, yes, uh, I believe you that I'm not bait in this situation. Yes, all right. Well, I mean, if it's better than just resorting to violence, I suppose that I could initiate some sort of contact between us. Mm-hmm.

And then, I mean, the second anything goes wrong, we'll be right there, you just run away like you do. Well, you could give a code word. Oh, no, the code word will probably be screaming as my bowels are tossed about the cavern and my blood is showering down on all of you. Oh, gosh. That's way too long a code word. Well, it'll be a lot longer when it's actually happening. Oh, jeez. I was thinking like, I don't know.

Just pick another word. Maybe, you know, even if you get scared. What about honey? Because bears like honey. You know what? It might distract him and make him think of honey instead of you as a raccoon dog. I don't think that's going to work, Romilly, but, you know, I appreciate the suggestion. It could be the word shit because I feel like you're going to scream that anyway. I don't think there's going to be any need for a code word. I think we're going to, you're going to just know. Or I'll be right behind you. Yeah, or pieces of me.

Well, just tell him that he doesn't have to die. He just has to give us his skin. I'll keep that in mind.

You don't have to die. Just get with your skin. I just want your skin, man. All right, Goon in the middle of the night walks up to a bear. Can I have your skin? You don't have to die. Okay, so let's get close and then we'll just be very quiet. We'll post up right behind him.

and you go in front. - Oh gosh. - Let's go. - It's all right. - Ronnie Mervis, Ronnie Mervis. - You're going to steal. You keep your stealth rolls as-- - Damn it.

As you continue onward, and I'll say with that, you're able to pinpoint the... You see a few ruined structures throughout this part of the woodland. And you see the larger structure that's almost like entirely encased in almost a ring of trees. But you see the stone covered in this ancient moss and lichen.

and you see that there's a large, crumbled entrance. As you get close, then you finally hear a very deep, grumbling snoring of a massive creature through the darkness of this place. You see it. - All right. I decided that the code word will be help. All right. Figured that's pretty straightforward.

We'll come and help. Only if I say the code word, all right? Only. All right. So if you say, "Shit, aw fuck, dear gods, I'm fucking dying," none of those things are the code word. That's correct. We won't come no matter what you say, unless it's a-is-is-is-is-is-is help. That is right. Thank you. And if this is the last time that I ever see all of you in one piece, then just know that you're my friends. Oh, fuck it. And I'll never forget you until I'm dead.

It's been so nice to know you, Hank. Yes, you too, Betsy. All right, before you go... Oh, yeah, all right. You can do it. Believe in yourself. And, you know, you're pretty charming, you know, and, you know...

I'm gonna look out for you, buddy. - Thank you, that sounds like something I might say. - I feel like we're a little more bonded now, right? - You're getting better at this. - In sort of like a warding kind of way. I cast Warding Bond. - I love that, what does that do? - It gives you plus one AC. - Oh, nice. - Plus one to saving throws. - What? - And you have resistance to all damage. - Oh, let's go, plus one AC, plus one-- - I will also take whatever damage you take.

So basically I take half of your damage. - Okay. - Oh, I see. - After the Shim Sham. - Well it's resistant, but I also take it. So it's full damage and we're both resistant. - Hypothetically he gets 20 damage. Do you take half of 10 or do you take half of 20? - No, he would take 10 and then I take 10.

- Oh. - So the full damage is just split between two. - Oh. - I'm gonna walk up to Booker and reach into my pack and pull out some really disgusting looking mushrooms. - Oh. - I think it would be a good idea if you ate one of these. They're magic. - Okay, should I eat it before or after I think I'm going to die? - You should basically just eat it right now. - Can I have one? - No.

I smell the mushroom. What do I smell? It smells like ammonia and dirt. I gotta be honest, Peggy, this smells like piss. I know. So you should eat it right now. What if I just save it? You don't want to do that, I promise you. It only gets worse. Sometimes the best medicines taste really bad. Mm-hmm.

Actually, it's a suppository, so you're gonna need to bend over. Stop asking! Alright, well, you know what? I choose death. Are you gonna go in wide and fruit? You're gonna need to take it. Or are you gonna start with the mushroom? It's really important. I'll eat the mushroom.

- What is it, what are you casting? - Haste. As you start to consume the mushroom. - Jesus. - Exactly right. - I do cocaine! - And now we're referencing the episode 300 from Futurama. - Yes. - The space around you just looks different. This mushroom hits different. And you feel very, very bad. - I'm just like, "I'm just like,

I actually look down and I see myself. I'm standing above everybody. Everybody's a ring talking to Booker and I'm like floating above my body like, oh my god. Why are you all talking so slow? I don't understand why I can't keep up with you. You're going really slow. I don't even know what's happening. I'm going to come talk to the bear now. And I walk off. What is he doing to him?

This is gonna go really well. I made what I call haste shrooms. Oh. Yeah. That's a powerful spell. I know, it's magic. I created it. Let's make sure we stay within 30 feet of him, all right? I'm just gonna keep hopping along. Yeah, and I'll say you're able to do that, and this will last for the extent of the roleplay, because it's rude and it's fun. Awesome, thanks, Mike.

- I need to make a stealth check. If you're trying to go stealth away. - Yep. - Yeah, I'll keep up on him. - You're trying to get in front of him and I think the rest of us were trying to kind of creep around his back. - That gives me another plus two AC. - Okay, everybody, everybody make a stealth check. - Is that a check out? - Double your speed. - The rest of us are kind of going around the back. - We want to get behind him so that Booker's here talking to him and we can be back here. - I would say that you're able to find where- - Plus two AC.

Advantage on deck saves, and then additional action on each turn. - Ooh! - Okay. I'll say, just for the sake of this, that actually you see that there is a pillar carved with the faces of the profile faces of what looked like deer, or what would have been deer, and that you'd be able to get a higher vantage point and stand atop a ruined wall while Booker's able to go on the ground that you'd be then able to pounce out from.

So, self-turns? Oh. Oh, terrible. 17. 17, got it. 5, 23. Hold on a second. Finally. 14. First roll higher than 20. 24. Okay. Finally had a decent roll. So, Grumly is clanking very loudly as he scampers up this column onto the wall as Booker, you step through.

into the darkness of this. And you feel the stench hits you first.

before you see it, as your eye is very used to this dark, the darkness of night, still have to adjust in the darkness of this ruined temple, as you see a toppled statue of some hooded druidic-looking deity of some kind, and in a massive, a curled up, almost like a massive ball, looking like a colossal boulder,

you see a massive, hairy beast covered in primal-looking leathers, but very sparsely clothed, is what I'll say. And the way that King George had described it to Peggy doesn't do justice to the massive axe that is twice as tall as you are.

with its curves so much, they almost meet at the top, both sides of the plane, sleeping, sitting beside this massive bear that is snoring incredibly loudly, but very still. And as you step forward, you then see a glint of white. As you see now its face.

The elongated snout slobbered, pooling out beneath it, and as you see these incredibly massive razor-sharp teeth, as it spits out some air, a bit of a snot bubble from its nose, this thing is absolutely massive. This looks to be, if it stood up, at least ten feet. As...

you see in the corner of this room a massive pile of rotting sludge or just this disgusting pile of gray and dark green and brown in one side and bits of scraps of that all throughout this temple. As you then approach, you hear you as it occasionally then seems to be

breaking into some slight distress as if it's dreaming, and then returning back. And that's what you see as you hit your haste. I would normally be shaking in my boots, but I'm actually vibrating because of the mushrooms. You're just standing still going... The noise you wind up... He's running to close his... Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!

So I'll actually like, without even hesitating, just like walk up to the bear and I,

In my, like, inside, I'm like, oh, I can't believe that this thing is, like, real and what I'm seeing, but the mushrooms have clouded my judgment, and I'm high as hell, and I will just... Excuse me. Excuse me, Mr. Bear. Mr. Bear, please wake up. Excuse me. Excuse me. And I begin to poke it. Can you understand me? Can you understand what I'm saying, Mr. Bear? Mr. Bear, excuse me. My name is Booker. Um, you...

- In my head cannon, you think you're going, "Excuse me, excuse me, Mr. Bear." But what you're actually doing is, "Excuse me, excuse me, excuse me, excuse me, excuse me, excuse me, excuse me." - Also, let's not forget what raccoon hands look like. - Yes, it's a little sharp, but probably not for the bear. - You do that and it's, you're tapping, you're tapping, you're tapping, and it takes

10 seconds. The rest of you are watching abject terror. It feels like it's an hour. As you hear a... And you know how bear lips can flap and slobber? You get coated in slobber. And then it stops. And then two eyes open. And they seem to be groggy with sleep, but distressed and bloodshot.

as they then process you, you see as in a movement that is incredibly, that seems too fast for a creature this large. You see as this massive beast leaps and heaves itself up, looking at you, and you see a glint of surprise and a glint of fear.

that then, as his eyes are bloodshot and strained even more, you see it look at you, and it lets out a bestial roar.

as it then turns to anger and primal rage almost, as it stands up and roars at you. Slobber once again flying across, looming incredibly large as one claw is raised up, one hand is raised up tall with razor sharp claws and another reaching for its massive ax. - Wait, wait, wait, wait, you didn't answer if you can understand me.

- Make a... - I'm going to wait to see, I mean, I'll make whatever roll you want me to make, but as soon as he like actually goes to swing the ax and I feel like I'm in danger, I would like to take an action. - Okay, make a persuasion check. - I think that one's pretty good for me. Persuasion, you say? - Mm-hmm. - That's a 24. - Oh, a 24. As you see,

As you see, as the bear looks at you, looming, and as it's snarling, it opens its mouth, you can see down its throat, this thing is so colossal. As it almost instinctively goes to lunge at you, as you ask if it can hear you. And it stops for a moment.

and it registers that you've spoken to it as it blinks and its eyes kind of glaze over a little bit. And then you see almost kind of this something well up inside of it, and then it shakes its head as it sniffs.

and you hear Grumly's armor clanking as it turns towards the four of you and then back to you, Booker, as it then seems to hesitate for a moment, but then is overcome once again by this strange kind of savage rage.

"Oh, I couldn't help but notice it looks like you have some pain behind those eyes. Do you know what would cure that? Some of Peggy's mushrooms. You got any more of those?" You're asking the bear? Yes! Me? I don't even know what the fuck that roll would be. Make a persuasion check. Hit disadvantage. Ah, shit.

At disadvantage? Yeah, it's a plus eight, so 17. 17. You will see as it blinks at you in confused rage, but you see that as the anger is and the rage is overwhelming, as it lets out another roar, you see that it's so tense, eyes are wide, it also seems to be mixed with fear.

as you see as it leans down to grab its ax and is attempting to raise it.

- As soon as, do I feel, so I feel like it just didn't register anything that I said. It's clearly conflicted. Like there's something going on there and it looks like it's going to attack me. - It's raising its weapon to attack you. You would all see this too. So you are all ready as well to. - The second that it raises its ax to attack me, if I may take in like an actual action, like a turn, if you will, I will sigh.

and say, "Oh, I'll just be exasperated 'cause I'll be sad that it just kind of ignored me and I really didn't wanna resort to violence." And I will shout, "Young bear, there are leaves all around." I said, "Young bear, eat that leaf off the ground." I said, "Young bear, won't it make a cool sound when you stuff them in your leaf hole?"

It's fun to chew on the leaves on the ground. And I'm gonna cast Suggestion, and basically it's gonna feel compelled to just eat leaves for the next eight hours off of the cave floor. I'm gonna use a d8 to use my cutting words to subtract the d8 from the roll, and it will be a wisdom saving throw on your end. Okay.

You'll have to subtract 8 from your roll. It's physically impossible for him to succeed in saving. Well, it depends on what his bonus is. Yeah, it depends on the bonus. I assume his bonus is shitty. I rolled well, but I didn't know there's no way. It's a 16. You need to beat a 16 plus the 8, I guess. So 24, technically. Or is 18, but I got a 10. He gets a 10. Okay, so he has suggested...

He doesn't understand why, but my words are so compelling that he just feels the need to just stuff himself full of leaves that are all over the cavern floor. I need to get a performance check too. Sure. I don't know how good I am at that one. I'd give you a 20. Oh no, I'm good at this. I feel good about this one. Let's just not fuck this up. 26. There you go. Damn.

You see, as he's looking at you with his primal savagery, as he lets out this roar, almost like there's some sort of blood rage, as he grips the massive axe and is getting ready to swing at you, you start singing. And as the song fills this room, you see the bear kind of stops back a little bit. And he blinks and he looks confused.

a little confused, and then as the song echoes and you continue to sing, you see his head slowly start to nod along, and where there had been fear and rage, there's almost a bit of joy and appreciation, and then as you finish and you command him to

as you compel him and you suggest that he eats grass, he just looks at you very dopely and he smiles and he says, I love vegetables. And he lumbers over and starts to just pull

grass out of the stones and pull ivy and just . So I'll be playing along while I'm singing and then as I stop to keep playing and look at my shoulder, "Ah, okay, I bought us a little bit of time. "It's only eight hours. "I don't know what we're gonna do with all that little bit "of time, but we have to make something, "we have to do something now."

He seemed confused, conflicted. I didn't know what else to do. And I'm just going to keep playing. Remember, we only have eight hours. There's basically no time at all. Nobody moves. He didn't say the code word, so we should just wait here, I guess. Just hold steady. I don't know why. That was weird, but the bear, that was crazy. Yeah, that was really cool. I was impressed with it. I don't know what he's playing, but it sounds like Through the Fire and the Flames. La, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la,

Um, well I didn't realize the bear would be that easily distracted. I didn't either. Well I guess we'll just wait here until he sends help. Nope, this is your key to come up with a plan. I told you we only have eight hours, there's basically no time at all!

- He didn't say it, he didn't say help. - He didn't say it. - Is he? - He was very explicit. I even asked like if he was screaming, oh shit, I'm dying. - I do nothing else, I say nothing else. I let you guys do your own devices. - He specifically said, do not unless I say help. - Yeah, but I mean, he looks like he's sweating.

I think that's just the mushrooms. He's probably shitting himself right about now. I forgot to tell him about that side effect. He's been in for like six hours straight. The bear is sweating. Look at him. He's really loaded up on leaves. He's probably going to die from the leaves alone. He's like eating a salad from Chop. I think we ought to check on him. Do you know what happens when you disobey Booker? I don't know, but he always comes around.

So he's still got that extra corn muffin in his pocket. Well, not in his pocket, but in his... I don't know where he put it. He hid it somewhere so I couldn't have it. I think I know where he keeps the stuff he doesn't want you to have. What do you do? Where? Let's go help Booker. I'm pretty fast. I can run down and then run back real quick. Are you going to do something when you get down there? Are you just going to run there and then run back? I can run and I can say one word and then I can run back.

Yeah, I mean, try that. I think we should all just go down. Well, no, first have Bitsy do that, and then we can figure it out. Maybe we'll have more information to make a plan. It's been like seven hours now. Oh, God. I'll use my action to dash, and I will...

Immediately arrive at your sign. Need help? And then I immediately run back. I said nothing. I don't think he needs any help. I mean, look at him. He's like in a puddle of his own. I'm going down there. Oh, bugger. When he's furious at you, don't say I didn't warn you. Here. Oh, it's okay. I've got my pointer stick.

I'm gonna very sneakily, avoiding the bears.

- Ivy eating nonsense. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - He's literally on the ground. - Eatin' leaves. I'm gonna sneak down, kind of avoiding his gaze and kind of come up like to the side and back of Booker. - How you doing? - Oh, hey, yeah, I'm good. Like I said, I can keep this up for about eight hours. He's just gonna eat there. I don't know what's gonna happen. His stomach might just rupture. I've never done this before.

We keep this up, this could get bloody quick. - Oh, we were just a little confused. We didn't know if you needed help.

Yeah, it was

You know, it was a little, we all caught the back of that, so we couldn't see his eyes, you know? We didn't really know what was happening. Yeah, there's definitely some pain behind those eyes. Oh, yeah. How'd you offer him? Well, try to get shrooms? Yeah, I was hoping maybe he had some more of those Peggy mushrooms. I think just Peggy has those. Well, it's hard to ask. Hey, guys, come down here. And I'll whisper shout-out to them. Oh. Did she say the code word? Does she even have one?

Oh, God, we didn't ask her if she had a code word. Well, I don't think we didn't discuss a code word, and she's telling us to come down, so I'm going to... What if it's a trick? I'm going to, like, shuffle. Fall. Grumly, are you all right? Oh, Jesus! You hear climbing from the room, and Grumly literally rolls along the ground.

Good lord, Bromley, are you all right? You roll underneath a massive bear's legs as you're like... I want to look around to see what's the sludge that King George talked about. Oh, I would say make a perception check at advantage because you're a dog. Take your time, Bromley. We have eight hours.

Maybe like seven hours and 43 minutes at this point. Based on your perception of time, you'd be like, we got six minutes left. Uh, at 15, uh, at 15, I'll say you're able to take your time and look around and you see scraps. And what is the pile of rotting organic matter? Isn't flesh. It is, um, uh,

stalks of carrots, the husk of a cauliflower, rotting vegetable. What the hell? In the corner. And you smell the vegetable that reminds you of the mess hall. Basically the trash and the mess hall. It's like compost, a bunch of vegetables. And he did say he liked vegetables.

Well, I convinced him he likes vegetables. Well, I mean, I guess he did say that out loud, but that could have been me. No, you say about leaves, and he mentioned vegetables. Those are different, and this is a pile of vegetables. I suppose that's a fair point. There's no bones or anything in there? Not that I saw. It's like carrots and potatoes and onions and...

And there's not really any leaves. This is all just vegetables. I like all those things, too. What I was telling Hazel is that, you know, there seemed to be something in there when I talked to him. For a brief moment, he recognized who I was. I'm going to continue to keep playing. But then all of a sudden, it was like he snapped into a rage. And I don't think it was just because I woke him up.

But I can tell you he's probably gonna be pretty pissed when he comes to when he's full of leaves. Oh no, well maybe he'll just get a tummy ache and go to bed. Do you think he's under the control of some kind of spell?

I'm sort of like, well, you know, maybe there's like a thorn in his paw. Oh my gosh. You know, and he's just really mad, but once we remove it, he's going to be a very nice chap. To be fair, I didn't really have time to check. At this point, as long as we don't, you know, distract him too much from the leaves, you might be able to look him over.

Let's take a look. I'll take the back paws. Just don't poke him too hard or prevent him from continuing to eat leaves. I won't. I'll try not to touch him at all. I'm just going to... Oh, hell!

- Is that Grimly's word? I thought that was Booker's word. - You look to where Peggy is and then you realize Peggy's already down there. - Oh shit! - You realize it's a stack of rocks that sort of vaguely resembles like a frog with little eyes on top. - I scratch my head, "Who the hell is Grimly and Booker?" - I would say, one of you choose to make a medicine check.

You blew hard. I don't know, it would be better. Oh, thank you, you should probably do it. Oh, medicine. Oh, I'm actually proficient in that. Holy shit. Yeah, do it advantage. Yeah, I've just probably feared medicine, you know? Do it advantage-ly. Oh, advantage, right? That was almost really good. Thank goodness for advantage. That's unfortunate. Oh wait, no, that's a 16. Uh...

- It's a 91. - 21. - 21. You look over and you, 21, I would say that you get the sense that there's no injury to this bear. He's very scarred. You see that on his person, like through the fur, you can see the remnants of wounds, of various bleeding weapons.

And you actually see a patch where there is no fur, where it looks almost like there have been teeth marks or claw marks.

And there doesn't seem to be any kind of Paul, but as you examine him and you look up and he's very happily eating all of these vines and leaves and grass, you actually hear that he's kind of humming along with the music and that it seems to be bringing some kind of peace as you look in the, as you look at his eyes that are very bloodshot eyes.

I think when the medicine checked, I would say that it seems to be that whatever kind of something that had been causing some sort of rage has subsided.

That's a baby? He's just...

I suggest a course of activity, that's it. - So he can do other things as long as he's, could he, I mean-- - He's very focused. - Funny leaves. - I mean, hey, feel free, you know, just whatever we do, don't harm him until we're ready for him to just like come at us and maybe regurgitate all those leaves. - I was about to stab him in the foot. - Oh, okay. - Don't do that, Betsy, don't do that. Funny leaves.

Let me try this. I'll pick up a big bunch of leaves and kind of go in front of him. Hey, Mr. Bear. If you tell me how you're feeling, I'll give you this big bunch of leaves to eat. Well, I like vegetables. How are you feeling? Oh, gosh. He's quick.

That didn't work. He seems like vegetables now. I like the music as he... Oh, that's good. Do you feel hurt in any way? I like this tune as he takes it and his voice booms out. What's your name? My name's Benji. Benji? Benji. Isn't that...

from our youth. - Dog New Benji. - Maybe that's what it was. You went to Dog New Benji? Maybe that's a- - It was a dog movie. - Yeah, it was Dog New Benji. Cool. - I'm worried if this is one of those uncharitable things that Peg was talking about, we're gonna have to break Benji's neck. - Oh gosh. - But I'll keep playing for as long as we possibly have to. - No, no, I looked over him, I figured,

I think whatever was afflicting him before might be done. It might have worked through his system. You think? Maybe it's just being soothed by the vegetables and the music. Music does soothe the monster soul. Well, no. I mean, I think it's like a more biological thing that's come to pass. I mean, I think he was enraged. His eyes were all bloodshot. No, they're not anymore. And I don't think it's the music. No offence. I mean, it's a nice tune. I'm not taking it. Um...

Benji, what made you so angry before? He looks at you as he's still focused on trying to-- he goes to another patch and pulls down a huge string of vines and shoves it into his mouth. As he says, "Oh, I'm a bear." And he continues to eat. It's not very helpful. Did you put all them people up in the branches and they're all dead and you killed them?

That's a good question. Oh, I did kind of forget about that part. He continues, "What? What people?" All right, so now I guess we... Here's the thing, we just... I hope you're right, but if I stop playing and all of a sudden he goes into a rage monster machine again, we're gonna have to do something about it. I don't think he killed them people. I don't think he did either. Yeah, way too tall for him.

That's actually a good question. Were they way up higher than you could reach? I would say you'd be easily able to make that determination. Oh, shit.

Because he's like 10 feet and they were like up like 30 some feet. Yeah, like roughly 250 feet in the air. Also, he has an axe. He doesn't need branches. Yeah. If he doesn't say that. Yeah, but that's way cooler. Why he has an axe. Obviously, it's in the picture and it's cutting people in two, but like, it originally sacrificed people in the trees. That's like way cooler. Don't respond to that. I'm just saying. I'm just thinking out loud.

You don't have to feel bad about your hair and fallen feathers. Or maybe you try to just stop playing and, you know, see how he feels. Benji, is there anything in the woods that scare you? Make you a scaredy bear? Pony deer? Oh, yeah, that too. I don't like them ghosts. Oh, Jesus Christ. What ghosts, Benji? And people trying to hurt me. Oh.

I don't like that either Benji. You mean ghosts isn't like bear, ghosts? What kind of ghosts? They got them horns. Ghosts! Like bear! Or like... Like a sheep? Like... He means antlers. Sometimes people don't know the difference when they say horns when really they mean antlers. What's the difference? I don't know, one's made out of bone and one's made out of cartilage or something.

I don't really know. Keratin? Yeah, I'm pretty sure they're both made out of keratin, which is the same thing your fingernails and your hair are made out of.

I don't know why that's great. She's got a weird... It's weird to think about, like, every growing stuff out of us, you know? Yeah. You think about that, like, oh, some perpetually growing stuff. Seven hours and 12 minutes. Why did you make us this way? She made us. Well, I mean, if she's a creator, she did, I guess. But I'm not sure she's a creator. I think she's eight.

I want to like, just sniff around the perimeter to see if I can get any sense of like, like,

- Ghost biz. - I don't know, anything out of sorts. - You sniff around, you're not sure what ghost biz he would smell. - All right, well, I think just let him do what he wants to do. I think he's a friendly chap. - As soon as you say that, all right, I'm happy to stop. - The exhaustion kicks in from the hay spell wearing off and I just stop. - You okay?

He's currently shitting himself right now. Oh, no. My voice doesn't do that when I take a shit. Well, I like that tune.

- How are you surprised? And his eyes go, as you see that he become more bloodshot, as he lets out a roar that booms out. - Oh gosh, oh gosh. Wake up, wake up, wake up.

I'm stopping toast for at least six full seconds. Oh my gosh! For however long the haste is. Six seconds would wear off at this point. Benji, calm down! I'll walk up to Benji. Where's your papa? Tell us more about these ghosts. What's your haste? Oh no! How long did your spell last? Oh, good. Eighteen. Eighteen.

I'll fucking miss. As he's dropped his axe and he's looking around and it's actually the corner of the room where he's going to swing with a massive bear paw and swing at you. Not feeling any fear because I don't understand the situation that I'm in. I don't flinch. So it just like whiffs right past my hair and like just... Well, I'm not plants. Fendi! Fendi!

Man, I really wanted this. I'm going to take out the honey that I found in the forest. Now, you just calm down, Mr. Benji Bear. And we're your friends. We're not going to hurt you. Make a... Make a persuasion check. At advantage. Please don't take my honey. 18.

18. It's the one that recurs that needs fixing, as opposed to the command check, because those are two different... That's what it is. You see as he's looking absolutely...

just filled with frothing rage as his jowls are shaking as he goes in to swing at you. And then he, and as soon as you pull out the honey, you see once again, kind of his eyes become less bloodshot and he has a dopey look. He says, I like honey. As he leans forward. As he leans forward, I'm going to say, now, now, Mr. Honey.

You can just have... I'll break a little piece of the comb off and wedge it on the end of his razor sharp nail so that he can like... Now you have to be a good bear and talk to us. I want all of the honey. And you will have it if you're a good bear and you don't hurt us. He seems hungry. Give him two, darling.

All right. May I have two dollars, please? I'll hunk off another and stick it on his other nail. Like bugles. Like bugles. Exactly right. I don't get honey very much. Well, now you... He savors that.

We don't want to hurt you because you didn't hurt those people and you didn't hurt us. Right? Is that where we're at? So far. We've caught up on the track of the mission. Alright, keep going. But, you know, we want to know more about the ghosts. Oh, them spooky ghosts out in the woods. Yeah, tell us more. I just see them and I don't know. They're scared. What do they look like? They got horns and hoods. Hoods?

How big are they? Scary eyes. I am hungry. Can I get another dollop? Oh, yeah, okay. Here's a... How big are they?

I just... I just only... I look at them, I get mighty feared, and I run the other way. I don't look at them very long, because Aya says it's a figment of my imagination. Oh, that sounds pretty scary. They come out at night? Or during the day, too?

- I don't know, I don't leave much. - Maybe a little honey will jog your memory. - Wait, who did you say said that there's a figure? - Keziah, my best friend. - Keziah, your best friend? - Keziah, my best friend. - Oh, Keziah. - Like Keziah Jenkins. - Oh my God. - Who's Keziah? - I love to read Spider-Man. - Oh, that's my best friend. She brings me vegetables, sometimes honey, but it's hard to get honey, she says. - What kind of critter is Keziah?

She's Bird. - What kind of bird? - I don't know. What kind of birds is there? - Do you attack her every time she shows up? - No, she plays a mighty nice flute and it makes me feel nice and comfortable. - It was the music, Grumly! I demand an apology!

And he leans forward and goes, he's for science. Can you back me up on this one? We had to know. We had to figure it out. Fine, fine. I'm running out of honey. I will begin to just play a simple...

- Nice tune for him and try to see if that calms him down as he's running out of honey. - Nothing tricky about it. Just playing like I would at a tavern. - Ooh, I like that tune. - And I have the rest of that. You gonna eat all that? - I didn't get to take any of that.

- I did, it was very delicious. - I begin just licking my hands, hoping a little scrap of anything stuck to them. - That's brutal. - Thank you very much, that's my manners.

All right, so we know that this Keziah person comes in here with a flute and soothes poor Benji to do what? Why does she come here? Just to feed you? She brings me vegetables. She says she keeps the bad folk away trying to hurt me. She got a... What's that mean? It's got like a... Oh, a crossbow! She's got a crossbow! That's what she said it was. Where does she live?

She lives in the village where she gets the vegetables and honey. Is the village, uh, no point in... Is it that way? Is that where she flies from? I don't know. Oh my goodness. Oh. What color is she like Hazel said? Oh, she's red. Okay. Does she have like a big hat that's red? Like a pony on her head? She's got real crazy hair. Hair, okay. Wait.

And she's just red? No other colors? I don't know. She's my best friend, but I don't know what kind of colors are there. What are my options? You got any more honey? No. There were some berries outside, but they seem to be covered in the blood of old dead people. Got any vegetables?

Wait, what's in my doggy bag? Give him that. She likes to stay with me. She likes to stay with me? Yeah, I'm hungry.

I pull out the baggie that's like, it's kind of deflated at this point. Most of the liquid has drained through, but there's some chunks of stuff and the soppy bread. So it's just like wet meat, vegetables and bread. It's just soggy and mush. It's just kind of like a mush. He like looks at it. I think I'm still hungry.

I'm sure there's some veins or something in there. And as he reaches forward, suddenly the bag explodes. An old stew spills everywhere. As you barely notice it crossbow bolt pierce through the bag. And with a loud clang, it hits the side of

the wall and your attention's immediately drawn towards a figure that's standing on top of the temple, aiming a crossbow at you. And you see that there's actually three different crossbows on this person. It's covered in a number of weapons,

a bandolier of bolts with a hood on, but a very large plume of feathers peeking up in front of it as she stares at you absolutely furious as she reloads and then points it at Hazel. And that's where we'll end the session. - Nice. - Well done, Gabe. - Interesting. Interesting development.

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