A D&D Story
We are a Podcast playing DND 5E. A homebrew campaign filled with adventures, misadventures, love and punishing the stupid. A brand new Dungeon Master builds a world for far more experienced players as they navigate through the various dangers. Recommended for ages 18 and up.
A D&D Story
Episode 82: The Masquerade
Thank you.
Speaker 2:No, I'm not big on sweets. I'd love a Snapchat buddy. The sweetest thing that I like to be around, bill, is you.
Speaker 3:Welcome to a D&D Story. I am Brandon, the Irish Wookiee, and with me today is Beal Welcome to a D&D story.
Speaker 4:I am Brandon, the Irish Wookiee, and with me today is Beal. Hello, I am Bill. I play Glenn, the half-elf rogue swashbuckler.
Speaker 3:And Brandon.
Speaker 5:Hi Brandon, hello, hey, I play Nines, the high-elf monk.
Speaker 3:And Justin.
Speaker 2:Hi Brandon, hello, and justin, hi brandon, hello. Hi everybody. I'm justin and I think today I'm playing moors, but now I can have a little bit of control over who I do play a tiny bit.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's true oh uh.
Speaker 2:Moors is a high elf wizard and I'm not playing sam the whole part of the intro we kind of forgot.
Speaker 3:And finally Maddie.
Speaker 6:Hi everybody, I am Maddie. I play Montoya Inigo, the Arctic Tabaxi Ranger.
Speaker 3:Wonderful, all right. So thank you all for listening to us, following us, giving us ideas. It means a lot to us. We appreciate it. The last episode we released was a Christmas episode with DM. Uh dmg, underscore run. Make sure you go check him out. He uh, he's that episode. Freaking, killed it on social media. It is now our highest listened to episode ever. Um. Highest downloaded episode, um. In the first week it was out it down, it passed 1100 downloads. So it's it's, it's up there.
Speaker 2:That's fantastic.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'm so glad I should not be a part of that? So we need to go give him a thank you for that. Did we get ratings at all on it? I can look up ratings. I mean Buzzsprout has some, but not a whole lot. Okay, I think I have to go to the individual platforms for that.
Speaker 5:Hey, did we penetrate the podcast top 100? No, no.
Speaker 3:No, maybe next time With 1100,.
Speaker 6:Yeah, he said penetrate.
Speaker 4:He did say penetrate.
Speaker 2:At least we know you're listening, Matty.
Speaker 3:While you're playing Fallout 76.
Speaker 6:Hey, I'm just collecting some stuff and logging off.
Speaker 5:He's doing his dailies, bro. He's gotta grind that rep.
Speaker 3:Make sure you give us a like and a follow on Facebook at facebookcom slash ADND Story. Follow us on Twitter or EX at ADD Story 2. And make sure you check us out on Instagram at instagramcom slash ADND Story.
Speaker 5:You should move over to Blue Sky.
Speaker 3:You know I was thinking about it actually. I think we've got to pay for that, though.
Speaker 4:You've got to pay for Twitter, too, if you want that symbol.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I don't care about that stupid checkmark. Alright, so let's roll for some recap.
Speaker 5:Oh okay, yeah, that's a for some recap. Oh okay, yeah, that's a good idea.
Speaker 3:Not you, Brandon. That's a terrible idea with you. Don't do that.
Speaker 5:I'll just read straight through our recap notes Great.
Speaker 2:Got a seven.
Speaker 6:I got a natural 20.
Speaker 3:Oh, I think it's you, justin. I got a four, yeah, but I've been not making people recap. Last time do the recap, so I'm not going to make you do a pill Even though there is only three people. Okay then why are we rolling?
Speaker 4:dice.
Speaker 3:What.
Speaker 4:To see if Matty or Justin's going to do it Pretty much.
Speaker 2:Because it's not a twinkos, a twinkos.
Speaker 6:It is not a twinkos, Twinkos Toinkos. It is not a toinkos Toinkos yeah, kasa toin for you, witcher.
Speaker 2:Sorry guys, I've been hitting the nog today.
Speaker 6:Hey, Justin, we're going to need you to focus Stop doing other things On the nog.
Speaker 5:Yeah, we're trying to penetrate that fog. Nog fog, nog fog.
Speaker 2:I made homemade n not this year, guys, it's pretty good. So we were sailing on a ship. Nines fell into a deep sleep and couldn't be roused. He could be aroused we found, but not roused oh my god don't interrupt my recap.
Speaker 2:We found this dude floating in the water. Don't interrupt my recap. We found this dude floating in the water. We brought him on board. His name was Kalthor. He was freaking out because there's some kind of spirit, energy or something had infested his ship and done some kind of badness. He was the only survivor from his whole crew, so nines collapsed and Morse tended to him. We looked for some help from the crew to get nines down below decks and she assigned a sailor to take him down to the hammock thingy in the crew's quarters.
Speaker 5:Was I aroused during this.
Speaker 6:I mean Nobody was really there, so maybe you had something to grab onto, to hold you, you know, while he carried you down.
Speaker 5:Stare him by the joystick.
Speaker 2:So the three of us went with Sister and Vara, who is the ship's cleric, into the captain's stateroom. For this night at least, it's Glenn's stateroom. My bad, Hang on.
Speaker 5:Question how did that come about?
Speaker 2:Well, he negotiated to have the stateroom the first night and we haven't had a full sleep yet. You were there for that part. That was a previous episode. Before we departed.
Speaker 5:Oh right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't. The terms are weird, I don't know. He's a robot. I guess he doesn't care about sleeping comfy.
Speaker 2:Anywho, k kalfour, the rescued sailor, uh was very sick. Uh was kind of out of it. His skin was clammy and gross. It looked like he was dreaming. His eyes were moving randomly underneath his eyelids.
Speaker 2:Um, sister envara suspected some kind of possession or maybe like a demon or ghost was living in the body or something. So she started just like detecting spirits in general and realized that there was something in Calthor, but there's also something in Morse. But we're like it's okay, we know about that one, it's alright, that being Sam. So Calthor woke up and was like I can still feel it, it's under my skin and started clawing at his arm. He drew some of his own blood. Morse started casting Detect Magic. Glenn started treating the wound. Sister Envira doesn't seem to trust Glenn. She's worried that maybe Glenn will just kill him.
Speaker 2:To remove this issue, as Morse finished casting Detect Magic, we identified some conjuration and enchantment magic just emanating from the heart of the ship, where we learned that there's a magical core that kind of powers a ship to let it propel without the assistance of wind. We go to check on the crew, following Captain Dadalorian and one of the supply keepers tells us that some of the fruit on ship has started to spoil much sooner than it should have. We're not even a day out of port yet and it's started to go bad. We get told that the crew's been paid a lot of money to get us safely up to Deadpelt Shadows and the captain's under a lot of pressure and the way he's behaving is kind of normal under this situation.
Speaker 2:We hear a blood-curdling scream from the galley and as we go down there we light the area up and we see that we're going through knee-to-ankle-deep green goo that looks about the same color as the ship's cook, flubber Stoffelies, who was some kind of gelatinous creature. We also find a half-dissolved body of a half-orc who we assume was Bloodspout, which was the guy that we sent to take care of Nines. So now we run to the cruise quarters to find Nines in there. Well, to see if we can find Nines and check on him. But there's some kind of black ichor leading out of the cruise quarters and so we follow that and we find Nines just staring at the crystal, the ship's core. He's got this weird grin on his face and he has a weird new voice. There's also a body down below us where we think it's probably the ship's engineer.
Speaker 5:Wait, did he sound like me?
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 6:Yeah, Brandon, you're looking like you don't remember any of this. That's weird.
Speaker 5:It's like I wasn't even there yeah, huh.
Speaker 2:Nines said something in his new voice. He said something like this is my chance to escape. And then, like a black mist, flowed out of Nines into the crystal, the ship's core, and Glenn waxed Nines with the blood of a dagger to kind of drop him, take him out of commission.
Speaker 6:It was no longer a threat, but we still knocked him out.
Speaker 2:anyway, I think I had it backwards. We knocked him out and then the stuff flowed out. We were told that why did you let that black stuff out? This will teach you.
Speaker 3:You gotta keep the blue smoke in. Everybody knows that.
Speaker 2:Magic Doritos. So it looks like we thought that the core couldn't be possessed. But whatever this black smoke was did get into it and we can see the spot moving around on it, all this contamination in there, and the crystal keeps cracking and reforming itself on all these different surfaces it's got. And then we bring the engineer back up, um grint, and they tell us that we have three options we can overload the crystal, we can break the crystal, or we can try to jettison the crystal. Um, and then cleric and var thinks that breaking the crystal might, uh, force the demon to come out.
Speaker 2:Morse tries to just banish the crystal altogether but cannot, so we decided to try to overload it, which became a skill challenge. We were struggling at first. There's flashing runes on these rods as we're holding the core up, so we're trying to rebalance it and it's just a lot of back and forth, trying different things. Eventually we managed to work, work together. The three of us where glenn's on the control panel and operating this thing, trying to get everything back and forth or back into under control. More is just focusing on like balancing the energies and monty's working on sealing the, the cracks on there to like re-stabilize the core.
Speaker 2:We get the core to shut down, um, and as we get a chance to see again, captain Dattalorian breathes a sigh of relief, and then everyone else seems to also visibly relax. We restart the core, everything seems pretty good, and the last thing that I have here is that Sister Anvara, as a show of gratitude, offers to let Mors and Sam talk during the next sleepy time, like in their own little headspace. And so Sam and Mors finally get a chance to meet Face-to-face, sort of. And now Mors has the ability, once per day he can choose to swap between Sam and Mors and one round in combat.
Speaker 2:Per day he can summon forth or, you know, manifest the passive soul into combat for a whole round okay, that's cool that's pretty cool manifest the soul yeah, so like if I'm playing stam like pull moors in for uh a round oh, for one round you can't turn. No, just bring moors back for one round.
Speaker 6:Okay, so like't turn into Morse.
Speaker 5:No, just bring Morse back for one round. Okay, so like as Morse, you're getting swarmed, and then Sam comes out and like for that round, you're barbarian.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, it's a separate.
Speaker 3:Yeah, spiritual energy. It takes a turn right after him as a spirit.
Speaker 5:Oh, so like you call in Sam to help you out in spirit form.
Speaker 4:Or Sam calls in Mors.
Speaker 6:It's like having a friendly pet chicken to help you out, except for that chicken can do more than just clock and create eggs.
Speaker 4:Well, chickens can do more than Just like a normal chicken can attack things with weapons.
Speaker 6:It's true. Okay, you're right, you're right.
Speaker 2:Did you guys overthrow government? Did you guys have anything that I forgot?
Speaker 4:The first mate does not like Monty.
Speaker 6:Why is the first mate not like Monty?
Speaker 4:I don't know. It's a line I have in my notes.
Speaker 3:You flirted with her, unsuccessfully.
Speaker 6:Which one's the first mate? Is that Anvara?
Speaker 4:Anvara is the. That's the cleric First mate oh the first mate's the big grizzly chick.
Speaker 6:Yeah, what's her name? I didn't go back to episodes for that one.
Speaker 5:Sounds like she's more like the not-if-you-were-the-last-man-alive.
Speaker 2:So you're saying there's a chance. Leela, yeah, leela.
Speaker 6:Leela, that's right, the half-elf lady.
Speaker 4:Yep, that's the only note. Monty told Mors about the shadow in the mast. That's the only other thing I have.
Speaker 2:Oh, I did also doodle one picture. This is for the boys. Uh, there it is. There you go okay that was us trying to take care of that tiefling dude.
Speaker 4:Nice so good that looks kind of like glenn, except for the feather, is way too small uh, I actually think that was Nines and Moors. Oh, nines was unconscious, not when you were originally taking care of him.
Speaker 2:Oh, that was episode 80.
Speaker 4:Oh, that was the first.
Speaker 3:Okay, all right. Any questions before we begin? How did you get to be so cool, surrounding myself with great people like you all?
Speaker 6:Ice cold.
Speaker 3:What a diversion, deflection.
Speaker 2:Did we I don't know if this needs to be pulled out of our talk Did we tell people that we're looking at our next thing? Are we going to?
Speaker 3:We mentioned it in the last episode.
Speaker 2:Are we going to give them something to chew on? Yeah yeah, keep it under wraps.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we're going to. I figure we'll after we record our first episode, we'll talk about a little bit more hell yeah which I need to set a date for are we still thinking?
Speaker 2:are you still thinking about doing like the 0.5, or we get to do a little us adventure? Get to know each other. You want to jump right in um, I'll prepare both.
Speaker 3:I don't. I don't think it's going to be because I I had I had pre adventures already prepped for that, in case you guys wanted to start at level one instead of level five I don't think that's necessary, but I think a little something.
Speaker 2:So we we know who our characters are and we know where cohorts are of course got a wall we can all climb together yeah, that's actually.
Speaker 3:it's all going to be wall climbing, that's it.
Speaker 6:Trust falls.
Speaker 3:Which of course Roll to catch All right, which of course is athletics and not acrobatics.
Speaker 6:Yeah, doesn't matter what it is, we'll still fail. All right, yeah, doesn't matter what it is, we'll still fail.
Speaker 3:Alright, so all of you get back to the deck of the ship. Nines, you are fully conscious. You are. You know. You woke up at the end of all this excitement and all of your companions are surrounding you. You're in the middle of Of this core just being re-spooted and everything. After all, the excitement ends, you guys all get back up to the deck of the ship and the sun is just starting to rise. You can see in the distance that there is a port not too far away as the crew up top is preparing to dock, and in the distance you can see it's a pretty bustling city. There are tall buildings with plenty of activity on the ports themselves or on the docks themselves, but there's not many ships moving in and out. You don't really see any ships moving from the docks, but you do see plenty of activity on the docks, People walking around, moving boxes, that kind of thing. So the ship is preparing to dock and about an hour later unless you guys have something else you want to talk about the ship is pulling into the dock.
Speaker 2:This is Dead Pelt Shadows.
Speaker 3:This is Dead Pelt Shadows, Just making sure, yeah. So Sister Anvar walks up to Mors and hands you a small black stone and says to you the next time you have a chance to meditate, make sure you're holding the stone and focus on it. Focus on wanting to talk to your inner self, and you'll have an opportunity to talk to the one that resides within you.
Speaker 2:Wow, that's so sweet of you, are you? Are you sure you can part ways with such a valuable object?
Speaker 3:It's just a stone that I found in the water. I just put some magic in it, so it's not. It's not really that that special.
Speaker 2:So do I have to like talk right to it and then Morse will like pick it up to like eye level and he looks right at it and says hi, I'm Morse yeah, sister Anvar looks at you like you're kind of fucking crazy, says no, you don't have to talk to the rock.
Speaker 3:Why would you talk to a rock?
Speaker 2:well, because sometimes they talk back.
Speaker 3:I've never had that experience. Well, no, you just have to focus on, you have to hold it and you just have to focus on, you have to hold it and you just have to focus on, you know, wanting to talk to you and yourself.
Speaker 2:Well, I appreciate that very much. I can't wait to try it. Great Morris runs around in his bag for a second to see if he can reciprocate with some kind of giving.
Speaker 3:Gives him a shard of the red crystal.
Speaker 1:Yeah Right in the neck yeah.
Speaker 6:Well, I don't have anything I can give you, but I've got this Um, pull this one off.
Speaker 2:Um, so, as Mors is playing through, have you ever been to Frother's Lamp? No I can't say I have. Have you heard of it?
Speaker 3:Yes, I've heard of it.
Speaker 2:Well, and then morse will like pull out this. He, he had that watercolor painting that he did of from the plant. Uh, would you like this? No pressure, I just I want to show my appreciation. I don't know, uh, what else I could show to you or give to you oh uh, thank you, I I've I've never had an oil before.
Speaker 3:Is that what it's called An oil?
Speaker 2:An oil painting.
Speaker 3:Oh, it's just a painting. Okay, yeah, thanks. And she takes it from you and rolls it up really, really carefully and she walks straight into the captain's quarters with it.
Speaker 2:Sweet Mors is tickled.
Speaker 3:Wonderful.
Speaker 5:Nines, did you have something? Uh, yeah, I wanted to attempt to relate to Mors by talking about the way that Nines, uh, self-meditates, or like, internally meditates, sure, uh, which is just by closing his mouth and screaming.
Speaker 3:Closing your mouth and screaming.
Speaker 5:Yeah, like you can screaming. Yeah, like you can. It feels like you're. It sounds like Nines is trying to scream with his mouth closed, Most of the noise coming out through his nose and uh, and he's like see, Completely silent.
Speaker 2:I'll have to try that. Normally I've always done it almost completely quietly. I just sit quietly. Okay, cool Nines is weird.
Speaker 3:I am putting in my notes that nine has taught mores how to meditate.
Speaker 2:I've always just done it the way my body told me to. As a high elf, it always came naturally. I didn't put much thought into it, but I will.
Speaker 5:Nines is also a high elf right yeah, nines will give him that like, use your diaphragm sort of gesture like yeah, from here, like this, and then she'll try to do the thing and he still has his helmet on.
Speaker 2:So it's like reverberating use your diaphragm sort of gesture, like yeah, from here, like this, and then he'll try to do the thing and he still has his helmet on. So it's reverberating a little bit as it shouts through his nose.
Speaker 4:Shouts through his nose.
Speaker 5:Yeah, Nines winces, because obviously Mors isn't doing it right, but gives him the double thumbs up anyway.
Speaker 2:I imagine Bean Sprouts just got his both fingers little raccoon fingers deep in his ears trying to block out whatever he can for this.
Speaker 4:So are we import tied up.
Speaker 3:You're about to pull in right now? Yes, Okay. The ship is getting moored right now.
Speaker 4:Okay, glenn will turn his back and start to walk away, shaking his head uh monty's right behind, uh glenn okay.
Speaker 3:So yeah, as your ship's getting moored, you can smell the, the brine in the air, um, and it's as it's mingling with the, the smell of what you of, of a damp earth, and you can hear the creaking of the dock ropes from the ships, uh, and the sun is is casting it, the sun is shining through, have pretty heavy clouds at the moment, and but you can see that the whole island and all the buildings has a slight silver hue to it. It's almost as if if the light was bending around the, the island's buildings, the dock itself is built of this dark gray stone, um, it's a. It's been worn smooth over over time from the salt spray and the water around you and on it you can see that there are faintly glowing runes that are carved into the pier and the docks around you, and they're flickering almost like a heartbeat or a pulse.
Speaker 4:I thought you said harpy.
Speaker 3:No a heartbeat.
Speaker 5:So like pulsing runes on all of the building.
Speaker 3:On the dock and the pier around you. What color the runes themselves? A light blue.
Speaker 6:What do they smell like? Do we recognize these runes?
Speaker 3:Do you recognize these runes? Give me a religion check.
Speaker 5:Ooh religion.
Speaker 6:I'm good at that, I'll look over to Glenn as I'm doing my religion check and say do these look familiar to you? Yeah, do we all. Is that just the All of you can give doing my religion?
Speaker 2:check and say do these look familiar to you? Yeah, do we all.
Speaker 3:All of you can give me a religion check, hooray 19.
Speaker 6:Monty got a 16.
Speaker 3:And Glenn, you can give me one advantage, because that's all your backstory.
Speaker 1:Oh, you're in a forest.
Speaker 3:You're not in a forest, it wouldn't matter 14. 14? Okay, so why am I so high on this?
Speaker 4:So, oh, wait a second. No, you can continue. I'm just looking somewhere.
Speaker 3:Alright. So, mors, you recognize this as the symbol of Malar. He's generally thought of as a chaotic, evil god, but most lycanthropes worship him. But as you're looking at the runes more, it seems to be a ward of a ward against Malar instead of for him. So it seems to be like the town folk are trying to ward themselves or protect themselves from Malar instead of for him.
Speaker 2:So it seems to be like the town folk are trying to ward themselves or protect themselves from Malar. Okay, do the others also pick up on this, or Morris will start talking.
Speaker 3:No, just you.
Speaker 2:You know, I think these glowing sigils are all protection against the god Malar, who is the, I think, lycanthropes worship him. I'm not too sure about their relationship.
Speaker 6:Is that real? Yeah, just table talk. Do you run into Malar?
Speaker 3:No, you've not run into Malar at all.
Speaker 6:It's like a brand new person you're throwing in here, Brandon.
Speaker 3:It's a god in D&D.
Speaker 4:So Glenn will pull out his big book of gods and page through it.
Speaker 3:So on page 71.
Speaker 3:Really interested to what order these gods are On page 71,. You know that Malar is also known as the Beast Lord. He's a chaotic, evil god of hunt, bloodlust, savagery, primal instincts, and he's revered or feared by those afflicted with lycanthropy. He's often depicted as a towering, feral figure with a great predator beast like a wolf or a panther. He's typically got blood-stained fur, glowing red eyes and he's described to have untamed fury. He's known for the thrill of the hunt, savage aspects of nature and the worship of the struggle for survival. He's a natural patron for lycanthropes.
Speaker 5:What's that You're craving? The hunter.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah exactly. He's a natural patron for lycanthropes who embrace their animalistic side.
Speaker 5:I was just going to point out that I think the emphasis is on the second syllable in lycanthropes, who embrace their animalistic side. I was just going to point out that I think the emphasis is on the second syllable and lycanthropy.
Speaker 3:What was I saying? Lycanthropy?
Speaker 5:That's what I was saying.
Speaker 3:Lycanthropy. Thank you, can we just call them werewolves? Yeah, so he's typically. No, it's because it's not just wolves, not just werewolves.
Speaker 6:No, they could be warehouses. Wear other stuff, wear frogs, underwears.
Speaker 3:It also says in your book that he's typically in direct opposition of Selune and Eldath. Both are the goddess of the moon and redemption and a pacifist goddess of calm and nature's stillness.
Speaker 4:Oh, Selune S-E-L-U-N-E.
Speaker 3:Yes, s-e-l-u-n-e, yes, s-e-l-u-n-e Correct.
Speaker 2:Are you telling that to us out loud or are you just reading that to yourself?
Speaker 4:So he will read it to himself and then he will explain it that Malar, Malar, Malar.
Speaker 3:Malar M-A-L-A-a-r okay, malar.
Speaker 4:So malar, is the the patron saint or the patron god of lycanthropes? Um, sorry, I'm making fun of me no, I'm trying to remember which is the right way.
Speaker 1:Lycanthropy.
Speaker 4:Lycanthropes and directly opposes Saloon and Eldath. So I think this town is pro-Saloon and Eldath I would gather from that. And so I think if we run into any of these Malor Malar worshippers we should probably be careful, because they seem to be savage.
Speaker 6:Isn't Eldath Mors'?
Speaker 2:BBF it is. So Mors will look around and he's kind of looking forward to if there are any signs of uh saloon and eldath in town or if it's just these uh sigils against malar. I didn't realize that eldath had any real enemies. It's interesting uh.
Speaker 3:So, yes, as you're looking around, you can see the dock workers. Uh, most of the dock workers that you see have faintly glowing eyes of various colors. You see yellow, uh, blue, green, but they're all going about their work. You can see that they have some scars on their hands from where they've obviously had uh, they've gotten into fights and everything, but they all seem relatively happy. They're going about their daily work. And almost on everybody's, on everybody's neck, you see a chain with a symbol of either a waterfall plunging into a still pool, which you know to be the symbol of Eldath, or a pair of eyes surrounded by seven silver stars, which you know to be the symbol of Selune.
Speaker 4:So just for my notes, what page is Selune on?
Speaker 3:Selune is on page two. Oh nice, I'm trying to figure out the pattern here alphabetical good luck recognizing a pattern, because I'm just throwing numbers out there.
Speaker 2:What's the date for this book 49 dragon age.
Speaker 3:Everybody knows that.
Speaker 4:I will publish this book later. Brandon's Guide to Gods.
Speaker 5:Glenn's Big Book of Gods. Glenn's.
Speaker 6:God Guide Brandon will read you the gods and you'll get them from a golden scroll and as soon as you read them they'll disappear. And then you have to put it in your own book. Perfect the book of glenn all right um so that answers your question, morse it does.
Speaker 2:Thank you, perfect go ahead, glenn.
Speaker 3:I think that's it okay we walk into town all right.
Speaker 3:So, um, as you're starting to walk forward, or as you're as you're starting to walk forward, or as you're walking into town, an older human walks up to you and let me find his name, I'm sorry. An older human walks up to you. He's pretty tall for a human. He stands about 6'4". He's got stark white hair that flows down past his shoulders. His eyes, they glow a slight silver color and he's got a uh, streak of blue, almost a blue vein, that goes up his right cheek. Um, he's leaning on a silver tipped cane, which, uh, he's using for balance. As he's walking towards you, and he is, the robes that he's wearing are midnight blue. And he walks up to you and the robes that he's wearing are a midnight blue. And he walks up to you and he says Welcome, welcome to the town of Dead Pelt Shadows. I heard we had visitors coming. My name is Elder Halric.
Speaker 4:So Glenn will take a step forward and stick out his hand and say I'm sorry, what did you say? His name was.
Speaker 3:Elder Halric H-A-L-R-I-C.
Speaker 4:Good morning Elder Halric. H-a-l-r-i-c. Good morning, elder Halric. My party and I are here to help you, but I've been wondering this for quite some time when does the name Dead Pelt Shadows come from?
Speaker 3:That's a very interesting story come from. That's a very interesting story. You see, a long time ago this island was used as a prison for the mainland. They used to send lycanthropes most people think it's lycanthropes, but it's not, it's lycanthropes to this island as a prison because they didn't want to kill their family members, but they sent them here as kind of a an isolation so that they wouldn't hurt others. And over time uh, you know, there were, there were several different packs reformed and and eventually we, we pushed out the more violent aspects of our nature and we were able to settle this town. But along the way there were a lot of blood and gore that was spilled.
Speaker 6:So Go ahead.
Speaker 4:I was gonna say, not to be rude, but so you're all lycanthropes. I was gonna ask the same thing we're good, lycanthropes, lycanthropes.
Speaker 3:Again most people think it's lycanthropes, but it's not. It's lycanthropes.
Speaker 4:Okay, lycanthropes, both of you are lycanthropes. No, that's not right.
Speaker 3:Is that actually how you pronounce it, or are you just fucking with me?
Speaker 5:No, dude it is.
Speaker 3:It is lycanthropy or lycanthropy fuck you got me, you got me fucked up. It's like lycanthropy in lycanthropes, like yeah the emphasis lycanthropes got it, yeah, okay so so you're all lycanthropes yes, everybody on this island. Let me take that back. There are two or three dozen individuals, family members that have come over with their lycanthrope, with the lycanthrope members of their family that have not been turned. But other than that, everybody else on the island is a lycanthrope.
Speaker 5:So all of these words are to keep people on the island.
Speaker 3:No, it's not to keep people on the island. It's more to prevent us or help us maintain our calmness and to prevent the more savage parts of our animalistic nature to come out. Most of the chains that we wear and the silver in our building is to prevent us from changing during a moon, during a full moon, and if we do turn, it's to try to maintain some kind of composure over our animals.
Speaker 6:Well, let's hope that nothing ever happens to them.
Speaker 5:Nines is just going to accept that, oh okay, great. And then he's walking down to the pier.
Speaker 4:Okay so Glenn will now start examining not examining but he will be paying attention to all the people walking around and, in his head, playing a game.
Speaker 2:Actually no, he will nudge Mors and say so rat Mors will look at who Glenn's gesturing at. Does he look kind of rat-like? Do these guys have any affectation for what critter?
Speaker 3:For what animal they're turned into. No, he doesn't look like a rat. His nose is a little longer and he has a little gaunt, but he's standing upright. He's by no means short. He stands about 5'9". You can see that he does have elf ears, or at least half elf ears. I wouldn't say he looks like a rat.
Speaker 2:I don't know, he could be a little weaselly.
Speaker 3:A wereweasel.
Speaker 6:Should we ask him I think I got shafted? Hey, what are you?
Speaker 4:Oh shit, Haurik what race are you? Elder Haurik, is it rude to ask what animals people turn into?
Speaker 3:It's not necessarily rude if you're their friends.
Speaker 4:Well, I'm friends with everybody. So I think we're good, let's go ask him and he starts walking away.
Speaker 3:I don't think that's a great idea.
Speaker 5:You must forgive my friend, It'll be okay though Nines will chime in with yeah, he has no social awareness.
Speaker 3:Yeah he has no social awareness.
Speaker 6:Table talk on this side. We're here for essentially one purpose with a side purpose, the main purpose being answering the letter we received from the person claiming to be Morrison's mother.
Speaker 3:That's correct.
Speaker 6:That's correct. And then the side one is this is the last known whereabouts of the six-fingered. Wow, is it the leader of the six-fingered elves that killed Monty's dad?
Speaker 3:Yes, the leader of the six-fingered elves.
Speaker 6:Now we found lots of six-fingered elves, but the leaders are supposedly here. Yep, as Monty's looking around.
Speaker 3:Does he see anybody with six fingers around? Every elf descendant that you see, so half-elf or elf, has six fingers on their hands.
Speaker 5:Not every Murderous rampage go.
Speaker 6:Including the including the the Halric is that his name, halric, is a human.
Speaker 4:Including Nines Moors and Glenn.
Speaker 3:That's fair Party not included I only have ten fingers.
Speaker 4:That would be a surprise for Glenn what the shit.
Speaker 3:Glenn grows a six finger.
Speaker 5:Yeah, nines is like I have way more than six fingers. Glenn looks down.
Speaker 6:He has a scimitar with a red jeweled handle on his hip.
Speaker 4:So Glenn is going to be walking around and saying rat, weasel wolf.
Speaker 3:As you're pointing to people.
Speaker 4:No, he's just looking and saying it. He's walking around naming the animals that he thinks that they are.
Speaker 3:Understood. Yeah, so, as you're saying some of these names, elder Holorik is trying to politely give you an affirmative or say no to whatever you're guessing, and he says yes to a few of them. You know, there are wereweasels, there are werewolves, there are werebears what else did you mention Sloths? There are no sloths. Warehouses we do have warehouses, yes, but they're not actual. They're not houses that change into warehouses. We do have warehouses, yes, but they're not actual. They're not houses that change into warehouses.
Speaker 4:They're not W-E-R-E, they're W-A-R-E.
Speaker 5:Nines will eye them suspiciously anyway.
Speaker 6:They're not people that turn into a house.
Speaker 4:Those are Transformers.
Speaker 1:We keep them around for extra storage.
Speaker 6:Bag of holdings. I got nothing on a warehouse.
Speaker 3:Alright. So Elder Halric says to you Captain Captain Lissandra asked me to pass off a letter of welcome to you and an invitation to our celebration of the moonlight tonight. If you are welcome, it's a masquerade party. If you would like to come, it's a masquerade party. We encourage everybody to dress up. There's only a few rules associated with it. Right, it's, it's? You don't reveal what kind of uh lycanthrope you are and you don't uh it the. The goal is to be somebody else. So if you're typically a werewolf, you would dress up as like a were raven, for instance but I'm a cat.
Speaker 6:Uh, what's morse's mom's name or what was signed on the letter?
Speaker 2:Lady Alariel Starsong.
Speaker 6:Okay so do we know who this captain is that we're receiving this invite from?
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 6:No, okay, who is this individual that is apparently aware of us coming to Dead Pelt Shadows? Who is she?
Speaker 3:It is the leader of Dead Pelt Shadows. Captain Lissandra is charged with maintaining the peace here.
Speaker 6:How did she know we were coming?
Speaker 3:She got word from Counselor. Thornwell, Thornwell yes, counselor Thornwell.
Speaker 6:Oh, that is nice to know. Noose can travel quite so fast when we're on a ship heading directly here.
Speaker 3:Of course there's magic, my dear boy.
Speaker 1:There's magic.
Speaker 4:You have magic. I'm just kidding.
Speaker 6:If we do not happen to have the weird capabilities, are we still allowed to come to this party?
Speaker 3:Absolutely. You are a special guest of Captain Lissandra.
Speaker 4:You don't have weird capabilities You're already a weird cat.
Speaker 6:I've always wanted to dress up like a human.
Speaker 3:You can absolutely do that. I'm a weird human. We have absolutely do that. I'm a were-human. We have a local shop where you can choose a character to be during the masquerade.
Speaker 4:So Glenn is looking at Monty kind of strange, you're not.
Speaker 6:No, glenn, I have never. I have forever and always been a cat.
Speaker 4:A were-cat.
Speaker 6:Nowhere necessary.
Speaker 4:Oh no, you need a werecat. No were necessary, oh no you didn't wear that.
Speaker 6:I just thought you were cursed. Oh, absolutely not. I was born like this. This is my natural form, all of you.
Speaker 5:Curses get started first. That's way worse.
Speaker 6:How did your mother? React when you came out he was quite surprised and happy, to be honest, uh I was I was one of nine. You were there, my, my, my eight other brothers and sisters, all uh were my little mates.
Speaker 5:She was very happy with the outcome are you the ninth son of a ninth son too?
Speaker 6:No, I am not the ninth son of a ninth son. My father was one of two, his brother, he only had one. Never mind Anyway so how did you?
Speaker 5:turn into a cat.
Speaker 6:I turned into a cat.
Speaker 1:the moment conception took place withinside of my mother Because my father was a cat and my mother was a cat Cat making dick.
Speaker 6:That's what cats have.
Speaker 5:There's nothing here. Let's move on.
Speaker 3:Okay. So Elder Hallrick says to you yes, there are a few rules, right? One masks are mandatory. So even if you are not a werecreature of some sort, every guest must wear a mask. It symbolizes our control over the beast within. No magic is allowed during the ceremony. It's forbidden during the event to avoid destabilizing the wards. We only do this ceremony once a year during a full moon, and we take a lot of preparation. We make a lot of preparation to ensure that there are wards in place. There are special magical precautions and we don't want anybody else's magic to interfere with those wards and cause us to destabilize them. And finally, guests are encouraged to avoid revealing their specific form of lycanthropy. I'm so fucked up with this word right now, it's not even funny Lycanthropy.
Speaker 6:The L word.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the L word. That's a different thing. Yeah, it is Lycanthropy, lycanthropy. Yeah, everybody who is attending is encouraged to avoid revealing their specific form of lycanthropy.
Speaker 4:Like you're not supposed to tell anybody you're a cat. We're not at the ceremony yet, Monty.
Speaker 6:You are correct about that. We are not there. So Monty kind of looks around and says I am all one for a good time, but I don't know if we should be. I think we have more pressing matters to attend to than attending a masquerade. This might be a better time to accomplish what we came here for.
Speaker 3:If you are looking for anybody specific I'm almost picking up your accent. That you're doing and I'm fighting, not doing it. If you're looking for anybody of importance, they will be at this masquerade.
Speaker 6:We are not looking for anybody of importance. They will be at this masquerade. We are not looking for anybody of importance, just somebody specific. We will find them nonetheless.
Speaker 3:Well, it is here for you. And he hands Mors a letter.
Speaker 4:Is it an L An L?
Speaker 3:He hands Mors a wax-sealed invitation. Oh okay, Add one invitation to. He hands Mors a wax sealed invitation.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay.
Speaker 6:Add one invitation to the bestiality party, to your party. So.
Speaker 2:Mors still wearing his helmet, so you can't see, like the, what the fuck look On his face.
Speaker 1:And then, like turns back to Elder Hallrick and accepts the Invitation.
Speaker 2:When does the prohibition on On other people's magic? Turns back to Elder Hallrick and accepts the invitation. He says when does the prohibition on other people's magic begin?
Speaker 3:It's in the ballroom of the masquerade. During the ceremony, during the ceremony itself.
Speaker 2:So anytime outside the ballroom I'm okay to still Absolutely yes, we encourage it.
Speaker 3:We have some very strong magic users within town.
Speaker 2:And then Mors will look back over at Monty and say and the specific person we're looking for? And he turns back to Alric do you know the whereabouts of Lady Alariel Starsong?
Speaker 3:He looks confused and he looks at you and he says I'm sorry, I've heard the name Starsong before, but nobody of that name has been here for quite some time.
Speaker 2:Where have you heard the name Starsong?
Speaker 3:We had some guests, probably about a decade ago, that were here and they were trying to help us with the curse. They thought they could lift it.
Speaker 2:What about a messenger named Ariem?
Speaker 3:I'm sorry, I don't listen to music very much.
Speaker 2:Oh no, she was a messenger. She came from here just within a week or so and brought a letter to me. I'll dig around my pack and see if I can find the letter that she gave to me. I'm pretty sure that's the right person I'm thinking of, right?
Speaker 3:Yes, yeah, it is. Yeah, I only said that because you guys gave me shit about it for a good like ten minutes.
Speaker 6:Ah, we didn't pick up on it.
Speaker 3:No, not at all. Yeah, you guys are pretty good about me saying something incorrectly or saying something not in line with the story and not calling me out on it.
Speaker 4:Or going off on tangents yes.
Speaker 6:Yeah. I never harp about the rules of D&D, of course, yeah.
Speaker 3:Yes, I know REM very well. She's one of our messengers from the town. She left a couple weeks back. She has not been back since then.
Speaker 6:And the signature on the letter, that person does not ring a bell.
Speaker 3:Like I said, it does ring a bell, but they have not been here in about a decade now.
Speaker 6:Monty will kind of shoot Morse a quizzical look that Morse can't actually see because Monty's not wearing a mask.
Speaker 2:Yes, indeed Interesting. Is there anything else that you needed to tell us? We appreciate you coming to meet us so quickly.
Speaker 3:No, that is it. If you all have credit, you are welcome to walk in. You have credit within our local masquerade store. You can go in and choose whatever image that you would like, as long as they have it, and I hope to see you all at the ball tonight.
Speaker 6:One more question before you go. This group of people, the Starsong, do you happen to know where they resided when they were here? You said approximately a decade ago.
Speaker 3:Yes, they were guests of the Moonfall family, which is Captain Lissandra's parents.
Speaker 4:So the Starfall family was a guest of the Moonfall family.
Speaker 3:Correct.
Speaker 4:Alright, alright.
Speaker 6:Well, call me Lightning Beam, Let us be on our way.
Speaker 4:How much credit do we have at the store?
Speaker 3:You're allowed to choose one outfit, so a mask and a cape.
Speaker 6:But I already have a cape. Can I wear this one? Yeah, absolutely the only rule is a mask. He has a mask that he may be a robot.
Speaker 2:He goes clonk, clonk and knocks it on the head. It's more of a helmet.
Speaker 3:I highly encourage you to choose a decorative mask and not that that may scare some of our guests.
Speaker 2:Oh no, I would love to. Masquerade sounds like a good time. Where exactly is the masquerade shop you mentioned?
Speaker 3:Oh, it's right there. And he points to a shop right across the street, less than 30 feet away.
Speaker 5:Let's get your fucking masks here.
Speaker 4:Zanmar's going to go use his credit at all the stores in the entire town. One of everything.
Speaker 5:Nines is going to go to the store and pick out the scariest thing that he can imagine A pink-faced pig.
Speaker 4:I would think it would be a mosquito.
Speaker 5:Because it takes your blood. Yeah, that's a good point.
Speaker 1:We don't have mosquitoes in the mountains though blood. Yeah, that's a good point.
Speaker 5:We don't have mosquitoes in the mountains though, so I that's why I rejected that outright.
Speaker 3:Yeah so you do look across the street. Uh, on the, on the sign it says unmasking opportunities as the the name of the shop. And uh, I'm not going to go through the whole shop sequence. If you guys want to choose a specific mask that you want to choose or that you want to wear, I will let you know if the shop has it or not and we can move on.
Speaker 6:Can you recap the name of the captain? What captain?
Speaker 3:Captain Lissandra Moonfall. Lissandra Moonfall.
Speaker 4:Oh, and they were the host of the Starfalls.
Speaker 6:Correct. That's what I'm putting in the notes.
Speaker 2:Does the shop have any raccoon wear?
Speaker 3:It does. Yeah, there are wear raccoons, no, no no, that's not what he said.
Speaker 5:He said raccoon wear. Do you want a costume for the fucking raccoon? Is that what you're saying?
Speaker 3:Okay, that's a good question. Are you asking for a mask for your fae companion? I'm asking for a friend. There are no masks for your fae companion, but there are raccoon masks there.
Speaker 2:Excellent. Is there a matching cape?
Speaker 3:There is a matching cape actually.
Speaker 2:A big furry silly thickly-furred neck piece Like a long furry drapey bit.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's what you imagine kind of a bandit. Look to it. It's got black and white and gray striped along the back of the cape.
Speaker 2:Morse happily takes the look of the record. Do they have anything that might fit our little bean sprout?
Speaker 3:no, these are all made for humanoid individuals there's nothing even like halfling sized no, there's. I mean there are halfling sized things, but even that is still too big for bean sprout uh, I think we could whip something up. If you'd like to buy one, I will let you for a gold piece.
Speaker 2:If there's any halfling-sized bear outfits, I would like to bear up my raccoon.
Speaker 3:Okay, yes, there is a halfling bear mask that you can buy for one gold piece.
Speaker 2:And hopefully a matching cape.
Speaker 3:Yes, of course.
Speaker 2:I will deduct one gold Alright.
Speaker 4:Glenn, are you saying that you want to dress to disguise him out loud?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think Mors would tell the shopkeep what he's trying to do. Well, Glenn will offer to help.
Speaker 4:He is a fully experienced disguise kit, fully experienced disguise kit or fully experienced disguise maker.
Speaker 5:Darken his eyes.
Speaker 2:I couldn't hear both of you.
Speaker 5:What are you going to do? Darken his eyes? The raccoon, I mean, he's going to help the mask.
Speaker 4:He'll help tailor the mask so that it fits. There's way more to disguise than just paint. Anyway, is there a were-kraken?
Speaker 3:No, there are no kraken masks at the shop.
Speaker 2:What about a were quacken? There is a goose here though.
Speaker 4:What about a?
Speaker 3:were-squid.
Speaker 5:No squid. You should buy several goose masks, then you can be a gudra.
Speaker 3:Then you can be Bill the Goose.
Speaker 4:A were-shark masks, then you can be a gudra. Then you can be Bill the Goose.
Speaker 3:I'll wear shark. There are no sharks. As you're looking, you don't see any aquatic creatures with aquatic masks here.
Speaker 4:I'll wear octopus. No, I'm just kidding Aquatic. Okay, a were-crocodile.
Speaker 3:There's an alligator mask.
Speaker 4:yes, Okay, glenn will choose the were-raven mask.
Speaker 3:Okay.
Speaker 6:Monty would like to look around for just a black mask that covers his eyes.
Speaker 3:Just a bandit Uh, there's.
Speaker 4:Oh, a were-raccoon yeah.
Speaker 3:Uh, as you're talking to the shopkeep, he lets you know that there's no individual band across, but he does offer you a were-raccoon mask.
Speaker 6:I don't want a raccoon mask. I want to dress up like a cat. How about a black cat?
Speaker 3:There is a black cat mask here.
Speaker 5:Okay, I'll take that your fucking disguise as a white cat is to be a black cat.
Speaker 6:I mean, he wouldn't let me disguise myself as a white cat.
Speaker 1:Man yeah, we're getting canceled.
Speaker 3:I'm going to lose the hell out of you.
Speaker 6:I mean it could be like a tiger-looking cat or something.
Speaker 3:There are also tigers here.
Speaker 6:Or a panther, a panther's fine.
Speaker 2:Yeah, is it like a really glossy black cat mask. It's all stitched up like the cheeks and the eyebrow?
Speaker 3:no, no, does it come with a? Whip no, it does not come with I knew exactly what you were going for?
Speaker 6:is it made of leather or?
Speaker 3:they do have. They do have a panther mask here if you'd like that black panther, I am yep, all right. And finally Nines, what Pig? I said the pig thing. Okay, yeah, there is a pig mask here, perfect, scariest thing, that Nines knows of.
Speaker 4:Other than mosquitoes.
Speaker 3:Does he say that to the other characters? Like the other individuals in the store, is he going to explain why the pig is the scariest creature?
Speaker 5:Oh, I mean he doesn't say that outright, but he's definitely like, isn't it so ugly? He's just completely disgusted by this thing. He keeps looking at it, seeing it out of the corner of his eye as he's carrying it around, and he gets startled and reacts to it.
Speaker 6:Okay, I do not believe so. One of my best friends growing up was a pig. His name was Toomba.
Speaker 3:Oh, my God Gross. He taught me a motto Did he eat your children?
Speaker 6:No, he taught me a motto to live by A kuno-tata. No, no, he just said, don't worry about it.
Speaker 3:Anything else you guys want to do before we go to the Masquerade.
Speaker 5:Ballroom. Just the rest of the campaign, just right quick.
Speaker 3:Oh, okay, well, you win.
Speaker 6:I mean, I wanted to continue the story, but we have to go to this party first.
Speaker 3:You've killed the BBG and you win Nice.
Speaker 4:So did Nines put up a fight. Wait a minute.
Speaker 6:Yeah, if you skip any more episodes, you're going to end up being the BBEG.
Speaker 5:Skip episodes. Shut the fuck up.
Speaker 1:You guys played without me.
Speaker 5:Fair, fair To be fair you.
Speaker 6:You guys played without me, Fair Fair.
Speaker 3:To be fair, you said you were going to come play, and then you fell asleep it happens so we played.
Speaker 6:I didn't know, that's what happened.
Speaker 5:Oh yeah, I started drinking early. It was a good night.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I sent a message to Brent. I'm like, hey, you still on for tonight, right 9, 930 start. And he sends me a picture of him with a full glass of whiskey and he says, yep.
Speaker 5:No, I think it was less optimistic than that, like we'll see. Lol, yeah, it was.
Speaker 6:That's funny. I hope it wasn't stress drinking.
Speaker 5:It always is Okay.
Speaker 6:But you're not in the military anymore, you don't have to do that. There's other ways to deal with stress.
Speaker 5:My body doesn't know that.
Speaker 1:Okay so.
Speaker 6:I'll help you with that buddy.
Speaker 4:I am curious what consists of starting early.
Speaker 3:Anytime I start drinking before noon is early for me, you can't drink all day if you don't start in the morning. That's a good point. Yeah, anytime.
Speaker 2:I start drinking before noon is early for me. You can't drink all day if you don't start in the morning. That's a very good point.
Speaker 3:Starting early for me is when I skip over beer. Did you guys know the Surgeon General just announced that alcohol could cause cancer.
Speaker 1:I'm just letting you know it was officially announced last week.
Speaker 5:Our life-giving star also gives cancer. I think we're kind of fucked regardless, I mean yes.
Speaker 2:Oxygen Cancerous Cancerous.
Speaker 6:So everybody say 10 out of 10 people who drink water die.
Speaker 3:That's a good point and you know?
Speaker 4:Because you can cure cancer by just removing all the oxygen drinking bleach will cure cancer alright what did you say?
Speaker 5:true, drinking bleach will cure cancer, or did?
Speaker 3:you mean the other, brandon no, I meant you no, okay, good alright, so as you all walk in, oh, go ahead, morse.
Speaker 2:I did actually have questions. We got here in the morning you said, yes, how much the time we spent talking to old man Bill. I mean, sorry, that's not him.
Speaker 3:Elder.
Speaker 1:Alrick.
Speaker 3:What was Hallrick's first?
Speaker 6:name. Is it Bill that was?
Speaker 3:William, come on in.
Speaker 6:He's fancy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, he's William Haldrick.
Speaker 2:Haldrick III. So between that and the masquerade, shopping and customization of Beansprouts outfit, which is obviously critical to the story, Of course. What's approximate time of day, are we done and what time does the chindig start? I know you mentioned a full moon, but is it like at sundown? Are we looking at the winter?
Speaker 5:Is there something you want to do before the masquerade?
Speaker 3:Yeah. So I would say, after you get everything said and done, you get settled into the local rooms that Elder Hallrick has prepped for you all.
Speaker 6:It's not an.
Speaker 3:Airbnb? No, it's not an Airbnb, it's a hotel. It's probably late afternoon, right before dinner time. You probably have four hours or so left before the ball starts.
Speaker 2:Cool, and you said this is a fairly busy bustling town. Yes, are we in a busy tavern kind of place?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's pretty busy. Okay, is there something you're looking to do.
Speaker 2:No, nothing specific, Just wondering the feel of the city.
Speaker 3:It is pretty full. Pretty much every lycanthrope that has been captured or turned has been sent here by the surrounding areas. So they're sent here to kind of either learn how to live with their animalistic nature or they're taken care of in other ways.
Speaker 2:Kind of seems like something somebody would have mentioned to us along the way when we mentioned coming out here.
Speaker 5:It's full of werewolves.
Speaker 3:You guys were told this that Crystal Deep was full of lycanthropes.
Speaker 2:That was mentioned, not that it was a penal colony At one time it was a penal colony.
Speaker 5:The Australia of werewolves.
Speaker 3:I mean, yeah, that's where I kind of got inspiration for it.
Speaker 5:Wait, how long ago are we talking? Is there a timeline to this? How long ago was the penal colony?
Speaker 3:Yeah, a couple generations ago.
Speaker 5:Okay, so it's like early Australia, yeah, early Australia.
Speaker 4:So are they still sending them?
Speaker 3:Yeah, lycanthropes are sent here not as prisoners, but more to learn how to control themselves.
Speaker 4:For their own protection.
Speaker 3:Yeah, for their own protection. Oh God, I don't say it like that no, they are sent here to learn how to maintain control over their more savage natures.
Speaker 5:Brandon.
Speaker 4:I need to know that these people are free. They are free. And be a more, a better part of society.
Speaker 5:Are these people here against their will?
Speaker 3:No, they are not here against their will. They can leave if they would like.
Speaker 5:Like is the process here? Against the will they can leave if they would like. Like is the process unnecessarily draconian to leave the island?
Speaker 4:Will they kill them if they do it?
Speaker 5:Bill is talking me into worrying about these people.
Speaker 3:No, Elder Hallrick has told you guys the process for this, but basically he mentioned to you that Elder Hallrick the Human, who is not a lycanthrope he is a lycanthrope.
Speaker 6:So he's one of them. Yeah, don't worry about him, you can leave anytime you'd like.
Speaker 3:Most lycanthropes that are sent here or come here on their own. They choose to stay because they're around like-minded individuals who are going through the same things they are.
Speaker 5:I just want to make sure that this is the first world country.
Speaker 3:Yeah, this is basically where pedophiles go after they get released from jail.
Speaker 5:I'm sorry, say that again. I'm sorry, go ahead. No, you just you were talking, I wasn't paying attention. I had something in my throat, I'm sorry. Yeah, like there was a glitching sound.
Speaker 3:We're all good, All right. So you guys enter the ballroom.
Speaker 2:One last question for.
Speaker 3:Elder Hallrich, yep, what you got.
Speaker 2:Do you have any? Are there any residents of Deadpelt Shadows that originated from Bayram Grove, from the pride there?
Speaker 3:Yeah, we have a few of Sorry. We have a few of their individuals here.
Speaker 2:Yes, Very good. We had a run-in. Who actually? He looked around the party and realized it was just him and Glenn. Actually, we had a run-in with them quite some time ago. I wonder if they'd remember us.
Speaker 3:From what I know, most, if not all of the Bayram pride lives here now.
Speaker 2:Are they open to guests? That might be something nice to do before the ball starts. We'll look at Glenn to see if he's interested at all.
Speaker 4:Sure, we could go meet with Nope, no name.
Speaker 6:This is just a couple of travelers you got, or adventurers that helped you in the forest with some orcs.
Speaker 2:Yeah, after we crossed the bridge for like a whole episode.
Speaker 3:Yeah, true, it's one of my early challenge skill challenge episodes.
Speaker 2:Megan didn't make. It past Crushed her soul.
Speaker 3:That's past Crushed her soul, that's fair, crushed her soul.
Speaker 2:Fasto is one of their names. Is there a Fasto here Versus hopefully.
Speaker 3:I'm sorry, I don't know all of their names. Oh, I know that most of them are part of the Crescent Fangs group, who are the protectors of the city. They're basically the city guard here.
Speaker 2:Well, there's no need to bother them, I do have a fast note. Maybe we'll stumble into them later. I guess we'll just have a couple of drinks until the masquerade starts. Is there anything else we should know about this before we go in? We don't want to step on anyone's toes or rub the fur the wrong way.
Speaker 3:No, that's a good one. Just keep in mind the three rules Keep your mask on, don't ask about what their wear form is, and no arcane magic or magic in general.
Speaker 2:Arcane magic. Is there acceptable magic?
Speaker 3:No, I would just stay away from magic.
Speaker 2:Okay, I think we could do that I thought it was.
Speaker 4:We can't tell people what ours are. That was the rule. I didn't know that we couldn't ask. I misunderstood the three rules.
Speaker 5:Guests are encouraged to avoid revealing their specific kind of lycanthropy. So it's kind of an unspoken thing.
Speaker 3:We haven't talked about it.
Speaker 6:Don't ask don't tell.
Speaker 5:It's a little bit of a taboo, and I know Glenn does have trouble with this. I think that Nines would be willing to take the destruction, which could be very funny.
Speaker 4:I think it would be very funny watching Nines.
Speaker 5:I'm trying to interpret the social hierarchies and the differences of. I think Nines is going to be surprised that there's not more butt sniffing. Well, let me put it this way Nines is going to be surprised at the amount of butt sniffing, whatever that number is, he's going. Nines is going to be surprised at the amount of butt-sniffing, whatever that number is. He's going to think it was going to be something different.
Speaker 2:Got it Elder. Just one last question before you go Is there anyone else we should be aware of, like important figures that will be attending? Anyone else that we should try to talk to or avoid? I'm not really sure. None of us have been here before. I don't think try to talk to or avoid.
Speaker 3:I'm not really sure. None of us have been here before. I don't think no. I mean there's Captain Lissandra. Obviously I will be there. If you're looking for me, I'll be in an owl mask myself. There's the Harbormaster, who is Valus Greytide, and there are a few other semi-high political figures like the Lantern Coven Trio and Fentalo. The Coven Trio is a sect of mystics. They are the ones that are typically in charge of our wards, and then Fentalo is an informant for the city. He keeps us apprised of all of the ongoings and if we get any kind of messages from outside the town, he's actually the one of the higher social economic individuals coming to this party.
Speaker 2:Okay, and the purpose of the event is just to celebrate that you're in control and you're going to practice it or socialize and celebrate.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's exactly it. The purpose of this is to show that we're in control of our staffetry. It's to celebrate it.
Speaker 2:Has this ever gone poorly? Just out of curiosity.
Speaker 3:No, this is our 25th anniversary actually this year of hosting this event.
Speaker 2:Wow, 25 years. That's fantastic. Well, we hope that we can help make it as good as any of them have been, if not better.
Speaker 3:I'm sure with special guests like you that have never been here before, nothing can go wrong.
Speaker 2:Is there anything you expect from us Besides following those three rules?
Speaker 3:No, just follow those three rules.
Speaker 2:Just those three rules.
Speaker 3:Just those three rules All right, all right.
Speaker 2:Okay, well, it seems so simple. Nothing could possibly go wrong.
Speaker 3:Nothing could go wrong. Is there anything else I can do for you?
Speaker 6:Curtains fade Just a mask. Fast forward. He said we only have to wear A mask and a cape.
Speaker 4:No, it doesn't say a cape. I am cut to Minds, being like guys. My mask is really itchy.
Speaker 5:And a cape no, it doesn't say a cape, I am cut to mine.
Speaker 2:Guys, my mask is really itchy, I've got to take this thing off or I'm going to explode.
Speaker 4:And it doesn't say anything about no pickpocketing. It doesn't say anything about killing people True.
Speaker 5:Well, I mean.
Speaker 6:Alright, we're going to a party in a full moon with a bunch of lycanthropy. What could go wrong here?
Speaker 3:I think it's lycanthropy.
Speaker 6:Lycanthropany. I think it's lycanthropany, lycanthropany.
Speaker 3:For our listeners. Brandon is actively cringing right now.
Speaker 2:Lycans, you're responsible for it.
Speaker 5:I was going to say that should be our outro. Keep it lycanthropic.
Speaker 3:Keep it lycanthropian.
Speaker 6:Keep it, lycanthropian, you keep a lichen.
Speaker 5:You keep a lichen Like and subscribe.
Speaker 6:Like and subscribe.
Speaker 1:That's the title of this episode.
Speaker 6:Like and subscribe.
Speaker 2:You're a wolf while you're peeing.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 6:So All right, if you turn into a wolf and then go have sex with other wolves. Is that bestiality?
Speaker 3:No, it's perfectly fine when in Rome, that's what I say. What kind of wolf are you?
Speaker 5:Are you a full-bodied wolf here, or are you more like a werewolf? Do you have a humanoid form?
Speaker 6:The question has been asked.
Speaker 5:What position.
Speaker 3:are you using Doggy style? Come on now.
Speaker 5:If it's doggy style, then yes, that is, but if it's literally any other position, then no, I mean what if you turn into a dog and then go have sex with humans?
Speaker 6:What then? Again, what is the position? It doesn't matter. Is it still bestiality?
Speaker 5:Yes, that's what I'm telling you. It's solely based on the position.
Speaker 6:Okay.
Speaker 5:Well.
Speaker 6:Monty's a sinner.
Speaker 3:More, more. It's solely based on the position. Okay, well, monty's the center, morse.
Speaker 2:Morse. Since I feel like this conversation probably came up while we were talking and drinking, morse will like he'll think for a minute and say actually I could turn one of you into a dog, if that's what you're into.
Speaker 3:As you all step through the grand archway of what you now know is called the lunar hall, a wave of beautiful music greets you and it's played by uh. You can see musicians at the end of a band playing at the end. The ballroom is absolutely breathtaking. It's got um, ancient, it's. It looks like it's a mix of ancient architecture fused with, uh, modern enchantments. You can see those same runes pulsing all over the place, on the pillars and on the floors, on the ceilings.
Speaker 3:The chamber that you're in is absolutely massive. It's circular, it's got a dome ceiling made of pale, enchanted glass that is also showing those same runes, and it's got a illusory night sky, lycanthropy, where a massive pale moon drifts overhead and it's slowly moving across the ceiling. It's shimmering with the shifting phases of the moon and it looks like it's almost in a countdown to when it's going to become a full moon. At the top of the ceiling, silvery light cascades across the marble floor and it shifts with the sound of the music and the mood of the crowd. And the crowd seems to be feeding off of that moonlight. They're either growing in tension and dancing more emphatically, or they're starting to slow down and they're slow dancing, depending on the phase of the moon that's shown above. You see some silver chandeliers enchanted above you and the floor itself has silver and black marble with those blue runes protective sigils that are designed to suppress the transformations during the event.
Speaker 3:And at the very front of the ballroom, on a elevated dais, dais, dais, okay. On an elevated dais, youis, daish. On an elevated dais, you see an individual in a white wolf mask with a white cape and silver braided hair twisted into a moonlit crown above her head, watching the entire audience and as you enter the room, she stands up and she makes an announcement and her voice is magically enhanced and she greets the party as you all enter and she says we have special guests. We have special guests tonight. I would like to honor our special guests from the mainland who have come to celebrate with us all. Remember tonight we honor control, not surrender. And she sits back. She sits back down. Is that Lissandra? That is what you all assume to be, lissandra.
Speaker 5:Yes, captain Lissandra and that's kind of the inner monologue.
Speaker 3:Is that Lysandre?
Speaker 5:Yeah, but what he says out loud is hey guys, I think that's Lysandre.
Speaker 2:Mors, he's excited. A raccoon figure nods his head and pats you on the back.
Speaker 4:Were you done describing the?
Speaker 3:Yes, I am.
Speaker 4:Okay, so did she say that right as we walked in?
Speaker 3:As soon as you entered.
Speaker 4:Okay. So Glenn will turn and look at Monty and say why the hell are we wearing masks if she's going to out us right here? I mean I mean. I mean, that's why I didn't see a point in wearing a black cat mask, but yeah, so, but Glenn will actually end it with a I mean car as he walks away in his raven costume that raven you.
Speaker 6:Uh, yeah, monty's, he's just kind of taking it. He monty's. Essentially he's gonna be looking around the room trying to figure people out the best he can. And again, what he's really looking for is elves six fingers. So if you happen to see anybody notable that monty would want to potentially try to talk to about their six fingers, let me know.
Speaker 3:Throughout the evening, through my passive perception of 74, 74, oh shit 16 16 yeah, you do see the capitalist sandra does have six fingers on her left hand well, there we go.
Speaker 6:That's a good start, okay.
Speaker 4:So Glenn's passive perception is 19. You also see that she has six fingers. Andy has dark vision.
Speaker 3:Oh great, I was worried about that.
Speaker 6:You see the seventh finger.
Speaker 3:Brandon or nines.
Speaker 5:Yeah, so correct me if I'm wrong here, but you said there were a lot of six-fingered elves.
Speaker 4:Yes, all of them.
Speaker 6:But not everybody's elves.
Speaker 3:But every elf is six-fingered. Every elf on this island does have six fingers. That you have seen so far. Okay, then is there?
Speaker 6:an elf with five fingers. Let's say yeah me. Let's say 10% of the room.
Speaker 4:I thought you guys all had 10 fingers maybe Monty would be interested in speaking to an elf that is not the six fingered elf you turn to nines definitely nines wades hi never mind, I will go pursue that side quest so Glenn will look for any elves or half elves with only five fingers on each hand, on either hand okay, give me a perception check you find nines hi eleven.
Speaker 3:so other than your party, because of all the masks and the, you find nines, I 11. 11. So, other than your party, because of all the masks and the capes and everything in costumes that people are wearing, some people are wearing more than just a cape and a mask. They're wearing full, full blown costumes. You're finding it difficult to determine if they're elves or not, but you do see a about a fifth of the room, or have six fingers in their left hand.
Speaker 4:Okay, as Glenn is walking around, he's noticing that these people are way more into the cosplay than he has gotten, and he is not happy about it. So as he flips out his cloak and he acts like he's going into stealth, so that the feathers turn dark, Okay. And so now that's adding to his costume and he is going to be walking around looking for anything laying around that he can use to add to his costume, along with his disguise kit.
Speaker 3:Give me a performance roll.
Speaker 6:As in, you fashion yourself a glove with a six finger.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I was going to ask you you change the color of what you're wearing? How?
Speaker 4:It's a magical cloak that helps him stealth. He's got the Gujra cloak. Yeah, the Gujra cloak.
Speaker 1:Three rules bro.
Speaker 2:I think he's suggesting that you're transforming Gujra cloak. Yeah, the Gujra cloak. Three rules, bro. I think he's suggesting that you're transforming Gujra. Are you using magic?
Speaker 5:Is that against the rules? Are we going to get caught? Are we going to be outed?
Speaker 4:Is he using an item, magic, I don't know. There's all kinds of enchantments and all that kind of shit in the fake moon, illusory moon.
Speaker 6:They've got the sorting hat up there on the stage. Yeah, there's all kinds of magic going on, yeah the floating candles.
Speaker 5:I kind of don't look at that.
Speaker 4:I look at the cloak. More of it's got feathers that have two sides, one of them's shiny and one of them's dark.
Speaker 5:It's like those pillows. Oh, yeah, like those sequins pillows. Yeah, it's like those pillows. Oh yeah, like those sequins pillows yeah. He fucking flips the entire cloak over and it's all black now.
Speaker 3:Alright. So you do find a couple things around the room as you're moving around. You do see a couple other cloaks that you can put on, you see a discarded mask, you see some berries that you could probably use to color things one way or another, some feathers that have been dislodged from other capes, and you do see what can only be described as a can full of shoe polish.
Speaker 4:Okay, so Glenn is going to be not using the shoe polish oh that's a good idea what's
Speaker 2:it doing at this ball mystery will never have solved I suppose look at people's shoes they're all very shiny it's a, it's a ball, it's a party.
Speaker 4:People's shoes get scuffed when they're dancing. They want to polish their shoes back up. I mean, I don't know what are you reading into it? Um, so yeah, he will, glenn will, just as he's walking around looking for people with, I guess, checking, counting everybody's fingers. Um, he will also be adding to his costume to make his costume even more, more and more looking like a were raven.
Speaker 2:So collecting shiny bits to play the part, yes.
Speaker 4:To make his nest Cool. That's what he is doing and checking things out, so Okay, what is everybody else doing?
Speaker 2:Morse is interested in going to talk to Captain Lissandra. All right, so she's up on that dais by her lonesome, just like continuing to observe. Then Morse will approach the dais. It seems like there's no rules, but he's still a little cautious about stepping up onto her elevated platform thingy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, as soon as you approach the dais, she waves you forward.
Speaker 6:Monty's going to follow at a distance to where he's kind of remaining within earshot of uh morse, but more or less just trying to stay close to him okay uh, yeah, so I'm assuming there's like stairs or something I don't have to like, just jump up no, there's stairs, yeah, absolutely yeah, so I'll make my way up.
Speaker 2:Uh, so I'm a raccoon figure with a small bear sitting on my shoulder.
Speaker 3:Naturally.
Speaker 2:Lady Lissandra, I presume.
Speaker 3:And Morse will hold his hand out, so she goes to grasp your hand. I'm just going to ask, while you're doing this, nines, what are you doing?
Speaker 5:Nines is definitely people watching, like super interested in all the costumes and stuff, just gonna walk around like checking out, like he's just curious all right, yeah, nines, you see a bunch of different animals that you've probably never come across before.
Speaker 3:There are even there's even one other individual dressed as a pig.
Speaker 5:Nines will recoil. I don't Just a short scream will escape, but with his mouth closed Can. I do like a that would be like a death.
Speaker 3:Give me a constitution saving throw.
Speaker 5:Oh, to stop myself from throwing up Constitution saving throw. Alright, I'm at a plus two here.
Speaker 3:I rolled a six and I got an eight. Yeah, you definitely feel something coming up, but at the last moment you suppress it and you're able to swallow it back down to your throat.
Speaker 5:I will avoid that section of the room, okay.
Speaker 2:Just for visualization purposes, should he throw up in the future. Is it a full face pig mask or does it leave your bottom mouth open? It is full face. Yeah, it's full face.
Speaker 5:So you would be like Imagine you slice off a pig's face and throw it in the mouth. Yeah, that's what I'm thinking.
Speaker 2:I was imagining, like the scary mask from one of the Saw movies. There's the yeah, that's what I'm talking about.
Speaker 1:Yep.
Speaker 2:Okay, that works for me Okay.
Speaker 5:Yeah, so just regular, regular, half pig face, regular, all right, regular, disembodied pig Regular disembodied pig.
Speaker 3:disembodied big face. Okay, you know what, brandon, you get some inspiration for that. That's good. And Justin, I haven't given you inspiration yet. You also get it for the recap oh, thank you so yeah, captain Lissandra reaches her hand out to you, morris, and she says I'm so glad you all could make it.
Speaker 2:I've been looking forward to meeting you all. Good, I don't know what you've heard about us, but hi, I'm Morse. And then he'll clasp her hand and she'll give it a shake. It's a little different. Morse is used to shaking hands with people that have five fingers per hand, and so his grip's a little bit off. He's like oh Sorry, I don't mean to be rude. Do you have six fingers on your hand?
Speaker 3:Yes, most people don't shake with their left hand in this town, but it is a pleasure to meet you.
Speaker 2:Oh sorry, if I use my right hand, it jostles my. He'll look at the raccoon and say my bear. And it jostles my. He'll look at the raccoon and say my bear. Oh, yes, your bear.
Speaker 3:That's a cute bear and she reaches up to scratch Bean Sprout. On the side he chitters warmly of course. Of course. Yes, I do have six fingers. That is a. It is. You know, it's part of my heritage. I guess you could say my entire family, all of our descendants. We were all six fingers. It's due to an ancient demon curse.
Speaker 2:Oh well, I'm sorry to hear that. That sounds troubling. Is there anything I might be able to do to help?
Speaker 3:I don't think so, unless you have a way to travel back in time.
Speaker 2:Well, not intentionally, no.
Speaker 3:Okay, well, I appreciate the offer. My grandfather, who originally made the deal, is in prison, so there's not much you can do anymore. He's serving his time.
Speaker 2:Your grandfather was the originator of the deal.
Speaker 3:That's correct.
Speaker 6:I'm assuming I know Monty's listening in somehow somewhere. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Monty's listening in. I can't help it. I don't have a poker face. It's Moors right, so he looks over at Monty.
Speaker 6:Monty will cast message to him. Would you mind finding out where this prison exactly is while you're having a conversation, or I can always do it later.
Speaker 4:So screw the no magic rule, he's cast magic everywhere.
Speaker 2:It's a problem Mors will be a little bit, having unexpectedly being messaged okay, um, that's really interesting. I I had heard of of the, that kind of curse. I had no idea that the original originator, uh, still lived it. Maybe I would be able to help it. Could I meet him at some point? Well, where is he? Well?
Speaker 3:people that are cursed with lycanthropy lycanthropy, depending on how you pronounce it.
Speaker 6:It's the new age versus the old age.
Speaker 3:We tend to live a very, very long time, like centuries, longer than most of our companions of the same race. He is still alive. He's close to 600 years old now is he kept locally on the island? He is on the island. Why? Why are you asking so many questions about my grandfather?
Speaker 2:it's, uh, quite a mystery and it's kind of a long story, but we had some run-ins with some other six-fingered characters and we're just curious to know more okay, uh, yeah, he is the captain.
Speaker 3:The island he's kept in the the, the town uh, I'm not going to sugarcoat, it's the town dungeon oh well, I hope he's, you know, not imprisoned for too long for what he's done.
Speaker 2:I'm sure he's paid his penance.
Speaker 3:We don't believe in the death penalty on this island, so he is imprisoned for life.
Speaker 2:Oh, that seems extra harsh for someone with such a long life. I apologize, it's not my place to judge, it's just coming from a strange case as also a long-lived race. I can hardly imagine such a long time in prison.
Speaker 3:I understand what you're saying, but if you were to cause pain to generations after generation after you, there should be punishment for that.
Speaker 2:Oh, I'm sorry, I had no idea. Does the six-finger cause you feel pain constantly from that?
Speaker 3:Everybody with six fingers is tempted at one time or another in their life.
Speaker 2:Tempted. I'm sorry. I don't mean to cry. If you don't want to share, it's not, I'm just curious, by nature. I apologize. If you don't want to share, I don't want to.
Speaker 3:Maybe after a few drinks, you and I can talk about it further. Brandon's going to go back and add a fourth rule. Don't ask about fingers, monty, I do need you to roll me a D20. A straight D20. For casting message.
Speaker 6:Okay, d20. Right, I think I'm good. What'd you roll? I got a nat rule A 20. All right, what do I get? What's your?
Speaker 3:roll. I got a nat roll A 20. All right.
Speaker 6:What do I get? What's my price?
Speaker 3:Nothing, get nothing.
Speaker 4:Your white eye falls out.
Speaker 6:Does Monty feel like something potentially bad just happened because he cast message? Or does he think that whole don't use magic thing doesn't matter?
Speaker 5:I definitely got away with it.
Speaker 3:There are no consequences to you casting message, so you can take from that what you want. Okay.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 3:So, yeah, captain Lissandra says to you Mors, she says, yes, we're all tempted at one time or another. All jokes aside, it is not something we're proud of. Everybody with six fingers is descendant of this, this demon deal that my grandfather has done. We are dotting the land now and his entire family is suffering because of a decision that he made in in poor, in haste, when he didn't have to, and, yeah, we're all suffering because of it. Made in poor in haste, when he didn't have to, and, yeah, we're all suffering because of it. So, yes, it was my decision and I'm punishing him for it.
Speaker 2:I understand and I trust that you've done the right thing and certainly we can move on. I would love to buy you a few more drinks. Maybe we talk about something else in the meantime do you?
Speaker 3:do you happen to dance? This is one of my favorite songs. Oh, maybe we talk about something else in the meantime. Do you happen to dance? This is one of my favorite songs.
Speaker 2:Oh, I don't have the occasion often, but I'm light on my feet.
Speaker 3:All right. So Captain Lissandra takes your hand, Mors, and leads you to the dance floor, Along with her two individuals in bear masks. Follow her onto the dance floor and they seem to just be watching over both of you as you're dancing and you can give me either a acrobatics or a performance check okay.
Speaker 2:I cast good at dancing no okay, he took that with his last. I cast good at dancing no, okay he took that with his last feet alright acrobatics.
Speaker 4:It is because my performance is no bueno, maybe I can persuade her that I'm good at dancing this is how they dance where I'm from.
Speaker 5:You don't know this one.
Speaker 2:My acrobatics at advantage gives me a 12 and a 4, so I will take the 12.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so you step on her toes a few times, but she takes the lead and she moves you through the dance. She's very experienced, obviously, and she kind of works you through the movements as the song progresses.
Speaker 4:She's very experienced and she works you.
Speaker 5:Hell yeah.
Speaker 6:Remember Submission, not Control, or is it Control?
Speaker 3:Not Submission. I forget which one it is. It's control, not surrender oh, not surrender.
Speaker 6:Okay, submission, surrender, same thing. Uh, monty's gonna be kind of uh, keeping an eye on, on moore's and what he's doing is is moore's looking giving like? Is he looking worried? Is he like I want out of? Is like what would mores be viewing this, this situation of dancing? Does he want, does he want, to rescue? Does he need a wingman in this moment?
Speaker 2:um well, I think morris is still talking with her too, which isn't helping his poor dancing performance. Um so he's, he's mostly oblivious. He doesn't even know he's doing a bad job dancing, he's just tromping around. Uh, he's probably still got his staff on him too, so he's probably like bonked her a few times or like tripped her feet up with the bottom end of it, trying to figure out how to hold his staff is this a fast song or a slow one, brandon?
Speaker 3:no, it's a slow song it's a slow one.
Speaker 2:So yeah, I've definitely like, awkwardly, put my hands in the wrong spots and then tried to put my hand on her shoulder and whacked her with my stick. Beansprout's trying to Ratatouille mouse me to stop fucking up. It's not going good.
Speaker 5:Rackacoonie.
Speaker 2:Rackacoonie baby. I'm enjoying myself and since you can see most of my face, I do just have like the like the raccoon snoot and mask eyes and ears. So, like my long flowing locks of elven hair are loose. You can see my whole chin and definitely smiling, you can see my whole mouth. Morse is having a good time.
Speaker 6:Monty will not attempt to save him To continue.
Speaker 3:What is everybody's passive perception Morse is having?
Speaker 2:a good time. Monty will not attempt to save him. Okay, do continue. What is?
Speaker 5:everybody's passive perception 20.
Speaker 6:19. 72. We had this discussion 17.
Speaker 3:Okay, what is yours actually? Monty, 16. 16, okay, so 16, 17, 19, and a 20. All right, very perceptive bunch, very perceptive bunch, yeah. So I'm going to say Glenn and Moors, as Moors is dancing around, you both look over at the same time and you see a slight flicker in a few of the wards that are around the room and the pulsing is now offbeat from the rest of the pulses. So they're pulsing offbeat from the rest of the runes.
Speaker 5:But like in a sexy way.
Speaker 3:Yeah, kind of like a little sexy, Just a little sexy yeah.
Speaker 6:Like you're in a room full of lichens and these wards are keeping them at bay.
Speaker 5:Yeah you know, and they're failing, we're throping.
Speaker 3:Somebody in a silver bear mask stumbles forward and clutches his chest and he grabs his chest and he stumbles forward into the crowd and you see the dance floor clear out a little bit as people move away from him and as he grabs his chest he growls I can't stop, I can't stop it.
Speaker 3:And so the enchanted moonlight on the ceiling starts to dim, the enchanted moonlight on the ceiling starts to dim and multiple guests around you start to show different signs of minor transformations. Either their eyes are glowing more than they were before, or you start seeing claws start to develop on their hands or fangs, or you see a blue, even a darker blue, vein on exposed parts of their skin. And as the crowd begins to panic around the dance floor, captain Lissandra pulls apart from Mors and she immediately calls out Hold your ground. The beast is not stronger than your will. Fight it. And so she looks to Mors and she says Please, if there's anything you can do, we must keep everybody in here. Now let them leave the ballroom. We must calm everybody down. So we're going to jump into a skill challenge. I'm open about skill challenges. You need to earn six successes before three fails. If you fail, we're going to be forced into combat. If we pass, we're not going to. We're going to move on with the story, can't?
Speaker 6:we just talk our way out of it.
Speaker 3:We used to get beat all the time you can talk your way out of it if you can calm your guests. So if you tell me what you want to do, I'll tell you the check and what you need to roll. So we're going to take turns. So everybody roll me some initiative.
Speaker 2:Initiatives turn, so everybody roll me some initiative. Initiative About how many of these guests have started showing signs of shapeshifting.
Speaker 3:About a half a dozen so far and I would say total in the room there's about 150.
Speaker 4:So, before this starts, Glenn is going to say so. This isn't the ritual.
Speaker 3:Alright, so we have Glenn with a 16, Monty with a 13, Mors with an 11. Nines. You want to give me one, oh, I.
Speaker 5:Oh, you're there 17. Yeah, 17.
Speaker 3:Thank you. So, nines, you have this one individual with the silver wolf mask in the middle. He's showing more signs of transformation than the rest right now. You've heard Captain Lissandra announce loudly to help calm down the guests or to help restrain the guests. What would you like to attempt?
Speaker 5:Well, especially seeing Morzen's attempt at dancing and being so much more skillful. Okay, I feel like nines could probably distract with some acrobatic dancing.
Speaker 3:I love that. So why don't you give me a performance roll to try to redirect some attention to the symbolic act?
Speaker 5:Oh, very cool.
Speaker 3:Performance and not acrobatics.
Speaker 5:Yeah, performance, okay, I was kind of angling towards doing acrobatics yeah, but dancing is performance because of my plus nine in acrobatics rather than my minus one in performance, and so I was hoping to like be helpful to this rather than to this rather than ninesing it up.
Speaker 3:Ninesing it up, I would say well, maybe.
Speaker 2:What kind of dancing are you going to do to sway Brandon that it's acrobatic and not performance?
Speaker 5:Well, and that's why I specifically described it as acrobatic dancing. As an acrobatic dance, yeah, well, and that's why I specifically described it as acrobatic dancing.
Speaker 2:What does that mean? Olympic level breakdancing?
Speaker 5:Well, it's more like a floor routine. Olympic level floor routine.
Speaker 6:Are you Australian? I know.
Speaker 5:Zero Nines has never even heard of a kangaroo.
Speaker 3:So let's do this. Then, brandon, you can either give me a performance roll at advantage or an acrobatics roll at disadvantage.
Speaker 2:Door number two.
Speaker 5:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I think so.
Speaker 5:It's mine. So a regular d20 rolls like a 10 and a half, at advantage is like a 15 and a half but I'm at a minus one, and so a uh, a 15 and a half minus one does not trump a 10 and a half plus nine so it it's at disadvantage.
Speaker 4:Well acrobatics is at disadvantage.
Speaker 5:Oh, acrobatics is at disadvantage.
Speaker 3:Yes, acrobatics is at disadvantage or performance at advantage.
Speaker 5:What is?
Speaker 4:the number, for it's like five, six, five and a half.
Speaker 5:I guess it would be damn. It's basically the same. Do what you're good at. I'm going to do acrobatics at disadvantage.
Speaker 3:Here we go. Okay, let's do it, let's do it, let's do it.
Speaker 6:At least we'll know what it would have been had he chosen the other one.
Speaker 5:Hell yeah, With a five plus nine I got a 14.
Speaker 3:That passes. So each of these checks are at different DCs. So each of these checks are at different DCs. So they're not all at this one, Nice, but this one does pass at 14. So, yeah, you start dancing. And what does your dance look like, Nines?
Speaker 5:It's mostly a kata. It starts off Tai Chi-ish and then it just gets faster and faster, hopefully along with the music, but certainly just a routine that he's done dozens of times, hundreds of times before, rather than improvisation.
Speaker 3:Okay, yeah, you see some of these individuals that are starting to show signs of transformation. You see some of these individuals that are starting to show signs of transformation. They focus their attention on you and it seems to kind of null some of the pain that they're going through as they're transforming.
Speaker 5:I like it. I'm a hero, you're a hero. Fuck, I was so inspired that I forgot to use my inspiration. That probably would have been helpful.
Speaker 3:That would have been Damn. All right, Glenn. This advantage be gone. You're up.
Speaker 4:So is there somebody near me that's showing signs? What do I see?
Speaker 3:The individual in that silver wolf mask, the one that originally showed signs of transformation, is standing less than five feet from you.
Speaker 4:Okay, so Glenn will take a step forward, standing less than five feet from you. Okay, so Glenn will take a step forward. He'll put his left hand on the silver wolf disguised person and he will calmly talk to him and say you're good, you're not changing, nobody can see anything's wrong. Everything is good.
Speaker 5:You're trying to gaslight him into not being a werewolf.
Speaker 3:Alright, give me a persuasion check.
Speaker 4:Oh, not deception, it doesn't matter, it's the same skill or the same level. Sorry, I rolled the wrong one, but it doesn't matter, it's the same bonus 17.
Speaker 3:That does pass. So the individual in the silver wolf mask looks up to you and he seems to be calmed. His eyes soften a little bit and he's focusing directly on you right now. You can see that his teeth are a little longer because he is only wearing a half wolf mask, so he is starting to grow fangs and his claws. Claws are out, but he's starting to calm down as he's looking at you.
Speaker 4:Glenn is going to continue roleplaying this, just real quick. But he's going to say you know how your teeth aren't growing, it's all good, there are no signs of anything going wrong everything is good you are gaslighting the fuck out of the sky, yep alright, everything is good.
Speaker 3:You are gaslighting the fuck out of this guy. Yep, all right, monty, you're up.
Speaker 6:Is there any chance that Monty happens to see a group of people off to the side potentially starting to howl or yip or make excessive amounts of noise? That would drive a response from the rest of the party, a response as in, they like them howling and that's causing other people to want to change as well oh, I see what you're saying.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there are a few individuals that are starting to make noises more associated with their animal noises that either grunts from bears or howls from wolves. Um, I would say there's two or three individuals off to the side that are starting to turn monty's gonna focus on that, because he sees that glenn's kind of handling the, the, the main person.
Speaker 6:So he's gonna go after this, this small, like isolated hopefully isolated group, and he's uh going to kind of dart over to them and then just simply, like in a very attempt to kind of calm them with his hands, he's just going to move his hands down to the side and you're going to see this, like again, he's casting magic. He's going to do he's going to cast silence, and so what that's going to do is put a you'll see this like dark um mist flow down from his hands as he's approaching these figures and kind of give him like a shushing sound and uh, everybody within that 20 foot sphere around him uh will be silenced, for, like, there'll be no noise for 10 minutes all right, give me a straight d20 roll another d20 14 alright, yeah, so this black mist starts coming down on these individuals and the sound just gets cut off and you no longer hear that.
Speaker 3:Mors, you're up cool, cool, cool.
Speaker 2:So the runes that we saw that were kind of out of sync with the others, are they grouped together? Are they kind of dispersed around the room?
Speaker 3:They're around the room, yeah.
Speaker 2:Okay, I'd like to, I guess, a turn. I probably only have a chance to look at one. I'd like to go up to one and kind of get a feel for it. Maybe I can do something to restore its synchronization or whatever. Whatever's out of, out of whack with it, re-hypenize it with the others so, uh, mores, you get the sense that you can.
Speaker 3:You can use your magic to try to refocus these, these runes, but you also know the rule right not to use arcana, arcane magic. Or you get the feeling that you can invoke your god or saloon to try to reactivate these protective symbols.
Speaker 2:So my initial thought was that the way Lissandra asked is if there's anything you can do. It felt like a free, open door to go try doing some wizardry. And I don't think Morse is tight with Eldath, but he's never had paladin or cleric level connection with her, so I don't know that he would instinctively call on her. She did yoink him from this existence not so long ago, yep. So I guess Morse Can I do when Morse can I do when Morse goes over to the wall, does Lissandra come with him at all, or is she still? What's she up to?
Speaker 2:Lissandra's trying to calm down the patrons around her all right, so she's not paying attention to Morse anymore. No well, morse, his background is one of intricate magic workings as a reclaimer for the tower. I think he would feel comfortable trying and then being able to stop in time should whatever it is that he's doing have some kind of negative impact. So I think he's going to proceed with the Arcana route and try to align the energies.
Speaker 3:Give me an Arcana roll.
Speaker 2:Arcana, I roll a 5 plus 9 for a 14. Nice.
Speaker 5:Plus 9 to Arcana. That's crazy.
Speaker 2:Though I do have plus 9 to Acrobatics. Yeah, you just use the same Same roll too, right?
Speaker 5:Yeah.
Speaker 4:I rolled a 5 as well on my perception or my deception.
Speaker 5:Dude we.
Speaker 4:Plus 12.
Speaker 5:Yeah, when we were using Roll20, they have a thing I don't know if you've ever experienced it, but they use some sort of apparatus for quantum, what they call quantum rolls ie completely random and then we end up with, you know, like three 20s in a row and the constant refrain was quantum rolls. By the way, completely random.
Speaker 3:Alright. So yeah, Morris, you're definitely using your magic to try to refocus these runes. I'm going to need you to roll me a d20 as well.
Speaker 2:That's a straight six, All right.
Speaker 3:So the rune in front of you, you start to see it solidify and then it fizzles and goes black.
Speaker 2:That's good news, right.
Speaker 3:No, that's bad news, that is a fail.
Speaker 2:That's great. Is it the six or the 14 that failed? The six, okay, so I have two separate rolls.
Speaker 3:Yes.
Speaker 2:Yep.
Speaker 3:Okay, back to you 9s. We have three passes and one fail, and we need six.
Speaker 5:Correct. Okay, well, the. I don't see medicine really helping too much, but I do have a plus six in religion. Can I cast back to the teachings of Ioun, the goddess of knowledge from a completely different universe, to help in this strange situation?
Speaker 3:Sure yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 5:I like it Okay so religion, you know what? I'm going to use my inspiration, because if I don't do it now, I will forget forever. So I'm going to roll religion at advantage. So with a plus six, ah, fuck me, I rolled an eight for a 14 okay, so what are you gonna say to Ioun uh? What are you asking?
Speaker 3:Ioun for well, the.
Speaker 5:It's not necessarily that uh 9's communes with uh, the god that he learned about in the monastery. Just that, trying to recall some of those lessons, hoping to apply something here.
Speaker 3:Okay, All right. So I'm going to say Glenn.
Speaker 4:Yeah, real quick. So you said you're trying to use the lessons of Ioun to help this person from changing right. That's what you said.
Speaker 5:No, just in terms of the overall situation.
Speaker 4:Okay.
Speaker 5:As opposed to a single individual, Because the first part was distraction and the second tactic here is more strategic.
Speaker 3:Okay, so Ioun comes back to you and through his teachings you get the sense that Ioun wants you to hold one of these individuals and try to keep them from berserking out if they actually change.
Speaker 5:Perfect. So definitely, interpreting this correctly, nines is going to turn to the closest changing person, the person struggling with this lycanthropic change, and just grab them from behind in kind of a bear hug and then pet them and be like it's not your fault. It's not your fault, it's not your fault, all right.
Speaker 3:So, inspired by your God, you're able to easily hold this individual with a gold fox mask and you're able to hold them in place as they're. They're fighting this change, hell yeah, hell yeah.
Speaker 1:What does the fox say?
Speaker 3:And Glenn, you're up.
Speaker 6:Monty pulls out the dadger.
Speaker 3:Oh, no, okay.
Speaker 4:So Glenn, okay. So what does Glenn see around him?
Speaker 3:So not a part of your role. Give me a perception check, glenn. Give me a persuade, or give me a a perception check, glenn. Uh 14, one four. Okay, so under the, the dais that captain Lissandra was on, you see a uh uh uh, the glow of something under the stairs that more is in Lissandra. Walk down you see a blue glow of something.
Speaker 6:Aren't there glowing blue runes all over the room?
Speaker 3:Yeah, this is like a bright blue, something that you wouldn't normally expect.
Speaker 4:That's not what I was expecting to find. I don't remember anything to do anything with magic. Let's see. My investigation sucks and I can't intimidate an inanimate object.
Speaker 3:Um so glenn, well, you could.
Speaker 4:You could try to intimidate somebody from the crowd to stay calm yeah, that well, that's what my plan was gonna be, but that's why I asked what was around me oh yeah, there are still people changing around you.
Speaker 4:Okay. So if there's people changing around me, can I say something and then do something? Yeah, absolutely Okay. So Glenn will say, morse, there's something under the stairs that you just walked over. And then he will turn to a person that is that you just walked over. And then it will turn to a person that is flipping out and he will pull out of his pouch a gold coin and he will start spinning it around in his fingers to distract the person and get their attention on something other than their emotional loss of control.
Speaker 4:Sleight of hand is what I'm shooting for.
Speaker 3:I don't think it's going to be sleight of hand, man, it's going to be performance.
Speaker 4:I'm flipping coins in my hand. I know, Give me the same choice as him, but that's fine.
Speaker 3:No, because you've got a skill that automatically puts you at plus nine if you roll below a ten.
Speaker 4:Oh shit, Then my deception was actually way higher than that.
Speaker 6:Way to go, Brandon. You just ruined it for all of us.
Speaker 4:Alright, well, I'll take the failure, I guess, since you're not letting me use my sleight of hand.
Speaker 3:So what does your performance tend to do? Because you get 10 plus 4, then 14? No, I'm not proficient in performance. So what does your performance tend to do?
Speaker 4:Because you get 10 plus 4, then 14? What? No, I'm not proficient in performance.
Speaker 3:Oh, you're not proficient.
Speaker 4:Okay, so it's a 6.
Speaker 3:Okay yeah, as you're twirling the coin, the coin falls on the ground and the creature in front of you looks more upset than it did before.
Speaker 4:I have a problem with that.
Speaker 3:That's okay, you could say that it doesn't distract them but, Glenn dropping a coin is unlikely.
Speaker 4:You could say that the light flashed off of it and hit him in the eyes and pissed him off more.
Speaker 6:But he didn't drop the freaking coin.
Speaker 4:He didn't drop the coin.
Speaker 5:That's the difference between you and Brandon. You got a freaking dexterity of 20 what'd you? Say Brandon that's the difference between you and Batman. Batman wouldn't have dropped the coin so I could roleplay this.
Speaker 4:so as he's spinning the coin, he doesn't realize that this wolf or whatever that's changing has grown up poor his entire life, and he sees the torchlight glint off of the gold coin and realizes that he doesn't have any gold to his name, so it just infuriates him and causes him to shift further into his.
Speaker 3:You're just not okay with Glenn dropping a coin, are you no?
Speaker 6:not at all. That was good though. I like that build Good job. You get my inspiration.
Speaker 5:It ain't worth a crap, but I'm going to give you some star points, Bill.
Speaker 6:That was real good.
Speaker 3:Monty, you're up.
Speaker 6:Question about rules. If I have, say, a feat that allows me to cloak along with anything I'm carrying if I pick up a person, does that count?
Speaker 3:No.
Speaker 6:Okay, so Monty is going to step outside of the cone of shame or sphere of silence, yep, and um is going to look for the next, uh, closest person that is changing um, and then he's going to or what is who? Does he see what's? What's the person?
Speaker 3:uh yeah. So the person in front of you, he's got a badger mask on. Why isn't all the dudes changing.
Speaker 6:Why isn't there any girls changing?
Speaker 3:I don't know. So he's got a badger mask on. He's laying on his back facing the ceiling.
Speaker 6:He's laying on his back facing the ceiling, correct? Okay, so Monty's going to run over to this person that's laying on their back and, using his cloak and everything else that he can around him, is going to attempt to hide or disappear into the shadows with this person, ideally removing them from the view, trying to prevent everybody else from seeing this person and becoming enraged by it the person from view or maybe you know escaping notice, I'm hiding behind things with this person.
Speaker 3:I guess that would be sneak or stealth all right, uh, that would be a 21 all right, so so just describe you hiding this person from view.
Speaker 6:He grabs him by the foot and just drags him behind a freaking table and throws a tablecloth over him, All right Eloquently, of course, without people noticing. Or maybe he brings him back into the sphere of the cone of shame so people just can't hear what's going on.
Speaker 3:Hoping to try to calm the crowd sure, okay, uh, more is once again, it's to you, bud, and it's a one-to-one.
Speaker 2:So failure, success is up to you right now excellent, I have a good track record, so that should be no problem no problem, no pressure buddy so does he get advantage?
Speaker 4:because I told him about the shiny thing.
Speaker 3:He knows about the shiny thing, but he doesn't get advantage.
Speaker 2:So I'll go see it like being confounded by this black rune that I just tinkered with. I'll go towards the shiny rune under the stairs that Glenn had mentioned. I'm going to investigate it and see what I can learn and do.
Speaker 3:So behind the dais, the stairs of the dais, you see a cracked crystal, a cracked blue crystal that is glowing. You can feel the magic emitting from this crystal and you get the sense that this is the thing that's causing the runes to fail.
Speaker 5:Like a. This is the bad crystal, like the crystals that we know.
Speaker 3:Not the grow, grow, grow crystals that you all know.
Speaker 2:Okay. Is there anything else I can see about this crystal? How big is it? Is it sitting on? A floor or floating.
Speaker 3:It's about hand size, so it would fit in the palm of your hand if you opened it up is it just sitting on the floor? Yeah, sitting on the floor underneath the dais okay suspiciously viciously.
Speaker 2:Um, am I getting any kind of like vibes from or anything, or just like? I think it's probably the cause.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you think it's probably the cause.
Speaker 2:Okay, just taking a quick look through my inventory to see.
Speaker 4:if I have anything here, yell at it and tell it to stop.
Speaker 6:Stop it. Hi, my name is Morse.
Speaker 2:That's my go-to. You do it, I'm thinking about it.
Speaker 5:What if it's just upset? What if you did something more About how much does?
Speaker 2:it weigh Brando.
Speaker 3:Less than 10 pounds, if that's what you're asking.
Speaker 4:Less than 10 pounds.
Speaker 2:What about less than 5 pounds?
Speaker 3:Yes, it does weigh less than 5 pounds.
Speaker 2:Between 1 and 5 pounds, sure Okay. Yes, it does weigh less than 5 pounds. Between 1 and 5 pounds, sure Okay. How big is this Cathedral dance hall? We're in it's large.
Speaker 1:It's very large.
Speaker 5:Tell me what you want to do, my god.
Speaker 2:I'm touring with Catapult and just launching this thing the fuck out of here.
Speaker 3:That's what I figured.
Speaker 2:That's 90 foot in a straight line and then it just stops. Would 90 feet get it out of this room?
Speaker 3:It would not get it out of the room, but you could slam it against the wall if you'd like.
Speaker 2:I don't think I can launch it hard enough to hurt it. Let me see, maybe I can actually.
Speaker 4:He said it's cracked.
Speaker 2:It's already cracked.
Speaker 4:Yes.
Speaker 5:What if we use a peasant cannon, A peasant railgun? Sorry oh.
Speaker 1:It's no longer allowed.
Speaker 5:Actually, it's still allowed because we used it in 2014. Is this a mechanic? That? It's this really terrible mechanic that allows you to freely pass things between people during your round or during your turn. And so if you get a line of commoners or peasants or whatever, however long each time, like if you mix D&D, movement mechanics and physics, like literal Newtonian physics then the commoners or townsfolk or whatever, passing this stone between themselves, yeah, so like it's over this distance within six seconds, and therefore it has this velocity now Okay.
Speaker 1:Here hold. This here hold this.
Speaker 6:Yeah, no flaws, sorry, justin, back to you.
Speaker 2:No, it's all good, this is just fine. How far from the door am I if I wanted to try to run this thing away? Fine. How far from the door am I if I wanted to just like try to run this thing away? How far from the entrance hall?
Speaker 3:I you're close to, I would say 150 feet okay can you catapult it down?
Speaker 2:so I did upon further reading. If I use catapult on this thing, it does do 38 3d8 damage to it if it hits something, so that might break the crystal. But I'm looking for like non-arcane stuff because I'm pretty sure that's what made me fail last time you will need to roll d20 if you try to use magic which I have nothing to do to help with that, but I do have.
Speaker 2:I could, like I could pick it up and banish myself, which would take it away from where we are true. Bruce B, which would take it away from where we are Listen.
Speaker 5:Bruce Banner, have you tried Hulk smashing?
Speaker 2:I'm a wizard Harry I need you to.
Speaker 5:I need you to channel Sam. So the other thing I'm looking at what would Sam do?
Speaker 2:W, w.
Speaker 6:S E.
Speaker 2:The other thing, though, is that I could turn myself into a deer and then pick this thing up and then run away.
Speaker 5:Dear God.
Speaker 6:That's magic, isn't it?
Speaker 5:Why are you overthinking the fuck out of this?
Speaker 2:It's an item. I'm sorry, I don't know what. I'm doing All right. Yeah, I guess I will. Just what is your heart rate? I will give it a good whack.
Speaker 3:Oh, your staff Give me an attack roll.
Speaker 5:Goddamn right, that's the sort of pro magnum caveman shit that I want to see in this game.
Speaker 2:Or I mean one. Yeah, that's fine. I guess one amplifying question I'm going to ask anyways. So the way bags of holding work in your world, Brandon, are they a pocket dimension?
Speaker 3:They are a pocket dimension.
Speaker 2:So in theory, if I put it in my pocket dimension, it shouldn't affect anything else around us.
Speaker 3:True, but remember, bags of holding can be broken if they have a strong enough magical item inside of them.
Speaker 2:I thought it was only if they had another dimensional.
Speaker 3:Nope, they can be broken.
Speaker 2:I know they can be broken, but Alright, that's fine. I've seen Nines whack enough with his going through his stances, his very quiet, introverted meditations, so I'm just going to go through a quick motion there and then just bring one of these metal-capped ends of a staff down and that's crystal Hell yeah.
Speaker 5:A nine-zient whack. Can we give him that?
Speaker 3:skill A nine-zient whack. Oh yeah, give me an attack roll, hell yeah.
Speaker 2:That is a unnatural dirty 20.
Speaker 3:That hits as your staff comes down the, the crystal shatters into a dozen pieces and the glowing stops from it and suddenly the runes around the room snap back on and they start pulsing that blue color again. Everybody around you starts to calm down and they start to stand up and everything seems to calm down in the room.
Speaker 6:Monty lifts up the tablecloth that he just like disappeared a man underneath and he's like are you okay?
Speaker 3:How are you feeling? I'm fine. I feel like I ate a bad burrito.
Speaker 6:Let me help you up, he extends an arm down and then he'll also dismiss the cone of shame around the other three individuals.
Speaker 5:And then he'll also dismiss the cone of shame around the other three individuals. Nines is beginning to struggle with the person that he was soothing. Because they're trying to get away now. But Nines is pretty strong, yeah, yeah this guy whispers.
Speaker 3:Like bro, let me go.
Speaker 1:As he whispers he whispers in his ear.
Speaker 6:Control, not submission. It's ear control.
Speaker 5:It's not your fault. It's not your fault. Stop resisting. Oh my god, just let it happen.
Speaker 3:Stop resisting.
Speaker 5:I'm rescuing you.
Speaker 6:This is for your own good, I'm helping you, monty will run over quickly to Nines and help Nines understand that everything is okay now.
Speaker 5:Nines will allow himself to be pulled back, but is still like Wait, are you sure, hang on, he's ready, he's got. Look at his eyes. Look at his eyes.
Speaker 6:Who's the person that Nines was restraining? What are they? He was restraining what?
Speaker 3:are they? He was restraining a gold fox.
Speaker 6:A fox. They were wearing a mask or they were turning into a fox.
Speaker 3:No, he was wearing a gold fox mask.
Speaker 6:What was he turning into?
Speaker 2:No, Not a fox. That would break a rule.
Speaker 6:That would break a rule. Monty will simply say Nines, this, this person was turning to a beast that was giving you quite a struggle. Yet they're wearing a fox mask, so I think it's safe to assume that they are back to their normal person now uh, nines is gonna like do the mental math.
Speaker 5:You can see the equation floating in front of his face. He'll nod slowly. He'll accept it.
Speaker 1:Alright.
Speaker 4:Alright so Glenn is gonna try to calm this guy down that he just rubbed his riches in his face.
Speaker 3:Yeah, he's relatively calm now. I mean he's still shaken from what just happened, but he's relatively calm now. I mean he's still shaken from what just happened, but he's calm. But he's looking at you and he doesn't understand why you're waving a coin in his face.
Speaker 4:I realized that he was not happy with the coin and I already put that away.
Speaker 3:Oh okay, man that tongue out did something for me.
Speaker 4:Now he's pointing it down for you to.
Speaker 2:Man. Whatever his top side is, so shiny, it must be a 20. Oh, oh.
Speaker 6:Oh, almost, it's not a seven, it's not a two, this is so.
Speaker 5:It's so bright. Yeah, it's ridiculous. 7. It's not a 2. This is so. It's so bright. Yeah, it's ridiculous.
Speaker 6:Take it up closer, don't let it lose you of the camera 14.
Speaker 2:It is a 16.
Speaker 5:That's what I was thinking of. What if I put the camera way down here?
Speaker 6:Don't put it down too far. Far. We don't want to see that or do we?
Speaker 2:I do that's a 16. That looked even more like a 14 that looked like a 14 11 what game are we playing? We're playing, watch the dice roll. That's a 24 that's a 20.
Speaker 5:Yeah right, alright. So that's a 24. That's a 20. Yeah right, weird isn't?
Speaker 3:it alright. So, uh, captain Lissandra starts to stand up and she's uh, you can hear her, she's assessing the area around you and assessing all the party members, or all the NPCs around you, and she starts to congratulate all of you and she says thank you all so much for helping us and maintaining this. It seems like we've got it under control and as she's starting to say this, the lights start to flicker and through the uh semi-translucent ceiling, the glass shatters and, uh, from the glass uh descends a what looks like a goblin and he's, he's floating there with with robe, uh, uh, you know, bellowing behind him, and he looks at all of you and he focuses directly on glenn and moores and you can just see the rage in his face.
Speaker 4:You left me behind.
Speaker 3:And he says, he says to you, he says you, you, you two thought you were heroes, didn't you Look at all of you clinging to your precious masks, pretending the beast inside can't be tamed, just like you left me broken, discarded, weak. And as he's speaking, you see all these crystals embedded in his skin. You see a red crystal, green crystals, blue crystals, a white crystal, a black crystal. And he continues and he keeps going.
Speaker 3:He says I remember, I remember when you left. I remember the darkness. I remember those chains that she put me in and her, that witch. She tortured me, she hurt me, she whispered, she told me how you left. You never came back for me and I was stuck with her. I was stuck until I was strong enough to get free, until I was strong enough to break free, strong enough to make you all feel my pain that I felt. And you see him raise up both of his hands and this massive fireball starts to be generated and he starts to move his hands downward. And as he moves his hands downward, time stops for Mors. So, mors, you're able to move around freely at the moment. And you see all your companions staring at this creature above you. Everybody understands who this creature is.
Speaker 6:It's Pocket Goblin.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's Cosmos, it's the Pocket Goblin, no idea.
Speaker 6:He was stolen by somebody and they're supposed to go rescue him and they never did yeah, well, yeah, because we got sent back in time freaking 10,000 years how?
Speaker 2:can you be mad at us? We didn't actually do that in this timeline I'm hearing excuses right now.
Speaker 6:Why didn't you complete the side quest um who stole him?
Speaker 4:and, in all honesty, nobody.
Speaker 3:Glenn never claimed to be a hero uh the the spider, did the spider that uh moore's head was friends with?
Speaker 2:yeah, the arachnid monarch not the arachnid monarch.
Speaker 4:No, no, glenda glenda.
Speaker 2:Glenda the good witch. Yep, she said she was gonna go get him right and rick restore him to us now glenda stole him the Asari.
Speaker 3:she is the one that went to go find her.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, Glenda was the bad one and we rescued that angel chick that was going to go get him back for us from her.
Speaker 6:Apparently, she didn't do what she agreed to do.
Speaker 3:We'll fill you in in a second here, Brandon.
Speaker 2:But we didn't do any of that because in this timeline we went back and fucked all that shit.
Speaker 4:There's no Brandon but we didn't do any of that because in this timeline yeah, we're in a totally different timeline.
Speaker 2:Fucked all that shit. There's no Moors in this timeline. There's no Adelaide's orphanage, so there's no Moors in this timeline. So we couldn't have done the thing you don't know. Well, it's very confusing. I understand that he recognizes us, but I don't know how we affected him. Okay, so I can move freely, yep.
Speaker 3:So Okay, there's a little bit of a mist around you as this time freezes and you start to see a form start to approach you through this fog, this mist. It looks like kind of the reflection of moonlight and she seems to emerge through the mist as it rolls gently off of her, off of her skin. You can you, as soon as she appears, you feel the sense of calmness, this peacefulness around you. Uh, her skin is a, a hue of, like a moss color. Her lunity, yeah, um, a smooth. She's got. She's got these smooth patterns on her skin. It kind of resembles a leaf and she's got long green, blue hair, that that flows from her head down to her waist and it looks like droplets of dew are actually clinging to the hair. Um, her eyes are a tranquil purple and she walks up to you and she's making no sound as she comes to you and she says, uh, and she extends her hand to touch your shoulder and then, almost barely louder than a breath, she says peace, I can help you with this one.
Speaker 2:So Mors knows instinctively, through recognizing her and feeling her presence and having worshipped her, that this is Eldeth the.
Speaker 5:Korean goddess. I was so close, who did?
Speaker 3:you think it was?
Speaker 5:Well, what I said was Thaludity which?
Speaker 3:is the word that.
Speaker 5:I made up to indicate how Thalud is something.
Speaker 2:So Mors closes his eyes and he nods, which is a word that I made up to indicate how someone's up again. So, morza, he closes his eyes and he nods and he says Peace, okay. And then he looks back up to the goblin who's like mid-spirit bomb on the gang here. What do I do? I want to protect my friends. I don't want to bring harm to that creature. I'm confused about how to protect my friends. I don't want to bring harm to that creature. I'm confused about how he could be here. It looks like that might be Gossmez, but he takes a deep breath. And he takes a deep breath and then, as he lets it out, he opens his eyes and looks back to Eldath to await her guidance.
Speaker 3:Yeah, eldath looks calmly into your eyes and she says. She says You've come far. There's more weight upon your spirit than your shoulders can bear alone. That is Gossmess, or at least what you know of Gossmess. Each of these realities there are thousands, millions, infinite numbers of these realities happening at once. Gossmess was hurt in this reality, as well as your original reality.
Speaker 2:How can I help him?
Speaker 3:He may be too far to be helped, but in your current state you are not strong enough to stop him. Gossmez sent that letter to you all to lure you to this island and try to get these lycanthropes to stop you.
Speaker 2:There's no cult, there's no greater threat here, it's just Gossmez trying to stop you. There's no cult, there's no greater threat here, it's just Cosmos trying to stop us.
Speaker 3:It's just him.
Speaker 2:Seeking his vengeance.
Speaker 3:In your current form, like I mentioned, you're not strong enough to stop him. Each of these crystals represents a certain god or goddess that has empowered him to go forth and cause you pain, to cause the world pain around you.
Speaker 2:Well, I don't want to hurt him. How can we stop him from hurting others? By bringing peace to him.
Speaker 3:There is a way that I can send you to one of these realms that this god, that a god, presides over, to take the power away from one of these crystals and to weaken him, but I'm not strong enough to do it on my own. And as she says, all this, through the mist walks Sam.
Speaker 2:Who I actually. Mors knows who Sam is now.
Speaker 1:Yes, Mors knows who Sam is.
Speaker 2:So, Mors looks back and forth between them. Okay, I don't think I understand. What are you asking of me?
Speaker 3:I'm asking something of one of you. I need the power of your spirit to send you all to the realm of one of these gods.
Speaker 2:Is there a way for us to come back, or is this a one-way trip?
Speaker 3:If all goes well and you survive your first encounter, we can go to the next, god or goddess, and we should have the power that we sat from that individual to get to the next realm. I don't expect all of you to survive this encounter.
Speaker 2:Morris takes a deep breath and he wraps both his hands around his staff and taps on the ground a couple times and then he says I followed you all my life and I will continue to do so. Sam can take my place here with me and I'll go with you. Can I say goodbye to my friends before we go, even if we don't stop time? Can I give them something to let them know that I'll remember them?
Speaker 3:I can't let you individually say goodbye to them. I'm not strong enough to bring you all in here with the power of all these gods against me. But I will allow you to give one item to sam to carry on in your legacy I can't interact with my friends at all before I go. I'm sorry, not in the physical realm.
Speaker 2:Okay, I understand he takes a deep breath. What about Beansprout?
Speaker 3:Give him one thing Eldath looks to the pillar behind her. No, I'm just kidding, I'm kidding, all right, roll initiative. Brandon looks to the pillar behind her.
Speaker 2:No, I'm just kidding.
Speaker 1:I'm kidding, alright. Rowan is different.
Speaker 3:No, Eldas says. Beansprout is his own being. If he would like to go with you, he can. If he would like to go with Sam, he can Is.
Speaker 6:Beansprout frozen during all this.
Speaker 3:Beansprout is not moving.
Speaker 2:Hmm, I don't suppose I could wear an eyepatch and a helmet at the same time.
Speaker 3:No, you cannot.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that makes sense.
Speaker 5:But why?
Speaker 2:Head cover, that's fair.
Speaker 4:I can't imagine why you wouldn't be able to wear them.
Speaker 5:Yeah, that doesn't make sense to me.
Speaker 2:Because they've got their own little magical fields. Yeah, Like you can't wear two magic rings in the same hand, obviously, Hello Skyrim.
Speaker 4:Oh, I didn't know that eye patch was magic.
Speaker 5:Oh, yeah, this is Diablo rules, got it? Yeah, you only have one thing on your head Definitely Try not to wear a ball cap and sunglasses.
Speaker 2:So Mors, he nods, he says I understand Well. And he closes his eyes and he reaches into his bag of holding just to see what's going to touch his fingers first and his fingers brush across some antlers. So he pulls them out and he nods and he hands out this like deer head antler it's really just like antlers with like a leather thong that goes around to the chin. It looks ridiculous. And he gives it to Sam. He says this may help you more than anything else I can give you. I hope you'll take care of my friends until I can get back to them. If I can get back to them, I know they're your friends now too.
Speaker 3:These are your characters, dude you play.
Speaker 2:Sam as well bud.
Speaker 5:Sam says I know there was no pause there, this is all good, come on, say goodbye. Come on now, don't rush me.
Speaker 2:This is hard. Sam tears up a little bit and she wipes the one uncovered eye and then she lifts the other one and wipes the other eye. This means a lot to me and I'll take care of them the best I can. I'll try. I'll try the best I can. I'll try. I'll try harder than I have for anyone else. And she puts her arms out to give Morris a hug. Morris does, he gives her a big hug, tasks her in the back and he says thank you, I don't know how to repay you. And then he turns a look at Eldath, takes a deep breath and says okay, I hope I can serve you as as well as you need.
Speaker 3:Eldath opens her arms and embraces Mors and she whispers in your ear and for the last roll of Mors in this campaign, I need you to roll me a d6. It's a five. Eldath looks at you and looks up at Gossmez and you see her focusing on the blue crystals as they blur and a portal opens up and Sam and all of your companions get pulled into it.
Speaker 6:So wait, we're leaving Deadpaw Shadows.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah you left and I found something to do there.
Speaker 6:I found out where the guy was and I'm going to go kill him.
Speaker 3:That is where we're going to end the night.
Speaker 2:Wow, alright.
Speaker 6:Wait, you said that was Mors' last roll. I thought he was going to go into these other realms and fight stuff.
Speaker 2:No, that's Sam you guys are going into those realms and fighting stuff With Sam.
Speaker 6:So what's Mors doing?
Speaker 2:He's hanging out with Eldeth.
Speaker 3:Mors sacrificed his power to give Eldeth. Mors sacrificed himself to give Eldeth the power to open this portal in the face of all these other gods.
Speaker 6:Oh, okay, what was the other option, sam?
Speaker 4:Sam. He had to sacrifice either Mors or Sam.
Speaker 6:Oh, one or the other. Oh, okay, Got it.
Speaker 1:Alright.
Speaker 6:That's not cool.
Speaker 3:No, so Sam does still have the ability to pull Mors for a round as an action.
Speaker 1:Cool.
Speaker 3:But as a spirit. It's not actually Mors Right, it's just a shadow of him, if you will. So to perform an action right after her turn.
Speaker 6:Just once per long rest.
Speaker 3:Once per long rest Alright. So I want to say thank you to everybody for following us, liking us, giving us ideas. It means a lot to us. Make sure you're giving us a like and a follow on Facebook. At facebookcom. Slash the D&D story. Retweet us on Twitter or ex at ADD story too, and make sure you give us a follow on Instagramcom. Slash ADND story and Justin, if you want to take us out tonight.
Speaker 2:No, I'm very sad.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'm, very sad.
Speaker 5:What the fuck More Zip.
Speaker 6:Justin, you should say never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down, never gonna run around to search you.
Speaker 2:It's been lycanthropic. A lot of changes happening today guys.
Speaker 6:It's been nerdy, thank you, oh, thank you.