Ep 33: Slay the Tower (Peril in Plutopolis)

The party takes the Chromatic Palace! Janus feels a warmth, Patch matches wits, Lucy disrespects the city, and Rex tries reading.

Transcript

0:05

Welcome back to Trying Up Quest. That's the show. Oh my god, this is raining. Come inside quick. Oh that's soaking. Take off your shoes. Take off your shoes. They look like a little wet dog. Shane, do you have a sweatshirt they could borrow? I'll let you borrow one of my shirts, like two of the people sitting at this table. Yeah. Guess who? I know Chloe did. Are you also? Um I have a Shane sweatshirt. Oh, just on hand, not wearing it, but on hand. It's like a little security blanket. It was raining. Watch the roan talk back. Zara was wearing it on that. It's true. Yeah, watch the roan. Yeah, we just we just recorded the real Housewives of Narcisum talk back. If you haven't listened to those episodes, they're very fun. And if you haven't listened to that talk back, um It's even better. We talk a lot about something called Bull House. Yeah, we do. We made it 10 months. That's the only context you're gonna get about Bull House if we mention it again. And we're gonna mention Bull House a lot. Because I've been I've been we've we this was like an hour ago. We recorded this, and I've just been thinking about nothing but Bull House Nonstop, and we're not gonna talk anymore about it except for when we do. Yeah. Yeah. And when Bull House becomes a reality, you'll you'll know. You'll know. You'll be the first invited to the party. They will scream it from the towers. Oh my god, Bull House. Bullhouse! We're here to play some Rollicking DD. That's why we're here. That's why we're here. Before we play some Rollicking DD, I thought it would be fun if we go around and give our sloth scores. Sloth like the deadly sin. I think it'd be fun if maybe we did all seven. I think we should. Yeah, let's find out what's in that box. Because Elspar is a, I think that was one of my Elspar is a Christian nation, correct? Because Elspar is Christian. All these gods and shit are also Christian. They're also Christian. I can't wait till we do our Beatitude scores afterwards. What? I cannot beatitude scores. What's that? Beatitude? Yes. The Beatitudes are like the list of like good, nice things to do. So it's like visit the sick. What's Lucy's visit the sick score? That's interesting. Well, she's pretty good at that. Yeah. Um sloth scores. Sloth scores. Who wants to go first? You know, I think uh I'm gonna go first. I'm already in it. Uh hi everyone. My name is Shane Jordan and I play Janice Apalon. Hi. Hi Janet. Hi. Hi. Hi. Hi. And Genesis sloth score is uh it's a negative tool. You know, he's up early. He's a go-getter. He's he's got lots of little hobbies, he's always got something to keep him occupied. This is very different from Shane Jordan, by the way. Yes. Wait, what? No. Who the fuck was that? I was opposite. I just happened. What? I was so locked into that not being like Shane that I was like, yeah, that's not like Shane. No, it's no Shane's got a sloth score of plus. No. No. Plus. It's at least a plus one. Brother, did you go to the gym this morning? No. But did you go to the gym yesterday? No. Is it just because your back is hurt? It's mostly because I'm no, actually, it's you just came back from vacation. It's because I'm still uh uh We're talking to the island Shane right now. Yeah, I'm still jet lagged from Cabo, so I woke up at like 8 45 and was like, oh no, I have to work. And that's that's okay, so that's a good example. Waking up at 8 45 is late for Shane. Yeah. Yeah. It's so late. I never sleep that late. That's so you have a you have a low sloth score. Like Janice, you have a low sloth score. Shane, we said, hey, what if we started a podcast and you bought microphones? Yeah. We've never once come over here and you not had like food ready. Like a little treat. Like this set. Shut up, Shane. Janice is Janice is the everyone gets one turn to hit Shane physically. Let me roll. Janice is not. Well, Janice is even more go-getum because uh Shane does not have Janice's level of go-getum-ness. Um and that's and that's that's Janice. That's Janus. That's Janice. Hi, I'm Matt Morton and I play Rex. Hi, Rex. Uh hi guys. Rex has a plus eight to sloth. Um easy. Uh, you know, the last six years he's been in bull house, so he's turning into a tree. He's turning into a tree currently, but in college, you know, he he really did not go to uh many classes, and so he'd sleep in a lot and uh generally um sloth behavior. Yeah. Yeah. And and Matt Morin also, I would I would say in college had a high sloth score. My nickname was snoring Matt Morin. So I learned a thing. That's crazy. That is a fantastic syllable. It has great. Or a great rhythm to it. That's what I'm saying. Break it out, you can have it. Hi everyone, my name is Chloe O'Donnell, and I play Patch and Edies, aka Patch. And I think hi Patch. Hi everyone. Hi everyone. Um, and I think Patch and Chloe have a similar sloth score. Where it's kind of like a law of averages, like uh Janice talked about last week, where it's like, I'm I can be pretty slothful. Like I think most of the time it's like a plus six or something. Like I love I'm talking about me. Patch loves uh, you know, sit around, play video games, you know, he'll drag his his hooves if people make him go somewhere. But if there's something that he's interested in, then he can be pretty product productive on it. You know, he did set up you have games at your function. I'm saying like if they have games at their function, he'd be productive. Oh, I need games at a function personally. What function are we talking about? Yeah, what function? You think Patch is being invited, places? You're right, that's on me. Setting up his shop, like doing his little artificer things, he's very ambitious about. Yeah. Um so I think overall Patch's sloth score is probably a uh a plus three as an average. Oh, okay. Uh hi everyone, my name is Sarah Katrenich. Hi Sarah Katrenich. Hi Sarah. Hey guys. Who the fuck do you play? I play the fuck Lucinae not. The fuck? Um just a little housekeeping. I I misspoke earlier when I said what the beatitudes were. They're actually the um the ways that you will live a virtuous life and get into heaven. So it's like blessed are thee. So poor in spirit, those who mourn the hunger and thirst, the merciful. Clean in heart, clean and heart, peacemakers and and persecuted for righteousness, which is right. Persecuted for hard hard cockness? What? I feel like I learned today. Anyway, so I think that Lucy's beatitude score is like we're not talking or beat. No, I know, but I thought I'd throw it out there. Lucy is a lady of Christ. No, yeah, I can tell. She's not a lady of anything. She she has a big porn spirit, you know. Uh but anyway, Lucy's sloth score. There we go. I think is like a negative five. Oh, so she's a real go-getter. She's a real go-getter. 100%. She's got energy on energy. I don't know if it's I don't know if it's highly focused, but it's definitely. It's not slothful. I think even if she's relaxing, she's doing it with energy to like make a point. You know? Yeah. Like I feel like she doesn't even in that, she's like, she's got like an internal, she's always running at 10. Yeah, I'm I'm you know, because Sarah does not operate that way. I I have a problem with a higher sloth score. I for sure have a higher sloth score than Lucy. I think it's her her divine energy. I think it's because of you know her parentage. Yeah. It's like a battery being overcharged. Yeah. Yeah. She has too much life force. Yeah, and she doesn't have any like after school activities or anything to put that energy into. She has only after school activities. I mean, I do feel like Lucy needs structure, and that's the Lucy never had. Yeah, she needs structure because she needs caring, I think. Not because she's too weird and wild. You know? Yeah. Like be as weird and wild as you want to be. This may be Sarah talking. I wouldn't want to curb Lucy's wildness. I just would want someone to care for her. Yeah, just make sure she doesn't like spend the night in the woods. Make sure she doesn't get dragged underneath a boat. Yeah. Or that someone notices if she does. Sure. Yeah. Or that she doesn't get dragged underneath the boat. Sometimes you gotta live and learn. I think Lucy's bar is kind of low right now. I'm thinking more of there's the concept of there's freedom in structure. Like if you are like that helps you be set up for success. Yeah, but what does success mean? I don't think she's like lacking in success in life. Everyone get in the comments about how you define. Let's psychoanalyze Lucy. Maybe I'm getting defensive of Lucy. But yeah, now we're talking about the philosophy of child rearing. Yeah. Yeah. I think we're all in agreement though that Lucy's sloth is low. Yes. Yeah. And that we wouldn't have it any other way. Oh yeah. Um hi. My name is Spencer Wilden. I'll be DMing today. Hi, Spencer. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for saying hello to you. You're welcome. I don't know why I said thank you. I didn't say hi to you. Okay, well no. I did it in a mean way. All right. Hi. Good morning. Thank you. Alright. Fine. I'll be DMing today. And what's your sloth score? Um characters. Yeah. Uh uh, is there a character you'd want to hear their sloth score? Let's hear about Boneses. That's a good one. Yeah, Ebenezer. Bones, actually, Ebenezer Bones has a plus two to sloth. Yeah. I like that a lot. He loves to be home and reading. He loves a slow morning. He'll get done what he needs to get done. But he loves to wake up right now. He's reading um uh The Artist Way. The artist's way. Oh my gosh. He's taking himself on artist dates. Yeah, he's doing his pages in the morning. He's doing his morning pages. He's really stretching himself because he's mostly an intellectual. And so to be like an artist is a little bit new for him. It's new for him. And he's mostly into like bones and dirt and necromancy, and so this is sort of like a new thing. I like it. Um to be in love with the thing that you're named after is such a blessing. Yeah. I wish I loved Donald's. It's I love McDonald's. That's not my name. Matt Comedy. That's not my name. That's not my name. Speaking of things that we love, uh a cold swim on a hot day, huh? Yeah. Yeah. That's what we were talking about. Hey, I also love a puddle after a big thunderstorm. Speaking of the uh puddle splash. Get out of there! You're not supposed to be in there yet. Well, now I have to come in there after you. Dirty road water. Now we have to dive in there after him. We can't dive into the puddle. I got in there. But we can dive into the recap. It's messier and messier. Splishy, splashy, splash. Party plague. Afflicted father. Catacomb clue. Yeah. Yeah. Last session, the party beat back scores of plague spores at the masquerade of Santa Hercadius, as their allies pooled their resources and attempted to clear the mansion of its civilians before they all fell beneath the indiscriminate axe of the astral plague. It was a brutal battle, but within it, Janice lit up with radiant damage like a Christmas tree. Patch turned Clanky into a white hot pinball to burn away plague. Lucy sploded lots of spores. And Rex got his hands on Windraiser, Iroas's sword, which unlocked some latent magic within him. In addition to sending shooting panes down his back. Ooh, unexplained. And he's not giving that sword back. Nope. The plague struck down ally after ally. High Sun Georgiana, Dod Ratley, Senna Hercadius, and finally Midas Apollon, Janice's father. That was Africa. Eventually the party and Ebenezer Bones completed the portal, allowing them and the other survivors to teleport to the Arcanery, safe from the plague for now. There the party took a moment to recover, realizing the depth of General Tryoctus's, Calidaeus's, Lieutenant Budlus's, or even all three's betrayal. That those who wake from the plague without any negative symptoms are kidnapped to unknown purpose. Possibly using the city's not quite suspicious catacombs. Maybe. Maybe they're in the case. Nothing down here but us bones. Catacombs that are accessible from the bottom of Plutopolis' protected chromatic palace. Oh, catacombs. There it is. I was gonna say now I was like, why is there a cat? That was the comb. Recovering and resting. We resume the following morning with the party having rested and now being high in the air above the arconery. You all find yourselves in Ebenezer Bones hot air balloon. No! I want it to be a black You see that instead of a balloon, it's a massive hollow lung of like a whale that's just like pulsating with heat as it rises in the air. Like two lungs? Like because don't whales have just like humans have two lungs? Uh maybe, but it's just one big, it looks like a balloon, but it's just like we only need one. Whales probably don't have any lungs. I'm assuming they do. They're mammals. Mamma? You're mammals. It's a big organ bag. We're in the hot air now. Hot organ bags. The the the basket is made of bones. Um and flesh. And it's sticky and bloody. Is Ebenezer with us? Yeah, he's flying you. Yeah, no, Mr. Bones, I I have to admit, I was expecting this to be a little more sexy than it ended up being. Are these human bones? It's not supposed to be sexy, it's supposed to be- Where are these bones from? Oh, you know, I get them around. He looks into the middle distance. Uh-oh. The catacombs? Oh, who knows anymore? It's the catacombs. It's always the catacombs. Who knows where they're from? Is this from a human? No. This this one says human on it. Um Did you card that in there? It's written on it. I didn't um This one says maiden Carnassus. Um wait, this one says Jeff. Uh well. This one says Abbey Normal. Wow. Isn't it a beautiful view of the city from up here? I mean, I mean it is. It would be except for the plain cloud. It's just, I feel weird standing on Jeff's. Well, don't worry, they died. You know what? Yeah. You're right. You're right. I don't know why we're worrying about it. You guys uh uh see in front of you the unfurling city of Plutopolis as the sun is slowly rising. It's early morning, you guys got some sleep, you were able to rest and recover after that very, very dangerous night last night. Um, and you are heading to the center of town, to the massive column of plague spores that marks Plutopolis' chromatic palace. The fuzzy dick. Janice, have you been to this building before? Yeah, when I was a kid. Do you remember anything kind of like special about it? Or like good like the stairways only go counterclockwise, or anything that would be helpful to know? Um, I know that it's made of colorful glass, and when the sun rises, it'll look pretty. Alright. I'll keep my eyes open. You can roll history to see if there's you know. Because this is where your mom works. And are there any people in there now, like normal people, do we might think? Just an eleven. Uh Ebenezer Bones goes, I can answer that one. There shouldn't be anyone in there, but that doesn't mean that, you know, if if they're trying to protect something in there, you know, the the bad guys. Just need no, just to make sure we don't have to worry about collateral damage. That's fucking awesome, man. Can I tap you up even though my hands are bloody? Why are your hands bloody, Mr. Bones? Yeah. Steering. Hey Rex. Yeah. How come this morning you told me that you wanted to be a bird? I'd rather be a bird than a tree. Oh, are you still worried about being a tree? Big time. I feel pretty bad today. You looking at Rex, see under like his armor, like the bit of his neck that is like just barely covered by his armor that you can kind of see. You can see like it's not bark, but it's close. Like his skin is starting to harden and form like almost rivulets of wood. I feel bad. You look like you got a plaque. But you look good, you look good, buddy. You got that new sword. I yeah, but I actually, Janice, can you can you look at my back? Oh, yeah. I can take a look. It's been hurting me ever since I started using this sword, and I looked at it last night, and it I looked at it for a second, and it went away. Uh, but it looked really bad. It looked like I infect got infected or something. Yeah. Looks looks fine to me. I don't see anything. You don't see anything? No, it looks fresh. Roll. Oh, sorry. That's just my butt. Lucy, look away. Now you have your butt out, Rex. I said I was going to show him my back. Yeah, there are two different things in a back and a butt. No. Have you ever heard of Sir Mix a lot? I've heard of backside. Rex. That's his nose took screen. Lucy turns away in disgust. We all have butts. What'd you get a train? 17. Okay. With a 17, um, you actually do notice something. The wood parts, like the parts of him that are visibly like not scabbing over, but hardening. Almost all of his back is affected by this. Except for a jagged bit of flesh. Just a a a stripe, almost like a claw, ran down his back and left just like pure unaffected flesh. Actually, that's the only part of your back that looks good. Ha ha! You sure? It's the part that hurts the most. Maybe once it get cut it gets covered up with tree bark, it won't hurt anymore. Maybe it's just plague stuff. I don't want that. Uh uh, everyone make a perception check. I got a 17. Rex got a seven. Pat got a nine. Uh, Janice got uh uh an 11. Uh with a 17, uh Lucy, you see I'm looking out into the distance. Not to look at my butt. Yeah. We're all the rest of us are just staring at Rex's butt. Yeah. Looking into the the city down into the city, you're not yet like into like a cloud level where you can't see the city, and you see figures moving around, um, including a fair amount of plague guard. These like entirely masked figures who disappeared last night in the middle of the party, who kind of like let the plague arrive. There's a good amount of them seemingly like all around the city. Can I try and hit one with a bone? Well, you don't see them. You just got iced. Damn. Well then. Damn. I guess you're putting that to herself. Can I hit them with a bone? Yeah, make a ranged attack roll on rude. Oh, that's a 20. The dirty 20. I am gonna make you do it with disadvantage because I feel like obviously I have to, right? Because you're you're in a hot air balloon and you're trying to drop a bone on someone. You said there's a lot of them. I'm not aiming for a specific one. Oh, so you're not aiming for a big one. That makes it worse. They're not like standing in a huge circle. How many are there? I don't know. They're in the whole city. So it makes sense I would hit one. Dare, just roll it again. I know you're gonna get an at 20. Oh no. Alright, it lands in the water. Lucy, why are you littering? Yeah, Lucy. That's so irresponsible. Okay. This is my city, Lucy. I grew up here and I know you don't like it, but it's my home, okay? And I'd like to keep it clean and you're just littering it with bones. Look, I'm trying to attack the people that let the plug in yesterday. Also, I'm I don't see anyone loose. Nothing wrong with a little bit of bones in a city. I'm just trying to check our altitude. How high up are we? 30,000 feet. Is that too high? Yep. Yep, 30,000 feet up. 30,000 feet up. Well, now that we're 30,000 feet up, it's about time that uh I think we're nearing the five. I think we're high enough. Uh I think it's time for you all to jump. Jump. Jump with what? You can't land. Guys, we can jump. I have free fall. What's it called? Oh, you can fall on this. Yeah. Is that the plan? We're just gonna fall. Are we How far up are we? Because I know we're 30,000 bones up, but. Yeah, you're 30,000 bones up. I think you're probably about 300 feet up. That's so far to fall. Um, but you're not you're trying to land on the top of the tower. But we Oh, yes. We know that we are like right above the tower, right? Yeah, like you are you are not gonna miss it. Yeah, you're not gonna you're probably not gonna miss it. Okay. Janice jumps. Lucy, are you gonna cast that spell on us? Yeah. Oh, then cool. Great. Rex jumps. Cast feather fall? Yes. Hey! Oh I'm gonna take Jeff with me. Um, okay, you take the bone marked Jeff. Level up, Lucy. Level up. Got it. Put on the uh bubble of of water breathing that also keeps out airborne uh things. You all jump out and uh Bones calls out after you Good luck, have fun! Also, I left something in the break room. What does that miss about? A Sogbaneer, I worry it went back. Oh, I love Sogbaneer. I didn't hear that Rex does too. As you guys are nearing, you see uh from the top of the tower. Uh, you see a massive tree growing on the top of it, shifting in the wind. A tree? Go starboard! Uh I'm Patch. What does everyone do when Lucy says go starboard? I think I Patch kinda tries to like swim through the air to like grab onto her foot so that we're connected. Okay. I'm like banking to the right, and so then we can kind of go slowly and yeah, I don't know how Featherfall works. You're just falling slower. Yeah. Okay, yeah. Rex is going for the tree. I I don't know if you should go for the tree. Innately, it's it's pulling innate. I worry about the fences for the tower. Grab Rex and bring with me. No, I must be with my tree. I grab Rex's other foot. Can I see if the tree is moving unnaturally? Yeah, roll uh insight. In a mean way. Or nature. Gosh, I'm rolling so bad. Um. Okay. Can I roll nature? Yeah. I got a 14. 14. Nice. I got a 21. A natural 20. I think 14 and 21. You both uh realized you've seen a tree move like this before, and that was at the layer of the dragon mod merch. This tree seems to be moving a little bit too much. It's a plague tree. I want to go to the tree. You gotta chop it. It's a it's a it's an attack tree. Can't do chopping on trees anymore. Bank, bank! Bank, bank! Don't talk about the bank to me, Lucy. I'm sorry. I just think that's so inconsiderate. You know how that feels. I turn off featherfall for a second. I turn it back on. As you all you all uh fall closer and closer to the tree, and as you near, you see it in greater detail. Janice, you've seen this tree before. Um this is a famous Plutopolis image. The uh tree of harmony at the top of the chromatic palace. That's nice. Uh it doesn't look harmonious right now. Is it a snake tree? It's a snake tree. Um the tree is comprised of six interlacing trunks, all made of different materials. So there's a wood tree, there's a steel or there's a wood like trunk, there's steel, there's crystal, there's gold, there's amethyst, and there's stone. Cool. And it it they form this this beautiful rainbow tree that's supposed to like signify democracy in Plutopolis. It's like the six uh the six districts of the council. Which one is wood? So cool, Spencer. I'm assuming that wood is the Druidic Council. Let's see, what's your AC? Um 14. Your AC. Sailing right past you. A branch of this tree tries to swat you out of the air. Uh roll for initiative. Rex got an 18. Janice got a 21. Patch got a 19. No, sorry, Pat got an 18 as well. Uh um, and my Dex is higher than Rex's. But I think Lucy got a 19. What is so I have a minus one to Dex, and I was so stoked to be. Uh I was like, 18, nice. I want this tree to get a nat 20 on initiative so bad right now. We're gonna burn this fucker down. I don't want to kill the tree. Sarah, will you look at this for me? You got a nat 20? You got a nat 20. That's incredible. Well, when all your shot like a shit. She's gonna punch us in the face and I'm not even mad about it. Just so you guys know, I have that power. So remember how I was pissed off at the start of the episode. I think you're just being yourself. My angry self. Yes. Um, yes. Your gangrene self. Your gangly self. Um, the tree with its first attack on its turn swings and misses Lucy. Uh it's now going to swing on uh Rex. Oh Tree on Tree Violet. And also misses with a huge lurching sound. It's probably not very dexterous either. I don't know if you guys can see because you didn't see earlier, but there's a tree coming at us! I see it now, Lucy. You guys are uh 30 feet from like the surface of the tower, so the the the roof of the tower, which the tree is on. And we're still falling. And you're still falling. You fall at 60 feet per round, so you you will hit the ground this turn and you won't take damage. Okay. Um, but uh the tree is here. Standard evasive maneuvers, everyone! Um form of bird! Form of tree. Damn it. Wait, are we forming a bird together or are we individually being a bird? Patch is just flapping his arms. Okay. Next in the order is Janice. Janice, you are sailing down towards the roof. We well then I guess I'm gonna I'm gonna hit the ground and I'm gonna look for how to get off this roof. Is there a roof door? Yeah, so you notice you know a couple things. Uh the exit of this roof is like under the tree. Uh-huh. Um there's a spire underneath it. Convenient. And then you also notice there's a kind of hollow spot in the middle of the tree where normally the resonant bell would be. That's normally the the bell is in the middle of the tree. You saw a replica at the party, right? It was very clearly a replica. Um, but you notice that bell is missing, and where it should be, there is a thick, like viscous stream of plague growing through this trunk. Ew, the plague got the tree. The plague's coming from the tree! So we don't want to hurt the tree, we want to hurt the plague. Yeah, um, can I run towards the tree and try to climb up it to get to the bad parts? Yeah, absolutely. Uh, you're able to get to the tree, and it's not that hard to climb. It is like, you know, 10 feet up, but you're able to, it's it's a pretty sprawling root system. Alright. Let us heal this tree by the power of Farrica. And this gem. Oh nice! Oh, do the gem, do the gem, do the gem! And I'm gonna healing hand punch the gem into the tree. Okay. It's a 21 to hit. 21 hit. With this attack roll, what I'm gonna have you do, uh, I'm gonna have you make a uh medicine check versus the current health this like stream of play is at. Got it. Okay. I'm gonna have to beat the crap out of it. So it's it's gonna be hard because it's not taking any damage, but I'll let you roll your damage first. So you're punching it with the gem. So roll your damage for the punch, and then that will help determine the DC. Okay. I rolled both of these things already. So I did um seven radiant damage for the punch. Okay. And then my medicine check was a 21. 21? 20? What? 21 is enough to get some like most of this plague from the tree into the gem. Whoa. Nice! You bash your fist into the tree and holding the gem, you start to feel it gr grow hot in your hands as the plague that is threading throughout this tree is now entering this gem. The rest of you see down below Janice disappear into the foliage and the tree start to twist and contort in the wind. If you can stay right here for one more round, you will successfully uncorrupt the tree, purify the tree. Oh, lovely. Do I get to do anything else to the tree? Uh yeah, if you'd like. Kiss it. Um, I was more thinking I was just gonna fight the plague. Take a few I thought you didn't like trees. I love trees. They're my brethren. My brethren? My brethren. Um, that's a 12 to hit. But not like it. And a 23. Both hit. Oh, yay. Oh, nice. Then I'll do another 7 plus 11. 18 force damage. Next in the order is Lucy. Guess what, guys? What? As Lucy's coming around, she casts web on the tree. Whoa! That's so in character. Lucy, as you cast web, you drop concentration on feather fall. I'll say that you can choose to land before you uh cast web. Yeah. But they will be in the wind. By how much? Um 30 feet. Do you get how much hurt do you get on 30 feet? Oh no. Is it 3d6? Oh, God. That's a lot. Lucy, please don't try me. So I I go to cast web and it like starts to come out, and then I go, oh, oh! I'm so sorry. I'm sorry guys, I'm just really concentrating on keeping us in the air. No, that's a good thing to concentrate on. We appreciate it. Thank you. Okay, okay. So then so then instead of being rope that comes out of instead, it's the a sorcerer's burst. So it's like electricity that comes out. Awesome. But I want it to mean I don't want I want it to get the plague, not the treat. Okay, cool. That's a 14. 14? That hits. Nice. Oh, okay. Wow. Um, I I'm holding a lot of things together in my head right now. You're so strong. I'm doing so good. Good job. Wasn't it weird to cut that girl's hair off when I was young? No, no, no. Totally. No, don't ever think that. No, not at all. No, I don't think about all the bad things I've done in my life. No, don't think about my gun. Okay. Just wait like six seconds. That is 10 damage. Next order is Patch. Yay! Um, okay, so Patch will land. I'm worried about hurting this tree if I try to hit it. Go for the go for the plague part. Okay, I'm gonna shoot a firebolt at the plague part. Okay, rob it. 18. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 16 fire damage. Awesome. Um, and then um, I think that's all I'm gonna do. Rex. Uh Rex is yeah, Rex likes being in the skies. No, Rex is gonna land. Lucy, you can let go of it now. Okay! I guess Rex is gonna try to scamper up to around where the plague is on the tree and take a swing at it with Windraiser. Awesome. Roll the hit, baby. Absolutely. Absolutely, mama. Uh just thought I'd try that. You're okay. And I like that you did it. It was Mama! We'll cut it, we'll cut it. Yeah, I don't know. We'll keep it, Mama. Mama, we'll keep it. Mama, we're not going back from that. Mama! What if I do it in an Elvis way? Would that make it better? Just mama. 10 damage. You know what? Rex is feeling a little spicy. Uh, he's gonna do fire damage. Hell yeah, with the sash. Well, are you still wearing the sash or is the sashay aware? The sash is on the sashay is uh is is still here. Nice mama. But I just an un unenthusiastic drag queen is funny. Nice mama. You gag cool. All right, mama. So how much damage did you? I did 10 uh uh 10 damage, I guess, would be doubled if I'm choosing if I'm using gradient or doing fire. Yeah, let's fucking do fire, I guess, with the sash. Hell yeah. Um, so 10 times two is 20. And then I'm gonna hit it again. Uh an 11 on the next one. Oh, that I'm I'm sorry, Mama, but that misses. Mama, don't worry. I'm grazing. Uh so it is. I don't like this. Mama, I'm grazing right now. Mama, I'm grazing. And I think graze is just plus five. Yeah. Nice. It's just a light notch. Next in the order is the tree. The tree of harmony is going to uh reach its branches down and attempt to grab Janice and throw him off the tower. That's not very harmonious, tree. More like the tree of harm, Oni. Oh, nice. Alright. That is a 19 to hit. That does hit. Alright. Janice! Hold on! Janice, more like the tree of harm, Oni! So it is going to attempt to grapple you. Batch, it's gonna murder me. Throw you off the floor. I'm not gonna be able to survive a fall this far. Oh. I feel like you're probably gonna be fine. Lucy, we need you to concentrate again on Featherfall. Um, Janice has his wing shoes. We're down. No, he doesn't. I'm wearing them. Oh shit. I'm gonna catch Web next. I'll figure something out. I'll press the digitation subject. Ew, Rex, not in front of all of us. I can do fire play if you're into that. Ew. It's literally one of those things. Fire play? Oh, that sounds like one hot show. You can instantaneously light or snuff out a candle or a torch or a small campfire. I can do that. You can start or just stop. You stop it. Okay. So you can start or stop. You can start or stop. I can put out a candle. No, no, no. This is magic. So it's going to attempt to grapple you. It succeeded on its unarmed strike to grab you. Now you need to make a dexterity saving throw uh with a DC equal to uh DC 15. OBKB. Dex save? Mm-hmm. OBKB. What? Uh 17. You do not get grappled by this thing. Um just don't ask. OK B. What'd you say? OBKB? No, no, no, no. Don't ask me. Don't come at that. Oh this. Nothing. It's gonna slam into you with the 16. And it's gonna miss. Okay, it misses. Well, we're cart wheeling around. Janice's AC is like 19. It's 19 right now. Janice, it's your turn. Um, then we're gonna keep uh punching away at this plague. Yeah, now that you have got back around, if you can successfully uh hold on to it with your gem, if you can deal uh I've got I'm writing a number down. I'm writing a number down. If you can deal that much damage or roll that high on a medicine check, you will successfully fully absorb the plague into the gem. So I'm having to decide if I roll once with a medicine and get a certain number, or I have to hit that much damage by punching it with my fist. I can also potentially give you a four. Give me a four? I think Lucy can also potentially I can bend luck for you. Bend luck for me. Yeah. OBKB. Uh let's do No one bring it up again, okay? Keep going, keep going, keep going. I'm gonna do this medicine check and I'm gonna have some help. I can help you. Okay. And his just can give me the help action. Okay. Um roll this in the crate of fate, baby. Okay. Sorry, roll this in the crate of fate, mama. I'll roll one at a time. Okay, so the first roll is a 12, so on its own, that's a plus seven is a nineteen. Okay. Second roll's a nineteen, so on its own is plus seven is a twenty-six. I feel like you don't need it. Oh I held up an 18. Yeah! Janice! So, Janice, as you are uh holding your fist in here, you feel in your hand this warmth of the plague entering the gym. But then you start to feel another warmth. Pee. Jesus. This time in your pants. I'm gonna put you all. You can't make Janice pee himself. I'm going to fall in timeout today. I'm going to put you in timeout. I'm going to put you in timeout. I'm going to put you in timeout. Shane, you're fine, but thin ice, buddy. I'm in a mood. And if you pee yourself, you'll fall through the ice. Janice pees himself. I want this moment to pee yourself. No, I don't want to. I'd like Rex. No, tell me. No, I don't want to. No, tell me as you. No, Janice doesn't want to pee yourself. As you heal the symbol of your town, I want you to tell me if you pee yourself. Janice does not pee himself. Janice is in full hometown hero mode. He is focused on this plague, and he is holding on for dear life to his bladder. Not a drop. You feel um a warmth sort of around your whole arm. There, you need to take a lap. Do you need to take your headphones off, take a lap? I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Sorry, Mr. Will Stoppy. This is a beautiful moment of my town, Lucy. Okay, mamas. We're going. We are on one. Mamas, we can we can pull it together. Okay, Mamas. Almost almost certainly we cannot get to a pivotal story beat this episode because I don't want this to be the energy if we do. This is fantastic. No, I won't say any more jokes ever again. No, it's perfectly. You don't want it to be funny. That's okay. I asked as a question, was it P? You could have just said no. Is that what you clock lit on fire? Okay. Janice, as you feel this gem in the tree begin to fill with the plague, you almost feel a energy coming from the tree itself. The plague that is filling the gem, slowly you start to feel the tree's own life force uh start to uh stream past the gem and around your hand as well. Janice uh kneels down and touches the now disease-free trunk of the tree. You pull the rest of the plague into the gem, and the tree begins softly glowing with a light that is very familiar to you. Great job, Janice. Whoa! Hey, hey, we s we saved the tree. And if you think about it, the tree is uh kind of very directly a symbol of the town. Yeah. So save the tree. We're one step closer to saving the town. Save the city. Maybe you can punch that gem that gem into Rech's Maybe you can punch that gem into Rex's chest, and it'll look like all the plague out of him. Yeah. Wait, does the does the gem feel brittle or or strengthened? It feels full. Can I do an arcana check on the gem now that it's plaguey? Dirty 20. Dirty 20? It is definitely full. Um, it cannot be used again in this way. Um, but it possibly could be used to directionally release the plague. Oh, let's release this shit on Caladus. We can't do that. That would be so unheroic of us, Patch. I can't believe you would even think that. Janice is slowly pocketing in the general. Don't worry, Janice. You won't have to. We will. Janice, um, my people, thank you. Are you are you speaking for the trees, right? Oh, Rex, do you speak Sylvan now? I speak Sylvan. Oh Exactly. That's what I've been trying to tell him. Oh, I would also like to speak Sylvan. I do speak Sylvan, that's the language of trees. Not you, him. Okay. I've heard it pronounced more like down with the thickness. Yeah. That's a bizzle. Oh, this was fun, guys. Janice, that was that was so cool. We did it. We did it. You did it. Well we started. Yeah. Yeah. Uh um, okay, so in into the into the den we go. Into the den we go. Into the thick of it. Do you f do you see um a trapdoor or a a hatch or a you said it's under the tree, right? It's under the tree. We gotta get under the tree. Pardon me, Mr. Tree. I wonder where the bell went. Oh yeah, that looks so important. Wait, what if we put our bell in there? Our little helmet-sized bell? Yeah, I don't think it'll fit, but it'll be a nice gesture, maybe. It might be, yeah. I mean, what are we gonna do with it? Oh, let's write our names on it. And so then everyone will know that we were here. Yes. Yeah, Patch pulls it out of the bag of holding and pulls out his magic sharpie and writes. Patch was here on the inside. Janice writes, Janice in all caps. I write Lucy not, but without the K. So it just says Lucy and O T. Awesome. Uh Rex writes Rex not. But with the K. With a K. There you go, Tree. We'll leave this here until we get the bigger one back. As we say in Sylvan. That was really nice, but why did you just say to me? Oh my god. Underneath the tree, uh, a series of branches and roots form like a uh a narrow staircase down into the next level of the tower. And following that you find yourself in the council chamber. This is where the council, when they normally would meet, uh, you know, non-plagot times, this is where they make their decisions. There's vaulted ceilings, a large dais where they sit and they convene. The desks you see are made of similar materials to the tree, um, marking out each representative spot, and out of the large open air balcony uh that you see behind the desk you can see the cascading lake, obscuring what would on any other day be a beautiful view of the city. Hello! Is it council chamber? Oh, it doesn't echo because there's an open air balcony. Um where does the triatus sit at this council? Does he really? Oh good call. Yeah. Um I don't remember all the materials, but he's probably at the steel desk. Yeah. Fully at steel. I wanna try I wanna get Bones' Sag Benear. Crystal desk or Amethyst? Yeah, I mean you you would know Janice. It's not really a puzzle. Oh. Um, if you can puzzle it. Okay, I just want to know if I need to take a shit in Triocus's desk. Which desk am I gonna shoot? Let us look first! Let us look Janice, soil yourself. Pat would like to look through Trioctus' desk. Yeah, I'd like to look through the trash can. Great. Um, so Lucy, looking in the trash can, you uh fucking roll something. Okay. I actually only got a 13 to look at the desk, unless someone's gonna. Alright, I'll roll survival. Okay, roll survival. That's an 11. Yeah, the trash can is there's nothing, there's like a really old banana peel. Like a really old banana peel. Can I have that? Look, a mouse! Oh, oh, oh, sorry, that was a really fuzzy banana peel. Can I have it? Disgusting. Yeah, if you want it's a little bit. I haven't eaten today. I always forget the patches go to. Oh, me too. Yeah, if you have any trash. Can I go to Bones' can I go to Bones' desk? Yeah. Um, most of these desks you notice are uh they seem like they were abandoned pretty quickly. You see like uh uh ink wells that have been knocked over. There are a few belongings, you see uh Sag Peneer. Two weeks Pat puts the Sog paneer in his bag of holding. Great, you get the moldy SOG paneer. Anyone else who wants to make any investigation or perception checks? I'd love to make a perception check. I'd love to do perception. Unless someone wants to help me investigate. Oh, I'll help. Okay. Well, that's a 14. Rex got a 15 perception. Got a 16 perception. Okay. You see that there's not really a ton of things left behind. You do notice, I'll say with a 16, is high enough to notice there's no paper. They went digital. I I think someone just kind of collected all the paper here. Oh. But probably someone collected it. Probably Triactus collected it. God, I hate that guy. Okay. Well, um, I guess we're going down, right? Is there an elevator? That would be really helpful if we could take an elevator right to the ground floor. I'm sure there is. That would be a reasonable thing to have in a tower this tall, right? Yeah, they're not. What's an elevator? We've been in an elevator, Lucy. Have we? Yeah, and in the other tower we were in. You called them upsi gozies. Even an escalator. I would settle for an escalator. I'm pretty sure there's a magic lift that may or may not be currently powered, but let's go see. Janice, you're able to lead everyone to where you know the lift to be. Um the upsygozi. You see that it is um on the floor. The lift is up. Uh it's this big round disc that takes people up and down. There's a crystal in the middle that you know powers it. That it looks to be a dull, lifeless gray right now. Step aside, everyone. Let me take a crack at this. Go, Patch. What you gonna do? Um well, first I'm gonna look at it. Make an arcanoche. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. That's a natural 20. Patch, wait a second. I'm kind of the magic guy here. So it's a 27 I got. No, it's so it's okay, Rex. Um, you just gotta press it right here. With a 27, you see that it's got a massive, like it someone took a hammer to this thing. It's got this massive. Actually, it's broken! Eaten out of the points to the big crack. And with a 27, I will say that you see on the ground near, you see like a massive puddle of ink. Ew. Looks like there's an octopus in here, guys. But but you put ink on paper. Put ink on paper. We didn't see any buttons. And there was no paper, but there's ink here. And someone smashed the upsie-downy controls. Do you think someone grabbed some ink with all the papers and dropped some? Well, I'm uh are there footprints? Can I make another paper from tree? Paper meet from tree. Is the ink in the shape of anything? Uh, it looks like a butterfly. Or maybe it's my my mom. No, no, no, that's definitely a family altogether. No, I think it's financial stability. No, guys, it's clearly a sword and a shield. It looks like two brothers kissing, I mean fighting. Oh, it says you're adopted. So does dude are there footprints like from the ink or you notice weirdly there's not. So is it ghost? Funny about that. Ghost footprint. Funny about that. It was a funny No! It's ghost footprints, guys! We haven't talked about ghosts once in this entire podcast, and I love the idea of introducing them right now. Well, what can't walk? What doesn't have feet? A rock. A rock was fine. Well, so we can float. We could there's magic. Like Pat Rex has flying boots. Rock, paper, scissors. Ink. Paper from trees. Is the ink on the lift disc or is it next or is it like on the floor, just like near the elevator? On the lift disc. On the disc. But Patch, you do notice the ink, there seems to be other puddles. Oh, like blood and stuff. Other ink puddles. Oh. Um leading kind of out of the lift area. Oh, that's we're gonna follow these ink puddles. Not footprints, just like if someone had a bottle of ink and went bloop and just kept like dropping little bits. It's like breadcrumbs. Yeah, Patch is following it as he's looking at them. Looks like there was a leak maybe in the bottle. That's on the trail. Follow me. Let's follow the trail. Okay. It leads you down um the kind of like um emergency staircase that normally isn't used, but it does go around the uh uh circumference of the tower. Yeah, this would be a great place to vape. This building's up to code. You see, eventually, uh, you go down, you know, a couple stories, you pass some offices, you pass some things of that nature. Eventually, it leads you down to a massive set of oak double doors that are hanging off their hinges. Oh, great, they're already oaken. We all drank our verra juice. I was gonna say if it's not oaken, don't fix it. When there was one set of ink blots, it was Jesus carrying you so the doors had oaken? We go through the doors. Yeah, opening doors. Are they open? Yeah, I mean they're they're hanging off the hinges. They're like practically open. Oh, they're broken out of it. So they are open. Yeah. Oaken up. Entering. What used to be, Janice, you know, uh, a library. You see uh bookshelves toppled over, uh a shocking lack of books. No paper! But a ton of little puddles of ink. You see, there's some blue puddles, some black puddles, some red puddles. Was this you know what they used paper for is to potentially burn things. Yeah, but like it looks like the paper from the books was taken. Are they like big puddles? It looks like the paper from the books were taken, but the ink was left behind. Yes. What the fuck is that? I hear I hear something. Oh, guys, it's a little banana peel that's screwing across the floor. Yummy. I want to catch whatever that is. What is that? Uh everyone roll perception. Ew, I almost had a mouse. I got a 25. Uh Rex got a six. What's that? Timmy's trapped in the well? Um, you ink well with a two, uh two on its stealth roll. You all turn around to see a little creature made of ink um looking up out of a puddle at you and go and then disappear beneath the puddle. It's a blot! What is that? I'm gonna kick it. You see another uh coming out of one of the red ones, another one pokes out its head and it goes and then goes back in. What are these things? They're playing peekaboo. Well, they're not plague, I don't think. I hope not. Hey little guy! I got nothing, guys. I don't know. I don't know. Uh does anyone speak ink? Can I I mean I feel like I've been on a piece of paper too? I know how to write. I feel like I've been doing this a lot, but can I make another Arcana check if I know these things? Oh, that's a 22. 22? You do know these things. Okay. These are called inklings. Inklings? I have an inkling of what it could be. Yeah. These are called inklings. They are little like elementals made of ink. They are uh often mischievous and and rotten. Um, they're often up to no good. They uh are often found in the service of what are called bookworms. Book W-I-R-M. Uh bookworms. They are uh uh purple-scaled dragons that hoard books. Uh-huh. So that no one else can have any knowledge. Dragons in their hoards. I think there might be um a dragon in here somewhere, so just keep an eye out for that. Um Hey, Janice is cool. Don't write uncool on his forehead. That's so rude. Can Patch like pick one up? Um, can I touch them? Sorry, Janice. So you go over to a puddle and um one of them them like opens. But he wants to do it nice. He's gonna be like, hey little guy. Make a animal handling check. With advantage. I don't have good animal handling at all. I got an eight. Oh, I'm gonna roll persuade- I'm gonna press Hey, be nice! Hey! Hey, it reaches its hand out to you, Patch. Do you take it? Um, yeah. Patch takes it. I rolled an 18 persuasion. As it clutches your hand. Holding on a little stronger, buddy. You feel ink start to spread on your hand in the form of a rune. Oh. Whoa. Nice ink. Um, um, give me I look a stamp too. Ah! Oh! Sorry, I thought it was hurt, but I didn't. Are they the same? No. Oh. Both of you roll a D10. I'm not touching this fucking ding. You guys doing henna tattoos over there? I can't think of a home wall. I've been trying to really play a patch's uh six wisdom. D10, right? I got a 10. Okay. I wrote a six. The um inkling uh kind of motions back to two other blobs of ink, and you see a uh a blue one, a red one, and a black one like kind of pop out and start investigating you, and one of them walks up to you, Janice, and reaches out. Friend. Oh, friend! He must be our friend. Look, I know that this could be a trap, but he's cute as hell, so I'm gonna go for it. Yeah, we just got cool stamps. Yeah. Janice puts his hand down. It didn't do anything with me. Um, roll a D10. I feel completely normal. A two. I don't want it. I don't want it. I prefer kitties. I prefer kitties. I'm already so fucked up, guys. I do not want to fucking sad. Fine, I'll do it for the story. Okay. Oh, you don't? Oh no. That was Spencer. Dangerous. Rex, put a little link on that paper. We opened it. It's like friendship tattoos. Fine, you fucker. You see, one of them, Rex, is pointing at the rubric. Open Ruby? We haven't talked to Ruby in so. I'm not gonna give you Ruby. Oh, hold on. We don't want to lace Ruby. Oh no, is there ink on Ruby? Uh it's magic. So probably not. I'm not gonna open Ruby. Not for you. Come on, come on, come on. I want it, come on. What are you gonna give me? I want it. I'll take one of my medical books out and like go, huh? You see um the red one grabs onto it and clunks into a puddle. And you see um ink traveling like along the stones, in between the stones and like the grout lines, um, out the door from whence you came. Oh, let's follow him. I don't want to do that with Ruby. Let's go! Let's go. Let's just say the other ones plop into their uh their puddles as well and begin racing along. This uh first red one that you're following is going down the stairs. You're tracing this like line of ink. Um occasionally it'll like pop back up and like turn back around to you to make sure you're following, and then we'll um disappear again, uh forming these blots like you saw upstairs. It leads you downstairs all the way down the staircase. I'm so smart. Well, this is good because you know I wanna I didn't get my morning run in, so you know. Looking ahead, you see the inkblot has entered into the like main floor of the palace, which is a general like receiving area you area. You know that there's like a space for people waiting to have like cases heard before the council. You know that there's um, you know, a a beautiful fountain here. Uh this is also supposedly where the um entrance to the catacombs would be, is on the kind of ground floor. Okay, yeah. My mom gave me a map of this floor. I wonder if the dragon's downstairs with all the books. Do you have a map of where the catacomb entrance is? I don't have a map, but my mom said uh Janice, you're gonna want to uh go, but there's a wall that has a freeze on it. You're gonna want to go into that. Uh there's a sort of a hidden door. Hello! Hello. Is that the dragon? Do you guys hear that or is that in my head? I don't know. I heard it. I heard it. Beckon imbeciles and enter. Excuse me? Beckon imbeciles and enter. The fuck should you just call me? Come here, idiots! Do the door open? You have to do that yourself. Is this our Sphinx friend? Open the door? Idiot says what? You walk in, and in here you see this place is also super fucking abandoned, except for in front of the uh freezes, in front of the like painted on illustrations of like Glutopolis history, a massive stack of books, papers, scrolls, all sorts of things. And on top of it, a purple dragon with shimmering scales looks down at you. This thing is massive. Oh, he's beautiful. Giving Barney realness. Hey, Mr. Dragon. Is that my guy? Which book is your favorite? You could not even begin to understand it. You could try and tell us. The book or your answer? Neither. I speak in a tongue too loquacious for mortal ears to comprehend. I can understand you right now. Uh is it is it the is it a uh the tongue of a book? Is it Sylvan? I speak Sylvan. I can speak halfling. Oh, I also can read, which is essentially the language of books. I can also read pedestrian languages. Oh, do you know about the language of math? How about that? We did walk here, so yes. Yeah, the upsy downsey is broken. Everyone roll perception. The little red inkblot pops up out of the ground and hands the uh dragon the book. You see the dragon with its tail lifts it up to its eyes and chuckles a little bit. Outdated. Throws it over his back onto the pile. Patch got a 19. Max got a 14. Eleven. Fourteen. Fourteen. Patch. You notice on this thing's neck a silver collar with uh some sort of three-digit combination on it. Oh, um, who's your owner there, buddy? Whoa! A dragon has no owners! Then what's that collar for? It's got the mark of Eurifon on it. Maybe it's a necklace? It's a loose alliance that I've made with some like-minded individuals. You have to wear a collar for a loose alliance? Seems like a tight. Sounds like you sold your freedom. I wouldn't quite call it that. Why not? Because I get to feast on all these books. In exchange for what? In exchange for making sure that you don't get down to the catacombs. Okay, what if I took the. So we have to go down to the catacombs. I can take that uh that collar off of you. I could take that head of yours off as well. Then who's gonna take the collar? Um, hey, so my favorite book is the complete works of William S. Shakespeareus, and um, I have the most rare copy known to all of kind. What do you think about that? Make a deception check. What copy do you refer? I refer to the complete one, second edition. From which codex? Primary. Uh 18. 18? Yeah. It's gonna roll insight. He shakes his head. There was no codex primary. You're right, it was post Mary! I'm sorry. Sir, what's your name, Mr. Dragon? Yeah, I like to know the names of the of the dragons that I kill. Oh, yeah, well, hold on, hold on, Russ. My name is Ernest! Yeah, well, that's very important. Alright, Ernest. Um, listen, I'm a bit of an I consider myself a bit of an intellectual as well. And I'm sure that two intellectuals, plus all of us, if we're all intellectuals, plus your little um ink friends, I'm sure we could come to some sort of agreement. Because you're not fooling me by telling me that the collar that you're wearing is not a mark of you having to give up some part of your freedom. Um, you don't see the red inkling right now. Will everyone remind me real quick what you got for perception? Oh, perception? 14. 19. You then see next to Rex reaching for the rubric is the red. Rex, I I I grabbed the little inkling if I can't. Bad boy. Listen, Mr. Ernest. Um, we're we're pretty serious adventurers, um, and we have a pretty serious goal right now, and that goal is not to kill you. We really just want to get down to the catacombs. We will kill you if we have to, but we don't want to because we're chill like that. Um, so let's let's work something out. Why don't we talk books? Let's make you a deal. You seem interested in this magical scroll of our. I got a book. You know what? We got another book. It gets smarter as it goes. I think it cares about the rubric. What do you have to offer me that I haven't already perused? This is what I'm trying to ask. That's what I'm saying, is this guy doesn't seem like he went to college. Sorry. Whoa. You just give a You don't have to go to college to be smart. I know. My buddy Patch is the same way. Yeah. But I have a book. It's my fraternities. That's right, then everybody here. It teaches you its pop-up book. Don't give don't show him the book of Mogus. I gotta show him the book of Mogus. Don't show him the book of Mogus. You're familiar with pop-up? I laugh at the idea. So you don't want it? Let me see it. Well, I don't know if I want it until I see it. If you want it, it means maybe we could work out a deal. I got this book. I guarantee you don't have it in this room. And you really don't want me to take your collar off. This collar is more for me than it is for them. And well, you like the way it looks? Do you enjoy wearing it? It makes it easy to return to them. It's a teleporting thing. Where are they? I would tell you, in exchange for that scroll on your belt. Oh, wait, you don't know what it is. Why do you like the scroll? Yeah, why do you want my scroll so bad? He's trying to act so above us, but doesn't even know what the scroll is. Oh my god. Yeah. Honestly. Can we talk to can can I talk with my associates about this business deal deal potentially? First, the scroll for safekeeping. Fuck off, we're not gonna do that. We're not gonna do that. Uh team huddle! Pri Privacy Huddle! He pulls out a copy of Blood Meridian in a dictionary. What you need, Patch! Yeah, get into Lucy's head. Um, I can probably make some sort of um replica of the rubric. I know. Well, Patch doesn't know that y'all tricked him into with Janice's Farrica book. Right. But we can probably do something like that. And I've I've been studying a little bit about um being a little sneaky for no reason in particular, but um, I we could definitely try something. Try making a replica. Yeah, go for it. Go for it. I have to go to the bathroom. So so, Mr. Dragon, you don't know what that scroll is, but you want it? That's odd. You all seem keen to keep it in your hands. Well, it's borrowing it. It's not really mine. Yeah, it belongs to it. It's from I mean, do you know where it's from? It's my No book ever belongs to anyone except for the great Ernest! Oh, it's not a book. It's not a book. And you know that's untrue. Dum-dum. There's so many books. I'm not a dum-dum! It rises to its rear legs. Whoa! Dum-dum. Can Patch try to make this fix roll? Yeah, make a uh uh sleight of hand check. I only got an 11, but I'm gonna use one of my flashes of geniuses, which is listeners when I my new level seven thing that I can do as uh an artificer is I can add just a D4 to my role. Great. Um, so that's a 15. Great. Um Rex, are you trying to incite this thing to a fight when you say dum dum? Yeah, I am. Like, I can't lie about that. I feel like Patch comes out like as it's rearing up, like, okay, Mr. Dragon. Do you have something for me? I sure do, and then I try to like make it look like I'm taking the thing off of Rex's belt. Make a uh slide of hand check there as well. 15. Okay. Doesn't seem to notice a swap. Okay, here you go. It patch holds it back. In return. In return, we can go through this door to the catacombs, and no one's gonna chase us and attack us. But its long neck, like, snakes around and gets right in your face. If I find it to be valid. Patchum puts his hand out to shake the dragon's hand. The dragon's long, like, sinewy wing wraps back around and clutches your hand. Looks like we have a deal. He takes the scroll from you, and you see his tail uh whips around and grabs a set of bifocals from the stack of papers next to him and puts it on the bridge of his nose. Let's see here. I don't know what you're expecting. I mean, it's just a rubric, so it basically just has like basic class information on it. Um, it says it has Rex's grades, they're not very good. Um, not very sorry. Uh it says uh I gave you bees. Thanks, Patch. It said would be a pleasure to have in class, but never comes. Yeah. That is certainly what it says. Yeah. Pretty cool, right? Back around with its tail and takes off its glasses. Unfortunate that it is such a false forgery. You just Probably don't understand what it is because you've never gone to college. Yeah, I think maybe your expectations were too high. That's the real one, buddy. I'm going to kill you. Roll it. Run, run, run, run, run! Everyone, roll for initiative. I want to run for the door. Rex rolled a zero. Pat rolled a four. I rolled a twenty. Janice rolled a uh twenty-three. First in the order is Janice. Janice, you see this great bookworm rears back to start charging its breath weapon at you all. Oh. Oh, what's Oh, what's it gonna be? Oh, it's of the freaking words? Knowledge! Oh not interested. Maybe in 1492, Columbus Hell the Ocean Blue! That's so weird. I kick him in his Adam's apple. Okay. I'm rolling a hit. The dragon's Adam's apple. So I got a 20, a dirty 20. 20 hits! So that's gonna be six force damage, and I'm gonna do a stunning strike. Um, so he needs to make a constitution save. 21? That's gonna pass. I'll just keep kicking. It still probably didn't feel good. I felt nothing! Uh so that's a 17 to hit and a 26 to hit. Both hit. So that's just for funsies. So that's 24 force damage, 12 necrotic damage, because I'm also gonna throw on a hand of harm, which I haven't done in forever. And he is now poisoned. He lets out a massive roar of pain, and on his turn is going to rear back his head and try to get you all in his breath weapon. Please don't. I need all of you to make an intelligent saving throw. Intelligence. Intelligence! I got a 16. 16. Oh, I got a natural 20. Rex got a three. Janus got a 14. Janice and Rex, you fail. So you're gonna take full damage from this. Lucy and Patch, you are going to take half damage, which will be 12 points of psychic damage. And Rex and Janice, you both take 25 points of psychic damage. And until the end of your next turn, whenever you make an attack roll or an ability check, you must roll a d6 and reduce the total by the number rolled. As this thing shouts at you, you almost see words, like see visually words coming out of its mouth. Sound waves blast you, and for a moment you see beyond your like mortal eyes into the realm of language. Mr. Dragon, why does it look like you're saying I am a cuck overnight? I'm not saying that, Mama! I'm saying I am a cuck. I can't read it. I'm not saying I'm a cuck. Perhaps that isn't a book I've read. It's either two. I have read so many and I will not know. Ah yes, perhaps that is from Madame Bovary. It is going to use its layer action to summon ink pools between you all, except for Janice and it. So you see uh three ink pools pop up. They are not, you're not in them, but they are like ten foot by ten foot pools that are in front of you. There's big ass pools. Next in the order is Lucy. Um, okay. Can we see the door that we're trying to get to that the dragon is guarding? Uh make a perception check. It seems to be like some you know where it should be. You know it should be behind this like pile of books. Uh-huh. But because there's like a massive dragon in a pile of books right in front of it, it's hard to make out the specific You think if you get closer, you might be able to like look around for it, but from this distance, there's no way. I So I want to run closer to the dragon. Okay. Uh to try to get like kind of underneath it. Okay. Um and um um uh uh opposite of l opposite of language, opposite of words, opposite insight, it's your gut! It's it's just knowing something without having to learn something. And I cast magic missile uh into its mouth. Right. Um it doesn't need you don't need to make an attack roll, it just hits roll damage. As you run past one of these ink pools, like a tendril of ink comes out and like smacks you in the back of the head. And I smack it. Um that is a 14 to hit. Uh that meets my armor class. Okay, so you will take some damage from that. No, meets it beats it! Yeah, meets it beats it. No, I beat it. I meet it. You take I beat it! You take eight points of legending damage. Damn. Okay. Four, then two, then four. Ten. As you cast this spell, you see the uh rune on your hand starts glowing, and you also cast dimension door on the target of your spell, and it can choose where it's gonna teleport. Does it take one of her spell slots? No. No, no, no, no, no. This is um this rune on your hand was activated with like it's it's almost like a wild magic thing. Where it's like, that's what you guys were rolling for, was what would happen when you next next cast a spell. Oh my gosh. Uh oh. As you cast this spell, the dragon appears behind Rex and Pact. Yeah, remember the shit. Oh fuck! Yeah, guys, we can read it. Um I should not have gone back here. Guys, come here! Next in the order are the inklings. Oh, fuck you. These things pop up out of the ground. There are three of them. One of them is going to attack Patch. Okay. That is a 16 to hit. That hits. You take four uh psychic damage. Okay. Um, the other two are going to attempt to spray ink at Patch and Rex. Ew. I need both of you to make constitution savings rows. I got an 18. Passes? 21. 21 passes. They both fail to spray your eyes with ink. You are not blinded. Whoa. Disgusting. I told you guys these things suck. You heard me. I wanna bite you. Um you can't. Next in the order is Patch. Okay, guys, are we heading for the um the door? Yeah, let's figure out this door. Yes. No! Don't get hit on your way over here, though. No, I didn't mean fuck! Patch's Patch doesn't like um how this dragon is acting like he's smarter than him. Because I am. So Patch is going to cast heat metal on the collar that's around the dragon's neck. And he just takes 2D8. And he just gets hurt. Yes. It says if a creature is holding or wearing the object and takes the damage from it, the creature must succeed on a constitution saving throw or drop the object if it can. If it doesn't drop the object, it has disadvantage on attack rolls and ability checks until the start of my next turn. Hell yeah. That's why I don't get on Patches' nerves. You got a 13 total for the save? That doesn't pass. Okay. Maybe mamas. And he gets disadvantage on attack rolls and ability checks, you said? Yeah. Um, and he takes 13 fire damage. Awesome. And then until the spell ends, I can use my bonus action on the each of my later turns to deal a damage again if the option's in range. As you cast this heat metal spell, you see the rune on your hand get ice cold. As you cast cone of cold on yourself. Make a uh con saving throw. Patch used up all his heat to give it to the dragon and so cold. 17 passes, so you're gonna take half damage. I got ice in my veins, and it hurts. You take 16 points of cold damage. Ow! As you um cast this heat metal spell, you do feel this rune is like siphoning the heat from that and and like reversing it almost. So you you are able to successfully cast the heat metal spell, but it does leave your hand kind of like almost blackened with frost. Ew. Frostbite! Frostbite! Um, okay, am I in a situation where if I run towards a door I'll probably get opportunity attacked? Uh almost certainly. But he has disadvantage. But he has disadvantage, but I'm pretty hurt. Okay, uh, I guess I'll send Clanky out for an attack in that case. Clanky, hi Clanky. Look at this little pedestrian beast. Bitch, I made this. He walks. You made this? Yes. If I made one, it would be bipedal. I chose to make it quadrupedal because I wanted a little doggy. Well, no accounting for taste is there. You have four legs. Loser? Well, that's different. I'm a dragon. That's how you would make it? I'd make it bipedal. By what? Uh, Patch got a 21 a hit. Or sorry, Clanky got a 21 a hit. That hits. And Clanky does six force damage. Awesome. I bet you can your hands are too clunky and and thick to make something as beautiful and complex as this. Yeah, Clanky doesn't have an instruction manual. Clanky was made from Patch's brilliant mind! Thanks, Lucy. And guess what? What guess what Clanky doesn't have? A collar. Oh, you gotta go back to Daddy Urifon when you're done finding him. Daddy does not control me! And why has he literally got his brand on your body? And you actually call him Daddy? I don't! Daddy Eurofon, you're a little baby boy. It's not too late to stop. I'm willing to take that collar off you if you want to stand down. Make a uh uh persuasion check with disadvantage. You can write a different ending to the story! All stories have already been written. We are just living the one at current. With disadvantage, it's a seven. Seven? Yeah. Um, it it it is cannot even begin to think about not attacking you because it's like you you see that collar burning into its neck. Yeah. Um, next in the order is Rex. Ah ha ha! You fucking nerd. I'm gonna fucking kill your ass. I don't give a shit what other my friends say. I'm gonna attack you with the blade of Irowas Windraiser. You're such a fan boy! Yeah. What do you like gods? Do you like god? You like gods? There is no god stronger than the might of a dragon. But for your fun, apparently. There's literally no dragon god. There's Akatosh from Elder Scrolls. There are also dragons in Akotar! I don't play video games. I do read Akotar. I read anything. You're the worst kind of nerd. What's that mean? Because I read the Akotar. And you don't play Akar. That is not sex positive of you. I don't know what Akotar is. I went to college. I read things like Name one The menu in the mess hall. Yeah, okay. And you read your papa book. Do what you're gonna fucking do on your. I'm gonna swing my fucking sword at you. And the order form is for the party is at bullhouse. Yeah, I read a lot of receipts from bars. What is bullhouse? Oh, you don't know about bullhouse? You'll never know. I wouldn't know about it if it's not a book. We'll tell you about it. Rex is swinging uh with uh Windraiser and he gets a 26 on his first That hits, baby! The first is 14 damage. Oh yeah. The next is 22 to hit. That hits. Uh Rex got uh 11 damage on the second attack. Awesome. And then Rex is going to use his boner his boner. I'm gonna uh bonus action rally. I can expend one superiority die to bolster an ally with temp HP. I'm gonna do that for Pat. Thank you. Eight temp HP to uh to Patchy. And then Rex is done. You are nothing but a bunch of braggarts. What? Well, you're nothing but a cook. I didn't say anything that wasn't true. You're a virgin. Hey, that's not a bad thing. That's not a bad thing. But when you're this guy. But don't use it as an insult, Rex. Yeah, Rex. The insult you throw at them. I'm not making fun of anyone else other than this. You're using it as an insult to someone, to anything, and that's not okay. It's tough when I have to learn a lesson, okay? Speaking of virgins, it's Janice's turn. You can't do it either. Everybody use it as an insurance. I'm a dragon. Okay. I'm a dragon. You can be a cuck and a virgin at the same time. I'm not a cuck. You can. You could get married, not consummate it, and then watch. Yeah. Yeah. That's something. Those things are fine. You can do those things if you want. It's better to be a virgin than a cuck. It's fine to be either. Janice. Speaking of cucks. Janice is, now that the now that there's no one around him, Janice is gonna walk up to the door and be like, how the hell do I open this thing? Make a uh investigation. Janice, usually there's some sort of latch mechanism that lets you open it. Usually there's some sort of like trial that the DM will put in front of something to make it hard to do, but Janice picks up one of the books and starts thumbing through it. They walk away. We have a plus two. That's only a seven, though. Uh seven? You you cannot find the like um outline of the door. Like it's it's definitely a flush door. Janice, it's a door. How hard can it be? It's it's a secret door. It's a door. It's a secret door. I thought you were perceptive. I'm using investigation right now. Oh, well. Then I'm going to go to the dragon. Okay. As you pass these, I Sorry. I'm gonna use uh patient defense and take the disengage action. Okay and then I'm gonna run to the dragon. Okay, there we go. Um and I'm going to take two attacks, and I'm gonna try and stun him again because he sucks. Let's see. First attack. 25 to hit. Okay. So 13 bludgeoning damage, and you have to make a con save. Um, actually, what did you roll to hit? 25. Okay, make sure to take a d6 off of it. I forgot to have rolls to it as well. I think both of mine went ahead, too. Yeah, I think so. I took a three off of it. That's a 16 to it save. It does save. Okay. Um, so I'm gonna punch him again though. Uh it's only a 12 to hit. 12? Uh misses. Well, that was bad. That is your turn. Yep. Next in the order is Ernest. Um, I don't even want to say this, but heat metal is concentration, and I got I think I got damage after I cast it. Yes, you got concentration from the ice. So I don't know what I need to do about it. You took it would be 10. DC 10 constitution table. I got it. Great. So you you keep concentration. Great. It's going to roll the C if it gets its breath weapon back. It does. Okay. 5 on the dice. Okay. Uh-oh. It's going to uh uh rear back its head and it's going to go. What'd that neck do? What? What'd that neck do? I want you to say that again, but look me in the eye. What does your neck do sexually? Do you give good neck? This is what the neck do, mama! And uh I need you all to make intelligent saving throws. I'm so smart. I have to, yeah. I got a dirty 20. Pass. Oh, I got a 16. Pass. 14. Uh fail. Fuck! Um, how about a six? Fail. Daughter of a goddess, daughter of a goddess. I'm a daughter of a goddess, I'm a daughter of a goddess. I'm a daughter of a kidnapped deposed queen. A god. That is the son of a council. 27 psychic damage if you failed. And half that if you succeeded. So 13 if you succeeded. Okay. And then I need me to make my concentration check again. Mm-hmm. Uh or constitution save DC 13. Oh, I didn't make it. Okay. The heat the the uh collar cool. Ow! Oh, oh, oh, okay, hold on. I'm gonna use my mythyl ward, which is I can take a reaction roll on the mythyl touched magic for a magical effect. Okay. If it requires a saving throw, the DC equals 11 plus the modifier of the ability. Uh, do I have to roll? Uh yes. Roll a D20. Okay. I don't fully understand what you're doing, but I support you. Um, it's a three. You and the uh dragon gain a telepathic link for one hour. What? Oh no. This is the dragon's worst nightmare. Why is this happening here? You hear you hear in the back of its head They think I'm stupid. And do you know what? You know what the dragon hears? Why does the dragon hear? Well Lucy just got downed, so nothing. Oh my god. Does the damage still? Yeah. Yeah, so Lucy's, I I have 25 hit points. Lucy! And I got 27, so it hears silence. Which breaks its heart. Yeah. Because it's like walking into an empty room and knowing that someone's supposed to be there. Oh, awesome. The person I tried to kill, I successfully killed. But you didn't realize what it would feel like to be in that person's brain and have the absence of intellectual aspect. But I've still got my ink buddies. See if you can last a second in Lucy's brain without her there to protect you. You want to last a minute in the room where I'm gonna go. You hear it go, Shelby? Who the fuck is Shelby? Well, hi! What you doing over here? Guys, he's talking about Shelby. Let's get him. You don't talk to Shelby like that. Patch, are you alive? I'm barely alive. Okay. It uh takes off and begins trying to soar overhead of you to get back in front of the door. So me and Clanky get an opportunity to hack. And Rex. Rex. And Shane. Shane Shane comes in and does it. Shane shows up and punches it. Daddy Spencer, does a 25 hit? Um, yes, but subtract the d6, baby. Patchanities got an 18 for his hit. Okay. Does a 19 hit? 19 does hit. Does a 15 hit? 15 misses. Patch got a patch got a um an 18 to hit. He got six damage, and then Clanky got a 20, a natural 20 to hit. Oh wait. Perfect. Am I still doing the d6 if I if his turn came around again? Yeah, if your turn once your turn ended, you stopped doing the d6. Oh, well then I had a 19 to hit. Okay. Um that hit. Nice. Clanky does 16 damage. Perfect. Uh Rex did seven damage. We're all just like jumping up trying to like. Oh, Rex is Rex is growing roots. Dennis also did seven damage, but he's gonna use his quarter staff and use give and expend a charge. So when you hit a creature with give, you can expend one charge and give you and all other creatures within five feet of the target, other than the target, uh, two d6 of temporary hit points. Oh thank goodness. Oh, that's cool. So everyone's gonna get um eight temp hit points. Oh, huge huge for the community. You all get eight temporary hit points, including Lucy. How? Lucy, when you get these temporary hit points, you are like conscious at zero hit points with eight temporary hit points. So you are living in a Nyquil fugue state. Okay. That's just normal Lucy. I've never been more unrestrained. I think Lucy's more. That's a lucid Lucy. Lucy. It lands on the books and it lets out another roar and goes, How long must you suffer before you die? That's not a good way to treat your books, dude. You're walking all over them. Yeah, we're breaking them, you're getting claw marks in them. Going to use its lair action. You see that the ink pools in the floor shoot towards him and crawl up into books. Like you see, these books get covered with ink, and as they get covered with ink, some of them start levitating and form like almost a ring around him and then shoot at you guys. Hey! But Rennan didn't need to do the ring thing if you were just gonna like shoot at us. It was cool! That's a dexterity save from everyone. Uh Patch got a nine. Okay, that's a failure. Janice got a ten. That's a failure. Rex got a four. Failure. Lucy got a ten. Failure. All of you take ten slashing dances. Except for I only take five. I'm vulnerable to slashing. You are? So that's a double it, and I'm down. Rex, you drop. Well, you're more like felled. Because the treat. Because you're done. I'll never forgive you. Rex, you're felled. Patch. Timber. You drop. I'm okay. Patch, you're still up. Lucy, you are back down. Janice, you are up. Yeah. Lucy, it's your turn. I need you to make a death save. Okay. That's a pass. Great. Uh, it is the Inkling's turn. They are going to make attack rolls on Patch and Janice. That's it. Both fucking miss five and eight on the dice. Next it's Patch. Patch this dragon is looking blah-ba-buh bad. Patch is looking blah ba-buh bad. Um, but Patch is gonna uh go up to it, getting into attack uh position, and he um is like you're not smarter than me, dude. I think I don't think you are, dude. Let's play a game of chess right now. Let's get on let's get on Arcana line right now. Arcana Online for pedestrians. Is that the only word you know to mean plebeian? Yeah, no, I know plebeian. Gotcha, got your ass, gotcha ass. Uh, Patch is gonna attack Lucy, you hear. They think I'm stupid. Patch is gonna do his double attacks with his light hammer and then uh clanky follow-up. Great. So hopefully these hits. First hits a dirty 20. Hits. Uh second is a 10. 12. Misses. Okay. First attack from Patch is six damage. Okay. And then clanky attacks. Got a 17 a hit. That hits barely. And that's another six damage. How do you want to do it? Yeah! Whoa! Incredible! So Patch is Patch is really fucked up. I mean, yeah, he saunders up to you. Listen, buddy. Intelligence has in everything. Sometimes you also have to be really cool and have people skills. Then he um I think he yeah he uh does like a big swing down, hammer swing down with his hammer onto like the dragon's nose, and then Clanky like runs up Patch's back and like goes for his eyes and is like clong at him. As your the invention of your intelligence takes down this massive dragon, it comes crashing to the ground, and we see the inklings go, Yeah, I killed your father. Drop back into the the ink puddles and start to swim away. Yeah, fuck off. L, owl, ow, ow, owl, and then I run to um to Lucy and Rex or whoever's closest to me. Okay. Yeah, you run to them. Um, you're both Janice and Patch, you're both up. I'll give some hands of healing. So I'm gonna give Lucy 11 and I'm gonna give Rex 10. I do have a potion of healing from Midas from last time, but I don't remember if it was greater or not. I think it was normal. So someone gets 10 from the potion of healing if they want to. Lucy, you take it. Well, I I Well, I could also kind of need it. I have one myself too, so I can take mine and get the 10 back. I got 10. I'm good with 10. Wait a minute. Who killed that dragon? Can I rip this in? I did. Badie, you got your dragon belt. I I did. That was exhilarating. You should take a trophy. Hey, Rex. I will. Um chop up his head. Oh, wait, I want to look at this collar. Uh I Rex, well, two things. I want to look in the book pile, but also, um, Rex, maybe there's another check mark next to you. Slay a dragon on your rubric. Like extra credit. Oh, yeah, we did two. We should open a Ruby. What was the last one? Curry Favor. Oh, yeah, did we do that? Well, we got Paneer. We almost, but that's not really a curry. They really liked us at the party. They really like you guys. That was so good that it makes me want to go back and re-record everywhere I said paneer and change it to curry. Curry. I should see what Ruby's up to. But do you guys I mean, uh what do you guys want to do first? Look in the books. I want to look at this collar. Let's look at the collar. Let's um let's look at the door, let's look at the collar. Let's take a little break. Yeah, I need a short rest. Um, Patch would like to investigate this collar, specifically looking for what the dragon was alluding to about it helping him like teleport. Um Patch also wants to yank a scale off of him. Oh, nice. You yank off a scale. Um, it you look it looks like the thing about teleportation. Go to make an arcana check. 19. 19. Uh, it looks like it's it's related to this like three-digit code. So if they set the code, it'll go where they want to go. Can I just kind of like take a mental note of what the symbols are on the collar? So I can kind of look for them going forward. Is it numbers or is it like numbers? Okay. Guys look out for three numbers. Two, seven, eight. Not this one. So two, seven, eight is like kind of the code in this area. So like it's a kind of the area code. Yeah, you could say that. Okay. And then you guys are looking at the books, right? Yeah. Yeah. Um, everyone who wants to look for books and make a make up your investigation check. So I'm gonna tell you what I'm looking for specifically or just in general. Books are boring. You can tell me what you're looking for specifically. I get my medical book back. Can I get advantage because we have time? Um uh yeah, sure, whatever. All right, I get advantage, too. Whatever. We do an investigation. Okay, with advantage patch cut at 28. With advantage, 23. All right, Rex gets a nine up from a six. You know what I'm saying? You guys can find the books. Oh, but Janice gets an 11. Janice, you find um your medical book. Yay. Patch. There's something written in the book. You find a copy of the Euryphase. I knew. Oh, I was thinking about I was trying to think of like the Iliad, but I was like, yeah, yeah. I thought it was gonna be How to Lie 101, like the last book I found. Euryphase. I mean, the eurythie pretty much is that. When we're done with him, we're gonna turn it into the Kilead. Rex, you find a book called uh uh a treatise on fate. Treatise on fate. Damn. Gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme. Lucy, you find a book called The Death of Juliana. Oh. I don't read. No, well, maybe they've maybe they were we were supposed to find these. Maybe I'll read this one and see what I find in it. And you can read that. Guys, we can start a book club. Yes! I don't want to. We'll do a presentation. I just feel like you should trade first and then make a trade back if you're gonna read them both anyway. Book of Juliana. I wonder who that's about. Book of Fate. I wonder who's about. Hmm. Rex, make a perception check on this book. Which one? The one the the Death of Juliana. But he doesn't have my hand. Oh, you haven't. I thought you don't have it. I'm doing a perception check on Lucy's fate book, and I got a six. Okay. Yeah, you don't fucking notice anything. You know what I mean? Maybe we should trade. Okay, perception on the Juliana book. I got a 15. Yeah, I mean, you feel like there might be some shit that someone else would recognize, but you definitely have no point of reference. Should we trade? Rex, this book is kind of big and heavy. Do you mind giving me that smaller, lighter book to carry instead? You can have this dumb book. Hey! Well, I'll take your dumb book. Okay. Yeah. I'd like to roll it. I'll say with Lucy's role, uh, no role necessary. You see, uh, this book is by one Maddox Apoloco, um, the dean of Afara AM. Dean Apoloco. Is this your dean? That's crazy, chicken. Whoa. Did he write the book on your mom? Did he is he also does he have a crush on your mom? Is he your dad? I hope not. Did you kidnap your mom? I don't know. My dad, I think, kidnapped my mom. He was a sensa, right? Oh, he got married. No, no, somebody else kidnapped your dad, your mom, and then your dad married her after. I don't we don't know. We're trying to figure it out. But this guy knows. Because I'm not gonna read this book. I'll read it. Rex, you like it. I'll read it to you. Like a story. Uh maybe we should go back to my college. But I do want to check in with Ruby. Okay. Hi, Ruby. Hello. Long time knows talking to you. I know. Hey, have I curried enough favor for you, my man? In fact, actually, you did. Whoa! What was the wordplay this time? Uh, it wasn't really wordplay. You did favors for those who are politically important. Oh, that's right. For the council. You curried favor and you swung votes, buddy. Hey. I did it without even knowing. You know what? You also found the sag paneer. That's a important one. That's gonna get with bones. Can I tell you something, Ruby, just between you and me? I wasn't even thinking about class. I wasn't even thinking about getting you get like making you feel like like getting a check mark. I was just going for it because like I felt good about it and I wanted to be like a hero. Oh, good. Ruby, can you do Google search? I don't think I can. Can't you figure out how I could turn into not being a tree anymore? Google Ace. Is that what you're gonna search, Rex? We know how to do it. No, no, no. Is that what you'd like to have? No, no, no. Ruby, Ruby, Ruby. Alright. Ruby Ruby. That's just a j jabs and shapes between you, you know, us two people of the tree, of course. Um do I have a new assignment rubric? Ah, yes. Let me look. Rex, you see um writing in ink on the rubric starts to form just one word. Sunder. Oh I get it. But you can't sunder anything. Because a man can't. You shouldn't sunder yourself either. No, no, no, no, no. I think I have to like do something at twilight or something. Sunday. No man can put a sunder. Ice cream. No, no, no, no. It's got I have to sunder this fucking blade, I bet. Well, you have to say it can't be sunder. What does sunder mean? It means to separate. I don't know. I just heard a head saying cracks. Sorry, Janice. Janice goes back to looking at the wall. I'm sorry, Janice. I'm sorry. What'd you find, Janice? A door? Make a fucking nerd. Um yeah, Janice, I think with the time that they took to do that, you are able to feel along the wall and Janice, you need help over there finding the door. I got it. I can do it. I found the door. You were struggling earlier. I know I was struggling. I found it though now. I almost died. Janus, there's a big gold handle just sticking out of the book right here. It's why we were this guy's crotch at my almost. It's a knob right under the door. You're able to open the door uh with no issue once you find it. I found it. But also, do you guys want to take a little resty rest? And he jingles the hut keychain. I would like to. I could take a resty rest. Wait, should we ask Ruby something? I did Oh, you would just ask you. Are you guys talking about a long rest? No, just a short rest. Okay. I would like to ask Ruby something. My dean at the school, Maddox Apoloco. Ah, yes, Dean Apoloco of Ephemeraine. He gave you to me. Mm-hmm. And he also apparently wrote a book called The Death of Juliana. Ah, yes, I'm familiar. What's this guy know about my mom? Well, he should know a lot. Ha ha ha. But why? I guess. Well, because he was uh part of the guard that was protecting her. He was in the Keranic League, and following the war and Juliana's death, he defected and joined the Olive Guard, looking to keep peace around Elspar instead of spreading the seeds of war as he once did. He was in the Olive Guard. I thought he did know your dad, and that's why you were allowed to stay at school for six weeks. I know that. Yeah, of course. Like we don't need to be reminded of that every time we talk about Maddox Apple. Patch is always muttering it to me. Your dean, your dad, and that's like Is that what you were saying at breakfast this morning? Yeah, he's always Yeah, my mouth was full. I'm sorry. I'm trying to stop doing that. All I heard was you crunching on the cereal. I didn't hear what you were anything outside of it. I knew he knew my dad, of course, but I just didn't. I mean, this is all very s I it's a mystery. And to have written a book on your mom, that's That's kind of obsessive. Yes, that's exactly what I was thinking of. I no, I think that he's a part of the cover-up. And the book is the cover-up. The book is hardback cover. Exactly. Put the cover up. You put the cover up. Well, I'm gonna have to read this book. Yeah, I think you should read the book. You read that book, I'll read the Euryphase. Alright. And you'll read your book, and and Janice will, I guess, look for more doors, and then we'll all check in and tell each other what we learned. Maybe he'll read his medicine book again. I feel like he's read it so many times. You're right. That's what he was reading at breakfast as well. That's his bathroom book as well. Are you guys are you guys g gonna take a rest? Yeah. Yeah, I'm a little nervous too, but I am okay with it. I'm pretty hurt. I could use a rest. Yeah, I could definitely use a rest. Just a short rest. You are able to place the uh hut. It's it's it seems like the magic still needs a little bit of time to attune to you guys. So it's like you're able to use it, but it's still like forming itself to match your vibe. Our vibe, your vibe. It's not decorated yet. It's not decorated yet. I think most of it. Uh she's like laying kind of against the like or she's like sitting on the floor with her back against the wall and like playing with the magic that's forming, because it's like, you know, tar on a hot day, so it's still kind of soft. Yeah. And so I think she's like fidget playing, like she's reading. She's like, you know, use that as a fidget spinner. Yeah. Yeah. Patricia's sitting next to Clinky and reading. Who are the people in these photos? What photos? The the photos they used for the staging. That's not us. No, that's just some random family. We should put pictures of us. It's just the ones that came in the frames, I think. Do we have a picture of us? We have that drawing that the Herald took of us. Oh, that's right. We all have a few. And your dad took a drawing of us. Should we hang it on the wall as our first piece of art? Yeah. Yeah. Wow, that's a bag. Um, I'm gonna minor illusion of frame around it. Uh well, we could just we could just uh take out the pictures from this frame and just use that one. Yeah. I'm gonna infuse that cold, austere frame with some like family magic and and make it warm and cozy. Oh, great. You can make it warm by peeing on it. Spencer! Whoa! What the fuck, dude? No. No, no, no. Where do you go gross today? No way. Spencer was. This makes it into the edit. This makes it into the edit. I'm gonna defend myself and say that we had to re-record the part. Because there were so many pee jokes that were being made at me, no matter what I said. No, it was gross. You were doing all of the talking. I don't remember any of that happening. I remember laughing and having a fantastic time. Kill you, my friends, with a gun. I don't know why you need to gaslight it on that. I took my short rest. I took mine. I took my short rest. I take mine. Is the euryphacy written by Europhone? No. It's written a hundred years after he was dead. You see, um Euryphy, the Euryphase is written by uh someone by the name of Laris Stonebreaker. Maddox Epilogue. Is there an about the author section? Uh oh, excellent question. No. Is there a five word? No. What about an epilogue? Uh no. I mean, I mean, maybe. There's like bits in the bits of the book. Um, during my short resume, can I try and wash this ink off my hand? Yeah, I think you're able to pretty well wash it off your hands. Can I try to recreate it on my other hand? Why and why would you want that? Is the question. The next time I cast a spell, the same thing happens. The other person can choose if they want to teleport or not. Yeah. Okay, sure. Yeah, you can try make an Arcana check. It did work in our favor this time. Yeah. And a 14. 14, 14's not high enough. Okay, I'm sorry guys, I'm I'm working on my magic still. I'm just doodling now. That's impressive though. Hang on, finish up your rest and uh and are able to suck back up the hut uh to the little magic item. Um and head into the catacombs, correct? Yeah. Yeah. So you descend a a thin narrow staircase behind this door that leads to a uh a dark underground clearing. You hear the sounds of skittering rodents from deeper in these tunnels. But right now you find yourself in a very large, almost hexagonal chamber. You see there's some exits um in the cardinal directions, and then uh in between those exits are tombs. Uh down the hallway, those of you with dark vision can just make out like the shelves and shelves of bones. But right here in front of you are these four tooths. I guess this is the catacomb, so we shouldn't be surprised that there are bodies down here. Yeah, I was expecting bodies or cats. I could put uh pharaoh cats down here. Um, can I look at the can we look at the names on the graves? The tombs? Yeah. Okay. Thank you, Lucy. Oh yeah, I forgot everyone can't see. I know me too. I forget too. Yeah. You see a uh a few different names. This one says Philippine Storin. This one says uh Alexdrenia Visgande. Is that a name that means something to you, Lucy? No, I just think it's pretty. This one says Dr. Holly Canonically takes place after that. Oh, wait, I'm sorry, it's smudged. Draw a Holline. That's not Holland. On the fourth one, you see uh uh it's very well gilded. Um it seems to be very well tended. You see the name Lieutenant Korvich Trioctus. Oh, as you stand outside the tomb of Trioctus's son. And as you notice this, you see pooling at the underside of the massive stone door, just seeping slowly at little bits of plague. Oh no, it's grief. The plague is grief. Oh no. The plague is resentment and grief and sadness. I think it's the box of many things, but you know, I let's hold on to that too and open this door. Do you think the box is in here? I think Triactus is in here with the box and he's trying to get his son back. Oh, that's so sad. Plague in there. Definitely. It is a little bit dark. Uh you're so you're gonna try to open the door. Um, it's it's it's pretty hard to open, but it does feel like it has been recently opened. I could do it. Rex, you're gonna doors. Hey, wood to wood. Uh does it say 23? Give me a few. Yeah, man. I wasn't gonna make you roll for it, but hell yeah. I like to show off a little bit. You the doors like slammed open. You see uh uh a few things. You see first, around the sides of the room, a number of coffins. You know that uh Triocus's son was burned along with his top men. You see kneeling in the center of the room, General Triocctus, his head kind of bowed down in prayer. He's got his sword on the ground in front of him, and as you enter his head, it lifts, and when his head lifts, you see what he's making eye contact with. You see what he's seeing, which is on the coffin in front of him, the coffin dead ahead, a plain unadorned wooden box with spores spilling out of the side of it. And that's where we're gonna end the session. Oh my gosh. I I I love that's incredible. You guys are trying to make up for that's really cool. It really is cool. That is so cool. Because I genuinely was like, House track is really involved, you know what I mean? Because there was still that sliver. I know. Yeah, yeah. There's still a sliver of being like the guy. He's the guy. He's at the very least a guy. He's a guy. I mean, he has the box. He's a guy of this, he's the guy of this a thing. He's a guy with a box. Just a guy in this catacomb. Yeah. Two nights. Yeah. Well, that was a fun one. It was fucking awesome. That was all over the place energetically. I'm sorry. But we had a great time. No, no, no. It was fun. It was fun. We did. Um so much for listening. Yeah. Uh, if you want uh to hear um the uh uh uh piss bit that got cut, you can check out our Patreon. Thank you all so much for listening. Thank you very much. Ah, this was so fun. And now you have to listen next week because like what's gonna happen is gonna thank you so much for listening. Thank you. Good night. Uh welcome everyone to the end of the episode. We are about to shout out our $25 tiered Patreon Titans of Elspore! Uh shout out to Emily, who was going to grab uh Ebenezer Bones' leftover sag smear before we found it. Yeah, that's she's a real one. Yeah. Uh shout out to Jamie, who's kind of like the gizmo of the gremlins of the inklings. Like he's like the is like the cool one. Yeah. And probably her name's like Scribble or some shit. Uh that's a good name. Um, shout out to Kevin, who was in the bathroom at the um at the party when the plague attacked. And this is from last episode. That's okay. But uh uh who was in the bathroom when the plague attacked, um, so missed the entire fight came out when everyone was gone. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Shout out to Damien, who's actually in a book club with Ernest, and thinks that the guy could use to be taken down a couple pages. Yeah, shout out to Phoebe, who keeps trying to give Ernest her diary, and he just does not want it. He's not interested. He's not into it. I want to read it. And shout out to Catherine, the person who smashed that Upsy Downsy uh gem. I mean, really was made us walk a lot, but you know, you must have had your reasons. Nothing to do with the ink blots. Nah. It happened before that. It was just someone who had a bad day. Uh yeah. Thanks all so much for listening. I will see you next time. Love you. Hi everyone. Um, thanks for listening to the podcast. It's your boy Patch. Um, there's a lot of people who made this podcast possible, including Caroline Petroff at Hell of a Fever, who makes all of our art and makes me look so cute. Um, and then there's Tony Brofi at Anthony Brove, who makes our awesome theme song. And then there's at Poor Morin, who that's Matt, he plays Rex, and then there's at SJordan X2, that's Shane, he plays Janice. There's at Sarah underscore Katrinage, that's Sarah, she plays Lucy, and then there's uh Spencer at Spencer Wilden, he plays like everybody. And then there's my mommy. What were you doing? Um, thanks for listening. Bye. Woo! The door is like slammed open. And inside. Tract is pain. It's tracked to open the door. The blade comes out of his penis. I'm so sorry, Spencer. This is a really important moment. I'm so sorry. It's a 1 a.m. Yeah, no, I'm trying to end it. I've been trying to end it for an hour. What do we see? Practice dribbles out the last drop and then he's at least give it a shake. No, I hate that word. And he's not pissing in his tongue's tomb. Um he's pissing next to you in the different room. He didn't want to leave. In case his son came back to life. I electrocute you all in the game. Um he cast muffle on us.