Hey there, pants peoples and lovers of literature.
If you're looking for something new in the science
fiction department, then here we are with Nicholas
Keating -Casbarro, our second clip of our interview
with him. So check him out online, vidalirium
.com, vidaliriumseries .com, right? There we
go. Stephen gave me the nod. And yeah, enjoy.
How are you liking it so far? Because my goal
there was to kind of create like a graphic audio
experience, like an immersive experience, music,
sound effects, you know. voice modulation where
it's appropriate yeah it tones when it gets suspenseful
it totally is i've been chewing it up um you
know like uh david is also pretty good at this
you know as we're playing our our dnd game you
know he'll change the music and and it felt very
much like that and that helped capture me and
get me into the moment because like you know
i could feel the these scenes changing you know
like in the in the jewelry shop sort of thing
when the music would start to change i i could
feel i was like okay now something's about to
happen yeah yeah there's there's definitely this
is definitely uh edge of your seat type content.
It's not your cozy fireside romance. So I felt
like that was important to make sure that we
were, you know, really kind of painting the scene
for everyone who was listening to the audio book.
Um, so I'm glad you're enjoying that. By the
way, the, the voices you guys do on the podcast
are, it had me laughing the whole ride up. Thank
you earlier today. That's a, you guys are awesome.
Yeah. We're having a lot of fun. We're having
a lot of fun. Well, before we go, I had one maybe
like two part question that it's been it's been
curious on my mind all day long. I wanted to
ask you, do you do you have any experience playing
D &D or do you have other media influences that
inspired some of the Videlirium backstory? You
know, it's funny, I I would let now in like now
that I've kind of dived into this world head
first. Cause I never even imagined I would have
written a book if you had talked to me, you know,
maybe three and a half years ago. But now that
I have, I'm really starting to kind of reconnect
with all of these different things that I liked
when I was a kid. I never played D and D, but
that's just because I just never had anyone around
me who was playing it. So I just didn't have
anyone to play with, but I would definitely play
it nowadays. Like I actually, I find it fascinating.
I think it would be a lot of fun. And it sounds
like you guys certainly have a lot of fun with
it. But if you're talking about influences, you
know, some some of the things that kind of, I
guess, help formulate what I ended up turning
Videlarium into. I mean, there's it's never one
thing, right? There's dozens of things. But I've
been a sci fi fan my whole life. And it's, you
know, my influences stem from, you know, everything
from like the dystopian classics, your, you know,
your Orwell's and your Aldous Huxley's to. You
know, Dune, Frank Herbert's work. I actually
write in the omniscient perspective, kind of
like he writes, except I do it for a very specific
reason. And I actually don't even find out what
that reason is until the end of the book. And
or the end of book one, I should say. But yeah,
no, I mean, I enjoy sci fi video games, sci fi
cinema. You know, I. Even some of the niche cult
classic stuff. Did you guys ever see Firefly?
Oh, sure. Yeah. Hell yeah. That's right. You'll
definitely catch a little bit of Mal Reynolds
in the protagonist. You'll catch a little bit
of... He's kind of your... When he's an adult,
he's a gruff kind of loner. Basically doing odd
jobs for... local gangs, like I mentioned. So
you're going to get almost like a little bit
of a Geralt of Rivia feel from him, but in space.
Yeah, exactly. Especially when it comes to what
his skill set is. And it's funny you mentioned
that, you know, that scene where his father is
quizzing him on the Fauna Diorum books. Well,
one of the things that he is exceptionally good
at is surviving outside of the protective walls
of Kairos, where 99 point... nine, nine, nine
percent of the population on the planet lives.
Oh, wow. And so he basically he knows how to
survive and not get killed by the countless,
you know, species of just vicious alien life
that that live on the planet. And so you get
you get a little bit of you definitely get a
little bit of that Witcher kind of vibe from
him. Hell yeah. Sci -fi Witcher. I love the sound
of that. I love what I've heard so far. And Pants
People, if you want to check out Videlirium,
Descent into the Void, look it up wherever you
get books, Amazon, Audible, VideliriumSeries
.com. Nick is all over social media as well.
We'll have his page up on the episode post for
this episode as well. And please go check Nick
out. I think you're going to really enjoy the
story. Appreciate that. Yeah. Thank you, Nick,
so much for joining us, man. Hey, thanks for
having me. Looking forward to seeing what's next
in the Vidalirium series. Storyteller Rune is
not here. He took a lunch break. I don't know.
Shit's too hot for Rune right now. I just want
to get into it. But before we get into it. Oh,
my God. Fellas, what's your relationship with
anime? Casual viewer. Non -existent. Non -existent.
All right. All right. Yeah. I would say I'm also
a casual viewer. A big lover of the art form.
I just don't do a lot of self, you know. at home,
just me watching things. It's always with the
wife. So I've recently gotten back into the sort
of inspiration for this show. That's what got
me on this. I've been hyper fixating on MHA,
My Hero Academia, lately, which is kind of the
initial seed that kind of this entire story setting
came from. I don't know. I'm curious. You have
a non -existent relationship. You've never watched
anything? I mean, I started. I started that.
You started that and you didn't keep going? Yeah.
But there's so much crying and impassioned speeches
and punching. I didn't feel that. I don't know.
Anime is just not my jam. I'm sorry. But it's
all like you can be a hero. It's not like I don't
hate anime. It's just not my jam. Just not my
thing. Get him! Pitchforks now! I think it was
Steven. I feel like Zebulon was a real Deku.
Sure. Yeah, I could see that. I would watch more
anime if I had more time to watch anime. Yeah,
that's it right there. Yeah. And like you said,
you know, usually if I'm sitting down watching
TV, it's with the wife and we'll watch some anime
together sometimes, but it's not really her jam.
So I'm just not usually, you know, home alone
enough or with enough time or with not enough
things to do that that I'm watching much like
I loved MHA. Yeah. Several seasons in anyway.
I don't know how far behind I am. I'm certainly
behind. Would love to watch more. Just don't
always have the time to. Yeah, I'm like way,
way behind on what's like One Piece, MHA, Jujutsu
Kaisen, Demon Slayer. Oh my gosh, there's so
many that I really want to get back onto. I just
don't. Tell us your favorites in the comments.
Tell us your favorites. Do we have comments?
Yeah. Like Spotify. Oh, yeah. Get those Spotify
comments. Is there anywhere else we could tell?
Don't. Yeah, dude. There's all sorts of places.
The Discord. No, no, no. You can tell us on the
Instagram. That too. That too. I don't know a
lot. How do you tell us on the Instagram? So
when we post. Just write a comment or slide into
those DMs. We're going to post just an episode
out there and someone's just going to be like,
one punch man. No, still get this. Still get
this. I don't know a lot about like the algorithms
and stuff on Instagram and social media. But
I was reading actually today that some of the
algorithm priorities have like changed for how
you get more exposure on the platform. And things
like liking a post now, that doesn't mean as
much as sharing a post. Or now the big thing
is saving a post. What? So if you really want
to help Fancy Pants get visibility on Instagram,
save the stuff. You can create a folder you don't
have to ever look at. Just save the stuff. Share
it with your friends. Wait, wait, wait. Make
two Instagram accounts and share it with each
other. No, I got it. I got it. Save the post.
Save the podcast. That's it. Right there. Tagline.
All right. Episode title. That was pretty good.
No, come on. That was good. I was proud of that.
We can just call it out. We can just go home.
Man, before we go home, before we go home, and
before we get into it again, last week, I want
to talk about last week because that was phenomenal.
Hey, come on. No, I just love how you skipped
Rune. You're like, no, that's too much cool stuff.
Go for it. No, I want to hear it. I didn't have
any ideas for Rude. You want the excuse? No.
You want me bare -chested? No. Oh, God. He's
taking his shirt off. It's been too long. Not
really. You want this? No. What are you? Pure
naked truth? Okay. What the fuck? Here it is.
What's the pure naked truth? I didn't have any
ideas for Rude. I was lazy. Oh, my God. I feel
like writing. So you had to be theatrical about
it. Yeah. Okay. Look what you've done. It's cold
outside. I'm going to just look at my computer
screen. And I'm going to keep my eyes down here.
See, this is what we get Patreon for. And looking
at no map. Here's the map right here. Look at
these hips. Nope. Yeah. Stare at this belly.
Get some, like, stickies to, like, place around
his chest. Where are you at? Point. Poke on me.
Poke my flesh. Where's Papalotian Hill? But last
week, no. How long do you think he's going to
do this topless? The whole show. The whole show.
He's going to do the whole fucking show. It is
kind of long in here. I have the fortitude. Yeah.
You should all take your shirts off. Let's go
shirtless, all of us. Shirtless, pantless. Nope.
Nope. Nope. Get out. Last week, though. It was
so crazy. Dude, I had nothing. From the second
this fight started, you're like, I'm flying up
there. I'm going after the thing that was, in
my mind, a background detail you weren't going
to go. It was way up in the sky. It's super,
it has a high movement speed. So when it turned
down, it's like close in distance. That thing
was, I described it as being like. Barely visible
in the sky. It's way, way up there. You see stars
fighting it. And you're like, fuck it, I'm going
to fly over there and just go after it. Which
was awesome. Which was cool. Because some of
the twists of the arc, one of the big twists
at least, I had to reveal to you now. Holy shit,
dude. Well, when I came to the realization that,
well, actually, I didn't come to the realization
until after recording already. But, well. I should
have come to the realization that when you were
like, yeah, it's going to take you like three
or four moves to get there. I should have just
been like, okay, David clearly doesn't want me
to interact with this thing. It wasn't even that.
It's just that in my mind, I was like, okay,
you know, you only have so much movement speed.
I know it's theater of the mind, but I don't
want to go too free flow. Like, and you're 120
feet in the air suddenly or whatever this is.
This thing should be, I mean, I imagine it was
somewhere like 200 feet up, right? And you had
to move three turns and to move down one turn
to like bridge that gap. I couldn't justify it.
I love that you made this move. I didn't want
you to not make this move. I think this is a
cool fucking move. I'm going to punish you so
hard immediately for this move. Yeah. Not because
I want to. I thought this was cool. I just have
to as a DM and a person who enjoys punishing
people. I've been looking through my spell list
all week trying to figure out exactly how I can
get out of this. I think Salome's kind of fucked.
Maybe. Take your shirt off and let me whip you.
What the fuck is wrong with you? I just want
to get those reactions out of you. So we talked
about the realization after we got off mic. I
don't know if any of the Pants people have put
two and two together about what actually just
happened at the end of that episode. We talked
about it and we figured it out. But we haven't
talked about it on air yet. What did that mean?
Yeah. A memory. You touch not a sort of connection,
not like a vision through this creature, but
a memory of this creature's. What does that mean?
It's not going to get passed along unless Salome
at least gets out. Fuck, yeah, that's true. This
mouth is closing upon you. I'm going to make
an attack on you. And it seems to me like it's
time for you guys to stop dawdling. Time for
us to get into this. You want to get into this?
Wait, can we talk about the crunchy? So if you
bite me, you then get an opportunity to swallow
me? I will tell you. What? As I continue my turn,
what's going to happen to you? It's going to
be very, very bad. Very, very bad. Let's get
some cool music playing. Oh, my God. Do I give
him fantasy plus? I was going to say, this sounds
very heroic. We're going to win. Yeah. Yeah.
Let me change the song real fast. Do I give him
two buttons for disadvantage on the bite? Ooh.
Salome, let me reset the scene. Let me set up
the scene. Give me a second to paint my picture
before you get all chunky. I'm so nervous. Put
that chunk away. Thank you. Salome, you have
just reached out to break any control or possession
on this draconic serpent terrorizing the skies
of Dialan. Dialan, I don't know. And your magic
failed entirely. However, your bardic inspiration
from jewels allowed you to connect to this creature
and to witness a memory. The memory of a captive
child. You can ascertain that much from the details.
Your small form, your tiny hand reaching out
towards a cage and tortured jewels. And the memory
of this Bakunawa, said to be the last of its
kind. A creature that, up until now, you knew
by the name of Pangil. And as your mind reels,
you connect these dots. And you find yourself
in great peril, as the creature that was once
named Paul is going to make a bite attack on
you. And by the way, I added a lot of oomph to
this CR12 stat block. So now it's CR. I don't
know. It's higher. Hold on. Hold on. It was CR
12. Yeah. And you added more to it. It was a
soft CR 12. We are a party of two level nine
PCs. Hey, you got some R. Hold on a minute. And
two level nine sidekicks. It was a weak ass level.
You should see those stats. They are laughably
low. I fixed it. Don't worry. Now it's scary.
You ready for this? No. Ready for this? Hold
on. Hold on. Here we go. Wait. I should warn
you though. If I hit you, it's going to be bad.
All right? One more shit. Two buttons for disadvantage.
Two buttons for disadvantage. Flying off on your
own solo. It's going to be bad. It's going to
be really, really bad. You're going to be bad.
It's going to be so bad. I am stalling and rolling
the dice because I'm nervous bad? Maybe. I'm
that bad. Yeah, that bad. Let's do this thing.
Disadvantage, you said? You're holding the buttons.
I forgot. I lost them. You got two more. 19 on
the die for the first attack. But you gave me
two buttons. The mouth is closing down. You know
what? Actually, you don't have to hit him. I
was going to show it to everybody. You don't
get to see. Sorry. You want to come see? Come
see my dice. Come look at the two on the die.
Mouth slams. Our camera pans this side. We see
Salome bursting out, just barely grazed by the
teeth. You are not swallowed whole by this creature,
which would have been death. It would have almost
certainly been death. I was terrified. I am still
going to make a storm tackle on you now. I have
two attacks. But the bite failed. Storm slam.
So as you throw to the side, you like move over
and you see this creature's body almost like
as a head slows to attack you, the body continues
on and this tail almost whips around. You dodge
one attack, but find yourself right in the path
of another. This one will hit with a 17 on the
die. Let me roll some damage on you real fast
here. That is 14. Blood genetic damage plus 11
thunder damage. This thing hits you in a wave
of thunder, wraps around the body, smashes into
you. You're also knocked. This doesn't really
matter where you are now, but you're knocked
10 feet sort of downwards. Boom! It's coming
down at you. So it says horizontal direction.
We're off horizontal right now because we're
fully in the air. It's coming at you from above.
You are knocked 10 feet lower, which puts you,
I think, 80 feet now above the sort of surface
where your allies are just finishing up their
combat. But that... is my full turn. Holy shit.
Tell me, are you still alive? Still up? Five
HP. Oh my gosh. Okay. I rolled pretty bad on
that attack too. Wow. Wow. I should note that
two Celestials, more D .Va, sort of move in to
surround the Bakunawa as this round ends. They
were chasing it. They glanced at you and raised
their sort of gleaming golden maces above them.
lightning cracks. You're an aspect of the storm,
Salome. But this thing, too, commands the storm,
and I have to wonder who the storm will favor
in the end. Now, top of the round. The serpentine
conquered jewel, high above everything around,
higher even than where you linger in the sky,
Salome, takes off to a different plane with some
cool sound effect. No. Right there. Nope. Damn
it. Nope. You're being an asshole. I'm not going
to give you what you want. You see sort of beyond
where it was before. Signs of battle to the south.
A battle that seems to be winding down now. One
blue -skinned angelic figure battling against
a single remaining giant as arrows rain on his
back from the tops of nearby buildings. To the
west of that, only one of the formerly three
giants there still stands, trading blows with
only a single remaining celestial. See, each
attack from the two sends waves of pressure to
the nearby, just crumbling structures, and the
area is almost reduced entirely to just this
larger, flattened layer of rubble and this circle
around them. To the north, a giant charges at
a projection of Atash as a diva rushes in to
join his king in glorious battle. And to the
east, the two giants charge an airborne handsome
Jai. Spikes of stone tear themselves up from
the streets, piercing the massive creature as
bolts of lightning arc towards Jai. And you hear
a broken scream as he falls to somewhere in the
streets below. And with that, let's get right
back into initiative, huh? Top of the round is
actually going to be Mesmerize. And once again,
I don't believe you see what she does as she's
sort of focusing on keeping this Atash figure
moving. Now then, you stupid giant, face me in
mortal combat. And Atash sort of almost just
weaving a little ways backwards, his own great
sort of outstretched, that same voice booming
out. And you see that giant on its turn is going
to full charge up to Atash. I want to make an
attack on Atash. And as its attack fully moves
through, it realizes it has faced an illusion.
Now, I don't believe I am able to run an investigation
check. Yeah, that'd be a full action. So it kind
of... Even the illusion doesn't have like a to
hit? It does not. If you attack a major image,
which is kind of her, she kind of pulled this
out seeing you guys in danger at the last second.
Didn't really have like a full plan in mind.
Just kind of a way to distract this thing. It
knows it's facing an illusion. You see it stops
and begins to scan the area around looking for
the caster. These things are not stupid. And
Yara may be in very great danger. You see a D
.Va has come. I think it sees the attack coming
right through Atash. And the D .Va source stops
and they're like, what? That's all we see over
there as we pan back in the sky to Salome. Salome,
what you doing? You have information. This thing
is bearing down on you now. The first thing Salome
does is she conveys the information to Jules.
What? I don't think she even needs to scream.
I think she speaks in her normal voice, but it
projects throughout, and Jules can hear it as
if she's speaking right next to him. And I will
say, Jules, you are in this burning building
down below and you did hear, just before this,
you probably, I imagine you were going in to
help Gabriella and you probably froze in your
step as you heard the words this creature screamed
in the last episode. Save Jules. Right after
that, you hear this. It's the boy. The Bakunawa
is who you seek. And David, can you remind me
when we drink potions? If you drink it yourself,
bonus action. Bonus action for yourself. Okay,
that's great. Let me do that real fast. Okay,
that's 14 back to Salome. Maybe just enough to
stay up. And for her action, you said this thing
was still bearing down on Salome? At this point,
you move out of the way. It's on a dour trajectory,
but roll me an insight check. This is free. 24.
It has taken some serious wounds. You see as
it storm slams you. It turns to look at you.
Its eyes glance back for a second. The other
two diva have come in. It has been fighting.
since before you arrived here. It was chasing
the D .Va that you had met on your way down.
It sort of caught you in that. But with the 24,
you get the impression it is going to leave now.
It is taking damage. You don't know what it seeks
here. All you hear is this mad cry, save him,
save him, please. You don't understand what's
going on. You've glimpsed some fragment of the
truth you don't understand. All you know is it's
going to leave. flee now. Fuck. And you know
this thing is fucking fast. I don't want it to
flee. Sorry, give me two seconds to look through
my spell list, because this is a totally different
scenario than I was expecting. Yeah, take your
time. We all have shirts on. We're all warm.
Take your time. So... Oh, shit. What? Stop it.
What? What are you doing? Well... Shut up. Well,
because we're an initiative, and I don't know
if, like... Because the instant Jules hears that
come through, he's doing something. It will be
your turn, but your turn is very safe. Okay.
Okay. Huh. Okay. You're processing this data.
It's like, whoa. Yeah. What? What? Just patience.
Shit. Okay, this might be really cool. Salome
tentatively speaks to the Bacchanawa. And she
says. I'm scared. I'm so scared. What are you
going to do? And she says, halt. And I need a
wisdom saving throw. This is command, I'm guessing.
This is command. That's pretty cool. You speak.
And again, it's just like you said before, your
voice is unchanging. It just projects so loud.
I'm going to say on this, without a save, the
two diva. fully freeze in place as if you're
speaking to them. You issue a command out. They
come to straight attention like full soldiers.
Angelic salute your way. You outrank them. Fuck.
But this creature, your word, project cross it.
Wait. Two buttons for disadvantage. Oh my god.
This is wild. I have plans. Okay. I know. I will.
I'm going to give you a deal here. Okay. I'm
going to give you a deal. Okay. These two buttons.
Uh -huh. I will take them. Uh -huh. But not for
disadvantage. I will accept these two buttons
and I will not burn a legendary resistance. If
I fail this roll, but I won't roll a flat. Well,
yeah, that's the only deal. That's the only deal.
It's still... That's the only way. But I'm going
to give you this. I'm going to give you this.
I think this is cool. I like the idea of, you
know what? New rule. New house rule. Give me
two buttons. I will ignore legendary resistance.
I think that's badass. That is pretty badass.
It's an alt way of using buttons. That's a fair
way of not wasting two buttons. I don't want
to waste two buttons. To add a little flavor,
if Salome is speaking to Jules coming through
as Martin, can Jules reply back? Hell yeah. I'll
allow it. Cool. You're in this building. Every
time seems to slow down. The fire before you
flickering in a slow motion pattern. Jules will
reply back. Hold him there. I'm coming. I want
to roll this in the open. You said to wisdom
save. I do have a pretty high wisdom save. Yeah,
I thought so. I thought so. But it's not a gimme.
I'm not burning the legendary. Is a plus eight.
Ooh, okay. I'm guessing you have, what, a 16,
17? 17. 17. So you have to roll. Nine or higher.
Yeah, twice. Let's turn that port -a -pain around.
I want you guys to see this. Okay. Ready for
this? Uh -huh. This is huge. And he rolled over
nine, and he wins. You ready for this? There
we go. 11. 11. So close. With that, I mean, it's
so on the edge. I think you just see it. I'm
too waste of buttons. The words. arc out. The
creature's eyes go wide for a moment. It stalls
for a moment. Eyes that look to you. I think
as you speak that word, something interesting
happens. Jules, speaking in your mind, you scream,
halt! And overlaid behind your voice, we hear
the voice of Jules LaRoche as well. And those
eyes fall on you. for a moment to go wide with
something, something. And then... The creature
begins to move away. I'm not moving yet because
it's not my turn, but you see it is turning to
move in this moment. Cool as shit, though. Damn.
Damn. Four buttons in two turns. Hey, you're
not dead. So this is going better than I thought
it was going to be going for it. It was so close.
It was so close. Dude, for real. And that's Arhalon.
Oh, Christ. Yeah. Holy shit. You guys are on
the track to earn some buttons back. It's not
today because I don't feel like it. I'm too cold
without a shirt. Can't give you buttons. That's
your own damn fault. Man, I have no idea which
way to send Arhalon. Jules is in the building
still? He's in a storefront right next door to
the sort of shattered tavern Arhalon is in front
of. And inside of it, beneath the sort of cover
of the roof, there's still flames flickering.
Arhalon would have looked over and seen Jules
and Gabriela both moving into there. That's all
he really knows. Okay. You know, Salome's in
danger up top too, possibly, but, you know, yeah.
Yeah. I feel like playing Arhalon means... moving
towards Jules. Okay. Can he see anything else
if he moves 30 feet closer? He moves 30 feet.
He wings flap and he blasts himself very quickly,
gathering speed right in front of the storefront
where you see the sort of broken, I think the
front of it is still mostly upright. He looks
through a window and you see down in the back
is where it's more shattered and he can see the
silhouettes of Jules and Gabriella moving into
thick smoke. I will say at this point, knowing
there's trouble, ears sort of honed, he can hear
the screaming muffled of people somewhere inside,
low. All right, he makes a double move and heads
in to back up Jules and Gabriella. Okay. It's
his double move. She slides in right behind you
guys as he's going in. What's going on? What's
the problem? And that's his turn, which brings
us to Gabriella. People, down low, they're trapped.
She turns to guard the situation. Smoke billowing
all around. I guess the fire is not spreading
out into the rain, but here, beneath the cover
of a ruined ceiling, it eats away at the wooden
floor in front of you. You're staying at sort
of the edge of it, the heat washing over you.
The fire also eats these supports beneath. You
feel the scream of creaking wood. You feel the
floor beneath you sort of shift, and you know
it's going to collapse in moments. And there
are people trapped in the cellar below. A beam
laying over sort of store shelves. There's a
whole pile of just refuse in your way, all laden
with goods, all sort of collapsed halfway over
the floor set. door that leads below, like an
old sort of trap door, ring pole on it, but there's
so much weight holding it down. What does Gabriela
do? So it's not Jules' turn yet, but in order
for this to proceed, he has to say something.
She can ready an action and then go after you.
I can also put her in an initiative after you.
So as Arhalon comes in, Jules will look over.
Go with Gabriela. Get them out of here. Okay.
Okay. Do you want to take your full turn now,
Jules, as the two of them move in to help them?
Yes. What are you doing? Jules is running out
the door. Hell yeah. Can he reach a nearby rooftop?
Oh, Rubble's pretty strewn about. Let's see.
What's the highest point he can see? If you want
to double move, you can reach the sort of unshattered
rooftop in front of the storefront. Yeah, I don't
want to double move. Is there a near, is there
a rooftop near that's not on fire? You don't
have, here's a question. Here's the big million
dollar question. Yeah. All jokes aside. Uh -huh.
Who has the Rod of Flying? Who has it? I don't
remember. Emon Rath might have it. No, Emon Rath
doesn't actually have it. He was the last person
with it. Yeah, I don't remember. Would Blanche
have kept it? Or does Jules have it? I don't
remember. I will let you. Pants people know.
I don't think we've really ever determined because
the last person that had it was literally Emon
Rath. Oh, was it? So it could have gone to anybody.
Okay. How about a luck roll? You want to do a
luck roll to who has it? You can do luck. I mean,
honestly, we never really determined this. It
would be Blanche or Jules. Yeah, I think it's
okay. I think you can tell me now who has it.
I'm allowing it because... There's still a cost.
I still want to do a luck roll. If you say you
have it, it doesn't feel right to say yes, I
have it. I'd rather do a luck roll. See, here's
my perspective. You can do whatever you want.
There is a cost to this. The cost is if you say
right now I have the rod, Blanche does not get
access to it for her entire arc. There's a cost
there, which is interesting to me. I think that's
interesting. You can say you have it, but inherently
you might fuck over Blanche later, and I think
that's awesome. Okay, so where's the nearest
rooftop? The one right above you. The one right
above me. Half of the building, the back half
is shattered, but you can land on the front.
Okay. We're going to do this. Blanche has the
rod of flying jewels. Misty steps up to the roof.
Oh, fucking Misty step. Bonus action, right?
Yep. Bonus action. Fucking bones only. Yep. Yep.
And you stand upon the roof. You've used a spell
slot on this. Yep. Okay. So he stands up onto
the roof. Looks up to the Bacchanawa. You see
it is, again, just to sound like 90 feet up.
At this point, you're up probably 30 feet, so
it's probably 60 feet above where you stand.
Okay. So as Jules is up there, smoke swirling
around him, he takes his loot off of his back,
sticks his arm straight up into the air with
the loot, and will cast, I guess this is just
more for flavor than anything else, he will cast
Light. Yeah. Hell yeah. And he will shine the
brightest light he has ever shown from. Oh my
God. Oh my God. It's so cool. And he'll look
up. I'm here. And he'll wait. Look at this. Look
at this shit. Look at those goosebumps. Oh my
God. This is really cool. Light blasting upwards,
shining through the falling Salome, shining into
the face of this Bakunawa who's turning to move.
Stops for a second. Eyes regard you. Again, there's
something. Give me an insight check. I thought
he was going to say charisma check. I was like,
sweet, we got it. Yeah, yeah. I think it'll be
that easy. I told you it'd be impossible, these
arts. Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on. What?
What? Can Arhalon see jewels? No, never mind.
It's a save, not a check. Never mind. I was going
to use an Arhalon reaction, but sorry. Gotcha.
Fuck. Sorry, reading is hard. Reading is hard.
He's a 10. 10. Yeah. There is something, a flicker
of something in the eyes that regards you, but
there's also... So much emotion swirling there.
They look almost mad. I need your help. Focus.
Then we can go home. An intake of breath. Oh,
no. Salome, you shaking as this breath behind
you. We feel clouds of the storm swirling into
this creature's mouth. Deep, deep embers. Storm
cracks. Lightning breaks. All of it shown in
this flash of light, this beam shining into the
sky and a creature. and it turns to fly away.
We threw everything we had at this opportunity.
The spell would have stopped it, but I can't
have it stop here. It's also, you notice, being
attacked actively by celestials, and it's hurt.
It's wounded. It needs to leave because it's
going to die. There's a lot happening here. But
as you see this light shining up, we pan down
because Arhalon and Gabriella have to make their
move. Arhalon's move was to get in here. He can't
act yet, but Gabriella can do something, anything.
Again, the floor begins to creak and groan. It's
all going to give out, and it's all going to
collapse onto this family down below. What can
she do? Okay, can I make a check to see? Do you
need me to make a check for Gabriella to see
if there's a way to get to the family? That's
clear and safe. No check needed. You need to
get all the stuff cleared. She had to, like,
push all this off the top of the trapdoor. It's
really, unless you can think of a way to break
through the floor and create another entrance,
maybe that's possible. But the easiest way seems
to be to clear all this, like, the debris, a
store shelf falling over, covered in goods, bags
of flour and stuff kind of mixed in. One of them's
broken open, white mist everywhere. No, never
mind. First things first. Give me a con save
real fast for Gabriella. What? Yeah. Dick. What?
Yeah, smoke inhalation. What? Dirty 20. She's
fine. I was going to give her a short -term exhaustion
level if she failed as the smokes go with her,
but she just kind of goes low, takes a breath
beneath it. She's holding her air in now, and
she's focused on the task at hand. Okay. Yeah,
I think she's going to just try and clear away.
Yeah. I want to use, like, Flurry of Blows to
try and, like, pound through the floor. But I
feel like Arhalon might be better suited to try
something like that. The two of them together,
maybe they can clear things in time. So she's
going to look back to Arhalon and say, help me.
Help me. Yeah. And then she's going to go and
start. And then Arhalon is going to say, okay,
yes, I will help you. Okay, yes, I will help
you. Oh, no, you cracked the code. I like this
game. This is bad. They become self -aware. Yeah,
and then they start clearing shit away. Give
me an athletics check. If you're going to just
be moving things, athletics. She's basically
pushing, carrying. She goes for the shell first.
No, the beam's on top of this. She goes for the
beam to try to clear that off. That's a 13. 13.
She makes some small progress. It's just like
pushing it, and it's not fully off, but kind
of... Is the athletics strength? It's strength.
She does have... I have a plus two. Oh, gotcha.
You also have... I believe she has proficiency,
though, right? Under skills, it should say. She's
a below nine? Yeah. She actually has a plus six.
Plus six? David, this says plus two. Plus two.
This says plus two. What number did I say? What
number did I say? You said 13. 13, so we're on
11, so that's a 17. With a 17, she's starting
off. Fucking hell, David. He's going to get people
killed. Yeah, he's going to get people killed.
Look, I remember I caught it. I remember I caught
it. God. You see, like, she's holding it, and
she's trying to push with her arms, and she realizes,
like, her arms are not her main asset. She kind
of bulks down. She is a dancer. And with all
the strength in her legs, her muscles tensing,
she pushes with everything she has. And you see
that beam slides off, leaving only one obstacle,
the sort of full sort of store shelf, lying over
it. I'm sure she's got some muscular calves.
She's halfway there. Yeah, she bulks up. What?
What? What? What? What? Stephen, give me a look.
No, I didn't. I was just smiling at Jeremy. Shut
up. Thinking about his calves. I don't know.
What do you want from me? Speaking of calves,
that's going to be the D .Va that's now attacking.
I'm just going to roll dice on this thing to
save myself a little bit of time. On this giant.
So you see the giant swings, swings, looks around.
D .Va comes flying in, starts pounding on it,
and does some damage. I know not why a projection
of my king is here, but I know you will fall
today! Draken says to this giant, wicked creatures!
That's this, okay. And that is the Bakunawa,
who, as promised, jets off into the clouds above.
The two diva -rata go to make attacks, and you
see they strike. Let's roll and see if they hit.
One hit, one miss. You see another spray of blood.
You see pain. Is this Paul's pain, Jules? You
don't know what's going on. You don't understand,
but maybe... It's best that this thing leaves
now, for if it is Paul, it will surely die here.
The wild all around you is beginning to sort
of simmer down. The gemstone will return who
knows when, very soon possibly, with more reinforcements.
And so, with a speed that is shocking, this creature
flies into the clouds. A jet of air blasts Salome
down just a little further, and it is gone. Just
a silhouette. In the sky. The storm giant is
going to make a check to find Mesmerize. Scanning.
Scanning. Where are you? Where? Where? It does
not see her. And it turns its focus back to the
D .Va. And that is that turn. Salome, that's
you. You see, again, everything around you seems
to be closing out very soon. Just commotion all
around, explosions, more earthen spikes ripping
from the ground far to the west, east, one of
those directions. So there's two giants still
standing, the one that's fighting Mesmer and
the one that's fighting Jai? There's a number
of them still standing. There's one fighting,
essentially one D .Va, and a number of, like,
it looks like a local militia have been, like,
joining in on that fight to the south, to the,
I believe, east of that. I'll have to double
-check my notes today. It'd be so much easier
if we had a map. I'm trying something. I'm experimenting.
I'm fucking with you. It's great. Oh, no, I'm
having fun. I'm just bad at the east -west. Basically,
you see a few pockets of fights. They look like
they're very close to ending. There's one, I
think it's a four. what are you, party, battling
a giant. They're kind of locking blows. One diva
along with a militia fighting another. Mesmer
and one diva are fighting this one. This only
one's really close to you. The rest are kind
of farther apart from where you are now. It's
more like different spots in the city where things
are happening. The world is shaking around. How's
Jai looking? You see spikes ripping up into two
figures that are slamming down something in the
streets below. Probably not good. Okay. For the
purpose of spellcasting range, maybe 120 feet
away. Here's the thing. You're really high in
the air. I just got pushed down. A little bit.
A little bit. Let's not get crazy over here.
Yeah. I was 90 feet in the air. Now maybe 80
feet in the air. I want you to give me a luck
check on this. You had 25 % chance. I hate doing
this. 76 or higher. Yeah. 75 or lower, he'll
be out of your range. He's too far out. 46. 46.
You could start heading that way. He's just too
far away. You can't close the distance in time.
Okay. The only one within that range is the one
that's looking for Yara. All right. I know David's
trying to kill Jai. I was going to give you a
chance. If someone was there sooner, but he's
in a bad spot. They're what kind of giants? Storm.
Oh, all right. What about 300 feet? More than
twice the distance. I'll allow it. I think that's
fine. It's close enough that he was able to get
over there. So 300 feet, yeah. In a 20 -foot
radius on the ground beneath these two storm
giants, snow starts to pebble the ground slowly.
And then the pace increases and the size of the
snow starts to grow. And then it becomes hail.
And then it becomes something more than hail
as Salome casts Ice Storm on the spot where they
stand. Hell yeah. You're above the city. You're
looking down from way above. You can see the
spot they're kind of trying to smash opens down
on. So you can see from trajectory where Jai
must be. You can omit him from this. You have
enough information to do that. You cast this.
What's happening to me? I need a dexterity saving
throw from both giants. Okay. One has a 19 and
one has a 7. Okay, so the 19 passes will only
take half damage. The second will take 2d8 bludgeoning.
A 2 and a 1 on 2d8 bludgeoning. But luckily,
there's also 4d6 cold damage. Okay. Before you
finish rolling that, let me roll a die. I just
rolled a set of dice to determine how much HP
this creature has left after battling with Jai.
Because I was not tracking that. Obviously. Let's
see if you kill it. So the full damage is 17.
Halved to 8 for the success of trying. Really
bad math. I think it's exactly 17. Can someone
check this map for me? Look at these dice. Is
that 17? It is 11 plus 6. That's so funny. Get
the fuck out. Oh, my God. Holy shit. That's crazy.
Wow. That's crazy. Okay. One down. Let's zoom
over to that moment, to Jai just laying. You
see him beaten and bloody near death in the streets.
Chest is, like, caved in. Breaths are shallow.
And you see he's still just got the blue skin,
the bulging muscles of his potion of storm giant
strength. When maybe his last gift from Karnar.
He's kind of just reaching out for his vessel.
Trembling hand. The creatures step up. I think
there's one male, one female giant. Both of them
raise their weapons in unison. They come down
to strike. Now, Salem. I never thank you for
my second chance. But I think this dream is over.
And we just see. A blizzard, swirling snow, his
eyes open wide. He just watches one of these
giants gets pelted and just ice sheet of ice
covering their bleeding bodies where they've
been struck by spike after spike. One of them
falls to the ground. You see like the body just
totally frozen. It's like in mid swing step and
just kind of unbalanced falls and perhaps like
the arm just shatters where it lands. The other
one is, So cold, so hurt, looks over and with
this opening, Jai raises a hand up and one last
spike of earth rips through this thing's gut.
At the end of this round, I was going to kill
him. Oh my God, I knew it. I knew it. I knew
I had to do something or Jai would die. Jai.
Yes! Cheers. as he is saved by a fellow soldier.
Oh, my God. Wow. Oh, my God. Wow. We slide back.
Let's see who else can be saved. Inside the burning
building, it's Arlan's turn. Gabriela has cleared
the way a bit. But can he finish the job? There's
still this store case landing over this thing.
People scream, fires licking. And he gets close.
I think she almost backs away. The flame has
moved. It started to overtake the sort of bookcase
or the shelf, whatever it is. I don't care. I
don't care what it is. Sort of crackle with flame.
But Arhalon does not mind the flame. He is the
flame. He steps into it. What's he doing? Arhalon
steps up and takes his place next to Dance and
bends down and grabs the bookcase or the shelf
and goes to heave it off. Hell yeah. It's just
a shelf covered in various goods. You see bags
of flour, like I said, all starting to burn and
blacken. The flame keeps closer and closer. He's...
15 athletics. DC 15. Oh, my God. Get out of here.
Holy shit. Jesus. He kind of, with all of his
might, pushes this thing, hurls it backwards
into the flames. The way is clear. Gabriella,
what's she doing? The second the way is clear,
she is getting in there and grabbing whatever.
child is small enough whatever people are small
enough where she can carry one or two or however
many and still walk and get out door snaps open
she looks down uh there is like one eight -year
-old one three -year -old both in the arms of
this like older woman probably their grandmother
with like spiraling sort of hair out of control
she's weeping tears in her air like wrinkled
she can get all three in one move yeah yeah if
she can if she can grab all three and still move
Then yes. All you gotta do is grab the grandma,
right? Yeah. You know what? If she's able to
do that, then yes. I'll give it to her. Yeah,
she's strong enough. Just like lift her up by
the hips and push her through the trap door.
I'll give Arhalon an opportunity. Help action.
Wait, hold on. Yeah, give me this. Give me this.
She grabs the grandma with the two kids who are
holding the two kids and then Arhalon grabs Gabriella.
Dude, hell yeah. And then they all, Arhalon gets
them all out. He didn't use his move action.
I fucking love it. Screaming the leadership reaction
the whole way. Whatever that means. He parries
a horse. Narhalon, charge up into the street.
You hear the weeping of a child. Yeah, I know.
Teenager, the street beside you as you stand
and look at the place where Paul once was. Jules.
It's your turn. You see Gabriela and Arhalon
burst from the smoke, carrying this family. You
lay them down. I think there's a few other people
that are down there too. A young man climbing
out in his own, charging out with them as they're
just moving away. As they go and turn, you hear
as the floor falls and sparks rising up. Sparks
that as they go to the roof sort of backlight
the scene of Jules turning and looking down.
What do you do? Can he get down freely? Yeah.
So he's going to get down. You slide down the
side. It's like a beam. You do a legless slide.
And as everything is collapsing around him, he's
looking around and noticing that this fight is
pretty well under control now. Yeah. He's walking
just slowly toward. The child. You see this boy,
maybe 12 or 13, like a very young, young teenager.
The long hair kind of in the eyes. You see this
figure has turned facing you now. Mother's still
down on the floor, ground beneath. And as you
move in, he stands and brandishes a knife. I
know who you are. I know who you are. Jules LaRoche,
the Prince of Midnight and Darkness. This is
your fault, isn't it? I won't let you have her.
I won't let you have her. I'm here to help. That's
how we're going to get rewarded for this. I bring
light to the darkness. And Jules will sit crisscross
next to the body. Give me a free persuasion check
here. Okay. As you go to sit. Okay. You want
to take a wild guess at what my modifier is for
persuasion? Is it like plus 11 or something?
13. DC 60. DC 60. It's very angry. It's a natural
one. Hey, it's a 14, I mean. Yeah, it's a natural
1. Oh, but yeah, 1's a 1's a 1's a 1. I will
say, just as you go in, you glance down at the
blade. You see the pommel of the blade is in
the shape of a horse's head. Anil Omen. As you
move in, he does drive the dagger into you. Now,
you have seen many fights. It's glancing below.
You take... I'm not concerned one bit. Yeah,
it's just like... You will take five points of
damage as this stabs. That's a good get. Dude.
That's max damage right there. But you just do
what you do. Dude, relax. Relax. Blade sticks
out, and he kind of stumbles backwards, almost
in fear. My magic didn't work. You killed her.
But I got something that will. I fucking hate
giving you what you wanted, David. Dude, we're
going to get rewarded in public trust, I think.
You take it out. I think it's like shock paddles,
is that what you said? Yes. Jules will take them
out. You hold these in your hands. You think
of your friends. He'll look over. Salome, Gabriela,
Arhalon, Chester, who's out there somewhere.
Paul, Blanche, Dresden, Akio, Jean, these things,
this miracle, this life -saving item. You think
of Zebulon. If only you had these then. Fuck
you. God damn it. And you're going to use them
now? Yes. Describe the scene. Child stumbles
back, blade flickers down, covered in your blood.
He looks over to, Jules will look over to Gabriella
and nod her over. And I want her to go over to
comfort the child as this is happening. Shh,
shh, shh. It's okay. It's okay. Eyes wide and
watching. You're running out of time. You're
almost out of time. Jules will scooch up the
body. And with the paddles on her chest, you
will see him recoil a bit. Come back up. And
then press down hard with his arms. And you'll
see light and lightning and sparks and shocks
coming out of Jules' arms into the paddles. And
it raises her chest up. And they raise a couple
feet off the ground, both Jules and her. Holy
shit. And then the shocks start to fade and they
slowly lower back to the ground. And he removes
his hands. And eyes flutter open to regard you.
Mom! Mom! Dance. lets him move the boy runs and
dives onto her covering over her and they embrace
where you stand the fighting dies down the two
diva that were chasing after the bakanawa shooting
down to the city to help their allies the one
that's seeking for yara locked against one diva
now gets doubled up on jai Flying back into the
fight to see there's very little fight left.
The creature is gone. Lost to the skies of Diolamon.
The jewel is returning. The rain yet falls upon
the destroyed remnants of this town. Calipay.
And there are still many who need help. Many
screaming into the night. Day is day. I will
ask one more question before we end this. combat
we are out of initiative soon the celestials
will be free to i guess investigate what has
happened here the damage and those who came to
save the day soon the gem will return loaded
with shield bears and who knows who else for
all you know atash may be on his way right now
and yet there are still people who need your
help salome in the sky looking down upon where
Jai was fighting. You know you have Satan as
you see him flying up. Jules, you are on Gabriella
all around with this weeping boy and his mother.
Now return to life. The paddles now with no magic
innate to them lying on the ground beside. What
do you do? Salome is lowering down. She has her
wings spread, both of her arms out. Her... Devotee's
sensor has started to expel smoke. She's starting
to spread the healing magic from her sensor.
And as she lands on the ground next to Jules,
she whispers to him, Run. Hide. I will find you.
You've done enough for now. And Jules will look
over to Arhalon and Gabriela, nod. And they nod.
And the three of them run. Don't know where.
But they are running. Run. And we'll call it
there.