People just want to say real quick the obvious.
Thank you so much for being here right now listening
to this show You're the best you individually
right there the one on top of two being you Enjoy
mortal souls of the conquered worlds. We are
here. We are here to protect you from mortal
weakness. We are here to heal the broken in body,
mind, and spirit. We are here to cure your illnesses,
your curses, your pains. We are here to stand
guard against the toils of the natural world
and to make you feel safe, comfortable, and happy.
We... are the staff of the Radiant Citadel's
House of Convalescence. Our doors are open to
you, day and night. Our care is always affordable,
no matter your circumstances. Using the auroral
diamond's own magic and the divine power of our
celestial staff, there is nothing, barring death
itself, that we cannot save you from. So, if
you are in need of healing, your salvation is
just a conquered jewel ride away. Come one, come
all, to the House of Combolescence. We open in
a stark white room. Bright light shines from
the circular brass plate set into the ceiling,
casting stark shadows where it touches the few
furnishings. We see a bed, a chamber pot, a desk
and chair, all fine quality. It could look quite
comfortable, if not for the lack of windows and
the iron -banded door locking away the outside
world. A man sits on the edge of the bed, dressed
in a simple white robe, dark skin, long, weary
face. I imagine Coley Groundspur, known to the
world as Storyteller Orin, is almost tough to
recognize without his iconic straw hat. We see
he just rocks back and forth, kind of muttering
to himself, No, no, I can't run. His eyes are
just lost. It takes the man entirely too long
to react when the iron -banded door to his care
room swings slowly open. and a wigged figure
steps in. A diva, with an angular face, ivory
white skin, and short brown hair parted down
the middle. His brown robe, fastened by buttons
down the front, is adorned with the angel -holding
infant mark of the House of Convalescence. Eyes
of light scan over the room and fall on Orin.
In Orin's eyes, they just remain locked forward,
staring into the whiteness of the wall as he
regards the diva. Well, if it isn't the good
doctor, Dr. Harthrick, here to sign off on my
release. The diva's expression is stoic, almost
bored as he raises the chart and responds, That
depends on you, Mr. Groundspur. Tell me, do you
feel better? Feel better? I would feel better
if you would tell me where my niece is. She's
the only family I've got left. Where is she?
Where's Kiana? You know where she is, Mr. Groundspur.
She is a murderer. You made a pardon agreement
with Atar to see her crimes forgiven, and then
you broke that agreement. Kiana has been taken
to the Sky Prison, where she will spend the equivalent
of two human lifespan sentences. Lydian, I know,
but there was some question of magical influence.
Orange kind of blinks a few times, the memories
flooding back. He winces, pushing back fresh
tears with an effort. So, why? Why don't y 'all
just arrest me too? Why all this playing hospital
bullshit? The diva Hothric attempts a reassuring
smile. You did not commit a crime, Mr. Groundspur.
You are just unwell. Your mind broken by your...
Recent family traumas. Anyone would snap had
they seen what you've seen, lost what you've
lost. You are here for your own health and safety.
Bullshit! You don't get to tell me how to feel.
I faced my trauma on God's breath. I faced Cradle
Laced Lake. I accepted it. What you are doing
here, hold me against my will. It's evil. I'm
sorry that you feel that way. I was hoping we
could have a productive talk today. Maybe see
about that release. The worlds miss you, Orin.
They could really use your guidance in these
difficult times, but you are having another episode.
I think you need some time to recover. We'll
touch a base again in a week. I sincerely hope
you feel better then. See, Hothric scribbles
him down on his chart and turns to leave. Then
Eva just stops, glances back towards a man laughing
on the bed. Y 'all think you've won, don't you?
Y 'all think you've got the world in your grasp.
Well, you're wrong. I faced my trauma because
I was not alone. And I saw something. Something
you wouldn't understand. I saw light in the dark.
I saw true divides in the face of terror. Real
luminaries. Real heroes. Just you wait. Soon
enough, y 'all are going to see that too. Without
a word, Hothric steps from the room, closing
the door behind him. cutting off the sound of
laughter. He steps into the hall and hears commotion.
Charging footsteps, the pain, the whinny of a
unicorn guard. The diva's stoic expression breaks.
He looks for a moment back to the closed doors
of staring through at the laughing man beyond.
Then he turns back to the white marble halls,
the sound of sudden battle, and he draws his
machine. We fade. Into another scene. Another
battle on another world. A brief glimpse of a
form clad in black armor. A form that may be
this black armor standing outside the walls of
Anissa Academy. We see one nearby, in quotes,
Carpenter, draws an axe and charges forward.
Another Stan's frozen eyes are locked on the
image of the infamous Storm Eye that has suddenly
appeared before him, and he just screams, runs
around the corner of the school, Ozen! It's Ozen!
He must be after Kejo! A mask! A mask! And we
turn to Ozen and see her. Helmhead looking around
frantically. Her metal form is shaking with some
unreadable emotion. She focuses on the approaching
guard and raises a hand, and we see nearby tools,
hammers, chisels, stones rising up around her,
then flying towards the approaching figure. Blood
sprays as a hammer cracks against the man's skull.
A stone snaps into his leg and he falls. And
as he does, more carpenters appear, whirling
around the corner of the school and approaching
with weapons raised. And here we fade through
the wall, fade to the interior of Anissa Academy
as the sounds of the slaughter are drowned away
by thick earthen walls. We fade into a silent
place, a bardic arts room where our heroes stand.
All right, with that, let's get back into it
with Blanche. Dresden, Akio, and Jean. I know
it was a brief little window into the world of
Jules and Salome there, but I posed puzzles,
I posed challenges for you, and you kind of overcame
them, and now you guys are moving again. When
those guys are moving, I want to get back over
here and see what these guys are all about. I
feel like a natural point to slide back in to
Anissa Academy. It's been two episodes, so let's
retouch base on what happened last time because
you fucked me. You fucked me in the first combat
you had to really get an idea of what these AG
-6 units, what these genius students could do.
Man, that rod. The moving rod over the crate.
Because my whole goal, that was there because
I was going to pop out. Let me leave my mind
here. So I had animate objects. obviously out
on a lot of these instruments i cast it out there
had them go to attack you guys it was kind of
her whole pre -plan if someone came into the
room and she was aware of them she was going
to that was her ready to action was to cast that
spell start a combat Her plan was to pop out
of the thing and start interfering with the combat,
but go back in so she can maintain concentration
without taking heavy hits. But immediately, you
walked away. I had Blink, but Blink didn't work
for like two turns. And when it did work, I kind
of looked at the rules and I realized it's such
a weird spell. You can't go back to the spot
you came from because from your perspective,
that would be a place that's an occupied spot,
right? So you have to go, in that case, to the
nearest place randomly rolled. And I rolled,
and she went outside. It's going to change so
much shit. Because the box is up against the
outside wall. It was up against the outside wall.
So, like, literally, insanity. You ruined me
in so many ways. You ruined that fight, but also
you've exposed something that was supposed to
be secret here because she had no choice but
to take that risk. She probably didn't think
through the fact that she was going to pop out
outside, which is... probably not allowed you
know that the the board uh that you saw the killing
game rules even stated that the uh uh there will
be no outside they won't be bothered they won't
be bothered no one's supposed to be in but you
assume no one's supposed to leave either so what
happens out there we're not going to see anymore
that was your last little glimpse because you
don't know right fuck i don't know so We'll figure
that out. This is how we get killed. David always
makes shit up on the fly. Right. Sorry for breaking
the game. I didn't think it was going to happen.
It's crazy. Oh, my gosh. What's so funny, though,
I realized this, because we were actually, just
before this, we were out walking, hiking Prospect,
Mount Prospect nearby, and having a good time.
And it hit me on the way down, that's such a
funny detail, which is the killing game rules
had a very specific setup, right? There was a,
if you were to retrieve these pieces out of the...
thoracic, I said it wrong last time, thoracic
cavities of the armor pieces, basically removing
these like fragments, stone fragments from the
chest, they would help to form a full sort of
summoning circle or some kind of magic circle
somewhere in this school. They mentioned though,
the well of the faceless one. What's interesting
is you need four. of these things because the
idea there's five students one went to trump
of all the others and grab all four of the other
ones and then line them up to move on to find
kejo that's the idea that was put forth one of
these is gone now there was a world where you
could just found four of these five right i mean
you found one and there was nothing there so
somebody else has it yeah somebody probably already
has it whoever the killer of that first guard
unit was. But now you know one of them's gone.
You have to find the other ones. At least one
of them's gone as long as I'm guessing that means
that she doesn't have it. Either that or she
finds her way back inside somehow. The only clues
you have as to who would have that one were puncture
marks all through the armor. I believe the armor
was covered in like a spider bite marks. Something
weird going on there. But from what you saw of
her magic It didn't seem to line up. In fact,
let's talk about what you've learned here before
we move on. What do you know about these creatures?
Do you want to roll anything here and see if
this fight taught you anything? Absolutely. What
do we think? Is that going to be like Arcana
to figure? I'll give you Arcana or Investigation.
Arcana will be a little bit lower to roll. Okay.
Contrast to Investigate? Hell yeah. Fuck yeah.
Hell yeah. You had this whole experience the
first time fighting them, and now you can learn
a little more. Oh! That's 23. Oh, sweet. 23?
Dresden got an 18, so between the two. Interesting.
Yeah, yeah. Dresden, this one you pick up on
as well. You were deafened in that room, but
before you were deafened, before they all came
to life, they came to life and you heard nothing.
It was a quiet room when you entered, and you
figure, Blanche, you know this because you were
literally watching through the eyes of Turbo.
The figure in the cage, in the crate, did a somatic
component, but there was no verbal component,
which tells you they do not need them. You also
question whether or not these things can even
speak. Because not a single word was spoken from
the creature. One thing you might have put together,
Blanche, that's interesting. It could mean really
nothing at all, could be a coincidence, but you
wouldn't know about Blanche, never mind. you
would just know the spell that was used here
was anime objects and you would know that it
is a transmutation spell um but after you like
you kind of fought them defeated them you realize
yep that was textbook anime objects but uh yeah
i think that's really all you're putting together
they don't need to this thing attacked you immediately
somehow vanished from this place maybe it's still
in the school maybe it's not out of character
you know it's not You might assume something
like that because you don't know how it got out
of there. You don't know why it took so long
for it to get out of there. Some weird things
happened. I think Blanche is going to, you know,
after the battle has sort of quieted down and
she's realizing that nothing's happening in the
box, she'll remove the rod, open the box, and
she'll say, I think it escaped somehow. I'm not
sure if it's nearby, but... Clearly had used
some sort of teleport magic. She's investigating
like the inside of the box to see if there's
like a trap door or anything. And I'm guessing
comes up with nothing. I will say this. You roll
pretty high Arcana. I think you can put together
that Blink was used. Okay. Any other teleport
magic, it would have happened immediately. And
you're thinking, why did it take so long? Why
wouldn't Shiva disappear sooner? You heard the
banging. You heard something. And you realize
blink has this effect where you have to roll.
It's randomized whether or not you'll phase into
the ethereal plane and be able to blink to a
space within 10 feet from there. And you might
sort of put it together because you're looking
around the room and you know. You have blink.
You've cast it before. During our last live show,
you cast it. You know the mechanics of the spell.
I think Blanche with a 23 looks at the wall and
realizes what happened. She puts her hand on
the outside wall. We might not have to deal with
this one. At least not yet. I don't know the
greater ramifications for this, but at least
for now, it's one we don't have to deal with.
Real quick, before I forget. Because we're getting
away from the fight. I want to shout out Rimac
on D &D Beyond for being the coolest human and
making individual stat blocks for the anime object
spell sizes. Oh, hell yeah. That was incredibly
helpful. And you are the broest bro. Sorry. If
you're listening to this, Rimac from D &D Beyond.
I think that's the first time I've heard you
call someone bro. Title fully for Ryback now.
No one else can be bro anymore. Whoa. Holy moly.
Oh, I thought you were going to say title of
the episode, bro. Title of the episode, Ryback.
I think you see Jean kind of moves up beside
you and looks pretty despondent, and he's sad.
You think, was that a student? Practically a
kid my own age, right? This is wrong. I... You
see he draws something out kind of from his...
What does he wear? It's kind of like a loose
sort of like... Yeah, like a tunic sort of thing.
Yeah, yeah. He just kind of draws something out
from a pocket there and holds it in his hand.
You see the figurine of the Tyrannosaurus Rex,
Joan Francine. He's just... It hurts me, you
know. It's a new papa to see young lives. Could
you imagine John Francine putting something like
this? I would not be able to live with myself.
Did you say his new papa? His new papa. To his
T -Rex figurine. You just go, hold it tight.
I'll never let you out of my sight, John Francine.
Never. Tucks it away. I fear this is more serious
than that. John, I don't know if the students'
bodies are elsewhere, remotely controlling these
suits. Their souls have already been absorbed.
Death of the suit, like we saw in the room next
door, is death of the student. I haven't puzzled
it together yet, but I'd like to try to find
a way not to kill any of them. I hope we can
find more clues. I think you just hear like a
simple sort of whimper from Akio. Yes. I hope
so too, Ruff. And to be using Ozen's image. I
would hate this. He would not be associated,
Roof, with this kind of murder. We'll have to
work on solving this and clear his name, won't
we, Akio? And Kejo Kamal, Roof, will need to
die. He'll pay his price. We'll see to it. Yeah,
as this conversation is going on, Dresden is
slowly walking around the walls, just... kind
of tracing his fingers along, you know, looking
at the walls, wondering how there can be no sound,
and then he turns his head. We're gonna fucking
get him. I like to think as you're moving, this
room full of instruments all over these racks
along the edge of the walls, that open space
in the middle made for, you know, drawing chairs
out and sitting and playing and, you know, possibly
in tandem as a band, possibly just here to practice
your bardic arts alone, but... In this space,
you look at one rack and you see a loot. Perhaps
you have to wonder, as you're dealing with these
horrors here, these dark mysteries, what are
your compatriots suffering in Dyalangan? So,
where do you guys want to go from here? There's
a door to the north side of the room. The only
way out you haven't seen yet, is that. Ooh. Before
we move forward, I just have a quick question.
This is kind of off mic. Who was in the live
show? Which characters? That was Jean, Blanche,
Jules, and Rimbell. Okay. So in that case, Justin
goes, Jean, did you fucking say Tyrannosaurus?
Yes, you also weren't there on Junito, yeah.
No. And Blanche rolls her eyes. Oh, he didn't
tell you about... I mean, I imagine by now enough
time has passed where Dresden's fully aware of
what's going on. And just, like, a full, like,
you know, the pictures falling down of him and
Ledoux and a T -Rex just, like, posing together.
Like, let me show you. Look. Joan Francine. This
is her first birthday. Obviously, she's younger
than a year old, but we wanted to give her something,
you know? And this is... You're insane. What?
Let's go. Just wait. She's beautiful. You'll
be glad you have her. And do remember, you have
a T -Rex. You can use it probably once this entire
arc. But you have a T -Rex you can release in
the halls of this school, and that is a weird
thing. Something I never... There's the most
random thing that can come out of your mouth.
D &D rules. What are you guys doing? So, Jeremy,
the Completionist in me wants to go back to what
looks like these two classrooms next to the Enchantment
and Illusion classrooms. We could go there via
this door on the other side of the... Was it
the gymnasium or the spell training ground where
we found the dead AG -6? I will say this. When
you were in that spell training ground, you also
saw there's a door leading to the room just north
of where you are now. Right. You'd be able to
put that together. Yeah. Why are you trying to
lead us north so bad? I'm just saying if you
want to... If you want to go around, you can
always explore one more room. One more room in
the darkness. Well, that's the thing. We could
go through the spell training ground, and that
door to the east is unexplored and would lead
us back to those last two classrooms. Yeah, that's
very true. And we wouldn't be going the way David
wants us to go. I mean, I was actually thinking
the exact opposite. I think Dresden sees a door
there. He's going to want to continue. We're
splitting up. I love it. Let's start with Dresden.
You're already moving. You're already gone. He
sprints out of the room. Alone. I'm fine going
north. We can go back to the classrooms later.
Because Dresden's going to be the one to open
the door and clear the room. Yeah, yeah. Are
we going north? What's going on here? We're going
to die about it? I don't know what you want to
do with that information, but Dresden's... Pick
a destiny? Dresden's vote would be north. While
I'm following you, soldier boy, you clear the
room for us. We'll be your backup. And Dresden
goes to the door. Sliding it open? Yep. Boom.
You open into what looks to be a very simple
room. It is essentially a mirror match in size
to that storage room for the training ground
you saw before with all the various sporting
gear and mannequins for combat training. This
one looks to be filled with... crates very similar
to the one you see uh was pulled into the room
behind you to hide the creature you realize now
where it came from and this looks to be almost
some kind of creature containment room now you
remember being told by your old buddy there prince
simbone that the school has the back entrance
to the school was used to bring in live creatures
they would use for like biology lessons or even
like combat lessons and stuff like that And so
you realize that that open sort of training ground
you saw where the one AG -6 had already been
killed looks to be maybe this is also a place
where they bring creatures out in cages, out
of cages to show around to the students in a
wide open space. And so, yeah, that's what you're
seeing here. From an immediate look, the cages
are iron bandages, the air holes on top. You
don't hear anything. It doesn't sound like there's
anything in them right now. It looks more like
this is some kind of short -term spot for them.
You couldn't obviously keep creatures, magical
monsters and whatnot, in a place like this for
long. Okay. That's what you see. And there's
a door leading back into the training ground,
and a door north of that leading deeper into
the halls of the school. Okay. So you could loop
around here and go back south if you want. Or
he can go north again, into the unknown. So,
here is my thought. I mean, we can do whatever
investigating we want in here. Blanche can do
her thing, and Dresden can do his thing. But
I feel like he would look into this room here,
into the spell training ground, see that it's
that room, mentally log it for a map in his head,
and then he would still go to the other door.
The northern door? Yeah. Doesn't seem like there's
much interest in here. The thing that concerns
me about that door is it looks like there's a
gate up there. It looks like there's an entrance.
However, it just hit me that Player Jeremy knows
that, but Dresden doesn't. Right. So, I don't
know. He's just going to keep going through the
doors until Blanche stops him. Yeah, I see. If
we want to take a minute in the room. Nope. I
don't think we need to do any investigating here.
It seems pretty... Okay. So, it's north. You're
not going to push back south? I mean, you imagine
you're going to see... probably everything at
some point, because now you know you've got to
hunt down every single one of these things and
do what? I will say, I think Dresden will crack
the door ever so slightly. Dresden breaks the
door in half. It's a huge, takes his poor pick
and cracks it in the middle. He knocks and says,
excuse me, coming in. You just look out and see
a hallway. It just curves to the north again.
Do you want me to send Turbo out to investigate
the hall? Oh shit, I forgot you got Turbo. Yeah,
Blanche will resummon Turbo to go to the end
of the hall and see what's down the other side.
Okay. Turbo sees that the hallway snakes up to
the north and there is a door leading outside
the school. There are, there's basically just
like a long hallway that moves off to the east.
Just lined with doors. Looks like they're very
close together. Some kind of stalls or something.
And there's one door left in the western wall
just north of where you're exiting. One last
room in the corner of the building you see here.
One door left to the west. The eastern branch
of the hall has many doors. Shall we explore
the west first and... Continue knowing there's
nothing unknown behind us. Aye. Going in? Mm
-hmm. Blanche will step up next to the door waiting
for Dresden. Keo right behind her. And Dresden
cracks the door. You crack the door. With just
a crack, you really don't see much at all because
you see that unlike every other room in this
school, this room is entirely pitch black. Only
the light from the hall falling into it gives
you just this tiny little glance. You can see
there's some kind of, almost like an apparatus,
a gleaming metal. You realize it's more of a
traditional cage, the bars of a cage. That's
all you can see in the light unless you want
to open the door all the way. Maybe I can take
this one with my goggles of night, I think. Oh,
you have the goggles on? I was thinking like
no one has dark vision. I forgot about those.
Aren't you like steampunking that where you have
like multiple lenses on your head? Yeah, exactly.
So cool. So Blanche will like shift her head
so the goggles of night fall down. And she'll
peek into the room. You're opening the door?
Yes. She's going to recall Turbo back to safety.
Akio is behind her. Yes. And she's going to open
the door to the room. Okay. On the other side
of the door, Jean will kind of be standing guard.
Blanche, you're moving up. So if you're in there,
I'm going to have Dresden step back. Blanche
steps into the door and opens it. How far do
you see into the room? Right now I can only see
15 feet, but the goggles of night are in my thing.
Oh, 60 feet. The room is 60 feet long, 30 feet
wide. And so as you peek in, you can just barely
see all the way to the far wall. Whoa. You notice
a few things. Ooh, what is that? You notice silver
-lined cages, silver -barred cages, line the
walls of the room, many different sizes, from
very, very small, almost like bird cages, to
these gigantic, you know, like some of them are
like 15, 20 feet long. There's one in the far
back that's the full sort of 10 by 10 square.
You're kind of looking around at this. The two
things that strike you are, one, it seems like
the cages have some kind of innate magic etched
into the bars. And two, they're all empty. Every
single cage looks to be empty. You notice passive
perception is what? Actually, Blanche's passive
perception is like 10. Okay. Some of the bars
look a little... off in some way you might want
to get closer to some of these cages to investigate
and you do notice that in the far back of the
room that only one cage has anything in it at
all and there's just this big angular rock just
sitting in a cage almost 10 foot tall 10 foot
wide almost like filling the inside of this cage
just a rock like a like a stalagmite type either
one I think tight, grips tight to the ceiling,
right? Okay, so might because it's on the floor,
I guess. It might be right. You think you're
so funny. You think you're so funny. Okay, I'm
just looking through to see if I have any smarter
way to make light other than just like a torch.
Okay, so I just Googled it. Yeah, you're right.
I was just double checking. Yay. And fun note,
it's stalactites and stalagmites. What? Yeah.
Don't tell me I pronounced something again. No!
No! One of these days they're going to get me.
They're going to get me on this card. Blanche
is going... Oh, sorry. I was going to say earlier,
did you say touch a base? Did I? I don't know.
Damn it. Blanche is going to pull out a torch,
which will give off 20 feet of light. Oh, hell
yeah. I'm looking through. I don't have any light
creating spells right now. She'll explain. It
looks like the cages are all empty in here. If
that room before was short -term storage, then
I imagine this is more of a long -term holding
facility. At the end, I can just see a rock.
It's big. It's in a 10 by 10 foot cage. I'll
shed some light on the situation. She pulls out
her torch. Okay, so now that both players and
characters are aware of the rock, I just want
to say my brain goes to two things. It's either
a creature that's formed into a rock, or there's
something smaller in there that's hiding around
the rock or in the rock or on the rock. It's
a rock! It's a rock. What are you typing over
there? Nothing. I'm just logging into D &D Beyond.
I realized that it logged me out and I had to
do my phone. I was glad you were vamping for
a minute because I was kind of just doing phone
stuff. Gotcha. I don't want you sad, but it's
probably lame. So now with the torch, Blanche
wants to... So you're holding the torch? Yeah,
Blanche has the torch. So 20 feet of light. 20
feet light. So she would have to move 40 feet
in to get... to the uh the rock 20 feet of bright
light is there uh is there a dim light radius
uh sorry hold on yeah i probably just i love
we're getting into the nitty gritty dungeony
stuff oh you're a dungeon this is why you dungeon
crawl this is why you do it uh 20 yeah 20 foot
bright 20 foot dim can be on that sweet yeah
so we'll say 40 foot in that Okay, do you see
that? The yellow is bright light, the green is
dim light. Okay, sure. Do you guys see that?
Yes, I can see it. Nope, I cannot. Oh, I've got
to give Jeremy... Oh, hey, I can fix that here.
Boom, now you can see it. Hey, I can see it.
Cool. So she's going to move in one square at
a time, so 10 feet at a time. Okay. And then
she's going to perceive or investigate the cages
around her. Okay. Dresden's hot on her heels.
Hell yeah. So just a nine for the first. Now
that you're closer, you can't tell what the magic
is supposed to be on the bars. You need to get
closer and more for that. What you do see, there
is evidence of creatures having been in these
cages. You see a couple of loose, large feathers
in the cage just north of where you stand. You
see what looks like the shed skin of some kind
of snake or something. In a cage to the south,
a longer one. And you're kind of looking at this
with a nine. You do notice it. It's not that
you don't. It's just that it takes you a little
too long to see that the bars have been bent
from the outside. And it's just as you realize
this that you see a tendril. launches out from
that great rock, shooting out to where you are,
attempting to wrap around you, and you see in
the middle of the rock an eye, great and yellow,
snaps open, a singular cyclops -like eye, a mouth
full of razor -sharp teeth. grinds open from
stone and that tendril mows in to attack you.
I'm going to make an attack on you and then we're
all going to roll for initiative. You ready for
this? You ready for this? Get back, everyone.
Stay back. Let me open this. Let me do this thing
real fast. Here's my thoughts, Jeremy. Oh! Yeah,
it looks like that. Here's my thought, Jeremy.
What the fuck? We don't need to fight this. No.
We can just get the fuck out of here. No, especially
if it's the only thing in there. Blanch with
my raid action. That's going to be a 27, oh,
sorry, 22 to hit you. Yeah, hold on. Because
if I hit you, it turns out you need to fight
this. Make some music going. Oh, fuck. Actually.
What? Oh, no. Meets it, beats it. Meets it, beats
it. Give me a second. Put some music on. I was
going to cast shield, but. I hate this music.
I love the magic. Blanche just like sees the
bars. And then you look up just in that moment,
look to that far cage, see the eye snap open.
You turn to move back just as you are grabbed
by this tendril. I'm going to, you are now restrained
by me. Fuck. You have disadvantage on strength
checks and strength saving throws. Great. And
now we roll for initiative. Okay. Oh my God.
That's a 14 for Blanche. It's a 19 for Dresden.
Oh no, six for Akio. Oof. It's a 10 for John
Franklin. What's his dex? Zero. Okay. I have
a negative, so he actually beats it. This wraps
around you, Blanche, and you can feel suddenly
something is trying to pull you as you're being
a fish on a lure, being pulled in. I always forget
that Akio has advantage. Oh, nice. So that's
22 for Akio now. 22? Oh, no. Okay. That sucks
for me. So this grabs you. You're a fish in a
line. You feel yourself being yanked, pulled
deeper in towards these gnashing, sharp teeth.
And Akio is the first to act. Okay. I'm willing
to let you guys roll intelligence checks on this,
too. if you're interested in learning more. I
think that's fine. We don't really use intelligence
much. I don't want to make it an action combat.
I think it's cool just to do it so you can be
like, oh, I know about this thing. It rewards
intelligence and stat more. Gotcha. It wouldn't
really work much for Akio. He's got pretty shitty
intelligence. For Blanche, though, if she wants
to. Justin's got a nine. Yeah, but taking an
action, she just wants to get out of there. No,
I'm not going to make it an action. Oh, sorry,
sorry, sorry. It usually does. It usually costs
an action, I think, to recall, but I think that
sucks. Okay. Because if you're smart, you just
know things. And I think intelligence is so underutilized.
So if you want to make rolls ahead of the combat
to see what you're facing, feel free. Sure. Okay,
do you want me to do that now? Yeah. Will you
let me do that? Okay, great. You wouldn't have
known before, open its eye, because it is indistinguishable,
I will say. That's a 17 for Blanche. 17. With
that, you only know, now that you see it, the
name of this creature. This is known as a roper.
They are ambush predators somewhat common in
the world of Rotham, the subterranean world.
That's it. Would Blanchard Akio think that Akio
could attack this tendril and potentially cut
the tendril? It looks pretty attackable. Okay,
sure. It looks pretty attackable. All right,
that's fair. It's something you can just get
from, yeah, if he wants to go for it, he can
go for it. Okay, then that's going to be the
play. Akio thinks he just wants to run up and
just cut this thing off if that's what's holding
Blanche here. So he'll go in for two Ichigenka
attacks. 17. Ooh, and 12. Does not break AC.
Wow, 17 didn't, oh man, that was like a something.
Actually, that was only a, yeah. It wasn't a
great. He goes in the slab of Nijigenka and tries
to come down in the tendril, pure stone. It's
so strange. It's like, it's pure rock and yet
it has this almost liquid sort of mobility and
fluidity to it. And Nijigenka just king clangs
off of it, shaving of stone, flies, sparks. You
are not free. That's his turn? That's his turn,
yeah. Dresden, you're up. Fuck. Okay, yeah. As
just a fastest reaction as you can possibly have,
he is taking out his war pick and going at the
tendril. Okay. Oh, I can't believe I rolled low
initiative again! This thing, if it gets a turn,
is going to be so incredible! So I'm going to
roll both to hits at the same time here. Okay.
First one, we'll probably do it with a 27. 27
will hit. Second one is not going to do it with
a 15. 15 will not. Okay. You have to break it
with this hit. Cool, however. What? However.
However? Um, actually. It's whomever. I'm sorry.
God, this is too important. What I love about
this so much, you do actually get the hidden.
And it's so cool because Akio comes in with a
katana. He's not able to break through the stone
tendril. But then a war pick, a weapon made to
break stone, comes flying in. And it's just perfect.
You just snap down on this thing. So here's my
order of operations that I'm trying to do. Okay.
But it really depends. It's almost like semantics.
It depends on the order with which it happens.
So I want to manifest my echo. Yeah. And unleash
incarnation. Okay. But it says whenever you take
an action. So does that mean if I manifest my
echo with a bonus action between the first action
and... Because that... You know what I mean?
The bonus will be after the action I already
took. So technically would that negate unleash
incarnation? Yeah. We can just say you did your
echo first thing. Okay, cool. And then you did
this. Well, he did that. And then we're going
to... Echo just appears. Yep. And then we're
going to Unleash Incarnation. Hell yeah. So in
this darkened room, in the light of the torch,
we see this shadow. I go, boom, appears. Unleashing
Incarnation, you're attacking more? Yep. All
right. Yep. That would be a 27. That hits. 26,
sorry. Okay. All right. So you got two hits on
this thing. Yeah, we're going. I'll leave it
at two. You break it. I'll leave it at two. Fuck.
Both rolls were a two. So one of them is an eight,
and I'm going to reroll the other one. Okay.
Twelve. No, ten. Sorry. Ten damage total between
the two? Yep. No, no. What did I say earlier?
Eight. Eighteen. Eighteen? Boom, boom. The eight
slides in. You see a crack from Dresden's own
war pick, and the echo slides in, comes down
with his, and the tendril. breaks apart. The
stone splinters the floor. Blanche is freed.
The millisecond it breaks, Dresden is going to
shove her out the door. Oh, because you have
the echo there too. Okay. Okay. I'll say Blanche
is five feet in. You can shove her five feet.
Cool. Actually, no, you know what? What? You've
used bonus action in all actions. Do you have
one attack left? You can turn an attack into
a shove. He took two attacks. I took two attacks.
Gives you one extra or two extra attacks? Gives
me one extra attack. Okay. We've already gone
through the whole, I mean. So it might be up
to Jaune to get Blanche out of there as fast
as possible. He's got the movement. Does he?
Okay. Yeah, I mean, I could do action surge,
but I don't want to expend all of that. Oh, actually,
it's Blanche's turn next. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah,
yeah. So, okay, in that case, Dresden is using
his movement to get out of there. All right,
hell yeah. You slide out of there. Echo's kind
of just standing staunchly against the darkness,
against that watching singular eye. Blanche,
you feel the stone coil drop around you. You
are freed. Blanche, Blanche, Blanche. Blanche
does a back handspring out the door and shuts
the door. You just see the Echo standing there
as like, that's a little, yeah, the last sort
of tendril comes out. You see like, We'll call
it the end of the round. You bunch out and you
see four more tendrils go flying out, all wrapping
around the echo, which just vanishes. You just
hear like a dry roar, like stone rubbing against
itself as the door closes. Got a cool shot for
that too. Got a cool shot for the door closing.
Oh yeah? The tendrils come out and the camera
is going with the tendrils toward the door. And
then you see Dresden at the door. and slams it
before the camera gets there. Well, that was
the shortest fight non -fight we've ever had.
That was a short fight. You got out. If I had
my turn earlier, four tendrils, I could have
gotten to everyone and pulled you all in. This
thing, ropers are so, they're so much fun. Didn't
get to go crazy with this one, but yeah. You
walk out, the room tells its own story. There
were creatures in there. Now there's just one
left, and it's very hungry. Because everything
else has been consumed. But you were not. The
door's closed, you hear like banging against
it. As you imagine these tendrils are trying
to like break through, but it's just outside
of range. Blanche dusts herself off as she starts
to walk down the hallway. Well, no students need
saving in there. What do you make of this hall
full of doors? perhaps some sort of dormitory.
Open some doors and find out. Yeah. Yeah. I just
don't know what to say to that because everything
is a hallway doors. He mentioned they were really
close together. Okay. Okay. They're really close.
Like I'm talking like they're every 10 feet.
Okay. So in that case, Oh, that might even be
too small for, it's enough for just a bed. Right.
But in that case, Dresden will say, let's find
out. Hell yeah. Do you want to start opening
some doors? Open some doors. We open doors together
from here on out. Very well, I'll stay behind
you. I'll not waste a lot of time here. I'll
tell you that you take some time, you open a
bunch of these doors, and you find you're looking
into small study chambers, like personal study
chambers, each one with like desks and chairs
and very little else. Looks like, you know...
When school is in session, perhaps some students
would take their studies in a quiet private place.
They could probably assign these things, get
a key from some master room, and go in and check
them all out. They're all unlocked now, and you
just peek into each one, and they are very sparse.
Just the chairs, desks, one of them has like
a number of chairs around a small table. It would
be like a little council room. What you do see
as you reach the end of these sort of personal
study lounges is there's a long... hallway leading
to guess what more doors all on the edges as
well as another long hallway going south you
have two different ways to go now you can go
continuing to the east following opening more
doors you know it looks like you're moving into
a different sort of region of the school the
doors are farther apart here perhaps this could
be some kind of dormitory if that's kind of what
you're looking for it feels like that fits a
little better here There also is a hallway snaking
down to the south that looks like it might reconnect
with the very hallway you stood in earlier. There
are doors along the edge of this. Two on both
sides, east and west. So I think Dresden would
be down with going south at this point. He's
followed the natural chain where he would go.
And then at this point, you know, they all know
that that probably snakes down and wraps around
to the rooms that we haven't seen yet. Or we
can go the top way and... go away from the area
that we've been in. So at this point, he's ready
to complete the circuit, if you will. I agree.
I think we should suckle back, meet up where
we have been before. Hell yeah. To the south.
I heard that is suckle back. You wish, soldier
boy. Oh, God. Do we want to open doors as we
go? Or do we want to follow this call down to
those classrooms? Because I'm guessing that there's
probably, like the first two classrooms we went
into, the Enchantment and Illusion, there weren't
any combats in there. So I'm thinking that we
might get more information out of those two remaining
classrooms. And who knows what we'll find anywhere
else. Yeah. Could find a good episode ending
somewhere else. What a good ending sting. You
never know. He's just walking around like, oh,
look at that ending sting. It's perfect. Are
we deciding how we crawl or are you? I'm just
saying, no, that's Jean. Could be a good ending
sting, sir. You never know. Jean, which way's
the ending? Give me a button and I'll open that
door. No way in hell. Yeah, I think it would
make sense to go all just, back and then come
back up. Sweet. Yeah, I would like to explore
this top classroom first. In that four square
of classrooms, the top right. So you move down
the hall, you move past the two different sets
of doors on either side, all the way down and
then you are standing just outside the conjuration
lecture hall where you saw the sort of final
exam rules written out on the board where you
turned way back when and moved your way to the
north. Now you're back. You want to open it up?
Let's go in. There are three more doors undiscovered
in this hall. You've opened the one to the lower
east. You're now standing at the one in the upper
west. You open the door, and immediately you
see just this storage room full of... I mean,
the smells coming out of this thing are absolutely
wild. I could not begin to describe them for
many, many reasons. But like, it just hits you.
A lot of like strange chemical smells, weird
kind of rotten smells, very, very earthy smells,
floral. It's just this hodgepodge and you're
looking into almost like an alchemical reagent
slash supplies. You see there are a number of
like beakers and bottles lining one like full
shelf on the end. You see like all sorts of mixing
supplies. You see jars and jars and jars full
of various plants and saps and dirts and... body
parts of creatures, insects just crawling around
inside, mostly a bunch of dead huss, maybe one
barely living one, because no one's probably
been feeding anything in this room. Blanche wants
to switch back to her eyes of minute seeing and
investigate. Okay. 19. As you investigate, you
do find there are a few finished products in
the far back, and you find three potions. of
greater healing. Ooh, nice. Damn. You're just,
like, digging through the beakers. You move to
the side, and you see, like, maybe there's, like,
a lower shelf. You pop open, and you just see,
like, three greater healing potions. Almost like
a med kit situation. So Blanche will walk out,
tucking the last potion into her pouch there.
Well, that was useful. Let's check this last
one. And move to one door to the south to check
that classroom. Okay. Clearing off the western
side of the hallway. You open it up? Yeah. You
find what I imagine you expect to find. An alchemy
lab. You see long tables set out with chairs
along them. And again, just like beakers actually
maybe like had been in use. You see like some
reagents are set out. teacher's desk at the very
front. There's all sorts of like component lists
lining the walls and books on a shelf in the
corner. They're all about, you know, combining
ingredients and the principles of alchemy. And
you notice something kind of strange. It looks
like a work in progress. There are a few reagents
sort of out of their bottles. There's like sort
of a soil covering one of the tables where maybe
something was plucked from it. And you see like
In a beaker just sitting in a stand, there is
this viscous brown liquid. And immediately, it
reminds you of something. Oh. Blanche pulls out
the stirring rod from the other app. Take a button.
Take a button. You got it. Oh, yeah. Yes, yes.
You see a stirring rod that was found in the
hands of the dead AG -6. And you know who was
in here. Who was making something? But what is
it that lies on this table? Can Blanche try to
figure it out with investigation or would Arcana
be better? Arcana or nature would be better.
Okay. I'm going to stick with Arcana. You want
to use that button? No, of course not. Jeez.
18. Oh, that's pretty good. Okay. With an 18,
I think it requires some experimentation. She
takes a sip. You're looking at it, and yeah,
it is an oil. And maybe you're thinking, like,
does this apply to armor? Does this apply to
weaponry? What do you do with this? And you're
playing around with just touches and touches
of it, and you put a touch of it on. Maybe there's
a scalpel nearby used for, you know, cutting
off parts of plants and animals to mix in. And
you kind of take a little bit of the scalpel
and you dip it. And for a moment you see something
strange. Like the oil soaks into the edges of
the blade. And you see like this gleaming, shining
sharpness that fades away. And you realize what
you're looking at is... A vial of oil of sharpness.
Maybe enough here for two rounds of it. This
is an incredible... What this would do, if you
applied to a weapon, it would give it the qualities
of a plus three magic weapon for one hour. Yeah.
Whoa. For one hour. I'm pretty sure it's one
hour. Let me double check this. Damn. Let me
make sure I'm not speaking on my butt. Pretty
sure it's one hour. Yes. Takes one minute. Lasts
for one hour. However... You saw it only last
in this thing for a few moments. It is incomplete.
She was working on it and she must have been
disrupted, distracted. She did not finish the
job, but it's very, very close. Does Blanche
think that she could finish it? You might be
able to. There are notes lying around, but this
is incredibly complex alchemy. And again, you're
just floored by the sheer genius. These were
young students casting. incredible magic and
putting together these incredible like like the
reagents would be extremely hard to come by in
the natural world sure and that would be a huge
limiter but for most people even alchemists oil
of sharpness would be just this incredible my
phone went off just this uh an incredible project
to sort of master but it's most of the way done
and you have some notes maybe you can figure
this one out You want to try? How long does Blanche
think it might take her to try? At this stage,
with your role, you'd think maybe one hour. Jesus.
Well, uh, soldier boy, I know you have that fancy
new weapon of yours. Care to sit down and study
it for an hour while I study with this? I really
hate stopping for an hour. But you'll get your
blind side. I know, I know. Dresden will just
pull up a chair and start doing his thing. I
imagine you just draw out the dagger and you're
holding it and you just close your eye and just
kind of, what? I keep forgetting. Same, same,
just same. Yeah, give me a button. You close
your eye and you're just kind of like slowly
letting this dagger, and it's almost like you're
feeling this. The vibrations in the air around
you, and like slowly but surely over the hour,
it's like you can see with your eyes closed a
little farther, a little farther, a little farther
out. You can see Akio sort of stepping in, the
football players' paws sending vibrations through
the floor into you, and it's all coming together.
Meanwhile, Zekio sort of moves back and forth
in front of the door, and Jaune is, I imagine,
kind of just like watching Blanche, trying to
kind of be like the helpful partner and handing
you things as you're asking for them. And what
is this stat? What do you mean? What is that
route? I don't understand. He's kind of just
digging through the, running back and forth to
the alchemical reagents room and flying back
in and handing you whatever, probably the wrong
thing most of the time. This is a Petri dish,
not a pipette. And you're just working so carefully.
Go ahead and give me another nature or arcana
check. 13 arcana. With that, most of the work
has been done for you. But unfortunately, you
only end up with one dose of oil of sharpness.
One of it. You're gonna give you an early test
and they kind of like falls apart You can if
you like trip something in the liquid a little
too too fast and in the brown Oil just turns
a deep black and like hardens and the little
violence explodes almost like this full geo just
drops to the table you still have a little bit
left and maybe a second one that you're kind
of working on and you you Shake your head wipe
some sweat off John John wipes the sweat off
your head with a towel and you take a tripper
pink and you watch as a Last ingredient that
goes into it, just this clear, would be like
this rare mineral water from a nearby mountaintop,
just drips in, bing, ripples in the top of the
beaker, and you watch that brown liquid shift
to this almost shimmering white. And you have
one vial of oil of sharpness. plus three and
a weapon for one hour. And Blanche will, she'll
snap Jules out, or not Jules, that's the other
guy. Blanche will snap Dresden out of his concentration
by putting a hand on his shoulder to tell him,
well, I flubbed up the first pot, but I ended
up making a dose and I thought you should have
it. Well, I was going to make some funny joke
about how Dresden wants the cool stuff in the
next room, but sure. You can't use the cool stuff
in the next room. Is your pick a plus one or
a plus two? Plus two. Oh, it's a plus two. Plus
one is a big deal. Yeah, for sure. But Paloma's
short sword is only a plus one, I think. Actually,
I think I will keep the cool shit in this room,
too. I guess we'll see once we find more cool
shit. Keep it on you. And we can distribute it
to them. Keep it on you and I'll investigate
the next room. Thank you very much. You slide
the vial away. You all make to leave this alchemy
lab. I'll step back into the hallway to continue
your exploration. And perhaps as everyone's moving
out, we see Blanche just kind of look back, glancing
at the table, her workspace, and the workspace
of someone who came before, someone who died
long before you entered this building, either
before or after they were placed in a metal shell.
You think of that body broken in the training
ground, punctured with holes, holding that stir,
and maybe... Just maybe giving you guys the key
to avenging their death. And we'll call it there.