Well, howdy, y 'all. I reckon you're wondering
what happened last time on Fantasy Pants, huh?
Well, you've come to the right place. You see,
we were introduced to a world, a world of many
worlds, you might say, all connected through
one locale, a great shining diamond in the deep
ethereal known as the Radiant Citadel. We met
a couple of goofballs, a couple of novice adventurers,
mayhaps, living there. Everyday lives, peaceful
like. That is until a storm hits on the world
of Tythos in the city of towers known as Cerule.
We see Zebulon brought here by the shield bearers
in an effort to rescue as many as he can. We
see Jules Laroche and his band of orphans known
as the Cherry Delights rushing to escape the
devastation. And as they move away, as they move
towards safety, well, then the lightning begins
to strike. And with it, a new danger arrives.
Jules, you are moving towards this. You're working
your way out of the low city. I think you're
reaching just around the border of the high city.
And as you get there, you see like... In the
road ahead, and you're staying kind of far off
to the side, right? Yes. You can see in the road,
maybe they don't really quite clock you yet,
but they're seeing all the other people kind
of funneling in behind you. Not just your group,
but people from all over the low city are moving
towards the plaza. You see the Roach guards.
Do you have a sigil, like the Roach family colors?
Blue and white. Blue and white, yes. In the blue
and white taverns, you see these guards kind
of standing in the gleaming silver armor, just
standing in a line at the edge of the first tall
towers of the high city. Ah, shit. Right in the
middle of the main road. As you kind of see these
people moving, they stare out towards these low
folk with just open animosity. Is there a back
alley we can duck out of? Yeah, there's other
ways you could try to work in. So you're going
to work on a back alley? Yeah. Okay. I don't
want them to see me at all. All right, so you
take your group and move around. But how many
are you going to take with you? Whoever's going
to follow. Okay. I mean, I'm bringing the Cherry
Delights. All right, so you guys start to move
out of the way. You wave the Cherry Delights
into an alley. And as you kind of move out of
there, you can hear the first of the guards like,
Halt! Go no further! By the roach orders, you
are to stay put. We are bringing high city folk
to the plaza right now. We are going to let you
pass. We are. But right now, it is flooded with
our folk. We cannot let you in. We are trying
to keep a reason. And people are just like, oh,
what are you doing? You can't do this to us.
Screaming. Banging against shields. Stay back!
As you move into this alley, you're moving away
from the sights of this, from the chaos behind
you. But you hear lightning striking down amongst
this crowd. You hear, like, explosions. You hear
screaming. And you just can't let it out. It's
humming creatures. Now, you've moved away from
this hell behind you. But right now, you are
about to enter the high city. You are, I will
say, four blocks from the plaza. I want you both
to roll for initiative. All right. First roll
of the game. Here we go. Oh. First roll. Nice.
That was the first session. Nat 20. That is amazing.
Mine was a 10. You will never get another one.
Plus 313. Nice. All right. Here's how this is
going to work. Let me break this down for you.
All right. If you guys attempt to move here,
you're going to be moving through difficult terrain.
You'll be making checks based on various things
each round. For one, if you're going through
more of the chaos of the streets, there are points
where you have to. You're going to need to roll
or at least find a way to keep your folk with
you. Keep the chariot of lights with you. Keep
an eye on their location because it's going to
be easy to lose them in the hell. I'm going to
conundrum knock because now when I hear what's
happening with the people behind me, I don't
know if I want to leave them. A lot of low folk
are in trouble. But at the same time, maybe whatever's
happening could give you the chaos, but it can
give you an opening to get past those guards.
Each round, depending on where you move, there
may be difficult terrain. If you're going into
a crowd, it's going to be some slow movement.
We're going to do theater of the mind for this
bit here. I'll help you get an idea of how far
you can go each round. Zebulon, same story for
you. You're standing in this gem. You're looking
out at the hell outside. You want to hang out
and sit back? That's fine. Those luminaries are
getting to work. Here in the crystal, looking
around, is there a chance that the shield bearers,
not expecting a fight, might have left some gear
lying around? I think rather than the shield
bearers having gear, you had a little time as
Arhalon was in your apartment as he got this
message for this, as he was preparing. He would
have some older... Like leather training armor
you could throw on. It's going to look ridiculous
on you. Like right now, you look like you're
wearing a full -on battle skirt. Because, you
know. Nice. You'll have a belt tied around where
your waist is, but that's where Arholon's chest
was in this leather sort of. Yeah. It's a little
goofy, but it's effective. It's cool. I love
it. Mechanics -wise, what are we calling that
item? Let's call it. Let's call it studded leather
because I want you to live. And Arhalon probably
has some pretty good gear. He's got connections.
You guys ready? No, not yet. Let me change that
up. Jules is always ready. I hope you're ready
for this. As long as you don't kill me, I'm fine.
I'm good. Oh, boy. Depends what you do. So I'm
going to roll die as well to determine how I'm
going to have these creatures react. You're not
in any, like... You're not exactly engaging in
combat with anyone right yet. Right. But should
you, things are going to make a very different
turn. All right. I think, like, during this moment,
the sounds of the screaming and the chaos sort
of phase away. You both maybe hone in to the
sounds of these creatures before you. Their movements
seem to... With the wind swirling around them.
What... There's some scheming going on at the
table. This is secrets kept from the DM. Secrets?
This is not for the DM's eyes. Well, I hate it.
I bet you do. Jules, you're up first. What do
you want to do? Shit. Your crew is going to follow
what you do. This is going to be a bit of a loose
fight in this first session. I really don't want
to leave what's happening on the street. You
don't even fully know what's happening on the
street. I think you're a little ways into the
alley, maybe ten feet in. I don't think there's
anything I can do there, though. It's your call.
This alley snakes forward about 20 more feet,
then takes a turn, moves closer to the high city
there. I can't show myself, but more importantly,
even if I did, we can't take on whatever the
hell is going on here. The guards and these creatures.
Okay. So we're going to keep going through the
alley. Okay. It's not difficult terrain. You
can move. You can double move if you want to
in this round. Yeah, let's double move. So 20
feet to the end of the alley. Let's get as far
as I can. My movement is... Like 30? 30 feet.
Okay, so you go 60 feet here. So what you're
going to do is you move 20 feet and you kind
of reach a point where the alley splits off three
different ways. You take a hard left here and
push your way down another sort of long alley
that's about 40 feet. So you kind of reach the
end of that and as it is going to turn ends,
you break out right at the rim of the towers
of the high city. There's a sort of a wide open
space where the high city ends and the low city
begins. Um, and you can see that there probably
were guards stationed, like, in some, uh, some
hundred feet apart or so, um, where the main
roads weren't exactly, like, lined up. Uh, you
see that the guards are now spread out as they're,
like, running towards these various fights that
have broken out. And you can see these creatures
are all over the place. Jeez. But in front of
you, there seems to be only one. Uh, it's about...
50 feet ahead of you, kind of like on the tower
side of this large expanse. And as you guys kind
of rush out of the alley, this creature with
this sort of buzzing hum turns around and its
eyeless face seems to clock you. You know it's
coming your way. Yep. Nebulon, what did you roll?
I rolled a 13. Okay. Sorry, go ahead. No, I was
just going to say, as we kind of see this thing
locking onto us, we know it. I'm just going to
kind of step out in front of the group and just
say, Cherry Delights, form ranks. And they're
all going to come in, and we're going to just
form one solid line. Hell yeah. In the alley.
All right, so you're just spreading out, kind
of holding the whole place. Yep. You can hear
like a crash as you guys... Round stuff smashes
a bottle against I think at the end of the alley
to come at me come at me come on Paul is just
staring forward like Storm Chester's like shaking
right your side. He's got like a little dagger.
He pulls out his pocket. Just like Jules Can
this thing be stabbed? We're about to find out.
Ah, hell. Ah, jeez. So, um, okay. My turn. You
did your movement. You did your double movement.
Now I get to go. But I can only move with this
thing, because I'm 50 feet away as established,
so this thing just... It's flying off the ground
as it, like, blasts towards you. You can see,
like, tendrils of lightning are, like, raking
at the cobbles below, and they're kind of like...
breaking, crumbling. Dust is bursting out from
everywhere this thing hits. And it flies across
and comes right towards you. Gets right up in
your face and just like raises a claw as it's
preparing to strike. Zebulon, where you stand,
these things are also going. So, you kind of
watch as Two of these creatures just, like, move.
I think one turns towards the gemstone. Begins
moving towards you, but not fast. You see the
one just kind of, like, zaps off into the crowd
somewhere and starts attacking. People are screaming.
Stop! Hey! Stop! This thing just kind of moves
up, like, towards you again, just, like, getting
ready to strike, and it's your move. The doorway
is now blocked by one of these creatures. Yawned.
absolute chaos is broken out. You don't see your
brother. Where is he? Where's Arhalon? Let's
talk gear for a second. And I don't know, we
can cut this out if you want. No, let's talk
some gear. Gear's fine. So since we're two players
in a larger campaign, one of the boons that you
gave us was picking a feat at level one. Yes.
The feat I picked for Zebulon was dual wielder.
I'm just having a hard time reconciling that
here and now he would be carrying two blades.
I mean, I don't think that's out of the question.
You knew something was happening. Okay. Maybe
they're like, I mean, they're probably, you know,
like trading blades. Maybe they're sharpened.
Maybe you sharpened them. I mean, there's something
that you probably personally keep to practice
with. Yeah, I'm almost kind of seeing that as
like you're always ready to. to shine. This is
your moment. You know it. You heard the sirens.
You knew it was happening. Arhalon was strapping
his gear on. He grabbed his greatsword. Polio
slung his greatsword straight over his back.
And Zebulon went into the gear room after him
and just picked up, like, hand -me -downs. Yeah,
there's some gear. All right, so... I picture
him having, like, these two sort of curved, semi
-curved sabers. Maybe they're more like dress
swords, like they're not actually meant for battle,
but he picked them up off of maybe some of Arhan's
old formal military wear. So he sees this thing
in the door, and they're killing people. I'm
sorry, brother. And he draws his swords and moves,
runs towards this. lightning being. Yeah, this
is like this creature made of lightning, this
weird humanoid thing. It's electric shape. Can
I get close enough to make an attack? You absolutely
can. I'll say it's 10 feet away from you as it
stands. Perfect. Just kind of moving into strike.
You're kind of far out of the action, so I think
it got to the doorway, and you were probably
a little ways off the doorway, so yeah, I think
that makes sense to me. Give me one second. Let
me just read this. Feet real fast. Read the feet,
baby. Get ready for defeat. Not funny, David.
No one laughs. Get ready for defeat. All right,
I'm going to make my first strike here. That's
not great, but it's a 6 plus 5, 11. 11 against
this creature is a miss. All right. Because of
the dual wielder, I got another strike. It is
also a miss. That is a 3 plus 5, an 8. Oh, boy.
So you just swing twice, and this thing's movements
are just all over the place. And now you're right
in its face, and it's getting ready to attack.
And you get the feeling it's going to hurt. Yeah,
I don't think I have any other moves. Well, end
of the round. I have one more turn I'm going
to go for here. Beyond this creature, you can
hear, like... I mean, it's not like some some
sort of like Stone breaking you can hear like
some magic cast whispered word or shouted Scott's
get up and an explosion Somewhere in the crowd
and as this thing reaches out to attack you just
kind of suddenly see the tip of a spear Bursts
out from its chest and the creature an explosion
of static Uh, breaks. Although, actually, I have
to tell you, this is going to be a, uh, I need
you to take a dexterity saving throw. As this
thing dies. Okay. I started doing this, and then
I remembered that, uh, this is not the most helpful
thing. Wow, we're rolling real bad. That's a
natural two, plus five is seven. Okay. Um, on
the bright side, you are a brass dragon, correct?
Yes, so if we're talking about electricity damage,
or... lightning damage, I don't know, whatever.
It's going to be halved. I get resistance, yeah.
I got a pretty bad roll, so you actually only
take three points of damage from this death burst.
This thing just explodes into this static discharge.
The figure behind it, as it kind of vanishes,
seems to have taken almost no damage. You see
that spear -wielding centurion. At level one,
three hit points is more than a third of my health.
It's not great. He looks at you and he's just
like, I'm sorry, I did not realize. Stay back.
Leave this to the luminaries. He swirls a spear
out of the air, you know, props it up high, gives
you a nod, and then turns and runs back out into
the crowd. The way is clear now for you. And
that is the end of round one. Jules Roche, you
are up. This thing is right in front of you.
You have your crew all around you at the mouth
of this alley. Up ahead, you see the star of
the towers. The high city district. Behind you,
you hear screaming. You hear volts of electricity
being cast out towards innocent people. Guards.
You don't know. You just know that people are
dying. But you know that freedom for you and
for your gang lies just ahead. Wherever you want
to go. You got a very big, very electric problem
right in front of you. What do you do? I'm going
to cast Invisibility on myself. Oh, shit. Okay.
Okay. And I'm going to move behind it. All right.
I believe that's what I can do at this point
in time. Very specific ability Jules has, given
that he's a variant human, has a couple of feats,
and I think he's trained himself in some pretty...
Pretty powerful magic in this one regard. At
least you go invisible. And you're staying in
its range, so you're going to move around behind
it. Sounds good. I think that's all I can do.
I just cast it. I'm pretty sure it's an action.
I'll just double check. Yeah, it's an action.
This is tricky. It's turn. You've vanished. But
your allies are still right there. Maybe not
entirely in its range. Maybe like, you know,
they're kind of close by. But I think you were
the one five feet away from it. I'll say it's
ten feet away from the nearest one of you it
can reach. So, what will happen is it kind of
turns. Jolting. Turns towards Chester, who's
like holding his knife forward. Jules? Jules,
where'd you go? Oh, man. Oh, no. And this thing
moves forward to attack. But steps out of your
range. You get to take an AOO here. I do. So...
You're invisible. You get advantage on this attack.
Is there anything that I can deduce that would
allow me to know whether or not I'm able to touch
this thing? Roll me an Arcana check as you're
taking a look at this guy. Actually, Arcana...
Do Arcana and do Perception. Okay. I'll let you
do both. For different reasons. So Arcana's 11.
Okay. And Perception... 9. Okay, so Perception
you don't really catch on to much, but with your
Arcana check, you realize this is at least some
form of elemental being. And given that, you
think you can make physical contact with it.
Okay. It seems like incorporeal in the fact that
it's just made of energy, but there is a body
to that energy. There is a method to all that
madness. Okay. So I am also going to cast Inflict
Wounds. Oh, shit. I'm going to just reach out
and touch its back. Okay. Holy shit. All right.
Oh, you know what? This is an AOO. I'm going
to allow it in this chaos. Okay. Yeah. Because
it's cool. I won't stop you from allowing it.
This is cool. All right. It's plus five to hit.
This is a looser combat than our usual, very
structured. Oh, no. This is a great start. That
is a natural one. I did give you advantage because
of your invisibility. So, very fortunate because
otherwise I would have had you inflict wounds
on Chester. Not really. So that's 14 plus 5,
19 to hit. That will hit. Can you imagine if
Chester just exploded? This thing dodges and
your spell hits him. Chester's my man. He's my
man, my right -hand man. Alright, so the damage
is 3d10. That's pretty significant. That's a
lot, actually. That is a good amount of damage.
Huh. Let's see what we get. Alright. Not bad.
10. 10 damage? Eh, it's not the best, not the
worst. 10 is exactly... What you needed. So you
reach out with a hand. What does it look like
when you cast Inflict Wounds on this lightning
monstrosity? With this thing, I think I'm going
to reach out and just lightly put my hand on
its back. And kind of like, what are those? Like
the Tesla coils? Is that what they're called?
Yeah, I know you're talking about the stuff that
they have. Yeah, I think those glass globes are
just going to just shoot out all sides. Yeah,
it's leaking from 18 different spots. Lightning
all over and then just with the metal vanishes.
He just disappears into the cosmos. Fucking love
it. I can't wait to hear how Jules got these
abilities someday. Oh, we're going to get into
that. I can't wait either. We're going to have
some cool, I mean, hell, you probably had some
crazy training in your younger days, given who
you are, actually, Mr. Jules LaRoche. But yeah,
you reach out, Chester's holding his knife, he's
going to fight this thing off, this thing raises
a claw, and then just, Tesla coil explodes in
front of him. Chester just, and I think, with
invisibility, no, you stay invisible after attack,
right? No, attack. You appear? Stops it, yeah.
So you suddenly just appear in front of Chester,
he's like. Oh, holy shit. Holy shit, Jules. What
the? I always got you guys. Oh, man. You know
that. Man, I was seeing the Reaper. We got to
go. Let's go. All right. And you still have movement.
Do you guys want to start moving this turn? Actually,
no. That was my turn. I think. What's that? Oh.
Steven is instructing me to open additional beverage.
But yeah, so that was my turn. So we're actually
gonna cut from that. Oh, Zebulon. The way is
clear. You're looking out. Again, just chaos.
No Arhalon. The luminaries you saw before have
kind of vanished into the crowd of screaming
people. The line that formed is now like a mass
of people. And there's some of these creatures
kind of pretty close by. So I think people are
trying to scramble into the building. People
are also scared. They're starting to scatter
away from safety. It's chaos. You see like...
You see a few folks kind of, like, looking, taking
all this in from kind of the fringe of the crowd.
They've got these, like, diamonds held up to
their eyes, almost like spy glasses. And they're
just watching all this. They're, like, speaking.
You can't really hear what they're saying, but
it's like they're talking. They're like, blah,
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And
you couldn't believe the blah, blah, blah. And
they're, like, talking into something, to nothing.
You're not sure. But they seem to be observing
everything through these strange diamonds. Okay.
So. With this adrenaline rush and the disappointment
that everything went so poorly for him, with
this combatant, Zebulon's going to drop his two
sabers and draw his short bow. Oh, okay. How
close is the nearest combatant to me? Let's see.
The nearest one of these guys is about 30 feet
ahead of you now. Okay. Short ways off the base
of the steps. So you're probably 10 feet in at
the base of the sort of sapphire gemstone you're
standing in. 20 feet out from there, one of these
creatures is like swinging out trying to stop
people. Okay. So he's swinging at people? He
is swinging at people. He's attacking. So that
means he's within five feet of an enemy. I'm
going to reveal Zebulon's class now. He is a
rogue, and this situation gives him sneak attack
damage. You son of a gun. All right, I'm going
to roll to attack. Same plus five. What do we
got? Nine plus five, 14. 14 hits. Nice. All right.
So the damage is 1d6 plus three, so I'm going
to roll 2d6 and add three for my sneak attack
damage. Can you kill this thing? You know the
HP now. It's a player. Two ones. Zebulon. Add
the three. It's 11. It's 11. Yeah. Add the three,
gets five. Man, been bad rolls tonight for Zebulon.
See, this bolt launches out, and you see as it
catches into it. No, it's an arrow, so you shoot
this arrow at this thing. It catches into, I
guess it's... quote -unquote, shoulder, and almost
like a magnet, just like it holds the metal tip
in place. You see a spark fire up as this thing
hits, and it kind of spins around to look at
you, just humming with this malign energy. All
right, and as he draws another arrow, that's
the end of my turn. Okay, all right. So next
thing that happens, you would not see. Roll a
few dice. Okay. I never like it when the DM rolls
secret die. Jules, we're back to you. The path
is clear. Mm -hmm. And we're running. We're running.
A double move will get you to the base of the
towers, and then you only have about a few blocks
to go. Okay. Each round is going to be about
a block, so you know you're closing in on safety.
Let's just keep going. Okay, okay. As you push
away across to, like, the high city, you start
to see people running away from the plaza. And
you start, like, reaching. You're pushing into
a crowd. And I think as you go into the next
round, we're going to deal with maybe some complications
based on all the panic surrounding you at every
angle. All righty. All right. I'm going to go.
Currently, there's no enemies near you, Jules.
Okay. You're clear. There's only one you guys
see right now, and this one doesn't really like
you, Zebulon Brass. So here it comes. You see
this thing launch towards you. It's at 30 feet.
They can move 30 feet. It flies up at you, goes
to swing, and completely misses with a natural
three on the die. Awesome. You just easily weave
to the side. This thing goes to strike. That's
all it's going to do. But you felt this electric
hum come close to your face. You know that this
thing is nasty. It's your turn. All right. I
think that if I were to try to... I'm not going
to swap weapons again. Even if I can do it by
the rules, I think it's kind of cheese. So he's
just going to take another shot with his bow
and arrow. At this point... I don't think I get
the sneak attack. If you shoot him when he's
right in your range, it's going to be disadvantage.
Right. You can swap weapons. That's fine. All
right. Yeah. Object interactions are free. Yeah.
I'll just flavor it and say that as this guy
was coming towards Zebulon to make the attack,
he could kind of see it coming and picked his
swords back up. If it makes you feel better,
you can even just use your bonus action to only
get one attack this round. All right, it doesn't
make me feel better, but I'll do it anyways.
Let's do that. I feel like that's a little more
honest. All right, yes, you swing your bow back,
use your bonus action to scoop up your blades,
but you only get time enough to strike him with
your main hand. As this thing moves in, it misses.
Natural one. I don't know what's going on. This
is four or five. I don't know what's going on.
This is Zebulon, baby. This is Zebulon. It really
is a one. I was kind of hoping I'd pick it up
and it'd be a seven. This is... Zebulon. He's
never been in combat before. In all his glory.
I think maybe you need to use a different set
of dice. I know. I do need to. I need to get
a different set of dice. You need to use my dice
tower. You guys both have nice dice. I have.
You should get nice dice. I have like, yeah.
What is it? Get nice die? Nice dice? I never
know. If you don't spend money on your die, you're
not respecting the game. I have like Fisher Price
die. Die. Dice. Dices. The Tonka truck of dice.
Yeah. Hey, Tonka Trucks are nice. Yeah, they
are. Tonka Trucks are nicer than these dice.
I respect the game with my turquoise Norse foundry
die. Please sponsor us. Wink. Anyway. Or at least
replace the D4 that David broke day one. Hey,
no, stop. That didn't happen. They're good. Buy
them. Well, you rolled it out of the box, so
that's what did it, I think. I probably did.
I don't know. That's the sad end to a sad turn.
Okay, well, very, very sad. We're all crying
for you. Okay, we're back to you, Jeremy, Jules.
You're moving into this crowd, so here's how
this is going to work. As you're dealing with
all this panic, you're keeping your folk with
you. If you want to keep everyone together, I'm
going to need you to make an athletics check
to sort of push your way through people, kind
of knock them out to the side. It sucks. But
if you want to open a way for your smaller folk
to get through, it's going to happen. All right.
So give us a try. I don't want this to start.
18. All right. Yeah, Jules, you get in there,
and then you're just wrestling people to the
side, pushing them over. I think the Cherry Delights
catch on and begin kind of helping you as well,
kind of working through the crowd. People are
scared, but you know where you're going. You
know. The safety lies ahead, not behind. Absolutely.
The city is being destroyed. You need to get
out. All right? And you guys push through the
crowd. Because you rolled so well, I'm going
to let you move normal movement. You get, like,
one block into the city. You're behind you. That
great sort of open expanse falls behind, and
you've moved down through a number of these large
towers that just zoom up into the sky above you
into these malevolent black clouds. All right.
I think as we're moving, I'm just going to kind
of put the burlap sack over me a little bit.
Because I don't know who's looking down at us.
That's a good point. I don't know who's looking
down. So the burlap sack's going over me. I do
not want to be seen by anybody in those towers.
You see, like, amongst the chaos and pantheon,
you see another person. Like, a half -orc woman
has, like, one of those diamonds at her eye as
well. And I think it just barely kind of swoops
over you. And maybe... Just as you're putting
the sack on, it kind of like goes back. It seems
to focus on you for just a moment. A little bit
of a double take. Yeah, a little bit of a double
take. You realize you're being viewed through
this thing. But you push forward. Get a ways
in. And now, I'm making an attack on you, old
Zebulon. Bring it on. I got big brother's studded
leather armor on. Stay strong, Zeb. Stay strong.
That is... It's going to hit, my man. Ouch. It's
going to hit. What's your roll? 24. It was a
very, very, very, very good roll. Yep, that hits.
Yeah, but luckily. By a lot. Very small. Okay,
that's only me one. So I only do three points
of damage to you as his claws break into you.
I think it just pierces you a little bit. You
can't take some damage. The falling current electricity
that kind of jolts into you doesn't do anything,
really. Just one point of damage extra as your
brass scales seem to inhibit it, tingling as
they run with that electricity down you, down
into the ground. Yeah, that hurts. Zebulon's
only at 2 HP now. You're hurt. Yeah. You're real
hurt. It's not looking good. But it's your move.
All right. You get two attacks this round, but
can you stop this thing before it gets another
hit on you? I love the vision of last round where
Zebulon reached down last moment as this electricity
being is attacking him, and he only gets the
time to do one sort of backhanded and just totally
biffs it, totally misses, but now he's up. He's
on two feet. He's got his stance, and he's going
to make... Two attacks. Do it. Do it. Let's call
them, uh... Zackies. Nat 20, baby. Holy shit!
Oh, man. Okay. Now we're rolling dice. Okay.
I mean, you were due for it, man. You were really
due. Yeah, I'm finally gonna roll damage. Oh,
man. There isn't a... Wait, that was just your
main hand, wasn't it? Uh, yes. Alright, I'll
do that. Second attack first, and then we'll
roll damage after. Let's see what's up. Sounds
good. Oh, that's a 17 on the die. I bet that's
going to hit. Just crisscross attack this guy.
Nice. Move your blades out forward. Roll me all
the damage. All right. So a hit is 1d8 plus 3.
So I'm doing 2d8 plus 3 for the crit, and then
another d8 plus 3. So 3d8 plus 6. Holy shit.
Okay. One. Eight. And seven. So 16 plus six.
That's a 22. Had five HP left. It is so dead.
What does it look like when you kill this thing?
Just like you said, it was just the crisscross.
right hand up to down, left hand up to down,
and that's classic X pattern. And maybe you could
even see the leftover lines in the electricity,
like they didn't close up. So there's just this
big blue X down the center of this being's chest
as he fizzles away. Fizzles away, and you can
hear like a whoop, like a hollering whoop from
the other side of this sort of plaza, and you
can see that that man you saw earlier holding
the gem is now focused entirely on you. A fist
goes into the air, holy, holy, screaming out
like he just saw the most exciting thing in the
world. And Zebulon takes a deep bow. Oh, yes.
He is soaking that moment in. Yeah. I think a
few other people even look your way and they're
kind of like some nods or something like that.
That's one of the brass, isn't it? That's one
of the shoelace. He's hurting. He's taking a
lot of damage, but he is trying his darndest
not to let it show. I'll even roll. Yeah, roll
me a con. A con save throw. Con save. To see
how cool he can play it. Con save. Yeah, let's
see. You just did a lot of damage. Let's see
how cool you are. He doesn't have a modifier.
I want you to tank this so badly. Right down
the middle. Ten. All right. You're pretty cool.
I think you're like half. You're slouching one
side. You're kind of trying to keep a casual
pose, but your legs are giving it away, shaking
a little bit. But it's like your top half is
real cool. Your bottom half is not cool. Knees
are a little shaky. All right. I'll take it.
You're halfway there. Yeah. You pee yourself.
Ow. That'd be a nat one. That's the end of my
turn. You just rolled out your pants. I thought
you said pee yourself, not shit yourself. It
keeps getting worse. It keeps getting worse.
Poor Zebulon. That bottom half. Can't trust it.
Okay, so shaky bow. We'll stick with that. You
made it. You did it. Yeah. And that's all I got.
All right. Sounds good. Great. Jules, we're back
to you. You're closing in on what you are trying
to find right now. Well, the way is you've worked
through a lot of the panic crowd. There's still
a lot of scattered folk around, but you can move
through them. It's difficult terrain. It's kind
of slow going. I'll let you roll. Let's see here.
I'll let you roll. Perception check here. to
see if you can wing around people, find a sort
of easier way through. There's a lot of folk
running. You don't want to dodge. You're leading
your cherry delights. Oh, boy. Of course, we
start these adventures like this. We got... Natural
one. Okay. Roll me a dexterity saving throw.
You see, like... Son of a bitch. There were,
like, some horses in the middle of the square,
and as you kind of move, like, out of one crowd,
you kind of suddenly see, you don't know how
you missed them. The whinnying of these horses
as this, like, these horses pulling this carriage,
like, running down almost over you. There's no
way I'm going to take damage from horses. With
a natural one, you probably are. There's no way.
What is that? Get out of town. Is that a one
again? That's another. It's a fucking one. Natural
one. All right. I get a plus two, so it's three.
No, nat one's a nat one, baby. I know. I actually
rolled 2d6 of bludgeoning damage. It's going
to be very bad. Oh, no. We're level one. You
only took three. Whoa. I mean, a horse can kill
a man. Yeah, absolutely. So I think you managed
to at least nullify the damage enough. Maybe
they strike you, but it kind of blows you backwards.
And rather than getting trampled, maybe you just
like... Jesus. Get tackled pretty hard and fall
out of the way, rolling into the cobbles. A couple
people, like, step on you as they run over you.
And the Cherry Delights are suddenly just all
around you, like, Jules, come on, you all right?
Yeah, yeah, I'm fine, I'm fine. Keep moving,
keep moving. We gotta go. Let's go. Keep moving.
Oh, look, it's just like, we forgot the rolls.
The rolls. Fuck the rolls, Mulligan. We'll get
rolls when we get there, okay? Damn it, Mulligan.
There'll be plenty of food on the other side.
We gotta go now. You promise? Let's go. Miskin's
like, we need to move. Those horses almost killed
you. I know Jules has, like, hoof prints on his
face. And Mulligan's talking about the rolls.
I like to think Miskin came behind and, like,
just, like, poked at one of the horses. Dad,
get out of here! Uh, there's definitely, uh,
there's some blood on, on, uh, on round stuff's
bottle. You have no idea where that came from.
It's a little, it's a little problematic. Oh,
God. Shit. You guys are moving on? Yeah, we're
moving on. Alright. We're keeping going. Uh,
you are, as you, as you kind of weave around,
uh, away from this, you kind of move, uh, across
the street, weave around one of these towers,
and down the way, this, this... Sheen of blue.
It meets your eyes as you see the conquered jewel,
the great sapphire ahead. Maybe two rounds and
you'd reach it. Okay. You are closing in. Zebulon.
There are no more of these lightning creatures,
these zappies. Zappies? Are we going with zappies?
Do we like zappies? I'm fine with zappies. Zappies
works. No, zappies works. Work with me here.
What do you got? Give me something. We just did.
We said Zappies works. Yeah, but I don't like
Zappies. I fucking hate Zappies. Zappies sucks.
Lightning guys. Zingers. All right, fuck it,
Zappies. So you see Zappies. No more Zappies
near you. You're staring out, and things seem
to be kind of calming in this plaza, at least,
as these things have been dealt with. Shieldbearers
have taken out a few other ones, and they're...
breathing heavy around. People are starting to
reform. The shoe bars are calling them back in
and everyone's moving in to once again create
a line to get to where you stand now at the gate
of this sapphire jewel. Down ahead of you, you
can see that the three luminaries have lined
up on one side of the plaza and they're doing
some high fives and getting ready to turn out
and move deeper into the city to help more people.
And then... The sky opens up one more time with
this crack of lightning so much louder than the
last. It breaks down, explodes against the stone
of the plaza, explodes right behind the three
luminaries who had turned to look deeper into
the city. And this flash is so bright. You're
looking at this, and I think you're blinded for
a second. You kind of cover your eyes. Everyone
around you, the screens get cut off. People stumble
over as it's almost like a flashbang went off
in their faces. Their ears, your ears are ringing.
You know that everyone in this plaza, you can't
hear anything but the... As it kind of fades
out, and you see a figure standing. where there
was no figure before, where the lightning just
struck. You see this man clad in this black samurai
armor. Ominous. Shining black armor. It's got
this mix of gray and dark blue bindings and kind
of like down like the armor skirt. You see those
bits of glowing gold adorning the plate. different
ornate patterns around the helm. You see the
same glowing gold kind of sticks out from the
helm as like a horn. You see like on the actual
face of this, what do they call that? A kabuto,
I believe. Yeah, I wouldn't know. It's like the
sort of open samurai helm with the horns on it.
This one has like a mask covering most of the
face. So cool. One eye is kind of open. There's
a hole in front of it. You can just vaguely make
out like maybe an actual human eye. Staring out
of that, the other one is totally closed off.
And you can see that one of these, so there's
like a gold sort of horn coming out of it, sticking
out from the eye and rising up in a curve above
the helm in the jagged shape of a stylized lightning
bolt. You can see there's a silver, long silver
beard kind of loose and wild running down under
the mask and down this being's chest. in similar
mane of long hair, down his back. You can see
this deadly -looking katana at his belt, which
he just slides out and just, like, snaps into
an attack position as he stares down these three
luminaries behind you. I want you to roll. This
won't be a hard one. Roll me a history check
on this figure. Roll me an advantage, because
you are a fan of luminaries in general. First
roll was an eight. Second roll's a nat 20. Ooh,
holy shit. Yeah, you know who this man is. You
know well. The samurai from Yiannido, known as
Ozen Yoshiketsu. You're gonna have to spell that
for me after the session. I will. This was one
of the original luminaries, one of the first,
those 56 years ago, to join the ranks of these
heroes in the spotlight, these traveling adventurers.
You know that he is a very old man. He'd spent
a lifetime traveling, fighting, winning glory
after glory, and he was one who really fanned
the flames of the movement. actions, the tales
about him were incredible. And, you know, he
retired probably about, was it 10 years ago now?
He became the keeper of the Shrine of Storms,
last you heard, a place in Hianito, a very significant
religious place. You know that he is generally
referred to as the Storm Eye, you know, for obvious
reasons, given his armors and his helm. But you
know this guy. Yeah. That's so badass. Yeah,
it's pretty badass. He looks badass. You're looking
at this guy, and I think Zebulon's first thought
is, oh, thank goodness. We're fine. Everyone's
fine. Jules is on his way. This isn't your thought,
but Jules, you're moving towards all this, and
you can't quite make any of it. I think actually
maybe in the... For this part of your vision,
you could vaguely see part of this, but you're
still so far off. This isn't really something
you're privy to. The lightning bolt, hell yeah,
you felt that. You felt that in the sole of your
shoes. But Zebulon, you're staring out and you
see this figure appear and you have that moment
of good. Things are more under control. We have
not just three luminaries that are well known,
but one of the most famous, incredible luminaries
to ever exist. travel the world's ever step on
the fossil of the Radiant Citadel. And as you
think that, maybe a slight smile touches your
lips. You see this man pull his sword from his
sheath and a flurry of movement so fast you could
barely comprehend them. The mage in that group,
dressed in the green and orange robes. is sliced
to bloody ribbons. Oh, Jesus. And now, Jules.
Let's talk about what just happened back there,
Jules. I don't want to talk about it. It was
embarrassing. It was embarrassing. I think we
glossed over something of such incredible import.
Most likely. You rolled two natural ones. Shut
up. I mean... Getting trampled by some horses,
that's bad. But is that two natural ones bad?
Steven, is that two natural ones bad? I did think
you got off a little easy. Yeah. God damn it.
It seemed a little easy, didn't it? No, no, it
didn't. Don't worry. We're going to rectify that
right now. All right, I'll take my comeuppance.
You see the sapphire in the distance. Like I
said, about two rounds, about two city blocks
away from you. End. You see safety. You're moving
towards it. And then that lightning bolt strikes.
A flash so blinding. A sound that just rocks
like a wave over the crowds in front of you.
Panic resurges. People screaming. You can see
the bodies of people trampled by the horse and
carriage all around you. That thing moved just
from this direction. The situation is... It's
bad. You can hear the screaming of the low city
folk far behind you, where you had to leave them
to survive, to keep yours safe. Jean, or Jeans,
I should say, she just looks at all of this,
sees these people moaning in the streets, sees
the bodies, hears the screaming from behind,
and just turns around, whirls to Chester, and
just says, those poor people. This is... this
is terrible and just wraps her arms around him
buries her her face in his in his shoulders and
chester's arms are flailing he's ah he doesn't
know what to do this is uh this is new um you
look the other way you see that round stuff is
is chattering excitedly to a very vacant looking
paul still just staring up at the sky uh you
see that her bloody bottle is now gone She has
a butcher's knife now. You don't know how she
got it. That's mildly terrifying. Yeah, it's
a little bit terrifying. She's just waving it
around. Very excitedly waving it towards the
sky. You don't see Miskin. You assume he's scouting
around, checking things out. I know he's there.
Working ahead. You know he's always there. You
hear some... uh from the other direction maybe
like off to your right you hear like a no no
no no no no no uh fibrosis you spin in that direction
you could see that there's a number of uh these
dirty looking sort of torn old parchments that
are just scattered all over the uh the middle
of the row people stepping on them as they run
by screaming um you can see that there's like
a broken strap on a leather bag he always carries
and these are you know His notes on magic and
spells. His one passion. And they're everywhere.
He's been collecting these for years. Stealing
them. Finding them in abandoned buildings and
garbage heaps. He's been working on this forever.
And he's running around like, no, no, no, no.
He's not paying attention. People are going to
run him over. You see Mulligans trying to help,
trying to hold him back. But Jules, what do you
do? Cherry delights. Huddle up. Group up. Now,
now. And Fibro, you can see, is still just, he's
so honed in on this. He's not listening at all.
He's trying to gather money pages up. Oh, we're
going to help him when we're grouped up. Okay.
I'm just calling him in right now. Okay, so you
kind of call to everybody. Yep. They're going
to kind of come on, come on, rushing in. All
right, guys. Guys, let's help Fibro get his shit
together. Then we got to go. We got to move now.
You see, you see Roundstuff, Paul, Mulligan all
run towards you. All of them kind of. hovering
off to your right there. And you're surprised
that Chester wasn't the first one to... And then
you hear him scream. Jules! Jules! Chester, where
are you? You turn your head and you see that
he's kneeling now. You see there's blood all
down the front of his jacket. But it takes you
a moment to realize it's not his. He's holding
a mortally wounded jeans. Who's staring up at
him in shock. Her mouth moving but no words coming
out. Blood is pumping out. And spurts from a
wound in her stomach. Staining her maybe jeans
overalls. And you see just behind them and above
them. An armored man in a blue and white tabard.
A crooked smile on his... Scarred lips, his wild,
bright green eyes are fixed on you, Jules. You
know this man. Sir Jessenth Kellig. One of your
parents' most loyal investigators. A man who's
been obsessed with finding you for years. And
that's when you realize your mistake. That's
when you realize that when you fell, when the
horses... trampled you, nearly killed you. Your
hood fell off. God. Jessen smiles. I knew it.
I just knew you'd be here. I was left in charge
of keeping the low city scum away from the plaza
so long as the shield bearers don't see you rot.
They'll be content with loading the high city
folk first. But I knew, I knew you'd come running,
Jules, like a rat washed away in a storm. I knew
you'd come running to safety and I waited here.
And now, Jules LaRoche, now you finally die.
And we'll call it there. Oh my God, kill this
man.