Welcome to Persona Sangrata, a real-play D&D podcast that plumbs the depths of what it
truly means to find one's place in a fractured world.
In a realm of overlapping planes and mysterious lands, our heroes are burdened with a unique
curse.
They must embody multiple character traits, each one representing a different facet of
their complex selves.
They must grapple with the challenge of reconciling these disparate parts of their identities.
And throughout their journey, you'll witness their personal struggles and triumphs as they
confront the mysteries that shroud the world they inhabit.
From distant realms to hidden dimensions, our heroes embark on an adventure unlike any
other, where the very essence of their beings is tested.
Join us as we explore the power of narratives and the intricate dance between self-discovery
and the tapestry of existence.
Persona Sangrata is more than just a podcast, it's an immersive journey into the hearts
of our characters and players, driven by the collective creativity of our storytellers.
So prepare to lose yourself in a tale of bravery, sacrifice, and redemption as we unravel the
threads of fate we invite you to embark on this riveting adventure with us, where the
boundaries between worlds blur and the power of stories ignites the flames of hope in a
fractured land.
Now here we leave a collaborative tale fueled by the magic of improv storytelling.
As the dungeon master, I'll be your guide, setting the stage for thrilling adventures.
My name is Chris McCarthy.
I've been an improv actor and tabletop RPG player since my high school days, but it really
took hold of me during college and grad school.
Now as a professor, I run a couple of D&D groups, one of other professors, one of my
friends, and this is that second group.
But before we get into it, I want to explain some of the dynamics for those unfamiliar
with tabletop RPG setups like Dungeons and Dragons.
Most of the action happens when a player decides to do something, anything really.
They take a 20-sided dice, also known as a D20, and roll that dice to decide the fate
of their actions.
The higher the roll, the more likely they are to succeed in the daring feats they attempt.
You'll witness moments of triumph and heartache as they confront the many challenges before
them.
From daring escapades to cunning negotiations, every choice they make will shape the course
of our epic narrative.
In this realm, I've set the difficulty checks to determine the outcome of their endeavors
to be fairly standard.
A check of 5 denotes an easy task, meaning if they roll above a 5, success is theirs
for the taking.
For a more medium task, the check of 10 sets the bar, while harder tasks require a roll
above 15.
Venturing into truly perilous territory, our heroes must surpass a difficulty check of
20.
And for the most unlikely of feats, a daunting 25 stands in their way.
And when faced with the nearly impossible, a difficulty check of 30 will put their skills
to the ultimate test.
Now I'm sure some of you were wondering, but Mr. Dungeon Master Chris, how can they roll
above a 20?
There's only 20 sides to a d20.
Aha, you are correct.
Throughout the adventure, the characters are going to be gaining certain ability score
improvements and those will be added to their rolls.
So they would have maybe a plus 5 to dexterity.
And so if they rolled a 20, they would add the plus 5 and get a 25 and then perhaps doing
that very unlikely but not impossible thing.
So dear listeners, I hope that I've prepared you to witness the bravery, the wit, the laughter
and tears that our adventurers share with you as they strive to overcome the obstacles
that I throw in their way.
I'm prepared to sit at the edge of your seat as our brave adventurers navigate the perils
that I set in front of them.
So what are we waiting for?
Are you ready to experience the thrills of high stakes dice rolls where destiny hangs
in the balance?
Join us as we embark on this extraordinary quest fueled by our collective creativity
and camaraderie.
Welcome to Persona Sangrata.
As the cursed chaos unfolds, our characters must confront their inner demons, forge alliances
with their alternate selves and harness the vast array of skills each persona brings
forth.
Prepare to witness.
All right, let's go ahead and let our journey begin.
This is Persona Sangrata's Cursed Chaos.
First of all, let's go to our introductions section.
And without doing any character introduction, which I will do for you as we go through the
story a bit, let's just talk a little bit about ourselves.
So this will be the shortest of our introduction here.
Ladies first, Ms. Hannah Clark.
Great.
I don't know what you want to know, but here's what I want to share.
My name is Hannah Clark.
I've been a role player and enthusiast of board games since I was a child.
Since I could hold the dice in my hands.
No, I really got into it in college and I started playing with 3.5 and then Pathfinder.
And so I adore role playing games.
I'm really excited to be here.
I work in Omaha, Nebraska as a professional actor and I produce ballet shows.
So that's cool.
And I think that's it.
Is there anything else?
I'm a Pisces.
Like what do you want to know?
Really I was just looking for just like your name for the listeners just so that they would
know who Hannah Clark is.
But now they know too much.
Now they know a lot.
Which is wonderful.
Yes.
At Hannah the Clark.
Absolutely.
Yes, I am at Hannah Clark on the socials.
Come talk to me about your dice.
Excellent.
And ready player number two, Mr. Scotty Schaeffer.
Oh, hi, I'm Scotty Schaeffer.
I am also an actor, but I'm based out of Colorado and I first I always wanted to do role playing
games, but my mom didn't let me when I was a kid.
So as an adult, I started doing it mostly through podcasting.
I think my very first character ever was part of a podcast, which was a fun.
So I was like the new character experience, which is nice.
This will still be my first spell casting character ever.
So that'll be so the little wheels are off.
I'm going to do it by myself.
And yeah, and but I really love improv comedy and I love improv stories and I love stories
and I love dice.
I love playing games.
So you who?
Yay.
We're so happy to have you here.
Perfect.
And rounding us out, Dr. Gregory Moses, not here in his professional capacity, of course,
not as the mathematician we know him and love him to be, but as multiple characters, which
we will come to see soon, but Gregory, just a quick little intro from you.
Hi.
Yeah.
As Chris says, I'm a college professor.
I'm a coworker of his, a friend of his for a long time now.
I started playing DND, well, a little in graduate school, more now.
I'm happy to be here.
Excellent.
And I am your wonderful guide, game master, dungeon master, whatever we want to call it,
Chris McCarthy, and just so excited to have three of my most favorite people in the same
virtual room as we play this wonderful multi-dimensional multi-state game.
We're crossing state borders.
That's how large and in charge we are.
Excellent.
Oh, good.
So let's jump right in.
Well, first of all, we have heard a little bit about this in the intro, but one of the
novel aspects of our game is that our characters, our players here are going to be playing multiple
characters.
So they're going to be playing characters that are inhabiting the same body, but in charge
at different times.
And so right now I'm going to have everybody go ahead and roll.
If you're a six sided die, if you have three characters, you know, just split it up to
one to two for the first character, three to four for the second.
If you've got two characters, just do a simple flip of the coin or one to three for the first
character, four to six for the second character.
Okay, I'm rolling a pink dice that glows in the dark.
Oh, great.
Great.
All right.
Coming in hot.
Who do we got?
And you know what?
I really made this easy on myself because instead of having to do prep for three different
characters and backstories and reasons and motivations, I got to do eight.
Yeah, that's true.
Sorry, Chris.
I like how we're over here.
Oh, we have to do so much work.
No, I imagine the deluge of backstories.
So who have we woken up as today?
Oh, who do you want to go first?
Let's go with you, Hannah.
Oh, no.
See, I asked that question and I know the answer.
Sad girl.
Okay.
Well, today we got ourself So Wei Lu, but her friends all call her Lu.
And she is a cleric of the sun god Sol.
How much do you want to know about Lu?
Like her elevator pitch when she meets somebody at the tavern is trying to convert him?
Yeah, absolutely.
You could just tell about kind of where you're from and what you're up to.
Yeah, I mean, that's what Lu Lu is all about.
So that's what she'd be talking about.
For sure.
She would be.
Yeah, Lu came from the top of the Sunstone Mountain, which is known by a lot of names
now that all of our realities are wibbly wobbly, but it's still the best place in all of the
dimensions.
And she studied as an acolyte of Sol, just your regular run of the mill temple of holiness
and light and violence and blood sacrifices and snacks.
It's a great place.
And she's down in amongst the common people as a young dragon born.
She's got crystalline quartz, glowy red orange kind of scales.
And her little quest is called an Ardeo.
So amongst her people, everybody goes on an Ardeo.
Think about like a Mormon mission, right?
Where you have to go out, you have to work amongst the people.
So then you can come back wiser and more appreciative of the boons of Sol.
So yeah, she's got a sunny disposition and a big sunny golden talisman.
And she's been working as a healer in this town.
And that was before all the calamitous stuff happened.
And this town is named?
This town is named Alarkin.
A-L-A-R-C-A-N.
Alarkin.
So Saweilu has been proffering her services as a healer and she's been hearing about children
that have been running away, missing children, which has seen as a grave violation of Sol's
divine plan in her eyes.
Oh yeah.
Can't have hatchlings running amok.
No, no.
Absolutely.
So these grieving families have been coming to Saweilu.
She is at our inn, at our tavern, drumming up some leads in terms of what's going on
with these children after a hard day mending bones and making polstices.
Absolutely.
Things have been real weird ever since all the crazy stuff has happened.
But you know, I think it's just a really gift from Sol because he always gives his best
and hardest gifts to his best servants.
Yeah.
Great.
All right.
We got to find these hatchlings.
They can't go missing.
They'll miss out on Sunday school.
And that's Lu.
Perfect.
And that's Lu.
All right.
So let's continue in the order we came in the intros for the ease of listening, right?
Mr. Scotty Schaefer, who do we have showing up today?
Hello.
Okay.
So today we have a flint.
He's a wizard, right?
He's a bit of a British accent.
Gertie Cat.
He's a dwarf and he can't really get hurt easily, but he's still afraid of it.
So that's what he's preoccupied with for most moments of his life.
He's an orphan, but his parents were kind of rich, which has similarities to another
rich orphan wizard, but that's what the similarities end.
No scar.
Yes.
And no friends really either.
So that's why he's just a scaredy cat.
Are his books his best friends?
His books are his best friends.
I can identify.
He loves books so much that even when his parents died at a young age, he was still
like, meh, as long as I can still go to school, I think I'll be fine, really.
Wow.
What's he doing in Alarkin?
What is he doing in Alarkin?
Well, having been left behind himself, he has been seeing these posters of these really
sad children.
And despite the fact that Flint was pretty much okay with being left on the surface at
the very least, he still sees there's an overwhelming sense of loss in the town.
Maybe some of the characters that he read about when he was younger, heroes of his youth,
maybe he can help by using his brain instead of his brawn.
So everybody seems to look at Flint and think that he's just going to be hitting stuff real
hard, but he really likes to crack walnuts with his mind, right?
Yes.
Oh yes, mind nuts, of course.
I love Flint.
That's awesome.
So there might be a little bit of a cord struck deep down about being lost and forgotten.
Flint is also in the tavern, having seen these posters.
A little bit of backstory.
He's still just trying to kind of get some semblance of order, right?
Everybody's short term memory is a little hazy.
They don't exactly remember what happened yesterday or the day before it.
A lot of things have to get pieced together.
The whole society has been kind of taken a few steps back into more survival mode rather
than thriving.
Finding some people to take on other people's problems is probably a little harder than
it would be in normal times.
And lastly, but definitely not leastly, Gregory Moses, who do we have showing up today?
Showing up today we have a monk by the name of Fan.
He's human, just finished his training, but an older gentleman.
He joined the monastery at a late age for various personal reasons.
Much like Lou, he has an exercise in learning and an exercise in his humility.
Initiates of the Dragon Tooth Monastery have to go out in the world and see what wisdom
they can glean from other lines of, let's say from other faiths or from other belief
styles.
He is in Atherkin on, well not a mission, because he's not trying to convert anyone,
but for religious reasons.
Hmm, I love that.
Is it Fan, like F-A-N?
F-A-N.
Fan, excellent.
Just wanted to make sure I was pronouncing that correctly.
And while Fan was wandering around the city, somebody was paying clean to him, you know,
and they're all dirty and they're in rags and they're just screaming about their daughter
and their daughter and she was having these dreams and I didn't think there was anything
bad and then she's gone.
Fan has also been trying to look into what's going on with specifically this one disappeared
kid of this seems to be a popper person, right?
So you guys are in the inn.
What do you do?
Well, Lou's going to take a look around and try to find the friendliest looking person.
Who looks the most open?
Well you see a figure moving with grace and humility.
Looks like a monk.
Wow, that person looks like they're full of grace and humility.
Absolutely brimming with it.
Lou will clank up in her armor and all of her, you know, healing stuff and her just
a lot of trappings.
She's got a lot of stuff, right?
Like if Fanny Pax has been invented, she would have it.
And so just seeing you gliding around and she goes, what's looking good cooking?
Sorry.
And then says, hello, my name is Fan.
I'm pleased to meet you.
But howdy.
Hi Fan.
My name is Soe Lou, but you can call me Lou if we're going to be friends, which I think
we are.
Because by the look of you, you're a man of devotion and grace and humility.
Ah, no doubt.
No doubt I am all of those things.
I'm looking for somebody.
If you've a child, some parent accosted me and I remembered that I drank a lot when I
was a child.
So here I am in the bar.
Right.
That's what I was thinking.
I'm pleased to go to taverns for this missing kid.
I don't think I see him though.
Yeah.
We always had a ritual once you were old enough to stand where we would get all the little
hatchlings real drunk and then see if they could walk along the super high bridge without
falling off.
Sort of seeing if soul would guide you when your mind was addled.
Yeah.
So I figured maybe, you know, that was sort of the same.
As you guys are talking about this, there are actually three dragonborn in the corner.
They're cloaked.
They're definitely smaller than normal trying to drink.
Man.
We have so much to learn.
Hey, well, it looks like there's some tiny little hatchlings right over there.
And I see by the dirty hand prints all over your garb that you were in fact accosted.
I don't know.
Maybe we should go talk to those little guys.
Actually wait, I think one of the, there's another little person over there.
Oh, do they have a beard?
Oh, nevermind.
Wait.
And over there, who do you find?
But a meticulously groomed dwarf with earth toned attire, got a subtle air, you know,
looks over things with, you know, a lot of aloofness, but it looks like somebody who
has a great knowing of things.
Ooh.
A beard?
Yes, Scotty.
Can I help you?
Hi.
Couldn't help but notice that you have a great air of knowing things.
And I was just wondering if you've seen any little ones running around, maybe unsupervised?
I suppose that you're referring to those three over in the corner that are drinking alcohol
or something.
But other than that, I'd know, I know that there's people missing.
I was just reading about it in the paper.
Oh yeah.
Oh yeah, the local paper.
What's that called again?
What's the name of the town?
Oh, the Alken, the Alken Tribune.
Well, this is a particular journal from the bar called the Alken Alky, just for people
who are in the bar reading.
Oh, that makes sense.
That's why there's a lot of vomit on it.
Most of it's scratched into the wall, but it's quite good.
Ah, the Alken Alky.
I like that.
Yeah.
You're looking for the kids as well?
Well, I'd like to, I'd like to try and help.
Reasons aren't important, but yes, it's a mystery.
It looks like it needs solving.
Oh, well, this is just a gift from soul on high.
I was so looking for some good hearted folks.
For some reason, I just can't keep a handle on anybody.
One day it seems like they're my friend and the next day I go up to say hi and they're
all like, you tried to stab me yesterday.
And I don't, something about this town, you know, lately.
So if y'all want a little company, I'd love if we maybe teamed up and went, costed some
teens.
I love the costing teens.
As you see that one of them starts streaking through the end, runs out and the other one
follows and so now there's one sitting there and they're doing that, you know, that nod
kind of circle, you know, the airplane head nod kind of situation.
This is a cultural reference that is above me.
Yeah, they're kind of like, it's like the mortal combat right before you're going to
finish them.
You know what I mean?
Right.
So yeah, it pretty much means that, you know, they're not all there is what that means.
Yeah.
Curious.
Yeah, we better get over there before they pass out or run.
I'll block the door.
Oh yeah, you want to block the door, Scotty?
Sure.
But it doesn't take much to push me over.
They just have to look like they're going to hit me.
On my duck.
Over there you have a dragonborn youth of around, what, I don't know, when they can
stand eight, nine and-
Dragonborn can actually stand at age three and reach full maturity at age 15.
So this kid's probably like five years, I don't know.
Five years old?
All right.
Yeah.
They've been sipping on cider, but they're still, you know, they're still pretty tipsy.
And so-
I heard that that was because the dragonborn had a different calendar than the rest of
us and in actuality they would be about eight years old according to legend.
Wow.
Well we do have a special calendar for soul, but I wouldn't, I wouldn't know much about
that.
I do know how many sun cycles I have been around for though.
And that's 13.
So-
That makes sense.
Yeah.
Now Chris, I'm very excited to talk to this drunk child, but Scotty did say that he was
going to try to block the door.
Okay.
Please block the door.
So did, yeah, did these teens bully him out of the way?
It sounds like you want-
At least one already left.
One already left.
Let's see if you can get the other one.
Let's go ahead and do, let's do our first roll.
So-
The first roll is going to be, it costs some teens.
Oh my gosh.
What would this be, grappling even?
Yeah.
So strength and they'll do a deck save.
Oh my God.
He's not very, okay wait.
Yeah.
I like how the two giant-
So-
Physical people are like, we're going to let him block the door.
Yup.
Well he seems so confident.
Let him play the goalie.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
He's got a low center of mass, which is important for this kind of thing.
Oh yeah.
What'd you roll, Scott?
Oh, what do I need to roll?
Above a four.
Okay.
Well I rolled a nine.
All right.
Your nine is enough.
Yeah.
Using strength.
So do you have any pluses or something?
You probably-
Plus two.
So I guess it was an 11.
Yeah.
So you got an 11.
You said strength and then decks or something.
I was like, oh wait, which one do I roll?
So that's my own fault.
I'm going to deck save for the strength roll.
No worries.
Gotcha.
You put your arm out and you clothesline this kid real nice and clean like.
Absolutely.
Real nice and proper.
Yep.
Just boom.
And they are down, but then they're right back up and they're going, what?
Everything's fine.
I'm okay.
They say, I'm Mishan.
What's going on?
You guys looking to party?
Looking to party?
What exactly do you mean by that?
Well, you know, everything's so crazy now and you never know when it's your last night.
So you know, we've been sneaking out of the orphanage and getting drunk.
Oh, how old are you young man?
I am 19 and four days according to the Canarian cycle.
Oh, the Canarian.
It's like, I don't know that one.
I know the Canarian cycle and you're not.
Oh, okay.
He's lying.
All right, Mr. Merritt, you're probably right.
Okay, fine.
I'm old enough to be here.
He looks at the barkeep and the barkeep just kind of like nods his head.
He's like, yeah, forgot Rom's fantasy land.
I don't care.
He's got gold.
Plus this young one got away from an orphanage, so he probably doesn't belong to any of the
caring parents that we've been talking to.
So I don't, but maybe he can give us some information.
Is there any like hangouts or hideaways?
Visibly dejected by that.
He definitely heard.
Well, you know.
His shoulders just kind of don't want to.
Oh, hey, we're all children of the Lord.
So you know, you have a brutal and un-caring father that looks upon you with a bland and
burning eye every moment of every day.
And if that doesn't comfort you, I don't know what will.
I have so wrong.
I've heard of that.
I know.
Soul.
Anyway, I'm going to do like the, like, you know, in 21 Jump Street where they're like,
hello, fellow teens.
I'm going to try to persuade him to tell me if there's any cool hangouts or spots where
all of these kids are going to party and drink.
That's not like the tavern, right?
Can I roll a persuasion?
Yes, go ahead.
Yeah, I'll be like, you can trust me.
I'm cool.
Which she is not, but I did roll a 17 and I have a plus three to Charisma's.
That's an unnatural 20.
There is a old storage basement that one of the kids has figured out a way to make some
poochin.
So Maishan says, well, yeah, there's this place, but you know, you gotta be like really
cool.
You can't just go there and like, just like ask questions and stuff.
Oh, sure.
Like, you don't, like, it's like a parent free zone, you know?
Like, no parent over shoulders.
Stoop down and whisper in theusir.
So is it our theory that these missing children are all just drunk somewhere?
I doubt that that's the full story, but it's what we got to go on.
And I bet you at least some of them were tempted away by the sweet golden liquors of the carefree
times, you know?
So it's a lead.
Is there any passwords, young man, that you need to say to get in here?
Absolutely.
The password is boobs.
Being a six year old boy.
Absolutely.
Very good.
He's six!
Oh no.
Oh dear.
Okay.
So he tells you where it is.
You gotta go down this alley, take a left, take a right, you know, go to this.
It's a false door.
You gotta knock twice.
Sure, sure.
You gotta wait.
Then you gotta shuffle your feet a little bit.
Then somebody asks.
So he tells you this whole procedure is whole.
Oh, it's a whole thing.
Wow, these are entrepreneurial teens.
Do you guys have anything else for Amishan or can we send him along his degenerate way?
I do actually.
I'd like to detect if there's any magic or just see if there's anything strange about
him other than being a drunk six year old.
Smile.
Okay.
Yeah, go ahead, roll.
Smelly drunk teen.
Roll for arcana.
Roll for perception or arcana?
Let's see.
I guess I would do it as an arcana.
I got a 15 plus five.
All right.
You get just the tiniest little inkling that there's something magical happening.
Amishan's not magical.
It's nothing that Amishan's doing and it's no active effect on Amishan.
But there's something occurring.
Something isn't, something's amiss with your read on him.
I see.
There's something interrupting your read on his aura.
So Amishan says, well, I got to go find my friends because either they're fully naked
and arrested or passed out in an alleyway right now.
Oh, y'all need the Lord.
Okay, you can go, but you got to take this pamphlet I wrote on a leaf.
It'll just tell you a little bit more about what you need to know to really find the light.
Okay.
He takes your pamphlet and he wraps up some butter and some bread in the pamphlet.
You can tell it's getting grease stained on it.
He's like, I'm for real going to read this afterwards.
I'm just being green.
Sure.
I'm just trying.
Yeah, I didn't want to ask for a to-go box.
So that's all I'm doing here.
Soul loves recycling.
No disrespect.
Of course.
Perfect.
All right.
Begain friendship point.
Do we want to go talk to the drunk one or should we just go check out our lead?
Oh, wait, Mr. Studious Dwarf Man, we didn't know your name.
Sorry.
We just sort of, some teens started running.
We didn't get to make proper introductions.
Oh, right.
I'm Flint.
Oh.
Hello.
Like the thing that you strike to make fire?
Yes.
Sweet.
All right.
I like that.
This is fan.
Nice to meet you, Flint.
Hello.
Gosh, maybe I should go as Foo and then we'll have a little more of a like alphabetical.
Yeah.
Alliteration in the party.
Yeah, I'll just go as F-U and I'm sure there's nothing wrong with that.
You guys make your way to this secret I-O?
I think so.
I don't think that the drunk kid has got anything more.
In fact, probably less than old me, Sean.
I'm going to give him a leaf though.
Chuck it under his little knocked out head for sure.
And a dirty look at the bartender.
The bartender is thoroughly confused by why they're getting a...
The bartender is doing their best in a hard world, Lou.
You gotta be understanding of these things.
Wow, that is some wise depth.
Where did you say you studied?
The Dragon Tooth Monastery.
Oh, I love dragons.
I am born of one, as they say.
Very cool.
Thank you.
And we chit chat about his walk of faith.
Nice.
Yeah, I proselytize a little bit.
Your various religious events that you take in place over your youth.
Oh yes.
Church camps where they took away your watches, et cetera, et cetera.
So you guys find your way to the secret hideout as it is, right?
And you get to the door and what do you do?
Okay, which one of us is going to be...
Which one took notes?
Oh, I know about the knocking and the shuffling and the boobs, but I'm just wondering which
one of us should be the one to approach the door who looks the most.
Which one of us is shortest?
Oh, that'd be me.
I believe that is you.
I believe me.
Then I might as well do it.
Right, because Dwarven children have beards pretty young, right?
So you could be a, all right, get in there.
Get in there.
Yeah.
And we'll kind of slouch rebelliously.
Just don't look like my parents.
Well, I'm a dragonborn and he's a human, so that'd be real hard.
Well, that's perfect then.
There we go.
So knock, knock, knock.
Boobs.
Come on in.
You guys look like some weird kids, but come on in.
Welcome.
And he opens the door and you guys find yourself in a really damp, mildewy, smelly kind of...
There's barrels everywhere.
The barrels are rusted.
They're all empty.
And there's this one kid that answered the door kind of in these rags.
And then there's another kid there and they're not in great shape.
So this hangout turns out more to be some sort of underground refuge for these orphans.
Hey.
And so they say, you guys been having the dreams about fairies too?
Oh, the...
Yep.
And they told me to bring you this bread.
So everybody, let's talk about our fairy dreams.
He smacks the bread out of your hand and he runs away.
What?
And then the other one goes, and then the other one goes, they didn't really give you
that fairy bread, did they?
Oh, no, no, this is normal bread.
This is not fairy bread.
This is normal ass bread.
Did the fairies give you the bread?
Did they tell you and dream to eat the bread?
No, no.
Why?
Why do things happen if you eat the bread when the fairies tell you to?
Every person that I've known has dreamed about the fairies has gone missing.
Oh, do you know where they go?
I got no clue.
I guess that's the nature of missing, huh?
Bernard, who just ran away, his adopted sister, she got disappeared, but he was in the same
room, but he just ran away.
I don't know.
Oh, listen, I just want to give you bread because y'all look hungry.
Okay, that was it.
I was just trying to be hospitable.
Take some bread and they kind of sniff it.
Normal bread.
He eats the bread.
Okay.
Why is it so, why is it so chewy?
It's not hard.
Oh.
He doesn't understand how to not eat stale bread.
Okay.
Did you have these fairy dreams?
You tiny poor child.
I don't know and I don't want no fairy dreams.
Please don't give me no fairy dreams.
No, no, no, no, not at all.
Dang, we need to go find that kid who hates bread.
Hey, real quick, the things you've heard about these fairies, why don't you tell me what
you've heard so I can remember if it's the same thing that I heard about these fairies?
What do they look like?
Where were they?
I mean, they're like, they're tiny little things and some of the kids say, some of the
younger kids say that maybe they're taking the sad kids so that they don't have to be
sad anymore.
They usually come, it's like the kids, the parents are coming, people are coming to look
at the kids and then the kids don't get taken by the parents and then they have the dreams
and then they get taken.
And it's bad.
I mean, it's basically adoption, right?
I mean, that's what they want.
They want someone to take them maybe.
But we never hear from them again.
There'd be no way, no way that Ace's sister would just leave him like that.
She loved him.
They were best friends.
She'd never just go.
She'd at least leave a note or something.
He said that she didn't take any of her toys or her blanket or her stuffy, nothing.
It was just gone.
Well you just said his name was Bernard.
Now you're saying his name is Ace.
So some suspicious child.
No, I know, I know his name.
Names are weird recently.
His middle name's Ace.
All right.
I call him Ace because he's only got one big toe.
Okay.
It's a weird accident we don't like to talk about.
Bernard Ace, the Ace of Base.
All right.
Okay.
Well, thank you.
Thank you for this information.
Yeah.
It seems like we might be getting a little bit of a spirit in a way.
Yeah.
Something.
The sad kids.
But you're not sad.
He drops his bread in the puddle in the basement that he goes, it's fine.
It's fine.
Picks it up and it's like gross standing water.
He's like, it's okay.
He rubs it off on his shirt and he eats it still.
It's sad.
You don't like to see it.
This is why we need to start letting kids into bars.
If we don't let them into bars, they get drunk in gross, mildewy basements instead.
Hey, I'm all about it.
Just getting drunk in church, right?
That's the real deal right there.
Okay.
Then we can really keep an eye on him.
Okay.
So he tells you, he goes, he goes, Ace, he says, I do know that Ace got a hideout on
the, on the roof of the orphanage.
So you're reading my mind.
Go find him there.
He's got a, he's got a secret, secret place where three roofs come together.
Absolutely.
Did Ace run out of the building?
Yeah.
Ace was the one that ran.
He was the first one that ran.
He'd been talking to this other kid.
But I was envisioning him running into the further in.
Deeper in is what I had also thought, but that's okay.
So he ran out.
I mean, maybe there's a ladder deeper in that leads up.
Wow.
No.
Yeah, that's true.
He, he, he disappeared.
How about that?
We're going to follow.
I actually go up to his, yeah.
Go to his little secret hidey hole.
Yep.
Secret hidey hole.
All right.
Invading children's personal space.
And so, and so starts the first stakeout for this, uh, this completely unplanned character.
So, uh, so you guys hang out there and then, uh, Ace comes around and he goes, are you,
are you guys, are you guys from the shelter?
What, what are you, what are you doing here?
Hey, we're looking for your sister and everybody else has been taken and we think you might
know some.
My sister, they said that she just ran away, but I know it's not that she never run away.
She never go without me ever, ever, ever.
Absolutely.
Uh, I mean, you seem like a really good brother, so your instincts spot on kids spot on.
We think that she might've been taken by the fairies and we aim to be getting her back,
but we need your help.
So he starts crying.
He goes, I was worrying about that.
She told me that there will be these dreams with fairies and she asked me to stay awake
while she was sleeping.
Cause she said that she was going to get taken and I tried to stay awake and I couldn't.
Oh, I'm used to dealing with children.
I woke up, I saw her floating through the window and then she was gone and nobody believes
me.
Everybody's telling me that it was a dream.
I didn't actually see her floating, but I saw her floating.
I saw her floating.
Yeah.
Y'all I'm used to working with children who were a lot more like grounded, you know, like
by, by age two, the kids up at the temple are like hunting and gutting with their teeth.
So this kid's little, you know, but I think that we should stake out the orphanage and
see if we can follow any more floating kids.
Hmm.
And that might be the next move, you know, if they're, if they're getting taken ace,
ace, ace goes, I'll, I'll be anything to help my sister.
I will be the person you want to be our berries can come case.
He says, I've been dreaming about the fairies, so I'm worried anyway.
So number one, our master bait.
Perfect.
All right.
I think this is a plan.
All right.
Okay.
So ace tells you that, uh, he goes, I, I used to not have room by myself, but now it's a
room by myself.
Come here, bring it in.
But, but it's, it's on the first floor and there's a window, not too far.
You guys could probably look, uh, you know, the walls aren't too bad, but, but there's
there are patrols.
So you know, because of the fact that kids have been missing, the town's been issuing
patrols.
So just want to warn you guys about that because you know, sometimes when we're sneaking out
to the bar or, or our tab or, you know, or our shelter, we, we gotta be careful.
We don't want to look like the ones who were taking the kid.
No, no.
Okay.
And there we go.
All right.
Well, you got to think sad thoughts tonight, which won't be hard.
And uh, we will, what do you guys think?
He's like, you know, love sad stuff.
Well, that explains it.
Huh?
Yeah.
Don't worry.
We're, uh, we're a couple of well-trained good Samaritans kiddo.
So you'll be fine.
Do you guys think that we should like wait on the roof, wait in the room?
I say we maybe even wait in, in different places, like one in the room, one on the roof,
uh, one on the street or something.
Maybe another, maybe another is hidden or something.
I also have an idea to, to try to eliminate by process of elimination, find out what exactly
what's happening.
So I suggest that, that, uh, that we, first of all, we just do something as old fashioned
as, as tie a rope around his foot to the bedpost so that he can't be, you know, the very least
he wants to do too well.
I love that.
I'll also try to detect some magic when it happens and does anybody else have any other
skills that could help make a trap or find something or see what can't be seen?
Um, yeah, well, I can, uh, I can sort of do this thing where my mind whispers to somebody
else's mind when I can see them.
So that might be helpful for lookout needs, you know?
Or to help console the child while to live nowhere.
Perhaps.
Yeah, in his brain I can be like, it's okay.
We got you.
Don't worry.
The hand of soul is ever upon your shoulder, red hot and burning.
Yeah, real comfort and stuff.
Was she, uh, is he still there?
Can we ask, um, was your sister awake when she was floating out the window or was she
streaming and clawing or?
No, she was, she was a, she was a safe.
She was snoring.
She was as peaceful as a little babe.
I volunteer to be the person out on the street.
That's where I want to be.
Um, the room.
Like under the window.
The room has two beds, but now it's only one bed that's occupied.
Is that right?
Oh, so maybe I could lay down as a pretend child in this bed.
I love that.
As a resident dwarf.
Yes.
I'm not putting on a bonnet though.
I'm just going to lay down.
All right.
Could you, could you snuggle a stuffy?
Well, I might, I might have one of my own.
Who knows?
And that leaves the rooftop for Mr. Monk, which is appropriate.
As it should be.
The first few hours pass.
What are, where exactly are you outside of their room?
I want to be underneath the window.
So when you're the wall underneath the window, maybe looking like I'm trying to like, have
you heard the good news about soul?
Like that's the reason that I'm there.
Oh, perfect.
Got it.
You have to make, maybe have a clipboard.
You're trying to get signatures or something.
Absolutely.
There's nothing better.
Okay.
So especially if it's night.
So go ahead and let's do an intense eye stare off between you and the patrolling guards
and let's see if you can out intense them like you're poaching outside of trader Joe's
trying to get signatures and get them to just completely look the other way.
I love it.
Cause I'd be like, no, no, no, no, we're not going to do with her.
Once we start talking to her, it's going to be three hours.
That's it.
What do you want me to roll Chris?
Go ahead.
Roll a performance.
Ooh.
Could I argue that it is in fact a religion?
I will let you know what you're doing.
I'll let you get your extra proficiency.
Thank you.
All right.
14 plus three 17.
All right.
That beats an 11.
Perfect.
So they look at you and one of the guys starts walking over the other guy like grips in like
the elbow death grip and he's just like, no, no, like I'll buy you a coffee.
No, we're not dealing with it.
And so where are you going lads?
Have you heard about the light?
So they leave you on your way.
Perfect.
All right.
And then go ahead and do a perception check for me.
What do you mean?
Perception 16.
All right.
So you it's it's almost like the colloidal effect of a tendal effect where you can see
like dust particles in the air.
Like you're starting to see little things like flitting around.
But as soon as you look at them, you can't see them anymore.
It's kind of like in your peripheral.
All right.
And let's see here.
I'll get better with the names.
I'm sure.
Flint.
I'll go ahead.
Roll a perception check for me.
Perception check.
Seven plus zero.
Nuts.
Maybe I'm sleepy.
He's got as much comfier than I thought it was.
Yeah, you are.
You are still sleeping and slowly the window begins to open.
Reeking as it moves.
So go over one more for me.
Be kind.
It is creaking.
You fell asleep.
Is this perception?
Did you stay asleep?
Yeah.
Perception.
I rolled a 17.
All right.
Or which 17.
All right.
Perfect.
And you're just conditioned from youth, whatever you hear, a window opening, you just automatically
jump up.
And so as a result, you can hear, you can see what's going on, but you don't move at
all, but you kind of bolt a little bit and you open and you can see moonlight shining
through the window.
And it pools onto the sheets above Ace's body.
And Ace's body starts to move, starts to float, rise above the bed.
And as it starts to flow, it's almost like it's coming like a black and white movie or
like the resolution of Ace is deteriorating somehow.
Colors being leached.
They're becoming almost translucent.
And then just carried by like a gentle breeze, they float out of the window and right past
Lulu.
So Lulu, you got, so go ahead and roll a perception check because at this point, Ace is mostly
translucent.
So it's actually pretty difficult to see.
Cool.
Can my Monk Buddy fan also get a perception?
Yeah.
Yes.
He's floating out the window.
Can we both be looking?
Yes.
Let's look.
Okay.
Well, I'm perceptive.
I get a what?
A 22.
Oh, nice.
That's great.
Cause I got a 12.
So you have noticed some layout and formatting issues in your flyers.
You're focused on that.
You're like, oh, that's the reason why these aren't working is cause it's confusing.
I need to reprint these.
This sun looks like a butthole.
Now I know why the kids were laughing at me.
And so, but fan, you've been looking at the, you know, these little kind of flicks in the
peripheral and so your eyes have already adjusted to the dark.
And so you can see this floating and you can see it's this shape and size of ACE.
It's got a blanket over, you know, most of it.
The blankets kind of just hanging down.
And it's just, just floating away.
Okay.
So what do you all do?
Not contributing much on the roof.
So I'm going to hop down and elbow, elbow, and get her attention.
All right.
Oh, blanket monster blanket monster's taking the kid.
I mean, I've well, wait, wait, where I should have asked this, this windows on the ground
floor.
So this kid should be floating like, yeah.
So I 60 off the ground.
Okay.
So yeah.
So I do that and I elbow Lou and then I tried to grab the kid, I guess.
So you, the body is moving a bit too fast for you to actually get a finger on it.
Right.
So you kind of try it and it's, it's doing this thing where he kind of looks closer than
it is, you know what I mean?
So like, you're like, it's right there.
Then you put your hand out and then all of a sudden it's like, you blinked at a jump
three feet or whatever.
So it is, it is very inexorably beating away from town into, into the forest that's on
the outskirts of our camp.
Flint, Flint jump out the window.
We got a hot footed after the kid.
Come on.
Here I come.
I also want to, well, I don't know.
I want to run like a magic check or something.
Like as I'm, as I'm running after this thing to be like, what the heck are we?
I'm not sure if it's investigation or something, but just like, what, like, can I glean anything
extra from what you've just told us by like, maybe I'm looking at the rope is the rope
that's on his boat.
Is there a rope?
I thought we tied a rope.
Maybe I forgot.
Maybe that's about it.
I don't remember anybody actually damn it.
You're one of those.
Okay, fine.
So now roll roll it.
Arcana though.
See if, see if you can figure out.
Well yeah, maybe.
Okay.
So I rolled a 12 plus five.
So I rolled 17.
Maybe I'm looking at the blanket.
Is the blanket affecting also or?
You read once in a book about, uh, fate disturbances.
You heard an old, old fairy tale song, kind of like a, you know, the ashes, ashes, we
all fall down kind of thing.
Talking about when you see the fairy at night run away, sleep at bright, make sure that
there's lots of light around and that these translucent bodies are turned translucent
on their way to the fate rock.
You know from the weird children's song that this is like, you're in the middle of the
middle of a kidnapping is where you're seeing.
That's what you can, you can believe.
Okay.
So we're running through the town after this floating kid?
Already in the woods.
Kids enter the woods.
Is the kid asleep by yell at him?
He's totally asleep.
You try to yell at him.
He doesn't wake up.
Is the blanket still hanging out?
I throw a dart at him.
Blanket still hanging on him.
You throw a dart at him.
Uh, it misses.
As you enter.
Gotcha.
So we can't make physical contact.
We're running into the woods.
Great.
As we run, I'm going to cast light on the head of my mace.
So there's a lot of light around us just in case.
Go ahead and the other two roll a perception check for me.
Nine.
Eighteen.
All right.
I have dark vision.
So the light was like, ah, I can't see things too well all of a sudden.
Exactly.
So tripping over stumps.
Sorry.
And so that actually does make sense that the only person that notices this is fan.
And so fan notices that the plants are lighting up around ace's body.
Just very faintly.
But there it's, it's his body is, is having an impact on the environment.
Right.
And, and you guys, it's not hard to keep the body.
Well, it's, it's somewhat hard to keep the body in view.
So you guys are kind of struggling your way through, you know, somewhat difficult terrain.
It's it's it's taking a bit, you know, it's not like you're just, you know, running for
a few minutes.
It's it's has been 15 minutes has been 25 minutes, right?
Like we don't know until you get to a clearing and this clearing and ace is already there.
They are in a puddle asleep still.
And the puddle is glowing rightly.
Hmm.
Fan, wait up.
Oh, wow.
You're faster running.
Come on, Flint.
We found him.
Very dangerous in short distances.
I'm going to try to grab him out of the puddle.
As the last of you gets there, ace sinks through the puddle and the light begins to dim quickly.
I jump into the puddle.
All right.
First, you jump into the puddle with the rest of you do.
Oh, don't protect us.
All right.
I throw I throw a rope to them.
You throw a rope in the puddle.
Yeah.
All right.
The rope goes in the puddle.
Nice.
And I mean, and I hold onto the rope and I'm like, here, take this.
You're fishing.
So I hold them.
I'm holding onto one end.
Yeah, you're fishing.
And I'm hoping because this way if they can get them, then we can all get back out again.
Or if something pulls him really strong, then maybe I'll get pulled in too.
But at least I'm on the ground.
That's a that's a wizard move right there.
So Flint does that.
And so he's sitting there holding his rope, just kind of fishing.
Right.
And the and the hole is dimming very fast.
The glow is is is lessening and lessening.
It's almost gone.
You two, Fan and Lulu pass through this portal.
There's a moment of disorientation.
You can't tell which way is up or down dark from light.
Your head spins and then you're in a completely different space.
So no longer are you in the drab clearing in the moonlight.
Now the sky bakes you in a twilight glow.
Clouds are moving across the sky at different speeds, first fast and slow.
And there's brackish water lapping at the shoreline of an island that you're standing
on.
And the island is standing in this water that's vaguely iridescent, like the wings of a dragonfly.
And the roots of the tree that grow out of the shallows of the water are like thin stilts
holding massive trees over the water of the swamp.
And you see aces there about 10 feet from you.
But they're not alone.
Gregory, those things that you were getting a little bit of a, you know, peripheral view
of are surrounding ace flitting around and chittering to one another.
As soon as they notice you, they go completely silent and then they flee.
They fly away?
Yep.
Do we see the rope?
Yes, you see the rope.
So if you want, you can.
Yeah, I'll give like two sharp tugs.
Hey, what does that mean?
What does two tugs mean?
You didn't talk about what tugs mean.
Oh, sorry, I pulled very hard.
Oh, I think Flint wants us to come back up, try to lay a hand on the hatchling over there.
Yeah, I tried to collect the kid.
The kid wakes up.
Do we make it?
Are we here?
Do we find my sister?
Where is she?
Renata?
Where is she?
Work in progress, work in progress, calm down.
I'm not leaving without Renata.
You can't make me.
I don't want to go.
I'm not going.
I manhandled the kid over and by the rope.
Let's see how slippery this kid is.
Yeah, I think we should keep going.
The kid should go back.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's what I.
For slippery kids.
He got a Natsumi.
He will be pretty swampy.
He is bopping and weaving.
You're getting juked.
You're a wide receiver.
There's no way to even lay a hand on Ace.
Ace is like.
Dang, kid.
You got some moves.
He does a moonwalk for you.
He's full of it.
Absolutely.
Ace is an ace.
OK.
So he says we got to go find Renata.
She would do the same for me.
All right.
Hold on.
Hey, fan, since we can't get the kid up, I think we better get our dwarf down.
You want to hold on?
Yeah, yeah, let's drag him down.
Yeah, we both just like pull really hard.
So you're combined strength.
OK, so you guys combined strength full and it's a tug of war.
What do you do, Flynn?
Do you do tug of war?
Do you do you find?
No, I thought that I was waiting for another little tug of communication because I thought
that he was a tug.
Two tugs means something.
So I was waiting for maybe three tugs means, yes, I don't know.
So all of a sudden I go, what?
And you hear.
And I go right in the water.
Perfect.
Excellent.
Sorry, Flint.
We didn't talk about the tugs, sister.
We did.
I am sad.
Sorry, that'll be we can let you decide the tugs next time.
But it looks like we're in the spooky swampy layer of whatever has been taking the kiddos
and also aces one slippery little little.
Oh, my goodness.
Yeah, we tried to get him out of here, but he's not going, man.
That's great.
He goes, can't touch this.
She does a little dance around.
Amazing.
Do you guys know what those do you guys know what those things were that were around that
were around me?
I saw them just for a second.
Me, too.
Can I do a religion real quick?
You can do a nature or an arcana check.
What?
No religion.
But that's my strong.
Yeah.
You classless bunch of heathens.
Nature or arcana.
I have arcana.
I want to do an arcana check.
You didn't see them.
Oh, I have a three plus five.
I'm disoriented.
Indeed.
And he didn't see them.
And you did not see them.
So you're being told them second hand.
So you're so you're like, I'm pretty sure these are Himalayan.
I didn't even hear what he was saying.
I was getting the water, the brackish water out of my ears.
Well I got a 16 on an educated guess.
What will that get me?
Very little.
He says, nope, I don't think it's nats and I don't think it's whatever you said it was
Lulu.
That seems wrong.
How?
Well?
And so and he said, but I did see them go that way.
And he points to and then there's like an obvious clearing.
All right.
That a clear path lies before you to the next island.
There's a thin bridge of land.
It's kind of native land and it's also made of like tree roots at times.
So you guys are crossing the bridge to the next island.
Let's go.
As you step off of the roots and onto the solid ground of an island, you find yourself
walking through a sea of flowers.
Some are familiar to you, though they grow in unnatural colors, blue roses, red violets,
prismatic daisies with each petal a different shade, while others are completely alien,
strange shapes and brilliant hues.
More notable though are the poppies that are grown here and there, each at least three
feet tall.
They sway enticingly in a light breeze and little motes of glowing pollen float off of
them.
Fascinating.
Those are beautiful.
Can I do a nature check on the on those flowers?
Those poppies?
You can.
But before you do that, they try to mess us up.
You are hit with some kind of blood force across your face and you take one point of
damage.
Oh, what?
Ow.
What happened?
Something just came across my face and ow.
I feel I feel like one point of damage.
I feel like one eighth of my life has been drained from me.
I mean, it's just been drained.
Wow.
All right.
High alert perception.
18.
There is nothing immediately obvious.
There's nothing that you can see.
Fan look alive.
We got some smackers or some attackers out here in the field.
I look alive.
Where are you all in relation to the poppies?
How close or far are you?
I mean, I feel like they're kind of everywhere.
But but if you want to be you could have been far away from that.
Just let me know.
Where are you?
I think we're on the path and there's maybe like the first of the tall poppies has somewhat
appeared in our vision and I took like one step towards it.
That's when I got smacked.
OK, perfect.
After you get smacked, do you want to resist being so you're starting to feel really, really
sleepy.
Do you want to resist feeling sleepy?
This sleepy feeling?
I'm just asking since it's related to a plant, is it a poisonous thing?
Sleeping poison?
You don't exactly know.
I'm just saying because I have I have I'm a dwarf.
So I have some some some stuff.
Immune to poisons?
Resistance and I think I have a.
So if anybody's going to roll the dice, it should be you.
Yeah, I have the resistance and the resistance.
This is also when I'm trying to like so yeah, I think I have an advantage on it.
So I rolled a 12 and 18.
So I have A against poison.
So I think I have advantage against it.
So.
So you make the saving throw and you do not go to sleep.
Whoa, that was crazy.
You you're you're like it's like a narcoleptic attack for just like a second.
Your eyes close and you just kind of fall asleep for a second and then wake back up
and then.
Oh, you're right there.
So you get smacked by just some blunt bludgeoning smack.
That's all you can.
I'll back out of the x-ray.
Yeah.
Oh, the straight.
And so you're still within five feet of the poppy plants.
Do you want to resist going to sleep?
Man, not if I just took five days.
Yes, I will resist going to sleep.
A string of the most foul profanities comes out of Lou's mouth and she goes, oh, sorry,
those are all words alone from the orphans.
All right.
Saving throw Constitution, you said.
Yep.
16.
A 16.
Okay.
So you fall asleep.
Yes, while while swearing.
But instead of falling asleep, asleep, you awaken in a place where it you know, you've
read about this before.
You've never experienced it.
But this is a place where the ethereal realm makes contact and over overlapping section
of it with the with the plane of the fairy.
And what you see is a giant 30 foot tall, six legged mushroom monster that is got spores
coming out of it.
Well, and has a bunch of darkness underneath its its, you know, mushroom umbrella things,
right?
And so you you can finally see this thing.
You can see these arms that were just hitting you.
Amazing.
Okay, so I'll defend us.
Two questions.
One, can I still see my compatriots even though they are separated by the veil of the ethereal
plane?
You can see them, but you cannot communicate, talk to them.
No, I can't talk to them.
But one might say that I could send a telepathic message to any creature I can see within 30
feet.
Oh, that's not power.
All right.
So I like it.
You can see them here in salute to them.
She looks like loses asleep, right?
Yes.
Okay.
You guys here in your heads.
Oh, my God.
Fall asleep, fall asleep and come help me fall asleep and come help me.
I'm not tired.
Snort the flower and fall asleep and that's it.
And we can't talk back, right?
It's not a walkie talkie.
Okay, no.
Not this version of my power.
No, a normal message spell you would be able to respond.
But this is this is just something.
And you can roll an easy insight check to see if it's actually Lulu or if it's like somebody
else.
Lulu.
I love that.
That's my name now.
Lulu.
Yeah.
It's just I rolled with modifiers and nine.
You're uncertain.
So I am still what Faye Magic's leaping or something.
But but it would make sense.
It would make sense to be like, well, I was definitely hit by something.
And I want to hit by like essentially, yeah, a sleep attack, right?
A psionic attack.
So now you're hearing voice in your head, which you've never heard before either.
I mean, she told you about it, but you never experienced it.
What about a fan?
Now, Faye has not experienced a sleep attack yet.
Well no, but but it has fan what is the role in insight check?
Does he think it's actually Lulu?
She if you want me to roll inside, I got a 26.
So perfect.
All right.
So you.
Yeah, you you you know, when you guys were talking about your religious experiences,
Lulu talked about how, you know, a mentor of hers had, you know, parted information
in a similar way.
So you're like, oh, yeah, no, I know that she can do this.
So you're not freaked out by it or sketched out by it.
And so she tells you to go to sleep.
Snort the flowers and sleep, sort the flowers and go to sleep.
And you know that it's her.
I'll snort the flowers if that's a thing.
The first trusting action of our little baby party.
I love it.
All right.
So you go up and you smell the flowers and you do not resist going to sleep, I assume,
and you fall right asleep and then you wake up in the ethereal realm where you see Lulu
and this giant.
Again, it looks like it's like seven mushrooms have just been like kind of like fused together
and all their little legs are coming out and some of them were tendrils that are trying
to go out and they're trying to attack one of the one of them has got ace all wrapped
up.
They got ace.
Yeah, exactly.
So what?
It's so tough now.
Are you race?
His slippery couldn't help them now.
Is Lu engaged in combat with this thing?
Does she look like she's about to be?
It does.
I think so.
She she spent her action before combat to try to get you guys back and get you guys
into the into the fight.
But yeah, we're about to we can we can definitely enter combat.
I don't know.
I mean, I assume this thing is looking for a fight, but I don't like.
Oh, I mean, you just smacked your friends, both of them.
So yeah, OK.
New friends.
Oh, yeah, that's why I took five damage beans and biscuits.
OK, I'll move up beside her then.
All right.
OK, but OK, let's roll initiative.
So let's you just you to roll initiative.
OK.
And then we'll we'll.
Well, because I want I just didn't want to interrupt.
I also want to want to breathe and sleep in here.
But you see maybe I might be on the next.
Just go up to these flowers and sniff a bunch of them and then just pass out.
So do you put.
Oh, no, no, no, no, I still I still heard Lulu.
I just didn't.
I was like, did you really hear that?
But you do it anyways.
Awesome.
So you were there as well.
Yeah.
But then I then I see I see him go.
So I'm like, OK, I'm going to go and do this, too.
So I go to smell it.
Great.
We're all in the airplane.
I see how this all ahead.
It all roll.
There's a fungus among us.
I got 11.
Yeah.
Yeah, we got our slippery boy.
Team.
Mm hmm.
Yeah.
We just rolled for initiatives.
One natural one.
I'm so excited that the first character that I play is my spell caster.
I was like, man, it's going to take a while for us to get to Lou.
And I mean, I want to play with all our spells and.
So we are kind.
Yes.
Wait.
So Chris, I do have a question.
One of one of the things I wasn't sure with my character, because I figured they'd be
wearing the same clothes.
One of them came with like chainmail, but the wizard couldn't wear the chainmail, but
he could wear like some other medium armor.
I had asked if it was cool.
I had to smother armor like medium or something.
I'm fine with you wearing chainmail.
We can we can.
I had to mess around a little with armor too.
Like my other than the came with Shane, but was not strong enough to wear it.
So.
Mm hmm.
Yeah.
I have that Lou has armor, but the other two take it off because they don't use her armor.
But she has like a note that's like, whoever keeps leaving my armor on the side of the
road, like, please stop.
And so they'll just pack it up.
But she's the only one like she's the pack horse of the three.
She has like all this stuff and everybody else is like, why?
Why with all the stuff?
Anyway, there you go.
So I think you just you wear it when you're that character and when you're not, you don't
wear.
Yeah, I like that.
I like that.
What's the mushrooms initiative?
The mushroom got a 19 plus one.
So.
And tell me.
Who has dark vision?
I don't.
I do.
But Hanna has still got her light spell.
I do not.
I assume.
Oh, you still have your light spell on.
Yes.
And the face is still emitting the sweet holy light of soul.
Yeah.
So regardless of the light spell, there's still a shadow that is within five feet of
this mushroom guy.
So yeah, unnaturally.
So the light spell will not pierce through that that darkness.
Wow.
So.
So we can see like, is this meaning that we can see the general like form of the monster,
but it's hard to like get a read on his exact.
Steez because of the darkness.
It's more flavor than anything.
Great.
Thank you.
Yeah.
Good question.
I was just asking, are we talking disadvantage?
What's going on?
Great.
Yes.
Good question.
There we go.
I just described what I see to be like, oh, it has it seems to have a delicate.
You can't see in the dark.
I don't know something.
It has a series of three testicles.
We each grab and squeeze.
Of course.
Mushroom balls.
Figured it out.
All right.
Well, he has multi attack Lelouch Dallas and he's going to come at he's going to come at
fan and he is going to move Fritz success on a first.
My goodness.
Well, well, we know.
Oof.
But OK, does five damage.
So five damage to fan and the second attack, which is going to be to Flint.
That is going to be a 12 probably does not hit your armor class.
Right.
All right.
Perfect.
Does not know.
16.
Oof.
You are poisoned.
You take an extra two damage because it hits you with a melee attack.
So when it hits you, the spores are poison you.
Sorry.
Yeah.
So but you are out.
Ouch.
It is your initiative.
So I mean, this it's a mushroom.
Can it move?
What's its attack?
It can.
It uses it has like it's standing on two mushroom stems and then it's got two or three extra
mushroom stems that it's like use.
It's kind of like water bending them to attack with those.
So it's it's it's doing just bludgeoning attacks.
An attack, I guess.
You punch it.
Yeah.
What are you going to do?
No, I'm using a Florida monk weapon.
15.
Nice.
15 hits.
Go ahead and roll for damage.
Eight points of damage.
I'm going to make an unarmed strike.
I'm going to get that's a monk thing.
I'm going to get a nat 20, which I would rather have gotten on the on the sword with the better
hit die.
But let's see what we do.
Six points of damage.
Nat 20 slap.
Oh, nice.
Six points of damage.
All right.
How's it looking?
How does it look like that that did for him?
It did a little bit of damage.
It's I mean, it's it's it's not.
Okay, so it cut off part of one of the tentacles that it was attacking.
Okay.
Now it has like two and a half tentacles.
Okay.
Yeah, go fan.
Show them how humble you can be.
They are.
Yeah.
Wait.
So you just judo chop half a tentacle off.
That's pretty impressive.
That's a good one.
You finished it.
However, like when you judo chop it because you touched the thing, you did get a score
another point of poison damage.
All right, Lulu.
It is your turn.
I'm going to lift up my holy mace and kind of swing it around.
But instead of hitting them, I'm going to cast fairy fire.
Like this is appropriate.
A bunch of motes of beautiful light, like almost like a sprinkler shoot off of the mace,
a dexterity saving throw, please.
From the creature.
Yes, yes, yes.
Can do.
And it fails seven.
Yeah.
Great.
Then it is outlined in a radiant purple light.
All attacks against it have advantage.
Nice.
And it illuminates in a 10 foot radius.
I don't know if that really much matters.
But there we go.
Now it looks like a super advanced Dragon Ball Z like form because it's got like this
weird purple outline, but then this like unnatural darkness surrounding the purple outline.
Oh, so it is quite a scene.
Absolutely.
Magic Eye poster.
That is a concentration spell.
OK, just so I have accountability on that and that'll be the end of my turn.
Excellent.
Flint.
OK.
OK, from what I've seen so far, it seems like this thing's attacks are physical, basically,
like they would kind of need line of sight to hit me.
Yes.
Did I?
Is that fair to glean?
Being close to it is dangerous.
I'm a scaredy cat and I'm going to use.
Yes.
So I'm going to go to a bit of a distance.
OK, so I'm a little bit out of reach.
So I don't know, whatever its reach is plus five feet or something.
And then I'm also going to go ahead and scaredy cat use my mold Earth cantrip to just pretty
much make like a whole barrier around me that that has basically like a like I'm lifting
it all up.
I've thought about this.
So I'm lifting lifting the earth up and making like like kind of like a little cage around
me that I have several like what?
Yeah, kind of like a donut, I guess.
Oh, yeah, like a donut with there's there's at least two staircases to get out.
It's about like a five by five, like five feet or four and a half or something anyway.
So so there's like a little stair, a couple different staircases to get out in case I
need to get out, but also I can duck down and be like completely hidden or something
if I want to.
Yeah, instant trench warfare.
Yes.
But also like don't hurt me.
You know, Earth Earth preserve me is what I like a little gofer that goes around.
Yeah, I'm not thrilled with that.
But yes, it's an apt response.
So but I think I cantrip cancels my actions.
I think that's all I do.
I don't know how much like ran and did that.
And then just for fun, I say, be careful, everyone.
You're all doing a wonderful job.
As you're finishing that sentence and telling everybody to be careful and they look at you,
they they see out of the corner of their eye this thing moving ungodly fast for something
so large.
And so it moves to right where Fan and Lulu are.
And they are now underneath and now in the dark darkness.
And it starts to shake.
Oh no.
No.
All of these noxious spores start to fall from it.
And so both of you make a constitution sitting throw.
See if you can dodge out the way.
Oh no.
You're good in your.
I'm allergic.
But oh no fan and Lulu got to save.
Got a five.
Don't do it.
What you got fan 16 works.
All right, Lulu, you get you're going to take only one point of damage, but you're poisoned
for a minute.
Copy that.
You can make a saving throw at the end of each of your turns, ending it on a success.
And that is the enemy's turn.
And what does it mean?
What?
Just disadvantage on a tax disadvantage on a tax.
OK, well, it's a slash.
I guess 19.
All right.
19 definitely is.
Roll for damage.
You have advantage, but if you want to just roll, see if you can get a net 20.
Oh, yeah, he does have advantage.
Hey, that's my job to remind you.
This thing is almost bloody, almost.
But.
OK, little satay.
So I'm going to squeeze in like if I kick this thing with my boot as an unarmed attack,
will that.
That's a good question.
Yeah, that's fair.
You got it.
That's fair.
Have you got any room between your boot and your greaves or whatever you're wearing?
I mean, as long as your character would have all of that all that skin covered, then I
think you're fair.
Yeah, the spores would just hit your leg and then you could run back out.
Let's try it.
I'll allow it.
It's believable.
17.
That's it.
That hits.
Four points of damage.
All right.
Excellent.
It is bloody now.
Perfect.
It only has two tentacles.
And one of them is kind of below.
All right, Lulu.
For my turn, I would like to move from underneath the mushroom and dive into Scotty's gopher
hole.
Does this promote attack of opportunity as I move from the mushroom threatened range?
Yes, yes, it does.
Great.
Roll it.
I will.
There's a 14 hit.
No.
OK, then it does not.
Slap those tentacles out of the way.
Lulu dives into the gopher hole, lands on the ground and goes, oh, I'm allergic.
Please repeat.
And I'm going to cast.
You're saving, Farrow.
Thank you.
I'm going to cast before I end my turn, cure wounds on myself.
So I'm going to do a D8 plus my wisdom modifier.
Great.
That's five plus one because I have to share the wisdom.
She's not that wise.
Anyway, six points is good enough.
And then I will do my save.
Thank you.
Oh, Nat one.
Oh, no, that does not do.
OK.
I'm still very poisoned.
Yeah, you do your healing word and then you like puked some blood up right afterwards.
It's fine.
I normally do that.
It's gross.
It's fine.
It's part of the problem.
Gotta expurgate, expurgate the evil.
Yup.
I usually would throw up, especially after the drinking.
That's the end of mine.
Perfect.
Flintz, what are we doing?
OK, so I'm in my little gopher hole and I think I want to do magic missile for the first
time in my life to see if it's worth all the hubbub.
OK, wait.
So how do I do this?
First I roll a 24 attack and then I'll do the roll with the one D4.
Yeah, it always hits.
Oh, that's right.
No roll.
That's right.
It just works.
I only get a D4.
OK, here we go.
So anyway, so I see him and Lulu just jumped in.
I'm like, hey, cool, hold on a second.
And I shoot a little magic missile and I roll a D4, which got a one jealous plus one.
So I did two damage.
The magic missile is more than one dart.
The magic missile is three darts, surely.
Well, no, because he's level one.
Oh, that's right.
So it's three darts at level one.
When you cast a spell using a spell stocked of second death or higher, you create one
more dart.
But three darts is the default.
Are you doing that, Scotty?
Great.
That's right.
Yeah, no, I am doing that.
Yeah.
So yeah, so I rolled one D4, but I got a one.
So I got a D1, D4 plus one.
So I guess each dart is two.
So I guess that would be then three.
So technically I say, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Hello, riding a horse.
And then I promptly poke my head right back down into the hole.
We love it.
And I grabbed my knees.
How much damage?
It's going to be okay.
Three D4 plus three.
So I guess it was one D4 plus one.
So I guess each dart was two damage, but then there's three darts.
So I guess is that six damage?
You can roll the D4 three times.
I mean, it's 9.6 damage.
Oh, okay.
I'll do that.
Oh, the next one was also a D1.
So that's exciting.
Being a coward.
And the last one was a D3.
So I guess it's two, two and five.
No, two, two and four.
All right.
Eight.
Eight damage.
Oh, that is much more powerful than I thought it was.
Plus three, right?
Okay.
Magic Missile.
Okay.
He already added it because he got one plus one is two.
One plus one is two.
Yeah.
I rolled a one.
One plus two plus two plus one.
Plus two plus one plus two plus one.
Plus two plus one.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
Makes all the sense.
I'm following.
100%.
Right?
Yeah.
All right.
Perfect.
The nightcap is up next.
And it's called a nightcap.
That's fun.
And nightcap.
Oh, a nightcap.
We all know about the nightcap.
Still out.
Before your eyes, it blinks out of existence.
What?
I did it.
Wait, but is the existence the one that we just sleep in?
It is out of your field of view.
But Lulu, you feel your body get hit.
And again, it's the similar to what happened last time, right?
You can't see it, but you feel it.
And does a 15 hit.
Oh, no, it doesn't.
So you can feel it kind of just go past.
The wind hits your face a little bit, and you kind of start to stir from your sleep.
And so he's in the other place.
I don't know how we get there, but we got to wake up because he's in the other one.
So you can try to wake up by rolling a constitution roll at any time.
Sweet.
At any time?
Because it's not my turn right now.
Well, during your turn.
Sorry.
It's during your turn.
At any time.
You got to give it up to Fan.
All right.
Cue that song.
Wake up.
Yeah.
A little makeup.
Oh, that definitely does it.
All right.
So you wake up and you see this giant nightcap, mushroom monster thing larger than life in
front of you in the normal ass as much as it's normal ass fairy plane.
Was waking up in action.
And that's the same thing.
So in the normal ass as much as it's normal ass fairy plane.
No, no.
So if you want to take an action, you can.
You can take an action to wake another character up, but you can also just take an action to
do your turn if you want.
Decisions.
Teamwork check.
Right?
Kick its ass.
Can I attack this thing and then forego my unarmed strike to wake one of my friends up
as a bonus action?
I'll allow it.
OK.
Kind of generous.
So I miss.
I mean, kicking a mushroom and kicking your friend is probably.
Yeah, yeah.
So I got a seven to attack, which I assume doesn't do it.
And I'm going.
No, doesn't do it.
You have advantage.
You hear Lou's voice from beyond the ether.
You have advantage.
So I get an 18 to attack.
All right.
Bad hits.
Lou with her Alar doing a healing word while concentrating.
It's amazing.
I love her.
OK, we're down.
I'll let me kill and see how it goes.
Six points of damage and I guess I kick.
Who do I want to kick?
I guess I kick Lou because I'm kind of hoping she'll cure me.
Well, she's not in a donut too, right?
You got donut boy over there in his little hidey hole.
So probably easier to kick Lou without falling over.
All right, Lucy, go ahead and make a con throw with advantage to wake up.
Little bit great with advantage.
Lovely.
Thank you.
Beep, ba, boo, bop.
That's what I love that advantage because the first one was a natural one.
This is being retired because the next one was a seven.
Oh, all right.
You are sleepy sleepers.
OK.
All right.
It is actually your turn.
So if you want to try to, yes, make yourself awake with fierce determination, it's like
when you're having a night terror, like a sleep paralysis dream and you're just like,
wake up, wake up.
Focus up, focus up.
Twelve.
Does not do it.
You are a sleepy sleepers.
All right.
I'm a sleepy sleepers.
Since I'm still asleep, I do still get a turn, but in the sleepy world.
Yes.
Yep.
Thank you very much.
How does Flint look health wise?
OK.
Well, you're fine.
I think I have seven out of eight.
Great.
I haven't been hit since I was the first one to get slapped.
OK.
Awesome.
Great.
Well, I figured I'd ask.
And I'm not the same.
I'm not the same.
I figured I'd ask and I'm going to send a telepathic message to fan be like, sorry about that.
Really trying to wake up.
Just didn't sleep last night.
Five more minutes.
Anyway, just five more.
Keep going.
You're doing a great job.
I don't want to go to that thing.
You go to it without me.
I'll come later.
It's fine.
You got this.
I'll come heal you in a second.
That's the end of my turn.
All right, Flint.
OK.
I once tried to wake up, so I guess I do a constitution.
Not do.
Saving control.
No.
Ten plus two.
It's twelve.
I don't think I did it.
So I have a turn.
One question that I guess I was going to I wasn't sure if I asked.
Even once we once we breathed in the spores and was able to see this dream creature, is
the rest of the land, the landscape all the same too?
It's just we can just see a slightly different thing.
It was like suddenly we're not in a swamp anymore.
It's just that you can.
The paths are in different spots or.
It's just that you can see this creature.
Yeah.
OK, so like, so like.
Did the.
OK, so the earth.
Yes.
Sorry, the earth I manipulated is also in the other.
OK.
But I guess I have something else to do.
I'm going to use prestidigitation to un-soil my hands.
I'm going to clean that up.
As a personal thing.
Perfect.
All right.
Excellent.
And it is back.
And the night.
Oh, yeah.
Ace.
Yeah, let's see.
And our resident rogue ace of base.
OK, I screened the ace.
Wake the other two up.
All right.
He does it.
So he still he goes and he kicks the other two.
So go ahead and take another roll.
Both of you with advantage to try to wake up.
I love it.
Kind and generous.
Got a reward ingenuity.
Fifteen.
Fifteen does it.
Fifteen.
Seventeen does it.
All right.
Everybody is awake.
Seventeen.
Take me again and I'll take your leg, kid.
I mean, thank you.
This night.
There it is.
This night cab seeing everybody awake, it looks around and disappears.
What?
Like disappears like it goes back to the sleepy zone?
No, like disappears like, yeah, so like.
Like gives up?
Like it runs away.
No, it doesn't.
That's right.
Okay.
I was going to say I breathe the thing again.
No, it's not that.
It runs away.
This is like this is it's yeah running away.
And stay out.
Yeah.
High fives.
Good job.
You guys made it.
There we go.
All right.
Close one.
Fan, come here.
Come here.
Let me put my little holy hands on you.
Come here.
There we go.
Good job.
Way to save the day.
Little chickens.
Yeah.
All right.
Oh, Paul.
Eight.
What I need.
Healing for you, sir.
There we go.
Heal it up.
You get a little shiny.
You're a little radiant.
That's all.
Blue slots.
Gang.
All right.
Good to know.
This rest.
No, you're good.
Wait.
So what?
Wait.
So we.
Oh, I was going to say we we chopped off one of its tentacles.
Right.
We get some food.
Is the tentacle still there?
Saute it up.
Oh, well, I was I was going to see if there was well, I was going to see if there was
loot or anything to do with it.
But I suppose if there's food, sure, like we can take some of the rations.
Lou already gave away one of the bread.
I'm more worried about us.
Does that make sense?
Oh, shiitake.
I want to figure out if we can find where it's been keeping these other kids.
Hopefully they're still alive.
I try to say that kind of away from Ace.
That's true.
I mean, do we think the mushroom thing?
Yeah.
Were we seeing mushroom spores?
Is that what you were describing around?
No.
Sleeping kids?
No.
Lou and Lulu saw flittering insect like things.
Oh, when you first came through.
So more fairy energy.
So that mushroom wasn't taking the kids.
That was just the peril of the landscape.
Yes.
Absolute.
Excellent.
Correct.
Yeah.
Our guard dog.
Absolutely.
So we're still on the hunt.
Or a guard dog or something.
Yeah.
Also, a dog on my old dog.
Yeah.
All right.