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Ep. 38 What Now - Bellum Draconis
126 Plays1 year ago
Morotah gone, Nxy gone, Magnus gone, Jandar gone. What happens to a party that has suffered much loss. Find out this week!
Follow us on our Twitters - @FellowshipTable
Intro written and produced by Joseph McDade
Recommended
Transcript
Episode Introduction
00:00:00
Speaker
just after the very untimely death of Magnuson, Danny's character. You killed him and you can't even remember his name. Yander. I do remember his name. I do remember his name. I just choose to forget this old situation.
Recap & Player Absence
00:00:42
Speaker
Hello everyone and welcome to this week's episode of the Fellowship of the Pet Tabletop Bellum Draconis. We are a live play 5e D&D podcast set in the magical home-brewed world of Aerith in the Kingdom of Sleepguard. My name is Mark and I am the Dungeon Master. And also with us for this week's episode we have Will who plays the human cleric Emron. Hello there. We've got Callum who plays the Warforged Artificer Alpha.
00:01:04
Speaker
Uh-oh, Spaghetti-O. And we've got Darren who plays the high elf artificer, Raines Haddow. Don't try and make me laugh, Callan. I'm still angry at you. Oh god. If you don't know what we're talking about, I recommend going back and listen to the last couple of tragic episodes. Unfortunately, we are without Ian and Danny for this week's episode because of the duuuude. Again. Oh god.
00:01:27
Speaker
This is why we love D&D though. I guess the character dies and it's the death death. It's permanent unless you end up getting revivifying.
Loss & Reflection in Sleepguard
00:01:34
Speaker
So I'll do a quick recap or resurrection. A quick recap on what happened in last week's episode and one major thing really took place. Two major things really. And then we'll jump into the episode and pick up exactly where we left off on last week's episode. We found ourselves halfway through battle.
00:01:52
Speaker
taken aback by the consummation, the engorgement of Magnus, one of the Nakavolo, a warforged like Alpha. His traveling companion, Yanda, the lizard folk fighter, was still alive and kicking, but not for much longer. Very quickly, he also was felled by the guard drake. And after a series of unfortunate roles and a series of unfortunate events, and Callum,
00:02:21
Speaker
He also fell, not just unconscious, failed his death saves and has also died. So yet again, a party that joined this contract to kill some grongs and to take on a guard drake have gone from three to five to three again. Let's be back with just Alpha Amron and Reigns.
00:02:49
Speaker
The midday sun starts to pass overhead slightly. Hues of red and orange bleed across the sky. Thin, nimbus clouds scatter all around, probably off to the horizon, if you could see it. But the horizon is far from your eyes. The thick, oppressive nature of the swamp lands and jungle fauna of these southern sleep guardian swamps
00:03:18
Speaker
shield your view from the horizon. The constant buzz of insects continues to infect your ears and the heavy breathing of the three of you after what felt like an age of combat is all you can hear. Shadows start to stretch along the ground
00:03:40
Speaker
as the last twitch or two of the guard drake subsides and there is for the first time in what feels like a while stillness again clarity as reigns you are stood as far as i remember near hunched over yander as he said and spoke his final few words to you we're going to pick up exactly there as yander's body goes limp
Emron's Celestial Identity
00:04:08
Speaker
and the three of you are found in the swamp again, alone with Orla climbing down from the scaffold to the north. What would you like to do? Rains won't say anything. He'll close Yanda's eyes and just stay now with him. Everyone.
00:04:29
Speaker
still currently in angel form will glide across the ground and just hover just to the left of reigns imagining that sort of he's there and he's a sort of almost at the head of where Yanda is and he'll look down. I am sorry that my arrival was not sooner.
00:04:58
Speaker
I wish I could have done more for him. I can't. He'll then turn and give a confused look at Enron. Confused a degree of horror, a degree of frustration. I can't. I can't process this right now. There are no words needed.
00:05:30
Speaker
They are gone now. To the plains of the afterlife, to Elysium, if that is their path. Do not feel you have to speak. Where's Emron? He is still here.
Alpha's Search for Understanding
00:05:53
Speaker
I am the part of Emron that he does not know of. He is still within.
00:06:01
Speaker
though he does not know what is or what has taken place. Rains will rise. He just can't process that right now. Emerald's been his one constant for so long that this other being being a part of him is just something that he can't even compute with right now. And without looking up, we'll just say,
00:06:30
Speaker
You hit him with that thunder wave and then chose to protect yourself over him. Alpha probably more cold and callous than what you've seen him previously is not going to acknowledge your statement. He is going to march quite briskly.
00:06:57
Speaker
straight up to the guard drake attempt to kind of flip it over onto its soft underbelly take out a small dagger and just jam it in and try and cut open this guard drake he doesn't know this yander he feels nothing for
Rains' Emotional Conflict
00:07:21
Speaker
being responsible for the death of Yanda, his mind is set on this one that he has seen that is like him, another of his kin. Okay, just for that to take place, the guard drake is kind of slumped on its stomach, but you could get to it kind of on its, get to its side. Guard drake's quite large and flipping on your own would be a really difficult task. That's fine, if it's too difficult for
00:07:50
Speaker
If it's too difficult for him to do, then yeah, the knife is just going to get jammed into the side and then all the strength he can muster to kind of...
00:07:59
Speaker
carving and hacking away all along the innards. The scales along the underbelly of the guard rake are smaller but still quite strong. This will take you quite a while to get through as you almost have to peel up and rip off each scale in order to get to the softest skin underneath. But then when you realise that skin is still quite tough itself, leathery,
00:08:22
Speaker
and thick and almost blubbery underneath and difficult to grab a purchase with the blade of the dagger possible, but it's not pretty and it will probably take you a good part of half an hour to 45 minutes in order to work your way through it to kind of open up a sizeable gap in this creature.
Funeral Pyre for Yander
00:08:41
Speaker
Yes, perfectly fine, that is Alphans however long it takes.
00:08:46
Speaker
Rains will then just turn to this figure who has taken over Emeron and will go, if Emeron is still in there and whatever you are, I ain't leaving here until dawn. This man is getting a proper shadow minion funeral as befits his station. I cannot remain for much longer my presence
00:09:15
Speaker
is draining upon Emron. It is complicated. As Emron grows, he may feel my presence more. He will not know of me appearing there. I don't know what you are or who you are, but the sooner you go, the better. I want my friend back. I am Tiloar. I am the
00:09:45
Speaker
celestial connection that lies within Imran's blood. Within the plains of Elysium, Imran's name would be Tilwa. He does not know his origins. He does not know what lies within his blood. Whether you choose to talk to him or not is up to you. How he will take it, I do not know.
00:10:12
Speaker
Will you take one piece of advice from me to perhaps give to him when you feel is right? Listen. Make sure he listens to his dreams. Through his dreams, his diva will speak to him, his guide. He may have already felt it already, but through his dreams, his diva will speak to him.
00:10:42
Speaker
and guide him. And then with that, the wings will recede. The eyes will start glowing and everyone will almost fall gently to the ground. Almost look asleep. And then he'll wake up. Oh, reins. Did we do it? What happened?
00:11:10
Speaker
Rains will glance around at Yanda's body. He'll come to Emron. He'll glance over at the drake and where Alpha is now butchering it. And he will just take his whiskey flask from his hip and just offer it to Emron and say, drink, rest.
00:11:29
Speaker
We haven't found many a thing to talk about, but now at the time. I'm sorry, Reans. Oh, fuck. And everyone will take the glass, take the
Search for Clues
00:11:39
Speaker
flask. Reans will glance at Alpha and just say to everyone, ain't your fault. Ain't your fault. If you like, I can...
00:11:48
Speaker
I remember from temples in Chadamend, I can perform a riot, a funeral riot of Alidó upon Yanda. No, this man was of the Chadamendian kin. I'll give him a burial by the accredence of the moon in the sun, but thank you. Okay, I can...
00:12:15
Speaker
OK. Raines will nod over to the wooden structure, almost the lookout tower, and he'll say, first light, we'll make sure he's placed on that thing and we'll give him the pyre of our deities. As he says that, he's then going to turn to Waller and go without saying anything. Price on that drake. Was it worth it?
00:12:47
Speaker
She steps forward, her eyes gaunt, tears in her eyes as she looks from the now butchered guard drake to the body of Yandou. 500 gold. And no. I'll fetch some wood. And she turns and goes collecting large logs and bits of wood to form what she assumes is a pyre.
00:13:17
Speaker
or at least get the wood ready for you to use as a pyre. I'll go and see if Alfa's actually doing anything constructive over there. I reckon might be able to take some of its teeth, maybe its scales, see if they're worth the anything to any amalgamists, see if we can turn a bit more out of what's become of this.
00:13:47
Speaker
Hi. You saved her life. You blacked out all of us. You saved her life. Oh, well. Just doing my job. Yeah, where we are. I'll go and see what I can do about whatever the Drake might have that is useful.
00:14:14
Speaker
We can get fire going, don't worry. When the thunder is as you want it, we'll light that fire and send Yandar on his way, as is the tradition. Campfire's already gone, but yeah, we're going to need a bigger one. Aye. Reigns will turn. He'll, as he goes, use an action to step out of the suit.
00:14:42
Speaker
to feel the steel and iron no longer about his person to just feel the looseness of his farm clothes. And as he goes without saying anything, he's just going to take the
00:14:55
Speaker
almost now cartoon and whimsical engraving of the still defenders off his shield and just drop it in the campfire as he walks past and he's just going to find somewhere to sit by the river, splash himself with water and he's just going to sit in solitude as everyone goes the other way towards Alpha. Everyone will wander over towards Alpha.
00:15:25
Speaker
You butchering that thing for any purpose or just trying to take some anger out on it? This creature has eaten one of my kin. I am determined to retrieve it. Him? I? It? Them. Yeah, I'm not quite sure what that thing was. Certainly it bared some resemblance to some of the rough drawings we were able to discover in our research.
00:15:56
Speaker
But from everything range and I know, that thing shouldn't have existed. It's... But it did. It did and I don't want to deny it. There was another of my kin. I have to find out where they have come from. It was your kin, Alpa.
Alpha's Introspection
00:16:15
Speaker
Well, it was... I don't know everything. When we made you.
00:16:24
Speaker
I'd say, I mean, I'd describe it more of a cousin, perhaps. But you're right, it is still your family in that it is perhaps something of what you were based on. I'm sorry we couldn't keep it alive. As am I. Although hope could possibly be had yet. If there is one other of my kind,
00:16:55
Speaker
perhaps there are more perhaps and if there are then then great because you know it'd be amazing to sort of see how they are made compared to how we made you
00:17:11
Speaker
Anyway, if you're going to be on the stomach area, I'm going to try and see what I can do about this thing's teeth and maybe at somewhat scale if I can try and pry them off with me with me pliers and that lot, just to see if there's out that any alchemists or mage riots in the city might want. It's not going to disturb you. Do as you wish. I don't really know what I want you to roll for this, Will.
00:17:38
Speaker
Not really sleight of hand. It's close I can think is maybe something like survival. Yeah, probably the ability to pull apart an animal. Yeah, I'm thinking your teeth scales. Like all he knows is a great point and therefore it's dragon orientated and dragon traditionally would have elements of magic to them. Therefore, there is the possibility that someone might
00:18:04
Speaker
Get some magical dragons with the scales or create magical dragons, teeth, weapons, who knows? Or the scales might, anyone might find properties of the scales that are useful. You know, he might take some to experiment with in the forge. Who knows? But yeah, happy to roll what you want me to. Give me a, yeah, let's go for a survival check. Okay, here we go. Let's see what this rolls like.
00:18:31
Speaker
You had all your naff rolls last time. It was a 12. Okay, 12 is good. Over the time, there's a silence that falls between yourself and Alpha as you both work on the carcass of this drake.
00:18:46
Speaker
You find the scales of the drake incredibly tough, hard, sewn into the body of this creature, very difficult to prize away, especially the larger ones that you're aiming for that sit around the important areas of the drake, around the neck and around the joint to its four legs.
00:19:07
Speaker
Though you are successful, you managed to get with 12, six of the dragon scales off in very, very good condition. You purposely also pick a few of the ones that haven't been affected by the multiple attacks it faced that are broken, cracked, or otherwise damaged. You get these in pretty much perfect condition.
00:19:28
Speaker
And they are not the largest, probably the size of the palm of your hand in terms of the size of the scales. So a decent size as to go. Again, not the largest, but they are the ones that are most pristine.
00:19:39
Speaker
Working towards the teeth, you realize this creature living underground for so long, many of the teeth were shattered, broken, and cracked anyway. Yet, you managed to prize out three teeth in excellent condition. One of them happens to be a large incisor sitting at the front. It had four of them. The other four were very badly cracked, almost down to the base. One of them was still in almost prime condition, given it was a buck-tooth look. And two of them were smaller, regular serrated teeth along the bottom end of the jaw.
00:20:10
Speaker
You also noticed that the blood is still flowing. I wasn't sure if blood was something you'd be collecting or... If I've got something that... I'm sure I've got a spare flask or something I could try and take some samples of it with. Assuming the flask will hold it. If you have a flask available, then yes, you can. You've got the ability to probably fill a flask's worth of blood in the process as well.
00:20:38
Speaker
Cool, thank you. While that's taking place, Callum, you continue to hack away. You get an opening, Callum does, and obviously Alpha does, an opening into the body, an incision in. Now it's the case of finding the right area you're looking for. Could you give me a survival, let's go survival again, please. Could you give me a survival check, please? I most certainly can. Thank you. I got an 11. Okay. You find the stock.
00:21:06
Speaker
And you start, whilst you're in there, kind of pulling, cutting away, cutting away, cutting away, to open up this creature and hopefully find the remains of your companion, of Magnus.
00:21:20
Speaker
Although whilst doing it you realise, well, very quickly you realise that this wasn't the stomach at all. You've been cutting into the wrong area and what you've cut into is some kind of gland that the creature has within it, which is obviously where it forms its kind of bile, its almost acidic stomach acid. And you are going to take five points of poison damage
00:21:44
Speaker
Jesus. I am resistant to boy and so I'm just taught that too, yeah.
00:21:52
Speaker
Your hand pulls back. Can you realize you hit the wrong area? I'm not going to make you roll for it every time to find the stomach. The next place you look will be the stomach, but it's just going to slow down your approach through this. It's going to add another 15, 20 minutes on as you continue to rummage around within the entrails of this creature to find the right kind of place you're looking for, which pushes back your goal ever so slightly. Is there anything you want to do in response to that, Callum? I'm going to pass over to Raines and see what he's pontificating.
00:22:22
Speaker
He would probably pause for a brief moment while this kind of bile maybe sizzled away on his hand, his arm, and all that kind of stuff. He'd pause for a brief moment. There's thoughts running through his head. He's starting to think how much of this kin of his could possibly be left if this is the damage that it's doing to his own hand.
00:22:51
Speaker
Emron would definitely see a thought probably temporarily cross into Alpha's mind about should he be doing this more sensibly, more like Reigns has taught him, but more primal instincts probably take over and he just kind of dives his hand back in with the blade still just trying to cut away.
00:23:13
Speaker
Okay, nice. And as you continue to hack away, to find the stomach of this creature on Passo, just to rein, to move yourself away from the group. Is there anything you wanted to do or work on whilst they're busy butchering my poor guard drake?
00:23:31
Speaker
Raines has just gone to the riverbed and he's just staring at his face. He takes in the golden eyes, he takes in the golden mixed with Orban hair and he looks down and he can see through his his Orban blonde beard that that actually he has
00:23:58
Speaker
forgotten so much about who he was or has willingly chose to run away from so much about who he is by birth that a host of emotions are going through his his mind right now and the only way he can process them is to immediately walk away from the riverbank and to just start
Technology & Kinship Discussion
00:24:21
Speaker
going over to this plinth, this guard tower, and he's just going to start just lobbing bits of timber on top of it, kindling whatever he can find. He's just going to start building a funeral pyre in silence. And Rains will do that until it's done. Not saying a word.
00:24:42
Speaker
Alla appears back out of the woods, sorry, from right between the trees, carrying a large dead log that a stacked halfling frame can handle and tosses it off on the pile of the others that you've made and looks at you. She holds her breath like she's going to say something and then walks off back, picks up a series of kindling that she drops and keeps it out separate to the side. Again, her breath comes in. It must be hard.
00:25:13
Speaker
You're so far from home. I'm so sorry. Raines will stop, look at her, and just continue with what he's doing. I'll give up my share. I'm not taking any money for this. I don't want any.
00:25:44
Speaker
The money is tainted now in my mind. I want you guys to use it for whatever you feel you need it for. I feel responsible. This was my decision. This was my choice. I dragged you into this and I shouldn't have. And I'll bear that burden until the day I die. Raines will just say you ain't responsible for what happened to these folk. Whatever else happened to do this. This ain't on you. They willingly took the contract.
00:26:13
Speaker
They didn't come here for the contract, they came here for me. If I'd have told you everything, we never would be here. They wouldn't have found us now, and they wouldn't have suffered the fate that they now have suffered. They rushed this. I rushed you. I just... We needed the money. We need the money. And we need a damn sight lot more than this.
00:26:43
Speaker
But that has to wait for now. We have to work through whatever the hell this all was. And I'm in no rush to move you on from it. So just tell me what you need for the pyre and I will...
00:27:01
Speaker
I'll continue to get the wood just know that I am very sorry and I will do whatever I can and will do whatever I can in the future to repay you given the kindness that you three that you five showed me all those months ago and the seller of that dingy old shop I will try
00:27:27
Speaker
We are all where we are and we've all made choices that have put us in this place. Least of all me. So... I don't know what to say, I'm really sorry. If you want to help, help remove his body. Very well. I'll bear him onto the platform above if that's where we need him to be.
00:27:55
Speaker
Oh, hold on. Rains will look at her. She's a halfling, right? Yeah. Pick up his axes. I mean, to send him on to eternity or whatever else is out there armed. I'll give him around to help me move him when he's done doing whatever he's doing.
00:28:20
Speaker
Will they? And she'll go and pick up the axes and solemnly walk up and put them up nearby. I've finished his stuff, leave Alpha to his craziness, and come over to Rains. Well, I've got some bits that might be useful. You might find some experimenting you can do with them. I don't mean to sound callous, Rains.
00:28:51
Speaker
I'm a practical man. Is there out Yander has on him that might, is there maybe any, have checked any notes, anything like that that might help us? He said something before he died about finding the promise and finding the door. Rains will turn to Yander's body and go, I'm sorry for him.
00:29:17
Speaker
promise I won't take anything personal and anything that don't look like it ain't for us, you'll be buried with. And it's very important that we just check, you know. I can do it if you want, Rains, you don't have to. No, I'll do it. Rains will just search yonder just to see if there is anything else about what information he carries from Shadowman.
00:29:41
Speaker
On searching his pockets in Satchel, you find that Yanda was a rather stoic individual. He didn't keep many items within his pack saved for those necessary for his survival. As you continue to look, you do find a lesser potion of healing. You do find a series of gold coins, about eight or nine of them, that sit in his pocket. A couple of silver and a few copper. I'll chuck it all to him then.
Responsibilities & Past Choices
00:30:09
Speaker
eight gold, four silver, and about 16 coppers. I just realized they're all very similar numbers, eight, four, and 16. Anyway. But you do notice one other item that sits within his pack, and it is a piece of paper folded in half with a broken seal. The seal is not one that you recognize of Charlemendium descent. It is not one that you recognize from your time on the Sword Coast either.
00:30:37
Speaker
You can barely make it out. It seems to be etched into the wax, this kind of light yellow wax. And it seems to almost be, it looks like almost a flame, like a candle flame, quite tight and quite curved in the middle. And that's it. No letters, no sigil aside from that. As you open it up though, I mean, sorry, do you choose to open it? The seal is broken on it.
00:31:03
Speaker
Yeah, this looks too important to not... with all respect and reverence to Yanda, this looks too important. You open up the letter and it's written in beautiful cursive handwriting. And it's a very, very fine piece of paper. This is in your parchment you get on the street. This is incredibly well crafted paper. And it perplexes you when you open it.
00:31:32
Speaker
because it's almost totally blank save for a single opening line of a letter my dearest yander with a comma after it the rest of the letter is blank there's nothing else written on it it's in pristine condition like he's only had a couple of days yet a couple of days ago he was probably not far from where you currently are now
00:32:02
Speaker
turning the letter over onto its back to see any other markings. There is nothing, there's no embossed markings on the paper. Just those three words, my dearest Yander, almost like the start of a letter. And that's it. Rains will turn back to Yander and say, I'm just going to investigate this Wren.
00:32:30
Speaker
And if it turns out that this is what I think it is, and it's just some kind of keepsake from someone very valuable to you, I promise you you'll depart this veil with with it about your person. I promise you that Rains will just hold it up to Enron and say,
00:32:54
Speaker
So leather doesn't appear to be much, just says to my dearest Yander and nothing else. Do you want me to have a look at it? I might be able to tell if there's any magic on it or if magic has had any impact on it. I was going to wait until I've been able to refocus my abilities and cast a spell on it to see if there is anything it's hiding. But if you think you can do that in a more expedious manner. I could do it in an hour.
00:33:26
Speaker
I'll handle that, that's when we're on. Give me some time and I'll see if Alito guides me to see what I can find. If it turns out it is something personal and private, not meant for us. I don't know if there's magic on it, I won't be able to activate it unless it tells me it can. Well, if it ain't for us, we get the impression that there's nothing to this and this was just for this fellow. But we should bury him with it. Oh, I should go with him.
00:33:58
Speaker
Mark, I'm going to cast Identify as a ritual. Okay, so that's going to take you the hour, isn't it? Yeah. Basically, you choose one object that you must touch throughout the Cahu spell. If it's a magic item or some other magic imbued object, you learn its properties, how to use them, whether it has any achievement used and how many charges it has, you learn whether any spells are affecting the item and what they are. If the item was created by a spell, you learn which spell created it.
00:34:23
Speaker
So you start passing through into your ritual mode of identify. Hang on. Hang on. No, it requires a pearl worth at least 100 gold to do it. I can't do it. So in the interest of spell components, I cannot do the spell. Okay.
00:34:42
Speaker
Sorry. Do you want to look over anyway for magical elements or anything like that? I'll look over it. I can't even check or something. Well, I mean, the Arcana check shouldn't really tell me anything. And Arcana check measures my ability to record information about it. But it won't tell me about it. It won't tell me about it. It won't tell me because there are spells specifically to check for magic. Just to expediate this, if you can't do it, Rains will come over to you and say, if you can't do anything with that, I'll stick to my original plan of
00:35:12
Speaker
waiting till I've recharged and having a look at myself. We can, if it's not for us, we can always get rid of it for him. Yeah, sorry, Rains, I thought I could, but we just don't have the resources to do it. Don't worry about it, just help me move him. Okay, I can help him and yeah, I'll do a little thing for him. How long we got? We have to wait until sunrise, is that right?
00:35:40
Speaker
this person spoke of soul more than saloon so i would sooner i'd sooner commit his funeral at the hour of the god's union at dawn rather than dusk uh we can that's fine well we can get his body ready and um you know do what we have to do and then at least we've got a fire going so we can make camp and i'm sure i've got some spare oil we can just put on the wood to make sure it burns properly
00:36:10
Speaker
Yeah. So let's get him moved then. And just for your benefit Mark, there's nothing else that I would want to do with Rains until his... Rains Rains is going to offer to take the final watch because he can do four hours and I've got nothing else for Rains now until he's
00:36:35
Speaker
at peace by moonlight. He's just going to, he's hurting and he's feeling a mixture of emotions and yeah, there's nothing else for him today. He's spent. Okay. Okay. Thank you for that. You managed to carry the body of Yanda up to the pyre with some dignity and place him down ready as the pyre finishes its kind of construction.
00:37:06
Speaker
And as you say, it rains, take yourself away and spend some time sorting through your head. In the meantime, you've been successful, Alpha, in finding the stomach and cutting it open. As you reach inside, you feel that same burning sensation on your hand, but lesser in the stomach.
00:37:31
Speaker
And you do manage to find a number of items within the stomach of this guard drake that are still whole. Now I'm guessing you want to take some of these out. I would be looking to empty the contents of its stomach entirely. Okay.
00:37:52
Speaker
You pull out five items, basically, many of which covered in black, bile-y, acid-y liquid, some long, almost limb-like functions, and some small, compact, and heavy, dense items as well. There are five in total. What they currently are in its current state, you're unable to tell. But these five items do not make up the entirety of what was, once, Magnus.
00:38:18
Speaker
One can only assume that the other items have already succumbed to the acid in the duct that you accidentally cut into and also the stomach itself. As you continue to search on the stomach, the burning sensation starts to overwhelm you, but you continue to search. There is nothing save grung bones that you manage to find within the stomach of this guard drake.
00:38:44
Speaker
Okay, so the five items that I've pulled out of the guardry stomach, I would attempt to viciously clean.
00:38:58
Speaker
with great haste, so he'll take out just whatever kind of rags or anything like that. He'll use his own cloak or anything like that if he needs to, just tearing off a piece of his own clothing and then just trying to wipe it all down to see what actually belonged to this fellow warhoard that had been devoured. You are near a river.
00:39:26
Speaker
We are. I did think of that, but I was kind of afraid if I put them in there, you're going to do some kind of check and they might just wash down the river and I don't want to go down the river. Yeah, they would. It's up to you and it will, it will burn through your cape. It does burn through your cape and you have to use quiet. After the last couple of sessions, I don't know if I trust Mark with anything anymore. Me? You can't...
00:39:53
Speaker
You can't blame me for that. Let's not get into the blame game. It's not fair. No, no, no, stop. Okay, I will. All right. No, fair enough. Yeah.
Magical Insights & Revelations
00:40:02
Speaker
Well, I'll probably still start doing that. But if I start to notice that it's just burning away my clothes, I would attempt to kind of timidly roll them down there.
00:40:14
Speaker
where the stream is. I would just get to the edge. I would grab one of the items and stick it in the water and just try and cleanse it that way instead, just one at a time. Again, you can tell me whatever actually comes up, but I'm looking for
00:40:31
Speaker
anything that I would recognise that belongs to the Warforged. Okay. The first item you wash off is about the sides of the palm of your hand. It looks like some kind of archaic circuit board. This looks like an early attempt. It's partially melted and corroded by the dragon's breath, by the acid in the stomach of the drake.
00:40:54
Speaker
some of the circuits still seem to be in some kind of working order and could possibly be salvaged the next item the small dense item that you pull out is almost undamaged it is a very very small incredibly heavy dark black box it seems to be made out of something denser than metal
00:41:21
Speaker
And it seems to feel like it vibrates ever so slightly. There's a slight vibration to it. That item you have no recollection of what it might be.
00:41:32
Speaker
The third item is part of a leg piston of Magnus, as you realize he ran on very dodgy pistons. And this is one of the leg pistons that kind of pulled his calf area of his leg up towards his hamstring that kind of acting as those two muscles for it. It's large, it's strong, it's made out of good metal as well. And it seems relatively undamaged by the acid.
00:41:59
Speaker
The next item seems to be the sensor array that sat in the front of its mouth almost at the grill of Magnus. The speaker behind it that Ian so eloquently described has burnt away but the kind of the front grill of this creature of its face kind of remains. The final item that you manage to polite seems to be some kind of
00:42:23
Speaker
Coupling of cables, a thick bunch of cables that may have perhaps run up where humans and other creatures might consider a spine are kind of the key cables from the neurological center of the head down to the different limbs of the body further down. There's a whole array of cables in there, many of which the colors at the moment you can't quite discern, given the haste at which you're trying to clean them. But there's a thick bundle, probably about
00:42:50
Speaker
as thick as the hilt of a sword worth of cables or kind of tied up tight together with another piece of metal probably about two foot long and about as thick as I said as the hilt of a sword and they're the items you manage to procure from this Drake's stomach. Okay the ones that are easily identifiable as something from Magnus so the cable bundle like
00:43:17
Speaker
face grill and the leg piston he's going to take a brief moment into kind of holding these and seeing something so raw and primitive kind of brings a lot of thoughts to out of surface of his mind he's kind of thinking is this what's inside me he's comparing his own build to just these little bundle of leftover components that doesn't seem to make anything
00:43:44
Speaker
He's going to quickly try and just push past it. He's going to put those in his satchel. However, the circuit board and this heavy dark black box, he's going to walk over to Reins and Emron at this stage. And he's just going to approach them. Do either of you have any idea about what these are? I do not recognize them as part of my own construction.
00:44:17
Speaker
Raines will glance at it as he's still just sat by the campfire. I have a suspicion of what it could be, and as does Raines, so I'm just, we are like a hive mind on this. Raines will glance at it and go, obsidian, perhaps.
00:44:39
Speaker
and then he'll properly glance at it and can I deduce whether my initial thoughts of jet black really heavy, it's potentially obsidian is correct. Give me a history check please. See if you can discern a memory perhaps. Seven.
00:45:03
Speaker
Well, there are like seven, there's not many other items, however, that you could discern that would have these properties. Yes, you have a quite strong memory of this being obsidian. It has a shine to it, a sheen to it, and also an almost marble, a marbellic, I was going to say, that's not a word, a marble pattern within it of blacks and then almost darker blacks within them that is almost synonymous with the obsidian of shadow-mend.
00:45:34
Speaker
If that's what I think it is, I know what it contains as well. Memory runes. Memory runes. What's a memory rune? Sorry. It's a place on the other side of Aerith that has... Have you ever heard of Dashkowrai? Bless you. But no, sorry.
00:46:31
Speaker
So what's the memory rune doing in
00:46:37
Speaker
Drake or doing in madness? Is it the memory of someone else? Well, the theory reigns out in his research that Nakavolo are animated by memories of laugh.
Planning Next Steps
00:47:00
Speaker
So the idea is that it's the runes themselves that give the construction
00:47:07
Speaker
its ability to be... Sentience. Everyone's trying to say sentience. But don't think of it as bringing someone back to life. It ain't that reductive.
00:47:26
Speaker
There's a time and a place we're discovering this, but discussing this. But for now, it's why you have hallmarks of your mother and your father. When you look at you, you can see their eyes. You can see family traits. It's why someone once told me it's called DNA. It's a knock of all those DNA.
00:47:54
Speaker
I'm not 100% sure I follow, but I feel like now is not quite the time for a lesson in the arcane arts of what you do. So I'll just sit by the fire and just warm myself as the sun continues to fall into the late afternoon. If you want to find out about him, Alfred, I'd keep hold of that if I were you. It will not be going anywhere.
00:48:26
Speaker
I have further questions, however. The designs, for me. Emron mentioned they were from elsewhere, almost. You had found them from where? There could be more of my kin somewhere out there. Alpha, before a few hours ago, I thought any attempt to build Nakavolo before you had ended in failure, there were designs, but all of them belonged to
00:48:55
Speaker
They belong to Archmage De Berenius. Any knowledge I have of how to build things about you, I thought died with him when they threw him in the gorge. Look, it's not easy to say this, Alpha, but my understanding of Nakavolo is that you were the only one until an hour ago. But your memory rune is inside your chest. It's kept inside
00:49:23
Speaker
layers upon layers of reinforced steel to protect the sheer power that is inside of you. There's a time and a place for us to discuss this, but for now let me say this. Me and Imran, our brains, what's in our head, that does so much of moral compass, that does so much of power in us. I even draw on it to use the suit.
00:49:51
Speaker
For you, all of that, all of that is contained within your chest. For me and Emrom, we have something inside our being that pumps our life force around our body. Those are in separate places on Earth and on you that whatever it is, what makes you different from like a mindless drone is the ability to do something organic with memory runes and to turn them into natural life.
00:50:21
Speaker
However, there are unexpected things that we discovered with that. Your memory is perfect because even though we built you a relay for your brain and for you to process cognitive thoughts, it's not doing anything functional for your body. That's all coming from the memory room. It's why your memory is perfect because it can run in such a perfect way to allow you to process things. It's why you can recall information because you're
00:50:47
Speaker
We built your brain to do multiple things and it turns out it only needs to do half of those things so that the power of what's in your head is more profound than ours because everything is coming from that memory room. But the payoff is that such raw, iconic energy that to remove that from your chest could blow a hole in where Goldview is. It could take out an entire city as far as I know. I don't want to try ever pulling a memory room out of you. It took me
00:51:17
Speaker
It took us. Emron had to forge about two or three different versions of your chest out of Forge. I thought Obsidian was... I've heard of it. I've seen it. It's in jewelry because it specs Alpha and Shadow Mend. You've got enough of it there to... I don't know of any blacksmith who can...
00:51:45
Speaker
mold obsidian into that kind of shit. Not even masters of Clan Shadow Shield could work what is essentially stone. I mean, that takes some doing. It's why we use metal, because there was no way I could recreate obsidian. Wherever Magnus was made and whoever forged him,
00:52:15
Speaker
weren't doing anything like me and Imran did when we made you. Was this construct superior to myself? He said he were older and he looked it. The point is that the information we had were
00:52:36
Speaker
were scraps and myths and legend and rumour and drawings of drawings from walls and drawings of drawings of drawings that have faded away. So, you know, we were working on half built, half remembered things. So, I mean, it looked like one, but... It functioned differently.
00:53:04
Speaker
It did because we didn't know how to, we had to sort of make it up as we went along after it. It wasn't able to communicate verbally like myself, but it communicated still with me. Oh, it could speak. It spoke to us. It spoke to you. It did. It can speak. The point is that it looked old, really, really old.
00:53:33
Speaker
There are so many questions, Alpha. I believe I may have to conduct my own research on this subject. Aye, but just be careful. That's a lack of order where an age before an age before an age before, you know, even it goes even beyond, I mean, look at rains and elves live for hundreds, maybe thousands of years.
00:54:01
Speaker
And even then, the only information we got is scraps. Just remember down this rabbit hole. Cause it could consume you. I always thought I was the first. You're the first or whatever. I'm the first of yours. Yes. You always told me, dad always told me I was just,
00:54:30
Speaker
The first, there was another like me that I was unique. You are unique, you are unique in that you are our design, you are what we made you. But there was another that was out here, different, but still like me. Different like you because it was whatever, it may have been one that came before Alpha. And the point is that that is what we based you on.
00:54:56
Speaker
This is new information to all of us, Alfred. The information that you had about your existence was the same as mine. I found out about the fact that someone else has been able to build Nakavilo. Or find, or find a Nakavilo. Well, as everyone says, we found this out about 20 minutes before you did, when they arrived. It's all new information to me, but
00:55:25
Speaker
Just be mindful of the fact that actions have consequences. When you hit Yandou with that Thunder Wave, you pay the part and put him on that pyre. And the only reason I'm not angry with you about that is because it ain't your fault that he was in some godforsaken Martian sleepguard. It's mine.
00:55:52
Speaker
And Reigns will get up at that and just walk away and realize that he's now engaged in conversations that were just far too heavy and far too profound for what he can process right now. And he'll just turn back and say, we need to risk. We need to gather. We need to heal. And then tomorrow we need to make a decision about what comes next.
Funeral Rites & Reflections
00:56:21
Speaker
For now, process this in any way you can or have to and I'll do the same. I'll take the first watch and the second. You three need some rest. I barely did anything to please rest.
00:56:44
Speaker
I'll be fine. I've got some of MC's coffee still. That'll keep me going for the first couple of watches. So just please, use the tents. I've cleaned one of the matches. Please rest. Please. I'll take one of the watches after you. Okay. I'll take the last ones. I can do it uninterrupted. That means we'll go all around Alpha and myself.
00:57:17
Speaker
And we all settle down for a long rest, so you will get to replenish yourselves. If you want to do that on D&D Beyond, you may do that now. All of the watch goes unaffected.
00:57:31
Speaker
She quickly wakes up Emron off the back of her double watch. You see her late in the night by the fire that she's stoked up, bleary eyed. Her eyes are almost shut. This double watch has taken its toll on her and she nudges you and says, if you're not feeling up for it, I can take this one and you can rest longer. No, no, it's all right. I've got it. It's all right.
00:57:58
Speaker
Thank God and she literally just collapses and falls asleep almost instantly on the ground. Then I'll make sure the fire is nice and bright. If need be he'll cast light on his hammer so he's got a little light around as well. He's going to go over to the pyre, stand near it and then I'm going to use, because I've got some powdered silver left over, I'm going to do for my hour
00:58:22
Speaker
I will do a ritual ceremony of funeral rite and everyone will perform a small prayer over it, which means for the next seven days it can't become undead should it ever try to be. A bit of roleplay, but yeah, so I perform a small ceremony over it as a ritual.
00:58:46
Speaker
Right, thank you very much. And you used up some of the silver powder I had left over from us going in the shop. No problem. The rest of your watch passes without event as well. You hear a rustling and the trees are half way through your watch, but this turns out to be either a bird or something that passes through the swamplands and moves on. The ever-present buzz and the humidity in the air remains.
00:59:09
Speaker
You wake up, we've got a double watch from all five in total, four watches in total. Yeah, so I'll then wake up Alpha, which will give the four hours for Darren for Rain to have had his four hour trance, then he can do the rest. Yep. Alpha, your watch begins. Is there anything you want to do or do you want to just expediate? Yeah, Alpha would just wait until
00:59:37
Speaker
he's confident that everyone has fallen asleep. He would move slightly away from the group, enough to keep him in eyesight. And again, he would pull out the quite large blue sapphire.
01:00:05
Speaker
Um, that he has, that he still relates to Nick and just kind of put it on the ground next to him. Um, and almost as if he's having a conversation with him, he begins to speak. So today was a rather interesting day. It turns out there is another of my kind, someone like me, but not me, not an inorganic creature, but a true construct.
01:00:35
Speaker
There wasn't much left, however. He unfortunately perished before I was able to talk, which is a shame. It's an odd feeling I'm trying to process right now. You always helped me try and get in touch with different sides of me, you and Marota. Oh, if he's there, by the way, just give him a quick hello.
01:01:04
Speaker
Uh, range is taking excellent care of his cross. She, well, she, she, she, she give, give her a hello. It's pronouns, right? Get a pronouns. Right. Jesus, man. 2023 get woke. Clearly I am not. Um, range is looking after her crops very well. Um, I believe he misses her a lot as well.
01:01:32
Speaker
But I don't know how to proceed with this. He's going to take out the obsidian that he just kind of kept in his satchel as well. I suppose this is what you might be able to call the heart of Magnus a little bit. It's quite possibly where his life energy came from for what I know of of Reims and Emron. I'm going to keep you too close by.
01:02:01
Speaker
I think he would have really gotten unwell together. He's going to put the blue sapphire and obsidian back in his satchel and then just remain on watch for the remainder then obviously when his time's up go and wake up brains. The remainder of your watch passes without incident or
01:02:28
Speaker
issue and you wake up rained for the last portion of the watch despite being the early hours of the morning close to daybreak the moon is it three quarters a waxing moon i don't really know what a waxing moon is but i'm reading Tolkien again and he says a waxing moon every other bloody paragraph is it it's like growing i actually really google this stuff but a waxing moon
01:02:53
Speaker
I feel like this is the point where Ian would tell our listeners to tweet us if they knew what a waxing moon is. Hey, there you go. Anyone does actually know what a waxing moon is or why literally in the two towers every other page it talks about the fucking waxing
Hidden Message Discovery
01:03:05
Speaker
moon. A waxing moon is any phase of the moon during the lunar cycle between the new moon and the full moon. So just a moon that is waxing is one that is great getting larger each night. So I was right, there you go, a waxing moon. This is a waxing three-quarter moon.
01:03:21
Speaker
man i'm such a lunar expert i know anyway it's a big moon it doesn't matter it's waxing every moon's gonna be waxing now i'm gonna channel my inner token here as it was quite bright basically in this cloudless sky uh stars are clear above your heads as well rains as alpha rouses you from your meditation to take your final watch is there anything you'd like to do do you have time yeah so rains will start his watch by walking into the suit
01:03:47
Speaker
who will gladly just acknowledge the wake up from Alpha and say nothing in silence. There's a host of emotions going on at the minute and they're running high and he's angry at himself.
01:04:03
Speaker
and that's been perpetuated into anger at Alpha for fleeting moments. That's very quickly rose into the surface of guilt as he's realised that Alpha has so much more to process about these two than he does.
01:04:18
Speaker
So Rains will pack all that into just saying nothing for now and will, as soon as he's up, walk over to the suit, step into it, pull out Yandhi's letter into the gauntlet and will cast Detect Magic as a ritual. He will then step out of the suit, leaving the gauntlet holding the
01:04:40
Speaker
letter from Yander and what Rains will do is he'll then just sit in front of the suit. NC will spring over and will go to the bag of holding and will just pull out a T mug. He will then NC will then sit in front of Rains and will tap the T mug and a timer will appear on it. Then NC continues to be able to use its ability to now
01:05:10
Speaker
do very small magical tinkering stuff that Rains was able to do with a low level artificer. And as soon as it does that, NC will then tap the mug again, and some writing will appear on it. And it will just simply say, so as I was saying in the Drake fight, tap, I now have the ability
01:05:31
Speaker
to communicate with you few magical tinkering. Pretty neat, huh? Tap. By the way, you have this amount of time remaining on your spell. Would you like me to keep notifying you of this? Tap. It will then say to you, you were right to burn that silly thing you put on the shield. Tap.
01:05:52
Speaker
You are not the steel defender, Tapp. You will never be Freid Zemrith, Tapp. The blood of House Hatho does not lead rebellions, Tapp. It leads kingdoms, Tapp. Yanda was on this side of the world because you were here, Tapp. If you were where you were supposed to be, Tapp. He would still be alive, Tapp.
01:06:20
Speaker
Own this. Tap. Take it forward. Tap. Make sure he did not die in vain. Tap. He believed that there was still hope for Shabamand. I can sense that in him. Tap. You will not find that hope on this side of the world. Tap. Before you can give Shabamand back, back to the people it rightly belongs to, tap.
01:06:48
Speaker
You need to free it from those who have enslaved it. Tap. The curse on your bloodline may be real. Tap. But it is your curse to bear. It is the privilege of your family name. Tap. You must own that. Tap. It will then just sit forward and just start to pour some tea into the mug.
01:07:15
Speaker
and we'll then tap it again and go, now, drink this, tap. You will find it much improved, tap. Raines will then just pick up the tea and take a sip of it, processing everything NC has said and just stare at this magical squirrel with a silly little hat on. And we'll just then look at it and go, you know, this is actually pretty good now.
01:07:39
Speaker
superior Nakavodo technology, huh? And then NC's eyes will flick as it goes to another one of the magical tinkering options and will now just emit simple phrases that it can pick up and it will simply just go in answer to Reigns. I am older. Oh shit. I'm even more confused right now. Reigns will drink his tea.
01:08:11
Speaker
And when that is done, he will go over to the letter after the needed time of 10 minutes has passed. He's cast Detect Magic as a ritual. Is there any lingering magic? And you don't have to tell me anything other than it's school. So it's illusion. Or you simply have to tell me as if there is any magic on this and what it's school is.
01:08:33
Speaker
I like to think that on the side of the mug it just starts flashing illusion, illusion, illusion, illusion as the timer reaches the end. Almost like an Alexa, Amazon, an Echo Show might give us some money, Jeff Bezos. And that pings up and so you walk over to the letter that's still held within the gauntlet. And as you open the letter up, because I imagine it's kind of folded still within the clasp of the gauntlet, you open it up and all of a sudden the moonlight hits it.
01:09:01
Speaker
And suddenly etchings appear below it. Words, phrases start to appear through almost like hidden ink. And the letter forms a full letter, not just the opening of a letter. And as your eyes scan over it, you start finally to make sense of some things, but it also leaves more questions than maybe it answers. My dearest Yander,
01:09:28
Speaker
I hope this letter finds you well. It has been too long since we last spoke, and I have grown increasingly concerned with each passing day. I fear they have grown too arrogant, blinded by their own power and influence. The signs are everywhere. If only one knows where to look. The whispers in the shadows. The rustling of leaves at night. The distant howling of wolves.
01:09:57
Speaker
This all bears witness to the coming storm. It comes, Yanda, a reckoning that is long overdue. The forces that we thought we had conquered have returned, stronger and more determined than ever before. But I have faith that we will prevail as long as we stand together. Please be careful, my friend.
01:10:23
Speaker
The dangers that lie ahead are grave, and we cannot afford to lose anyone to hubris or carelessness. In solidarity, B, D. The initials just B, B, Bravo, and D, D, Delta. I've also shared the letter in our WhatsApp group as well, so you don't have to memorize it, I've written it all down. It's also there for you, Prime's ready to rock and roll.
Episode Conclusion & Engagement
01:10:50
Speaker
And as the letter, you read over that and you take that in,
01:10:56
Speaker
As I mentioned, maybe more questions are answered, maybe more questions have formed as a result of that. But you look up to the waxing moon above and the slow rise of the sun at dawn over the horizon to the east. As a new day dawns, a new beginning approaches our party in the fellowship of the tabletop.
01:11:21
Speaker
And that's where we're going to leave it for this week's episode guys. Thank you very much for your time and effort and your lovely bit of RP from everyone as well. Very good. Great stuff as always. Great stuff as always. I'm going to transition really awkwardly and going to knock it on the head. If you want it to also be awkward in our
01:11:41
Speaker
in our Twitter feeds. You can do so if you wish to be awkward and send us awkward messages when you're not quite sure. If you want to be chill me, or wish you wish to give us praise for excellent podcasts, then you can DM us, our followers, which would be great, retweet us, give us a review, you name it. We can be reached on our many social medias at fellowship table, search for fellowship table top, you will find us
01:12:06
Speaker
out there in the interwebs. If you used to go one step further and follow us individually, you can do so. You can follow me. I'm at natural20will. You can follow Darren at… DarrenPaget6.
01:12:25
Speaker
You can follow the Murderer Callum at BD20Gamer. I want to hear all about your favourite waxing moon. And you can follow our mooning DM at... HastyTheWorldDM. But before we move on, I just want to say if anyone out there is an artist and wants to draw, I think we need a little image of... Of a wax.
01:12:45
Speaker
the top hat with a waxing moon behind him. That's all I'm saying. That's what I want. The image of the top-hatted half squirrel form. If anyone is a talented artist and wants to produce a little bit of art for us, that'd be absolutely fab to see that image in it. Yes, I'm fired at hastily rolled DM. Until next time, everybody. Farewell.