Desperloch | Age of Umbra Episode 1 Part 2

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Hey there, Matthew Mercer here, and you're listening to part two of this episode of Age of Umrah, a dark tale and campaign setting from our recently released tabletop RPG Dagger Heart from Darrington Press.

If you haven't checked out part one yet, pause this now and head over there first.

Otherwise, let's return to our adventurers striving against the darkness in part two.

Welcome back.

So,

your troop of makeshift delvers sent on this rescue mission to bring back the

last seen still-living vigil member, Velk Dravenmore.

who exists somewhere left behind near the newly discovered gate to the firmament's hero.

You take the map that you had plucked from the clutches of Eren

to Reskello and marks for you, which I did on there for you, the path that was taken

to where they had uncovered

where this entryway was.

There are blue dots among it, which are blue torches that are left on the last mission delving.

They will leave blue flame marks.

to remind them where their last path was until they've been recovered.

So there are little blue flames along the way that guide you to the last known expedition.

Okay.

With this information, you trek outward into the jungle itself,

towards the base of the Grief Cleft Mountains.

Who is

leading this

journey?

I am.

I mean,

she has eight wings.

She can do whatever she wants.

That's true.

I mean,

I'm not.

I've never been out here before.

I have been out here before.

I've been all over the place, actually.

You're so brave.

Really?

Yes.

I mean,

I don't think of myself that way, but I mean, I guess if other people do, I'm not going to say no, no, to it.

I'm a little bit scared.

Oh.

Have you...

I don't.

Have you been...

Where are you from?

She is from the old world.

Yes, I am from the old world.

What does that mean?

She is a living relic.

Yes, I'm a living relic.

You have to give her her utmost care and respect.

I do, of course.

I just don't know what that means.

You know, she's a living relic?

Yes,

I'm a living relic.

Absolutely.

Living relic.

Is that...

I just haven't encountered many of those.

Tell him, tell them.

Yes, I-I-I.

Yes,

this form was

made to

praise and worship and

kneel before

the old gods.

And

that is what I was made for.

Which is why you're going first.

No, no, I get that.

It's just, how did you come back to life?

Did you know that...

Did someone...

Or were you always alive in there?

Like, were you a statue and you were like, oh, get me out of here?

I can't, I can't move, I can't talk.

Like, for years and years, and then somebody, like, animated you?

Or was the is it a powerful wizard or a a wish or a a curse?

I guess we should all be honest then if we're gonna go out.

Really?

I just

I found my way to this statue.

I was

wandering for quite some time and

I found the statue and it felt familiar and

I have memories, I think, from the statue.

You were out of the statue?

You found the statue.

What were you at?

I don't mean to pry, it's just.

No, it's it's it's strange for me as well, but I

believe that

I died

and I

wandered for quite some time and then

I found my way to this statue

after August found the statue and

cleaned it up, I guess, as much as he could and

it woke up and I was in it.

So you're you were dead?

Does that mean you're like a

undead?

Clearly not.

I feel very, very much alive.

Very alive.

Certainly alive.

Yeah, I feel very much alive, and I am a friend.

Best not to make assumptions.

I'm not.

I've just...

I've seen a lot of

undeath out there.

Does this look like undeath to you?

I think it's also fair to say we don't really know.

Garrick takes in sort of lost creatures, people without a lot of answers.

And we're hoping to find some of those answers out here, but

I don't think Misty knows much more than she's.

Do I look like I'm dead to you?

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, not at all.

I mean, it's okay, I know.

People see me and they get very nervous.

You're tall and imposing and powerful looking.

Powerful.

One last question.

Sorry.

No, don't be sorry.

I will tell you.

This is

out of my business, business, but

do you poop?

Oh,

you know what, those are actually very interesting questions.

I was actually curious, too.

I feel like I would want to know the same.

I don't think so, because I don't...

Do you eat?

Eat.

No, no.

You don't pebble?

I don't pebble.

I mean, I could- I could try, I guess, but um...

You don't have to.

Thank you.

That was him.

Was that me?

That was me.

Was that my ass?

I don't know if I...

if I have one, and I start like circling to try.

Nothing I've ever seen back there.

No.

Misty.

Thank you.

Was your name Misty in your previous life?

That was given to me by August.

You needed

something to call her, and she was a mystery, and it sort of got shortened

on the way here.

You know, the

old ones, the old clerics, they used to use these statues to

get divine messages from the veiled gods.

If this is familiar to you,

perhaps you got a connection to the veiled gods.

Maybe I will.

Maybe.

Maybe.

Maybe

I have

memories that I...

I don't feel like are my own.

And I feel like they are the statues, but I don't know.

But maybe we will find out.

You are a bastion of inspiration.

Thank you.

I will fight to defend you.

But snakes, you should know this information.

We don't.

We're careful with it.

Please.

We keep it close.

Yes, for sure.

People might misunderstand and desperate luck.

I will not hurt you.

Oh, thank you.

No, no, I understand.

Secrets are very important, very valuable.

Yours is safe with me.

And maybe at the end of all of this,

I'll get to go home wherever that is.

Sure.

It's the hope.

Shall we adventure?

We shall.

I'm happy to lead us, but it's scary out here.

And so be ready to run.

And

in my experience,

once danger presents itself, it's better to

scatter.

Just run away.

Just run away as fast as you can in

different directions.

Yes.

Someone may end up the slowest, may end up falling, but

if you're fast enough, you won't be the slowest.

I don't think I'm very fast.

Typically, the vigils say that to work as a team in a

sure, they're strong and they can fight.

But if you're not strong and you can't fight, you can just run.

Sure.

That's okay, too.

On that note,

are we out of eyeshot from the slide walls?

I'll ask again.

Who is leading the fake fall?

That's me.

I would like you to take an instinct roll for me, please.

Just sit here in the doorway, the gateway.

Insight.

Instinct.

Instinct.

Instinct.

All right.

You've got this.

I sure do.

Everybody in Dust Brolock has been listening.

Nine with hope.

Nine with hope.

Okay, so you can take a hope.

However,

I should have called this before.

Yeah, you have to call it before the roll.

Experiences, you call them pay for before the roll.

Yeah.

Well done.

I'll remember that next time.

That's okay.

Are we out of eyeshot, though, from people?

You get a hope.

Yeah,

you're beyond.

You guys have been walking with this conversation, but you've been meandering through the jungle as it progresses.

And indeed, like, there is that

sound of the local wildlife kind of strongly pushing through here in the midday greenery, the kind of choking canopy of the stretching jungle trees, like tangled and pulling into each other as vines fall down and seem to sway with the occasional burst of wind, or without wind, seem to almost move and twitch on the roan at the corner of your eye.

You turn and they're still, but you continue to push onward.

For to stop and to slow is to leave yourself available for whatever might be hunting or stalking you from behind.

Once we clear and we're into the forest line,

you all have probably noticed some clinking of heavy armor, and

Brixton sheds her tattered

robes of the pyre keeper and underneath it has like full plate armor that is a little rusted, definitely battle worn,

a little ill-fitting.

It was not made for her

custom.

And she like kind of tucks and refashions her robes kind of around her waist and

finally affixes a sword on her back.

And this display amongst the nerve-wracking reality that as a scout and

a messenger through the settlements, you have a very clear and repeated path between settlements to take, the safe route, the known route.

You've not gone to the vaults before, and nervously pushing ahead without noting a few times you get a little lost and just kind of keep it quietly to yourself

um it's this way guys

occasionally you hear

a low

kind of off to one side and you kind of quietly push on until it begins to fade in the distance every now and then there's a stillness

boats scatter out from one area and you kind of freak out

as they kind of settle off in that space, you also note that means they've made noise and let your location known, so you should also keep moving.

And it takes a little longer in the afternoon than it should have until you come to the base of the mountains themselves.

The whole process taking a little bit of toll on your mental health.

I need you to go ahead and mark a stress for me.

What do you what's your experience?

Fearless coward?

What is it?

I have uh

an experience that would have helped us if I had remembered to use it called well-traveled.

And then there's one that's spineless coward.

But indeed, here at the base of the grief cleft, you can see familiar to those who have been to these vaults before or, you know, tracked to see their exterior, at the base of the cliff, there is a massive kind of pointed archway.

where the entrance to the vaults have been since before this area fell to ruin.

Since back in the veiled gods still were present on this world and their vision brought hope and light and purpose

this massive double-doored gateway itself the doors open and chained to be a shaded step into a sightless expanse you can see there are chairs and tables and a few tents around here that currently are closed and left alone for when various members of the scholars go in to do their research, to search for or

excavate for memories, for reliquaries, for shreds of the past and lost faith, the history that they still try and clamber and piece together, or the delvers set up camp before they proper push into the mountain.

But you still have

time you gotta keep to.

And an individual who might not be

able to last too long.

So you push on into the cavern itself.

And as the

gentle gray of the midday light fades, it really is so soothing.

You light your torches and push into

the dark

Veluzal vault.

Hear the smell of old

still air,

the scent of flesh decaying long ago sits faintly through each inhale.

You can smell rust.

You can smell old water

and earth only recently uncovered.

Who's leading with the map?

Before we get to the map, I'll just kind of share that Velk Draven more is a Qatari in his

40s, but he also has

all sorts of trinkets.

He carries bones and

tea leaves, and

he's a bit different from some of the other vigil that I've talked with because he still believes the gods didn't leave, that they're still here, and that there's evidence of them being here.

So we should keep our eyes out for anything that might seem like little bits of worship or or

something of his stuff

interesting

I have the map here

if this is the correct entrance we should see two torches lit across from each other shortly past the entrance

You continue in through

maybe about 30 or 40 feet stepping through you can see the glimmer of blue beyond like this slight right turn.

And it's at that moment you see the scale of where the map is.

And it is a little off.

What looks small and truncated on that map is far longer and not quite a one-to-one for its hand-drawn purpose.

If you wish to use that map,

I would like for you to either make an instinct roll or a knowledge roll.

The choice is yours.

Would you like to do this, I will do a knowledge roll.

Yeah, if you want, if you

will spend a spend a hope to help with this.

Is there any way?

No, it doesn't really make sense.

You're gonna roll for me?

Ooh, yeah, I'll take it.

Okay.

That is going to be 11 plus 5, which is 16 plus 1 for my knowledge.

So 17 with hope.

17 with hope.

Go ahead and take that hope.

Pushing onward down

the cavern, using the map what you can to your torchlight as you step across

exposed, damp earth onto uncovered stone step,

a cracked dais.

and the surrounding rock and fallen rubble eventually giving way to structure to reinforced archways, some built recently, some uncovered from long ago.

A patchwork of the old age and the new trying to push deeper into this forgotten

interior.

You feel fairly comfortable in following through, but the sounds grow more and more still the further in you go.

There is no wind.

There is no air.

It is just quiet.

And every shifting of armor, every fall of heavy boot, scraping on stone

echoes ever so faintly.

That's gonna scatter out

one point, causing you to spook a bit.

Check the map.

Feeling fairly confident.

We should reach a T intersection not far, in which we will need to take a right.

You push in, and you find where there are two of these blue torches, and indeed like multiple tunnels that kind of fork off the different sections.

You can see there's a central part of rock that kind of rises up a bit where one of the torches is fixed to.

You see signs of tables and chairs, and this area was utilized as a kind of waypoint for the delvers or scholars as they were coming through.

You can see there's like red crystals kind of glowing in the walls to just kind of like keep the area somewhat lit.

Kind of like a fixed tube is some sort of an iron pick.

And you look in here and

just turn right.

But you kind of step in and look around and the direction of where you would come from and where you would sit kind of seems to fade a little bit here.

Are there footprints on the ground?

Go ahead and make.

Go ahead and make a knowledge roll for me.

Right.

Actually, knowledge or instinct on this one.

Oh, that knowledge.

Yeah.

Cocked.

Cocked.

Alright, that's

1890.

That's 20 with hope.

20 with hope.

Very good.

Looking around, you can see that there are many

signs of boot scuffs and footfalls throughout this chamber.

The heavy dust and dirt that has fallen either from the ceiling or from the progressive excavation.

This area looks like it was tunnels that were between the various like sculpted and carved vault walkways.

So this was a built intersection to try and connect disparate found portions of it.

So it's a little rougher hewn.

But you can see all manner of footsteps.

You can also see what looks like signs of partially excavated bodies.

I have low light also, so I can really see.

Yeah,

there are bits of bone, a skull emerging from a wall.

It looks like figures that may have been part of the vault when it originally collapsed, that have since become part of the surroundings.

Order them to see the skull kind of open its jaw, kind of half agape.

You feel like a flash of heat.

There's no wind.

There's no source of it beyond the torch that you've sat back behind, behind, but there is a a warmth that seems to be omnipresent.

Something's weird.

Maybe we should

just stay here for a second.

You glance and see this there's those the red crystals that are in the wall kind of flicker, and you look about and you see one that's kind of affixed to the ceiling above

that dislodges

and falls.

A slight flame flicker on it, and it

hits the ground and spreads out.

You step back instinctually.

It's like an odd

viscous, crimson, gelatinous

cluster that kind of shimmies

as it

comes to rest.

And you see just the gentlest lick of flame

around it, and that warmth becomes hot.

Staying, staying, staying where it is.

Yeah, it's not moving.

Is it in our path?

It's in the room with you.

And there are other of these gem crystal situations?

There are multitudes of them affixed to the walls around.

Yeah, they're just like red crystals settling.

That one's not making any moves towards us, it's just sort of bubbling on the ground.

It's just kind of sitting right there.

That's my instinct here.

Have I encountered one of these before?

No.

Controlled pace is okay.

As you turn to the rest of them, you feel the strong heat towards your back and glance over the skull that was protruding from the side of the stone and earth.

You can see now that red jelly is pushing through its sockets and out of its mouth.

And flames are licking up the side of the bone as it shh.

And as it does, it pulls the bones with it out.

And you watch as it

settles itself on the ground, this odd mixture of partially burned and charred bone kind of now slightly swirled within the skull kind of bobbing and floating.

I like Snyks' idea.

Maybe we run.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, let's run.

Running's great.

It's very scary.

You go in which direction do you run?

Do we follow the map or do we go backwards?

Give me the map!

How many ways are there in front of us?

Two.

We're in a team.

Are they glad?

Four to five?

Four to five.

They are definitely

moving towards us, right?

I'm gonna pick one.

One creature is standing up that we've seen.

I think I'm gonna

give this thing a quick, uh, quick attack, maybe.

So I'm going to, as we back up, I assume that we are backing up.

Oh, yeah.

I'm going to pull out a

like foot and a half long needle and just very gently tap right in the tear duct of my eye, my larger eye.

And what?

Just a little bit of water comes out, and then I'm just going to fire it off and turn it into an ice spike directly into this into this.

Go ahead and roll for me, please.

Disgusting and

awesome.

awesome yeah

that's uh yeah that's right

oh yay um so i actually that's nice i can because this is a six i can uh burn a stress because i have that power woohoo uh that's um

uh 16 with 16 uh 16 with oh thank you hope

take that hope and that is a success go ahead and roll damage for that please thank you for that and uh damage for this thing is

D6

plus my preview.

Four points of damage.

Four points of damage, alrighty.

August, I'm pretty sure everybody said we were going to run.

We are.

It doesn't mean I can't do this.

So the ice spike

shoots into it,

and you watch it.

The ice immediately turns to mist.

The heat of whatever this is begins to burn brightly, and the ice liquefies and steams out of it.

That was cool.

You pull that way, and you turn around in the direction where you were planning to flee, and you watch as clusters of bones that have been reaching out of the wall

the skeleton seem to clamber onto the ground and begin to reform.

I'll be right back.

We don't know.

Age of Umbra Map.

Umbra Map.

Oh!

Our tomb!

Oh,

what the shit!

There are felled columns!

Wonderful minis brought to us by our friends at Hero Forge.

So, as you guys were moving in through probably

this direction here,

and the events were happening, and this began to back up back where you came in.

That was where you had turned, and you were met with

one of these dissembled skeletons.

The rest of you,

as you would cast your ice spike, whereabouts would you have been?

Um, probably

I'll say the source of the impact that you fired at would be about here.

So I would have probably been uh where is where is Misty?

Uh Misty is right here.

Uh, Misty, where would you have been?

Jesus.

I feel like I

feel like I'm sort of taking up the rear.

Because I was sort of

uh

that's great.

Like I'd be yeah, I was probably over there with these folks and you would have turned around to go this way.

Definitely staying here.

So I would have been about right there.

Yeah, that's a huge

stone feathers.

I would probably be near Snicks.

Alrighty.

As we were both staring at a map.

And how high is the

other blob that had dropped down is right there.

Oh boy, look at that thing with the arms and the skulls coming out of this.

There's two blobs over there, and there's a skelly behind us.

Correct.

Oh boy.

We're from it.

We're good.

What are you doing, Mark?

Oh, boy.

I would warm it up.

I'd take the halberd out from behind the cloak as the furs and leather sort of move.

And using familiar force, I'll sort of whip it around my head once and take a one-two stride, and I'm going to swing it right for the middle of that

skelly

blobby's movement.

Heavy swing towards that one

That is

13 plus

15 to hit 15 hits with hope alrighty

And that is a 1d d10 plus 2 let's go

That's nine points of damage and I'll actually also burn one of my prayer dice using my class feature to add three additional points of damage if I can't That's 12.

12 points of damage.

12 points of damage.

That is going to be a severe wound to that one.

So that's three points of damage.

I'm sorry.

I'm sorry.

14 points of damage total.

Gotcha.

That's great.

That's severe damage.

Great.

So as you

strike with a Howard, it burns and sizzles and you carve it in two pieces.

And it uses reaction to split.

So there's two blobbies?

There's now two smaller flaming blobs.

What did you do?

I made a mistake.

What did you do?

Mistakes were made.

Where there was one, there was nothing.

I'll see.

I made a friend.

Oh, boy.

They immediately both

retort against you.

Both are doing strikes.

First of all is going to be a 20, not a natural 20, but a 20 to hit you.

And the second one is going to be a 9.

That is my evasion.

Alright, so yeah, so both hit hit you.

The first one strikes you.

Why are you so slow?

You take three points of magic damage

and become ignited.

You are now on fire

and will take

damage each time you roll until you manage to

extinguish it with a finesse roll.

With a finesse roll.

You or somebody else.

This is so bad.

This is so bad.

got ice spikes.

The one does five points of magic damage to you as you begin to burn still.

I'm going to burn one of my armor slots to negate that last one and only take one hit point out of the two.

You got it.

Okay.

All right, that finishes their reaction and their spotlight.

Who's up next?

How tall is the ceiling here?

In here, it's about, let's say, 10 feet at most.

It's not terribly high, except for at the top here, it's about 15 or so feet with only a five-foot

clearance.

So flying is a little iffy.

For now.

Anybody, or should I?

When August attacked with his ice spike, it didn't split into two, right?

No.

So it's maybe when you just slash it.

When you do dope-ass shit to it.

Sure.

That's what splits it.

Yeah.

As I turn around and I look and I see...

see the undead.

And I just say, be at rest, oh cursed one.

And I charge forward and I'm going to attack the skelly.

Yes, the skeleton.

Oh, cursed one.

All right, so you push past

Snyx and immediately rush towards that skeleton.

Go ahead.

Palm him in the face.

Go ahead and make your attack.

It's bad.

Seven with hope.

Seven with hope.

That is going to miss, but you take a hope.

So you swing wide.

It's meant to strike out towards the skeleton.

You hit the side of its shoulder, which the arm just kind of breaks off and the bones shatter, but it doesn't seem affected by the fact that you just removed one of its arms.

Its jaw hangs open, and it's going to rush towards you immediately.

Skeleton warrior is going to strike out at you.

Ooh, not great.

That's a five.

Miss, which is a miracle.

Misses, I'm going to go ahead and spend a fear.

That's true.

That's amazing.

I'm gonna spend a fear and spotlight this ooze.

It's gonna

come towards you, the one that you had ice-spiked rushing towards you, August.

It's gonna go ahead and attempt to strike out you with its ignite action.

Very nice.

Oh, that's gonna be a 20 again.

Wow.

To hit you.

That,

you know,

I'm

thinking of reducing.

Yeah.

That's just to hit.

I'll just take it.

I'll take it for now.

Okay.

Five points of magic damage.

And you also

burst into flame.

Oh, I mean, that's not a problem.

Everybody's on fire.

I hear the clattering of bones.

This is terrible.

As

shifting around the corner on this side, awakened by the sound and anger of your presence, two other skeletons seem to

reform and

begin to shamble in your direction.

Level one.

Where are we trying to go?

Remember the running thing?

Yes.

It was a good idea.

It wasn't a bad idea.

All right.

All alright.

I have an idea.

I would like to get

running.

Well, it will help everyone run, I think.

Oh, there you are.

Close range of everybody.

Except for these skeletons here.

If you want to move within the skeletons as well, you can move up.

Great.

Here, and I think.

Yeah, that'll get you in close range of both of them.

Okay.

I.

I don't know this body well, but I know that it was made for music

and was made for

praise and worship.

To worship and

so, um, I am going to cast enrapture.

Okay.

And I am going to sort of unfurl all eight of my wings

and

everyone starts to hear

it sounds like music but as the feathers sort of slowly start to move

it almost sounds like like a wind instrument but also like chimes but

in my favorite key B minor

so it's a little sad Do you have a favorite key?

I do.

I love it.

And it's like...

As the feathers move, there just is this beautiful, entrancing music.

And I'm going to try to get all of their attention.

Is it a single target or is it all targets within close range?

It is.

Fuck!

It's a single target.

Uh-uh.

Well, which of these targets are?

It says target, and I thought it was a bunch of targets.

That's okay.

Okay, so then let's do.

Do we want where we want to go?

Here?

Away.

Wherever it feels like there's an opening for us to go to, I would like to sort of draw them away from an opening.

Yeah.

That's not where we came from, correct?

No, we came from here.

So we're taking a left.

There's red.

Are we left or are we going blue?

Red's over there.

According to the map, we should be able to get a little bit of a data.

Because we want to go blue?

We don't know.

We don't know yet.

We don't know.

I mean, it seems like blue would be the choice.

Let's go with blue.

Well, how do we know which one it is?

We have to follow.

Just get rid of a guy and then we'll figure out where we're going at right after that.

Well I'm just gonna I'm I'm just gonna try to make space.

Gotcha.

So I'm gonna do this.

You're keeping space for this guy?

I'm just like keeping space for him.

Fair enough.

And which one are you focusing on?

I am focusing on one skeleton here.

Yeah, so if we're going

to

if we're going this way,

I want to attract those ones so that we can clear a path going that way.

Okay, so this skeleton here?

Yeah,

let's go with that one.

Sure.

All right, then go ahead and roll.

Spellcast against the target.

Okay, okay.

Which one am I gonna do?

I'm gonna do this one.

I'm gonna do these two.

Are we gonna roll good?

I don't know.

Oh, they did.

Let's go.

So I rolled with hope.

Okay.

And that is a 20 total.

No, wait.

I am adding my

presence as well.

22 with hope.

That's a success with hope.

Take that hope.

And what is the the effect of your ability?

So they are

enraptured with me, and they mark a stress.

Okay, good to know.

Alright, so you can mark a stress.

That's calm.

Looks it focuses on.

Once per rest.

Sorry, hold on a minute.

They become ten.

While enraptured, a target's attention is fixed on you, narrowing their field of view and drowning out any sound but your voice.

Once per rest on a success, you can mark a stress to force the enraptured target target to mark a stress as well.

Let's do it.

Sure, mark a stress.

It marked a stress as well.

All stress.

Matt, am I supposed to be adding my strength to my attacks?

Not unless you have an ability that lets you.

Okay, okay.

There are some valor cards that we can do though.

Okay.

It just says melee.

Strength.

Let me get this straight.

Strength is what you get to on the attack wall.

You're trying to draw them closer to you?

Yeah.

They're just skeletons.

I'm much bigger than them.

Oh, God.

Can I spend my turn looking at the map and trying to figure out the way out of here?

Yes, you may.

You can go ahead and make a knowledge or instinct roll to see where on the map you've been and where you are currently hoping to go.

I will use

an instinct roll, and I'm going to use my Ridgeborne

ability steady.

You have advantage on rolls to traverse dangerous

environments, navigate harsh environments.

That would be this, right?

Well, it's pretty harsh.

This is harsh rock.

And to give myself a bonus, I am going to use my experience while traveled.

I've looked at maps, some of them better than others.

You're Richborn, you're from the mountainous areas, and this is actually in a mountain.

So this all checks out.

Okay, okay, so I've got all kinds of advantage and all kinds of stuff going on here.

Oh, God.

You just shorted out

13 with with fear.

No, no.

I'm going to use my last prayer dice to give you plus four to that.

Ooh.

17 with fear.

17 with fear.

Okay.

Nice.

That's good.

That's

slow drag.

You looking at the map, you realize...

It was upside down!

I was following the instructions.

Indeed, you came in at an odd angle the way the first entrance was.

The path you probably want to take that is the shortest distance marked on there is this path.

where the blue flames are leading you it's the blue flames

that's what i said i say in between just being en flamber who's on the hood movie

oh god he's still on fire

to put his fire

if you want to move if you want to move over him

yeah if you want to immediately go again and then try and move over to put out his flame you can try it i i can also i can also throw yeah a ice bike right next to

Travi.

Yeah, that was just fear.

Is it your go, though?

It is, though.

Okay.

So, I'm saying, when it comes back, you can go ahead and drop it if you want.

I'm gonna wait.

I'm gonna

wait.

Well, on my end, the two

tiny oozes that have now been split from you are going to shore up

against you.

It's gonna be a 14 to hit you, yes,

and a 3 to hit you.

Misses.

All right, so with that, you take two points of magic damage as it lashes out at you.

And then

I'm going to go ahead and spend a fear on this end.

Two.

Too much.

I'm going to say the skeleton is going to go ahead and move up towards you.

And it's going to go ahead and take a swipe at you.

Misty.

That's going to be

a 10 to hit you?

No, it does not.

It misses you?

It does.

It just goes wide on you.

That's my...

What's your evasion?

Evasion.

11.

Then yeah, it just

went.

So it swings wide and you see it coming, you just kind of step out of the way.

Your wing kind of bats it away and just goes completely off center from its original strike course and

just strikes out and hits nothing to the left of you.

I'm going to spend one more fear to let this one, who is enraptured by you, to rush up and jump on top and attempt to strike at you with a rusty spear that it's pulled out from the nearby walls.

Sort of put my hands up.

It's gonna be a three.

So you just put your hands up, and whether it be through divine prominence of this stone body's original purpose, or through a clumsy-ass, barely summoned skeleton from the nearby ruins, it just does not find purchase upon your body with its weapon, and you are saved in the moment.

You know, I'm gonna

let that ride for now.

You guys can take your

I'm going to put an Ice Spike right

next to Idol, and if there's time, just because I can actually just summon them, and

they actually don't have to be attack.

It's not just an attack spell.

You can just make these ice spikes.

So you're shooting him with an ice spike?

No, I'm putting one right next to him.

Next to

Idol.

So what it says is

the ice spike.

Make a spellcast will summon a large ice spike with far range.

If you use it as a weapon, make a.

So assume that I'm not using it as a weapon.

I'm just putting ice that he can hopefully hug to help.

Got you.

I see what you're doing.

Cuddle the spike.

Okay.

Cuddle the spike.

So yeah.

So go ahead and roll a spellcast wolf.

All right.

That's a giant ice agree.

That's.

Can you make it look like a rocket pop?

That was the plan.

All right.

That's a

24 with fear.

That is a success, and I'll take a fear.

Also, because you are also on fire, as you're summoning this, the flames burn you for two points of magic damage.

Oh, I'll spend an armor to lower that to one.

Two points.

Well, two points of magic damage.

Oh, two points?

Yeah, I'll just take it.

Yeah, so you take another hit point.

Alrighty.

You conjure this ice spike and

send it.

It's a heavy cast, too.

This massive elongated pike of just like conjured icicle death, more or less.

Sticks in the ground and jams about a foot into the earth and a kind of exposed stone to the ground next to you.

You kind of pull back, and there's about a foot and a half of it still sticking out.

That like cold mist and air kind of around you.

Is he still on fire or is he okay?

Actually, I'm going to burn it.

No, he's still going to make that fire.

Well, the ice doesn't get rid of it.

He still has to do something to get rid of it.

Cool.

But that is there.

What I'll do is

I'll say if you want to use a finesse roll to get rid of this, or somebody does in the proximity, it'll give you advantage because of the ice proximity, too.

Let's do that.

May I assist and help with trying to flatten my wings?

Sure, if you'd like to, if you want to spend the hope to give him an extra.

Well, here's the thing.

He already has advantage because of the ice bike.

So you can either make the finesse roll yourself to put it out on him or he already has advantage.

The Vengeance Design, right?

Correct.

Okay.

Yeah.

Double H speed.

Look at that.

Stop it.

Boom.

Don't stop it.

All right.

So you gain a hope and hear stress if you have it.

The flames are put out.

And I'll say, as you were kind of flapping your wings while holding the skeletons attention,

it pulls up the icy misp around this icicle as it begins to melt.

You draw it up and

you kind of reach down and find the flames cast off your body.

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I'm going to take another swing at this guy in front of me.

Go for it.

Come on.

Come on.

Okay, this is better.

And 10 plus

14 with fear.

14 with fear.

That does hit.

But that works.

And then it can roll 2d10 and take the highest.

Ooh, that is a 10 baby.

So 13 damage to this to this boy.

13 damage.

That is going to be a severe wound.

This skeleton is

scattered into a cluster of shattered bone pieces

you hear them like sprinkle and bounce off the nearby stone walls from just the sheer volume of the impact uh

brother

i'm gonna haul ass towards this blue uh torch that we're gonna just move so you can move close distance or you can move far distance and make an agility roll to see if you can make the the run what do you want to do

Let's make a roll.

Why not?

So go ahead and roll an agility roll for me, please.

What's What's stopping me is if I trip and

drop rolls, but let's see.

Let's see.

This is so fun.

Yeah, that's going to be a six total.

A six total with fear.

A six with fear.

You go darting this way, and immediately your shin hits that box on the side.

There's a crate set with like pickaxes and excavating material.

You're like,

immediately, like your

knee cap pops out of the side a little bit.

You're like, oh,

I go ahead and mark a stress on that, and you only make half the distance.

That's okay.

That's fair.

I will take that extra fear as it comes back to me.

The two oozes that are still on the ground are...

Yep, and they will attempt to reignite you as they reach out.

Those are still there, y'all.

And they're still very fire-centric.

That's going to be eight to hit you.

Misses.

That misses your evasion?

It does.

Okay.

Evasion is nine.

Other one, that's going to be a four.

So they rolled like absolute dog shit that round.

Can I but I will spend a few immediately to spotlight this one that's sitting behind where you are trying looking at the map and you feel this like heated growth behind you as it's gonna come at you for that's gonna be a 16 to hit you.

Oh, my evasion is 13.

That hits.

That hits you.

The edge of the map begins to burn.

No, no, no.

Fire on the side.

You are also beginning to burn as you are ignited on flame next to your fun spider companion August there.

You do take

three points of magic damage from the flame.

Okay, that's not fun.

Ouch.

And I'm gonna

spend another few

and I'm gonna spotlight this skeleton here that's focused on you.

You've enraptured it and it is now entirely driven to destroy this statue, this beautiful relic of an age past that reminds it of a time that maybe it was not as corrupt and pulled from its dead space.

It has no conscious memory.

It is a skeleton raised by anchantic power.

It just wants to destroy you.

It is going to go ahead and come at you.

That is going to be an 11 hit?

Just hits.

That hits.

Okay.

So you take from this skeleton warrior as it strikes out at you

three points of physical damage.

Okay.

I'm rolling real bad on some of these damage rolls.

Which is good for you.

Yep.

And

I'm going to hold the rest of my fear.

Who wants to go?

I would like to be put out.

If anyone wants to help with that,

I'm just going to roll.

What is it?

It's that

finesse roll.

It's a finesse roll, yes.

I'm going to roll a finesse roll if anyone wants to

help.

We're over there, we're both on fire.

Yep.

Within

an un

no, a

slightly damaged ooze there that you struck originally.

All right, here we go.

Follow August with a

helper strike.

Let's go.

That's

that's a 15 with fear.

15 with fear?

15 is a success.

So you are no longer

a flame.

However, as you finish...

Oh, that was you right.

I'll pass this right over to you then.

No!

You managed to pat out the fire,

and just as you finish that process of doing so, brother, you can move on your turn as well, if you've wanted to on your turn.

I was hoping to

get the fuck out of here.

Yeah.

I was hoping to take flight.

TFO.

Take flight.

okay as in fly

so i will yeah you're a spider who flies so i i kind of shift my coat a little bit and tap

and you see two

moth wings oh come out of my back and if you're paying close attention Someone has clearly surgically implanted a living giant moth into my spinal cord, which is a completely separate entity, clearly with its own little mouth and head that is just bound there.

It's very silent.

You're welcome.

That is so cool.

Does everybody have wings?

My only phobia.

I hate you.

I will, I will use that dice to commentate you as flying, but you can get about that far.

And then, as that turn ends, it comes to me.

As everyone's charging that way, you have the mat that's now slightly burning.

You have a burning ooze that is focused on you from behind.

But I'm going to go ahead and activate and come at you immediately.

That's going to be a

11 to hit.

No, my evasion is 13.

Oh, so it misses you entirely.

I'm running around with my hair on fire.

Things back to you guys.

Who wants to go?

I'm going to take my Halberd, and because it's a very close weapon, I'm going to activate Spirit Weapon,

and it can fly from my hand to attack an adversary within close range and then return to me.

But I'm going to mark a stress and have it attack an additional target with the same attack roll and try to hit both of those blobs.

This is fucking giving me grief, man.

You got it.

So go ahead and make that attack roll.

Hey!

Green giant.

That's 17 with fear.

17 with fear.

That definitely hits.

So go ahead and roll damage.

KD10 plus 2, 8, 10, 10 points of physical damage.

As you describe how you spin this halberd and chuck it to slash through both and destroy both of these oozes.

I spin the halberd above my head again, but I open my palm and the staff starts to spin

right on the center and I'll throw it like I'm throwing a frisbee and you see it go

woof, and comes back around.

I catch it and spin it, and then tuck it under my arm.

It strikes part of the outer edge of that pillar, and like as it impacts, like holy sparks

screen off of it before you catch it and stuff the momentum in your hand, both of those flaming oozes

just dissipate onto the stonework and vanish.

The heat now absolved.

They can be cut!

We gotta go!

And I'll take off running towards the blue lantern.

Full far run or just a part run?

I'll do the full far run and make an adjustment.

Make an adjuvant, please.

Badass.

12, 17, plus.

20, dirty 20, with hope.

With hope, so take that hope, and you manage to go the full distance up to here.

Far range,

which will get you actually a little further into there.

He's going for speed.

In the tunnel, heading that direction.

Awesome.

All alone!

Finishing your go.

Since it's now come towards you a secondary time and you've dodged out of the way, it's going to see you flashing this light of this halberd and destroying the other ooze.

It turns its attention just to see you vanish around the corner and instead it's going to lunge towards the closest target in its sight, which is you, Brixton.

It's going to go ahead and come at you for a 14 to hit.

That definitely hits.

All right.

The flaming ooze comes out for five points of magic damage.

Okay.

And you are ignited.

Can I use my armor to, if I don't take any damage, do I not catch flame?

I'll say yeah.

Okay, I am going to use an armor point to knock that down to no damage.

Then you are not ignited.

It strings out towards you, and you just kind of shrug off your long collected relic of armor.

You quite literally, almost like a chef that can hold a cast iron pan, you see me parry it with an open palm,

which

affects me none.

Thanks to handling flame my whole life.

Yeah, I'll allow that.

Parry your weapon.

It affects me none.

It affects me, none.

And then, can I take, since I'm here and I'm fighting it, can I take and

I'm gonna go ahead and I don't wanna slice it, but I do want to like take my great sword and spin it around and almost use like the butt, like the hilt of my sword to see if I can just like bludgeon this thing.

Sure, go for it.

Almost like damping down the flame.

Roll the attack.

Okay, and then may I, while using my sword,

may I,

I want to use one of my Orderborn dedicated virtues

where I can have three sayings or values that are instilled upon me.

And once per rest, I don't know if it's short rest or long rest, I can describe how I'm embodying one of these principles and use a D20 as my hope die.

So I would like to use the strongest steel must first be tempered by the flame.

Given the heated, literally heated exchange that the source of fire has been amongst your friends, you see flicker in your eyes the deepest fire of the sacred pyre that keeps Desperlock safe and held.

And in that moment of inspiration, take your strike.

Amazing.

Hear me whisper it.

Sacred pyre.

Oh, that's amazing.

I rolled a 19 on my hope die.

So that's going to be

23 plus 2 to my strength, so 25 total.

That definitely hits.

Go ahead and roll damage.

Murder.

Great.

I will take take that 8, 9, 10, 11 total.

11 total.

11 damage.

Damn.

That's going to be a severe on that one.

All right.

It is.

You strike it with the butt of your sword and it's

it quivers angrily.

You kind of almost like pull the flame from it for a moment, almost like you're siphoning the essence of the sacred pyre.

Maybe that's just your imagination.

It looked cool in the moonlight.

I'm going to use a fear for its reaction to go ahead and split

into two ones.

And I'll just use a secondary one here.

It's a little bit smaller, but they're both barely holding on at this point.

They split into two.

They're both like

spotlights still on you guys.

So, do you want to keep running?

Or?

Oh, you can do whatever you want.

Go, you go.

I just want to put out the fire.

I was about to help anyway, so I can

before you do, yeah, I can throw a spike down for you.

Oh, nice.

I mean, there seems to be like little green puddles everywhere, or is that just the shininess of the map?

Yeah,

you are You are exploding.

No, I will say that there are damp elements of like

water and groundwater that's like seeped through and caused small puddles.

I'm going to jam the map into one of those puddles to try to put it out.

You put out the map without an issue.

And then try to

roll around and just splash on the bottom.

I'm not firing while you're rolling around.

So go ahead and make a finess roll for me to see if you can put out the flame.

Okay, let's do it.

13 with hope.

13 with hope is not going to succeed.

What?

It's not going to succeed.

But I get a hope.

You get a hope, but you also take

three points of magic damage as the fire continues to burn you as you're rolling on the ground.

Stop, drop, and roll.

Not working against this.

It's not working against this.

Do I still have movement or is that

it for this turn?

So you can move, but then the spotlight's going to come back.

Sure, I'm going to do what I do best, and I'm just going to run.

I'm going to run this way, though.

Okay.

Towards the bottom.

So you can get there.

That's that.

Great.

Away from danger, I hope.

Alright.

Now, spotlight's back to me.

I'm gonna go ahead and...

One of the other skeleton aside here is that's still up against you.

The other one is just missing, and Todd's gonna go ahead and try and come at you with like this gnarly-looking axe, Misty.

And that's gonna be a 16 to hit.

Does that hit you?

All right, for that, Misty, you take four points of physical damage.

The axe...

Impacts in your forearms as you guard it.

I am your shield.

Oh.

I'm near Misty.

You

Okay.

So, you want to go ahead and step in and take that blow?

Yeah, emboldened by the flame

and probably my imagination.

See my flaming hand.

I'm just going to reach in front.

Yeah, as the swing comes down, all of a sudden out of nowhere, Brixton's hand grabs the axe and pulls it down onto her.

You take four points of physical damage instead.

Oh!

I will, that's okay.

I'm going to use an armor to negate that.

You got it.

all righty Thank you

That was so kind you must be protected.

It is now back to you

I'm actually finally gonna take that ice spike and drop it

Next to

okay, go ahead and roll for spell time making my little spell time

That's ooh, that's two nines.

Hey, dang, you guys are critting up a storm.

This is wild.

All right, so clear that stress and take that hope.

And that strikes immediately next to you.

You will get advantage on your next attempt to alleviate that flame.

Do you want to stay put or do you want to move?

Well, is anybody in

melee with me or no?

Currently, no.

You are then very close to that skeleton in the top, but

I'm going to start rolling down this way.

I'm not going to go double speed because I want to be able to help out with combat.

But yeah, I'm still flying and I'm just going to keep an eye on everyone because I'm going to start trying to put you up here.

I'm keeping an eye on things perfection.

That'll work.

Alrighty, so with you there,

are you trying to put it?

I'm gonna try one more time to hug the ice spike and see if it can help release.

Have advantage because of the ice spike's proximity.

Great.

18, 19 with fear.

With fear, I'll take that.

Fear, but you are no longer engulfed in the ooze's flame.

Prodding my eye over and over again with this buddy meebles.

Thank you, Spider-Man.

Everyone gets one.

You can move

right there.

At that distance around the corner, if you're still trying to

coming back to me,

this overall skeleton up top is going to try and they're trying to carve away at this statue that's drawn their attention, and either they continue to miss or somebody else keeps getting in the way.

Whatever necrotic force has pushed them to this semi-state of terrorizing consciousness, they are driven to try and chisel away at you.

The The one on top is going to go ahead and strike at you.

That's going to be 10 to hit you.

Does not hit?

That misses.

I'm going to spend a fear that I just got to have the other one strike at you.

Same role.

Wow.

I'm going to step one more fear.

Yeah.

And then,

because they've both been activated this turn, they don't have relentless.

I can't activate them again.

This ooze is going to

slip through at the top and is going to attempt to strike at you from behind.

that's a seven.

Say it.

I'm gonna leave it at that.

You could just spend one more fear.

I'm okay.

Is everybody out of the vicinity?

Is Idol

making his way down?

Oh, he's already down there.

Yeah, most everyone's there.

It's just behind me.

I'm right behind.

You're right behind.

Ever

Misty.

The two of you kind of hold on three at the moment.

All right.

Shall we run?

Let's run.

Okay, I'm gonna try to step down and start trying to run towards the a full run or just through close distance?

Just close distance.

Okay.

Close the distance.

Okay.

You wanna do anything else on your turn?

I don't think so.

If you want to roll, if you wanna go to a far distance, you can make an agility check if you'd like to.

See if you can do it.

Up to you.

Sure.

I'll love it.

Why not?

Let's go.

Let's do it.

So you would be here.

Go ahead and roll into it.

Nothing to add.

So, oh, well.

Nine with hope.

Nine with hope.

That's not going to succeed, unfortunately.

The terrain here is a little more difficult.

So you only get a close distance at the end.

You get a hope, but that brings it back to me.

The two slimes that are still up there,

the one skeleton that's focused on you at this point.

I'm going to go ahead and do that.

This skeleton, it's going to take a chunk out of you.

Yeah, that's okay.

It wants to so badly.

I'm going to go ahead and activate it.

Coming at you.

There we go.

That's going to be a 13 to hit.

It hits.

Okay.

Okay.

The skeleton hits you for three points of physical damage.

And it feels vindicated.

I'm going to use an armor.

I'm so excited.

I'm going to use an armor to get rid of it.

It feels dejected.

Hate statues now.

And I'm just going to get rid of that.

Questions, it's all all present.

You said these

oozes are barely hanging on that I've been carrying.

Cloven oozes.

What do you want to do?

I tell Misty, I'm right behind you.

I'm gonna swing at them and I'm just gonna try.

I'm gonna pick one.

I might do a whirlwind if it succeeds.

Let's go.

Please fucking work.

Okay.

And it's an 11 to hit with hope.

That hits.

Okay.

Okay.

I'm going to spin a hope into a whirlwind and

hit everything within my range.

Wait, but you just got a hope.

Because you rolled with a break.

I rolled with a hope.

I keep that.

Yep.

You're welcome, girl.

All right, so how much damage?

So that will be

icky.

Hopefully, it's enough, though.

Five damage for both.

Five damage does one hit point to both of them.

As you carve through

Yes

Both of the oozes are splattered against the rocks their flames subsiding and vanishing great and now I follow after Misty.

Okay.

Are you going for a full far sprint?

You know after I ate shit last time I'm gonna keep it keep it calm and keep it smooth.

I'm feeling like a badass.

Yeah.

Okay.

Since we're there, I'm gonna take my turn since well, no, you're you do you wanna I'm running.

Yeah, do you wanna yeah do do what you do.

I was just gonna throw an ice spike at that very tall skeleton that's headed to the bottom.

Let's go.

Yeah.

That's 14 with hope.

All right.

Let's take that hope.

That's a success.

Go ahead and roll damage.

All right.

Ice spike is a d6.

That's a four.

A four.

That's going to be two hit points, which is enough to shatter it.

Let's go.

That skeleton gets blown apart.

And now I'm flying back.

We'll say at this point, as you all begin to flee into here, the speed of the skeleton is not quite enough to keep up.

And as you begin to vanish down, further, further, down that path that you had noticed on the map, you can no longer hear the skittering of bone, just the silence of the interior cave.

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Okay.

Okay, so dripping goo that catches things on fire.

Probably the worst thing we're gonna encounter.

Yeah.

Why would you say something like that?

That's it.

That's the scariest part.

No, no, he's being sarcastic.

Yeah.

Oh, don't listen, Andy.

That human thing where the humor is implied, but I understand it's this is the same type of thing.

The lying is funny.

Yes.

Okay.

Oh, boy.

Brixton, you

were very powerful back then.

Oh, my goodness, you're a warrior.

A true warrior.

I thought that you just were a f a fire keeper.

Yes, you see i um

i've been tending to the flame for about 15 years now

but

it gets maddening

doing the same thing day in day out year after year

i don't actually know how much time i've spent at the top of that tower but a handful of years ago

curiosity got the best of me

So I made friends with a few of the Delvers and

they let me sneak sneak on by.

Sneak on by?

Like to train with them?

No, just

take walks.

Outside the wall?

Outside the wall in the vaults.

Wow.

I would do it off hours when everyone else was asleeping.

One day,

when I came through here, you know, I started off small.

100 meters at first,

200 meters, 300 meters.

I was quite the coward when I first came down.

But over time, I was more and more boldened.

The flame had spoke to me.

The pyre.

And then I came across a body.

A skeleton.

And it had this armor.

Oh.

And.

I don't know, something inside her.

It was almost as if

the skeleton's eyes lit up with flame and it called to me and

I knew

this armor was meant for me.

This was to be my new calling.

This was my destiny.

This just happened right now.

What

the skeleton and the armor?

Are you talking about what just happened?

No, no, no.

This was not that long ago,

a handful of months at most.

I don't know, I don't know.

So, it happened twice.

This is the second set of skeletons on fire that

the one she's talking about was dead.

Do I think she's telling us the entire truth about how she got that armor?

Uh, if you want to make an instinct roll, you can make an advantage on detecting

phase

a present role.

Sure, it just seems like a weird coincidence, is all I'm saying.

That one's kind of cocked.

I'll say yours is a reaction roll, so

you don't get hope or fear on this one, but it's a reaction roll.

Okay.

15 with hope.

Okay, I definitely did not roll that.

I rolled a 11.

Okay.

Um.

So you can take a hope and express what he senses about your presentation.

What she's saying

she believes at least.

I don't know.

Maybe she's a little unhinged.

Oh boy.

Maybe doing nothing but staring at fire for over a decade.

Maybe that body was still alive when the armor was on it.

I don't know.

I don't know.

She saw a dead man.

His eyes lit up in flame because she sees flame everywhere.

And

I would say the armor does not look current.

Got it.

This is definitely

armor from the old world, from the Knights of Yore, from the

I don't know who these you help me out here.

It's definitely the insignias on them that you've kept mostly covered when you left Desperlock

themselves hold the banner image of the old amber reach.

This was armor that adorned a decorated soldier of the armies of the old world

and those that were given station in the military, the military beneath the God King.

I don't know who the valiant person was who wore this, but I just want to do them honor.

I think you already have to wear these vestments.

It is

not a station that I take lately.

I'm just gonna go up and sort of trace each of the sigils or anything that's on there

to just try to see if they feel familiar to me.

You glance into it and you place your finger across the beautiful, like, metal tooling and design work along the kind of top of the breastplate where it meets, meets like the clavicle in the...

Can you just trace it?

It's so beautifully made.

As you do, your consciousness kind of falls into a haze

and you hear suddenly this distant echo of hundreds of shields clattering and together and you see from

a window an army moving

brightest day the bluest of sky

and

soldiers off

to some conquest

A flash of a time forgotten, a memory that's yours, Not yours.

You don't remember this, but you do now.

Why?

You pull back and you withdraw your fingers from her breastplate.

I just saw visions of...

of battle.

I think this is a very incredible piece that you're wearing.

I took great care care to hide it from the scholars.

I know if

they saw me with such a relic,

they would surely remove it from my person.

But it's not it's all for them.

It was meant for me.

It was meant for me

to maybe bring back

the valiant knights that once were.

Of course.

It was my destiny.

Well, you definitely were impressive.

You fought with

strength and

steadfast passion.

Yes.

But we should really keep going, don't you think?

Yes, of course.

I mean, I figure we'll walk and talk.

This is a walk-in talker.

Yes, a walk-in talker.

While looking out for droplets of flaving.

Fair, fair.

Who is taking the current turn on the newly

analyzed map?

I can keep leading if

you would like

instinct or knowledge, your choice.

Instinct, but do I get to keep using this advantage on navigation through harsh environments or no?

As your ability as a ridgeborne.

I'd allow it because this is a subterranean, mountainous region.

Alright.

That is a 16 with hope.

Nice.

Alright, take that home.

You follow the map now that you've oriented yourselves, and you see now where there was a bit of confusion in the early

analyzing of the placement of where these various intersections were.

There was an earlier intersection that was missed in the shadow and had set you further ahead than you had anticipated.

But now that you've reoriented yourselves, you follow the line as it was written and follow the next blue torch and the next blue torch.

The stillness and quiet of these caverns continuing until you curve around one of the fresh excavations.

A what was once a solid rock wall that's been recently broken out and braced on all sides.

Here you can see there's gathered tools on each side where the recent excavation team had broken through and left what they didn't need to use at the time.

Because when they broke through this wall, it opened up into another chamber.

A still partially collapsed stone pathway, but as it opened up wider and curved upward, it almost stepped into a larger area with a massive, beautiful, sculpted gate.

You kind of come around the corner and just see it there, and you can see where the gate itself sits.

The smell of

faint scent of burned flesh still hanging in the air.

Any sign of blue torches in this room?

There are two blue torches, one set closest to you, up above part of the wall, and one further back near where the gate is.

And what little bit of flicker of blue light there is, you can see the shadowed shapes of burnt corpses strewn across the ground,

as well as a large armored corpse that looks to have been carved and set

along what was some sort of a battle here.

How many bodies do we spot?

You can see four bodies.

Four?

That's these are the guys who died.

Do any of these look familiar to you?

Do I recognize any of

any of the corpses?

Do you guys enter towards the site?

Yeah.

Okay.

As you move and kind of clamber up the rock, indeed you

do begin to recognize some of these vigil members, or at least the armor and the bits of pieces you've seen.

Their features features are gone.

Their bodies are charred corpses, as is

standard for those who fall under the corruption of the umbra.

If a body is not destroyed within a period of time, it will rise again.

So those who fell here were

burned.

But there was also the massive kind of armored fiend.

You heard Rascello speak of a gate guardian that they felled when they were here, and you can see its body strewn out, its limbs elongated, its

kind of cloaked hood, a skeletal from what bit you can see peeking out from underneath, exaggerated in size, and its neck itself almost arched backward, what little bit of the jaw you can see.

The hood that's over it adorned with a small crown that almost has like gold leaves kind of sculpted through it.

It's a

large kind of wholly emblazoned shield on one arm kind of pressed out where its bony fingers are like broken off and now kind of scattered a few feet from its hand.

A massive scythe-like hooked blade that itself extends almost seven feet to one side, itself laying partially jammed into the stone off to the side.

A great fight took place here, definitely.

I'm going to go up to some of the fallen vigil soldiers and just sort of collapse to my knees.

It's just so horrible that they would die like this, and I'm going to be rifling through their pockets.

It's just, they're our brothers and sisters, and they just

seeing if I can find anything, any trin, anything to take.

Yeah, I'll say, make a finesse roll for me if you don't mind.

Okay.

Did they also burn that guardian?

No.

Or does that need not need?

And the guardian's the one that has the crown, right?

Correct.

But no,

it's the

those who are mortal and died.

Those are the ones that need to be be burned

20 with hope 20 with hope take that hope

yes in fact you

uncover on that body

an

an amber reach round shield that seems to have been scavenged from the ruins It's a round shield,

as well as what looks to be a small pouch.

This pouch is almost burned, but not to the point where the interior of it was destroyed.

There is a

what's called an armor stitcher.

It is a

series of metallic patches and an alchemical liquid that can be used to set it over damaged armor to repair it, rather, rather than duct tape.

Duct tape, Universal Bonda, stuck it.

Yep.

Yes.

Cool.

Duct tape.

Yeah, I'm going to take these items and I realize that my pack is kind of full.

This is a weird time to do this,

August, but can I deliver your stuff to you now?

I kind of need the room.

Will you take delivery in this cave of death and wonder?

It is COD, so

what have you got there?

I've got some good stuff for you that you asked for.

Yeah, no, what do you got that you need to make room for?

Oh, no, it's just junk.

It's just junk.

Is it?

Yeah.

No, let's take a look at that.

It's just no, no, no, it's going to be a good one.

I'm going to take a, I'm going to attempt to grab

at least one of the smallest.

I'm going to try and grab the pouch with Press of Digitation.

Okay.

So

it's a sizable object.

I will say, go ahead and make a finesse roll against you rolling.

So excited.

A reaction roll of instinct.

This is for you two.

It's sensitive.

Do I get to add my instinct to this?

Yes, you do.

Oof.

Twelve with hope.

Oh, there's no.

Eight with hope.

So you

pluck it and you watch as there's this like tug on the pouch that you had just acquired and as it tries to pull away you kind of grasp it and it pulls away.

You look over and see the look in August's eyes.

I'll take my stuff later.

Look, I'll show you what this is, all right?

I'd let go.

I'll show you what this is.

It's some sort of thing for fixing armor.

It seems pretty cool.

That's bloody brilliant.

Yeah, expensive.

Whoever has their armor damaged can use it.

Of course, if you had any armor, you could too.

But I don't think you know what that is.

You're a strong fighter.

You're a spider moth.

I'm really not a strong fighter.

But I don't need it.

I don't need it.

Just, you know, show what you got.

That's all.

But I did have stuff for you from earlier.

The stuff you requested.

You wanted meat.

I got you a few ounces of pain beast meat.

All right.

All right.

That'll do.

You asked for some juniper berries.

They're a little rotten.

Okay, here they are.

I'll take them.

Thanks.

And I reached into my pouch.

You asked for some fabric.

It's gray.

Later.

Later.

Gray linen.

I couldn't find a whole book on etiquette, but I did find this.

It's a pamphlet about dress codes for formal occasions.

That's it, actually.

The pamphlet will fit in my bag.

While they're having this conversation, and you're kind of taking in the surroundings here, you can see the massive double gate that...

was noted by Raskello and the team where this fight took place, that he believes to be the gate that leads to the

Firmaments Hero.

The right-hand side of the gate is slightly pushed in

did you check the guardian for anything

is that what you were checking i didn't check anybody i was mourning the loss of these fine fine men but did you get the

channel

should go check that one

are there footprints leading into that door by the way i'm sure the the people in the works the smithy and the leather work people would appreciate the crown

i agree with you you.

We could all also use it for humor by

wearing it and saying that we're that

we're

the guardian.

Like ha ha ha, this is a joke.

It's actually pretty funny.

It's not bad.

Humor.

Yes.

As you walk outside the gate where it's ajar, you can see it's about two feet wide.

Where it is, there's a part of the gate, part of like the wooden frame of it, where it looks like a small

like a nail of some kind was driven into it, where a hanging

trinket like a bone that's been tied with twine and has like carvings and it has been set there and there is a bloody handprint that is pressed and smeared against it and indeed there is a trail of blood from inside this room and beyond the gate.

This is Velk's though.

Remember I told you he has bones and tea leaves, all the stuff.

This is he was here.

Green tea leaves and whatnot.

Yes, all right.

And you're inspecting the body of the Guardian?

If that's what you guys would like me to do, I'd be happy to.

Sure.

I'll go over and inspect the crown.

It's not too heavy for you.

Oh,

the crown is not too heavy for you.

It is.

But I'll go check it out.

Okay.

How big is the crown?

Did you say?

The guardian.

It's about, it's a little, it's like a human-size, a little, a little larger.

Like I said,

the features are exaggerated, but you go in like a percussion, grab the crown, press the digitation just

faster than you can expect.

Expect suddenly, a massive, gauntleted, bony skeletal hand

with the fingers reformed, and the rest of you watch with lightning speed as the guardian grabs onto your forearm and

begins to rise up from its broken space.

I'll be right back, Gira.

No!

Why won't you grab the crown?

Why would you

do that?

Dumb idea!

I need a little help setting this for you.

Oh, God.

Here's.

So just give me a second.

Oh, boy.

Oh, my gosh.

Oh, boy.

Ready.

Who has multiple armor slots down?

Me, but I can recover them.

You have two down.

Two of them by five.

If I can get a little help

bringing this over, buddy.

I can also give somebody

a boy.

Wow!

Whoa, look at the gate!

gate!

That looks so cool.

Wow.

Wow.

That crush your fingers is some wedding cake.

So, as you had walked up to the gate here,

and you all had been conversing

back around this space, I want to do

over here.

Oh, that's the guardian?

No, the guardian I haven't taxed yet.

Oh.

Oh, my God.

Just right into the honeypot, we did.

As it rises.

Oh, that's so sick.

Oh, he's lunged over.

We see

the once holy warrior who is tasked with preventing this gate from breaching for those unworthy of the monastery's great holy order, itself over time taken by the corruption of the umbra and other powers that sink deep into the roots of this mountain leave it a mockery of its once holy self

as it's clasped onto your wrist snyx it's gonna go ahead and make a sweeping strike

it's going to shift forward slightly and as part of its sweeping strike i will spend a fear to do that and it makes an attack against every PC within very close range.

It takes its massive, scythe-like blade, and

that's going to be a

14 against both you, and

let's see, that'd be Misty.

Yeah, okay.

Hits.

Hits both of you?

Yeah.

Alright, so both of you take...

Wait, what did you roll?

Sorry?

14.

14.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, that hits.

Oof.

It's going to be 11 points of physical damage on both of you.

I am.

Who's rough?

Who's I'll reduce that by one armor?

I only have one, and I can reduce.

I have two armor.

We'll just.

How many points of damage?

14?

No, that was

11.

11?

Sorry?

I'm near Misty.

I am your shield.

I'm gonna take it.

I'm gonna marcus stress and take it.

I am your shield.

Alrighty.

So you take that 11 points of physical damage.

Yes, I will reduce it by one.

That's to what I do.

That's what I do.

Okay, wait, so I just take one.

You take no damage because she's not going to be able to do it.

I take no damage because you took two.

Okay, okay.

And I just cheese one because I'm reducing it.

I will go ahead and do my frontline tank ability where I can spend three hope to refill two armor slots.

Alright, so you use your hope ability to regain some armor slots?

Yeah.

You got it.

The gate guardian now, its head, you can't even see its eyes.

Where the crown sets upon its hood, the cloth blocks the top of its skull.

You just see the nose and the jaw.

It's sucking up,

hang open, and the smell of decay just emanates from it.

This black shadow almost just wafts off of it as it moves.

What are you going to do?

I'm going to reach back with the halberd, and as I swing it behind me, I thrust the staff forward and I'm going to cast bolt beacon towards the guardian.

Let's go.

Roll for yourself.

I'll make a spell casting roll against the target within far range.

That is a 14, 15, 16, 16 with fear.

With fear.

That is a success though.

All right.

I'll take that fear.

So I'll do d8 plus

two magic using my proficiency.

That's 12 points of damage, and the target becomes temporarily vulnerable and glows brightly until his condition is completely damaged.

Magical damage, correct?

Magical, yes.

Okay, got you.

All of a sudden you blast it with this divine power as it burns around it.

The shadow that was seeping off of it suddenly gets scattered in the moment and you watch as this the cracks in its armor are now glowing from the inside like they're molten giving you direction on where to strike for maximum impact.

Okay, so

right now the next magical attack

does what?

He is vulnerable temporarily.

So what does that mean to a magical attack?

Exactly.

It just means temporarily vulnerable.

Yes.

Yes.

So vulnerable means attacks means to have advantage.

However, roll with fear, which brings it to me.

Okay.

Yes.

D6.

So, he's going to go ahead and

leap in the air with an unnatural speed, almost like a Jack Skellington jump in the air.

And then

land right behind all of you, spend that fear

and do another sweeping strike.

Whoosh with its massive curved blade.

It's going to be coming at all three of you within close range, which is going to be Misty, Brixton, and Snyx.

That's going to be a 16 to hit.

That's not me.

That hits all of us.

That's not me.

Sorry.

That's Brixton, Misty, and Idol.

Yes.

That hits.

That hits us nine points of physical damage to all three of you with one heavy strike.

I'm going to.

Very close.

Nine points of heavy damage?

Nine points of physical damage.

I'm going to use an armor.

I'm going to use an armor.

Who needs armor, by the way?

I'll take it.

I'll take it for now.

Wow.

Does anybody need armor, by the way?

I know.

I know.

Huh?

Does anybody need armor?

Not yet.

Okay.

It's back to you guys.

Who's doing what?

Anyone?

Anyone need armor?

Sure, everybody does.

Okay, good to know.

And your...

You can repair armor at downtime.

That allows you to do it.

No, I have to.

If you get to downtime.

That's true.

I know.

Gotta survive first.

Stop it.

So I'm gonna try, I'm gonna let my wings out again.

I'm gonna

give my poor moth a little meat.

All right.

And then we're gonna take off again.

All right.

And I'm gonna try and get within close range.

Yes, it does.

I'm gonna feed my moth a little meat.

Close meat.

I'm trying to get in.

How close is close range?

Close range is about

there.

Turn out are gonna be over up here would be close.

Yeah, I'll be up.

I'm gonna pop up there and I'm going to

suddenly a bunch of extra arms

come out that have been hiding in the back of

my coat, kind of make their way out and make their way out.

And we all just sort of pass this little needle around as it just starts to take some of my spider thread and make this little sigil as it goes.

And then we cast it out and I'm doing arcane barrage as this fires at

this jerk right over here.

I don't roll for this.

Nope.

It just goes on.

So I assume that it still means that the condition that he's talking about, about the next one having advantage, doesn't change.

Well, does it say the next one has advantage?

Or does it, or it's vulnerable?

Travi.

Travis.

Yeah, just temporarily vulnerable.

Right.

Temporarily vulnerable means until I spend a fear to get rid of it.

Oh, well, in that case, this doesn't have a, so I can just, I'm going to spend,

let's see, how much hope am I going to put into this?

One, two, three.

Let's put four hope into this.

Whoa, what is what?

That's a live universe.

That's 46 46 magic damage

as August just unleashes that this this massive barrage of arcane energy that blasts through all these different silken threads

Riding along them like little magical cable cars.

That's so cool so cool

11 points of damage 11 points of magical damage that makes it a minor a major wound.

That's two points two hit points it marks on that one.

It gets impacted multiple times bone splinters and armor density and it kind of pulls back to this full backward arc.

Stays there for a second.

Back up, and it's now looking up at you.

Oh, God.

It's like the hood still covering its eyes.

Anyone?

I'm going to go

real quick.

Is it still our turn?

Yeah.

I want to go unstoppable.

Which is my classed feature as a guardian.

And then I guess I'm going whack at it and that's what I do.

Um okay, here we go

Come on, wait.

Do I still ooh, that's pretty good.

Do I still have advantage on this?

Is he still vulnerable?

He's still vulnerable.

I think it doesn't really matter at this point.

Yeah, that's fine.

Um, so that's gonna be 10, 21, 23 to hit.

That hits.

Okay.

And then that is going to be

let me just make sure I'm doing everything correct here.

Yeah.

Double sevens on my damage die.

So that's going to be seven, eight, nine, ten, plus the one for my unstoppable die.

So that's 11.

11 damage.

11 damage.

You strike it heavily with your weapon.

And as you impact, this like glow from its holy buckler seems to emanate for a second.

And you hit, and your weapon seems to meet resistance, some sort of magical protection, and your blade only does half damage, physical resistance from your strike.

So it only marks one hit point.

It's also, I'm going to spend a fear to remove its vulnerability,

and then also, as a reaction to that, spend a fear

to

use its hallowed cry.

This silent beast now, after the strike and impact, have it taken physical damage from you.

It looks up and goes,

and as it screams out,

two of the burned bodies

begin to climb out, the bones pushing out of the burned flesh and crawling towards you.

You know, there is a half-open door.

We

shut the door.

There's these two dredge skeletons

that arise from the bodies here and immediately activate.

You could run.

They,

as part of their spotlight, shift forward

and they're going to, this one's going to go ahead and move up to here to you, idle,

as the two of them.

And they're going to make a group attack.

Oh, boy.

To spend a fear on that.

We can always do a like velocity.

We should do that too.

Yeah, we can do some tag team attacks.

What you got?

That's going to be 17 to hit you.

Yes, for sure.

So you take...

Two points of physical damage

from both of those dredges of meat.

Go away.

Okay.

Alrighty.

And when you roll with hope or fear on you, is it with fear?

Thank you.

So I'm going to take that fear back.

And now he's going to shift.

No, he's going to hold on to this right here.

He's in a good position.

He's going to spend a fear again to make another sweeping strike against this crew.

That's going to be a 19 on the die, which for an Umbertouch creature is a crit.

Oh, no.

So,

he's eating who?

He's doing another sweeping strike against all three of you right there.

Wait, so

never mind.

I don't have enough hope for that.

Carry on.

You just spent four hope.

Oh, God.

Never mind.

That's going to be 16 points of physical damage to Brixton, to Misty, and to Idle.

Yep.

Okay.

Okay, while I am unstoppable, my damage thresholds are reduced down.

So I'm going to spin one armor to take no damage from that.

Hasn't done damage yet.

Just hits.

No, I just did 16 points of physical damage to all three.

Oh, I thought it was 16 points.

I understand.

I did too.

No, I rolled a nitral 19, which is right, because that's what you were saying was a crit for a number touchdown.

So

shit.

Okay.

Oh, where's the thing I can do?

So that's severe.

I gotta do an armor for that.

Yeah, yep.

Okay.

So if I do one armor, that just takes you down to the next threshold.

She's gonna major, yeah.

Fuck.

Okay.

We gotta get out of here.

We gotta run to the door and maybe shut the door behind us.

You can use hope, right, to regain armor?

No, she has an ability to do that.

That's a good idea.

So that is specifically to that.

It's all good.

Good looking out of the way.

But it is back to you guys.

What do you want to do?

Fuck.

I'm going to run into the middle of this mess.

Oh, Jesus.

Over here.

Stupid.

We got to go.

Yep, we got to go.

Oh, shit.

And I'm going to whip out

my boomerang.

Let's go.

It's dirty.

It's gross.

It's rusty.

I'm going to just fucking chuck it at the big guy.

Let's go.

Roll an attack.

Okay.

I'm going to add a bunch of stuff to it.

First, I'm going to add my Wayfinder feature.

I can mark a stress to add an extra damage dice.

I guess I should see if I hit it first, right?

Um, well, you add it before you roll, okay.

So, yeah, so I'll do that.

I'm marking a stress to double the damage dice.

All right, I'm gonna roll to see if I hit.

Do you want do you want

help trying to hit?

I mean, yes, but you don't have very much hope to spend.

No, I don't.

Okay, I won't wait.

Uh, all right, oh, God, please work

17

to hit with fear 17 hits okay

and that is

2d10 plus 2

that's 17 damage and now I will spend three hope

to hold them off that will make my attack

the boomerang will hit him and then hit both of the other guys okay is it physical damage this is magic damage okay This is

not resistant to magic damage.

That's 13 damage.

What did I say?

I think it was.

No, it was a huge damage.

Sorry, it was

17.

17.

I'll take it.

Damn.

Yes, it was 17 because I rolled 15 plus two.

Yes.

How do you want to do that?

He got the howdy dirty damage.

We're the boomerang.

We're the boomerang.

Yes, how'd you do that?

Does it kill all three of us?

Oh, yeah.

That's the lamest shit I've ever heard.

You're so mad.

That's awesome.

Oh, my God.

I'm discussing death moves over here.

I had one in my lap and I was like,

yes.

Okay.

I run into the fray with my new friends,

shaking with fear,

unable

to look at what I'm doing.

I cover my eyes and I throw the boomerang as hard as I can,

hoping that someone will see how cool this is.

And the boomerang will clang cling clang all the way around

and come right back in the boomerang

you throw and it misses the guardian it spins around

destroys one of the skeletons destroys the other you miss it on the return and then it shh sticks into the shield of the guardian

the magical runes

glow and then detonate the shield exploding and the boomerang itself uh seems to strike into the ceiling whoa

The guardian looks up as a rock.

Amazing.

With your boomerang intact.

What the fuck?

That was amazing.

We gotta get out of here.

Let's go.

End the dog.

Wait, did you get the crown?

No,

should I get the crown?

Alright.

Wait, how much damage does your boomerang do?

It just did 17 damage because I doubled it and I did all sorts of things.

i did everything

i used everything retrieve your boomerang

the the uh the gate guardian is now scattered into multiple pieces it's someone's blade is thrown off and stuck into the wall yeah we've seen that before his fingers were off the came back on

it as your group pushes through the door the blood smear of a previous uh

figure who had stepped through grab the little bone on the thread you're going to the thread you um you're all it takes a moment for you all to pull this door close

You're in the darkness beyond, where the torchlight doesn't reach, you ignited torch to light the space.

And there is a staircase that just ascends, a beautiful, smooth, marbled staircase that climbs up.

And that's where we're gonna finish this episode.

Come on!

Give us more!

Just try to get built!

We'll pick up there next time.

We're turning going and turning back, right?

We're turning back.

We got to get built.

Just like 10 more minutes.

You guys just went this way.

What?

No, I know.

Just like you went.

Wait, but

the bone was on this door, right?

We were heading in the right direction.

We're going the right way.

And the hand spring.

We're going the right way.

We are getting the right direction.

We should play for like 15 more minutes before our next save.

And then we can go to bed.

Before we get to the save.

Well,

if you want to like take a short rest at the top of the next session, we can go over that process to get there because y'all are wrecked right now.

Yes, we are.

But we'll pick up from there.

Next time.

Nevertheless, thank you so much for joining us on this first episode of Age of Umbra.

We'll pick up from there next time.

Once again, big

thank you to our friends at HeroForge for helping us create these awesome minis for our player characters.

Big shout out for Bisterium Games for this awesome mini and maybe more you'll see them fight throughout the series as it progresses.

They have awesome sculpts.

But yeah, I'll see you all here shortly.

Is it Thursday at?

And we finished up this episode.

Thanks for coming along on this wild journey with us.

If you liked the adventure, consider leaving a review on your podcast platform of choice.

We're always looking for new critters to share our stories with, and your review may help help a new batch of wayward adventurers discover the show.

See you next time.

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