Tavern Tales - Maze Rat Pack Ep. 02 - The Sky Blind Spire Part 2

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I think we're past that, Charlie.

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Somebody call action.

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Kindest regards to all you, Rikaloo.

Slink your way into the stinky dragon and throw back our latest thirst quencher, Miss Contrue Blue Crew Brew.

It's a mixture of indigo bye-bye tea leaves, agave vermilion vermin syrup, and not maybe nutmeg.

One slurp of this sneaky sipper, and you'll be.

Wait.

Where did you go?

You.

you were just here.

Anyway, previously, our adventurers ventured into the tower of the late wizard Ditarinal in search of the missing son of Murin.

Little did they know that simply stepping through this spire is an entirely different story.

Literally.

Can this pack of rats reach the end of their maze, or will they reach the end of their days?

Draw yourself a drink and let's dive dive into this dink drama.

As soon as you pull it away, an immense phantasmal door appears in the middle of the staircase.

and out steps a large looming spectral figure.

Its penetrating gaze fixes squarely on Muffin and immediately begins gliding menacingly towards her.

That I did expect.

What do you want to do?

Could Muffin, as she's making eye concrete sinks, slowly put the jar back into the offering of the statue?

Yeah, you put the flask back in and it still approaches you further.

It doesn't look like it's moving quickly towards you, but it is zeroed in on you heading in your direction.

Wow.

Well, Muffin's dead, guys.

Can I help?

Yeah, absolutely.

Okay, I go down to the same statue that Muffin's at, and I take one of I take my vial of acid that I've had this entire time, and I put it with the offering as well.

Something that you brought on your journey with you?

Yes.

Okay, as you do that, you kind of walk in step with this floating spectral figure, and it sees you and bows its head towards you and says, I see.

You're on the path.

That's right, I'm on the path.

Um, may I proceed?

Are you going to the altar?

I was just on my way to the altar.

And where might we find said altar?

Where are you going?

I must stay here, but if you were going to the altar,

that is at the top of the tower.

Right.

Can I take my friend with me?

Is she going to the altar as well?

She is totally going to the altar with me.

Yes, alter.

My pupil will be thrilled by this.

It's saddened that Titard and all could not finish this path.

This makes me sad too.

It really does.

Tear right to the eye.

Yeah, that's the guy who, quote-unquote, fell.

Yep, big fan of him.

What do you want to do?

I reach out and grab Muffin's hand and walk to an egress out of this room.

As you're doing that, Muffin grabs one of the charged back and forth.

Oh, my God.

You're taking one of the offerings.

Right.

Is it supposed to be stuff we take or is it we need to leave stuff?

We ask that you offer offerings, not take offerings.

Well, I didn't know if it was like a give a take kind of thing, like leave a penny, take a penny kind of thing.

You're just taking, you're not giving though.

I just wanted to see the brand.

I'll put it right back.

Actually, you know, the same kind of stuff we got at home, so yes, yes.

As you do that, the spectral figure reaches out behind it, and a door appears behind it and opens ominously into blackness.

Where might that bead lead to?

Is that room 14?

No, 14 is elsewhere.

Is this perhaps like a warp pipe?

Might we skip a few levels?

Actually, this structure figure points to the east.

14's this way.

Oh, okay.

This door leads to the after.

What?

Well, we should do the after after.

Perfect.

That sounds about right.

Yes.

So you're gonna leave the vial there, little muffin, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

You're gonna leave the vial there, right, Muffin?

My hands are clean.

Vial there.

Hands in pockets, as my mom always said.

I ain't got no pockets.

I'll put them in your pockets.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

As you put them in the pockets, this spectral figure says, By the way,

if you ever need help in this staircase again, my name is Esme.

My name is Big Benny.

It was a pleasure to meet you, Esme.

Yes, for future reference, it's nice to introduce yourself to people.

Right.

It usually is.

So, if we want to summon you, we just say Esme?

Do we have to say it like three times, or like, what?

How do we do that?

That'll work.

Okay.

Okay.

Hey, but I think we should get out of this bleeding room and get to number 14.

Yeah, 14.

Yeah, 14.

Esme backs up into this doorway and just like stares at you as it's entering the storeway and the doorway closes and disappears in front of you.

So what's the cheese made with Esme?

Nice, nice.

Do Do you want to move towards 14?

Yeah.

Yes.

So y'all exit the staircase, room 13, and head your way east towards room 14.

It's a small room that branches off with stairways leading up and down.

In the center of the room is the number 14 on the ground.

What do you want to do?

Yeah, you want to take that stairway to heaven?

Yeah, no, no, no, that's the wrong room.

Lad Zeppelin, see?

Yeah.

I don't know if anyone in human existence has said that sentence before in that kind of dialect.

Lad Zeppelin, yes, yeah,

yeah.

It's a classic.

Yeah, we gotta go down the stairs, down the stairway to hell.

See?

Down East of here.

Yeah, it seems like the next number is 15 if my math checks out.

So that would be down the hall.

Down the hall, down the stairs.

Benny points to Muffin and goes, this wouldn't seem smart.

Let's go with that.

I think

15 is next.

I went to school one day

for a whole day.

A whole day.

Yeah.

How did you make it through a whole day of school?

That's amazing.

My brain is so wrinkly right now.

I just went to school of hard knocks, see?

Benny elbows up to Billy and goes, is the brain supposed to be wrinkly?

I don't know.

I was like, yeah, yeah, if Eric says so, then yeah.

All right, y'all descend the staircase down several, almost like two flights, it feels like, to the room 15 you see on the floor, but it's almost don't find it with all the refuse and garbage that's strewn about on tile yuck see as you're walking in apart from the dire smell that you you're taking in you also see these enormous flies that are buzzing around they're huge like way bigger than they should be and they're kind of buzzing around all this like uh detritus and kind of notice you and like shift around as they kind of see you and they're looking at you like kind of feeling you out.

Flies, big flies?

How big are the flies compared to rat people?

Like are they birds to us?

Bigger than that.

Okay.

This room that has filled with refuse, are there any other features to it?

Like is it just a standard room that's filled with refuse and flies?

Yeah, as you look up, you see that there is a shaft.

It's a very odd dynamic and perspective though.

It feels like it's cone-shaped, like it's getting smaller as it reaches the top.

Oh, as it reaches the top.

Some more like a pyramid.

Yeah, except it's conical.

Would you say it's the width of like one or two of us?

Like if we went, if we hooked arms back to back and put our feet up on the wall and climbed, is that something

that

might be some like sticky, gross walls, though?

I would say that if you try and do that and put pressure on the backs and try and climb up that way, it will be a really far reach on the bottom.

Way more than it is at the top, obviously.

But as you get to the top, you're not sure from this angle if two of you could fit through.

Like, it's really hard to tell how narrow it is at the top.

It's really far.

Do the flies fit through the hole?

From here, it doesn't seem like it, but again, you're like 30, 40 feet away, and for some reason, it seems even further.

Could I approach the flies?

Yes.

Okay.

They start buzzing.

Benny walks up to him and he goes, Hello, fellow vermin.

My name is Benny, Big Benny, to my friends.

We are trying to find our way.

We are trying to find our way through this tower.

Do you perhaps know how we might get past this room?

Unfortunately, I do not speak.

Wait, I have a mask.

You do.

I understand them.

Or could you speak fly?

You put the mask back on?

Yeah.

Okay, you put the mask back on and suddenly you can start speaking fly.

What?

No way.

Jeff Goldblum.

Hello, fellow vermin.

My name is Big Benny.

How are you doing?

From our perspective, do we just hear Benny going

I have recently procured an ability through an apparel construction I'm able to understand your complex and beautiful language.

Cool.

What might this room be strewn about with so much lavish materials?

Let's think think in their terms.

It's home.

It's om.

What is above ohm?

Not home.

Really getting a lot on this guy.

Try another fly.

Is there...

Thank you, Moff.

I appreciate

the suggestion.

Is there perhaps one of you who is your leader?

He starts looking around, kind of like looking at the other three flies in this room.

I like the idea of a fly looking around, that like the whole body is just moving.

They don't have like necks.

Yeah.

And they start like buzzing to each other like,

okay.

Are they big enough that maybe

Muffin could utilize them for flying power?

Like strap on and fly away.

Yeah.

Or like a jetpack kind of thing if they're on your back.

I'll say it's completely possible.

Will they let you is a completely different matter?

Right, right, right.

Okay, so we are trying to get up to no om above you.

Understand?

Okay, my phone dear, her name is Muffin.

Would there be a way for us to ask a favor and you take Muffin up to the ol up there?

Make a will check.

This is gonna go great.

You

like the idea.

Muffin is just seeing Big Ben go

pointing at her.

Okay, rolling for Will.

That's only a seven.

As soon as you say muffin and point at Muffin, that one buzzes straight towards like marker and starts like trying to like nibble on muffin a little bit.

It tickles muffin.

I don't know what to do now.

Much like a cowboy trying to break a wild horse, I'm going to jump on a fly and try to ride it.

Oh, God.

Okay, tell me what your approach with this is.

Like, in what way are you doing this?

Once that one fly is distracted trying to eat muffin, I'm going to walk up behind it and then just try to jump on its back and see if I can hold on to it and like try to pull up.

Do you perhaps give us a yee-haw?

Yee-haw!

There you go.

Welcome on into the stinky dragons.

Okay, yes.

Since you're not trying to will this thing, I'll say it's more like a strength check that you're trying to wrangle this thing into submission.

Typical Gus.

I try to go with diplomacy, Hinny goes for violence.

That's such a Gus move.

That's just how Gus solves all of his problems, even in real life.

My will role is actually better, but since we tried will and it didn't work, hey, let's try the other way.

Where there's a will, there's no way.

There was no way.

2d6?

Mm-hmm.

And you said strength, right?

Correct.

9 plus 110.

That's a 10.

What are you, you're just grabbing onto it?

Is that what you're doing?

Yeah, and I'm going to try to find a way to see if there's little hairs on it where I can pull to try to get it to go in the air.

They do have little hairs on them, right?

Yeah, absolutely.

You grasp anything you can on where would be the neck of this thing.

And for some reason, this fly like completely eases like it was meant to be really

and uh kind of like waits for you to take the lead.

Okay, yeah, I pull up,

let's go.

You hear a trumpet in the background, like da-da-da-da-da-da.

And then you take off up this wall.

And as you're getting higher and higher, it's getting narrower and narrower.

And you're concerned you're not going to be able to even fit with you in this fly through this hole at the top.

Is that a fat joke?

How far away does the hole appear to be from where I am when I start to worry about this?

I'll see the exit to this is probably like 10 feet away.

You're getting really close.

While While he's thinking about that, what are the rest of you doing?

Watching in absolute awe.

Yeah.

I was hoping that someone would have rope and we could just toss it down and I climb up that way.

Like, boss, Eric, rope.

I'm not there.

Eric's really far up there.

Billy's holding back to see if someone else makes it up even before he tries to wrangle a fly.

Okay.

Yeah, I think we're just all watching to see if it works.

Yeah.

So what do you want to do?

In that case, I'm going to try to ride it out as long as possible.

And then if it seems like it's going to become too narrow, I'm going to try to jump up.

Yeah, you are.

Oh, for the hole off of the fly.

Billy's trying to hold his arms out until he's following just below, like trying to make sure he could catch his boss.

I got you, boss.

I got you.

I got you, boss.

I got you.

Billy, as you're kind of like making your way through this garbage, getting closer to the wall to make sure you catch your boss, roll a D6 for me.

Yeah, you got it.

Okay, here we go.

D6.

That's a four.

As you're kind of rummaging your legs through this trash, you come across a coin.

Ooh.

It's a silver coin, and it's like bigger than a plate you would eat dinner off of.

Whoa.

Silver coin the size of a plate.

But it looks like a coin that's maybe been like the opposite of shrunk.

Enlarged?

Yeah, enlarged?

Yeah.

Does Billy see any like

coin slots like on the front of a pinball machine or anything?

You look around for coin slots.

You don't see any.

It's really odd.

Yeah, you wish there were though.

Okay.

It would make sense.

Yeah.

i'm rich so

well that's only one coin there yeah but it's huge it's worth a lot jump back to eric eric you're getting closer and closer and you're just kind of like getting ready to leap off of this fly at the chance you need and um the fly below you is starting to get nervous like you think maybe it doesn't like leaving home and it's also getting close to this hole and it's concerned that we're not going to make it so it starts like kind of wobbling what do you what are you going to do I guess at this point is when I need to make my leap, either straight up or to the wall, whichever seems more likely to be made.

Do you have anything on your person you want to use to help make that happen?

Yeah, thinking or getting ahead.

I have some iron spikes that I pick sure I would use to either like hold into the wall or to like try to grab up near the hole at the top.

Absolutely.

Okay.

I have two iron spikes.

Okay.

Yeah.

If you pull those out, I'll say you can make a dex check with advantage.

Okay.

Whoa.

Be dexterious.

I think this is really a cool idea.

Would you call those like pitons or pitons?

Pitons.

I hate

Yeah.

Yeah.

Oh, okay.

That's a.

So we just recorded the second win for that Infinite episode, and

I forgot to bring that up.

I will forever be corrected on the pronunciation of P-I-T-O-N.

Who knew?

It's Piton, even though it's still Python.

It's the weirdest pronunciation for a word that shouldn't be that way.

Yeah, so I rolled a five, a six, and a one.

So that's an 11.

11, yes.

You leap off of this fly as it kind of starts nosediving away from the hole above you, and you latch on to the edge of this seemingly cliff side, but it's stone, stonework of a wall, and you kind of see the edge at the top.

And you think you can probably pull yourself through, but it'll be a tight squeeze, kind of like through a vent shaft.

So the two options I have here is I can either try to tie a rope to the spikes and then drop it down to make it easier for everyone, or I can try to pull myself up and try to go through the hole.

Based on what I'm seeing here, which one seems like an easier option of the two if I had to choose between the two of them I actually see no reason why you couldn't do both okay in that case I'll try to tie a rope here and then drop it for my friends below not my friends my traveling companions below

and then try to pull myself up ahead okay do you think Billy heard that and his heart broke a little bit

so yeah you tie off the rope on the one of the pitons and then you kind of pull yourself up the last bit I'll say that since you rolled so high with the deck check, you don't have to make a check for that.

You get to the top and you climb the rest of the way, is that what I hear?

Yeah, yeah.

Okay.

We will resolve that in a second.

The rope falls to the ground and the three of you have a way to climb this thing now.

Ladies first?

Yeah.

And she points to Billy.

Oh, oh,

I curtsy.

And then I

climb up and then I climb up.

Make a strength check with advantage.

Strength check, so that's all three dice plus my modifier, right?

Yeah.

You got this rope that's been thrown down to you.

Whoa, triple four.

That's eight, nine.

Great.

I'll say you start climbing and you get about halfway and your foot slips and you're having a hard time getting your footing, but you're still holding onto the rope.

Okay.

It's this coin.

It's just so heavy.

It's really slick and sticky in spaces and it's hard to tell which is which when you're climbing.

Yeah.

Should I drop down and then give it another go after someone else?

Or?

It's up to y'all.

What do you want to do?

You see your friend kind of starting to slip and fall.

What do you want want to do?

Guys, guys, I'm falling.

Guys, boss, Eric!

How would we, like, help that, though?

Push my butt!

You got inventory?

If you want to look through there, or if you got anything creative solutions you want to do, you want to talk to the flies more?

Yeah.

Can I?

I have a war hammer.

Could I perhaps like golf swing up and help?

Billy up through.

Oh my god.

That's how Billy died.

As you pull out your war hammer, you kind of look at Billy and Billy starts to look like a nail.

Yeah.

What are you staring at?

Or like a ping-pong ball that I can just kind of send back up.

Croquet.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, croquet.

All right.

I'll say if

you can kind of push this garbage up a little bit and give you a boost to get a little bit higher.

What you call me?

And if you want to try and swing at him, go for it.

Yeah.

I will say that he'll probably take damage unless you roll really high above a 10 is what I mean.

Because like it's a hammer, it's hitting him.

It's gonna hurt.

Yeah, big Biddy, why are you holding your hammer and looking at me like that?

I say, if you get anything like above a 10, you it won't cause damage.

I'll say okay, Doc, you'll never believe how the Warhammer got up there.

It was a million-to-one shot.

Oh, God.

Normal roll?

Yes.

Because you've not really done this kind of thing before.

That's what you say.

Okay.

It's fine.

It's fine.

We got this, Billy.

Billy, we got this.

Okay.

Oh.

Rolled a five and a six.

That is 13 with my modifier.

Oh my god.

All right.

You kind of angle it in just the right way where, like, Billy is expecting it.

Like, he's ready to kind of boost up off from his butt.

And you swing and hit those cheeks.

He was presenting.

Is that what we're saying?

He was.

Yeah.

Okay.

Tail out, ready to go.

And yeah, you get boosted up.

I'll say like another five, ten feet up this rope.

And like you're maybe like 15 feet away from the top now.

Okay.

You're welcome.

Thanks, Benny.

So I'm 15 feet away from the top yeah and you see the same thing it's very conical it's getting really tight at the top but you do see some pitons where the rope is is lashed onto oh thank god okay i'm gonna grab on to those and maybe either use them as footholds while i hold on to the rope or just kind of support my way as i continue up yeah i think you could totally do that you you manage to grab get a gra uh a handhold on each one and like uh squeeze your way to the top and you find your friend your boss oh boss eric so good to see you yeah that's a good boy come over here Yeah, yeah.

All right.

What does Muffin and Big Benny want to do?

So much.

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I think Muffin watching that happen, she's almost tempted to ask to be

helped the same way.

Like San's rope, just like, hit me with your war hammer.

I think she's just going to try to straight climb.

Okay.

She got decks, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

You start moving your way up to this garbage heap and roll a D6 for me.

Just one D6?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Five.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You step on something and it makes like a, almost like a gong kind of sound.

And as you get your foot like away from it, you realize it's a giant brass bell.

So we had a giant silver kind of coin plate looking thing and now a giant brass bell.

Yep.

Have we seen these objects before or like regular sized before?

Maybe in your life you have, but regular size, but at this tower, you've not come across these things.

I wonder if there's things like falling from that hole.

Like, I guess, would these things seem like they could fit through the hole at the top?

You kind of like size it the best you can, and like, it doesn't make any mathematical sense.

Hmm.

Because, like, I'm wondering if these are coming from somewhere.

Could I look at the bell?

Sure.

What do you want to discern about it?

See if there's any like markings or writing on it.

Sure.

You kind of feel your way around and clear off some of the dirt and grime, and you come across some words etched, like hammered into the top of the dome, and it says lunchtime.

Uh-oh.

You know, I am thinking, how there's a bunch of flies down here maybe this is like where the food goes maybe i hope it's the food like at the cafeteria when you put your tray in or scrape all the trash off benny's looking at that bell with his hammer really hard

uh could i maybe before climbing up just like rummage around a little bit to see if there's any other items kind of under here absolutely yeah as you're rummaging around you You start seeing other items in the garbage, but something else tracks your attention attention more in the garbage you see footprints that are like actively walking through this garbage right now

and making impressions in the dirt and grime and you don't see anybody in front of you one of the icaloo yeah could i like as i'm tracking the footprints try to grab whatever person or or creature this might be in front of me sure make a dex check nine oh no plus two eleven eleven just put the bell on top of them so you see these footprints in front of you and the bells right there and you kind of like launch off the bell and grab a hold of something in front of you that you can't quite get a vision of, but you know it's there.

And you see like the rustling of fabric and like kind of hear squeaking and like squirming around.

Can I try to pull

their clothes off?

Oh.

All right.

Like if I like, because I know, because I think we know about the fabric at this point, right?

How like these creatures are invisible and so they're probably wearing some type of invisibility cloak or something like that.

Pull the robe, so you're just grabbing and pulling.

Is that what's what I'm hearing?

I think I would pull like upwards, up, yeah, sure.

So, you try and like grab a hold, whatever this fabric is that you've you've got your hands hold of, and you throw it up, and you find a rodentia that is

shocking odd at you finding it.

Uh,

um,

you can see me,

I sure can, little man.

Now, where's the rest of your clan?

Now, Muffin's whispering is creepy.

It starts like backing up as it's back to the wall, like kind of scared of you.

Nowhere to run.

Nowhere to run.

And then it pulls out a knife.

It's a very crude knife.

It doesn't look actually very intimidating, but it is a knife nonetheless.

What are you gonna spread me out some toast?

Don't come any closer.

I'm just here for this silver.

Silver?

I mean, the silver?

What are you talking about?

There's tons of it in here.

Okay.

Points out like the giant silver coin.

Like, there's silver right there.

What's your name?

My name's Balthazar.

Balthazar.

By any chance, Balthazar, are you a part of the

Raycaloo gang?

That's pronounced the Reikaloo, but yeah, that sounds about right.

Now listen, I wrote it down on my paper and I don't know.

I don't I didn't write like phonetics on it.

You don't look like you stayed in school for more than a day.

I've never been in school.

Do you work for Patisse?

Bastis?

Once again, another name that sounds pretty different.

Pastis.

Okay.

And are you responsible for taking our friend Vol?

He throws the knife at you.

Oh.

Could I dodge it?

Uh, yeah, I'll say you make a dex check, and I'll make an attack roll, and we'll see which one gets higher.

I rolled an eight.

He rolled a four.

He misses.

Yeah, he tosses this knife, but it's like, it doesn't seem like it's very hefty either, and he wasn't really prepared to throw this thing.

It just kind of whiffs past you.

What do you want to do?

Choke him.

Lightly.

To where he could still talk.

Lightly.

That's such a Canadian way to approach combat.

Well, I don't want to kill him.

I don't have information.

It's like you caught yourself being too violent and your Canadianness came to you.

Kill him politely.

All right.

Do a strength check.

Okay.

Seven.

Seven.

Yeah, you grab a hold of him, but maybe like you still have a lot of grime and slime on your fingers from all the garbage and stuff you've been touching.

And he kind of slips right out of your hands.

But he's up against the wall.

He's trying to like eye his solutions and sees this rope and grabs hold of it.

I mean, yeah, sure.

Go on up.

Can Eric and Billy see what's going on?

Do they know that this is happening?

You tell me when you get to the top, are you more concerned about the top or the bottom?

Since Eric is up there.

He trusts his boss, so Billy's like more concerned about getting the others up here.

Okay, yeah, you you kind of look down and like because I could just shoot this guy off the rope.

It seems like everybody at the bottom is bigger than they should be.

Oh, like they look like they're giants down there.

Weird.

Easier targets.

I mean could be.

Can I try to grab

Balthazar?

Yeah, Balthazar is like grabbing hold of this rope and like getting ready to climb and you you're gonna try and grab what I have manacles.

No, I have bracelets.

Gum gum.

No, I ain't no gum gum.

These are manacles.

Not boy uncles.

No.

I was thinking the same thing.

Can I can I like lock him up or try to restrain him with them?

Yeah.

Actually, could I like since he's trying to climb up?

Could I just manacle his legs like his feet?

Absolutely, you can.

That's what I'm gonna do.

All right.

He starts getting his hand hold on and he starts climbing up and you're going for his ankles, right?

Yeah.

Man, ankles.

All right.

Make a dex.

Check.

Eight.

Okay.

You get one on, but the other one kind of slips off as you're trying to like chain them together.

Just as good.

Just as good.

I grab the one that is not on him and I just pull.

Okay.

He's going to make an action real quick to see if he can get further.

And

he doesn't have strength, so he has a four.

So he fails.

Like, he's like feeling the anchor weigh down and you grab a hold of him.

And what are you going to do?

Try and just pull him all the way down?

Yeah.

Could I try and like uh like ball and chain him to the uh like into like the trash good god uh make a strength check yeah that one's only gonna be an eight

um you do it and you pull him off the rope but it kind of lands on you and knocks you and you both get like knocked into the garbage as well okay so now you're kind of scrambling around in this detritus muffin get him what are the two of you at the top doing well with me i know Billy was looking down and more concerned with the bottom.

I think Eric would be more concerned looking at the top.

Like, in Eric's mind, he's already done everything he needs to do to help people up.

He would drop the rope.

You don't need to help anybody.

Right, the rope's there.

It's on them to come up now.

So, I would be Eric would not be looking down.

Eric would be looking ahead.

Oh, yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

Great.

I can fill you guys in on what's happening up there.

You enter a messy hall split in two with bones littered about.

There's a large cooking pot over on the side with a fire pit underneath.

And

there's these like sleeping mats that look like they're made of hay, they look really rough, and then of course, there are giants, uh, maybe like four of them that you're starting to count out.

Uh-oh, and this hall that's split in two, there's two different numbers, 16 and 17 on the ground.

Maybe they're just really small people, and we're looking at them from a weird perspective, and they look huge.

How many uh vials of poison did you bring?

Do you got enough?

Eric's fresh out.

Oh, no.

Do you recognize any of them?

You actually do.

You recognize one of them is sitting by the fire and has

this green

stain across its chin, is like nursing it, trying to whine to its twin next to it.

Uh-oh.

I'm so glad Eric went up first.

I'm so happy right now.

Oh my god.

We'll deal with this later.

Why don't we deal with the Belcazar?

What's going on down there?

We all decided to run away from this giant, and Gus is like, I'm going to go and give him poison.

That wasn't Gus.

That was Eric.

That was Eric.

Can Billy, who's looking over the edge,

call down to his friends down below and say, Should I take this shot?

Do you need help?

Shoot him.

So we shouldn't keep this guy alive, right to get more information out of him, or what do you think?

You can live with an arrow in yourself for a bit.

What do you think?

She's asking Balthazar.

You want to know from him if he wants to stay alive?

Yeah.

That's a great idea.

I'd love it so much.

Okay, then you better listen to him down there because I got my crossbow trained on you, dude.

Yeah, we want want information.

You look really small up there, though.

Well, you look really big and easy to hit from here, so...

I guess it's a matter of perspective, I never thought of that.

Yeah.

So what do you want to do?

Should we try to get some type of information out of him or should we just continue on?

I feel like I don't care for his information and just want him to not be able to attack us anymore.

You have him already chained.

You could chain him to something to make him stationary so he can't join his friends or something.

Is there anything for me to attach the other manacle to in this room?

Sure.

There's a pipe on the wall that's it looks like it's big enough like to be able to or small enough to be able to lasso a chain link around.

Then I manacle that other end to the pipe and I turn to him and I go, you want to play a game?

Of course not.

And I say, you stay there.

Okay.

Steal his cloak.

I don't think I'm going anywhere.

Yeah, I take his cloak and I give it to, or Muffin has the cloak, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

I pulled it off.

And Muffin keeps it.

Okay.

I mean, it's a little cold cold in here could i put the cloak on yeah you can put the cloak on okay it's on me now uh as you put it on muffin yeah exactly you look around and like muffin is like hard to find now you see like footprints where muffins should be but it's almost like muffins not there anymore benny i'm right here muffin what was that

i'm wearing the cloak Oh, that tracks.

Don't tell Billy or Eric.

I kind of want to sh I kind of want to surprise them.

Yeah, Billy, you look down and muffin's not there anymore.

Okay.

Ah, I think we lost my muffin.

I like that.

I love pranks.

I'm a big prankster.

Why don't you get on my back and I'll climb us up?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay, okay.

Muffin, uh, hold on to the back of Benny.

Okay, I climb.

All right.

Like, uh, what's his face in Princess Bride?

Princess Bride.

Yes.

Uh, you make a strength check.

And I'll say, um, it won't be advantage or disadvantage because...

You're just pulling yourself up with someone else on your back.

That's double fours with a two.

10, even.

Dirty 10.

Okay.

Yeah.

You start climbing.

You see that below you, it seems like you should be further away from it, but it looks bigger below you.

And you see that this Rikalu, you know, Rodentia is still down there, chained and linked.

But it seems like from out of perspective, they're getting bigger, but you're at the top of the conical shaft is getting smaller.

And you finally reach these handholds of these pitons, and do you pull yourself up?

I'll hold on to them so then Muffin can get up first since you said it was like small enough that it couldn't be like two of us.

Yeah.

Okay, Muffin climbs up.

All right.

Yep.

You climb up and then what?

And then I go behind Billy and I tap him on the opposite shoulder.

Yeah, boss.

What do you need, Eric?

I like to picture that my back is to him.

So like Muffin's between us and we're not facing each other at all.

I tap both of them on the backs.

Eric, you playing pranks on me?

You guys both look at each other and you actually can't see each other for a second.

Where'd you go?

Looks like the room is just there, but like it's like some kind of shadow, some play of tricks, like there's a phony mirror or something like that.

You know, I hate pranks.

Get over here.

I pull myself up.

Okay.

You all enter this hall filled with giants.

Yeah, like I said, you have four of them.

Some of them are hanging out by the fire, and then there's a few, like, kind of resting or sleeping, that kind of thing.

And there's a bunch of bones and clutter on the floor.

Yeah, luckily they know better than to mess with us anymore.

See?

Yeah.

When you say they're giants, does that mean they're probably too heavy for us to like push?

As you're looking at them this time, they look different to you.

The first time you saw them, the head was too big to come through the doorway.

The body was too big to come through the doorway.

And now they look large, like larger than you, but they aren't like building sized or room sized.

They're more like just really tall and big people, like maybe 10 feet or 15 feet tall.

Are we in Alice in Wonderland?

Muffin in Wonderland.

That's interesting, because the creature we stabbed in the eye, that was the giant that we thought.

Or tried to stab.

Yeah, tried to stab.

Yeah.

In fact, he's here.

He's by the campfire.

Yeah.

Right.

So, Muffin's actually here, guys.

What?

And he's...

Where?

No, she's not.

And she's actually got a cloak on that she might be able to get past these large fellows with.

Oh.

I died.

I'm just kidding.

I'm just kidding.

I'm alive.

I'm just wearing one of the cloaks.

So we could do something like we did in the bird room, you know, maybe, you know, looking at the map, if you ran through these rooms, I think you can maybe draw their attention so that we can also enter the rooms that we need to go to.

I also wonder if maybe it's gonna sound mean.

I don't know if these things are hostile other than the fact that one of the one of them tried to growl at us before.

But maybe we should just like push them over the edge.

Oh my god, that's murder.

I love it.

As y'all are talking amongst yourselves, you kind of see one of them by the fire start sniffing around.

Protention.

I think the hole's too small.

See, we gotta make a break for it.

Whatever you say, Eric, I'll follow.

I'd be down for running.

I mean, I'm invisible, so I feel kind of confident.

Stakes are super low for you, Muffin.

I say that to the wrong area.

I'm not looking at Muffin.

I'm looking directly at Muffin.

Could I, like, maybe sneak across and like do a bit of reconnaissance first while they're kind of more hidden?

Oh, French stuff.

Absolutely, you can.

Yeah, I'll say

you're walking gingerly across this floor.

You almost step on a bag, like a sack of silver coins that are just kind of spilling out onto the floor.

There's a ton of them.

It's a rather large treasure trove.

Do you keep going or what do you do?

Yes.

You press on and kind of ignore your instincts to grab all this silver and you move forward towards the edge of the room and you see three ways out of here.

One to the north, west, and then east.

East heading towards room 17.

Okay.

You said this room is just like full of these beings.

It's like three or four?

Yeah, they're mostly migrated to the east side, towards room 17, but there's one that's kind of near the silver that is sleeping at the moment.

Oh, sleeping.

Okay.

I go back and just relay this information to the team.

Okay.

What do you guys want to do?

Should we just do a good old stealthy...

Yeah, see?

Yeah.

Yeah, whatever the boss said, I'm there with them.

And if anyone finds us or gives us Guff to get the dagger in the eye.

Oh my gosh.

All right.

I'll say Muffin, you don't need to make any kind of checks for this, but the three boys need to, and I'm going to take the lowest one, and that's going to be what the group check is.

Well, actually, I'm going to take the blueprint that I have of the map, and I'm just going to hold it in front of my face.

I love this so much.

There's a headless rat walking by.

I will give you advantage if you choose.

So John gets advantage, and Blaine and I roll just two D6.

Dex checks.

Dex checks.

Three, four, one.

Rolled an eight.

Rolled an 11.

I got an eight.

All right, so you guys make it about halfway through the room and you're just eyes, maybe they're drawn to the silver.

Maybe you're recognizing that giant is kind of giving you like, putting you on edge.

And you kind of like bump into each other as you're trying to shuffle along this room.

Yeah, I couldn't see your face.

And the one that's by the fire looks up and like sees the three of you standing right in front of them.

And starts getting up from their seat and moving towards you.

Please, please, don't get up.

I'm gonna point at him and yell, yeah, you stay seated down, or I'm gonna, I'm gonna mess you up again.

See, yeah, you remember me.

They look confused on their face, like they recognize you, but you look different for some reason.

And uh, go ahead and make a will check.

Yeah, because you're much bigger, probably.

Yeah, I don't think I'd recognize a rat if I saw it again.

You'd recognize a rat if it put poison in your mouth.

Yeah, I guess if it also talked like an old bugsy, uh,

like a surge mobster.

I rolled a nine and I have a plus two on Will, so that's eleven.

Whoa.

Oh, you got Will.

Yeah, Will's my thing.

Oh.

It like starts to put it together like rat, rodent, poison, no.

And starts backing up and trips over the fire and falls to the ground.

Like, kind of awakens the other three giants around them, and they start looking up.

Perfect.

I'm trying to like see what the cause of the ruckus is, but they're in the other room and they don't see the three of you yet.

Benny speaks up and goes, chase it!

Chase it!

That's exactly what I was going to say,

And just runs for like the room to 17 and the exit out of 17 as best he can.

Okay, yeah.

You make a dash for it and head towards this other exit to the east.

Same.

That's definitely what I had in mind.

Make a break for it and make a run.

I'm going to do the same, but for me, it's pretty easy because I'm completely invisible.

Yeah.

Yeah, you kind of see them coming and you immediately like you're probably first in line at this point.

Yeah.

Billy's going to run, but then he's going to see all of that silver.

And he's going to stop and he's going to say, oh, boss, look at all this money.

There's gotta be at least 30 pieces here.

That's a biblical reference.

And that guy, Murin, Murin.

Murin.

Murin.

Murin.

He did say we could keep all the silver we want, all the treasures, right, that we found?

Certainly did.

Can I make a grab for any stuff and just keep running, or is that going to totally trip me up?

If you want to try and grab them, you'll make a dex check, because this is a risky situation.

It's not that you can't grab that, but if you roll low, something may happen to you from the giants do it do it do it do it go for it billy i'm gonna do it i'm gonna take all this money yeah all right make a dex check let's play it at 90 10 see yeah

what

90 for who though that's uh eight plus two ten nice you get 17 silver pieces and just uh in a wow fast grasp of these bags and start like making your way to the door or are you gonna grab more uh no i'm gonna i'm gonna call it good there All right, you can add 17 silver pieces and then you start heading towards the east and out of the giant hall here.

The four of you make your way through this patch and see on your map and head into a small room labeled 18 on the floor.

There's a strange thing happening to the north that you can't quite make out, but judging from your experiences thus far with the fabrics, you think it has something to do with this blueness again.

That was good work, Billy.

You gave me 15 of those silvery.

I'll let you keep two of them.

Whatever you say, Bossy, whatever you say.

Hey, guys, just letting you know I'm still here.

Who said that?

Who said that?

I don't know if this room to the north maybe has more fabric that you guys could use to do what I'm doing.

Super sneaky.

I do like stealth.

And then also to the east is a egress that branches off in several ways.

Can we try like poking or prodding at that northern passage that seems like weird, like the fabric?

Yeah.

You wanna use anything in particular?

I guess I'll use my dagger and just kind of like poke at it.

Just raised his hand.

Yeah, you start like poking out where it looks like it's a wall to you, but you keep poking and it like pushes in like it's like it's fabric and stuff like that.

Gotten fabric of our lives.

I keep thinking the same thing.

We spend way too much time together, all of us working together.

I'm going to try to grab at it and see if I can pull it down.

Sure, yeah.

You reach out your hands and you immediately feel fabric again.

And if you want to take your dagger or try and scratch away some fabric, you totally can.

Yeah,

see if I can cut away at it.

I'll roll a d6.

Okay.

That is a three.

You get three feet of this fabric.

Oh.

Oh.

It's a nice little cape.

And once the fabric is gone, what is exposed behind it?

Like, was it hiding something?

You see, yeah, another egress, another corridor heading north.

And

it's actually a familiar corridor.

It's the same one when you first entered.

that you heard the stomping of giants.

We still was like, it was the smell of smoke was coming from it as well, if I remember right?

Yes, exactly.

So you would guess that this would go back to the first room.

I guess the smell of smoke was the fire from the, that the giants were around, maybe.

That's what you surmised, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

They're all connected in the circle of life.

Can you imagine if we went through that side first, the smoke side?

Oh, God, we'd be.

I wanted to.

That was my initial inkling was to go that way, but I'm glad we didn't.

Bad times.

Can I try to take some fabric as well?

Is there any left that I can?

Absolutely.

It's a big section of this wall that is kind of like obscured for you.

Yeah, if you want to do the same thing, just roll a d6.

Okay.

Saw my boss do it.

Now I want to do it.

Eric's my hero.

I won't tell him that, but I think he knows.

Two.

Yeah, so you get two feet.

Okay.

Should we proceed along the numbers?

Yeah, let's do it.

See?

Do you want any like cool fabric, though?

You can look invisible.

Yeah, like me.

He's got tons.

He uses it for the best, uh, the best use.

He hides his face, see?

Good one, boss.

So you guys see on your map that you can go south and then take a right going west and you'd hit 19 if that's the room and you want to go into next.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Y'all head that way.

You recognize that south on this hallway is the same staircase where you met Esme and have these altars and statues.

But instead you take a right and go west into room 19.

Before we get into 19, I yell down, I go, hey, Esme, Esme, we made it over here.

Hey Esme, remember me?

You see a door appear at the middle of the staircase and it kind of creaks open just slightly and goes, hey, and then closes.

That's my friend.

She just goes, yeah, boy.

Bye, bye, boy.

So y'all enter this sparse room with two windows to the west.

They both seem to be on the third floor looking out south.

And then there's one more thing that you've kind of noticed in the corner of this room besides the number 19.

And it's this small tattered coin purse.

Could I pick it up?

Sure, yeah.

You want to look inside or just hold on to it?

I'd like to look inside.

Okay, you open it up and you see one coin.

Whoa.

This one's a normal size coin.

It's not a plate.

It looks different from most coins.

It's not that like the Sigilon is any different from the currency of this land, but it just, there's something about it.

The sheen of it, maybe it's, it feels nice in your hand.

Like, I don't know.

It just, like, you don't want to let go of this thing okay guys i'm gonna i'm gonna hold on to this for us and if anyone notices any like you know as my uh buddy billy there said like a big coin slot or something like that somewhere let's uh keep an eye out gotta watch out for those yeah yeah all right and the only exit is the way you came in and all the sparks have followed you thus far cool yeah let's uh backtrack go back out to the east hook a left back up a little to the north and then hook a right to the east yeah you'll follow your map and you head towards room 20 and another sparse looking room with two windows again but this one has a set of stairs to the south you find a bottle is kind of hanging on one of the windowsills

hanging sorry sitting on one of the windowsills ah he's chilling hanging out hanging out is what i mean yeah and this is in room 20 yeah empty

something yeah it is full of something it actually i would say it's not actually completely full it looks like it's been slightly used

just don't drink it because i previously found a bottle of acid, so that would be bad news, bears.

I'm pretty thirsty though, that's looking pretty good.

It doesn't look like the acid, it looks yellow this time.

Yeah, free mountain dew, see?

Free Mountain Dew, love Mountain Dew.

Chug, chug, chug, chug.

Oh, you guys.

Can I give it a whiff?

Yeah.

Yeah, you reach out to grab it, and you can drink it, sniff it, whatever you want.

But you also notice there's a label on it.

Hmm.

Labels are for losers.

Yeah, I should probably have to do it.

Readings for nerds.

See?

It will look after.

Real rats just drink what's in mysterious bottles in towers.

Ah, shucks, you guys.

You guys are such pranksters.

I'm going to read it.

You read it, and it says potion of super strength, and there's a question mark at the end.

Oh, my goodness.

Just urine, guys.

Nothing to be seen in here.

I'll pocket that.

Okay, actually, I'll share with the group guys.

It's a potion of super strength, so if I want to be as strong as Benny, maybe I'll take it, but I don't think we need it right now.

Why'd you lie to us then?

See, can I trust you?

Well, I told the truth.

I don't know.

You said it was nothing, see?

Mr.

Eric.

Yeah, but you guys are goofing with me, so I'm goofing back.

It's that's what friends do, right, Mr.

Eric?

Just gaslighting, Billy.

So you guys are in this room.

Like I said, there's two windows at the top.

There's a couple of egresses to east and west.

You find on your map, it's places you've been before.

The only place you haven't been yet in this hallway is down south on this staircase.

All right, let's make our way downtown.

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You head down the stairs and you reach room 21.

It's a sparse room again,

more of these windows and a set of stairs.

And then an ascend of rooms 21.

There's one thing that's odd about this room.

There's no way to go other than the window.

A specialty.

As you look out the window, you see that you're high above on the tower, facing the east, and you notice that it's starting to get actually a little bit dark outside.

Maybe the sun is setting opposite of where you're looking.

And also about this window, there's blood on the windowsill and a small tooth.

Oh, another tooth, like the ones we dug out.

Yeah.

I guess I'll grab this one and put it in my pocket.

Take it with us.

We seem to be teeth collectors now.

Yeah.

Okay.

I'll look at it first.

Does it seem like the other teeth that we undug?

It seems like it could be the same time frame of like

look and feel of these other teeth.

Like obviously a different tooth, but it could be from the same mouth, could be the same species.

You're not sure.

I'll pocket it.

We probably should have looked in Vol's mouth.

Yeah.

Smarter rats would have done that.

We didn't look, right?

No.

You opened the helmet, but you're more focused on the map.

And he's all the way back in the first room, which at this point is...

I mean, it's not that far back to get to.

Yeah.

We were too busy beating this knot out of him.

Oh, yeah.

Could we go through the back through the

fabric doorway that they cut off of and go check on his mouth?

Do we want to go back or do we want to keep going forward?

See?

Because we can go to 22 and 23 and we're back there.

I mean, ultimately, what we're going to learn is whether or not this is his teeth, which I don't know if that's like vital to a puzzle.

I'm always Mr.

Eric, you know, wherever he goes, I follow.

I'm like a shark.

Yeah.

No neck.

Yeah.

Can't turn back.

I don't know what that means, but yeah.

I guess we'll just save it for the end when they get back to the beginning.

All right, yeah, it'll be a good reveal for the end.

It could also be like a fly instead of a shark.

Maybe these teeth are just like the Riddler trophies in like the Batman games where they're just collectibles, you know?

Yeah.

Do you solve my puzzle?

Yeah.

Alright, where do you want to go?

I guess out the bloody window, right?

Yeah.

Seems like the only way forward is down.

Yeah.

Yeah, so you see there's a chain dangling out the window.

I'm assuming someone wants to start climbing.

I'll go first this time.

Oh.

Oh, brave Benny.

Okay.

Yeah, you start climbing down

and it's not too hard.

Go ahead and make, just for kicks and giggles, a strength check with advantage.

That's only

nine.

Oh.

Nine.

You make it to the bottom and where this thing is nailed on the window still starts to like come up a little bit and unhinge a little.

Can I do like a repel move where I just push off the building with the chain and swing into the window on the fourth floor?

Uh, yes, I'll say if you don't do well, there could be serious repercussions either for you or the chain being no longer usable.

Do it.

This feels like a worthwhile stuff.

Yeah, this feels like a worthwhile.

This feels like we that all I'm hearing from Micah is you should totally do this.

Yeah, go for it.

I got the opposite impression.

That's what I heard, right?

Right, Billy and

their favorite.

This is gonna be a dex check.

Yeah, that's fine.

I hate boys.

I hate boys.

Dex with no advantage or death with

advantage.

There's no advantage.

There's no advantage?

Okay, sure about that.

Little brother.

I won't need it.

I won't need it.

I'm just gonna really get these dice mixed up.

Ready?

And ha ha!

Aha!

10!

Dirty 10!

Oh, nice, nice.

Eat my rat shorts.

The hinge that this chain is linked to starts bending away.

And at the last second, it clamps back down as you swing back into the window.

And you go through the opening.

Yeah, and I tuck and roll.

All right.

And I yell, clear.

You swing and you tuck and roll into this room and you recognize...

Actually, you don't recognize this room, but someone else might.

You come through the window and you're

covered with books and scrolls and tables study yeah the nerve room yeah we did tell benny about the study there you go so you would you would recognize it from the description before um benny is horrified of this room

uh yeah so you see benny just kind of took action and and went out the window but uh you see i've got another rope here and uh i think this could have helped us and made things a little easier see yeah so what are the rest of you gonna do i guess you could use that as a repelling thing so if one person stays up top they can have the rope uh wrapped around the other person that's climbing down just as a safety precaution.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'll say you guys kind of

anchor this rope down.

You have the chain still.

It's not quite as sturdy as maybe the rope is.

But with those two things and you guys being careful, you three easily are able to descend down this into this next room into the window.

Wow, this is a cool room.

I've never seen it before because I was waiting in that hallway.

Is this what school's like, see?

I've been in this room.

There's a lot of books.

That's all I know.

So you said there's a table with some papers?

Yeah, there's like a dozen tomes as you're kind of like glancing across all these papers.

You see the word castromancy over and over again.

K-A-S-T-R-O-M-A-N-C-Y.

And there's a hundred torn sketches of like what look like blueprints similar to the one you have, but they're torn about.

There's notes marked through them.

There's like things in the margins.

And one thing that you do notice that's common in all of these is this 24th room.

And you don't see that on your map.

wait so they all have a 24th room but our map doesn't it doesn't actually have the the room itself it just has that in the notes 24th room oh all right so that's that's uh

to tartara what's his name t tardonal titardinal titardinal yep you got there titardinal that was he didn't finish so he didn't get to the room 24.

do we know where 24 is it's not on our map i've got an idea.

Yeah, me too.

Boss, you go ahead.

You go ahead, mister.

I think we need to count all the windows, see?

And we need to see there might be one that doesn't connect anywhere, you see?

What?

Every floor has four.

There might be one missing.

Well, he did fall, right?

So maybe he was trying to reach the 24th room or look for it or something.

So maybe it's, yeah, you're onto something with the windows.

So wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

Okay.

In room 20,

there are two windows, but they only have one

symbol saying where they're going.

Same with 19.

Oh, really?

Dang it.

So those match up.

There's still more books and tomes and stuff if you want to keep looking for any more information.

Can I look through them?

Sure.

You kind of peruse through some more like buried books and paper that you didn't see initially in the glance.

And you see something written in the margins in like a hand script.

It's no longer like been stamped around or like maybe officially planted on this paper.

And it says the words drowned lover.

Velin is a name that you keep seeing over and over again.

Velin?

Yeah, V-I-L-I-N.

V-I-L-I-N.

It's some kind of like poem you gather.

Like, it's not very good, but it seems very heartfelt.

I think I'm on to something.

Oh.

Yeah.

I am totally lost.

No, no, no, I got something.

I got something.

Okay, go for it.

Never mind.

No, never mind.

Did it go?

Did it go?

Is it gone?

It came and went.

No, it wasn't.

Well, I thought I found the missing floor, but it was 5S.

It's just real small on the map.

And

don't, don't,

ignore me.

Maybe is there a sixth floor?

Oh.

I'll also point out that you guys realize you're still in 22.

We need to go back to 23.

Right.

Maybe we should go to 23 and then try to figure this out.

Yeah.

And if we go through the window here in 22, it'll take us down to 3E?

3E.

Which would be 23.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah, as you're looking at the window, you realize that there's more blood on this windowsill.

Did he like fall and just like knock his head on all of these windowsills?

Well, maybe he was looking out of 5E and fell down.

He had a knife in him.

So I think he got stabbed somewhere and then was climbing down.

No, Vol did.

Right.

We're talking about Vol.

Talking about T Tardinal.

I was talking about T Tardinal, how legend is that he like fell.

Yeah.

But I think, like, it's possible he was, he fell by, like, looking for something or got pushed.

Did 5e have the window?

Did that window have blood as well?

It did.

That's the one you came down.

Why would there be blood at the top?

This is, wait.

I thought this tower only had four floors.

Oh, it's five.

Five.

Five floors.

So top floor, if we look out 4e window and look up, is there anything above 5e?

Look out 4e and you're looking up past it.

Is that what you're saying?

Yeah, we're like in room 22 and we're looking at the window that I flew in.

you know that there's a top of this tower There's no more rooms, but you know there's a top of this tower.

I think we got to go up there.

Maybe that's the altar that cheese made nerd.

No ease may

was talking about cheese maid.

I heard cheese master and I was like oh god

let's go to 23.

We have to do that first.

Yes.

All right.

So you go

go out the window kind of similar to what you did before and start to descend down into 23.

You make it inside and that's where you see this blood still spilled on the floor, but no longer a volt corpse.

And then you see a window to the north and it's off the fifth floor.

I just want to check real quick.

We still got our orbs above us, right?

We didn't lose the rest.

Oh, thank God.

Okay, so if we stick our head out of that north window, so we're looking down the south direction of the fifth floor.

Yes.

Yes.

Yeah.

As you guys are looking out this window, you hear three sets of footsteps coming down the hallway and they stop right at the threshold of this room.

Be very quiet.

Are you still wearing your cloak?

Yeah.

Okay.

I know I am.

Can I like listen to see if they are saying anything?

You are listening, and you hear breathing, but you don't hear any talking.

And all you hear is

that's the most horrifying thing ever.

Like a weapon being drawing of a weapon.

Maybe they're just like swapping out the Game Boy cartridges.

This tower just got really creepy.

Yeah.

And then you hear something fall on the ground and it clatters, and it's the manacles that you had before.

Uh-oh.

We get our deposit back now.

Let's roll initiative.

Oh, no.

Oh, good lord.

We should have.

We should have killed Balthazar.

It's a two d6 for initiative.

One d6.

One d6.

Um, I'm just gonna go with Barb.

What did you roll, Barb?

Oh, you sure you didn't want to go with Blaine?

I got a two.

She just told him of a finger.

No, I went like this.

I got a few.

You got a two?

Okay, I got a six.

So these creatures are going to go first.

You suspect these are the recaloo, if you had to guess.

And you already heard an unsheathing of something.

First one goes for Big Benny.

And you see this obscured kind of warping of space lunge out at you.

And at the last second, you instinctually like definitely jut out of the way to the left.

And you hear it kind of like just nick your fabric.

And it's some kind of metal scraping against you.

Next one, this time you hear the stretching of fabric and fibers and it sounds like almost like a rubber band stretching eric

you hear something whiz past your head like a like a rock or a bird flying past you that's right see that's a warning shot get out of here and then last billy you hear another thing whiz past your head as well and they just don't seem to have you zeroed so now it's your turn what do you guys want to do um i have a potion of strength if i was to take that could i use the effects on that on this turn or would it have to be until the next time absolutely okay then i'm gonna be like boss I've got you.

And I'm going to chug the potion of strength and then draw a sword and shield and just hack it.

The area, I'm assuming, where they are just based on the weirdness and the, you know, vision blurriness.

Yeah, you drink this potion that's yellow and you read the label again, like as you're looking out of the bottle emptying and it says super strength and your both your arms become enormous, like gorilla-sized arms, and they actually weigh you down and now you're like almost upside down, like a handstand, with like how your arms are just so heavy.

But you feel like you can throw or punch anything if you can get your arms up.

Wow.

Okay, then I want to see if I can get my arms up and just start swinging.

Just start at these cloaks figures.

All right, make a strength check, and I'll give you advantage.

Yeah, we're gonna call him Billy Big Arms.

See?

Yeah,

yeah,

shoot.

That's a six and a two.

That's eight plus one, nine.

You feel a connection as you start helicoptering these massive arms, these biceps around, and you hear it connect with like some kind of bone cracks, and you see something fall to the floor, and it, the cloak that was covering it, has fallen off of it, and you just see this bloodied Rodentius staring blankly at you now.

Oh, cool.

Plus, I killed one for you.

One shot.

Yeah, good job.

It's like the brother from Umbrella Academy.

Oh, yeah.

I get compared to that guy a lot, actually.

Oh, the actor from the Netflix.

Yeah.

Let's keep going.

Who's next?

I'll go.

They can't see me, right?

Cause I still have a cloak on.

Correct.

And they don't have any like special abilities to like see people in the cloak.

You don't know.

Could I try to flank one of them, get behind him, and take my two daggers and stab him in the back?

So let me ask you, if you can't see exactly, you can see, you can guess where they might be and they're kind of in this doorway.

How are you, how do you think you'd get around them?

Ooh, that's a good point.

Ooh, instead, actually, I have a lantern and oil.

Oh, God.

Could I take some of my oil and like throw it onto the ground?

Absolutely, you can.

And then what do you want to do?

Like, keep going with that idea.

Well, I don't know if I could use my lantern, but I also have a tinderbox.

Yeah.

And I kind of want to light it up.

Yeah.

Okay.

Are you going to light it at the same time?

Are you going to toss one and then hopefully toss the other?

Like, what's the mechanic here?

Essentially, my goal is to, like, make this oil flame up on the ground.

So it potentially like burns them.

Let's let's do it um make a dex check and we'll just say it's a it's a flat dex check not advantage disadvantage that would be a 11 actually yeah

yeah you manage to get it what you think is like if there's one on the ground like it seems to be covering the left side of this doorway you think there's two other ones and you toss it and kind of towards them immediately hits the ground and flames jut out from this oil and start filling the the doorway with uh these like red hot licking flames and you start hearing like screaming and like they start backing up a bit.

Do we see like their cloaks or something?

Or like, are they on fire now?

So we could actually see them.

You can see the flames, yeah, like catching them on fire.

You still don't see them, perhaps, but like you see where they should be now, like kind of their outlines in the fire.

Okay, and that's probably my action, right?

What did you roll again?

An 11.

You see one of them fall to the ground and is like trying to like douse themselves, but they can't do it in time.

And they kind of fall over, but they're not uncloaked, but you see that they're like, there's smoke rising from the ground from this lifeless corpse okay and there seems to be one left after that happens there's one left okay that's my turn let me go muffin who's next uh i guess i'll run up with my dagger and try to stab at the area wherever the final one appears to be sure and i'll also say like you guys don't have to go like one at a time you can do things together if you want you want to stab together benny

benny you want to do a stab yeah Could I, like, if you can stab them, could I then like use, I have a shield.

Can I use my shield to like push them into the fire even more or back into the fire or something like that cast them into the flames yeah you totally can let's do Benny you make a strength or deck so leave it up to you and then boss I'm gonna ask you to do just an attack yeah

five nine to five you guys look at each other and like we got this and like you start lunging forward but it's just like the flames are too hot and you're like oh this is actually harder than I thought you're like dancing around these these flames.

Billy, you messed me up.

There's one more.

Ooh, this final one is like really upset at all this and starts screaming.

I'm like, you killed my friends.

And like starts lunging towards Big Benny.

And you see this knife come out you.

Like it's clearly like not no longer cloaked by this blue fabric anymore and lunges towards you and you see it stick you in the arm.

You see it stick in your arm and it's gonna be really hard to move that particular arm, but you don't take any damage at this point, at least right now.

Okay.

Adrenaline.

Where are we with initiative?

Are we back to another initiative roll?

That's true.

Actually, we didn't roll.

I'm just going to say it's y'all's turn now.

Okay.

Then I would respond to such a transgression.

Me too.

She just sees this injustice and takes both her daggers and tries to stab.

Yeah, you all four can do something together if you want.

Let's gang up on him, beat him while he's down.

Hook smash.

All of us.

Yeah.

Not Benny.

I still got I got one hand that can use, and I have a one-handed axe, so I swing that around.

Okay.

You can make an attack roll.

Billy, if you want to do another advantage, strength, and then whatever else the rest of you want to do.

Attack.

Similar to Muffin, I'll go in with dagger.

Nine.

My attack is 12.

Okay.

I got a ten.

Okay.

Eight.

Okay.

Hey, you're the brains.

You're the brains.

You all four take this thing down and like tear it to shreds, really, is what happens.

Yeah.

And falls into this ashy heap of rodentia.

And there are no more enemies to be dispatched.

You have

cleaned my

rat mace.

Yeah, we did it!

But there are flames that are still clinging onto this room and starting to spread on the floor.

Uh, that's my bed.

Have I got a water scan or anything like that?

No.

There's a lake outside, see?

You can use a lake.

And just a reminder, there is a window to the north that's on the fifth floor.

Should we try to go to the top, toppity top roof yeah if we look out that window to the north and we look up is there a way to go up and into something that is a new room there is a chain dangling down well

dangling down to us from five okay from above yeah uh what do i do with this knife in my arm could muffin take it and yank it out real quick Totally can.

That's what they always say.

Yeah.

Whenever you get the knives stuck in you, you gotta pull it out immediately.

It's like...

It's better to be kind of injured than to try to climb a rope with a knife.

Yeah, so blood starts kind of oozing out of your arm and like you can feel it again.

Like you could probably use it again, but you do get damaged from it.

What's my damage?

It was one.

I have medicine with me.

I have three medicine.

Could I give any one of the medicines?

Absolutely, you can.

I lost an HP and I got it back.

Boss, are you injured, boss Eric?

Nah, I'm good.

I'm tough.

See?

Yeah.

Oh, killer.

It's okay.

It's like that scene in Kung Fu Hustle with the throwing knives where he actually stabs his partner and then pulls it out and puts it back in.

Love that movie.

That's such a good movie.

Then that's a great scene.

Yeah, let's climb up that chain, see?

I'll lead the way because I got these big ol' arms and I can help you guys up.

You go, big arms, Billy.

You got it, boss.

All right.

I'll climb up.

You lead the way and start climbing out onto this chain.

And as you do, you see that the sun is almost completely set.

The sky is starting to dim.

The moon is full and casting beams that are glistening off these chains.

You climb further and further and further further until you reach the top and you come across an altar.

There's a table that looks like it's made for some kind of offering or ritual that you're not sure what it could be.

Esme was right.

But you do realize that...

Oh, oh, oh,

sorry, you have my favorite.

You do realize that

your spark is still above your heads.

And I'm assuming all of you climb up there.

Yes, I climb up.

Waffin, didn't you find a special coin?

I did.

Should we get Esme here just to watch or just hang out or just do it ourselves?

I say, just go for it.

Do it.

Do it.

Do it.

Muffin looks at Eric and goes, I got it.

Yeah, do it.

You're the one talking about finding a friend, see?

So I just gotta make sure I give you the encouragement that you need, see?

She puts a thumb up to Eric and then she takes the coin out and puts it on the table.

Altar.

Alter.

You pull out the coin and you try to put it down, but it doesn't leave your hands.

Sticky hands.

I guess I'm going with this.

Muffin, let go of the coin.

I'm trying.

Make a will check.

Waiting for that.

Seven.

You don't want to let go of the coin.

Why would you?

Muffin.

Something's compelling me to not let go.

But as you approach this altar, you see that the spark over your head starts falling in front of your face and kind of it's almost like if it had a face, looks at you in the eyes and then enters the altar and the altar starts glowing with murky light oh maybe it wasn't the coin

i think i think i need eric just to tell me to do it again do it do it

is it the coin or is it the light i'm confused what does the light in the altar look like it's almost like water waves if you're looking at light underwater you see like these lines kind of washing across the table what's happening with the lights from everyone else's heads they're still a little bit like a few steps behind you, so they're still hanging out above their heads.

I'll approach.

Yeah, let's all approach the different sides of the altar.

Same thing.

All your sparks kind of come out in front of you and in front of your faces and then move forward into the altar, and the altar becomes even brighter and brighter.

Before you know it, lightning starts striking in the air.

Everybody make a dex check.

Oh, no.

That is a six.

Eight, nine, seven.

The eight and nine are fine.

The six and seven, you're gonna take six two damage and seven one damage.

I'm down to two.

All right.

And the weirdest thing is that the lightning didn't come from the sky.

It came from the lake.

Whoa.

Like it shot out and kind of arced right for you all.

But we do know.

You hear a voice emanate from the altar.

What is your wish?

Our wish is for you to return the life to Vol.

I don't know what we're actually trying to wish for.

I mean, that would be nice, yeah.

It's a very noble wish.

As you finish saying that, Muffin, you hear, like, way down in the distance...

What do the other three of you want to do?

Do we get a wish as well?

What is your wish?

Oh, cool.

We all get a wish.

Oh, yeah.

Happy day.

I wish for another kitty.

Every campaign.

The cat lady of the group.

I am.

Thank you very much.

I will take that title.

A tiger appears next to you.

Oh, it's so big, kitty.

And it starts purring affectionately.

Hello.

I will call you Muffin.

Wasn't your other cat also called Muffin?

That is correct.

I find this offensive.

Everybody, make a dex check again.

Oh, no.

Do we need to get out of this lightning room?

I might die.

10.

13.

Okay, that was a 10.

Six.

Uh-oh.

You're going to take two more points of damage.

Oh.

Eric falls to the ground.

Oh, no.

Lightning strikes Eric in the chest, and he's thrown into the parapets of this tower on lifeless.

What do you do?

I want my wish!

I want my wish!

I wish that my

adopted dad, Eric, was back alive!

What happens?

What happens, Eric?

My eyes pop open and I see glowing light around my adopted son, Billy.

And I have like two giant arms.

Kobe, keep me home, Papa.

Oh, come here, son.

Eric, make your wish.

We need to get out of here.

We've all heard of bear hugs, but you've never seen a gorilla hug like this

from a rat.

Yeah, I wish I was respected as a legitimate businessman, see?

You feel something appear like a piece of paper in your pocket.

Oh, I pull it out and look at it.

It says, Eric, tycoon and master of all business.

Yeah.

One day this will be yours, son.

See?

Let's get out of here now.

As that's happening, Muffin goes, Esme, Esme, Esme.

Esme appears and a door opens before you just in front of the altar.

Yes.

Let us in.

Muffin Muffin runs for the door.

Chase it.

I run.

I run.

Same, same.

Do not wait for lightning.

You guys start running for the door and clouds start sparking with life all around you and the lake starts emptying out from water.

Just as you close to the door, the whole tower explodes with light and water and floods the island below.

Luckily, you're on the edge of the lake on the other side.

It's a shame Vol had to die twice.

Yeah, I was gonna say, where's Vole?

Where's Vole?

You see, Vol is in a rowboat, like just trying to get out of there, but he's stuck in a waterless lake now.

Oh, no.

I knew me riding boat here was gonna be a good option.

Oh, yeah.

Great goal, Benny.

Great goal.

Our tale moves forward into the future.

Vol is returned to his father, safe and sound, and wiser than before.

He heeds his father's wisdom much more.

now having a second chance at life.

Murin is a rodentia of his word, and then some.

Upon hearing the report of your heroic adventure through the Spire and what you've done for his son, he doubles your promised bounty and rewards each of you with 100 silver pieces.

The fate of the Reclu gang remains a mystery, particularly because it's unclear how devastating your dispatching of the three blue-cloaked Rodentia was to their faction.

However, word has begun circling throughout the region region that Pestis, their leader, is looking for the four of you, this maze rat pack.

Oh.

The lake that surrounded Titardinal's tower is henceforth permanently dried of all water.

From what few clues you unearth from the spire and its secrets, it seems the curious castromancy that was cast upon the structure has fallen dormant since its destructive demise.

But what of its connection to the lake, or this perplexing path of sparks?

Perhaps the door to that enigma shall be unlocked in due time.

What becomes of the four of you with your newfound treasures, magic, and granted wishes?

I slowly expand my business empire

and corner the market on cheese imports and exports across the land.

Ah, very good.

What does Billy do?

I pay for a prosthetic finger for my friend Muffin if she wants it.

And I try to follow in my papa's footsteps as a legitimate businessman.

Jesus.

What?

Benny would do obviously the one thing you would do with this kind of

money injection.

He buys a farm and he turns it into an animal shelter for cats.

And they're all named Muffin.

They're all...

This is, it's called Muffin Land.

I could get behind that.

What about Muffin?

Muffin happily takes the finger that her friend Billy acquires for her.

He gave you the finger?

Yes.

Unfortunately.

So used to it.

She attaches it to the hand that already has five fingers so that she has

four and six now.

Perfect.

Super hand.

I think that's a, you know, she's not one to settle down anywhere, so she, you know, lives her life on the road and I think wastes away all of her earnings gambling.

That's the lie.

Classic Movin, the best story to end on.

And thus concludes this tale of the skyblind spire.

But is this the last we will hear of our maze rat pack?

Or do the fickle fingers of fate have more in store for our furry friends?

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This episode of Tales from the Stinky Dragon was produced by Ben Ernst and edited by Mike Reisinger.

Hey, that's me, and Kathleen Arnold.

I know her.

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