The Adventure Zone Royale: Episode 13

Speaker 1 Previously on Taz Royale. It is not until now that you get sort of an idea of who's gone.
There is a chime of a pleasant sounding bell and twelve more holographic busts materialize around the room.

Speaker 1 You will have the rest of today and tomorrow to recover before we reconvene for our next trial. And I need your guys' help

Speaker 1 to put a bag of dog poop on the gentleman's front doorstep. You and I are oil and water, and

Speaker 1 we are going to have to solve this sooner rather than later, I think.

Speaker 1 Welcome back to Taz Royale. You've joined us in a calm time, a period of rest and relaxation between the trials.

Speaker 1 Quiet, I encourage everyone to reflect from time to time on their actions and what they would have done differently. And their words.
It's how you grow as a person and as a wizard.

Speaker 1 It is the day after the trial of evocation.

Speaker 1 Most notably in the last episode, it was largely dedicated to a prank gone terribly wrong.

Speaker 1 We almost burned down the house of the gentleman from Wisbury. When I say we, I mean that was mostly you guys, and honestly, mostly Travis.

Speaker 1 What?

Speaker 1 Well, it was your idea.

Speaker 1 It is the morning, though, of the day after. And I don't regret it.
Okay.

Speaker 1 I don't know if you're supposed to or not, but you will at some point. You all have to do it off before the next trial commences.

Speaker 1 And you are able to spend that day however you'd like. Later, we're going to all head to the Adelier to grab some new spells,

Speaker 1 maybe some new merch. I've asked you guys to level your characters up to level four,

Speaker 1 which is not the most exciting benchmark in Dungeons and Dragons. You basically get to choose between some stat increases or you grab a feat.
So we can talk about what you end up doing there.

Speaker 1 But I'd like to start with either Hellgrammate or with Lorith. How would you like to spend your free time today before the next trial begins?

Speaker 1 Hmm.

Speaker 1 I feel like Hellgrammat needs a little bit more exposure to

Speaker 1 the land. I think he needs to do a little groundwork and get more familiar with the rest of the entire playing area.
And

Speaker 1 I don't think he, you know, he needs to reconnoiter.

Speaker 1 Sure. I'm here for it.
That is if he has already connoitered at some point to do that. There's some areas you've definitely connoitered.

Speaker 1 The residences here in the sort of southeast quarter,

Speaker 1 you know, you've been around the eggs, the ziggurat, obviously, the gardens you died in, and there's the observation platform, the tower you went up.

Speaker 1 But there's a lot of stuff on the sort of north side of the island that Hell Grammat has not sort of visited.

Speaker 1 What's the one part we are forbidden?

Speaker 1 So you have the Crystallarium? Yes, you've been warned multiple times

Speaker 1 not to approach the crystallarium.

Speaker 1 You should try it, Dad, because I heard Griffin just has a wall there. If you try to walk into it, I heard you just hit geometry.

Speaker 1 Griffin just says, like, denying it.

Speaker 1 I'm wondering if Hellgrammat, just because of his innate curiosity, might hang around in the forest, in the woods a little bit, right up there, and get right up as close to the crystallarium as he can to see what he can see.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 1 All right. I like that.
So you head over to the sort of northern edge of the woods.

Speaker 1 You are able to kind of spot the crystallarium. It is slightly across this kind of like outcropping of the lake, sort of separating you from the entrance to the crystallarium.

Speaker 1 But you're able to kind of like you know, get a decent look at it.

Speaker 1 I think if you the the extent to which you're going to be able to surveil the crystallarium is going to depend on, you know how sneaky you can be.

Speaker 1 I think this would definitely be a good opportunity for you to use your uh exquisite hiding skills with your uh chameleon carapace, right?

Speaker 1 Um, so give me a stealth check with advantage using your chameleon carapace here. Stealth check with advantage that would be

Speaker 1 there's a 12,

Speaker 1 which for Hell Grammar is a hell of a roll. Yeah,

Speaker 1 and that's a

Speaker 1 well now wait a minute. That's an eight.
Yeah, but look at the can you see the die? No, is it cocked? It said 15.

Speaker 1 Wow. Wow.
It says on our thing eight. Okay.
That's crazy. We all saw eight.

Speaker 1 That's so wild. It's so weird.
It was up against the edge. It was kind of halfway.

Speaker 1 It was cocked. And I don't want to go off half cocked.
You certainly don't. I'm going to be full cocked.
We'll take a 12 with a 12.

Speaker 1 You head up to the edge of the woods. You are able to

Speaker 1 get closer to the crystallarium than you have in the past. There is a

Speaker 1 long sort of staircase approach leading up to the crystallarium.

Speaker 1 The building itself appears to be made out of several

Speaker 1 enormous, sort of perfect geometric

Speaker 1 crystals. They appear to be amethyst.

Speaker 1 There's like a dark red, maybe ruby kind of central structure with these two great amethyst pyramids flanking it.

Speaker 1 And right in the center,

Speaker 1 there's just kind of a bunch of large, like six, seven foot tall crystals that are overlapping, forming a kind of like

Speaker 1 barricaded entrance into

Speaker 1 into this structure. The crystal is mostly opaque.
You are not really able to see through it to see exactly what is happening inside the crystallarium.

Speaker 1 If you were able to get right up on it, like go up the

Speaker 1 approach, up the stairs,

Speaker 1 you might be able to get a better look. But from where you are,

Speaker 1 you can't quite see what is...

Speaker 1 what's happening inside the building.

Speaker 1 I think you are close enough that if you wanted to roll a perception or investigation check, you would do that sort of flat just to see if you can, you know, figure anything else out without having to get any closer to this place.

Speaker 1 Well,

Speaker 1 I have a spell I would like to use. Okay, great.

Speaker 1 It's called Obscure Object.

Speaker 1 Okay, I don't remember that spell.

Speaker 1 I didn't remember it too. I just see it.
It says at will. Did you get it when you were leveling up, Dad? I have never seen it before today.

Speaker 1 So I'm thinking maybe it came from today's level up. You took magically mischievous as a feat.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 Okay, that's exactly what it is then. So

Speaker 1 you have taken magically mischievous as a feat. You gain proficiency in sleight of hand.
That's cool.

Speaker 1 When you succeed on a dexterity sleight of hand check to steal something, you can magically turn the stolen object invisible as part of the same action as if you would cast obscure object.

Speaker 1 The object must be small enough to fit in the palm of your hand and it lasts for one minute. You can use this ability two times per long rest.

Speaker 1 So it's not like he has the spell, but the spell is like an extension of this. Yeah, he's a stinker.
Like he took the stinker feet. Yeah, for sure.
Okay. Is the thing that you wanted to obscure?

Speaker 1 Where on earth?

Speaker 1 I just thought they helped him at hiding anything during a sleight of hand.

Speaker 1 Nothing up my what? He's blowing.

Speaker 1 Nothing up my neck. Nothing up my chit.
Nothing. He's got nothing up my chitin except for mandrels and shit.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Bunch of bug stuff.

Speaker 1 Okay, so what were you hoping to obscure here? Well, I thought maybe I would obscure part of the crystal wall, see if I can make a little peephole,

Speaker 1 which would make it, I would think, a perception check a little easier.

Speaker 1 Okay,

Speaker 1 I think that is

Speaker 1 a stretch for the description of magically mischievous, but if you want to roll dice to see if it works, I will allow that. But first, you're going to have to get like

Speaker 1 quite a bit closer.

Speaker 1 You will need to get like right up next to the crystallarium in order to do that. And you have been warned not to do that.

Speaker 1 So the trade-off trade-off I'm willing to do here is like, you can attempt this, but you're going to need to put yourself in a more vulnerable position to try it.

Speaker 1 Okay, so

Speaker 1 I'll use chameleon carapace

Speaker 1 to get a little closer. Sure.

Speaker 1 Do I still have advantage?

Speaker 1 Yes, I will give you advantage here. I think because it is off time, like you can creep so slowly that it's still technically hiding, right? Okay.

Speaker 1 And you're just kind of like scuttling across the ground very, very slowly.

Speaker 1 Let's get this stealth check with advantage as you actually approach the crystallarium. Okay.

Speaker 1 That is a 10. Again,

Speaker 1 typical hell grammar roll. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Oh, an 18. Wow.
Your highest roll yet.

Speaker 1 You needed it the most. All right.
18. It takes like, you take your sweet time.
We're talking about like

Speaker 1 a painful, slow crawl over like an hour. You kind of skip this like stony staircase approach to come at the building from the side.

Speaker 1 And you are able to eventually make your way up towards the crystallarium. As you get closer, you can see some automated sort of defenses that are mostly surrounding this front approach.
There are

Speaker 1 these sort of slender stone towers,

Speaker 1 maybe 15 feet tall,

Speaker 1 with these swirling white crystalline orbs on top of them that you can feel just like a very powerful, magical,

Speaker 1 you know, ward inside of. But you are able to go so slow and so sneaky that you can get up right to the crystallarium.

Speaker 1 And as you kind of hold your hand out towards the side of one of these amethyst walls, you cast obscure object.

Speaker 1 Give me.

Speaker 1 Give me a slight hand check, right? This is how obscure object's supposed to work. So, like, to see how effective this is at kind of like using this spell in a,

Speaker 1 you know, lateral thinking sort of manner. Okay, that's 12.
12, great.

Speaker 1 Is that great? Yeah, no, I mean, it's for Hellgrade Man. So, with a 12,

Speaker 1 you, you hold out your hand, and

Speaker 1 you see the wall begin to kind of slowly deform.

Speaker 1 And it's very, very subtle.

Speaker 1 It starts out as just kind of like a pinprick flaw in the side of this like smooth crystal that very slowly expands to create a hole that is just like a half inch in diameter.

Speaker 1 And you put your face towards the edge of the crystallarium, and you can look through the hole.

Speaker 1 Can I make an investigation check? You're going to make some sort of check here, right? But like,

Speaker 1 this is a, I will tell you now as the DM, like a pretty risky thing that you are doing.

Speaker 1 This thing is Fort Knox, and you have managed to penetrate it, albeit just a little bit. So I'm going to want either an investigation or a perception check.

Speaker 1 And because like you have no peripheral vision into

Speaker 1 into this building, it is it is going to be made with disadvantage. Okay,

Speaker 1 well, let's see. There's a

Speaker 1 seven,

Speaker 1 okay.

Speaker 1 Shit, and a 21. Wow, that 21 would have been really, really, very, very good.

Speaker 1 Amazing. Amazing.

Speaker 1 It would have been, I mean, I'll make you a devil's bargain here, Dad. Okay.

Speaker 1 You can use that 21 if you want, but you're going to get caught.

Speaker 1 Or you can take the seven.

Speaker 1 Hey, you got to

Speaker 1 live large. Okay.
Spend money to make I'm going to take the 21.

Speaker 1 Great.

Speaker 1 You peer in through this hole, and

Speaker 1 when you do,

Speaker 1 You're only seeing, you know, a half inch worth of

Speaker 1 activity

Speaker 1 inside of the crystallarium.

Speaker 1 It is much more spacious inside than you would have expected.

Speaker 1 From the outside, it just looks like a huge like solid crystal, but obviously like there is space inside and it appears to be kind of greater than the volume of the building would suggest just looking at it.

Speaker 1 You can see very clearly small kind of like moats of

Speaker 1 what appear to be kind of multicolored light

Speaker 1 swirling around. Not swirling around.
They seem to be moving in a fairly orderly fashion

Speaker 1 between different places. You see

Speaker 1 almost like...

Speaker 1 almost like shelves of these lights in orderly rows, and occasionally moats will fly from one shelf to another,

Speaker 1 almost like an abacus, like beads moving around an abacus.

Speaker 1 You can see what appears to be, and I think you have a particular affinity for this particular observation,

Speaker 1 like webs of light inside.

Speaker 1 Not quite the same sort of

Speaker 1 construction as a spider web, but there does appear to be some kind of like

Speaker 1 you know, something familiar.

Speaker 1 Just looking at a beehive or looking at your the nest that you kind of like grew up in, there is a biological natural structure in order to that and what you see in here is like kind of unfamiliar but it does have that feeling of

Speaker 1 a like a biological system something that has been engineered by by biology

Speaker 1 and you can tell I think just taking this extra look and taking this extra time to look, the little moats of light that are floating around are the crystals that you all have,

Speaker 1 you know, created as your

Speaker 1 memories have been kind of manifest, and your spells have been manifest into these different little stones and the different stones that you found that have given you access.

Speaker 1 So, looking inside, you are able to kind of glean that there is a

Speaker 1 there is some sort of structure in here, some sort of system where the stones that have these magic spells kind of imprinted onto them are being

Speaker 1 managed. And

Speaker 1 right next to your ear or your thrykine hearing hole, whatever it is, you a voice comes very loud and says, Hell Grammit, I must warn you, you have broken one of the rules of the conclave, and therefore you are to be eliminated immediately

Speaker 1 without

Speaker 1 wait, wait, wait, I'm

Speaker 1 you look at your side, and you see on your grimoire, the crystal

Speaker 1 that was set there as sort of your personal assistant,

Speaker 1 has caught you in the act of spying into the crystallarium. I'm afraid I must report you immediately to the octave

Speaker 1 because

Speaker 1 what rule did I break?

Speaker 1 You were specifically forbidden, as are all of the aspirants here, from approaching, attempting to enter, attempting to invade or learn the secrets of the crystallarium. Oh, I was not trying to...

Speaker 1 I didn't touch... I never touched it.

Speaker 1 Let me explain myself. I felt this

Speaker 1 compulsion.

Speaker 1 I felt another, what I thought was another thrikene

Speaker 1 in jeopardy, in some kind of stress and strain. And

Speaker 1 I purposefully didn't touch anything. I just was trying to reach out to them and see if there was anything I could do to help.

Speaker 1 I sincerely apologize. I had no intention of trying to break in or trying to get through.

Speaker 1 That's why I tried not to touch anything, but I just felt this inner connection to someone in danger or hurting or trying to reach out.

Speaker 1 My intentions were pure, I assured you.

Speaker 1 There's some lies in there, but there's some truths in there. So I don't know if this is a persuasion or a deception check I'll leave it to you whichever one you

Speaker 1 I do better at persuasion okay well we can do that not that I do well in anything but

Speaker 1 geez Lamine

Speaker 1 I got a hell gram at four

Speaker 1 that's a two plus a two

Speaker 1 but to be fair dad that's like a Loravith 12

Speaker 1 yeah I know that's true the the like little crystal holographic shape that has appeared over the grimoire you see it kind of percolate on what you just said, and

Speaker 1 you hear the voice say,

Speaker 1 I am willing to overlook this this time. However, I am afraid that your memory must be purged from the last 10 minutes in order to keep the playing field fair.

Speaker 1 It's so important that here on the octave ziggurat, that all of the aspirins have a fair shake to ascend to the position of the new octave.

Speaker 1 And by looking into the crystallarium, you are, I'm sorry to say, cheating quite a bit.

Speaker 1 So, if you can agree to the memory purge, then I can, I suppose, let this slide and not have to

Speaker 1 run this up the flagpole, so to speak.

Speaker 1 Can I have just a minute to think it over? This is a big decision for me. Between death and a memory purge? Yes.
Okay. Yes.
Give me just a minute, will you? Sure.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 he scrolls in the dirt with his claw

Speaker 1 Thriking symbols

Speaker 1 that say

Speaker 1 biological moats in the dirt. Okay.
Okay. All right.
Now, is the person watching him famously stupid? Yeah, Raven. I meant to ask if they're famously stupid or unobservant.

Speaker 1 Give me a slight of hand check here. You have, you're good at this now.
And so to do this without the little,

Speaker 1 you know, 22. 22.
With a 22, you can scratch.

Speaker 1 Griffin. Yeah, really? Griffin? Yeah.

Speaker 1 How far it's... No, you know, I'm rooting for you guys, right? Like, this is the.
Yeah, no, I know. I just wanted to make dad feel good for a second.
Thank you. Okay.
Thank you, buddy.

Speaker 1 He needs

Speaker 1 this. With a 22, I think

Speaker 1 you can etch in like a decent, you know, Thrykeen. We can say that Thrykeen sort of language has a sort of shorthand quality to it,

Speaker 1 like a court stenographer will be able to do. You're able to etch in enough sort of information here.
And Chris says, if you're done using the bathroom or whatever it is

Speaker 1 doing, you know,

Speaker 1 I realize I'd done you wrong. Chris, is it Chris? That's right, Chris.

Speaker 1 I am

Speaker 1 moved to the core with shame.

Speaker 1 Not so much I want you to kill me, but enough that I purge that memory. Take it, Chris.
Take the memories. Take them all away.
Please stand by.

Speaker 1 Give me a wisdom saving throw, please.

Speaker 1 Wisdom savings throw.

Speaker 1 Holy shit.

Speaker 1 That is a mat one.

Speaker 1 Wow. You forget everything.

Speaker 1 is

Speaker 1 a complete

Speaker 1 obliteration of

Speaker 1 an absolute

Speaker 1 remarkable forgetting that takes place right here.

Speaker 1 You are standing stock still, and just a second ago, you were like walking through the woods and you were trying to figure out like how you wanted to spend your day.

Speaker 1 And now you're kind of like standing by the lake here between the woods and the crystallarium. And

Speaker 1 I'm going going to need, I hate to do this, but with a crit failure,

Speaker 1 as you kind of like snap back to your senses, I'm going to need a luck check just to see, or a perception check to see if you notice the symbols that you etched into the ground here before you before you walk away.

Speaker 1 Do investigation again?

Speaker 1 I mean, no, because you don't know to look for it, right?

Speaker 1 I'll take it.

Speaker 1 That's a seven.

Speaker 1 With a seven, you

Speaker 1 don't notice these symbols that you've written in the ground. Neither has Chris.
Neither has anyone else. They are there.
You have written a secret message by the,

Speaker 1 you know, ground level of the crystallarium as to what it contains.

Speaker 1 But you

Speaker 1 come back. You come back to the present and you see, you don't know where you are.
You don't know why you're standing here. You know where you are.
You don't know how you ended up here.

Speaker 1 Chris says, hello there, Hell Grammit.

Speaker 1 I am here to tell you that you have experienced a brief lapse in your memory because of an arcane incident. Oh, my God, what did I do?

Speaker 1 You

Speaker 1 did break a rule here on the Ziggrott, and I chose to show clemency to you.

Speaker 1 And I am hoping you will repay my kindness in turn by returning to the residences to rest and sleep off this incredible breach of your mental sanctuary.

Speaker 1 Chris, I would be happy to, but I ask one favor. Just

Speaker 1 tell me what I did wrong so I know not to repeat this same offense.

Speaker 1 You broke one of the cardinal rules of the Octave Ziggurat. Enjoy your rest, Hell Grammar.
It's time for you to go home. Very well.
Thank you, Chris.

Speaker 1 And you head back to the residences

Speaker 1 to sleep off the memory wipe,

Speaker 1 leaving behind a clue

Speaker 1 as to the crystallarium that no one has seen.

Speaker 1 This is very Robert Louis Stevenson stuff. I mean, it's huge hell grammar stuff.
I think you can own that entirely.

Speaker 1 Loraveth,

Speaker 1 how are you spending your day?

Speaker 1 Well, after watching all of that play out from a distance

Speaker 1 and enjoying it a great deal. and observing all of it, seeing all of that, enjoying it.

Speaker 1 I find myself drawn to the Gilded Lily.

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 1 I'd like to explore over in that area. I haven't been through there yet, and the idea of being around the lake and being near some water appeals to me.
Yeah, it's you head over.

Speaker 1 The Gilded Lily is, you know, this great,

Speaker 1 you know, crystalline flower emerging from these two kind of lily pad-shaped islands connected to the rest of the Ziggarapa. These two long

Speaker 1 sort of

Speaker 1 painted red bridges. You cross those over to these lily pad islands, and it is indeed like this is the

Speaker 1 lap of luxury of the island. As you approach the Gilded Lily, you can see inside it's kind of separated into a few different chambers.

Speaker 1 Inside of one, you see a few aspirants seated at these very posh-looking dining tables,

Speaker 1 eating some delicious-looking, well, delicious to maybe non Goliaths very fancy looking food you can see through another that appears to be a little bit more opaque for privacy you can see like there's a spa set in in one part of the gilded lily

Speaker 1 you can see like a small kitchen where unseen servants are kind of toiling away cooking food for the for the assets. I'll head into the spa.
Okay.

Speaker 1 You make your way into the spa and

Speaker 1 when you get there, there is a small reception desk, and there doesn't appear to be anyone seated at the reception desk, but there is a small golden kind of ring-for-service bell positioned on it.

Speaker 1 Ding.

Speaker 1 You hit the bell, and you hear...

Speaker 1 And from behind the desk, you see there climbs up a mage hand.

Speaker 1 And it gives you a little wave, and

Speaker 1 it gestures towards

Speaker 1 a door over to the side that says body massage.

Speaker 1 There's one that says,

Speaker 1 you know, mud bath. All of the different services that a spa can provide seem to be separated into these different doors, and this mage hand is like gesturing towards them

Speaker 1 and then giving like a thumbs up, like, huh? And then towards another one, like, maybe that one.

Speaker 1 Yeah, perhaps.

Speaker 1 I'll admit, I have not

Speaker 1 such services in the past, but I um

Speaker 1 my rock that I normally sleep on at home, it lies just so. This angle, you see here? You see, I've been demonstrated.
I've searched

Speaker 1 perhaps three dozen rocks here. Beautiful views overlook, but the angle, it just is not right.
And every morning I wake up with the worst pain. Here and here.

Speaker 1 is this something you can

Speaker 1 banish

Speaker 1 banish from me you see the mage hand kind of tap its fingers on the desk like it's thinking and then it puts a single finger up

Speaker 1 and then it puts its hand over the bell and it rings it in like a very specific

Speaker 1 sequence it gives it a shave and a haircut like a ding ding ding ding ding and

Speaker 1 When that happens, you hear, you see a huge door off to the side of this like spa chamber that is unlabeled. It like bursts open as though it's been kicked, and

Speaker 1 an enormous mage hand kind of like climbs in, almost like a like a kid making a dinosaur out of their hand, kind of just like stomps in with each finger fall. It kind of just like shakes

Speaker 1 this, you know, this deep red glass chamber that you're standing in. And the giant hand sort of scurries over to you.
It is about the size of like a grizzly bear, this enormous hand.

Speaker 1 And the smaller mage hand gestures towards the body massage chamber and gestures to the enormous hand,

Speaker 1 which seems to be kind of like waiting to follow you. Yeah, I'll head into the chamber.
Okay, sure.

Speaker 1 You walk over to the body massage chamber and

Speaker 1 lay down. There is a very, very soft bed.
Do I? Do you? Well, what do I lay down on? Don't tell me I lay down before you tell me what I'm I'm laying down on. Well, there's a there is a

Speaker 1 tell me I lay down. You lay down and you die.
What if it's nails? You lay down on me. You squeeze a nail, Effin.

Speaker 1 You walk into the sales. What if it's lava? And I was like, I'm lying down in the lava.
I'm burning. It sucks.

Speaker 1 Why would you do that? No, get on. I die.
Do I care to die? Don't lay on that bed? What's wrong with you?

Speaker 1 There is a soft-looking bed with a sort of like

Speaker 1 a small head hole carved into it or cut out of the cushion. I'm not a massage expert.

Speaker 1 I don't think it's a soft bed i don't think that that's the right i think it's got to be some firmness what happens though is when you walk in this enormous hand lumbers in after you and just swats this soft bed into the side of the wall where it kind of like shatters and falls apart and then it points right down at the hard ground now we're talking yes this i can respect uh you see this giant hand shall i undress to my level of comfort uh it gives you a thumbs up like of course dude you naturally now of course you should this is about to get extremely extremely wild okay yeah just like a like a leather wrap around

Speaker 1 my dangle yeah shirt and then around

Speaker 1 and like an anti-no like an anti-sock kind of deal there's a leather strap to my butt crack that's purely structural yeah amazing uh okay

Speaker 1 you lay down and um you see that

Speaker 1 excuse me and it's quite cold uh it

Speaker 1 it you see it walk over. There's a small

Speaker 1 there's a small sphere set into like a plinth in the corner of the room that it kind of like rubs its index finger over, and you feel the temperature of the room begin to increase.

Speaker 1 The room seems to warm up quite a bit as it manipulates this sphere, and it gestures towards the ground, which is now quite a bit warmer as you lay down on it. Do you lay down on it? Holy shit.

Speaker 1 I do lay down on it. I apologize.
I do. Yeah.

Speaker 1 you

Speaker 1 feel uh this enormous mage hand uh

Speaker 1 sort of to to start kind of apply an amount of of pressure to your back that

Speaker 1 seems a little bit intense however you are made of fairly stern stuff uh and so you know it's not like this this giant bear-sized mage hand is crushing you uh and after doing that for a few seconds you see it like scuttle in front of your face and give you like a thumbs up like that good

Speaker 1 I could take I could handle more I could handle more uh okay uh you feel it return uh to sort of uh straddle your back with its uh thumb and pinky and it begins using its other three fingers uh to give you a fairly deep tissue massage uh give me a uh a constitution saving throw as this enormous hand begins to rub your back Okay.

Speaker 1 Sorry, a saving throw? Yes, constitution save. Okay.

Speaker 1 13 plus 5, 18. Yeah,

Speaker 1 it is totally bearable the amount of pressure this hand is giving you.

Speaker 1 You have definitely gotten firmer, more intense

Speaker 1 sort of body work done to you in the Goliath community that you hail from.

Speaker 1 And so, like, you get the sense that you know you could stand a little bit more pressure. It does feel pretty nice, though.

Speaker 1 That's ah, yes.

Speaker 1 Nope, that's actually that's that's the limit. That's right there.
That is actually the most. Right, hand

Speaker 1 you uh, the hand scuttles in front of your face so it can address you. It looks at you, gives you a thumbs up, like, good, no more.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 my feet. I know, I know,

Speaker 1 but if you, if you could,

Speaker 1 uh,

Speaker 1 it kind of I don't know if that's inappropriate. I don't understand me.
Huge hand culture. It looks a little timid.
Not does it? Yeah, it does.

Speaker 1 The professional massaging hand responds to my

Speaker 1 give me an insight check. Give me an insight check.
Timid about rubbing feet. Give me an insight check.
Let me see. On you? On the mage hand.
On the bear-sized mage hand. Okay.
Got it.

Speaker 1 17 plus 18. It's not that it doesn't want to touch your feet.
It doesn't want to hurt you.

Speaker 1 You can tell this large hand.

Speaker 1 Oh, okay, Pan. I read you perfectly.
It's not that you don't want to touch my feet. It's that you're afraid you'll hurt me.

Speaker 1 Yeah, with an 18 insight check, you get the sense that this giant mage hand massage therapist has hurt people in the past,

Speaker 1 not perhaps understanding its own power.

Speaker 1 Can he tell with an 18 if the hurt was physical or emotional or whatever? It's both. It's an emotional pain.
This mage hand is. I want you to know something, huge hand.

Speaker 1 Huge hand. It grumbled.
You don't know how. These tootsies have been through much worse than you could ever know out.

Speaker 1 I'm sure you are quite a powerful hand, but unless you have the crushing force of an angry mama black bear, I assure you, these tootsies can handle it. All right.

Speaker 1 It sort of shrugs with its knuckles, and you see

Speaker 1 uh it scurries

Speaker 1 down to down to your legs give me another constitution saving throw please i look forward to the extended universe novel about the time that uh loraveth fought an angry mama black bear with his feet with his feet

Speaker 1 yeah uh okay that is a nine so you you did get a uh a a really good massage here um before this part uh so i'm going to give you uh

Speaker 1 you you are going to what is your hp do you know what track you're gonna take give me damage no wow no my man no my man okay 38 is my current 38 hp is you what you got now yes now i will say that i have i have

Speaker 1 uh

Speaker 1 my for my level four thing i took the feet of athletics okay so what i saw i was thinking is maybe this thing limbered me up so i remember i'm i'm getting a little bit more comfortable climbing a little bit better dexterity yeah due to the loosening up there i do like narratively justify my sure sure uh okay yeah you have the athletics, the athlete feet,

Speaker 1 which allows you to increase your score. Sorry, I have athlete's foot.
You have athlete's foot and

Speaker 1 athlete's feet. This is a cool feet.
It lets you sort of climb better. You can stand up from prone a lot easier.
This felt, right? It felt like a good pairing. Yeah, for sure.

Speaker 1 I am also going to grant you an additional

Speaker 1 10 points, temporary hit points that you can start the next trial with. That will be sort of a buffer on top.
Oh, is that out of pity or do you want to do that? No, I want to do that. Okay, thank you.

Speaker 1 Because I do not need the pity. No, it's not pity.
I don't need it.

Speaker 1 I want there to be some sort of like, you know, repercussion, some result of the stuff that you do. Just for the record, I'll take pity bonuses

Speaker 1 about this.

Speaker 1 You feel great after the first part of the massage. It starts in on your feet, and you can tell pretty much immediately.
It doesn't really know how to really do...

Speaker 1 You get this, it's more of of a large muscle group specialist. Um, and so it starts to rub your

Speaker 1 tootsies very tenderly and just kind of pinching it between its thumb and forefinger.

Speaker 1 And as you kind of move a little bit, sort of suggesting there is an amount of discomfort, the hand kind of just like starts like rubbing your legs, trying to like figure out, get back in the swing of things.

Speaker 1 And then you can tell it like it's it's getting pretty frustrated and it starts rubbing the rest of your your body,

Speaker 1 you know, with a little bit too much firmness

Speaker 1 and sensing that it has completely fucked this up.

Speaker 1 It hasn't.

Speaker 1 With a nine on your feet, man, it's so frustrated. But that's me.
I couldn't handle it.

Speaker 1 You feel this hand sort of raise and, you know, there's no pressure on your body for a moment. And then it brings the palm

Speaker 1 down onto your back and you smash through the floor of the lily pad, leaving a sort of cartoonish, lorivith-shaped hole in the ground.

Speaker 1 And you are immediately met with water as you plummet into the lake below.

Speaker 1 While you are, you know, momentarily. Still in just your leather strap.
Injust your leather strap.

Speaker 1 As you are momentarily kind of, you know, suspended in the water here, give me a perception check, please. Okay.

Speaker 1 Holy shit, man. Wow.
Nat 20. It's a natural 20.
Wow. You see the molecules binding together.
The water. I never realized it's just hydrogen and oxygen.
What's the point?

Speaker 1 Anybody could do this.

Speaker 1 I have that stuff at home. Why are we buying water? You are smashed through the ground, and immediately I think your fight-or-flight response

Speaker 1 grants you sort of superhuman perception. I'm so relaxed.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 My body is so undense. You

Speaker 1 you immediately like your body springs into action and

Speaker 1 you start to feel you know back above you towards this hole so you can climb in. You're underneath this island and that's a terrible place to be.

Speaker 1 But you also see something underneath the water. What do I see, Griffin? You see

Speaker 1 a glimmer of gold, an enormous golden shape. There's some sunlight directly overhead

Speaker 1 and

Speaker 1 it is shimmering off the surface of this large golden shape that, as you look down at it, you can tell is

Speaker 1 a tower

Speaker 1 reaching up from the bottom of the lake almost all the way to the surface. This huge,

Speaker 1 extremely tall tower. You can see little...

Speaker 1 small mage hands kind of weaving around it seemingly preparing it for something you see what looks like

Speaker 1 a few hands dragging in some crossbows in through a window. You see large kind of urns filled with that are sealed because it's underwater.

Speaker 1 You can't tell what's inside of them, but those are being pulled in. There's just this fleet of mage hands preparing this tower for

Speaker 1 what you assume to be the next trial. Okay.

Speaker 1 And getting a glimpse at it in this way, I'm going to also give you a point of inspiration that you can spend in the next trial as you get a little sneak peek.

Speaker 1 So this is like,

Speaker 1 are we where I'm seeing this? Just so I'm looking at the map now, I'm trying to place this in my head.

Speaker 1 Am I more, is it closer to the crystallarium end of the lake or closer to like the arena end of the lake? It's closer to the crystallarium end of the lake. Sorry, where the bridge is?

Speaker 1 Yeah, kind of, kind of here, right next to the long spanning bridge here. Right underneath that, there's a great golden tower that is being,

Speaker 1 Griffin? You were telling me it was so beautiful. Before we started, you were telling me you had this beautiful name for the bridge.
Nash?

Speaker 1 You know, it is. Is it? Yeah, it's Nash Bridge.

Speaker 1 Well, there's two of them because there's another one on the other side, so it would be the Nash Bridges. This is Little Nash.
This is Big Nash. This is Big Nash Bridge.

Speaker 1 And you're underneath it, that's where you see the Golden Tower.

Speaker 1 Guys,

Speaker 1 the selection set for this joke is four human beings.

Speaker 1 They're all

Speaker 1 of them. One of them is Don Johnson.
Nash Bridge and Don Johnson. Don Johnson and Cheech Marin, both big tads.
No, Cheech Marin didn't even get it. He forgot he was on Nash Bridge.

Speaker 1 There's no way Cheech remembers he's on Nash Bridges.

Speaker 1 You are able to pull yourself back up through the six seasons. I'll take it.
Crazy. Pull yourself back up through the hole into the massage room.

Speaker 1 As you get in there, the big hand is like frantically scurrying around with that 18 insight check. You're really plugged into this thing.
You can tell, like, oh my God, I killed another one.

Speaker 1 It seems very relieved to see you and helps pull you back up into the room and lays a rug over the big hole that you and it made in the floor. And

Speaker 1 you are wet, but you do feel revitalized by this great massage that you've received. And I, Justin McElroy, learned that they did a Nash Bridges reboot in 2021.
So it's

Speaker 1 all sort of grown a lot today.

Speaker 1 We are so appreciative to Squarespace, which has been a partner in imagination with the Adventure Zone for a very long time. And we so appreciate their support.
And I hope you do too.

Speaker 1 And you're going to if you decide you want to make a website. with Squarespace, because when Squarespace is in your corner, you're not going to need anybody else in the web design game.

Speaker 1 I mean, if you want to just just express yourself with a website, that's great. Squarespace is there for you.

Speaker 1 If you want to sell stuff, you can make a website with Squarespace that will do exactly that. A lot of pros do

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They want to promote stuff.

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Speaker 1 And the website that you're able to generate is going to look really professional because it's going to be based on templates created by some of the best designers in the business.

Speaker 1 Head to squarespace.com/slash adventure for a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use offer code ADVENTURE to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.

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Speaker 1 Now that the gift giving season is fully upon us, because my birthday has ended,

Speaker 1 we can really lock in. And I have been telling people, and I'm going to keep banging this drum, if you want to get a great gift, get an ORA frame.

Speaker 1 You know, get it for a loved one that you want to keep in contact with. It's a super easy setup.
You plug the frame in, it's connected to their wi-fi.

Speaker 1 And then from then on, if you want to zip that person a photo, you just whip it right at them with the internet. I mean, not, you know, digital, not like literally.

Speaker 1 You can upload it and then it's going to appear on their frame. Imagine how fun that'll be.
You capture a moment and then just, you know, a few moments later, it's on grandma's frame.

Speaker 1 And, you know, maybe you got her one last year. Oh.
What's that? She turned around. She's got another one in the other room.
It's different and she loves it just as much, right?

Speaker 1 You don't just have one picture frame in your home. Why have one aura frame? I mean, I can't think of a better gift to double up with.

Speaker 1 For a limited time, visit auraframes.com and get $45 off Aura's best-selling Carver map frames. Name number one by Wirecutter by using promo code Adventure at checkout.

Speaker 1 That's AURAFrames.com, promo code ADVENTURE. Yeah, even if they've already got an Aura frame, what better way? They're already in the ecosystem, right? What better gift could there be?

Speaker 1 You could always use use another. That's A-U-R-A-Frames.com, promo code Adventure.
This exclusive Black Friday Cyber Monday deal is the best of the year, so order now before it ends.

Speaker 1 Support the show by mentioning us a checkout. Terms and conditions apply.

Speaker 2 Hey, I'm Jay Keith Van Stratton from GoFack Yourself, and I'm here with MaxFun member of the month, Josh Mentor, who has been a Maximum Fun member since 2016. Hello, Josh.

Speaker 3 Hey, Jay Keith, how are you doing today?

Speaker 2 I'm so well, and thank you so much for being a listener and supporter of our show. What made you decide to support MaxFun in general and to support our show, Go Fact Yourself?

Speaker 3 Jordan Morris on Jordan Jesse Go has a thing that he likes to say, which is, you know, you tip your bartender a buck of beer, you tip your podcaster a buck a month.

Speaker 3 You know, I get way more use out of MaxFun podcasts than I do like Disney Plus or Netflix.

Speaker 2 Well, it's something we very much appreciate. And by the way, when was the last time Netflix selected you as a member of the month?

Speaker 3 Exactly.

Speaker 1 Exactly.

Speaker 2 Josh Mentor, congratulations and thank you again for being the Max Fun member of the month.

Speaker 3 Thanks so much, guys.

Speaker 1 Become a MaxFun member now at maximumfun.org slash join.

Speaker 1 Walking About is the podcast about walking. It's a walkumentary series where I, Alan McLeod, and a fun, friendly guest go for a walkabout.

Speaker 1 You'll learn about interesting people and places and have the kind of conversations you can only have on foot. We've got guests like Lauren Lapkis.

Speaker 1 I figured something out about this map, like how to read it. Betsy Sedaro.
I had no key. That's awesome and nuts.
John Gabris. This is like great first date for like broke 20 something, you know.

Speaker 1 And more.

Speaker 1 Check out Walkin' About with Alan McLeod on Maximum Fun.

Speaker 1 Okay, it is later in the day, and the three of you have made your way to the Adelier, the great sort of cat-headed tent here right by the residences.

Speaker 1 You see a couple other aspirants kind of filing out as the three of you make your way in. And

Speaker 1 behind the counter,

Speaker 1 you see John Arbuckle. And he is,

Speaker 1 he looks up to see the three of you you uh looking up from the the sort of fleet of crystals floating overhead uh and he says oh uh hey guys welcome welcome back how'd the last trial go you look uh you look well some of you look refreshed and rested um

Speaker 1 you you you yeah

Speaker 1 Rick does did not sleep well it took him a long time to fall asleep he looks like crap yeah well he's became an arsonist and that'll take it out of anybody uh attempted arsonist griffin sure sure sure uh he said okay so, well, let's get you stocked up.

Speaker 1 Very, very exciting. As I suggested last time you all were in here, I am able to dispense a few kind of magical implements to aid you moving forwards.
And we'll get you all set up so that

Speaker 1 you can put up a fair fight in the next trial. Because, guys, it's only going to get way harder from here.
Way, way, way, way, way, way, way harder.

Speaker 1 I need something that deflects, like, something that stops a spell. Do you have that?

Speaker 1 Something that stops a spell. Like, if somebody tried to cast something on me that it would, like, bounce off or, like, back at them or something.
Do you have that?

Speaker 1 I mean, you know that the way that we do things here is sort of a random distribution. Um, so there are some things like that.
Obviously, there's lots of protective magic.

Speaker 1 You already did the trial of abjuration, so you should know that. Um, but um, I, you know, reach reach in, and we'll see kind of what we what we end up with.
Okay. You want spells or an item first?

Speaker 1 What kind of items do you have? Well, let me show you. He pulls out

Speaker 1 an orb,

Speaker 1 a sort of gelatinous-looking swirling purple orb.

Speaker 1 He says, so a lot of the magic instruments that have been confiscated by the octave from the fold below, they end up in here. And

Speaker 1 you can reach in. You can take, you know, like a special random prize and, you know, use what you get here in the trials.

Speaker 1 Maybe you'll get lucky. Maybe there will be something that will, you know, like a special umbrella that bounces spells back at people, or I don't know, something like that.

Speaker 1 I don't know what's in the orb. They don't really tell me, but you're welcome to conjure whatever you'd like from there.

Speaker 1 We're going to do our sort of like spell draw situation and our a random item draw today here okay Adelier.

Speaker 1 You all take out your little prize bags that you got for your third place finish in the last trial,

Speaker 1 which include a few small copper cubes similar to the ones that you got as the prize in the first trial.

Speaker 1 And whoever wants to go first, why don't we do the spells first and then we'll get you guys an item. Loravith, you go first.

Speaker 1 Hellgrammer, after you.

Speaker 1 You're lucky. Go for it.

Speaker 1 I didn't call him Bugman. I'm trying to curry favor.
What? What?

Speaker 1 Oh, I'm sorry.

Speaker 1 I was a little

Speaker 1 distracted.

Speaker 1 What are we doing? What?

Speaker 1 You all did this once already. You're going to concentrate on.
I'm sorry.

Speaker 1 Yes, sure.

Speaker 1 I'd like

Speaker 1 ham on Swiss.

Speaker 1 No, what are we doing? Okay, I'll go first. You place your three copper cubes on the counter.
You see John Arpuckle kind of like sweep them and place them in a small sack under his desk.

Speaker 1 As you do that,

Speaker 1 you see a selection of crystals fly down from this, you know, amorphous cloud of spell stones floating overhead. Five crystals land on the counter.

Speaker 1 He says, for the copper prize or this trial, there's five random spells here. You can pick three and take them into the next trial.

Speaker 1 Just choose wisely because you never really know what's coming your way and you got to be ready for anything.

Speaker 1 The five spells that have landed in front of you, selected at random from the pool of available magics, I have just texted to you, Travis, if you need to refer to them that way.

Speaker 1 It is Gust, a cantrip that lets you make a gust of wind. Mending, a cantrip that lets you fix things.
Magic Missile, first level spell. You know what it does.

Speaker 1 Unseen Servant, which allows you to conjure an invisible assistant to do your light work for you.

Speaker 1 And then the second level spell, Locate Object.

Speaker 1 Not a bad selection of wizardly spells. You get to pick which ones you want.

Speaker 1 Definitely Unseen Servant. Okay.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 locate object.

Speaker 1 Got it.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 Magic missile. Great.
You take those three spell stones. The other two soar back up into the cloud.
And as you slot them into your Grimoire,

Speaker 1 again, you have this kind of disorienting moment where the memories of three other wizards kind of pop into your head. I don't think we've seen any gust

Speaker 1 you have had used against you back in the first trial, I believe by Zephyr,

Speaker 1 but that is not one you chose.

Speaker 1 So the others are wizards you don't really recognize, but you've gotten kind of used to this process of internalizing these memories and feeling comfortable with these spells as you gain them.

Speaker 1 Who wants to go next?

Speaker 1 Hellgrammat will go next. Okay.

Speaker 1 You do the same thing. Put your three copper cubes up on the counter.

Speaker 1 Five spellstones appear before you, of which you can choose three, Hell Grammet. Five spells, and you can add three of them to your grimoire here there's create bonfire

Speaker 1 which you've seen used before it does kind of what it says on the 10 silent image which is a first level spell lets you make sort of a silent very realistic looking illusory

Speaker 1 image of what whatever you'd like cloud of daggers Second level spell that makes a kind of field of swirling blades that you can use to kind of block off an area or damage people who enter it.

Speaker 1 Misty Step,

Speaker 1 which was the spell of Mr. Mister, who you didn't really get a chance to meet, but did perish in the last trial.

Speaker 1 Basic sort of teleportation magic, and then shocking grasp, which is a sort of electric melee spell attack. Those are your five.
You get to pick three.

Speaker 1 Cloud of Daggers? For sure. That's, yeah.

Speaker 1 Shocking Grasp?

Speaker 1 Got it. That's a cantrip.
Picked on up. Not looking to win a lot of new friends.

Speaker 1 But you will influence people. For sure.

Speaker 1 And I believe Misty Step.

Speaker 1 Add those, please, to your character sheet.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 you

Speaker 1 slot

Speaker 1 those into your grimoire. And again, this is a phenomenon you've experienced a few times.
You do see Mr. Mister as you slot in the Misty Step spell.

Speaker 1 And, you know, you didn't know him, but you see memories of

Speaker 1 this wizard who

Speaker 1 had a sort of like street magician vibe,

Speaker 1 working, you know, the busking circuit, just showing off how he can sort of displace himself from one spot to another to earn, you know, to earn a living.

Speaker 1 It was a hard, hard-fought life, very exhausting, and then it ended here. And now you have his magical spell.

Speaker 1 And you also have these two others.

Speaker 1 And Loraveth.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I put down my cubes and take my chances. Okay.

Speaker 1 All right. Five spellstones.
Fly down from the cloud. The selection that you have been offered.
Mending, again, the cantrip that lets you fix broken things. Earth Trimmer, first level spell.

Speaker 1 Takes a little earthquake.

Speaker 1 Blur,

Speaker 1 a

Speaker 1 illusion spell that allows you to kind of like blur your image, which forces disadvantage on attack rolls against you.

Speaker 1 Alter self, a favorite of dad's from past seasons, where you can sort sort of like change your form to have an aquatic adaptation or change your appearance. I think I'm going to take the alter self.

Speaker 1 I have a good feeling about alter self. Yeah, for sure.
We've had fun with that one. It's a lot of fun, man.

Speaker 1 You also have... The last one that appears is

Speaker 1 one you are actually pretty familiar with. You can sense inside of the last of the spellstones that appears is Ice Knife, which was the spell possessed by Absolute Zero, the kind of icy

Speaker 1 ninja that you worked with and befriended in the first trial before

Speaker 1 the last one. Yeah, I mean, you can tell what these spells are as they appear.
All right, I picked that one up and kind of like

Speaker 1 nostalgically give it a once over, just sort of like to see if I don't know. I want to know if there's any sense of the person there still.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I mean, absolutely. It is a crystallized

Speaker 1 manifestation of memory,

Speaker 1 which is which is how these magic spells are kind of like passed from one aspirant to another. So yeah, I mean, definitely there is a part of him that is that is in that stone.

Speaker 1 Well, I thought you'd want me to do some sort of role-playing game check or something to figure that out, but um no, I mean, you can, that is how this has worked for all of these, right?

Speaker 1 So you would know that that is kind of how it, how it happens. I know that's how it happens.
I'm like, I don't know, personality. Talk to him.
Does it have a vibe? Is there a soul in here?

Speaker 1 Is there a soul in there?

Speaker 1 You can give me an insight check on the on the crystal to see. Okay, it's an 11 plus one.
I don't know. Pretty.

Speaker 1 These stones, as you have like, as you understand them and as you have kind of like

Speaker 1 received them in the past, there's not like a

Speaker 1 there's nothing trapped in here necessarily. There is not, they don't talk to you.
These are are straight up, you know, recordings of a person's, of a wizard's past.

Speaker 1 It is like a, um,

Speaker 1 I mean, it is crystallized experience, right?

Speaker 1 Because the reason why it is so impossible for people, you know, who can cast magic down on the, you know, in the fold is because it takes a long, long, long, long time to practice these spells.

Speaker 1 And so these crystals are just kind of a,

Speaker 1 are just kind of hard copy recordings of of that practice and of that experience um there is no there's no soul or anything trapped in here there's no way to communicate uh with absolute zero in here you can only kind of see what he experienced okay i will take his cube thank you okay you take his spellstone and you have one more you can choose uh i'm gonna grab mending

Speaker 1 okay um i feel like this would be the most useful Okay, considering what we what I've learned and they have not.

Speaker 1 And if they at any point act like they know the stuff I know, I'm gonna going to fill it my shit. Okay.
Just a warning. I take my headphones off whenever I'm not talking, Justin, just to make sure

Speaker 1 that I don't know that.

Speaker 1 I know you're not a big listener, but I'm not really that worried about that. Okay, alter self, ice knife, and mending.
Please add those to your character sheets.

Speaker 1 As you

Speaker 1 insert the spellstone for ice knife, you do

Speaker 1 get a quick, like sort of,

Speaker 1 you know, life flash before your eyes version of absolute zero's story uh growing up in a uh this sort of like elemental monastery uh training you get the sense that uh he had a pretty intense regimen he was throwing hundreds of ice knives every single day uh you know practicing his his aim and his ability to kind of like manifest the elements uh you see yourself in the memory of when Absolute Zero first met you during the trial of abjuration.

Speaker 1 What was his read on me

Speaker 1 first glance? It was he was impressed.

Speaker 1 He was very impressed by you.

Speaker 1 I knew I liked Absolute Zero. What a champ.
You also see

Speaker 1 a brief moment where

Speaker 1 he enters into the eggs.

Speaker 1 When you first kind of had your breakdown. Egg memory.
I remember he, yeah, what did he, what did I get out of that? You, do you remember which of the eggs he went into? Oh, yes, Griffin. I have it.

Speaker 1 I got a tattoo of it, like the guy in Memento. It's,

Speaker 1 oh, no, it says, no, I don't, actually. The tattoo just says, no, I don't have any clue, Griffin.
What a maniacal thing to ask. Was it three?

Speaker 1 I believe it was three. I believe it was the third egg.

Speaker 1 See, dad listens, Travis. That's what listening is.
That's what I'm doing. Sorry, what?

Speaker 1 That's what you have to be on guard of. I heard my name, and so I have to.
This generation remembers how to listen. You have to be careful with them.
It's like

Speaker 1 it is hard to pick out specifics of these kind of like of these memories.

Speaker 1 You don't necessarily have the ability to, you know, Ti-Vo through the memories to pick and choose the parts that you really want to be able to focus on. Give me a history check.

Speaker 1 uh to see how much of this memory of the third egg you can kind of glean

Speaker 1 heck yeah that's a 20 you're a dirty 20 a A natural 20, unnatural 20. That doesn't work either.
That doesn't work. I'm a gentleman's 2020.
I'm just going to do whatever it takes to get this community.

Speaker 1 And I'm talking about all the TTRPG community. I want to unite everybody and stop saying dirty 20, please.
A gentleman's 2020.

Speaker 1 A gentleman's 20, I also don't love.

Speaker 1 I don't love that either. It's just 20 because the other one is a natural.

Speaker 1 Right? So we have a natural 20 and we have a surreal 20.

Speaker 1 Surreal classic 20. An alternate 20.
Who was it that went into the second egg? That was you, Hel Grammar, right? Mm-hmm.

Speaker 1 And you didn't necessarily share what happened in there with other people? No, I don't think so. Okay.
I mean, I'm not adverse to it. Yes.

Speaker 1 With an unnatural 20, you are able to pick up a lot from this memory. You see absolute zero, kind of nervous being sort of bullied into going to this egg by you.

Speaker 1 It seals behind him, and he, you know, receives the same kind of disclaimer from Chris

Speaker 1 about how

Speaker 1 the history of this world will be revealed through these different chambers.

Speaker 1 And that

Speaker 1 the history of this world is divided into eight different eras. This third era that you see Absolute Zero go into,

Speaker 1 the voice coming from his Grimoire calls the era of cognition.

Speaker 1 And immediately, like the darkness inside of this egg is replaced by

Speaker 1 just a

Speaker 1 smorgasbord of evolution. It is,

Speaker 1 you see single-celled sort of organisms appear and float in the air all around him that then begin to grow and mature. They go through these very primordial stages of life.

Speaker 1 You see

Speaker 1 creatures swimming in the ocean and pulling themselves up onto land.

Speaker 1 You are seeing the whole of the origins of life on this planet sort of condensed down into this one extremely visceral kind of tangible history lesson.

Speaker 1 And you realize that the kind of euphoria he experienced as he came out of there was

Speaker 1 this connection to not just nature, but to consciousness, to life itself,

Speaker 1 which it characterizes apparently in the you know octave's beliefs, the third era of

Speaker 1 the world.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 it's not enough to like grant you any sort of additional benefits, but like you do feel a sense of

Speaker 1 great peace kind of overcome you as you have that memory.

Speaker 1 Great.

Speaker 1 You see John Arbuckle says, That one would doubt smooth.

Speaker 1 Little tingle. John Arbuckle says,

Speaker 1 John Arbuckle says, Okay, now time for the conjuration. And

Speaker 1 I'll warn you that these are also kind of coded to the prize levels that you received in the last trial.

Speaker 1 So I wouldn't be expecting any, you know, great flaming swords or anything to be yanked out of here, but you might get a little extra bonus that might help you out. So

Speaker 1 whoever wants to reach into the gelatinous purple orb first,

Speaker 1 go right ahead. Deuce.
All right. You plunge your hand in.
You're going to make a D20 roll here with disadvantage for your

Speaker 1 third place finish.

Speaker 1 And... Well, that's an eight.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 a.

Speaker 1 I know I could have done that one roll. Ah, 17.
Okay, great. Would have been swell.
You reach your hand inside of this orb. It feels cold.
You're reaching into a sort of

Speaker 1 fluid void

Speaker 1 that is not particularly pleasant to plunge your hand into. You feel your hand brush against a few different objects that kind of slip from your grasp as you try to grab them.

Speaker 1 And finally, you are able to close your hand around something solid, which you pull out and you see

Speaker 1 a pair of dark-tinted spectacles.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 they are fairly large. They are large enough to fit over your face.
They actually appear to fit you quite well.

Speaker 1 And you see John R. Buckle pull out a small leather-bound book and says, oh, okay, so those are the spectacles of Bernard.

Speaker 1 These were sent in by listener Marissa. Thank you, Marissa.

Speaker 1 If you want to send in a magic item here for the Orb of Conjuration, you can do that by sending us an email at adventurezonecast at gmail.com.

Speaker 1 Yes, the spectacles of Bernard sent in by Marissa. Dark tinted spectacles imbued with the spell animate dead, but only works when the spectacles are placed on the recently deceased.

Speaker 1 User gains advantage on deception checks when trying to make someone else think the corpse is still alive. This spell ends after 24 hours or if the spectacles are knocked off.
Ah, okay, I gotcha.

Speaker 1 This is fun.

Speaker 1 Let's get this. Let's get this in the next handbook.

Speaker 1 Sixth edition, please. Sixth edition.
It's what Gary Well wanted.

Speaker 1 I will try to find a way to put this in

Speaker 1 the system so you can add it to your character sheet. Okay, yes, Rictus, please roll.

Speaker 1 A 14 and a 3, Griffin. Okay.

Speaker 1 Again, you reach your hand in and you feel your hand close

Speaker 1 around

Speaker 1 something sort of slippery, plastic, slightly squishy feeling. You grab your hand around it and pull it out, and you pull out a...

Speaker 1 what looks like a um

Speaker 1 a a faintly red and white faded plastic water bottle um with sort of like a squeezed top lid um and there is a a post-it note that is kind of like taped around it uh which reads jordan

Speaker 1 and uh you see uh

Speaker 1 john arbuckle says oh yeah that that one is deceptively pretty effective stuff that's i mean it's secret stuff it's jordan secret stuff sent in by by Brian.

Speaker 1 This magical flask, rumored to once have been owned by Jordan, the greatest wizard ball player who ever lived, contains a special potion that strengthens anyone who drinks it.

Speaker 1 Any creature who drinks it gains plus 1d4 to skill checks for the next 10 minutes. The flask has enough for one drink, which refills each Dawn.

Speaker 1 Every time you drink the potion, the drinker must roll a DC-20 perception check

Speaker 1 on a successful roll. They realize the potion is just water, but come to understand the strength was inside all along.
This creature can no longer receive the benefit of drinking the potion.

Speaker 1 However, if they succeed in a DC-10 deception roll, they can convince others of its powers and have them consume the potion and gain the benefit without having to roll the perception check. Wonderful.

Speaker 1 Jordan's secret stuff. I love that.
Thank you. Okay,

Speaker 1 Hell Grammar, you are the last to approach the Orb of Conjuration. Roll two D20s?

Speaker 1 Yes.

Speaker 1 7 and 18.

Speaker 1 Okay, great. You

Speaker 1 reach your hand into the

Speaker 1 Orb of conjuration and very quickly something just kind of like flops into your hand it doesn't feel great but you're able to close your hand around it and you pull out uh straight up it's a banana peel and he uh you john arbuckle says uh oh well don't don't be too discouraged that is no ordinary uh produce garbage that is a very powerful magical artifact.

Speaker 1 This was also submitted by Marissa. Thank you, Marissa.
It is the artificial banana peel, a banana peel that never rots or loses its slipperiness. Make someone else slip and fall over.
Ha ha.

Speaker 1 So, this is a banana peel that you can use to try to trip someone up, and it never rots or loses its slipperiness.

Speaker 1 Oh, great, that's awesome. Thank you so much.

Speaker 1 Hey, man, I told you, these are copper rewards. They're not going to be amazing.
Do better in the next trial. You'll get better stuff.

Speaker 1 Well, I can't because I roll for shit.

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