WWW #30: The Snake

This is the sound of Worlds Beyond Number.

Hot, salty blood splashes across your face.

Limbs tighten over your shoulders and hips.

You feel Ursulan behind behind you.

Badze's chest begins to open as her fractured ribs scratch the skin of your back, opening wide as though a massive venous fly trap was trying to open its maw.

In front of you, a wet, choking whine of an attempted howl coming out of the bloody neck stump of Heinruhl.

The severed wolf head, the eyes go immediately bloodshot.

The tongue lolls out as the jaws snap wildly without consciousness over and over again.

Sokoro leaps back, kicks the head into the bubbling pool, and the headless wolf body staggers to its feet as blood gushes out of the open hole in the severed stump.

Ursulan, roll initiative.

13.

Ursulan, you are first to act.

Go ahead and give me a strength saving throw.

The difficulty is 17.

That's a four.

Badze, who wears her human glamour in this moment, but her human glamour is quite inhuman.

As her chest spreads, her arms pin you down, rows of razor-sharp teeth, her glowing bioluminescent eyes,

sort of like inky skin that is mottled purple, deep gray, dark black, like a sort of like almost just at the point past twilight where the fireflies first come to life.

She pulls you down into her chest and can feel her chest opening up and you feel cool mist pouring out of the cavern of her open torso.

She goes, We do not mean you harm as she restrains you.

It is your turn.

Can I make an insight check

with regard to that?

The specific, we do not mean you harm.

Give me an insight check.

This will be with disadvantage.

You are drunk as hell.

15.

It's a crazy thing to whisper in your head as this is happening, but what you can see is she's pinning you down, but doesn't look like she...

Like she could be biting you or doing something else in this moment that she's not doing.

Sokoro just chopped Heinrule's head off and

gingerly stepped out of the way to kick the head into the bubbling hot spring as this massive dire wolf body that's quite a bit larger than Socorro suddenly gets up onto its feet.

Sokoro, his muscles tighten and expand.

He almost, because he is made of wood, the muscle groups of his body are his skin.

It almost looks like those de-skinned anatomical things where it's just muscle groups but made of like moss-covered bark and wood.

And you see his roots sink into the plant life here, sink into like the dirt as he attempts to sort of like enchant himself to be even stronger and more potent in this moment.

So it looks like chopping Heinrule's head off was the start of something and not the end of something.

Got it.

In that case, I think Ursulan has been in in this situation before.

Not this exact one, but essentially people imposing violence on him when he is too drunk.

And so I think in this moment, kind of smelling Stahl's feeling of just kind of becoming very present,

knowing that his body is not where he wants it to be, but that he just needs to focus on breathing and movement.

So he is going to attempt to become untangled from the vines of of Bodze.

Okay, it's the exact same role on success.

You will free yourself.

A five.

You struggle, and she goes, do not struggle.

There is a way we are trying to help you.

You see, now it's going to be Sokoro's turn.

He goes next in initiative.

You see Socorro lean forward, massive wooden warrior, pointed ears.

He opens his mouth and

a cloud of gas and spores comes out of his mouth,

enveloping the werewolf's body,

or enveloping the dire wolf body of Heinruhl.

As it does so, he leans his shoulder in and tries to knock the form

back onto its side.

In the pool, you hear muffled howling that is not traveling from inside the pool of water going

sort of bubbling up from the water.

Sokoro gets under the dire wolf body,

like fully cleans and presses it over his head and dives into the water with the wolf body.

I'm gonna need a wisdom saving throw as it goes to Badze's turn.

12.

Badze's ribs finally spread enough that they come across the wide of your back and you feel the bones, the shattered sternum.

Suddenly you sink into them and they come across the front of your chest and she goes

and begins to swallow you with her torso.

And you feel ribs closing.

You fold at the waist so that suddenly

your face is like in your own crops.

Your arms and legs are intermingled, all pointed in the same direction.

As you see her smile and relax and hear her exhale calmly as her

chest and stomach swallow you.

And the last thing you see is the light fading as the ribs close up just beyond your fingertips and the soles of your feet.

And the light disappears as the seam in her torso closes.

An icy hallway lit by ice-blue torches and the

of the fox's little feet on the floor beside you

as you wend your way from the skybridge where you met with Indry.

And presumably, where are you you going?

Where is Ami heading after her meeting with Indry?

I think I want to go find other spirits in the castle.

I think I want to talk to them and find out about them.

And

I think I also want to talk to Neif.

Hell yeah, give me an investigation check.

That's nothing.

Six.

You do not find Neif,

and you do not find

many spirits.

The fox looks around, sort of following you, and goes, boy,

that lady was.

I don't know how to put it.

She like...

How is it?

What does someone do

where they say words?

Talk.

Talk.

They talk.

And they're not saying...

The words don't mean anything that I don't like,

but I still get a bad feeling after they're done saying things.

What is that?

Well, when someone says something that on the surface seems nice, but has a deeper hidden meaning, it could be that they are being manipulative, or they are being passive-aggressive, or

lying.

I get that.

So, lying, okay, I understand lying.

Yeah, you know lying.

This is what manipulation is, is something

subtler.

She was lying by not saying the whole truth.

And she was saying things that make us feel bad.

Okay, so like a river has a surface and it's deep.

And sometimes there's like snakes in there, but other times there's not snakes in there.

So it's sort of like

someone's talking and there's snakes in what they're saying, but you can't be sure.

Yes, exactly.

And you have to...

The problem is, is that witches are really really good at making a nice crisp looking inviting river of words and then there's a lot of big fucking snakes in there

snakes are scary yeah but sometimes snakes can be friendly so you know sometimes you can what do you like what

something smells good

Uh, he takes off, he says, you want to come with me?

Yeah, sure.

And he takes off down a hall.

He turns turns a little corner and you see that this is another nondescript kind of hall this one is a little bit interior and you realize that you in getting back to in just sort of like searching the palace you've gone deep into the central keep this is sort of like the witch of wind and stars keep

and that this is where the the meeting hall is and it's where the great sort of you know the the conclave meeting is but you're up on a higher floor and you're way out of the way you even have been like huh as you're just like searching for spirits and looking for Neif,

you don't know how you would get here if you weren't kind of in.

There would be no reason to pass by here.

This is a place you only get to by aimlessly meandering.

And you see the fox runs up and turns a corner of the hallway and there's a few nondescript kind of smaller icy doors in this place.

And outside of one of the doors

is a

mostly full plate of food from dinner and a sort of half-drunk glass of juice or something but it looks like mostly the food's all there and it's placed right outside the door to the right kind of like you would do with like room service in a hotel and you see that the fox goes up and goes

and runs up and just grabs a thing of sort of like the uh roasted pork and begins to

be rude.

I pull him up.

I'm holding him by his middle.

I tuck him under my arm like a little football.

And I

pick up the plate and

I look around.

And I knock on the door.

You hear a voice inside saying,

Hello?

Hello?

Oh, hello.

I have dinner, and I'm so sorry.

My fox here was trying to get at it, and so I think maybe it might be safer inside with you.

Oh, yeah.

The door opens a crack, and you see

one of the most beautiful people you've ever seen in your life.

They are of a comparable height to Suvi.

They are a robed figure.

They have a beautiful face, long,

pronounced, aquiline nose, a little bit of some kind of ruby rouge on their lips, and what looks like a simple black kind of eyeliner or mascara, but broad-shouldered, long arms, long, delicate fingers, like a musician or a painter.

They have some wisps of wavy black hair, kind of where, like, the sideburns would be, but are otherwise

no other hair on their head or face.

They have a

kind of like white and black checkered covering on a shaven head, and then are wearing their

garment looks like an extremely beautifully wrapped single piece of fabric, like either a robe or a toga or something like that.

And it has some geometrical patterns and some tassels that kind of go at diagonals.

They're really wrapped in it, and then have what look like some kind of fluffy polar bear-looking slippers that are literally given to them.

But you could tell immediately on looking at this person that they are deeply sick, like stuffed up nose, a little bit of mucus running, look like they're freezing cold.

And inside of their room, you see

that they have a number of

large pieces of junk, like a section of warped metal fence, just some giant masonry stones.

There's many bags of scrolls.

There's about 30 books piled up on a desk.

And

you see that

they have...

They're not heavily tattooed, but there are some little...

Their hands have a couple of little decorations.

The wrists have a couple of little decorations that mostly seem like geometrical little bands and lines that are punctuated by very small, simple glyphs, but it's not choked with text.

It's more like a banded line with a single glyph in the middle.

They look down at you and sort of sort of towering over you and immediately upon seeing you, you can tell that they reflexively hunch shoulders, bring their head down a little bit to be a little bit less than the very tall they already are.

And you see also that they're holding on their sort of like

on their head covering.

They put a hot water bottle on their head and are holding it there with one hand.

No, the

sorry, the

ditter, I've had as much as I my appetite has has left me.

So thank you very much.

But that could go back.

Oh,

hello.

I um

all my obvious kind of looking uh like mouth was just open a tiny bit.

Hello, um, I'm I'm so sorry to bother you.

Um,

I see, I'll take it.

Sorry, this this little guy is just always causing trouble.

This is the fox.

Hello, this fox looks up and says, Hello, I'm the fox.

And you see that this person looks down and says, Uh, hello, uh,

are you one of the are you one of

the Witch of Wind and Stars

retinue?

Oh, I am.

I'm sorry.

Um, I put down the plate of food and I and I do a little curtsy.

Oh, sorry, I'm sorry.

Uh, uh, I'm Ane, the Witch of the World's Heart.

Uh, this is

the

yes.

Oh, I'm so sorry.

Uh, uh, give me an inside check.

That's uh, that's a nine.

You, yeah, you look and and uh you just I think you just see startlement, befuddlement.

Oh, I'm so sorry.

I did, I, I, uh, sorry, you're the the witch of uh

the witch uh the witch of the world's heart.

Um, the new

anew

you're one of the four great witches.

The four

great witch?

Uh

five uh

are

the number of our conclave.

I'm so sorry.

Can I assist you in any way?

Are you magical?

I don't want to get it.

I don't want to.

I was told to remade

in the

by quarter until such time as

I, okay.

I'm so sorry.

And you see that they turn to go around and go take a seat.

They say, I'm so sorry for interrupting.

My name is Tefmet.

And you see, pointedly, they say, My name is Tefmet.

It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Tefmet.

Can I do a quick

little medicine check or

sort of a survival check?

Yeah, go ahead and give me medicine.

16.

16?

Oh, they have a cold.

They have a cold.

Do you just have a cold?

Oh, do you have a.

You just have a cold.

What?

A cold, you know, like the simple sniffles.

It's not not a magical ailment or.

Would you mind?

Can I...

I have some remedies here.

I'm quite used to tending to those with common colds and flush back in my village.

Are you certain that that would be

advisable?

The mistress of this palace bay to be

remated by quarters until such time as the conclave was prepared to meet.

And

she better.

Well, we are.

are we we have already met so you've fulfilled your uh promise to the mistress of this place and also

I I'm fairly certain that there it's it would be easy for me to help you out here.

All right, well I don't I I don't want to if this if the conclave has already started and you are a member of the conclave that I don't wish to

cause any fuss, but please do understand that I was bait by the mistress of this place to

well you can stay here.

I can I can I can can be here too and stay if you don't mind.

Well, that satisfies the conditions of what I was bade to do.

Yeah, if you if you wish, but it's really not.

I'm not that.

No, please, I insist.

This is my happy place.

Okay, I uh I close the door behind me.

Um, I start fussing around in the herbalism kit.

Uh, the fox jumps up on Tefmet's lap, and Tefmet goes, Oh, and you see the fox goes, uh, this is, I'm uh, assisting the Witch of the World's Heart, and we need to warm you up.

And you see, the fox looks over at you for backing up on that.

Yes, Nurse Fox on the job.

I'm Nurse Fox.

And you see, the fox circles up and just becomes a warm little animal on Tefmet's lap.

Go ahead and give me an herbalism check.

The fox will also actually

help you here being Nurse Fox.

But this is, we'll call it a DC-12.

That's it.

Yeah, that's 14.

You get a little remedy and poultice together.

You know that this cold will run its course in some time, and it's really just about alleviating the symptoms.

While, but you also see that, like, this room is made of ice, and Death Met has clearly come from a place where, like, they are, they do not have the cold weather gear that all of you have traveling here.

I mean, if I want to, can I immediately,

like, healing word, or would that.

Yeah, you want to do a little bit of magic.

Yeah, do a little little bit of magic, right?

We have spells, as yeah, exactly.

So, as I am uh uh

making making some herbs, oh, yeah, go ahead,

go ahead and describe it.

I think the mat, I think it's all so.

We won't even use the DD terminology.

Just talk to me about how you create the remedy and what kind of magic goes into it

from a tiny kit in my pack.

I pull it out and it has different

unlabeled vials and packets that have warming spices and

things, things like elm bark and

low-quat syrup that I drip into it.

And I make a mug of steaming hot, warm in

both the temperature and

sort of emotional

measure of warmth.

And it's in a lovely little mug that I had packed away safely in my bag.

And so

everything about it feels like truly the kind of medicine, quote-unquote, that you get from your parents when you're sick.

And they just are trying to help you feel better about it.

But in this case, it is imbued with a little bit of magic.

And I speak over it and I say,

drink up.

Tefmet takes the mug from you.

It immediately warms their hands.

And you see, they do a little kind of holding it with both hands and steepling the fingers to have like the most skin contact on the warm mug.

They take a sip.

Ugh.

Oh.

Oh my.

Wow.

That is the finest cup of tea I've ever had.

My voice, my head.

Oh my goodness, I can think again.

Oh my goodness.

Thank you so much.

That is absolutely delightful.

One of the best joys in life is sharing tea with a friend and making them feel better in the process.

Um

are you from yeah I assume that you're not accustomed to the cold weather here?

No, no, no.

We must be very far north.

Yes, yes, in the North Pole.

How did you...

Sorry?

Yes, we were in the North Pole.

How did you arrive here?

A gate was opened for me, and it was the exact geographical location.

Wow, the North.

You see that they stand up and go,

I don't wish to be rude, but can I.

And they walk over

to a small mobile of hanging sort of stars, moons, planets on a little sort of brass whirligig and begin to adjust a couple things.

And there are some little

sort of depressions in the base of the mobile that have red wax in them.

And you see that they, that Tefmet sort of rubs the runes off the wax and rewrites them slightly, and the mobile starts spinning, and you see little magical protections start to go over the room, and you see Tefmet Tefmit goes, the exact North Pole.

Well, you couldn't, yeah, you can't.

How would you?

You wouldn't be able to do the longitude and latitude.

It's a unique location on the planet.

Okay.

Uh,

thank you so much.

Of course, I'm very happy to be of service.

And

frankly, it's nice to have another

friendly face in the castle here.

I feel a bit

lost, to be honest with you.

Really?

You're one of the great witches?

Um, well, I'm a pretty okay witch.

And also, I'm new to this.

My mentor, Grandma Wren, she passed recently, and only in it's only recently that I was able to recover all my memories and my training enough in time to show up at the conclave and uh have them vote on my destruction.

I'm sorry, that was a lot.

You're ill and

sorry, Sorry, what?

Uh, yes, it's uh

witches, you know.

You're, you're, you're not a.

You're not a witch.

You seem more in line with, you know, maybe

a wizard of some sort.

Uh, give me an insight check.

Okay, there it is.

19.

Uh, Tefmet looks utterly horrified.

Did not hear a word you said after vote on my destruction.

And it goes,

sorry.

The

there.

When you say destruction, do you mean destruction as in destruction being a metaphor for change?

Oh, uh, oh

boy.

Oh, I wish, I wish.

Uh, no, it's uh, she said, or my death and the ending of my station of the world's heart.

Oh,

all right.

Yeah, I'm so sorry.

I really truly feel like I just emotionally dumped on you in a big way.

And

well, I appreciate the tea.

And you see, Tef Met just sort of goes thousand yards there, and they are like staring out in the middle of their room.

And of course, I don't wish to be rude to my host,

but based on our short interaction,

I don't see what I would term cause for destruction in any of the things you've done or said, which has been making me a lovely tea.

Witch of the world's heart, you said?

Yeah, my realm touches upon humanity and connection and its relationship to the spirit world.

And I feel that,

well,

it's not anything personal.

I think it's just they needed, for political reasons, perhaps, to eliminate my station.

Um

so

how about you?

Where are you from?

I like your tattoos.

Oh, thank you.

Um

well

uh yes, I the uh sorry a moment ago yes, as you said, I am the wizard Tefmet.

Um

and uh I

um I

don't have an S name.

Hmm?

You don't have an S name.

Give me an insight check.

18.

Tefmet looks at you and says,

Uh, what would indicate to you that I should have an S name?

Um, well, I believe it is traditional when a wizard takes a name cloak

to have an S-name.

Yes?

Um,

so

so this tea is

so wonderful, and you and your charm, and the nurse, haha, the fox, it, it, it, it, it's all been so charming and so wonderful.

And I'm so sorry about what's been uh, you know, not sorry because I disagree with you, I don't know what I disagree with.

You don't have any

real

obligation

or direct loyalties to the citadel.

If that's what you're concerned about.

Give me another insight check.

Bah, that's only an 11.

You see, Taffmett looks at you and goes, Well, it's been a pleasure to do.

And says, I hate my studies.

Because obviously, who I, my, my wish for the world is that everyone be well.

And I want everyone to be well.

And I don't want anything to happen that shouldn't happen.

And so, my wish for you, Witch of the World's Heart, and you're wonderful, familiar, is that nothing that shouldn't happen happens, and everything that should happen happens.

Good day.

I let myself be pushed out of the room,

uh, and the door closed behind me.

And then I sort of uh

I knock on the door and I say very quietly,

I

have friends who are antivolus too.

It's a 23.

The door opens a tiny crack, and a wide, horrified eye looks out.

You what?

Yeah,

an antivalist, um,

society of whisperers and

all of that

wizard intrigue.

I'm not.

I don't only carry good drinking tea.

That's what I'm saying.

You see,

the eye blinks a couple times, and Tefmet just looks out and goes,

ha.

Well,

congratulations

on

knowing antivolists.

I've

the uh you

have and I just hope the best and actually my study my studies and you see closes the door and you hear suddenly like a loud tinkling of music and furious scribbling and uh and a voice go time for bed and a long deep sleep.

The fox looks up and goes, did that go well?

I, you know,

I don't think there's snakes in that pool, but I sure don't know what's under there.

And we move from Amay and the fox to the library of stars.

No, we can go back.

A gleam in a far tower that fades suddenly as this earliest memory of the beginning of the coven of elders, a young Hakea in a massive tree in a forest primeval.

The image fades.

The spider recollects this.

This mirrored spider has now captured all of the stars' memory of the one known as Yorin.

And this now

important memory of Hakea.

The language that is captured is her speaking to the tree in a tongue you cannot comprehend.

But you can give me an Arcana check if you would like.

We'll call it honestly just a DC-10 Arcana check.

21.

Your understanding is that from what you know of

your protector, the strongest man in Silbury, he could understand this.

This sounds similar to when you have seen him speak to horses or speak to the, like, this is a speech that he, as a wild one, is capable of.

Would I have the ability to try to like

even if I don't understand what's being said, can I try to remember rote just like how it sounds to try to attempt to replicate some fraction of it for Ursulon in the future?

Okay, as a 21 on the Arcana check, the memory is captured.

The stars are still hanging here in the air.

And what you see as you attempt to recreate it is the spider having captured itself.

It moves to go back to the music box to spin up more scorpions, but instead hearing you vocalize, turns to face you,

lifts up a shard of mirror from its abdomen, and the mirror flickers and replays the moment from Hakeea.

Yeah, I'm going to give it like two or three playthroughs just to get the like,

to try to get it like syllable, syllable for syllable close enough to like at least at least like the most passionate moment in that to like get a little break in a phrase to see if I can pass that on and then I like allow the spider to go back and continue its work.

The spider goes back to continue its work.

Now you are standing here in the library.

The spider creates a few more scorpions and seems to have run out of mirror in the box.

Those scorpions go and you see these last couple that it makes do not go down the wells where the first ones went.

They instead quickly run from shelf to shelf,

just collecting and mirroring light from all of the stars on these shelves.

They complete their circuit,

and those handful of mirrored scorpions come back and you see that the mirrored spider wraps them up in threads of silver and devours them.

As it does so, it it turns to look to you and waits.

Is the point of this music box to simply like record what was going on so that conclusions about the magic and point of this can be divined later?

As you look at this and have this moment of being like,

what am I witnessing?

Why does this feel so right?

What am I doing in this space?

You see that in your moment of

search and confusion,

the spider regards you

and taps the music box and it begins to play the rainroad in reverse, which is a little bit haunting.

And you begin to hear chittering

and scorpions pour out of the wells.

Rushing back to the music box, the spider consumes them and begins to spin up and replace the mirror in the back of the music box, making the music box hold once again.

And in a few moments, you see that all of them have come except for the one scorpion by the door projecting that knock spell.

And it and the spider both turn to you with a very crouched, pensive waiting.

You sense that this is almost done, but that the last thing to be recalled recalled will be the scorpion that is projecting an illusion on the door.

Yeah.

I'm going to go and get the music box,

holding it open, and move back towards the door.

And there is something

like her left hand can't stop.

It almost feels like arthritis or an old injury, like the need to like...

Shake something out of feeling and if she was paying a little more attention she would be like moving moving her hands

in a very specific pattern that doesn't mean anything to her

but then is going to like getting back up to the door scoop up the last mirrored scorpion.

The spider consumes it, spins it back into the music box, and deconstructs itself, falling into a spider emblem welded of mirror.

So it's like a plane of mirror in the back of the box with then the sort of lines of welding creating a spider, also of raised mirror in that mirrored plane.

The figurine stops spinning, the music stops, and the box snaps shut.

Yeah.

And you are looking at an unlocked door that you are standing in front of that leads back to the hallway.

Give me an Arcana check.

This one is, we're gonna call it DC 15.

Wait, plus eight.

Exactly 15.

All of the lights have been returned to the condition that you found this in.

You have one sudden moment of spellcasting memory, which as the box closes, you feel an incredible sense of emotional achievement.

And then whatever, you know, that you cannot describe.

You're like, I've done something that I was supposed to do that I don't remember.

And

there might be some part of that that feels haunting to Suvi because of the degree to which it's outside of your own conscious memory.

But there's something that you are aware that

there is something you are aware of that a clandestine business here has been concluded and you are free in a way that you weren't in your first days here at the Palace of the Witch of the Wind and Stars.

The only thing that is not a crossed T and a dotted I that remains in front of you, that you are suddenly now wondering if this is actually a hole in the plan.

Like, whatever this was, the Citadel's plans are vast and incredible, but not always perfect.

Is suddenly

that knock or that arcane lock on the door is just dispelled and gone.

Yeah.

And if you leave here, that is the one piece of business left that will be some indication that something occurred here.

Suvi pulls out her spellbook and just keeps flipping through pages.

Don't, I don't know something that that replicates this.

Fuck.

I can't fix it.

I can't make it a sealed unit.

And then, as she's kind of replacing her book, she brushes one of the like

little bottles of her ink demons

and goes, okay.

Might be time to throw someone under the bus.

And Seovie picks up.

Like she knows them by cork now and grabs Vandal.

A angry red ink swirling in this glass bottle.

You look at Vandal's little stopper.

What do you do?

They get to the other side of the door

and unstopper Vandal.

We're gonna have fun, but we're gonna be quiet about it.

Oh,

how good are you at magic, little guy?

I

am a demon of ink.

It is given to me the magic of curses, swears, vulgarity, profanity.

There is no sacred thing I cannot make dirty.

I feel like we got off on sort of a rough foot, and that's on me.

I'm gonna let you out,

and you're going to see this room.

And I point at like the library behind me.

Go absolutely fucking wild.

Break nothing,

but nothing's left sacred.

Go ahead, give me Arcana with advantage.

23.

Randall does somersaults backwards in the air and goes,

Great wizard sky,

your wish is my command.

Quiet, quiet, quiet.

And you see that he swells up his belly really full and begins to squeeze it like he's popping a zit and just blast red ink over every corner.

It begins to, he starts to like scramble with his claws and and write words.

You see, one of the words he writes is like, um,

he literally writes, like, he writes the witch of wind and stars, and then begins to write things that I don't even care to repeat on this podcast.

Uh, Timmy takes notes,

like, ooh, those are worse cusses than even I think of.

That one's just a combination of all of them.

Yeah,

super cuss.

References, uh, references, both scatological and profane, uh, begin to pepper throughout the library.

And you see, he comes over to the door and with his mouth begins to do something very vulgar to the lock on the door.

And

just starts to go nuts.

Sweet.

And as he's like...

Going off, I'm like, when you're done here and you're doing a great job, I need you to work your way down the hallway and make your way back to my room.

Oh.

And you get to do this one time.

And I like spread out my arms and like lean my face forward.

I'm like, you get to write three awful things on me.

You see, he goes

and gets very solemn and salutes.

A number of curse words in Imperial are written over your face.

You are soaked with ink as you walk through the halls from this place.

Hear Vandal cackling.

Where do you walk from this space?

You go back to your quarters?

Yeah, I'm going to make my way back with Vandal towards my quarters.

And then once we get outside the door, restop our Vandal and start slowly prestigitating all of his work in the hallways away.

Like I'm in the middle of fixing a problem and I don't know where he headed.

We're going to roll a very momentous luck check right now, just to see how much time

you have available to you.

One through five is going to be very bad.

Six through

15 is going to mean that there's not quite enough time, but there's mostly enough time.

And then 16 and higher means you have all the time in the world.

Okay.

Please, please,

19.

Oh my god.

Wizard shit!

Vandal roars back once you're back in your room.

And

you see, he hits, he comes back, you stopper him again, and as you are cleaning once more,

so you're now prestigating all of the Vandal sort of like things away.

Wheeling around the corner, following Costa is Inri,

who barrels down on you and says,

Wizard Sky?

Oh,

I'm

your witchiness.

I'm so sorry.

Andre, I'm so sorry.

Ame, you turn the corner and join Suvi in this moment.

You are outside of sort of a crossroads where three different sky bridges meet in a conical tower that has some columns, but it's mostly like open to the sky.

It looks honestly like a landing eerie where like a flying mount could land.

And Indry Indry wheels on you as another bridge, you come down, and Suvi is following this like vandalizing of the palace.

Injury says, What is the meaning of this?

So sorry.

It's uh um

uh

things kind of went sideways.

Uh, your sister

and I had to send the other wizards back to the sh and wizard sky,

what have you done?

I'm I'm sorry, I will clean it.

I will.

What happened here?

We're a ghast in this in a palace.

You see that Indry says,

describe to me the nature of what has occurred.

I'm in possession of

a demon made of ink, and in my

rush to send off missives about the death of one of my comrades, they were unstoppered, and I am just trying to clean up them.

They are harmless.

Having chosen your words very carefully to paint a picture, but not quite telling a full direct lie.

I'm going to give you an advantage on the deception roll here.

And what I'm going to do here, too, though, is you're rolling against the insight of a witch, which is a mighty, mighty thing.

You see that the fox looks up at you, Ame.

And I'm going to roll the insight for the witch.

I go to CV and

I grab her by the sleeves and I say, this is a colossal embarrassment to the station of the world's heart and cast guidance.

Okay.

So a little bit of the world's heart magic floods into you.

Indry didn't roll great, but she adds a plus 12 to her insight checks.

Yeah, okay.

So

she, so you're still trying to beat a 20 is a flawless

victory.

You need to at least clear a 15.

Okay.

Go ahead and roll guidance first, which is a d4.

Three.

Okay, so now you're going for 12 and 17, and you're rolling your deception with advantage.

What do you add to deception?

Two.

We're not big liars here.

Okay.

Doable.

I'm so good at lying, actually.

With an 18 on the die.

Thank you, New Dice.

Thank you, New Dice.

Clever, clever wizard.

Standing here,

you see injury looks at you and you

know that you do not have the

control of the timbre of your voice or

the ability to bluff in the way that a gambler has.

That's not the life that you were born from.

What you do have is brilliance.

You chose your words to commit no open lie.

You just simply constructed half scraps of truth in a way that painted a picture for a woman that you know, above all else, is proud.

Would a proud witch believe

that her,

in this moment, nemesis, would allow her face to be mocked and covered in profanity?

She looks at you and finds you so buffoonish in this moment that she cannot countenance your ability to do exactly as you have done, which is outwit her.

And she turns and says,

It need not be fixed by you.

You have done quite enough, Wizard Sky.

Thank you for your service.

The rest will be cleaned by me.

Nef!

And you see that Neif rushes up with a scrub brush and says, I'll look after it.

And you see, she says,

The creature that did this,

it has been captured.

Yes.

See that it remains so.

And she wheels away with Costa, who

growls and moves after her as Neif goes and you see that Neif starts scrubbing right here.

And you see that the Witch of Wind and Star says, Don't start here, Neif.

And Neif runs down to start where you know the terminus of this string of vulgarity is.

I don't normally do this, but I do need to tell you

what your exceptional roles have done here, which is

if you had had a partial success, you would have survived and she would have destroyed Vandal.

I knew it.

I knew it.

But she turns.

She turns and departs from this place as Neif runs off with Costa, and out in the open air, the fox and Ame and you, with all three of your ink demons and your music box hidden away, stand here completely triumphant in this moment.

Blitch of the world's heart, I am so sorry.

Can I offer you a cup of tea?

And she

doesn't happen again.

There was such words as I have never even conceived of.

What could...

And then we hit like the inside of the door and the door snaps shut and CD like moves back up full.

Oh my god, thank you so much.

See, the fox looks up at you, Ahmed, and goes, The Fox looks at you, Ahmed, and goes, why are you laughing?

Why were you so weird to the wizard sky?

I'm full of snakes.

Hey, real quick, what did he write on my face?

I, oh boy, that one is, oh my goodness.

Yeah, he did a lot of work, and then he spent too much time on my forehead.

And honestly, part of the like fear and embarrassment when injury came by was, I genuinely don't know what's on here.

What's a squiron bucket?

And a fart burser?

That's an illustration.

There's a very drawing?

Oh, of course.

There is.

It's like a really graph.

I don't even know what's.

It says,

I'm pretty sure a kumquat is a fruit and not a bad word, right?

Okay, I can't tell if you're also fucking with.

Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Here, here, let me, let me get here.

Oh, this time I hand you the handkerchief.

And then at this point, Suvi leans in.

And she's like, get it, get it,

get it.

You feel a radiating joy from the red bottle of ink in your, just that, what a day for Vandal today.

Honestly, MVP.

What a guy.

I was like, kind of fuck that ink bottle.

Favorite.

Yeah.

Incredible.

I love it.

Super cuss.

I'll tell you later.

Are you in the crescent moon or the keep of the world's heart right now?

I would have worked back towards the crescent moon,

so you're in Subi's quarters right now, um, and you're, uh, uh, you guys, that you still have that uh, um, it's under a bunch of stuff, but that scarf is still in this room.

But you haven't seen Ame since uh, essentially dinner.

Yeah, a lot has happened.

Uh-huh.

So I

uh fill Subi in about um everything about injury, my discussion with injury.

It's a just a whole lot of nothing.

And

she's so hot and such a bitch.

No, she smells so good, and it's just like her hair is so

just.

But she was gonna get your mug back?

God.

Before killing you in your station?

Yeah.

How sweet.

Nice little.

Oh, speaking of mugs,

I met a wizard.

They're

really

they're beautiful.

Yeah, Tivolis.

Um, yeah, that's my guess.

We're acting very strange about it.

But uh, they were told that they're that that I, that I might be, they, they hazarded a guess that I was one of the four great witches,

but there's five.

That's what I said.

So it's like a different thing.

Of course, you're a great witch.

What does that mean?

Cute.

Didn't you is it in your like, you know, your little coma, your little coma memories?

Is it in there?

Um, I look, I think back to there's nothing about great witches.

No, I mean, the coven of elders,

yeah.

Yeah, but like, there's nothing about.

Give me an insight check.

Let's call it, we'll call it a DC-15.

13.

13.

Yeah, I don't think you pull anything.

They seem horrified at the notion that my station and I would be destroyed.

No, that's.

Wait, so they knew?

Yes.

Did they

kind of emotionally dumped on them?

It's kind of in the forefront of my brain right now, so.

Wait, no, no, no.

Hold on.

Four great witches.

And your coven's a five.

Did they know that you were going to, that your station was going to be dispelled, and they're already talking about only having four left in your coven?

Yes,

I suppose it was that Indri said four great witches.

Perhaps already presupposing my destruction gross gross I don't hey maybe that or could mean I really would love to have some follow-up questions yeah I did say that I was friend with antiphilus though

so I don't know

interesting was that a super fun lie or

I you know I'm sure that somebody I met at the Citadel was probably

sympathetic to the cast no no no No, kind of the wrong side of the Civil War, you know what I mean?

Right.

But I'm sure that after they lost the Civil War, that all of that ideology just went away.

Well, you would think, like, if sort of the crux of their argument is to Citadel or not to Citadel, it would be incredibly fucking crazy to then rock up to said Citadel.

And partake of the resources and work within the system.

Yeah, their whole thing was like fiercely independent and absolutely bug fuck nuts and paranoid.

Like, I don't think them sort of entering into the system

would be big for a person.

The person didn't seem especially paranoid, but you know, well, we can.

Fox sort of chimes in and says, I don't know.

They had a whole interaction with you where it was just a giant eye in the doorway.

That's a little paranoid.

Oh,

well.

What happened with you?

Yeah.

Oh, I went in there.

What did you get?

I found, and I describe, uh, I very specifically describe the like search for uh coven information and the wildness with Hakea and the wand and the wand in the tower.

And I try to like, I make a little map on like a piece of paper to draw from what I remember of like the map of where we've been.

If I can make like little blueprints and be like, I think it's this tower, and at the top of it, there was uh that wand.

But I don't know, is that tower, Ooh, yeah, putting stuff together.

Can I do I know what that tower was?

No, that tower, you know that it's a tower off of the main keep.

Okay, but what, like, is there a world where it's one of the towers of the other witches?

Because I don't know where Ursulan went to go hang out and do like Hakeea stuff.

You don't think it's in one of the guest witches' towers.

It seems to be in private quarters of Indries herself.

But you do, you see that the fox, as you relate this, says,

I know where Hakea's place is.

Oh, is it a little tower?

No, it's a copse of trees.

Of course it is.

Okay, so why would the tower...

Why does Injury have Hakea's little wand?

What do I know about wands?

Uh, powerful.

You know, there are a lot of...

I don't think there's a tried and true.

There is not a single truth about wands in this world they are an old

they are an old like the citadel doesn't tend to use them citadel tends to use staves um because they're a little bit easier to enchant they're bigger you can put more like you can inlay more stuff into them they're a better receptacle for magical ingredients um wands tend to be a little bit older in meaning that like there's a lot of ancient wands that are very powerful but they're not in vogue anymore

Huh.

I don't know why she would have it.

You know, I have a meaning to speak with Hakeea

myself because she is the oldest member of the Coven.

I think the only one that's been here the whole time.

She's the first time.

Yeah.

She's like as old as the world.

And she was the only one who

defended me and whose absence in the vote was key to my destruction not happening in that moment we should go talk to hikea and then we find the wand

and

that we're ursalon's oh yeah we can pick up his drunk ass

you made that juice you made that i did i actually did give him a little vial of uh you know uh the electrolyte powder uh but i think we need to like

gum go and fully yeah just make sure he's okay okay.

Yeah.

He's having a good time.

All right.

Fox, can you take us to the little cops of trees?

You see, the fox looks up and says, All right, cops of trees, next stop, Ursulon.

And the fox pitter-patters down the hall as we look out at stars and snow.

Darkness, all-encompassing.

Night eternal.

The tightness and constriction of your muscles gives way, Ursula,

and you feel suddenly that you are not being met with active resistance,

but merely the pressure of being

underweight,

under

some force that can be pushed against.

Go ahead and give me a strength saving throw.

Seven.

You struggle here

under the weight

and struggle for quite some time,

long enough to eventually become somewhat sober.

Once the feeling, the pallor of the liquor has left and made your mind less foggy,

you find that

one of the sides is softer, and you push and tumble out of rich loam

and leaves, and you are standing in a cool

grove of trees.

The bark is

bone-white,

ribbed with

black in segmented ridges encircling the tall trees.

Their crowns of leaves

sway and rustle so softly.

The light of the moon illuminates

a grassy meadow at the center of the grove

with an old stone well in the middle.

Above the well,

a thatched roof suspended on wooden beams.

And leaning against that thatch is a long walking staff.

And laying over the stones a black cloak and a wide-brimmed black hat,

a figure in shadow under the roof pulls a creaking rope.

And up from the darkness comes

a humble bucket of water.

And a voice echoes from under the roof, covering the well.

Brother Ursulan,

are you thirsty?

First,

like perceiving that, Ursulan is going to try and

in getting a sense of where he is, do I feel like we I have been teleported Or am I within like to, I think Ursulan,

even as he hears the man in black speak to him, is going to take a second to try and understand where he has arrived.

Give me an Arcana check.

Four.

You are disoriented and

I think honestly,

your most intuitive assumption is you have died.

Like, it's like, well, I remember I got eaten by a woman's chest and now I'm a dead, now I'm dead.

Have I returned to the realm of spirits?

The man in black is, you still can't see, he's covered in shadow from the roof.

Like the moonlight, the brightness of the grass under the full moonlight is making it so that you still can't see him under the sort of roof of the well.

You look and see that there is a small dirt path that approaches the the well, and off in the trees outside the grove, you see a road that it looks like the man has come off of to this well to stop his walking and take a drink.

But you are, you leave this, you are deeply confused.

The man in black speaks:

steady yourself, brother Ursulan.

You

have not been moved upon the world against your will.

I meant what I said to you in that forest of flame, the wizard's belt.

You

still lie

in the grass

in the palace of the witch of wind and stars.

You met Badze, yes

She is the spirit of this grove.

The grove of the well.

And so being within her heart,

some vision of you is still here.

But

just a vision.

Your sight, your sound, has come here.

But I would not drag you across the world against your will.

Yet, I needed to have my words understood.

Erskalon's going to slowly start to approach the well.

Well then let's have a drink.

He takes a small tin can off his belt and pours a ladle, sort of wooden ladle in the bucket of water and passes it to you.

Here close, you can only see the front of him is still in shadow, but you see the light along raven black hair, a bit of his neck.

You see that he wears a long shirt buckled with silver at the wrist and a dark patterned vest and long black trousers and tall leather boots and he hands the tin cup of water to you and says, drink deep, brother.

I do.

I know well this grove the first time I met Bodze.

I had come here to lay low a great woman.

Was that

Grandmother Wren?

It was.

A task I did not relish, and which in the doing I knew bore little chance of success.

A desperate gambit for these desperate times.

And yet, here in the grove,

after her departure, when I proved not to land the blow that would have ended things,

I saw there in the water a vision.

of what might be

He reaches under his cloak and takes a sword from under the cloak.

Wrapped in black leather on a belt.

You see the hilt is black leather, the cross guard

silver moonlight.

The pommel white stone.

A sword of night itself.

Would you hold this for a spell, Brother Ursula?

This is your sword.

My sword indeed.

It's sharper than a spinster's tongue and harder than a miser's heart.

With it, I can cut the spring from a man's step and the apple from his eye.

I can part the lightning from the thunder and skin a man's shadow off his boot with this blade.

Ursulan's going to extend his hand.

The heft of this sword,

even in its scabbard, feels mighty.

I have not drawn this blade

in an age of men,

and

I do not wish to wield it in the wars to come.

For the next I draw it, a fate will befall me that I do not wish.

I look now

for a champion to wield it.

One who can brandish the sword of night, lay low the proud, and restore balance between Umura and the world of spirits.

I have returned to the grove to drink deep and make sure I saw the vision clearly that I saw here first when I came for Ren.

Do you know what I saw, Brother Ursula?

No,

no, I do not.

A mighty warrior,

the son of a great bear

with a golden cauldron and a tree upon his shield.

I need a champion to wield my blade in what is to come, Brother Ursman.

Brother, might I draw your sword?

I would wish that my champion behold the blade only upon accepting this offer.

When you came

to this world

the second time,

you wished

for honor and a quest

I know not of quests and honor but I know of purpose

great purpose could be yours

not lying fallow In the gutters of the roads that mortal hands built.

Not slipping into sorrow and the stink of liquor on your breath.

Great

purpose, Ursula.

I cannot do as they do and compel.

Your breath is your own, and I wish for only free spirits by my side.

But I will say this

You are

the champion.

I smelt it on the road behind you in the forest of fire.

And now

that I have come back to see that vision clear once more, I know it for a fact.

You are who I wish to wield my blade.

But

if that purpose is too great for you,

know that you will not doom me by your refusal.

You guarantee my victory by picking up that blade,

and you guarantee it by refusing.

Also,

what you and I need to know

is who

you are.

Ursula is going to look down at the sword,

hold it,

Feel its weight.

Your offer is

enticing

and resonates with the reasons that I came here.

But you speak of balance

between

our world and theirs.

Does that balance require the death of those under my protection?

Yes,

Brother Ursulan.

Yes, it does.

One

for reasons of fury and the other for sorrow.

Ursulan is going to drop the sword on the ground.

There is a dull thud in the grass.

You drop drop my blade for me to pick up, Brother Ursula.

If this sword's aims are what you claim they are,

then I will have no more to do with it.

Do you pay me disrespect in this moment, brother?

I do not mean to.

As I believe the things we want are aligned.

But if the way you see to achieve them is through those things I care most about,

then we cannot stand together anymore, brother.

Long

shadows as the moon moves through the sky.

You break my heart, Brother Ursula.

But your will is your own.

Would you do me one kindness here

by the well?

Pick up my blade and buckle it to my belt, that I may not have to bend and raise it from the ground from where you've left it.

This will be the last kindness I do for you, brother.

He raises his arms to either side as though in anticipation of an embrace that you both know will not come.

You see his belt,

and you see where it would clasp to the scabbard of the sword on the ground.

Ursulan picks the sword out,

steps toward the man in black,

and clasps attaches the sword.

This close to the man in black gives me perception with advantage.

19

Near the vest of the man in black,

you're looking and see the pattern on his vest.

It's almost like a hound's tooth or something like that, but you actually see it's hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of chalices,

its cups, over and over and over again,

all along the pattern of his vest.

And you recognize this pattern.

It's the symbol you saw on the back of Captain Emlis's neck.

On that 19,

you buckle the sword and

the man in black looks at you and says,

We may next meet as foes, but always as brothers.

I won't suffer you to leave while I am in your debt.

You have paid me the kindness of placing my sword upon my hip.

To settle our accounts, I would offer you

a gift

or the answer to a question.

Make your choice and leave me.

I'll have a gift.

Something to remember you by.

He reaches into the coat of his vest, pulls out a silver pocket watch, flicks it like a coin through the air

as it lands in front of you.

Time is ever walking down the road, Brother Ursula.

That was Lou Wilson as Ursulan, Erika Ishii as Ahme, Abria Iyengar as Suvi, and Brennan Lee Mulligan as Everyone and Everything Else.

Worlds Beyond Number is edited, designed, and scored by Taylor Moore at Fortunate Horse with additional sound design from Michael Gelfie Studios.

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