E34: Door-To-Door Menders

After an exhausting ritual, the Runts catch up on their shopping and shenanigans in Waterdeep.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
All right, you guys, welcome back to Front Pack Ghost Plane
Walking episode 34. Let's get into it.

(00:48):
The. Last time we began having found
the body of Vinnie. Now this was very sad for us.
But also we needed a body. So we went ahead and took it to
the Temple of Mystra to use in the ritual to resurrect Monty
after, you know, some debate. We also learned that Vinnie was

(01:12):
on his way to meet a suitor named Dean Novenal Mason, what's
his name? Dean or Dane.
There was some debate on this. It's spelled DHEN, so however
you want to pronounce. That OK, so Den.
So Den. So just fucking not a name.
OK, Den. He had a a date with a suitor

(01:34):
named Den Navanol who we were meant to meet.
Well, we were meant to meet who he was meant to meet later at
9:00, but in the meanwhile we took his body to the temple.
We met Arch priest Ereval and she brought us down to a white
basement for the ritual. She told us that if Hire, the
closest person to Monty, could give some reassuring words to

(01:57):
Monty's corpse, reminders of what it meant to be alive, it
would assist in the resurrection, which Hire did
excellently and very successfully.
During the resurrection, Monty came back to life choking and
hire Heimlich a gross greasy ball out of his throat which hit
a wizard and then just sort of rolled away.

(02:20):
And we decided to return back tothe hotel with the, at this time
unconscious Monty, who had a lotof sleep to catch up on.
We returned to the hotel, Oro took a shower, Dulum, Damos and
Abel worked on decoding Piccolo's music, and Smear and
Jaya baked a welcome back to Life cake for Monty.

(02:43):
Meanwhile, Hyer and I went to gomeet Dan.
We figured we owed it to him to tell him that Vinnie was, in
fact, dead. We had a talk.
Dan took it. You know, as well as one would
assume, not terribly he it was afirst date, but he was a little
put out when we asked him to tell Vinnie's parents again.
Understandably, while we were having this conversation, we

(03:04):
were pickpocketed by two pickpockets, so we turned to
pursue them As for once we have money worth stealing and thus
worth keeping. And while we pursued the
pickwockets, Dan did sort of sadly wander away.
These pickwockets turned out to be two teenage boys named Ollie
and Eddie that hire subdued by hitting one with a spiritual

(03:25):
guardian. Just keep that in mind.
Remember that I tackled mine nonviolently.
This. Guardian really hit him.
I don't know. These two boys were actually
both seeking to commit a crime and be imprisoned for it, as
their dads are both in prison and they want to break them out.
Oro was sort of sympathetic to their plight and marched them

(03:47):
back to the inn to get them a room to stay in as they looked
like they've been, you know, sleeping rough, not eating well.
They did think I was kidnapping them for a minute, but then we
clarified that I I gave them their own room and told them
they were free to go if they wanted, But I paid for the room
for I think 10 days. Meanwhile, Jaya and Samir were
cooking together. You know, varying levels of

(04:11):
success. They had a nice talk about
Jaya's family and Samir's family, where Jaya failed to
press Samir for details when he alluded to having a brother,
which is something we've never even heard about before.
I can't have. Marriage.
Not grilling him. Meanwhile, Doolumdemos Enable
started a band. What was it?

(04:31):
The impotent fingers? The inane fingers.
The ignorant. Ignorant.
I like Impotent, the ignorant fingers.
Where they did successfully decode Piccolo's song, which
opened up a rift to a pocket dimension full of glimmering
ribbons of magic. These day, most determined were

(04:52):
encoded thoughts having been stored from before.
Piccolo sort of lost his mind ina very literal sense.
Only a few thoughts remained, asmany had degraded over the past
few days, but they were able to recover 4 memories.
One being Piccolo on stage in a crowded concert hall where he

(05:15):
turned to see a woman, the face of the cello player in his
mysterious orchestra. Also where he saw Atlas Sarkoff,
also known as Rex Yamir, in the audience with a little girl,
potentially their daughter. The second memory was Piccolo
writing a letter in a dark room to someone named.

(05:37):
And. Tell me if I messed this up.
Kulad dryad I think. It was grind I.
Liked why you guys say names. Grind, Kulad grind.
Look, dude, Mason, when you say when you just drop Kulad grind
and I've got to write that shit down.

(05:57):
No, I'm doubling. Okay, Kulad grind.
Got it. Did you want to spell that for
me? Kulad grind.
Yeah. CULAD Kulad.
I even spelled it right on the first try.
Last name DRIME Drime. It was drime.
Okay, Kulad Drime. The third memory was Piccolo on

(06:22):
his first night off in a long time, on a rooftop, watching
stars. A sister beside him, presumably
a sister. A younger woman beside him asked
Will they really clap when it's over?
And a spell jamming ship which Piccolo recognized drifted
overhead and he knew in that moment he was meant to play on

(06:42):
it. And 4th and last memory was
Piccolo playing music with an orchestra triggering a mass
enchantment mass dominate person.
Now while our friends were finding these 3-4 very important
memories, I got a hotel room forOliver and Eddie.
Then me and Haya returned to thehotel room and we found out

(07:03):
about these memories, prompting Oro to attempt to send to Atlas
Sarkov, also known as Rexy Muir,which was unfortunately blocked
by their, I don't know, super powerful blocking, spelling
message jamming stupid stuff. And then Monty woke up,

(07:25):
unfortunately sort of his first,I mean you know, him and I had a
good reunion for a couple minutes and then very quickly
Monty sort of got on this ether is dead and has forsaken us sort
of trip. We all introduced ourselves to
Monty, explained our group what we do here, and I got him some

(07:50):
food. Specifically, Oro and Malagus
left to pick up some food since they had been extremely awkward
in meeting Monty and needed sortof a reprieve from the whole
goddess dead dog. Malagus tried to convince me to
introduce him to my new recruitsOliver and Eddie, but obviously
Ora Feus refused. As analogous as a terrible
influence. Instead, we actually upset 2

(08:11):
human women in suits who were inthe room next door to us, who
had a sort of orbular thing, a little stone they slipped into
their pockets. Orbular.
Meanwhile, Malagus, you know, having got a little more
information on these recruits, learned that Higher had hurt one
of these teenage boys, now teenage boy, technically under
18. Being a minor triggered

(08:34):
Malagus's Curse Cosmic Bond to cut off the finger of Higher who
had hurt a child. Yeah.
Monty, of course, sort of awoke again just to time to see this
go down. It was pretty everyone was
pretty. Let's let me put it this way.
No one loved this except Malagusand also, you know, kind of

(08:57):
hire. There was a moment Malagus was
saying we can put it off buddy. I'm not on the time limit.
Touch my drew a knife from his bag and said the immortal line I
can tell you're going to be insane about.
This. That is a great line.

(09:18):
That might have been a highest line of the campaign, right?
For me it was, For me it was forsure.
Or I left the room to go craft with some ear instead of
sleeping in this sort of insanity.
And in the middle of the night, something thumped to the floor
in the room. Doolum, never truly sleeping,

(09:39):
awoke to pick it up. It was a small smooth stone, and
immediately Dhulam fell into a magical sleep, potentially it
being an autonome. This is its first sleep ever.
And. That brings up to date with the
podcast. All right, Welcome back,

(10:01):
everyone. To run Peg the Gun King.
This is an excellent place to pick up everybody for Doolum.
You fall into a deep and sort ofprofound sleep.
I actually went through my notesand I found that you actually
have fallen asleep once before, though that time was more of
just sort of like a natural sleep that you had one night.
You had sort of like a strange dream, if you recall, about the

(10:23):
Lady of Pain. Yeah, but this, this is a more
magical sleep, meaning it is a bit more fuzzy for you, and it
feels almost more human in a way.
You have less control over it. And as you fall asleep, your
body sort of nods its head down,going into a typical standby
mode posture, but your presence sinks lower and lower into a

(10:46):
beam. You find yourself back on
Mechanis, a time before you remember, a time of order and
beauty there unlike anything you've ever seen.
You see the great gleaming gold gears cracking away around you,
and you feel at peace. You feel home.
It's been a long time since you've been home, and sort of

(11:09):
those strange human feelings areleaving you.
You feel the anxieties of the world, the anxieties that you
felt seeing chaos around you slowly melt away and replaced by
a simple feeling of satisfaction.
And you look around and you feelcomfortable.
But then something hits you, a sort of moment of realization

(11:29):
that this isn't real, and you feel like you're in a dream.
You're not quite sure why or howyou got here, but nevertheless,
you are here, so you get to sortof walk around on your own
volition. Is there anything you'd like to
do in Mechanis? Oh, I guess I would immediately
try to find my superior. All right, you could begin
walking about. Walking on the gleaming gold and

(11:51):
silver pathways around Mechanis,you feel just again that
overwhelming sense of peace and calmness and satisfaction, and
every turn you take, your walking path is perfectly
efficient to the nearest building, one that you can find
you, you know you're superior will be inside one.
You'll find somebody who will help you.
And eventually you walk inside and find a much larger what

(12:14):
looks like some sort of monodrome creature, one of the
lower tiers of drones in mechanism, but nevertheless a
one step above the the the humble autonome you find this
creature with. It's with this one large central
eye and somewhat large circular body moving quickly over a large

(12:35):
timetable, looking at what looksto be figures and numbers.
And as with anything in mechanistic stuff above your pay
grade so you have no interest init.
The creature gives you a smile as you walk in and speaks out
rhythmically. Afternoon Dulum looking good
today, work going steady. Not as steady as I imagined.
I think there's something wrong with me.

(12:57):
Oh. What seems to be the problem?
The creature stops what it's doing and sort of pulls around
the table to approach you. The monodrones are much larger
than the simple autonomes, beingmedium creatures and that with
this big round bulbous body it almost like feels your entire
view as you see it approach you.I'm not quite exactly sure is

(13:19):
this real. No.
Oh, is there any way for me to return the creature?
Turns around and you see it flipsome what looks like Abacus
Abakai on the table behind it flipping some numbers and
running something and goes not for a few more minutes.
I suppose it's just us then, forthose next few minutes.

(13:40):
Yes, though I suppose it's just you for the next few minutes.
Oh, are you me then? Yes, nice to meet you.
The creature extends a hand and the two of you do a simple one
shake handshake, a typical movement and mechanists yet
again a defining efficiency. And the creature sits back down

(14:01):
at the table and begins flippingsome numbers and then looks over
at you and goes. Feel free to sit down, sure.
Sit down next to. It as an extension of yourself,
I suppose. I can't tell you anything you
don't already know, but in otherways would you like to talk?
I suppose so. What do you think it was that
sent us here? It appears to be magic.

(14:22):
I was thinking the same thing. It is odd though, looking at
your diagnostics, your core seems to be especially active in
your rest. I suppose I didn't realize that.
Not to worry, I believe that is why you are dreaming.
Oh interesting, did this happen when we dreamed before?
Yes, the creature sort of looks over at you and then looks down

(14:42):
and goes. It's buried in here somewhere,
but normally when an autonome falls to sleep, it doesn't think
or dream at all. It merely stops existing for a
bit. Powers back on, of course, but
right now you are sort of still awake.
Interesting. Maybe one of those books from
Doctor Him. We'll talk about this.

(15:03):
Maybe we should look at those more.
I agree. Speaking of Doctor Him, you did
a good thing to bury him. Thank you, it felt great.
I agree that was a nice thing, though I will note retrieving
the nonoton beacon might not have been a wise decision.
Yes, I was very hesitant about it.
Luckily you disposed of it soon after, but if it was a tracker,

(15:26):
it tracked your location to Jackknife Spar.
Suppose I didn't think about those implications.
Not to worry, I doubt it will bemuch of an issue, but something
to keep on your radar. That's very true.
We don't want jackknife spar to get destroyed again.
Ha ha ha. The creature sort of looks down

(15:47):
again and begins flipping some more Abakai in front of it and
goes oh, looks like you're due any second now.
I guess time moves weird here. I guess it does.
How strange. It's like you're in another
dimension. Kind of like look up and look
into the sky, sort of. You look up and you look into
the brilliant, golden, gleaming skies of Mecanis.

(16:08):
Snow clouds, of course, only that sort of consistent yellow
radiating glow of light. You don't see anything out of
the ordinary, and again, you feel a bit at peace, but you do
notice and you sort of turn around.
The rest of Mechanis seems to bestrangely empty.
Normally you would see an airship or two or flying
creatures of mechanical types flying about in Mechanis, but

(16:31):
right now it's kind of empty. In fact, sort of looking around,
you notice that you and this mono drone in front of you seem
to be the only creatures in the area.
I guess only parts look the same.
I wonder the same as you, does mechanis still look like this?
I'm not sure. It seems we've learned through
trial and error that time moves differently on different planes.
We've never thought does mechanis move the same?

(16:54):
Has it been faster or slower? I suppose we should try to
figure that out. I agree, especially with all
this business about Primus not contacting us.
You're right, maybe Primus just hasn't had enough time yet.
Maybe it's only been a fraction of a second.
Precisely, things to consider. The creature looks down and
grabs a piece of paper and sort of folds it up neatly and then

(17:15):
looks over at you and gives a sort of mechanical smile and
goes, well, looks like you were up, thanks for chatting.
And suddenly everything around you begins fading as you go to
respond. And all of a sudden it goes to
blackness. And then you feel something
worrying inside of you, and a warmth, and you open your eyes
and you're back in the room. All of your friends are still

(17:36):
sort of asleep. That looks like they have been
for some time. But you feel that sense of magic
slowly release itself from you and you look around.
A bit of fear comes over you, human fear and emotion that
you're starting to get used to, but nevertheless it makes you
uncomfortable. Every time something happened,
somebody was in here. You look around and you see
looks like there's a crack in the wall, the wall that you were

(17:59):
approaching before. It's thin and slim, but you
approach it and you can almost see through it.
You're not sure if it was there before, it's very thin, but you
get closer and you smell something coming through it.
And then you look around. Your friends all look the same,
all their belongings sort of look the same.
But please give me a perception check. 15.

(18:20):
OK. You look to your side.
Your own satchel and sack, including the small bag which
holds the architect in it, are still all there, but they've all
been opened slightly. You open your bag itself and you
look through and it's been slightly picked through.
You count all your coins and youlook through all your items and

(18:42):
it looks like everything of yours is here with a 15.
You look around and you make note.
It looks like all of your party has had their belongings
slightly rifled through. Nothing violent, nothing's been
strewn across the room. Someone was looking for
something, something specific. You're not sure if they found
it? OK, I'll try to wake up the
party. OK, you guys all hear a quiet

(19:05):
chime as Doolim sort of Dings the morning alarm.
I will try to sleep. Keep it in your pants, robot.
Sorry, but I think there was an attempted robbery.
Oh shit, Aliga slams up and justbegins kicking at whoever's near
him who's probably orifice. I'm sleeping on Samir's floor.
You're not here. I'm not here.

(19:28):
Oh wow. The bed charge is essential all.
Right then he's gonna kick in demos.
Just saying for the record, thatmeans my stuff also isn't here.
So that means your stuff has notbeen rifled.
Through Orpheus. Yeah, baby.
Except I don't think it's possible.
I have whatever they're trying to steal, but if they were after
the cube they're out of luck. That's a good point.

(19:50):
They probably wanted your personal diary.
I don't keep one cuz Orpheus doesn't believe in reading or
writing. My God.
I do have a notebook of blueprints though.
Doolan, did you did you happen to see who who did this?
No, only a stone. Is the stone still there?

(20:11):
You wake up Jaya, dawn in hand, as you did a couple nights ago
when you were attacked in the middle of the night.
I stayed struck. Oh.
I know, I know. And you've probably got your
like sleepy time bear hat on too.
I see it. You look under sort of like a a
side table, and sure enough you do find a very slim small stone

(20:35):
underneath. You pick it out and Jaya, you
notice there are runes carved and drawn along the entire
surface of this thing, and now not being a magic man yourself,
you don't really recognize them or can read them.
But passing it around the room abit as the rest of you guys sort
of wake up. You guys identify this as looks

(20:55):
to be some sort of glyph of wording.
I think this is what put me to sleep.
Yeah, I think, I mean demos, canyou maybe find out who who used
it is, can you do, can you use your magics for that?
I probably can't find out who made it, but I could possibly
try to see if I could find what spell was on it.

(21:18):
Yeah, I'm assuming there's some kind of sleep spell, but dude,
do you sleep? I thought you robo robots didn't
you know, put in sleep you. Robots.
It was very strange for me. I even had a dream.
Well, what was your dream? Well, I guess it wasn't really a
dream, it was just me talking tomyself.

(21:38):
Kind of like a lucid dream. Whoa, sort of like a wet dream.
Was there water? No, there was no water.
Yeah, you were talking to yourself.
Like, was the conversation like,was it good?
Sorry. I don't say that.
I'm so sorry. What's it being weird?

(21:59):
OK, bye. You made it.
Weird. OK, fine, I do say that that if
it's about weird, I don't know. It felt wrong.
I think it was a productive conversation.
All right, Mason, did you say that?
Like, have we looked through ourbelongings yet to see if
anything's been stolen or shouldlike, do we do that now?

(22:21):
Yeah, at this point, yeah, an investigation check is in order.
I won't make all of you guys roll it.
You can just have whoever has the highest investigation roll
with advantage as everyone else sort of helps.
Probably Demos +2 is very low. And +5. +5 Jesus man yeah let's

(22:42):
help Demos. Damn, you should be our new like
Sherlock. Really, really really really
really really. You're not.
Here Orifice, yeah. You're not really here.
Plus. 11. Higher counts the gold coins
that make up his bed. You're not a dragon.

(23:02):
Higher Dragon, you guys all lookthrough your stuff.
Yeah. So, Demos, do you want to give
me an investigation roll? It was a pretty low roll with
advantage. It was 13.
With advantage it was 13. Wow.
Luckily it doesn't actually takethat long to find what is most

(23:24):
obviously missing. It does take probably about 10
minutes of rifling through all of your stuff.
You also get a check stance to sort of look down at the stone.
You determined that it definitely was a glyph of
wording and it looks like it hassort of dark indents on it and
black paint drawn in where someone cast the spell.
You guys looked through all yourstuff, you determined no gold is

(23:45):
missing. You guys were not robbed of
money, which immediately leads you all to believe that this is
some this certainly a high classcriminal because you guys didn't
have a lot of money. No, instead what you find
missing to your horror demos, you look through your stuff and
find that the Vile Book of reversed spells is not there.
I know it. Shit, fuck, who did?

(24:08):
Who did we talk to about that? There was someone who wanted
that. I feel like there are quite a
few people who who wanted that. Shit, man.
Well fuck. Somebody heard something and
they goddamn snuck in here, Goddamn it.
I can't believe blog would do this like that.
Well, we got to get it back right.
We don't even know who fucking took it.

(24:29):
I mean, unless we can figure it out through that spell, but I
don't know. God damn it, how'd they even get
in here? The doors still locked.
I don't know, maybe we should goget orifice and come here.
I mean, how do you know how muchtime the spares do?
I do a little you do. It's actually near morning.
It's it was pretty deep into thenight.

(24:49):
It's. Been a few hours.
At this point they might have gone away too far.
I can't catch after but I do think we should go get or face
and smear. All right, I'll go get them.
You guys stay here and keep looking around see if anything
else is missing or figure out how they got in.
They must. I will help you in finding stuff
but my my brain ain't too smart.That's OK, Jaya.

(25:13):
That's OK. I guess.
I guess first demos would maybe like look at the window.
All right. You go to the window and inspect
it. Give me an investigation check
for that too. I'll walk up to the ball crack,
so investigate. I'd also like an investigation
from you, Doolum. 23 on the window.

(25:33):
Wow. OK, you investigate the window.
No, it looks like the window wasnot touched.
You're sure it's still locked inthe door?
Every like locking mechanism of it looks solid.
The window pane itself is looks unmarred as well.
Doolum, what'd you get? Dirty 20.
All right, now Dooling, this crack seems a bit more
interesting. You approach it, and it's still

(25:53):
very thin, almost razor thin, like somebody perhaps shoved a
sword in the wall and dragged itdown a bit.
You do notice though, it it looks like a hole.
In fact, just barely glancing through, you think you can see a
sliver of darkness on the other side the room next door.
It looks like it's just thin enough for someone to perhaps
slide. That's very thin, smooth stone

(26:16):
through. And it's probably just thin
enough too, for someone to be able to see through the crack as
well. And it dawns on you that if
perhaps a wizard was able to cast a Glyph of Warding, they
could just as easy cast a misty step right through this hole.
It seems like they came from ourneighbors.
I say we investigate them. Why don't we barge in that door
and see if we can find somebody there?
Now, now, I don't think we should be acting rash or

(26:38):
anything, but how about we go have a friendly little chat,
maybe, maybe see if we can invite ourselves in the room,
Take a, you know, ask a few questions and then pop the
quick, then tell them what happened in our situation, if we
trust them enough. Because if we go in there and
accuse them, I don't think they're going to be so
cooperative. I, you know, they're not going

(26:58):
to appreciate that. I agree, let's go knock on their
door. Nap All right, so the group of
you get up and exit the room, sort of arming yourself a bit
and getting like changed into real people clothes, knocking on
the door next door ba. Ba ba ba ba.
You get no response. Can I peep under the door?
You lean down and look under. Give me a perception check.

(27:20):
Oh God, oh God, probably shut 19.
Dice. You peer under.
You do not see anybody. You don't see feet.
It's dark in there. The lights aren't on, and with
what little light is sort of gleaming into the hallway of the
inn, you really don't see a thing under there.
It looks like it's either empty or whoever's in there is hiding.

(27:40):
They could just not be home. I don't want to assume anything
and make more issues than we already have.
Do you guys? Remember, he was staying in this
room. Malagus.
Does he have anything to say? No, he's getting not there.
Fuck. Me.
But he's getting you now. Sorry Doom, do you remember?

(28:02):
No, I don't believe I've ever seen her neighbors, though I
could go and get the proprietor of this in.
There's a chance that they've been attacked in there.
Let's ask them. We could also tell, you know, we
could also tell them that we've been robbed.
And I think that that would makethem a little bit more
cooperative and helpful. Yes, I agree.
All right, let's go. Let's start walking over.

(28:26):
All right, about this time, Orpheus in Samir's room, you're
just about finished. For all of your tinkering for
the night, you're sort of packing it in.
Samir himself is pulled off to the side and you hear a loud
Bang Bang Bang Bang bang on the door and then the door gets
thrown open as Malagus rushes inside.
I, I orifice Samir, you guys work or we got robbed.

(28:48):
We got fucking robbed. We got robbed.
I sort of like rubbed the sleep out of my eyes.
Wake up, God damn it. Not like it's sort of throws all
your shit off. OK, yeah, I'm like, yeah, you
got robbed. What was stolen?
Was it money? Did you get robbed or did
everyone get robbed? Were you out?

(29:09):
Were you, you know, hiding women?
No, I fucking was a Jesus or face.
Just come downstairs. All right, I don't know who got
robbed or what it was, but we need, we need your, your
investigative prowess. Yeah, I thought you might.
I sort of stand up with the hunch of someone who fell asleep
at a desk and my back pops really loud.

(29:31):
All right, take me to the crime scene.
All right, all right, let's go. Speaking of your night,
Orifaeus, you know, I've actually had a lot of our fans
asking about how your item creation has been going, so I
suppose it is worth asking aboutwhat exactly you would want to
be building first. I know you guys have some magic
items. You also have an intellect book

(29:53):
that you've been reading. What have you been working on?
So here's the problem. I and that has requested
slippers of spider climbing and Carter wants a persuasion
proficiency item. We haven't bought the
ingredients for those things yet, so I think I would and just
be working on reading through mybook.
All right. Does anyone else have any
requests I didn't like do them demos?
Do you guys have things that I just didn't write down?

(30:14):
Not. Yet sure.
Let me know what you want, Demoslizard man.
Next time we have just a shred of free time, I'll go get the
ingredients for the slippers. All right, so orifice you are
LED downstairs, then after having spent a night of reading,

(30:37):
Malik describes you by the arm, with with a gloved hand of
course, and drags you down the stairs and across the way just
to find the roof of you guys waiting out front of the door
just to finishing your conversation about what to do
next. Oh shit, for those ladies
witnesses or something. Ladies in the room, the our
neighbors, Malagas told me. You'd all have been robbed.

(30:59):
Yes, we believe that the robberscame from this room.
Oh shit, Balagas and I saw thosetwo ladies last night.
They were like wearing suits. They were all professional
looking. Shit, yeah, they they were like
fancy looking. Yeah, they looked nice.
I mean, it's a change that wasn't them.
I don't know if they're still staying in that room.
It's I don't know. We we're going to check in with

(31:21):
the innkeeper and let him know about the situation and see if
we can ask him a few questions. I'll just try to open the door.
You try the door, it is locked. OK, shit.
Well, at least we know their faces.
But if they were Wizards, couldn't they be doing some sort
of disguise? You think they were Wizards?
What's happened exactly? Well I heard a stone fell so I

(31:45):
went to investigate and before Iknew it I fell asleep.
When I woke up all of our stuff was rummaged through.
I see. And we found a hole inside of
the wall leading to this room. OK shit, that's pretty damning
evidence. You said you found a rock that
puts you to sleep. Yes.
Madly remember when we saw that one lady was sliding a rock into
her pocket? Shit.

(32:05):
Seems like it's definitely them.Definitely them.
OK, all right, so it was 2 ladies who looked real nice and
real pretty. Very nice looking women.
Nevermind. Did you guys Malagus?
Did you catch their names? No, we didn't like ask.

(32:26):
That's crazy. Are you sure you've been?
Really. Interested in talking to us?
I don't blame them. Fuck.
Well, not only you, but mortal Malagus.
Yeah, I mean, and we didn't meetunder the best circumstances.
We sort of were banging on theirdoor and they weren't happy
about it. Shit, all right, all right,
well, let's just break in there,right?

(32:47):
If they definitely went through the wall and we saw those
bastards with the fucking stone,let's fucking.
And he sort of plants his foot against the door to go to kick
it down. No, let's, let's.
Get the. Innkeeper before we get
ourselves more shit. OK, well I'm staying here in
case they try to sneak out. OK, but do them and I will go

(33:08):
get we'll go get the the inky. Okay.
Actually do them. Can you go get them?
I'll stay here. Make sure they don't do
something. What?
Do you mean we're? Going to be fine.
Christ, get a load of these guys.
I'll start walking all. Right.
The two of you guys begin walking downstairs.
It is late at night, so you notice the amount of

(33:30):
proprietors. I mean, specifically the in
keeps and the main desk attendants all seem to be mostly
asleep for the night. Instead, there's sort of the one
graveyard shift attendant up forthe night, sort of portly man
who looks to be halfway through reading a book, some thin
wireframe glasses hung over his nose.

(33:51):
He looks up to you guys and sortof sits up straight and goes
Problem. Yes.
You what can I do? Show you.
I apologize for the hour, but itseems as though we've just been
wronged. My goodness, in the end you're
you have a room here. Yes.
Oh shit. All right, well, what, what room
are you in? And the figure sort of stands up
out of the chair and you see himpull out a large Ledger and

(34:14):
begin flipping through it. I'll tell him the room number.
All right, let me see. And, and who do you think?
Did you have any, any, any leadson who it was?
Was it a bandit? I haven't seen anyone come or go
all night. No, no one suspicious at least.
Well when I when I was trying tosleep inside of my room I heard

(34:34):
a bang and when I inspected it, it seems like it was a stone.
It forced me to sleep through magic and when I woke up I found
that the hole was right next to our room that seems to be
leading to our neighbors. The figure nods up and down and
goes. I see, I see.
So your neighbors, was it on theleft side of the right side?
And the figure flips through a little bit more.
Oh, it looks like you guys have two rooms.
Is that right? One, Sir Orifice has rented the

(34:58):
room to your left and the one you're currently in.
So was it to the right then? And you recall.
And yes, it was the room to the right of your own.
Yes. Well, but that can't be Nobody's
renting that room tonight. It's empty.
It's been for a few days, actually.
My companions said that they actually noticed two women in
there earlier tonight before we were robbed.

(35:20):
Well, they shouldn't have been in there.
I mean, that door, that door should be locked.
In fact. Hold on, let me see.
And he turns around and approaches the huge key wall
that is sort of commonplace in most of these larger scale ends.
And the figure sort of thumbs through a couple of keys.
And eventually he stops someone and walks over and goes, look, I
have the key right here. This is the only one.
No one should be able to get in or out of that room.
I suppose they somehow broke in.Maybe it's your magic.

(35:41):
God damn it. Well, I, I could take you up
there right now and, and here you can have this key and he
gives it to you is maybe somebody's been squatting there
shit. Thank you, We can help
investigate. Thank you.
Yeah, I think that's a good idea.
Damn, I can't believe someone broke into your room.
I'm so sorry about that. We at the Flaming Bore apologize
for anything that's happened to you.

(36:03):
Your stay here should be nothingless than magical God.
And you see the figures, you getsort of flustered and pull it
there the the top of their coat.Oh Jesus, that just makes me
sick. I can't believe that on my watch
too. Damn, thank you.
The man gets up and begins following you with the key.
Back at the. Door.
All right, back at the door. Do you guys want to do anything?

(36:23):
I think, or I'm waiting under Jaya's watchful gaze.
You sure we can't knock this thing down, Jaya?
I heard that someone in our group has sort of a knock spell
or like an arcane lock or something that does something
with locks. We should just wait.
You know, they'll, they'll probably help us out.
You know, we've been robbed. They're concerned about their

(36:47):
in, you know, it would be a goodbusiness for them if they have
people like somebody here robbing them, robbing their
customers. So let's just let's just wait.
Let's just wait. In the meantime, I guess, how
did they know that we had that book?
Who all knew? I think Volcker suspected it and
we definitely told the guy at the black staff everything you

(37:08):
would need to know to figure outthat we had it.
Do you think either of them would want to steal it?
Damos, what do you think? Would Volcker steal it from you
if you didn't give it willingly?I don't want to say yes, but
it's it's been a long time sinceI've seen him so.
And even then, you know he he does work with other powerful
mages so. I will say to me it seems the

(37:31):
black staff is more likely than Volcker just because he really
didn't like us like for sure andalready sort of tried to steal
something from us once and also we basically told him we had it.
The guy that sent Ajora, I thinkto like go get the book in the
first place. Volcker.

(37:53):
Oh. I'm certain your old master
wouldn't send goons after us, though I will say this was a
quite nonviolent way to get it. I imagine if someone really
wanted to, they could attack us in the streets to acquire the
item. Abel sort of holds his chin and
goes. This must have been the work of
somebody professional. I agree with that for certain.
The ladies looked very professional.
It sounds even more likely it's Volcker then because he had some

(38:16):
he sent in someone else to do itand they didn't provide harm to
us otherwise. It's true.
That's. True.
Otherwise, why not just take it and torture us till they get it
sort of thing? I don't know.
I do think the black staff mighttake up a similar thing.
You know, theoretically they're somewhat bound to the laws of
this land, and it would be a scandal if they were kidnapping

(38:37):
and attacking people. And about this point to the one
of the innkeepers. The current attendant arrives
back with Jaya and Du Lamento. The innkeeper is sort of
swirling a key in his hand and looks at the group view and goes
are you guys all the oh damn, you're all the part on the OR
face ticket, is that right? Yeah.

(39:00):
I'm so sorry again about the robbery.
We really try to hold ourselves to a better standard here.
I mean, we actually have a few guards patrolling these very in
halls. If they had seen something, they
would have, they would have toldme for sure.
So whatever happens here, it must have been some shady
individuals. Can you tell me more about what
happened just for my Ledger? First off, have you seen anyone
leave the inn tonight? Specifically to women

(39:21):
potentially wearing suits. He sort of scratches his head
for a moment and goes, and no, I, I don't think so.
There was a family that left earlier tonight, a group of six
or seven people, a big family. And then I think there was one
guy who came back in later, a sort of drunk guy.
And other than that, a few people came down for a snack,

(39:43):
but nobody left the building. They could have slipped out with
the family, but for now we need to go post someone by the door.
Was the drunk guy this man righthere and I want to point them
out again. Hey, what the fuck?
No, no, sorry. This man though.
I have seen this man drunk a lotdownstairs.
Hey listen buddy, I knew it. Enough of that.

(40:04):
No time for arguing. Someone needs to be at the door.
Malagus Abel, can you cover it? I'll go cover it.
Yeah, Yeah, sure. Sure.
Abel, go with him, he might get distracted.
Off I go. And the two of them go running
off. All right, we need to get into
this room, Sir. Right, right, yes.
He fumbles with the key and thenplaces inside the lock and you
hear a click as it opens, revealing a almost pristine Dean

(40:26):
clean in room. You look around, both beds have
been made and you see the blankets folded perfectly on top
of the bathroom. Looks clean and tidy.
The whole room looks like it's ready for someone to stay in it.
It looks untouched. Shit.
It's just I was saying this roomis unoccupied.
No one should be here. Can we check the wall that's
connected allegedly to our bedroom?

(40:48):
You look at the wall, approaching it.
Sure enough, getting closer, youdo see a small slit in the wall,
not very wide, again only the width of maybe a large coin, but
it is long. It looks like a slash of sorts.
The innkeep sort of leans over and looks through and goes oh

(41:09):
this is how they got in. Damn these walls are thick.
This must have taken a while to get through.
Shit your walls. Maybe they had a magical item
that made it silent. Yeah, seems like we're dealing
with a lot of magic. Yeah.
Could be could one of us maybe try to do like an arcana check
to see if there are any like spell remnants in the room or
something? Oh, can I also make an

(41:30):
investigation check in General Mason?
I'm looking for any signs of life, strands of hair, warm
spots on the bed. I'm looking under the bed,
anywhere anyone could hide obviously anywhere where anyone
might have rolled a joint. I'm sniffing for weed.
I'm really getting all up in there.
Nat one, yes I would allow. That and sorry, did you just get

(41:53):
a Nat one higher? Yeah, you sniff around and it
just smells like disinfectant, like cleaning agent.
Likely someone mixed some lime and maybe like salt in a giant
water bucket and then cleaned this whole damn room with it and
that's all you can smell. I smell the disinfectant get
kind of like chloroform myself and it's so.

(42:15):
Tired. You're tired.
I mean, you were woken up in themiddle of the night.
Higher. You want to go back to bed like
this mystery could really wait till tomorrow morning.
It looks like if there were people in here, they're long
gone. Oh, is my Watson helping me?
Oh yeah. Yes.
Oh wait, what? Not the best role 19 just
because in case I don't, was wondering why plus plus 11?

(42:38):
Wait, So what did you get? 19.
Oh, with a + 11 OH. Stop.
Let's stop it. Don't talk to me like that.
OK, hold on a SEC. All right, so you look through
the room. You and Doolum, your Watson
looked through you. Check the bed first.
The sheets are crisp, perfectly folded at the corners.

(43:01):
Nothing. No warm spots there.
The curtains are hanging perfectly fine and you smell it.
Smells like lavender lingering in the air nearby.
None of the floorboards creak. The mirror inside of the
bathroom is sparkly clean and you don't really see any dust
anywhere. No luggage, no notes, nothing
personal, but with a 19. Uh huh.

(43:24):
You find caught on a drawer a single thread, almost too fine
to see. OK, it shimmers faintly and you
see it's sort of a silvery black.
Like from a black stuffed robe perhaps?

(43:44):
Mace. Can I it?
It smells sort of like lavender over here Damos.
Are there any spells that use lavender as a component?
Gonna make an arcana check for that Mason.
You can certainly make an Arcanacheck, yes.
Year 26. Oh my God that is crazy.

(44:05):
So from your memory, there's no spell that uses lavender
specifically, but however there are a few spells that use sort
of flowers in general, and lavender is, you know, obviously
such a flower specifically. 2 spells use flowers, Summon Fay

(44:27):
and the spell sleep. Sleep in particular uses.
Typically it uses petals of flower, and as you know,
lavender do have sort of small purple petals.
Lavender do have. Lavender do have it.
They don't. This is what you recall.
This sort of. It might explain how the sleep

(44:49):
spell was cast. All right, I relate that to the
party I. See.
Well, I guess we should rest forthe rest of the night and then
in the morning we can try to maybe hunt down who did, who did
this. Yeah, that's a good idea.
I turned to the NQ. Don't know his fucking name?

(45:09):
That's fine. Thank you.
Did you guys find anything? Is there anything I can I can
help with? Maybe is there any evidence that
somebody was here? Definitely they cast the spell
from inside here because we can smell the components still.
OK. All right.
What does that mean exactly? Which means they were for sure
in here. It's proof that's the attackers
came from this room. I see.

(45:31):
Well, I'll, I'll put a note out.Two women in in suits, you say?
Yes. Can I try to give a more full
description of them? What was their like species
appearance? Give me a history check.
Oh yeah, I remember when this was my best at you guys.
I remember what happened 18. Could maybe Malagus give me

(45:54):
help? Yeah, Malagus is like, no, she
was taller. She was more beautiful.
She was really pretty, I remember that.
Okay, no, that was actually worse.
Okay, 18. 18 you say, OK, you recall with pretty good detail
what the two of them looked like.
They were both human, you think,though you sort of have a memory

(46:15):
of one maybe having slightly pointy ears, and that's where
Malagus goes. No, I definitely think one of
them had like sort of kind of pointy ears, like 1/2 elf.
You relay their height, their complexion, and what little you
could see of their face underneath the optics they were
wearing. OK.
And also I'll go into detail about these optics.
You explain it, and you flame the suits as well, and the

(46:38):
proprietor takes out what looks like a small notepad and a
quill, writing down as much detail as it can.
Yeah, thank you. Thank you, guys.
We'll put out a note, and we'll make sure that these individuals
are questioned if they're ever to enter the establishment
again. We do not take thieving lightly
in the flaming bore. If you don't mind me asking,
what exactly was taken? I can inform the guards.

(46:58):
Look at Namos. Damos shakes his head.
Nothing. I keep looking at demos.
You know, just some some personal valuables like like a
journal of mine was taken. Quite sadly, it was all black.
I see. What did it have any monetary

(47:20):
value? Like were there secrets in there
or something? I consider my secrets
invaluable, So yes, quite. I see.
Yes, right, a journal and no money was taken.
Master. Knowledge no journal also have
like like the location of like your like like your estate like

(47:43):
your treasurer in there. My estate?
Yes, My family's estate. Yeah, you have like a running
will like in there, would not want that fall into the wrong
hands, am I right? Exactly, exactly.
And now you can see, Sir, why this crime is so serious.
Yes, of course, any robbery serious, I completely agree.

(48:05):
I just, I want to make sure I'vegot this.
All right, All right. And is there any physical harm
that was done? Were any of you guys attacked or
anything? I put a hand on Doolum's head.
More mental. On.
I'm sorry, Explain what? Was there something done to you?
I was put to sleep. Oh, interesting, that magical

(48:27):
sleep. I believe so.
I see. All right then, if you don't
mind, I would like to. The figure nods up and down and
goes. Perhaps get in contact with the
Black Staff Tower to inform themof this crime.
I wouldn't, preferably. What do you mean?
Well. There's a captain on the Guards,

(48:48):
Captain Topher, and I trust him with just about anything and I
want his eyes on it first. Oh well yes, but the Black Staff
tower usually deals with crimes related to wizardry.
I don't like them. Uh huh.
We, we've done some dealings with the, you know, law

(49:08):
enforcement in this city, guardsand the Blackstaff Tower.
And the way the Blackstaff Towerhandled the last issue we worked
on with them was really unproductive.
They kind of ruined an open investigation we had going on
through negligence. I see.
And is that something that you want to report to them?

(49:29):
Sorry, it's just we sort of do things in dealings here.
I'm sure you understand. There's an order to all the
stuff that we do. For example, the Black Steps get
involved when there's magic. I don't understand why you'd
want to avoid them. I mean, they're professionals.
They're not so good. It's their jobs.
We found. We are also, you know, sorts of
professionals, more like contractors I suppose in the,

(49:53):
you know, crime fighting industry.
But the black staff aren't very professional and they're not
very good at their jobs and they've already drew into one of
our investigations, so I don't really want to bring them into
another. I understand.
All right, Captain Tofa, you said.
I'm going to write that down. Thank you.
Yes, best captain. I recommend going to him first
for any matters you have. Right.

(50:14):
Would you like to get in contact?
Would you like to get in contactwith this captain or or should
I? Look at my friends, what's the
vibe? Do you think we should
prioritize? Like, you know, what's the best
use of our time? Because I do think Captain Tofa
would like to hear from us directly, but also we've got
criminals to chase. I think we already needed to
talk to to captain in Topher, soI think.

(50:35):
That's true. I think we could do it that way
we control the message. Control the message.
Let's go to Topher then. The man continues as he goes.
OK, you sure you don't want me to talk to the guards, are you?
Good on it. The confusion, I guess.
I guess we'll handle it. And we just wanted to report it,
you know, to you since it is your end.

(50:58):
But yeah, no, we'll report it. And you could tell your personal
security, maybe see it collect some witness statements from
them. Yes, yes, of course.
I I'll be sure to do that. Thanks.
Thanks you guys. Again, apologies about this.
We're going to look into this, Ipromise.
Have a good night. All right, And let me just see
if I can patch this hole up realquick.

(51:19):
And he walks over to the hole and sort of looks at it and you
see pulls out a small what lookslike long tape and measures with
this measuring tape the hole in the wall.
Maybe don't patch it up. Actually, maybe that could be
important evidence. Oh, oh, OK, sorry.
It's all right. You know, I think we would
appreciate a new room though. Yes, of course, of course.

(51:39):
You know what? Let me move you guys upstairs.
It's the least I can do. I'd actually rather stay.
Well, OK, yeah, that's fine. He nods and dashes away, coming
back a few moments later with another key.
I'm going. To need the key.
Oh, sorry. Yes, please go ahead.
I'm going to need the key for the nearest room to our new room

(51:59):
that has 2 twin beds. What?
Why? Why is that?
I am renting 2 rooms next to each other.
If I move one, I'm going to wantto move the other two.
Yes, of course, of course I can get that.
Are you? Would you please wake up your
companions? Yeah, I'll get them, no worries.
All right, the man runs off and returns with a plethora of keys
for you guys all to have, including some to investigate

(52:22):
these two rooms as well. It's pretty easy for you guys to
gather all your things and move into a slightly larger, nicer
room similar to the one Samir isrenting in the floor above.
Leveled up. Whoa.
While everyone's settling into the new room, I'll go find my
recruits. The middle of the night.
All right, you head to the Yeah,because you head to the room

(52:43):
next to your own knockout. In a few times you hear sort of
a lazy what is it and come from inside.
I don't knock. I I just sort of jiggle the
doorknob furiously. And then when he says that'll
say it's auto, I need to talk toyou.
It's sort of an emergent situation.
And piss off for sleeping. OK, now I start banging
furiously on the door. Bang Bang, Bang Bang, bang,

(53:04):
bang, bang. You hear no response.
Wake up right now. It's a matter of safety.
Finally, the is that a? Threat.
The front is slightly opened anda sort of sleepy looking man
looks in. It looks like Ollie speaks of

(53:24):
what the fuck you want. I'm just trying to sleep.
Oliver, last night someone brokeinto our room, the room next
door, as you're aware. So we're having all of our rooms
moved up a floor. There are also nicer rooms,
which I need you to to get with me now.
Collect your things. Wake up, Edmund.
Yeah, All right. Where?
Where should we go? Upstairs.
Just collect your things and follow me.

(53:45):
I'll show you your new room. Sorry to wake you, I know you
need your sleep, but this is important.
All right, all right. It's it's fine.
It's fine. God damn my head hurts.
Fuck. And the.
Are you hungover right now? Piss off, or if I wanted to hear
you God damn bickering, I'd staysomewhere.
Fuck the damn good stuff, Oliver.
Are you hungover right now? I throw my foot in the door.

(54:08):
You throw your foot in and then you sort of see the figure back
up. It's it?
Piss off, all right, I'll fight you again.
What's your problem, Oliver? Yesterday you were doing so
well. What's changed?
I just. And you get a second to sort of
poke your head in the room and sure enough, you see several
large carafs of wine in the room.
I I OK I get visibly very angry then turn around and run out of

(54:36):
the room and don't close the door behind me and I'm running
upstairs. I want to burst into my friend's
room. I need help.
I need help. I'm in a situation I can't fix
on my own. You guys are all settling into
your new room. Who is the best at parenting?
It seems obvious. Nevermind.
Yes, Samir. Or Jaya.
Why do I have OH? Jaya Yeah.

(54:57):
Both Samir and Good morning, Shia.
If you were taking care of a kid, it's not your kid, but it's
a kid you're responsible for. And you gave them money to, you
know, pay for food and clean everything up.
And they spent it all on alcoholand got really hungover and
we're being a jerk to you. What would you do?
They're not your kid. No, but if they don't have
parents you can go to unless they have moms.

(55:19):
I should ask about that. Well, I guess you tried to kill
them. They stole from me and I was
following your lead, but I guessI can't do that either.
How was it my lead? You casted Spears, Guardian
while I was chasing them? Yeah, you.
You were chasing. Them.

(55:41):
Not every time you chase someoneare you going to hurt them when
you catch them. Well, I I stopped them very
efficiently. End of sentence.
Listen. He was already punished for
this, all right. Just go ahead and look.
And now like it's just just a oryou know why you're still sort
of wrapped hand. Points taken.

(56:03):
Jaya, come with me please. Smear you should also.
We need the big guns. What a face.
This isn't going to become a recurring event, is it?
I don't plan on keeping track ofthem for very long.
I'm going to try to find someonebetter to keep track of them,
but for now they're my responsibility and while you

(56:23):
don't have to help, I would really appreciate some help.
No, no, that's not what I'm asking.
I'm asking the next time you come across anyone on the
street, be they a child or not, and you feel the need to help
them and bring them back home for us to take care of instead
of you. That is what I'm talking about.
Are we going to make that a recurring thing?
Because it's nice to look after people, but if you can't handle

(56:46):
it, you can't keep bringing themback.
I just need you to be aware of that now.
OK, never mind, I got it. I'll go leave.
Wait, I'll come on. I'll come with you.
Yeah, I don't mean to make it your responsibility, Jaya.
I just really didn't expect thisand I don't know where to go
with it. And I think I'm just going to
get angry and this will make it worse.

(57:07):
Like first let's so bring him upand then afterwards we can, we
can talk to him right now. You know, he's wrong.
Not really going to pay attention, not really going to
listen to much. So let's just let's just get
that done and then afterwards wecan deal with maybe I can't say
punishment, but I'm talking to. Orifice is completely awed by

(57:30):
you in this moment. That's all.
Such a good idea, Jaya. OK, let's go.
Really good at this. I mean I raised 3 kids, trust me
they weren't. Or two kids.
They weren't easy. I thought we just got a huge.
Blow drop, Who's the 3rd? Yeah, you don't talk about the

(57:52):
third kid, Jaya, who messed up. They're dead to.
Me. Just kidding.
Just kidding. I'm a loving person.
That's fucking crazy, Jaya, That's crazy.
OK, I'll show Jaya to Eddington and Oliver's room.
Is the door still open? You returned, the door is

(58:14):
closed. I'd start trying to open it.
It seems to be locked. You can't get the thing open.
Shit, they locked us out. Knock on the door.
Hey, it's it's one of aura faces.
Friends, trust me, I'm not I'm not trying to be y'all or

(58:34):
anything. I just want to make sure that
you guys are good. You know I you're probably
hungry. Do you want some snacks?
Do you want some water? He carries the best snacks.
We're fine here, all right? Piss off about it.
It's trying to get. It's late.
You can't sleep right now. I changed your room to upstairs.
No one's paying for this room anymore.
You're going to get kicked out. Why'd you do that?

(58:57):
We hadn't asked you to do that Autumn next door, and it was a
safety concern. Let let me talk to you, right.
Yes, yeah, yeah. You know, you guys can still
rest up. You know, we're not going to bug
you or anything after that. We just, you know, you just need
to get into a different room. Something happened with the

(59:18):
rooms. You know this one apparently has
bugs in it, so. And you don't want bugs, right?
You don't want little crawly things.
You see, you can't care about lying about this after your
friend just said you've just gotbroken into, all right?
What's your bullshit? Really?
Watch the bullshit Christ. I can't.

(59:38):
I don't lie. Come on, listen, how about, how
about this? How about?
What? What what's something that you
guys have been wanting to do? Fucking sleep.
It's our first night and so havea nice evening.
Like forever, All right? We thought this was a gift.
We thought you guys were giving us a gift.
It is a gift. Just you know, we're not taking

(01:00:00):
away from you. How about this?
You know, we'll leave you alone after you go back, after you
change rooms. After that, we'll leave you
alone. Fuck, fine, if that's all it
takes, fine. And you hear some rummaging
inside and about 3 minutes laterthe door softly clicks and you
see a very sleepy looking man slowly dredge himself out,
followed by an another equally sleepy looking guy.

(01:00:21):
The second guy sort of shoots you guys both a stink eye and
goes, I thought you'd be nice tous all right, but we'll move,
we're out of here. We get the we get the fucking
gist. All right, we're gone.
You're still. Going to have a room we're not
kicking you out like the end you're still going to have a
room here they're. Actually nicer rooms now because
they're upstairs. Sure.

(01:00:44):
Yeah, whatever. All right, I'll get how this is
going to be now. It's not like that, you guys,
Someone broke in the autumn nextdoor.
They went through the wall in the autumn and they know you're
with us. It's not safe for you to be
here. Listen to our face.
They're not going to listen to you right now.
Let's just get them upstairs fornow.
And I. Turn red from not talking the

(01:01:10):
string. The smoke comes out.
Yes, there's smoke pouring out of my ears.
The two figures wander upstairs,but they seem to only have a
backpack on each. OK, I'll, I'll hand Jaya the
keys to their new room. I'm just going to check out the
extent of the damages in here. Yeah, I hope it's not bad.

(01:01:32):
I gave them each. How much did I give them each?
Was it 10 gold each? That's right.
I gave them each 10 gold. I just want to be certain that
there's not 20 golds worth of liquor in here.
Yeah. We would be so much.
Maybe, you know, we take it justso we're, you know, making sure
they're not spending it on just liquor.
I know Boys has probably been through quite a bit.

(01:01:55):
I just, I didn't want it to be strings attached, you know, I
wanted to just be offering them as much help as they wanted and
just like the room and then somegold.
But now it's like if I have to make sure they're spending the
gold on good things, it feels like a lot more responsibility,
which I'm not scared of responsibility per SE.
It's that I wanted to trust themto take care, to have their own

(01:02:15):
best interests at heart, you know?
I mean, they are. Kids they are.
You know, it's like trusting Malaguese with a bunch of money.
August is older than I am, I think, but.
Yeah. Yeah, that's why I'm not letting
Allegis meet them ever, because I think he'll just teach them
new ways to be terrible. Yeah, influence on them.

(01:02:38):
Yeah. All right.
The boys trudge up to the room that you find them and just sort
of enter in wordlessly. While Jai's leading them to the
room, I want to step into their old room.
You step in and look around. It's a bit of a dump.
There seems to be a lot of what looks like half eaten food lying
around and a lot of wine that seems to be just sort of

(01:02:59):
scattered around the place. It looks like they had a bit of
a smorgasbord. OK, but there's food too, at
least, and it's just wine, not hard liquor.
Can I do an investigation check to see if I can like figure out
any more details about what happened?
Yeah, give me an investigation check.
Natural one. I'm angry, crying too hard to
see anything. No.

(01:03:20):
I just had so much faith that they would make the right
decision. God damn it.
God damn it. You don't get to find anything
that you particularly like. OK, I'll just try to do my best
to tidy up the room and then head upstairs.
All right, you tidy up, get a chance to look around a little
bit and. Oh, actually, there's one more

(01:03:42):
thing I want to do on this floorbefore I retire.
I want to go back to the women'sroom.
You head back. I want to open the curtains on
the window. You open them, you get a nice
view of water deep. I'm assuming the latch is in
place on this window. Yes.
OK, I I guess I just want to seewhat where I think they would
have misty steps next if they were leaving through this

(01:04:03):
window. Like what's the nearest point?
You look out onto the street, itseems to be the main road in
front of you that you can see. This room faces out the to the
front of the building, same as your own does, and it just seems
to just be a long wide St. you. From this angle you can even see
the alley that that one musical player, Piccolo had stood and

(01:04:24):
watched the flaming bore the night that it was attacked.
It's a pretty wide street so there's all sorts of alleys and
dim looking buildings across theway, perhaps a Tavern or two
that are unmarked, that all seemto be glowing very warmly in the
deep night. OK, cool.
You really? Can't tell.

(01:04:45):
Awesome. Yeah, you really can't tell
exactly where they would have gone.
All you see is just a pretty wide space to head in any
direction they'd like. OK.
Jaya. The two gentlemen step into the
room and close the door behind them, leaving you alone on the
floor, and orifice soon comes upand joins.

(01:05:05):
Thank you for your help Chaya, you made that easier.
Yeah, no problem. I just, I wouldn't bend over
backwards over trying to save again.
They're I mean it. Was.
Just a little bit of wine, nothing praying.
They did they damage the room really bad.
I was, I had a hard time really investigating, but not that I

(01:05:27):
noticed. You're right.
It's not that out of the norm. Yeah.
I mean, Malik just does it all the damn time.
He does. He does.
He's an asshole too. Maybe people are just assholes
after they drink. Yeah, you'll see this
reoccurring thing. OK, well thank you Jaya.

(01:05:47):
I next time I have to talk to them, can I bring you with me?
Yeah, of course. And you know, we don't have to
tell them what to do. We'll just, you know, let them
know that we're here for support.
Ultimately, what they've that's.What you wanted, I just wanted
to give them, you know, information that could help or

(01:06:07):
offer another pair of hands if they do have to, you know, step
in to help their fathers. Yeah.
You know, I do appreciate what you're doing.
Although Samir says it's an inconvenience, which it can be,
it's still nice to know that youcare about.
Well, of course I care. It's, you know, a nice job to

(01:06:28):
take care of people, and when you meet someone who really
needs help, it's hard not to. Personally, I don't see it much
as an inconvenience. I hug you and while I do that,
my goggles sort of are bumped and just tears fall out, fall
out of them on you. Thank you, you're a really good

(01:06:48):
dad. Also person in general.
Oh, thank you. I hope so.
I just want to be a good father of my children.
I miss. You have the children.
You're the luckiest children in the world.
Oh, you're too kind of making giant cry.
Oh, it's true, it's true. I'll cry on you for as long as
you allow. Slowly lightly push you back

(01:07:14):
once it was like a socially accepted.
Are. We going to sleep more tonight
or are we going to Captain Topher right now?
Let's go to bed and then the morning, you know, we can deal
with it. OK, that sounds good.

(01:07:35):
I'll head back into our friend'sroom.
Urgent to talk to Captain TopherI.
Mean somewhat urgent, but I don't at all here, actually,
while we're still in the hall, I'm not so sure we want to get
this book back. I mean, I know it stands for a
lot of gold, but if it means crossing the black staff and
it's kind of an evil book, right?
So I don't know Jaya, it's just a thought.

(01:07:56):
The truth comes out. Yeah, we'll see.
I mean, it's not great that it'sin somebody else's hands either,
though. That's true.
That's true. It's just we weren't using it
like a lot, but I guess the black Staffs would also use it a
lot. Maybe we should have just given
it to Volker all those days ago.Perhaps, but what have could

(01:08:18):
have should have? Yeah.
Let's. Go to bed.
Oh, oh, go back into the room. OK, that's dealt with.
Goodnight everyone. Shit, Matt, we're not going to
talk about this. That was crazy.
Burglary in the morning. Yes, that was crazy.

(01:08:40):
Yeah. I mean, dude, what the fuck?
What's wrong? You're just going fine, flying
forever. Whatever.
Go to bed. Jesus you people are so weird.
No, I'll talk to you, Malicus. Tell me what you're feeling.
I don't know, I'm just like, shit, man, we got attacked in
the middle of the night. Like fuck, I thought we were
tough. Like, I don't know, I guess that
we've never lost a battle. Well, I've died a couple times,

(01:09:02):
but you know, we've never like truly lost, but like do it.
If they wanted, those women could have just come in here and
slit all our throats in the night and that would have been
it for the runt pack. That's fucking scary, man.
We need to like, I don't know, man, I'm going to do something.
Free. Does the knife win in?
SO that would have alerted you guys probably.

(01:09:23):
But if your throat was catched then the air would just go
through the cottage. Wouldn't really be a screen.
That's a. Cool way to think of this, okay.
Just something to keep in mind. Higher, silly little lizard.
The issue is I really thought wewould be safe somewhere like an
inn, you know, in so indoors in respected inn, and we're not.

(01:09:47):
So maybe we have three people onguard every night now.
Sure, shifts. Sucks though, I mean fuck, I
feel like the only explanation is someone got in here who like
has a lot of pull. You know, you guys were talking
about it could be a black staff wizard and I I think that could
be right. You know that that sounds like
it could be the case. That's what I think.

(01:10:07):
And it's just like, I don't know, I don't know.
It's scary to imagine that someone that important is
fucking with us. But clearly they only took one
thing, so it's not that important, right?
Book is kind of what did all thebad stuff to Monty, and yeah,
I'd really rather that not happen to another person.
Dude, you wanted to keep the damn book, we were going to sell

(01:10:29):
it. Yeah, I wanted to keep it so
that no one else could do evil messed up stuff with it.
You think these Wizards are going to use it for evil?
Well, I guess they aren't like the best.
Yeah, that's not and. Jordan was a wizard who was
corrupted by the book. Now I will say I don't know we
were the most responsible book Havers either.
Maybe we should have just given it to the Lady of Pain.

(01:10:50):
Too late. Yeah.
We should try to figure out who took it though.
What we haven't talked about is that this could be connected to
the Symphony of Net. Fairpoint.
Yeah, we do have a lot of enemies who could want that
stuff from us. Yeah.
OK, well, see, that's why I'm glad we're, you know, debriefing

(01:11:10):
it now because shit man, this like, I don't know, this shit
seems intense and I'm just want to make sure we're all in the
same headspace as all. I'm scared too, Malikus.
Right. This shit's scary man now.
I think it's easier when you like, never view yourself as
safe. And then it's like, we didn't
just like lose anything there except for the book, but like.

(01:11:30):
Except for the book. Higher.
I know you don't feel that way though cuz you've got friends
who care about you and it's not like that.
I mean, yeah, no. And you guys are great, but just
like you know, you know, if there are sick, if there are
sick freaks like Zaprix in the world, you know?
Yeah, it's scary. Yeah.
Is Samir in the room with us right now?

(01:11:51):
Yeah, Samir's off to the side. He's got his arms crossed and he
looks a bit nervous. I don't think you should sleep
in your own room anymore, Samir.It's not safe.
It is. We were told this in is the
nicest one in town, so to think we're could be attacked here
means we could really be attacked anywhere.
I will say though, Dulum. Didn't you?

(01:12:14):
Share with me that you have a way to sort of protect an area
like an alarm of sorts. Yes, I suppose I was in
agreeance with or FAS. I don't expect it to happen
here. No, I agree, but well, if it's
not too much to ask, that alarm could be what protects us each
night and at least gives everyone the ability to sleep.

(01:12:36):
Keeping three people on watch every night, That gets
exhausting. We should at least have some
safety, and you could be that safety dulum.
You're very good at it. Would you still feel comfortable
with me being that protection ifI failed tonight?
Well, Jolum, you didn't fail. It could have happened to any of
us. We shouldn't have put you on
watch alone. It wasn't a fair position for
anyone to be in. We just have to have.

(01:12:58):
That's why we have multiple people take watch.
Usually. I, I felt so good last night.
I just didn't even think we needed to.
But yeah, I guess we're just never safe.
Ever. I sort of give higher an
uncertain look and I'm like, yeah, it's important.
That's the least the first part for sure.

(01:13:18):
Look, the realities of the sick,twisted, fucked up world
nightmares are real. Stuff like this didn't really,
well, I don't know, but to do them, it's not your fault, so
don't even get that into your head, OK?
Yeah. Thank you.
It sounds like you were the onlyperson even awake Doolum, so it
certainly couldn't be anything to do with you.

(01:13:42):
You did what anyone else could, you did your best, and luckily
this turned out to be a pretty successful robbery.
Not to say that it was dangerous, but if all they took
was that wretched book, then good riddance, right?
Well. I'm not disagreeing with you,
Samir, but I think there's two schools of mine within the party

(01:14:02):
on this issue. Samir shrugs and then goes on.
Orifice. I did think there was one more
thing that I needed your help with before you went to bed.
Oh yeah, sorry. I don't even remember falling
asleep to be honest. Just kind of happened.
What did you need me to do? He gestures to the door.
What? What does that mean?

(01:14:23):
What is it? The door is broken.
Leave. Don't be like that criminal.
I I needed help in my room OK. I'm going to sleep with where
everyone is and I think you should also, but I would love to
come work first. He walks out the door.
I think I'm supposed to leave now, you guys.
I'll see you in soon. If we're not back in half an

(01:14:46):
hour. Someone killed us.
I I won't hear. Doolum start workout.
You guys step outside and a couple paces away from your door
out of your shot. Samir turns back to you and sort
of stops you up against the wallor her face.

(01:15:08):
Listen, I really need to talk toyou about the two boys that you
are currently housing here. OK, Yeah.
What is it about them? I don't think I have step back.
I didn't make myself clear enough earlier, but it is very
important to me that if someone near to me takes children into
their home, for example, these two boys that you seem to be

(01:15:30):
looking after, that you actuallylook after them, I mean.
To hear you. Into the room and shout that you
need help raising two kids that you had very privately by the
way, stowed away in. I'm not raising them.
I just, they needed a place to stay.
So I said I'd help them, you know, pay for 10 nights here.

(01:15:52):
They gave them some money to buy, you know, food, new
clothes, new daggers. And I was going to try to help
them get their dads out of prison if I determined that
their dads needed to get out of prison.
And if we couldn't get their real dads back, I was going to
try to find them jobs. But I'm not raising them.
I'm not going to be around for that long.
If that's the case orifice, you wouldn't have cared what they

(01:16:12):
did in their room alone, but youcame in babbling to Jaya about
them drinking in their private time.
You clearly care about them quite a bit for having only met
them, and yet it still seems like you can't do it alone.
And that's all right, but what aface.
And he sort of clutches his bag as he says this.
It's really important that if you bring something like that
into your home, you have to lookafter it.

(01:16:33):
Look after those two, care for them.
You can't just do a tough fast. You can't just bring them around
and then leave them on their ownor stop looking after them.
If you already promised you would.
I didn't promise. Anyone I or should I just have
not helped them at all? No, but.
He clutches his bag. I understand what you're getting

(01:16:54):
at Samir, but I don't have the capabilities or time or
experience to just like raise toteenagers.
Also, they're, you know, old. They can look after themselves
to some extent. I know they need help, that's
why I'm trying to help them, butI'm not looking to parent
anybody. I just wanted to help someone
who needed it. Exactly, that's what I thought
too. So if you are saying that, then

(01:17:16):
why did you run in talking abouttheir activities this evening?
That's a good point because it was frustrating.
They were being irresponsibly and using.
It was. OK.
Yes, it was. It was Malagus like meaning of
course childish, immature, repulsive.
But do. You see what?
I'm saying. OK, yes, but OK, I sort of see

(01:17:39):
what you're saying. So then am I just supposed?
To listen, taking on a child, nomatter what age is a big task.
You brought those two in here. You gave them a room.
That's fine. That's all well and good.
I'm actually very happy that youwere able to help these two.
And if you'd like to help them break the fathers out of prison,
perfect. But there comes a point where
you toe the line when you start caring about what they do in

(01:18:01):
their free time. What do you consider these
immature actions that you want to write that is no longer just
being a friend or being a helpful stranger on the side of
the road. That is different and that then
it starts mattering what you do and how you do it.
OK, I see what you mean. OK, I just, I wanted to make
myself clear on this because it's something I care about.

(01:18:22):
I know, and it's an important thing.
You know, I just had and gives you a neutral smile.
Thank you out of face. I appreciate that.
I didn't actually have anything to show you that was a ruse.
What? I know it didn't feel right, it
feels very icky for me to say too, but I just needed to
explain myself to you. OK, so what's?
So there's nothing to do in yourworkshop.
No good night, thought of face. You're not going to sleep in

(01:18:45):
there, right? No, I'm not.
I'll come back, but I do want tograb a few things.
OK, I'm going to go with you in case there's someone lying in
wait there, but first I'm going to go tell Doolum to restart the
30 minutes timer. He gives a neutral smile.
That sounds nice. OK, I I do as such.
All right, you walk back in duelMUC orifice not dead. 30 more

(01:19:06):
minutes. Nastiff I.
Try to give you a robotic wink. I like to think the lens just
sort of like shudders. All right then.
You head back and you watch overSamir as he wordlessly gathers
some of his more valuable thingsinto his backpack.

(01:19:28):
And then he returns to the rest of your room and it now being
well into the evening. In fact, it's hitting that point
now where the ever so slight glow of early early morning sun
is losing through the window. And it's hitting that point
where you're like, shit, man. There is no feeling more
miserable than trying to fall asleep before the sun comes up
all the way. Oh my guess, worse.

(01:19:52):
Drunk bastard. Oh like zip my head into my bag
and turn fall asleep. All right, the group of you guys
all cram into this room. It's actually a slightly larger
room, so it fits you guys all a bit better.
For example, now instead of two smaller beds, you now have two
much larger sort of king sized beds that you can crawl out on
more. It does take you guys a bit of a
time to move, for example, higher.

(01:20:13):
It takes you a while to collect every coin that you've been
storing under the bed like an animal, but eventually you do
so. And you guys all go to bed a
second time up now does anyone want to keep watch?
I'll start setting up alarms. All right, you set up an alarm
spell around the room. Takes a moment, but once you do
so, it looks good. It seems well placed.

(01:20:34):
And with that, to the group of you guys, go to bed.
I suppose I should ask, is thereanything that anyone would like
to do before you go to bed? I'll keep watching.
Oh, you were muted. Now higher sort of stays up with
you, Doolum and higher. It's again that sort of sickly
early morning moment where it just really sucks to be awake.
Kept awake by existential dread and anxiety of being murdered in

(01:20:57):
our sleep. And you guys go to bed.
Everyone at this point could adda long rest if you haven't done
so already. I think you guys all have, but I
don't know. And the next morning comes, you
guys all wake up only a few hours later and a bit groggy.
Having a bit of a slower start. Samir rejoins the room about 20

(01:21:19):
minutes later and sort of rests in the corner.
And this little tent that he sets up after he sets up and you
guys go to bed. You wake up the next morning to
the smell of coffee being brewedas Malagus is up with a horrible
look on his face, slowly grinding some grounds into a
what looks like really pulpy coffee.

(01:21:39):
You're doing good, but the coffee is going to make you feel
even better. Whatever, fuck you.
Yeah, OK. You suck.
You guys all really, really suckand that's how I feel about
that. OK, but get it out.
Yeah. It'll be better.
I guess sort of grunts and get some more coffee grounds and

(01:22:03):
begins grinding them in and the rest of you guys wake up.
It is a fine late spring day. You hear birds sort of cawing
outside of the large windows andthe day is yours.
What would you guys like to do? Oh, it sounded like we maybe
wanted to buy things at least some like raw ingredients for
like cool items. But otherwise, you know, I

(01:22:27):
personally have a high priority and kind of talk having, you
know, Monty reunite with his people and like saying hi to
them again. But also we obviously need to
talk to Topher and the cops about not only what happened
last night, but also Vinny. So we have a lot of things we
could do. I can be on team go talk to

(01:22:49):
Tofer. And just for note, Monty was
resting most of that evening, still sort of sleeping off the
lethargy that he had being undead.
So I imagine you guys just sort of woke him up and move him,
moved him in the middle of the night.
Nice. Mason not to be weird.
No, sorry. OK, I need to stop the saying
that. Because it is to be weird.

(01:23:15):
Maybe. How did Monty sleep?
Did he have any dreams? Did he gasp for air like he has
sleep apnea because his you saidhis throat was damaged?
Yeah, he was. Doing.
A perception check just for the general evening. 21.

(01:23:36):
He was sort of wheezing most of the night, sort of like a slow
shallow, and it didn't sound particularly healthy.
Great. Just noting that down.
Got it. And when he wakes up?
Hey. Man, that was weird night's

(01:23:57):
sleep. Did we move around in the middle
of the night there? Yeah, do not remember.
It was pretty late. I mean, yeah, dude, I remember a
little, but like, that was weird, right?
Yeah. You know a lot a lot kind of
happens to this group. So the book that like Agora did

(01:24:20):
all that evil stuff with it got stolen.
And so that was kind of like a big deal, but I'm I'm.
Looking in. You mean the book that I was
sent to go fucking look after the bitch who turned into some
sort of evil witch down in the goddamn dungeons?
You're talking about that book. Yeah, I I guess people wanted

(01:24:42):
it. What the fuck?
Yeah, but it's OK. It's OK.
We're going to get it back. And yeah, yeah, all good.
Shit, man, all good. I'm worried it's not going to be
all good. I mean, fuck God.
Monty sort of lays back in bed again and just sort of like,
looks around a little bit and goes, I mean, I don't know.

(01:25:02):
Is this something we need to worry about?
You know, people coming in and stealing shit from us the middle
of the night, That's not good atall, is it?
Absolutely. But I, you know, you know, we
can only deal with one problem at a time.
And so, you know, we can worry about it if we want to deal with
this first. But if not, you know, there are
other things to worry about. Is that comforting?

(01:25:23):
I don't think that. Felt No, not not particularly
comforting, man, but that's all right.
I'll work on that. Yeah, yeah, he sort of rubs his
head. God I had so many weird dreams
last night. I think sometimes our dreams
have meaning. If if you want to share, that's

(01:25:43):
part of how I found you I guess.Oh yeah.
Well, I don't know. It was weird.
I was, I was walking in like a very dry place and I and I just
kept walking and I needed something like water, a drink so
bad. It's like I was in a desert and
it was felt so real and I was, Idon't know, man, it just felt

(01:26:04):
awful. It's really weird though.
Yeah, that that, that you're probably just thirsty or I don't
know, I guess. Maybe the dream?
About needing to pee. Yeah, yeah.
Huh. Yeah.
Well, I have been pretty, pretty, pretty thirsty lately.

(01:26:25):
I don't know why. Yeah, seems like we'll
definitely find a doctor or something for that throat.
Yeah, man. Thanks.
Listen, I, I don't know if I'm up to walking all the way to
the, the the people, you know, our people from the mundane
plain of Ethera today. I, I know you guys were talking

(01:26:48):
about that, but I think I, I think I want to just stay in.
I I can look after tick and and that weird cow thing.
Yeah, that'd be very nice. Thank you.
It's gravy. Jaya really likes her.
Him. He's trying.
Oh wow, I support you Gravy. I like fat the cow.

(01:27:13):
Bat, bat, bat. Well, ticks really into drawing
these days. I'm sure she'll have lots to
show. Yeah, man, that sounds good.
Yeah, I look forward to that. Also, you know, I kind of did
some writing just to just to like, I don't know, like say
what happened while you were gone.

(01:27:33):
If you want to read that, I think you can as well.
It might. It might help.
That sounds good, yeah. OK, good team.
So on. Parkland for the day, one to
Captain Topher, one to shopping for ingredients.
The other thing I would like to do today is Rexy Meer sent me
some information about talking to the one wizard at the Black

(01:27:54):
Staff Tower, and maybe if Rexy Meer trusts this wizard we could
get some Intel about the Black Staffs in general.
There is one problem though. Aren't we like, banned for life
from there? Rexy Meter knew that when they
gave me the new instructions, soI think they have a work around.
I don't know, I haven't popped them open yet.
Well, did you tell them that we're banned for life?

(01:28:14):
Yeah, I I told, I don't rememberexactly, but we got really drunk
with Bezel and Mammon and I was telling them about all my
problems and I got the instructions the next morning
and they were like new instructions because before I
was just supposed to go there and talk to him, which makes me
think Rexymere heard what happened.
All right. Sure, man.
Sounds good to me. I'm just, you know, just the

(01:28:36):
messenger, I guess. What?
Maybe the voice of reason. I don't know.
I mean, I'd imagine they don't spend a lot of time thinking
about you, no offense. I don't.
So like, there's that. I look a little.
Sad, sorry, I I don't know what I'm saying.
Malik is sort of scratches at his face and drink some more of

(01:28:57):
this coffee in front of him. I just, I'm ready to get out of
here. I I want to go shopping and
fucking man, I'll go to the tower with you.
Even if we are kicked out, I'll I'll fight fight him down with
you. I'm going to Captain Topher.
I'll look at the instructions later.
Fine. I'll go with Jaya.
Jaya, where we going? Me.
It's fine. It's fine.

(01:29:19):
Well, what is everyone else doing?
We're going shopping and also going to talk to Topher.
Yeah, I'm going to see Captain Toffer about the burglary.
Aunt Vinnie. Aunt Vinnie, right?
OK, I don't want to split us up too much.
I do eventually want to talk to Abel a little bit more about

(01:29:39):
that one GIF he saw, but I'd. Love to.
In fact, Sergeant, you and I have a date.
That's right. If you recall, you promised me a
sparring lesson. God, my old man brings getting
to me. You know what?
Let's do that. No, that sounds like work.

(01:30:03):
On it again. Show off Show off what?
Your skills. You got some skills in you.
Yeah, I only like using them when I know I'm about to die.
It feels like a waste of anything if I'm not.
But I'm glad you think I have scales style.
What if people threatens to really hurt you?
Then it could be like real. It would have.
To be a threat, either go. Off the ladies.

(01:30:26):
He'll hurt you all. Right, fine.
He punched me on like 3 days ago, remember?
Yeah, really brutalized. You that sort of thing.
Quite on accident to my dad. You're just quite weak, I
suppose. You're lucky I'm not saying kick
your ass. I got bigger, more important
things to do than teach you a lesson.

(01:30:47):
Hurt when we started fighting, for the record.
All right, all right, whatever you say.
First night. Yeah, sure.
I'll stick around with you, Sergeant.
All right, I'm going to Captain Topher to talk about the
burglary, and Vinny Malagus is either scared of me or Captain
Topher and isn't going to accompany, but would anyone else
like to? I'll join.
Not scared. I think we should all talk to
Topher. I'll stay with Malagus to make

(01:31:09):
sure he doesn't do anything bad.Thank you, Jaya.
I'm excited, Sergeant. We're going to get a proper
sparring lesson. I haven't trained in this body
yet and I believe once we get a couple of rounds in, I might be
able to strengthen myself to make myself a better, more agile
fighter. Hell yeah, brother.
What? Class.
Is he all right with that? Right now he's a fighter.

(01:31:32):
OK, right now, Bart incoming. Bart.
Bart incoming. I'm just used to what I was
doing on the plains of Alhala, fighting with a sword in hand.
That's what I'm. Used to the way it should be,

(01:31:53):
really. Precisely everyone should have a
sword issued to them by the government.
Yeah, then there'd be no more, you know, crimes because
everyone will defend themselves.If everyone had a sword, then
it's like no one has a sword. There's already too many bad
guys with swords. We need more good guys with
swords. Precisely.
Besides, it's all right, one of the amendments, I believe.

(01:32:15):
Yes, All right, I'm good to go. Let's hit.
Hit the captain's quarters. Do them.
Let's go. All right.
And higher and demos, are you guys also going with?
Yeah, I thought it was. Yeah.
And I'll come demos along. And demos.
We've got the whole gang. Monty sort of speaks up at his

(01:32:36):
bed as you guys go, and he goes,yeah, man.
Hey, thanks for inviting me. Sorry I can't join today.
I'm really excited to hang out with you guys though.
Have a good day, all right? Jesus, you sound terrible.
No, what that was really mean. We'll we'll be back.
We'll be back soon, bud. Have fun I.

(01:32:58):
Meant you think it wasn't an attack on his character.
I look at you in the eyes and and like, look at you and like
kind of quietly say he's not stick.

(01:33:20):
OK, my hand tightens on your head.
I'll just straighten up and walkout.
Okay, let's get going. I sold the group of you guys.
Leave where? Where do you want to go first?
Captain Dover. Got to find a new Doctor.

(01:33:50):
You guys all make your way to Captain Topher's office, knowing
where it is now. It's only about a 12 or so
minute walk through the city. You exit the building and travel
along the great streets, smelling particularly salty
ocean air today. It must have been a tumultuous
tide the night before as you're smelling a lot of the CU air.
Drifting in further than usual After your walk, you eventually

(01:34:13):
arrive at the sort of administration building in the
Castle Ward. Stepping inside and turning in
to the right, you find Captain Topher's office.
The door seems to be slightly ajar and you see him sat at his
desk, same as the last time you guys all arrived.
You see him poke his head up. He looks like he was mustache
deep in some paperwork as you walk in and he gives a full

(01:34:36):
faced smile. Welcome back.
I give him an equal smile. Topher.
What brings you guys all back here?
Unfortunately it's never good news, but I'm guessing you
understand that sort of comes with the job.
Yeah, yeah, I understand. All right.
Come on in. I take a seat, I'll pull.

(01:34:59):
I I assume there's like some chairs in one of his desk?
I guess he's got 2 chairs set out in front.
You even noticed there seemed tobe a small array of sort of
cheap wooden folding chairs in the corner to make room for all
of you. A recent addition since last
time you guys were all here. I grab a folding chair and sort
of fling it unfolded next to himon his side of the desk.

(01:35:22):
And. Sit down.
He like very carefully shuffles the papers over a bit and goes.
So what can I do you all for? I imagine something bad
happened. Was it a murder again?
For a second, you didn't sound like yourself.
He sort of straightens up a little bit and goes, sorry,
sorry. I'm, you know, already been a
long day and it's just the morning, eh?

(01:35:44):
Yeah. How do we meet each other?
Captain to offer. He sort of cocks his head and
looks confused. You, you feel all right.
You stick in the head. Listen, I can't come down with
anything right now, right? I'm, I'm just in the middle of a
big promotion I'm looking at. So I need you to kindly leave if
you feel sick. I'm not sick.
I look at higher. Kins, no one's sick.

(01:36:07):
No one of those are sick. Yeah, none of us are sick
anyways. Yeah.
So remember that like body you let us to which thank you.
By the way, your guards didn't know who that was.
We do know who that was and. Oh, yeah.
Is it Randy on the street? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

(01:36:27):
Do you guys know who that was? But I thought you didn't you
take that body. Yeah, yeah, we sure did.
And, you know, it was hard, but we we did it because we had to.
And thank you again. Yeah.
But we're really distraught about the murder of Vinnie.

(01:36:52):
What's his last name guys? We're really distraught we're.
Really distraught about Vinnie. What's Vinnie Who?
Who you talk about the body thatyou came across the other day
that you told me, that was somebody you guys knew, Yeah.
Vinny Smith. Vinny Smith.

(01:37:14):
Traveled with him for a long time.
Yeah, son of Cayman and Denise Smith.
Oh, that's too bad. I don't suppose you still have
the body? God damn.
Well, I don't mean to be rough with you, but unfortunately this
Vinny Smith knowing he's got a family and sounds like, you

(01:37:34):
know, mom and dad, we might needto find him a burial.
I'm meeting now to go to that those nice parents and let them
know their son is past and I'm going to have to tell them that
you guys took the body. You don't know that that's not
going to help like them or us really.

(01:37:54):
And the body's gone. I don't think it's coming back
so. At least you don't you don't
understand. I mean, they're going to ask
where the body is and I can't just tell them it disappeared.
They're going to want to look atit and I'm going to have to tell
them somebody took it. And listen, I'll take the blame.
I'll say I gave it to you guys, but they're going to want to
also know who identified their their son.

(01:38:15):
And I'm going to also have to say you guys.
Woof woof woof, woof, woof, woof.
I mean, listen, that's my job. I'm due for a promotion, all
right? I I mean, I can't be skating
around the edges now. OK.
And we're we're thankful for your help.
Yeah, here's the thing. We don't want to get in trouble

(01:38:37):
with anyone. Did we ever tell you why we
needed the body, Captain? I don't think you did.
Well see we Hire's brother was anew arrival in this city, along
with, I don't know if you've seen them, but there's quite a
few refugees from Aether in the temple ward.
Those are their people. And Hire's brother Monty was the
only one who was strong enough to really try to make a living

(01:39:00):
here. So he went down to the dungeons,
took on a quest for the court wizard Volcker to find Volcker's
apprentice Jorah, who is down there searching for this book.
And it turns out Jorah had foundthe book and just made her evil,
and she was raised in an undead army, and she turned Hire's
brother Monty into an undead. And we found him and we needed

(01:39:22):
to fix him. And for that we needed a freshly
dead body. And Vinny's just the only one we
could find. And it really hurt us because
Vinny was a good friend for sometime, though we'd gone our
separate ways because the adventure in lifestyle was too
dangerous for him. But anyways, it really forced
our hand. We didn't have a lot of choices.
And oh God, if you could just not helping his parents.

(01:39:44):
It was us, you know, It's askinga lot.
He sighs. Listen, kid, I understand.
You know? I like you.
I like all you guys. You're good people.
I mean, you helped me, but getting you this body was
already sort of off the books, right?
And now you come to me and you tell me that this is somebody
you knew. In fact, it's somebody that you

(01:40:06):
knew and then still went throughwith this.
You got to understand that looksreal rough on my side.
I mean, you know, I mean. To a family, getting the body of
your loved one, it means almost everything.
To some families, it means the world to be able to see the
person you love one last time. And you guys saw that and
willingly went through with thisplan of yours anyway.

(01:40:27):
Yeah, because just like you saidit, you know you would do
anything to see someone one lasttime.
And I wanted to see my brother, not a walking corpse, one last
time. Listen, fellas, I get it.
You did what you had to do, but now I got to do what I have to
do. I'm going to have to tell them,
and they don't know who you are,right?
So it's not like it'll be personal, but it's just part of

(01:40:50):
the job. If you're going to tell them, I
would like to go with you, I think.
Listen, all right, I don't like to make exceptions like this,
but your story is good and I trust you guys.
And if you'd like, I could leaveit up to you to deliver the
news. All right?
You don't have to to give in to all the stuff about where the

(01:41:10):
body was found or what you guys did with it, but I just what I
ask that you answer their questions honestly, it's the
least you could do. We we can do that.
Yeah, I was sort of hoping to dothat anyways.
I just hadn't found someone who could tell me where Benny's
parents were yet. Right.
You told me their names. Ian.
Annie Smith. And what was the father?

(01:41:30):
Came in Smith. Came in right.
Let me see here. And he leans back and thumbs
through what looks like a large accordion folder and he drops it
and picks up another one. Smith is, you said.
Yes, they're Smiths. And he digs around a bit more
and finally finds what he's looking for and goes.
Right. Yeah, I got an address right
here. OK, Looks like it's a 12 acorn

(01:41:52):
lane. 12 Acorn Lane. I write it on my hand.
Yeah, that's up there a bit north of the Trades District.
Looks like they live above theirown shop.
It's actually not too far from where the body was found, only
about a street away. OK.
He nods his head solemnly, and he even sort of reaches out with
the hand to shake your hand and goes.

(01:42:14):
Listen, this isn't an easy task,all right?
I mean, I would do it myself, but it means a lot that you're
doing this. In fact, you're doing me a good
job. I hate delivering this kind of
news and so late and with such unfortunate circumstances.
It's going to be a hard sell. But I know you're going to do
good. Thanks.
We already told. If it's means anything for our
honor, we already told the person Vinnie was going to meet,

(01:42:37):
figured out who it was, and we went to let them know in person.
The man before you nods his headand Captain Topher looks at you
guys and goes. That's good, that's good.
Listen, is there anything else Ican do for you?
Maybe something nicer? He sort of gives a half smile.
Just something more positive. I like you guys and I was sort

(01:42:58):
of excited when you were walkingin the door.
OK, well, it's not the most positive, but it's definitely
less depressing. But we were burglarized last
night. Oh, that's too bad.
Got any eyes on the guy? 2 ladies in tuxedos or suits I
guess not tuxedos all the way. Oh, did they have glasses on?
Yes. Yeah, listen, close the door,

(01:43:19):
would you? Oh.
Great, I'll go do it. You close it with a soft click,
and he turns toward the group ofyou and goes, Listen, I know
those types. They're sort of like thugs, but
on a bit higher level. They work privately.
And listen, I'm going to say this and it's going to upset
you, but I'm going to have to tell you anyway.

(01:43:41):
The people that they work for are not the type to be arrested.
Mask Lords. Black Staffs Court Wizards.
Oh, and not the court weiser. No, that guy's a sort of a joke.
No, he doesn't have a lot of, hedoesn't have a lot of power
around here, No, but. Somebody.
Looks around and gives you guys a solemn nod and goes yeah they

(01:44:01):
work for the the Mass Lords typically.
I've heard of black Staffs hire in them, but Mass Lords is
typically who they work for. I take it then you guys have
attracted the attention of a Mass Lord I.
Thought it was only positive attention.
I mean, that's why they're masked, right?
There could be anyone in the city.
If a the mask Lord shows you their face without the mask on
it, would they still hire these people to come steal your shit?

(01:44:25):
Or does that mean they really like you?
Oh no, never. If you see the the real face of
a Mask Lord and you know that's what they are, then that means
they trust you that that's sort of a given in Water deep.
If you see a mask Lord's face and you know that is them, then
now that you're in their good books for sure.
They only do that with the most trusted allies.
In fact, it's pretty rare. What if you saw a Mask Lord, but

(01:44:46):
you didn't know he was a Mask Lord?
And maybe you had some sort of intense love affair with him,
and then maybe afterwards he found out you owned something
really expensive. I look at Nemos, but also when
you had sex, like he definitely seemed like he could be a masked
Lord. I'm not talking about myself,

(01:45:08):
I'm a virgin. Captain Topher sort of shrugs
and goes. That's why they're called mass
Lords. I mean, they mostly walk the
streets like normal people. They, they're merchants, they're
aristocrats, they're even sometimes common sell swords.
They, they look like any other man.
The masks part comes when they actually have sway in this city

(01:45:28):
and are able to hire those blacksuited black optics to sort of
thugs that you saw earlier. The thing is, is when you know
they're a mass Lord, it makes the difference.
How so? Well, I mean, to be honest with
you, you've been walking the streets of Waterdeep for what, a
month to now? How long you guys been here?
A few weeks. I would have said a week, but I

(01:45:49):
don't really. It's hard to keep track of.
I would wager you've probably run into two or three Mass
Lords. I.
Mean they're everywhere, These people, they're it's sort of the
reason why we don't have a lot of law masters in Waterdeep.
Not a lot of police force either, actually.
You see, when there's sort of this inside secret mash Lord
that could be in your very party, people seem to sort of

(01:46:11):
police themselves a little more.I look at Davos again, but this
time different. It's a lot of people consider it
sort of fun, like a celebrity walking around the streets.
I mean, there have been hundredsof mass laws and what a deep
history. And usually when they retire,
they announce who they were. I mean, we've had I could you
not beggars who are mass Lords. These people, they have so much

(01:46:33):
money and so much free time. They do whatever the hell they
want. So often times that ends up
being following some inane hobby, be that you know,
crafting, say smithing swords orweaving baskets or making on the
street, or even just sleeping around town.
Is Vinnie's dad a mask? Lord, is that what you're
hinting at? Is he going to kill us?

(01:46:54):
Probably fucking not. I mean there really aren't that
many. I'm just saying like.
OK, OK. They, they don't always hold
places of high power. That's what makes them so
alluring. That's what makes everyone in
this town so excited to talk about them because you could run
into them every day. I mean, the bakery down the road
could be a mask Lord. It's sort of exciting in that
way. But either way, it seems you
guys have attracted the attention of 1.
Poor attention. I've heard of black Staffs using

(01:47:17):
these thugs before, but not often.
They usually like to get their hands dirty themselves, part of
their training or whatever. Shit, who have we pissed off you
guys? Oh, Demos, it has to be that
guy. The black staff tower that
professor. I mean, yes, we did piss him
off, but Tofur just said the Blackstaffs probably would have
done it themselves and it sort of makes sense.

(01:47:39):
Well, there's one more thing I should say, which is of course
the obvious fact that any memberof the Blackstaff Tower could
also be a mass Lord. Shit, Clark.
Wait, Glag. You choking over there, Glag?
The wet. Oh my God that has to be 1.

(01:48:00):
Yeah, also definitely Damos slept with one and he's angry
Damos didn't stay with him forever.
So the guy kind of ditched Damos.
Well, but then didn't he also say you could live in his house
for as long as you wanted? He he said I could, I could stay
for as long as I want. I don't.
I don't know if that was the open invitation to to actually

(01:48:21):
stay, but who knows? He would just say something like
that and not mean it. That's well, you know, I feel
like if it's just one of those things you say to be polite,
but. I'm mystified.
Listen fellas, if a mass Lord invited you to stay over and you
turn them down, that very well could be an insult that gives
them enough time. I mean, you ever heard that old

(01:48:42):
phrase that, you know, you neverpissed someone off who has too
much free time and too much money?
No, I've never. Heard that A new one.
Yeah. Yeah, well, I don't know.
I just keep an eye on, all right, these mass Lords, they're
smart. I mean, they didn't get to their
position by accident. So if you pissed one off,
they'll luckily tell you what they want, give you some sort
of, I don't know, message. Unless you pissed off one of the

(01:49:05):
crazy ones, which a lot of thosetoo, so who knows.
I mean they might have wanted are items they stole more than
they wanted. Who all knows?
We had the thing that got stolen, the black Staffs.
They could have sold that information to, I mean, I don't
mean to offend you, but they're not exactly the most moral
people all myself, I'm not a bigfan of them.

(01:49:26):
Me neither. Fuck those guys.
They're like our biggest enemieshere.
Well, them and Neff. Do you think the Symphony of
Neff could have stolen it? I don't know who that is.
They're the people even tracking.
Remember where we captured Piccolo, who was one of them?
Oh, right. Yeah.
Nice. Yeah.
Whatever happened to that? That Piccolo fellow, did he get
killed in the end? Black Staffs executed him.

(01:49:48):
Shit. Yeah, Well, listen, it's a lot
of speculation, right? And that's why I asked you to
close the door. It's improper to talk about
these sort of things, and I wishI could give you more.
I mean, hell, if I was a mass Lord, it would be quite easy to
dig into this. And he sort of twiddles his
mustache and stares up into the distance wistfully.
Why do the mask Lords? Communicate.

(01:50:08):
Oh, I mean, sure, they run the city.
They have all sorts of meetings all the time.
So if we talked to our mask Lordfriend, they might have
something to say about it. I really don't understand how
you guys have mask Lord friends that you've only been here a
couple weeks, but if you really do know someone who you're
actually convinced as a mask Lord, it would be an excellent
idea. I'm sure they could give you a
lot more information than I have.

(01:50:28):
OK, but you're still the most helpful guy, I told her.
So thank you. Ah, thank you, of course, of
course. And again, I'm sorry you got
robbed. I wish I could help you more.
But those, those thugs, you can't really put a finger on
them. It's actually one of the first
things we learn in boot camp around here on the Crown's guard
is best to leave jobs done by those fellas untouched.
OK. I don't love that outlook, but I

(01:50:50):
understand I think. How are cities run?
That's all. Right.
I wish you didn't have to be that way either.
You could be the changed over. From the inside.
From the inside. I don't know what you mean.
Change inside? Inside of what?
How do you get promoted? Are you at the place where your
boss still promotes you or do you like run for the next

(01:51:11):
position? I'm running.
That's why I'm up for promotion.Yeah, I've got a few colleagues
that are competing against me right now.
I'm a captain, but I'm interested in sort of going up
in the ranks. No, it's like, is that something
I can vote on or is there some higher decides?
Or maybe like if I put a good word in with a certain masked
Lord? Oh, well, I mean, I wouldn't ask

(01:51:34):
that of you. That would be, I mean, goodness.
Oh. It's done.
Consider it's done Topher. I'm going.
To ask Lord, which which should I do?
It's not a public vote, see. It's mostly done in private.
So I mean, the word of a mass Lord will get you high up.
In fact, pretty much every Colonel here is had the good
graces of a mass Lord somewhere or another.

(01:51:54):
Do you have that yet? Oh, God's, no.
I mean, how would you know? I was telling you about you've
probably met two or three. You never actually know who it
is. That's part of the allure.
It's sort of likely allure. I'd like to know who I'm
serving, but I'm on it, Topher. Well listen, if it doesn't hurt,
just bring up TOFA for the upcoming run for major.
Major Tofa doesn't have an answering to it.

(01:52:16):
Oh yeah, he. Gives you a nod.
Thank you for all your help. Of course, of course.
Listen, I wish I could help you guys more with these things you
got working on, but good luck with the breaking the news to
the old Smith family, yeah. Yeah, thanks.
Yeah, all right, You know where to find me if you need anything
and he gives you a nice. Start.
I give him a salute. And you know, you can always ask
us if you need anything. I'm the best investigator in the

(01:52:38):
city. Sure.
Yeah, Right now, no open cases beside that whole sympathy and
net thing, but unfortunately theblack staff sort of swept that
out from under us. Don't let him.
You should keep into investigating it in secret.
Oh, you know what? Actually, I do have one more
thing. Oh yeah.
Well, there's this fella here and he sort of taps down on a
what looks like a large stack ofpapers off to the side of his

(01:53:00):
desk. Looks like several notes and
there it looks like even be a wanted poster shoved in the
middle of it. You can't see what it's whose
picture it is, though. And he continues.
Fella who broke out of the Terminus Institute a couple
weeks back. Last known location was actually
at the inn that you guys are staying at.
You wouldn't have happened to seen anyone right?

(01:53:21):
White hair, sort of long and built body.
A known pirate. Topher, I want to tell you
myself. Oh.
Oh, I'm sorry. You go higher, you go higher.
No, no, you got this. I just didn't expect you to take
that route, but you got this. Tofer Until about a month ago, I

(01:53:44):
was dead. Dead as you can get.
I didn't have a body anymore or any memories of being alive.
I'd been a ghost for millennia and I was really good at it.
I was a knight in Valhalla. Do you know what?
Valhalla. Is you see Captain Topher's
eyebrows fully crossed in front of him and he sort of squints at
you and goes fuck you on about what does that mean?

(01:54:05):
It's the afterlife for human warriors, which is sort of all I
have to go off for about what was happening when I was alive.
So I guess I was a warrior, but that's not sort of anything I
remember. Anyways, about a month ago, I
woke up in this body. This isn't my body, you know.
I'm a knight named Dorotheus. I'm about 7 feet tall.
It's not like this. But I woke up here because this

(01:54:27):
girl and I point at my body, Iceland, she dragged me here
into this body, which is her body, so she could trade places
with me. It's not a big important for you
to know the details of that. But basically I was brought to
you against my whale. Dare you following me or?
Exactly. I was kidnapped.
Oh, that's a that's a real bad crime.
What can I do to. Yeah.

(01:54:48):
All right. Yeah.
I'm working on it already. It's complicated, you know, lots
of history with her and everyoneelse in the world.
But anyways, so now if I hadn't been brought into Iceland's
body, but instead into the body of, say, a prisoner.
I see now. I don't think I see.

(01:55:09):
Maybe someone brought me here for a reason, or maybe I even
had come here on purpose with animportant goal I had to achieve,
like maybe saving a friend of mine who had been kidnapped, but
I was in prison, but it was for a crime I didn't commit.
But obviously no one would ever believe me that I was suddenly a
ghost possessing the body of someone who was in prison for

(01:55:30):
life, right? Right.
And my quest is a good quest that deserves to be fulfilled.
I see. So what am I meant to do in that
situation? Suppose that he looks completely
confused at this point. You can tell that there is not a
lot of not a lot of movement behind those eyes.
He does not look like he quite knows what's going on, right?

(01:55:52):
I, I, I think I understand, but I, I really don't know what the
the answer is to that. And moreover, maybe I'm I don't
get it because I'm actually kindof confused.
I don't know what else to say. Hey, So what happened to
Orafius? Like, like spawning in someone
else's body, like against their will.

(01:56:15):
That happened with a prisoner, The prisoner we're talking
about. Listen, man, you don't have to
talk to me like I'm fucking stupid, all right?
It's just a lot to take in. Oh OK, sorry, I thought you
didn't get it. Yeah, I don't get it.
Yeah. It's a real complicated thing to
wrap my fucking head around. You tell me you were dead and
you came along. This is a lot.
Listen, just. I'll figure that out later, all

(01:56:36):
right? Just let me let me work on
something else, all right? And he seems to be confused and
I was a bit dismissive and he tries to shoot you guys out just
on you get. All right.
Sorry, OK. I just listen.
I thought you guys would it's whatever.
All right, just be on your way, all right just come back if you
need anything else, it's fine. All right, off you go off you
go. Thank you thank you guys for
your service. You good, good citizens.

(01:56:57):
We'll put you in a word with themask, Lord.
Sure. Thank.
Thank you. Yeah, I'm sure they they
wouldn't have happened to be from your dead plane too, are
they? Yeah, they are.
How did you know? Right.
Yeah, I'm going to go ahead and sort of.
Right. OK.
Why do you hate that? I'm confused.

(01:57:19):
You seem like you really hate. That on you go then yeah, you
guys have a good one. Why does he hate us?
We're sorry. Right, yeah.
And he sort of slowly shuts the door, looking away and going
dead people. Oh my God, goodness.

(01:57:41):
And he shuts the door quietly. No, Captain Topher loves us.
You look back to Hire and Doolumand Demos and you guys are sort
of alone now in the Watchtower did.
He seem angry at the end there. What was that?

(01:58:01):
He kind of angry like earlier on, like, like we said something
and he was like, yeah, I have nofucking idea, like sort of
thing. And then we said that and he
kind of lost it. So sounds stressed.
Did you guys get some sort of Zavrixy vibes at the beginning?
I really don't want to live thisway.

(01:58:25):
I can't keep doing this. I mean, he sounded like Zavrix
in the voice, and then his smilewhen we walked in.
I don't know. His smile felt genuine to me.
But he sounded so much like Zavrix.
We did just tell him a lot of information.
Yeah, don't know. We've killed Zavrix.

(01:58:46):
Well. What if it's one of Zavrix's
brothers come to avenge him? Can Archbay have siblings?
No. I think anyone can have a
sibling, but I don't know. Are you born as an archbay?
I, I don't know, I mean, everyone sort of has some sort
of family, right? I'm not sure.
He seemed to isolate himself a lot.
Yeah, that's true. I don't.
I do agree though, Captain Topher has never been so hard to

(01:59:08):
read before. Yeah, we'll end the smile.
And at the beginning he sounded so much like Savarex.
But you're right, we killed him.And either way, I don't think we
told him anything that Savarex could use against us.
Except for the mass Lord thing, The kind of year old situation
about Abel, about Vinny, about my brother.

(01:59:30):
OK, maybe a couple. Things.
OK, well, on to Vinny's family, right?
Yeah, yeah. Let's do that.
I was thinking that maybe we canmake a pit stop first by the
marketplace. Sure all.
Right at this point, I would like to jump over now to Jaya
just to sort of catch up what we're doing back at the home

(01:59:52):
front. Jaya, you stayed back with not
only Malagus and Abel, but I remain here also are Monty and
Samir stayed back as well? He seems to be prepping a
workshop for all the buildings that Orifice is going to do.
So it's just you and a bunch of MPC buddies.

(02:00:18):
See you in the Masons. Hello SO.
Sergeant, what are we doing today?
I hear you got something plannedfor us.
I would thought we could maybe start with the basics.
I'm sure you know better, Sergeant.
You have two kids that you trained right?
Well, you see, you know, I am a fighter, but I was more so on

(02:00:40):
the supportive end than the offensive end.
And you know, my brother was better at that than I would.
And so they kind of learned fromfrom him.
But I did, I did teach some of some of it to him.
So I can start with the basics. Excellent, I would like that.
And Samir speaks up. Whatever you guys do, would you
mind keeping it down a little? I wanted to prep the station

(02:01:03):
over here for me and our face are doing a bunch of exciting
things. He says with a neutral smile.
Shut up over there you bitch, you're building.
We're getting strong, we're doing manly shit.
You don't have to be like that. Come on.
Look at him, he's doing pussy shit.
He's building. You know we're doing we're
destroying with big strong swords smell like a sort of

(02:01:25):
tries to flex, right? Well, I don't imagine we'll be
destroying. We'll be crafting all
strategies. Yeah, it's not going to be
anything crazy. Like we're not going to be
flinging things that far around.I mean, a little, but like, not
that much. Like not enough to like, you
know, hit the wall or anything. And Malagus, don't let go of

(02:01:47):
that damn sword. Like let.
Me let go. Throw it is what I'm trying to
say I'm. Not going to.
Fucking throw Jesus. Why do you think I'm going to
throw it, Christ? I don't know you.
Sometimes you get a look in youreye.
I get a little scared. Well, I mean, you know, it's
exciting to throw things, but you can't get mad at me for
that. I think I can.

(02:02:08):
I think we all we all can. Yes, I think we all can too.
Especially because I know you'regoing to throw it at me.
Shut up. I'm.
Fucking throw it at you, God damn it.
Well, if not me, you're going tothrow it at Monty, who's sick
and in bed. Jesus Christ.
Fuck, I'm not going to. I'm not going to throw.
You know what? Let's go outside then, huh?
Try sparring inside is stupid anyway.
All right, let's take it to the street.

(02:02:29):
I second that. We don't want any innocents to
be harmed. Yes, let's find the more
secluded area. You know, I actually heard some
swords clinking in the alleyway behind this very building.
I believe perhaps some of the stable boys, perhaps the
innkeepers are sparring in theirfree time.
Sort of makes sense. Yeah, maybe we can join them.
Just like me and the other busboys shooting guns outside.

(02:02:59):
The group of you step out and Samir sort of nods.
Thank you again. I'll have it looking extra
pretty in the other. Perhaps I'll even go to the
market and buy some of those supplies.
That'd be great. You know you need anything.
I'll be in the back. Right, thank you, Sergeant.
All right, Sergeant, nice to getthis thing on.
And the three of you guys exit the building and enter into the
alleyway behind the building. Here at the Flaming Bore, things

(02:03:22):
are kept pretty tidy, so the alleyway behind the Flaming Bore
seems to be no exception. It's not like a dingy dirty
alley. It is merely just a smaller
street with sort of us a divot in the Center for rainwater to
pour through. So it's sort of a slanted
street. You have to sort of stand
awkwardly with your ankles. That's sort of a tilt to stand
upright. But nevertheless, it seems like
a nice flat plane. You don't see anyone else out

(02:03:43):
here, say, for what looks like one chef, or perhaps one of the
sous chefs at the Flaming Bore, standing out here smoking a long
pipe and just leaning up againstone of the walls.
He doesn't seem to pay you any mind.
OK, Abel, it's not. You right, if if you don't mind,
I I have this and he slowly unsheaths his great sword that

(02:04:07):
he has a huge piece of steel andhe holds us out and goes.
I'd like to. Practice with this?
This is mostly akin to what I was wielding back in Valhalla,
and I'm pretty comfortable with it, though I'm not quite
comfortable with his body. You know that that is fair.
Let's use a sword mainly. Could I borrow your sword?
Sword sword. I use fucking daggers dude.

(02:04:28):
Oh, you don't have a sword on you?
Fuck that. Why would I have a sword on me?
What am I? I'm trying to get stabbed.
If someone sees you have a swordon you, they're they're gonna
stab you. That's how it goes.
Oh, why? So why?
Carrying a sword makes you 70% more likely to be a victim of a
violent crime that's. Why?
That's why everyone needs to carry a sword around with them.

(02:04:55):
We're. Playing both sides with this
metaphor. It just feels right, but I'd
like to practice with these. And he pulls out his 2 slim iron
daggers. You know, this is sort of what
I'm used to. I might even throw one of these
in. And he sort of crackles what
looks like a bit of arcane energy in his left hand.
I like that pretty cool thin energy.

(02:05:16):
Pretty cool, right? Yeah, you know, you got some
jerks up your seat, man. I guess I feel like you you
should use them more often. Thank you.
You know, I'm glad you think that, by the way, I also feel
like I've got some tricks up my sleeve.
But you know, use them at the appropriate moment and if you
you know, if you ever have any questions about when they did.
You just ask. You.
Don't ask. Right now is a moment that I

(02:05:38):
would understand are appropriate.
So me and Abel are just going torush you, right?
We're just going to try to kill you as fast as we can.
That's what's going to happen. That at the same time, well, I
guess we could have run drills together.
Yeah. How about?
I mean, whatever you want, Sergeant.
You know what? You 2 do it against each other.
I'll watch you. I'll tell you guys what to do.

(02:05:58):
Maligus, I want you on defense. Abel, I want you on offense so
you able try try to disarm him. Try to disarm Malagus.
Yes, I'll do my best. And you see Abel sort of take a
stance that to you Jaya looks very professional.
You spent a lot of time among soldiers and a great many of
them swordsmen, just like Abel. And the stance he's taking looks

(02:06:21):
very practiced. You you almost like get sort of
happy like oh, this this studentcan be taught.
And in comparison to that, Malaga sort of like crouches
over a bit and he like, looks like he spits on the ground and
he holds his hands out in front of him as wide as they can go.
Is there anything you'd like me to do in specific, Sergeant?

(02:06:43):
Just I'm in a certain way, a certain flourish you're
interested in, if you even can, you bitch.
I just want to see what you got so far.
Show me. Show me what you know.
How do you do it? Work on it from there.
Right then off I go, I suppose, and Malagus steps forward and
then you see able rush at him, Stamp, stamp, stamp, stamp,

(02:07:07):
stamp. In the back alley, the man
smoking the long pipes so it just stops puffing for a second
to turn his head and watch what's happening.
You see Abel take a huge swing toward Malagus, and Malagus's
eyes go wide, all the confidenceimmediately drained from his
body. He's going.
And you see him throw his body out of the way, dodging just by
a hair's breadth. One of his daggers seems to
clatter out of his hand as he jumps back.

(02:07:29):
The fear of the blow is making him drop whatever he was holding
with the other dagger. He sort of holds it out with two
hands now and goes, hey, listen,I'll actually stab you, dude.
I'm counting on it. I want this to feel like a real
bout and. Abel.
Turns swiftly and runs at him again.
Fuck dude, I don't want to fuck,and Malagus curls under and
begins slashing with his dagger furiously, a couple wide slices

(02:07:51):
that Abel seems to dodge with a bit of ease.
This goes on for a bit, Abel making huge slashes that Malagus
narrowly jumps out of the way of, and Malagus sort of slapping
back that Abel seems to dodge pretty well.
It is until the 3rd strike that you see Abel's trying to swing
down hard with that giant blade.He barely misses Malagus yet
again, but then shoots out a foot, catching Malagus right in

(02:08:12):
the gut and stamping hard. Malagus catches the foot and
goes spinning down the alley, slamming onto the ground.
The force of this kick must havereally knocked the wind out of
him. With that, Abel slowly walks
over as Malagus tries to catch his breath.
And you see, just as Abel leans down to grab the other dagger
out of Malagus's hand, Malagus throws up what looks like a
handful of dirt right in Abel's eyes.

(02:08:36):
Got you, you bitch. And Malaga steps forward while
Abel looks to be blinded and plunges his blade.
It looks to strike true, and he turns to you almost hesitantly.
In a moment, Malagas watches you, Jaya.
And then he turns back, hearing nothing, and he plunges the
blade right into Abel's chest. You see a lot of blood, a lot of

(02:09:01):
blood to get pouring out of Abel.
Abel sort of brushes the dirt out of his eyes and stumbles
back for a moment, catching his breath.
Then he looks down at the blade that looks to be plunged right

(02:09:21):
into his chest. It looks like it might have
caught a lung. You see blood oozing out of this
wound. And Abel begins breathing a bit
more ragged. And there's a lot of blood that
was caking the alley. You, you here behind you are are
pattering as the the sous chef goes running inside with that
malagus goes running over and goes shit, man, shit.

(02:09:43):
Fuck. I thought I was going to say
something. I looked at you.
I stopped for a second. Why didn't you say anything?
I said I was going to stab him. I meant it.
OK, you looked at me for a second, did not get a chance to
react. Immediately with fucking ancient
I've seen your reaction speed when you're shooting guns.

(02:10:04):
You're officially the worst babysitter we've.
Ever. This is Oh my.
God, I'm going to go do a medicine chicken.
What the fuck no. No, I got, I got, I got, fuck.
Malagus runs to Abel, catching the ground quicker and sort of
pushes his hands around the dagger.
Shit, man, shit, I'm sorry, fuck.
And he tries to be got a hand tograb onto the blade.

(02:10:25):
And just like that, Abel sort oflooks up and gives him sort of a
curious look and just throws outa lightning fast sucker punch
right at Malagus's face. You see the fist connect with
Malagus's like square in his face and you hear a crunching
sound. Malaga sort of makes a wet
gurgling sound as the fist connects with him.

(02:10:48):
This very large arm on Abel really glistening as he throws
out all of his muscle at once. Malaga steps back, staggers and
then falls to the ground, and you see blood oozing out of his
face. With that, you see Abel fall to
a knee. You make your way over.
I'd say I won that fight, didn'tI?

(02:11:09):
Yes, this is. Exactly how we did it in Vala
Vala. I'd say this is precisely how it
went. What a stabbing.
And you could ask horror Faeus oh, this really hurts.
Should I, should I take it out? Dial you sort of grasps around
the. Blade I.
Believe I'll take it out. Leave.

(02:11:31):
Leave it in there. Because if you pull it out, you
know you're going to start bleeding out.
And you know, our healer isn't here, which is why this was a
sparred match. And you know, I should have
realized that you're from some, from a different place.
And Oh my God, wow. Badly.
Badly. Don't worry, Sergeant Pish Posh,

(02:11:51):
I can't die. It's no worries.
I'll just take a dried Taft. And it begins grabbing the
blade. Oh my God, Oh my God.
Oh my God. Oh my God.
Leave it in. Leave it in.
Leave it in. Let.
Me. Take a look.
All right, give me a medicine check, please.
Certainly your medicine is good +2 so not bad OK, but not bad.

(02:12:14):
Can I get Malik? This is how.
He he is on the ground right now.
He is not moving. No, this couldn't have gone.
Worse, he like passed out. You turn over his like he's head
down like Family Guy death pose.He's not moving.

(02:12:37):
Oh. My God I hate, I hate bubbling
so much. I can't be responsible for them.
Lots of talk this episode about responsibility, especially over

(02:12:58):
children. Thematic.
These bitches aren't children. These are two grown men in their
late 20s to early 30s. Grown ass men, God damn it.
I got an 8. Yeah.
Yeah, All right. You look over Abel and you do
determine that, yes, pulling outthe blade would probably be a

(02:13:19):
bad idea, but you have no idea how to make this better.
There's like, the blood continues to ooze.
You see, Abel's still on, like down to 1 knee, and the color is
draining from his face, even though he's got this sort of
slick smile on his face from what do you imagine is the self
satisfaction of winning this spar?
His great sword just sort of clattered to the ground beside
him and he's just sort of clutching at his lungs and

(02:13:40):
breathing really raggedly. Oh my God.
Oh, what the hell are they goingto give back?
Oh, God, I fucking hate you guys.
I go over the malagus. Don't you dare dare kick that
out, Abel. OK.

(02:14:01):
Not to worry, Sergeant, I won't touch it.
At this point you hear a gurgling sound from Malagus.
Oh you bitch, you fucking oh. He grabs at his nose.
You fucking bitch. Oh my God, what?
Why'd you do that? That fucking oh, you sucker
punch me, you fuck. Oh, he grabs at his nose and you

(02:14:22):
see, it looks like it's broken. There's like a a definite curve
happening where a major part of the cartilage looks to be
cracked off to the left. Why'd you hit me, man?
That fuck I I didn't actually mean to stab you, I tried to
tell you what the fuck. You look, you actively.

(02:14:45):
You actively look, look that you.
Oh my God, I can't. Oh, what the?
Fuck this hurts like a bitch. Let's go inside and get you guys
cleaned up. All right.
Oh. Malika stands up and slowly
starts limping toward you. He looks pretty messed up, so it
looks like the edgings of a black eye are also forming too.

(02:15:07):
Abel's fist was just a square. It sort of caught his eye and
his nose in the same smack. I can't piece in this, Oh my
God. And the group of you guys had
inside around this time, those of you guys outside of the
house, head over on Demos's instruction to the trades
district to buy some wares. You find all the merchants lined

(02:15:29):
up and there's stalls all waiting for you guys.
What do you want to do? OK guys I think I solved.
I solved the body problem and then how?
Many. How many bodies?
TMOS is going to look to purchase and urn.
Oh yeah, a nice stone urn runs you about 5 silver pieces.

(02:15:57):
You can buy that no problem. OK.
And then on top of that, I'm going to I'll, I'll tell the the
merchant, I'll, I'll pay double if you can fill the urn with
them with any, any ashes you gotlying around.
What an odd request. Oh my God.

(02:16:23):
We can make our own ashes free. We're already here, might as
well ask the man. Exactly.
The the gnomic merchant that you're talking to goes.
Whatever you want, I'll make it happen.
Could have cost you an extra though.

(02:16:43):
You name your price. Yeah, yeah.
And the figure sort of wanders around and goes, listen, I
burned some bread this morning, made some ash with that.
Is that going to work? Does it smell like bread?
No, no, it smells like ash. OK, yeah, that'll that'll be
fine. They'll run you. 2 gold screams
out 2 gold. You know it fine.

(02:17:04):
You know, for convenience. The the figure looks like he
he's all excited having thought he he got one over on you and
runs to the back and brings you a large sack of what looks like
ash. And you open it up and there
look to be a few bread crumbs inthe ash, but you can sort of
pick those out. And he grabs the 2 gold out of
your hand and sort of Snickers to himself.

(02:17:25):
He had two cooties. He's just two.
Gold I ever got. That hands you to earn with the
ash packed inside. All right, gang, I think we'll
just have to tell them that, youknow, Vinnie.
Tell them the truth, Vinnie of magics and and then we hand them
the urn and then they'll just assume it's him.
So you don't have to lie, but I'll lie if you guys.
Want me to? I don't even know if I could be

(02:17:46):
in the. Room.
I. Agree, I mean if you think about
it that this will make the family feel better.
Yeah, I mean, you don't want to tell them that they can never
see the sun again, do you? No.
So this is better. Yes, you.
Guys, have to understand I have pretty strong feelings about the
way bodies are treated and soulsin the afterlife and resting

(02:18:10):
eternally well. That's why we brought demos.
I just, I I know we've all gotten pretty comfortable with
letting demos lie for us, but. I mean it's.
Dark. I see it to stop.
You from doing it because I see the marriage and how it could
make his family feel better. But I'm just saying I don't know

(02:18:32):
if I could be in the room while you do this.
I don't think we have an alternative do.
I have to be there. Oh, no, no, you shouldn't be in
the room then if you don't want to be.
But I think this is our best plan.
I mean like. Yeah, I guess OK.
I think it would be bad to just tell them what happened.
Extremely, yeah. OK, I think telling them would

(02:18:54):
be better. Oh God, oh God, I look here to
do them to Damos. I realize none of these are
people I can trust. Fuck fuck, how do I get stuck
with these guys? Oh.
God. Oh God, I don't know you guys.

(02:19:14):
It's OK, you don't have to. That's why Damos is taking the
lead. Oh God.
Oh God. Oh my God.
OK. Oh my God.
Oh my. God.
I mean, what we did to Vinny wasmaybe the worst thing that any
of us has ever done. I don't know.

(02:19:36):
We can't really change that either.
We try to make the family feel better and, you know, also
selfishly avoid, you know, blamebeing placed on us or what We
tell them that their son was randomly killed.
We took the body used in a ritual and they're never going

(02:19:57):
to get it back. Oh God, I.
Feel sick, going to be bad either way, yeah?
If it's bad either way, why do we not just help the family and
tell them the truth? To me it feels as though it'll
be less bad for the family if they haven't heard.
I don't think the truth's going to help them.
Do we have any like talking a Vinny we could give them?
Like did he ever give us a gift or something?

(02:20:19):
Demos opens his backpack. It just has all the Vinny stuff
in it, okay? So what's they gave him?
Them his stuff. And we were like.
Sorry you. Can't have the body, but here's
all his earthly possessions. He loved you very much and he
talked about you very kindly came in and especially you,

(02:20:40):
Denise. When we say that we can't give
them the body, but instead give them their stuff, what do you
think they're going to do? Ask where the body is.
And then what? Are we going to tell them the
truth? I think this could end in us
being attacked and more enemies.Oh, I don't like that.
But you know, I guess we could live up to what we did.

(02:21:04):
I'm going to I don't. Oh, what did you guys decide?
What does everyone think is the right choice?
All right. Tell them OK do them says tell
them hire national on team lie demos.
You know I'm on Team White Lie if that makes it any better.
Oh yeah. Demos is on Team White Lie OK.

(02:21:26):
You know, I also feel like we'regoing to have to ask the Vinny's
parents some questions, you know, because he did die in a
very suspicious way, and I doubtwe'll have the cooperation if
they knew what we actually done.Oh.
But OK, I think I've made my decision.
I'm what you guys like to do. I've made my decision.

(02:21:47):
No decision. I don't.
Know what you guys should do, but I don't want to be if you're
telling the truth. I understand that I owe it to
them to be part of that confession, but if it's a lie, I
really can't be there. I'm sorry.
It wouldn't be good for anyone for me to be there.
Understand. Yeah, and, you know, maybe,
maybe the truth can wait until we catch his killer, you know?

(02:22:09):
I think we should do it now. I agree.
I think it was part of the risk that we took on by using his
body. God, I kind of agree with
Doolum. If we can't tell someone what we
did, doesn't that mean we did the wrong thing back then?
We did a horrible thing. But we had to do it right.
Right. I don't.
I don't. Know yes, I will say yes, we we

(02:22:32):
had a time limit we this was it was our one chance.
It happened to be Vinny and and that was sad and that was sad,
but a lot was riding on this. Want his life?
I, I, it was certainly the worstthing that I've done and I don't
know how I can worship the same,be the same person, but I know I

(02:22:54):
would do it again if I had to. So felt like the right decision
to me and I do think we should own up to that decision and the
consequences of that. But I I don't see how this
family needs to suffer more because of our choice.

(02:23:15):
I think lying to them would makethem suffer more.
Well, and earlier you mentioned how if we told them the truth,
they might hurt us, which made it feel like we were lying for
our own sakes more than for theirs.
I agree. Well, would they really find the
truth that helpful in any way? It's not for us to say, I don't
think. We're giving them bad news and

(02:23:35):
it's not something they can change, so I think it's just
going to make them sad. Them not knowing it's just going
to be less sad. If you insist, we could go back,
maybe ask the whole group so we get more of a vote.
But I think everyone's vote is known here.
I don't know what to do. I'm sorry, but I won't stop any

(02:23:56):
of you. Emails start slowly walking.
Oh God. With Earn in hand, you make your
way, following the address that Captain Topher gave you to 12
Acorn Lane. It's actually in the same trade
district that you're in, and youwalk slowly with the urn.
Orefaus, do you follow? No way.
OK. Orefaus slowly turns back home.

(02:24:19):
I think I would just wander the trade district, start looking
for equipment to build Jia's thing.
You wander around, then I'll jump to hire Dulum and Demos.
You guys walk toward the trade district.
Doesn't take long to find the shop you're looking for a simple
Smithy with what looks like a simple wooden sign with branded

(02:24:42):
letters in it that reads very overly Smith Smith.
That's. So cute Tulum, you didn't I
thought orifice need an extra hand back there.
Really. He didn't say anything.
Apologize for saying it, but if you don't agree with us, it

(02:25:06):
might be better if you stayed with Orapheus.
I feel like at this point, sinceI've been part of this decision,
it's part of my moral duty to tell them if you guys are
fearful of attack, I could do italone.
I don't care about the attack, Iwas just trying to be
convincing, trying. To get you the fuck out of here,

(02:25:29):
dude. Tulip's going to murder you.
I mean, like I said, I guess it's not the worst thing in the
world if we tell them, but I'd really rather not then.
It really hurts me to see that you would rather be deceitful.
I just don't want to make their life harder.

(02:25:50):
I feel as if we've taken enough from them.
Either way they won't have a body correct?
They would only have this ash. I mean yes, but certainly having
the ash ash is preferable. I don't believe it would be.
Damos, I feel like we're losing this fight.
I don't see why it's a fight. On Damos's side, are we?

(02:26:16):
I think we're just saying, doolum, that if we're going to
do this, it would be best if we were all on the same page.
I suppose if you'd like me to go, I will, but I won't view
your decisions the same. Demos looks to hire for this one
I. Really realized how valuable
life was, how much it costs. Grade one for another.

(02:26:36):
I wish I had known that. Which is why I think it's
valuable for you to learn this lesson and told them.
I guess I wish Doolum would go with the majority, but I care
more about what Doolum thinks than their parents than his
parents, so I guess we can tell them.

(02:26:57):
But then Demos is going to put the urn in his backpack.
I really hope. This is a spill, but later.
Here Damos. It was a good plan and I liked
it. You shouldn't have to have paid

(02:27:19):
for it. I can at least reimburse you
since it was my decision that swayed the vote.
Oh, that's that's quite all right.
Hi, I'm sure I'll find another use for this.
I'm. Not sure.
I'm quite confident actually so.It's unlabeled, it could be
anyone in there. Hey, nice, cool all.

(02:27:44):
Right. Who wants to be the the leader?
I think, I think Doolum will do a good job at conveying
information morally and without,you know, a lot of emotion.
So I think Doolum can convey some facts and then, you know,

(02:28:04):
we're kind of there to apologizeand whatnot.
Well, Doolum, do you want to take the lead?
Sure, as Hire said, I don't knowif I'm great at helping with
their emotions, but I can tell them what happened.
OK, cool. We'll just have Hire jump in if
they get a little too inconsolable.
And with that, Demos does like aloud triple knock on the door.

(02:28:29):
You hear a sort of gruff voice come from inside.
Coming and then a sort of stop stop stop stop and opening the
door looks to be a wide and tallfellow, a man with a long dark
black beard which matches this sort of light to green skin
tone. 1/2 orc man stands before you he looks down at you and you

(02:28:52):
see he's wearing very bookish glasses on his eyes, sort of
reading glasses which age him quite a bit you see the crow's
feet gathering around the edges of his eyes.
He looks sort of down at you guys from the stoop and filling
the door frame. He steps down into the street
next to you and sort of rubs hishands.
It looks like he's got black chalk or perhaps ash all over
them. Oh, what can I do you for?

(02:29:14):
Hello, Sir, were you the father of Venice Smith?
Yeah, that's that's my boy Vinny.
Well, what's up? I have the guards or anything up
from him. I put in a missing person just
this morning. We were friends of his.
May we come in. Sure, sure.
Yeah. I'll put on a pot.
You guys like tea? I like to my friends.
Yes, tea would be delightful. Oh yeah, dude, it is all right.

(02:29:34):
And he beckons you all inside, following after closing the door
softly. You're letting it into a very
quaint shop, which seems to be connected to a home.
The shop seems to make up the entirety of the first floor of
this building. You see anvils and chainmail all
over the place. But this man, who you assume is
Vinny's father, leads you upstairs into what looks like a

(02:29:55):
small home. Very quaint.
You see a breakfast nook and a dining table fit for four.
There is a quite a beautiful stovetop here and it looks like
there's a teapot that's already got some tea leaves brewing
inside of it. You see the man approached the
stove and light a small fire under it to get the water
boiling and otherwise turn back to you.

(02:30:16):
The way he speaks is unusual. His large beard and mustache is
so full you can't even see his mouth.
It's more of the sort of anime effect where his beer sort of
opens and closes. He speaks quietly now as he
goes. Is this bad, bad news or good
news? Should I go get niece?
I believe it's bad. News get Niece.
Right. Yeah, OK.

(02:30:38):
He nods his head and slowly makes his way into another room.
You hear a quiet conversation between two people.
It's hard to hear, but you hear raised voices for a second which
quickly subside and soon the half worker man slowly trails
out of the room and behind him walks a much shorter and sort
of. Stooped.
Over bright red tiefling woman. She looks older.

(02:31:03):
As tieflings go. You guys haven't met a lot of
older tieflings in your time? Very few at all.
She has curled back ram's horns and sort of grayish black hair
tied in a tight bun at the top of her head.
The bun is so tight it almost pulls her skin back a little
bit, giving her sort of like a facelift effect.
But she has kind eyes and she looks to be wearing a sort of

(02:31:23):
dark black lipstick. She wanders in and looks to be
wearing a sort of standard commoner's clothes.
That one might lounge her on theHouse with she looks like she
hasn't slept in a while. Yes, if you heard something
about my Vinny. Yeah, we'd love to talk to you
about everything. Please, please sit down, could I

(02:31:44):
get you some tea? And the man puts a hand on her
shoulder and goes. I already, I already offered, of
course. Yes, please sit down, I can put
up a few chairs, it's been a while since we've had this much
company over. She looks nervous and moves
around quickly moving chairs into place.
And the group of you all sit down and you see the father
pours some glasses of tea and placed them all out in front of

(02:32:06):
you. It smells strongly of chamomile.
So what? What happened?
Well, I look, are they both sitting down?
Yeah, they're both sitting down.I wish we could have met earlier
with some different circumstances.
We were all looking forward to meeting you.
We heard a lot from Benny. The two of them sort of hold
hands as they say that, as you say.
Then they look to each other. I didn't know he talked about

(02:32:27):
us. He didn't, actually.
We were the ones that helped himcome back here.
Yes, yes, he quite a bit about you guys.
You helped him out of some low lows, am I right?
I suppose so, yes. That's why we're very upset to
come to you with this news. We have found Vinny
unfortunately deceased. The two hold still for a moment.

(02:32:48):
The father, who you've been toldus came in, lowers his head,
looks down. The mother, the niece sort of
looks over at you all and she has this wide eyed expression
and she goes, is it? True.
You've you've seen proof then. Unfortunately, yes.
The man begins softly weeping. The niece puts a hand on him and

(02:33:09):
goes, shit, it's all right, it'sall right.
Listen, to be honest with you all, we, we sort of assumed
Venice had passed when he disappeared all those months
ago. It travelled through that portal
as as he told us, and we actually had the funeral for
him. Then the man continues weeping
softly into his hands. He takes off his spectacles, the

(02:33:30):
reading glasses and puts them onthe table, staring down.
The woman kind of consoles him and rubs his back and she goes.
To be honest, it was a miracle when we saw him return that you
brought him back. You brought off Vinny back from
the dead. We really didn't.
Expect to see him again. In fact, we'd sort of already
gotten over it, but seeing him again, I thought maybe things
would go back to normal. It's only been a few days,

(02:33:51):
barely a week and a half play, Understand.
Perhaps he made an enemy while you guys were out too.
I'm sure adventuring parties always make their enemies.
By the way, he wasn't a fighter,never was.
Or poor Vinny, he he was. He really loved everyone.
And not a fighter it. Was a good.
It means a lot that you bring usthis news.

(02:34:12):
I do question though, why? Why don't the guards come here?
Do they know of his death? Are they investigating it?
I imagine it wasn't an accident,was it?
Unfortunately, it wasn't. The guards actually let us come
here alone to break the news. She nodded her head as the man
continue softly weeping. Yeah.
OK, well please have them look into this for us.

(02:34:32):
The least they can do is figure out which bastard, ruffian,
thief, scoundrel, whoever it is,killed him in the night and took
his body. Unfortunately, there is more
news. Oh well, his murderer did not
take the body. She looks at you guys confused.
What? What do you mean?
So the body is found? Can we have a proper funeral?
Unfortunately not. The way we came across Vinnie

(02:34:53):
was actually we were doing our own quest in order to bring back
one of our party members brothers.
We needed a fresh corpse, but wedidn't want to make one
ourselves because, well, that seemed very immoral to us.
Sorry. The two look at each other and
look at you with harsh eyes. The man you see tears streaming
down his face. You took, you took my boy's
body, you took it for a spell. He slams his hand down on the

(02:35:17):
table. You're allowed Fang as the wood
sort of cracks under his big fist.
How dare you, That was my son. You knew that was my son.
How dare you take a boy from here?
Unfortunately, we did not have much time to make this decision
and we do all regret it. I I don't understand.
The man looks around. What's the meaning of this?
I tried to bring him back. I promise that I don't know.

(02:35:38):
We we did a bad thing and I wish, I wish we hadn't, but it.
Happened. We wanted to tell you the news
ourselves. The two parents look at each
other and grasp each other, holding dear.
You see the man continue to weepand clutch his hands, his
knuckles turning white, and the woman on the knees turns to you
and goes. It came and seems quite upset.

(02:36:00):
It really means a lot that you gave us this information.
I suppose we won't have anythingto bury poor Vinny with, but as
I understand it, well, you did your best and that's all anyone
can ask. I'll walk you out.
I think it's best you leave now.Yes.
OK, thank. You.
You're. Incredibly kind for saying that,
even if it wasn't necessarily true, but your kindness is

(02:36:24):
appreciated. She leads you guys downstairs
and makes toward the exit of thebuilding.
Walking past all the steel in here, you see all the projects.
Thin motion. You actually see there's quite a
heaping pile of fresh iron rightby the entrance.
A beautiful stack of iron bars all stacked high.

(02:36:44):
It could have been Denny's next project.
Regardless, it looks expensive and you've seen any sort of
guide you guys around the pile and toward the entrance?
She looks to you all with pleading eyes and goes, Is there
something? Else yes, before we go, would
you like all of his possessions he had on him?
Yes, that, that would be wonderful.

(02:37:06):
It would mean a lot if I could have that.
Yes, thank you. That's very kind.
Did he have anything special on him?
Oh well, he had. Well, maybe it's not my place to
say, but in our investigation wedid turn up a, a letter to a, a
perhaps a suitor. Yes.
Anyways, I'll just give. I'll just give everything to.
You. Yeah, we should just give her

(02:37:26):
the letter and go, yeah. Yes, but if you can think of
anyone who could want to or did want to hurt your Venus, stay in
contact with us. We're at the the flaming bore
with us. We're staying right now.
Yes, of course. And golly, do you have any idea
who could have done this? I mean, killed with magic?

(02:37:48):
It must have been a very powerful opponent.
Yes, well, I can only say that the city's been very dangerous
of late. Any strange magical occurrences
and crimes of late, so be safe. Right, yes, Thank you again for
these we'll. Find them.
Right, best of luck and thank you again.
She sort of walks toward the front of the door and beckons.

(02:38:11):
You guys are loud, nods and gives you a wrinkled smile, and
then turns away and you see the smile instantly disappear as she
closes the door. You guys are left outside now.
As we go aside, I would love to class cast clairvoyance.
No, no, this is fucked up. Higher.

(02:38:33):
Higher starts freaking out, but OK, you know what?
I'll just voice it out loud. What do you think?
They killed them. No, no, I just, you know, I
think I feel like it'd be betterif we knew like beforehand if
they're going to pursue legal action or anything, you know?
OK. I think I'm going to draw the

(02:38:54):
line there. I think we've we've already
taken their son. We don't need to take their
privacy as well. But if if you say so.
I would rather them personally strike me down.
Well. Then spy on them now.
OK, well you know, when the police come, I guess I'll just I

(02:39:14):
know who to point the finger at anyways.
We have 10 other people that could kill us that probably want
us dead. What's a few more?
I will say it was strange, she said.
Killed with magic. I don't believe I ever said that
phrase. True, true she was.
Very calm about it and maybe it's worth looking into but I

(02:39:37):
don't know, maybe not right now.Yeah, let's just get going.
I'm sure Orifice needs help at the market.
I. Am not going to.
You guys. I'm never leaving the house, you
guys. You're all evil.

(02:40:02):
What? Am I evil?
Doolum's not. Evil, but so I'll let you guys
Stew in that for a bit. We'll jump over to Aura now
Orifaeus in the market you wander around a bit and bump
into Samir out here you see him wandering the market stalls
just. Sort of wander over.

(02:40:26):
It's like start walking behind him, like I'm walking with him
but I don't say anything. I'm being followed.
Do you want him to know you're there or you want to just sort
of like I'm not? Like hiding but I feel like we
probably go like 40 seconds before he notices.

(02:40:47):
Me. He eventually turns around, goes
or a face. I didn't see you there.
Yeah, I'm just here. It's already.
Everything all right? No, it's terrible.
I was out shopping for ingredients for those magic
items you are making. Would you like to walk with me
and we can maybe talk about it? I would like to walk with you.
And maybe talk about it. Maybe I feel like I have a lot

(02:41:10):
of emotional problems lately. Like I feel like every time I
feel like I'm crying all the time and it always feels like
the situation warrants it. But when it happens multiple
times a day, I don't know if theproblem is me or if things just
are that bad, or if everyone cries this often but most of you

(02:41:31):
just don't take off your goggles.
But then none of you wear. Goggles.
Slow down or a face slow down. Slow down.
What? What happened this time?
This. Time.
Was it Malagus? No, I'm not going to lie, it was
kind of mostly demos, but also alittle bit of information.

(02:41:56):
I see. And how did demos upset you?
Well, we were going to Captain Toffer to tell him that we knew
it was Vinny who died. And Captain Toffer said we had
to tell Vinny's parents ourselves because he would feel
bad doing it. And also if he did it, he would
tell them we did it. And I was like, no, we should

(02:42:18):
tell it. Be the ones to tell him because
it's our crime. So we should, you know, deal
with their emotions and also it's the right thing to do.
So I guess back then I knew. But then we were walking through
the market and Demo sort of stopped into a store and then he
bought an urn. And then he bought all this ashy
bread for two golds, which seemed like a lot of gold for

(02:42:41):
ashy bread. And then he put the ashy bread
in the urn and said we were going to give that to the
parents and tell them that was Vinny's body.
And then Doolum was saying that we shouldn't lie to them because
to lie is the wrong thing. And then Hired was saying that
it would actually be better for their emotions if we lied.
And then Davos was also saying that.

(02:43:01):
But then I also thought maybe they were lying because it would
be easier for us if we lied. Right.
That's not slow down or a face slow down.
You're rambling, and that's not like you.
Sorry. You don't get this upset.
I know you. You're brave.
You're a brave knight. You fought and killed what I
imagine are thousands of warriors on the plains of
Valhalla and you're letting whata disagreement between friends

(02:43:24):
get you this worked up? But my friends never disagreed
back in Valhalla. Well, I know that's not true
because you and Abel still disagree.
But if it ever got battery to see would just tell us what to
do. Well, then I, I suppose what we
need then is a proper leader because it sounds like all that
would have needed was somebody to tell you what to do in that

(02:43:45):
moment and it would have worked out.
Eh, uh huh. All right, then it's settled.
This is something I've actually wanted to do for our group for
some time. Next time we're all together.
Maybe tonight we'll. Tell them you're the leader.
Oh, what? No orifice I I am still not
accomplished. I am just, you know, I suppose I
build things in my free time, but.
Who am I supposed to listen? To.

(02:44:08):
Who do you? Think that is experience could
do it. Name someone who I.
Should trust their judgement. That's why we'll vote on it.
For example, do you not trust the judgement of Jaya the
Sergeant? Jaya said he would kill someone
to make a corpse for Hires ritual.
A random person. Jaya said that.

(02:44:35):
Okay, give me another name, let's play this game.
Well, certainly you trust Dulum judgment.
Well, to be fair, that was very early in our relationship with
Dulum, right? I should just follow what it
says. I like Dulum a lot.
I think he's a it's a good lad, same as I like Jaya lot and I

(02:44:58):
think he's a great father, but Ican't trust either of them on
everything. They're wrong sometimes.
Go on another name. Who's next?
Don't get upset with me orifice,I'm just trying to help.
I. Know right?
But you see where I'm coming from, right?
There's no ray to see here, for the most part, no one to follow
around. Well, I I know this might upset

(02:45:21):
you, but what about Abel? No, not Abel.
He's a mess. A mess, you say?
Yes, he says not to trust Ray tosee anymore and he has sex with
random people to get his way andI don't know, he made higher
again. That made a lot of people upset.
Yeah, not just type of homophobic, it just seems to

(02:45:44):
make everyone really upset. And Abel doesn't seem reliable
at all. Also, he's so.
Frivolous. It's true, he is very frivolous.
Yeah. You can't trust frivolous
people. Well, if it makes any difference
orifice, I think you could be a good candidate too.
How does that help me if I'm theone who has to make decisions?
No, no, no, no, no. It's not what I'm good for.

(02:46:05):
Not at all. Well, orifice, we have to come
up with something, right? I mean, you agree that you can't
live your life this way, and if you don't want to take charge,
which I still think you could bequite good at, then who will?
I look back at him. Why do you keep?
Looking at me. Because you're the other one who
hasn't done anything fucking crazy so far.
You're reliable. You make choices I've agreed

(02:46:27):
with. I'm glad you feel that way out
of face, but I have no experience with leading.
I have no way to prove myself toany of the people that I'm with.
Well a good way to do it is not trying to kill anyone or doing
anything insane, so done. Well.
Let at least. What do you think?
Is it worth putting to a vote? I think that could be worth it.

(02:46:48):
I feel like we do that every fewdays and it it's not going to
change my mind. You don't think it would change
your mind if we really sat down and actually did it the right
way instead of just the let's all yell and see who's the
loudest I. Didn't follow Regisi because
everyone voted her in charge. I followed her because she did
the right thing as far as I could tell.

(02:47:11):
And what was the right thing? She didn't hit me back.
Did demos hit you back? No, Demos hits strangers all the
time. Demos is the evilest smear, I'm
sorry to tell you. This she's that evil friend.
Of mine, I really like him but he's pretty evil and he pays way
too much for bread ashes. On his ass.

(02:47:33):
But I thought of face I I hear you.
What if we just go shopping thisafternoon, let you cool off and
we can talk about this on a coolhead?
OK, do I cry too much? I was also crying because I was
thinking about that. You don't cry too much.
It's maybe. It's just like I cry all the
time. It's probably just an effect of
the body you're in. Did Iceland cry this much?

(02:47:56):
Be honest. I'm not going to answer to that.
Oh my God. OK, let's go shopping.
What goes into spider slippers? How many spiders do we need?
All right, so let me just quickly discuss payment for this
stuff because Jaya, you're buying the shoes of spider
climbing, right? Yeah.

(02:48:17):
All right, I, I forgot, did I give you a?
Did I give you a quote for that?No, I don't think so.
I did not. I did not.
All right, I'm just going to quote you right now.
It's going to be crazy. Charge me, I'm poor.

(02:48:38):
You're poor. You're not more Mason just paid
us. I paid you big money dude.
Don't remind him. Not bad.
This is a pretty powerful item Iwill say.
I mean you can literally walk upsheer surfaces like you could
climb your way out of like a a pit trap.

(02:49:01):
See. And isn't that so cool?
Yeah, it is really awesome. So my price for that, the going
rate for climbing out of a pit trap is 500 gold pieces.
Chat Is it worth it? Chat.
Listen, if you're excited about it, that's only half of the
money you earned from killing Savrics, right?

(02:49:22):
This is the item you picked out of all possible items, so
clearly you want it pretty bad, right?
I couldn't really think of anything else.
I like to think that Jaya is no longer there and actually
doesn't have a choice in whetherthe materials are bought and or
a FAEUS will actually backlog itto Jaya.

(02:49:43):
I like that, yeah. I mean, Jaya told me that he
wanted this so. OK, $500 sounds good.
Oh my God, I didn't hear 500 That's crazy.
Your logic made sense. My bad.
Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, fuck you.
Yeah, my bad. No, Samir would have probably

(02:50:05):
quoted you before he left to buyingredients.
Yeah. Just hit you with something
disgusting. I can't wait to get back to you,
Malagus and Abel and win the rest of my argument with Samir.
This is what they do. When?
We're gone. All right, so you guys walk
around it. It takes probably half an hour

(02:50:27):
to find all the equipment you want.
You duck your head into quite a few magic shops and other such
interesting establishments. And then just focus on the task
at hand. Eventually you get all the
things you're looking for and Samir gives you a nod and a few
hours go by and you get to cool off a little Feyus.
Enough time goes by that like you step away from the situation

(02:50:49):
enough that you actually get to have sort of a level head on the
situation. OK.
How do you feel a lot of feyus? Better that's I sort of like
shopping in these markets. Yes, I do too.
I was looking forward to it, yeah.
Let's go build something. Or actually, I guess we should
wait till tonight. There's more to be done today,
but we should go back to the room and meet up with everyone.

(02:51:10):
He smiles wildly. I thought you'd never ask.
What do you think? How was their sparring going
when you left? Goes with it.
Was it malagus? I bet Malagus can kick Abel's
ass. I actually wasn't there for the
sparring. I didn't get the chance to see
it. Damn.
OK, well we'll have to ask Gile be honest about who won.
I bet so, and I would certainly believe that Jaya has the

(02:51:32):
opportunity to really prove himself as a worthy combatant as
well. Yeah, Oh yeah, If Jaya has a
gun, it's really no competition,right?
Unless I guess Malagus starts casting magic and then who
knows. I thought Malagus would do that,
though. I mean, I don't know.
I thought we talked Malagus out of casting magic on friends.
That's sort of a shitty thing todo, you know?

(02:51:53):
Shooting at friends is also sortof strange.
I don't really know how you spotwhen you are a gunslinger.
I. Suppose I also don't know, maybe
it has something to do with the way a gunslinger can shoot
bullets that don't kill people. You know the non lethal damage?
I've never seen Jaya do that. I'm sure they found a Safeway to

(02:52:22):
do it. Oh, I also like to check in on
some friends of mine. Oh yes, that is a great idea.
OK, let's head back. Actually, never mind, I won't.
I was going to pick up a snack but I won't.
Is everything all right? Because when you pick up snacks
for someone, that takes on too much responsibility for them and
I don't want to send them the wrong message.

(02:52:42):
Who? Do you not want to pick up a
snack for some? Friends of mine.
Our friends, no. Not our I was going to make up a
snack for Eddie and Ollie to show that I'm not mad at them
about the alcohol anymore, but then they might take that the
wrong way. Oh well, that shouldn't be too

(02:53:02):
bad I imagine. That's not too bad.
No, I think they would like that.
OK, but would that be like taking on too much
responsibility? I don't think so.
What a face. I actually think that would be a
nice thing to do. OK, OK, great.
I'll look around for a healthy snack.
Something protein heavy. Some Turkey legs with little
pieces of lettuce on top. All right, you look around.

(02:53:25):
Honestly, everything you're looking for is in the merchant
district. You're able to find enough food
stalls to fill a village, and you eventually find exactly what
you're looking for, for a total of 1 silver piece for all of it.
Dope, spend that. All right, you blow the load and
then you are pretty much set up for your afternoon and evening

(02:53:49):
on your way back with Samir holding all the items.
I'll jump back now to Jaya. Jaya, you, you have dragged
Malagus and Abel inside. Now they're both extremely
injured and neither of them seemthat happy.
What do you? Want to do they?
They're both What? Extremely injured and neither of
them look that happy. What do you want to do?

(02:54:11):
OK, guys, you know, this didn't really go the way that I had
planned. Neither do this again, but I
need you guys to understand themwhen I say sparring and when
most people say sparring, they don't.
You don't go for the kill. You don't injure somebody.
You stop right before you're about to do it.

(02:54:33):
I get it now, Sergeant. I thought we were really
fighting, you know, like sparring is like, sounds like
fighting, you know? Have you?
I mean, I asked the able this already, but Malicus, have you
sparred before? No.
See that I should have answered that.
You know what I take? Responsibility.
I should have asked that. We'll do this again, but next

(02:54:56):
time I will be clear about the instructions and I will make
sure that nobody gets injured. I'm not sure if I want to do
that again, Sergeant. It was quite upsetting to me.
You don't have to do what we can.
You could do with me. I just thought it might be
better to do something that was a little bit more melee combat
rather than with my firearm because we don't really.

(02:55:18):
Do. We don't really go against that
many people. They have guns.
Yes, well, I suppose I would be fascinated to try with you.
In fact, I sort of was interested in sparring with you
in the 1st place. Sergeant, No offense.
I don't really think Malagus is a good teacher.
Hey, fuck you, man. Oh God.
And he rubs his nose again. Really gave a number on Man I.
Just did a good grasp on your skills, which you know are

(02:55:42):
pretty good. Actually you had some pretty
good stances there. It was a lot more polished than
Malagus. A lot more.
Well, thanks, you know, fuck me I guess, but thanks.
I will I. Appreciate that, Sergeant,
that's very kind of your chap. Thank you for the compliment.

(02:56:04):
I just hope I didn't upset you too much with that bit of a
cheeky punch there at the end. Fuck.
Listen, let the record show. When everyone gets back, I want
them all to know that Abel's sucker punched me.
I thought we were going to be friends, Abel.
Well, it's not out of the question yet.
What? How about let's not punch each
other? I quite agree, Sergeant.

(02:56:26):
A bit of a nasty thing, isn't it?
Sort of violence that way. Yeah, now we could do wrestling,
but I don't trust the male guesswith that either, so.
I'm a great. Wrestler.
I think you would just start punching and kicking.

(02:56:49):
The two of them rest on their wounds and soon after Sir
Orafaeus you return with Samir and all of your items.
You find Malagus with a bloody nose and a black eye, and Abel
sort of just sitting there with a pleasant smile on his face
with what looks like a knife sticking out of his chest.
Blood oozing from the bleeding out looks really pale.

(02:57:12):
Can someone please help him? I can.
Explain I can. Explain.
I would stand up to agree to you, but I don't think I can
stand right now. Jesus, I can't explain.
I can't look. We were sparring.
I should have clarified with both of them what sparring
means. Because to me, you know, you

(02:57:34):
don't go in for the kill. You're just, you know, you stop
right before you would injure somebody.
And we consider that as a point.But you know, I didn't I didn't
take into consideration that like they wouldn't understand
that. And you know, you know how

(02:57:54):
Malikus is stabbed him. And thought about.
It he had a second to thought about it, to think about it and
he just, he just went for it. So you know he's going to need.
Some no no. I guess.
And ice looks different, like better maybe.
Fuck. Off Look at all this blood.

(02:58:15):
I'm definitely bleeding the mostand the worst.
Abel's is frothing from the bubbles out of his lungs.
Malagus. It's quite a right orifice.
I think I'll get over it and it's just a pinch.
Now sit stale. I want to, without further ado,
pull the dagger out of his chestand then cast Cure Wounds.

(02:58:35):
See. His teeth grit as you hold out
your hand to cast your wounds. I didn't know you could cast
that. Or affairs.
Goodness. Yeah, dude, I'm our secondary
healer. Very nice.
You hold out your hand to heal him, and you see the wound
slowly close up as Abel breathesa bit less ragged.
OK, Malagus, let me fix whateveris going on there.

(02:58:58):
I want to come up and sort of for a second I'm just pinching
his nose and then I'll. Heal it.
Wow, that fucking stop it. Okay, let me let me roll the
healing for both of them, I guess.
Oh, Abel got a great role. 14 heal.
All right. Malagus gets 8 heal.

(02:59:18):
All right, Abel's wound seals upand it looks like there's still
gonna be a bit of internal bleeding, but you at least
sealed the wound and malagus you, uh, heal and a lot of the
bleeding goes away and you see the black eyes slowly disappear,
but the nose is still really crooked it kind.
Of suits. You fuck off.
What do you mean suits me? No, it's like now that you have

(02:59:39):
a broken nose, I'm like, didn't he always have a broken nose,
you know? No, I didn't.
Oh, it's still tender. I thought you fixed it.
Yeah, I can heal it one more time.
Fuck dude, it really hurt. It really hurts.
OK, OK, one more. OK, 13 healing, right?
I think I haven't cast this manyhealing spells and the whole

(02:59:59):
campaign put together besides. Right now.
And at this point, you see his nose slowly curl back to a much
more appropriate angle. Oh, that's, that's a lot.
Thank you, orifice. Thank you.
See, that's, that's a good fella.
You're a nice guy sometimes. A nice guy all the time.
Yeah, well, you know, I, I just thank you.
I, I And he holds his nose and you see it's still just ever so

(03:00:20):
slightly crooked, but it doesn'tseem like he noticed.
Sort of. Is there a mirror?
In our room. Yes, there is up in the sort of
a vanity in the bathroom. Is my nose also crooked like
his, his or am I? Is it is it genetic or is his
just still damaged? You walk right to the bathroom?
No, yours looks fine. It looks like it might just be a
break. OK, just making sure I don't

(03:00:43):
have that problem. No, you're still a little
crooked, but it's actually it really doesn't look bad.
Thanks, RFAS. That's that's nice.
I think I just leave it like this.
I think I'm going to call it a night.
Me and me and Monty are going tobe in the same bed.
That all right with Monty? What?
No, no. But yeah, All right.
Thanks, bud. We're both getting better.

(03:01:03):
Now consider us the sick, Sick bed.
I don't want to be in there withyou, dude.
I I really don't. That's fine.
It's fine. No, I guess he doesn't want to
share the bed. Why don't you and Abel share?
Make friends after you hurt eachother.
Well, I believe that me and Malagus had a quite a noble
spar. I mean he taught me that common

(03:01:24):
St. rats will throw dirt whenever they're at risk.
And I suppose I taught him a thing or two about the five
finger bloody nose. I don't think either of you
should be proud of anything you did today.
I'm quite proud of our face, thinking how gorgeous I still
am. At least I wasn't hit in the
face. Kind of as you were, actually.
I thought you mention it. Oh come now, Orpheus, have some
sense. You would want this beauty to

(03:01:45):
disappear. Nonsense.
Kind of kind of would, yeah. OK.
Anyways, Jaya, we got the stuff to make your slippers.
Oh, you did. Yeah, we did.
Awesome, How much do I5? 100 cold pieces.
Oh. My God.
Ed, we got this all on sale so it's non refundable.

(03:02:07):
So you didn't. Was it possible to get a quote
before like doing? Sorry, Jaya, I guess we should
have talked about it more, but you just seem so excited about
it, that's all. Because I thought it sounded
cool, but I just I, you know, I don't, we don't got a lot of
magic back home. So I just didn't really think

(03:02:28):
about the price. It just God damn.
OK. We'll build it for you tonight.
You'll have it by tomorrow. Think about how much cheaper
you're getting it since you don't have to pay us for our
labor. Yeah, I guess so.
That's sort of look at some here.
You're not gonna charge Jaya foryour labor, right?
Well, you're gonna be the one that makes a total face, so I

(03:02:50):
expose it to your question. Oh no, I'm not going to.
There you have it. There you go, wholesale spider
slippers. Not too bad, right?
No, no, I guess not. Here, Here we go.
Here's a 500. Go.
The five. The five.
You're right there, Sergeant. You seem a bit.

(03:03:13):
No, it's all it's quite. It's all good.
I'll met you. Yeah, me.
Watching the 500 coins leave my coin purse.
I'm. Crazy.
I'm losing my mind. All right, please subtract 500
gold pieces, Jaya, as you as youpurchase some slippers of spider

(03:03:36):
climbing. Sorry.
You also bought my gear, right Aura?
I was doing them in order, so I did Jayas tonight and then I was
going to get yours the next time.
But we could go back and buy thestuff for yours as well.
That would make sense. Oh, Samir.
Should I grab the? Stuff for hires thing too.
Oh yes, let's go do that. Also, didn't demos make an order

(03:03:57):
with you? Yeah, yeah.
And Demos, how much gold do you carry with you?
Because I think together. Well, Demos is also costs 500
gold pieces, I've been told. So Demos wants an amulet of an
amulet of proof against detection.
And oh, I can't read his handwriting here, but something
else. Do you know what this says?

(03:04:19):
The picture, Xavier said. We did not have the second word.
You were sent up picture. Yeah, why should you?
Send me a picture, yeah. I got.
Adm Oh it. Says.
Amulet of detection and L dot dot dot L I'm assuming it says
lying probably, but I don't know.

(03:04:41):
Hello lying. Damos.
Here I could look it up if you want the full name.
OK, it's basically an item that protects him from being scried
on. I guess the the amulet of proof
against detection, yeah. And.
Oh. Well, I thought you meant there
was another item. Was there another item or just

(03:05:01):
that one? No, just there's a second.
There's another word in the title of that item.
Why does that matter? I don't, you know.
Anyways, then Hire wanted an item that would grant him
persuasion. Sorry, Proficiency in persuasion
or expertise in persuasion? And one for Monty cuz.

(03:05:22):
Oh yeah, yeah, he wanted one forhim and one for Monty.
All right. I think we priced those as well,
but let's just go out and get everything.
They'll probably be back later. OK.
I mean, as long as you carry thegold with you to pay for all
that stuff. We'll be fine.
Typical. What?
Well, I guess I just remembered that I paid you like 800 gold
the other day, so you at least have the gold.
See. Not all that bad, right?

(03:05:45):
Let's go get it. All right, with that, you guys
head back out into town to find what you're looking for.
In the meantime, back at the Smith, Smith Demos, Dulum and
higher, you guys are all waitingoutside the street, just sort of
Gabin. What would you guys like to do?
We would head back. You guys would also head back.

(03:06:06):
Yeah. All right, on the walk back, you
run into, looks like Aura Feus on the way out of the flaming.
Yeah, the flaming bore with Samir in tow.
Or are you guys head again for the night?
How did it go? I heard that you had to break
the news. Yes, well, we weren't attacked.

(03:06:26):
That's good. At least that makes me very
happy. Not being attacked is a is a
very good thing. I agree.
Or a face. Not being attacked is a very
good thing. Which did you do in the end?
We ended up telling them it seemed like the right thing to
do. I.
Also think that I'm sorry. I I'm sorry I was a coward about
all that. It's not that I'm a coward.

(03:06:47):
It's I, well, I am. I, I was afraid we would do the
wrong thing and then I would have done the wrong thing.
Sorry. Oh, you're.
We we had it handled. I will say, I guess if we take
votes on things in the future, Ido wish the majority would win.
Well, unfortunately some things I think supersede votes.

(03:07:08):
Well. It sounds like it worked out in
the end and you know, it sounds like you didn't even get
attacked, which is I didn't think that would be a worry, but
that's good. That means you're you're safe
and that is important. I'm sorry that you guys had to
better that news. That must have been hard,
actually. I think I went well.
That's good, right? Also, Orpheus, do you need help

(03:07:29):
with anything? Samir and I are shopping in the
market for some equipment and then I was going to go home and
hope we would run into you guys and so we could read the
instructions Rexy Meyer sent me to get into the Black staff
tower. Continuing on, Rexy Meyer's
quest for us seems like the right thing to do because we

(03:07:49):
could earn a bit of their favor and also maybe learn a bit about
more about the black staff. That sounds like a great idea.
You can come shopping with us ifyou'd like.
Sure, I'll. Rub your head.
All right, So sort of two ships passing, you guys flip up and
trade groups to go do what you got to do.
I imagine then we can just sort of quickly run through picking

(03:08:11):
up all the materials it takes tobuy Hires and Demos's items.
At some point during the shopping trip, I do think Oro
would pull Doolum aside. I know I already apologized
once, but I want to apologize again to you specifically
Doolum, because I think I agreedwith the point you were arguing
and instead of staying on your side, I left.

(03:08:35):
And so you had to stand up for what we both believed on your
own, and I should have been there to to also stand up for
what we believed. And I'm proud of you for making
the right choice. Thank you.
I don't think there's much you need to apologize for.
It was a difficult situation. Yeah, but you did it.
You know, you, you, you won the difficult situation and you

(03:08:58):
shouldn't have had to do it on your own and you shouldn't have
had to take all the responsibility on yourself.
When I felt the same way you didand I shirked the
responsibility. And that's not right.
So I, I won't do that next time.And I'm a little sorry for not
trusting your judgement too. I, I do think you have good
judgement. It's just sometimes you remind
me a bit too much of myself for me to trust you that well, you

(03:09:20):
know, not that I think you're lying, but I think you're young
and I think you don't know that much about this world, whereas I
think Hired and Demos do know more about this world.
That is true. I'm.
Rambling now, sorry. You keep going, you say.
You don't have to apologize all the time.
Orifice. Oh God, do I do that now?
Well, not now. Or I suppose I mean to say it's

(03:09:42):
nothing super new. Oh, God.
OK, I'll keep that in mind. I'm not going to fall into the
typical trap. How do you say that?
And then I say sorry. And then you're like, oh God.
It's all right. It's both of our first times
here on the Material plane, is it not?
Yeah. Well, I guess technically not
for me, but I don't remember the.

(03:10:02):
So yes, basically. So I guess we can figure out
together. Thank you, and thanks for being
brave. Of course you taught me to be.
Don't tell Samir I'm crying again because we sort of just
had a conversation about it, butthat was really nice.
No, hug you. I'll hug you back.
Well, you know I can't keep secrets.

(03:10:23):
I know, and I don't want you to ever start.
You're a good lad and an honourable one and a brave one,
and yeah, you're good all around, basically.
Thanks, Ruthius. Yeah.
So is there anything else we need to buy?
Let me look at this list. Dump the goggles, Look at the.
Start. Walking.

(03:10:44):
We should catch up sesame here, otherwise he'll buy all the more
expensive ingredients. All right, I'm gonna send you
the quote now higher. So just to remind you, to get
expertise in something, you already need proficiency.
So if you wanted to go from nothing to expertise, you would
need to buy both a ring of proficiency and a ring of

(03:11:06):
expertise. And you could even layer them on
the same figure. I like that you send the quote
like you're pushing it across the table on an envelope.
So investigate that, tell me what you want to get exactly.
Just assume that Orifaeus and Doolum and basically everyone
else is going shopping, picking up while you guys are a good
deal. While you guys are out shopping,
is there anything else you'd like to do?

(03:11:27):
That was it for me. Cool, nice.
And that is 2 rings that you're looking to buy higher.
That's my quote. I'm quoting you guys.
Put it down rating. Can I be crazy and get Monty
proficiency, but then myself theproficiency and expertise?

(03:11:51):
So that's gonna be, I think, 5:50.
Yeah, that sounds good. You can get that.
And what skill was this in again?
Sorry, I just said it written. Persuasion.
Persuasion. Got it.
Hey dude, just between us, you really don't have to buy me any
items, Monty would say. When you guys get back.
I mean, that's a nice thing you're doing, but please don't

(03:12:14):
worry about yourself. You're way more of an adventurer
than me, Monty. I'm afraid we're in some sort of
position of power. I think the both of us, and I
know from talking to the people of Ethera, I know you mean
something to them and they look up to you as a leader and a sort

(03:12:36):
of representative of where we came.
I feel like you always have been.
I, I almost want an item to try to legitimize that power, at
least in a, in a sort of way that others could understand
just visually. I I think we both have a role to

(03:12:59):
fill and you certainly don't have to be 1 as an adventurer,
but I think these people need toand skills like persuasion
matter. Well, hey.
Thank you, Prior. That really means a lot.
You know, I would like to, yeah,I think this would help me rally
the troops a little more, as it were.

(03:13:20):
I think I could really make some, make some moves with them,
you know? And it's not something you have
to, you know, do alone. I guess I'm, I'm certainly there
to help and just, I guess for me, you know, I feel like I
can't, you know, out in the realworld and I'm telling people,
oh, there's a bomb, there's a bomb.
You're all gonna die. And then like no one believes

(03:13:40):
you. And then and then like maybe
your, maybe your own party members like don't even like,
like you can't even persuade them.
So then it you know, it's a roadblock for sure.
Yeah, yeah, I, I agree with that.
Yeah. Hey, listen, Thank.
Thank you, man. You really don't have to do
this, but you are. And that's, that's the kind

(03:14:01):
thing. I won't forget that.
And all right, so go ahead and please subtract what was that
550? Hi.
Hi. Gone.
All right, it is gone. OK so seeing this excellent deal
oral face learning the quote on making this rings I want to try

(03:14:21):
something unorthodox. What would you?
Like to do, and we don't have torole play this, but I would like
to keep an eye out for a thrift store or antique store as we're
walking around. OK.
And particularly. One that carries higher budget
items like you know, maybe a thrift store for adventurers
with like armor and weapons etcetera.
Are you looking for magic items or just like anything?

(03:14:42):
Just anything actually. I'm specifically looking for not
magic items. There are a ton of thrift stores
around here. Hell, every adventurer who went
in the dungeon once decided theywould come home and make a
shitty thrift shop. You find hundreds.
Perfect. I want to pick just the biggest
one I can and walk in and try tobroker a deal with the
proprietor to see how much stuffI can cast mending on to make

(03:15:04):
some gold. Huh.
OK, give me an investigation check please.
Does Watson help me? I'll come broker with you.
That's what's funny. Oh.
My God. Oh my God.
That is crazy. So what is the total?

(03:15:25):
Just cuz I'm curious. 31. So you look around with a Nat
20. You find what you're looking
for. After about 25 minutes of
wandering, tucked between what looks like an alchemy lab and
another pawn shop, you find justa really narrow good storefront
with a wooden sign with a that looks like a shield with hand

(03:15:48):
painted letters on it that readsthe attic.
Second chances for first time heroes.
You step inside and what looks to be a thin spiral staircase
leads up into a much larger 2nd floor area, sort of like a a
roost. Nice.

(03:16:09):
And you step into a room floodedwith shelves of mismatched
armor, bins of one eyed plushies.
You see cookware racks of capes and weapons behind the counter,
sort of moving its long nap up with sort of a squawk.
Looks to be a Vulture era Cocra.That's the coolest thing in the

(03:16:33):
world. This whole store is actually the
coolest thing in the world. If I lived in D&D, this is what
I would do with my time all day.What can I do you for?
I want to pick up something that's broken.
It's easy enough to find. You find a a cracked shield.
A cracked shield. Perfect.
I pick it up and I set it on thecounter in front of him and I

(03:16:55):
say check this and I say how much does this sell for?
Check this out. Unless you're here to use that
as a pot lid. Really not worth much, wouldn't
recommend it. How much does it sell for?
2 silver I found it. Perfect.
I cast mending on it, then hold it up to show it gleaming in the

(03:17:16):
light. How much now?
The era COCRA sort of turns its long Ultra neck to the side and
looks at you, curious. You mend on purpose, for free.
First one's on the House, how much for me to walk around
mending all your stuff? Let's say 45 minutes of my time

(03:17:37):
just walking around mending. Anything else I can find or
anything you can bring me? I got a lot of stuff you can fix
I sure. Do yeah.
Let me think if you can fix everything in this store, I'll
give you 25 gold pieces. All right, for 45 minutes of my
time because I don't have all day, unfortunately, I want to
help you, but I don't have all day.

(03:17:58):
So you know the most important things you could bring me in
that time. Yeah, 35 gold sounds.
Good, good. Like fixing the whole place in
35 minutes. Can't be 45 minutes, can't be
done 45 minutes. I'll give you 12 gold pieces and
that's pushing it. All right.
Have a good day Sir all. Right, you want to say something
on the road? And the creature gestures to a
pile of items besides the desk that say fix me, I'm fabulous

(03:18:21):
and it looks like a bunch of real shit.
Does my negotiation tactic work at all?
He's not interested in paying memore.
I say I'm going to walk. A real little persuasion check.
OK, does my Watson look really adorable and convincing at my?
Side I'll start like running outthe door.

(03:18:44):
I'm gone. I'm taking advantage.
Oh my God, Mason, it's another natural 20.
Oh my God. Money, please.
Money, please. A natural 20.
All right. You start to saunter at the door
and you hear a cry, a sort of cry behind you.

(03:19:07):
Wait. Wait.
What? No, listen, I really could use
the help. I really could.
Come back. Come back.
Not for 12 gold, I won't. All right, all right.
Listen, so 45 minutes every time, it's nothing, all right?
Every apprentice on the street can gas mending.
Hell, I can gas fucking mending.The bird snaps fingers and you
see the shield that you were holding.

(03:19:28):
Sort of. The small crack on the front
fixes. Well, I can only do it twice a
day. OK, so I'm going to cast it
probably like, let me see, I cancast it to 10 * a minute for 45
minutes. So I'm going to cast it 450
times. So it's as though I'm doing,
let's see, 225 days of your labor.
Oh. That's just that's worth.

(03:19:50):
Every apprentice on the street can cast that, so I will.
Why don't you listen to you? All right, I will give you for
the lot 25 gold pieces and I'll throw in one of my mildly Magic
I for free. OK, done.
You got me with the mildly magicI.
All right, you got lucky though.You got me in a good mood.

(03:20:13):
All right, I'll see then. What's your name by the way,
boy? Sir Otifaeus of Valhalla, I hold
up my hand. This is Dulum and our friend
Samir and my daughters were goneand come join us soon.
What's your name, Sir? Pleasure to meet you, Sir, I
said. Dulum, my name is Clark.
Clark. A grasp its wing.

(03:20:34):
Grass the creatures ring and shake it up and down.
Pleasure to do business with you.
Let me acquire your gold. Just have a run about the place.
Nothing's really worth more thananything.
Great. I'm on it.
The vocal rumbles through a backroom.
Do them. I bet you you can cast spending
right? Yes, I was going to help you.
Well, if we're doing double the work, we should get double the
pay and you should keep half of it.

(03:20:55):
I suppose that's true. Hey Clark, one more thing.
What my friend over here casts mending too.
If you pay, it's 25 gold. We'll do do twice the work I.
Don't think so. I'll go back to 35 though.
Shit. I don't have 900 items here,
you'll just be wasting your timeand mine.

(03:21:15):
Fuck, how much? 40 gold for the both of us.
Told me one last persuasion check.
OK. Now I'm losing money but OK 19.
He nods his beak. Yeah, I'm fine.
Quit bothering me. OK, great. 20 If it's yours, do
them. How are you losing money?
Oh, I see. Because you gave up five.

(03:21:37):
Yeah. I was going to do it just to
help you. I didn't really expect to be
paid. Yeah, but if you're helping me
make money and I'm not splittingit with you, it feels wrong.
Also, I'm sure there's somethingyou wanted to buy, right?
I haven't really. Thought about it.
Well, let me tell you this, rings of expertise are much

(03:21:57):
cheaper than you might think they'd be.
Fuck. You and.
Persuasion, that's basically free.
Sorry, I mean proficiency is basically free.
So you really want to get in on this deal?
Well, I suppose if you're offering, I'll take some, but
you don't have to give me half. Oh, I'm going to give you half.

(03:22:17):
You know, works worth just as much as other people's.
OK, now let's get to it. I start running around like a
madman fixing everything. All right, how about this?
I'll keep the mini magic thing he talked about.
Sure deal. All right, the two of you go

(03:22:38):
running around mending as fast as you can.
In that time, would anyone else like to be doing anything?
Was if here in Waterdeep the onethat Abel saw?
I don't know, roll a history check.
My end is so long, I can I just can I ask what?
Is it? About that gift you saw, was it

(03:23:03):
here in Waterloo oil? The gift that I saw remind me,
what is that? Hippo.
Yes. Was it a water name?
The hippo that I saw, Well, let me think.
I suppose I did run into a gift folk one of these days, though I
don't remember it. And what context was this?

(03:23:23):
Was it not him who brought it up?
God who did. I'm just quite forgetful.
I don't know if you recall, but I was stabbed not a few moments
ago. Did Ora face not heal him?
I healed. His ass healed.
Brain damage. Let's not be.
Rude. I believe.

(03:23:46):
I mean, my memory is pretty bad too, but I believe you had told
me that you saw a gift folk at the bar one day.
Oh, yes, that's right. You remind me.
Thank you, Jaya. Listen, Sergeant, and I don't
know if you recall. But I believe.
I well, this body that I inhabitused to be a seafaring man and

(03:24:07):
well, his crew was known to inhabit this bar, but nearby a
very kind gift folk looked sort of like yourself, militaristic
and all was known to frequent that bar.
He was the one who found me in the street one day when I well
just busted out of prison and eating scraps from the trash
cans. He found me down there and said,
oh good Sir, your crew was looking for you at the bar and

(03:24:28):
of course I scampered away out of fear.
Didn't really get a chance to fellow.
He seemed like a nice chap though.
I suppose he frequents the place.
If you'd like to go visit it, I could show you.
Where it is I'm a bit. Frightened to go in myself.
I would greatly appreciate that.You know, you don't have to go
in with me. I can do it on my own, but I
would appreciate you showing me where that is.

(03:24:48):
Yes, of course, I'd love to showyou where it is.
I'm quite interested in visitingthough.
I think I'll watch it from a distance again.
I'd rather not be jumped by a bunch of fools who consider
themselves by apps. Yeah, no, I get that.
Again, I'm sorry about the way that the sparring went.
In the future, you know, I won'tinclude Malagus.

(03:25:08):
I thought it would just been a good good way to let some of his
steam off and but I, I don't know had maybe I should do it
just me and him next time so I can get a hold of him.
Yes, well, that could be worthwhile.
I'm sure you and this fellow will have a lot to talk about.
Would you like to head there right now?
I could show you where it is, how long?

(03:25:30):
Do we think that would take? Are you in some sort of rust,
Sergeant? No, I just worry about I don't
know. I don't like running off without
the others knowing where we are.Well, of course you're not.
You're a good person. I take no offense to that.
I suppose what we could do is ask around, see if anyone else
is interested in going. I believe the crew is just

(03:25:51):
finishing up their shopping. Yeah, at least is Malik is still
here. Yes, he is still here.
What? And Lisa Mele, guess, could you
let the others know that, you know, we're going on a little
side trip to go talk to one of my folks?
Sure. Yeah, whatever, Sarge.
All right. Thank you.
OK, I think, I think we can go for a bit.

(03:26:12):
All right, Sergeant, you step out and during this time you're
45 minutes or Orifaeus and Doolum.
You guys rush to clean up as much of this place as you can,
mending as everything you can pick up.
You find things you're not even broken, but you guys mending on
them anyway, getting every six seconds in flowing through the
place. 45 minutes go by and you lost it.
Your tongue or a face hurts fromthe verbal component of the

(03:26:33):
spell making the same formation of your mouth, your hands
stretching out and forming the somatic components of casting.
You're exhausted and completely wiped out, but you look around
and you and Doolum have made this place spotless.
Doolum, you yourself were efficient, you knew exactly
where to go and at what time, and sure enough, your entire
half of the establishment had been completely cleaned up and

(03:26:54):
fixed to a Polish. The culture era COCRA clerk give
you guys sort of a a feathery clap.
Very thank you. You did a great job.
This looks amazing here. Here's your gold.
It passes over to you a a you know, a hefty sack filled with
35 gold. 40, sorry it's 40 total.
Oh, sorry, 40 you're right, you commissioned. 40. 40 gold

(03:27:17):
useless. Clerk keeping an eye on you.
It was nice doing business with you.
Clark. You've got to find shop here and
I'm happy to help to make it a little finer.
Now about that mini magic item. Yes, yes, mildly magical.
Mildly magical item, yes. Yes, yes, I think I've got just

(03:27:38):
the thing. The creature steps into the
backroom and comes out holding what looks like a very simple
leather belt. Fucking sick.
Like I said, mildly magic. Don't expect my trick.
Toss it over. What's it do?
He tosses it over to you. This is for you, Orifaeus.
The belt of one extra pocket. This simple This simple leather

(03:28:03):
belt has on its backside a very small sort of seam in the belt
that you can reach in to reach one extremely small extra
dimensional pocket. How small is extremely small?
It's about the size of an infant's fist.
OK. I don't even think I have

(03:28:27):
anything that would fit in that.I was hoping I could put like my
blasting powder in there because.
It would not fit. OK, I'm going.
To reasonably cram probably like100 pieces in there if you
really shove them in. 100 gold Wow gold pieces are smaller than
I. Realize they're pretty small.
There's 100 and an infant's fist.

(03:28:48):
About, I mean, you, yeah, you'restretching it.
Here's what I'll do. I want to turn it.
So First off, the pocket is in the front.
So well OK, do I think a pickpocketer could ever get in
this or is it like a secure pocket?
It is. It is seamless as far as you can
tell you. Only by picking around it and
pulling on it could you find it.You think that the DC of finding

(03:29:09):
this with any sort of perceptioncheck would be while.
OK, so it's not a possible, but it's certainly well hidden.
OK, I'll go ahead and slip my rock of incendiary Cloud in
there, as well as my pedal of Remember your happiest moment of
your life. You slip both into the belt of
one extra pocket. Or is it better to have the

(03:29:29):
flask back there? Also one pack of raisins, really
smashing them in. And I should note it is on the
backside, so it is sort of an awkward grab.
Yeah, that's OK. These are like things I don't
use often that I want to keep extra safe.
Right. You could spin it around to the
front, but then the belt buckle is on your back, which looks
weird. And that just looks so stupid.
Yeah. Great.
Like I said, not. Great.

(03:29:50):
Do you have like a strip of fabric or something?
Maybe yellow fabric, but sure. The era COCRA digs under the the
the shelf in front of him for a second, then comes back with a
sort of long yellow ribbon. Oh.
God, it's so girly. I was hoping for like a scarf.
Whatever. I'll tie it over the pocket on
the back of the belt just as like one more layer of security.

(03:30:13):
Hoping it just looks like a little bit of a little bit of
flair. All right, you get it on there
and it does look like a nice little piece of actually looks
pretty good. Nice.
And with that, the bird bid you guys to do with new found gold
and guys are sort of free to do what you'd like.
Would anyone else like to be doing anything at this time?

(03:30:35):
I understand Doolum and Orpheus just you know, went crazy on the
shop and we also have Jaya heading to the to the bar.
Would anyone else like to do anything?
I guess Demos was thinking aboutheading over to a Samson's
place. Oh my God.
Really. The.
Craziest. Dancer, we'll just after

(03:30:57):
everything, get out. I mean, you're gonna.
Blow. Awesome Steve, not sex.
Maybe if. It comes up.
All right, well, you make your way to Samson's place.
On your walk you pass through the beautiful castle gates and

(03:31:19):
make your way to his opulent manner.
You find as you were here beforegate around the Manor.
There looks to be a few of thesenot crown guards but sort of
personal bodyguards dressed in much more casual but still very
fine leather with the symbol of Samson's house to recall.
Looks to be sort of a all black sigil.

(03:31:40):
The two guards look at you stiffly as you approach and one
of them holds out of hand faults.
Who goes there? Hello there, my name is Demos
and I was hoping to speak to themaster of the house if he was
in. Demos say, are you?
You're one of the masters companions.
One of them heartbroken. Yes, yes, I was.

(03:32:05):
I see. Well, the master isn't in now.
You'll have to come back again some other time.
Oh, glad that's quite all right.Is, is Belvedere serving
tonight? I would love to chat with him as
well. You see the guard sort of cocked
his head at that and go, you know, Belvedere.
Oh yes, we had quite the nice chat the morning after, if you

(03:32:25):
know what I mean. I see right.
And the figure sort of looks at you and goes sure, yes, you you
can be allowed entry to to see Belvedere.
In fact, feel free to wait untilthe the master is curious.
Right then I'll I'll lead you. Thank you.

(03:32:45):
And the figure opens the gate slowly and guides you in as they
do so. Jaya, you and your bestest
friend Abel, go walk it. Go do a walk to the pier.
We walked so good. On your walk to the pier, you
make your way slowly but surely toward the sort of edge of the

(03:33:10):
docks. The strong smell of salt feels
your nose once again as you get closer and the sound of seagulls
going up ahead. Sound up above and it's a bit
odd the smell and feel of the place.
Eventually you go ahead. Does it just like how does it
seem Mom Well. I suppose I mean that as a place

(03:33:31):
you don't normally spend a lot of time.
Call on that. Yeah.
You never spent much time in theyears.
And for you, it's just a bit oddto see, you know, the docks.
You're much more used to the jungles and the, you know, the
sky really, as opposed to seafaring travel.
It just feels so old fashioned. Geezers.
Eventually, you find the place that Abel is looking.

(03:33:53):
Nestled right on the corner of the docks themselves, in a long
thoroughfare that leads back to the major city, rests a corner.
Sidebar, it looks quite nice actually.
It has a beautiful entryway built right into the itself with
no doors. As you can tell, it looks like
this place is literally a 24/7 need for this.
People sort of wander in and outas they please.

(03:34:14):
The large sign on the top seems to dub this place the big
bucket. The sign itself seems to be
drawn onto a humongous barrel that I suppose is meant to be
the big bucket itself. The barrel looks like it's
almost the size of a tub. It could probably fit four or
five people sitting inside of it.
It sways on a long chain and looking inside you see inside

(03:34:39):
able sort of gestures in and goes Sergeant.
Still not sure if I want to go in there myself.
I'm a bit worried I might get hassled start to just between
the two of us. Is this all right that I stay
out here? Yeah, no, I won't.
And don't worry, I won't say nothing to anybody.
I will. If they ask anything, I'll say
that you came in with me and youwere so brave.
Thank you so much, Sergeant. I'll just wait right outside.

(03:35:00):
And he gives you a wink and a charming smile inside.
It's sort of bright but damp, and even though it's sort of mid
afternoon it is roaring with life in here.
Salt stained beams above you seem to drip with tea mist and
the oar is sticky with spilled beer.
The air stinks of sweat and alcohol and sort of old sort of

(03:35:22):
slightly rotten fish. You see ropes hanging everywhere
above you, almost like cobwebs with hammocks sagging in the
corners. There look to be sailors lying
in them trying to find a dark torest 10 feet above you, and
every table is mismatched and knife scarred.
You see chairs lining the floor and most people seem to be
standing here. It's somewhat of a standing, but

(03:35:43):
there are about 40 or so occupants in here in total and
you see 3 bartenders running. It's fairly busy and every
single person in here looks to be a hardened and very musty
sailor. You see classic sailor beards
all around you, that salt and pepper bee spray in them,
captain's hats adorning many of the heads of this bar, and you

(03:36:03):
see a a great number of real hardened and roughed criminal
looking sailors. You know your pirate types
residing in the far back reachesof the bar, sitting quietly and
sternly watching the events and festivities of the bar.
Full kind of cloud smoke from pipes.
I knew you were going to say it.Oh my God.
Oh my God. What are you?

(03:36:24):
What are you squawking about? You're not.
You're not here. I know it's making me insane.
Making you. All right So what would you like
to do in here Jaya? You stick out a little bit,
especially higher. You really don't match the rest
of the rough sort of rough and tumbled type here that all have

(03:36:47):
these very weather stained stained sailors closed.
You have a much more clean and pristine soldiers outfit on and
you do notice you get a couple eyes glance at you not only in
the but definitely a few in the back too from quiet smoke
covered tables. What would you like to do?
I look for my man. My man.

(03:37:08):
Give me a perception check please.
Oh God, Oh God, oh God, oh. 16. 16 All right, one second.
Sorry, I'm finding my notes realfast.
I feel like you you guys are being way too calm about this
situation. I'll.
Just put that out there. Jaya.

(03:37:30):
You look around and sure enough,you do find that resting up
against one of the far side walls near the entrance, but
still in a sort of smoky quiet corner, sits a GIF.
The broad figure seems to be sitting under a beam with almost

(03:37:51):
heads Above most in the bar, yousee Gray skin and tusks.
A long blue naval coat seems to have been faded by brine and
son. You see the ceremonial brass
pauldrons on both arms, the sameones you're wearing, but much
older, but unmistakably Igorian.You see his belt hosts a number

(03:38:12):
of tools, not weapons, but you see a compass, a barometer, and
what looks like a few maps shoved in there.
He sort of matches the sort of saltiness of everyone else in
this specific bar, especially with the beaten and tattered
clothes. And you see he looks to be
looking down and of a solemn. I'll go walk up to him.
You. Slowly saunter over and you're.

(03:38:33):
Deep in the bar. Oh you grab 2 drinks on the way
it's. A classy move.
Yeah, you make your way over. Your deep deliberate footsteps
seem to bring attention to this.Across from you you see his face
rise and he looks out sort of inconfusion and you notice as you
get closer his both of his eyes are glassed over and empty.

(03:38:56):
Oh my God, that's so sad. He looks around almost
expectantly, waiting for someoneto approach him.
You say words and he hears you and he stands up.
Immediately you see him straighten up.
He removes what looks like a small hat that he had on the
back of his head, holding it to his chest, and he speaks with a
deep and precise baritone that you recognize.

(03:39:18):
Well, how do there I salute you,Ken?
And you see him snap to a crisp salute.
Yeah. I salute.
He. Bag.
He sort of reaches an arm out toward you, placing a heavy hand
which looks to be clad in a storm worn glove, toward yours
for a handshake. And shake his hand firmly, of

(03:39:40):
course. You shake it and it's firm, and
you receive the exact same firmness back, just like you're
back in the military. In fact.
Your handshake reminds you of the military cast, and you hear
him speak by the line of the ivory command.
You're military, aren't you a friend.
Sit down, He gestures to the table in front of him and he
sort of sits back in his. The man gestures for you to sit

(03:40:02):
down in front of him and gives you a what looks like a very old
but charming smile. Now, how long have you been?
Here first please introduce yourself.
Dry Ironwood. I I am not supposed to
necessarily be here. I mean, this wasn't purposeful.

(03:40:23):
I sort of fell through a portal and met a bunch of other folks
who were in the same situations,you know, came from different
planes or different areas, and we've been trying to get each
other back home. Hell, nobody knows that I'm
gone. What's your rank there, Private
Gyre? Sergeant.

(03:40:45):
Well, Sergeant, that's a fun thing.
But I myself am Colonel Thalam Cask.
I suppose that makes me your superior.
As if once I was part of the regiment.
Now I captain the Lily Hook. A modest ship, sturdy hull.
I never expected to see another Tusk this close to the water.
Did you willingly leave? Not really.

(03:41:08):
You know, I would never really like spending my time here.
I mean, the primitive fair, no pressurized steeps, no radium
malt. One has to adjust to this.
He gestures the bar around. You guys recognize a lot of the
terms he's saying, the food thathe's mentioning even told
calling you another Tusk. That's a very common term in a

(03:41:30):
Gloria that doesn't really get out.
Radium malt is a food. A malt, you know, like a malt
looks. Radium.
I eat and breathe radiation. It's just that it's made.
He reaches out and grabs the tanker that you've displayed for
him and takes a long swig and drops it down and gives a very
satisfying. Well, you see Sarge, I left to

(03:41:53):
glory about 12 cycles past. You see my Commission, it lapsed
budget cuts, I assume. Not sure why, but I've heard
rumors. Since then they've been saying
the and he leans forward slightly.
The war machines are replacing the line officers.
Oh my God. You're getting automated.

(03:42:16):
Fucking AI is taking over fog. My bad.
I mean, you know, it might just be, but let's between us, even
your your simple war machine can't haggle for crates of
ammunition like we can, can't give arousing speech when his
troops are in need of recompense.

(03:42:36):
Sorry, the officers are getting automated, but the troops are
still human lives. That is.
Crazy. So fucking difficult.
Yeah, I worry about our entire military Sergeant Jay Iron.
I think we are slowly but surelybecoming mechanical.
He sort of pauses to let that settle.

(03:42:57):
Now that completely defeats the purpose of even having an
officer in the 1st place. I mean who?
That's like the the heart I guess.
I can't say I'm surprised, but Idon't know.
I was really hoping it wouldn't go this way.
You would listen just between 1 fella Tusk to another.
It's real nice to see a friend. It looks like you've only been

(03:43:20):
lapsed recently. Is that right?
You were decommissioned soon. I still smell a Gloria on you.
Well, again, it wasn't intentional.
I was in the middle of a fight when it happened and I tried
contacting them but I guess I just didn't think about the
security and they asked me to like prove that was me but I was

(03:43:42):
My friend was using magics to you know, contact them but I
just want my family to know thatI'm okay.
Of course, Sergeant. Actually, from one friend to
another I've been in contact with Rory recently.
Got myself a prime transmission.Turns out some of our kin left a
radio signal kitten just in a waterfall outside a water deep.

(03:44:05):
Problem is, I had to give up these.
And he points to his two glassy eyes to get the message.
How does this rule you? I pray.
Hell of a price to give, I know,but some creatures have took up
arms around the thing. Wouldn't let me in to use the

(03:44:26):
damn thing without giving them aprice.
Dangerous. I tell you what, I would not
recommend it. But I've been in cocked.
There's talk, whispers through the old branches, and he sort of
pauses a moment, then leans in even closer, his breath sort of
sticky. In front of you.
I've been told that three whole barracks have gone quiet.
Three barracks, mind you, all blacked out at once.

(03:44:48):
Said to be internal sabotage maybe.
Or maybe those machines taken over.
You know, the rumors about our military.
There was a great industry and at once they never really shut
down all those sonar and radar machines.
The thought course, they still exist, you know, still dreaming.

(03:45:10):
I think they're waking up, but then you see a shake his head
all of a sudden refocus in but forgive me, tales from home are
often louder on the OC and he sort of smiles faintly and looks
off into I miss you, I. Feel like there's everything we
should do. About it.
We can't just let that happen, Imean.
Barracks are shutting down, Sergeant Jaya.

(03:45:33):
There are more and more droids every day taking your position.
You think you were sitting here on accident?
Please, I bet your superior officers jumped at the chance to
go off that planet any chance they could.
Did for me too. Pulled the rug right out from
under me one day, I was there the next bam, teleported here.
No resignation, didn't even get to say bye to my.
I mean, does you, do they know that you're alive now?

(03:45:56):
Yeah, with my one message I got to send to they know now.
But my wife, she moved on already. 12 cycles is a long.
Time. Oh my.
God. You got some family at home.
Who? Cares and I.

(03:46:17):
Listen you got kids I'm sure your wifes faithful as ever I
just. How does time move differently
from here to versus there? I don't think time, well maybe
it does. You know, I'm not much of A
scientist. I'm a soldier.
Same you. You'd think time wouldn't change
at all or we're same dimension or whatever.
At least that's what they talkedto me back in the Academy.

(03:46:37):
But hell, maybe it is different.Things are moving quick up
there. I maybe it is time.
Maybe it's just technology, you know, makes the world move
faster. You know, they don't even have
ways to communicate across the countries here.
Takes weeks for a horse and traveller to get across.
Back home you just send a message, bam it's there.
Maybe things move faster becauseof it, I don't know.

(03:46:59):
It's just so quick for your wifeto message the neighbor and she
didn't have to get out of bed. My wife.
Cheat on me. I can't.
They can't. I bet someone already stepped
up. No.
They're there. You're not there.

(03:47:21):
Does it hurt more when your wifefucks him or when your kids
start calling him dad? Oh.
My God, Oh my God, don't say that.
Don't say that. Don't say that to me.
Listen, Sergeant. Sergeant, we got to get you
home. I mean, you got a family.
You got to get back to me. I've already settled down here,

(03:47:43):
running my little ship, running the skiff across the way.
It's nice for me. But you, you still got a life
there. Listen, I don't don't think you
should go, but I feel your plot and I feel your fears.
If you'd like, I can show you a map of where that radio antenna
is, but I don't recommend you go.
The creatures that guard it, they're dangerous.
I would appreciate that. The people that I've met, they

(03:48:07):
are quite a, an interesting group to say the least.
But you know, they're pretty strong.
They've surprised me many times.Well, let me one second here.
And he turns back and opens up asmall satchel Siemens bag.
Whoa. Opening up, you see him pick up
a few maps. You notice he feels the map.

(03:48:29):
There's all cut marks on each corner for identification.
He rubs his fingers along each one and eventually settles in
one been cut in a sort of rounded circle shape with a hole
poked in the middle. He brings the map to you and you
see a map of the outer what looks like SE edge of water
deep. There's a small trail that leads
to what looks like a deep forest, and about what looks

(03:48:51):
like 1/2 day's ride into that forest, a large waterfall is
circled and starred. I was saving this for a rainy
day. Made it actually before I lost
my eyes. You can have it.
And he push it toward you. We have no idea how much this
means to me, and you know I would you ever consider going
back yourself? I'm sorry, Sergeant.

(03:49:13):
I really wish I could. I'm settled here.
There's nothing for me to go back to.
Wife has moved on, and it seems the Army has moved on without me
as well. That decommissioned me.
I didn't even get a medal. That's all right.
They're. Going to do the same to me.
Listen, Sergeant, I think you'vegot real promise in the
military. I was.
I was sort of a slacker. You've got charm, I can tell.
You've got you've got something they want, and hell, you might

(03:49:34):
be the droids and get them out of our army.
Put flesh and blood back in their place.
Soldiers should feel. Yeah, we can't let this happen.
Not at all, and again, be be warned with your transmission
that I think the thought cores are waking up.
He sort of Mumbles to himself something quietly after that,
and then he grabs the beverage you placed in front of them and
slowly takes another long swift.If you need to find me again,

(03:49:57):
Sergeant, you know where I'll be.
My sort of regular drinking hole.
Understood. He stands up again and you see
straightens out his is back and offers yet another crisp salute
and says be warned, those thingsat the waterfall, they they
sing. He raises a hand out to shake
your hands. They shake back so firmly, the
firmest handshake that you've ever seen.

(03:50:18):
You shake, the two of you sort of lock eyes, though his are
long off, and Spacey smiles at you, very charming.
And then he sits back down and sort of falls back into the
corner, comfortable with that. I think that might be a good
shopping place for tonight, you guys.
Oh. My God.
Yay. All right.

(03:50:41):
First off, thank you Mason for an excellent episode as always.
Yay. Now do you guys like want some?
Pool results. Yeah, yeah.
Give it to me. All right, in episode 28, brass

(03:51:01):
heart cold and we ask you who will be felled by Abel's charm
first. Now, as always, I'll go through
this in echelons. The person, the only person with
0 votes was in fact, but Jaya, who's I think we all have little

(03:51:24):
evidence. So Jaya is is that my wife?
Abel is not my wife. You're so faithful.
Good. Job Jeff.
Now in the second echelon we have three people, each with one
vote. First is Orifaeus, brother in
arms, second is Doolum, not a sex spot and 3rd is Damos, the

(03:51:49):
town bike. The town.
Bike. Town Bike.
It's a matter of time. In 2nd place with three votes
was higher. It will be once dot dot dot and
in first place with four votes was Malagus Bros.

(03:52:10):
And Bros. Oh, that's.
See, that's really good, yeah. That's not going so good so far,
though. That's really good.
All right, you guys, today we want to ask you who sounds slash
seems the oldest. This is not our characters

(03:52:31):
because that's giant. That's easy.
I'm talking about Maisie, Annette, Carter, Isaac, Xavier
and Mason. Now if you're thinking who the
fuck are these people since we almost never say a real thing.
That's true, isn't it? Yeah, I'm Maisie.
I play Aura Faeus, Dalam is played by Isaac, Annette plays

(03:52:53):
Jaya, Xavier plays Demos higher.Wait, I almost said higher plays
Garner. That's not right.
Feels that way. Carter plays higher and Mason is
of course our loving DM. Also known as analogous.
Samir, Abel, Tick, Monty. There you go.
Those are your options. Now you can vote in this poll by

(03:53:15):
going to our episode on Spotify and clicking the little you
know, dot dot dot to get to the episode page.
Then once you're there, you can vote in our poll.
You can also comment on the episode, but you didn't know you
can do that and I will read yourcomment.
That is a promise in blood. Also, while you're on our
Spotify page, you might as well go ahead and follow us.
That'll make sure you don't missour next episode next Monday as

(03:53:39):
always. And if you liked it, you should
go ahead and rate US. If you didn't like it, as
always, please don't write it. To yourself, yeah.
Give it to yourself. No one cares.
OK. Also in our Spotify bio you can
find our little link tree. This gives you links to our
podcast and all those other freaky networks.

(03:53:59):
Amazon podcast, Apple Podcast, YouTube podcast, whatever.
You'll also find the link to oure-mail address.
soivegottenivehadalotof[e-mail] me emails, I'll respond.

(03:54:20):
Heartfelt, heartfelt, long, heartfelt response.
Send me emails and the other thing you can find in that
little thing is our subreddit. This is our slash the road pack
come post your fan content, fan theories, fan art.
We love it we love to hear from you.
We love to see from you, you know, love to smell from you and

(03:54:41):
because this. This.
Dungeons, Dungeons and Dragons is all about conversation.
It's not a single player sport. It's not even a 123-4567 player
sport. That can't be right, 123456.
It's not even a six player sport, it's at least A7 player

(03:55:01):
sport, and that's of a player isyou.
So come get mold. Let's chat.
And most importantly, as always,don't miss the episode next
Monday. We'll see you then.