Episode 11 – Memoriam

Gather round friends, let me tell you a tale of three heroes, noble and bold A brute, a druid, and a thief who is but nine years old You know them by name, you know them by deed, their quests are famously daring So here I sit, singing to you an adventure that is worth sharing Tuck is the brute, he knows not his home, he loves to sing and fight Fingers have health, he shifts his shape, and wields a spear with great might Peely's a thief, his tiny size does mask the largest heart Best and brightest they may not be, but their friendship outweighs their smarts So gather round friends, and listen close For the tale's about to start Hello everybody and welcome S-fucking- Dispeltlore The unending torment You wanna do it again?

I subject myself to day in day out In that I love all of you, and I just wish that you loved me the same way I'm your game master Sean O'Hara and joining me as always playing Fat Billy the Halfling Thief is Jessica Tai Hello everyone And playing Ving the Half-Elf Druid is Paul Oppers Hey And playing Tacoma Dome the Barbarian is Abdul Aziz Hello When last we left our heroes, we found them On a journey across the Sea of Graves On their journey, they had run afoul of a school of mermaids And our good friend Tacoma Dome the Barbarian had been spear tackled into the ocean That fight went both well and not well There was some pain that was dealt to and from Ving turned into a dragon, it was pretty cool He was getting used to the sea dragon body Found out that they have the ability to breathe boiling hot water And they're not jets of steam That's pretty tight Tuck found out that he's pretty good at killing mermaids Oh yeah And also that when you do that, they release a death whale Which is something the players introduced Much to their chagrin And to my own brain's chagrin Because I had to remember to do that every time they died Billy was just man with no naming These fucking mermaids from the deck with a handful of rocks Absolutely bulls-eyeing people And the fight went on until things looked okay And there was a brief gap in the violence After Tuck started playing music from Touched by the Darkness With the hidden loot that they discovered in the wizard Aquaria's study Chimes took that opportunity, that brief pause in the violence To engage some sort of ability of his to make the boats rocket forward At borderline uncle's ski-do speed!

And they escaped Heading towards the eye of the storm with a terrifying rapidity Before being drawn into the vortex surrounding the storm And Perel had passed out too Chimes had passed out Holy shit, I'm so sorry And Chimes had passed out too You're gonna feel like such a genius when Chimes pulls down his fake beard And it's been Perel The whole time? Oh my god, we all beat him up! Yeah, I would've gone away with it too if it wasn't for you pesky kids!

I was trying to take over the old cotton mill so I could smuggle paintings or something! He hasn't figured out his scheme yet No It's hard to, you gotta come up with a scheme on the fly It's the only way the cops won't track you down Chimes passed out in the boat Ving fed him a bunch of leaves and sticks and mud Which Chimes willingly and gratefully swallowed and then passed out Arriving at the base of the eye of the storm A place that we determined is called the Wooden Wastes made up of…

Dozens and dozens and dozens of ancient and destroyed vessels The party set foot at the eye of the storm for the first time Tuck scooped everybody up and ran Cause Billy Cause Billy Oh yeah Oh right yeah He had a little bloom Billy had a rose blossom in his hair We were saying like because the like spiritual and magical energy is so intense here Yes, it's converging in a strange way It's almost inducing Billy to become…

Yeah, it's converging in a strange way It's almost inducing Billy to become his fae form It's a spiritual form Yeah So that's happening right now And scooping everybody up and running as close to the pillar as possible The party discovered an eroded entrance Pounded into the side of the pillar Entering they found a splotch of blood on the ground And following that blood a short ways they found a slumped over and seemingly dead Bullywug And that is where we join our heroes now I go to the Bullywug Yep Shake him No response Check his pulse Do you know where to check for a pulse on a Bullywug?

Yeah Discern realities This is an armpit I'm a vet and a doctor?

Yeah, I got six And eight Tuck eight He drops chimes Yeah To the ground He's fine I'm gonna check his pulse And then I stick my thumb up its butt And then Tuck comes over and takes my thumb out of his butt And puts it on its neck Two D six plus one Two D six plus one Two D six plus one Two D six plus one Two D six plus one Two D six plus one Two D six plus one Two D six plus one Two D six plus one Oh, wow Holy shit Eleven There we go It's seven to nine We get one question What happened here recently?

Great question So, this Bullywug is very recently dead Probably within the last hour It's still warm in there Oh, geeze Get your fingers out of there, man I wanna know his time of death What are you doing?

He keeps putting his finger in his belly button I think it's dead It definitely died of natural causes Oh, yes so you look at the wounds on the Bollywog and they were made by gigantic talons very consistent with Thunderbird talons you can tell they're Thunderbird talons because the holes are cauterized that's so fucking sick that's really neat give me a second so they're cauterized Chad's just cleaning himself up no I never clean myself up it's a reminder so yeah the wounds are cauterized you can still smell the burned flesh almost and you being a master of the natural world this entrance was eroded also within the last hour and this amount of erosion should have taken hundreds of years if not thousands but something just drilled through and based on the tracks that you see on the ground this was not the only Bollywog here so basically what happened recently is there was a fight outside with Thunderbirds and Bollywugs and something transmuted this pillar in to get away oh my god so is there does the tunnel keep going sure does I think Perel's down that tunnel Chimes don't slap me I'm not going to yes you are Chimes what Perel I think is down this tunnel we think who the guy we're trying to save who fucking cares okay I pick him back up I throw him over oh my god oh my god such a baby Chimes god just give me like five more minutes so old yeah you got it kid whoa you're a genius you're a fairy and a detective wow thanks I am and then waddle away I don't know okay yeah so you can continue down the tunnel yeah let's go let's go yeah so you continue for quite a surprising distance until you feel air blowing at you what does it smell like like damp and it smells like yeah the air is moving from further down the tunnel oh further down the corridor opens up suddenly and you feel like you're in a cavernous space ooh the light from Tuck's axe reaches up but not enough to see like the ceiling of where you are and you're at the edge of a presser precipice it falls down you're at the edge of yeah basically a landing and stairs set into the wall uh like spiral down basically spiral down oh my goodness wow this is fucking cool can I roll trap expert yeah absolutely look shit uh oh oh actually six so okay um I imagine somebody just grabs Billy's collar as he starts walking forward Billy I was gonna walk off the stairs and then I was like oh shit I'm gonna go to the other side of the building I was gonna walk off the stairs and then I was like oh shit I'm gonna go to the other side of the building I was gonna walk off like into the hole Billy hole cool oh fuck six uh shit does that mean I fall down then no well what I was gonna say is because Bilbo was gonna try and uh check out what's going on I was gonna try and just to make a little a light happen yeah a little flame but neither of those things happen sure or actually maybe one of them does happen things like Billy wait and summons a little puff of flame incidental enough that you don't need to roll anything you're looking around at this place the light from the flame is not enough to reach any other wall or anything or ceiling but it is enough to attract the attention of something oh no the stairs go to the right to a corner and then down to the next corner down to the next corner that's how the stairs are arranged uh to your right where it also goes to the other wall you hear frog fuck frog wait frog evil frog no wait frog friend I imagine you all have like a PTSD flashback yeah you're all like oh fuck oh fuck but you if you do you turn to the right we turn and look it's a single Bullywug nude ew none of actually the one of sorry actually I should have mentioned that too the one that you found was not wearing clothes it's just a frog yeah so there's a Bullywug and it's a and it looks over its big bulbous eyes like he looks terrified yeah he looks really scared he's noticed you I will give you time to react to this you can see his neck pouch swell ew it's gonna make a call what do you do who does something somebody do something Billy pop that bubble yes rock yeah rock throw throw rock Billy rock and roll come on 2d6 plus dexterity for volley fuck six again plus your one for halfling oh seven shit yeah nice so what do you have to do I'll take what I can get okay you roll the d8 and then you roll a d6 and you subtract that from the damage five mm-hmm two three okay three actually yeah that's enough you again bullseye this thing I'm gonna roll a d8 I'm gonna roll a d6 I'm gonna roll a d8 I'm gonna roll a d8 I'm gonna roll a d8 I'm gonna roll a d8 I'm gonna roll a d8 I'm gonna roll a d8 a d8 Yeah, you run forward and you just whip this thing.

Billy throws way harder than he should be able to. I was thinking that his hand, like it's like a ball thrower for a dog. Like that movie Rookie of the Year. Yeah. Like he pulls his arm back and you can hear his tendons going like twang, twang, twang. Yeah, she kills his butt. We're like, funky butt loving. Yeah, and it does, it hits it right in its little pouch, pouch slap, and it gets knocked right in the throat and it dies. What was it rummaging through? Bunch of rags and boxes and stuff.

Let's rummage through those. Yeah, rummage. I will also rummage. Rummage, rummage. Rummage, rummage, rummage, rummage, rummage. It was digging around in the trash like some kind of animal. We should dig around in that trash. What kind of trash would get here?

So you start digging around in this garbage and there's nothing, empty boxes, some rags, but tucked into the corner, like it fell behind a bunch of trash and just got stuck there for God knows how long, is a very pale brown leather scabbard about hand length with a symbol of a crescent moon embossed on it. Ooh. Oh. Dibs. Dibs on this. Okay. It's mine. Yeah. I pick it up. We've never seen him want anything. It's got a handle. It's got a, it's a knife. I pull it out.

You pull it out and you close your eyes because the blade is so bright. Ooh. Ooh. Looks at it. The blade looks like it's made out of a beaten white shining metal. Whoa. Does it glow? Yeah. It looks like it's reflecting the light of the moon. Oh my God. Wait, there's no moonlight in here. No. You're hot damn right. There's no moonlight in here. What? I put it away. I'm like, I deserve this because I lost the bill hook, which was the best thing that we ever had. I'm sorry about that. Yeah.

It's man. It's a real shame that he lost that bill hook and you know, Billy lost all of his weapons, but Tuck should definitely have this knife and put it in his backpack. He drops it in his backpack. Billy grabs like a couple of rocks. Never mind. And actually you're more than fine with these rocks. I guess so. Yeah. I think we found Billy's thing. Billy's moving the bags around. He finds the knife and Tuck just jams his hand past him. I deserve this. I have suffered so much more than you guys.

Billy's picking debris off the ground. It's okay. I just fill up on the rocks. It's a good idea. Yeah. So you find that that's beautiful. It's pretty cool. I'm sorry. Tuck was just a dick. No, that's no, it's funny. Okay. He wasn't. He was. He grew up on the street. Yeah. I guess that was a bit of his urchin is coming out as much as you love your family. You're still in your heart. Have this like me first. Well, especially when I see a pile of trash, here's all the old stuff inside.

You saw that leather and you're just like, oh yeah. Oh yeah. It's leather. Yes. It's like a pile of trash. It also made me really hungry to seeing piles of trash also makes tuck hungry. Well, it makes Billy hungry too, but no one asked him. Billy's eating a rotten scarf. No, I'm not. Yeah, I know. My try is too rotten. All right. Yeah. You find that. Cool. Is it time for a discern realities to figure out what the fuck this place is? Could well be. Do it.

I'm going to look at the discern realities about this fucking place. I suppose we is done. 10. Sick. All right. Three questions. Yep. So yeah, I looking around. Who's really in control here? Some. Okay. So something that strikes you as you're looking around is considering that entrance was eroded. It's very strange that there's a landing here. Because there's no door. Yeah. And you're looking around and you're like, there's no door. Why does stairs lead here? Yeah.

So you can see that that section of the pillar was made of a different material. Like it was a door and then it was filled in. What? Hmm. So. Like a bricked off opening. Yeah. Yeah. Like they just fill it up with something. Yeah. And Tuck, as a child, you saw a lot of places like this in McCall. You get the very strong feeling though. It seems weird for one to be here. It's kind of built like a prison. Hmm. The people that built this place are keeping something in here.

They wanted to keep something in here. Does that make sense? I guess so. I mean, somebody also burrowed their way through like meters of rock and is now in this building. Is there a clue as to who or what that person is? Bullywug Flappy's on the ground and one pair of human feet. It's Perel. Is it Perel maybe? It is. Although we did lose that vase. Oh. Fuck. Which has all of Perel's fucking meds. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Perel's fucking magic in it. It fucking does.

I just want to point out that this erosion is indicative of a water erosion. Really? Yeah. It was eroded. Oh my God. Like eroded, eroded. Piss monster. Piss monster. Jesus fucking Christ. That water dick just fucked its way into this damn pillar. True. So what should I be on the lookout for? Hmm. Um. Um. I just don't know how to answer this question. I mean, just do it. Oh, okay. Fuck. I fucking should have thought of that. Sorry. I don't know how to. I'm dumb. Okay. Okay. I just. Yeah. Okay.

That's not working. I was trying to not do it. Fuck. Sorry. So, okay. So, you know there's, you know, there's Bullywugs here. You know there is a person here. Somebody that wears shoes. Could be a Bullywug that jammed its fins. Flippers into a human's pair of shoes. Yep. Um. So, but you know that there are malicious forces here. There's one stairway. Uh-huh.

So I guess what you should be on the lookout for is another way down that won't you, won't lead you right into the center of whatever's going on. Good point. Yeah. Okay. What is about to happen? Uh, okay. Well. If any of you had to guess, the only reason you can imagine anyone would break into a prison is to release whoever's being held there. Oh, fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Ooh. Big boss time. Um. And that's Billy's cue to himself to start to pretend to be a big boss. Yeah. Be brave boy. Yeah. Time.

I touched that like recently received cut, which I realize is still probably really open. Oh yeah. But I slap it to be brave. It hurts a lot. It's a lot. Fuck. Yeah. Billy, stop picking at it. I'm not just getting ready for what is going to be probably a really hard fight. Uh, yeah. So that's what you know. This place seems to be built like a prison. It was supposed to be very secure.

What you should be on the lookout for is a different, if you don't want to walk right into the middle of whatever's happening is a different way down. Okay. And someone is likely you would guess trying to break out whoever's in here or rob the them. Like it could be a tomb robbing situation, but no one ever come robbing. So it's a tomb and a prison. Yeah. I shouldn't have said that. I mean, you can spell or spell or stay guys. Fuck. Fuck me. Literally two ones. You know what?

I'm not going to do it. We're rolled. Die. How like five times or something. I think it's been five games. Yeah. Crazy. Snake guys. How do you think it's happening? I don't know. I don't know. What do you think is happening? So statistically unlikely. I mean, I think that the story is choosing what dice rolls are coming out. Yeah. I think so. Yeah. He's taking it personally. So you're looking around because you do notice carvings on the walls.

Oh, like the walls are engraved with various scenes and they just don't make any sense to you. What are they looking like? There are images of people that you don't recognize. There are natural images, the sky, the land, and they look ancient. I'll tell you that much. They look ancient. Okay. And as you're looking around, Ving is like, hmm, have I seen these ancient drawings before? And in classic Minds of Moria fashion, accidentally kicks a piece of debris over the edge. Oh.

And it's just silent. And then you hear clack, clack, clack, clack, clack, clack, clack. It's dark in here. It's dark in here. Here, here, here, here. Oh, shit. Ving, what did you do? What happens? Do we hear anything? No. Nothing? There's no response? No. Oh, thank God. But crisis averted. Or probably whoever's down there will be ready for you. Yeah, we've lost the element of surprise. Yeah. And it'd be pretty dumb of them tactically to rush up a rail-less stairwell. Yeah. Okay.

I have some ideas for how we can get down there. I'm gonna go ahead and do it. Okay. So, you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it.

And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it.

And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. And then you're gonna go ahead and do it. Wait, what do you mean? Oh yeah, is Chimes awake yet? He's getting there. Come on, man. You know what? You could try harnessing the thalamic energies of the world via fucking tattoos. See how that makes you feel, but I should be fine pretty quick. What did you guys do? Where are we? We give him the rundown of what's going on. We're like, we think this might be a prison.

Seems like Bullywugs are guarding it, which makes us think it might be an evil aspect of the wizard Perel that broke in here to get something or someone out. He looks around like he blearily blinks open his eyes and looks around and listens and smells. He closes his eyes again and sighs through his nose. Of course. Of course what? Of course. And you can see that he's struggling against the truth rune that he has tattooed on his body. He has a truth rune on his body?

I'll just tell you what the rune is because I think it's interesting. He has a rune on his body that lets him see the truth of things. So he can see through illusions. People can't lie to him. He can always tell when someone's lying, but it makes him tell the truth. And that's why he always answers our questions? I like that. Because he's magically compelled to tell the truth. I like that magic cuts both ways in our world. You can't compel truth without having… To incur that on yourself.

Especially runic magic. Like tattooing runes on you, you're opening yourself up to a lot of shit. Okay. Tell us what's fucking happening. Yeah, we're in danger here. And Ving just kicked a bunch of rocks off the edge. What the fuck? Okay, this could be kind of heavy. He struggles for a long time to not tell you. And then he says, This is Lillian's tomb. Who's Lillian? Lillian. My wife. What? My wife. Tuck feels bad now. He doesn't want to ask any more questions.

Sorry I kicked a rock down your wife's tomb. That's okay. It doesn't matter anyways. When did she die? That, I can truthfully tell you, I don't know. So long ago. So long ago. It's a long time. After our son, but… Before… And he, like, taps the truth ring on his arm. I really wish we didn't come here. What happened to her? We had a boy. He was something else. What was his name? Rian. Rian. He had her passion and he had my… Stubbornness. And he died. How? I don't want to get into it.

Oh, sorry. You kind of have to tell us. I know. And I will. I'm sorry. But not now. Okay. After he died, she just… Something in her broke. And the heavens broke with it. And she was never the same. Is that what caused the coronet? What do you think? Were you married to the moon? I was. Wait, so… Your honey was the moon? How? He shakes his head. He blows a little bit of air out of his nose and he shakes his head. Where'd you go on your honeymoon? We try really hard not to laugh. Yeah.

And he says… Spirit world. Beautiful. It's a beautiful place to be. Nowhere else like it. Wait, so what are you then? What I am is a man. Just a sad old man. But what were you? A happy man. He's evading. Yeah, he has to tell the truth though. He can evade questions. He can give just enough truth that he doesn't have to directly answer. And he's trying to avoid this. Or he can say, I'll tell you later. Because he means it. But he's not telling you now. Chimes. Yeah. You know what I am. I do.

Why can't you tell me what you are? Do you want me to just lay it out? Yeah. Just in terms that you understand? Yeah. I, Chimes, am the patron of sailors. I was one of the first to take the waves. And I mastered. And over time, they mastered me. What? What? Oh, Jesus. I'm sorry. No, I realize what it sounded like now. There was a different word for that when I was young. This one's pretty new. That one's a newer word I always forget. Master is a very common word when you're a sailor. So seaman.

Seaman. But, uh, yeah, I'm pretty old. I'm sure you've guessed by now. Oh, can I ask one more question? I suppose I am unable to stop you. Was it, was it related to the Exodus? Your son dying? No, no, no, no. Okay. From before? Way before. Long before. Like I said, I was one of the first to take to the waves. When was the last time you were here? Oh, when we closed up that door. Oh. You built the tomb? I helped. Holy fuck. Why would someone want to break in here? They got a score to settle?

With who? With Lillian? No, I'm asking you. Do they have a score to settle? Oh, yes, certainly yes, 100%. If they let her out, she'll get it done. I thought you said she died. Dying's different when you're a god. Somebody's here already? Yes. What, are we gonna fucking sit around all day, busting chops? Let's see what's what. And he, yeah, he slaps his thighs a couple times. Yeah. Slaps his calves, and just, you hear like the, like him, you can hear his bones creaking like old beams. Mm-hmm.

And he just stands up to his full height, which is shorter than most of you, except for Billy. It's interesting, like, we haven't noticed it before, because we've never seen Billy before. Yeah. And he's like, oh, I'm gonna go to the bathroom. I'm gonna go to the bathroom. I'm gonna go to the bathroom. I'm gonna go to the bathroom. I'm gonna go to the bathroom. I'm gonna go to the bathroom.

It's interesting, like, we haven't noticed it before, because we've never been around Chimes when it's been quiet. But, like, now that we're separated from the ocean, he, when he stretches, he sounds like a ship creaking. Yeah. Yeah. And he always smells like salt spray. Yeah. Um. I don't know why this was in my head. Chimes is exactly as tall as my dad. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Pat's not that tall at all. He's not. He's, like, five, six. Yeah, he's a lot shorter than I am.

But he's still got that leathery… Everything in him seems like it's 100 years old. And he's just as vague as your dad. Sure is. We gonna stand around chipper-jabbing all day? No, let's go. Let's fucking figure out… Let's go do some… Fucking… Let's go fuck up the water. Piss. Chime starts doing that brushing, like, go, go, go. Billy's already walking, like, 12 steps down. I'm running my fingers along the wall.

This is what always happens whenever, like, world history is being revealed, is Billy just leaves eventually. He's like, I've seen all this before. I knew the poem. All right. Billy Kai remembers when he says Lillian, and then Rian, he's like, I've heard of Rian, and then he just, like, is gone. Yeah, bye, everybody. And we're like, Billy, come back! And we run. Back, back, back, back, back. Yeah, so, I mean, you can head down these stairs all the way.

Are you looking for anything, or are you just trying to get to the bottom? I'm just touching the wall to see if there's, like, another door-ish kind of thing. You start walking down these steps in the purple light of the axe, and you feel the, like, pressure in the room getting greater. Like, you can feel it's like you have a weight hanging above your head. Our ears are popping. Yeah. We're going below the water level, I think. We are. And after you do a full circuit… Basically, you go down.

Boop, boop, boop, boop. Underneath the landing that you started on, you see another section that's, like, walled in. He chimes. Do you remember what's behind there? Yeah, I do. It's an old practice. Purely ceremonial, but that's the offering room. Offering room? What's that? Sort of a thing. The idea was, since it's a tomb and a prison, it was supposed to both honor Lillian and… And potentially equip whoever was sent to destroy her. It's still sealed. Yeah, I fucking hope so. Uh…

He and he… Are you all just, like… You're all looking at each other and then looking at the door, and chimes is like, don't even fucking think about it. Okay, fine. Yeah, that's… We're not gonna steal your dead wife's shit. Sorry. Damn right you're not. Okay. Let's just keep going. We're mercenaries. It's instinct. Right. We just want to find… We just want to find… We just want to find our stupid wizard. Yeah. And you continue down the stairs?

Wait, can Billy, like, feel for Perel to see if he's down here? I think I'm gonna try… Oh, yeah. Are the walls damp? Yes. Okay. As I'm running my fingers along, I am gonna kind of, like, reach out my vibes for Perel. Oh, through the water. Yeah. Yeah. Sick. Defy danger charisma. A nine. Oh. Nine, okay. I have a jar of the sea graves. Oh, you do? For an aid. Okay. Oh, interesting. Yeah, okay, sure. 2d6 plus bond. Holy shit. 13. Wow. Yeah, so what do you do with this water? Can I just…

He just puts it in my hands. Yeah, totally. Pours a little bit in there. Mm-hmm. And you send your little mental magical pulse through the water on the walls. You feel it, like, course down the structure, kind of mapping it out almost, like… Yeah. Bing, bing, bing. Man, this… Guys, this goes deep. And you get all the way to the bottom, and it hits the floor, and then you're like, oh, it's just fucking webbed feet. Wall to wall. What? And in the middle, there is a man.

And it feels very similar to Perel. And I know I've communicated with him before. Yep. And this is what I'm going to say, since it's a 10. Yeah. You start to reach out, and then it feels wrong, and you pull right back. Ooh. But you're like, that's Perel. I'm going to say hi. No, I am not. And then you pull it back. Oh, no. Guys. Perel's at the bottom. But he feels weird. I should say there's a lot of frogs down there, too. The fuck? We've already deduced that this is the piss monster.

I feel like that confirms it. I think so. Where's Perel, then? Where the fuck is Perel? No, that's Perel. So has the piss monster taken over Perel's body? I think so. So what the fuck do we do? If our friend is, like… What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck do we do? How did we get the piss monster out of Perel before? I died. Well, that's not really enough. Okay, that's… We're not doing that again. He's slowly putting bullets into a .45. What the fuck is that?

Chimes is like, give me that back. Shoves it in his pocket. What does that do? You know what? You don't want to know. How do we… How did… What I will say is that you guys didn't… Didn't. Yeah. No, they were already separated. It leaked out of the box into Billy. And then you removed it from Billy. Oh. Fuck. Shit. Yeah. You didn't meet the physical form of Perel until you freed him in the vault. Hey, I turned to Chimes. I'm like, have you been following what the situation is right now?

I'm putting it together, yeah. Is there another way that we can free our friend from this malignant piece of him? Hey, I… Tuck wouldn't know that word. Malignant? Would… Is there a way that we can get the piss monster out of our friend? Hey, I hate to say it, but you guys are punching above my weight right now. What the fuck are you talking about? You're a goddamn patriot. Uh-huh. How the fuck do we solve this problem? Honestly, I gotta say, I have no fucking idea.

When we first met Piss Monster Perel… Yeah. It was just the Piss Monster version. You mean like back in season two? Yeah. It was Perel was stuck in the box. Yes. Which was… Starting to like open. When it cracked. When it cracked. And the box being near Billy caused the negative aspects of Perel to leech into Billy. And then we went to the pool. Yeah. And… T-bagged him. T-bagged him. And the malignant negative magical energy wanted to go into the place that there was the most magic.

So it went into the water, which is how the Piss Monster escaped. And then we introduced it to the Sea of Graves. Because we trapped it. And then we put it in the vase. And then we stored the vase in fucking Morris Wadges' house. I'm sorry. And then Billy dropped it in the goddamn fucking ocean. I'm sorry. This is exactly the situation that I want. It is like stacked. Like complications on complications. Story threads driving forward to like a breaking point. And now you're kind of fucked.

You guys. Yes. The book. The Aquarius notebook. Oh, yeah. I know. I'm gonna pull it out of my backpack. Someone read it. Ving, you read really well. Fuck you, Tuck. That's fair. No, he's right. I show it to Ving. I'm like, is there anything in here we can use? Flip, flip, flip, flip, flip, flip, flip, flip, flip, flip, flip, flip, flip, flip, flip. It's three. It's three. Plus his intelligence is three. This is… This should be illegal. We need a re-roll. Why do we keep giving Paul dice?

Uh, so… What you do learn from this book is it has fucking nothing to do with this. They had no hand in the prison. It's literally just them spitballing ideas back and forth, mailing a book to each other. What we realize when we read through it is that it is a draft copy of Love and Lust. And they were the original writers of it. No, no, no. You said there's diagrams. There's designs. We looked closer. It's a drug. You have two people having sex. Oh my God. I refuse. No.

What it is, is it's kind of like, um, you know when you just text a friend to bounce an idea off them? Oh, yeah. It's the magical equivalent of that. They sent the book back and forth. And there's like… It's a message thread. Exactly. You'll see a page with like a design that Morris Wadge came up with and be like, what do you guys think? And then like notes from Aquaria and Perel being like… Perel's like, this is a dog shit design.

And then, uh, Morris, you later, uh, further down you see a page that's written obviously by Morris in his handwriting. It goes… A page by Perel. I want to make a bigger frog. I made a pretty big frog before and I'm going to make an even bigger one. This is just a book of bickering egos. And then just a drawing of a really bad frog. And Perel being like, I would never do this. Fuck. Well, there must be a reason she hid it away.

I think she was embarrassed to be associated with these two idiots. Or it meant a lot to her. Yeah. That's really nice. Okay, good. I'm glad we get my shitty world and ruin your sweet book. Yeah, so this book could be useful and interesting, but not in this situation. What about this book, Magic Weather Book? Well, I'll be hot damned. We're in a magic storm. Yes. Maybe it could be useful. Yeah. Tuck. I will try and read. He pulls out a pair of glasses that he's been hiding.

He's so self-conscious about this. Tuck wears glasses? Yeah, he just didn't want everyone to know that he was a fucking nerd. This is huge. Wow. This is bigger than the Lillian thing. Yeah. Tuck wears reading glasses. My best friend is a nerd. My mouth is a gate. Nerd. Nerd. Nerd. We're really giving them a lot of confusing information down there. Yeah, they're like, what is happening? Are they coming to stop us or what? Why are they screaming nerd? I'm like 99% through my evil plan.

I love the idea that Ving and Billy are like, the magician's journal. They should have deep insight into these magical workings. And Tuck is like, cloud up there. Book of cloud. Starts flipping through. Idiot. The book about clouds. Idiot. Clouds are related to this somehow. I've always thought clouds were evil, and this confirms it. I've never trusted clouds before. I've never trusted clouds from the day that my dad died. Bruce Spruce. I saw that chicken, and I saw a bunch of clouds.

I think they colluded together somehow. So I'm going to take this book. And learn about these clouds. And this is Tuck's internal monologue. But he's doing the thing like in a sitcom when someone has an internal monologue, and he's acting it out. Yeah, so he's wearing his fucking nerd glasses, and he's going to. So this is a Spout Lore. Spout Lore. Shit. Fucking. Fuck. Whoa. Holy. That's what I'm saying. Two sixes. Two sixes. Plus intelligence. That's what I'm fucking talking about. Two sixes.

It stays the same. All right. Hey, so here's the reality, gang. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know how you're going to solve this problem. How does this book help you? What does it tell you? Okay. I think it might have something to do with the fact that there's a vortex of cloud above you. That is a coalescing of magical and spiritual energy. Yeah. The spiritual energy is being drawn from below. The thalmic energy is being drawn from above.

And the thalmic energy is being cascaded when there's a buildup in the form of lightning and electricity. Yeah. The electricity is actually. Just raw magic. Raw magic. Raw magic. It's sick. Also, Billy, I should say, the deeper you go in this tower, the more flowers you start feeling in your hair. Oh, my God. I'm like. You have a beautiful midsummer crown. Thank you. And you just like spit up like a fern. Bunch of pollen. Like a kid. A bunch of pollen. Who falls out of his mouth. Yeah.

Puff of yellow pollen out of his mouth. Billy, are you feeling okay? No, I feel weird. Oh, yeah. Tuck and Ving. Your kid is covered in flowers. Yeah. We just noticed. Billy. It's like. Rose. Geranium. Peony. What can we do? How can I help you? Billy, what's happening? I just thought of something. If Billy's reverting back to his fairy state, he's forgetting like himself. I just imagined like the further he got, the more separated from Billy, the human he would become.

So it's like Billy would just keep flowering and then eventually turn into like my summer child. Where you evolve to your next state. Yeah. Like he's forced into the summer. Can you feel. He can't feel it yet, but he knows the process. Yeah. And he's afraid. Yeah. Billy. Now that you're down at this level of the staircase, you can just smell Jasmine in the air. And I take a step back. What's going on, Bill? I don't think I can go any further. Okay. You don't have to.

So I turned to Ving and I'm like, hey, can we can we talk just you and me? Yeah. Yeah. So we we walk off to like have a conversation. Okay. Chimes says. Make it quick. I don't want to risk Billy. We're not going to risk Billy. We're taking him down there. We're risking him. There's always a way out. There's not always a way out. No, I am. Why are we going down to get Perel? But we can't sacrifice Billy to save Perel. Hell no. And we wouldn't. Fucking shit. We can't leave Perel behind, right?

We can't choose Billy over Perel. But we also can't choose. Perel over Billy. That's not who we are. Yeah. We got it. We got to try. I think. I think I know what we have to do. Billy and Chimes have to go back up to the top of the pillar. Ving would have to leave the way we came. And Tuck would have to go down. Okay. So we walk back to Chimes and Billy. And I'm like, I have a plan. But Billy, you might not like it. What? What is it? So. Like, I just want to hear what your ideas were. Yeah. Yeah.

The thing that we just talked about was that, like, there's no way Ving or Tuck would risk Billy. Like, our kid is turning into a flower man. Yeah. And there's, like, no universe where, like, us as parents would be like, let's keep going down. Yeah. Yeah. But then we started thinking, like, larger, too. And it's like, if Billy is reverting to his spirit form, then that has effects on Ving's shapeshifting and Tuck's axe. Oh, shit. Yeah. Oh, fuck. I didn't think of that.

The axe might be useless and I can't. No, the stronger that would be. Yeah, the stronger it would become. But it's like, Ving couldn't shapeshift in the spirit realm. Yeah. Oh, you could just call spirits to you. And the axe. Yeah. Like, Terry, Larry, and Chad would become closer to the aspect of rock. Oh, yeah. The axe would just become an axe without Terry, Larry, and Chad in it. Interesting. Yeah. Because we were only thinking about what the increased spiritual energy would do to Billy. No.

Yeah. It's going to be all connected to the spirit world. Totally. Holy shit. Okay. Yeah. Damn. So what was your plan based on that? Was it leave? No. It's not all of us. Not all of us. And I will say about Tuck, the thing he's most concerned about is that his kid doesn't forget who he is. Yeah. Like, above everything. That's what it is. Okay. So you're not going to risk Billy and you don't want to leave Perel behind. What is your plan?

So Tuck is flipping through the book and he's like, redressing his glasses. It's been so long since he's worn them. Yeah. They're upside down and Ving's like, he takes his glasses on and puts them the other way around. And then Tuck flips the book up. So basically, I get to the part about collections of magical weather systems and the effects that they have on wizards.

And it says that high concentrations of magic in water can allow wizards to separate aspects of themselves, especially if there is a strong dichotomous force within the wizard. Oh. So when Billy was teabagged, there was… Like, the good part of Perel, who tried to save the world, and then the insane part of Perel, like the darkness inside of him that formed from like a hundred years of being trapped in a box.

And it said that that is true of any intense magical field will cause that separation to happen again. And the lightning bolts in this storm in the Sea of Graves are pure magic. So the plan that came was this. We would knock a fucking hole in the water. We would knock a fucking hole in the water. We would knock a fucking hole in the water. We would knock a fucking hole in the water. We would knock a fucking hole in the roof of this pillar. Oh. And open it up to the storm. Mm-hmm.

Then Ving would use the Thunderbird. He would use a natural ally to call down a massive pillar of lightning. Whoa. To create enough of a magical field to allow Perel to free himself. Mm-hmm. Wow. So to make that work, my plan was to send Chimes and Billy back up to the storm. Mm-hmm. And then I would go up to the top of the pillar to hammer that hole in the top with my axe. Uh-huh. I would take the knife, go down, and get ready to pull Perel out of there.

And Ving would leave the way we came and get the Thunderbird and get ready to fly it into the hole that you guys are making. Man, so sick. That's a great idea. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that's the plan, correct? Yeah. Okay. Well, is everyone okay with that plan? Yeah. Yes. Like, that's also risky, but whatever. This whole thing is crazy. It's fucked. It's fucked. Yeah. I think, like, that's just what we're saying, is like, Billy, we can't let you go down any further. It's too dangerous.

Um, I guess I don't feel very good, but I don't want to leave you guys. You won't. This is a way that we can all be together, which is not right now. We just have to split up to make this work. Okay. I mean, this sounds like as good a plan as any. You good? He looks at Tuck. Can I get some of that? You got some fucking armor that was in your wife's, like, treasure chamber? Please. Please. Please, James. Because all I have is this knife, and I pull out the moon knife. If you guys take my axe.

He looks at that, and he snatches it out of your hand. Hey, man. I took that from Billy, fair and square. And he… I stole that from my kid. And he holds it, and he's just, like, tears in his eyes. Oh, no. And he says, technically, you stole it from my kid. What? What? What? This is your son's knife. This is Rian's knife. It was in a free box upstairs. I'm sorry. Sorry, there's a lot of rags. It said free on the side of it. And there's a DVD of Cool Runnings in there. It was empty.

The DVD was empty. The DVD case had just Taylor Swift's red in it. And a bunch of dead earwigs. And he… Yeah, he just says, his mom made it for him. And he clasps his hand around it really tight. And then he slaps it onto your chest. I agree. Damn it. If you lose this, you're gonna regret it. Yeah. Tuck's balls shrivel up. Yes, got it. Yeah, I bet I will. And I guess he takes you to the tribute room. Okay, so he… You get to the top. Yeah. And it's stoned in or whatever.

And Tuck is like, all right, here we go. And he pulls the axe back, and he puts a hand on you. And then he just puts his hand on the stone. And it melts away. What? Whoa. Did I not mention I can do that? No. No, you didn't mention… You made us just walk around feeling around like a bunch of idiots? I guess I did. Boy, is your face red. Come on, come on. And he takes you into this room. I think the majority of it is like over a thousand years old. It's probably unusable.

It's laid out on four statues. Mm-hmm. Set like, boom. Like one, two, and in the back, three, four. And they're all armed and armored. Uh-huh. Like they have silver helmets, silver chest plates, silver greaves, silver bracers, and like a silver sword and a silver shield. And they're all just like covered in moon motifs. Is it silver or is it something else? Because I feel like… Shining. Sorry, it's shining. It's a silver color. Yeah, it's not made of silver. Cool. Wow. And most…

It's beautiful. Sorry. That is what they would have looked like in their heyday. I think most of it… Most of it is like crumbled with time. Oh, shoot. Oh. Yeah. And Chimes goes, ah, hell. And he turns to the three of you like, I probably should have expected that. He goes over to the dehumidifier and it's unplugged. Wow, there's a problem right there. There you go. Shit. So who unplugged the dehumidifier? God damn it.

No, it's plugged into the wall, but there's a switch that's unflipped and he flips it and it turns back and he's like, I keep telling people not to use this switch. And he puts a piece of tape back over it. Do not use. Can I like look around? Or what do you call it? Yeah. Discern reality. Yeah, discern reality. Eight. Eight. So you get one question from the list. What here is useful or valuable to me? Please, Seth. Let's figure it out. Let's figure it out.

So like there's several boxes, well, like stone. Chests. Chests. Stone chests. Yeah. And I'm like, can you guys help me push the lid off this one? Yeah, I do it. And I open it. And it's like shining pieces. Oh. Oh, armor. I see. It's in the chest. So it didn't disintegrate. Yeah. And there's pieces with ward stone. Oh. Integrated how? What's it called? Like inlay. So it's silver colored armor with ward stone inlay. Hot fucking damn. That would be a big deal. Yeah. With a pretty penny.

That's what Bing says to Chime. Oh, danger. Ching. And he just looks at you. I mean, Cha Ching is an honorific where Bing comes from. I know what it means. Good. Okay. I know what I know what Ching means. It means many apologies for the loss of your wife. But at least she was rich. I'm old. I'm not stupid. Okay. So I'm neither. Okay. Okay. I like the idea that it fits Tuck. I also like the idea that he has to make do with what he has. I like that more. It's like you get like a bracer.

I think that that also suits Tuck's style more where he's just like fucking just kicks the box and like scatters everything across the ground. Chimes is like, come on. Dude, what the fuck? You know me. Come on. Don't be disappointed in this. Yeah. We have to rummage through for the goods. Yeah. We don't know how to. We can't. We can't. We can't. I just want you to understand that you're saying the words rummage in my wife's tomb. How else are you supposed to find things? Yeah. Reverently. Okay.

I will reverently rummage or whatever. And yeah, we just start going through it. And I think Tuck, like it is, the armor is like really small. It's too small for Tuck. But there is one leather. Bracer. Bracer. Bracer. No, I think it's, I think it's metal. Oh yeah. I think it's, I think it's a metal grieve. It's a leg over Tuck's forearm. Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. It was for a leg, but it fits over your arm. Yeah. Some of this might fit Bing too.

He's very, Bing's very tall, but he's like kind of normal human width. Yeah. I'll take, I can take on some, but doesn't want to be weighed down. Yeah. I think that's Tuck. Yeah. He's like a, he's like a real natural guy. Yeah. Yeah. Like both of you are looking at this armor. Like, I don't know. I mean, it's really flashy. Yeah. I don't want to look, I don't want to be that guy. It's a little too chitching, you know? Shows up in armor. Sorry.

I was imagining this like discovery of an amazing and ancient suit of like anti-magic armor. Yeah. And you're all like, I don't know. And you look over at Bill and he's like drumming on the helmet. I would never. I know. I'm being reverent. So yeah, I take, I take the grieve, like the leg piece and I strap it around my arm and I loop the leather holster for the neck. And I slide the knife through this, one of the straps and I slide the knife in there. Rian's knife. Cool. Yeah.

And I'm like, this is all I need. I think. Can you please wear this chain mail? Just in case. Oh, it's so cute. And he's like, holding it up with all this strength. And I'm like. I don't want to leave you. Okay. Okay. Billy, I'll put it on. Okay. And I put it on and it's a half shirt on me. Crop tops. Crop tops. It's a mesh half shirt. Yep. It looks good. Yeah. Thanks. Those greaves kind of look like big puffy socks. Tuck has an additional point of armor. Cool. Cool.

Ving finds a little, a chain that was holding on a cape. It's like, I don't know, three feet of silk, the silver material chain. Yeah. Sweet. He wants to attach it to his bird, the wooden bird thing, puts it around his neck and finds a, there's a glove. That's one of the silver. It's a silver unarmored glove. Ooh. He puts on over top of his messed up hand. That's cool. Mm-hmm. Oh, he has just one silver glove. Nah. Why? What's wrong with that? Shimon. Does this look cool? Shimon.

Tell me the truth. Shimon. Yeah. Okay. Sweet. So you have like a gauntlet and a necklace. Yeah. Yeah. Billy, find anything? Do you want the other gauntlet? Yeah. You know what? That makes sense. Yeah. I'll take both gauntlets. That's good. Yeah. I should wear both of them. That's a good point. I am wearing the helmet, but it's definitely too big. For me. Yeah. What's the thing that Billy could find? What about daggers and stuff? Oh, yeah. Because you only got rocks. Yeah. There's like, yeah.

There's a very high quality silver dagger. I'll take that. Sweet. It's like a sword on me. Yeah. That's true. Yeah. It's basically a short sword. So you have like a short sword instead of a dagger. Ooh. What if so he's not just throwing rocks? Billy finds a sling. Oh. Like just off, like not even in this chest. There's just like a sling off in a corner. Yeah. It's not the greatest quality, but I'll take it. Cool. Are you done robbing my wife's tomb? Look, we're just trying to help. I know.

I know. I'm sorry. I'm being, I'm feeling touchy. I know. There's a bunch of frogs down there, like wrecking the place. Oh, if you think I'm frustrated with you, you should wait until I get a hold of them. Okay. Everybody done? Yes. All right. Let's get the hell out of here. All right. And you guys like leave back onto the land. He's like, wow, you know what? I got to say for a bunch of evil frogs, they're being super accommodating. I was going to say that too.

But he's like, that must mean that they're close or focused. So we should get a move on. Yeah. And I turn and I bring Bing in and I give him a hug and I'm like, if I don't get out of this, you got to, you have to take care of Billy. I can't do it on my own. Tuck, you're getting out of this. Yeah. Bing reaches over and grabs the handle of one of the rotten swords and snaps off the rusted sword and then holds his hand up in front of his face, his stump of a crystal hand. Uh-huh.

And forms it and it slowly goes up into the shape of a purple amethyst billhook and then snaps it off. Whoa, fuck. Jams it into the handle and says, here, you're going to need this. Thanks, man. Is this one impenetrable? Yeah. Yeah. I grab him and I hug him tight and I'm like, I missed it so much. And I kneel down and I bring Billy in and I hug him. I hug you back. And I'm like, you stick with Jams, okay? Yeah. Take these. What do you have? Two feathers. Okay. Okay. I take the feathers.

Just for good luck. I tie them into my beard. Thanks, Billy. I'll see you later. I'll see you later. You promise? I promise. You promise? I promise. Pinky promise. Pinky promise. Rub a dub dub. In the tub of love. Okay. I turn to Jams and I give him the axe. I'm like, you take care of these guys. You hand him the axe and he sags under its weight for a second and goes, holy hell. Okay. Good. Tuck just takes one last look at everyone. He's like, all right, guys. I'll see you later. Okay.

See you soon, buddy. See you really soon. And I start walking downstairs. I hate to see him leave, but I love to watch him go. Billy doesn't say anything. He just watches Tuck walk into the darkness. And the camera hangs on that image for a second. Ving and Billy watching their friend descend into God knows what. Oh, my God. And Chime stands beside you with Tuck's axe over his shoulder as Tuck walks to his potential death. And that's where we're going to end it for this week.

I'm your game master, Sean O'Hara. Joining me as always, playing Fat Billy, the Halfling Thief, Jessica Tai. Bye, everyone. Playing Ving, the Half-Elf Druid, Paul Oppers. See you soon. Playing Tacoma Dome, the Barbarian, Abdul Aziz. Thank you to Aaron Reed for our amazing intro and outro music. And thank you to all of our amazing supporters. Susporters. Susporters. I actually saw somebody. On the fag club say, whenever Sean says supporters instead of susporters, I get a little sad.

Yeah, I saw that too. So this one's for you, name forgotten. Because of my bad memory, not because you're forgettable. I love each and every one of you. You can find us on social media at speltloremostplaces, including patreon.com slash speltlore. And that's it, man. We'll see you next week. We're going to see how this wraps up. Bye, everybody. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.

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