Episode 6 – Gangs of Highspear

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 Billy'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 Welcome to Spell Lawyer everybody, welcome back I'm your gaming host, Game Master Sean O'Hara, with me as always, playing Tacoma Dome the Barbarian, Abdul Aziz Hey, hi, hello How are you doing?

I'm good, I'm doing an intro, is that cool with you? Yeah Playing Fat Billy the Halfling Thief, Jessica Tai Yes, hello Playing Shathane the Elf Ranger, Mark Robertson Hi guys And we're playing our game today Okay Wee!

Okay, so at security headquarters, it takes a couple hours, but Cartwin has finished painting portraits for Tuck and Billy I think Wicker is in Billy's portrait, as per Billy's request Yeah, he is Yeah, so Cartwin spent some time doing very small, very delicate painting with some watercolors that is very precise I posed with my guitar Okay I insisted on it Yeah, so what does that look like? It's just you like, doing a power stance?

Yeah, it was hard to, it was me, so I had my, I was like in the, you know, the Star Wars poster, it looked like that I had the guitar up in the air Right With one, where the lightsaber would be Right, it was really hard to get that into like a two inch by two inch watercolor portrait She did a good job though Yeah, she's good at painting Thanks Cartwin She says, no problem Do you think I can use this for like a dating profile?

I think it would be difficult Yeah Because it's just one small painting It's It's attached to this ID badge, if you wanted to carry it around with you later, I guess you could Yeah Great, so she explains that she's happy to help you, she has an idea of how she can get you in contact with the spirit world She says, I haven't done it in decades, not since, and she kind of looks at Shathane and doesn't say anything explicitly, but she's like, it's fine I don't know if she's happy to help me, but she's like, it's been a long time But I just need to go back to my place, I've got some supplies there from back in the day, and once we get that, then I should be able to help you out Okay, do you need us to take you there?

I don't think it's safe for us to travel in the mall right now Yeah At all, I don't know what's going on with the hot meat boys Yeah, remember you may or may not have instigated a gang war Right Yeah Just a couple hours ago, you killed, I want to say five men?

That reminds me, we have to update something, and I turn around and I flip over a flip chart, and on the back, tiny little portraits of all the gangsters in the mall, done by Cartwin, all connected up with colored yarn Wow And I get out my red paint, and we cross off the ones that died Whoa And cross their names out Wow Heavy Really, seems like you have a murder wall here A bunch of people that you're planning to kill, and seems like we're just helping you work your way through this murder list Nah, I just need to keep track of what's going on in the mall, who's doing what Okay So you've got a list and like a chart of all three of the gangs All three, yeah Crazy Can I examine it a little bit?

Yeah, absolutely Is there any specific information you're looking for? I want to know who is directly above and underneath the people that we just killed Looking at the chart, you see that those five or six people, are the ones that are killed, right?

Yeah So those five or six people were basically reporting to a lieutenant of the head of the Hot Meat Boys, which you have named Veranda Okay A dwarf woman, and we haven't talked about what dwarves are like, so we don't know much about her Except that there are rumors that she's a cannibal or something like that Sure You said that! I know, I don't remember Oh man It's just a rumor!

So they're two levels below Yeah, yeah, yeah So they were basically just like foot soldiers Okay And you get the idea that tracking down Billy for this crystal seems like a thing they were doing pro bono Like this was just their thing that they wanted to do Gave them a bono Yeah, exactly Tell me the name of the lieutenant That they reported to?

Yeah Just give me one Uh, uh, uh Skimpy McGee Alright Jessica jumped in with Skimpy McGee Cool So Skimpy, Skimpy was the uh, is the lieutenant that they report to of the Hot Meat Boys Is there a picture of him on this wall? Sure What does he look like?

He's got a round face, and uh, he's kinda given like a cool peace symbol, like yo what up And um, he's just got a face of a man Wow Really knocking it out of the park It's been a while since we've played It's hard cause he's wearing all his clothes are the same color as the skin so everything's like beige Yeah He looks like he's naked, like a skin color A little bit, yeah You have to look twice and you're like, oh there's a tie Yeah, oh and he's wearing a turtle neck Yeah Cool Good for him Or there's something wrong with his neck Something's wrong with him Yeah, so Skimpy McGee, that's him Uh, what race is he?

He looks human He's beige Again, it's hard to pick out features, he could be anything The beige race Fantasy race of beige, he's from a place called Beige Yeah And the people from Beige Beige Beige Beige Beige Beige Beige Beige Beige Beige Beige Beige Beige Beige The people from Beige are also called Beige Yeah So, yeah, there's information on the Rock Pirates and the Cool Treat Kids, which we don't know too much about Let's give just a quick, quick summary of the Rock Pirate Clan, what's their deal, where do they headquarter themselves Um, well we talked about how we saw that there were, the mall is in disrepair and actually as you guys were traveling up you noticed that like, curbs and things, rocks were missing missing there's like people are stealing rocks and building materials and it seems like these guys basically are hoarding we don't know what they're building with it but this is a major problem it's starting to at first it was just a couple pieces missing here and there then doors and locks and sinks and so they're really just hoarding building materials for something I suspect they're they're at first we thought where they were selling it but just the sheer quantity they're clearly trying to build something but we have no whoa oh my god that's intense what are they building who knows I'm intrigued by this mystery let's abandon the current narrative to follow this it's a an issue in the principality um and uh you know my responsibility is really just to make sure the mall doesn't fucking fall apart and and burn to the ground so you think the rock pirate clan expands outside of the mall oh yeah for sure there's like there's issues with the the spire there's issues with other buildings around stuff's just going missing interesting that's pretty cool wow yeah because the spire is like a magical artifact it just floats there it was built by a wizard yeah yeah so if they're stealing pieces off of that they've got some fucking juice behind them yeah totally so and do you know where they're headquartered in the mall do they have a location no they're kind of they're just like transient sometimes they'll just set up a little shop somewhere and then we'll figure out that that's them running it and then we'll you know go there to shut them down they'll be gone already and like all the shop fittings and the fucking door will be gone and carpet will be rolled up and everything's gone and then yeah nice are they what do they dress like are they like with peg legs and eye patches they look exactly like pirates they lean into the pirate thing yeah cool hard you guys should be figuring this out though oh yeah it's like they're looking like pirates and they're all coming in with like gold teeth and stuff like that yeah I don't know if they're like pirates and they're like that you guys should this is your fault there's lots of pirates yeah also not every pirate it's really not cool to profile can you like not to just assume a pirate is a member of the rock pirate clan that's fucking racist not really all pirates what were you gonna say about frisking like do you frisk all the pirates is that allowed are you suggesting they stop and frisk it's a method that has been used in other billions racial profile if we see a pirate with a backpack uh most stores will make them leave their backpack at the front counter wow man that's fucked up I see your point tuck yeah my views have changed okay hold on I I get down I get down on one knee I look billy in the face and I put my hand I guess on his shoulder but it also like goes it's basically on his whole side yeah and I look him in the eyes I'm like all right this is a teachable moment my mind is open yes so it's important to understand that while social circumstances can lead certain members of a national group to act a certain way not all members of that national group act that way unless they're goblins or dwarves it's fine for goblins and dwarves they're fucking shit they're shit people okay we're learning stuff about either goblins and dwarves or tuck billy's writing this all down and I'm like oh my god I'm so sorry I'm so sorry I'm so sorry I'm so sorry down also there's a pirate nation like a pirate nation oh really whoa that is cool like or is it a bunch of ships strung together in a calm ocean could be the sea of calm nope nope also billy's writing this all down despite the fact that he is illiterate oh yeah calm ocean he's like how would I remember yeah how does that look when billy writes it so it's just a series of pictograms that are hot dogs and cookies yeah and cakes and then he like checks it off and is like yeah good and then he draws a face for the pirate and he's like good but also bad to make it equal and fair yeah exactly I'm proud of you thank you beautiful do we have any information on the cool treat kids uh the cool treat kids started back some years ago a number of years ago and it started when all the parents who would take their kids on like shopping trips they would go to the store and they would go to the store and they would go to the store and they would leave them at the daycares but because the mall is so big they like couldn't always remember which daycare they left the kids at and so they'd be there for like days and weeks at a time and then these kids were like well no one's coming for us we have to band together and so they survived by like dumpster diving and like you know eating ice creams and burgers and other hot dogs that are just like laying around in the food court and they would you know as they're getting their skills improved they were able to eat less garbage and more like what do you call it when you like bully people into giving you stuff stealing oh like yeah yeah like extortion extorting people for food yeah anyway it got pretty serious and so now they're just like a bunch of regga muffins who are in it for themselves yeah are they connected to the old um that old chocolate factory factory at all uh why wouldn't they be for sure they are I mean a bunch of like hungry kids yeah a chocolate factory like they are swarming that zone oh so that's they ruined the chocolate factory yeah they really did they ruined the abandoned chocolate it wasn't abandoned when they started it was a perfectly good running chocolate it was but the kids you know they would just like go diving headfirst into the chocolate rivers and like in the chocolate pots and they were like well this shit is unusable now sorry um it's just a bunch of chocolate kids yeah so and this is the one that was that used to be like wizard run or whatever yeah that's sweet so that so this was like pre-exodus so they've been around for a long time and also when the kids like hit a certain level of puberty they graduate to the hot meat boys oh I see oh they get recruited hot meat boys recruit they do the cool tree kids what level of puberty all right so this is basically a long uh way of saying that it is not safe for you to be walking through the mall yeah we're confident yeah I'm feeling good about the fight billy's amped off of that fight from earlier yeah he's like doing this what is it what did he do he's dabbing yeah as a youth it's on it's unavoidable he saw it when he was in the food court and he was like I'm gonna try that that looks like a cool thing to do okay so she leads you out of uh security headquarters yeah yeah so and then I but when she leaves before I go through the door too I stop shithane and I'm like hey she asked me to come back to her house with her and then I wiggle my eyebrows at her like you get it I'm just gonna shake my head this is it's far more dangerous than you guys have any idea hey man like we don't ever have any idea that's clear that's clear so it is so dangerous in the mall for you now that you've pinged the attention of the hot meat boys and I'm gonna get you guys to undertake a perilous journey role when you travel through hostile territory choose one member of the party to act as trailblazer one to scout ahead and one to be quartermaster each character with a job to do roles plus wisdom so choose who's gonna be who um well you've traditionally been the trailblazer no but you said you wanted to be the scout I guess yeah and as an elf ranger yeah every you don't even have to be the scout you don't have to be the scout you don't have to roll for this the elf ranger move is when you undertake a perilous journey your job succeeds as if you've rolled a 10 plus wow so the trailblazer uh is determines how long it takes to get there the scout determines if you're spotting any trouble fast enough to get the drop on it and the quartermaster reduces the number of rations I'll take that okay and I'll take whatever is left trailblazer yeah trailblazer I am trailblazer so she says that if you're walking through the mall uh billy just gets hungry yeah of course so how many of those two rations do you think billy eats I mean I guess I failed so I probably eat both because I think I probably have more yeah more so billy eats two days worth of food while walking through the mall just as a snack so mark off both of those rations it's been five minutes yeah I'm sorry and tuck you're walking part one is trying to lead you like the fastest way and you are just the worst kind of person to be in a mall with because you're like whoa they got smoothies what what did we call the music shortened mclean is that yeah I think that's what you call short mclean you're about half an hour into uh the walk and you see shortened mclean there's a picture of like a person playing a guitar like a little drawing on the sign and you see like two for one albums repairs rentals all that sort of stuff oh sick lessons they got one of those recording studios to go and record your own singing oh yes please so cartman's like I don't know if we really have time but tuck's already done it so I'm gonna go ahead and do it okay like already walking sick yeah so she looks at chathane we don't have time for this he's gonna do what he's gonna do there's nothing we're gonna be able to do to stop him we just if he's not there I can't and then I yell back hey I have poor impulse control and I'm too big for people to control me she looks up at the windows and sees the sun moving and looks at tuck like okay we'll just we'll make it quick what is billy doing he's like following and eating just enjoying himself mm-hmm okay yeah yeah so in the store there is a very dissatisfied looking youth behind the counter with a piece of metal through one of their nostrils and unnaturally dark hair most likely died in a really tattered shirt and pants just kind of leaning on the counter welcome to shorten mclean we have a two-for-one special if you need any help my name is duggan and I'll be at the counter hey duggan hi uh I have a broken guitar let me see it here he looks at the guitar he's like oh this has got more heads than you would think more than you need uh this one's broken we can fix this okay cool thanks it'll take 20 minutes just please feel free to look around okay I'll do that and he basically opens a chute and throws it down oh and you hear like clang clang clang clang clang clang and then he closes the chute is it okay down there yeah we've got elves down there it shouldn't take long you have elves down there yeah we've got elves down there yeah we've got elves or elves elves oh yeah they're good at this they're great yeah or do you pay them hard to say please feel free to look around this will be done soon feel like it was a yes or no question and he's turned around and he's like writing on a pad whatever the fantasy equivalent of being on the phone would be what are you writing it's my poetry oh cool can I can we read it I don't know can we I'd love to hear him recite some of it yeah yeah and he's like acting like he doesn't want to we're like dug in dug in dug in he flips his hair out of his eyes goes okay but you can't tell anybody because it's not ready this is just a look into my soul it's called a look into my soul by dug in death mall it's fitting okay verse one have a look into my soul when you look into my soul you will see that it is dark and inside the darkness is my soul as that's happening I wander away he doesn't notice yeah yeah he doesn't notice inside my soul is more darkness and inside that darkness is my soul souls upon souls darkness within darkness that is a look into my soul verse two and then we cut to whatever tacoma's doing I'm at the albums and I'm like yeah it's just a big bear it's like a big bucket full of glass bottles and is anyone with me there's like a just a couple people milling about what about that woman that we're with cartwin no she's listening to duggan's poetry okay no one's with me nope okay no I'm really I I feel like this could go somewhere I'm in the drum room oh okay trying out drumming away yeah wait you're just wailing on some drums it's sealed up so you just see my arms flying around but you know some shit's going down so what's tuck doing I'm just like opening the like little samplers on top of the bottles yeah there's like little glass vials yeah tied to it that give you just a little taste yeah just like when you go to the yeah just like when you go to the liquor store and there's like a tiny vodka on top of a big vodka yeah exactly yeah I'm just opening it up and I'm like that's that's not what you're supposed to do with those little bottles wait isn't it like a sampler like you just try it no it's like costco there's free samples attached to all the things you're supposed to buy yeah yeah so you're just cracking them open and there's like little loot solos coming out oh yeah pretty good one is just a scream oh and like drums fuck yeah and then there's a there's a barrel to the side that says uh speed metal and it's like a bunch of metal flasks oh yeah yeah okay crack one of those well so as when you open it uh it just goes like and duggan's like don't please hey you gotta buy that okay he like huffs and then he continues his poem so on the third level of my soul is inscribed memories of my father and his soul so billy while you're listening to the poem getting kind of into it it's really making you feel introspective you feel strange like you felt when you when you were coming to the mall when you were traveling from bulrush village and we've talked about how when billy gets hungry he thinks he's you know he was having visual hallucinations of black spots in the corner of his vision or seems like shadowy forms and that starts happening again weird because I just ate two days of food so exactly billy tries to shake it off it does go away and then appears somewhere else in your vision and instead of it being in the corner of your vision this one's much stabler then you shake your head again and that one goes away and then it's gone but next to you just outside of you you hear can you see me where you look and next to you is perel oh he he kneels down he says you can see me now right yeah spectacular what are you doing here I've just I've got a lot to explain and you look around and you notice that duggan is frozen mid speech okay and tuck as you see tuck frozen cracking a bottle and you see cartwin kind of shaking her head but her hair's flipped out because she's been shaking it and it's frozen in time says I've been trying to get in contact with you since since the pool you remember at the pool yeah and then I try to punch him he uh he your your little fist goes right through him says it's not quite that simple and then I grab my knife so you're welcome to try okay so I take a big swing right through him ever since the pool what was removed from you that wasn't me that was some darker part of me while I was stuck in this box I was pouring into you my frustration my anger my ambition my rage and that's what got stuck in you and as you removed that from yourself it was removed from me do you do you understand I do but I don't buy this garbage how do I get out of here it says please please please I'm just trying to I'm just trying to explain something I'm trying to talk to you person to person well then do it says when I was alive I tried to do real work real good work and I think that I have that opportunity again thanks to you thanks to your friends and I just I want to help you okay but but how how you showed real power in that pool no regular person should be able to do what you do there's something else here do you know anything about your parents um no uh I just know that I've been around for a while and no one wanted me and that poem is really like it's really hitting me in the feelers why are you bringing this up in the pool you showed raw potential that that energy that left you that was unchecked it was focused only on you and I don't know if you can see it but I through the help of that crystal but that power is inside you the ability to manipulate these energies these forces is within you and with my help you could refine it don't you want that you don't want power I don't know it seems like hard stuff and this gives me a headache talking to you okay well just think about what I said because I'll be here where and he kind of looks over at takoma he's like you know nearby okay he says just think about what I said and he reaches his hand out yeah and puts it on your shoulder and you feel real weight for just a second just a second okay he says just think about what I said okay we'll talk soon okay and he disappears everything starts moving again and you hear duggan go and his soul so takoma while you're cracking music uh and hearing and kind of listening to duggan recite his poem you look over to make sure he's not watching you steal more music and you think for just a second you see somebody kneel down next to billy but there's nothing there and then it cuts back to and I've opened nine of these and they're all still they're all playing simultaneously I'm like oh yeah this is crazy this is making me feel crazy then we cut back to to duggan and he says in conclusion darkness souls souls darkness the end by duggan death maul what'd you think um I think we got somewhere but then we missed it well you're a little kid so okay yeah that's true I'm gonna contemplate what you said and billy just leaves I'll roll out of the drum room and I'm like and I hear all of the bottles playing away and I see you there and I'm like what the fuck but uh I'll go over to you because weren't the wasn't music a way that uh like news traveled around oh yeah yeah it was like information yeah did you bother to try and open any that might you're gonna steal all this music you may as well try and get something that's gonna help us man it's not stealing it's called pirating and it's fine everybody does it pirating that's how you lose all the urinals in the bathroom and carwin comes up and says whether or not everybody does it doesn't matter we've got work to do and if we keep if we keep dicking around we're gonna get jumped by the hot meat boys we don't have time for this we need to go now hold on there's just one more that I want to open and this one is important it's a speed metal album called the sea of graves and then in parentheses it says is uh is a guitar solo uh and then in another set of parentheses it says but with lyrics yes you!

And then in underneath it says 94 minutes spectacular and and then it's another set of parentheses it says one song it's a big bottle so you're opening this right now I'm gonna can I just steal it I'll just steal it for now okay roll a 2d6 plus dexterity if you're gonna try and steal this uh that's five plus four is nine so you you're trying to do it casually and you just grab randomly like you put it down so duggan's not looking and you're like oh my god you're looking away so duggan doesn't see that you're trying to steal something so you're just grabbing randomly and you shove a random bottle in your back are you fucking kidding me seven to nine partial success you steal something we all want to know what's going on in the sea of graves yeah but you did but you rolled a seven to nine so you can either risk getting busted and steal the one you want or you can grab randomly and not get caught okay fine I won't get caught okay and cartman says are we done here are we done yeah I just gotta grab my guitar you hear a ding ding ding and duggan opens the the shoot and it just goes and pops right up out of there and he grabs it out of the air says your bass guitar is done thanks yeah two coins please okay and uh yeah and it is fixed and carl says all right that was I hope this was worth it for you if we all get stabbed in an alley remember that this all happened I will yeah and our twin she starts walking away okay to the residential area at that shit then you know that as in the direction of the residential area you're pretty close now you're maybe 30 minutes away and I should have just bought it I have like so many coins it's fun to steal stuff yeah says this head of security then I high five I'm like yeah so as you're walking um shithane tantamile is sort of keeping an eye on the crowds and she's alerting you to hot meat boys in the area that are either looking for you or trying to get a angle on you but thanks to her keeping an eye out and you keeping an eye out, you're able to avoid the worst of it.

We're outside of the mall now. You're inside the mall. She's walking to a residential area in the mall. It used to be just a storage area. It was a warehouse, a really big series of warehouses, but people have built it into separate apartments and there are little living zones hanging from the roof. It's one of the extremely repurposed areas of this very, very old mall. Are there any enchanted things around? Not enchanted, but magic.

As we have established, there is a vague difference between those two things. We've talked about how there were floating platforms and elevators from the chocolate factory that don't work anymore, but they still float. You see that people have dragged some of those probably at great effort into this area and built living areas on top of and also hanging underneath. There are some sections of the residential neighborhood. You basically have two walls.

You're walking in between series of apartment buildings and then there are hanging clusters of apartments here and there attached by rope bridges or rope ladders. Cartwin leads you into a pretty tight and narrow living area, like a really tightly packed apartment building. It's kind of tough for you to walk through, Tuck. You've got to go sideways once in a while.

She gets to a corridor that's very high up on both sides and has balconies, and she stops in a hallway and says, there should be more people out here. Something's up. I put Wicker down and I'm like, go find it. Wicker meows, but doesn't leave. Oh, okay. I'll find it, I guess. Discern realities? Yeah. What is Billy doing? Oh, I guess, yeah, that's smart. I should discern realities first. Yeah, so that's 2D6 plus wisdom, I believe. That's a six again. I want to help him. Yeah, you can do that.

How is Tuck helping Billy with this? I can hold him up higher so he can see more. I guess crouching on the ground probably didn't help. Yeah, you're pretty low to the ground. I was kind of the same level I was standing. So I'm like, do you see anything? No. Well, I see and then there's like a candy and I put it in my mouth. Okay, that was not candy, but I'll lift you up. You gotta stop eating stuff off the ground, Billy. Yeah, it is astounding that you are never sick. Yeah, it's pretty good.

Lifetime of eating stuff off the ground. I'm like, do you want me to hold you up? Sure. Yeah, so that is a partial success. For both of us. So I take him and I put him on my head and I was like, everyone yield to King Tacoma. And I'm like, yeah, and I put up double thumbs up. So Billy's just a crown? Yeah. And as we mentioned, there's nobody out here. So nobody sees you doing this. What a waste. Yeah, exactly. Cartwin and Chathain see you doing this.

Okay, so we look at them and then we're like, pretty cool, right? We just made it up. On the spot. If you want to remain inconspicuous, this is perfect. Cool. Nice job. And then I high five his head. That's the sound of Billy slapping Tacoma's head. So on a seven to nine with discern realities, you get one question. And the list is what happened here recently? What is about to happen? What should I be on the lookout for? What here is useful or valuable to me? Who's really in control here?

What here is not what it appears to be? I would recommend what is about to happen. Yeah, let's do that. You want to do that? So Cartwin mentions, I live down there just like four more doors down. And you see that her door is cracked open. Oh, we should not go in there. Or we should go in guns. Fucking blazing. That's true. And so I. So I unsheathed my axe. Yeah. And I turned to Shathane and I'm like, can we go fucking nuts? I haven't done anything all morning. I am so cranked up right now. Yeah.

Ordinarily listening to all of the speed metal albums got me like I am having a panic attack. Every element of my being tells me not to do this. But we we definitely need to get what's in there. Yeah. Can I run in and do shoot first? Yeah. Well, yeah. Basically, Billy can get in there and make a move before anybody else reacts. Yes. So Billy would basically lead. I guess in this case, Billy would lead the charge. But because the Billy has been the deadliest part of our team for a while.

He's scary. He's really scary now. You thought you had impulse control. So you can try and sneak up if you want. But sneak. He is not as fun. And I imagine Billy had already started running with his dagger. Yeah. Okay. So. So what happens is he does. He trips because it's like a cobblestone ground. And so he kind of like is rolling really fast. Like a bowling ball. He's got his like knife held out to the side. Yeah. And so you're rolling and you what you hit the door.

The door is being propped open because a hot meat boy is like peering out. But he's looking the other way. So basically. Yeah. Billy crashes into this door and it hits somebody. You hear what?

And then they hit the ground and everybody else in the room turns around because there's three hot meat boys in this small apartment and they are tossing the place like they've pulled drawers out of out of dressers and turned them over and there's chests open and there's smashed plates and bowls and stuff like that. But this guy hits the ground in the middle of the room. He looks pretty young, maybe like 16 or 17 years old. Human human guy.

And the three of the other hot meat boys turn around and they're shocked. And Billy's just standing there. Oh, yeah. Well, I get up and I'm like, hey, guys. And then I because of. Yeah. I'm still kind of reeling from both the moral lesson that taught me earlier and the poetry. And so I'm feeling like righteous. And I'm like, you shouldn't touch. You shouldn't touch stuff that isn't yours. And then I run at them. Yeah. Yeah. Also, keep in mind, Billy is a thief. Yeah, exactly.

You can't steal from people. Only I can steal from people. That poetry really spoke to something deep inside. Well, it was a lot of repeating words. It was like. Soul's darkness. It was making me so fucking bored. I just needed to do something. So Billy has made that declaration and is apparently the avenging angel of this situation. Yeah. So now you have an opportunity to act because there's a guy on the ground. That is how he knocked over by a door. Okay. Right in front of you.

So what do you do? I guess I. Oh, man, I'm going to have to kill him or something. I mean, you can attack people and not kill them. That's true. You can choose not to. Police. We're the police. We can arrest them. Yeah. Okay. Billy, do you have cuffs on you? I don't. So I don't know what to do. And I'm feeling, again, feeling moral, feeling moral feelings. I don't know how to describe it. Yeah. So Billy just slaps the kid in the face and he's like, stop it. It's just a kid, right? Okay.

All right. I don't even know what that would be. I guess it's a hack and slash, right? Yeah. It would be a hack and slash if you just slap him. Yeah. I slap him. Okay. So it's a hack and slash. 2d6 plus strength. Oh, seven. Okay. So on a seven to nine, you deal your damage to the enemy. So you're just slapping this kid as hard as you can. Three. Okay. But it's emotional damage because he feels embarrassed. Yes. So you just slap him right in the face. Yeah. And he goes.

But then on a seven to nine, he also deals damage to you. So he's like, hey. And then he slaps you. Damn. Yeah. So Billy gets slapped in the face and you take two damage. All right. Yeah. You hit him harder, though. His eyes teared up a little bit. Yeah. And he felt extra dumb because his friends cry. Almost cry because he got smacked by a child. And just two weeks ago, he was a cool treat kid. Yeah. Yeah. He's new. Yeah. So Tacoma, you charge in behind Billy. No, I don't charge you.

Oh, what do you do? I turned to Cartoon and I'm like, hey, what are these walls made out of? Wood. Okay. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. And then I turn around. And I smash through the wall next to the door. Okay. Go ahead and roll 2d6 plus strength for a defy danger. Wow. 14. Wowzers. Wow. So the thing is, though. This may be the first double six I've gotten. It is. In the whole three seasons of recording. Yeah, it is. You just. You just crash through this wooden wall. You wreck the wall.

You smash through. And there was a hot meat boy near the wall who is looking at his friend get slapped by a child. And yeah, he gets. You just come through this wall and there's a kid right in front of you. And he's like, whoa. I get in there and I see what just happened. I see a tiny handprint on this 16 year old kid's face. I see a big handprint. On Billy's face. Yeah. And I'm like, oh, I guess this is what we're doing. And then before the kid has a chance to respond, I smack him in the head.

Oh, my God. All right. Hack and slash. Five plus two is seven. Okay. So, yeah. Roll your damage. One. One. Great. So you slap him and he goes. And then he slaps you. Roll a d6. Five. Yeah. He nails you. Wow. What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? You have a fight or flight response. You come through the wall and slap him.

And he gets really scared and leans back and just wails on your face. You know that when the side of your whole face goes numb? Yeah. And also, I start to tear up a little bit. Yeah. And I feel embarrassed. Some of it is emotional damage. Yeah. And Cartman sees you crash through the wall and slap this guy and looks at you then like, what are they doing? And she runs into her apartment and she just spear tackles one of the kids into a room. Into a shelf. And Shathane, what do you do? Who else?

Who's left? There's one person that hasn't been slapped or spear tackled into a bookshelf. So I just walk in the front door, see what's left, see this guy standing there and I'm like, you want to get smacked too? Roll a defy danger charisma. Are you just trying to like talk him down? Yeah, basically. Defy danger charisma. Eight. He puts up his hands? He goes, hey, I don't want to get smacked. But you know how it is. Like we're here. We're here on Veranda's orders.

Like we can't just, we can't just walk away empty handed. No, I'm going to arrest this guy and we're going to interrogate them. It's like, you just, you know what? If we can bring her a little bit of, you know, and he starts doing the money thing, rubbing his fingers together. Were you here looking for money? We're just looking for whatever, man. You guys decide to just kill a bunch of our guys and you think that nothing's going to happen. We know Cartwin. We know where she lives.

Well, obviously we're here right now. What's your name? Fantasy name generator. No, no, no. You come up with the name. Billiam. Wow. And so I go up to him and I slap him. He's tall. So do you slap his leg or do you try and? Yeah, I slap his leg. I don't have time to climb him. Are you, is this a hack and slash? Yes. Okay. So yeah. Jesus. Okay, nine. Nine. Okay. Also, I kick him. Okay. So roll your damage. Five. Five. Damn. Nice. Wow.

So you just kick him really hard or punch him or something in the leg? Yeah, I slap him and then I kick him. Okay. In the same spot. So you like, as a short guy, short kid, you're probably used to having to hit people lower down. Yeah. So you just hit him right in the spot that you know makes tall people buckle? So yeah, his knee buckles and he goes down under his knees so he's face to face with you and then you grab his face. Yeah, gently. But I kind of press his cheeks together.

I'm like, respect our name. So Billy basically took this kid out. Cartwin's like, got this kid. So she spear tackled the one kid into a bookshelf and she's got her arm up against his neck and she's just yelling at him. I just wanted to stay here. I wanted to make a simple living as a portrait artist and you guys had to go and mess it all up. And she kind of like hits him in the side. Like, don't you ever come to my house again. If you do, I will kill you. I will straight up kill you. I'm a vet.

I've been in a war. You think I will kill you, kid? She's a fucking veterinarian, man. She could fucking kill you. She knows what's inside of dogs. She points right at you and she says, shut up. That is enough out of you. This is my house. You wrecked my wall. I will kill you too. Hey, it was 50-50 me and them, I think. Yeah, it was 50-50 them crashing through a wall. She like gets up.

She picks the kid up like by his shirt and throws him at the door and says, get the hell out of here and throws the kid out. Shathane, what are you doing with this one? Is your stuff? Here. Did they take anything? Do you have what you need here? Is it still here? She doesn't look around and she says, yes. I'm not going to say anything more because we've got a bunch of thieves in my house. But yes, it's here.

But once we get these kids out of here, I can grab this stuff and then we can do what we need to do. We don't have, we don't have the time to deal with this other one. So I'll uncuff that other kid and just toss him through the tuck shaped hole in the wall. If you let them leave, they're going to leave and they're going to tell the other people. Is there a closet we can lock them in? Yeah, let's put them in the closet. Okay.

Yeah, Carwin's like, all right, yeah, I've got a, man, I was just starting to like this place too. And she opens up a closet that just has like linens and cloaks and stuff in it. She starts throwing people in, pulls a key out of a pouch she has and locks a padlock looking lock on the door. It says this isn't going to hold them forever, but it should hold them for a little bit. Yeah, we should give them some magazines. What do you have? I've got mud affairs and I've got golf digest. Oh, cool.

I love it. And so she slides those under the door and we go, oh, well, thank you. And then one of them's like, do you know how to read? So she looks around and is not particularly pleased. So she huffs around a little bit. She's like, I really, I'm going to be honest. I regret all of this now. Look, I just got a Cartman, you know what we have to do. I know. I get that it's important. I get, oh, what if magic comes back or whatever it was you were talking about? This seems like a big deal.

And I remember how bad it was, but you know, I just got the furniture the way I like it. And now it's all over the damn place. I, um, I, I hear her complaints and I try and like, I do like shuffling of the furniture around and I'm like, was this how it was? Just leave it. I'm sorry. Just leave it. I'm sorry. And a wicker who didn't come into the house previously. She now is like picking her way through the rubble and just meowing over and over like meow, meow, meow, meow, meow, meow.

And she goes over to, um, there's like, you see that she's really digging something just out. She like heads back out the door. She comes in, meows a bunch and then heads back out. All right. I'll follow her. She hops up in a planter that Cartman had set up outside her place. Cause it gets a little bit of light from the glass ceiling. And, uh, she's really dig, she's meowing a lot.

And she's sniffing an orange flower, which you recognize as the flowers that wicker has been following since you left mudlark. Thanks for listening, everybody. That's our game for this week. With me as always playing Tacoma dome, the barbarian, Abdul Aziz. I have a leather wrist strap on. Playing fat Billy, the halfling thief, Jessica tie. What happened? Is it just cause of the stuff I said? Playing Chathain, the elf ranger, Mark Robertson. Did you see high rise? Did you see that? Uh, movie.

You can find us online on Twitter at Spout Lore or on Facebook at facebook.com slash Spout Lore. Thanks for listening. And so ends the tale of adventures three who tried the best they can. Though dumb and scared and lost they be for times of rest in revelry. And though our journey may be like a conclusion. We will not leave you without a resolution. Return next week to hear some more whilst you commute or do your chores. And for you, I gladly Spout Lore. Oh,