The Adventure Zone Royale: Episode 20

Previously on Taz Royale, Six Daggers plunge into him and you see him stand stock still and fall backwards over dead. LEGGIE! I want to chop his arm off. And the gentleman is gone. In rage, Richteth takes off for, I guess the ziggurai. Being a father of an adult man didn't make me weaker. It made me stronger than you could ever know. Then I give him one big kick off the bridge. Damn you Gokhan! Even in death you failed me! You see, a message is in your own handwriting. That message reads Thrakeen Inside. Hello everybody, welcome back to Taz Royale, our battle royale winter take all season of the adventure zone. On the last episode, we finished the trial of Conjuration, the fifth of our eight trials here of the Octave Conclave. Completely shockingly, frankly. We all, the three characters we've been playing survived. That was long odds in Vegas. That was not predictable. I was on the edge. I was going to say, Grecon V. Lorovith was the closest we got to a competitive sort of match. You embarrassed the gentleman with your ploy. Well, Dr. Legg, you never really stood much of a chance. Let's pick up, right where we left off, which was Lorovith. You were on the bridge where the duel took place with your old friend and rival, Grecon. You defeated him in just a punch festival. Killed him. You killed him. Yeah, I mean you killed him. You punched him so hard that he died from it and fell into the waters drifting off over the edge of the Octave Ziggurat Island. You are standing on this bridge looking around and you can see most of these like big red rectangular walls that were sectioning off the different arenas have vanished at this point. During your duel, you were distracted by the dueling grounds where your dear ward, I guess, not your ward. You're protecting him. Yeah, ward. Yeah, ward, I guess. Duber Sweetleaf was battling Pip, the gigantic gnome. The duel has ended. What do you do? I need to stride over there. Okay. You stride over crossing across the island until you reach the woods on the southwest quarter of the island where the mages tower stands. As you reach that part of the island, trying to catch a glimpse of this battle, you see the red light barrier surrounding the arena where Duber was fighting suddenly disappears. It leaves behind it just a big solid block of fog, thick, dense, roiling fog that, as the barrier disappears, this fog then drops and begins to slowly sort of disperse through the island. As it does so, it reveals Pip, who again had magically enlarged himself to a gigantic size, is lying impaled on the top of the mages tower. Give me a perception check, please. Griffin Pip is still enlarged, right? Oh yeah. Ah, we won't starve. Excellent. Gonna eat Pip? I'm not saying that's my first choice. Nine. Nine. With a nine, you show up to this very, very grisly scene. With a nine, you hear movement up in the trees sort of near your location in front of the tower. There is a slow drip of blood falling out of the boughs of these trees. And looking up, you see Duber sweetleaf was hiding up in the boughs of these trees. And he looks pretty bad off. He's got to cut over his eye with some blood dripping down. And he is just kind of trembling in fear. I'm gonna use Battle Medic as a utilize action. I can spend one use of a healer's kit to tend to a creature within five feet of myself. That creature can expend one of its HP dice and then I roll that die. The creature gains a number of HP equal to the roll plus three. So that's a D6 plus a three. Five plus three, eight. Okay, yeah, I mean within five feet, you are a tall goliath and you can basically just sort of reach up to where he is in a fetal position. Also still big in this tree. Right. Yeah. So you you you just sort of two hand grab him up out of the tree and set him on the ground and tend to his wounds with your doob. I'm very proud of you for not dying. What happened? You took a life, Duber. How do you feel? He looks up at where Pip is impaled, just kind of like trembling, shaking his head sort of catatonic. He is in shock as you are sort of tending to his cut. I won. Yes, you won. You you won, Duber. And yet you lost something very dear. Innocence. I just meant to hide. I didn't. Yes, yes, I didn't know that he would he would fall and become. Oh, are you Duber? I'm going to be sick. May the proper choice. I'm very proud of you, as I said. You you survived, though. That's that's. Deep breath. So what? Deep breath. Hold on. This was staying. OK. What of? Good boy, Duber. What of? Gracan then. Dead. Dead is yours. Well, not quite that dead. Oh, boy. I believe you have a taste for the darker the darker things. I had a bit of shadow in your boy. I wish Randolph were here. I wish I was back home. Please. You say that, Duber, but think of this. What of the Duber of you today? What to meet the Duber of then? Who would emerge from that dark alley, victorious? I suppose. I suppose I am stronger, sir. Um. I think I need to go and lie down. Well, it's highly advisable, Duber. I'd stay off this leg, too, if I were you. What? What? Nothing. Would you like me to put you in a papoose sort of situation on my back? I think that would be quite large. You wouldn't say, Duber. I think that would be nice. He climbs up into your little papoose. Expect that answer. All right. And he looks up at you kind of nuzzles and closes his eyes and falls fast asleep. Rick, this you were storming towards the ziggurat after defeating the gentlemen on a mission. What are you? What are you doing? Is there a door that he can bust through? You find a few members of the octave, including Coxsey, the one. It's a yes or no question, Griffin. Is there a door he can bust through? They are standing outside of the ziggurat watching. Could you all go inside? Because I was kind of going to do a thing with busting through a door. We don't want to, we don't want to miss the rest of the trial, but I suppose if you're doing a dramatic thing. Okay, no, you guys stay here. He goes into the door and slams out of it. Okay. Whoa. Oh, yeah. Congratulations, Rick. This I was hoping you would be one. What did you do? Well, uh, we, we said sure, come on in and then we sort of jumped backwards. We came out and kicked in the fight. We did. Why did you intervene? Oh, you mean that the fire that came out of the big flame over there. That is, um, yes, I mean that we have told you all have all the aspirants here on the island repeatedly that, um, if you remove your grimoire from your arm, you, you will be eliminated. It is one of our core sort of tenants here. It's one of the main sort of rules that we enforce. And so, um, when his arm was sort of removed from his person during your duel, thanks to your quick thinking and vicious trickery, I will say, um, we, we did have to enforce that rule. He was no longer equipped with his grimoire. And so we, um, that is what happens. Um, it would be doing us a huge favor if you wouldn't tell a lot of people about what happened because like then a lot of people are going to start doing like loop holes, like trying to get each other's grimoire. Rick just grabs him by the like lapels. I push him against the wall. No, you're going to know, my friend, you are going to need to make an attack roll if you're that's what he attempts to do. Yeah, that's what we're going to do. 19 plus three. Holy fucking shit. You jump forward and you, uh, reach your hands out to try and grab Coxie by his flashy golden lapels. As you make contact with him, you pass right through him. As you do, uh, you see sort of this colorful cloud kind of, uh, disperse where you, uh, jumped through him. Uh, and then Coxie, uh, reappears just in front of you in front of the door. He says, Rick, this Rick, this listen to me was mine. Rick, this listen. First of all, another one of our rules is don't do that thing. You just did. You are very lucky that I am not actually appearing here in person, or you would be punished in the same manner in which the gentleman was. You passed the trial, Rick. This you did, uh, a very good job, uh, against an opponent that frankly, a lot of us did not think you were going to, uh, be able to best. I think you need to take your victory in stride. But he is no one here is yours to kill. Rick, this, do you understand? I demand an audience with whatever octave member specializes in necromancy. You demand the. I ask, uh, is tell me, is this our intimidation persuasion? What's the tact you're taking here? Uh, persuasion, persuasion. Okay. Give me that role, please. 15 plus one, 16. Good rules. He sighs. He thinks for a minute. He says, this can be arranged. The number of aspirants remaining is small enough that we can make, uh, some office time available to you all. I suppose if you seek it, I will make him aware. And, um, you can, you can visit him when he calls for you. He will answer whatever questions you have. But Rick, this for real, buddy, the attitude you got to turn it around. You're, you are diabolical, my friend. And I think that you would make a great addition to the team of eight here. Um, but you got to get this anger thing on the ego under control. You know what I mean? Uh, Rick, this takes a deep breath. See, better, isn't it? I, I have one more ask, please. Yes. I, I would like to claim the crystal that contains the spell of time that the gentleman wielded. Hmm. This is unconventional, right? This, but I will bring it up. Uh, with our, our expert in the necromanic arts and, um, he can address this topic with you tomorrow when you, uh, when you meet with him. Is this satisfactory? Well, I have to recover it. It went inside that weird, crazy soul sphere thing that was glowing and just obliterated his arm. I almost saw that. I was like, what? So, but I bet we can probably get it, um, put back together for you. Um, but again, that is not my position to award things like that. I, I suppose I will leave it to him. Is that fair? Thank you for taking it into consideration. Of course. And Rick is his back. He's just like clenching his right fist. Yes. Uh, where that like weird, uh, purpley, like gray and black part of the, uh, wither and bloom manifests from, and he's just like clenching it like open and closed, uh, restraining him. So grump. So cranky. Rectus, please, uh, make your way into the zigarot. We will be summoning everyone for this sort of proposed trial debrief. Let's, um, let's find out who survived. Yes. Um, hell, Grammett, what are you doing in the moments after the trial concludes? Um, I think hell, Grammett is really studying the ground where, well, his new bride to be just scared away to, sure. I think he's, um, investigating it to see if there's anything unusual about it. Okay. Are you investigating the crystalarium? That is where the sort of, uh, this, this great crystalline centipede sort of dug underneath the, the structure to burrow inside. Uh, you are standing at sort of the edge of the woods overlooking the crystal area where you had etched the secret message that said Thrykeen inside, uh, to yourself. You know what, give me a wisdom saving throw, actually, in this kind of to see, to see if you remember sort of writing this as you're confronted with another nine. I think, I think you do realize this is yours. I think you, you don't exactly recall the moment of writing it, but like you, I think you remember enough to know that like this isn't some trick. This isn't some illusion. Like you very, you very much know that you did write this, um, in reference to whatever is happening inside the crystalarium. Okay. Well, then I'm going to head to the crystalarium then and maybe investigate. All right. Are you trying to take a stealthy approach to this, remembering that the crystalarium has been sort of off limits, uh, to you all, uh, as, as one of the core rules of this island. I would think so. Yes. Okay. Give me a, uh, stealth check, not using your communion carapace, because it's not a hide. It is a sneak. Do chick. If it's a nine, I'm gonna. Oh, it's a dirty 20. Yeah, absolutely. Okay. Um, yeah, you are able to sort of creep crawl along the ground. You find like a small ridge, uh, that you can kind of, uh, skitter around, uh, to reach kind of the base of the crystalarium where you saw this, um, this centipede burrow down into, uh, looking down at the ground. Uh, give me, give me an investigation check. Could I do a nature check? Sure. Yeah. Either, either one would be fine. Okay. Nature check. That would be a 25. Wow. God, man, you know everything about it. All right. Yeah. Okay. 25. Looking down the ground. You are a nature. You, you, you are unable to, uh, see through the walls of the crystalarium. The crystal that forms those walls is, uh, opaque, uh, sort of a dark, uh, amethyst color. So, so you're unable to sort of like see inside of the structure. Looking down at the ground where the centipede burrowed, um, there is a, I think they're called carpenter spiders. Whenever they dig down, they leave these like very, um, recognizable hills of, of kind of round granules, uh, that really kind of like stick out, uh, alongside the like other dirt that they, that they dig down into. You are able to see, uh, it's not carpenter spiders, but you can see like very, very, very obvious signs of insects burrowing basically around the perimeter of this crystalarium, but literally hundreds of times. There has been a lot, a lot of coming and going from this structure, uh, from some insects that you would estimate to be like not like, not that small, like roughly about the size of this centipede that you saw earlier, which was about, uh, I forget exactly what I said, like, uh, 16 inches long or something like that, like a big, big, long, wide sort of flat centipede. Uh, there are a lot of sort of burrows. None that you can like get down into, but, um, this is, this is a, a heavily trafficked sort of insect, uh, exit and entrance. Hmm. Um, but way too small for, for, uh, hell, Grammar to get into, right? Um, hell, Grammar is senior. Hmm. I need a ward. I need a ward like you. Get in there, doober. Yeah. Um, yeah, no, I mean, it's, it is, you are considerably larger than, than those bugs are, right? It, it is, um, it is, it's, it's not impossible that you could dig down through there and back up into it, but I will say from like, from what you remember, uh, about sort of the moment where you wrote this message, you know that fucking around here for any amount of time, carries with it a pretty enormous amount of risk, whether it be death or you being forced to forget all of this stuff that you are all of a sudden able to remember. Then I'm going to try one, one quick thing before I leave. Okay. He, uh, can communicate mentally. Okay. Thriking telepathy. Without magic, you can't speak the non-thriking. I would love to hear Daffy Duck say that. Thriking telepathy. I would love to hear his ass even try to say that shit. He did. I'll just think about that. He tried it in the 25th and a half century. Uh, you can't speak the non-minga trigger trigger all your vocal stems. Dad's splayed out on the ground here. Mel blank is fully into his body. I'm just trying to say if he said Thriking telepathy, it'd be a whole thing. You can use telepathy magically transmitting your thoughts mentally to creatures within 120 feet of yourself. Any creatures? Yeah. I've been saving this. Um, okay. Thriking telepathy. Uh, to any willing creatures? Yeah. I figured they came up and spoke. They'd be willing. Um, is it a, is it a one way thing? You can transmit your thoughts mentally to willing creatures within 120 feet of yourself. Uh, it must be able to understand a language. It is broken if you're the creature move apart or if you either of you are incapacitated. Okay. So this is a question of, you can send this message. Absolutely. It is a question of whether or not you will receive anything in return. What would you like to say telepathically? Um, I didn't get your name. Or your digits. I guess she doesn't, she wouldn't have digits. Come, come back and talk to me. Um, this is all telepathically, right? Yeah. You see a, a very, very small, uh, insect, uh, a little beetle, uh, skitter out of the ground where you are sort of looking and projecting these thoughts. As it appears, you hear a whispered response in your mind that says, you must flee the time is not right. We will reach out when the opportunity strikes. You cannot be seen here. You must go very well. Do you have a name? Oh, please be Ringo. Very well. Okay. But, but you will call, right? I mean, it's something, I mean, you will communicate, right? We will call. You're not going to ghost me. I cannot. You, you must survive though. You must leave now, Helgrammet. Okay. And the beetle skitters back under the. Helgrammet exits stage right. Pursued by bear. Uh, you all are summoned back to the, uh, the ziggurat at the center of the island as the, uh, the dust of the, uh, the trial settles and the sun begins to slip, uh, over the, the horizon of this floating island. Uh, as you may, is, is Pranklin still alive? Well, let's find out. It's time to find out who survived as you make your way over to the ziggurat. You see, uh, those big holographic busts of the, the entrance into this trial begin to slowly kind of migrate through the sky. Uh, they had been floating over the arenas where each pair had kind of been matched up. Uh, you see your own visages, uh, alongside a few other familiar faces float over, uh, and take their place in a big ring in circling the highest tier of the ziggurat, slowly kind of rotating, uh, as motes of light shoot up and sparkle around them in celebration. And you see also as the other, uh, the other bus that were remaining over the arenas begin to wither and shrink and zoom in, uh, through the entrance of the ziggurat into the foyer, joining the kind of, uh, memorial exhibit where the other fallen competitors have appeared in those fallen withered faces. You see the gentleman, uh, smug, even in death, zipping to his sort of his plinth, uh, followed by Dr. Legume, uh, the, the imposing face of Grecon appears on his pedestal. You see Pip the gnome, and then you start to see others that you had not known, uh, the results of their battle. Mad Mantis, the mad mantis, the contact juggling clown mystique, uh, Hilda, the sea witch, gunk, the nasty little toad man, no, gunk, the precocious urchin, and now he's dead. The precocious urchin called pockets, the fedora capped detective magic. And the last two bringing up the rear of the fallen, uh, wait, sorry. One last quick question, just because we'll never talk about this again. The fedora cap detective magic. Can you tell me where the capitals are in that sentence? Detective magic is his name. Detective magic was the next to last wizard I came up with. Detective magic is his name. Detective magic. His, his game is detect magic and he's detective magic. The fedora is just. Detective magic is his name. Guys, I want you to understand truly, truly, I really mean this. He has a. I made a bunch of wizards and sometimes you guys ran into those wizards and sometimes you didn't. At one point you rolled a dice to see who your new friend wizard would be and you got Scorpo, who could have gotten detective magic. And the course of this entire season. No, we're just trying to figure out how the fedora plays into. There are people who are maintaining wikis about this show. Right. Bless you, by the way. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. History. Thanks you. I just wanted them to know fedora capped detective magic. He had a fedora. No, it's not his full title. His only name is detective magic. His full name was not fedora. He's wearing a fedora. I like to give a little bit of flavor for these guys as I bury them. His name was detective magic and he wore a fedora. I'm sorry to hang such a bright lantern on it. That says so much, though. That is the most educational garment you could put on someone, though. And it's kind of putting a hat on a hat. Kind of. The last two to join the memorial. Hell, Grammar, you actually recognize them from an encounter you had during the trial of abduration here. You see the clean shaven bald human man and the blue and red spandex wearing superhero, both known as the spider, leaving only the Thrykeen, the spider as the sole inheritor of that name. He walks into the foyer. And as you all gather here, it feels after this sort of most recent calling, like pretty barren. There are only 12 of the original 64 aspirants, 12, 12 wizards here in this room who are kind of peering around at the survivors, sizing them up. Rictus, you, Hell, Grammar, Loroveth, Scorpo, made his way through Hippocrates. Pranklin the orangutan did come through. I believe he's the one who defeated detective magic sliding doors. When Hell, Grammar walks in, Pranklin tugs on Rictus's like jacket and points to Hell, Grammar and Rictus kind of shakes his head in disbelief and then hands $100 to Pranklin. Yeah. Pranklin nods pocket set. You see Fremagio Bucatini walk in with his tall, suspiciously wiggly chef's hat. Hacey Jane has survived her trial. Burger Man. Tommy Falcon surfs in on his floating board and, of course, a stitched up doober sweetleaf. These are the only 12 remaining aspirants. But I think it's the 12 that everyone expected. Like from the beginning, I remember episode one, there were people making brackets. And those are the 12 that I think everybody predicted. You see the octave members who were outside walk in and take their places over these silver pools. The rest of them kind of appear and float up over their various bowls. Rictus, you are able to see like now you know the identity of like most of these octave members. You see one floating wearing a very, very dark velvet robe and a sort of golden mask that is sort of round and bulbous with like two small black eye holes cut out for it. Just like looking around at the remaining sort of members of the octave here, you are able to kind of deduce like that is the that is the necromancer of the group. You make your way in, you size up the crowd and Coxsey says aspirants, congratulations. You have each bested your rivals and claimed victory in the trial of conjuration. Your winnings will be distributed to you if you've not received them already. As all of you selected your dueling partners personally, you'll all receive gold tier rewards and we have reshuffled the residences accordingly, leaving 12 deluxe suites for you to occupy as you await the coming trials. Did you have a question, Laura, with because you were sort of grumbling and making sort of moaning sounds? Just saying, don't feel much like a victory. Oh, OK. I'm well, do you need to talk about it with someone or is there grief counseling? Oh, sorry. Yes, I need to talk about it. I thought you would be excited knowing how sort of competitive I am. It's just we've had to say goodbye to a lot of fine, fine people. Yes, it is. This these trials are. Inconceivably difficult on the mind and body and spirit, but these are the tests that we must conduct in order to ensure that only the worthiest become members of the octave. Yes, hell, Grammond, I say you raising one of your. I feel bad, too. OK, yes. I feel very. Oh, I feel bad about Dr. Please do not buy into the bug man's machinations, machinations, the semblance of emotions causing causes him to produce a crackling noise. I am a turmoil of emotion. I just found out I'm engaged. So what? What? I've got a fiance I have. I have. Let me guess. She and she lives in Canada, right? I I assumed when you said engaged, you meant in a protracted debate on truth. So no, no, no, I've got a I've got a fiance. Sure. I wanted to share with you two guys, but you were you were given money that one guy and you were just grumbling. So listen, OK, this is getting away from us. Eyes and ears. Eyes and eyes and ears here, please. You all have made it to what the quarterfinals, I suppose, of this competition. There are but three trials that stand between you and your your final victory in this conclave, the trial of illusion, the trial of necromancy and the trial of enchantment. They are what await you. They will not occur in the order I just said. And we from this point on will not be letting you know the trial that awaits you until the morning that these trials are administered. So I suggest you all spend your day of rest preparing yourselves for anything. As always, in this has been recently pretty relevant. We have some rules that remain enforced. Do not attack one another or any of us. Rectals. Do not remove your grimoire and do not approach the crystalarium. There has been some pushing at the borders of these rules. And I will tell you now, you all have come way too far to be eliminated for doing just such a foolish mistake. So please rest tonight. Enjoy your day off tomorrow. Spend it wisely, getting ready for the final three trials. And we'll be we'll be we'll be thinking about you guys. We'll leave a light on for you. And they sink into their basins and vanish. Into the ether. The hardest part of any idea, any project, any dream is just getting started. Just getting moving, just taking one foot and putting it out there. Maybe that foot for you is going to be via Squarespace. You know, building a website can be a really good way of organizing your ideas. It can be a great way of bringing other people into what you're making and saying, hey, like I made this this idea. This is where we're at. What do you think? 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And as part of putting more good into the world, we've opened our annual post drive charity sale. Maxfun members at $10 per month or more can purchase Maxfun Drive keychains featuring designs for shows across the network. And all members can buy our charity exclusive keychain starring Mikey, our little microphone buddy from this year's Maxfun Drive. This year, we've decided to send the proceeds of the charity sale to the Center for Constitutional Rights. They're dedicated to the creative use of law as a positive force for social change, tackling issues like human rights abuses, racial injustice, and sexual and gender based violence. These folks are fighting to make things better. So to get your keychains and support the Center for Constitutional Rights, head to Maxfunfun.org slash charity sale. And if you're not yet a member, you can still get in on this. To support the show you're listening to and get access to bonus content and the charity sale, just click the link in the show notes. The sale is live now and it ends on Friday, May 15th. That's Maxfunfun.org slash charity sale. And thanks again. OK, it is your day of rest, your day off. I'm going to have you guys level up to level six. Which we can handle between episodes, if you would like, unless you want to do it right now. I want to do it now, Gryffin. I'm so excited. OK. Well, yeah, go ahead. Bump yourselves up. Yeah, doesn't look like there's anything. Oh, wait, I have undead thralls. Oh, holy shit, really? Yeah. At six level, you add the animate dad spell to your spellbook if it's not there already. You can animate the dead now. I like that for you, actually. Yeah. I do have sculpt spells, though, at six level. Oh, what's that do? You can create pockets of relative safety within the effects of your evocations. When you cast an evocation spell that affects other creatures that you see, you could choose a number of them equal to one plus the spells level that shows the creatures automatically succeed on their saving throws against the spells, but it's great bubble of safety. I like that. Defensive, that goes in well with the narrative of our game. We can make that work. Cool. Hmm. I'm going to have to study mine. I have I get self improvement. Biomancy. Whoa. Yeah, sure. Biomancy. What is biomancy? Six level school of biomancy. You can perform minor surgery on your body, improving yourself in a very literal sense. You can increase your jumping. Great. Great. And Vibra Springs, where you can triple your jumping distance. You get an extra appendage where you get an extra tail or an extra arm. What? You get detachable hand. That just picks up books at Gen Con and just like starts reading. Firefly skin. Owl eyes. Skin. You can exude slime. Your body is covered in scales. Spider sense. I can have spidey sense. Talon. One of your hands is replaced with a wicked giant Hawks talon. I mean, it sounds dope, man. It's it's just as he is it made up, though, is the question on everybody. I am looking at homebrew Hellenia's guide to monster. I'm not on homebrew. Dad was in it's I'm editing. Scotland in some cafe and he saw this like Xerox center rules they picked it up. Brought a home. He said, yep, this is in it now. It says you get the key blade. It says the key blade. I don't know. Key blade. Travis, where did you find that? Well, I found that on worldanvil.com. Worldanvil.com where it says homebrew Hellenia's guide to monster hunting. Blizzard, yeah, homebrew Hellenia's guide to monster hunting. Blizzard School of Biomancy. I just don't think it's I just don't think we I just don't think it's a real thing. My dad is cool. Yeah, but he's been playing as a biomancer since day one. Yeah, but he's you can't decide now that a biomancer is not real if he's been biomancing this whole time. Or else what's he been doing? Yeah, he's been biomancing the stone. This is the entire time. So if I click on your character sheet and I look at wizard subclass, is it going to say that your wizard subclass? Well, yeah. Are you on my sheet? I am. Transcripts. We can see if the word biomancer has ever been spoken before on this show. If you go if you look at wizard, it says core wizard traits, spellcasting, ritual adept, arcane recovery, scholar, wizard subclass, Biomancy savant. I guess I can't argue with the super precedent here. You are a you are a thrykeen. I think it's OK. Don't make me regret this. Don't make me regret this. No, I will. I know I will, too. It is not one of the eight schools of magic that have been sort of stressed here on the on the octave. But I understand that this is not magic. It's a picture. It's a feature. Yeah, yes, yeah, yes. OK, it's your day off. Who would like to spend their time first? Rick, maybe we should save yours for for for the last. OK, mostly to give me time to think about how to. OK, start with me and hell, Graham. OK. No, no, stop from the beginning. Biomancy. Explain. Well, I get to do surgery on myself. I guess I have to be doctor. Well, you know, I killed a doctor, so I assume I become a doctor. Isn't that the way it works? You're sort of a bug. Doctor, I will endeavor to work with the coat. Try to treat you with some monocle respect. Oh, good. It's about time. Oh, you're a professional now. Professional men in a career that I can respect. What should I go with? The third leg scales, firefly skin, bug man. Yes, don't say third leg to me again. Oh, sorry. Appreciate it. I didn't mean to shame you. I'm sorry. So what are your options? I can jump farther. Choose now. I can attach another leg, but seven just seems, you know, a greedy. Yeah, I can have a detachable hand. I can have firefly skin, which means I can cast a light cantrip at will. Get exhausting. I can have a little bit of a cantrip. It doesn't cost anything, but truly doesn't cost anything. Every time I do a cantrip, I feel a little bit tired afterwards. Those are slime. I can exude slime. I can have scales, spider's. Think about that for a minute. Wow. I can have a talent. They're uniquely adept. I feel like I've gotten the upper hand on spiders repeatedly. I can have a TL. You told me not to say. Sorry. You told me not to say third leg again. I think you're a version. And oh, oh, oh, try morphism, which sounds even nastier. You can cast the enlarged. I'm going to slowly start to walk backwards until I can turn and walk away. Oh, I think I'm going to go with the grow or shrink. I love that idea. So you are selecting try morphism as yourself. I don't know yet. I don't know. OK, I want to give it some thought. All right. Great, great scene. Literally just reciting the features that were just discussed. Hey, listen, it's enough that he showed interest in poor hell. Grimit, who has felt very neglected by him. He wants to be his friend. As a matter of fact, I'd like you to be my best man. I'm not there anymore. If you'll remember, canonically, I've left the room. Or if it's OK, then Rick, this will be my best man. I would like to check up on doober if I can see how he's healing up. OK, you make your way to his sort of deluxe suite over in the residence's area. Doob cave, the doob cave. As you come and knock on the door, a much smaller sort of door inside the door opens up and you see him poke his head out kind of nervously. And he says, oh, Laura, thank goodness you're here. What are you doing out of bed? All right, you knocked on the door and I came to I came to answer your call. Yes, how are you? Not not great, not great, I think. He shuts his little door and opens the big door to to let you in. Would you like a tea or a pool of my sweet leaf pipe? Oh, yes, I suppose. Yes, I'll try a pipe. So I brought you a I made these. Well, not unlike coffees, sort of a ground sugar cooked on a stone. This used to help me when for mother when when I was was injured. He pops them in his mouth, gives him it gives him a suckle as he packs a pipe for you. And he looks up at you and he smiles. He says, this this is quite good. I had no idea that you could you could create. Are these like magically conjured? These sweets are no really more of a preservation tool. A way of keeping sugar there will last longer. Well, thank you. And here, as long as we're sort of exchanging favors, he hands you a freshly packed pipe. Give me if you're hitting that thing, give me a constitutional. No. Give me a constitutional. Oh, please. Is it the first time that you have let me smoke on this show? I think so. All right. Is it Constitution? Yes. I'm going to one. I would do anything. I do anything, please. I can't because I got plus five. Thirteen plus five, 18. Yeah, good, good stuff. He looks up at you, sort of impressed. He says, I assume because of your stature that you would not have a difficult time with it. Not many outside of the hill folk can withstand a good sweet leaf strain. But I I I I cannot believe I'm still here, sir. And I am a bit lost without Randolph. And I cannot tell you how much I appreciate your the security that you have provided me so far, sir. Even though I do kind of question whether or not you're keeping me around as sort of a what's the word, a goat for when we reach this of all time. I think that's like a sort of final sacrifice, a sort of last step to the finish line. I'm I do. But is there is there a difference? I mean, the way this contest is structured, supposedly, one of us has to be the vector. So I'm not sure of the answer to your question either, Dopa. You're both in the situation. Why are you helping me still, sir? I know that Randolph promised you favors in exchange, but he is long since gone. I don't know why you are you are still showing me this this kindness when eventually one of the two of us must perish. Dopa. Let me get a bite. Give me another bite. Yeah, sure. Constitution, say we therefore be pleased. Eleven plus five. Sixteen. Nice. I had a heavy rip, sir. Thank you. Thank you, Dopa. Dopa, I am a large man and someone that many would consider a threatening presence. If I appeared to have a very visible weakness, like, say, you, for example, people are more confused about me. They don't know quite what to think. They don't know quite what to make of me much like yourself. Yes, Dopa, does seem fair. Yeah, I'm I'm here against some of the most powerful wizards in the world. And I am not one of the most powerful wizards in the world. If I, if that is true, then I must be something else, something which surprises even me. Right now, Dopa, for your benefit, that is a father. Yes. Sorry. Thirteen. They're getting progressively worse. You just feel you feel this slipping away from you a little bit with with each passing toke. I had a point. Yes, sir. I'm I'm waiting. I know that sometimes sometimes with the sweet leaf does make us go on a journey. Nineteen plus five. Twenty four, you're back. That was a better one. Sometimes you get over the top of the throat. You know what I mean? Yes, sir. We call those ticklers. We call those ticklers in the hills. Hill ticklers. Oh, it's just good sportsmanship, Dopa. You've got a big target on your back just a little guy pie. So I'm just trying to help out, make things a little more even. I don't know where that leads me, but it it helps me to sleep at night. Fair. I understand, sir. I do. I just I don't want to be a wait hanging around your ankles. I I I don't know how to fight. I don't know. Do you want me to get your Dopa? Do you want me to get a big rock to smash your head in? No, sir. Of course not. Well, then go to sleep, Dopa. And do your best to kill me tomorrow. Uh, he smiles and nods. I think I understand, sir. I thank you for the toffee. You are welcome to open. Oh, no, you got greedy, sir. You should fall. Yeah, all of what? Yeah, you should lay down here on the couch, sir, and not operate any heavy machinery for quite a bit. I learned. The pantry is well stocked with funyons and munchums which I brought from my home. You may enjoy them at your asleep. OK, Randolph. Oh, yeah. He's here, Dopa. I can see him. I'm doing my best, Randolph. He's such a hard boy to love. You see Randolph in the mists on the ceiling looking down at you. And he gives you a big thumbs up and retreats upwards back to heaven. You you are unconscious. You are you are fucking fully laid out at this. You are lucid dreaming. I rolled a five in my religion check. Randolph. I'm sorry. You experience a sort of conversion, I suppose, in this in this lucid state and we'll circle back to that. Rictus, you awake in the next morning. There is a small gold card sitting in front of your doorstep. And it is sort of an etching of the statue of death that you have seen now a couple of times down inside of the mausoleum in the graveyard. And you see written underneath it, it says third bell. And you wait for the appointed time of the third bell. And do you answer the summons? I suppose. Yeah, they assume that you will since you. I asked for it. You make your way down the the marble stairs of the the mausoleum, making your way down a spiral staircase until you reach this long bridge crossing over an endless black abyss down here beneath the graveyard. At the edge of this bridge, there's a small sort of circular island where you can see that statue again of a very sort of archetypical angel of death. And from behind it, as you enter, you see this gold masked wizard, sort of very ethereally kind of float in front of the statue. And before I go in, I cast protection from good and from evil and good on myself. OK, remind me what that does. A lot of stuff, but basically one willing creature you touch is protected against creatures that are aberrations, celestial, elementals, fey, fiends or undead. The protection creatures of those types have disadvantage on attack rolls against the target and the target can't be possessed by or gain the charmed or frightened conditions from them. The last time Rictus was, you know, oh, no, I mean, this was the spell that was meant to solve this kind of this this this puzzle back in the trial of abduration. So it makes absolute sense to cast it now. Yeah. OK, you are you are protected as you enter into the mausoleum. You know that this is not going to turn out like last time when I think you had to spit in Hasty Jane's eye or something like that. His own foot and break his own ankle. Yeah, Jesus Christ. Rictus has really been through it as you approach. I mean, you see this this wizard of the octave float in front of the statue and then just kind of like gesture forward. He has these long, slender, very, very shallow skinned fingers. He outstretches them as if to say like, is this slender man griffin because if it's slender man, you have to tell me. Or it's entrapment. Oh, it's slender man. It's not slender man. OK. Yeah, Rictus approaches. OK. He doesn't react as you approach. He is waiting for you to sort of make the first move here. Greetings. And he bows respectfully. OK. He sort of nods his head in a very, very like about as small as a bow as you possibly give in return. Um, I'm Rictus Raven with the fourth uneckrom answer like yourself. Um, and I have. Like three questions, if I may. Sir, mad person. Seeing you kind of like struggling to identify, to identify him, he holds out a hand again and just extends four fingers like that. I'm the fourth. Is that what you're saying? No, he shakes his head. There is a breeze, a stiff breeze from below coming out from the void from far below you in the sort of echoing of that breeze as it shoots upward. You hear words kind of form in the wind. That says you may call us for. OK. That was cool. That was very cool. I don't know where to start. First, let's start with just like the crystal with the time spell. Can I claim it? I defeated him in single combat and as the person like I was able to withstand it multiple times. And it seems like from his reactions that that was not something he was used to. So it seems like I would be able to wield it better than anyone on this island. And as the only person who practices magic that deals with death, it seems like I would also be able to handle magic that deals with time. Another breeze blows up from below and it says, this power is uniquely treacherous. Are you certain you wish to wield it? It is not the worst thing to have this world be rid of it. Yes. As soon as you say that, he extends his hand and from it, the stone that was sort of in the center of the grimoire of the gentleman drops down to the ground in front of you with a clink. You hear a voice from below in the wind say, I believe you had two other questions. Yes. What? What has the octave done? When you establish the veil, you separated death from this world. You disrupted the natural order, but not like in a cool, like, necromancy way, but like in a bad way. There's a long pause and then the wind blows up and says, Rick, Disraven would the fourth we assure you. What we did was both absolutely necessary to prevent our extinction and also done in a very cool necromancy way. Yeah, I should have assumed that part. Your last query. What? What is wrong with me? There is another long pause and give me a God, give me an insight check. That's a 19 plus two. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wow. OK. You are tapped into this wizard on kind of a whole other wavelength. And it is not quite anything you have felt before. You are not sure if this is coming from from for or if it's just kind of like something you are putting down yourself. But even from behind this mask, even as sort of like ethereal as he is, he sort of swoops down low to come close to you. And as the breeze kind of comes up from below and you you hear his whispered voice, you feel what. You could only describe as a type of pride or affection, but not without some level of malice behind it. You hear him respond. Absolutely nothing. And in the blink of an eye, he vanishes. Rick Distance for a second looks at his hands, where his right hand that black, purpley energy is just glowing. And his left hand, the green healing light is very faint. Yeah. And he's trying harder to get it to go. And he is just barely there. And he extinguishes both of them and picks up the time crystal and places it on his grimoire. Give me a wisdom saving throw. Well, the end of the good rolls, Griffin. That's a two plus five, a seven. Oh, man, what a bad time to get it. Right. You never get that kind of roll when it's like I sample the smell of the bread. You know what I mean? Like you never it's never been. That was not a great roll to roll that on, Travi. Do you want me to make some more jokes about what a bad time this is to give you more time to come? If I'm about to be possessed, I did cast a spell. You feel. You feel a hand claw at your at your mind desperately as you put this crystal in. You feel the the barrier that you have kind of erected around yourself, activate and attempt to fend off whatever this sort of attack is. But it doesn't feel quite like when this statue tried to take over your mind, like when you came down here in the first place. This feels like something entirely different. Because you cast protection from good and evil. I will give you an opportunity here to either remove the stone or attempt to thwart whatever this sort of psychic attack is and maybe succeed or maybe not. Brick this grits his teeth and then screams as he leaves the stone in place and rolls at 12 plus 5 17. You scream and as you do a swarm of bats that was nesting on the ceiling above are disrupted. You see those bats begin to swirl around you as your mind is is under attack with a 17 wisdom saving throw. The attack that is happening is not from some outside force. It is literally like your mind is being overwritten. You are trying to hold on to who you are. You're trying to hold on to your memories as the memories of the gentlemen enter your own mind. This is something that you've experienced a couple of times as you have slotted in these new spellstones that you've gotten. This one is again on a whole other level. It is not just you are remembering things. It is the gentleman is trying to take over your body and supplant your memories with his own in this way with a 17 wisdom saving throw. You are really struggling to hold on to who you are to your identity. And after a few kind of agonizing moments, all of the bats surrounding you in your sort of immediate vicinity freeze in place. You feel yourself immediately drained of nearly all the kind of remaining magical reserves that you have in your body. And you feel the gentlemen in anguish sort of vanish into the background of your mind as you survive this takeover. And after a few more moments, the freezing spell stops. The bats fly up and out of the mausoleum and you collapse to the ground unconscious. And you feel the gentlemen in anguish sort of vanish into the background of your mind. And after a few moments, the gentlemen in anguish sort of vanish into the background of your mind. And after a few moments, the gentlemen in anguish sort of vanish into the background of your mind. And after a few moments, the gentlemen in anguish sort of vanish into the background of your mind. Maximum Fun, a work-grown network of artist-owned shows, supported directly by you.