The Adventure Zone Royale: Episode 13

Previously on Taz Royale, it is not until now that you get sort of an idea of who's gone. There is a chime of a pleasant sounding bell and 12 more holographic busts materialize around the room. You will have the rest of today and tomorrow to recover before we reconvene for our next trial. I need your guys help to put a bag of dog poop on the gentleman's front doorstep. You and I are oil and water and we are going to have to solve this sooner rather than later I think. Welcome back to Taz Royale. You've joined us in a calm time. A period of rest and relaxation between the trials. I encourage everyone to reflect from time to time on their actions and what they would have done differently. In their words, it's how you grow as a person and as a wizard. It is the day after the trial of evocation. Most notably in the last episode, it was largely dedicated to a prank, gone terribly wrong. We almost burned down the gentleman from Whizberry when I say we, that was mostly you guys and honestly mostly Travis. What? Well it was your idea. It is the morning though of the day after. And I don't regret it. Okay. I don't know if I was supposed to or not. You will at some point. You all have to get off before the next trial commences and you are able to spend that day however you'd like. Later we're going to all head to the Adelier to grab some new spells, maybe some new merch. I've asked you guys to level your characters up to level four, which is not the most exciting benchmark in Dungeons and Dragons. You basically get to choose between some stat increases or you grab a feat. We can talk about what you end up doing there. But I'd like to start with either Hellgram it or with Laura Vith. How would you like to spend your free time today before the next trial begins? I feel like Hellgram needs a little bit more exposure to the land. I think he needs to do a little groundwork and get more familiar with the rest of the entire playing area. He needs to reconoiter. Sure. I'm here for it. That is if he has already connoitered at some point. There's some areas you've definitely connoitered. The residences here in the southeast quarter, you've been around the eggs, the ziggurat, obviously the gardens you died in, and there's the observation platform that tower you went up. But there's a lot of stuff on the north side of the island that Hellgram has not visited. What's the one part we are forbidden? So you would have been- Is that a solarium? Yes. Multiple times, not to approach the crystal-arium. You should try it, Dad, because I heard Griffin just has a wall there. If you try to walk into it, I heard you just hit geometry. I heard Griffin just like to die. I'm wondering if Hellgram just because of his innate curiosity might hang around in the forest in the woods a little bit right up there and get right up as close to the crystal-arium as he can to see what he can see. All right, I like that. So you head over to the sort of northern edge of the woods. You are able to kind of spot the crystal-arium. It is slightly across this kind of like outcropping of the lake, sort of separating you from the entrance to the crystal-arium. But you're able to kind of like, you know, get a decent look at it. I think if you- the extent to which you're going to be able to surveil the crystal-arium is going to depend on how sneaky you can be. I think this would definitely be a good opportunity for you to use your exquisite hiding skills with your chameleon carapace. Right. So give me a stealth check with advantage using your chameleon carapace here. Stealth check with advantage. That would be there's a 12, which for Hellgram it is a hell of a roll. Yeah. And that's a- well now wait a minute. That's an eight. Well, but look at the- can you see the die? No, is it cocked? It said 15. Wow. Wow. It says on our thing eight. Okay, I think we all saw eight. All right. That's so wild. That's so weird. It was up against the edge. It was kind of half way there. Yeah, edge of the- it was cocked. Sure. And I don't want a roll of half cocked. You certainly don't. You want to be full cocked. Well, take a 12 with a 12. You head up to the edge of the woods. You are able to get closer to the crystalarium than you have in the past. There is a long sort of staircase approach leading up to the crystalarium. The building itself appears to be made out of several enormous sort of perfect geometric crystals. It appears to be amethyst. There's like a dark red, maybe ruby, kind of central structure with these two great amethyst pyramids flanking it. And right in the center, there's just kind of a bunch of large like six, seven-foot-tall crystals that are overlapping, forming a kind of like barricaded entrance into this structure. The crystal is mostly opaque. You are not really able to see through it to see exactly what is happening inside the crystalarium. If you were able to get right up on it, like go up the approach, up the stairs, you might be able to get a better look. But from where you are, you can't quite see what's happening inside the building. I think you are close enough that if you wanted to roll a perception or investigation check, you would do that sort of flat just to see if you can figure anything else out without having to get any closer to this place. Well, I have a spell I would like to use. Okay, great. It's called obscure object. Okay, I don't remember that spell. I didn't remember it, too. I just see it. It says at will. Did you get it when you were leveling up, Dad? I have never seen it before today. So I'm thinking maybe it came from today's level up. You took magically mischievous as a feat. Yeah. Okay, that's exactly what it is then. So you have taken magically mischievous as a feat. You gain proficiency inside of hand. That's cool. When you succeed on a dexterity side of hand check to steal something, you can magically turn the stolen object invisible as part of the same action as if you had cast obscure object. The object must be small enough to fit in the palm of your hand and it lasts for one minute. You can use this ability two times per long rest. So it's not like he has the spell, but the spell is like an extension of this. Yeah, he's a stinker. He took the stinker. He's stinky. Yeah, for sure. Okay. Is the thing that you wanted to obscure? We're on earth. I just thought maybe I'm hiding anything during a sleight of hand. Nothing up my what? Yeah. He's going like nothing up my neck. Nothing up my neck. He's got to say nothing. He's got to think of my kite and accept for mandrels and shit. Yeah. It's a bug stuff. Okay. And what were you hoping to obscure here? Well, I thought maybe I would obscure part of the crystal wall. See if I can make a little peephole. Okay. Which would make it, I would think a perception check a little easier. Okay. I think that is a stretch for the description of magically mischievous, but if you want to roll dice to see if it works, I will allow that. But first you're going to have to get like quite a bit closer. You will need to get like right up next to the crystal area in order to do that. And you have been warned not to do that. So the tradeoff I'm willing to do here is like you can attempt this, but you're going to need to put yourself in a more vulnerable position to try it. Okay. So I'll use chameleon carapace to get a little closer. Sure. Do I still have an advantage? Yes. I will give you advantage here. I think because it is off time, like you can creep so slowly that it's still technically hiding, right? Okay. And you're just kind of like scuttling across the ground very, very slowly. Let's get this stealth check with advantages. You actually approach the crystal area. Okay. That is a 10 again. Typical hellgremet roll. Yeah. Oh, an 18. Wow. That's a nice roll yet. Yeah. You need it the most. All right. 18. It takes like you take your sweet time. We're talking about like a painful slow crawl over like an hour. You kind of skip this like stony staircase approach to come at the building from the side. And you are able to eventually make your way up towards the crystal area. As you get closer, you can see some automated sort of defenses that are mostly surrounding this front approach. There are these sort of slender stone towers, maybe 15 feet tall with these swirling white crystalline orbs on top of them that you can feel just like a very powerful magical ward inside of. But you are able to go so slow and so sneaky that you can get up right to the crystal area. And as you kind of hold your hand out towards the side of one of these amethyst walls, you cast obscure object. Give me a slight a hand check, right? This is how obscure objects supposed to work. So to see how effective this is at kind of like using this spell in a lateral thinking sort of manner. Okay, that's 12. 12th, great. Is that great? Yeah, no, I mean it's for hellgrainment. So with a 12, you hold out your hand and you see the wall begin to kind of slowly deform. And it's very, very subtle. It starts out as just kind of like a pinprick flaw in the side of this like smooth crystal that very slowly expands to create a hole that is just like a half inch in diameter. And you put your face towards the edge of the crystal area and you can look through the hole. Can I make an investigation check? You're going to make some sort of check here, right? But like the, this is a, I will tell you now is the DM like a pretty risky thing that you are doing. This thing is Fort Knox and you have managed to penetrate it, albeit just a little bit. So I'm going to want either an investigation or a perception check and because like you have no peripheral vision into this, into this building, it is, it is going to be made with disadvantage. Okay. Well, let's see, there's a seven. Okay. Shit. And a 21. Wow, that's 21 would have been really, really, very, very good. Amazing. Amazing. It would have been, I mean, I'll make you a devil's bargain here, Dad. Okay. You can use that 21 if you want, but you're going to get caught. Or you can take the seven. Hey, you got a, live large. Okay. I'm going to take the 21. Great. You peer in through this hole and when you do, you're only seeing, you know, a half inch worth of activity inside of inside of the crystalarium. It is much more spacious inside than you would have expected. From the outside, it just looks like a huge, like solid crystal, but obviously like there is space inside and it appears to be kind of greater than the, you know, volume of the building would suggest just, just looking at it. You can see very clearly small kind of like, moats of what appear to be kind of multi-colored light swirling around, not swirling around. They seem to be moving in a fairly orderly fashion between different places. You see almost like, almost like shelves of these lights in orderly rows and occasionally moats will fly from one shelf to another, almost like an abacus, like beads moving around an abacus. You can see what appears to be, and I think you have a particular affinity for this, like particular observation, like webs of light inside, not quite the same sort of construction as a spider web, but there does appear to be some kind of like, you know, something familiar. Just looking at a beehive or looking at your, the nest that you kind of like grew up in, there is a biological natural structure in order to that. And what you see in here is like kind of unfamiliar, but it does have that feeling of a, like a biological system, something that has been engineered by biology. And you can tell, I think just taking this extra look and taking this extra time to look, the little moats of light that are floating around are the crystals that you all have, you know, created as your memories have been kind of manifest, and your spells have been manifest into these different little stones and the different stones that you found that have given you access. So looking inside, you are able to kind of glean that there is a, there is some sort of structure in here, some sort of system where the stones that have these, these magic spells kind of imprinted onto them are being managed. And right next to your ear or your striking hearing hole, whatever it is, you, a voice comes very loud and says, hell, gram it, I must warn you, you have broken one of the rules of the concave. And therefore you are to be eliminated immediately without, wait, wait, wait, I'm, what, what rule? You look at your side and you see on your grim war, the crystal that was set there as sort of your personal assistant has, has caught you in the act of spying into the crystal area. I'm afraid I must report you immediately to the octave because what rule did I break? What, what, what rule? You were specifically forbidden as are all of the aspirants here from approaching, attempting to enter, attempting to invade or learn the secrets of the crystal area. Oh, I, I was not trying, I didn't, I never touched it. I, I, let me explain myself, I've felt this compulsion. I, I felt, I felt another, what I thought was another Thrykine in, in jeopardy in, in some kind of stress and strain and, and that, I purposefully didn't touch anything. I just was trying to reach out to them and see if there was anything I could do to help. I, I, I sincerely apologize. I had no intention of trying to break in or trying to get through. I, that's why I tried not to touch anything, but I just felt this inner connection to someone in, in danger or, or, or hurting or trying to reach out. My, my intentions were pure, I assured you. There's some lies in there, but there's some truths in there. So I don't know if this is a persuasion or a deception check. I'll, I'll leave it to you whichever one you. I do better at persuasion. Okay, well, we can do that. Not that I do well in anything, but, cheese, lemme, I got a hellgram at four. That's a two plus a two. But to be fair dad, that's like a loraveth twelve. Yeah. I know. That's true. The, the like little crystal holographic shape that has appeared over the grimoire, you see it kind of percolate on what you just said and you hear the voice say, I am willing to overlook this, this time. However, I am afraid that your memory must be purged from the last ten minutes in order to keep the playing field fair. It's so important that here on the octave cigarette that all of the aspirants have a fair shake to ascend to the position of the, of the new octave. And by looking into the crystalarium, you, you are, I'm sorry to say cheating quite a bit. So if you can agree to the memory purge, then I can, I suppose, let this slide and not have to, not have to run this up the flagpole. So to speak. Can I have just a minute to think it over? This is a big decision for me. Between death and a memory purge? Yes. Okay. Yes. Give me just a minute. Will you? Sure. And he scrolls in the dirt with his claw, thriking symbols that say... Myological Moats in the dirt. Okay. All right. Now, is the person watching him famously stupid? Yeah, right. I meant to ask if they're famously stupid or out of service. Give me a slide of ancheck here. You have, you're good at this now. And so to do this without the little, you know, 22. 22 with a 22, you can scratch. Jack Griffin. Yeah, really Griffin. Yeah. How far it's? No, you know I'm rooting for you guys, right? Like this is the... Yeah, no, I know. I just wanted to make Dad feel good for a second. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, buddy. He needs this. Yeah, with a 22, I think you can etch in like a decent, you know, thrikey... We can say that thrikey in sort of language has a sort of shorthand quality to it, like a forced stenographer will be able to do. You're able to etch in enough sort of information here. And Chris says, if you're done using the bathroom or whatever it is, you're doing... No, I... You know, I realize I've done you wrong. Chris? Is it Chris? That's right. Chris, I am moved to the core with shame. Not so much I want you to kill me, but enough that I purge that memory. Take it, Chris. Take the memories. Take them all away. Please stand by. Give me a wisdom saving throw, please. Holy shit. That is a map one. Wow, man. You forget everything. It is a complete obliteration of your... An absolute remarkable forgetting that takes place right here. You are standing stock still. Just a second ago, you were walking through the woods and you were trying to figure out how you wanted to spend your day. Now you're standing by the lake here between the woods and the crystalarium. I'm going to need... I hate to do this, but with a crit failure. As you kind of snap back to your senses, I'm going to need a luck check just to see... Or a perception check to see if you notice the symbols that you etched into the ground here before you walk away. Do investigation again. I mean no, because you don't know to look for it. I'll take... It's a seven. With a seven, you don't notice these symbols that you've written in the ground. Neither has Chris. Neither is anyone else. They are there. You have written a secret message by the ground level of the crystalarium as to what it contains. But you come back to the present and you don't know where you are. You don't know why you're standing here. You know where you are. You don't know how you ended up here. Chris says, hello there, hellgram it. I am here to tell you that you have experienced a brief lapse in your memory because of an arcane incident. Oh my god. What did I do? You did break a rule here on the Ziggurat and I chose to show clemency to you. And I am hoping you will repay my kindness in turn by returning to the residences to rest and sleep off this incredible breach of your mental sanctuary. Chris, I would be happy to. But I ask one favor. Just tell me what I did wrong so I know not to repeat the same offense. You broke one of the cardinal rules of the Octav Ziggurat. Enjoy your rest, hellgram it. It's time for you to go home. Very well. Thank you Chris. And you head back to the residences to sleep off the memory wipe, leaving behind a clue as to the crystallarium that no one has seen. Man, this is very Robert Lewis Stevenson stuff. It's a huge hellgram it stuff. I think you can own that entirely. Laura Veth, how are you spending your day? Well after watching all of that play out from a distance. And enjoying it a great deal. And observing all of it and seeing all of that. Enjoy it. I find myself drawn to the gilded lily. Okay. I'd like to explore over in that area of I haven't been through there yet and the idea of being around the lake and being near some water appeals to me. Yeah, it's, you head over. The gilded lily is this great crystalline flower emerging from these two kind of lily pad shaped islands connected to the rest of the Ziggurat. These two long sort of painted red bridges. You cross those over to these lily pad islands and it is indeed like this is the lap of luxury of the island. As you approach the gilded lily, you can see inside it's kind of separated into a few different chambers inside of one. You see a few aspirants seated at these very posh looking dining tables eating some delicious looking. Well delicious to maybe non-goliaths, very fancy looking food. You can see through another that appears to be a little bit more opaque for privacy. You can see like there's a spa set in one part of the gilded lily. You can see like a small kitchen where unseen servants are kind of toiling away cooking food for the outside. Oh, head into the spa. Okay. You make your way into the spa and when you get there, there is a small reception desk and there doesn't appear to be anyone seated at the reception desk, but there is a small golden kind of ring for service bell positioned on it. Ding. You hit the bell and you hear tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, and from behind the desk you see their climbs up a main chand and it gives you a little wave and it gestures towards a door over to the side that says body massage. There's one that says mud bath. All of the different services that a spa can provide seem to be separated into these different doors and this may chand is like gesturing towards them and then giving like a thumbs up and then towards another one like maybe that one. Yeah, perhaps I'll admit I have not sought services in the past, but I've never been I, my rock that I normally sleep on at home in light so just so the sand. You see here, you see I've been there and mistreated. I've searched perhaps three dozen rocks here. Beautiful views over look but the angle it just is not right and every morning I wake up with the worst pain here and here. Is this something you can banish from me? You see the may chand kind of tap its fingers on the desk like it's thinking and then it puts a single finger up and then it puts its hand over the bell and it rings it in like a very specific sequence. It gives it a shave and a haircut like a ding, ding, ding, ding and when that happens you hear you see a huge door off off to the side of the this like spot chamber that is unlabeled. It like bursts open as though it's been kicked and a an enormous mage hand kind of like climbs in almost like a like a kid making a dinosaur out of their hand kind of just like stomps in with each finger fall. It kind of just like shakes this you know this deep red glass chamber that you're standing in and the giant hand sort of scurries over to you. It is about the size of like a grizzly bear this enormous hand and the smaller mage hand gestures towards the body massage chamber and gestures to the enormous hand which seems to be kind of like waiting to follow you. Yeah I'll head into the chamber. For sure. You walk over to the body massage chamber and lay down there is a very very soft bed. Do I do you? Well what do I lay down on? Don't tell me I lay down before you tell me what I'm laying down on. Well there's a there is a tell me I lay down you lay down and you die. What if it's nails lay down on me. What if it's a nail? Yeah you walk into his lava and I was like I'm going down to the lava and burning it sucks. Why would you do that? No get on. I'm tired I get tired of lying on that. There it is. There is a soft looking bed with a sort of like small head hole carved into it or cut out of the cushion. I'm not a massage expert. I don't think it's a soft bed. I don't think that that's the right. I think it's got to be some firmness. What happens though is when you walk in this enormous hand lumbars in after you and just swat this soft bed into the side of the wall where it kind of like shatters and falls apart and then it points right down at the hard ground. Now we're talking yes this I can respect. You see this giant hand as shallow and dressed in my level of comfort. It gives you a thumbs up like of course dude you naturally now of course you should this is about to get extremely extremely wild. Okay yeah just like a like a leather wrap. No I'm my dangle yeah sure then around. Like a leathery drop kind of deal. There's a leather strap through my butt cracked is purely structural. Yeah amazing. Okay you lay down and you see that it's good we had it's quite cold. You see it walk over there's a small there's a small sphere set into like a plinth in the corner of the room that it kind of like rubs its index finger over and you feel the temperature of the room begin to increase. The room seems to warm up quite a bit as it manipulates this sphere and it gestures towards the ground which is now quite a bit warmer as you lay down on it. Do you lay down on it holy shit I do lay down on it I apologize yeah. Do feel this enormous mage hand sort of to start kind of applying them out of pressure to your back that it seems a little bit intense however you are made of fairly stern stuff and so you know it's not like this this giant bear sized mage hand is crushing you and after doing that for a few seconds you see it like scuttle in front of your face and give you like a thumbs up like that good I could take I could handle more I could handle more. Okay you feel it return to sort of straddle your back with its thumb and pinky and it begins using its other three fingers to give you a fairly deep tissue massage give me a constitution saving throw as this enormous hand begins to rub your back. Okay sorry a saving throw yes constitution save 13 plus 5 18 yeah it is totally bearable the amount of pressure this this hand is giving you you have definitely gotten firmer more intense sort of bodywork done to you in the Goliath community that you hail from and so like you get the sense that you know you could stand a little bit more pressure it does feel pretty nice though. That's ah yes ah no that's actually that's that's the limit that's right there that is actually the most right hand you the hand scuttles in front of your face so it can address you it looks at you gives you a thumbs up like good no more hand my feet I know I know but if you if you could it kind of I don't know if that's inappropriate I don't understand me huge hand culture it looks a little timid not that yeah it does the professional massaging hand response to my to give me an insight check give me an insight check limit about rubbing feed me an insight check let me see on you on the me chair on the bear size me got it 17 plus one it's not that it doesn't want to touch your feet it doesn't want to hurt you you can tell this large hands all okay man I read you perfectly it's nothing you don't want to touch my feet it's such a afraid you heard yeah with an 18 insight check you get the sense that this giant maychand massage therapist has hurt people in the past ah not perhaps understanding its own power ah but can he tell with an 18 if the hurt was physical or emotional or what it's both it's an emotional pain this maychand is I want you to know something you had huge hand it grumbled you don't know how these touches have been too much what you could never know I'm sure you are quite a powerful hand but unless you have the crushing force of a angry mama black bear I assure you these touches can handle it all right it sort of shrugs with its knuckles and you see rip them down you see them it's gris down to down to your legs give me another constitution saving throw please I look forward to the extended universe novel about the time that Laura with a fight an angry mama black bear with his feet yeah okay that is a nine so you you did get a really good massage here before this part so I'm going to give you you you you are going to what is your HB you know what try you're going to take give me damage no wow no my no my man okay 38 is my current 38 HB is your what you got now yes now I will say that I have I have my for my level four thing yeah I took the feet of athletics okay so what I saw I was thinking is maybe this thing limbered me up sorry remember I'm I'm getting a little bit more comfortable climbing a little bit better to dexterity yeah due to the loosening up there I do like narratively just a fine sure sir okay yeah you have the athletics the athlete feet which allows you to increase your score sorry I have athletes foot you have athletes put and athletes feet this is a cool feed it lets you sort of climb better you can stand up from prone a lot easier this felt right it felt like a good pair yeah for sure I am also going to grant you an additional 10 points temporary hit points that you can start the next trial with that will be sort of a buffer on top now is that out of pity or do you want to do that no I want to do that I do not need the pity no it's it is not I don't need it I want there to be some sort of like you know repercussions some result of the stuff that you just for the record I'll take pity bonuses yes you you feel great after the first part of the massage it starts in on your feet and you can tell pretty much immediately it doesn't really know how to really do you get the sits more of a large muscle group specialist and so it starts to rub your your tootsies very tenderly and just kind of pinching it between its thumb and forefinger and as you kind of move a little bit sort of suggesting there is an amount of discomfort the hand kind of just like starts like rubbing your legs trying to like figure out get back in the swing of things and then you can tell it like it's it's getting pretty frustrated and it starts rubbing the rest of your body you know with with a little bit too much firmness and sensing that it has completely fucked this up and it's so with a nine on your feet man it's so frustrated but that's me I couldn't handle it you feel this hand sort of raise and and you know there's no pressure on your body for a moment and then it brings the palm down onto your back and you smash through the floor of the lily pad leaving a sort of cartoonish loravith shaped hole in the ground and you are immediately met with water as you plummet into the lake below while you are you know still adjust your leather strap and just your leather strap as you are momentarily kind of you know suspended in the water here give me a perception check please okay holy shit man wow natural 20 you can see the molecules binding to the water I never realized it's just hydrogen allows to just what support anybody could do this I have that stupid home why we buy water you are smashed through the ground and immediately I think your fight or flight response grants you sort of superhuman perception I'm so relaxed yeah my body is so undeniable you you immediately like your body springs into action and you start to feel you know back above you towards this hole so you can climb in your underneath this island and that's a terrible place to be but you also see something underneath the water what do I see Griffith you see a glimmer of gold an enormous golden shape there's some sunlight directly overhead and it is you know shimmering off the surface of this large golden shape that as you look down at it you can tell is a tower reaching up from the the bottom of the lake almost all the way to the surface this huge extremely tall tower you can see a little small mage hands kind of weaving around it seemingly preparing it for something you see what looks like a a few hands dragging in some crossbows in through a window you see large kind of earns filled with that that are sealed because it's underwater you can't tell what's inside of them but those are being pulled in there's just this fleet of mage hands preparing this tower for what you assume to be the next trial okay and getting a glimpse at it in this way I'm going to also give you a point of inspiration that you can spend in the next trial as you get a little sneak peak so this is like late or are we where I'm seeing this just I'm looking at the map now I'm trying to place this in my head yeah my more is it closer to the crystal area m into the lake or closer to like the arena end it's closer to the crystal area m end of the lake is somewhere the bridges yeah kind of kind of here right next to the long spanning bridge here you right underneath that there's a great golden tower that is being named that bridge Griffin you were telling me it was so beautiful where before we started you're telling me you had this beautiful name bridge Nash no you know it is is it yeah it's Nash Bridge well there's two of them because there's one another one on the other side so it would be the Nash bridges this is little Nash this is big Nash this is big Nash Bridge and you're underneath it that's where you see the golden tower bridge guys the the the selection set for this joke is for human beings right all this call one of us don't want to ask bridge and don don't don't want to teach me earn both big test you know teach me earn didn't even get it he forgot he was on Nash bridge no way teach remember sees on Nash bridges uh you are able to pull yourself back up through the six seasons I'll take crazy pull yourself back up through the whole into the massage room as you get in there the big hand is like frantically scurrying around with that 18 insight check you're really plugged into this thing you can tell like oh my god I killed another one uh it seems very relieved to see you uh and and helps pull you back up into the room and laser rug over the big hole that you and it made uh in the floor and you are wet but you do feel revitalized by this great massage that you've received and I just a macro I learned that they did a Nash bridge is re-brewed in 2021 so yeah I know we all are this grows today this podcast is brought to you by Squarespace you've heard us talk about Squarespace so many times over the years 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categories and it consolidates all of your different accounts into a single dashboard so you get just a uh a clear picture of your financial health all in one place uh it really does what it does extraordinarily well and i can't recommend it enough let rocket money help you reach your financial goals faster join at rocket money.com slash adventure that's rocket money.com slash adventure one last time rocket money.com slash adventure got a few announcements uh before you get back to the rest of the episode we got some new merch up in the Mcroy merch store over at Mcroymerch.com uh new t-shirt with a helping is always a free action design on it there's a 20 make it stick and namel pins on there uh lots of really really great stuff this month and 10% of all of our merch proceeds this month will be donated to border angels whose services include educational programs water drops in the desert day laborer outreach familiars reunite us immigration bond fund program and shelter aid support into youwana to aid migrants and asylum seekers in need i also want to let you know that i have a book coming up very soon it's a choose your own adventure book uh it's called the stow away uh it's appropriate for middle grade readers uh but i think it's a rollicking adventure a survival tale set in outer space that that anyone would get a thrill or two out of there's entry there's action there's stunts there's everything that a book can have i think those are the three right i said action in stunts right yeah no that's all of it so you can pre-order that now at bit.ly slash griffin stow away and it would be gosh just a huge help to me if you would consider doing that the book is ten dollars uh and it comes out again on march 10th so don't wait go ahead and uh secure your copy today that's it enjoy the rest of the episode we will be back with a new one in two weeks so talk to you then bye hey it's tv chef fantasy league you know the podcast where we watch cooking competition shows and we treat them like fantasy sports right now we're getting ready for top chef carolina's we spend all year covering these competitions but now it's time for the main event the apex predator of competitive cooking television shows tune in for after team and play along with your hosts cierra cotto mic gabbell on and if you want to wait new episodes every week at maximumfund.org or wherever you get your podcasts wonderful is a podcast where we talk about things we like that's hard to sell in a promo like this so we've enlisted the help of piano rock superstar billy joel to tell you about some of the topics we've covered take it away real billy joel they didn't stop the podcast except that's not true they didn't want to do they didn't stop the podcast no they actually did that was a fact of it listen to wonderful every Wednesday on maximumfund.org or wherever you get your podcasts thanks real billy joel no problem Griffin okay it is later in the day and the three of you have made your way to the the addley a the great sort of cat headed tent here right by the residences you see a couple other aspirants kind of filing out as the three of you make your way in and behind the counter you see you see john arbuckle and he is he looks up to see the three of you looking up from the the sort of fleet of crystals floating overhead and he says oh hey guys welcome welcome back how the last trial go you look you look well some of you look refreshed and rested um you yeah it's just not Richter did not sleep well it took a long time for us he looks like crap yeah well he's became an arsonist and that'll take it out at anybody uh attempted arsonist Griffin sure sure uh he's a okay so well let's get you stocked up uh very very exciting as I suggested last time you all were in here uh I am able to dispense uh a few kind of uh magical implements to age you moving forwards and uh what we'll get you all set up so that you you you you can put up a fair fight in the next trial because okay guys it's only gonna get way harder from here way way way way way way way harder I need something that deflects like something that stops us about do you have that something that stops us spell like if somebody tried to cast something on me that it would like bounce off or like back at them or something do you have that I mean you know that the way that we do things here is sort of a random distribution um so there are some things like that obviously there's lots of protective magic you already did the trial of abduration so you should know that um but um I you know reach reach in and we'll see kind of what we will be in up with okay you want to spell or an item first um book items do you have well let me show you he pulls out a uh an orb a uh sort of gelatinous looking swirling purple orb uh he says uh so a lot of the the the magic instruments that have been confiscated uh by the octave from uh the fold below and up in here and uh you can reach in you can take you know like a special random prize and uh you know use use what you you get here in the trials um maybe you'll get lucky maybe there will be something that will you know like a special umbrella that bounces uh it spells back at people or I don't know something like that I don't know it's in the orb they don't really tell me but um you're welcome to conjure whatever you'd like from there um we're gonna do our sort of like spell draw situation and our a random item draw today here okay at all yay um you all take out your little prize bags that you got for your third place finish in the last trial uh which include a few small copper cubes um similar to the ones that you got as the prize in the first trial um and uh whoever wants to go first why don't we do the spells first and then we'll get you guys an item more of a thugor first uh hellgrapman after you hmm you're lucky go for it i didn't call him bug band i'm trying to carry favor what what oh i'm sorry i was a little distracted uh uh what are we doing what you you all did this once already you're gonna contract me i'm sorry i'm i'm yes sure um i i'd like uh ham on swiss no what are we doing okay i'll go first you place your three copper cubes on the counter you see uh john arpacle kind of like sweep them uh and place them in a small sack under his desk as you do that uh you see a selection of crystals fly down from this uh you know amorphous cloud uh of spell stones floating overhead five crystals land on the counter uh he says for the copper prize or this trial uh there's five random spells here you can pick three and take them into the next trial just to choose wisely because uh you never really know what's coming coming your way and you gotta be ready for anything uh the five spells that have landed in front of you uh selected at random from the pool of available magics uh i have just texted to you travis if you uh need to refer to them that way it is gust a cantrip that lets you make a gust of wind mending a cantrip that lets you fix things magic missile first level spell you know what it does uh unseen servant which allows you to conjure uh an invisible assistant to do your light work for you uh and then the second level spell locate object sick not a bad selection of wizardly spells uh you get to pick which ones you want uh definitely unseen servant okay and locate object got it and uh magic missile great you take those three spell stones the other two uh soar back up into the cloud and as you slot them into your grim war uh again you have this kind of disorienting moment where the memories of three other wizards kind of pop into your head i don't think we've seen any gust you you have had used against you back in the first trial uh i believe by zephyr um but that is not when you chose so the others are are wizards you don't really recognize but you've gotten kind of used to this process of internalizing these memories and feeling comfortable with these uh spells as you as you gain them um who is who wants to go next uh hellgram it will go next okay uh you do the same thing put your three copper cubes up on the counter uh five spell stones appear before you of which you can choose three hellgram it five uh spells uh and you can add add three of them to your your grim war here there's create bonfire um which you've seen used before it does kind of what it says on the ten silent image which is the first level spell let's you make sort of a silent uh very realistic looking illusory uh uh image of what whatever you'd like cloud of daggers second level spell that makes a kind of uh field of swirling blades that you can use to kind of block off an area or damage people who enter it misty step um which was the spell of mr mister who you didn't really get a chance to meet but did perish in the last trial basic sort of teleportation magic uh and then shocking grasp which is a sort of electric melee uh spell attack those are your five you it's big three um cloud of daggers for sure that's yeah shocking grasp got it that's a cantrip i'm not looking to win a lot of new friends but you will influence people for sure and i believe misty step add those please to your character sheet and uh you you slot uh those into your your grim war and again this is a a phenomenon you've experienced a few times you do see uh mr mister as you slot in the misty step spell and you know you didn't know and but you see memories of uh of this wizard who um had a sort of like street magician vibe uh working you know the the busking circuit just showing off how he can sort of displace himself from from one spot to another to earn you know to earn a living uh it was a it was a hard hard fought life very exhausting and then it ended here and now you have his magical spell um and you also have these two others uh and loraveth uh yeah i put down my cubes and take my chances okay all right five spell stones uh fly down from the cloud uh the selection that you have been offered mending again the cantrip that let's you fix broken things uh earth trimmer first level spell pixel earthquake uh blur uh a uh illusion spell that allows you to kind of like blur your image which forces disadvantage on attack rolls uh against you uh alter self uh a favorite of uh the dads from past seasons where you can sort of like change your form to have an aquatic adaptation or change your appearance or whatever i think i'm gonna take the alter self i have a good good feeling about alter self for sure we have fun with that one it's a lot of fun man yeah you also have the last one that appears is uh it is is one you were actually pretty familiar with you can sense inside of the last of the spell stones that appears uh is ice knife which was the spell possessed by absolute zero the kind of icy uh ninja that you that you worked with and befriended in the first trial before i know that yeah i mean you can tell what these spells are as they appear all right i picked that one up and kind of like nostalgia give it a once over just sort of like to see if i i don't know i want to know if there's any sense of the person there still yeah i mean absolutely it is a crystallized uh manifestation of of memory uh which is which is how these magic spells are kind of like passed from from one aspirant to to another so yeah i mean definitely there is there's a part of of him that is that is in that that stone oh i thought you'd want me to do some sort of role playing game checker something to figure that out but i'm no i mean you can that that is how this has worked for all of these right so you you would know that that is kind of how it how it happens i know that's how it happens i'm like i don't know personnel to him does that have a vibe is there a soul in here uh is there a soul in there give me you can give me an inside check on the on the crystal to see okay it's the 11 plus one well no pretty um these stones as you have like as you understand them and as you have kind of like received them in the past there's not like a there there's nothing trapped in here necessarily there is not so they don't talk to you these are straight up you know recordings of a person's of a wizard's past um it is like a um i mean it is crystallized experience right because the reason why it is so impossible for people you know who can cast magic down on the you know in the fold is because it takes a long long long long time to practice these spells and so these crystals are just kind of a are are just kind of hard copy recordings of of that practice and of that experience um there is no there's no soul or anything trapped in here there's no way to communicate uh with absolute zero in here you can only kind of see what he experienced okay i will take his cube thank you okay you take his spell stone and you have one more you can choose uh i'm gonna grab mending okay uh those would be the most useful okay considering what we what i've learned and they have not and if they at any point act like they know the stuff i know i'm gonna bullet my shit okay just a warning i take my head funds off whenever i'm not talking Justin just to make sure yeah i don't know i'm sure i know you're not a big listener but i'm not really that worried about okay alter self ice knife and mending please add those to your character sheets um as you uh as you insert the spell stone for ice knife you do get a quick like sort of uh you know life flash before your eyes version of absolute zero story uh growing up in a uh this sort of like elemental monastery uh training you get the sense that uh he had a pretty intense regimen he was throwing hundreds of ice knives every single day uh you know practicing his his aim and his ability to kind of like manifest the elements uh you see yourself in the memory of when absolute zero first met you during the trial of abduration what was his read on me uh first first glance it was he was impressed he was he was very impressed by you uh i knew i liked absolute zero yeah what a champ you also see uh a brief moment where uh he enters into the eggs when you first kind of had your your break time egg memory i remember he yeah what did he what did i get out of that you uh do you remember which of the eggs he went into oh yes Griffin i have it i got a tattoo of it like uh the guy in momentum it's um oh no it says no i don't actually the tattoo just says no i don't have any clue Griffin one of my nighacle thing to ask you three i believe it was three i believe it was the third day um say dad listens Travis that's what listen is that's what you have to be on guard of for my name and so his generation of rumors how to listen you have to be careful with them it's like okay uh it is it is hard to pick out specifics of these kind of like of these memories you don't necessarily have the ability to you know tivo through the memories to pick and choose the parts that you you really want to be able to focus on give me a history check uh to see how much of this memory of the third egg you can kind of glean heck yeah that's a 20 30 20 a natural 20 unnatural 20 that doesn't work either i'm gonna do whatever it takes to get this community and i'm talking about all the ttrpg community yeah one of you night everybody is stop saying dirty 20 please yeah gentlemen 20 uh a gentleman's 20 i also don't love okay i love that either it's just 20 because the other one is a natural right right so we have a natural 20 and we have a real 20 right real classic 20 on alternate 20 who was it that went into the second egg that was you hell gram right mm-hmm and you didn't necessarily share what happened in there with other people no i don't think so okay i mean i'm not adverse to it yes with an unnatural 20 you are able to pick up a lot from this memory you see absolute zero kind of nervous being sort of bullied and to go into this egg by you uh it seals behind him and he you know receives the same kind of uh disclaimer from Chris uh about how uh the the history of this world will be revealed through these different chambers uh and that this the history of this world is divided into eight different eras this third era that you see absolute zero go into uh the voice coming from his grim mark calls the era cognition and immediately like the darkness inside of this egg is replaced by just a a smorgasbord of of evolution it is uh you see single-celled sort of organisms uh up here and and float in the air all around him that then begin to grow and mature they go through uh these very primordial stages of of life uh you see uh creatures swimming in the ocean and pulling themselves up onto land you are seeing the whole of the origins of life on this planet sort of condensed down into this one extremely visceral kind of tangible history lesson and you you realized that the kind of euphoria he experienced as he came out of there was was this connection to not just nature but to consciousness to life itself uh which it characterizes apparently in the you know octaves beliefs the third era of of of the world um and it it's not enough to like grant you any like sort of additional benefits but like you do feel a sense of uh of great peace kind of overcome you as you you have that memory um right uh you see john arbuckle said that one would not smooth john arbuckle says minty after finish thank you absolute zero john arbuckle says okay now time for the uh conjuration and um uh i i'll warn you that these are also kind of coded to the prize levels that you received in the last trial so i wouldn't be expecting any you know great flaming swords or anything to be yanked out of here but uh you might get a little extra bonus uh that that might help you out so um whoever wants to reach into the gelatinous purple orb first uh go go right ahead dives all right you plunge your hand in you're gonna make a d20 roll here with disadvantage for your uh your third place finish and well that's an eight and a i'm not good at that one roll uh 17 okay great what have been swell you reach your hand inside of this orb it feels cold you're reaching into a sort of um fluid void uh that is not particularly pleasant to plunge your hand into you feel your hand brush against a few different objects that kind of slip from your grasp as you try to grab them and finally you are able to close your hand around uh something solid which you pull out and you see uh a pair of dark tinted spectacles uh and they are they are fairly large they are large enough to fit over your face they actually appear to fit you quite well um and you see john arbuckle pull out a small leather bound book and says oh okay so those are the spectacles of Bernard um these were sent in by listener marissa thank you marissa if you want to send in a magic item here for the orb of conjuration uh you can do that by sending us an email at adventure zone cast at gmail.com uh yes the spectacles of Bernard sent in by marissa dark tinted spectacles imbued with the spell animate dead but only works when the spectacles are placed on the recently deceased user grains advantage on deception checks when trying to make someone else think the corpse is still alive this spell ends after 24 hours or if the spectacles are knocked off uh okay i got you this is fun let's get this let's get this in the next handbook please six edition please six edition it's what gary will want it uh i will try to find a way to put this in the uh in the in the in the system so you can add it to your character sheet uh okay yes rick displease roll a fourteen and a three griffin okay again you reach your hand in and you feel your hand close uh around uh something sort of a slippery plastic slightly squishy feeling you grab your hand around it and pull it out and you pull out a what looks like a um a a faintly red and white faded plastic water bottle um with a sort of like a squeeze top lid um and there is a a post it note that is kind of like taped around it uh which reads jordan and uh you see uh you john our buckles says oh yeah that that one is deceptively pretty effective stuff that's i mean it's secret stuff it's jordan secret stuff sent in by brine this magical flask rumor to once have been owned by jordan the greatest wizard ball player who ever lived contains a special potion that strengthens anyone who drinks it any creature drinks it gains plus one d four to skill checks for the next ten minutes the flask has enough for one drink which refills each dawn every time you drink the potion the drinker must roll a dc 20 perception check on a person on a successful role they realize the potion is just water but come to understand the strength was inside all along this creature no longer received the benefit of drinking the potion however if they succeed in a dc 10 deception role they can convince others of its powers and have them consume the potion and gain the benefit without having to roll the perception check one jordan secret stuff i love that thank you okay uh hell gram it you are the last to approach the orb of conjuration roll two d 20s yes seven and eighteen okay great you you reach your hand into the the orb of conjuration and very quickly something just kind of like flops into your hand it doesn't feel great but you're able to close your hand around it and you pull out straight up it's a banana peel and he uh you's john arbuckle says uh oh well don't don't be too discouraged that is no ordinary uh produce garbage that is a very powerful magical artifact uh this was also submitted by marissa thank you marissa it is the artificial banana peel a banana peel that never rots or loses its slipperyness make someone else slip and fall over ha ha um so this is a banana peel that you can use uh to try to trip someone up and it never rots or loses its slipperyness oh great that's awesome thank you so much hey man i told you these are copper rewards they're not going to be amazing do better in the next trial you'll get better stuff oh well i can't because i roll fish 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