Perpetua 02: The Shadow of the Dragon Tower Pt. 2
Transcriber: Akumu (akumu#7506) [00:00:00 - 00:27:14] / Jay (8325) [00:27:14 onwards]
Recap        1
Flegg Encounter        2
The Cabin in the Woods [00:39:28]        33
Travelling to the Tower [01:14:45]        52
The Tower [01:20:49]        55
Recap
[“Perpetua” by Jack de Quidt begins playing]
Dre: Jonathan is sitting in the cockpit, he’s got the windows open, he is holding his signature pipe in one hand.
Jack: Moving through the evening field, you know, there’s maybe like a dewpoint starting to rise on the ground.
Art: I imagine that you find Nicky in the kitchen on the Little Snail, maybe cleaning up after our evening service.
Ali: Sitting on the edge of one the, like, outer platforms of the Little Snail with her, like, feet over the edge and with, like, a book in her lap.
Austin: When you wake up you can’t find the map, and also someone’s gone through your stuff. The dishes aren’t clean. Someone stopped the dishwasher overnight.
Art: What?!
Dre: What?!
Art (as Nicky): Arrrrrggghh!
Ali: (laughs)
Austin: This is cuh-lassic flegg behavior.
Dre (as Jonathan): God damn it, which one of y’all left the wagon door open again?
Ali (as Veile): Get ‘em, Jonathan!
Austin: It’s 54 damage. (all laugh) Now, I have a question, would that kill any of you?
Art: Uh, yes.
Jack: Uh, I, I think it would kill me.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: I think it would kill every one of you.
Ali: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Now let me tell you something.
[Ali gasps]
Austin: It doesn’t kill a flegg.
[Ali gasps louder]
[“Perpetua” by Jack de Quidt plays out]
Flegg Encounter
Austin: When a flegg reaches zero HP, it unbreaks, retracting its arms and legs inside of its shells, face vanishing and exterior hardening into an unbreakable stone-like form. One week later, the stone shell will shed, and flegg will reappear.
Art: (laughing) Wait.
Austin: The, the fire blast hits this flegg, and when the fire clears, there’s just a little stone there, just a little egg-shaped stone. You can’t kill a flegg.
Jack: Does this mean that there is, uh, a finite number of fleggs? In the world?
Austin: There are, that’s right. As far as you know—well, you don’t know, maybe there could, maybe it’s not a finite number, maybe it’s a growing number.
Jack: (laughing) A growing number.
Art: The fleggs will, eventually, overwhelm us all.
Austin: (overlapping) The fleggs will inherit the Earth.
Dre: Yeah, can I just kick this, this flegg-stone off of… ?
Austin: You absolutely can! I call that a free action.
[Dre cackles]
Jack: [laughing] Into the river.
Austin: Into the river!
Dre (as Jonathan): Go on, git!
Austin: Uh, the other ones do not like this. That is the end of our round, uh, we are back around to the top. Uh, who’s going first, because you still have initiative, and in fact, now, you will both start and end each round here, so, who’s up?
Dre: I mean, I can go again, just so that I…
Austin: Still have that bonus, right?
Dre: I maintain my buff, yeah. (laughs)
Art: Uhhh…
Austin: Let’s do it. Why not?
Dre: Yeah, sure!
Austin: Unless there’s, unless there’s an objection.
Jack: Wait, hang on—
Art: Uh, you don’t get the +5, ‘cause the 5 was only that flegg.
Austin: Oh, sure.
Art: But everything else is still good.
Jack: Yeah I wanted to, I wanted to actually go back. What was it that you did with that oyster? I understood that you made an oyster. [Dre laughs] I thought, I, I was misunderstanding what was happening.
Art: Uh, I made the oyster, then I made the flegg eat the oyster.
Austin: Okay, well, fweh.
Jack: Okay, and then, what did that do to the flegg, it…?
Art: It made him take more damage from fire attacks.
Jack: Okay, great. Cool.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: Just like a flat 5 damage from the next fire attack.
Austin: Which turned into a flat—
Art: ‘Til the end of my next turn.
Austin: —10 damage, because of the double… hit.
Jack: Does anybody have a spell—we don’t need this for the scene, but like, this just feels like it would be really useful in party composition—does anybody right now have a spell that can identify weaknesses?
Austin: Um.
Dre: Ooh, no.
Jack: We can do that with a, with a opportunity.
Austin: You can do it with an opportunity, and, and, I should note there are things that we have not done that you could be doing besides attacks in any given action.
Jack: Ooh, yes.
Austin: Or in any given round. Um, uh, you can obviously do—let me try to find it, yeah, here we go—actions. There’s a list here, there’s minor actions, minor activities, so things like picking up an item from the ground, or dropping something you’re holding, you’re allowed to do that for free. Now, changing your equipment and rearranging your gear, that’s different. You can quickly toss an item you have to an another character, so if you, you know, have the, the gem of, of cartouche and need to get rid of it, you can football toss it to somebody else for free. You can perform a minor interaction with the environment, like opening an unlocked door, or pulling a lever, or kicking down a wooden plank: those are all free. If what you’re doing requires a check, then that’s probably the action you take for the turn. Beyond that, there’s a list of one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten other things listed here; they’re in the handout section as, uh, dah dah dah dah, “conflict actions.” “Attack: perform a melee or ranged attack. Equipment: you may switch any number of equipped items with any number of items in your backpack.” This does not apply to armor, you can’t change armor in the middle of a fight. Um, “guard: only once per turn, until the start of your next turn, you gain a resistance to all damage types.” Super important to think about this. It means you can take half damage from anything coming in. “You gain a +2 to opposed checks.” So if someone’s trying to like wrestle you, and I say, “It’s a might/might check.” And then you can cover another creature and prevent foes from performing melee attacks against them. You just straight-up prevent them from being hit. This is super useful for if you, say, want to guard the orphans who are being attacked by the evil fleggs, I don’t know. The next thing you can do is hinder, “you perform a check against an opponent. If you succeed, you inflict dazed, shaken, slow or weak upon them.” Those are all, uh, debuffs that are pretty powerful. “Inventory: You can spend inventory points to create and immediately use a consumable item like a potion or an ether. Objective: You work towards accomplishing an objective within the conflict. This will require an attribute check or an oppose check. Complex goals will often require clock.” So for instance, if you were like, “I want to scare the fleggs away,” or “I want to convince them to give us that map,” that might be an objective roll.
Dre: Hmm..
Austin: “Spell: you cast one of the spells you have learned. Study: you will attempt to gain information about someone or something. This will generally require an insight/insight open check.” This is the one where you could theoretically use to learn something.
Jack: Hmm… okay, cool.
Austin: Um, uh, but you wouldn’t learn everything, I would say, in a single roll, outside of a hugely succe—I mean, I guess it’s an open check, so if you get like a 20, I’d be like, “damn, okay, you know everything.” “Skill: some skills require you to spend an action,” and “Other: you perform an action that’s not covered by the above, negotiating its resolution and effects with the game master,” so, big set of things there. There is also, I wanna say, I wanna say it was lore master, but maybe it’s not… um, there is a, uh.. Yes. I think it’s Quick Assessment. “At the start of a conflict, you may spell, spend skill level times 5 mind points. For every 5 mind points you spend this way, choose an option: choose a creature you see and the GM reveals one of their traits—
Jack and Dre: Ooh! 
Austin: —or, name a damage type and choose a creature you can see and the GM reveals that creature’s affinity towards that damage type. So, there’s a way that you can—
Jack: Oh, that’s really fun.
Dre: That sounds good!
Austin: —even before you start, you can start in on that.
Jack: I love that it’s not, tell me how it’s weak.
Austin: Mm-mm.
Jack: It’s us saying, “Fire. How’s it feel about fire, Austin?” and you go “Ah, it feels fine about fire, sorry.”
Austin: (overlapping) “It doesn’t mind about fire so much.”
Dre: I mean, yeah, that’s how Persona works.
Austin: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, exa—it sure is! And metaphor, right? Same, same thing.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: It does not just give you that. Uh… cool. Um, I’m trying to remember if, if, how traits work. Traits are a different thing. I do know what their traits are, but I’m trying to remember how their traits get invoked. Oh right, villains can invoke traits to reroll. So if there, if there was a, a—
Jack: Flegg villain.
Austin: —flegg villain, you may be able to… they have a really funny set of traits, I’ll say.
Jack: Yeah villains have like, they have villain points, which are sort of like dark Fabula points that can do similar stuff.
Austin: Yeah, exactly.
Dre: That’s awesome.
Austin: Um, cool. Uh, Jonathan, are you gonna double blast? That’s what it sounded like we were doing.
Dre: I don’t know.
Austin: Maybe not!
Dre: I, I uh, I kinda…
Austin: Now that I’ve said the word, “convince them.”
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: Sure.
Dre: I mean, I did just like, obliterate a flegg.
Austin: You, you sure did.
Dre: I feel like I have, I have some, like, uh, some parlay power to bear.
Austin: I like this, yeah. Uh, do you want to try to convince them, to back off?
Dre: Yeah! Yeah. And to give the map back.
Austin: And to give the map back, yeah. Yeah, is that, is that the pure thing you want is, give us the map back.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: You’re not telling them to leave the bridge.
Ali: And apologize.
Dre: They’re not going to apologize, it’s…
Austin: You could, I mean, I think it’s a different difficulty [Ali giggles] but I think it’s, I think it’s, you could ask.
Dre: Yeah, you can roll that, if you want, Ali. [laughs]
Ali: But it’s a total dick thing, to have done.
Dre: It was, it was. [Ali laughs] You’re right. You’re right!
Austin: Uh… are you trying to, uh, persuade them, are you trying to intimidate them, are you, what are you appealing to here?
Dre: Um… I think persuade more than intimidate, um, yeah.
Austin: Yeah, okay. That’s going to be, uh… inspiration/willpower, probably.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: These are suggestions, by the way, here on the frequently used checks thing. We can, we can always negotiate out differently if there’s a situation that fits, but I think that this fits inspiration/willpower. What do you say before we do the roll?
Dre: Yeah, um.
Austin: You know there’s the one, you killed the one—or you, you did not kill it. You turned it back into its stone form, you stone shelled it.
Dre: Yeah, mm-hm.
Austin: Uh, the, the flegg that was trying to hurt you and annoy you. There’s the one that was bonking Veile, or trying to bonk Veile and missed, and then there are two more down by the bridge. So, uh, what do you say to them, as a group?
Dre: Um… can I have a, can I just have like a bullhorn on the deck of the Little Snail?
Austin: Yeah, it sounds like a thing that you would have to be like, “Order up!”
Dre: Yeah! Oh, I love that. Yes! It’s the restaurant speaker system.
Austin: Yeah.
Dre: Um, I think I, like I just shoot my gun in the air just to, like, draw their attention.
Austin: Yeah.
Dre: And then get on the restaurant speaker system and say,
Dre [as Jonathan]: Alright, alright, we had our fun. You had a little caper. I understand, it’s in your nature. Uh… but just give us back the map; we’ll call it even.
Austin: Uh… this is wonderful, ah, give me—
Jack: Ohh, my defense die is not gonna help you here.
Austin: Yeah, I don’t think, er, ah, I don’t think it is, no. Um, is there…
Ali: I have a move that does something similar to this, is there like an assist…?
Austin: There is a, well there’s group rolls and there there’s, again, there’s—you don’t have a bond with Jonathan.
Ali: Oh, sure sure sure.
Austin: There’s um, uh… I believe bonds can, can be—again, bonds can be called on, if you had a bond… um, I believe actually, Jonathan would need the bond towards you to be called on by spending a Fabula point, uh, if I’m remembering right—
Ali: Okay I have—
Austin: But there’s not just like, “help,” you know.
Ali: Yeah, I have some options here, so.
Austin: Yeah, so I guess we’ll see how this goes is, is what we want, right?
Ali: Mm-hmm.
Dre: Okay.
Austin: Um, so yeah, give me your persuade check. I’m trying to remember, do I need to tell you what the difficulty is ahead of time or not? Let me see. “Performing an attribute check. You state your goal / what you want to accomplish.” I think it’s pretty clear, you wanna convince them to give you the, the map. “The player controlling describes your approach,” and you’ve done a great job of that. I declare the difficulty. So the difficulty on this is 13.
Dre: Ooh…
Austin: It’s hard to convince a flegg, you know.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: They’re immortal, Dre.
Dre: That’s true.
Austin: They’re having a good time, you know, why not fight—
Dre: And they have no consequences.
Austin: Exactly.
Dre: They’ll just turn into a stone, wake up a week later, and go back to it.
Austin: Yeah. And go back to it, exactly.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: No, they do lose the week, you know, but, that’s, you know, that’s sometimes the cost of doing of business.
Dre: You know, what’s a week to a flegg.
Austin: What’s a week to—[laugh] that’s, that’s why they say that.
Jack: [laughs]
Dre [as Jonathan]: You know what, it’s just like my, it’s just like my momma always used to say: you can’t convince a fool if he’s just a got a weekday of fleggs.
Austin: [laughing] That’s, that’s right. Exactly. Alright, so yeah, and I think—
Dre: Ooh, nope.
Austin: Oh no. [Ali, Dre, and Jack laugh]
Jack: God, persuading someone through authority or diplomacy.
Austin: That did not work.
Ali: Oh boy.
Austin: They do, they all get together. They like, the one that’s up near Veile, who tried to do a, like a big stomp on Veile slowly walks down the hill to like convene [Dre laughs] a meeting of the fleggs.
[All make flegg noises]
Ali: I do have, I do have a… an ability that lets Dre reroll one of those…
Austin: Oh!
Dre: Oh yeah?
Ali: But it’s a 1 and 6, so we feel like, do we have confidence that that one will change enough that it’s gonna—
Austin: I mean, the one could be the, the first one is a D12, they’re both D12s actually, so, you could uh—
Dre: Mm-mm, no, it’s a D12 and a D8.
Austin: Oh, ‘cause it’s a willpower, right right right.
Dre: Yeah yeah yeah.
Ali: Oh, I see…
Austin: So there’s a lot of room to go up from one. What do you need? You would need…
Art: There’s eleven higher numbers on a D12.
Austin: There are eleven higher numbers. What’s the move?
Dre: Yeah.
Ali: It’s basically, it’s I spend my Fabula point instead of Dre doing it, ‘cause the move here is My Trust In You. “After another player who is able to hear you performs a check, you may spend one Fabula point and invoke one of their traits or bonds—
Austin: Oh, interesting.
Ali: —in order to reroll a die or to improve the result of a check—
Austin: Yeah.
Dre: Mm!
Ali: —following normal rules.”
Austin: Yeah. That would work. And of course, Dre, you could also just spend a bond, or er, a Fabula point—
Dre: A Fabula point.
Austin: —if you can invoke, if you can invoke one of your, one of your things.
Dre: Yeah, I’ll, I would like to spend a Fabula point and invoke the theme of curiosity, ‘cause like, despite just doing 54 damage to a flegg, uh, Jonathan is not a combat character, that is not what he is interested in.
Austin: Mmmm. [Ali giggles] Despite being able to summon a gun from nothing. Heh.
Dre [as Jonathan]: Well, you know. You drive around a lot, you gotta, you gotta protect yourself. It’s wild out here.
Austin: Yeah, it makes sense. There’s fleggs out here; there’s all sorts of stuff.
Dre: Yeah, there’s fleggs out here! [laughs]
Austin: Yeah, I feel you. I feel you. Alright, give me the, give me the D12.
Dre: Mm-hm.
Austin: Yeah, give us the—I bet you just click on insight, and it’ll roll it.
Dre: Let’s find out—yep.
Austin: Let’s just roll one. Ohhhh!
Dre: Bazinga.
Austin: Yoooo! Hit the 12!
Art: [laughs]
Ali: Wowww…
Austin: Wild success.
Jack: Oh my god.
Art: Um, are we taking notes on the things we say when we roll high numbers?
Dre: No.
Jack: [laughs]
Austin: Are we not, we’re not, we’re not going “yo?”
Dre: Nah, I made a mistake. Do you wanna do that again? Do you want to pretend like I rolled a 12 again, and I’ll, I’ll say something less awful?
Austin: What did you say?
Ali: Wait, why? What?
Austin: You said “bazinga.”
Dre: [laughing] I said “bazinga.”
Austin: You said “bazinga.”
Ali: Oh, no, that’s fine.
Austin: It’s fine.
Art: You can say “bazinga,” I just want—
Ali: You were gaming.
Dre: Yeah yeah, it’s true. That’s true.
Austin: You were gaming. That’s, it’s [stammers] it’s the bazinga hour. [Ali laughs]
Dre: Mm-hmm.
Austin: That’s why they wanted to name that website that.
Art: That’s why, I, we’re renaming the show The Bazinga Hour.
Austin: Uh-huh, great, I’m sure we will—
Dre: The Bazinga Four Hours, more like.
Austin: Boom, got us.
Art: Well the show’s also getting lot shorter.
Austin: Oh, okay.
Art: Thanks for joining us here at episode seven [all laugh] of the first arc of—
Austin: Uh, that is a 19. What’s the, I wanna know what the extra effort here, because like, you see them convening, you see them debating. What’s the follow-up that you say, what, how do you turn that 1 into a 12.
Dre [as Jonathan]: Ah, you’re hate me, Nicky. Come on, y’all can keep the horseradish. We’re being reasonable.
Austin: They—
Art [as Nicky]: Nnngh, they can’t keep the horseradish. I’m gonna [laughs], I’m gonna jump them for the horseradish.
Dre [as Jonathan]: Nicky, I will find you some horseradish.
Art [as Nicky]: That horseradish is from very far away.
Austin: They hear that, and one of them jumps up and like, scrambles over to the other fleggs with the map in hand, and uh, and gives it to you. And I think you learn something very important, here, which is, they don’t wanna lose their cool stuff, right?
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: Like if you turn them all into stones, someone else might come by and get that horseradish. So, uh, yeah, they hand you back this map. They’d been using the map as a plate, so there’s actually a little horseradish on it. Um, uh, but you—
Dre [as Jonathan]: Ah, see, Nicky? It all works out.
Austin: It all w—it all—
Art [as Nicky]: It’s from the Korath Plateau, that horseradish. It’s a lot of climbin’.
Austin: That’s true. Uh, and, and, you’re, they go back, this flegg goes back to the group. Uh, oh, who, uh, one of them, on the, it’s like, on the way back down, grabs the stone that you kicked, the stone flegg that you kicked [Dre laughs] and drags it back over to the group.
Dre [as Jonathan]: Sorry about that.
Austin: And tosses it into what you now see is a pile of like six other flegg stones [Dre laughs very hard] that are just waitin’, they’re waitin’ for their buddies to come back.
Dre: Ohhhhh, that’s so beautiful, actually.
Austin: Mm-hmm. Uh, I will—
Jack: Flegg weekends.
Austin: I will now reveal to you one of the many flegg traits. Flegg trait number… four: family oriented.
Ali: Wow.
Jack: [laughing] How many flegg traits are there? [Ali laughs]
Austin: It’s four, it’s the final flegg trait.
Jack: Oh, this one’s the true one.
Art: It’s the final flegg trait. The ultimate flegg trait.
Austin: The final flegg trait. Family oriented. Yeah.
[Stinger plays]
Austin: Alright. The fleggs disperse back to their bridge. You have the map. The map is pointing you to the southeast towards this little cabin. Uhhh… boop. Which is, I would say, another day’s travel away, depending on how you’re counting.
Jack: How’re we gonna cross the river?
Dre: Oh…
Austin: Great question. That is the, like I said, that is the other part of this dilemma. It’s actually another two days away, so you’re gonna make two more rules.
Dre: Nnn.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Jack: Also, you know what, do you want that apology? [Ali laughs]
Austin: Didn’t ask an apology.
Ali: I mean, I do have, wait, let me see this. “You may use an action and spend one Fabula point to choose a n—” okay, non-hostile creature.
Austin: Well, it’s not hostile now.
Ali: “... able to hear you and understand you. If you do, that creature becomes helpful towards you so long as you are kind and respectful towards them and your requests are reasonable.”
Austin: Are you gonna ask these fleggs to help you repair this bridge?
Ali: Yeah!
Jack: They’re gonna fuckin’ hate that.
Ali [as Veile]: Excuse me. Excuse me!
Dre: Is that reasonable? To ask a flegg to unflegg the thing they flegged?
Austin [as Flegg]: [flegg noises]
Ali [as Veile]: People use this bridge.
Austin [as Flegg]: [acknowledging flegg noises]
Ali [as Veile]: I think you’ve really extend past your reach here, you know, this is—
Austin [as Flegg]: [equivocal flegg noise]
Ali [as Veile]: This is really, this is really a little too far.
Austin [as Flegg]: [affronted flegg noise]
Ali [as Veile]: What if somebody was sick, and wanted to cross medicine across this bridge? Do you want that on your hands?
Jack [as Elena]: Achoo!
Austin [as Flegg]: [distressed flegg noises]
Art: Flegg [inaudible 20:16]
[All laugh]
Austin: If people have not seen the drawing of the flegg, you need to understand, it is a stick figure of the egg, with, with, it’s like little Ys or Ts coming out of its—it doesn’t even have fingers.
Dre: Uh huh.
Austin: It has two little, it’s like a branch, it’s like a tree branch, coming out of the side. Yeah.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah. [flegg noise]
Dre: It’s like what if a snow man was just one segment.
Austin: That’s exactly right. That’s what I’ve drawn here.
Ali [as Veile]: If you took that bridge apart, you can certainly use those hands to put them back together.
Austin [as Flegg]: [recalcitrant flegg noise]
Dre [as Flegg]: [irritated flegg noise]
Austin [as Flegg]: [flegg noise]
Ali [as Veile]: It’ll be all faster if we all work together.
Austin [as Flegg]: [flegg noise]
[Ali laughs delightedly]
Austin: And, like, alright, they gesture that you better help, too.
Ali laughs
Austin: Are you spending the Fabula point?
Ali: Yeah yeah yeah.
Austin: And then are you spending the, the night working on the bridge, or are you gonna do it in the morning? “I would like to scold the fleggs,” you have written, [Dre laughs] and you’ve done this. What was the name of that ability?
Ali: Um, it was… Unexpected Ally.
Austin: Well, wow. True.
Dre [laughing]: True.
Austin: And as long as you treat them respectfully, you’re gonna be, it’s gonne be fine. Uh, yeah, okay. And I think they go like, [flegg noises], which of course means, “sleep first,” right, but then you know, [flegg noises].
Ali: Is it, is it afternoon?
Austin: No it’s night-time now.
Ali: Oh, we still—
Austin: You did a whole-ass day of driving.
Dre: Yeah, the sun was setting.
Austin: Yeah.
Dre: Right? Yeah.
Ali: Ohhh…
Austin: Yeah, you were doing—yeah, the sun was setting, yeah.
Ali: I had not realized.
Austin: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Ali: That’s so funny. Okay, well.
Austin: Yeah. And, you’ve trained them especially—
Ali [as Veile]: But no funny business overnight!
Austin [as Flegg]: Mm-hmm.
Dre [as Jonathan]: Hey. Hey, if you all promise to behave, you can stay in the tree.
Austin [as Flegg]: Tree. Tree! Tree! Tree! Tree! Tree! Tree! [faint sound of someone pounding a desk] [Ali laughs]
Dre [as Flegg]: Tree! Tree! Tree! Tree!
Austin: They begin marching up the hill in single-file, and they’re doing a weird thing with their hands, where they’re like, one’s are out and up, one’s are out and to the side and then one’s are out and down, and they’re like bringing them in and changing position, do you know what I mean? Like they’re going, up! In! Down! In! Out! In! Up! In! [Jack laughs] And it’s in like, perfect synch, uh—
Dre: ‘s making me think of the uh, there was like a Rhythm Heaven game like that.
Austin: Oh, perfect.
Dre: And it was like, the first game that made you hit on the offbeat.
Austin: Are you thinking about Patapon? ‘Cause they actually kind of look like—
Dre: No—
Austin: —Patapon guys now that I’m thinking about it.
Dre: It was definitely Rhythm Heaven, but—
Austin: Oh, it was literally a Rhythm Heaven.
Dre: Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah.
Austin: I see, I see, I see. Yes. Yes. Shout outs to Rhythm Heaven.
Dre: Seriously.
Austin: All time. Um, alright, yeah. Um, they’re gonna climb—they like, so quickly climb the, the truck and the, or the wagon, the Little Snail, and like get into the tree. Like, that’s where they belong. They love to sleep in trees.
Dre: Aw.
Austin: We’re out of, we’re out of initiative, we’re out of the conflict pretty, pretty simply here now. Anyone doing anything before going to sleep, waking up and I guess repairing the bridge?
Ali: Do we gain our, um, MP and stuff while we snooze?
Austin: You do not. You sure do not. You could take a rest, which requires spending—in the, in the wilderness… actually, I’mma just read from, from the damn, the damn book here. “Recovering from status effects: status effects can be healed through resting.” “Rest and pacing.” “Bonds and resting scenes.” “Resting”! “The hero—” this is on page… 90. “The heroic life can take a heavy toll on player characters. They often need to rest and recover their energy. Depending on the location, characters have access to different options for resting. Resting in the wilderness: when far away from the safety of cities and villages, traveling on the road or exploring a ruin, characters must have access to one of the following in order to rest. One: a magic tent (see page 104) created by spending 4 inventory points. One tent is enough for the entire group.” Again, we can, we can think about this as like, the stuff you need to rest. It’s not literally a tent, y’know.
Ali: Mm-hmm.
Jack: Right.
Austin: “Two: hospitality from someone friendly, usually in exchange for help or money, or, three: a safe location where they run no risk of being attacked. Perhaps a consecrated temple, a secret room, the inside of an armored transport or an area protected by a magic circle.” This is a transport, but it is not an armored transport, unfortunately.
Art: Wait, how does my quirk interact with this?
Austin: It’s when you do this… action.
Dre: Mmmm.
Art: It’s when you camp, okay, it doesn’t provide you camp.
Austin: I believe it’s when you do a camp, right.
Art: Three, camp activities have two…
Austin: Yeah, because…
Art: Oh, I need what these—yeah, it’s camp activities, we’re not—
Austin: Yeah, when you, when you rest, you recover all of your hit points and mind points, you recover from all status effects, you get, um, apparently it takes four to six hours, and when you do a rest, it’s called a resting scene. “During the scene, players can spend some time roleplaying conversations describing what their characters do while sitting near the campfire or relaxing around town. The end of a resting scene: each PC may do one of the following: create a new bond towards someone or something, add a new emotion to an existing bond, or erase and emotion from a bond and replace it with a different one. When you add new bonds or change their emotions, describe how and why your character’s view of others have shifted.” Uh, so yeah, so yeah, you can, you can, this is like one of the chief ways of not just healing, recovering, but building new bonds with each other. Um, my, you know, you can spend 4 inventory points to do this, I have no problem with that, but I would say, you’ve basically spent none of your character resources at this point, you know.
Ali: Okay, sure, yeah, so maybe we hold off.
Austin: Yeah. Like no-one’s been hit by any damage yet, right? And hey there’s, there’s fleggs in the tree, I don’t know that that’s… it’s gonna be fine, I’m not screwing you over here. [Ali laughs] But, there are fleggs in the tree in the, in the vehicle, in the Little Snail, so. But if there’s nothing else, you can wake up in the morning and get to repairing this bridge.
Dre: I don’t know.
Jack: Yeah, I don’t think so. Is Nicky just, just steamed about this, just like, bad grace, going to bed early, clanking around…?
Art: Yeah, I think that’s right.
Jack: Yeah. [laugh]
Austin: Uh, you wake up with a flegg on your chest, Nicky.
Ali: Ohh… [dissolves into laughter]
Austin: And it goes:
Austin [as Flegg]: Breakfast? Breakfast. [clapping in time] Breakfast! Breakfast! Breakfast! [Dre laughs]
Art [as Nicky]: [chuckles angrily] Alright, I’ll get you your breakfast. Go downstairs.
Austin [as Flegg]: [flegg noises]
Austin: And it runs downstairs. Or it like, yeah, it slides down the ladder. Um, and it takes you all a second to realize it: there is, there’s six fleggs in the damn, in the damn van. [Dre laughs] Two of ‘em woke up overnight.
Dre: Yeaahhh!
Austin: Um, you have a couch? Do you have a like, a place to sit somewhere in here?
Ali: Oh, it has to be booth seating. [Austin: Upstairs.] What are you talking—? Oh, upstairs.
Dre: There's a, yeah—
Austin: What's the—?
Dre: There's a deck.
Austin: There's a deck. Okay. They're just all out on the deck together, all six of them. Like, lounging, waiting for breakfast. [Dre and Austin make flegg noises] And after breakfast, I guess you're gonna get to building—I mean, what is for, what's for breakfast?
Art: Eggs and toast.
[group laughter]
Austin: They chow down. It is not a thing. They are happy to eat eggs and toast. And they, they, they set to work, these six fleggs. One of them just starts slow walking down into the river to pick up the bricks that were tossed in there and then bringing them back up like, it's, like, stoically, like, it's not a problem. But you will need to help them, as that was the promise that you made, Veile. What's—This is probably a group check again. This is a big group check. It's gonna be a little hard, I think, rebuilding a bridge in a day, even with the help of some fleggs, you know, that takes, that takes a little doing.
Jack: Sounds like a Might roll, right?
Austin: Well, it depends on what you're doing. Like, are you just, are you just carrying the stuff up? Are you giving them orders? Are you, like, ordering the fleggs around? Or, you know, is there—Is the leader, whoever's rolling this, are you directing people? Or are you leading by example? By being the chief person putting stuff places? And also, who is leading this? It feels like it's Might and Insight in terms of knowing where to build or in Might and Willpower if you're like, alright, follow me, do this. You know?
Ali: Yeah. Well, I was just looking at—looking at Tinker. Is this—I guess this isn't really…
Austin: Oh, the, the maneuver. The—
Ali: Yeah, the frequently used checks.
Austin: Oh, oh, oh, I see. Which is… Yeah, it's definitely not Dex. It's definitely not Dex. This is building a bridge, you know.
Dre: Well, the, the caption for Tinker does say completing a work of craftsmanship or repairing something.
Austin: But that is—Sorry.
Jack: [crosstalk] I think it’s like repairing a watch
Austin: [crosstalk] Yeah. And this is something—The person who made the ship. 
Dre: Okay. Yeah. This isn't like that.
Austin: I believe. Maybe they're, maybe they're in here, but they're not, yeah, you know.
Dre: If you would take a pitch for Tinker, my idea was that, like, Jonathan and a handful of the fleggs, like, build like some sort of, like, simple machine [Austin: Oh, sure.] to help make the process of, like, dredging all the bricks out of the water faster.
Austin: Yeah. That's interesting. I would—I think that can be—I think that's part of the thing you're doing. I mean, really, the thing that we should be doing is putting a clock on screen and doing a classic fill the clock. But I'd like us to keep moving. If this was, let's say, a more—If this was not the introductory adventure, I would think I would put a clock on screen and be like, how do you do this? And like, what all could go wrong? And could you lose the faith of the fleggs? And could they turn on you again because they think that you've stopped treating them fairly? But instead—
Dre: Unfaithful fleggs!
Art: The faith of the fleggs.
Austin: We should really start releasing—
Dre: The fickle fate of the fleggs!
Austin: I think we're doing a single roll. I think we're going to do it in a, in a one big group roll again. So we do need to know who's leading. I like that idea. As part of the thing is that you're building a device to do this, though. [Dre: Sure.] It's also like, you could be—Could you use that device to just get you across the damn river? That feels like a whole other second thing you're building to some degree.
Dre: I do also like the idea of, like—I mean, I mean, what if Veile is, like, organizing the fleggs? She's the one who, like, convinced them to help. 
Austin: Totally.
Dre: It would make sense if they listened to her. And nobody else. [laughter]
Ali: Sure.
Austin: I think that's—
Art: Or what if—Or, you know, or Nicky could lead it because that's clearly the most annoyed, you know, What
Austin: I think this is actually, I think what we've partly identified is whoever's supporting can roll different things to support, right? So like, Jonathan, you've described a Tinker action that would help you support the main roll because you're building a device to help them get the bricks out easier. Right?
Jack: Oh, is that so? Or is that something we're deciding?
Austin: We're allowed to decide whatever the fuck we want, because the, because what you're basically doing is—It's a group check, but it's a group check where—Where how you're helping is different. You know, it's, you're not just doing the same action. You're not all just lifting the, the bricks and putting them in the thing. Some of you are talking to the fleggs and some of you are building a thing for the fleggs. So I think that that's. I think it's a fun thing we're allowed to do.
Dre: Yeah, I mean, it's on like, what? Like one of the very first, like—I guess it's not the first page of the book, but like in the game rules page, the first one is like, hey, this game is built to like, give you advice and to give you rules, but like, as you learn this game and you learn how you want to play it.
Austin: Exactly.
Dre: You should tweak stuff.
Austin: Yeah. And in fact, I actually don't—I truly don't think that this is out of the rules. I think a support check can just be broader than that. [Dre: Oh, cool.] Originally, but I guess I'm not 100% sure, but it doesn't—I don't see anything here that's like, make the exact same check, you know, so. So yeah, let's do—Who, who wants to take the lead on the build—the bridge rebuilding? Also, Nicky, are you not helping because you're so angry or are you going to help but just…
Art: No, Nicky's helping. Just kind of grumbly about it.
Austin: Yeah, that makes sense. So who's taking the lead? And then what's everybody else doing to support?
Ali: I mean, yeah, I don't mind taking the lead as the, the, the flegg foreman.
Austin: Great. Yeah.
[Ali laughter]
Dre: I mean the flegg ambassador.
Art: Fleggman sounds like a department store.
Austin: Oh, yeah. I'll meet you at Fleggman's. 
Art: Gotta go to Fleggman's. 
Austin: Sale on coats at Fleggman's.
Dre: Ooh, Black Friday deals at Fleggman's.
Austin: [sing-song voice] At Fleggman's.
Jack: I am going to support by—The thing that I am doing to help is [sniggering] trying to keep Nicky on track. This is like, like Nicky is, is doing it. But there is, like, this real thing of, like, I'm making sure that the simmering frustration—You know, I'm just, I'm hanging out with Nicky. If it's like this—Needs some extra help carrying that thing, you know, just making the—Making things a little.
Art: Distract him when he picks up a rock and then—
Austin: Yeah.
Art: Motions to throw it at a flegg.
Austin: That sounds like—That sounds like a Persuade to me, maybe. Or maybe a straight Willpower. Maybe it's, it's, it's purely about, you know—I think maybe you're—Maybe it is Inspiration plus Willpower still. Or not Inspiration.
Jack: Yeah, I think so.
Austin: Hey, that's more than a 10.
Jack: Oh, my God. That's a 19. We're having a great time, talking about previous flegg encounters. The works.
Austin: Great. Dre, you want to roll your Tinker?
Dre: Yeah, sure.
Austin: All right.
Dre: That's not a 19.
Austin: Not a 19. This building a device to help—I mean, you could Fabula Check this. But remember that the result is a plus one on Veile's role. I think that it's just they're too chaotic for this, you know? They, they do not want to wait for you to build a device for them, and then you build the device, and they don't know how to use it right, and they're getting involved with, like, the, the chains and the—You know, like, it's just not the energy. The right energy for them, unfortunately.
Dre: Fair.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: We have all been the flegg in this situation.
Austin: You finally get it ready, and you're like, alright, it can bring up one brick at a time. And they're like [flegg noises]. And it's like, no, how did you get to six? Six is so many more bricks. Then they just hook up—They put four on there, and it breaks, you know, and they're not being mean. They just—It's just how they are. They're like, I know more. They look at it, they go, this could do more than one brick.
Dre: So, yeah, they probably send up, like, four fleggs on it the first time to test it, they're like, oh, I'm about the size of a brick.
Austin: Yeah, I can turn into a stone. [Dre laughter] Nicky, what are you doing to help?
Art: I think it's Endure. I think that's the—Yeah. About Might. But it's also about Willpower.
Austin: It's also about Willpower. It's also about just getting through the day. Are you mostly, like, lifting stuff and literally doing the work of building the bridge?
Art: Yeah, I think this is a—Yeah.
Austin: Love it. All right, give me, give me an Endure. Hey, that's a 10. That's exactly what you need to succeed and give Veile a plus one. So Veile, go ahead and take a +2 to this roll, which… I think this is Persuade, because that's mostly what you're doing, right?
Ali: Yeah. That sounds true, yeah.
Austin: You’re, you’re mostly doing Insight. You're not doing most of the physical building the fleggs and the—and Nicky are.
Ali: So Persuade +2, right? 17.
Austin: Plus Willpower. That's way more than enough. I was going to say that [Dre: Flegg whisperer!] at very high 13 or maybe even a 15, but a 17, damn. You manage to keep them, keep them focused. By the end of the night—The bridge is—this next day or the end of this next day, the bridge is back in working order. It'll hold. It'll hold. You're pretty su—It'll hold. But the fleggs did rebuild it, and the fleggs aren't known for building things. But you don't—You need to trouble check it, it looks good. It looks surprisingly good. You did an incredible job. So, you know, there you go. And you're able to cross it immediately so that if, for instance, they decide to take it apart overnight, you're on the other side already.
Ali [as Veile]: I'm very proud of you all. 
Austin [as Flegg]: [flegg noises] 
Ali [as Veile]: It was great spending this time and I hope you learned something. 
Austin [as Flegg]: [more flegg noises]
Ali: I pat each of them on their little domed heads.
Austin [as Flegg]: [more flegg noises]
Austin: And they go over to a little bit of—they get across the bridge, they wave, and then they all just stand in a circle and start burning the grass using their flegg blast.
[group laughter]
Dre: Beavis and Butthead ass moogles.
Austin: [laughing] That's right. Oh, Lord. And finally you can get back on the road. Well, you know, tomorrow you can get back on the road. We can make our travel check to see if you can make it the rest of the way there. I'm gonna move you across here. Dre, I think it's time for you to drive one more time.
Dre: Oh, sure. What's the—
Austin: It's—It is you are moving through a D10 and a D8 hex at this point. So it's the highest, which is a D10. So roll a D10 and try to get a low number. Hey, 4. Nothing happens. The Little Snail drives the rest of the way across the river and winds up at—getting to the—following the map, you know this—it looks like just plains here, but, you know, there's some hills and you kind of get lost down in the kind of valleys of these hills, and like, you gotta figure out, okay, I know it's southwest of the lake, but, like, there's a lot of southwest of the lake. There's 20 miles of it. And so as you start getting closer and closer, you start to find the right walkway or the right pathways. There's areas that other vehicles have driven on before. And eventually you find your way to a small kind of copse of trees that you have to park outside of and walk the rest of the way. There's a way to lock up the Little Snail, right?
Dre: Oh, yeah.
The Cabin in the Woods [00:39:28]
Austin: You're able to do that. And then head towards the—what you see in the middle of this kind of collection of trees after about 10 minutes of walking is a little wooden cabin that's been built here. This is the destination that you, that you have been bringing Veile to. You've finally done it. There is—I guess I'll ask you, Veile, what's. What's Vinnor look like?
Ali: Vinnor is a big bird guy. I—actually, you know what, why let a bird go to waste? [Austin: Why let a bird go to waste?] When I saw a great bird that I linked to the chat right before we started recording that looks like it's wearing little pants that I love.
Austin: Yeah. What is this bird? [Ali: [laughing] No idea.] it does look like it has little pants on.
Ali: It has sort of like—So it's an all white bird with a black beak and actually really interesting—It, like, has feathers that like, look like, it sort of carries the line from the beak back to the face and like, even a little bit of like winged eyeliner situation post eyeball and all, all white instead of—Except for some brown feathers on the chest and at the end of the wings and at the end of the little feather butt. I don't know how we're doing bird-man butts, but we're just—okay. Like, really thick down, down feathers on the legs that make it look like loose pants.
Austin: Mm. This is a ptarmigan is the name of the type of bird you've linked. P, T, A R, M, I, G, A, N. And it looks like in the winter they get this extra plumage to keep them warm and they go all white.
Jack: Oh, good for them.
Austin: If you search for winter ptarmigan, you will get a bunch of these guys. They're great. These are fantastic. Big fan. And then, yeah, you've linked a particular type here or a particular one with the, with the eyeliner look, which is great.
Ali: Oh, this one looks great too. Wait, let me just—Link this one real quick with the—
Austin: Oh, that's—
Jack: This one literally looks—
Austin: Those are great. Let's say it's this one, this rock ptarmigan with the red eyes, the red, like, eye frill or whatever, ridge? And then like, I think a long robe that's like, you know, maybe it's like beige with some, with some bright—Like a white belt and a handful of little brown bits on it. And Vinnor, is he/him?
Ali: Yes.
Austin: Pronouns?
Austin: Okay. Vinnor is here, I think, chopping wood out front of the cabin for the fire. That's not true because we said it was kind of summer weather. Vinnor is here hanging up clothes, washing a different robe and hanging it up on a line in front of, in front of his cabin. And, and he sees that the four of you draw near. Do you, do you call out to him? What do you do?
Ali: I guess so, yeah.
Austin: What do you say?
Ali: What's his title? Steward? No—
Austin: No, he's not a steward. He is a, he is a solivagant, is what it is. Sah-liv-ih-gent.
Ali: Solivagant. Yeah. Then I think I, I approach and call out
[as Veile]: Excuse me, Solivagant Gekk?
Austin: Isn't it Jekk?
Ali: Jekk?
Austin: Is it Jekk or is it Gekk? 
Ali: Jekk. Sorry. [laughing]
Austin: Okay, okay.
Ali: We talked about this a while ago. Its been four hours later. Sorry.
Austin: It has been. 
[as Vinnor]: Is it—It is. It's—No—Are you the Iron Trigon? 
Austin: Looking at the three of you, not seeing what he expected. Along with Veile.
Ali [as Veile]: We ran into some trouble, you see, or at least I did with the Iron Folk.
Austin [as Vinnor]: It is good to see you, Veile. But are these strangers trustworthy?
Ali [as Veile]: Yes. Yes. They helped me go the rest of the way. I might have been lost as well without them.
Austin [as Vinnor]: Hmm. Interesting. Come in, everyone. Come in. My name is Vinnor. You can call me Vin. You call me Vinnie. I'm just a member of the Way. 
Austin: Why did you roll? Oh, because you traveled.
Art: Yeah, I was just gonna try to squeeze.
Austin: Is Nicky picking up ingredients as we talk?
[laughter]
Art: That certainly would be appropriate.
Austin: Yeah. Uh-huh. Did you get umami again?
Art: Yeah, I did get umami.
[as Vinnor]: Those are quite good. Those are quite good. 
Austin: Pointing to some mushrooms on the, on the tree nearby that you're picking.
[as Vinnor]: But I would say those are—I was going to have those for dinner so I could take you—You can have them. Come inside.
Austin: There is a—It's, it's like a nice cool interior to this, to this cabin, but it's, it's fairly—You know, I wouldn't say that he's living an ascetic life, but it's a pretty simple life here. There's a shrine to the nine gods. There is a desk that's covered in books and notes. There is a fireplace, the fireplace is empty and actually it looks like it hasn't been used in quite some time, but there is a sort of chill in the air that I think you recognize immediately, Elena, as feeling sort of similar to the way Rillspur starts to get cold in an unnatural way? It's not cold, but it's like—You know, it's like you've come inside and there's air conditioning on, which isn't what most houses have, you know? 
[as Vinnor]: Introduce yourselves. I like to use names with people.
Jack [as Elena]: I'm Elena, sir. I come from the Great Rillspur Dungeon. I'm of the People. And I've been traveling with the Little Snail. We’re—
Austin [as Vinnor]: From the dungeon. From Rillspur?
Jack [as Elena]: Yes, sir.
Austin [as Vinnor]: Fascinating.
Jack [as Elena]: You have a connection to the place?
Austin [as Vinnor]: Oh, no, not a personal one. I simply—It's a fascinating location. The nine Passika dungeons. I don't know if you'd call them a dungeon. The nine Passikan ruins seem to have no connection to the Ennead at all. Yet they match the, the given elemental strengths of the gods.
Jack [as Elena]: Yes. Well, I suppose that it feels less strange because it's my home.
Austin [as Vinnor]: Wonderful. And Mr. Terrapine?
Dre [as Jonathan]: Howdy. You can call me Jonathan.
Austin [as Vinnor]: Jonathan.
Austin: Offering a hand to you, Jonathan.
Dre: Yeah, shake.
Austin: Shake. Firm shake. Yep. 
[as Vinnor]: You don't happen to be from Spillaway Peaks or? 
Dre [as Jonathan]: Roundabouts. 
Austin [as Vinnor]: Wonderful. I have a few friends. And the chef?
Art [as Nicky]: Uncle Nicky’ll be just fine.
Austin [as Vinnor]: Uncle Nicky. I feel I've seen you about somewhere, but I can't quite remember.
Art [as Nicky]: I think I just got one of those faces.
Jack [as Elena]: He's got one of those faces.
Austin [as Vinnor]: He has one of those face…
Art [as Nicky]: Everyone says that. You got one of those faces. They should call me Uncle Faces. That’s not very good.
Austin [as Vinnor]: It’s funny you say that. I feel, you remind me of people who have names like that. You know, Jimmy the Face.
Art [as Nicky]: No, I don't.
Dre [as Jonathan]: He's a chef.
Jack [as Elena]: Has been for a long time.
Austin [as Vinnor]: Interesting. [Dre [as Jonathan]: A professional!] Interesting. In any case, Veile, I—Can I speak with you? I could give you some water and, um, everyone take a seat. Just…
Austin:  He provides you some snacks and stuff.
[as Vinnor]: Veile, I'd love to see you out by the river or the, the lake. 
Austin: And behind the cabin is the little lake. Go ahead. What were you gonna say?
Ali [as Veile]: Yeah. If you'll excuse me, everyone.
Jack: A glance to the, To the other members and it's sort of like…
Austin: Yeah.
Dre [as Jonathan]: Thumbs up.
Austin [as Vinnor]: Veile. I'm sorry. This is a problem.
Ali [as Veile]: I beg your pardon?
Austin [as Vinnor]: It's so good to see you. The prophecy, of course. But those are not—They're not the Iron Trigon. If any of the intercessors learn that the Iron Trigon was—Where are they?
Ali [as Veile]: They, they tragically passed.
Austin [as Vinnor]: What happened?
Ali [as Veile]: Well, I'm not quite sure. I was knocked out. And when I woke, they were departed.
Austin [as Vinnor]: You know, this mission of ours is…
Ali [as Veile]: Important, yes. 
Austin [as Vinnor]: Important, and frankly, not something the Way would prefer us to do. Any sign of failure or derailment will cause them to cancel the whole thing. They'll see it as evidence that the Ennead doesn't want us doing this.
Ali [as Veile]: Well, perhaps—Maybe we shouldn't?
Austin [as Vinnor]: We shouldn't? No, we have to. It's the fate of the world.
Ali [as Veile]: Yes, right.
Austin [as Vinnor]: If we can find and open…
Austin: I've forgotten the name of the thing.
Ali: The White Lectern. [giggles]
Austin: Lectern, yes. I forgot it was Lectern. I was like, tabernacle. That's not right at all. The Catholicism is going to try to find its way in. We got to fight it off. No tabernacles.
Dre: Oh, see, when you were talking about white tabernacles, I think about Utah.
Austin: Oh. Is there a, is there a—What's up with—?
Dre: I'm pretty sure there's, like, a Mormon tabernacle.
Austin: That makes sense. That makes sense, yeah. 
[as Vinnor]: If we can find and open the White Lectern, we can address the, the Goddess of Light herself. And if we can do that, she could—We could convince her to delay or even stop the cycle. It's a matter of life for everyone here. No, we have to continue. Are you paying these new mercenaries?
Ali [as Veile]: No, they did it out of kindness.
Austin: I think the big red ridges on this bird-man's face kind of like, like drop as he squints at you. 
[as Vinnor]: Out of kindness. Well, did they walk the Way? Are they pilgrims or are they simply decent people?
Ali [as Veile]: They just seem kind.
Austin [as Vinnor]: I'll take that into consideration. Come with me.
Austin: And leads you back in to the cabin and addresses the three of you and says:
[as Vinnor]: First, I want to thank you so much for bringing Veile to me. I wouldn't say that it is often that you meet people who go out of their way to do kindness to others, especially this far south. Could I, could I bother you to escort her further?
Jack [as Elena]: Well, um, I mean, of course we'd be happy to, but surely there is someone better suited?
Austin [as Vinnor]: I don't know that that's true.
Dre [as Jonathan]: I don't know if it is either.
Austin [as Vinnor]: I may have another request, which is simply for now, on the rest of this small journey, not very far, just to the east a little. If anyone asks who you are or assumes that you are the Iron Trigon, don't dissuade them of that belief. Hmm?
Jack [as Elena]: Is Veile in more danger? I mean, we ran into some fleggs, but…
Austin [as Vinnor]: No, Veile is—Veile, you're—It's perfectly fine. But the mission Veile is on, the mission I am on, the goal that a small number of us in the Way have is—It isn't—The Protectorate doesn't think that it has an opportunity to succeed. And so any bump in the road would make it at risk of being canceled, of being aborted, of being shut down. And we can't afford that. I don't know how much Veile has told you, but this project of ours is a matter of life and death. A matter of the future. I can't pay you much, but I could teach you a few things. I could have a few—
Dre [as Jonathan]: Sold. 
Austin [as Vinnor]: It's curiosity kicking in, huh? 
[Ali laughter]
Austin: Take a Fabula point. I think you have absolutely dragged yourself deeper into the muck by simply saying yes because he said he could teach you some stuff. Hey, it's your wagon, right? [Dre: Mm-hm.] Amazing. Well. And takes a second and rolls out a big map of this section of the world and puts a big, like, almost like a giant queen chess piece on it.
Jack: Oh, it's one of the first [crosstalk] pieces of the spiel.
Austin: [crosstalk] It is, it’s one of the pieces. Unfortunately, he's not going to play a game with it. He's simply marking a map. But yes, it's one of the—It's one of the game pieces. And he tips it over and he says:
[as Vinnor]: Just to the east of here, there is a tower, or was one once, which belonged to the Dragon Watchers. It fell in an attack from the Valtese nearly a century ago.
Dre [as Jonathan]: Oh, yeah.
Austin [as Vinnor]: OF course, you were there. Not there, but around. Your people live long, right?
Dre [as Jonathan]: Fella, I couldn't even tell you.
Austin [as Vinnor]: I need you to go to the tower and recover something. I don't know how you'll get it back here. It's quite large. It's a sort of furnace, or a wide—It has piping involved. There's some sort of mechanism from the ruins.
Dre: [laughter] Jonathan's eyes just growing wider and wider.
Austin [as Vinnor]: They say the Dragon Watchers captured the flame of a dragon and stored it in a sort of big eternal flame stove furnace thing. And I need it to confirm something about, about our situation, and if you can do this, then I will be more confident than ever that Veile is on the path and that we are, we are facing a grand opportunity to save many lives.
Dre [as Jonathan]: Okay, so just to. Just to clarify here, we're bringing the furnace back.
Austin [as Vinnor]: The furnace. And if you find any notes or anything else of seeming value. The Dragon Watchers are. In some ways, they were the first ones to understand the truth about Perpetua. Perhaps they didn't say it in the same words that we would now, but they understood the importance of dragons. And the dragons are beings which live beyond our sort of domed realm of reality. So, yeah, the big stove and anything else. Veile, I know this is murkier than what was promised, but prophecies always are. You can't summarize all of the steps in the path in a single line. Normally, you simply state the origin and the destination.
Ali [as Veile]: I understand, sir.
Austin [as Vinnor]: Alright. Well, for now, I could make us some dinner or—We have a chef here.
Art [as Nicky]: Yeah, I can see what I can whip up.
Austin [as Vinnor]: Yes, Uncle Nicky, you should. 
Austin: This guy knows who you are. This guy knows who you were. It's really clear.
Art: Yeah, it’s weird.
Austin: Yeah.
Art: I'm suspicious of this man.
Jack: Well, actually, that's a good point. I was wondering if I could maybe—Is there another room here that I could, like, slip away and see if I could…
Austin: Over the course of the day, that sort of—You know, how a house—You know, you've done the big greeting, and then it's like, oh, we're gonna make some food. People can hang out, read some books, you know, whatever. You hang out on the couch, you know? 
Jack: Yeah. [pause] Yeah. I'd like to see if I can, like, get into his office or his workspace or something?
Austin: Nothing here is, like, locked up, you know?
Ali: Do we want to pick this up next time? Dre, how much are you getting—?
Dre: I'm actually okay. I'm okay.
Austin: I'm happy to, I'm happy to wrap up. Yeah, maybe let's do a little roll and see the—[Dre: Yeah, poke around.] We can end on this poke around roll. I think this is—You're probably sneaking, this is probably Dex and insight to not make noise while you—
Jack: I think this is just like, I left my bag in the other room, sorry.
Austin: I think this is gonna be. I think this will be 10, I think. You know, actually, I'd say that this is, this is an open world. Depending on how well you do, you'll, you'll learn more and more.
Art: So is there an assist opportunity? Could I, like, make a bunch of noise cooking?
Austin: I don’t—Again, I think that there's—We could do another group roll where you could potentially give up to a plus one, you know?
Jack: We could spend a Fabula point.
Austin: Alright. Because you two have the bond, right? So you could, you could cash in the bond would be the way that, that might work, you know,
Jack: But that will cost [Austin: Alternatively—] But we can do that after the fact.
Austin: Alternatively, you can think of it as a group roll, which we've been doing a bunch of, so. Yeah, Art. You could, you could try to do a distraction type maneuver here and just be the two of you working together. I think that that totally works.
Art: But we could do it after the fact. It could be like, I could hear—
Austin: It does not work that way. You do a group roll ahead of time to—I mean, it's—You're not taking any extra risk. You know what I mean? Necessarily. So you may as well do the, do the, whatever your roll is to try to distract this guy. Right? Which presumably would be a willpower? Willpower. You're just kinda chatting them up?
Art: I was thinking of just like, cooking loud. Just like…
Austin: Oh, sure.
Art [as Nicky]: How long you been here? 
Art: Clang, clang, clang.
Austin: I think that—Then that's one of the physical ones, Dex, or Might and Willpower. Willpower is definitely necessary here since it's a social roll of some sort. You're trying to keep his attention. And the DC here is 10. Or the difficulty here is 10 because you're just—
Art: Yeah, I’m not gonna push too far, I'm gonna roll Might plus Willpower. But I'm just gonna hit Intimidate. But that's not really what it is, you know?
Austin: Yes, I do understand. Hey, that's a 10. So, yeah, go ahead and take a +1 to your roll.
Jack: Of what? Dex and ins—?
Austin: Dex and ins—dex and insight. That's with the +1. 7+1+1 is a 9.
Jack: Although I can spend a Fabula Point.
Austin: Absolutely can. What are you, what, what trait are you invoking to do this?
Jack: I am invoking the trait… I'm invoking my origin here from the Passika thing because—so there's two things going on here, right? The first is that I was weirded out by the immediate sort of sense change in here. And then also having rescued Veile from one—from the claws of one attack, I'm a little skeptical of just like, bring her to this destination and then a guy talks to her outside and now sends us off on a new mission. So there's this kind of sort of like, suspiciousness and uncertainty, especially around the feeling of the ice.
Austin: So give me a, give me a. What is a D—What's your dex? Alright, give me a D… [Jack: 6.] Try not to get a 1. Well, that raises it to a 10, which changes the category of success. Again, this is an open ended roll. The question was like, how much are you going to learn? Not are you gonna learn, you know, anything.
Jack: The category change is—
Austin: Going from a 7 to a 10 is a big jump. You know, at a 7, you're gonna be like, yeah, he's got another room. [Jack laughter] Yeah. You know, in the kind of workspace you find a, you know, some basic letters or some, maybe a smaller version of a map or you find sketches of that, say, White Lectern, question mark. And it's like various attempts at drawing a sort of temple-like structure in various styles, like as if, as if they were part of different styles of architecture from around the world. Like, here's what it looks like if it was an Elven building, here's what it would look like if it was a Sonnorian building, etc. And I think that you just kind of get the basics of this here, which is like there is a group of believers of the White Lectern. They have been effectively, let's say, marginalized inside of the Way of Fearless Truth. It's a small sect that's barely allowed to live, but it's—not live—but it's barely allowed to exist. Except that the, the intercessor for the Goddess of Light, whose name again is Lucena, L, U, C, E, N, A, Lucena, Bringer of Light, has like gone to bat for them. You maybe find some letters that are specifically letters between Vin—Vinnor and the Intercessor of Lucena, like asking for supplies and support. And you can see that the Intercessor believes in this. So this is not just something that only this sect believes in. The Intercessor has a letter that's like, you know, I can't publicly back this, but privately I hope that your efforts succeed. You know, I have not given up on this world yet, says the Intercessor. So there's someone at the highest ranking of the Way that believes in this and is hoping that it succeeds. And you find some notes on Lucena herself. I mean, these are, these are news maybe to you more than to other people, because, you know, she's a—she's one of the Enneads, she's one of the nine gods. Lucena is kind of Goddess of Light, Goddess of Curiosity, Goddess of Knowledge. She's often depicted as an inventor, she's often depicted as someone who is—who makes stuff, an architect. She's sometimes depicted as a, you know, not a tinkerer, but, you know, a step up from that. She's kind of like a da Vinci-esque quality to her, right? Someone who invents things that don't always get built. But if you think of like—I actually genuinely think Leonardo da Vinci is like a great comparison to the way that she is discussed, you know, artist, inventor, designer, Renaissance woman slash Goddess of Light, you know? So in fact, I would say it's probably not absurd to say that, Jonathan, you know, a few people who, like, are worshipers of this goddess because of her connection to tinkering and building stuff and engineering. And in fact, there's probably a little prayer to Lucena that, you know, whether you say it or not, I don't know, but that's like, you know, by, you know, by Lucena's Grace or like, you know, the way that some people will say a prayer before turning on a new invention they've built for the first time, you know? That's the type of moment where someone might pray to Lucena and be like, I hope it fucking works. Yeah, but you don't find anything, Elena, that is, you find a sketch of what clearly is Salann, the seaside town that Veile is from. And you could tell that it's been made with a sort of detail, a loving detail that someone who enjoyed their time there would do, you know? Oh, right, the time I spent out on the port town of Salann. And there are a bunch of similar drawings to that. There's a sort of maybe—a reference we make a lot on this show, Arthur Morgan's like, little book of drawings, you know? And you just get the impression this is someone who's bounced around a lot of places and is—in some ways, maybe has lived the life you're hoping to live. This is someone who has done the tourism drive already successfully, has seen all sorts of places in the world and is now dedicated, dedicated to this particular, you know, goal.
Jack: Hmm. Interesting.
Austin: So, you know, I can't tell you how to respond to that necessarily, but I. But I do think that it's. You don't find anything here that makes you more suspicious instantly. There's no—[Jack: Yes.] you know, whatever, clearly incriminating evidence of anything bad.
Jack: Okay.
Austin: I need to know how the cooking went. What are you cooking everybody? And I need you to make a Dexterity and Insight roll to see how good the cooking goes. I'm thinking it's a insight.
Art:  I've always assumed that for things like, outside of the delicacy rolls, that I'm not, like, strictly—that I have, like, some sort of, like, Top Chef pantry.
Austin: Right. Because they're not, they're not delicacies. Exactly.
Art: Right.
Austin: Yeah. Yeah. 
Art: So I think this is simple. You know, he said he was gonna have those mushrooms, so I put a little of those and make, like, maybe like a roast chicken with some mushrooms and maybe like, a flatbread, something I can make quickly in an oven.
Austin: Yeah, sure, that sounds great.
Art: Yeah. You know, with a gravy.
Austin: Yeah, let's make the roll open ended. How good is it? 
Art: What did we—said Dex plus...
Austin: Insight. I think that sounds right to me as like a cooking—
Art: Sure. So we'll call that anticipate. I'll call it Tinker.
Austin: Yeah, it's Tinker. Yeah, it's Tinker. But food. Hey, that's not bad. That's better than normal. It's a 12.
Art: It's a new kitchen.
Austin: I mean, that's a great point. That's a great—And you're busy trying to distract this guy so that Elena can poke around. I think the flatbread is done. He breaks out a bottle of wine from Grande Sonnerie and pours everybody a little bit and says, 
[as Vinnor]: Well, Veile, would you like to bless the food?
Ali [as Veile]: I—Oh yes, yes, of course. 
Ali: With all the awkwardness of like somebody being asked to give like a speech in front of the president, basically. Like, I'm so under-ranked as far as blessing the table to this guy.
Austin: It's true.
Ali: But you know, you know, he's, yeah, he's. He's telling me I, I should, yeah, I gotta do it. And I don't know that I could [laughs] freestyle prayer right now. But I do think the gist of it is like, you know, the same sort of like, thank you for this food. Every—you know, every meal we have until the end is a blessing and a joy and time spent together is a gift.
Austin: So true.
Ali: And dig in [laughs]
Austin: Dig in. And I think, you know, pour—lifts, lifts the glass of wine and says:
[as Vinnor]: To new associations.  
Austin: and takes a sip.
Dre [as Jonathan]: Hear, hear.
Austin: And I guess if no one has anything else they want to do, y' all can turn in for the evening. And then in the morning Vinnor sees you off, kind of send you off to, to go to this place. So you're off to this place and I think we should maybe just pick up going like getting there. I like travel rolls and stuff and I think there's good times for them Though, I guess, I—There is an interesting choice here. You could come at this place through the east, like the, the—You're kind of close to the kind of fallen part of the tower. You know what I mean? It's kind of fallen in two directions. Do you know what I mean? There's the south—or I guess it fell in one direction, but now it's fallen into this whole valley. In my mind you were going to the base of it though, so maybe we just pick up and you're at the base, you know?
Jack:  At the base of the tower?  [Austin: Yeah.] A classic friends at the table place to begin.
Austin: Yeah, Exactly. And that way we don't have to spend the opening getting, like, failing three travel rolls, and…
Jack: Unless Art wants ingredients.
Austin: Oh, I guess that's true art. You do want ingredients.
Art: I do want ingredients, but right now I'm fine.
Austin: Are you sure?
Dre: Could Art just roll for ingredients? [crosstalk] And not do the travel.
Austin: [crosstalk] No, we have to do the travel, we have to do the travel rolls. If we're gonna roll for ingredients, I have to do the travel rolls. I mean, the other half of this is, some people are good at travel rolls. Like, some people have things that like—for instance, Dre. I've now changed my mind. We should do the travel rolls. You have a truck that's good at travel rolls. You know, that lets you go twice as far. That's the thing that I should, like, make part of play, you know? And you're not going too far. This seems coverable in a couple of days. And actually, you're getting further away from the stuff that's dangerous here because you are going across just empty plains. This should be a pretty simple roll. And I have a pretty good idea of what you would run into here if you wound up, you know, bumping into anything. But, let's do it. Let's do some travel rolls. What's the mood on the Little Snail? Any updates to the Little Snail between sessions that I need to know about?
Dre: No physical updates.
Austin: Okay. I heard an owl might have moved in.
Dre: I don't think the owl moved in. I think the owl has been there for a while.
Austin: But, yeah, tell me about this owl. Please. I love to know about the owl.
Dre: Do you want to know about the real owl or the in game owl?
Austin: The in game owl.
Dre: Okay. It's. She's very small. [Austin: Uh-huh.] She's like the size of a softball.
Jack:Oh, my God.
Dre: Very fluffy, big eyes, very expressive, kind of moody eyes.
Austin: Love this. What's the real owl she's based on called?
Dre: That's a great question. Let me double—Let me open this TikTok I posted.
Austin: It's a very fantasy name. It is—It is the elf owl.
Dre: Oh!
Ali: Oh, that's right.
Dre: That is cute.
Jack: Didn't we also pick up some fleggs?
Austin: They are not in the car anymore.
Jack: Oh, they left, I thought we had some like, flegg eggs.
Austin: I don't think—
Dre: I thought that some of them like, hitched a ride.
Austin: I don't remember that. Maybe I'm misremembering. I would remember if there were fleggs who had allied with you, notably, again—
Jack: Let’s say no fleggs for now. And if they come up in the edit, the fleggs burst suddenly from right now.
Austin: Yes. Well, then they scurry away. I say this again because there are moves that you could take to have fleggs. And I—you know, you're gonna take those moves to get a flegg. I'm not just gonna give you a flegg.
Dre: Gotta earn a flegg.
Austin: Yeah. At least not a loyal one. Any flegg that sticks around is a risk. Any flegg that's around is a liability.
Ali: We don't want that energy at the priest's house. And the flegg doesn't want that energy either. We—It was a “I'll see you later” sort of situation.
Austin: That's how I think. Yeah.
Jack: Yeah. Good. Okay.
Travelling to the Tower [01:14:45]
Austin: All right, so dice rolls here. You can move two tiles per, per move here. Roll a D6 because you are now traveling through—I guess actually it's a D8. Prairies, patrolled roads and countrysides. Give me a D8, Dre, Jonathan. Oh, motherfucker.
Dre: Oh, that's right. This is one where low is good?
Austin: Low is good. You should have rolled low here. Instead you rolled high. Here we go.
Jack: [laughing] Imagine if we got jumped by fleggs again.
Austin: No, I actually just think that it is a freezing cold, strange wind rolls in. It's the middle of the summer. You're pretty—I mean, I guess we decided we don't know for sure that this is the whole world. We don't know if there's area beyond the west or the east here. I was gonna say we were equatorial here, but we're in part of the world that I think of as being fairly warm, but a kind of freezing cold, strange like, windstorm, bitter cold, hits and everyone is gonna take 10 damage. And let's start with Shaken.
Dre: Ooh.
Jack: I would like to dispute this. I have a resistance to ice.
Austin: This is not ice damage. I guess it's cold damage.
Jack: It's cold. It's a frozen storm.
Austin: Yeah. Take 5 damage, you resist, so you take half. So take 5. Unfortunately, [crosstalk] even you are Shaken.
Jack: [crosstalk] And I do—I start Shaken?
Austin: Unless you have a thing that says you don't take Shaken. So it's been freezing cold. I need another roll here. Even—you turn on the oven, and nevertheless it is cold as hell. Give me another D8. 
Dre: Alright, 3.
Austin: There you go. That's a 3. That's nice and safe. You make your way to the edge of the fallen tower here. In the morning, you will, you will be able to get to the fallen tower. Art, you should roll again for ingredients. Seems you already got a 5.
Art: I already did.
Austin: Oh, you get 2. Sorry, you don't get 5. You got—What did you get?
Art: I got bitter and sweet.
Dre: Ooh.
Austin: Okay. And then from the second one.
Art: No, that's 4 is—1 is bitter and 4 is sweet.
Austin: We did two travel rolls. So you get, don't you?
Art: Oh, it's every—it’s per roll?
Austin: It's—isn't it? Per travel. It's per…
Art: Per… after each travel roll.
Austin: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Art: I gotta start throwing shit out.
Jack: Sadly, the Great Umami Era—
Art: Another sweet and one of my choice…
Jack: Yeah, the fleggs kind of ended the Great Umami Era.
Art: All right, I have all my ingredients.
Austin: Amazing, and—
Art: Frostbit blueberries, winterflower honey and lake anchovies.
Austin: Incredible. As you arrive at the fallen tower, the sun is, is kind of rising over the, the eastern shore here. We are—This tower is kind of at the cape of this continent, not the, not the easternmost point because the north part of the continent goes way further east. But in terms of the southern half of the continent, it's pretty far east. You can kind of just barely see—maybe you can't. Maybe it's too far. It's probably too far. You can see the horizon. You cannot see the next little island over, remembering how the shape of the world is. And if it's this big, then it's already far further than the—I guess I don't know how—if this was the whole world, where would the horizon line be? I can't do that math really quick. It's too far to see the mountains over there, but you can see the ocean in every direction for a while. You can see the tower which—we've described these towers, this being one of the Dragon Watcher towers, as being sort of like conceptually like lighthouses, like cosmological lighthouses, but they may even have certain lighthouse-like qualities. I think that the base of the tower originally had a bunch of facilities in it, for instance. And not only has it fallen here, it has like cleaved into the ground deep and wide in a way that feels like it wasn't just, it didn't just tip over, but was perhaps attacked. We know it was attacked by the Valtese about a hundred years ago during our world building session, during our game of Cartograph. The front of it is marked with the sort of stylings of the Dragon Watchers. There are a very—like, classically draconic looking gargoyles. There is script in a language I doubt any of you know. I don't think any of you are dragon scholars. And so there's a sort of draconic script etched into various parts of the building. These kind of low areas especially, you know, kind of like up on, you know, between each floor of the tower, there's like, you know, some sort of prayer or something, written incantation, you don't know, written in this draconic script. And there are, you know, huge places where the open—a huge hole where the open, or where the doors once were. You know, big kind of stone doors, one of which you see actually kind of wedged into the ground not too far away. Clearly, this place has not only been damaged by some attack many years ago, but it's been raided in the time since. Elena, you are from a dungeon. You know what it is to be a place that looks like maybe there's valuables inside. Adventurers come to these places, they sack it. You know, they go through, they fight some monsters, what they think are monsters, at the very least, they leave with the goods. And you can see the telltale signs immediately that you are not the first, you know, four people who've come to the base of this tower. What are you doing? What are you—what's up? What's the, what's the play here?
The Tower [01:20:49]
Jack: I'd like to begin by trying to figure out if there is anybody here right now.
Austin: How are you doing that?
Jack: I am hopping off the Little Snail. I think I'm, you know, wearing some sort of, like, short, like, knitted shawl or something from the, like, the cold wind that blew through. Jumping down off the side and looking more consciously at the debris. I think I'm using my experience here from—I think Rillspur has gotten pretty good at fending off adventurers, at least on the top level now. You know, there, there's a—adventurers have come to understand that, you know, you can come in and you can buy some oysters or whatever in the top level, and you can maybe sell some equipment and you can go down and then start adventuring deeper in the dungeon. There's nothing to be gained from killing the, you know, the hosts of the top level of the dungeon.
Austin: Right. 
Jack: But I think this is this thing, this, this caution of, like, is there anyone—how fresh do these tracks look? Can I see, like, a cart tucked away behind something, you know?
Austin: [crosstalk] This sounds like a check to me.
Jack: [crosstalk] Picking it apart very carefully.
Austin: Yeah, I would imagine it's inspir—I keep saying inspiration, insight. Probably 2 Insights.
Jack: Yeah.
Austin: Unless you're, like, moving stuff around in some way. But I think it's probably double Insight.
Jack: I think so.
Austin: So give me, give me that, I guess maybe Study is the button that we could hit here?
Jack: I hit Recall, which is the same.
Austin: Sure. Yeah. A nine. I think this is an open end test. You're gonna get more based on what you roll. I would say you are fairly sure, even on a nine, no one is here right now. You can't quite tell who—you know there was someone here. You know, for a fact that there was someone else here. You can tell that, for instance, the front door was not. That front door was removed at a different time than the rest of the damage was done here. That damage does not seem like it was flung off from the attack a hundred years ago. That seems like someone—you find, you find claw marks in it, suggesting that some, someone or something ripped it off and wedged it in the ground, tossed it into the ground at some point after that. But you couldn't tell if that was 10 years after that or 10 years ago or 10 days ago. But you don't, you don't find any carts, you don't find any recent footprints, you don't find any evidence that anyone is there right this second, you know?
Jack: Okay, that's good. We can move with some more confidence then.
Austin: Totally. Anyone else have any things to do before stepping in to the front door or do you go somewhere else? Do you try to go a different way through?
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: Alright, cool. Bring you over to a different map, sort of a different map. I'm bringing you over to a different page, which I think should look blank for you right now. Is that correct?
Jack: Yes.
Austin: Okay. What about now? Do you see where it's—
Jack: Oh, my God. We’re dungeon crawling.
Austin: Entry hall.
Art: Entry hall. Wow. This is—
Ali:  It's round.
Art: This is momentous.
Austin: Is it? I guess so, yeah.
Jack: Art wasn't there for that time that you made Keith solve.
Austin: Oh, true.
Jack: A saw trap.
Austin: That's true. I did make that happen. You step into the entry hall of this fallen tower of the Dragon Watchers. Do any of you know anything about the Dragon Watchers? Is this something that you've encountered before?
Dre: Hmm. I don't know, but I'd be interested in rolling to find out.
Austin: There we go. This sounds like recall to me. [Dre: Yeah.] So again, insight-insight. Oh, Jonathan, I know that you've done a lot of exploring the world, trying to learn things right now, it does not look like you have done that so much. You've rolled 3, 3. And unfortunately, you do need to get, I believe, above a 6 in order to get the crit from a—From rolling doubles. 3, 3 does not, does not a opportunity make, unfortunately. You could potentially spend a Fabula point to do better.
Dre: You know what? Yeah, let's do it. [crosstalk] We had this whole talk. We had this whole talk about spending Fabula points, let’s—
Austin: [crosstalk] You can reroll—We had this whole talk about Fabula points.
Dre: Let's do it.
Austin: Which of the—Which of your, your theme elements are your—Sorry, your—what are they called? Identity elements. I know there’s [Dre: Yeah.] Identity, theme and origin. There's a better word, there's a catch all word for these. I forget what it is. [Dre: A trait.] A trait! Which of these traits do you think you're calling on to spend a Fabula point to reroll?
Dre: Yeah, my curiosity.
Austin: That makes sense.
Dre: I've just been—I've been poking around at everything forever.
Austin: There we go. Okay.
Dre: And so we'll reroll recall.
Austin: There we go. Hey, that's 8. 8. That's above 7, which is the lowest possible. Which is the lowest success on an open ended thing like this. So that's alright. Yeah. You know a little bit about these guys. They are—one, they have been attacked. You don't really know why, but over the last like hundred years they've been attacked sometimes. And you know that they worship the dragons. They worship dragons. They think dragons are real special. They think dragons can, can maybe, maybe they can live between Perpetuan cycles. That's about what you know, that's the thing that they—You've maybe heard them say that or you've heard someone say that that's a thing that they believe. But you also have some loremaster stuff, don't you? 
Dre: Yeah, but I don't think any of that would come in here because I have to roll over a 13.
Austin: I see.
Dre:  To get that one skill, yeah. So.
Austin: Yep. Okay. That's fair. Cool. Alright. So yeah, that's basically what you know. This entryway that you're in, this entry hall has a classic pair of, you know, stairs, like two stairways kind of curved up and leading up to a balcony. This place has been, has been tossed over very clearly by ambitious but novice adventurers. You can find the—Lots of, lots of remnants of things broken or stolen. You know, you find like, chips from ceramic vases that have—That were dropped on their way out. You can see the scuff marks of where fights happened. There are skeletons in this room. You probably know, I would say either Elena or Nicky, you know what this is. It's the classic thing when a group turns against itself. Whether that's a heist or a group of adventurers trying to exit a dungeon with the goods. Someone decides, actually, I want a bigger cut. And so you see the remnants of that and then you know, you see the signs of an earlier struggle of some sort. You see people who are clearly wielding weapons from a different era. This is this hundred years ago attack who have, who have died here. And in general this place seems like it was badly damaged but did not fall in whatever, whatever happened to it a century ago. What do you do? And I should say, in general, these rooms continue with—We are in the Dragon Watchers tile set of this game, right? The walls have intricate writing on them often. You find some, I guess on this level, you're not finding much because, like, anything that was, anything that was even nailed down has been taken. Even some brickwork has been removed. Even the, the bits with the dragon script written on the wall, some of it has been, has been, like, chiseled out and taken. People have robbed this place blind. At least this, this first entry hall level. What do you do? 
Dre: Hmm. So there's two staircases, you said?
Austin: But they're looping up to the same balcony. 
Dre: Okay. Yeah, yeah. I guess we just keep moving.
Art: Now, I have this fundamental belief that if there was something on this base level, someone else would have found it just out of—
Dre: Okay, what it, what is Uncle Nicky like in a dungeon? Like, is he impatient? Is he, like, bossy? Is he just waiting around or?
Art: Great question. I think—especially something like, this grand is a little unsettling. You know, Nicky's small time.
Austin: Interesting.
Art: This is, like a lot. This is like, this is like taking Sonny Corleone and putting him in the Temple of Doom, it’s like—
Austin: I wish they’d done that.
Art: Yeah. They knew each other. They could have. Coppola and Spielberg, not—
Austin: Indiana Jones and Sonny Corleone, huh. 
Art: They were alive at the same time. So nothing specifically.
Austin: Yeah, right. That young Sonny.
Dre: That might have been the plot to the old movie ride at Disney World, now that I think about it, actually.
[laughter]
Jack: Okay, I'm ready to head on up.
Austin: All right. As you climb the stairway, you get up to this balcony. And the balcony enters into what is very clearly a stairwell up, a sort of stairwell along the outside of the tower. Not the outside, but the interior walls of the tower. Except instead of going up, it's going down. This part of the tower from the balcony has been driven down into the ground. Does that make sense? It's like you—imagine a tower that has a stairwell going up, right? Like around the interior walls of the tower. It just, it's just a vertical tube. Imagine a tube. Then on the interior of the tube, imagine that there is a set of stairs going upwards. Now imagine you cut that tube in half and put it in the dirt. So from the balcony, instead of being at what feels like the bottom of the tower, you're actually at what was once the middle or the top of the tower. And the stairs seem to go down. I almost said into hell, but it's not hell. [group laughter] It is glowing orange down there. Down in the dirt below. But it's as if someone has cut off this tower and not only topped it, sorry, toppled it over, but here has like, slammed it down through the ground into a deep chasm. So it is a stairwell, almost inverted. You're taking it downwards. I mean, it's not literally inverted because then it would be impossible to walk on, but it is a downward stairwell. As if you're starting at the top of the tower, descending, and before the—kind of as you're looking down over that or like towards that part where you can look down, there is a figure, there is a kind of statue of what looks like a—Trying to remember how we described the Dragon Watchers. I feel like we described them as having—I mean, there's a statue. So the statue was gray and there are like, lightly draconic features, you know, longer, like, hands, not quite talons, not quite claws, kind of sharp ears, not quite elf ears, but like, they have kind of, this kind of dragon-like quality, kind of stretched a little longer. The. The skin texture on the statue feels a little scaly or looks a little scaly. And the eyes have the kind of lizard eye thing going on. And the statue, it's a woman in robes holding a book in one hand and then her arm is out forward with the other one and she's kind of just like on this—The, the kind of the, the like—What is the word for when you take stairs and the stairs come to a landing. She's on the landing at the top of this stairwell before you descend.
Art [as Nicky]: I don't, I don't trust this.
Jack [as Elena]: It's not to trust. It's just a statue. Yeah.
Austin: Okay.
Art [as Nicky]: Yeah. Why is there a statue here?
Jack [as Elena]: There's a fancy architecture.
Ali [as Veile]: It's lovely.
Jack [as Elena]: It's beautiful.
Art [as Nicky]: It's lovely?
Jack [as Elena]: Come on, lighten up. It's a bit—you know, everything else has been ruined. We have a beautiful statue here.
Art [as Nicky]: It looks like I wouldn't want to touch it.
Ali [as Veile]: You don't have to touch it.
Dre [as Jonathan]: I'll touch it.
Austin: Okay.
Art: I don’t think you should touch it.
Austin: You touch it?
Dre: Yeah, sure. What'd you say she's holding?
Austin: A book,
Dre: And it's like, it's like a—It's a stone—
Austin: It’s a stone book, not like a—
Dre: Not like a real book. Is it open or closed?
Austin: It's open.
Dre: Oh, is—Can I—Is there like legible text on it?
Austin: Sure. Not for you. You don't know the dragon tongue. As far as I know. You don't know the dragon tongue. I mean, you didn't—You just failed this role on dragon stuff, so you definitely don't know their language secretly. I don't know anything about them, but I do know how to read and write. That would be wild.
Dre: Jonathan does, like squint at it to try to figure it out. And I think in doing so, he puts his finger on the text and is tracing along it.
Austin: Jonathan, I need you to give me a Willpower-Willpower roll. 
Dre: Let’s go. Let's do it.
Jack: Before you roll the dice, Elena is like:
[as Elena]: Yep, looks great. He can touch it.
Art: This is a terrible idea.
Dre: If I just click Willpower twice, will it do this?
Austin: Well, don't do that way.
Dre: Okay. Yeah, yeah. Well, it's a 5 altogether.
Austin: It is a 5. Great. This is fan—It's fantastic. Hey, everybody, I guess let's start with, hey, Jonathan, your finger is turning into stone. [Dre: Oh!] You are, you are some number of rounds—Hey, you know what time it is? Time for a clock, baby. [Jack gasps]
Dre: Let's go, let's go.
Art: Oh yeah. Already in the season.
Austin: Let's get a clock out.
Ali: Oh, I have this though. Don't worry about that. I have this.
Austin: You do?
Ali: I think so [laughing]
Austin: Sure. Okay, that's good. That's good.
Dre: That's handy.
Austin: Yeah. Let's just make a little clock real quick. Put this on.
Jack: The Vengeful Watchmaker returns. New season of Friends at the Table.
Dre: While you're making that clock, I think Jonathan's reaction to this is just—He holds up his finger, goes:
[as Jonathan]: Ah, shoot.
Austin: Uh huh. And as you do this, the statue is returning to life, starting with the book. [Ali gasps] The book begins like—the pages start moving in the breeze as they become unpetrified. And then the hand holding it starts to become unpetrified as well.
Jack: Austin immediately baited us with the statue.
Austin: I mean, he didn't—I'm shocked, you touched the statue.
Ali: I was.
Dre: Hell yeah, I touched the statue.
Austin: Okay.
Dre: Somebody's gotta make stuff happen here.
Austin: You coulda just keep walking. But no, we touched the statue. Right? Let me just write down here.
Dre: Yeah, but now maybe we can talk to the statue before I turn into a statue myself.
Ali: Oh, I love doing that.
Jack: I think Veile’s—
Art: What does a statue have to say? [Austin: Great question.] Thanks for giving me flesh again? Your flesh.
Dre: Well, maybe—Well, let's find out. Let's play to find out what happens.
Jack: Yeah, this is Emily Short's Galatea that we’re gonna play now.
Austin: Uh huh. I need, I need a—Sorry, an initiative check.
Dre: Aw, that's not talking at all.
Austin: That is not what this person is here to do right this second. You want to get them to talking, you can try to get them to talking, but they are not beginning at talking, let me tell you.
Jack: Who’s our—
Art: I got a negative one.
Austin: Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. We're—I guess—Yeah. Everybody, we need to pick a leader before you do this. But who would—
Art: Wouldnt have been me, I have a minus.
Austin: Yeah. Who has the highest base stuff because that tends to be your, your initiative leader.
Dre: I have a zero initiative.
Austin: That might be the highest.
Jack: I have a negative one initiative.
Ali: I have a negative one.
Dre: Yeah, I think—Yeah, I think we determined that last time.
Austin: As a reminder, you can't—You cannot critically fumble, thankfully, Nicky, on a support check, because it's a group check. You're just trying to roll over a 10. And if you do, then Jonathan gets a bonus.
Jack: Nobody gets a bonus here. Jonathan was the only one who rolled over a 10.
Austin: Perfect. You're gonna go first here, Jonathan, with a 13. This awakened dragon watcher seems to have—be a little slower than you.
Dre: Well, yeah, they're more stone.
Austin: Yeah. Obviously. [Art: For now.] As she begins to shake this stone off and it begins to cover you, you see that she is like, it's not even a choice. Like, she's already charging up some sort of elemental attack as a—elemental energy. It's gathering in her, in her—Let's say in her eyes. You can see the kind of bright color coming to her eyes as she's like, she was already in the middle of doing this attack when she was petrified.
Jack: Oh, wow.
Austin: You go first. Jonathan. What do you do?
Art: Wow.
Austin: Actually, it's not true. It's not you go first, your side goes first. Anybody can act first on your side. These are not individual inventory or initiatives. It's you go. Then their side goes.
Jack: I would like to say I have a real doozy of an opening.
[Ali laughing]
Austin: Exciting.
Ali: I have an idea, but I don't know if it's gonna work.
Jack: Oh, no, we know my opening move, which is just boost everybody's defense die for the entire battle. But. If you have, like, an opener that you would like to hit before that, Ali. Well, you said I've got this.
Ali: Yeah, well, I have—The one spell that I have is Dispel. You release a wave of negative energy and cleanse all magic from a creature. 
Austin: That would do it.
Dre: Ohhh.
Austin: This is—Yeah.
Ali: I don't know if a petrify spell is like a proper noun in a way that this doesn't—You know what I mean?
Jack: This is great, though, because this is like—This is why these sort of mechanically heavy systems are really interesting, because I feel like I'm playing Darkest Dungeon or something. And I'm like, what will this button do in this fight? And you push the button and you're like, oh, nothing.
Austin: Okay, yeah, petrified is not its own status effect, but it is just—It is still a kind of affliction, and it's a magical affliction that 100% is a thing that you could use dispel on if you wanted to immediately jump and stop this clock from advancing.
Jack: Something that it might be worth checking is true, with you, Austin, is that, as I understand this, right? Because—So in our first fight, we fought a huge amount of fleggs, and also we were numerous because there's only one of us. Oh, sorry. Oh, my God. One of her and three of—four of us. It goes, we move [Austin agreement] then she moves [Austin agreement] then we move three times.
Austin: That would be true if she were a soldier class enemy and not an elite.
Jack: Oh, what do elites do? They just, they move alternately—
Austin: She gets an extra turn, she gets way more HP and she gets—
Jack: She gets an extra turn.
Austin: Uh-huh. So she gets—She'll go twice in this round.
Jack: I see. It's going to be us, her, us, her, us, us.
Austin: Correct. 
Jack: Okay.
Austin: Us, us, us. Because then the next turn will—The next round will start with you again.
Jack: Given that, I think, Ali, your scheme is good. Do we want to get a barrier up first?
Ali: I guess, Jack, if you want to. And then we'll see what happens.
Jack: Yeah, that sounds good. I am going to cast my barrier spell.
Austin: Okay.
Jack: [reading] You project your soul outside your body and weave it into a barrier to protect the targets from attacks. Until this spell ends, each target may treat their defense as being equal to 12 against any effects that target it. They are free to use their normal defense score if it's over 12. [stops reading] I am casting this on… all of us. So that is going to be 20 magic points.
Austin: Oof. Okay, [Art: Wait.] That's a lot of magic. No, up to three. It's up to three, isn't it?
Jack: Oh, up to three creatures. Yes. Yes. And this is what we learned last time because Nicky doesn't need it. So it's going to be 15.
[Ali laughter]
Austin: Okay. What's that leave you with in terms of MP?
Jack: I still have 40 MP.
Austin: Okay, so you're doing fine.
Jack: Yeah. This—last time we saw it, it, like, lifted her off her feet. And here, I think it's this—It's a very sort of, like, stubborn, alright, we're fighting. You know, she throws her hand with her glass staff out to one side, and her cape kind of, like, billows briefly behind her and then this sort of, like, pale blue—I picture it like, you know, haunted houses have that dry ice, that very particular kind of dry ice that, like, is heavy and, like, sits around the floor? I pictured this as sort of this, like, cold but not unpleasant, or like, breeze of icy smoke settles on the party as the barrier spell begins to take effect.
Austin: Right. Okay. And this is for your regular defense score, not your magic defense. Right.
Art: Oh.
Jack: Each target may treat their defense, yes.
Austin: Yes. Okay. From the eyes of Chelik, Awakened Dragon Watcher, a beam of ice shoots out. Roll a 1D4 to find out who. Actually, I'm going to roll 1D3. It's not going to go after Jonathan because of the positioning. Jonathan, you were presumably behind her reading the book, right?
Dre: Yeah. Like, peering over her shoulder.
Austin: Peering over her shoulder. Yeah. So I'm just gonna roll for Elena, Veile, and Nicky. So 1D3. 1 is Elena, 2 is Veile, 3 is Nicky. It is Elena, who just put up that barrier so that, you know, that kind of works. And this is—What is your magic defense?
Jack: My magic defense, thanks to my snazzy shirt, is 12.
Austin: Well, it ain't 13. Rolled a 10 and a 2, +1 is 13. You take 25 ice damage.
Jack: Absolutely not. I take 25 divided by 2 ice damage, because I resist ice.
Austin: So that's 12 damage. However, as you see here, the target does suffer slow. So I need you to check slow in your status effects. It's the—I think it's the little clock underneath your defense score. And it's—slow temporarily reduces your dexterity die by 1.
Jack: That does nothing to me because my dexterity die is as low as it can go.
Austin: It can't go below D6? It can't go down to a D4. [Jack: No.] That's good. That's lucky. Alright.
Dre: This sign can't stop me. I can't read.
Austin: All right, back to y'all. Chelik—
Jack: She's, like, gritting her teeth. There's, like, frost on her eyelashes, and—
Austin: She shouts out, 
[as Chelik]: Invader! 
Austin: Or, like, is it like, 
[as Chelik]: Invader? 
Austin: You know, having been frozen solid before, or turned to stone before she could get the words out.
Dre: Hmm. 
Austin: Who's up?
Art: I feel like I should get something cooking, because who knows what it's gonna do?
Austin: Oh, right. Yes.
Jack: Art's cooking powers at this point in the early campaign are procedural.
Austin: That's right.
Art: Let's combine the honey and the parmesan cheese.
Ali: Oh, boy.
Austin: [disgusted noises]
Art: Gonna do sweet plus umami.
Austin: Uh-huh.
Ali: That could hit. You don't know that.
Dre: Yeah, if you put some other stuff in there, that could be alright.
Ali: That's a cheese plate.
Austin: And what, are you rolling again on this?
Art: Yeah, I mean, I assume that there's also, like, a master chef pantry situation here.
Jack: The experience of listening to your cooking class without the documents in front of us is like jazz, just figuring it out.
Art: So here's 1D12.
Austin: That's right. This is sweet. And what? [Art: Umami.] Okay, so you roll a f4. 
Art: And 4 is not taken, I don't think. Each of this delica—delicacy's targets recovers 40 Mind Points.
Jack: Oh!
Austin: This amount increases to 50 if you're level 30 or higher.
Jack: This is a, this is a mana spell.
Austin: You should. Yeah. Uh-huh.
Art: So that happens with sweet and umami.
Austin: So you feeding this to someone?
Art: Seems like it's for you.
Jack: Yeah, this is.
Austin: Who is you in this scenario?
Art: This is for Elena. So everyone can have some, all of my allies can, and I think the, the cheese plate is actually pretty accurate.
Austin: Are you handing Elena a cheese plate and saying, hey, eat this?
Art: Well, it's combat, so I think I'm sort of like, throwing a cheese plate.
Austin: At Elena?
Art: Yeah, I've seen video games before. This works.
Austin: Elena, you catching this and scarfing down?
Jack: Yeah, this is like honey and parmesan, right? Yeah.
Art: And some other stuff, you know.
Jack: Yeah, she's. No, I don't think it is some other stuff. It's two ingredients.
Austin: Two ingredients.
Art: Well, but it's. I think, you know, fiction. You know, there's. You know, it's. It's seasoned. It’s not just like.
Jack: Mmm, thanks.
Ali: Well, Elena just was attacked. You need a quick cheese.
Austin: Yeah. Cheese up.
Jack: Absolutely. How much does this give me? This gives me how much magic points?
Art: 40.
Austin: Jeez.
Jack: No, wait. [laughing] Surely it doesn’t.
Austin: 40 is right.
Dre: That's so much mana.
Jack: Wait, Art, hang on. How often can you do this spell?
Art: As often as I have the ingredients.
Jack: Oh, we can't die.
Dre: Well, famous last words.
Austin: Yeah, famous last words.
Art: If I can figure out a way to roll 3, I can also recover hit points, but.
Jack: Okay, so I have full mana again. What's she gonna do now?
Austin: Oh, right. She goes again, huh? Right.
Dre: That's what you told us.
Austin: I sure did. She does the thing that I think, you know, you could have expected from a Dragon Watcher. Following up the ice beams from her eyes, takes a big breath and facing again, all three of you in front of her, releases it. Trying to hit all three of you with some flame breath. Yeah, that's a 16. What's—Is anybody's magic defense above a 16?
Dre: You said—
Art: I think you know it isn't.
[laugher]
Dre: All three of us?
Austin: Again, you're behind her right now. [Dre: Okay, okay, okay.] She doesn't—
Dre: I'm just making sure.
Austin: Yeah, yeah, yeah. [Dre: Sorry.] So, again, this is for Elena, Veile, and Nicky, take 18 fire damage each.
Dre and Art: Whoa.
Jack: Oh. I'm dead.
Austin: That's fucking right you are.
Art: Oh, I'm, I'm—What's the thing where you have half—?
Austin: In crisis.
Art: I'm in crisis, which lets me choose a specific creature that I can see and make a bond of hatred towards it.
Austin: Well.
[laughter]
Jack: Okay, listener, I would like, for the purposes of hubris.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: Remember when I said we can't die?
[hysterical Dre laughter]
Austin: I do. How long ago was that, Jack?
Jack: It was about 41 seconds. But I'd like to be clear that I was talking about our immortal souls, Austin.
Dre: Oh, sure.
Austin: Yeah, right. Yeah. Uh huh. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yes, of course.
Jack: I'm burning like—I'm like a candle.
Austin: Yeah.
Art: Hey.
Austin: You know immediately, this isn't like regular fire. This is like—This fire feels like it burnt—You've burnt yourself before. You work in a kitchen. This feels different when it hits you. I guess any of you who've been burnt before, this feels like a truer fire than there has been in your life. And in fact, Elena, the ice magic feels a little different too. When you got hit by that. There is like, something primordial about it. This is draconic fire. This is draconic ice. This goes beyond simple—the simple current cycle of Perpetua.
Jack: What did she do to you, Ali? How much health do you have?
Ali: I have—I went from like, 32 to 14.
Austin: Ain't good.
Ali: I think we should flee, perhaps.
Jack: No, well, hang on, wait. I can't say anything because I'm on fire. I'm literally opening the book to like, dead.
Austin: So yeah, here we go. Zero hit points. Do you want to read zero hit points?
Jack: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: It's on 86.
Jack: Oh my God. What a way to go. Dying after having just eaten a cheese.
Austin: Actually, it's not on zero hit points because it starts with NPCs and then goes to villains. You are not either of those. [reading] Depending on their role in the story, defeated characters have different options available to them. [stops reading] You are player characters. That begins on page 88.
Jack: Yes, here we go. [reading] Like villains, player characters follow their own special rules. When reduced to zero hit points, a player character must either sacrifice themselves or surrender. When reduced to zero hit points, a player character may give their life in order to accomplish a seemingly impossible deed such as [Dre: Time to die.] putting an end to a centuries old curse, temporarily taking away a demigod's powers, or single handedly holding off a small army to make sure their allies can flee. You may only sacrifice yourself—
Art: Does it say beating one person?
Austin: That you didn't need to touch in the first place.
Jack: Eating parmesan and dying. [reading] You can only sacrifice yourself if at least two of the following are true, a villain (see page 100) is present on the scene. [stops reading] I do not believe [crosstalk] that this is a villain.
Austin: [crosstalk] This is not, no.
Jack: [reading] Your sacrifice would benefit a character you have a bond towards. [stops reading] Debatably untrue. [reading] And you believe your sacrifice would make the world a better place. [stops reading] Fucking hilarious.
Austin: It's great. And so we don't—You're not gonna sacrifice yourself here. So we need surrender.
Jack: [reading] Surrendering. Characters who surrender fall unconscious and become unable to act for the remainder of the scene, even if their hit points are restored above zero. The GM cannot kill a character who surrenders, but may impose a narrative consequence chosen from the list below, or a consequence that makes sense within the scene. If multiple characters surrender, or worst of all, if the entire group gets wiped out, the game master may impose separate consequences or a single major consequence. They may also decide to bring the consequences of your surrender into play later on. While surrendering should never kill your character, the GM can still impose heavy consequences. Given the general mood of Fabula Ultima, however, permanent or crippling injuries should be avoided. When a player character chooses to surrender, they immediately gain 2 Fabula points. [stops reading] So I'll just mark those now. I don't have a maximum of Fabula points, do I?
Austin: Fabula points can keep going up.
Jack: Cool. Right. [reading] At the start of the next scene in which they appear, the player character regains consciousness and recovers an amount of hit points equal to their crisis score. Sample consequences of surrendering. Darkness. You must change your theme to one of the following: Anger, Doubt, Guilt, or Vengeance, your choice. Despair. The enemy gets to make a decisive move, or the heroes lose the faith and approval of an important person or group. Loss. Something incredibly precious, such as a magical artifact, a loved person, or an ancient and important heirloom is taken from you. Resentment. You are forced to erase one of your bonds and replace it with a bond towards a character chosen by the GM. This new bond must be of Hatred, Inferiority, or Mistrust, your choice. Separated. You are no longer with your allies. You might be captured, dragged away, lost, or stranded in some unknown location.
Austin: It's that one. You stumble backwards, the fire climbing up your body and fall down the stairwell. Fall down the tower. We hear like a, like a loud crash as your, your body, which is not made of flesh, right? It's, it's made of living stone. Stonework?
Jack: No, it is. It is made of something that looks and feels like flesh when I am not in the thing. But it is not human flesh. It is Tesserae material. You know, it's something like that.
Austin: Yeah. You hit with a loud crash somewhere below. Who's up on your side?
Jack: The good news is that you now get three moves consecutively.
Austin: That's true.
Ali: Oh, but it's only me and Dre in this round though.
Austin: Right, but then you start the next round too.
Dre: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ali: Okay, I see. I see. I see.
Art: Well, if I can. If I can hit Chelik, I can regain two hit points, so I think—
Dre: Oh, you're doing fine.
Austin: Okay. Yeah. Oh, did you, did you make a bond of hatred?
Art: Yeah. Uh-huh.
Austin: With who? With Chelik, presumably. [Art: Chelik.] And is that with a—It's with an individual person? It's an individual creature? Right? Not like with Dragon Watchers.
Art: A specific creature you can see.
Austin: Okay, so it's with Chelik. Yeah. Go ahead and write a hatred bond with Chelik. Level one bond.
Art: Yeah, I got it.
Austin: Yeah. C, H, E, L, I, K for the listener.
Jack: Worth running down our options here. Among others, attack, equipment switch. We can guard, which allows us to gain a resistance to all damage types and a +2 bonus to oppose checks. And we can also cover another creature and prevent foes from performing melee attacks against them. Not helpful because she's doing dragon bullshit. We can hinder to inflict a dice problem on another opponent. We can spend inventory points to immediately produce something from our inventory. We can work towards accomplishing an objective, which, you know, is possibly something there, bury her under rubble, etc. We can cast a spell. We can study some skills, which require you to spend an action, and then we can also just negotiate with Austin about stuff to do.
Austin: Yeah, like last time we talked down the fleggs, which I actually think I called a skill check last time, you know, or maybe it was an objective check. I don't quite remember, but it was one of the two.
Art: I mean, it's worth considering. This is definitely a case of mistaken identity.
Dre: Oh, yeah, yeah. This very much seems like this person was frozen in the middle of an attack and is just woken up.
Jack: I do hear you, but remember when Hitchcock tried to negotiate with Thackeray at the beginning of Marielda and he immediately cut his throat? I think, you know, this is an elite enemy midway through a spell.
Dre: Okay, I think we should make a call here as far as, like, strategic wise. Do we want to try and fight this out or do we want to run?
Ali: Well, there's no, like, escape move. I mean, we could—
Austin: You could.
Ali: I guess it would be like an objective.
Austin: An objective, yeah, exactly. Trying to escape.
Ali: I would, I would, I would love to dispel you and get the hell out of here.
Dre: Okay.
Ali: Or like, talk? I don't know. I guess talking isn’t gonna work. She—But like, we could try. We are here to take something.
Dre: If I get dispelled, does that also cure my shaken as well?
Austin: I don't think so because that's not a magical effect. You're just cold. [Dre: Okay.] Run through by bitter winds.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: Unless it says it does that, but I don't believe it.
Ali: No, it's just a wave of negative energy that cleanses all magic from a creature.
Austin: Yeah, yeah. It's not a magical cold. It's just—Well, it is a—You know what? It was a magical wind, but it isn't a magical cold. Do you know what I mean? 
Dre: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. This could be. If I just sat by a fire for a while, that would…
Austin: Yeah. I believe if you camped, it would clear—Yeah, right. If you did the rest action, you know. Yeah. But I might be wrong by that. I'm not 100 sure. Yeah, it would. Resting would recover all of your HP and MP and would recover status effects. Something to consider once you get out of this situation.
Dre: Yeah, sure.
Austin: So what are you doing?
Dre: I'm gonna cast a spell.
Austin: Okay. What are you casting?
Dre: Well, I guess I don't—I don't cast spells. [Austin: Yeah, you don’t cast spells.] Yeah. I've got like little, little spell circles with my—What are they called?
Austin: They call them Magispheres.
Dre: Magisphere.
Austin: Right. Yeah.
Dre: Yeah.
Austin: But you tell me what it looks like for you, because let's start about—
Dre: [crosstalk] That’s what I’m trying to figure out, yeah.
Austin: [crosstalk] I don’t want to default to whatever the books kind of, iconography is. What do they kind of—Let's start with function.
Dre: Yeah. So what they do is that basically they replicate a spell. I think for a certain character, this would look like a spell grenade, basically. I don't think that's what they look like for Jonathan.
Austin: Are they—Yeah, you're not like a potion maker either. You're a tinkerer.
Dre Yeah, that seems… Yeah. Potion maker almost seems closer to the vibe, though.
Austin: I, I don't want to step on Keith's toes. Keith has a lot of potions.
Dre: That's true, that’s true.
Austin: I actually think grenade or like—
Dre: Oh, yeah, they're fuckin’, they're fuckin’ Rubik's cubes.
Austin: Ooh, that's fun.
Dre: And I just. I just twist them in the right way and then you smash them on the ground and they cast the spell.
Austin: It aligns the elemental energy. Yeah, sure.
Dre: Totally. So I'm gonna—So to do that, I have to spend 2 inventory points. So let me write that down.
Austin: Which brings you to what? 3?
Dre: 3 altogether. And then I will cast Stop.
Austin: Ooh.
Dre: You trap a foe inside of a circle of altered time and space. The target will perform one fewer action on their next turn to a minimum of zero actions.
Austin: I love it.
Jack: Oh, that's great.
Dre: That does also cost me the MP amount too. So that costs 10 MP. 
Austin: And it is an attack. Is it?
Dre: It's the inventory action.
Austin: Sorry. But the—Does the stop spell say you have to roll to hit?
Dre: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: Which is what? Inspiration. Fuck. Insight and willpower. I don’t know why I have this, this block in my head.
Dre: Ten.
Austin: A ten does not hit. [Dre exhales] You deploy this, this Rubik's Cube. You slam it on the ground next to her, and, you know, I think that, like, the stop field appears around her, but it kind of shimmers, and she's continuing to move at the speed that she normally moves at.
Dre: Can I invoke my identity of being a gearhead to reroll one of these?
Austin: I can. I think you can. 
Dre: Okay.
Jack: The implication here is that she has a 12 magic defense.
Austin: She's higher than 10.
Dre: Higher. Yeah.
Jack: Higher than 10.
Austin: Yeah.
Dre: Okay.
Austin: No one else has tested her magic defense yet, right? There’s not like a—
Dre: I don't think so.
Austin: You don't have her numbers quite yet.
Dre: Okay. So the good news here is that my insight was the lower number, which is my better die. So I will reroll that one. Well, it got worse.
Austin: Well, you got a 3, unfortunately. [Dre: Well, okay.] That's not as good.
Jack: Oh, that's a rip.
Austin: Womp womp. Alright. Yeah. So as, as said, you know. Yeah. You even, like—You even, like, pick it back up and reset the Rubik's Cube, like, things and slam it back down again. And this time, I think, you know, she kicks it across the room away from her, not letting it even get the second attempt.
Dre: Oh, dear.
Austin: Veile. Oh, sorry. And, Jonathan, more of your body is becoming stone. You're still able to move because, like, enough of your muscles have not been covered yet.
Dre: Wait, but even after Dispel was cast on me?
Austin: I didn't know that that happened yet.
Ali: Oh, I thought you went before me. Yeah, but I can just do that.
Dre: Okay, okay, okay, okay. My bad, my bad.
Austin: Yeah, it's your turn now. I was doing that so I could set up Veile, potentially using her, her action to dispel you.
Ali: You know, boy howdy. I, I would like to. I really don't have—I, I, I need people to be fighting. Losing somebody is really bad. [nervous laughter] But, yeah, I'm going to. I'm gonna release a wave of negative energy, cleanse all magic from a creature.
Austin: Okay.
Jack: What does Veile releasing negative energy look like?
Ali: I think that, like, I—So the way that I saw it initially was like her doing a reaction like immediately and like stamping her staff on the ground and like the little bell rings and like, if you can imagine the, like the, the silly visual effect of like, waves in the air going to Jonathan and like… 
Austin: Maybe it simply took you a second to—I mean, first of all, you know, it's worth saying all of this has happened in seven seconds. You know, everything that's happened so far has been super quick. Maybe you've just been gathering the energy to do it, you know, instead of like, I don't want you thinking that Veile has been like, you know, twiddling her thumbs, being, now what should I do? She's been in the spell casting pose gathering entropic energy to dispel this powerful petrification curse, you know?
Ali: Yeah, it's, it's—I'm, I'm glad that I'm able to do this. [laughing] I wish I could help in other ways.
Austin: You could. That's fine.
Dre: Hey, not being petrified. Helpful.
Ali: Yeah. I just want to scream “stop”. I don't know that that's gonna work.
Austin: Well, it's the top of the. It's top of the new round.
Dre: I tried.
Austin: Well, you yelled stop or sorry, you cast stop.
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah.
Dre: Maybe you should yell stop.
Austin: It's your turn order again. So who's going first? What are you doing?
Ali: Yeah, Veile's instinct is to not want to be fighting anymore and to just be like, 
[as Veile]: Well, stop it. 
Ali: Which I don't have a—You know, that's, that's gonna be about as useful as that is, as we think that'll be because I, I don't have like, a skill that tells me.
Austin: You do though. You could always just do a skill check.
Ali: Okay, sure.
Austin: Right. And so a skill check is, is just a combination of—Or sorry, like not the actual skill, but the—You could basically do an attribute check. Right?
Ali: Okay, sure.
Austin: Which is, in fact, I think they are still just called skill checks, even though they are the combination of two attributes, basically, right? You don't have a particular ability or anything, but it is, it is—would be Willpower plus Willpower to attempt this basically. You know, and I think this is an objective check, right? If your goal here, the thing that you want to accomplish is stopping her from killing you, it seems. Right? [reading] Describe what you want to accomplish and how you intend to approach it. Needless to say, you can only pursue a goal if you have a reasonable way to achieve it. The game master has final say on which actions can be performed, but should do their best to allow a variety of different approaches. Since objective gets you closer to what you want within the conflict, it will always require a check. If your goal is opposed by another participant, the check will be opposed against them. If multiple participants can oppose you, only one of them will perform a check. Otherwise, it will be an attribute check. [stops reading] I don't think this is an opposed check. This isn't like you're trying to tug of war something in there, and she's trying to tug of war the other way. Right? This is you are trying to convince her of something, which is that you are not a threat, that you should be—that she should stop trying to kill you. [Ali: Right.] There is a—
Art: She's clearly mad at someone else.
Austin: Yes. Seemingly. Right? Though what she said was invader. Maybe she also thinks of you as invaders. You know, who could say? We've not talked yet. 
Ali: But I would love to be like, hey, we don't want to hurt you. I don't want to hurt you.
Austin: Right? Totally. Yeah.
Art: Stranger’s just a friend you haven't met.
Austin: That, to me, sounds like Willpower-Willpower. You're not, like, making a, you know, a reasoned argument. You're not being like, you shouldn't fight us because we are not wearing the clothes—You know what I mean? You're saying, please, we don't want to hurt you. Don't—stop fighting us. So, yeah, Willpower-Willpower.
Ali: Okay. My staff just uses Willpower-Willpower. So I'm gonna just roll that.
Austin: I think it's. That's bad, that's bad optics. That's bad juju.
Dre: Yeah.
Ali: There isn't a button for it here. I'll do it the other way. That's a 16.
Austin: Look at that. It's not just—That's not just a 16. It's a crit.
Ali: Woo-hoo!
Dre: Hell, yeah.
Austin: Unbelievable.
Ali: Being nice works!
Austin: Let's read the rules on critical success. When both—you rolled two 8s. [reading] When both dice rolled during a check show the same number, and that number is 6 or higher, the result is a critical success. [stops reading] I love this line here on page 40. [reading] Another way to put this is you'll score a success on double 6, double 7, double 8, double 9, double 10, double 11, or double 12. If you roll a critical success, your check is automatically successful, and you get to apply the effects of an opportunity. (See the next page) Page 41. Opportunities are unexpected twists in the story, sometimes good, sometimes bad. When you spend an opportunity, you may pick an option from the list below or come up with a different twist that fits the current scene. The GM has final say on whether an opportunity is appropriate to the current situation and some spells or skills will allow you to spend opportunities in new and powerful ways. Their example: Valea the thief is hopping from roof to roof in an attempt to shake off Count Eligor's mercenaries. The GM calls for a Dex plus Might Check. Valea rolls 7 and a 7. Critical Success. The player controlling Valea describes how she loses her pursuers and chooses the favor opportunity. Her daring performance will earn her sympathy of the villagers who are already fed up with the Count's tyranny. [stops reading] The example or the, the pre written opportunities here which are fun to choose from. And I think—I think—have I put them in the, in the side thing? I may have. I may not have. I did. There's a little opportunity. This page is just in your handouts. You can see them and look at them and consider them. It should just say opportunities in the handouts list.
Ali: Advantage, Affliction, Bonding, Faux Pas, Favor, Information, Loss, Item, Progress, Plot Twist, Scan, Unmask.
Austin: And you can choose any of those. Or we can have one of our own.
Ali: Fucking god. Okay, let's go—Give me a minute.
Austin: [reading] Advantage. The next check you perform will get a +4. Affliction. You give a creature dazed, shaken, slower, weak. Bonding. You make a new bond towards something or add an emotion to one of your existing bonds. Faux Pas. Someone on the scene makes a compromising statement chosen by the person who controls them. Favor. Your actions earn you someone's support or admiration. Information. You spot a useful clue or detail. The GM may tell you what it is or ask you to introduce a detail yourself. Lost item. An item is destroyed, lost, stolen, or left behind. [stops reading] This is for when the enemy gets an opportunity on you or when you want to take something away from somebody else. Like if you were like I want to destroy that book that, that she has. [reading] Progress. You may fill up or erase up to two sections of a clock. Plot Twist. Someone or something of your choice suddenly appears on the scene. Scan. You discover one vulnerability or one trait of a creature you see. Or Unmask. You learn the goals and motivators of a creature of your choice. [stops reading] But we can always invent our own.
Ali: Yeah, I mean in terms of like picking from the menu. Like Unmasked feels like it makes the like most narrative follow through right? Of like—no, we get to talk to her. I would love for like—I guess this—the scene isn't ending. The combat is ending. So Elena is still…
Austin: Yeah, Elena's not in the scene. Elena's down below somewhere.
Jack: Oh, I’m gone.
Austin: Elena was separated from the party. That was the consequence of surrendering.
Ali: Alas. Okay. I mean, I'm happy to have this fight be over and to talk to this person.
Austin: So, yeah, you say stop. And I think sensing the—or you say, we don't want to hurt you. And sensing the truth in your, in your, your spirit here, she pulls back and snaps the book closed, but kind of—you know, actually, I think what she does at that point is she lifts up into the air and begins magically hovering kind of over the pit, making some distance between the two of you and is like, 
[as Chelik]: Who are you?
Art [as Nicky]: She's definitely talking to you.
Ali [as Veile]: I—My name is Veile Delynn. I'm a priestess with the Holy Proctorate.
Austin [as Chelik]: You aren't with the one who—
Dre [as Jonathan]: Pardon me, but what, what day do you think it is?
Austin: I think her answer is an obscure—you know,
[as Chelik]: It is the 73rd day of the Dragon Whale, of the Year of the Dragon—you know, the month of the Dragon Whale, of course.
Art: That might be right. I don't—
Ali: What day do you think it is.
Art: I don't know what day it is.
Austin: Of the Dragon Whale. Yeah.
Ali [as Veile]: Were you—Have you been stuck here?
Art: Foiled again.
Austin [as Chelik]: Stuck? No. You and your invaders arrived with a terrible being.
Dre [as Jonathan]: Can we just take a breath and could you look around for a minute?
Austin [as Chelik]: What have you done to our tower?
Dre [as Jonathan]: We got here five minutes ago, and then I touched your book.
Austin: Oh, that's actually wrong. Sorry. That's not what she would say. She would not say, what have you done to our tower? Yeah. In fact, what she would say is—because that was a very funny joke line. I hit it. She looks around and says: 
[as Chelik]: Yes. Not content with letting us live in ruin, you came to pillage the dead. 
Austin: Clearly she is talking about whoever arrived after the initial siege, not about—She, she was not like this—Made like this, from what we know is the original Valtese attack, which I'll just say out loud now so that everyone can get on the page. You know, not, you know, 
[as Chelik]: Not content with letting us live in the ruins of the Valtese attack, their treachery. You had to come to pick over the pieces.
Dre [as Jonathan]: Ohhh. Were you aware the whole time you were stone?
Austin [as Chelik]: I was—Ah. They petrified me. I see. You are not the invaders who—No, I was not aware. One minute.
Dre [as Jonathan]: I don't know if that's better or worse.
Austin: I—probably better. I don't want to be aware for some amount of years stuck in the stone statue. I—you know, you only do two days. The day you go in and the day you get out. Like, I'm trying to—you know, definitely not. 
[as Chelik]: If you aren't with them then? Who are you?
Ali [as Veile]: Um. Well, it's been some time. But we were. We were sent here. We were looking for something.
Austin [as Chelik]: More adventurers looking to pick meat off the bone.
Ali [as Veile]: Well, I—It's important.
Austin [as Chelik]: What is? Stocking your coffers with gold?
Ali: Sort of glancing over her shoulder at Nicky and Jonathan. 
[as Veile]: We intend to stop the, the cycle, if you're aware, ma'am.
Austin [as Chelik]: Stop it? 
Austin: I think she says: 
[as Chelik]: How could you possibly stop it? 
Austin: At this point I have a question again. How much does the party know about the, about the prophecy? Did—How much did Vinnor say in public? How much have you said? I don't quite remember. I think this came up in conversation right beforehand too. That was like. Have we heard the words White Lectern? Or has the rest of the Little Snail heard the words White Lectern at this point?
Dre: That's a good question.
Jack: I did not believe that we had.
Dre: I don't think so either.
Austin: You just know there's some sort of mission that Veile is on.
Jack: Yeah. And the mission has one step right now which is go and get the sort of casing, the fire casing. And it's a religious mission.
Austin: Right, Right.
Jack: That's the other thing.
Austin: And you presume—Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it's, and it's supported by the head of the kind of Goddess of Light part of the church. You know that, that's the thing that you found, right? The Intercessor. I forgot. I forgot the word Intercessor. Funny that I would. Yeah. So. Yeah. So I think she's like, how could you possibly stop the cycle?
Ali: You ever be vulnerable to someone then you're, you know, you're stacking a whole conversation about it? Yeah.
Austin: Yeah.
Ali [as Veile]: Well, it's, it's, it's all quite complicated, I think. But I'm told that there's a, a place where we could speak to the gods. To the Rev—specific one that was in my head.
Austin: It is Lucena, Goddess of Light, Bringer of Light.
Ali [as Veile]: That we could speak to Lucena and ask for mercy.
Austin [as Chelik]: Your gods are pitiful in the Shadow of Eternal Dragon. But I do believe the cycle is unnatural. Do you have evidence of this so-called mission?
Ali: Awkwardly, like pulling a backpack off of her shoulders, I guess. Or like whatever the crossbody equivalent of traveling gear is on the character that you sort of squint and say, yeah, inventory points, I guess. 
[as Veile]: Well, I have some letters here and I have a mark, so I'm told.
Austin [as Chelik]: Show me.
Austin: And give me a roll here for how you're attempting to convince—you've given me the pathway towards convincing her not only to not kill you in this moment, but to let you move forward. But it's still a big ask. Like, it's still. I'm gonna say this is an open ended check. Depending on what your roll is, this could be a group check. If Jonathan and Nicky want to help in some way, they absolutely can, but I want to know how. But, but you're—The higher you get, the kind of more permission she's going to give you going forward, if that makes sense.
Ali: Yeah. Part of being open and honest here is like, knowing that what we would do immediately after this conversation is go upstairs and take something really important.
[group laughter]
Austin: This is exactly right. Yeah. This is part of why I'm like—
Dre: We're not here to rob you. We're just taking it for the church.
Austin: Yeah.
Dre: You see?
Austin: Yeah. No, she is potentially sympathetic, though, so. So, yeah. Are you doing a group check? Are you just gonna do it yourself? Veile? 
Dre: The only way I could think of helping would be… at least from Jonathan's point of view. I don't know. Did you have something Art?
Art: No.
Austin: I mean, you could feed her.
Dre: She probably hasn't eaten in a long time.
Art: Yeah, she probably—She hasn't eaten for a long time. Does she want—I wish like, I wish I had like a big ham leg. Just be slicing off—
Austin: Right, right, right. Hey, what's that bond you have with her again?
Art: Some slices of—hmm.
Ali: [laughing] You have that Parmesan at hand, though, right?
Art: No, I used the Parmesan.
Austin: I mean, I guess that's a question, Nicky, is like, are you fuming at the thought that this conversation's even happening?
Art: Yeah, but I'm angry a lot.
Jack: But you are specifically angry in this moment, right? Like, we have a mechanical specificity of anger towards this now.
Austin: What's your other bond? Your other bond is with Jonathan, not with Elena. Okay. Elena has one with you.
Art: Yeah. We're going in a circle.
Austin: So. Jonathan, nothing? Nicky, nothing.
Dre: Not that I can think of.
Austin: All right, Veile, give me Willpower.
Ali: Willpower.
Austin: Yeah. Again, unless you can—Unless you're making a more, you know, concerted effort to try to, like, lay it out for her in a, in a sort of clean argument, like, you should be helping me because reasons A, B, and C, and because it's the right thing to do. You know what I mean? You can kind of think of it as like—
Ali: No, I think that like, in character impulse here of like, like, look at this weird mark on my hand and read this letter…
Austin: 100%. Willpower.
Ali: Is just where we're at.
Austin: Yep.
Ali: Okay. No modifiers there. Oh my God.
Jack: Oh my God.
Austin: Uh-huh. What’s your wait?
Ali: This will help. But you have a lucky number at the beginning of each session. That number is 7 once per scene. After you perform a check, you may replace the value shown. So that would bring me up to a 9.
Austin: I bring up to a 9, which is more than 7, which is the lowest possible success you can get. And then you could spend a Fabula point to reroll the other one. If you go to 2 on a 1D8, like that could go up a lot.
Ali: Okay. Yeah, that feels, that feels real. That feels like I would do that.
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: Unless, what? If I get a 1? Then it's still an 8.
Austin: Yeah, but 8, the, the breakpoints are 7, 10, 13, 16. So like, like—
Ali: 8 and 9 are the same thing.
Austin: 8 and 9 are, you know, not in combat when someone has an 8 defense, but in open ended tests like this, that is the sort of way these work. Yes. 7+ is like—is like, you know, a low success etc, you know, 10 is a normal success.
Ali: Okay. And I'm spending a Fabula point to do this. [Austin: You are.] That becomes a 15.
Austin: Oh, you rolled an 8. Yeah. Okay. I think she sees this and is like, 
[as Chelik]: You, you bear the mark of smoke. Yes, yes. You must, you must hurry. What, what is it you're here for? And like comes floating down like having been convinced by something. You—Okay—What? Huh?
Ali: Okay, I built this out really good, let this happen. I, I, what are we here for? The lantern? The, like the light, I don't know how to say this.
Austin: The Eternal Flame. The, the, it's hard because like we call them Eternal Flames, but they're not, you know, that we don't have a word for like the big stone thing and also the thing that contains the like, the copper pipes that the gas runs through or whatever. You know what I mean? Like, we don't really have a term—we don't call that a stove, you know, but the sort of Eternal Flame and its fixture, I guess. Unless. Jack, do you have better words for this than I do?
Jack: I don't think so. Yeah, yeah. The thing and the thing it goes in.
Dre: The doodads.
Austin: The doodads. Yeah. Yeah. At a 15—if it would have been one higher, you would have gotten a little more. But at a 15, she is like, 
[as Chelik]: Yes, of course. Ah, this day must, must have been faded. Perhaps it is time for, for me to leave this place. For once the Dragon's Flame leaves, it will no longer be our tower, toppled or otherwise. You have a means of transporting it?
Dre: Oh, yeah. And you too.
Austin: No. 
Dre: [sadly] Oh. 
Austin [as Chelik]: What year is it in your calendar?
Austin: Great question. We have not made a decision.
Dre: Yeah, I was gonna say, Austin, what year is it in our calendar?
Austin: In the western continent, we use a reverse calendar. I think it is the year like 99 before the end. You know what I mean? It's 99 BE or whatever. Because both Sonnerie and the Protectorate believe that the world will be ending in 100 years. Sorry, not 100 years. 400 years is what I've been playing with. Not 100 years. So, yeah, it's like the year 398 BE, before the end.
Jack: Wait, so what year will the end be? Oh, I see, right.
Dre: And this attack happened like a hundred years ago?
Austin: That's right. Well, the attack that knocked over the tower happened 100 years ago. [Dre: Sure.] Whatever petrified her happened more recently than that. And so—Yeah, do you—You say the year that it is, you give her the 398 BE? [Dre: Yeah.] And, and she's like—
Dre: And then probably for context, say, you know, the initial attack happened 498 or whatever.
Austin: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And well, she's like—And she's like, 
[as Chelik]: I was there for the initial attack and I was there 50 years later when the intruder came. Strange being. And they are the one who petrified me. Yes, you will take the, the Eternal Flame. You will take it and pursue your mission. I need to reconnect with my people and see what, what of us still remain. 
Austin: And yeah, at a 15, I think gives you the basic rundown and says. And says,
[as Chelik]: When I last walked these halls, the tower had fallen thusly.
Austin: And reveals to you some of your map ahead. You're gonna—We kind of—You're gonna go down this stairwell and then you're gonna kind of have an option at the bottom of this, this kind of—This part of the tower, it splits into two pathways forward, kind of out into the crevice of the—Sorry, I should actually make this visible too. Boom. The bottom of the stairwell, what you would have found is that it splits into two different directions. And on the left hand side here is a training hall. She says, you know, 
[as Chelik]: And if you go—If you take the left hall, you'll—
Austin: Or the left tunnel, because at this point you're like underground effectively, 
[as Chelik]: you will find the remains of our training hall for the, the Dragon Squires, our militant arm. And if you take the right pathway, you will come to the library of our squires. Sorry, of our scryers, where I taught young acolytes in the way. From there, I am unsure what the state of things could be because it was turbulent even at the time I last walked. If there's nothing else, I will wish you well, but be on my way.
Dre [as Jonathan]: Could you offer any help to our, our friend?
Austin [as Chelik]: Could you—If you bring her to me?
Dre: Yeah, this is me also reminding us, we gotta go get Jack’s character. [laughing]
Austin: You don't know where Elena is.
Dre: Oh, that's right, yeah.
Austin: You've been separated. You don't know what—where she fell to.
Dre: Is, is like mechanically—Is that our option? Is, is she just out of this scene until she's out of the scene? [crosstalk] We could make camp—
Austin: [crosstalk] She’s out of the scene until you find her. You have to go find her. She's gonna—Yeah, well, we're gonna cut to her in a moment waking up somewhere. But you know, we have to get to you making decisions about where you're going first. So, you know. Do you say your goodbyes here to Chel—I think Chelik finally does say
[as Chelik]: If you, if you have need of me. 
Austin: Actually, yeah. I think. I think what Chelik does is like reopen the book and open towards the back of it and rips a page out and begins to fold it until she has made a small origami dragon and places it in your hands, Veile, and says, 
[as Chelik]: If you need to speak with me in the future, open this, write your message on it and refold it as I have here, and then release it into the air.
Art [as Nicky]: We're gonna be just fine, thank you. [Ali laughing]
Dre [as Jonathan]: Well, hey, I want to see how this works.
Austin [as Chelik]: One use. Don't refold it. I will only receive it once. [Dre [as Jonathan]: Oh.] You have to send it to me.
Ali [as Veile]: Well, it was nice meeting you.
Art [as Nicky]: How convenient.
Dre [as Jonathan]: Hey, I'm glad you're not stone anymore.
Austin [as Chelik]: I'm glad you're not stoned too.
Art [as Nicky]: I wish I was stoned. [Ali laughter]
Dre [as Jonathan]: Just, just, come—
Art [as Nicky]: Not that kind of—
Dre [as Jonathan]: Come on, Nicky. Come on. Come on, Nicky. Come on. Come on. Let's walk—Let's walk it off.
Austin: And she hovers away, up—
Art: This game is T for teen.
Austin: Up out of the, the remains of this, this tower lifting off into the air and flying away. She can't fly very far, but she can fly for a little bit.
Art [as Nicky]: Must be nice. Must be nice.
[“Perpetua” by Jack de Quidt begins playing]