The Adventure Zone Royale: Episode 23

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So you can go sign up and become a new member. You can upgrade your membership or even just boost by a couple of dollars if you're not ready to move to the next level. It's all there. Maximumfund.org slash join. Let's get to the episode. Previously on Taz Royale. Close to the end of it now, Duh. You play yourself a jaunty little tune in case the noises get too upsetting. Listen, I gotta go. Those bugs are to protect you. Later

Wait, no, hold on, I saved your life, man. You owe me. Fine. It's an antidote. I don't know to what, but uh There's probably a reason it's here. Then he turns around very quickly and starts to charge downward down the hallway as he screams even louder, Run! As another corpse mound, a horde of zombies begins to pour into the room, ready to eat your whole body and ass.

It is my favorite thing about this season, is I don't know what the fuck Hellgram is always up to some shit. Loravitz always up to some shit. Rictus is always on his own shit. It's like Doing his best I can't. Kevin, you say that, but I've been attempting to parent a boy for three straight months. I don't know. I'm not throwing the curveballs, man. I adopted a man I thought that you adopted an adult man is itself, I think, a curveball. Yeah, but it's past you, dude. It's on the ground.

Rick just is just out here battling his inner demons, Griffin. I don't understand what he's trying not to be an evil murderer as he has to murder people. Yeah. And he's Death's Avatar. What I don't understand. And that's a little shithead. And that's a nasty fucking shit everybody's fallen in love with. It's so yeah, a nasty little shithead everyone loves. People can't get enough of Hellgram being nasty. Uh welcome back everyone to Taz Royale, our Battle Royale winner take all season.

We are in the middle of the sixth trial of the Octave Conclave, uh, to decide who will become the new member of the Octave, the god wizards that ruled the world of the fold. Uh we are in the trial of necromancy. Where you all sorry, Griffin. Yeah Griffin, I'm sorry. We're in the trial of necromancy. I dad has rearranged his setup.

Due to a recent my brother, my brother and me uh McLear family clubhouse recording. Yeah. His rear end is set up so there's a picture of him a big picture of dad. A huge picture of him pulling open his shirt with a Superman style C underneath it. It is

In c I am not super easily distracted on these. It's incredibly distracting. It's hugely distracting and I'll say it it's it's sitting, it's like a poster-sized picture sitting on a tripod and it does look like The entrance to his funeral, like when we did well Hey Daboo If there was a wreath there getting a side man, put that somewhere easy to find a Yeah.

No, no, no, don't lose it. No, no, no, Dad, Dad, you're gonna lose it. Dad, you're gonna you'll forget where you put it if you move it right now. Leave it right there. Leave it there. Uh we are in the trial of necromancy. You all are taking shelter inside of a manor that is under assault by the uh the the fallen fifty-two uh wizards, fallen fifty-two aspirants. who have died in the previous trials, who have come back in undead form assaulting the mansion.

Uh, in the last episode, we lost uh a couple real sweethearts, the spider, Tommy Falcon. Both lost to the undead horde. Uh, the rest of you are kind of scattered across the first floor of the manor. Uh you were on a sort of mission to find the uh the whatever is powering the barrier, cutting you off from the second floor so that you can Take up a more defensive position up there. Let's start on the uh east end of the house. Loravith, you're on the ceiling of uh of the library.

Uh, after stowing Duber Sweetleaf inside of a piano, you uh have uh g followed uh Burgerman and the spider into the office, saw Burgerman murder the spider. before running into the office you did sneak a peek at the rune that is powering the barrier uh inside that office before Burgerman

uh locked himself inside. A corpse mound has smashed through the window and witnessing Burgerman's crime uh has sort of been aggroed onto him. Uh so you are on the ceiling in the library and You you can see the corpse mound sort of bashing against this door, trying to gain access to the office where Burgerman and the rune are. Uh, Lorveth, what do you do?

The door's shut. The door is shut, yes. The blob's trying to get through the door to Burgerman. Yeah, it is a mound of corpses. It's not like a slime. Situation. I know. I okay. Sorry I didn't You get it though. I didn't call your blob the right thing. Our words are our words are all we have just. Literally. No, Griffin, your words are all you have. I carry a knife all the time. That's big muscles. I'm watching.

I'm watching for a second. Yeah, dude. That's a totally fine answer to this situation. What are they doing? What are they what is the mound doing? Uh they're smashing against the door. Uh give me a like a blob against the door. Like a blob would do against the door. Give me a a perception. Uh I'll give I'll give you advantage. You have a nice vantage point here on the on the ceiling.

We need to catch up to him. Just to do something, please I'm dy please. They're gonna keep going until we do something. Unless you wanna keep waiting and wait for them to just smash the door Let us help him. Um good. I'm gonna cast shield on myself. Okay, great. Uh shield that increases your AC, I believe, by a flat amount.

Yeah. And now I'm gonna body slam into the big amount of corpse. Oh wow. You have a plus I don't have that's the only point of they're just completely distracted. If I shield myself then I could just like completely get the drop on this big mount of corpses. It's taken a beating in my head. It's gotta be pretty well beaten up. So, you know, and I and also I'll gotta be honest with you guys. There's this big

Symbol in there that I saw that I got a peek at. And like I'm this is not really about Burger Man for me, but if he hits that and gets a cape. I'm gonna fucking flip out Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so this is a surprise attack. I'm going to grant you advantage. This is the same corpse mound that you blasted with a fireball uh earlier, and so it is it is somewhat diminished in size.

Uh so you're gonna make this attack with uh advantage here uh as you leap down from the ceiling and smash down on 14 and a

18. 18. Okay, yeah, absolutely. With uh an eighteen, you are going to hit. Um you have this shield on, right? And you're landing sort of in a mosh pit. So I'm not gonna make you take like any sort of falling damage here as you leap down from the ceiling. Uh instead I think I'm going to confer that falling damage onto the corpse mound using Newton's third third law. Uh sure. Tough puff. So uh go ahead and uh first roll your unarmed attack damage and then you're gonna add one D ten to that.

Four? Oh nice. Plus a D ten? Seven. Nice. Okay. Uh okay, you come crashing down onto this corpse mound. As you do, uh you fully flatten uh a a couple of uh a couple of zombies. You see, you see, let me see, let me pull up the list. Who's dead? You s you you hear the poor frame of uh the goblin uh demolitionist powder keg Kelly uh get just completely squished underneath you.

Uh i th there's there's a few of these guys you have now taken out. The corpse mound is less than half the size it was when you first sort of fed um Tommy Falcon to it. With that Burgerman you can see uh, you know, one of his eyes peeking out of his sesame seed bun, peering through a crack, uh, in the door. And he shouts, Eh yeah, get him! Do it, Laura Vith! Um I think we're fine. Nothing more from you, meat boy. Uh with that the corpse man is going to uh counter and uh Eh well real quick.

I would like to use my bonus action to activate my large form. Oh shit, okay. Uh I'm fighting a big mount of fucking bodies, so I'm gonna go ahead and do that. Give me uh what what does that mean, uh your large I'm I'm big. For ten minutes, I'm big. I have advantage on strength checks and my speed increases by ten feet. Alright, cool. You stand up from the pile of corpses you have just kind of dispersed a bit, uh, and you are now considerably larger.

Uh you also have a plus five to your AC, which is great. Uh because of their diminished size, they are not going to make three attacks against you. They are only gonna make two. Uh I'm gonna roll this on the table. And and it is worth noting that it also because of my hills tumble It has received the prone condition from me. Now I don't know how a big

Mount of bodies goes prone, but it goes. So it's not leaping into an attack. It's gotta take a second to recobulate. Yeah, yeah. I mean, they'll spend their move action to stand up, but you also land it in them. So they're not having to move particularly far. Uh okay, so uh the first thing that happens is one of these zombies uh lurches upwards and tries to sink its teeth into your shoulder.

What's your AC? What number am I trying to beat here? You really don't know. Oh you'll never you'll never beat nine. It's a nine plus five. So fourteen. Plus wait, hold on. Plus my shield. Oh, I'm not sure that's that's not gonna matter, my man. Uh that is a nineteen plus six. My shield griffin. Nine plus five is fourteen. We've covered this. Um that is a that is a twenty-one. Uh, okay. Your AC is nine?

I mean I don't know. That's what Griffin said. I'm a wizard. I mean why does a wizard need better AC than nine? You're a big old dude. I don't know, man. This is just it's been nine the whole time. But can I just say it could have been a lot higher and I still would have taken a beaten there. Yeah, that's a big nineteen. Uh okay, so it's all semantics at this point.

Uh you see this zombie, it is rotted sort of beyond uh be beyond your ability to uh recognize them. Uh crashes Uh its teeth sink into your shoulder and you are going to God dang, 22 points uh of damage. Uh and now I need a uh constitution saving throw. You are trying to beat a uh a DC 15. I see here that Lorveth has not great dexterity, I think is the AC problem here. I believe that is a crit fail. It's a critical failure, my lord.

Sorry, I don't know why I talked like that. I'm a failure in podcasting as well as adventuring. Lore of it. Neither entertaining nor confident. As the teeth of this creature uh sinks into your shoulder, you feel uh a an immediate sort of burning sensation begin to course when you pee. Uh throughout your body when you pee from this wound. Uh, you are going to take uh Nine points. uh of uh of necrotic damage. And that is going to continue until you are able to save from it.

Uh the uh there's another attack coming your way too. Another uh zombie of the corpse pile is going to uh try and claw at your legs. Uh they do not succeed, that is a three on the dice. Uh okay. You see Burgerman shouting. Fool me what BLOOD BLOOD BLOOD Um Burgerman threw the crack in the door shouting.

Um I'll help! I swear to God, Big Ben! He shoves his meaty mouth up to the crack in the door and grease begins to shoot out of it, uh covering the uh the ground where the zombies are currently trying to get to their feet. creating a slippery, uh slimy, greasy hazard. And he says, I did it! I'm a hero Uh Let's jump over to the western side of the manor, uh, where uh when we last left our heroes, we had four wizards in the hallway. We had Scorpo, Rictus, Pranklin, and Hellgram.

Uh, and you were investigating these sort of servant quarters here on the west side of the house. Uh before a corpse mound smashed through the door, leading Scorpo to race away in flight. Hellgram it, you're on sort of like the farther end of the hallway. Uh through the door leading back into the kitchen, you see the corpse mound has uh smashed So you guys are basically facing two corpse mounds now.

uh that are coming at you from kind of two directions. Uh from the servant quarters you have a couple exits that are not blocked by zombies here. One leading uh to the north, toward the stables in the north sort of wing of the house. Uh or you can head back into the dining room that Richdis and Franklin just sort of ran in from. Um Hellgrammate uh calls out Uh through my psychic link I I I realized that

Loravith is in great danger. I'm where? On the in the library. Um you guys got this covered. I'm going to go help Loravith. And he bolts through the door into the dining room. Have this covered, Rickdis yells after him. Uh Scorpa just sighs as Hellgramit bails uh on them. Okay, uh I will say that you will be able to make it.

Uh, all the way to the library. I don't think that there is a path you can cut that does not go through haze and blaze. Unless you're lying and you don't actually wanna go to the library. Uh no. Well, they're all zombies, Dad, so in a way. I believe it was Reyes and The other one, Frage. Frage? Uh the Days, yes, that that have been killed. Uh Blaze and Haze are both kind of just sort of very slowly crawling, chasing after uh Rictus. So

Uh unless you wanna attempt some sort of maneuver here to kind of get around them, they're right flat in the center of the room. They will get opportunity attacks on you if you wanna try to make it to the library in one turn.

Uh you see Blaze and Haze reach up towards you and you just kind of effortlessly vanish and reappear behind them. They turn and they look back at you. And then they decide that's not worth it. They still have their eyes uh set on Rictus and they continue their crawling that way as you make it past, and you are able to make it into the library as you No.

No, no. No, I'm gonna stay right here. And he's going to mental it using the psychic link. He's going to tell Lorbeth, I'm on my way, friend. Hang in there. Okay. Uh you take up a position by the door and we hop over to Rictus. Ricktus, you have corpses to the left of you, corpses to the down, and Here I am stuck in. You've got Scorpo and Franklin in the hallway with you. Um Scorpo is just kind of like taking very slow steps backwards away from the corpse mound, uh unsure where to head.

Next, what do you do? I freeze time. Interesting. This is going to be so we haven't done this yet since you first sort of discovered the power. The way this is going to work, when you cast Time Stop, it is a, I believe, a ninth level uh spell in the DD book. So you are not supposed to have this yet. Uh we have tried to convey this narratively through the fact that er when you've used this spell it has been pretty fucking uh pretty wild.

give me I it's going to cost you nine spell slots, right? It's going to cost nine so like if you if you have that uh you you can spin that or You can attempt to do it just as a third level spell, uh, and you're going to have to roll sort of a wisdom saving through it to make sure that you can kinda handle the power. So I'm offering you there's a safe way of doing this that is very expensive, or you can attempt to use this spell at like your current level

with potential side effects. I have a plus five on Wisdom Saving Thirst Griffin. Let's do that. Okay, I want you to uh before you cast the spell, uh bur go ahead and use a third level spell slot. Uh-huh. And I want you to make a wisdom saving through it. The number that you're trying to beat here is a 17. Okay. That is a nine plus what? Plus four.

Or plus five. Okay. For a total of fourteen. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So that's it, right? You said I had to beat what was it? F you said a five. Yeah, you just had to beat an eight. No, you have not reached the seventeen DC. Uh Scorpo my brain. Scorpo and Franklin uh look to you as you sort of reflexively uh sort of shout as you try to channel this spell. Uh and What happens is a bubble of sort of uh opaque light uh begins to envelop you and spread around you.

You see yourself inside of this like area of frozen time, and you've been in it before, and whenever the gentleman cast it, you were fairly good at resisting that kind of uh effect. Here, you conjure this uh this sphere of light, and uh as it spreads out uh around you, you realize with horror that you are also frozen in it.

Um you have created this sphere and then sort of trapped yourself uh immediately inside of it. Uh and Scorpo, you can see through the bubble, like looks at you sort of in a panic. Uh, and Franklin, hm Franklin's gonna try Franklin's gonna try to save you. He's gonna roll a DC uh 17 also to try to get in there and try and save you and I'll roll this on a table. He is adding a Uh four to this. I need a fourteen. That's my point.

My boy. Franklin reaches in and grabs onto your elbow and with considerable effort. uh manages to pull you back out of the bubble. Give me as you sort of return to real time, I want you to give me a uh a perception check as you are sort of removed from the bubble. Uh thirteen plus five, eighteen. Okay. With an eighteen, as you are sort of pulled through the edge of this bubble, looking back into it, you see uh a very, very faint image of a d a tall humanoid figure

uh wearing a sort of tattered cloak. Uh, you realize as you are pulled out of this bubble, inside of there, you can see this entity that has called itself Death that you have communed with uh a couple of times uh in the past. past. Uh he doesn't appear to be moving, he doesn't appear to be like completely all there. Uh the image is like fairly static y. Um but as you're sort of pulled outward uh and the bubble dissipates, uh you you do witness that. Uh prank

Franklin gives you a little sort of violent shake. He is a he is a i an orangutan. He he he's very, very strong. Uh and you manage to come to your senses. And as you do, you see uh that time has passed as you are.

As you were in here, the corpse mound has caught up to Scorpo, who is attempting to sort of hold off the the the crowd, the the corpse mound. I'll give you another action here, since that one. Option B, I run to Scorpo and grab him and cast Thunderstone. OK, cool You can move other things with Thunderstop? Yeah, you can move somebody blah blah blah. The uh you can also teleport one willing creature of your size or smaller.

Uh they must be within five feet of you when you cast a spell and there must be an unoccupied feet within five feet of your destination space for the creature to appear in. Uh are you just sort of grabbing him and pulling him away from the corpse mound or I'm grabbing him and then we are going to uh thunder step.

Next to Franklin by the door to the dining room. Okay, cool. And the corpse round is gonna take some damage here, right? Correct. Or they have to roll something. Uh they have to make a con save, beat a fourteen. Okay. Let's see. Doot doot doot doo doop. That is uh what is their con save? Probably not great. They're a pile of zombies. Uh their con save is No, that's not going to do it. Yeah. So they are going to take wow, holy shit, man. Eighteen three D ten. Eighteen points of damage.

Okay. Uh as you do that, you see that uh from around sort of the corner that you have uh t teleported behind, uh, you just sent a few full zombie bodies like flying backwards off the corpse mound. considerably. I will say as that happens and you appear by this door next to Scorpo, the door behind you leading deeper into the other side of the servants' quarters where the other corpse mount is starting to sort of move into sandwich you, uh, they have arrived on the scene. Um

Okay, I I grab the other two and head towards the dining room. Okay. Uh you head back into the dining room. Uh as you break in, uh Blaze and Haze have made their way over and they are sort of the first thing you see as you come in here. The other thing you see is kind of hellgram it. Host it up. Hello grand. I had to fight my way through those guys. No, you didn't.

Yay, how do you know? Because I'd already weakened them and they look exactly effectively for them, then you'd be dead! No, I'm just I'm dodgy, I'm fast. Uh Loravith, uh, we're gonna hop back over to you. Uh you are standing sort of in this uh pile of now greasy. Zombies remaining from this corpse mound. Uh Burgerman is now just kind of just like your fan fiction, Griffin. Yeah. Grease it's a little bit. These oiled up. These up, uh shambling dead.

Okay. Change of plans. It's from Griffin's fanfiction, the fucking dead. Okay, so um change of plans here. Yeah. We're going to Rick Grimy gets in there with the grip. You don't even have to change that. Grimes is fine. Yeah, but he doesn't want to get sued. So like I'm gonna have a change of plans here. I am going to try to force my way into the room with Burger Man. So cause I am clearly outmatched here. I cannot take this thing mono. So I think that uh I think I'm gonna just push my way in.

Uh okay. Yeah, not not not yeah. The door is weaken enough that it's not gonna put up much of a fight. Really what this is gonna be is a strength contest with to Burgerman. He sees you coming in and he is not going to There is no way he will be down with opening this door at all. Um so uh this'll be just a straight up sort of strength strength contest. Burgerman has rolled a twelve. Very good.

So that's a one. The other one was an eleven. So eleven is close enough to twelve. You you push the door and it budges a bit. You hear him say, Uh no thanks. You s you can d I already got him greasy, so it should be easy enough to finish him off, I think. Um You got it you got it man and then I'll come out once you finish them off I'll I'll I'll open it up for sure. What's the smell like in there, Griffin? Not great. Well, okay. Fine, Burgerman. Have it your way.

I climb up the wall spider climb. Okay. Uh all right. This thing will kill me and I don't wanna die. No one will protect Duber. Yeah, absolutely. Uh okay, you you uh hop up onto the nearest shelf, scale upwards uh towards back towards the ceiling. Uh the the zombies you notice are still kind of fixated on you ha after having like come down and jumped down and smashed a few of these guys. Uh their their ire has been drawn towards you.

Uh so as you climb they are kind of uh trying to fruitlessly uh scale the shelves behind you to Oh and they're slippery too. I bet it looks so stupid. Uh so you are able to even with their super well defined muscles and grazing. This is what I plan. I'm luring them away to save Burger Man's life.

I will say that is an easy thing for you to do uh with your spider climbing and their greasiness. Like you as you move up around the wall, the corpse mount kind of just like shambles and slips and slops away. Uh and uh you are able to get them Uh out away from the door. Uh as soon as they are clear from the door, you see Burgerman uh smash through the door behind them. He looks at you, looks at the corpse mound, looks back up at you at the ceiling, and then he is going to bolt.

For this sort of rear door to the outside uh away from you and the corpse mound, running and shrieking and leaving a trail of What do you do? Um I mean, I don't think I can okay, well let me ask you. I feel like I've done an action and done a move. So we're not in initiative right now. Okay. So we're we're having some liberties with But he's clocking me still?

Uh the course round is following you, yes. Uh uh in a few. I'm trying here's what I'm trying to determine, Griffin. Yeah.'Cause I can't I mean, we have a map here and even with this I can't like If I'm already up here and I like want to make It's just the symbol, man. I really want to touch that symbol. Yeah. I hate the cape it pist the cape it pastos is truly legendary. You got any fire?

Yeah, but like I as an as an as an entertainer I'm hesitant to just catch fireball again, you know? Well they are covered in Greece. They are pretty grease is l non flammable. Um What do you mean it's non flammable? What are you talking about? It's burger grease. He cast Greece. Greece is non flammable. Explicitly non flammable in twenty twenty-four rules. Greece is explicitly non-flammable. But it's twenty twenty six. We're actually using the we're using the twenty eighteen uh classic.

Where I believe the the the wording is extremely flat no if you I'm not gonna railroad you into using another firewall against these. And no, I'm tell I just want you to uh you guys are gonna be really embarrassed and I don't I want to see the embarrassment. Yeah. I'm playing Dungeons and Dragons professionally, Justin. How much more embarrassed can I be? I am wait a minute. What's it doing right now?

Sloppin' and slimin' and sliding around the floor of this library trying to chase after you on the ceiling. Oh fuck him then. He's not gonna catch me. I've but I'm gonna bolt for the door. Into the office? Yeah, he's not gonna get me. He's got crap. You're on the ceiling. You're on the ceiling. I'm on the ceiling. He's not gonna expect this. You're Lionel Richieing all over the place. So you kinda double back.

Uh uh and as the course amount is just simply not agile enough. Uh it probably wouldn't have been even if it wasn't all greasy. By the time you reach the door to the office, they are like on the other end of the room struggling to sprint. Towards the red symbol and like dive so that the cape materializes as I'm flying through the symbol and I'll like midair just like fly out the window is what I'm hoping will happen.

Some of that the cave was a thing you invented, like what if it happens, and then it became so real for you that you dove. Yeah, Trav, again, I am playing Dungeons and Dragons professionally. That is you are absolutely that is the writ of law. Uh okay. As you Can you describe the cape slowly and in detail, Griffin? Episode Episode O This guy finds a magical cape and he fights It's all been prelude to this moment.

I miss that show. You run into the I run in I know, Dad, you're the only one. I run into it and they threw a Cape Con every time Dad's alone in a rim. Um I uh I wanna r walk up to the symbol and and step into the red symbol. Okay. Uh as you move towards the symbol Yeah, I wanna do a quick arcana check and then step into the red symbol. Okay, cool.

I'm really bad at Arcana. The cape energy is so sick. It's more of a formality at this time. It's whispering. Fucking hell, man. Holy shit, man. It's a one. It's a one. I just really this symbol. This is why I think there's a cake. This symbol you've never seen before, but it is magic, and that must mean case. So you've never felt more certain of anything in your life than the fact that when you step into this symbol

You will it will you're gonna you something's gonna happen to you. I step into it and I accept my cape. Yeah. You step into the circle. Uh as you step into the circle it flashes bright red. The cape must be invisible or something. The cape must be one of those invisible, weightless, intangible capes. It's there, it's like your own invisible cape. Like in that movie Crash.

And uh you step in and there is a flash of red light from the symbol. Uh and as that red light flashes, uh you Hear the corpse mound outside uh begin to get whipped into a frenzy.

Uh, cape, cape, cape, cape, cape. The symbol disappears, uh and you hear a loud whining hum. uh emit through the first floor of the house as the barriers separating the the first and second floor uh dissipate. The other thing that you can see now through this like sloppy pile of corpses that has uh approached the door to the office now, behind them, on the other end of the library, uh some of the shelves

uh appear to be kind of nested inside one another. They slide out away from each other, forming a uh a stairway up to a uh a balcony. uh overlooking the library up on the second floor that has appeared as you have uh removed this seal. So that's another way up to the second floor? Yes. There are now a few ways up to the second floor. Uh you can see there's uh let me use my ping tool. Uh there's

This guy here on the west side. There's there's basically the the main foyer entrance. There's one to the north and then one in the library and one in the servant quarters past the now two giant piles of zombies uh that are creeping through there. Okay, well I'll I wanna look at I'm wanna look at the deck. That didn't do anything for me, Griffin. I want at least one look at the desk before you leave.

Uh. Uh before your a all saying I departs from me, I would just like to look in the desk real quick to see if there's a knife or some coins. Give me an investigation check. You stop to check out the desk as the corpse mound move inches ever closer. No, it's having like no it's it had no shot. You made that very clear. Give me an investigation check. Give me an inv Justin. I've got a box of toys over here. Sixteen. Sixteen. Great. It's a really nice fountain. Ooh. Not even that large!

As you open up the desk drawer, uh you you reach inside, sort of rooting through there quickly, and you find a uh a small sort of cylindrical vial. uh that is full of a uh sort of luminous red liquid inside. Um you are going to now also, before we leave you, thank you for reminding me, uh, you are going to take Six more points of necrotic damage from the toxin that is coursing through your shoulder and you may make another charisma saving throw trying to beat a seventeen uh to break

To fight off this contagion. Oh. Well a three? Three's not gonna do it. Okay. You are still poisoned, feeling pretty bad. Oh wait, I'll drink the vial. Okay. It cured me. Uh you chugged. And what's that growing out of your shoulders? Whoa It's a Kate potion. Uh you chug the potion, the red potion. And it's man, I'll you know what? A little cape comes out. A little cape comes out of the wound.

A little cape comes out of the wound in your shoulder, okay? So it's not like a full cape, it's like a half cape, but not in terms of length, but in terms of width. You have a little basically like a little napkin that's going over your shoulder now that is. Like Captain Marvel has sometimes. Sort of, yeah. So you have this cool red Scarf. Quarter cape, I guess. Sort of scarf now. Uh this is a potion of superior healing that you have uh chugged here, and also it gives you a cape.

Uh with the potion of superior healing, you are going to heal for I do know oh uh eight D four plus eight. You are still poisoned. D four plus eight, ninety-two. Eight. That's a lot. Eight D four plus eight. I don't know why you couldn't do the math for me, but thank you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh so go ahead and recover eight d4 plus eight hit points. Uh you still are poisoned. Look at all those big fucking pyramids. Wow dude That's a pretty goddamn good roll for eight D four plus eight. Yeah, man.

Uh You chug, you feel uh a bit better, you still definitely feel this burning sensation. uh in your shoulder but it's now you have like a cool kinda cape coming out from the shape. Or if it looks at the blob and licks some blood out of the corner of his mouth and said, Bad news, pal Uh the sloppy corpse p mound uh begins to uh come towards you. It uh it is loud as it sort of shambles and groans, but through that sound

you can hear another sound sort of uh echoing through the library, uh coming from deeper in the house. It is the sound of Uh piano strings being scratched in a sort of frantic rhythm.

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Uh okay. You come into the library. Uh I will say like you gain some information as you come in the library. You couldn't quite see the situation, but you do see this greasy corpse mound.

Uh you don't see Loravith uh'cause he's sort of tucked away in the office and you see this staircase that has appeared up to the second floor. More importantly, he doesn't see me, right? He does not see you, no. Uh so you are going you definitely hear this sound of the scratching piano strings uh down in the drawing. Uh and you make your way down into there.

You see a room in a state of of great disrepair. Uh Loravith caused quite a mess in here. He threw a fireball and a guy out that window. There's there's there's blood all over the ground and toppled chairs and shattered bottles. Uh and you see there is a piano that uh this sound is coming from, and right next to that piano you see a zombie. Uh and this zombie is

about five times the size of any of the other ones that you have seen before. It is also wearing a cute little conical hat that you recognize as uh the hat that Pip, the uh enlarging, reducing gnome. uh that Duber dispatched and his duel uh has come into the room. and is kind of pounding on this piano. This is so important. When the gnome enlarges or reduces the same size, yes. Thank you. Of course, yeah, no I guess. So Pip is the kind of guy that goes to a party and if there's a piano

He just he has He is a yeah, he's a real douche about He's gotta play. Yeah, yeah. He sits down and you hear him start playing Wonder Wall. He starts playing some Ben Folds tracks. Okay, so Hell Grammet is in that drawing room. Yes. Uh for what it is worth, Pip doesn't seem to give a shit that you're in there. Pip Pip's eyes are blood red, as you have seen sort of a few times before, and his gaze is fixed squarely on this piano. Okay.

Does Hellgramma have any indication that Duber is in the piano? He has no indication that I'd like to do. Is Duber strumming the strings? Yes, you have an indication that someone's in there, but I don't think Loraveth communicated to you that Duber has been stored. Okay. I wouldn't communicate to any of you. Yeah. I'm going to have uh Hellgramt, as long as he hasn't been noticed by Pip, take a take a little stop and uh use his psychic link.

To cast around to see if there's i i hello, you in the piano. Are you okay? Are you good if you got this? Is that you? Hell Grammet, save me, please! I I I don't wanna be squished, I don't want to be bitten and killed. Shh Nike. Um If I don't help you, you'll tell Lorveth, won't you? Yes, definitely. Poop. Okay, so Hellgramite casts infestation. And he's gonna shoot a bunch of maggots. Oh flesh eating maggots that eat The flesh of the dead.

Hey, I'm just gonna lean into it a little bit. Yeah, absolutely. So this is uh gonna do two D six damage after he uh if if he does not succeed on the constitution saving throw. Okay, uh Pip is gonna make a con save here. That is a thirteen. Does a thirteen save? Nope, doesn't make it. Constitution save of fourteen. Okay, uh then go ahead and roll your two D six damage against Pip. Sh that would be a four and a four, that would be eight. Okay. I think poison um wait, is it just poison damage?

And it also moves it five feet away. Yes. So I does this work on large Yeah. No, it doesn't say anything about uh yeah. So yeah, this will this will move him five feet. You can move uh oh, but you roll a D four. So it is a random direction. So go ahead and roll a D four. I will say if you roll a two on this D four and you roll to the south, you will knock him out the window. That's a two.

That is a two, man. That is very, very, very fortunate. Uh Pip, the gnome, uh takes a big wobbly step backwards, uh trying to swat some of these maggots off of him, trips over the ledge of the window and falls outside. Uh as he does that, you see him stand and his eyes uh meet yours uh and flash red as he sort of transfers over uh the the aggro onto you. However, Pip is going to just kind of stand there menacingly for a moment, and then he rushes off into the woods out of sight.

You lose track of him as he uh as he leaves to to regroup. Okay, I'm gonna open the piano and get Duber. Duber looks at you and he says Hel Grammet, thank you. Thank you. I I I always believed that you were good. I think Scorpo is wrong about you, sir. I I I you're you're like a nephew to me. I mean You could have just set the piano on fire and I would have died and then there would have been one less competitor.

Oh no no it happened. When I saw the bugs come out, I was like, Oh, time to be eaten by bugs, but then I went off to pip things. Let's go through this door and up these stairs and let's get onto the second floor, okay? Yeah those stairs lead to the second floor, right?

Yeah, absolutely. Easy. Yeah. You uh you are able to take him up the stairs uh leading up to the second floor of the building. Uh as you do that, we're gonna hop over to to Richtus, you are still in the dining room here uh with the two zombies you hadn't quite finished off and a bunch of just a absolute world war z level wave of zombies uh pursuing you from the west side of the house

Uh uh you can see Pranklin has blocked off the doors uh leading back down. So you cannot access the kitchen or foyer from here. Uh but the doors that are still open are the one out to the uh library and then the doors to the north. uh end of the house that you have not quite explored yet. I cast Animate Dead on Days. Okay, cool. What's that mean as I Try to add days back. I thought I was pretty safe in getting rid of his token there, but Um The Target becomes an undead creature, which

Should be pretty easy for them. On each of my terms I can take a bonus action and mentally command the creature I made, uh if they're within sixty feet of me. Um, I decide with the what action it will take and where it will move on its next turn. You can issue a general command. Um, and because I'm an a necromancer savant person. Uh they get plus six health and plus three to attack damage. Okay, well let me override the HP of this zombie. Uh okay.

Uh that is your action, right? Is is is using that. And then you have bonus actions. Okay, I'll go ahead and let you move days here. Uh what what's your what's your goal here? My command is run interference for us. OK Uh you see days look up at you uh lacking that kind of like uh, you know, red shining uh aura about its eyes.

uh and it cambers over to its two sort of former teammates, Hayes and Blaze, uh, and grabs them by the ankles and begins to claw uh at them. Give me Give me an Arcana check, please, Rickdus. That's a a one? Okay. That's not good that's not very good. Magic happens. One of the lower numbers. Yeah. One of the lower numbers. Really, really, really bad rolls today, guys. I know I usually wait until afterwards to get my notes on how you roll, but really, really super bad rolls.

Uh okay, yeah, Daze uh uh begins to pull at Hayes and Blaze, whose attention turns back towards Daze and it does appear to be uh they do appear to be distracted for the moment. And we run for that north door. Okay, uh Scorpo and and Pranklin are sort of ahead of you here because they realize that is sort of the only safe option. uh for them. Uh and you head into the kind of north hallway.

Uh there's a few doors leading uh out of here. Uh one sort of to a a a meeting room that has some small windows you can uh peek into and see it appears to be uh empty. No one has gone in there, uh undead or otherwise. Uh, you see at the end of the hallway another door leading into like a sort of parlor and then back into the dining room, and then there's this sort of smaller carpeted staircase heading up to the second floor that is now

it is un unprotected by a barrier. The other thing you see is opposite uh end of the hallway, you see uh Two figures, the sort of plague mask of Hippocrates, who uh you ran into before he scattered and ran off uh out of the dining room, and standing over Hippocrates you see hasty Jane. uh who is holding in her hand a candlestick that she is using to make uh a series of pretty brutal melee attacks against Hippocrates uh on the ground.

She is uh shrieking as she brings the the candlestick down. You can't tell sort of how many times she's done this, but Hippocrates seems to be in pretty bad shape. As she brings it down. The next uh blow she he kind of like is manages to hold off as she rolls a ten. Jane for attack roll. Uh she turns around super quick as she hears your voice. Uh she uh you know, her face is is is covered in blood and she looks back at you sort of in a panic.

And uh looks back down at Hippocrates and takes a step step away. She says I I had I didn't have a choice. I I I thought for s he he was moving towards me and he I uh he he just he I I could tell he had that sort of a menacing aura and I I I mean look at him, he looks kinda scary and I I Uh fuck. Hey, it's okay. Uh she's gonna bolt. Uh she turns on her sort of afterburner boosters and uh goes flying up the carpeted staircase uh up to the second floor of the house.

Hippocrates is on the ground in front of you, uh and uh he is sort of he is he is gasping for air. He Uh pretty pretty injured here. Um Hey, the the thing you gave me, the vial you gave me, will it help you? Hmm. He shakes his head no. He says You have to move me. There. Okay, uh Scorpo Planklin, can you guys get him upstairs? Uh Scorpo kind of sighs and looks back at you and He says, Are you sure?

We need all the help we can get to survive, and I'm pretty sure when we kill people, they turn on us. The zombies target us. Pranklin uh pulls on your arm and gestures back to the doors where he has started to kind of reinforce them. Uh Pranklin is kind of walling up the the places that you come through. Uh he points at the door at the far end of the hallway and gives you a thumbs up, uh basically saying like I'm gonna go.

Give me an insight check. I just a b uh a baseline insight check to tell how well you can kind of communicate with Franklin, uh sort of nonverbally. God damn it, guys. That's a one. He points at that door and then it gives a thumbs up as if to say, cool door, huh? You're sure he says cool door hot. Probably sandwiches behind there. Okay. Uh okay. For sort of trying to pull him away. Yeah, I was gonna go help Lorveth, but if Franklin's not helping, then yeah, I'm gonna help Hippocrates.

Okay, uh you grab onto Hippocrates and Scorpo and you uh begin to pull him uh up the stairs. Give me a perception check, please. Okay, I'm pretty nervous now. Okay, sixteen plus five, twenty-one. With a twenty-one, you are able to hear and very quickly process back down the stairs, back towards the hallway in the direction that Franklin was heading towards. Uh there is a loud crashing noise and you hear a Woo ha!

As one of the corpse mounds uh gets to the door before Franklin does. That's my boy. That's my boy. Yeah, what do you do? I burn all of my spell slots in freeze time. Whoa, holy shit, okay. Uh all right. How many spell slots let me look at your character sheet. I wanna I wanna make sure we're doing this sorta honest, because if you don't have enough you're gonna have to do it the nasty way again. Uh view.

I don't even know. That was a panic maneuver. One, two, three, absolutely. I could hear it in your voice. Yeah. I have eight available. Yeah. Yeah. I mean if you want to do this, you're gonna have to do it the the bad way. Um Okay. All right

Um no. Okay. And I burn eight spell slots, Griffin, please for Franklin. No, you don't you don't burn the eight spell slots. You never No, I'm saying thirteen and I burn eight spell slots. Please for Franco. Oh, I see. You've reached the bargaining phase. Yeah. Um okay. Uh as you drop uh Hippocrates, Scorpo first of all goes, Ah fuck what? Why? Uh as he sort of now has to carry uh all of the weight of uh this large bird man wizard uh up the stairs by himself.

You leap down, you see this uh mound of corpses. begin to grapple Pranklin with its first attack, you reach outward and project another bubble outward from yourself, another bubble of opaque white light. That spreads spreads slowly away from you, but again, I'll delete my cantrips too, Griffin, please. You are unable to uh control this spell as uh you are surrounded And Through the bubble. You see this corpse mound uh begin to pull Prinklin inwards. You are frozen in time.

unable to help, unable to do anything. You see one of the uh the larger zombies in the corpse mound sink its teeth into one of Franklin's legs that it is pulling uh back inward and he howls a a terrible howl and then from right next to you You hear a voice say Well, if it isn't my master That's what you said, right? Master of master you can't talk, you are frozen in time. Master of death master of time. two, looks like you've really really got a great grasp on it, Rictus.

I told you and so did the gentleman These powers are beyond your control, and yet you thought you could hang on to them and make them your own. Because that's what your family does. It is the only thing they know how to do.

uh along its leg. Uh it seems to be doing sort of s surface level damage, but he is trying very desperately to uh to pull himself away uh from the mound, kicking backwards uh sort of helplessly. Um You can't speak but you can think right now, Rictus. What's going on? Um a lot of thoughts about the difference between master and servant. Hmm. Um, and wanting to be a conduit rather than a control panel.

Okay. Um I think that this whole challenge As much as Richt has been looking forward to the necromancy challenge, I think that this has been a real like bastardization of his concept of necromancy and like this like these people died in the pursuit of the goal of this thing and now their bodies are being used to continue to kill more and not really given any kind of I don't know respect. Okay. Um give me give me an insight check, please. Okay. That is a nat twenty. Holy shit. Okay.

drifts in front of you, uh, between you and Franklin and lowers his head towards you close enough that you can sort of see through the darkness of the cowl. You see the kind of milk white sort of skull uh inside. and you are not afraid of this. It feels sort of natural to you to have this kind of audience with death. And in this moment, all of those thoughts sort of going through your mind, death. i i is is recognizing too. You can feel like a kinship with him that you have kind of aspired

to kind of known i i i is your desire, known that it's something that your family hasn't always gotten right. All of these like pretty complex realizations uh are are are happening and you can feel a kind of understanding from him. He takes a step back and looks at Pranklin, uh behind him. He looks at you, Rictus, he says. You wish to save the ape? And break this thing. That's my dude. Okay. I can't keep helping you, Rictus, if I don't know That you are ready to leave behind your family's ways.

and become my instrument. If I help you now I am going to require collateral. To know. That you're ready to do. And He holds out his hand and grasps and pulls backward. As he does that, you see the ghostly figures of your great-great-great-grandfather and his dad. Rictus, Ravenwoods, the first and second, uh, who have been with you in ghost form this entire time, uh, pull towards him. Um, and they are holding on to you as well. Death says, This is unnatural.

This is unnatural. The mind is not meant to persist eternally, and that is what your family has built. This ruined world, this hellish contest, these are the wages of the eternal mind. Give them to me and offer you. Yes. As you think that, you see a look of shock in the faces of your ancestors. And then you see a look of absolute stone cold fear in their faces for just a moment before death. Squishes his hand into a fist.

These ghastly apparitions vanish, and suddenly you are freed from this bubble of frozen time.

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