Transcript:Uthodurn (episode)

Pre-show
[cheering]

BRIAN: What's up, motherfuckers?!

[cheering]

BRIAN: In celebration of my favorite television show sadly coming to an end [laughter] my costume this year is a joke for exactly 23% of our audience.

[cheering]

Here's some of the names that were thrown around backstage just now: Janky Alexander, [laughter] Kat Von D Minus. [laughter] The cool thing about this outfit is every tattoo leads to a different clue about why my parents didn't love me as a child. [laughter]

AUDIENCE MEMBER: We love you, Brian!

BRIAN: I love you too, goddamn it.

[cheering]

I look like if Jared Leto's Joker auditioned for John Wick (laughs). I feel like... All right, all right. Welcome to Critical Role Live at Gen Con.

[cheering]

I had this wig made from Laura's discarded hair. Just kidding, every week before the show I clip a little bit of it off and put it in a Ziploc. Hey, at intermission, if you didn't already, say hi to Tal and everybody in our crew that's working at the merch booth. They will have stuff for sale still during intermission. Before we bring out the cast, we like to ask a few things of everybody that's in attendance at the live show so you can have the best experience and so the folks at home watching can have the best experience. We are live broadcasting this and it will available on everywhere that our shit ends up available, so outside of the occasional picture or two, there's no reason to have your phone up filming what's happening because we have much better cameras than your phone. And God forbid you're one of those people that goes to a concert or something and films with an iPad!

[laughter] [booing]

Get your fucking iPads out of here, man. If I see it, it's over.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Fuck him up, Brian!

BRIAN: I will fuck him up, dude. Look at this shit.

[cheering]

Take anybody right now. [laughter] Also, there's going to be a lot of super fun stuff that happens tonight. Something that isn't fun is when people shout suggestions, rules, jokes they think are funny at the players while we're playing. It's not very fun and most of the jokes are pretty bad. Take it from someone who knows. Be respectful of the people around you and of the folks at home and to not distract them because, let's be honest, they all have very short attention spans.

[laughter]

Let's see, anything else? Someone wanted me to shout them out, but I'm not going to. Yeah, we are going to have an intermission and you can use the restroom then because, as you guys remember, in this theater, the seats are creaky as fuck! So try to minimize your getting up and sitting down if you can because it's like someone's stabbing a frog, like every third thing. It's like the craziest thing. Last but not least, don't forget to love each other. Respect--

[cheering]

Respect everybody around you. If someone has too much to drink, you know, just knock them out, let them sleep it off until the show's over. Just be respectful to everybody around you and I know it's dark and if you're getting up and moving around and stuff, also think about all of our friends that are in cosplay with expensive and delicate items, unlike the fucking outfit I'm wearing right now. Without further ado, [cheering] I would like to introduce the cast of Critical Role. Travis Willingham.

[cheering]

♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical ♪

BRIAN: Marisha Ray!

♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical ♪ ♪ The adventure begins ♪

BRIAN: Liam O'Brien

♪ They were always beside you ♪ ♪ Your nerdy best friends ♪ ♪ And the DM to guide you ♪ ♪ And they rise from the flames for the battles ahead ♪ ♪ Villains beware 'cause you're ♪ ♪ 'Bout to be dead ♪

BRIAN: Taliesin Jaffe! (dramatic music)

[Cheering] ♪ They got magic and flair ♪ ♪ They got falchions and cunning ♪ ♪ They don't see over there ♪

BRIAN: Laura Bailey!

♪ There's a monster incoming ♪ ♪ Inspiration is waiting ♪ ♪ Rise up, don't think twice ♪ ♪ Put your fate in your hands ♪ ♪ Take a chance, roll the dice ♪ ♪ Roll the dice ♪ ♪ Critical ♪

BRIAN: Sam Riegel!

♪ Role, Critical, Role ♪ ♪ Can you answer the call? ♪ ♪ Dig in deep in your soul ♪ ♪ As the legend unfolds ♪ ♪ Now it's your turn, your turn, your turn ♪ ♪ To roll ♪ [cheering]

BRIAN: The only person who can save us all, Matthew Mercer!

[cheering] ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ [cheering] [laughter]

MATT: So... [cheering] So as you can tell, we all agreed to one, singular theme.

[laughter]

SAM: What happened, guys? I thought, I thought you guys said to just be fabulous and, and expressive and, I think I read the wrong email.

[laughter]

MATT: No, Sam, I think we all read the wrong email. I think you got it very right.

[laughter]

MATT: Welcome, everyone, to Critical Role.

[cheering] [cheering] [cheering] [cheering] [cheering] [cheering]

MATT: Where a bunch of us nerdy-ass voice actors sit around and play Dungeons & Dragons.

TRAVIS: We play Dungeons & Dragons! [cheering]

MATT: (laughs) This is so insane. (laughs) What's great, too, is with the lights on us, all we see is darkness and so it's very Eldritch horror. It's just a wall of voices.

TALIESIN: Just the two lights.

MATT: And the two beaming lights of-- it's amazing. So welcome, welcome to us live here in Indianapolis. Gen Con. Thank you all so much for coming. Super excited tonight. We have some quick announcements to get through, so bear with us. First and foremost (laughs), our sponsor for the evening and have been our sponsor and friend for the entirety of Campaign Two, D&D Beyond!

TRAVIS: D&D Beyond!

[cheering]

MATT: Sam?

SAM: Guys, the election for D&D Beyond president closes tonight at intermission, so head on over to D&D Beyond to cast your vote for me before it's too late. Get special rewards just for voting. You can also vote here at the theater. I think there's kiosks set up or you can go to D&DBeyond.link/CRelection. I will pay anyone who votes for me in this theater $50.

[laughter and cheering]

If I win. And to celebrate the end of the election, I thought I'd just do a throwback and sing that classic song that we all love [cheering] for you guys. ♪ He had the perfect warlock ♪

[cheering]

MARISHA: Oh, I'm so sorry!

[cheering]

SAM: ♪ His falchion and supplies ♪ ♪ But he decided to mess with Uk'otoa ♪ ♪ And consumed too many eyes ♪ ♪ He can click open the website ♪ ♪ He heard about on Critical Role ♪ ♪ But he won't find any stats at all ♪ ♪ And he's even weaker than before ♪ [laughter] ♪ F-J-O-R-D ♪ ♪ Fjord, the feeble orc ♪ ♪ F-J-O-R-D ♪ ♪ Once a warlock, now a dork ♪ ♪ He's got no magic, he's got no sword ♪ ♪ And he lost that Southern drawl ♪ ♪ F-J-O-R-D, F-J-O-R-D ♪

TRAVIS: ♪ Doodoo doodoo doodoo ♪

SAM: ♪ Fjord, the feeble orc ♪

[laughter and applause]

MATT: Thank you, Sam.

SAM: Sure.

MATT: So D&D Beyond is an online app where you can make and build all your D&D characters. (laughs) They're awesome sponsors. We should let you know about what they do. Thank you, and thank you, Sam. All right. Also, quick thanks to our friends at The Rook and the Raven, who you've heard us mention before on the show. [cheering] Who provided some great giveaways for a lot of the folks here in attendance. Thanks to them for all their continued support. They're amazing. If you have a chance, check out their stuff online or possibly here at the con. Next up, on Monday, August 5th, Between the Sheets will make its triumphant return to our channel here at Critical Role's Twitch. [cheering] 7PM Pacific. We welcome the wonderful musician, writer, and just all around badass Amanda Palmer. [cheering and applause] One of my favorite creatives for well over a decade and it's just a dream to have even had her be involved and this in an incredible interview, so don't miss it. It will be on VOD immediately for Twitch channel subscribers and will be available on YouTube the following Wednesday. So keep an eye out for it. For those who haven't seen, Taliesin's Call of Cthulhu one-shot. [cheering] The Shadow of the Crystal Palace in which, I mean, you did an amazing job.

TALIESIN: Thank you.

MATT: (laughs) Featuring Marisha Ray, Erika Ishii, who's out there in the audience somewhere, Liam O'Brien, Phil  LaMarr, wonderful, loving friend, Travis Willingham here, Ashly Burch, also from which you got to see here last year. [cheering] It's on our YouTube and Twitch channel, so if you haven't had a chance, check it out after this show and possibly after the con, go do so, because it's pretty badass. Also, just a reminder, there is no Wyrmwood giveaway tonight. We are just here to enjoy the experience of our friends of the internet and here in person, so. [cheering] So that being the case. Let's go ahead and jump in to tonight's episode of Critical Role.

[cheering] (water bubbling) (thunder) (explosion) ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Roll the dice, roll the dice ♪ ♪ The adventure begins ♪ ♪ They were always beside you ♪ ♪ Your nerdy best friends ♪ ♪ And the DM to guide you ♪ ♪ And they rise from the flames for the battles ahead ♪ ♪ Villains beware 'cause you're 'bout to be dead ♪ (dramatic music) ♪ They got magic and flair ♪ ♪ They got falchions and cunning ♪ ♪ They don't see over there ♪ ♪ There's a monster incoming ♪ ♪ Inspiration is waiting, rise up, don't think twice ♪ ♪ Put your fate in your hands ♪ ♪ Take a chance, roll the dice ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical, Critical ♪ ♪ Role, Critical ♪ ♪ Can you answer the call? ♪ ♪ Dig in deep in your soul ♪ ♪ As the legends unfold ♪ ♪ Now it's your turn, your turn, your turn ♪ ♪ To roll ♪ (flames burning) (dragon roaring)

Part I
[cheering] [cheering] [cheering]

MATT: So that one of the most chills-inducing experiences of my life (laughs).

TRAVIS: Shit.

LAURA: Wow.

TALIESIN: And that was the last thing he ever heard.

MATT: I know. All right, so.

[laughter]

Last we left off, the Mighty Nein, after sending some friends and family to safety in Nicodranas, made their way to the Greying Wildlands in search of answers regarding both the fractured halves of this blade that had been gathered across their adventures and possibly these visions that had come through the Wildmother to Caduceus Clay. Upon seeking another remnant of the Raven Queen's historical pact with the Wildmother, you made your way towards Kravaraad, the volcanic mountain, to Cinderrest Sanctum, or as you know it, as the Burning Lodge, amongst the Clay family, to meet the Dust family. While you were here, you learned a bit of the history of this blade, and the individual, Dulgrim Smeltborne, who apparently still resides in the city of Uthodurn. As you spent the evening there, visions came to Fjord of his, I don't know what you would call it. Faithful? Not at all. A dark entity known as Uk'otoa, in which you had fallen into a pact with long ago-- [laughter] That's awesome. [cheering] Who is very unhappy that you had absconded with the third and final means of unsealing his current fate, and showed that the power you had been granted can indeed be taken away. You, however, in the face of this challenge, placed your own blade into your chest, played essentially chicken with this entity, and when it wasn't going your way, threw your pact blade into the actual molten center of the Cinderrest Sanctum.

[cheering]

Seemingly now absolved of your pact, powerless compared to your previous travels, you came forward with your friends about your current predicament. As you gathered various items of support, you all sought for more answers, seeking this Dulgrim, possible elements of the refined residuum that may be connected to Caduceus Clay's vision, and leaving the mountain into the freshly snow-set mountainsides of the Flotket Alps, began traveling southwest, towards the city of Uthodurn. So Mighty Nein, how would you like to progress?

SAM: Uh...

[laughter]

LAURA: Are we outside of the entrance already? Is it like, we're in the snow?

MATT: You guys were just stepping out and where there's the fresh snowfall, the storm that came last night, seemed to have past. Still gray sky, but there's a fresh snowfall that has come across the Alps.

LAURA: All right, how do we get there?

SAM: Yes, did anyone ask for directions before we left the Kiln?

MARISHA: Well, we have a map.

TALIESIN: We do have a map.

SAM: Oh, we have a map?

MARISHA: Yeah.

SAM: Great, let's just follow it and go tell Laura Dern.

MARISHA: Yeah. [laughter]

TALIESIN: I suppose we'll check to make sure we're taking the safest path, too, if there's anything we should be looking out for.

MATT: Okay.

LAURA: There's a path marked on the map?

MATT: There isn't so much a path marked, but there are positions across it.

LAURA: It looks fairly obvious looking at that where we should go for sure.

TRAVIS: We are here. We're going there. Mountains.

MARISHA: So there's only two mountains in the way. That's nothing-- look at all these mountains.

SAM: Can we go between the mountains?

TRAVIS: It specifically says do not go between the mountains.

SAM: That accent is super weird.

TRAVIS: What are you talking about?

[laughter]

SAM: You talk funny.

LIAM: Do the mountains block the direct route if we were to set out on foot?

MATT: If you want to go ahead and take a look to the direction you're currently--

LAURA: I'm just going to run back inside really fast, okay? I'll be right back. And I'm going to go ask for directions.

[laughter]

MARISHA: I'm going to follow Jester.

TALIESIN: Yeah.

MARISHA: I'm going to follow Jester.

LAURA: Yeah, if you could just write them down because I'm kind of bad at remembering things.

TALIESIN: Anything we may run into if there's anything particularly dangerous.

LAURA: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

MATT: All right, so you rush back in. You go ahead and see Jeramess Dust is currently sitting down and looks like enjoying some sort of a morning coffee. Some sort of hot beverage, blowing it off, and as you approach from the entryway tunnels that lead you deep into the sanctum and she looks up and goes, "Oh, hello, again."

LAURA: It was a really, we were there and back, or, how do we get there?

MATT: "You go southwest. Eventually look for a series of small towers and--"

LAURA: Just southwest?

MATT: "Yeah."

[laughter]

LAURA: Is there a path or a road or how do you--

MATT: "There is when there isn't fresh snowfall because that covers the path, but."

LAURA: That makes sense. Okay.

MATT: "Put it this way. When you look out and you go straight to where the southwest is, the first mountain you see in your way, go around the left side. The next mountain you see, go around the right side."

LAURA: That's perfect, that's all we need.

MATT: "Past there, you might find it. Just keep your eyes peeled."

MARISHA: What kind of fiends or beasts might we encounter? Anything that you know of?

MATT: "There's all sorts of creatures that call the Alps home. There's wolves, winter wolves, dire wolves--"

MARISHA: Lots of wolves.

MATT: "There's the orcs of Boroftkrah and the various other wandering Rime Plains orcs that come up here for hunting because of the better game up here in the mountains."

MARISHA: Do they hunt the wolves?

MATT: "Probably and wargs, too, they bring down from the path south of here. Also, there's all sorts of things that may be wandering from the Crystalsands and-- just try your best to not be seen."

LAURA: Oh, hm, okay, we're pretty stealthy.

MATT: "Good, good, you might survive."

MARISHA: What do these towers look like? We know it's an elven city, are they?

MATT: "It's elf and dwarf, actually."

MARISHA: Oh, sorry, sorry.

MATT: "It's all right, but you see, around the base of the mountain, there's a cluster of them about maybe half a mile across and you'll see a big, old roof in the center. That's probably where you're going.

LAURA: Caleb! Where is southwest?

LIAM: It's that way.

LAURA: Then that's where we're going.

[laughter]

MARISHA: So we're going to get to the first mountain and we're going to take a right.

LAURA: No, a left.

LIAM: I thought it was a--

MARISHA: Shit!

[laughter]

Okay, we're going to get to the first mountain, we're going to take a left, and then we're going to get to the second mountain and then we're going to take a right.

LIAM: Right, so we go lefty-loosey, then righty-tighty, and then we are there.

TALIESIN: Right.

TRAVIS: And then towers.

SAM: Easiest adventure we've ever gone on.

TRAVIS: No problem.

SAM: Let's go!

MATT: All right.

LAURA: Stealthily!

MATT: All right, first and foremost, I need a marching order from you guys.

TRAVIS: I'm in the back.

[laughter]

MATT: All right, we got Fjord in the back.

LAURA: Actually, Fjord, maybe in the middle, because if something comes up from behind us.

LIAM: As the former weakest person in this group--

[laughter]

SAM: Caleb, Caleb, you're very strong!

LIAM: I also used to think the rear was the ideal position, but maybe second to last or possibly third to last or maybe all of us around you in a protective ring.

[laughter]

MARISHA: You have your shield, right?

TRAVIS: I do, I have a shield, yes, and--

MARISHA: Have you ever fought with a shield before?

TRAVIS: No.

MARISHA: All right.

TALIESIN: You need to make a Caleb-Fjord hot pocket. It's not quite a sandwich, it's like a--

MARISHA: Maybe we should double layer it, you know, like a, yeah, okay.

LIAM: What are we talking about?

TALIESIN: I'll take front then.

LAURA: I'll take back.

TALIESIN: All right.

LAURA: There you go.

MATT: All right, so we have Caduceus up front.

SAM: I'll go in the front with Ducey.

MATT: All righty.

MARISHA: I'll be behind Nott.

MATT: Where are you, Beauregard?

MARISHA: Behind Nott.

MATT: Behind them?

MARISHA: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

MATT: We have at the front, we have Caduceus and Nott up front, behind them, we have Beauregard, in the center, we have Fjord, and then behind them we have Caleb and Jester.

LAURA: Sounds perfect.

TRAVIS: ♪ Hot Pocket ♪

[laughter]

MATT: I don't think we can clear that.

LIAM: I think that's Goth Pocket.

TALIESIN: Goth Pocket.

TRAVIS: Goth Pocket, yes.

MATT: All righty, so--

SAM: We're a Lock Pocket?

(Marisha laughs)

SAM: Nope.

MATT: Who is guiding the direction of this? You're at the front?

SAM: I guess I am?

MATT: Who's taking point in guiding the group is what I'm asking.

SAM: Yeah, Caduceus and I.

TALIESIN: Yeah.

MATT: All right. Either one of you make a nature check with advantage or both of you take one separately.

TRAVIS: First roll, come on!

TALIESIN: You with nature check, advantage, because my nature's terrible.

LAURA: We should be stealthy. We were warned not to be so--

SAM: With advantage? Thank god, that's cocked. Ooh, shitty, shitty, shitty bang-bang.

[laughter]

11.

MATT: 11, all righty, all righty.

TALIESIN: That was, yeah, you don't even want to know. I just took a fun roll, no.

MARISHA: What?

TRAVIS: We're fucked.

TALIESIN: Yeah.

MATT: Nott continues to guide you guys around the same lake that you had previously traversed, keeping an eye on the sky above. Beau, go ahead and make a perception check just to keep looking above in the vicinity around you.

MARISHA: Okay, yeah. 14.

MATT: 14, good, all right. Continuing forward, the wind isn't terribly strong, but it does pick up in gusts here and there and (whooshes) blows past a moment. Kind of swelling on occasion. The ice and snow-capped trees eventually consume the horizon as you lower down from the base of the mountain into the central forest heading across towards the one mountain to the southwest that Caleb had pointed out. Right as you begin to lose vision, you begin to see clusters moving briefly. Beauregard keeping a close eye out and Caduceus also keenly aware that what looks almost like slow avalanches and sections moving separately, you just barely squint your eyes and you can see instead they are small clusters of wild white bison moving across the exterior of the distant mountain, causing this optical illusion effect. But you keep close to yourselves for warmth and dive under the canopy of the forest, continuing onward. The first hour seems to go by fine. A couple more hours, you guys eventually make it towards the base of the first mountain, at least you begin to see the treeline break apart, you can see where it begins to ascend up the side of that rocky cliff.

MARISHA: We forgot to ask how long of a journey this was.

SAM: They told us it was like a day, day-and-a-half.

MARISHA: Oh.

SAM: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

MATT: All right, so are you guys continuing to move stealthily by the way?

LAURA: Yeah.

MATT: That does slow your travel. So it might take a little longer than a day-and-a-half stealthily.

LAURA: I think stealthy is better, though, right?

TRAVIS: We're leaving tracks behind us, yes? Quite a few?

LAURA: No, I'm behind us. I'm using my tail to brush them as we walk.

[laughter]

MATT: Roll a stealth check to see how well you're doing.

TALIESIN: I believe in you.

LAURA: Which one?

TALIESIN: Yeah.

SAM: (like Jester) The cute one.

LAURA: Stealth, 17.

MATT: Okay, you think you're doing an all right job covering some of the tracks. Doesn't look like nobody walked through. Now it just looks like one weird, drunk worm has been pushing its way through the snow.

[laughter]

LAURA: Hey, man, a worm is better than a group of people.

MATT: Could be helpful, we'll see.

TRAVIS: Fuck that.

(laughter)

MATT: Continuing onward, for the next few hours, you guys are turning right or left against the first mountain you come across?

TALIESIN: Left.

MATT: All right, look at that. You got a memory, that's good. Curving around the base. Are you staying within the treeline or are you coasting up on the side of the mountain?

MARISHA: Let me scout it real quick, how about that?

SAM: Oh, yeah, sure.

MARISHA: I'll go up the mountain a little bit and see if I can scale a tree, get a viewpoint.

MATT: Sure, all right, go ahead and make an athletics check.

MARISHA: Wait, you don't still have your bird, right? Is your cat a bird or is your cat a cat?

LIAM: It's always a cat.

MARISHA: But, okay, you know what I mean.

TRAVIS: Yeah, it changes sometimes. Where's the octopus?

LIAM: There is a-- who said that?

[laughter]

MARISHA: He lost his powers, he's not deaf.

LIAM: There is a cat shaped like a cat sitting next to you on the ground now, so, that's what you got.

MARISHA: All right. I scale the tree.

MATT: Athletics or acrobats, your choice, since the trees here are pretty close together.

MARISHA: Acrobatics.

MATT: Go for it.

TRAVIS: Wow, that was a cool roll. Yo!

MARISHA: 27.

SAM: Whoa.

[cheering]

MATT: Yeah, like an Olympic gymnast, leaping from tree branch to tree branch, you watch as Beau quickly ascends to the top of the tree. As you poke out past the canopy and look ahead, you can see along the mountainside, there are clusters of trees. This one mountain isn't too much of a spire-like. It tends to break off towards the top and there's a bit of a roundedness to its edge there. There looks to be some sort of a watchtower built on the top of it. You're not sure of the quality or if it's manned or not, but that's towards the peak of the mountain.

MARISHA: Can I tell what it's made out of? Is it like a wooden?

MATT: At this distance?

MARISHA: Wooden watchtower?

MATT: Make a perception check to see if you can make out any details, because it's quite a ways away from you. It's probably like-- (Travis groans)

MARISHA: Natural one!

MATT: As you're picking upward, one of the frost zephyr birds flies by and poops right in your eye [laughter] and you're like (groans) and your eyes just have a hard time focusing once you wipe it free and, unfortunately, at this point, everything just looks like it's covered in snow and you're stinging really bad.

MARISHA: Fucking birds. I'm glad Thaddeus is gone.

[laughter]

MATT: You swear you heard it (hooting).

[laughter]

LIAM: All birds are assholes.

MATT: As a bird owner, kind of. I love them, they're assholes.

MARISHA: All right, I can see the-- oh, I go back down to the group. I don't know if that's, do I need to?

MATT: After a natural one, go ahead and roll another acrobatics check. With disadvantage.

[laughter]

TRAVIS: You got shit in your eye.

LIAM: Caleb has been watching through Frumpkin all this time as well.

MARISHA: Shit in my eye doesn't affect my dope abs, though.

[laughter]

TRAVIS: Hey!

MARISHA: It's still good. 19.

MATT: Yeah, see, it doesn't affect you at all. You were fine.

MARISHA: Okay.

MATT: Almost without having to use your vision and as much as it's stinging and blinking, you manage to leap down without issue, making your way to the base. Beau comes down with this streak of white on one side of the face.

SAM: Oh, what happened?

MARISHA: So there's a tower up ahead and I think, like a fucked up mountain. Probably the mountain we're going. Looks like a watchtower. Jester?

LAURA: Hmm?

MARISHA: Or Caduceus, do either one of you have a wet wipe?

[laughter]

LAURA: I use the bottom of my sleeve.

MARISHA: Thank you.

LAURA: You're welcome.

MARISHA: It looks like some sort of watchtower. I don't know, I was just trying to get a--

SAM: Is that the tower that we are looking for?

MARISHA: Nah.

LIAM: So we stick to the trees then.

SAM: Okay.

MATT: All right. You head to the left, continue around the base of the mountain. Are you guys going stealthily?

LAURA: Mm-hm.

SAM: Sure.

MATT: Everyone make a stealth check, please.

TRAVIS: You moved up and down that mountain incredibly well. How long does it take to learn to do that?

[laughter]

SAM: Fjord, if you want, Fjord, I could teach you how to use a crossbow. My five-year-old can do it.

[laughter] [cheering]

TRAVIS: That would be lovely, thank you.

MARISHA: I gotcha, Captain, I got your back. I just, you know, I just.

MATT: Stealth checks around the table.

SAM: 27.

MATT: 27, Jester?

LAURA: Seven.

MATT: Seven.

TALIESIN: 12.

MATT: 12.

TRAVIS: 13.

MARISHA: 21.

LIAM: Also seven.

SAM: Ooh.

TALIESIN: We don't have Pass Without a Trace, so.

MATT: Okay.

TRAVIS: I did okay.

SAM: It's on.

LAURA: Yeah, I didn't cast it.

TRAVIS: No, no, it's not on, no, no.

MATT: All right, so. As you guys dive into the treeline, making your way around the edge of the mountain, you get probably around three-quarters of the path before you begin to head back in that straight line through the mountain range that leads you in the direction you were told there would be. As you're moving forward, Caduceus, you can see a couple of prints in the snow directly ahead. Small, clustered, forward, quadrupedal.

TALIESIN: How close are we to the prints?

MATT: You see them about 30 feet ahead of you and to the right.

TALIESIN: I'm going to take a long look around. I'm going to stop everybody and take a long look around to see if there's anything waiting to pounce.

MATT: Make a perception check.

TALIESIN: All right. These I'm good at. Ah, that's better, 22.

MATT: Glancing a little ways ahead, you can see two wolves, white-gray fur. Relatively large comparison to a regular wolf. Not massive, but maybe, I'd say, nine or so feet from snout to rear.

SAM: That's big.

MATT: There's two of them in a pair, just making their way through carefully, through the center of the forest. They don't seem to notice your presence yet. They're about a hundred feet ahead of you.

TALIESIN: They're going to the right? They're heading their own direction?

MATT: They were.

TALIESIN: Oh no. Have they noticed us?

MATT: One of them seems to be going (sniffs) and glances over in your direction.

TALIESIN: Then I'm going to say, in the manner that one can talk to wolves: I really don't recommend this. I know this looks easy, but this is going to end so badly.

[laughter]

MATT: You watch as it stops and then gets low. It seems to, as it gets low, vanish beneath one of the little snowbanks and you lose sight of where it may be.

TALIESIN: Okay.

MATT: The other one follows suit, curving around in a pincer formation to the left. Then also dips down below one of the nearby forest banks where the small hill rises up and you don't see it emerge from the other side of the hill. You've now lost sight of both of the wolves.

TALIESIN: There's at least two wolves currently circling us and they're going to make an attempt to eat us, at least two, possibly more. I guess get ready, kids.

TRAVIS: Are you sure that's not just behavior that lets us pass?

TALIESIN: Yeah, I'm pretty sure.

MARISHA: Should we run? Is running a good idea?

TALIESIN: I think flank and prepare.

MARISHA: Okay.

TALIESIN: Let's make a circle.

LAURA: Circle up around Fjord.

SAM: And Caleb. [laughter]

LIAM: These are regular-sized wolves. I think I will be on the outside, it is all right.

TALIESIN: They're about nine-- they're pretty big.

LIAM: They are big ones?

TALIESIN: They're pretty big.

MARISHA: They're nine feet long.

TALIESIN: Bigger than you.

LAURA: Get in the middle, Caleb.

[laughter]

LIAM: I have thought better of it. I will go in the middle.

[laughter]

I cast Mage Armor.

TALIESIN: I'll say, yeah, Fjord, you don't have to stay in the middle if you don't want to, if you want to test out how you feel.

TRAVIS: Mm, okay.

LAURA: Don't do it, don't.

[laughter]

MATT: So Fjord, you're staying in the center?

TRAVIS: Yeah, sure.

MATT: All right. You guys encircle Fjord and begin--

LAURA: And Caleb, and Caleb, too, now.

MATT: Caleb as well in the center? All right.

SAM: Ladies and Caduceus surround.

[laughter] [cheering]

Squad! In formation, go!

LAURA: I'm going to prepare Spirit Guardians the minute I see any movement.

MATT: Okay. You begin casting Spirit Guardians

LAURA: To release as soon as we see anything.

MATT: Okay, as you guys continue stepping forward, Caduceus, out of the corner of your eye, you look across one of the banks. For a split second, you look over, you begin to feel this slight rumble in the ground. (rumbling) You look up in the direction of the first snow bank and you see the bristled fur of the large wolf there as it pulls back, snarling.

TALIESIN: I cast Blindness. (growling)

MATT: You cast Blindness?

TALIESIN: Yeah.

MATT: All right, so you release Blindness. You see it leap, too, as he casts the spell. You look over. What's the DC on that?

TALIESIN: Constitution 17.

MATT: Constitution 17, natural 19.

TALIESIN: Motherfucker. [gasping]

MATT: Unfortunately, it leaps in the air. The spell has no effect and there is a spray of white snow as emerging from the ground beneath it (booming) you see a flash of blue and white. You see numerous, spiny legs emerge from the snow and earth beneath as a large, serpentine, almost centipede-like creature bursts from beneath the ice and snow and devours the wolf whole in one bite.

[yelling]

SAM: We're winning! [laughter]

LAURA: I turn around and look back at our tracks. Oh, shit. [laughter]

MATT: It turns back towards you, these large, insectoid eyes, at its current length standing about 10 feet above, its large maw glistening, clacking as its mandibles pull back in, its numerous arms and legs clicking around its body. It spins around to look at you with these large antenna. (gurgling) Everyone roll initiative. (yelling)

TRAVIS: Oh fuck!

MARISHA: Oh, Captain, my Captain.

TRAVIS: Fuck!

SAM: Oh, I don't have my helmet--

LAURA: Wait, but I cast Spiritual Guardians.

SAM: This combat is powered by Dwarven Forge. They've just launched Plaguestone, a new line of Pathfinder 2 sets. Go check it out now, Dwarven Forge. Oh my god (laughs). [laughter] Whoa, cool camera angle! [laughter]

TALIESIN: Does Jester get a Spirit Guardian cast pre-roll?

MATT: Yes, you do, as a reaction, you do.

TALIESIN: Bless you.

SAM: Oh, nice.

MATT: All right, I'm going to get over here to some proper battle music, thank you.

LAURA: Why does it keep doing this?

MATT: There is one wolf, who is hiding behind here. You can just hear it react and then on this end, you see where the creature had just risen past here and devoured the wolf.

TRAVIS: Fuck that thing!

MATT: In one leap.

TRAVIS: I want the wolf instead.

[laughter]

MATT: All righty, so. Initiatives, 25 to 20.

SAM: 23!

MATT: 23, we have Nott. 20 to 15?

LAURA: 19.

TRAVIS: 17.

MARISHA: 15.

MATT: All right, so we have 19 for Jester.

LAURA: Yes.

MATT: 17 for Beauregard.

TRAVIS: 17 for Fjord.

MATT: Sorry, for Fjord.

MARISHA: 15 for Beau.

MATT: All right, 15 to 10?

TALIESIN: 13.

LIAM: 12.

MATT: All right, and we have--

TRAVIS: We're just getting right into this shit.

[cheering]

SAM: I'm just looking at the map.

LAURA: Stop it! [laughter]

SAM: Just looking at the map! [laughter]

LAURA: Oh, it's really hard.

MATT: No, no, no! Twitch TOS, Sam, come on.

LAURA: It hurt my finger.

LIAM: ♪ Copa Cabana! ♪

TALIESIN: Oh, boy.

MATT: All right. Nott, you're up first.

SAM: Okay, I'm going to run full speed about 30 feet, flanking all of us, you pick a direction.

MATT: Like around this way?

SAM: Yeah, perfect.

MATT: All right, so five, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 35.

SAM: Sure, and then the last five feet, I'm going to like, like a hockey stop, like sort of a deep slide, so I want the snow to cover me and I'm going to bonus action hide under it.

MATT: I will say because you're small enough and there is enough snow from the storm last night, I'll allow it, go ahead and roll a stealth check.

[cheering]

SAM: 28! [cheering]

MATT: A unique element of this. As you run through the snow, because of your ring, I'll say the snow is not quite as difficult to get through as you thought it would be, which is nice. So you get your full movement.

SAM: Nice.

MATT: What was your stealth check again, it was--

SAM: 28, stealth.

MATT: You just skid and (poofs) vanish into the snowbank.

SAM: And cock my pistolera and I fire, hoping that I'm hidden.

MATT: All righty, go for it.

SAM: Do I get advantage, no?

MATT: Go ahead and I'll say yes, you do.

SAM: Yeah. Okay, 24 to hit.

MATT: That definitely hits, roll damage.

[cheering]

SAM: Oh, doctor! [laughter] I'll use Fury of the Small, 40 points of damage!

[cheering]

TRAVIS: Oh, shit!

MATT: Rogues, man. All righty. As it turns, it watches and tracks you as you spin into the snow and vanish, it begins to look around and its weird, insect-like face going (clicking), right in one of its eyes (whooshes), the splash of blue gore out of one side of its face as it rears back (gurgling). That's your turn, I believe, right?

SAM: Oh, yes.

MATT: All right. The ground begins to shake once more, this time heavier. And larger.

TRAVIS: No.

MATT: (whooshing) You all turn around and, behind you, right in front of Caleb and Jester, the ground explodes and one of the nearby rocks gets pushed off to the side as you realize the one that you noticed may have been the child. (gasping) If I can figure out where I dropped the thing. Of course.

SAM: Bring out the monster!

MATT: There it is.

TALIESIN: Jesus Christ.

MARISHA: (groans)

LAURA: No! [cheering]

MATT: As it does, oh god, as it does so, the rock tips over, rolls off, and actually knocks this tree onto the side there.

TALIESIN: Good save, good save.

MATT: So this entity, now standing tall at about 15 or so feet, its body much larger, the armor thicker, its eyes much more angry, spins around, shifts towards Jester, Beauregard, and Caleb, and it's going to make a bite attack against--

LAURA: Wouldn't it get, wait, doesn't it get attacked by my Spiritual Guardian?

MATT: It does, actually. Go ahead, and what's the wisdom save on that?

LAURA: Wisdom save 17.

MATT: 17. Natural two, no, it does not save, go ahead and roll damage. [cheering]

TRAVIS: Come on, hamster unicorns!

LAURA: Hold on, hold on, hold on. Oh, wait, that's four of them, hold on, I only get three. Seven plus eight is 15.

MATT: 15 points of damage against it, nice. So as it emerges, suddenly (whooshes), it's splashed and assaulted by a cloud of angry little temporal unicorns, begin spearing it with their tiny horns. As it looks back to you (gurgling) and it's going to attack you.

LAURA: How does it--

MATT: You were the first to hurt.

LAURA: How do they know it's from me?

MATT: You're just too adorable.

LAURA: (groans)

MATT: You seem to be the source of where they're swirling.

MARISHA: Sentinel attack.

TRAVIS: Oh, yeah!

MATT: Yeah. Go for it.

TRAVIS: Get that shit.

SAM: Guys, we're getting good at this.

[laughter]

I don't think anyone's going to die this session.

MARISHA: 14. [laughter] Tell me I hit it, 14.

MATT: 14 does not hit. You swing with your staff and as you hit its armor, as much as the insectoid carapace on the bottom looks like it's a little fleshy, it's harder than you thought and it just bounces off with no impact. As it bites down toward Jester, with a 22 to hit.

LAURA: Oh, that hits.

MATT: I think that hits your armor class, yeah. All right, so you, as it bites into you, you take-- I've got to get all the d10s here.

[gasping]

TALIESIN: Don't want to look.

MARISHA: 10s, 10s across the board.

MATT: All right. Ooh.

SAM: 6d10s?

MATT: Okay, that's not good.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Lord have Mercer!

MATT: You take 43 points of piercing damage.

[gasping]

Plus--

SAM: Plus?!

MATT: Nine points of fire damage. As cold as it looks on the exterior, there is a burning heat from inside its mouth and body and immediately, just having its open mouth clamp onto you, it's singeing you by proximity. You are also grappled.

MARISHA: What?!

MATT: While you're grappled, you are restrained. You guys watch as Jester is bit by it and it lifts its head up and Jester is now, her legs peeking and kicking out of its mouth like Audrey at the end of "Little Shop of Horrors."

[laughter]

It rears up and her feet are about 10 feet above you. That ends its turn, Jester, your turn.

LAURA: (muffled) Help me!

MATT: I also need you to make a constitution saving throw for concentration, please.

MARISHA: Save the unicorns.

SAM: Save the world.

LAURA: Why, it's so weird! Oh, my dice are just so crazy. 12 plus constitution?

MATT: Yes.

LAURA: 14.

MATT: 14, unfortunately, the unicorns fade. The damage was too much and as you struggle and squeeze around in the mouth of this giant creature, you lose the spell, however, it is your turn. What would you like to do? Right now it is just near darkness as the top half of your body is in the process of being chewed by this creature.

LAURA: Um, I'm going to, oh jeebies, wait. Can I cast anything?

MATT: Yeah. You're just restrained.

LAURA: Okay, okay, okay, okay. I'm going to cast Inflict Wounds from inside of it.

MATT: Okay.

LAURA: I'm going to cast it at 4th-level.

[cheering]

MATT: Okay. Because you are restrained, the attack is a disadvantage, however, you are inside its mouth, I'll just say roll, a straight roll, I won't give you disadvantage because it's hard to really miss it, you're just trying to pierce its armor right now.

LAURA: Okay, hold on, let me cast this. Okay.

SAM: This is fun.

LAURA: This is so much fun, you guys! Okay, okay. Vomit.

SAM: Big dice, big dice.

LAURA: Plus-- 19.

MATT: 19 hits. [cheering]

LAURA: Okay.

MATT: Go ahead and roll damage on that.

LAURA: 6d10.

MATT: Fjord, you're on deck.

[cheering]

SAM: How many?

LAURA: 6d10.

MATT: 6d10 necrotic damage.

LAURA: Yeah. Okay.

TALIESIN: You need more or you good?

LAURA: I can't believe I need extra dice, hold on. How many is that, one, two, three, four, five. 18 plus nine is 27 plus five is, plus nine is 41 plus one more. One, 42.

MATT: 42 points of necrotic damage.

[cheering]

You feel the muscles constrict and pull and it, it hurts, but you know, you enjoy the fact that it's hurting so badly as well. The rest of you watch as you freak out watching Jester get brought up and lifted off the ground, legs kicking, its throat suddenly goes dark. You watch as veins across its body pulse black down the sides of its throat and it begins to thrash around in pain as the flesh around the area where Jester is currently being latched in with its jaw, it seems to be rotting before your eyes. Is that the end of your turn?

LAURA: I guess so, yeah. As a bonus action, I'm going to kick my legs really hard.

MATT: All right, you do so. Fjord, you're up, Beau, you're on deck.

LAURA: I'm going to do some synchronized swimming moves.

[laughter]

MATT: (laughs) Perfect.

TRAVIS: Jester is still in its mouth?

MATT: Yes, just grappled and held up in its jaw.

TRAVIS: Fuck! I will use my 30 feet of movement to move out towards the sides. Since we're all in a nice little group here right in the middle and as I run by, I will take a swipe with my Dagger of Denial.

[cheering]

MATT: (chuckles) Go for it, that would put you, nah, you're not quite flanking with it, so you just do a regular attack roll.

TRAVIS: I'm going to do a swipe as I run by and try and--

MATT: Go for it, go for it.

SAM: The dagger is trolling him (laughs).

TRAVIS: That is a 22 to hit.

MATT: That hits, wow. [applause] Nice roll.

TRAVIS: Yeah, don't get too excited, 1d4.

[laughter]

Hey, six! [cheering]

MATT: Six points of piercing damage to the creature, as you rush by with your dagger (whooshes), like Naruto stab across the side.

[laughter]

TRAVIS: Coming, Jester, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!

MATT: Awesome. You also--

LAURA: Somebody get me out of there before--

MATT: Take 15 points of fire damage. [gasping] As you strike across it and open a wound, the heat that emanates from its body is so strong that it scalds the side of your face and Jester, as a reminder, too, when you did attack it, you also did take 13 points of fire damage. I needed to remember that. From the heat inside of its body, it is like a burning furnace on the inside of this large, blue centipede-like creature.

MARISHA: Your face. Oh no.

LAURA: I'm super close.

MARISHA: Okay, okay.

SAM: I take back what I said before.

[laughter]

Someone's going to die.

LAURA: Ah, man, are you going to kill me at the very beginning of the show? What am I going to do?

MATT: Oh, I'm sorry. Beau, you're up.

MARISHA: All right, I am going to turn around and I'm going to kick off of the tree behind me and parkour off and I'm going to use that and do a big swinging Iron Man, Superman punch to its lobster fucking face.

MATT: You go for it. Go ahead and make an acrobatics check for me.

MARISHA: Copy. Yeah, 21.

MATT: 21. You run, jump, and run up the side of the tree, vertically leaping off, and as you spin in the air, come down for the strike, I'll give you advantage on the attack because of that acrobatics check.

[cheering]

MARISHA: Okay! Thank God, because one's a natural one. The other is a 17 plus 10, so 27.

MATT: That hits. Go ahead and roll damage.

MARISHA: 10 damage.

MATT: 10 damage, all right.

MARISHA: Stunning Strike.

MATT: Stunning Strike. 15. What's your DC?

MARISHA: 15?

MATT: It succeeds, sorry.

MARISHA: Fucking ballsacks.

MATT: The first strike, as you slam down, it takes it, but it seems to shrug it off, no effect beyond the damage it sustained.

MARISHA: Second attack, I'm going to, as I'm using my momentum to swing down, I'm going to come around with a knee to the face or abdomen or I don't know, whatever.

MATT: All righty.

MARISHA: 19.

MATT: 19 hits.

MARISHA: 11 damage.

MATT: 11 points of damage.

MARISHA: Stunning Strike!

MATT: Stunning Strike again. Natural 18. I'm sorry. It's rolling really well.

MARISHA: Okay. Flurry of Blows. Pop-pop!

MATT: Go for it. So you leap up, the first hit, you grab on and mount yourself onto the back of its head and just start pummeling it from above, go for it.

MARISHA: First attack.

MATT: Currently now affixed to its body there.

MARISHA: Mm-hmm, 28.

MATT: 28 hits.

MARISHA: And nine damage.

MATT: All righty. Nine.

AUDIENCE: Nein!

[laughter]

MARISHA: Jester's looking bad. First, I hit with a Flurry of Blows, Extract Aspects.

MATT: Okay.

MARISHA: Order of operations. I'm trying to keep them all in my head.

MATT: All right, you understand this creature is immune to cold and fire damage.

[gasping]

SAM: That seems contradictory. [laughter]

MATT: Welcome to D&D;.

MARISHA: That's it?

MATT: Yes, and as this information comes to you, you're like, huh, how is it immune to fire damage? You look at your fists and they're scalding from the impact. You take, from the first hit, nine points of fire damage.

MARISHA: Nine!

MATT: The second hit you inflicted another nine points of fire damage.

SAM and AUDIENCE: Nein!

MATT: The third hit, another nine points of fire damage.

AUDIENCE: Nein!

MATT: Go ahead and roll your fourth and final attack.

MARISHA: All right, yes.

TRAVIS: That's a lot of damage just from punching it.

MARISHA: Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

LIAM: Das tut mir leid.

MARISHA: Okay. Oh, 15.

MATT: 15 does not hit.

MARISHA: Okay, no Stunning Strike.

MATT: Do you wish to remain on the back of the creature?

[laughter]

You're currently riding on its head, clutching the back of its spine.

MARISHA: How close is Jester from the--

MATT: She's about five feet from you.

MARISHA: I'll stay on the back.

MATT: Okay. [cheering] That finishes Beau's go, now it's the wolf's turn. The wolf is going to run the fuck away.

[laughter]

It is out.

LAURA: We should maybe follow suit.

SAM: Smartest creature in the campaign.

MATT: Mother nature, for some reason, has a good instinct for these things. Speaking of which, Caduceus, you're up.

TALIESIN: Motherfudger. Okay, there's not a lot I can do to help here. You look like you just, you just got kind of, yeah, I don't want you to drop too low, too fast, so I'm going to do a Healing Word at-- let me pick a level. It won't be a ton, but it'll help at 3rd-level.

MATT: All right, so 3d4 plus--

TALIESIN: 3d4 plus five.

MATT: Plus five. Go ahead and roll that.

TALIESIN: Not the best, but it'll help.

MATT: As Caduceus reaches up and shouts out a magical word of encouragement and healing towards Jester in the creature's mouth.

TALIESIN: Oh, that's so terrible. 11 points of, 11 points up.

LAURA: Tight.

TALIESIN: Taking it and my bonus actions just suck in this, don't they?

MATT: But Healing Word is a bonus action, so you have your action.

LAURA: Back to double digits, that's good.

MATT: You have your action still.

TALIESIN: Oh, that was my bonus action?

MATT: Healing Word is bonus, yeah.

TALIESIN: Is bonus, but for action-wise, though, I can't cast a spell.

MATT: You can cast a cantrip.

TALIESIN: I can cast a cantrip, okay, that'll do. That's right, I'm learning how this works. It's only been so long. I'm going to, no, that doesn't work, I'm going to cast, I suppose Sacred Flame because that's what I got right now.

MATT: All right, is that a dexterity-saving throw?

TALIESIN: Sacred Flame is a dex saving throw.

MATT: All right, that is going to be a 10. I believe that's a failure.

TALIESIN: That is a failure.

MATT: Go ahead and roll damage.

[cheering]

LAURA: That's good, so that's radiant damage, right? That's not--

TALIESIN: That's radiant.

LAURA: Okay, that's good, that's good, that's good.

TALIESIN: That's not bad. 14 points of radiant damage.

MATT: Nice. (whooshes) The fire burns across it. You're starting to see now, it's looking like it's taking some damage. It's still strong, still standing without issue, but you can see there's some wear and tear. The one that Nott shot earlier also is seeing some wear and tear.

TALIESIN: Yeah, and I'm just going to hold my, I'm going to just try and stay in between the two.

MATT: Okay, so you're staying put?

TALIESIN: Yeah, sure.

MATT: All right.

MARISHA: Also, Matt, do I have time for Beau to be like: Avoid fire and ice (groans). George R.R. Martin--

MARISHA: Beau just shouting at the top of it, swinging, "No fire and ice!"

MARISHA: Yeah!

SAM: It was a great book!

[laughter]

MATT: You got it, all right, Caleb.

LIAM: Caleb, he had an idea, but he just starts rapidly going through the spells he knows. This, no, this, no, this, no, this, no! He sees his dear little blue friend looking rough and pulls out a cocoon and casts Polymorph and turns her into a mammoth.

[cheering]

LAURA: (laughs)

LIAM: Sending you the stats! And I'm backing the hell away from this monstrosity. This way.

MATT: All right. I didn't bring my mammoth mini because I wasn't expecting that. We'll just use the wolf for it and consider it a bit larger. You watch as the jaws suddenly distend and snap, almost, as Jester's body begins to swell and grow brown fur, the armor seems to protrude and expand until it becomes this extremely deep-brown, furry, just a hunk of flesh and muscle before it spits her out instinctually.

[cheering]

Knocking this tree over into the other one.

LAURA: Yeah!

MATT: Which it does not make its dexterity-saving throw, so it takes an additional three points of bludgeoning damage from the tree slamming into it. The tree tumbles over there onto the ground. All right, you're a mammoth now.

LIAM: Caleb will move his full movement, 30 feet this way, going: Schnell, schnell, schnell, schnell.

MATT: This way?

LIAM: Diagonally this way, DM.

MATT: All right, as you rush back, the creature, now having its jaws freed, is going to make an attack of opportunity against you.

LIAM: Ja.

MATT: That is going to be a 15 to hit.

LIAM: Shield.

MATT: Shield, all righty. [cheering] You guys watch as after Jester is expelled from its mouth, the creature turns around and (growling) lunges like a snake, snapping towards Caleb as he runs and (whooshes) throws up his shield. Its jaws snap out to consume him and (whooshes) get reflected from the arcane shield, bouncing backward, its head withdraws back, and it gets its bearings after its head took the impact.

LIAM: Scheiße (groans).

MATT: That gets you about there. All right, that finishes your turn, Caleb. It is now the younger one's turn. Younger one.

TRAVIS: Fuck you.

MATT: It's going to go ahead and-- Let's see here, yeah. It's going to spin around to this direction. It's going to go ahead and bite down towards you, Nott. (Sam yells) Because you were the one that shot the hell out of it last turn.

SAM: (yells)

MATT: That is going to be a 21 to hit?

SAM: Hits!

MATT: All right. It bites down towards you, its fangs and jaws sinking into you. All right, that's a really good roll. 10, nine, and a four. That is 27 points of piercing damage. Plus eight points of fire damage as its jaws bite into you. It begins to drag you back a bit. You can feel the inner heat from its mouth and throat burning, singeing the back of your body as you pull free. It does not have you grappled.

SAM: Uncanny dodge.

MATT: All right, so you take half the damage then.

[cheering]

That ends its turn. Nott, your go.

SAM: Am I in its jaws?

MATT: No, it has not grappled you.

SAM: Oh, thank goodness. If I run, it will kill me. So I don't want to do that. Oh, man, this is a predicament. (Travis laughs) Shit, shit, shit! I will run-- nope, I'm just going to sit right in front of it, plop down in the snow, and just go, ping!

MATT: All right, go ahead and roll for an attack, then.

SAM: Shit, that's not good either, because I won't get a sneak attack, it's not worth it!

MATT: What are you doing?

SAM: Fuck, shitballs! I'm going to run!

MATT: Okay.

SAM: I got to run.

MATT: All right. You go ahead and start running which direction?

LAURA: Run at a zig zag.

SAM: Yeah, serpentine, serpentine!

MATT: Zigging around here! All right. (Laura laughs) Five, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 35. That gets you about there. As you rush past it, it does get an attack of opportunity on you. It attempts to bite out once again.

LAURA: At disadvantage because of the zig zag!

MATT: No. [laughter] That is a 24 to hit. 23, 23.

SAM: Hits!

MATT: I'm rolling really well tonight.

TALIESIN: Stop it!

MATT: No, it's fun for me.

[laughter]

All right. 18 plus four, 22 points of piercing damage.

SAM: Damn.

LAURA: Oh no.

MATT: Plus 10 points of fire damage.

SAM: Damn!

MATT: So 32 points of damage to you.

SAM: Damn! I'll use my bonus action to somehow, like, jump into the tree and hide! Maybe? [laughter]

MATT: Make an acrobatics check for me.

SAM: Okay.

MATT: With disadvantage because you just got the fuck bitten out of you.

SAM: Oh, not good. 13.

MATT: 13, okay, you scramble up part of the tree. You think you may or may not be far enough into its branches. You're using a stealth check for your bonus action.

SAM: Yeah.

MATT: Make a stealth check with disadvantage because you've just barely scampered up.

SAM: Okay, 22.

MATT: 22. Even hurting and ow, ow, ow, rushing your way up there and climbing up the tree and slipping in, climbing up more, you think you're still pretty well hidden. So I think that's your turn there.

SAM: No, I haven't done my action.

MATT: Oh, that's right, because you didn't attack it, you didn't shoot it, so, yeah, take your action.

SAM: Now I will shoot it and hope that I'm hidden.

MATT: All right.

[cheering]

So you are currently up in the tree.

SAM: 21 to hit.

MATT: That does hit. Go ahead and roll damage.

SAM: Is it sneak attack?

MATT: Actually because you jumped up into the tree and hid, it would be sneak attack, so go.

[cheering]

TRAVIS: Come on, come on, come on, come on.

SAM: 23! No! 29!

[cheering]

MATT: (whooshes) As the impact of the crossbow bolt slams under its jaw, you see it cough (spluttering) and spit up this dark, purple-black blood that spatters and drips, and you can see the snow that it impacts immediately (hisses) steam and sizzle. You now see, as they've emerged from this area, all the snow in the vicinity is melting and hissing as it moves through the swathe of soft powder. Does that finish your turn?

SAM: Not dead yet?

MATT: No.

SAM: Fuck, shit, fuck!

MATT: (laughs) All right. That now brings us to the main creature's turn. Now that there is a mammoth that it just spit out.

[cheering] [cheering] [cheering] [cheering]

SAM: Colts forged!

MATT: You don't know with what you toy.

LIAM: You're going to drive him back to Uk'otoa.

SAM: and LAURA: (whispering) Uk'otoa.

MARISHA: Travis just wrote "bury Sam," I don't, oh.

MATT: All right, the creature, it's spat out this large mammoth that is now (booming) on the ground, pushing over a tree. Caduceus, you watch as this mammoth stomps the ground around you, shaking, it almost steps onto you.

TALIESIN: Oh, yeah.

[laughter]

MATT: The creature is going to go ahead and try and swing its head up and try and shake off what's on top of it. That's going to be 26 to hit.

MARISHA: Me?

MATT: You, Beauregard.

MARISHA: No, yeah. Yep, it hits.

MATT: All right, so, Beauregard, as it shakes you off, slamming its neck up in the air, you lose your grip and (whooshes) fling, as you do, the head spins around (whisks) and is going to attempt to bite you up into the air and does so.

LAURA: What?

MARISHA: Wow, that's kind of cool. That was a dope move it just did. Sucks that it's me.

[laughter]

MATT: Take 48 points of piercing damage. (exclamations)

SAM: 48?

MATT: Yes. Plus nine points of fire damage.

[exclamations of dismay]

LIAM: Bugs, man.

MARISHA: I go limp in its jaws. I am unconscious.

MATT: You are unconscious. Your unconscious body is currently grappled in its jaws.

SAM: Oh no. Oh No-regard. (laughter)

TRAVIS: Oh, shit.

MARISHA: Please don't kill me at a live show. (laughter)

TRAVIS: Holy shit!

MATT: And then it burrows underground. (yelling)

TRAVIS: You!

MATT: (laughs)

LAURA: Beau!

LIAM: (extended) No!

TRAVIS: Holy shit!

MATT: There is an indent where, as it disappears beneath, the cavern underneath, it's left there, open, you can see the slight opening and you can feel it rumbling in the ground, beneath where Caduceus and the mammoth are. But you have no visual sight of it at the moment. Jester, your turn.

[laughter]

SAM: Wow.

LAURA: I do a (squeaks) with my trunk.

LIAM: [elephant trumpet]

LAURA: (screams) That was good! I can't, I can't follow it as a mammoth.

TALIESIN: Well. How big is the hole? How big is the hole?

MATT: The hole, I'd say a lot of it's collapsed inward, so it's about 10 feet across.

TALIESIN: Okay.

MATT: So it's about an eight to 10 foot from side to side and a lot of it is fallen in beneath it, but there is a little bit of an opening.

LAURA: I'm going to, I'm going to turn around and look and I'm going to spot its baby.

MATT: There's the hole that it left right there.

LAURA: I'm going to rage towards, try to charge the baby.

MATT: All right. You rush (thumping) over Caduceus.

LAURA: How far away from it was me?

MATT: It's about 25 feet or so, I'd say.

LAURA: Okay, I'm going to walk, oh, at least 20 feet, okay, I'm going to run forward and use a tramping charge on it.

MATT: I'm going to say-- [cheering] This tree is toast (laughs). As you slam towards it, Caduceus, you almost get pushed off to the side, having to catch yourself on the edge of the snowbank.

LAURA: It has to succeed on a strength check of 18.

MATT: Okay. That is a, it has a good strength, but not enough on a natural three. It's a seven, that's a failure, I'm pretty sure.

LAURA: So it's knocked prone and I get to make a bonus stomp action on it.

SAM: Whoa.

MATT: There you go. Roll your damage on it, the impact.

LAURA: Well, that's a 23 to hit on it.

MATT: A 23 to hit. That does hit.

LAURA: So whoa. [laughter] That's 4d10 bludgeoning damage.

[cheering]

And that's just my bonus action.

TRAVIS: Fuck it up!

LIAM: [elephant trumpeting]

[cheering]

LAURA: That's 30 points of bludgeoning damage. And then I'm going to gore it with my--

MATT: All right, roll damage.

LAURA: Oh, that's 28 to hit! Oh, shit, wait, that was 4d10 plus seven. I didn't add the seven.

MATT: Okay.

LAURA: Holy fuck. (laughter) And then the gore attack. It's cocked. 10, 15. That's 15 plus seven, that's 20 what, 22 points of goring tusk damage.

MATT: You take eight points of fire damage.

LAURA: Fuck it, I'm a mammoth, I don't care.

[cheering] [cheering]

MATT: And how do you want to do this?

[cheering and applause] [cheering and applause]

LAURA: Caleb, make my noise for me.

LIAM: [elephant trumpeting]

LAURA: And I'm stomping.

MATT: (laughs)

LAURA: (screams) My trunk is everywhere! Then I run over to Caleb and I'm stomping and like: Let me out so that I can help Beau, though. Except I'm not saying that, I'm just thinking it. (groaning)

MATT: Okay. As you rush towards, screaming that, you shove it down and as it's on the ground, you jam your tusks into it and tear its body through. You watch as its interior muscles tear open, its brackish, purple blood spraying across you and burning your face, but also spattering across the snow and as it does, the immediate snowbank behind it just liquefies and you can see the green grass below the surface, where the previous storm had covered. The creature is no more.

[cheering]

LAURA: I kind of want to be a mammoth all the time.

[laughter]

MATT: You hear [elephant trumpet]. I can't do it as well as Liam. That finishes Jester's turn. Fjord, you're up with Beau on deck.

TRAVIS: Yes, can I run over to the hole where the fucking asshole went?

MATT: Yeah.

TRAVIS: Do I see anything?

MATT: Make a perception check.

TRAVIS: Oh, sure. 12, 13.

MATT: You see movement, as parts of the earth are closing in, you're not sure which is snow and which is the creature, but you can see movement.

TRAVIS: Fuck! I will take the Inescapable Lash whip and I will try to whip it from the, whip it good!

[cheering]

SAM: Dun, dun, dun, dun!

MATT: All right, go ahead and make an attack.

TRAVIS: Okay. 16, oh, plus five? That's great, that's 20.

[cheering]

MATT: You're proficient with whips?

TRAVIS: No. I don't know why it says plus five. It's a plus one to hit, so it's 16.

MARISHA: What's your?

TRAVIS: Dink, dink.

MATT: Right, right.

SAM: This is the problem when you don't have stats.

LIAM: Yeah. [laughter]

MATT: Well, no, I mean, if you're proficient with--

LIAM: New character, who dis?

MATT: You're proficient with martial weapons, so yeah. That plus five is your proficiency bonus.

[cheering]

That does hit, so go ahead and roll damage.

TRAVIS: Hey, 1d4 plus one! Two plus one is three! Four, four points of damage!

MATT: Four points of damage.

LAURA: Are you going towards it or are you trying to bring it towards you?

TRAVIS: Four points of damage and I will use my bonus action to grapple the target.

SAM: Yes.

MATT: Okay.

SAM: With the whip or with your body?

LAURA: With the whip.

TRAVIS: With the whip, I don't know, it's what it says!

TALIESIN: Oh, yeah, it's a whip catch.

MATT: Okay, so (whooshes), you slap the whip down there, (whooshes) wraps around what movement is there and it begins to tug and pull.

TRAVIS: Fuck.

SAM: Oh god.

MARISHA: Oh god.

SAM: Yeah, yeah.

TRAVIS: Yeah, I'm holding onto that shit.

MATT: Okay. Beau? I need you to make a death-saving throw.

[groaning]

MARISHA: Is it this one? Is it?

TRAVIS: It is that one.

MARISHA: Successful, 12.

MATT: Okay. That's one success. It's the wolf's turn. It's even further out of sight.

[laughter]

Caduceus, it's your turn. You see, as you recover from watching this mammoth Jester rush through and just completely destroy the younger creature, you spin around and see Fjord whip and then (cracking) (groans), start being pulled towards the opening in the ground. What are you doing?

TALIESIN: Wow, I'm going to run right over and look down and see if I can see what he just grabbed.

MATT: Okay. You move over here, that's 15 feet of movement there. Make a perception check.

TALIESIN: All right. That's a 28.

[cheering]

MATT: You can see there is currently a whip around its, like the very tip of its tail and one of its back legs and it is latched. You can just barely see the cusp of it. It's about to completely vanish beneath the surface.

TALIESIN: I'm going to cast Blight.

AUDIENCE: Yeah!

[cheering]

MATT: Okay.

TALIESIN: I don't like it, no. That says constitution 17 save.

MATT: Natural one on the save. [cheering] Go ahead and roll damage.

TALIESIN: This is going to take a while. Double checking what this does. Yeah, okay, and this is necrotic energy.

MATT: It is.

TALIESIN: Okay. Oh, that's nice. 16, that's 20. 34, 35, 37, 38. 42 points of necrotic energy.

MATT: Nice. [cheering]

TALIESIN: Yeah.

MATT: I will say, as a reaction to the pain, it withdraws deeper inside. Fjord, the whip is tugging you forward. Are you going to let go or continue to hold on?

TRAVIS: I'm holding on to my sec--

MARISHA: No, this is turning into a BMX video, don't do it! Let go of the bike.

LAURA: No.

SAM: Do it.

MATT: Fjord, what are you doing?

TRAVIS: I'm holding on.

MARISHA: (groans) I love you.

MATT: Fjord disappears into the hole as, very much like "Tremors," you're just (whooshes) pulled (poofs) underground. All right.

SAM: Is it still a tunnel we can follow through or did it--

MATT: You can certainly try.

TALIESIN: Does it look like it's collapsing?

MATT: It looks like it's probably not meant to be structurally sound, the creature definitely doesn't leave a bunch of, you know, it's not a spherical worm that carves through the earth, it has a bunch of legs and burrows through and what's behind it seems to fall in.

TALIESIN: Yeah, before it vanishes, I'm going to use a bonus action to cast Light on the creature so we can maybe keep a light on it. I don't know what else to do with it--

MATT: You can cast bonus--

TALIESIN: Oh, and it's touch. Never mind.

MATT: Sorry, man.

TALIESIN: Yeah, I don't know what else other than, yeah. I don't know what else.

MATT: All right. That's the end of your turn? You can still move if you want. You got 15 feet of movement.

TALIESIN: I can still move and I have to be able to see, I have to see somebody to cast Spare the Dying, right? Yeah.

MATT: Correct.

TALIESIN: Never mind, okay. Yeah, I'm going to circle in and just get ready and round that hole to see if it's going to collapse or if it's going to stay sound.

MATT: You've got it. Caleb, you're up.

LIAM: Okay, Caleb's head is whipping back and forth from mammoth problem to hole to mammoth to hole. That's taken care of, drops the mammoth spell, Polymorph is gone.

MATT: Jester suddenly is now standing over this body going. (growling) (laughs)

LIAM: Using movement to run to the hole, am I able to get there with a vantage point to see the creature in the hole?

MATT: You do not see a creature, all you see is rock and snow falling in.

LIAM: I don't see anybody, I don't see my friends?

MATT: Actually, you do see Fjord's feet being pulled into the rock and snow.

LIAM: The catmint bloom comes out and I reach out my hand and a little spectral version of Frumpkin appears right by Fjord and then (poofs), there is a giant cat's hand which attempts to grapple Fjord.

[cheering]

MATT: Okay. All right, go ahead and roll for the attempt on that.

TRAVIS: Daisy chain!

LIAM: Okay, its strength is very high.

TALIESIN: I'm looking up options.

LIAM: That's a total of 32. [cheering]

MATT: So the hand wraps around Fjord, the base of the legs and then (whooshes) begins to pull him out with the whip taut. I need you to make a strength check.

[groaning]

SAM: Oh no!

LAURA: Natural 20, natural 20, natural 20!

TRAVIS: 17. [cheering]

MATT: You feel the shoulder joints pop, pop out a little bit, but you maintain your hold and as you're pulled out there, your entire body is on fire. I will say, because this is going to, you take three points of stretching damage. (laughter) As your body is yanked out.

TRAVIS: It's almost like being with Avantika again.

[laughter]

MATT: Is there any additional movement on the hand?

LIAM: No, it will just pull taut and try to keep this from moving forward.

MATT: Okay, so as it pulls--

LAURA: Pull him back!

MATT: You pull Fjord back and out of the hole--

LIAM: I am able to?

MATT: Yeah.

LIAM: It can do its movement while holding?

MATT: I'll allow it if you add some movement.

LIAM: Yeah, yeah, yeah. If I haven't lost hold of him, I will start to make slim even slimmer.

MATT: Okay, how far back?

LIAM: Out of the hole, if I can.

MATT: Well, how much movement does it have?

LIAM: Oh, yeah, that's probably something I should know.

[laughter]

It's 30 or 60, where is it on the spell?

SAM: For the hand, for pushing, it's usually five feet per level.

LIAM: 60 feet.

MATT: 60 feet, so you can move back 30, because you are dragging, so it's a half-speed. Moving it back 30 feet, it pulls up over the rock, Fjord is like (groans) being stretched, barely holding on--

LIAM: Is there a monk on a string?

MATT: As you do (crunching).

[cheering]

You watch as, against its own strength, it's being pulled backwards, its legs are trying desperately to burrow and dig in and find purchase against the rock and it's just being dragged out by this giant cat hand as Fjord is just screaming in pain.

TRAVIS: This hurts so much! Fuck! [laughter]

MATT: Fuck it, you take another one point of damage.

TRAVIS: Okay.

MATT: (laughs) From the drag. I rolled it really well. I rolled really poorly, so you're happy. All right, that finishes Caleb's turn. Nott, you're up.

SAM: Yeah, yeah.

MATT: You're still up in the tree.

SAM: I'm going to hop down. I can see the creature, correct?

MATT: From where you are, it can glance over, yes. There's a tree between the two of you, but the creature's large enough that you can see the movement around the outside.

SAM: I'll get close enough so I can see it and I will take out a bit of fleece, remembering the instructions of Caleb and I will rub it together and I will cast Phantasmal Force on the creature.

MATT: Jester there. Phantasmal Force, all right, what is the save on that?

SAM: Intelligence 15.

MATT: It actually, it rolled a 17, but it's minus three on that, so that's a--

[cheering]

So 14, what's your spell DC?

SAM: 15.

MATT: 15, it just fails.

SAM: Do I see Beau's legs dangling?

LAURA: She's fully in.

MATT: Well, you can see the feet somewhat out.

SAM: Okay. All right, I'm going to conjure an image in this beast's mindscape. I'm going to make it think that Beauregard has wriggled free and is slowly running away, flipping it the bird. I would like, I hope it takes a bite at the fake Beau.

LAURA: And drops the actual--

SAM: And drops the real Beau.

MATT: Okay. Well, if I recall, does it take psychic damage?

SAM: Only if it, if the image that it perceives is giving it damage.

MATT: Gotcha. All right, so, yeah, that is not the case. However, it does believe.

SAM: It believes that Beau is running away from it.

MATT: Yes, it does, okay.

SAM: So will it take an attack of opportunity?

MATT: Yes, it will, and it'll open its jaws and Beau will fall.

[cheering]

TRAVIS: Fucking slick.

MATT: So Beau's unconscious body falls limp out of its jaws. It is a 10-foot fall, so you do take a point of damage.

SAM: Oh, shit.

MATT: So you do lose a death save.

[groaning]

MARISHA: It's okay, I'm good, I'm good!

MATT: It lashes out towards the illusion (whooshes), moves through it, you watch as the running Beau, suddenly the jaws snap around it and she just continues running out of its face (poofs). It withdraws, confused, whipping around.

SAM: Yep, that's it (laughs).

MARISHA: That was amazing!

SAM: I will use my bonus action to hide and my free action to remind everyone that you can still vote in the election.

[laughter]

And if I am elected, you'll see many more cool moves like that.

MATT: All righty.

SAM: Bonus action hide.

MATT: Make a stealth check with disadvantage just because the snow here is starting to melt. Actually, where you're standing right now, there's very little snow because of the creature, so I won't allow it.

SAM: Okay.

MATT: From the death of where it died, all the snow in the region has now melted, so there'd be nowhere to hide.

SAM: I'll take it.

MATT: Okay. That finishes its turn, now it's the creature's turn.

TRAVIS: Oh god.

MATT: Angry and being pulled back and snapping at the unconscious Beau, the only other thing that it sees within range within range is Caduceus.

LAURA: Didn't it see the Beau that came out of its mouth running away?

MATT: It does, but it runs away.

SAM: I said very slowly.

[laughter]

It's just doing a fade away--

MATT: In order for it to make an attack of opportunity, she has to move out of its melee range, so. However, that will be a 20 to hit. What's your armor class?

TALIESIN: 18.

MATT: So that does hit. Caduceus, you take... Man! Like, just so you guys are aware, it's 6d10 damage on this. I've been rolling so well. This is an eight, 10, nine, 10, six, and a three.

[shouting]

I've been rolling so well on damage tonight, I am so sorry.

TALIESIN: Guys.

LIAM: I was so waiting for, "It's all ones, you guys, it's all ones."

MATT: (laughs) All right, 32, 38, 46, plus seven. 53 points of piercing damage, Caduceus.

[groaning]

And 10 points of fire damage. As it snaps you into its jaws, its teeth crunch around you, you feel the armor pressure in the shield just placed up against your torso. Your staff almost snaps from the impact as it draws you up into its mouth. You are grappled and restrained. Lifted up, your feet dangling and just barely kicking past the unconscious body of Beau bleeding out in the snow. And it's grappled from the rope, so it can't move, so it can't burrow, so it's going to stay there. [cheering] Jester, your turn.

LAURA: (groans) Fuck. I can't run up to it or else I will die if I try to do that so I'm going to Guiding Bolt it.

MATT: Sure.

LAURA: Yeah, from far away.

TALIESIN: But Beau, also--

LAURA: I'm going to, I know. I'm going to try to take it out. I'm going to Guiding Bolt it at level--

SAM: 20.

LAURA: At level four. Guiding Bolt it at level four.

MATT: Okay (laughs). Go ahead and roll an attack on it.

LAURA: Beau's unconscious.

MATT: Beau is unconscious on the ground, yes.

LIAM: Two death saves.

MARISHA: Do you, you do you.

SAM: (pigeon cooing)

LAURA: No!

MATT: What are you doing, Jester? Level four Guiding Bolt or something?

LAURA: Well, if it dies then Beau will be saved, see.

MATT: That's a valid point.

TRAVIS: But it'll...

LAURA: If it bleeds, though, then Beau will be in a lot of trouble here (screeches). But (heavy breathing), I'm going--

MATT: Hurry up, decisions, you got six seconds. You will have been passed--

LAURA: No, no, no!

MATT: If you don't make a choice here, waste your turn.

LAURA: No, no, okay, okay, okay, okay, look, I'm going to run up. And I'm going to Cure Wounds on Beau.

[cheering]

LAURA: I'm going to slide down and I'm going to hold her.

MATT: The snow itself is hard to move through in this space, but you move across the rock and slide down the side. Your movement gets you to right about where Beau is, then the five feet before there. The heat is emanating from the creature. Beau on the ground--

LAURA: I reach down and I put my hand on Beau's forehead and I cast Cure Wounds at level four.

MATT: All righty.

LAURA: That's 4d8 plus five. Okay. 14, 18, 20, plus 25 points.

[cheering]

MARISHA: Fuck.

LAURA: I'm a cleric. (laughter)

TRAVIS: With disdain.

LAURA: As a bonus action, I'm going to just be like: Man, I think I could have killed it.

[laughter]

MATT: As you envision what it felt like to have strong tusks. Beauregard, you come back to consciousness.

MARISHA: Do I come back to consciousness seeing Jester's face of regret and disdain?

(laughter)

I just say--

LAURA: I'm glad you're back and stuff.

[laughter]

MARISHA: Why aren't you, like, a wizard or a sorcerer?

LAURA: I don't know.

[laughter]

LIAM: Best friends forever, K-I-D.

TRAVIS: Holy shit.

MATT: All righty, that finishes Jester's turn. Fjord.

TRAVIS: Yes, I still have the whip attached to its foot, right?

MATT: You do.

LAURA: Its foot.

TRAVIS: Whatever the fuck it has, as an action, I can-- buh buh bleh, buh bleh bleh-- cause them to become restrained?

MATT: If you'd like to.

TRAVIS: Yeah, I'd like to try and do that.

MATT: Okay. So as you, you're standing there, holding it at bay, you invoke the whip, and it pulls you a little bit forward and the claw a little bit slightly (whooshes) towards it. As the whip begins to extend and wrap around it, you see its body begin to be rope-tied along its midsection and it's pulling against it. You are-- [shouting] Magically hogtying [cheering] this creature.

SAM: Hogtie it!

TRAVIS: Yeah.

MATT: That's your action.

TRAVIS: Yeah, no, that's it. That's the end of my turn.

MATT: All righty.

TRAVIS: I'd love to give you a health potion or, you know, do something else, but that's all I've got.

[laughter]

MATT: Beau, it's your turn.

MARISHA: (groans) Okay.

MATT: Caduceus is currently up here, in its jaws.

TALIESIN: Thank you.

MATT: There you go. Just for a visual aid, you know, make it fun.

TALIESIN: No, not yet.

MARISHA: How, hmm...

LAURA: (gasps)

TRAVIS: Fucking run.

LAURA: No, no, you've got the lightning gloves!

MARISHA: Hm?

LAURA: You've got lightning gloves.

SAM: (pigeon coos)

LAURA: I'm right next to her.

SAM: (coos) Lightning gloves.

LAURA: I say: Don't hit it, it's--

MARISHA: Mm-hm.

LAURA: It makes--

MARISHA: Yeah, get to use those once a day. This feels like a long hiking trip.

[laughter]

LAURA: We could rest after this, you know.

MARISHA: I will take out my bo staff, though. Do a cool little flourish.

MATT: You're still prone.

MARISHA: Stand up.

MATT: Okay.

LAURA: Ooh, but do that cool Arya move where she spins and jumps up and yeah.

MARISHA: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

MATT: You got it.

MARISHA: And help myself up there as a way.

MATT: So not as cool as I envisioned, sure.

MARISHA: Then pop, pop!

MATT: Go for it, two attacks on it.

MARISHA: Both natural 19s.

MATT: Nice. Damage on the first one?

MARISHA: I rolled an eight on an eight. 13.

MATT: 13 points of--

MARISHA: And another eight. [cheering] 26.

MATT: Nice! [cheering] Great, so, whack, whack with the staff twice, with each slam, the heat that bursts out of its body, you take--

MARISHA: Can I run?

MATT: Nine points of fire damage.

MARISHA: Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, please don't die.

MATT: And 14 points of fire damage. [gasping]

MARISHA: Okay.

SAM: Whoa, that's dangerous.

MARISHA: Okay, okay.

SAM: That's like two, right?

MARISHA: Yep.

MATT: You still have your bonus action.

MARISHA: Uh-huh, I'm going to Step of the Wind. (laughter)

LIAM: No, no, hit it again, hit it again.

MARISHA: No! I will spend a ki point to take the disengage action.

MATT: Pop, pop (whooshing). (laughter)

MARISHA: I cry a little, yeah.

MATT: Just go running full speed.

MARISHA: Uh-huh.

MATT: You lost half your speed getting up, so you have 20 feet of movement left, I believe, what's your movement speed?

MARISHA: 45 feet of movement.

MATT: Yeah, I'll put you 25 feet. You can move away from it if you want to. Are you going full 25?

MARISHA: Yes!

MATT: All right (laughs). There you go, just sprinting through.

LAURA: I'm still on the ground.

MATT: Actually, technically, the snow, well, no, I'd say it's melting around the creature because of its proximity.

MARISHA: I go away from the melty bile.

MATT: You got it.

MARISHA: I don't.

MATT: That finishes your turn, Beau?

MARISHA: Yeah!

MATT: Caduceus, you're up. You are also grappled and restrained and you're not, it's not darkness, it bit onto your body, and one arm and your head is sticking out one side. One leg is inside, you're pushed up and mangled. You can still see, but you're being flung around as it swings you (whooshing) side to side. What are you doing?

TALIESIN: Well, I'm torn.

[laughter]

TRAVIS: Bad use of words, that's not, no--

LIAM: Not yet, you're not.

TALIESIN: This thing was looking pretty rough a while ago, right?

MATT: You started to see it take damage. It's starting to look rough, yeah.

TALIESIN: Starting to look rough, that's so nice.

[laughter]

I'm going to just, I'm going to trust in my friends' ability to get shit done and I'm going to cast what's that thing where if I hit zero I go back to one? Where is it? Is it--

LAURA: Death Ward?

TALIESIN: Death Ward, yeah, I'm going to do Death Ward.

MATT: Okay.

TALIESIN: Where are you? I'm going to cast Death Ward on myself.

MATT: Go for it.

LIAM: Tal, do you still have the periapt? The Periapt of Wound Closure?

TALIESIN: I do. I don't have, yeah, I auto-stabilize, but this way, I don't, you know, I'm conscious.

MATT: All right, you got it, so, Death Ward on yourself. You feel the Wildmother's magic suffuse you and safeguard you from slipping into the edge of death.

TALIESIN: Excellent and for my bonus action, if I have one, where are we? I can't do Healing Word on myself, can I? No, I can't do that. Just for fun, I'm going to turn invisible to see what happens? [laughter]

MATT: Okay. (poofs) The jaws are now chewing something. (laughs) You got it.

TALIESIN: I'm going for whatever I got, okay.

MATT: All righty, that ends Caduceus' turn. Caleb, you're up.

LIAM: The bug is restrained, correct, from the whip?

MATT: Currently, yes.

LIAM: Yeah, okay, so the cat's claw, Cat's Ire is going to drop Fjord, let go, and just shred the bug.

MATT: All righty.

TRAVIS: You also have advantage because--

LIAM: Because it's restrained.

TRAVIS: Sorry, Beau.

LIAM: So Fjord, you get pushed out of the way and drop, like (grunts) the whip goes limp a little bit and the cat's claw rushes forward, claws out. Go ahead and roll an attack, I believe it is. Is that what you're trying to do?

LIAM: Low rolls, both low rolls.

MATT: Aw.

LIAM: It's a-- zub zub zub-- 15.

MATT: 15 does not hit, unfortunately.

LIAM: Yeah, okay.

MATT: The claws hit the back of its body. Unfortunately, a section of its carapace that hasn't taken a lot of damage yet. It scrapes and you can see marks left behind, but nothing actually pierces into flesh.

LIAM: Okay, I am going to drag it towards me for some of its movement and I am going to back away towards the player called Liam.

MATT: Going to back away?

LIAM: Ja.

MATT: All righty, how much?

LIAM: Hey, let's go the full 30 and we'll put the Cat's Ire halfway between me and the bug.

MATT: Okay, climbing onto the rock, you lose a little bit of movement and the Cat's Ire is going to move, shift into that space there. All righty. That finishes your go. Nott, you are up first.

TALIESIN: Nott.

LAURA: You've got to kill it.

SAM: I've got to kill it?

LAURA: You have to kill it.

SAM: I hope I don't kill Caduceus. I'm going to, he's engaged with Caduceus, right?

MATT: Caduceus is nowhere to be seen.

SAM: Shit.

LAURA: But I am right underneath.

MATT: There is a whip around it. It looks like it's currently bound a bit by it as Fjord is now facedown, in the snow, being dragged.

LAURA: I'm on my knees.

TRAVIS: Do something!

LAURA: Right underneath it.

SAM: Does it seem like, fuck--

TRAVIS: Shoot it!

MATT: What are you doing, Nott?

SAM: I will, I will shoot it! I will, I will shoot it!

MATT: It is restrained, so you do have advantage on the attack.

SAM: Oh, great, I will shoot it.

TRAVIS: Fucking hurry up!

SAM: Okay, I can't, you're talking so weird!

[laughter]

29 to hit.

MATT: Jesus! That hits, go ahead and roll damage with sneak attack.

SAM: With sneak attack, okay, good, thank god.

TALIESIN: Thank you.

SAM: Also, sorry, I was going to use my explosive arrow.

[cheering]

TRAVIS: You get advantage.

MATT: Okay. Go for it.

TRAVIS: Advantage on this.

MATT: Sure.

SAM: Okay.

TALIESIN: If you can hit a part of it that's away from the head.

MATT: He doesn't see anything.

TALIESIN: No, okay, again.

MATT: This seems very familiar.

SAM: 21.

TALIESIN: Again.

MATT: 21.

SAM: But that doesn't include the explosive.

MATT: Correct, now roll the explosive damage.

SAM: Which is?

MATT: Oh, it's 3d6. 3d6 fire damage.

TALIESIN: This could end me.

SAM: Nine more.

MATT: All right, so the creature and Caduceus both take nine points of fire damage. However, it's immune to fire, so the explosion has no effect on it.

TRAVIS: Cool, cool, dude.

TALIESIN: Thanks, Sam, that's cool. Thanks.

SAM: 'Kay. So just 21 points.

MATT: 21 points of damage to it and Caduceus, you take nine points of fire damage.

TALIESIN: Okay, cool.

SAM: Are you alive?

TALIESIN: You don't know.

MATT: As the arrow impacts and (booming) detonates--

LAURA: Are you no longer invisible, though, because you just took some more damage?

TALIESIN: No, I'm invisible 'til my next round.

MATT: Yeah, damage doesn't get rid of invisibility, so you see the explosion, the smoke emerge, the creature seems unfazed except for the wound that it took, its jaws almost clamped around this invisible space where you see this burn mark and you hear a slight grunt of pain. (grunting)

SAM: Bonus action, fire again!

MATT: All right, fire again.

SAM: With advantage, still or?

MATT: Yeah, it's still restrained.

SAM: Okay, 24 to hit.

MATT: That hits, go ahead and roll damage.

SAM: That is 11 points of damage.

MATT: 11 points of damage. It's looking really hurt. (groaning) It's looking really hurt. The second one sinks into its body. It now is trying to find a way to escape.

MARISHA: Fuck.

MATT: That finishes your turn.

SAM: I'll just use my movement to go huddle with Caleb. That's it.

MATT: All righty.

TALIESIN: Hey, guys.

MATT: That gets you up onto the rock with Caleb. On its turn, it's going to go ahead.

TALIESIN: It's still restrained?

MATT: It is restrained, but so are you, so it's just a straight roll. That's an, oh, that's 28. (gurgling) It swallows Caduceus.

[shouting]

Falling into its gullet, darkness takes you as the muscles constrain and burn against your body. You're blinded.

TALIESIN: Cool.

TRAVIS: The fuck, man?

MATT: It's going to attempt to burrow again. Make a strength check for me.

[groaning]

TRAVIS: I thought its speed was zero.

SAM: Hold that, tiger!

TRAVIS: I thought its speed was zero.

AUDIENCE: (chanting) Fjord, Fjord, Fjord!

TRAVIS: 19. [cheering]

MATT: So. From a--

MARISHA: Oh my god.

MATT: I'm considering this a contested roll because you're trying to grapple a huge creature with a 20-foot whip, so I'm considering it restrained but I'm not considering its speed reduced to zero, I'm considering it a contested strength roll. It rolled a natural four plus seven, so it's an eleven.

[cheering]

It attempts to burrow and dig in and in spite of yourself, your arms still hurt, you pull back, and dig your feet into the rock, and lean and lean and you can feel the tissue (crackling) [groaning] You take, I'll say, 13 points of just internal damage as your arms are just tearing away from your body. But the creature does not move.

MARISHA: (laughs) [cheering]

MATT: Now it's Jester's turn.

LAURA: (scared sigh) Okay. I'm going to cast--

TRAVIS: Smoke this fucking thing!

[laughter]

LAURA: Yeah, okay, I'm going to try to Guiding Bolt it then, this time.

MATT: Okay.

MARISHA: Up the butt!

LAURA: Okay. Yeah, I'm going to Guiding--

MATT: What level?

LAURA: At level four.

MATT: All right, go ahead and roll for the attack. It is restrained still, so you get advantage on the attack roll, yes.

LAURA: Okay, okay, okay, okay.

SAM: She's choosing her dice.

LAURA: Two natural 16s. So plus nine is a 25 to hit.

MATT: That hits. Go ahead and roll damage.

[cheering]

LAURA: So wait, that's at level four, so Guiding Bolt, that's 7d6.

[cheering]

SAM: Come on, come on, come on, come on.

LAURA: 11, 14, 16, 20 points of radiant damage.

MATT: How do you want to do this?

(cheering) [cheering] [cheering] [cheering]

LAURA: From crouching down on the ground with my hand raised up, I'm going to say: Traveler, I have so much faith in you right now, you are the most amazing person/god, I've ever met and I love you and please save us all! And I'm going to shoot pink Guiding energy out of my hand.

MATT: As you release your hand, you watch a bright, radiant doorway (whooshes) open and, right before your hand, and from the center of that horizon, the familiar symbol, you watch energy gather like a sunrise. Then (poofs) fire off towards the creature, impact underneath its jaw as it bursts with radiant energy, it burns away, it screams (screeches), this high-pitched scream as it rears up and as the burning radiant energy continues to just cast away pieces of its flesh and its armored hide, it leaves this smoking stump where its head once was, the body (thumps), slumping to the ground, no longer alive.

[cheering]

LIAM: Get you a woman who can do both!

[cheering]

MATT: All right, so, Fjord, it's your turn.

TRAVIS: It's my turn? I run in and try and find Caduceus in the throat of the beheaded beast.

MATT: Okay. Go ahead and make an athletics check.

SAM: Athletics?

MATT: As you are climbing into, we'll put that there.

TRAVIS: 16.

SAM: Wow.

MATT: 16! You manage to pull your way in. In doing so, you do take...

TRAVIS: Caduceus?!

MARISHA: You're not still invisible, right?

MATT: 26 points of acid damage.

[groaning]

As even though its head is gone, the inside of its body is still filled with digestive fluid and you're like (sizzling) and you're pulling and you get through to a point where, now, you feel the base of something's foot. You're pretty sure it's Caduceus.

TRAVIS: I hope this is Caduceus! And I'll pull him out.

MATT: Well, that was your turn climbing into it.

TRAVIS: Oh, good, oh, fuck!

[laughter]

I think I've got him, but it burns!

MATT: That was your action, pushing in, making your way inside the creature.

LAURA: And you're holding on to his foot.

TRAVIS: Yep.

LAURA: Okay.

TRAVIS: And screaming like a bitch.

MATT: (laughs) Beauregard, your turn.

MARISHA: I vomit.

[laughter]

And my stumble forward going: The worm, the friend, our cow, he ate it and out of the bison but Caduceus (mumbling) get him and I just wrap my arms around Fjord and I say: Pull, buddy, pull. [laughter] I want to help you.

MATT: So you're going to try and climb into the--

MARISHA: No.

MATT: You saw Fjord disappear into its open neck.

MARISHA: Wait, Fjord is gone, too? Why do people keep disappearing in this thing?

MATT: It swallowed him into his body and the creature probably length-wise is about 30 feet long, so Fjord had to climb about probably 10 feet or so into its body to get to Caduceus.

LAURA: You have to climb in after Fjord--

MARISHA: No, I just go where's, this is ironic because Fjord would suck things into his body and now he's being sucked into worms' bodies. It feels like everything came full circle and then I just collapse again and pass out.

MATT: All right, Beau passes out. Caduceus. Your turn.

TALIESIN: Okay.

MATT: You feel Fjord grabbing your foot.

TALIESIN: I'm going to start helping and shoving us both back because I assume it's let go, I mean, I assume it's no longer constricting me.

MATT: You are currently, you are still blinded.

TALIESIN: Sure.

LIAM: Probably a muscular tunnel.

MATT: I'll say you're not restrained, but any attempts to push your way out are at disadvantage. If you're trying to push your way out at this point, go ahead and make a strength check or an athletics check with disadvantage.

TALIESIN: No, that doesn't sound like me. What am I going to do? [laughter]

LAURA: Do you heal yourself up so that--

TALIESIN: I can heal a couple of us if we have to, but I know I'm getting pulled out, right?

MATT: You feel something grab your foot and you hear (mumbling).

TALIESIN: All right, that's good enough for me.

[laughter]

I'm going to heal myself then for, where's my Cure Wounds? There we go. I'm going to heal myself at 3rd-level. I know, I'm taking his, I'll heal for level three. The periapt doesn't work, it's just on the, yeah, nevermind.

MATT: Yeah, you just take--

TALIESIN: So. It's these.

MATT: So 3d8 plus five, I believe.

TALIESIN: That's not bad, okay, 15 points.

LAURA: Plus five?

MATT: So you healed 15?

TALIESIN: Yeah, that's 15, I heal 15.

MATT: That's your action.

TALIESIN: Yeah.

MATT: Anything else?

TALIESIN: Let's see, let me just do that. For bonus actions, I don't know if there's anything useful but let's take a look. Yeah, bonus actions, no, I don't really have much. I'm just going to yell out: All right, just keep pulling. I'm going to try and make myself easy to pull.

MATT: All right so you just stretch yourself out. Make it easier to pass a Caduceus.

TALIESIN: Yeah.

MATT: You got it.

TALIESIN: I'm not claustrophobic, I'm cool with this.

MATT: All right.

TRAVIS: That, wow, wow.

MATT: Caleb, your turn.

LIAM: Okay, I see this predicament in front of me and say: Oh my god, vored like a sword and not by Fjord. The cat claw will move forward and slide one or two claws into the mouth of this thing, into the mandible.

MARISHA: Yeah.

LIAM: Rip away the bottom jaw and hopefully just tear down the front of its body and open it up.

MATT: It's like the worst rectal exam.

[laughter]

Go ahead and roll damage.

TRAVIS: Yeah, rip open that muscular tunnel.

LAURA: Yeah, do some good damage to that muscular tunnel.

[laughter]

SAM: Yeah!

LAURA: What? What did you mean?

SAM: Stick your finger into that--

LIAM: That is 20 points of rectal damage.

[laughter]

MATT: Its jaw tears apart, the inside of it burning away, the bits of gore slopping into the snow and sizzling and hissing as it begins to melt away into steam. You do see Fjord's lower half begin to emerge from it and you now find your feet actually getting some purchase on the ground.

LAURA: Oh, good.

TRAVIS: I got him!

MATT: Nott, you're up. Or are you done with your turn?

LIAM: I'm holding my ground and waiting.

MATT: You got it, Nott, you're up.

SAM: Oh, boy. I can see a foot?

MATT: You can see the lower half of Fjord now pulling its way out of the remnants of what its head once were.

SAM: All right, I'll run over and grab, grab that boot and I'll pull.

MATT: All right. Go ahead and make an athletics check.

SAM: Athletics? 11.

TRAVIS: Strange, I seem to do better than that.

[laughter]

SAM: I will push it deeper into the--

MATT: (laughs) All right, so, Fjord, you get a couple inches out and then about another couple inches get shoved back into the wound.

TRAVIS: What are you doing? Pull!

SAM: I don't know, I don't know how to do this! I'll just spend the rest of my turn drinking.

MATT: Okay. [laughter]

LIAM: Your head's in an esophagus.

MATT: All right, Caduceus, at the top of what would be the corpse's turn. You take another 21 points of acid damage.

TALIESIN: Cool. I ain't bothered.

SAM: You're dead?

TALIESIN: Nope.

LAURA: No, no, no, no, no, no.

TALIESIN: I'm fine.

LAURA: He healed himself.

MATT: Jester, your turn.

LAURA: I'm going to run up and try to yank them out.

MATT: Make an athletics check.

LAURA: Well, all right. At advantage because I'm really high on my kills?

[laughter]

MATT: Nah.

LAURA: That's okay, I didn't need it, that's a 20.

[cheering]

MATT: As Nott and Fjord are struggling, Jester waltzes up and grabs the back of Fjord's pants and just one big (whooshes), yanks both him and Caduceus out (thumps) like some extremely aggressive birth.

[cheering]

SAM: Call the midwife!

TALIESIN: Anyone down? Is there anyone down? I'm just sitting up. Anybody down?

MATT: You see Beau is passed out in the snow.

TALIESIN: I immediately am going to cast, oh, God, Spare the Dying on her.

[laughter]

MATT: Okay.

SAM: She's not, she's not dying.

TALIESIN: Are you sure? She looks bad.

LAURA: She's just kind of passed--

SAM: She's just being dramatic.

TRAVIS: What about yourself? You were inside the throat of that creature. Are you all right?

TALIESIN: Yeah, no, I'm all right. [laughter]

SAM: Fjord! You were incredible!

[cheering] [cheering]

You were pulling that load with such torque. It was amazing! You had four on the floor and you were just. You were stronger now than you've ever been before. If, if I weren't married...

[laughter] [cheering]

MATT: (laughs)

SAM: Also, if you had bull legs and a human torso.

LIAM: While this conversation is going on, the cat claw sort of disdainfully picks up the insect and drops it in the hole and just goes (thumping).

MATT: (splurting) Its body awkwardly stuffed into the remnants of its hole.

TALIESIN: Oh boy.

LAURA: We need to heal.

TALIESIN: Yeah. I'm going to sit down and start a Prayer of Healing, if we've got a minute.

LAURA: We should take maybe, like, a short rest.

TRAVIS: Long rest, at least, yes.

[laughter]

LAURA: At least a short.

SAM: We hiked for an hour? [laughter]

MATT: This was a few hours into your day.

SAM: Oh, okay.

MATT: I'd say you got about maybe say half a day's travel.

SAM: Okay.

LAURA: Short rest, let's take an hour and just sit here for maybe an hour?

TALIESIN: I mean, we can.

LAURA: Yeah.

SAM: Short rest, long rest?

TALIESIN: I don't, well.

MARISHA: I'm still unconscious.

[laughter]

TRAVIS: Do your thing and then we'll see where we're at.

TALIESIN: Okay, I'm going to take 10 minutes to just do a Prayer of Healing at level three.

MATT: All right.

TALIESIN: Because we're burning through them today. That's, where's my other d8? There we go.

TRAVIS: That fucking sucked.

MARISHA: Yeah.

TALIESIN: That's okay. Everybody gets 19 points back.

MATT: Not bad. [applause]

LAURA: Still feeling pretty rough.

TALIESIN: Mm-hmm.

SAM: We could probably make it.

LAURA: Sure. We just run into another one of those worms, we all die immediately, no big deal.

TRAVIS: For just a moment, we were moving through the trees, it came from underneath the ground. Is there any reason that we should move up to the side of the mountain and take the mountainside around?

TALIESIN: That's not a bad idea, actually.

SAM: But that's where the watchtower is, right?

TRAVIS: It's closer to it. We'd be out in the open, but I feel like those things could feel where we were coming from.

TALIESIN: That's really pretty smart, actually, I think. I don't know.

SAM: You know, he sounds smarter now, too.

[laughter]

It's weird. Everything you say, just say biscuit.

TRAVIS: Biscuit.

SAM: It's amazing.

TALIESIN: I suddenly want biscuits now, yeah.

TRAVIS: So the mountainside, is it worth it? Or do we keep going this way?

TALIESIN: (sighs) I don't think we can survive another one of those without a long rest, so.

TRAVIS: I don't either.

MARISHA: (gasps)

TRAVIS: Hello?

MARISHA: Did you die too? Who all died? Raise their hand.

TRAVIS: So many died. So many.

LAURA: Everybody did, Beau. You were not alone.

TRAVIS: All of us died. Caduceus saved us all, thank god.

MARISHA: Wow.

LAURA: If we take a short rest we can heal up, though.

SAM: Okay, we can short rest it.

LAURA: Just an hour?

SAM: Yeah.

MARISHA: Yeah, I'm great, I'm good. We can go right now if we really wanted to.

MATT: You have about three more hours of daylight, essentially, to travel.

TALIESIN: We could take the mountain for two more hours and set up camp and if we see anything iffy, just.

LAURA: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

TALIESIN: Unless you want to pull another 10 minutes to heal. Do you have a mass or?

LIAM: Caleb steps aside to Nott. Were you hurt much?

SAM: Was I hurt much?

LIAM: Ja.

SAM: No, I'm okay, I'm all right. I'm fine, are you all right?

LIAM: Not a scratch.

[laughter] [cheering] [cheering]

MATT: I'm going to make a note of that.

[laughter]

LIAM: Give me one game, one game.

LAURA: I mean, I can cast Pass Without a Trace on us and try to be a little more stealthy, you know? So maybe we can make less of a rumble as we walk across the ground and stuff.

TRAVIS: That's a great idea, yes.

LAURA: Okay. I'll do that. I don't have any healing spells other than Cure Wounds, though.

SAM: You're a cleric?

TALIESIN: I cast Mass Cure Wounds, so that was a lot faster anyway.

MARISHA: Yeah, you do know that Cure Wounds is like the healing spell more or less.

LAURA: I brought her back, she died, I brought her back. Did you see that?

SAM: No, I was fleeing. [laughter]

LAURA: I did it. I also killed those fucking things, but no big deal.

(laughter) [cheering]

SAM: Fair point.

TALIESIN: I mean, it'll tap out my spells, but I can do another, not entirely, but it'll, you know--

TRAVIS: No, no, save them. Cast Without a Trace, seems like a great idea.

LAURA: Sure.

MATT: You're Pass Without a Tracing?

LAURA: Mm-hmm.

MATT: All right, two to three more hours to travel, lasts for an hour, how many times can you cast it?

LAURA: I can cast it three times.

MATT: Well, then, I'll allow a single stealth check from all of you guys, not with advantage, with the bonuses of that.

LAURA: Okay. So I cast it three times.

MATT: You cast it three times in a row for three hours, so all of you go ahead and make your stealth check and this will be for all three hours as opposed to making it separately for each hour.

MARISHA: If you roll just hypothetical.

TALIESIN: Oh no.

MARISHA: If you roll a one, do you still get to add the plus 10 or do you still fail?

MATT: It's still a natural one?

MARISHA: I rolled a natural one.

MATT: But it's an 11 and a natural one.

MARISHA: Do I get to add my stealth too?

LIAM: Did you roll at advantage?

MATT: Yeah, add your stealth, too.

MARISHA: Wait, it's not advantage.

MATT: No one's rolling at advantage unless you have something that allows you to. Everybody gets a plus 10 because of the spell.

LIAM: Oh, okay, okay.

MARISHA: So 20.

MATT: 20.

MARISHA: My stealth is plus nine.

MATT: With a natural one, good to know. All right, Caleb. Caleb?

LIAM: 17.

TRAVIS: 27.

MATT: 27.

TALIESIN: 29.

MATT: 29.

LAURA: 24.

MATT: 24.

SAM: Natural 20, so 43.

[cheering]

LAURA: 28, I was wrong, 28.

MATT: All right, as you guys are carefully making your way around the side of the mountain, Beau is about to step on a pile of dry, rotted sticks and right as she goes to step, Nott is so stealthy--

SAM: (caws)

MATT: Nott swoops in, grabs the bottom of her foot, and adjusts it off of it and manages to make up for it. You guys manage to move forward unnoticed.

[cheering]

TRAVIS: Are you all right, you okay?

SAM: I got you, boo.

LAURA: She doesn't die every day, you know.

TRAVIS: That's true, yes.

SAM: Watch out for the--

LAURA: You didn't die-die, Beau. You just went unconscious.

MARISHA: Uh-huh, yeah.

MATT: All right, as you guys continue on for the next three hours, undetected, without issue, you eventually watch as the light in the sky grows darker and darker, forcing you to make camp. Are you making it on the mountainside or the forest side or right on the treeline?

TRAVIS: I would vote treeline, but.

SAM: I'll go with Fjord. He's been very lucky today.

LAURA: Can you make your thingy, Caleb?

LIAM: I can, but you are not worried in the treeline about things coming up from beneath?

TRAVIS: I thought it was--

LIAM: No.

TRAVIS: Oh, fucking nope. [laughter]

LIAM: No, but I could have it match the color of the mountainside.

SAM: We could find a rock to sleep on. A rock or like a big boulder or something.

TALIESIN: Well, the mountain's kind of.

SAM: Or the mountain, yeah.

TALIESIN: Yeah.

MATT: Fucking mountain.

TRAVIS: We should check the mountain to make sure it's actually rock or granite and not soil or something that could be burrowed through.

SAM: All right.

LAURA: I mean, yeah.

MATT: All right, who's checking for that?

SAM: I will poke the mountain. [laughter]

MATT: Make a nature check for me.

SAM: Nine.

AUDIENCE: Nein!

MATT: Nott eventually finds a nice, solid patch of stone.

TRAVIS: Of stone.

SAM: I think, at least two inches down, yeah. I just probed two inches down.

TRAVIS: What did you use?

SAM: My finger.

[laughter]

LIAM: Caduceus, you are used to living out of doors. Is this the best spot, what do you think?

TALIESIN: I mean.

SAM: Seems confident.

LAURA: What if we climb up and we sleep in the trees? That way we're not on the ground, the worm won't be able to hear us rumble.

SAM: The dome can't protect us in the trees.

LAURA: Yeah, but the trees can protect us in the trees.

TRAVIS: These sort of trees, what's the lowest hanging branch? How high?

MATT: As the pine trees, they actually start at about, some of them, like five, six feet and then higher from there. Depending on the size of the tree, the treeline, they're a little smaller, so around four to five feet, they begin.

TRAVIS: I mean, we could.

MARISHA: Okay, a new pitch. You, can you take your dome and put it upside down and we hang it in the tree and then we all just cradle together in the safety of a, you know, a bowl? [laughter] I'm not thinking clearly.

LIAM: We need to find this woman a place to rest.

[laughter]

LAURA: At least it would keep things from jumping up underneath us.

LIAM: I think it is a decent idea, yeah. Maybe go a little deeper in to higher trees?

MARISHA: Wait, are you actually going to do this?

[laughter]

LIAM: No, it does not work that way, no, but we could sleep in the branches. I think either that, or we pick a spot on the hillside and I throw up the dome.

MATT: What are you guys doing?

LAURA: Go up the trees.

SAM: Into the trees!

MATT: All right.

LAURA: Oh no.

MATT: It takes you guys a little bit of time to try and find a patch of trees. How are you staying in the trees?

LIAM: Well, I will-- hmm. I will turn into that giant ape again only white this time and climb around and find a sturdy place that can keep us relatively close together and ferry people up as needed.

MATT: Make a survival check.

LIAM: Okay.

MATT: Using the gorilla's wisdom.

LAURA: Gorillas are so smart.

[groaning]

MATT: As you guys prepare camp within the first hour of nightfall, as you get comfortable and lay down, you hear (ticks). (crunching) The whole canopy that you had set up camp snaps and falls out from under you. You tumble about 10 feet.

MARISHA: What?

MATT: Everyone suffers six points of bludgeoning damage.

SAM: (groans)

MATT: Your treetop canopy has broken. It has been an hour into night and you could hear the various sounds of nocturnal creatures beginning to come out--

TRAVIS: Mountainside, mountainside sounds good, yes. Let's go to the mountainside. Yes, let's go, quickly.

LIAM: Caleb just starts cursing heavily in Zemnian and is pulling out his spellbook and finds that spot and plants his butt down and starts ritual casting the hut.

MATT: You guys eventually gather yourselves to this spot chosen, Caleb finishes his incantation. The dome encases you all for what hopefully is an evening of well-earned rest as you all come to sleep, we're going to take a break.

[cheering]

SAM: That was intense.

TRAVIS: What the fuck, man?!

MATT: (laughs) You guys didn't roll well for stealth and on my table, I rolled that encounter.

TRAVIS: Your 6d10 can shove it!

MATT: I'm sorry. Anyway, we'll be back here in a little bit. Guys, enjoy your break at home and here in the theater. We'll see you for the second half of this adventure shortly.

[cheering]

Break
(upbeat music) ♪ You got the perfect warlock ♪ ♪ Her weapons and supplies ♪ ♪ But you need a place to track your stuff ♪ ♪ 'cause you're so disorganized ♪ ♪ You click open the webpage ♪ ♪ You heard about a Critical Role ♪ ♪ And now you're ready to kick some butt ♪ ♪ In that mineshaft full of gnolls ♪ ♪ It's D&D;, D&D; ♪ ♪ Yeah, D&D; Beyond ♪ ♪ Yeah, D&D;, D&D; ♪ ♪ Yeah, D&D; Beyond ♪ ♪ You got your stats, you've got your swords ♪ ♪ And you got your invisible wand ♪ ♪ It's D&D;, D&D; ♪ ♪ D&D; ♪ ♪ D&D; Beyond ♪ AMANDA: And that kind of validation, especially after being a fringe, maligned weirdo, always other kind of kid and then in a band that was always, like-- we were the weird ones. We were never cool. We were The Dresden Dolls. The Boston music scene hated us. We were the gay mime band. BRIAN: Mm-hm. AMANDA: We were never invited to the party. BRIAN: Yeah. AMANDA: Ever. BRIAN: Yeah. AMANDA: And we were, you know, we were a posse and we were like fuck your party. We have our own party. A party where everything is allowed, everyone belongs. We're allowed to have feelings. Fuck your system, fuck being cool, fuck your plaid shirts. We're not going to stare at our shoes. We're going to look at you and be like us doing this now, family, community, punk rock, here, let's do it. Like have a feather boa, here's a drink. Let's do this shit. (speakeasy music) BRIAN (VO): Last time on Talks Machina. BRIAN: Chris, our sound guy, got engaged last week. TRAVIS: Oh, shit! BRIAN: Chris, can you come out here for just a sec, buddy? He's been asking to come on camera and we just haven't had an organic moment. The mics'll be fine, buddy. We're just going to keep talking at this volume. TRAVIS: Get out here! BRIAN: Chris is our sound guys for Talks, Critical Role, Between the Sheets, almost everything we do here. TRAVIS: Come on! Get over here! BRIAN: Get your ass over here! Sit down, sit down, right here between these-- at the end of this thing. TALIESIN: Right there. BRIAN: Hi, Chris. Now you're going to have to talk pretty close into Taliesin's chest. CHRIS: Hello. BRIAN: Hey, you got engaged, man. Congratulations. CHRIS: Thank you. BRIAN: How long have you and your lady been together? CHRIS: About nine years now. BRIAN: Nine years! TRAVIS: Wow, congrats! BRIAN: Jiminy Christmas. TALIESIN: Awesome. BRIAN: So why now? Did we give you a raise or something and finally? CHRIS: Uh, no Contract trial is up. BRIAN: You had a nine year trial contract. CHRIS: Now we can fully get married. BRIAN: If only Ashley knew about those before we met. TRAVIS: (laughs) BRIAN: It would have been a much different story. Dude, congrats, man. CHRIS: Well, thank you, guys, very much. TRAVIS: Yeah. BRIAN: Chris ends up getting some love on Reddit, which is awesome, but he deserves a lot of love for how much you contribute to all the shows and you can really tell the difference when Chris isn't here during some episodes. TRAVIS: Yeah. BRIAN: But, anyway, get your ass out of here, man. That was enough. Fuck him. Does it help that it's your wife? TRAVIS: Well (sighs), no. Laura's just a fucking amazing performer, like, period. Like whether, you know, anything scripted or unscripted. Man, nobody catches the ball and throws it back better than she does, that's just for damn sure. She's so keyed into what's going on. That's an asset for any sort of a improv scene you're trying to score. BRIAN: We know you're watching, Laura, and we just want you to know we appreciate you and all these things we're saying, we really mean. TALIESIN: (snorts, laughs) BRIAN: Taliesin figured out Molly's accent the night he died. TALIESIN: Like 35 beautiful minutes. TRAVIS: (laughs) 35 beautiful minutes. Oh, yeah, I really feel like I'm getting the hang of-- oh, fuck. BRIAN: And then Ashly Burch came along and-- TALIESIN: Ashly texted me at Comic Con and sent a little, "there's a you-know-who cosplayer on the train." "Have they noticed you?" "They have not ID'd me as the murderer." (laughter) BRIAN: No way. Ashly. DANI: We don't blame you, Ashly. BRIAN: Ashly, I only bring that up every couple of weeks just so we get tweets. TRAVIS: And she goes, "No. "I just stood there." (laughter) BRIAN: That's hilarious. TALIESIN: I feel so bad. BRIAN: Taliesin, "This episode was one of the few times "we've seen Caduceus show emotional vulnerability--" vulnerability. I haven't been drinking since this morning. Drinking since last night. "--vulnerability about his personal issues. "How has he been coping "with not being around his family for so long?" We were just talking about this is the longest he's-- but how is he coping with it? TALIESIN: He's coping with it A because, thankfully, everybody around him is a mess, which there's nothing more, and I think this is true of anybody, there is nothing more calming than other people's problems. Other people's problems are just a delightful distraction. A real, especially after nearly dying, tripling down on the I am on a mission from God, from the Goddess herself to go save the world and save my home and save everything and realizing that if all of this gets taken care of, everything gets to go back to normal. That's-- it's that notion of if we just keep moving forward, at the end of this, I get rewarded with everything going back to the way it was. BRIAN: Yes. TALIESIN: So I mean, it's really just that idea that there's no other way to get to normality than to just keep pushing forward. BRIAN: Zach, do you have the PTZ ready to go? Has anything ever summed up Critical Role more than this pile here? TALIESIN: Oh, that. BRIAN: Has anything summed up Critical Role more than what you see on the ground right there? DANI: You're showing the magic. TRAVIS: Dollar, dollar bills, decapitated llama, Jester, a flask, and a katana, and a parrot? BRIAN: Two flasks, a pillow with my face on it. TALIESIN: Oh, yeah. BRIAN: It's just kind of-- that's so wonderful. That's how things go sometimes. TALIESIN: The llama head really ties it together. (static crackling) ("Clair de Lune" by Claude Debussy) LIAM: Subscribe or don't subscribe. Oh, that's not a question. Whether it 'tis nobler in the mind to ponder the pros and more pros of Twitch or Twitch Prime or to take hands and gift new subs to Critters who find they can't afford them. To play. To sleep. No more. And by a sleep to say the cast and crew of Critical Role might find their naps around the hectic schedule of a live broadcast that we have brought for your consumption, both Critter and fan alike. To play or sleep. No sleep, but just to stream. Aye, there's the rub. For with your subscription, what streams may come. Oh, man, oh, man, oh, man, that is a fucking tagline. Do we got that? Oh, that is Twitch poetry. Oh, anyway, subscribe to Critical Role. Use Twitch Prime to subscribe, gift some subscriptions-- you, you got it. Wrong soliloquy for the skull, but that's fucking good. (classical music) (dramatic music)

Part II
MATT: And welcome back.

[cheering]

TALIESIN: Oh, no, oh, no.

MATT: I do quickly want to point out that I think I've had this mini for close to eight or more years and it finally got used tonight, so I'm happy about that. [cheering]

TRAVIS: What is that?

MATT: It's a remorhaz.

LIAM: Remorazz, remorizz?

MATT: Yeah, remorhaz.

TRAVIS: Sure it is.

MATT: They're fun.

TRAVIS: Yeah, fun, fun.

TALIESIN: Are they?

MATT: Eight years I've been waiting to--

SAM: Matt, there's no giveaway tonight but I, I'm going to give away something. [exclamations] Would the person in seat double D-- thank you. DD9 look under their seat and they'll get a little special something courtesy of the cast of Critical Role.

[cheering]

SAM: That's it.

MATT: Wherever you are in the dark abyss before us, DD9, congratulations (laughs).

[cheering]

SAM: Back in the bad seats. I mean, the far seats.

MATT and LAURA: (laugh)

TALIESIN: I like balcony.

MATT: Perfect.

LAURA: How'd that rest go? Did we rest, did we rest?

MARISHA: We took a long rest.

MATT: You guys, safe within the dome created by Caleb, complete a long rest without issue. Go ahead and mark that on your character sheets.

LIAM: Holla!

MARISHA: Wow.

TALIESIN: Oh, wow. I'm going to manage some spells while we got a second.

LAURA: Yeah, same, same, same!

TALIESIN: I'm reevaluating a lot of things.

MATT: You now have about one more days of travel should you continue at the pace you've been going, uninterrupted. Are you guys moving with the same strategic grouping? The same marching order?

TALIESIN: It worked out okay.

TRAVIS: I don't think we need to protect the middle, I think, yeah. It's all right.

MARISHA: Yeah, I think you can fend for yourself.

TRAVIS: It's appreciated, but not necessary.

SAM: So you're in front then?

TRAVIS: Sure, I'm a member of this group, I'll be in the front.

[cheering]

MATT: Who's in the front with Fjord?

LAURA: Me.

MARISHA: I'll be with Jester.

LAURA: Me and Beau.

MATT: All right. Flanked by tougher ladies. [cheering]

MARISHA: (sings battle prep music)

MATT: Who's behind them and what order? Is it just the same three and three or?

LIAM: Well, I will be second to last and I will cast Mage Armor.

MATT: All righty, Mage Armor's up for eight hours, buddy.

TALIESIN: Yeah, maybe--

MATT: Who's at the back then? Is it going to be Caduceus or?

TALIESIN: Yeah, I'll take the back, and I'll keep an eye out for things.

MATT: All righty. Put Nott and Caleb in the center and then Caduceus at the back.

SAM: Nott Pocket!

MATT: Like a reverse flying V. All right, so, continuing stealthily?

MARISHA: What do we think, because, I mean.

LAURA: We should be stealthy.

MARISHA: Stealthy seemed to not do that much, though.

LAURA: Well, I'll cast Pass Without a Trace on us as much as I can.

MATT: How much can you cast it? Because you have about, I'd say, a solid eight to 10 hours of travel.

LAURA: I'll start out as soon as we're down off the mountain, I'll cast it, and then I'll cast, you know, just cast it a few more times throughout the day. So we'll have three hours of travel that will be stealthed, potentially.

MATT: So three out of eight to 10.

LAURA: Yeah.

MATT: You got it. All right, so for the first couple hours of journeying around the rest of the mountain base--

LAURA: I'll wait 'til dusk to cast it again.

MATT: Wait until dusk?

LAURA: Right, that's when scary things come out is dusk.

TALIESIN: I mean.

MATT: The fight you just had was during the day.

LAURA: Oh. I will wait 'til around the same time that the fight happened yesterday.

[laughter]

MATT: All right. That'll put you about five hours into your journey.

LAURA: Yeah, that's when I'll cast my third one.

MATT: Okay. That's when you cast your third one, you said?

LAURA: Yeah.

MATT: You're starting for the first hour?

LAURA: Yes.

MATT: All right, everyone roll stealth with plus 10, please. (laughs) Meteing this up into sections.

LAURA: Natural 20.

MATT: Nice.

[cheering]

SAM: 35.

TALIESIN: 27.

TRAVIS: 26.

MARISHA: 25.

LIAM: 23.

[cheering]

MATT: So first hour, you guys, like some trained, Navy SEAL shit, make your way through the edge of the treeline around the mountainside, down into the next valley. You can see the next large mountain pass ahead of you. You start making your way in there. Are you continuing for the second hour, to continue those rolls or do you want to?

LAURA: Yeah, let's keep with those rolls.

MATT: All right, so mark off another cast of Pass Without a Trace.

LAURA: Okay, okay, okay.

MATT: You guys continue with that, unnoticed, pushing through the valley floor now through the various thick elements of the pine forest ahead of you in the center of the alps.

MARISHA: Any like disturbed dirt that looks like holes that, like, a 12-foot worm could pop out of?

LAURA: Or melted snow, like--

MARISHA: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

MATT: Make a perception check.

MARISHA: Any signs, yeah. (laughs) 12.

MATT: Not yet. Third hour, are you continuing or are we?

LAURA: I'm going to wait--

MATT: You guys are now heading into the center--

LAURA: I'm going to, oh.

MATT: You're now beyond the first mountain, you're now down into the valley that leads into the secondary mountain.

LAURA: What do you guys think? Should we keep Passing Without a Trace in this valley area?

SAM: It's been fine.

TALIESIN: I'll say, personally, valleys kind of freak me out.

LAURA: We can keep it up for this next hour and then we'll be without it for like seven hours potentially.

MATT: Okay, third hour continues. You guys are now cresting into the very center of the low point of the valley. Hitting the base of the trough. The trees are at their thickest. The forest floor is not as snow-covered as a lot of it has been caught up in a canopy, but it is a soft floor, it is darker.

LAURA: I could use up my 3rd-level spell slots to keep casting it. Potentially.

MATT: You can use higher spell slots to cast it again if you want to.

TALIESIN: Does it change when you use it at higher levels?

LAURA: No.

MATT: No, it just gets used again.

TALIESIN: Yeah, all right.

LAURA: What do you think? No?

MARISHA: Eh.

LAURA: Okay, if you guys think we're--

MARISHA: Yesterday went great.

LAURA: We totally did, yeah.

MATT: So without?

SAM: Without.

MATT: I'm asking her, not you, Nott.

SAM: I'm drunk.

LAURA: I'm going to keep, I'm going to keep it up while we're in this deep valley.

MATT: Okay, you've got, I'd say, two more hours of travel before you hit the base of the next mountain, so you can either expend two more slots or just one and then roll again as you pass around the mountainside.

LAURA: I will use one more and then we'll roll again.

MATT: Okay, so, pushing now, you're about halfway through the day's journey, just cresting past that, you guys begin to hit the turn up of the rock formation to the base of the secondary mountain. Which direction are you traveling?

LIAM: Right.

LAURA: Right, to the right.

MATT: You continue onto the right side, curving around the mountain. Everyone make a new stealth check without the plus 10 bonus, please.

TALIESIN: Hey.

MARISHA: Yeah.

LIAM: 17.

MARISHA: 24.

TRAVIS: 21.

TALIESIN: Natural 20, 21.

[cheering]

LAURA: 18. SAM: 23.

TRAVIS: Fucking shit!

MATT: As the clutching shadows of Jester's magic fade, you all still keeping in step with Nott and those of the party who are a little more deft at avoiding being seen or causing a ruckus, as a group, you still manage to make your way through the final bit of the forest line, up towards the second mountain, around its base, and you continue on, do you want to continue with that stealth roll? You have one more roll for the last bit of the day as you come around the edge and begin to hit the next valley beyond.

LAURA: I mean, yeah. I don't think I'm going to cast it anymore.

MATT: Okay, now, since--

LAURA: Right? Yeah.

MATT: I need two people to make perceptions check for me. Who's keeping an eye out? All right, so both of you guys roll perception checks.

TRAVIS: Are those good movements?

SAM: Nope, they're not.

[laughter]

TALIESIN: 14.

SAM: Oh!

LAURA: Eight.

MATT: Okay. You guys come around the second mountain and looking out into the next valley, you can see three more mountains and a little, like a smaller valley between. You're not quite sure which direction to go towards, which one of these mountains.

LAURA: Southwest, which way is southwest?

LIAM: Well, that way is north. So southwest is that way.

LAURA: So we keep going southwest.

MATT: Okay, following Caleb's lead. Make one more stealth check as you guys push in to this final valley.

TALIESIN: Hey!

LIAM: Not good.

MATT: Caleb?

LIAM: 11.

MARISHA: 24.

TRAVIS: Four.

TALIESIN: 18.

LAURA: 13.

SAM: 20.

MATT: All righty.

TALIESIN: Oh, I don't, come on--

LIAM: Tarrasque.

LAURA: No!

[laughter]

TALIESIN: Should I mention that we are walking without rhythm. Does that help, does that?

MATT: Wrong universe.

TALIESIN: Damn it. Worth a try.

MATT: So as you crest through the base of this final valley heading in a southwest direction that you believe Caleb is properly sending you towards, not as quiet as you had hoped. However, you do manage to come upon the outskirts of a campground. You can see a little bit of smoke. Not black, but almost like a white-gray. It's been burning for a while and it's towards the end of its cycle as a fire.

MARISHA: Any sign of what kind of camp? Like trolls.

SAM: Summer camp?

MARISHA: Summer camp, space camp?

MATT: It's not a space camp. You do come upon a cluster of stones set around a fire but it's now embers left. The snow around it has melted for the most part with elements of slush and ice that have just slightly gathered around the outskirts of it. You can see a bit of the underbrush poking through. You can see elements of the floor around it has been mussed and shifted like there were bed rolls and other things set up in that space but have since vacated.

LAURA: What about footprints? Do we see any footprints?

MATT: Make a survival check.

LAURA: Okay. SAM: Survival.

TRAVIS: And vacated, no tents, no nothing like that?

LAURA: 15.

MATT: 15? You do see some elements of the brush that's been pushed down through weight in a rhythmic pattern in multiple places and they all lead loosely in the direction you're traveling.

LIAM: You said there was a circle of stones for a fire?

MATT: Mm-hm.

LIAM: Could I make an approximation of how long it's been since the fire went out?

MATT: Sure, make a survival check.

LIAM: Okay. 16.

MATT: It looks like the fire was meant to burn through the night and it is down to its embers and had been probably in embers for the past three to four hours. The fire, you're not sure when the people left, but the fire itself has not been a useful fire for that long.

LIAM: Ja.

SAM: You said the footsteps are going in the direction loosely that we're traveling?

MATT: Correct.

MARISHA: Do the footsteps appear large or we're too far away to know?

MATT: They look medium-sized creature.

TRAVIS: Can we scan the horizon, see if we see any creatures in the distance or looking?

MATT: You are in the center of the heavy forest right now, so there's no horizon to look at. There are treetops, tree trunks, and a little bit of the sky above you, you can see past the canopy, that's barely visible, other than directly above you.

LAURA: Can you climb a tree?

SAM: Beau, I'll race you to the top of a tree.

MARISHA: Deal, I go.

SAM: I'm going too!

MARISHA: Instantly.

SAM: I'm instantly going.

MATT: Acrobatics checks for both of you.

[laughter]

TRAVIS: Oh, shit.

MARISHA: Yeah.

SAM: 26.

MARISHA: 25. (exclamations)

SAM: I'm going to do some parkour shit.

MARISHA: I take my staff and I jam it under Nott and I try and trip her off the tree.

MATT: Make an attack roll.

MARISHA: Sorry.

TRAVIS: Not sorry.

LIAM: I thought I was the catty one.

MARISHA: 23.

SAM: Hits.

MATT: Go ahead and roll damage.

MARISHA: With my staff, right?

MATT: Well, if you're just trying to trip her up, go ahead--

MARISHA: Just trip.

MATT: Go ahead and make contested strength checks.

SAM: Oh, no, nope, nope.

MATT: This is a shove maneuver.

SAM: Two.

MARISHA: 14.

MATT: As you're getting up to the top and you're getting ahead of Beauregard, you just (whooshes), leaping up these trees, suddenly, there's a crack, a flash of white as a staff hits you right in the shoulder. And your fingers lose the grip on the tree.

MARISHA: Ha ha!

[laughter]

LAURA: (laughs)

MARISHA: Beau makes it to the top.

MATT: Go ahead and make a dexterity saving throw for me, please.

SAM: Am I falling?

MATT: You are about to be falling.

SAM: Unless I? A dexterity save or a check?

MATT: Saving throw.

SAM: 14.

MATT: 14 (whooshes), you catch a branch but Beau has gained a 10-foot lead on you.

SAM: Mage Hand! Pulling her hair.

[cheering]

MATT: Make a contested strength versus your-- d20 plus your ability modifier for your spell casting.

MARISHA: Wait.

MATT: Should be your intelligence.

MARISHA: What do I roll? Strength?

MATT: Strength.

SAM: Not great, 14.

MARISHA: 19.

SAM: (groans)

MATT: The Mage Hand tugs back at her hair and it comes off of the usual set bun.

MARISHA: Ow, ow, ow!

MATT: She pulls out of it, a few hairs pull out of the roots and are now left in the somewhat spectral hand floating in space, but you both continue keeping up.

MARISHA: I reach in my bag and I pull out a firecracker and I light it and I throw it behind me.

LAURA: No! You're attracting people!

MATT: Okay.

MARISHA: It's just a firecracker.

MATT: Lighting a firecracker, it isn't like a pull out and throw, you got to pull out (ticking), (sizzling). It's not a very fast maneuver.

MARISHA: Fuck that, too much time. I just throw the firecracker and hope I hit her in the face.

MATT: Okay. (laughter) Roll an attack with your dex bonus, no proficiency modifier because you're not proficient in throwing a firecracker.

MARISHA: Natural 20. (laughter)

MATT: This is the dumbest shit!

SAM: Oh my god.

TALIESIN: Of course now.

LAURA: Oh my gosh.

MATT: All right. You take a firecracker to the face.

[laughter]

You've certainly lost your lead. You guys are now neck and neck between two bits. I'd say you guys, both together, have one more push up this tree.

SAM: I'm going to shoot her with my gun.

[cheering]

MATT: Okay. Make an attack rolL.

MARISHA: Step of the Wind!

SAM: Attack is 21 to hit. (gun cocking) (booming)

MARISHA: Hit, you bitch.

MATT: All right, roll damage.

SAM: I'm aiming for her ass.

[laughter]

MATT: Roll damage.

SAM: I am shooting her with a gun.

MATT: This isn't with your crossbow?

SAM: No, with my gun! [laughter]

MARISHA: The one you have one shot for?

SAM: It's worth it! [laughter]

[cheering] [cheering]

MATT: All right, go ahead and roll damage.

LIAM: This is what Percy has wrought.

[laughter]

SAM: Oh, roll damage?

MATT: Yeah.

SAM: Okay, where's my d10?

MATT: d10 plus dex modifier.

SAM: Ooh, 14!

MATT: 14.

MARISHA: (yells)

MATT: Okay.

SAM: That slow her down at all?

LAURA: She's got a bullet in her ass.

MATT: Yeah, okay, so she takes it, if she wants to and continues onward.

MARISHA: Yeah.

LAURA: Musket ball.

MATT: Right in the ass. Not expecting, you hear the explosion sound of the gun firing and a sharp pain in your butt. Shit, probably should have deflected that.

LAURA: I immediately start scanning the--

MARISHA: Oh, that's right, I forgot I could catch bullets. But it was in my ass!

MATT: I know.

TRAVIS: Shot me in the ass!

MARISHA: Shot me in the ass.

MATT: And you learned, you learned a valuable lesson.

LIAM: You kind of did catch it.

TALIESIN: Clench, yeah.

MATT: You did, that's true.

SAM: Hot Pocket! (laughter)

MATT: So the downside is you did get shot in the ass.

MARISHA: Yeah.

MATT: And took 14 points of piercing damage. The bonus is with Step of the Wind, you make it to the top first.

SAM: Darn!

MARISHA: (yells) I have a lot of blood running down my leg, but fuck you. I win.

SAM: It was a fair race.

MARISHA: It was a fair race. I shake Nott's hand.

MATT: All right.

MARISHA: And then I let her go.

SAM: (yells)

MATT: Just flings you off down the treetop.

SAM: I'll Feather Fall.

MATT: As she slowly pummels, bouncing off, make a perception check from above the treeline.

MARISHA: Oh god, I hope I don't fuck this up. None of it was worth it, ooh.

LIAM: Holy shit.

MARISHA: Oh, okay, nine.

AUDIENCE: Nein!

MATT: The searing pain in your bottom is a little distracting.

LAURA: In your bottom!

MATT: You make out a couple of shapes at the base of the mountain, central to where you guys are facing, but you can't make out more detail than that. It's something.

MARISHA: At the base of the mountain?

MATT: Yes.

MARISHA: Okay.

MATT: Like just above the treeline.

MARISHA: Don't look at me like that.

SAM: Hmph!

MATT: You guys all gather again at the base of the forest, Beauregard conveys the inkling of information that she gleaned at the top of the tree.

LAURA: Are we scanning amongst the trees, seeing if anything was attracted by that giant ruckus?

MATT: You mean the extremely loud gunshot that echoed through the entire forest?

TALIESIN: Oh, I'm paying attention. SAM: Sorry.

MATT: Yeah, roll a perception check, both of you.

SAM: Sorry about that.

TALIESIN: Oh, for--! 12.

LAURA: 14.

MATT: 14, okay. You guys don't notice anything... yet.

TALIESIN: We should--

SAM: Maybe we should just keep going fast. Maybe we should just keep going.

MATT: Are you going full pace or are you going stealth--

SAM: Full pace, full pace.

TALIESIN: Also, I wanted to, before we leave, I want to cast Detect Magic while we were at the little campsite.

MATT: Okay. You cast Detect Magic as they're having this brief discussion.

TALIESIN: While they were running.

MATT: Right. Nothing catches your attention in this space.

TALIESIN: Cool, all right.

SAM: Let's just go. Our race caused a bit of a ruckus, Beau and I.

TALIESIN: Really?

MARISHA: Yes.

SAM: So we should probably just hurry as fast as we can.

TALIESIN: Yeah, we'll just--

LAURA: So we run the last bit of the day?

TRAVIS: Sure.

MARISHA and SAM: Sorry.

MARISHA: It was, sorry.

MATT: All right, for the last few hours, you guys continue pushing on, unstealthily, at a full run. As the light begins to darken in the sky, the elements of dusk beginning to slowly settle in, you hear it. (wolf howling)

[howling]

LAURA: That's a lot of wolves, you guys.

[laughter]

SAM: 2,000 wolves!

MATT: That's a lot of fucking wolves. They're getting louder and closer.

TALIESIN: From behind us or?

MATT: From behind and around you.

TALIESIN: I'm going to use Thaumaturgy to start a big earthquake behind us and start trying to scatter wherever I hear wolves.

MATT: Okay, you make a mild rumbling sound, as it is a cantrip.

TALIESIN: Yeah. I mean, it's about a thing to shake earth, so.

MATT: It does, it shakes the earth a little bit. Like under a person, sure. You fake some worms.

TALIESIN: Fake some worms.

MATT: Anybody else doing anything as you guys are running? All right, you guys are running. As you're heading towards the edge of the treeline, you can hear the howls getting louder and they're communicating and they're circulating and they're starting to pincer around.

[howling]

As you rush up through the edge of the treeline, you can see now, ahead of you, a dozen or so stone towers rising out of the snowy mountainside about 300 or 400 feet above. This is what you had barely noticed, this time without bird poop in your eye. You can see, it's got a cross about a mile or so at the base of this large crag. You can see four of them appear to be centered around a specific smaller structure that's barely visible among the ice and rock and at the edge, you can see about eight or nine heavy, fur-cloaked figures standing there.

SAM: Guards of some sort?

MATT: What are you guys doing?

LIAM: Well, the wolves are still howling behind us, yeah?

MATT: Yeah, and they're getting louder and louder.

[howling]

LIAM: Guys, it's okay. Caleb is a werewolf. [laughter]

LAURA: Should we put our hands up as we're running towards them?

TRAVIS: They're from this area, they know their wolves here. We should keep moving.

MARISHA: Yeah.

LAURA: Yeah, yeah, but it'll let us know that we're friendly as we run towards them with our hands up.

TALIESIN: How humanoid do these things in cloaks look?

MATT: Make a perception check.

TALIESIN: Okay. I'm going to try the bee die again. Ooh, that's okay, 25.

MATT: 25.

TALIESIN: Yeah.

MATT: A lot of them look squat and sturdy, dwarven in exterior form, some of them appear to be taller, a little more lithe, you see a combination of dwarf, elf, and other humanoids amongst these and beyond the eight that are facing you, there's others in the towers and in the vicinity.

TALIESIN: I'm going to call up to them then, projecting my voice: Travelers requesting sanctuary, we've got a wolf problem.

MATT: You doing the same, Jester?

LAURA: Yes, yes, yes.

MATT: Both of you guys make persuasion checks, please.

TALIESIN: Oh, okay.

SAM: All of us or just--

LAURA: No, just me and--

MATT: Just the two of them, since they are the ones raising their voices initially.

LAURA: Why?

TALIESIN: 22.

MATT: 22. And you rolled a natural?

LAURA: No, no, no. I rolled an eight.

MATT: Okay, okay. So as Jester starts shouting initially, you see a bunch of them raising their crossbows, their longbows, and mounting it. Caduceus puts up his hands, using Thaumaturgy to project the warning--

LAURA: I'm just yelling help, help, help, help, help, help!

TALIESIN: We've just got a wolf problem and we're requesting sanctuary, hello?

MATT: You watch as all eight of them (booms) fire (whooshes), release their arrows in your direction. (whooshes) Whizz past you and you can see as a group of wolves begin to emerge from the treeline (whimpering) some of them get knocked back. They go ahead and reload again as you guys begin to approach. (whooshes) A second volley and you can see about a dozen or so of these large wolves, similar to the ones that you guys had encountered in the first battle, charging, and a few more get hit. Eventually, they begin to split off and recoil back towards the comfort of the forest.

TALIESIN: Either they're friendly or they have terrible aim. Either way, we're pretty good. (laughter)

MATT: Yeah. As you guys rush up to meet them, you can see, they're all pretty haggard, definitely the type of dwarves and elves that spend most of their day out here patrolling the outside of a very tough, snowy, icy mountain range. They all give you a grimace and an acknowledgement nod, but definitely glaring at the eyes of, all right, outsiders, we left you alive, you know? So as you guys approach and slow down, feeling a little more comfortable in the space where they stand, what would you like to do?

LAURA: Well, hi.

MATT: One of them steps up, you can see, he pulls his hood back a bit. This is a male dwarf, you see long, tangled, black hair, big bushy beard that just (poofs) at the front of his face. You can't even really see his mouth. The mustache and beard merges, so he just talks, you can see it move and a voice emerges from somewhere within. [laughter] He just goes. "Hail! So, travelers, what-- What's your issue, what are you doing here?"

LAURA: Blessings be upon you. We're here for Dulgrim, right?

TALIESIN: Yeah. We were hoping, we're looking for someone?

LAURA: Dulgrim Smeltborne.

MATT: "You're looking for a Smeltborne?"

LAURA: Aye. [laughter]

MATT: "Let me look at you," and he walks over and begins, one by one, inspecting each of you. He goes up to Fjord and grabs the armor and suits you up and looks at your face from side to side.

SAM: He's harmless. [laughter]

MATT: Walks up to Beau, looks her over a bit.

MARISHA: I was shot in the ass, it's not-- It's not because, yeah.

MATT: Looks past Caleb and Nott. Looks at you, kind of like.

SAM: (teeth baring) Ah.

MATT: "You come with a goblin?"

LAURA: She's a really, really sweet goblin, mostly drunk.

SAM: Do you want a drink? I'll offer my flask.

MATT: "I like this goblin."

TALIESIN: Well done.

MATT: "All right, just be careful in there. If you're looking to get inside, just tell the guards that Senior Glassblade Birrat said you're okay, mention the Smeltborne name, that'll at least get you in the gates. Don't cause any business that's funny."

LAURA: I don't know, did he say Senior Glassbeard?

TALIESIN: Glassplate, Glassblade?

MATT: Glassblade.

MARISHA: That's a cool name, by the way, Glassblade.

LAURA: Glassblade!

MATT: "It's more of a title than a name, but thank you."

LAURA: Aren't you looking for glass or something?

TALIESIN: Well, I mean, not really.

MARISHA: Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what I was getting at.

LAURA: Wait a minute.

TALIESIN: I feel like you're reaching again.

LAURA: Can I look at the guy and be like: Is it green?

LIAM: What responsibilities does the title come with--

MATT: "We don't actually fight with glass. It's just a name."

LAURA: Where did it come from, though, do you know?

MATT: "I don't know, I'm not historian."

LAURA: Okay.

MATT: "You think I'd be out here if I was in the books?"

LAURA: No?

MATT: "Good, get inside." Puts his hood back up, takes out a piece of jerky, and rips it in his teeth, and goes to walk back to his patrol. The other ones are watching you, their hands on the sides of their various weapons, shrug their shoulders away and they go about, scattering amongst the perimeter, keeping an eye in case the wolves try and circle back.

MARISHA: For the people who are out here who read books, do I know what a Glassblade is?

MATT: Make a history check.

MARISHA: Oh, ja. 25.

MATT: Okay. What little bit you've heard of Uthodurn, the Glassblades, you understand as being the title of their essential military and ranger force that guards, hunts, and just looks over the perimeter of Uthodurn. You're not entirely certain what the source of the name was, but it's been the title of their military since Uthodurn was first founded, which was shortly after the Calamity. This place, you do know, however, has existed probably for between 600 to 800 years. With that history check, you know the elves are a comparatively recent addition. Initially, a pure dwarven society, the elves came after the destruction of Molaesmyr and the corruption of what is now known as the Savalirwood. They were essentially refugees and the dwarves allowed them sanctuary and have since created a dual society known as the Diarchy of Uthodurn.

LIAM: Diarchy?

MATT: Yes. That's what you get for a 25 history roll.

LIAM: Ja. Is this like a small, rugged place or very civilized and built out?

MATT: What you see right now on the side of the mountain, there are the towers, there's some perimeter fences, you can see a number of small buildings warmed by gentle firelight, thatched roofs. They're fit to be, you know, fairly sturdy in the months of harsh weather, which, as you've now noticed, occasionally blows through the alps here. You also can tell there are some winterbred horses and large goats that are kept outside of makeshift liveries and some of the perimeter guards, you can now see on the edges of it, are using these as mounts as they walk across and these are large goats, they're, you know, probably from foot to shoulder, about eight feet tall.

SAM: Goats?

LAURA: Goats, are they dire goats?

MATT: They're squat, so they're almost circular, but, what was the question?

LAURA: Are they dire goats?

MATT: They're not dire goats. You don't see any additional bony protrusions or a nightmareish hint to them, they're just large and sturdy.

TRAVIS: That's a big fucking goat, Jesus.

MATT: A lot of it's fur. You're not quite sure where the shoulder stands, but from the fur wreath around the head and that it stands about eight foot tall.

TRAVIS: If we yell boom! Do the eight-foot tall goats fall over?

MATT: You want to try it?

TRAVIS: Yeah.

MATT: All right, go ahead and make an intimidation check.

[yelling]

TALIESIN: Not even in the gate yet.

TRAVIS: Natural 20. [cheering]

LIAM: ♪ Now I'm lying on the cold, hard ground ♪

(screaming).

MATT: As the large, muscular, massive-shouldered goat with its square eyes, pupils, in some ways reminiscent up close, in the eyes, as to a moorbounder, turns around to you (smacking). What do you do?

TRAVIS: Boo!

MATT: (bleating) It bolts in the opposite direction (thudding), slams into the side of the gate. The gate (booms), splinters open and it begins running out along the side of the mountain. A couple of the other goats begin to follow the opening space and a bunch of the-- Glassblades begin to rush off to try and get them back into the fence.

[laughter] [cheering]

SAM: Walk away, walk away.

TRAVIS: Nott, how could you do that?

SAM: I'm sorry, I'm drunk!

MATT: The guards seem to not particularly appreciate your presence at the moment. Looking around, you do see a large, heavy gazebo-type roof structure in the center. You must face the gazebo alone. (laughter) You can see beneath the roof of it, there is a wide pit where the snow and the ice and the rock tends to give away and you can see probably 50, 60 feet across, from side to side, just a black, circular opening that descends deep into the mountain rock.

LAURA: Huh?

SAM: Are there stairs?

MATT: Do you approach it?

SAM: Yes!

LAURA: Wait, wait.

SAM: Yes!

LAURA: I mean, this is Uthodurn, right?

SAM: Yes.

LAURA: Okay, okay, okay.

TALIESIN: We're assuming.

MATT: May or may not be, you haven't asked the question.

LIAM: Seems like the outskirts. Are we in Uthodurn proper?

MATT: One of the guards that passes by, you see an elven man, hood still up. It's interesting, the features are pure elven, but you see elements of a reddish-brown beard that has emerged from the chin. He looks at you and goes, "Aye," and points towards the hole.

SAM: Oh, oh, it's down there.

LIAM: Down below, in the underground.

MATT: You glance over and you can see, now that you're getting closer, there are numerous spiral staircases that descend down, about 15 feet wide each, that continue on. There's railing around the outer edge and you can see there are guards posted there as well, keeping an eye on anyone going in and out.

SAM: Uthodurn. Earthadown. Maybe, it's like, maybe, I don't know?

MARISHA: It's Dwarvish. I actually speak Dwarvish.

SAM: Yeah, what does it translate to?

MARISHA: I, what does it translate to?

MATT: I'd say Uthodurn translates roughly to "the new under salvation."

MARISHA: Well, you see--

SAM: Let's go.

(laughter)

MATT: So you guys continue down this spiral network of staircases that descend for 100, 150 or so feet. There is railing on the edge to make sure that nobody plummets in, because the center of it is an open pit that just falls straight through.

TALIESIN: Well, that's a refreshing change of pace. (Matt laughs)

MATT: There are people that come up and pass by and you have to move to the side as you can see some other of these Glassblade rangers, you can see some people with backpacks, ready to face the elements, with heavy cloaks and heavy hoods, thick furs, and thick leathers and hides, passing by you as you descend deeper, deeper into this section of the mountain before, eventually, the staircase stop in what is like a large, semi-domed, a foyer path that is about a hundred feet across, side to side, and you can see multiple hallways that lead outward. The smell in here is that of wet earth, burned wood, soot, and an iron-like scent to the air.

LIAM: "Iron-like." Nott and I mess a lot with components. Do we know if it is something specific?

MATT: Iron.

SAM: (laughs) It's very iron-like.

LIAM: Could have just said iron.

SAM: It's ironish, it's ironic.

TRAVIS: What's the difference in the temperature from where we are now to where we were?

MATT: Much warmer. As you come down and you've made your way down the stairs, you're starting to sweat a bit beneath the thicker clothing that you've used to make your way through the open, snowy wastes of this mountain range.

MARISHA: Are there crickets down here?

SAM: Yeah, that's crickets.

MATT: That's interesting. Not what I wanted (laughs).

SAM: Careful, there's dire crickets everywhere.

TRAVIS: Under New Salvation: cricket haven.

MATT: All right, so what I was looking for was not cricket sounds.

SAM: ♪ Apple bottom jeans! ♪ Fur!

MATT: Don't you dare.

[laughter]

There it is, that's what I wanted. Thank you for your patience. All right, so. Coming down into this space, you can see it opens up into, on each side, pockets of almost barracks built into the edge of this where you can see numerous Glassblades are currently at watch or heading into buildings built into the side of this large dome, you can see little balcony pathways, you can see areas of the outside where different weapons and large bells are situated and placed up and hung against the side of the wall. There is a very wide opening, affront of you and to the left that seems to open up into a city. You can see a central, wide road, maybe 30 feet across, where various small carts and stuff are set up on the edges and buildings, as it slowly curves to the left.

LAURA: Wow. This is really cool!

TALIESIN: This is very, very nice. Let's maybe find a way to get ourselves situated?

LAURA: We should go towards the city.

TALIESIN: Oh, yeah, that thing.

LAURA: Yeah.

MATT: As you head out through the central tunnel and it opens up around you, this is a massive underground cavern, from floor to ceiling, probably close to 100 to 120 feet high and hundreds of feet wide, side to side. Like close to maybe 1500 feet or more. In that space, this wide, very, very pinched, from the top, arched cavern, there are just buildings that sprawl out. This is an underground neighborhood that continues. As it descends, it curves, like a gargantuan auger that just slowly spirals deeper and deeper into the earth. You can hear all manner of voices shouting and laughing and making comments and aggressive grunts as various individuals are coming through, carrying large mine carts filled with freshly-mined iron and other minerals from a mining works off to the far right that encompasses a heavy side of this entryway. To the left, you can see other residential buildings, which is interesting, because along the base of it, you can see more squat-heavy stone buildings, and built up against the wall, curving up, as the cave meets the edge of its sides, you can see more elven-based homes. In this weird in-between, you can see where the merging cultures between dwarf and elf, classically at odds, or at least very, very dissimilar lifestyles have come into this symbiotic existence together. There, amongst the people of Uthodurn, while primarily dwarvish, a lot of elves walking through. Elven children, couples of dwarves, and elves, and dwarf and elf together. It is a complete merger of the societies.

LAURA: Wow, so it is possible.

[laughter]

TRAVIS: We see the landscape moving down and to the left. You said the entrance into this area was a circle in the ground.

MATT: Right, it was like a spherical dome that the staircases came down with and then you had elements of barracks that went off to the sides and then one central opening that opened into this neighborhood.

TRAVIS: Does the cavern look like it's circular and that it moves down as if it was an enormous tunnel?

MATT: As if it was a large tunnel. You can see it's roughly hewn and there are numerous pillars throughout that rise up to meet the ceiling to both maintain the weight and give this grandiose, massively-scaled grand hall feel to it as you see people pass through, deeper into the city.

TRAVIS: I mean, we should move forward, yes?

SAM: Yes.

LAURA: Yeah.

MARISHA: Do we want to try and find a place to stay or?

LIAM: Yeah, maybe find a base of operations and start asking questions there and work our way outward.

SAM: Beau, you speak Dwarvish, maybe you should chat up a local.

TALIESIN: Is there a-- Yeah.

MARISHA: Okay.

[laughter]

I just, you know, I would like to point out that it was just in class. My teacher who taught me this was actually elvish. It was super ironic now that I think about it. So I haven't had a lot of practice with it.

LAURA: You'll be great.

MARISHA: Okay. I find a friendly-looking dwarf guard person?

TRAVIS: Are the Glassblades noticeable amongst everyone else that's walking around?

MATT: You do see a few, but they're mostly just patrolling the streets as would a townsguard you're familiar with in the Empire or, you know, Zhelezo would on the Menagerie Coast. They seem to be more essentially relegated towards the entrance and places where conflict would be more of a defensible position of conflict within the city, but they're scattered about. Otherwise, you see other folks across the town, dwarf and elvish and, occasionally, other folks as well. You see the sporadic human, the sporadic half-orc. They're not purely dwarf and elf, just primarily.

TRAVIS: What about smokestacks? Anything that would denote a fire or something?

MATT: You see a lot of firelight throughout some of the homes and abodes, but what you notice is a lot of the buildings that have that are clustered around the base of these large pillars and the chimneys are built in a slant that merge with the mountain itself. These pillars not just act as base pillars but seem to be in some sort of a funneling exit for the various bits of smoke and soot that are built up through the various works being done here.

MARISHA: Cool.

MATT: So you look around for, who do you want to talk to? A regular townie, you want to talk to one of the Glassblades? What are you thinking?

MARISHA: Yeah, I'll look for a Glassblade that just looks like he's on patrol.

MATT: Okay, you see a female Glassblade approach, similar armor. The heavy cloak is not present. It's a lighter cloak. Similar look and attire. The armor has a dull, gray-gold motif to it. You can see, across the front of it, there is an emblem. It looks like a sideways look of a warhammer. One half is white, like the hook part of the warhammer is white, the front, the blunt edge of the warhammer is black, and where they merge, there is a center, it looks almost like a yin-yang, where the two colors are opposite, symbolizing the merger of the two societies.

MARISHA: Okay, yeah. Hey, how are you doing?

MATT: She walks up. "I'm working."

MARISHA: Sure. We were just curious if you could point us in the direction of a local tavern or an inn, somewhere we could get some food. Maybe some rest.

MATT: "Here on the Volition Disc. Yeah, take the Auger Trail down about maybe five or six blocks and you'll see The Broken Stool."

MARISHA: Wait, what's that?

MATT: "The Broken Stool's a tavern."

MARISHA: Okay, okay. Five or six blocks on the left?

MATT: "Correct."

MARISHA: Any other taverns or that's probably--

MATT: "That's the one's closest here. It's got rooms."

MARISHA: Mm-hmm.

MATT: "I'm not going to guide you around the city."

MARISHA: Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, no, no, I'm just--

MATT: "It's not my job. I'm supposed to protect people. Keep the law from getting broken."

MARISHA: Yeah, yeah, you're doing--

MATT: "I'm going to go."

MARISHA: Okay, yeah.

MATT: She keeps walking, continuing her patrol.

SAM: You did great!

LIAM: Your voice becomes even more guttural than usual when you're speaking dwarven. Did you find a place?

MARISHA: Well, it has that guttural, like, (coughing) to it that you have to get. Anyway, yeah, I point us in the direction of the...

LAURA: Broken Stool?

MARISHA: Broken Stool.

MATT: Broken Stool. You continue on down, keeping an eye out, and eventually, you do come across a two-story inn with a tavern and the exterior, you can see, hanging underneath, the warm lit interior, just underneath where the outside porch is situated, hanging on a chain is a stool at an odd angle and it looks like it's missing one of its feet. It's partially broken off and that's just the symbol for its space here.

MARISHA: You know, it's got great theme-ing, it leans into its name. I'm into it.

TALIESIN: It has to lean. It only has three legs, it needs to, yeah.

MARISHA: All right, we go in.

MATT: You wander inside. It's comfortable, the tavern floor is wide here, like you're used to seeing, you know, you've been to a few wide taverns. The Hupperdook one was fairly expansive. This has probably 15 tables or so and about half of them are full. As you've now come into the dusk hour of the day, it looks like a lot of various miners have come out, miners as they work in the mine, not minors as in underage. (laughter) Though you're not sure what the drinking age is here in Uthodurn. Probably a little more lax being dwarven. So you see a number of these people covered in soot, tough-looking figures, some of them carrying various wounds of the job and look to be maybe issues with either miner collapses or creatures they've stumbled across and they're all just drinking and talking and sloshing around and chatting. There, at the far end of the bar, you can see there were a few male and female barhands in the process of setting up drinks and such and you see, standing, looking over, and shouting small orders to them, you see a female dwarf, older, gray-brown hair, it's pulled back into a messy bun that (poofs) from the back of her head. Thick mutton chops that come down right to the edge of her chin and stop. Looks like a series of scars across her chin and the edge of her clavicle. She looks to be the one in charge.

MARISHA: Excuse me, is it open seating or do we need to put in for a table?

MATT: "Yeah, you can certainly find something to sit, go for it. Take a bite, sit down."

MARISHA: Thank you.

MATT: "'Course, 'course. So this is your group here?"

MARISHA: Yeah, this is my posse, they're rolling with me, you know.

MATT: "Just getting drinks, are you getting food as well?"

MARISHA: Food, drinks, and you wouldn't happen to have any room? Rooms?

MATT: "We could probably squeeze two rooms in if you don't mind sharing, huh?"

MARISHA: Yeah, we're cozy.

MATT: "All right, I'm Luda, what's your name?"

MARISHA: Lunda?

MATT: "Luda."

MARISHA: Luda, Beauregard.

MATT: "You got to work on your "oh" sounds in Dwarven."

MARISHA: Luda, okay--

MATT: "That's fine."

MARISHA: I am new to it, so if you could just--

MATT: "I could tell."

MARISHA: Hmm.

MATT: "I'm not judging, actually, it feels nice that you're at least putting some effort into it."

MARISHA: Thank you.

MATT: "Not just assuming."

MARISHA: Luda.

MATT: "Aye."

MARISHA: I'm Beauregard.

MATT: "Pleasure. Where you from? You don't look like you're locals. You're all wearing some strange clothing."

MARISHA: Yeah, you know, we're traveling from Rosohna on a little bit of a mission.

MATT: "Don't know what that is, but good on ya."

MARISHA: Okay, good. Just passing through. We actually just came from Kravinraad.

MATT: "You went to Kravaraad?! That's the fucking volcano! What's to find there?"

MARISHA: An entire family of people, it turns out.

MATT: "Weird."

MARISHA: Yeah.

[laughter]

MATT: "I hope it went well, your reunion. Anyway, you want rooms, I got two rooms. They are," looking over here, looking for the, this would be, "per room, five silver pieces a night."

MARISHA: Oh, I toss her a gold and just...

MATT: "Look at that, exact change. Two rooms, here's your keys." Pass it over. [laughter]

MARISHA: What's the local beverage of choice?

MATT: "Ale."

MARISHA: Dope. Can we have a round over there?

MATT: "I think we can manage." She goes ahead and gathers up drinks, you guys find a table and kind of, after an exhausted journey, making your way to Uthodurn, you sit around, ale is provided, drink is provided, you have rooms for the night. What would you like to do?

SAM: Should we talk to the locals about Smeltborne or anything else--

LAURA: Or Dulgrim?

SAM: Yeah.

TALIESIN: Smeltborne, at the very least, we should start--

LAURA: Does anybody speak Common?

TALIESIN: I mean, I do.

LAURA: Oh.

[laughter]

TALIESIN: Yeah.

SAM: I think she meant the locals.

LAURA: Hey, Caduceus, do you know where Dulgrim Smeltborne's place is?

TALIESIN: Not off the top of my head.

LAURA: Okay. Maybe we should ask somebody else, then.

TALIESIN: That's fair.

MARISHA: Are people speaking Common, or are they all pretty much speaking Dwarven and Elvish?

MATT: Actually, no, there are conversation in Elvish, there are conversations in Dwarven, and there are conversations in Common. Common is, believe it or not, a common language here. [laughter] Especially as part of the unification of the Diarchy, so, yeah, it looks like common is readily used here, but all languages flow freely, probably in even amounts.

SAM: Anyone around the tavern who looks like they're the center of a conversation or holding court or have a lot of friends around them?

MATT: Make a perception check.

SAM: Oh, I'm good at that. 10.

MATT: You see one elf who is wearing some sort of a leather apron of some kind. It's a bit covered in dirt and smoot. You can see his face is also smudged. He's got a little bit of a tickle of whisker across the bottom of the chin. Short, dark hair. Kind of ruddy-textured skin. Couple of burn marks on the edge of his hands, looks like he's probably done some hard work in his time. He's laughing and he's telling a story around a couple other friends.

SAM: Elf or dwarf?

MATT: He is elf.

SAM: Elf, I'll go over to him and: "Hello, stranger, can I, can I contribute to the delinquency of you miners?"

[laughter]

MATT: The whole table stops talking and laughing and turns and looks at you.

SAM: I mean, can I buy you a drink?

MATT: "By all means."

SAM: A round of whatever they're having over here, please. Hi.

MATT: One of the barhands comes by, it will cost you, for everyone at the table, it should be six people, ale, that'll put you back about three silver pieces.

SAM: I'll give them three silver.

[laughter]

MATT: The barhand goes, "Oh, exact change, great."

[laughter]

The elf looks to you, goes, "Thank you very much for your patronage."

SAM: Ah, we're just new, me and my friends are new to town and we were wondering if any of you lot could maybe give us some tidbits about your fine village here, your town, your city center, your capitol--

MATT: "You're saying you're not from around here, goblin."

SAM: No.

MATT: "Funny. I wouldn't have guessed. Yeah, that's fine. For the round of drinks, I'll tell you. Welcome to Uthodurn. The central road here is the Auger Trail. It wraps around multiple times. On the way down, there are three discs. There's a Volition Disc, which you're currently in."

SAM: Bolition?

MATT: "The Volition Disc."

SAM: Volition Disc?

MATT: "That's the top level. It's the oldest of the regions. Houses most of the citizens. Following that downward, you come to the secondary which is called the Deliberation Disc or the Liber Disc for short. That's divided by a series of wide pillars and lofty, heavy steel gates between them. Utilize, they're a means of protection in case warfare ever found its way here, so don't worry. Heading past down the Deliberation Disc, there's," looking in my notes, "the Grand Disc. That there is the bottom disc. That's where a lot of the rich folk live, right there on the cusp between that and the Deliberation Disc. The base of there is where the Luddenbrock Mines are. It's also where the Grandcast Citadel is. That's where most of our town is, you know, lawfully taken care of, I guess you'd say. Looks like a frozen tornado, it's crazy."

SAM: Wow. You are amazing, thank you so much for that information. We're looking for a fellow named--

LAURA: Dulgrim Smeltborne.

SAM: Dulgrim Smeltborne.

MATT: "Smeltborne, Smeltborne, that's a smithy, right?"

SAM: Yes.

MATT: "Smithy, right? If I recall, that's probably, that's in the Deliberation Disc. Can't recall where exactly. I haven't been there myself but I've heard about it, so you can go ahead and look. It's a little ways further down. Maybe about hour, hour-and-a-half walk."

TALIESIN: Just for giggles, is he telling the truth?

MATT: Make an insight check.

TALIESIN: Cool. 21.

MATT: 21.

SAM: Whispers. [cheering] Guys, the D&D; Beyond Presidential Campaign has come to an end. I can't wait to claim victory. [laughter]

TALIESIN: I take out my dagger and now, just kidding, okay.

MATT: (laughs)

TALIESIN: (stabbing)

MATT: (grunting)

TRAVIS: Can we all see who Nott is talking to?

MATT: Yeah, and you can see across the table. You notice this, too. They seem charmed with this little goblin that came up and bought them drinks and is asking about the town and you get the sense that maybe goblins aren't very prominent up north. There's less of an immediate judgment here.

SAM: I like it. Caduceus.

TALIESIN: Yeah?

SAM: I did what you always do, I just went and told the truth and was nice and they were nice to me.

TALIESIN: That was very impressive, I actually was watching all of that, that was really good.

SAM: Yeah, it felt good. They didn't throw anything at me and--

[awwing]

And, I think, if I play my cards right, I might be able to steal from them later.

[laughter]

TALIESIN: I'll make you a deal. If we don't steal from the first people that we meet down here, I'll definitely not be mad about you nearly blowing me up again.

[gasping]

SAM: Okay.

MATT: (laughs)

TALIESIN: Does the wink mean yes okay, or does the wink mean no?

SAM: Sure.

TALIESIN: Just the-- you're really hard to read, you know that?

SAM: Yeah.

TALIESIN: Oh, boy.

LAURA: What time of day is it?

MATT: At this point, it's probably just sunset.

LIAM: It is exactly sunset.

LAURA: Oh, okay.

MATT: So pushing 8:00 in the evening. There's still a whole night ahead of you.

LAURA: So Dulgrim is like four centuries old, so he probably was in bed like five hours ago.

(laughter)

SAM: Maybe he's watching his stories?

LAURA: Maybe. [laughter]

TRAVIS: "Watching his stories."

LIAM: Why don't we plant ourselves here for the night and go over at a decent hour in the morning?

SAM: That sounds good.

LAURA: I like it.

MATT: Okay. You guys settle up for the evening. Your rooms are adequate. It's not extremely comfortable, especially not Lavish Chateau level, but you have a bed, you have door that locks, you have a chair and a table. Both rooms contain these things and that's it.

LIAM: Before everyone goes to bed tonight, Jester.

LAURA: Hm?

LIAM: Do you have the ability to send any messages?

LAURA: Yes.

LIAM: That music is lovely. Would you do me a favor and contact Essek and see what our, what their timeline is for the, the Vollstrecker.

LAURA: The what?

LIAM: The Scourger in their prison that they have.

LAURA: Yes, yes, like how long they plan--

LIAM: If they can still hold a while longer. I would like them to hold a while longer if they can.

LAURA: Yes, I will definitely do that. I am going to send a message.

[laughter]

To Essek. " Hi! Here with Caleb. Just wondering, can you keep that Scourger alive a while longer, please? [laughter] He wants it kept alive for a while longer, please. What do you think? I don't know how much time...."

MATT: As you trail off, Essek eventually responds. (laughs) "Jester. I will do what I can, but my power is still limited against that of the Dynasty. House Kryn, the den has no interest in keeping the prisoner alive much longer. I shall try."

LIAM: Yes, no?

LAURA: Well, he said that it is going to be hard for him because they don't really care and they want to kill the Scourger, but he's going to try real hard to keep the Scourger alive a while longer. But it's not really up to him.

LIAM: Do you have one more in you?

LAURA: Ja.

LIAM: Could you tell him that while the chances are slim, there is a chance because of my history I could maybe learn something that would help them.

LAURA: Yes. I definitely can do that in 25 words. I've just got to think for a minute about how I'm going to phrase it. Because of your history, you think you could learn something about yourself from the Scourger.

LIAM: Ja.

LAURA: Okay. I'm going to send a message to Essek. "Caleb thinks that because of his history, he may be able to learn something about himself that would help you guys if it's alive. You pooping?"

[laughter]

TRAVIS: (laughs)

MATT: Sadly, I do not think the last bit made its way through. But Essek responds. "I will do my best. I make no promises but will implore the mercy." (farting) "Excuse me. [laughter] "I had to drop a dunamis." (laughter)

SAM: Oh, no.

MATT: No, but--

LAURA: (laughs)

MATT: "I will do my best, but no promises."

LAURA: He said he's going to try real hard. He's going to do his best, but he doesn't know if they'll listen to him, but he's going to try real hard, he just can't make any promises.

LIAM: Okay. Why did you ask if he was pooping?

[laughter]

LAURA: I just thought, you know, because you guys said that sometimes I may be interrupting people or something.

[laughter]

When I'm casting my spell and so, you know. I don't know, maybe he didn't want to be bothered or something. Although, I think, you know, if you were pooping, that's the best time to send a message. [laughter] Because what else are you going to do, you know?

LIAM: I, I think you are correct. It is the best time to send the message, but maybe not the best time to receive a message.

LAURA: Oh.

SAM: Do you think he floats over the seat so he doesn't have to put down?

[laughter] [applause]

You know, one of those things? It's very sanitary.

LIAM: Listen, I have read a lot and those Kryn toilets are amazing.

MATT: Is there anything else you wish to accomplish before bedding down for the evening?

LIAM: Thank you, thank you, Jester.

MATT: All right, you guys head to your rooms--

SAM: Bed down for the night?

MARISHA: I guess so.

MATT: Okay. A nice evening's rest amongst rooms that are passable, but an evening without worry. Door's still securely locked and I assume, Caleb, doing his general evening rigmarole.

LIAM: Every night, every night.

MATT: Yep. Morning comes to you, at least, you acknowledge it's morning. Once again, another day awakening within a subterranean cavern. Sunlight mornings have been a very spotty thing in recent adventures and travels for you guys but you come to consciousness. You come to a breakfast that is included as part of the evening. It is hearty, is made of no fancy fruits and, you know, tropical Menagerie Coast elements of a breakfast dish. It is mainly meats and hearty roots, potatoes, with a little bit of garnish of green, you're not quite sure where it came from.

LIAM: I'm into it.

SAM: Yeah.

MARISHA: Caduceus, what is this green thing? Is it a fungus? It's a fungus, isn't it?

TALIESIN: Is it a fungus?

MATT: Make a nature check.

TALIESIN: All right.

MATT: Make a nature check to assess breakfast.

[laughter]

TALIESIN: I mean, 17.

MATT: 17, it's fungus.

TALIESIN: No, yeah, no, yeah, it is.

MARISHA: You eat it first. Is it good?

TALIESIN: It's garnish, isn't it?

MATT: Maybe.

TALIESIN: It's all right.

MATT: But it's not bad.

TALIESIN: It's pretty good.

LIAM: Give it to Caduceus, he'll try anything.

LAURA: Caduceus, do you want my garnish because I know you aren't going to eat your meat. I don't want you to go hungry.

TALIESIN: Free garnish, all right. I nibble. [laughter]

MATT: Caduceus, the garnish hoarder.

TALIESIN: Yeah. Somebody got to eat the parsley, man.

MATT: There's a couple of plates left out from folks that have finished their breakfast, the garnish still left on the side. You're picking up the dead soldiers of other people's meals.

SAM: All right, so we'll go see, go down and see the guy?

LAURA: Dulgrim.

TRAVIS: Head down to the Deliberation Disc.

LAURA: Is it the deliberation or the liberation?

MATT: No, Deliberation Disc is what it's called, but you heard it referred to as the Liber Disc.

MARISHA: What's the one that we're on called?

SAM: We're on Volition.

MARISHA: Volition?

MATT: You're in the Volition Disc which is the top, then there's the Deliberation Disc, then there's the--

SAM: Can we find the elevator down? The stairs down?

MATT: There we go, the Grand Disc.

SAM: Is it the same spiral staircase down?

MATT: No, actually, the spiral staircase was only the entrance to the city. The rest of it is just one, wide, spiraling cavern, like a corkscrew that goes deeper and deeper.

TRAVIS: Down and through we go. SAM: All right, let's go.

MATT: All right, continuing past the city, now bustling in the morning, it's crowded. The evening was not quite as much, maybe it's just the culture has grown over time, it's the combination of the two, but I wouldn't say overpopulated, but it's a very crowded city. As people are moving through and pushing past, they're going off to business, they're going off to various work appointments, they're going to get ready for their shift, looking at the outskirts of the city. Some of them are just taking their kids who are screaming through the streets to try and get them fed. It's fairly bustling at this hour. As you push through, also, you can see the various, the pillars, you can begin to see the metal gates that connotate the end of the Volition Disc. There are the pillars that hold up the central parts of the cavern every hundred or so feet. These now hold aloft these thick, metal, like dark, dark metal gates that look ready to drop at any given point in time. They're partially embedded in the ceiling above it. You can see now, this place is designed to essentially lock itself down from various defense positions should it be attacked from one or the other direction. The pillars that are not affixed to these gates within and beyond that, you can see up to the top, there are homes, largely of elven design that are built at different heights along it. It looks like they're starting to make use of whatever space they can to give more housing. It's a very unique, patchwork cluster of different aspects of your own world experience with both cultures all jammed into this weird, beautiful tapestry. Continuing past the metal gates deeper into the Deliberation Disc, you do, if I have my notes here, you can see floor to ceiling with homes and emporiums. This place is the bustling market center of the city. There are all manner of shops and carts and the smell of different foods being cooked and dried and smoked all throughout the main street. There are barkers and people just shouting out to get your attention and the attention of those going by, most folks just push through. They're not paying attention unless their business is to go there. Who's keeping an eye out for your destination? All right, go ahead and make a perception check.

TALIESIN: 21.

MATT: 21. As you guys glance through, you, thankfully, are probably one of the tallest if not the tallest--

TALIESIN: Oh, yeah.

MATT: -- person in this city at this moment. Glancing above the crowd, you do see a massive temple that holds the symbol of Moradin, which is the dual-sided warhammer with a dwarven face on each end. You can see as it rises up to this pinnacle and there, this anvil sits on top where that emblem is emblazoned across it. Just beyond that, you see a sign that you swear says Smeltborne that is dangling from the outside of some sort of a heavy, stone building glowing from the inside of the open door.

TALIESIN: I think that way.

SAM: Great.

TALIESIN: Yep, yep, that's, yep. Yeah, wait, yeah.

MARISHA: I look behind us, are we being followed? Or I look around.

MATT: Make a perception check.

LAURA: I look for a bakery.

MATT: Make a perception check (laughs).

TALIESIN: I also want to--

MATT: Both important rolls.

MARISHA: Natural one.

LIAM: Give us a 20!

LAURA: No, that would've been amazing.

TALIESIN: I also would like to--

LAURA: 11.

MATT: You also would like to--?

TALIESIN: Check our pockets to make sure we haven't been pickpocketed. I've been to town before.

MATT: Okay.

[laughter]

No pockets picked. No sign of being followed. And, yeah, there's a bakery. (laughs) You come up to what's called The Softer Stone Forge, is the name of the bakery.

LAURA: That's so cute.

MATT: It looks really like pretty rough-hewn on the outside, it doesn't have any sort of color that would present itself as a bakery beyond just the title, but you can recognize the smell.

LAURA: Yeah.

MATT: You recognize it immediately and as you approach, the door, which as opposed to a door that opens and closes, it's like a saloon that pushes open and then flaps back.

LAURA: (whooshes)

MATT: As you push through, on the inside, you can see a baking kiln and sheets and sheets of rough iron that contain these risen dough pods and cupcakes that are in the process of being frosted. [laughter]

LAURA: Dough pods!

MATT: You can see a young elven girl with a short, combed over, quaffed to one side, look up to you, her face, a little bit of frosting pushed on one cheek goes, "Can I help you?"

LAURA: Hello, beautiful. I would very much like to try some of your wonderful baked goods here in the fabulous city of Uthodurn.

MATT: "My what an entrance, certainly. How many would you like?"

LAURA: How many have you got?

MATT: "I've got plenty. We've got blue ones, flavored like blueberry. We've got black ones, flavored like black moss. We've got--"

LAURA: Black moss?

MATT: "Have you not had black moss cupcakes? Are you serious?"

LAURA: (tearfully) No!

MATT: "Well, I'm going to put about four or five into that one for you."

LAURA: Okay, okay. And the blueberry, just like--

MATT: "And the blueberry."

LAURA: And what else?

MATT: "Okay, well, what do you like? Do you like more sweet--"

LAURA: Yes.

MATT: "Do you like more savory?"

LAURA: No.

MATT: "All sweet, okay. I'll give you this one and I'm going to do a baker's dozen mish mash. This is your first time, here you go. This'll put you back about four silver pieces."

LAURA: Oh my gosh. I give you five silver pieces.

MATT: "Thank you for your patronage."

LAURA: You're welcome. I'm very excited, I immediately take out the black one and shove it in my mouth.

MATT: All right. At first, it has a charcoal, earthy flavor and you're immediately disappointed. But then the cream filling kicks in and the subtle after flavor has almost like a matcha, green tea with a hint of sweet to it. It's not super sweet, but it's very unique and not bad by any means. It wasn't what you were expecting, but not bad.

LAURA: This was worth the entire trip.

[laughter] [applause]

MATT: "Why, thank you very much for that."

LAURA: Okay, I'm going to see you tomorrow and probably the next day and maybe--

MATT: "Any day, we'll be right here."

LAURA: Later on today, okay, bye. (yelling) You guys!

MATT: Jester arrives. LIAM: What do you have there?

LAURA: I have cupcakes, there's this really good--

LIAM: A lot of them?

MATT: Well, how many do I have, 13 here, one, two, three, four, five, six, so good, that's one for each of you and the rest for me.

[laughter]

TRAVIS: They're so dark, are they burned?

LAURA: No, it's called black moss.

TRAVIS: Oh.

LAURA: You should try it.

LIAM: I start to eat the blueberry one.

LAURA: You are missing out. You can get blueberry cupcakes anywhere.

TALIESIN: These are very good.

LIAM: Maybe so.

MARISHA: Caduceus, is it fungus?

TALIESIN: It's just very chewy.

LAURA: Fjord.

TRAVIS: Yes?

LAURA: Have a cupcake.

TRAVIS: No.

LAURA: Yes, Fjord.

TRAVIS: No, I-- [laughter] I'm not a fan of dark-looking sweet--

LAURA: (thumping) [laughter]

TRAVIS: This is lovely.

LAURA: Are they good?

TRAVIS: (choking)

LAURA: No. I will carefully close the box and keep them very not shaken and put them as carefully as I can into the Haversack so that the frosting doesn't get smushed around.

MATT: Okay, the box is too large to put in there because the Haversack is a series of small pouches, so you may have to put them in individually.

SAM: Or just eat them.

LAURA: I'm going to carry the box gingerly.

(laughter)

MATT: Fair enough.

TRAVIS: Shall we go on then?

LAURA: Yeah.

MATT: Okay, then. You guys continue following Caduceus' lead. You make your way towards the outskirts of Moradin's Mantle, that's the name of the temple. On the inside, you can see there are numerous reliefs and statues of the Allhamer, Moradin. There are numerous crafts that are brought and set upon there as part of the worship. You can see the inside has almost like a miniature, I want to say like a museum of various things that meant a lot to the worshipers of Moradin. Beyond that, as you pass by, you see the specific location that Caduceus has sussed out from a distance and you can see the Smeltborne sign saying the Anvil of Smeltborne emblazoned on a wooden sign hanging from a very nice, well, well-made forge and blacksmithy.

TRAVIS: Seeing that temple, Caduceus, I'm rather new to the whole deity thing, is it worth us going and leaving something, some sort of offering as we pass through?

TALIESIN: I imagine it always is. The question is what sort of offering is appropriate to leave.

TRAVIS: To the Allhammer?

TALIESIN: To the Allhammer.

MARISHA: Do you have a hammer?

TRAVIS: I don't have shit.

MATT: Make a religion check if you'd like to think of something.

TRAVIS: Sure.

MATT: That might befit the Allhammer.

TRAVIS: Oh, 18.

MATT: 18. The Allhammer really appreciates the process of creation, whether that be crafting or making or forging or whittling or building, the essence of a life creating something outside of itself, beyond progeny of any kind, is, in itself, an act of his joy and will. So whatever you could make, big or small, generally, is considered a good offering.

TRAVIS: Jester, was there anything you'd like to create as an offering to the Allhammer as we pass through? You do have-- oh.

MARISHA: You knew. You knew.

TRAVIS: I forgot. That's my, my fault, my fault.

LAURA: I'm going--

TRAVIS: Nope, mm-hm.

LAURA: What would you like me to make?

TRAVIS: Whatever you like!

LAURA: I'm going to paint on the ground with my miraculous paint.

MATT: Okay.

LAURA: A stone hammer, but it's going to be a hammer with a dick and then the two-- (laughter)

MATT: Just waiting for it.

SAM: It's a ball peen hammer.

[cheering] [cheering]

LAURA: I'm going to place it very gently in front of the--

MATT: All right, you can see this very, very old dwarf with this long, thin beard and mustache that curls down towards his belly and it goes yellowed at the tips, completely bald on his head with liver spots and his eyes have heavy wrinkles underneath, robes on him, heavy chains around his neck. He looks almost like a maester from "Game of Thrones," with a heavy anvil at the base of his thick chain necklace and he goes, "Thank you so much, dear," and gives you a nod.

LAURA: Blessings be upon you, my child.

[laughter]

MATT: He looks down at it and goes, "Huh?" As you walk away, you see him pick it up to inspect it. All right. You guys are at the outskirts of the Anvil of the Smeltborne.

SAM: Let's go in. Who has the sword that we're going to--

TALIESIN: I do.

SAM: You have the sword?

TALIESIN: Yeah.

SAM: All right, whip that shit out, let's go.

TALIESIN: Well, let's, let's have a conversation first.

TRAVIS: Let's locate the man first, shall we?

LAURA: Let's have a conversation, or let's have a conversation with him?

TALIESIN: With him.

LAURA: Okay, good, I don't want to talk to you guys anyway.

TRAVIS: Can we go up and approach the entrance?

SAM: Dulgrim!

TRAVIS: Maybe a little--

SAM: Dulgrim!

TRAVIS: Okay, whoa.

SAM: We're here.

MATT: All right, so as you're approaching the door, the door which is partially open, you can see the warm glow inside and you can hear this hammering of metal, like, ting, like that.

SAM: Oh, shit.

[laughter]

How did you do that?

MATT: Purely accidentally.

SAM: No. You're a demon.

MATT: You're just shouting Dulgrim?

TALIESIN: I'm going to, to knock on the door and gently--

MATT: The hammering stops, you hear some footfalls and the door opens and you see a younger dwarf, sweaty, his fine, long, blond hair that's tightly braided behind his head that goes almost to his mid-back. He has his chin area shaved and this heavy, heavy mustache that's braided in two braids that dangle past his waist, but they're tied to his sides so they won't get in the way of his work. You see him wearing a leather apron, leather gauntlets, and he's clutching a smithy hammer in one hand and he comes to the door and goes, "Sorry, you were saying, what were you saying? Were you saying Dulgrim?"

TALIESIN: We were hoping to have a conversation with a Dulgrim Smeltborne?

MATT: "I take it you're not from around here, are you?"

LAURA: No, we've come a very long way to talk to him.

MARISHA: Why, is he dead or something?

MATT: "Yes, he passed away about four years ago."

MARISHA: Fuck!

SAM: She means we're sorry for your loss.

[laughter]

Many blessings be upon his memory. Did he have an apprentice or a son or daughter or?

MATT: "I'm Umagorn, I'm his son."

SAM: Did he teach you his ways?

MATT: "No," as he holds up his blacksmithy hammer.

[laughter]

TALIESIN: We have a deeply complicated job that we were hoping to find someone to help us with. May I show you what the--

LAURA: We brought cupcakes.

SAM: And money. [laughter]

MARISHA: And booze.

MATT: "Get the fuck in."

[laughter]

You guys enter and you can see there is an assistant, this very young, probably mid-teen elf girl who is also similarly dressed and is currently the assistant to the forge, who's holding the heavy metal tongs and you can see her holding a metal blank for some sort of a weapon and is just in the process of wiping her brow, looking over at the rest of you and gives a wave. As he walks and he takes his gauntlets off and slaps them down on top of one of the side by tables, turns around, "All right, cupcake?"

LAURA: Which flavor do you like?

MATT: "Pick one."

LAURA: Ooh, I'm going to give him a blueberry one.

MATT: "Alcohol." Swishes it around in his cheeks.

[laughter]

"You have my attention, so, you're looking for my dad. What for?"

TALIESIN: Cut to the chase. I'm going to put the broken sword in front of him.

MATT: He takes both halves and sets them down. Reaches over and grabs the lantern off to the side and lights it and hangs it from a chain and sets it down so it dangles.

MARISHA: We came from Kravaraad.

LAURA: And much farther before that.

MATT: "So you came from the Sanctum?"

MARISHA: They pointed us to you.

TALIESIN: We're on a mission for the Wildmother.

MATT: "Well, I definitely reckon my father's craftsmanship in shoring up the blade. The repairs look difficult."

LAURA: But you can do it!

MATT: "I don't know. Give me just a second," and he gets up and walks off and you see he starts rummaging through a couple of crates on the far side of the room and he's pulling things out and glass containers, robes, outfits, looks like probably keepsakes from his father that were placed away to be stored and he pulls out a small, leather book, like a little pocketbook, and begins thumbing through. While you're there, you see the little elven girl, she's sitting, she's placed the metal blank and quenched it in the water and set it aside and she's quietly in the corner, watching wide-eyed, this waifish girl, with big arms. She's pretty tough for a waifish, elven girl. She's been working this forge for a while. Actually, Beau and her probably have similar arm structure.

MARISHA: I compare my guns. Are mine bigger?

MATT: How so? Like do you just look at them or do you like? Challenge?

MARISHA: I kind of inch towards her and just.

[laughter]

MATT: She looks at you quietly and flexes too.

[laughter]

MARISHA: That's pretty good. What's your name?

MATT: She makes a hand motion.

MARISHA: I know Dwarvish, but I don't-- fuck. I pull out my paper.

MATT: As you're doing this, Umagorn is in the process of going through his book, goes, "That's Deilin, she doesn't speak, but she can hear you. Deilin." He goes through and finds, he goes, "Oh, oh, oh." He comes over and pulls the page and brings it over. If you have something you want to do real fast, since he's coming over with the book, what do you want to do?

MARISHA: I'll talk to Deilin later.

MATT: Sets down the book and you can see the page that he has open, there are sketches of the exact blade that you have there as one.

TALIESIN: Look at that.

MATT: "All right, well, there's, there's certainly some good news. I can probably repair this. Bad news, I don't have the material needed."

TALIESIN: Refined residuum, I assume.

MATT: "No. I don't even know what that is."

LAURA: What, what do you need?

TALIESIN: Interesting.

MATT: "Well, if you look here," and he points out to the base of the blade, you can see there's elements that creep up and there's these faint veins around some of the runes that have this blueish, black-blue metal color, he goes, "This, this is called iceflex."

SAM: Iceflex?

MATT: "It's a treated form of mithral that is used and it's very difficult to attain and is what could repair this and bring the magic back whole. I don't have any."

LAURA: Where would you get it?

MATT: "Well, you see, iceflex is a nickname for mithral that's been treated with white dragon breath."

[exclamations]

SAM: White what?

MATT: "White dragon breath. It infuses the metal with its subtle ice, wintery magic. Some mumbo jumbo like that. I don't know, you have to go to the fucking steeple to get more information about that, but--"

LIAM: The steeple?

MATT: "The Vellum Steeple. It's kind of the archive."

[laughter]

TALIESIN: Oh, you shouldn't have said that.

MATT: "They'll know where to find white dragon, probably, if anyone could but--"

LAURA: Do you think maybe somebody just has extra iceflex hanging around?

MATT: "Feel free to ask. The only person I could think of, though, that'd possibly have some shit like that would be the Plexus Post, Ava, but she's crazy."

SAM: The what?

TRAVIS: Plexus Post.

MATT: "The Plexus Post."

LAURA: Ava?

MATT: "Master Ava Endlewood. She's kind of a collector."

TALIESIN: What kind of crazy, if you don't mind me asking?

MATT: "Kind of crazy who has a building that's just filled with things she's collected. She's a strange one."

TALIESIN: I can handle that.

LIAM: She is at this archive? Not that I care.

LAURA: The Plexy Post. She's at the Plexus Post. The Plexus Post?

MATT: "That's where Ava is, yeah."

LAURA: Yeah, yeah.

SAM: So we go to Ava, we get something from her, then we go do research at the Steeple, then we go kill a white dragon.

TALIESIN: Well--

MARISHA: No, you can go kill a, no--

MATT: "You don't have to kill it. You just have to get the metal enchanted with its breath."

MARISHA: So wait, you like--

SAM: Oh, that's easy.

MARISHA: Hold the metal up to the dragon and be like: Breathe on this!

MATT: "Good luck, yeah."

LAURA: Or, maybe--

MATT: "That's certainly one way."

LAURA: Maybe you could run up to it and one person could be like, "Bleh!" so it tries to attack you and then another person who's invisible will be invisible and they will hold something up in front of it and then the dragon won't see you and then the dragon will breathe fire at the person that's distracting and then they would accidentally have infused the mithral.

MARISHA: Yeah.

MATT: "That's also a method. Good luck."

SAM: Do you know any white dragons?

MATT: "I don't, but you can certainly ask. The Steeple probably has some idea."

LAURA: Or, or instead of having a person be the distractor, Fjord, you could just cast your Major Illusion--!

[gasping]

Or... You could just say hi.

MARISHA: (laughs)

[laughter]

LAURA: Do you want a cupcake?

TRAVIS: I'm fine, thank you.

TALIESIN: Nothing wrong with doing it the hard way.

MARISHA: So if you got this iceflex from some dragon, it could theoretically be hundreds of years old, I'm assuming.

MATT: "I don't know, I don't know much about dragons."

MARISHA: What's your name, by the way?

MATT: "It's Umagorn. I already told you that when you came in. Umagorn Smeltborne."

MARISHA: Sorry, I'm still, your accent's thick.

MATT: "That's fine. Humans."

TRAVIS: Right, so, if we acquire some of this iceflex as you've said, then we should return here, you might be able to do some work on it, perhaps--

MATT: "I'm going to ask you a question."

TRAVIS: Yes?

MATT: "What do you need this sword for?"

TRAVIS: (sighs) How much time do we have?

TALIESIN: You can sum it up.

MATT: "No. What do you need this sword for?"

SAM: To kill things.

MATT: "What kind of things?"

TRAVIS: Ancient evils that have been unleashed after being dormant for hundreds of years. I know, it sounds thrilling.

MATT: "Is he fucking with me?"

TALIESIN: No, he's really not.

LAURA: Do you know there's this guy who's really big and he's got lots of mouths on him and he's really bad.

SAM: He's called The Laughing Hand. He's a demon fiend thing from the Abyss.

MATT: "This is the strangest morning I've had in a long time."

SAM: Well, I mean, we did give you a cupcake, so.

MATT: "You did and you caught my attention. Look, look, look. I've got orders to fulfill. I don't have any mithral on me right now. If you want supplies, you got to get some mithral, get it taken care of. I don't know how you're going to do that, but when you do, bring it back, and we can work out some sort of a deal to make this, I know I can do it. I just don't have the means."

TRAVIS: Sure, we can do that. You should know that your father worked on very important items like this before. I know he was very old and we're sorry to hear that he passed. This could turn the tide in a great way. There are entities that you don't want to know much about and neither do we, but we've been tasked with finding a way to try and defeat them and this could be a key to that effort. We'll return with the items that you said and with the coin and more cupcakes and ale. But we appreciate your time. It means a lot.

MATT: Make a persuasion check.

TRAVIS: 21. [cheering]

MATT: You begin talking and he's looking down at the ground and eventually his eyes meet yours and he gives this intense stare, like he's looking into and through you. As the words continue, you see him slacken a bit in his chair and his chin raises a bit and he goes, "My father didn't make things like this for money. He made them for the right people. You seem forthright and honest. If you seem like the kind of person that's stupid enough to go ahead and go running towards a dragon to get this thing blown on and you return and what you're saying is true, I'll do it for you. But you go telling folks that Umagorn Smeltborne has reached his father's level,  huh?"

TRAVIS: It would be our absolute pleasure to spread that exact tale.

MATT: "Great. Survive." [laughter]

TRAVIS: Yes, I agree, that is the first step.

MATT: "Who knows, you might find some iceflex already out there. Probably not, but you could ask around."

LAURA: We will.

TRAVIS: Yeah.

TALIESIN: We need to find a few other things, too, so.

MATT: "Go for it, have fun with that or your white dragon or whatever else your business is. You know where to find me. I've got to finish my orders."

LAURA: Thank you.

TRAVIS: Yes, thank you for your time. And nice to see you, Daelin.

LAURA: Deilin.

MARISHA: Yeah, I just go up to Deilin really quick and pull out my notebook and tell her I'm Beauregard, we'll talk again soon, okay? I'm going to go.

MARISHA: She gives you a flex.

TRAVIS: Jesus, what the--? [laughter]

MARISHA: She's cool.

MATT: She grabs a bite of a little sandwich on a plate off the way. Umagorn is like, "All right," gets up, takes his book, folds it up, puts it back in the crate, turns around. "Anything else?"

SAM: No, we're off, we're off.

LAURA: No, no, I give Deilin a cupcake on the way out, just because, you know, I don't want--

SAM: Sure, sure.

MATT: Takes it. Looks over at Umagorn with an expectation. "All right, eat it, then we'll get back to work." Scarfs it hungrily.

SAM: Well, we have quite a mission in front of us. We have to find a dragon and get it to blow us.

[laughter]

LAURA: Yes, that's going to be very hard.

SAM: Yes. [laughter] We can-- [laughter] We can do it, though. We've done harder things.

MATT: As you guys are having this conversation and as you've been keeping your eye out to see if you're being followed, a cloaked figure from the nearby shadows, from the backside of the temple begins to approach you. And that's where we'll end tonight's episode.

(shouting) [cheering]

We'll pick up from there next Thursday with a guest who will be joining us.

TALIESIN: What?

MATT: The fabulous friend, Mica Burton, will be joining us. Maybe you know her from Overwatch League and many other things. She's awesome, you'll love her. Shell be joining us for the next episode. Excited to have her on there. Guys, thank you all so much for joining us here both live and [cheering] at the wonderful Murat Theater. Sincerely and seriously incredible every time.

LAURA: So much fun.

MATT: Guys, do not forget that we love you very much. And-- [cheering] Is it Thursday yet?

BRIAN: Hey, actually, actually, actually, actually, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry, before we end the show, I'm being told the election results are in. [cheering] It's time to find out the president, the 69th-- [laughter]

TRAVIS: Houselights, get some houselights.

BRIAN: President of D&D Beyond. If I could have the candidates please join me at the-- [cheering] At a decent remove, if you don't mind. You're fine. Any last words before we find out? This has been the long, drawn-out tens of thousands of dollars in post-production has been spent on one of the candidates' ads specifically. Any last words before we begin and find out the results, Liam?

LIAM: For the good of D&D Beyond, let's put this conflict behind us. [cheering] We need to move on.

BRIAN: I agree.

SAM: I have four things to say.

BRIAN: Christina, if I could please have the results. Christina, ladies and gentlemen, with the sealed-- [cheering] Results of the, thank you, the D&D Beyond election. The winner, people of the universe and world, holy shit! The winner, stop, stop celebrating early. The winner, everyone in the world, is Mr. Liam O'Brien! [cheering] The 69th president of D&D Beyond. For America, for the world, for Dungeons & Dragons.

AUDIENCE: (chanting) Liam, Liam, Liam! Liam, Liam, Liam, Liam! [cheering]

BRIAN: Thank you, thank you, thank you. I understand. Mr. President. It's time for your, it's time for your acceptance speech, sir. Mr. President. [laughter]

LIAM: Critters. [cheering] You are the wind beneath my dead wings. [cheering] I need to thank you all. I would not be here without you. To the min-maxers of the Midwest. [cheering] To the rollicking role players of the Golden Gate. I owe this all to you. And I thank you. However, I have to say, there is one person that I could not have done this job without.

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Arsequeef!

LIAM: Not Arsequeef. [laughter] If I'm being honest, I could not be here today without my goblin and my husband, [cheering] Sam Riegel. [cheering] Sam, my beautiful husband, I would like to propose [cheering] a partnership. We need to put bygones behind us. All our differences, they have to go. From here on out, we will president as one. Will you make me the happiest president of D&D Beyond on earth? [cheering]

SAM: Liam, I've never lost anything in my life. And by accepting this, I keep that streak going. [cheering] Yes, yes, a thousand times yes. I will be your co-president.

BRIAN: A man who's willing to grab your loose ball for you. Is for sure. There we have it, the first bi-presidential election in the history of D&D Beyond. Bi-president Liam, bi-president Sam. Come on out, you guys, come on out, take a bow. Let's take a bow. [applause] Thank you, Gen Con! Good night!

[dramatic music]