Trick of the Light | Critical Role | Campaign 4, Episode 31 Part 1

Summary

Critical Role Campaign 4, Episode 31, Part 1: "Trick of the Light"

Date: July 2, 2026
Podcast Host: Matthew Mercer & Critical Role Cast

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Episode Overview

This episode brims with high-stakes intrigue, fateful choices, and supernatural interventions as the heroes of Ahriman race to uncover sinister family secrets, enact radical magical rites, and rescue endangered allies. The story divides between tense espionage in Dolmak Yar’s haunted manors and one of the most consequential plays ever staged in the hallowed round, with both plots fusing together in a night of cosmic revelation, character sacrifice, and unprecedented magical consequences.

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Key Discussion Points & Episode Breakdown

1. Aftermath at the Mercknaud Couturier

[01:19–27:03]

• The party regroups after their espionage mission at the secretive tailor's shop, uncovering the brutal workings of soul-harvesting magic—specifically, soul fabric: black bolts infused with mortal spirits, demonic shadow-thread, and an array of magical items.

• Laura Bailey’s character investigates warlock tomes and discovers a ritual connecting the creation of soul fabric to her own family, the Hailovars, on the orders of the dread patron Ksharavi:

  “These are rituals. K’ Shara’ V made these men warlocks and gave them the knowledge of how to shear souls off a person’s shadow.” (15:20)

• The group loads up on loot, debates what to do with a captive enemy, and discusses staging a death for one of their own to maintain their cover.

• Notable scene:
  Laura Bailey, on the need for grisly "proof" in the ensuing deception:

  "I think I should have some proof that I killed you to my family." (20:06)
  The party debates what body part to give over as a trophy, culminating in an improvised amputation.

• The sequence ends with the group scattering: some head to the Via Aurora, and others to safe houses, setting a frenetic tone for the rest of the night.

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2. Revelations at the Hallowed Round: The Play & Magical Miracle

[31:43–80:25]

• The other team attends and supports (or anxiously watches) the play “Kothaerai,” written and staged by the revolutionary playwright Hal. The play becomes not just an artistic rebellion but an arcane ceremony, bridging the worlds of the living and the dead.

• The performance is set against a cosmic backdrop:

  • Orcish afterlife souls, believed destroyed, are found to have never been lost—their connection is miraculously restored as magic sweeps through the city.
  • A dragon, presumed a myth, rises to empower and stabilize the ritual (36:27–39:22).
  • Druid Tysha, played by Mary Elizabeth McGlynn, commands the honored dead with a miraculous nat 20 Nature check, giving direction and peace to restless spirits:

    “Your fight is over. ... You are free and the land knows peace.” (52:57, 54:11)

  • This act creates an entirely new celestial being—Kedra, “a new, new revelation of the old path”—as the paint magic literally transforms the underworld.

• The audience of mortals only see the play, while the party and gifted participants witness this metaphysical event.

• Hal, the playwright, is overwhelmed with pride and hope, strumming a song:

  "He could die tomorrow and it would all have been worth it." (59:21)

• Marisha Ray’s character sacrifices a personal dream to anchor the network of afterlives—a choice of selflessness that is praised by DM and others:

  "I think you did a good thing. You sacrificed your own dreams so that you can help this wish come true." (63:45)

• Onstage, the play climaxes with a rallying cry and magical display, inciting the city beyond art:

  • Hal strums up a centuries-old song; the gathered citizens, now imbued with magical energy, are led out into the streets to parade and celebrate (80:25).

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3. Manor Intrigue: Rescue Mission and Dread Awakening

[90:27–147:48]

• Thimble (Marisha Ray), Octys (Liam O'Brien), Julian, and others attempt to rescue their friends and survive in the perilous Obramus Manor. The tension escalates as the Taconis family rallies their undead forces.

• Hanon, a Circle of the Hunter druid, arrives and starts an anti-undead ritual that changes the balance of power, giving the party a slim chance to escape.

  • Hanon:

    "Those things which are dead had best remain in the state to which life has judged them now." (107:10)

• Thimble narrowly avoids detection and gathers clues from dangerous locations, racing against the imminent return of the Taconis family.

• When Thimble discovers Teor and Cid dead, she faces a choice: retreat or risk everything against the monstrous, still-building undead Raymond Divinos, who holds a torn magical banner and the souls of her friends.

• In a breathtaking attack from the shadows, Thimble delivers the killing blow (137:12), freeing Raymond from his undeath and earning Teor’s legacy via the campaign’s "death boon" mechanic—immediately attuning to the legendary bracers of oak and birch:

  "My body grows to human size, stepping forward... your strength sets to 19... These bracers give you the strength of a giant." (142:02)

  • She escapes with the bodies, wielding new strength and donning a magical glamourized armor.

• Meanwhile, a confrontation in the manor’s courtyard leads to a lethal power struggle as Primus Taconis executes Hanon and prepares the family’s retreat, vowing open war on the druids and Dolmak Yar (151:26).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Mary Elizabeth McGlynn / Tysha:

  “A wall of paint, like a towering wave, crests upwards... Suddenly, the dark and dreary forest of the underworld is the most vibrant, living, glowing thing you’ve ever seen.” (55:19)

• Brian W. Foster / Hal:

  "Faith has returned to Dol Makyar. Not in kings, not in creed, but in the hearts of all folk, free and fair." (76:10)

• Matthew Mercer (DM):

  "This is a new, new revelation of the old path... What you leave behind is the celestial of your story and what your life meant." (58:50)

• Marisha Ray / Thimble:

  “I’m gonna fly into the chest cavity and up the head... I just kind of run into something. I’m gonna walk over to Teor... I have a Padawan braid.” (136:42, 146:07)

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Important Timestamps

| Timestamp | Event/Highlight | |-----------|----------------| | 01:19 | Start of in-world narrative; hit point rolls; exposition. | | 10:37 | Discovery of the soul-infused cloak and soul fabric. | | 15:20 | Confirmation of Ksharavi’s dark ritual and familial culpability. | | 31:43 | Recap and commencement of the night’s three objectives for the party. | | 36:27 | The dragon appears to stabilize the magical ritual linking afterlives. | | 52:57 | Tysha’s nat 20; the creation of new magic for the honored dead. | | 59:21 | Hal’s existential reflection—sacrifice and worth. | | 76:10 | Hal’s curtain speech: “Faith has returned…” | | 90:27 | Switch to Obramus Manor; the start of the most dangerous infiltration. | | 107:10 | Hanon, the Circle of the Hunt druid, asserts control over undead. | | 137:12 | Thimble risks everything for the killing blow and is rewarded with the bracers. | | 142:02 | Thimble’s transformation and escape—"your strength sets to 19."| | 151:26 | Primus Taconis kills Hanon and declares a new, desperate campaign. |

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Episode Tone & Language

The episode is emotionally potent, balancing humor, urgency, and awe. Dialogues often shift between tactical planning, poetic imagery, and gallows humor—original character voices remain playful, determined, and raw in moments of danger or triumph. The party is united by a sense of fraught camaraderie, with stakes higher than ever as personal and political destinies converge.

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Conclusion

This episode traverses both the metaphysical and the material—delivering powerful, decisive character arcs, cosmic revelations about the fate of souls, and a city teetering between revolution and ruin. The party’s actions have altered the balance of Ahriman, spurred by a night of loss, victory, and new legends written in paint, steel, and song.

To be continued in Part 2, releasing Tuesday...

Transcript

[Travis Willingham]

Illumination.

[Sam Riegel]

Minions and Monsters.

[Matthew Mercer]

You want to make a monster movie? And what are you going to use for your monster?

[Marisha Ray]

I know the perfect monster for your movie.

[Sam Riegel]

Just try not to look too delicious. Quick question.

[Matthew Mercer]

I want to eat one of these

[Sam Riegel]

funny looking yellow guys. Is that okay?

[Matthew Mercer]

Minions and Monsters Rated pg.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Parental guidance suggested some material may not

[Travis Willingham]

be suitable for children.

[Sam Riegel]

In theaters now.

[Matthew Mercer]

Why, hello there. I'm Brennan Lee Mulligan, and welcome to Campaign 4 of Critical Role. Thank you for joining us on this journey as we explore Ahriman, a world of fractured kingdoms, tumultuous rebellion and sorcery that rises from the graveyard of the gods. You're listening to part one of this adventure, with part two arriving this upcoming Tuesday. Our episodes typically arrive on the Critical Role podcast network a week after our initial Thursday night streams on Beacon, YouTube and Twitch. But if you'd rather listen to a full podcast episode of Campaign 4 Right When it airs without any ads, consider becoming a Beacon member. You'll receive access to exclusive content discounts at all our online Critical Role shops, pre sales for live events and so much more.

[Sam Riegel]

Free.

[Matthew Mercer]

Start your 7 day free trial today at Beacon TV. Now, without further ado, let's begin this episode of Critical Role. Here in Dolmak Yar, we find several of our heroes who have been engaged in some spy craft of late, spread out throughout one of the upper neighborhoods of the city, Witkanderhaelovar, in the streets nearby. And down in the marketplace at the Mercknaud Couturier, we find our companions as well. Events are moving quickly, for indeed your mission. Spying on the great meeting of the sundred houses has concluded. That meeting has since ended. But first, you guys need to roll hit points. Let's roll them.

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah. It's a 10, right?

[Matthew Mercer]

It's a D10.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

I'm just a D10.

[Travis Willingham]

Let's do it.

[Matthew Mercer]

Reroll it.

[Sam Riegel]

Yes.

[Matthew Mercer]

Eight.

[Sam Riegel]

Nice.

[Matthew Mercer]

Hey, I also rolled an eight

[Liam O'Brien]

as a twin.

[Matthew Mercer]

Hey, bros. Lovely. And a lovely healthy dose of hit points for you both. As you stand in the currently sort of blood splattered Merckonade couturier. Sam, you have leveled up. In a previous episode, however, I level up again. Holding this lion's head emblem and seeing the motes of light whisk around it and slowly leave the emblem and whisk around you, you become aware of, as if through divine or oracular sight, that the soul of Teor Pridesire has left this world and that he wished for you to have this. The light that he carried, that due to his Life as a soldier and a mercenary never could be the focus of study or investigation has vanished from the world. How many great and wondrous miracles have died in the trenches of Pasatar's many wars before their miracle could be explored or explained? Perhaps many. His light is leaving this world. But there is some part of you that is not solely of this world, and you will not forget his light as a part of dying. In this campaign, which does not have any magic for resurrection in it, we allow what is called a death boon, which is that characters can pass on certain abilities or features. In some cases, they can grant one of their highest ability scores. And in this instance, your charisma increases from 18 to 20 permanently as Teor's light suffuses into the aura being cast by your own filamental tattoos.

[Ashley Johnson]

That's amazing. Very sad, but really good. As I sort of feel this flow, this light pass through me and over me, I'm looking down at this.

[Matthew Mercer]

It's made of wood. What is this thing? It's a piece of. It's beautiful in its own way, but it's definitely a folk carving. It's not made by some vast. It's not varnished heavily. It's just got some humble beeswax polish on it. Looks like it was carved by hand.

[Liam O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Ashley Johnson]

I mean, just remembering that he had sworn to protect me and now he is gone, I think it both makes me frightened for myself and my future. But also I'm going to have to look after myself now. And so I guess I'm emboldened as I step forward, but also super scared if he just died. He's real mighty. The others there with him must be in danger. So I think, even though I would really like to see what my friends here are doing, and I really know that there are soldiers approaching the stage. And Hal, I think I have to dash as fast as I can to the Taconis House.

[Matthew Mercer]

Okay.

[Ashley Johnson]

Is there. I know I said I was just on the streets. Are there horses or carriages available to me from the Hailuvar House?

[Matthew Mercer]

Or how do I take taxis?

[Ashley Johnson]

Is there an Uber?

[Matthew Mercer]

You haven't walked very far from the Hailovar House at all. You could easily rush back and get one of your house's carriages if you so wished. And it occurs to you, in this moment of extreme danger, I just noticed the red X. Aw, RIP King. It does make it seem like you're kind of the one doing it. But, Lord Wicander, it also occurs to you, thinking of how to get there the fastest. That as you have deceived your way back into the good graces of your family, arriving at the Taconis house in a carriage probably means you will be safer than arriving on foot.

[Ashley Johnson]

Okay then, for sure I'll get a carriageman and order him to take me without delay, to Obermas Manor.

[Matthew Mercer]

You are off to Obermas Manor, our friends that are in the Mercknaud couturier shop. You descend the staircase. You are in this horrifying basement. Manacles hang from the roof above, where a body would be with its wrists up over its head. You see a workbench with several different shears. One of these pairs of shears is. At first you wonder if it's drawn onto the table, and then you realize as you move through the room, it is three dimensional, but it is so jet black that it doesn't appear to have any form. It's so matte black that light can't bounce off of it. And so it just seems to almost sink into the table. There are shears there. There are bolts of black fabric that I believe you are very aware. I think that the more classical way to hold souls is often within gemstones, but that's also a very known quantity. And so it seems that the murkinauts have developed some manner of turning shadows into a fabric that holds the soul of dead mortals. And there are about 18 bolts of that fabric radiating infernal magic off of them in the corner.

[Laura Bailey]

Any scrap fabric?

[Matthew Mercer]

There's a ton of regular, mundane fabric here.

[Sam Riegel]

Bolts of soul fabric.

[Matthew Mercer]

No, it does not look that the process of creating these bolts of soul fabric leaves soul detritus around.

[Laura Bailey]

They're not making clothes with it.

[Matthew Mercer]

Well, funny you should mention. You guys want to go ahead and give me investigation checks?

[Laura Bailey]

13.

[Matthew Mercer]

Where's my investigation?

[Taliesin Jaffe]

20.

[Matthew Mercer]

20, 20 will absolutely get it done. The body you are currently wearing has. The body you're currently wearing has a magical ring on a finger. You don't know what it does particularly, but you also see that each of these gentlemen has a pact tome with them. They are warlocks. Two Pact tomes there on that 20 investigation. These are warlocks whose patron is none other than Ksharavi. Shadow of suffering.

[Sam Riegel]

Uh oh,

[Matthew Mercer]

two rings. 18 bolts of this jet black fabric. The shears themselves are magical. And you also see up on a massive loom, there is a bobbin of jet black thread, which you recognize seems to be composed of pure demonic shadow, so that a tiny spool of thread is there as well. The dead body upstairs had one magical garment of this Cloth that is already constructed. So not the raw material. But you also see that there is down here a large, voluminous, high collared black silk cloak. This silk cloak appears to be double sided in that one of them is just an extremely regal, quite glossy. It's very silken. So it's quite. And it's weird to say because it's a black on black garment, but it is a little ostentatious. Like there's black gemstones up in the collar. The other side, you realize is much like those shears. Very hard to even directly look at.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Well, that's tasteful.

[Laura Bailey]

Is that like the cloak that you're wearing?

[Taliesin Jaffe]

That is much nicer than anything I am currently wearing.

[Travis Willingham]

I don't know fashion. What is all this bullshit?

[Laura Bailey]

Well, it certainly looks like it's from my ilk. These guys, I think, were working for my father. Speaking of, Blair, do you want to ask your boy some questions about how they do their work and maybe where their bodies go? Mm, while you're doing that, I'd like to just nip off the tiniest inconsequential piece of the sole fabric and make myself a tiny bikini.

[Matthew Mercer]

Okay, why don't we get.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

There's an upstairs, if I recall. Let's get a couple garment bags, why don't we?

[Sam Riegel]

Absolutely.

[Brian W. Foster]

And let's start.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Well, definitely we're gonna need that, that, that.

[Laura Bailey]

Let's drop this place blind.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yeah, I got the bag.

[Travis Willingham]

Am I capable, am I okay to

[Sam Riegel]

take a stuff and just stuff it

[Matthew Mercer]

in a regular old bag, Baby, you can grinch it up as fast as you want.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Yeah, feel free to make a mess.

[Laura Bailey]

Yeah.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

So do you want to talk to him or is he asking him?

[Laura Bailey]

I think you should ask him.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

One moment. All right, I'm gonna go inside.

[Travis Willingham]

Oh, Ruleous.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

You have been a busy, busy boy.

[Matthew Mercer]

My brother. You killed him.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Well, not specifically me, but honestly, if we think back enough, I suppose it's decisions that you've made that led you here. Let's be honest,

[Matthew Mercer]

I'll get you for this. You have no idea.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Oh, no, I definitely know you won't. In fact, if anything, I think that this might be the end of you. I think your thread has been cut. So now it is really up to

[Matthew Mercer]

you, what happens next.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

We could let your soul flutter out into the world, but I think we both know where you're going. I have an option B if you just want to take your chances. Or you know me well enough that we could make a deal.

[Matthew Mercer]

Give me persuasion or intimidate your Choice, which is different.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

I don't. I think they're both the same.

[Sam Riegel]

Cool.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Yeah, I'm just kind of. It's always dealer's choice.

[Ashley Johnson]

That's

[Taliesin Jaffe]

16.

[Matthew Mercer]

What's your deal?

[Liam O'Brien]

Well,

[Matthew Mercer]

we come into a bit of

[Taliesin Jaffe]

a difficult situation because, well, your business has created some problems for everyone involved. I need you to answer some questions truthfully and

[Matthew Mercer]

give us a little bit

[Taliesin Jaffe]

of a look at how your operation works. And in return, I will drop off your face. Once I'm happy enough with what I've gotten from you, I'll let you go. No more of my influence. You just get to leave. Sadly, you can't stay here. This shop is now compromised. It was sadly a conflux of a lot of unfortunate incidents.

[Travis Willingham]

When Bolair's having these conversations with the

[Sam Riegel]

host of whoever's in the mask, is

[Matthew Mercer]

he just blanked out? Is it out loud?

[Travis Willingham]

Is it in your mind or.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

I can do. Right now it's just in my mind

[Brian W. Foster]

and my face is kinda

[Taliesin Jaffe]

a little stiff occasionally anyway. But there would be no real sense that anything was happening unless. Yeah, at the moment I'm just sort of looking around and it's just like having an imagination, I guess.

[Travis Willingham]

The question is the length of the conversation happening.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

It's a little faster than what it is. The real world is going. Yeah, this goes quickly again, like a dream.

[Matthew Mercer]

Oh, okay, cool.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Yeah,

[Matthew Mercer]

Looking cad again, by the way. So shears, thread, bolts of fabric. You're popping the jewelry off of the dead guy. There's gemstones here. There's 418 gold pieces stashed away in a vault. I mean, if you're just robbing the fucking place, it's like blamp. It's all going in their pack. Tomes go in. There's a ton of non magical text here that is still written in demonic. That has to do with their process, how they do what they do.

[Laura Bailey]

While he's having the conversation, can I read it and take that information in?

[Matthew Mercer]

Give me an arcana. Check with advantage.

[Sam Riegel]

Ooh,

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Ooh.

[Laura Bailey]

Arcana 15.

[Matthew Mercer]

Your father's name is all over this. These are rituals. K' Shara' V made these men warlocks and gave them the knowledge of how to shear souls off of a person's shadow.

[Laura Bailey]

Does it say where it's going?

[Matthew Mercer]

You look and see that all of this makes its way back to the Candescent Creed and you are able to grab that information. It is, you know, this is. Forgeries are possible in this world, but the fact that the same handwriting that is delivering how to carve a soul off somebody is also like. This fabric will be delivered back to the Via Aurora is for its worth as extremely damaging and compromising material. Is that. But you see that it all seems like it's going not to the church, but to the hail of ours as a family. It's going to their. It's going to Zobani's office. Essentially.

[Laura Bailey]

I would like to take the book and also if possible, absorb. I want to see if we can do the soul stuff to. To our guy to Ruleus.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

I was about to ask anyway if that was a big mic or you

[Matthew Mercer]

on a 15 arcana check. You remember the fact that Teor had been here for hours and the two of them working on it together hadn't finished. Okay.

[Laura Bailey]

It's a long time.

[Matthew Mercer]

It's a long time.

[Laura Bailey]

Okay. Regular style.

[Travis Willingham]

Anything good in the. In a sec.

[Sam Riegel]

So much.

[Laura Bailey]

Let's take it all.

[Sam Riegel]

All right.

[Matthew Mercer]

Over the top. You throw that cloak in there and the only thing of value left in here are paintings that are too large to carry. And that's all she wrote.

[Laura Bailey]

I've put on my hastily. It's a string bikini. It's really just a couple triangles. I didn't want. I kind of didn't want it to look like we had taken anything. But I see now that that was. That was a mistake. But whatever. I have a bikini on made of stuff.

[Brian W. Foster]

Cadogan is shading his eyes to the side.

[Sam Riegel]

What a gentleman.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

The glass on the back of your brother's head. What was that about? Do you have it? This is just curiosity.

[Matthew Mercer]

I do.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Interesting.

[Matthew Mercer]

Do you have a soul? Not on me.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Finally, something we can both delight in. Me neither. Thirdly, who do you work for and

[Matthew Mercer]

what do you do with the bodies?

[Taliesin Jaffe]

How do you hide so many bodies, cleaving so many souls from them?

[Matthew Mercer]

What happens? We cut them in two and send half to the Priestly House of Flame and the other half to the Priestly House of Shadow.

[Sam Riegel]

Yes. The souls.

[Liam O'Brien]

Yes.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

What do you do with the boys?

[Liam O'Brien]

I don't care about the souls.

[Matthew Mercer]

They go across the river. Master Lothalia.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

How unoriginal. I am disappointed.

[Matthew Mercer]

This bag's heavy.

[Travis Willingham]

What's he saying?

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Oh, I think we've got everything that we are going to have to do.

[Laura Bailey]

Okay, so they're doing really bad stuff. I mean, I don't know if it's worse than hiring demons. I'm a demon. I'm working for the crew.

[Travis Willingham]

What do we do with him?

[Taliesin Jaffe]

When there's something worth saying, I am muttering it out loud. So these things are being communicated.

[Laura Bailey]

I think that we should kill him personally. Or, I mean, Bolari. He's yours now, so you can do whatever you want. My question is, Khadigan, that man that I saw, I recognize now as Primus Deconis. I think that it's a bad idea for you to be charging back into the Via Aurora. But do you want me to try to kill him?

[Matthew Mercer]

What, you kill him?

[Laura Bailey]

Not by myself. I don't know. Maybe we can do something. He just got his shit chewed out in front of everybody. I think that the Halovars are really pissed at him. So maybe we can. I don't know. It seems like a scary thing to just go for him directly. But he's got to die, right?

[Marisha Ray]

Yeah.

[Travis Willingham]

And he has to die. But look, I'm a little confused. It's been a long and strange day. Can we. Can we sort that out after we figure out what we do here first?

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

I mean, I pull back out for a moment.

[Laura Bailey]

I think that. I mean on my behalf, my story to my sisters, and then some, is that you're dead. I think the two got into a scrap over the mask, went crazy, killed each other, and you escaped. And I killed you. And so I get the credit, right?

[Travis Willingham]

Cause I was supposed to die in here.

[Laura Bailey]

Supposed to die in there.

[Travis Willingham]

So we gotta set up a scene. Are you suggesting you fake my death?

[Sam Riegel]

What about your fingers? What?

[Laura Bailey]

I won't eat it.

[Travis Willingham]

One of my fingers from my own body.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

While this is all going on, I'm gonna need a way out of here, by the way, so you all think about how that's going to happen. Excuse me? I'm going to start stripping the clothing off of myself while they're talking and folding it and putting it in one of the bags.

[Matthew Mercer]

What the fuck is happening?

[Laura Bailey]

I'm looking.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

And then I'm going to start manacling my own hands into those manacles.

[Travis Willingham]

Great.

[Matthew Mercer]

Killer. Killer.

[Travis Willingham]

Great.

[Laura Bailey]

Great. I mean, I think that we can just go out the way we came in. I mean, you can't be seen. Do we see a different way out? Maybe where there are. Where they get these bodies to go? Is there a different door?

[Matthew Mercer]

Give me an investigation check.

[Sam Riegel]

I don't see shit.

[Matthew Mercer]

You don't see shit. I've got a plan.

[Travis Willingham]

Keep myself hidden.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay.

[Laura Bailey]

I think that you can keep undercover.

[Matthew Mercer]

It's a great plan.

[Laura Bailey]

Pretty great.

[Travis Willingham]

But I'm just gonna put my hood

[Matthew Mercer]

up over my head.

[Sam Riegel]

I believe you. Oh.

[Laura Bailey]

But I think I should have some proof that I killed you to my family.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

So What'll it be I'm hanging from now? Oh, yes, Caddy, I have a quick gift for you.

[Travis Willingham]

Feel free.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

You can either put me on on the way out or just tuck me away. It doesn't matter. I just made a promise. Sir, you have been so helpful. I now release you from my bondage. And I drop off his face.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh, wow.

[Matthew Mercer]

The mask drops off and you see? Aurelius goes. Now you've done.

[Sam Riegel]

Shit.

[Laura Bailey]

I tickle.

[Sam Riegel]

Stop. Listen.

[Matthew Mercer]

Your father. I serve your father.

[Sam Riegel]

So what?

[Laura Bailey]

I'm his daughter. You think I give a shit?

[Matthew Mercer]

You are going to be discovered. And you will be unhappy, unraveled and made into something more obedient.

[Laura Bailey]

You're gonna try and scare me right now. But who has the manacles on you or me, pal?

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Do it quick before he does something stupid.

[Sam Riegel]

You can see.

[Matthew Mercer]

I actually even need you guys to roll initiative real quick.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh, my God.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

I thought you guys were clever enough to know that you should not let a mage just sit there for nat 20.

[Matthew Mercer]

Nat 20.

[Liam O'Brien]

Great.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Thank you.

[Sam Riegel]

Can I just stab him?

[Matthew Mercer]

Go ahead and give me. Go ahead and give me an attack roll.

[Sam Riegel]

Great. Okay,

[Matthew Mercer]

what do we get here? 21, 21.

[Laura Bailey]

18.

[Matthew Mercer]

What's that?

[Laura Bailey]

18.

[Matthew Mercer]

18 is a hit. Go ahead and 18 is a hit. Go ahead and roll damage with the. And Katrin, you can give me some attack rolls here as well.

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah, sure.

[Matthew Mercer]

And you have a puppy too. I do have. Oh, let's let this guy go now.

[Sam Riegel]

You're going to kill him.

[Travis Willingham]

I'm doing.

[Matthew Mercer]

I'm playing along.

[Marisha Ray]

Yes.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

I'm the only one who said he wouldn't fuck with him.

[Matthew Mercer]

14 for the first attack. 14 we should have had to do. 14 is a hit.

[Sam Riegel]

14 is a hit. 9 damage on that one.

[Matthew Mercer]

Okay, 9 damage here.

[Laura Bailey]

7 damage just like.

[Sam Riegel]

Are we just jumping this guy?

[Matthew Mercer]

I think you guys are just jumping this guy.

[Brian W. Foster]

Great.

[Matthew Mercer]

9 and 16. Okay, so 9 and 7 is 16.

[Sam Riegel]

I missed my second attack.

[Matthew Mercer]

Missed your second attack. And then for bonus, I'll just.

[Sam Riegel]

I'll call Wulfric over and let him take an attack.

[Matthew Mercer]

Just a strike. Go ahead and give him an attack. Oh, gosh. I haven't done this in a minute.

[Sam Riegel]

Sorry, it's been a hot minute.

[Matthew Mercer]

Oh, you got it.

[Sam Riegel]

It would have been too much of

[Taliesin Jaffe]

a break to Warnell, really.

[Laura Bailey]

This guy thinks that I care that my dad's his boss.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Yeah, but he might try and escape.

[Laura Bailey]

Well, not with his guts all out.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

That's why you gotta gut him quick.

[Matthew Mercer]

And then it's eight plus two.

[Sam Riegel]

So with an eight so 10 points of damage for ult.

[Liam O'Brien]

Oh, Wolfie.

[Matthew Mercer]

Okay, 26 points of damage. He is going to go. Oh, fuck.

[Sam Riegel]

Mm. What if I fucking die?

[Matthew Mercer]

None of his spell. All his spells require somatic components that he can't use right now. Except one. Thaumaturgy. So you see, he is going to as loud as thunder, go and shout out to Wakander Haylofar. He goes help at the top of his lungs. And you guys hear it reverberating throughout the marketplace.

[Brian W. Foster]

Yeah.

[Matthew Mercer]

It is your turn again.

[Laura Bailey]

Okay, Khadigan, if we hear the door open, I think that you should run.

[Sam Riegel]

Right.

[Matthew Mercer]

I'm gonna lumber out with my giant sack of boots.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Do I play me or no?

[Sam Riegel]

Oh, yeah.

[Marisha Ray]

Still alive.

[Laura Bailey]

But if somebody.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

You should really. Yeah, just.

[Laura Bailey]

Yeah, that's a 19.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Yeah, I would.

[Sam Riegel]

Do I get to.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Oh, man.

[Sam Riegel]

Do I get to attack twice?

[Laura Bailey]

Because it's the knife that hurts people who have hurt people.

[Matthew Mercer]

Unfortunately, you would need to know the name of someone that he had harmed. This knife does not reward popping off.

[Brian W. Foster]

All right.

[Matthew Mercer]

So

[Sam Riegel]

cogged.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Yeah, because you don't know anybody.

[Marisha Ray]

He's hurt.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

That's fair. That's a long list. I know.

[Sam Riegel]

Six.

[Matthew Mercer]

Six points of damage. Yeah. Tyranny. How does he die?

[Laura Bailey]

Oh, I was fucking navel to nose.

[Matthew Mercer]

Just like knife up, innards spill out. He is dead. However, you can hear similar shouting off in the marketplace.

[Travis Willingham]

Let's go. Come on.

[Ashley Johnson]

Hurry up.

[Matthew Mercer]

I've got Bolero. I think for just a second, the Chaos Gremlin.

[Travis Willingham]

And Kadigan thinks about putting it on,

[Matthew Mercer]

but he just shakes it off and pockets it for a second. Boy, it goes in the pocket. You guys rush to. Where are you rushing?

[Laura Bailey]

I am rushing back to the Candescent Creed and I'm. Where? I mean, where are you going?

[Travis Willingham]

This is on the run.

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah.

[Travis Willingham]

I don't know.

[Matthew Mercer]

Where should I go?

[Travis Willingham]

You seem to know my destiny. Hal's house.

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah, right.

[Laura Bailey]

I mean, that feels like a safe place.

[Travis Willingham]

Got it.

[Matthew Mercer]

This is all for you. I don't want any of this shit.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay.

[Travis Willingham]

Come get when you need it.

[Matthew Mercer]

If you want it.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay. Great.

[Travis Willingham]

Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

I'll see you there.

[Marisha Ray]

See you there.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay, I'll tell quick.

[Travis Willingham]

Are you good?

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah.

[Travis Willingham]

Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

Okay.

[Sam Riegel]

Where's Balare?

[Matthew Mercer]

In my pocket.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh, you have him. Okay, great.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yes. All right. So no finger. You are charging back to the Via Aurora.

[Sam Riegel]

Give me a finger.

[Matthew Mercer]

You want more human fingers? Are you fucking kidding me right now?

[Sam Riegel]

Take it. That I thought.

[Laura Bailey]

Give it to me.

[Sam Riegel]

I need proof.

[Marisha Ray]

What do you want?

[Laura Bailey]

Your nose.

[Sam Riegel]

You think I can build ear, toe, penis.

[Matthew Mercer]

I have a few extra.

[Sam Riegel]

Stop.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

What that is.

[Travis Willingham]

I'm a left.

[Matthew Mercer]

Oh, you've done so much good work over the years. You're gonna do it?

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah. Fuck yeah.

[Matthew Mercer]

I slice it, tyranny cuts your finger off. You head to the Via Aurora, you head to Hal's house and you will get into the rest in tonight's episode of Critical Role. What?

[Sam Riegel]

And I eat it.

[Matthew Mercer]

No.

[Travis Willingham]

Hello my friends and welcome to tonight's critical Role Announcement playhouse. Before we get into tonight's adventures in Aramon, we have some announcements to get through. But first, reminder for all you folks that our new Daggerheart miniseries, Age of umbraland, this premieres July 9th. So excited for you all. We have an incredible cast of players that includes Laura Bailey, Lubakar, Salim Jennifer English, Nico Ortiz and Zachary Ronaldo. You'll feel wonder, heartache, dread and delight as this unusual crew ventures into the wastes in search of ensues. It was so much fun.

[Marisha Ray]

Good crew. Very good crew.

[Sam Riegel]

They all have such good chemistry. Oh yeah, it was great.

[Travis Willingham]

A very fun, kind of unique vibe in the realm of Age of Umbra from our first run, but still feels in the world. I had so much fun running a forum. They seem to have fun playing it and I hope you have a fun time watching it now. Seriously, please come check it out. You can get a close look at it and what we've revealed so [e-mail] Umbra Umbra, umbies.

[Sam Riegel]

Girl.

[Travis Willingham]

Liam, you're up.

[Brian W. Foster]

Girl. You need more Briarwoods in your Life. Next Tuesday, June 30th, Dark Horse is releasing the collected volume three hardcover edition of the Legend of Vox Machina, the Whitestone Chronicles. Featuring our favorite couple we love to hate. This run is written by New York Times best selling author Marika Naikamp. It is illustrated by Aviv Orr. So amazing. Colored by Eisner nominated colorist Diana Souza and lettered by Jimmy Bettencourt and Richard Starkings. Find the Legend of Mox. Ooh. Find the legend of Vox Machina. The Whitestone Chronicles, Volume 3. At your local comic book store or darkhorse.com the Briarhoods. Hate to see him go, but I love to watch them leave.

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Thank you, Liam.

[Sam Riegel]

She did wear hoods, right? Box Vakana and the Briar Hoods. My favorites.

[Travis Willingham]

I'm Red Bubble. Travis, you're up.

[Laura Bailey]

Oh, yes.

[Sam Riegel]

All episodes.

[Matthew Mercer]

All episodes. All episodes of the Legend of ox Machina Season 4 are available now.

[Sam Riegel]

Proper.

[Matthew Mercer]

Come join some of our cast and crew for our finale episode of Inside the Legend of Vox machina tomorrow on June 26th at 3pm Pacific as we chat about all the fun behind the scenes details from the making of season four. The art, the storyboards, the acting, the directing, getting Sam to just shut up. There will be spoilers. So be sure to watch all of season four hand beforehand. Otherwise you're gonna ruin it for yourself. That would be awful.

[Ashley Johnson]

Don't do that.

[Travis Willingham]

Don't do that. Or do watch it twice just to make sure. I believe that concludes our announcements. So with that my friends girl, let's get back into Arama Girl.

[Sam Riegel]

Sam. Ram, If you're looking for new ways to get ahead, then you're our kind of person. We're Udemy and we help learners like you upskill in AI, productivity, leadership and management and more. Learn at your own pace from real world experts. You can also prep for certifications that show employers what you know upskill for the career you [e-mail] now back to your regularly scheduled listening

[Matthew Mercer]

we return tonight's episode of Critical Role. What a wild couple of episodes. It's been

[Brian W. Foster]

very well here.

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah,

[Matthew Mercer]

once again we see that in our previous episode, the heroes of Ahriman have seen, after their various quests throughout the world of Ahriman, returned to discover on this momentous night that there were three objectives in front of them. To spy on the great of the sundered houses to see if the House Taconis could indeed be backed into a corner by all of the achievements of our heroes. To infiltrate Obramus Manor, to rescue Thiazi's co conspirator Mara the Wing, and to protect and ensure whatever magical goings on were going to occur at this opening night of the play Kothaerai, which due to the machinations of forces both near and far, promised to be one of the most momentous magical evenings in occurrence, the sundered houses were successfully spied upon. Mara the Wing has, to our knowledge, been at least momentarily rescued. Not without great cost, though your characters do not know it. Teor Pridesire has left this world and at our play we see that paint rendered from an ancient river Styx, composed of blood, the Gavzidra was painted by a young daughter of the families Loy and Fang into the murals of a hallowed round that is indeed now hallowed. The story of Va Revolution calling out to the souls of those orcish heroes captured in an afterlife that had been severed from this world following the death of the gods. No more. In addition to the most momentous magical Discovery of the last 70 years. The fact that the Shapers war did not destroy the afterlives. A hanging question that has haunted this world for 70 years and spurred the retribution and violence during the Ghost wars and all manner of horrifying things. That question has been answered. Those souls are not lost. Perhaps souls never can be. Perhaps only lost for a time. You also see that as those souls of orcish spirits cross the proscenium of the theater, that they are rendered in celestial status. Here in this story being told by their descendants in this place of their heroism, they are filled with light. More than that, as the magic became unstable, we saw in the letter of this professor some other co conspirator of the Ozzy Fang's. We saw in this letter of the professor a stable trinity of bridges. One anchor, the Pariah blade, now painted and held aloft as a symbol rather than just a sword by young Shadia Fang as a member of the chorus. The paint rendered in the workshop of Solrekshi into a series of murals depicting the great stories of the history of the Royani. The stone of Nightsong, used here for its connection to Faerie has just been sundered by a sister of Salandri, smashed

[Liam O'Brien]

apart,

[Matthew Mercer]

sacrificing a dream she has held for 70 years. Because to seize that dream would be at the detriment of these still living people. What a choice Vaelys has made. She risked her life to do both, but only able to do one. She raised her sensor on high and in the city that we first met her, coming to seek the stone to return it, has chosen to destroy it alongside Azune Nayar, speaking a word in Navi Kaan, the language of his people that he has not had much occasion to speak. Saying Remember that word spoken in Navi Khan, the lost language of dragons, Sir.

[Sam Riegel]

Thanks.

[Liam O'Brien]

Yes,

[Matthew Mercer]

we should talk. As a dragon reared its head from Lake Nahami, a dragon that had been asleep perhaps since long before even the Shapers war arose, to take that shattered remnant of the stone of Nightsong, push it into the ground and create a cavern of mooncrystal much like the one that our soldiers table saw in Hawthorne's glade where the forest of Tintasi meets Lake Nahami. An anchor to the spiritual energy of Faerie has been created more powerful than any we have yet seen, seen in the story we are telling. It is that anchor that stabilizes the connection between the afterlife of the Runyani, or the once afterlife of the Runyani, I should say, and the playhouse, the hallowed round and by extension, all of the living world of Ahriman. For all of you.

[Sam Riegel]

Exactly.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yeah, exactly. Murray. You see everything stabilized. Those tendrils reaching out.

[Sam Riegel]

I did. I'm such a dwarf. I just think about bridges. That's right. And they.

[Laura Bailey]

Bridges. They be.

[Matthew Mercer]

We have no idea what they did.

[Sam Riegel]

I'm like, oh, good job. You're so good at this.

[Matthew Mercer]

So we return. That connection has stabilized. I cannot begin to tell you all of your worst fears of what was gonna happen tonight. The reason that you had 100 magpies in the wings. All of the Stay Puft, Marshmallow Man. The dead pour forth chaos and ruin. I had all of my notes ready for that to happen if you went home with your family. And instead.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

So you can still do it.

[Marisha Ray]

I take it back.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Don't cry that.

[Matthew Mercer]

And instead, those bridges stabilize. However, Hal and Tysha and Murray as well. You see that while the connection is stabilizing, which means that the planes don't come unfurled and the dead don't pour forth into living Dolmachiar, the living world of Ahriman is fine. The people here are watching a nice play. But you see the same sense of crisis on the other side still unfolding of the. The spirits feeling panicked. Their celestial status is wavering, as they cannot tell whether they should walk the path or stay and defend this place. And I think you both see paint still bubbling up as raw, untapped, magical energy that seems to require what paint perhaps always requires, which is direction and intention. For those of you here, we will begin first of all with a little bit of business. Hal, you need to roll hit points.

[Sam Riegel]

Let's go.

[Brian W. Foster]

Let's go. Keep it low. Keep me civilian. Squishy. It's a five. Right in the middle.

[Matthew Mercer]

Right in the middle. We love that. That's good.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

That was a supportive, like.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh, you did good. That's a D8.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yeah, for you.

[Brian W. Foster]

D8. For me.

[Matthew Mercer]

See, that's what just taking the regular

[Ashley Johnson]

thing and gets him just safe.

[Matthew Mercer]

No koratsune. Taking these search for levels.

[Travis Willingham]

What are you doing?

[Matthew Mercer]

Leave me alone. Chicken.

[Sam Riegel]

You're a Jackie, not a chicken. Walk. In

[Matthew Mercer]

the second act of the play commences. And this is the act, by the way, because the end of the first act ends on a high note, which if the first act ends on a high note. Oh, no. We're watching a tragedy because it's setting up for the. In the second act, and we see that this is what begins to happen. The story of Vokjan Murzat being betrayed by those close to him to the priests of Osgra. And we see a number of that as the story commences. It becomes harder and harder. Turning it over to Hal here for a second. What do we see in that second half of the play as it begins

[Brian W. Foster]

to unfold while Hal is in the wings as. As act one begins. He's just moments ago given lash Bardick zhuzhing to keep him on point on stage. And as he goes out and begins, Hal is. He is a mix of conflicting feelings. There is a foot waiting to drop either tonight or tomorrow. The hail of are going to be pissed. He has put all his money in and is betting on this play which is a tragedy which tells the story of Volkjan Murzad who was a precursor to the Shapers War. One Runyani who tried to overthrow the chosen of Asgrad, the priests two centuries before the Shapers war and was struck down. Some of his own brethren turned on him at the offer of power. And boy, he didn't set out to write it to mirror his brother. But it is beyond coincidence how much it hews to the loss of Thiazi.

[Travis Willingham]

And

[Brian W. Foster]

all of this has been worth it, no matter what with the miracle that Hal has seen come to life here at the the hallowed round here in our church, in our temple. But he also has the highest hopes that this play mirroring what's happened to his brother will stick in the hearts and minds of the people in the audience. And he watches with bated breath from the wings every corner of choreography, every word dropped, every note the chorus chants into being. And without reciting an entire play, because I don't have that. Murzot enlists. The audience sees Murzot has enlisted some of his other downtrodden Runyani to stand make a stand against these priests of Osgra. There is one of his allies who is lured by the priests with an offer of a seat amongst them to turn. And in the final moments of the play Murzot is beset. His own friends turn on him. Their heretic rebellion, that first rebellion is crushed, killed along with Volkjan Murzan

[Travis Willingham]

as

[Matthew Mercer]

the play unfolds, building to this horrifying crescendo. Tycha, you look out and see a city of free orcs. Who knew that this was. I mean it was billed as the tragedy of Vokjan Mirza. But there's some part of them living after the successful Shapers war, leaning forward as in all great tragedies going no, win. Don't, don't do it this way. There's Another way, there's got to be some possibility of avoiding what is to come. And you see everyone leaning forward in their seats here. Azune and Baelas, towards the end of the second act, you guys both return to catch basically the last 30 minutes of this. As you both walk back into the theater, I think, Vaelys, you feel fairy shapes swirling around you. And you look over and see there's a woman in the wings of the audience who looks over to you and you see a beautiful glass stick. This is Temelo. Red curls of hair, a headband that has costume antlers. These very small, delicate antlers coming off her head.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

She's so pretty.

[Matthew Mercer]

She looks at you. She has small fawn dappled white freckles on her face. And she looks over to you and goes,

[Marisha Ray]

Yes.

[Matthew Mercer]

What's your name?

[Sam Riegel]

Phelis.

[Marisha Ray]

What's your name?

[Matthew Mercer]

Temelo. Are you a wild thing?

[Marisha Ray]

How do you mean?

[Matthew Mercer]

You, Azune, look over and can see the wind kicking up around Veelys as invisible pixies and sprites swirl around her. And she says, have you freed something? Did you break something? Quite strong and hard to let something loose upon the world.

[Marisha Ray]

I believe I did.

[Matthew Mercer]

She leans in and kisses you on the side of your cheek. You are wild. And she grins and smiles and looks at the fairy doors leading out into the Tintasi wood. And Velas, you're standing in this funereal garb that is your sister of Salandri and Azsuna. You watch as sprigs of wildflowers begin to be populated all around Velas's clothes, as fairies begin to leave flowers all throughout your garb.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh, my God,

[Matthew Mercer]

I love the runes.

[Travis Willingham]

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[Matthew Mercer]

As you. Yeah. Templar just takes your hand and smiles and all these fairies are looking at you. I don't know. I mean, Vaelys has the relationship to the fair Folk that she has. There is a strong correlation, like Salandri married the King of Faerie. But fairies have always had a kind of playful distance from elves, even though they're both sylvan. Things, because elves are. They're immortal, but they're of the world and they live in it forever. And there's a formality and a sorrow and a melancholy to them. And you realize that when Tamalo called you a wild thing, wild thing was capitalized. She meant that there was something else there.

[Marisha Ray]

What is this?

[Ashley Johnson]

I think it's beautiful.

[Matthew Mercer]

And it reminds me. I need to find Tysha.

[Marisha Ray]

We do.

[Matthew Mercer]

Tysha. You are, I believe, still nearby conducting this ritual. You see the panic setting in amongst the honored dead.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

I want to, as subtly as I can, because the hallowed round is built at the edge of Lake Nahami. So I imagine that there are pressure systems where there's a little bit of fog that rolls in in this natural theater. If I can, I want to communicate with the celestials here that are kind of beginning to freak out via this sending out a little fog cloud that rolls to all of those fallen warriors. I just want to to convey that their fight is over. And the people that they see watching their great works in the form of this play are the next generation who are here to take up the fight, to try to calm them, to move on, accepting. You said that there were some priests here, right?

[Matthew Mercer]

Yes.

[Sam Riegel]

Cool.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Now, what I know about them is that they love fighting to the very last drop. And watching them has reminded me that

[Liam O'Brien]

I hate their asses.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

So I would love to command them to stay and keep guard until everyone else has passed through hell.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yes, go ahead and give me. Give me nature. And give me insight as well.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Natural 20 for nature.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh my God, she is a Druid.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

I did it much worse. 12 for insight, 12 for insight.

[Matthew Mercer]

Okay, go ahead with that. Nat 20. Nature. She's starting to leaves. Oh, also go ahead and give me, as you're commanding the priest of Ozra, give me an intimidate check as well.

[Sam Riegel]

10.

[Matthew Mercer]

10.

[Sam Riegel]

Isn't that the one Alex blessed? Yeah, he gave me the Natural 20,

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

but it ran out of.

[Sam Riegel]

Alex, spit on this again.

[Matthew Mercer]

Nat Tony. Nature is crazy. So on those rolls, here's what I think happens. On the insight you have, the mist rolls out from you. And as your physical body continues to call the corners and walk and do the ritual on that nat 20, nature, a version of Tysha Loi appears formed of mist in the tenebral reaches. This does not need to be. You are no longer at distance. The spirit of Vokion Murzat's. You can see. Hold on one second. You see, Ajmi, the wife of Vulkion Murzot is there, who is Wavering back and forth between celestial and undead in this moment. Going out and saying Vulcion. And you can see that Voceon's spirit is almost all the way out of the Tenebra reaches because he's riding alongside Lash. He's telling his own story. And on that NAT20 nature fog is everywhere. You call out to the priest and you see that some of these heroes begin to just chase the priests into the dark forest. As you are like, stay here and serve and redeem yourselves. You see these tortured souls who were their paradise was to be torturers at the right hand of Oscra to avoid suffering by enacting it on his behalf. And the heroes of Phokion's rebellion chase them screaming into the forest. For they will not serve. Their souls are so wicked that they will not serve willingly in this moment. But that doesn't mean that they've gotten away. It just means that they're being chased by those rebels.

[Brian W. Foster]

Up till this moment, they were watching the play going, are we the bad

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

just fooling for you? Is this fucking play about us?

[Matthew Mercer]

Is this fucking play about us?

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Wow.

[Matthew Mercer]

But you can see Ajmi as you appear here in mist. AJMI turns to you. Flickering being like Vulcan ajmi. You know my name.

[Sam Riegel]

I do.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

I know your story. And my name is Tycha. I am from a time far later than you know. But where your efforts, your husband's efforts, our people's efforts have come to fruition.

[Matthew Mercer]

She looks at you and pauses and sees her husband up there. And you can see rolling out of the woods is this mist that you're calling to you. But you also look and see quite near you. Hal is technicolor vibrant, filling the forest with light. You see that Lake Nahami has become made of paint. It is bubbling paint. And you can see that around it there is a bubble for a second that goes and almost looks like the Loya state. And another one comes out and almost looks like Howl's house. And the rookery bubbles up all around you. And on that NAT20 nature check. We have to reward NAT20s on a NAT20 nature check. That paint is completely under your control. Ooh, sweet.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

I want to offer my hand to her.

[Sam Riegel]

Be at peace.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Your husband is coming. Will you help me with the project?

[Matthew Mercer]

Yes. Are you a witch? Are you a.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Are you a woman of truth of the old path? And you are about to walk it. But there is one thing I would like a little help with first.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yes. Runa, Lock in, please. And you see that she starts to call all These other spirits who follow you.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Yeah. We're going to head to Technicolor Lake and start some finger paints. I'm just full, Ms. Rachel. Time for an art project.

[Matthew Mercer]

You go and leave and lead these orcs with you to the lake. And they sit down and you see. Ajmee looks up and says, in your time, what has become of the conqueror?

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

He has gone dead and destroyed.

[Matthew Mercer]

We did not even dream in our wildest dreams.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

I know we couldn't have done it had you not shown us and built in us a bravery to keep trying.

[Matthew Mercer]

All right then. You are free and the land knows peace.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Complicated almost. There is still so much work to do. But we know the way. It will take work. It always takes work.

[Matthew Mercer]

She looks at the old path and goes. And you see her flickering towards becoming undead. And she goes. How can we leave if there is work yet to do?

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Those of us living, it is our time to work. A series of bridges have been built and what is left is for you to walk them. There is paint here. There is magic here. And I would ask that you walk through, cover yourself in it, and in your passing, cover this place with all of the color and vibrancy of your life and your love and make it stable.

[Matthew Mercer]

On a NAT20 Tysha, A wall of paint, like a towering wave, crests upwards. And you see that the souls of the Rimiani push their hands into it. Bright, vibrant color everywhere. And the paint swirls around them, splashing onto the forest. And suddenly the dark and dreary forest of the underworld is the most vibrant, living, glowing thing you've ever seen. You look at Hajmi, she looks up and goes, grabs the paint and smears it over her arms and legs and then fully leaps through it. And the wall collapses in front of her as she leaps through it. And she grows in size and the paint looks around and she is beautiful and radiant and tall. And the paint parts and Ajmee steps out of it and turns around and is looking at herself, this wispy, translucent, beautiful ghost of a woman who her ghostly self has tattered garments. She was a peasant. And she looks up at this 12 foot tall prismatic. It's a rainbow creation, but it's a liquid thing. And as the paint falls, it hits the ground and sizzles with light and small lava lamp globules of this paint scatter around. It's this glowing, effervescent thing that smiles shimmering green and purple and red radiance and this enormous version of her whose garments are heroic and beautiful. Kneels down and she looks at herself and she goes, We can't stay. It's your fight, but we can leave. And the 12 foot tall rainbow angel of her goes a story.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

That's all we are. In the end,

[Matthew Mercer]

she looks up and you see the 12 foot tall celestial version of rushes up and Hal, in the middle of one of Lash's moments where he's being stabbed and eviscerated right towards the end of the play, you see that Vokion is pulled out of him and his wife hurls him through the paint and the same miracle happens. And you see this small family of translucent spirits that get direct, reincarnate and walk the path and live again. But this massive orcish celestial which Tyson that nat20 I'll also probably ask Tycha to name. We've never seen the creation of a new form of celestial because it's. There's no. You are in the way that like great prophets and religious leaders have new revelations. This is a new, new revelation of the old path.

[Sam Riegel]

New angel just dropped.

[Matthew Mercer]

New angel just dropped. Because there is something to answer here, which is the part of me that wants to cling on to life is because I want to keep being of service. I don't want my grandchildren not to have my help. And the miracle of this paint in this moment and of this performance that Hal's troupe is giving is that you get to rejoin the world. But what you leave behind is the celestial of your story and what your life meant.

[Brian W. Foster]

You said that Hal sees this, sees this from the wings. He's watching this final moments with Voltjan and Lash on stage and seeing this miracle happening in the audience. And he can see Tysha illuminated by these two celestial beings. And all he can think, watching two stories unfold at once is that he could die tomorrow and it would all have been worth it.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Can you name her? Kedra.

[Matthew Mercer]

Kedra.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

There's a. When you are making new trails in woods, it's a little bit of marking you do on the tree in order to show the path for other people. Tyche's.

[Sam Riegel]

That's crazy.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

You roll the syllable wheel in your

[Matthew Mercer]

head, you reach to this old. It's a very ancient Bunyani word that you know from having studied ancient naturecraft. But there is, after all, one final wood we must all walk through.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

They're making my job easier by making a Technicolor footpath.

[Sam Riegel]

Great. Yeah.

[Matthew Mercer]

You see, I mean, you literally see, we see in this moment the marriage of the Druidic tradition of Druidcraft and Bardcraft of the nature of life and rebirth which is old and primal and the importance of story. And it comes together in this moment. And as the caedre here. It is genuinely challenging to guide people down a dark and frightening forest. And as these angels surge forward, you see Vokion joins his family to bid farewell to the world so that he can be reborn with them. And looks at this towering celestial Kedra that takes these two enormous axes in his hand and smiles just like rivers of purple and red and yellow and green tracing down his face as this endless font of burbling paint. And he goes treble. Well, I hope to live up to your example. As the story points at the man and flies. And almost like the human torch, there's this swirl of glowing paint behind and races up and outwards as you see in the wood. Dolmakyar bursts out of the lake. It is a dark and frightening city of the undead, as the geography of the underworld tends to be. But at the base of that dark and gothic city, its mirror image in the underworld, you see that the hallowed round is a glowing multicolored beacon like a heart at the base of the city. And Kaidra rush out from it into the city and into the forest.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

I spend the rest of my time just crying.

[Sam Riegel]

That's what I do.

[Matthew Mercer]

This new figure is created of those who must walk the path but wish to leave behind something for those that come after these people who lived a life and leave an enlightenment and a story and meaning behind them. Kedra rush flying into the city. These trails of paint hitting the ground effervescently bubbling and evaporating behind them.

[Marisha Ray]

And

[Matthew Mercer]

we return to. And the 10,000 people in the audience don't see none of that shit. That is all happening on a different plane of existence that's happening in the underworld. Everybody else is just. Great show. Oh, theater is sick as fuck.

[Marisha Ray]

You guys.

[Matthew Mercer]

Did we catch any of this? You guys caught all of that. And you can join Tysha in this.

[Marisha Ray]

Oh boy.

[Matthew Mercer]

Do you see what you did?

[Travis Willingham]

What?

[Matthew Mercer]

You helped too.

[Marisha Ray]

I did the right thing.

[Matthew Mercer]

I think you did a good thing. You sacrificed your own dreams so that you can help this wish come true. It's been a long time since I've seen a sacrifice be given so fully like that. I understand so much more now thanks to you.

[Marisha Ray]

What was that language you were speaking?

[Matthew Mercer]

That was the language of my people. Navikan. I've all but forgotten most of it. It's hard to pass things down from one generation to the next sometimes.

[Marisha Ray]

I haven't seen a dragon in quite some time.

[Matthew Mercer]

I didn't think they were real. I thought they were just a story made up to scare kids. Well, sometimes it just filled us with this wonder. I have to tell Tycha.

[Marisha Ray]

We have to tell Tysha.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Tell me what?

[Marisha Ray]

Hi. Were you there this time?

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

We were in a theater. There's a play happening.

[Matthew Mercer]

There's more than a play happening.

[Brian W. Foster]

Of course.

[Ashley Johnson]

You know that.

[Matthew Mercer]

Behind you guys. You hear.

[Sam Riegel]

I'm sorry. Hold on. Let's go back to the.

[Matthew Mercer]

Come on, come on, come on.

[Marisha Ray]

We saw a dragon, for starters.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

What?

[Sam Riegel]

That's where you start.

[Marisha Ray]

I have to.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay.

[Marisha Ray]

And we found. And an anchor of

[Matthew Mercer]

a fey.

[Marisha Ray]

Fey energy. A cavern.

[Brian W. Foster]

It's.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

You were gone for like 20 minutes.

[Marisha Ray]

I take out the little piece of moss that I took from the door just for you to have.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Thank you.

[Marisha Ray]

You're a Druid. I figured maybe you could.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

You can eat it.

[Matthew Mercer]

You can eat it.

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah.

[Marisha Ray]

What is it you do?

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Okay. We have to have a conversation about what we all do as people.

[Matthew Mercer]

That's what I did.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

You all look out and see the play coming to its crescendo. Here in this moment, you see Lash, who in the beyond, you can see that as the Khedra have moved out into the end and as the ritual's coming to a close. You realize once this play is over, you guys will lose the ability to peer through the veil. Right? That peering through the veil is happening because the space between the underworld and this world is there. That'd be real cool. Cause I don't know if you guys can see it.

[Sam Riegel]

Don't worry. It's just a normal play. You guys see the normal play? Yeah.

[Matthew Mercer]

You see a bunch of ghosts and Tycha. You can see too, this connection to the dying fields has been created. But the number of spirits or souls that you saw was finite. It was those, Nunny that were involved in Voceon's revolution. And no more than that. And so this is an incredible achievement. But it is very much the beginning of something. There are vastly many more stories. The work of this is not done by any stretch. You also look out and see in that vibrant forest stretching down the path that begins to be filled with light. It is this path here, presently in Dolmakyar. The achievement is profound and cosmic and celestial. But it is a very precious little seed that has just started to grow. And as it grows, you look out and see the Khedra have also gone off into the forest. And you see drenched in paint of deep dark reds and burning Oranges. You see those priests whom you condemned that have been basically smeared and covered in paint and are in the forest just pointing down the path.

[Sam Riegel]

Fucking darks.

[Matthew Mercer]

Which is simultaneously fitting punishment and a far kinder fate for them than they were happy to inflict on anybody else. On the stage itself, Lash's final soliloquy begins. Speaking of paint. His eyes are covered in red stage blood. As Vocion's eyes have been cut out of his head. He looks out dying under the tree in the center of the stage. Shadia as a chorus member has collapsed across the stage. The painted blade, the pariah blade on the ground beneath her. You could see an uncomfort fall over the crowd as that pariah blade clanged into the ground out of her hand. My baby's so good at acting. You see that Lash as well. Vocion calls out. You will see. All of you will see. One day you will look to the top of the hill and no longer will Oscar be there. No more will his visage tower over us. You cannot see it, but I can. He calls with his eyes cut out of his head. Look and tell me, dear eyes not see a free world breaking just beyond the horizon.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Look.

[Travis Willingham]

Look.

[Matthew Mercer]

And he points out. And everyone seems to turn to look to see where he's pointing, knowing that at the top of the city of Dolmachia is where Oscar used to sit. And there's a moment where this is going to be an enjoyable moment of being like, oh yeah, Oscar doesn't sit there anymore. And they turn and look up into the city and see the lights of the Via Aurora so bright, and the gray tower, its lights dimmed and bright lights celebrating the foetarch's resurrection. Meaning that at the very top of Dol Makyar, the brightest thing they see are the flags of the sundered houses. The feeling that settles over the crowd in this moment is a deep stomach turning confusion that settles into something more like rage. What is sitting at the top of this city as they turn? Lash's last line. You'll see one day.

[Brian W. Foster]

As he starts to sink, condensed in a tiny moment, Hal is overwhelmed with a feeling of pride in his family. And that word means so much to him. It means Tycha. It means Elodie, it means his children. It means every single member of the rookery. And now the hallowed round. It means his new complicated little family of magpies. It means all the citizens of Dolmakyar. He wishes his son were here. He wishes his brother were here. And watching Lash sink to the ground in the dark in the wings quietly speaks resonantly the words I believe casting enhance, ability, charisma on himself. And just with the simplest little bit of theater cantrip. It's not in the play. It wasn't part of any rehearsal. The rest of the rookery has never seen this happen. But from the wing, Hal twists his hands and almost as if the clouds have parted and revealed in sudden moonlight in the tree, the ancient tree that rises above Lash's collapsing body at the heart of this place, ancient. The entire audience sees a falcon perched on a branch above the fallen form of Volkjan Murzat. A single cry and then its wings explode outward and it lifts into the

[Sam Riegel]

air

[Brian W. Foster]

and arcs over the audience and out over the hills and trees in the distance. And only we can see it follow the path and vanish.

[Sam Riegel]

I'm gonna. Yes, and you. Because also we talked about this before as part of our plan. As the falcon, the physical falcon, starts to fly up and over the hills from the balcony, Murray is going to go ahead and do skywrite and throw up the symbol of our magpie falcon. Bird, bird symbol, Sky.

[Matthew Mercer]

Falcon takes to the wing, the sky overhead. There is something in this city ten times as large as the lights of the Vio Aurora. And as the falcon's wings go over, the lights of the stage dim and return as the chorus stands and the crowd goes fucking wild. Flowers, flowers, flowers. Panties. Flowers, flowers.

[Liam O'Brien]

You.

[Matthew Mercer]

You see that people in the front row, people are like have snot running out of their nose. They were bawling. So you can see that. You look at how everyone in the boxes up here all the way to the nosebleeds. The nosebleeds. People leaning over the rooftops of adjoining buildings that are not even the hallowed round are like weeping. And you can see this tension where all of them just were waiting for something else to happen at the end and are left with this boing energy, this thing of no way. He was not supposed to die at the end. That's not what's supposed to happen. And so you watch people, instead of having this feeling that this has all somehow resolved, this feeling of what do I fucking do with all this energy? And they just go nuts.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Let's feed that energy. Yes, there was that call lightning that Hanon did that I opened the radius on I want thunder as they're starting to get loud. Let's make the city loud.

[Matthew Mercer]

And you see up at the concession stand, Olgood crying harder than anybody else going, oh my God, we're not gonna have to show.

[Sam Riegel]

Shut Down.

[Matthew Mercer]

We're profitable.

[Liam O'Brien]

Oh God. I have a job.

[Matthew Mercer]

And you see that there's flowers. Curtain calls. Lash takes a bow and everyone begins to clap and ask for you to come out on stage.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay.

[Brian W. Foster]

Hal moves to the center of the stage carrying a an old Rongniani lute and walks to the center of the stage.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Briggs with Lysa.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yes.

[Brian W. Foster]

Got my wigs with Lysa on. And I plant the base of it on the ground with my hands on the top. Runyani friends and all good folk of Dolmachyar, if I may. Good tidings to you all. The hallowed round is doubly blessed for your kinship here this night. Because we gather in this storied place. History lives and breathes. So on behalf of the my family of talented mischief makers. My eyes trail across this little group in the crowd. Thank you. Our gratitude knows no end. Now in a few moments our company will shed their glamours like a dream and join you all to celebrate tonight. I encourage you all to share in wine and song first on the steps of the hallowed round. But then we will carry this magic back to the city. Tell your friends, tell your neighbors. Faith has returned to Dol Makyar. Not in kings, not in creed, but in the hearts of all folk, free and fair. And then he lifts the lute up rapidly and strums his hand down hard and begins a centuries old Ranjani folk song that everyone in this fucking audience recognizes and strides out amongst the people playing. And then the musicians of the hallowed round jump on in and suddenly the theater is alive with music and singing.

[Matthew Mercer]

Incredible.

[Liam O'Brien]

Yay.

[Matthew Mercer]

People are drinking. Is there intention for the. You see, Nevada goes out. Oh, we did it last. Beautiful boy. You only made. I counted maybe less than five mistakes. And you see that? She says, are we having the after party here? Are we going to Caravan Hill? Are we going to the rookery?

[Travis Willingham]

Where are we going?

[Brian W. Foster]

Nevada, get him up. Grab a bottle.

[Matthew Mercer]

We're taking it on the road. All right, let's get drunk.

[Laura Bailey]

You see that?

[Matthew Mercer]

She wanders off and you guys begin to just a party procession begins to pour out into the city streets. You see, Romina looks over at you and goes, oh my God, Lash, you were amazing. I brought flowers.

[Travis Willingham]

You see

[Matthew Mercer]

if anyone here has any. Does anyone have detect magic or anything else like that up at this end of the play?

[Sam Riegel]

No, have my see invisibility still up.

[Matthew Mercer]

Cool. See, Invisibility is fine. You guys. You're heading out. And you guys watched that special moment. This was a again. Tyche you have witnessed a Druidic revelation. Something new has happened in your ancient faith for the first time here. But the specialness of this evening, as Murray says, that this play is going to be a hit. Murray, our diviner, foretold that veil closes, which is a good thing. It is safer to keep these planes plainer, right? However, your ability to see on to the other side ends with the ending of this play. You don't know if it will pick up again in another play or not, or whatever it is. But for right now, harmony once again exists between the waking world of Ahriman and the other side in the underworld, but with a presence on that other side like the underworld has never seen before. And within that, you all head out, start merry making.

[Brian W. Foster]

I think that Hal has made his way up the hill. And as he gets the. His intention here is to try to rabble rouse and get everybody in a good mood. But also, as Tysha said, harness what's going on in this audience. And by the time I crest the top of the seating on the lute, I start to weave in threads of broken wing mixed into this ancient rungyong folk song. And I want to Pied Piper this horde of people through the streets of Dol Makyar.

[Matthew Mercer]

Hell, yeah. Do you have a neighborhood in mind? Are you trying to stay close to the theater, which would be like Caravan Hill or the Fray, or are you heading all the way up through the whole fucking city?

[Brian W. Foster]

I think that we will go up one side. Cause there's bridges that pass over the water up the middle, right?

[Matthew Mercer]

Yeah.

[Brian W. Foster]

So we will go all the way up to within sight of the Loy estate and then cross over a bridge and explode through the streets and alleys of the Rookery. The taverns, the bars there?

[Matthew Mercer]

Hell yes.

[Travis Willingham]

Great.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Can I do one more bit of paint magic before we go?

[Matthew Mercer]

Yes, absolutely.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

I guess it'll probably look a little like graffiti over Shadia's beautiful murals, but as high up as I can underneath where you can see the Via Aurora, like from this stage. I just want to write the words in Runyani, remember?

[Matthew Mercer]

Ooh, hell yes. Great, great. I love that.

[Sam Riegel]

Three roses deep. Just sobbing, just sobbing, just sobbing. Flying over.

[Matthew Mercer]

I have so much alcohol in my house.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Come to my house.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Let's go.

[Brian W. Foster]

Her beard is soaking wet.

[Sam Riegel]

She's just holding hollow.

[Matthew Mercer]

Give me an investigation roll as you do that. And anyone else who wants to give me a perception roll.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh, shit.

[Laura Bailey]

Yeah, perception.

[Sam Riegel]

As soon as I see these people

[Matthew Mercer]

leaving, there's something else that clicks in with Me, it makes me a little bit worried for their safety. Cool. And the moment I let my guard

[Ashley Johnson]

down to take this wondrous moment in,

[Matthew Mercer]

it starts to fade away. And I'm going to draw my shield and I will cast detect magic. Great.

[Ashley Johnson]

And I will

[Matthew Mercer]

cast Marshall again. Dirty 20. Dirty 20. Dirty 20. Azune, you have detect magic up on a dirty 20. You put remember on that part of the wall up there. I think Azune, you see that in Runyani, but still the word remember on that dirty 20, you feel because you are a healer, there is a life force within the people leaving this place that is hard to explain. The people here are filled with an energy leaving from the hallowed round. Azune, the pariah blade that Shadia sort of sheaths has a powerful magic on it that you can actually see is unlike what it. You saw it many times in the Arcanade. There's a new magic on it. And I think on that detect magic and on that dirty 20, the commoners leaving this place, I'm going to give it to you in game terms. But Tycho doesn't understand it in game terms. Every commoner leaving this place has about 40 temporary hit points.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh, God.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Just give me some motherfuckers in mint rocking up, please.

[Matthew Mercer]

You. They pitchforks abound. Pitchforks abound. You also on that detect magic, everyone who give me. Give me perception checks, anyone who wants to. And you can do so with advantage with the technically. 23.

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah, not good. I can't see through my runny mascara.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

25.

[Sam Riegel]

25.

[Matthew Mercer]

8. 8. Okay, Tysha, you clocked this as well. And I think again off of the detect magic happening here. Bayless, I'm 23. You see it as well. First of all, fairies are leaving, but they are not following into the city. They are rushing out the fairy doors in the back towards Tintasi Wall. And you see that a tiny little pixie there is a tiny little naked, long eared, 1 inch tall guy wearing an acorn hat and no other clothes. Tiny little gossamer wings flies up to you and goes, will you be our queen?

[Sam Riegel]

Oh, God. Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

And then leaves before you answer.

[Sam Riegel]

Hi. You see that?

[Matthew Mercer]

He forgot what he asked the moment he was done asking it.

[Laura Bailey]

Wow.

[Matthew Mercer]

But Also in the 23, Tycha and Bayless, you both see some of the paint in the theater is moving. A tiny two dimensional painted chameleon with a small painted mask in its mouth is crawling along the ground and the veil is already closed. This is really happening on the stage. And goes and jumps it can't leave the floor. So its jump is it just moving along the ground. Very like Mario TV Scroller played that game. It jumps. You see, it jumps onto a box marked extra wigs, maybe lice, and jumps inside towards the coffin that you delivered from here, which is still here in this room.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

I do like the snap point to see if anyone sees what I see.

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah, I'm gonna go.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Let's go. I'm gonna go. Hal told me not to touch stuff. I'm fucking running.

[Matthew Mercer]

Running.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Yeah, cool.

[Matthew Mercer]

You go and run and see that there is a painted chameleon and holding a painted version of Bolair's mask in its mouth. That is crawling on the outside of the coffin of Oblad.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Hey, buddy, you good?

[Matthew Mercer]

The mask opens its mouth and goes, ah.

[Sam Riegel]

I'm Bolair. What?

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Okay, interesting. Are you for real?

[Matthew Mercer]

I'm Bolaya.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Okay.

[Sam Riegel]

If he says it one more time, it must be true. Yeah, yeah. You know what?

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Insight check, insight check.

[Sam Riegel]

You know what? Here's the thing. I can see it 50.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Yeah, I know. Unfortunately, if he said it was anyone but belair, I'd be like, nah.

[Sam Riegel]

But maybe.

[Liam O'Brien]

Oh, boy.

[Sam Riegel]

Kind of weird. Yeah. 15.

[Matthew Mercer]

Uh, might be Bowler.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Hey, bud, why are you flat?

[Matthew Mercer]

Masks are always flat. Let me in the box.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Um, shit, that's a really good reason. I don't want to let you in yet. Why are you. Why are you outside of the box?

[Sam Riegel]

Why.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Why are you not a man with a bad wig?

[Sam Riegel]

What?

[Matthew Mercer]

My wig's good. I'm Baulaire.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

I do believe this is Baulaire now.

[Laura Bailey]

I'm Bolaire.

[Matthew Mercer]

The chameleon drops the mask and goes, I'm Figment. Let me in the box.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Figment.

[Matthew Mercer]

Let me in the box.

[Marisha Ray]

Can I grab the mask?

[Matthew Mercer]

You go to grab the mask, you poke it. It's dried paint, so you poke it and you see the mask goes, ow. I'm Bolair.

[Travis Willingham]

What is happening?

[Sam Riegel]

I don't know what's happening.

[Matthew Mercer]

I don't want to look at her.

[Travis Willingham]

You see that?

[Matthew Mercer]

You see that? The mask and the chameleon both sort of lean their heads against each other and say, let us in the box. We're good.

[Laura Bailey]

No, that feels like that shit, I

[Brian W. Foster]

think might be having an effect on us.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Okay, why don't you just come with and I want to rip the cardboard off and take it with me and be like, let's go over here and then we'll go in the box later.

[Matthew Mercer]

Oh, do you want to lure them off the coffin onto a piece of cardboard?

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah.

[Matthew Mercer]

Give me a persuasion check.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

No. 13, please come with me.

[Matthew Mercer]

Alaric, with my friend, you can physically pick up and move it if you would like. But Balelaire would say not to touch this.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Baler may or may not be here. Now, I grab it and she'll take it.

[Matthew Mercer]

You pick it up and it's fine. You've traveled with it before. It's still closed. The pain is on the underside of it, you see, as you begin to move it, you see that Baher looks at the chameleon and goes, oh, no, they don't want us to do it. And they sort of move around to the underside of the coffin.

[Sam Riegel]

No, no. But they're stuck on. Are they stuck on the coffin?

[Matthew Mercer]

Stuck on the outside. They can't get inside.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Okay, I'm keep rolling it so I've

[Sam Riegel]

got eyes on them the whole time.

[Matthew Mercer]

Great.

[Marisha Ray]

Is the mask still in the mouth of this lizard?

[Matthew Mercer]

As they need to move, the lizard picks up the mask in its mouth and begins to move with it. It doesn't seem that the mask has the ability to move itself on the coffin.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Do you want to hold that?

[Marisha Ray]

I mean, I will scrimp so you can be busy with something.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

What am I doing?

[Marisha Ray]

I don't know.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

And with that Baelis, you get this coffin. It's like you just smashed the Stone of Nightsong and now you're responsible for some other ancient psychopomp relic. Okay, I'm sorry.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Hanging out with me is weird.

[Sam Riegel]

It's the best, actually.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

At least there's no birds flying out.

[Matthew Mercer]

You guys. The procession is leaving. You guys head out. There are some staff that are quickly start cleaning up. And you see, Olgood says we can clean up tomorrow. Come out and have a drink. We'll take care of it later. The hallowed Rand begins to leave. You guys take the coffin of Obelad and we are going to move from this table to our friends at Obramus Manor.

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah.

[Matthew Mercer]

Oh, no.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh, no.

[Matthew Mercer]

We return to Obramus Manor, where Thimble is trying to find Teor Pridesire. Our friends.

[Marisha Ray]

I'm going to save him.

[Matthew Mercer]

You're going to save him. Our friends Octus Taconis and Julian Davinos have featherfalled, assuming that Thimble would come right behind them. But before that, having concluded our first round of the areas that you guys traveled to in the manor, we are going to roll for overall threat, as we said before. Correct. So I would like everybody here to roll a D8 for me. I will roll for Teor and Cid. And I would like you guys to. Oh, they having triggered one of the undead crypts. Absolutely count even in death as that makes sense. So we're gonna roll D8s, and I just want you to let me know if you roll a one, a two, a two.

[Ashley Johnson]

No.

[Liam O'Brien]

Seven. Five.

[Matthew Mercer]

Okay, I'll roll for Teor and Cid. This one is for Cid. That is a seven, and we will roll for Teor. Teor, Come on. Teor got a one.

[Marisha Ray]

Teor is unlucky.

[Matthew Mercer]

That is true. You do not have to roll. But it is going to degrade to a D6. And Teor and Cid, having been in the same scene, are going to roll next. If we get a one on either of these rolls, it keeps cascading. Sid, that was almost a 1 2. Oh, come on. Okay, we stop. However, the next time this roll occurs, you'll all be rolling D6s.

[Ashley Johnson]

Okay?

[Matthew Mercer]

Okay. Yeah, I'm fine.

[Sam Riegel]

Everything's fine.

[Matthew Mercer]

The threat level has increased in the house, but is not as bad. Basically, a 1 on a D4 means all of the Taconuses immediately are home.

[Travis Willingham]

Right?

[Matthew Mercer]

Cool.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yeah, yeah.

[Marisha Ray]

Wick's distracting them. Just keep distracting them.

[Matthew Mercer]

Wicked. You have the unconscious body of Mara,

[Liam O'Brien]

the wing I am currently holding, in one hand.

[Matthew Mercer]

You have Julian, a stack of papers taken from Korol's room, as well as your sister's Wraith jam.

[Travis Willingham]

Correct.

[Matthew Mercer]

Octys, you land on the street after Featherfall. Look up. Some shape has just thundered onto the Wraith roof of Obramus Manor. I need a constitution saving throw from you.

[Liam O'Brien]

Oh, okay. That would be a 21.

[Matthew Mercer]

A thundering pain surges where your heart should be as you feel a fiery strike and a feeling of something shattering as you land on the ground. On a 21. You are not immediately destroyed.

[Liam O'Brien]

Octys just lands and then sits on the ground and.

[Travis Willingham]

Octis. Octus, what's wrong?

[Liam O'Brien]

I don't know. Something is burning inside me.

[Matthew Mercer]

I don't know.

[Travis Willingham]

I keep my gauntlet at the ready and pull back the coat to see if there's anything visibly different.

[Matthew Mercer]

Give me a perception check.

[Travis Willingham]

SP15. Actually.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Nope.

[Travis Willingham]

12. Sorry, I misread the die.

[Matthew Mercer]

Sorry. 15 or 12. It's a 12. 12. You look and don't. There's no heartbeat in there. Octys is experiencing a moment of really visceral pain. As the visceral pain begins to fade, Octys, you begin to feel that the pain passing almost feels like not an arrow going in, but one coming out. There's a feeling that something that was of tremendous risk or danger to you has Actually been unmade.

[Ashley Johnson]

I

[Liam O'Brien]

feel better.

[Travis Willingham]

Good. We gotta go.

[Liam O'Brien]

Where? Looks up. Sees Thimble. Sees Thimble has not followed them down.

[Sam Riegel]

What is she doing?

[Liam O'Brien]

Have you flown back in?

[Marisha Ray]

Yeah. I remember I said I was really sneaky. No. I ain't going. She didn't.

[Liam O'Brien]

She didn't come down.

[Travis Willingham]

Julian. About five steps away. Stops and turns. What are you doing?

[Liam O'Brien]

She didn't come with us.

[Travis Willingham]

Who?

[Sam Riegel]

Thimble.

[Travis Willingham]

She's hard to see. She's quick.

[Liam O'Brien]

She didn't follow us down.

[Travis Willingham]

That's her choice. We have to go now. We have what we need.

[Liam O'Brien]

I'm not gonna leave her.

[Travis Willingham]

But you want to go back and die as well?

[Liam O'Brien]

If anyone's gonna live in there, it's gonna be me. She doesn't know her way around.

[Travis Willingham]

I'm not going to let you walk back into the hands of your family. For whatever dire purpose they have still

[Brian W. Foster]

of use of you.

[Liam O'Brien]

Look, take Mara. Bring her back to everybody.

[Matthew Mercer]

I will go get married.

[Travis Willingham]

Mara's not even my charge. I don't give a shit about what Tazi's friends were. I got what I need. I helped you out. It's not my fault that she went back in there. To go and sacrifice herself needlessly.

[Liam O'Brien]

Then why do you need me? Why do you care?

[Travis Willingham]

I. I get the sense that your family is not done with your usefulness. And I don't want them to get their hands on you before we understand what that is.

[Liam O'Brien]

Well, I'm sorry if that doesn't make me want to follow you. I am going to go. And I'm going to get the one of two people that care about me in this world. And I'm going to find her. And I'm going to bring her out of there. She is not dying in my family's house.

[Travis Willingham]

Teyr was a soldier. He knew the risks. If he can't make his way out of there, he will die a soldier's death. Thimble. She's an example of why the rebellion failed in the first place. This foolhardiness gets each one of them killed. They have to think with your head. You have a big brain in there, supposedly. Still, right? Use it. And what the fuck is that on the roof?

[Sam Riegel]

You.

[Matthew Mercer]

As you say that, you see that the thing on the roof leaps off and lands in the courtyard as lightning crashes around the house.

[Liam O'Brien]

That's not something my family can do. Or at least not something I know they can do. Look, I understand that you have this vendetta against my family. And I understand that you don't want Them to get me because I may have some part of their puzzle piece of their planet. I understand all of these things. I am not. I am tired of trying to placate your anger towards me. I am tired of trying to do the things that I think you want me to do so you'll stop trying to kill me. I am tired of pretending I give a shit about you. Go do whatever you're gonna do. Save your sister. I helped you with that. Take that stone. Go get your sister. I am going to get Thimble. I start to turn around and walk towards the gate.

[Matthew Mercer]

You're walking towards the gate. That you guys.

[Liam O'Brien]

To the wall which we jumped over to find a way back in.

[Travis Willingham]

Gotcha.

[Liam O'Brien]

Great, great, great.

[Matthew Mercer]

Julian.

[Travis Willingham]

After you said my piece, I'm going to go ahead and follow behind him in step as he is beginning to to say. I never asked for you to care about me. I don't care that you don't give a shit about me. Do what you got to do. But you're not leaving my sight.

[Sam Riegel]

Fuck. Fuck.

[Travis Willingham]

I'm going to go ahead and activate the Boots of the Hair.

[Matthew Mercer]

How far up is the wall? It's about 18ft straight up.

[Travis Willingham]

18ft straight up? Well, with the Boots of the Hair, I can jump 30ft.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yes, that's correct.

[Liam O'Brien]

I can get over and I'll pull out a piece of.

[Sam Riegel]

Come on.

[Liam O'Brien]

Please scroll down. Jeez. I'm pulling out a piece of. I love that. It doesn't tell me anymore. Oh no. It doesn't require it. A little drop of a liquid and a spider in this vial. And I pour it into my hand and I cast spider climb on myself.

[Matthew Mercer]

Amazing. Hare's charm. Spider climb up the wall. I need a stealth check from both of you.

[Sam Riegel]

Yep.

[Liam O'Brien]

Seventeen.

[Travis Willingham]

Fifteen.

[Matthew Mercer]

One second.

[Marisha Ray]

What about Mara?

[Matthew Mercer]

Mara's going back into Obra Manor. Seventeen is the higher of the two group stealth. Check. We'll go with 17. I'm just checking a number of different passive perceptions.

[Liam O'Brien]

Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

Both of you alight to the top of the wall. Look down.

[Liam O'Brien]

I do. Look before I go over the top. I look to see whatever that Thunderstrike was appear over the top of the wall.

[Matthew Mercer]

Give me a perception check. Difficulty 12.

[Liam O'Brien]

15.

[Matthew Mercer]

You see Hanon in the courtyard walking up to the main gate of Obermas Manor.

[Brian W. Foster]

Shit.

[Liam O'Brien]

Hanon's here.

[Travis Willingham]

Great. More help then.

[Liam O'Brien]

I'm going to

[Matthew Mercer]

Thimble. We cut to you. You did not get a high enough investigation. Check. But it was not too terribly low. You are flitting down trying to find your Way back into the crypts, specifically where you think Teor and Cid were headed. You find yourself flitting through a place closer to the front gate. Actually, you get down there very quickly, but all of a sudden hear footsteps and have to dart into a side area. On that high stealth roll, you are in a dark office, but not supernaturally dark. And you look around. Give me a perception check as you get in here.

[Sam Riegel]

Um, 15.

[Matthew Mercer]

15. You flit into an office. You realize this is sort of the central stately office of Obraus Manor, the main study. And looking around, it's not a weird secret ritual crypt. That shit's all underground. But you do see a large book open with schematics for ships on it.

[Sam Riegel]

It's a thing.

[Matthew Mercer]

As you do, you hear footsteps, a clanking of armor. You hear voices. And a woman's voice, stately, regal, speaks out and says, naosha, we're under attack. The gate guard is dead. What do you mean, we're under attack? The gate guard is dead. Koral is dead. There are infiltrators in the house this very instant. Do you understand? Lightning strikes outside. You see that? She looks out and says, that divinos beast in the crypt has awakened. That was the roar we heard earlier. Send word at once to Primus and the children. They cannot come home by wagon or carriage. They have to fly.

[Brian W. Foster]

You

[Matthew Mercer]

hear her speak out. There is a thud of something landing in the courtyard. She goes, what in the name of the dead shapers is this? She says, nauscha. At once, Primus hear immediately the children. And you hear footsteps running. Her voice speaks out, and you hear her speaking, saying, forsaken souls of the accursed dead, heed my words and serve at the pleasure of the house of death, we are under attack. You feel that?

[Sam Riegel]

So much harder.

[Matthew Mercer]

You feel the temperature drop about 15 degrees in the house. And looking out through the crack in the doorway, about four or five dozen shadows, those beings from before, from the first crypt you fought in.

[Sam Riegel]

Those ones are bad.

[Matthew Mercer]

Those ones are really bad. Flit out and she goes. Shades of the accursed dead. Search the house. Kill anything not of the house Taconis that you find. And they move out from her as boom, boom, boom. A fist bangs on the door. She goes, coming and turns around as she does. She opens the door, and at this point now, by the way, we are not in so that you hear all that occur. So shadows are moving. No one has come up to this thing yet. But you are in an important room that anyone might come into at Any moment you hear her go, hello. You weren't announced by the gate guard. I did not come through the gate. I am Hanon of the Circle of the Hunter. It is my understanding that a member of my order is being kept here against her will.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh, my God.

[Matthew Mercer]

You see? She goes.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh.

[Matthew Mercer]

We had no word of your arrival. You said, han, you are. I am a Druid of the Old Path.

[Marisha Ray]

Do I know Hanon?

[Matthew Mercer]

Hanon got mentioned in the big meeting.

[Marisha Ray]

Yeah, but I didn't ever meet him. Right. He wasn't there in the big meeting.

[Matthew Mercer]

He was not there in the big meeting. You guys are seeing this interaction occur. So you're seeing it from way. You guys are probably 160ft away from this. You guys are way the fuck across the courtyard. You're hearing it while I'm hearing it.

[Marisha Ray]

Is there a second exit from this? Is she in this office with me? She's at the front gate now. So I can potentially get out of this room.

[Matthew Mercer]

You could potentially get out of this room. Let me answer your question. Hold on one second.

[Marisha Ray]

Oh, leave, leave. Jump off the gate.

[Matthew Mercer]

She's within eyesight if you leave this door. Okay, so it's a stealth check to get out of the room you're in.

[Marisha Ray]

And there's no other exit from this study?

[Matthew Mercer]

No other exit from this study.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

This study leads out to a small balcony with stairs that go down. And the balcony that the single door faces looks at the front gate of the manor.

[Marisha Ray]

And the book that I'm looking at, is it hand drawn schematics? Is it like. Or is it basic bitch stuff that I could find at a library?

[Matthew Mercer]

This is extraordinarily exquisite. Hand drawn runes and arcane shit around ships.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay, I'm gonna try to rip out some pages.

[Matthew Mercer]

Hell, yeah. Give me sleight of hand. As you are. You take out a small little fairy knife and begin to carve the pages off.

[Marisha Ray]

19. Ooh.

[Matthew Mercer]

Hell yeah. You carve through. You look at this book. You don't know what this book fucking says, but there's only about eight pages that have drawings of ships on it. And you grab those eight pages, fold them up, and that's like a spear on your back.

[Liam O'Brien]

Is this.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Yeah.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay,

[Matthew Mercer]

you see that Hanon speak as you're doing that? Hanon continues to speak, going, may I come in and retrieve the member of my order? You see that? He says, and to whom do I speak? She goes, I am the Lady Trimus to Konis. I'm tending to the house during my stay here in Dolmak. Yar we the woman of whom you speak. Yes.

[Marisha Ray]

I'm flying up to the doorway, peeking out while they're talking.

[Matthew Mercer]

You peeking out. You guys up on the wall. As this is occurring as well, you're hidden in your current stealth. At this moment, I'm not moving.

[Liam O'Brien]

And now seeing that there's people looking out the door, I'm not going over the wall. I'm staying in this spot where I'm looking over the wall, watching.

[Marisha Ray]

What's happening is her back to me is what's happening.

[Matthew Mercer]

Her back is to you. Currently, there may be undead present that you cannot see. Those ghosts appeared out of nowhere up above, but her back is to you. Once her back is turned, if she chooses to come into this room, who knows what the fuck happens right when

[Marisha Ray]

her back is turned. I'm gonna try to get out of this room.

[Matthew Mercer]

Give me a stealth check.

[Sam Riegel]

Eighteen.

[Matthew Mercer]

Let me see.

[Marisha Ray]

Do I have advantage? I find anything, it's just cause I'm.

[Liam O'Brien]

You're so small.

[Marisha Ray]

I'm so little. I'm so very, very little.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

18.

[Liam O'Brien]

Okay.

[Marisha Ray]

Ooh,

[Matthew Mercer]

18. That's such a funny roll. Okay.

[Marisha Ray]

Why?

[Matthew Mercer]

Well, because the necromancer does not see you, but the druid in the doorway with a very high wisdom score does. So you dart out.

[Marisha Ray]

I'm gonna make eye contact with Hanan as I come out of the door.

[Matthew Mercer]

He makes eye contact with you. Now he's gonna have to make a deception check, opposed by Trimus. Insight. I'm gonna keep it spicy and roll in front. This is Hanon's deception. 17 plus one is 18. You. You want Trimus to roll a nine or lower.

[Marisha Ray]

Oh, fuck me.

[Sam Riegel]

Eight.

[Matthew Mercer]

Eight. Unbelievable. Hanon clocks you. What do you communicate with your face to Hanon? He darts. Hanon turns around and she says, as you say that Trimus is speaking to hand. And he darts, looking at you, shrugs, looks back, realizing he doesn't want to give you up. But you see that Trimus speaks to him and goes, oh, a member of your order? I'm sure I wouldn't. No. Oh, we had. There was an awakened beast that was attempting to steal from our home that we've captured. Is that. Could that be? And you see, he goes. He makes a roll here. And you can see on Hanon's face that in his head he's like, fuck. Mara does love to steal, you know, like he has that moment and she says, but I'm unsure. And he goes, may I enter your home? I would like to see this captured. You see that? Trimus goes, I am so sorry. My family bears a tremendous curse. Our home is very largely haunted. The barrier between the tenebral reaches and the waking world of Ahriman is quite thin here. It is not safe for guests to travel in this place. You see, Hanon, stand tall and go, would you like me to fix that? And you see, she goes, oh, he says, you described it as a curse. I would be more than happy to heal your family's curse. She goes, I. He goes, you're here in the free city of Dolmakyar, a noble, sundered house. Obviously, people often misunderstand your house's gifts. You are not commanders of armies of the undead, but simply fairy souls from one side to the other. I would hate to think of you being cursed in such a manner. You don't have any undead servants here in the house, do you? And you see, she looks and goes, nothing of the kind. And he goes, well, you're worried for my safety and you've been kind enough to warn me. I am waiting for you to produce someone that it sounds that a member of my order may have wronged your house. The Circle of the Hunt recognizes the august membership in a free society of the House of Taconis. So why don't you produce the prisoner, and I'll get started fixing this abominable rift you've just mentioned. And you see, she goes, that sounds lovely. And he goes, very well. Please don't bother me during my administrations. Just produce the prisoner and I'll get to her when I'm done. And you guys watch hand and walk out into the courtyard, put his hands to the side. Enormous claws grow from his hands as the bird mask lowers. He crouches, and circles of vines begin to grow through the whitestone courtyard. And he goes, those things which are dead had best remain in the state to which life has judged them now. And he hears you all hear thunderous clattering of bones disanimating throughout the house. And Thimble, you see the shadows lessen in their severity as he begins to cast this lengthy ritual.

[Liam O'Brien]

To my horrible chagrin, does this affect me at all?

[Matthew Mercer]

You are an honest man. My first thought. No, it does not affect you. In this moment, you can see that this ritual is going to probably take the better part of an hour. And in addition to that, as he's doing it, the very first thing to go are skeletons. Those things are. They're all undead. But the difference between a skeleton and a ghost is, Miles, a skeleton is like, honestly, half telekinesis, right? It's like, yeah, as an undead spirit. Barely.

[Liam O'Brien]

Barely.

[Matthew Mercer]

We all know this.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

We all know this.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yeah, Obviously with that. So give me your stealth check as your. Oh, no, you already did. You got your 18. So as you see him begin to turn away from that interaction with Trimus, you can dart off wherever you. And as you dart, you see as he begins this powerful ritual. The circle of the hunt is the hunt and kill. Undead circle. Everything that made that first interaction with octys so dangerous is now rapidly becoming a little bit better. As you go downstairs, the difficulty of the investigation. Check. Is now only a 10.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

Because as you go down, your natural fairy light can now penetrate the darkness is no longer magical darkness.

[Travis Willingham]

Down there,

[Matthew Mercer]

you literally watch your family's worst nightmare. This guy is going. You told me you got a rift of the underworld. Happy to take care of that for you. That's literally my job.

[Liam O'Brien]

As much as I want to tell Hanon that we have what he's looking for, I think we should let him continue to do this. He's severely damaging my family's estate.

[Travis Willingham]

That's good to know. Where is Timbula?

[Liam O'Brien]

She's upstairs. If she stayed in the room she was in, she's got to go down the hall and then downstairs. But as soon as she gets to where we were, she won't be able to see. It'll be completely black. And she can't carry a candle.

[Sam Riegel]

But I can now.

[Marisha Ray]

I can see.

[Sam Riegel]

I can see.

[Liam O'Brien]

I don't know that, but I can.

[Travis Willingham]

We'll stay as long as we can before it becomes and we have to flee.

[Liam O'Brien]

With Hanan here, the whole building's going to be on alert. There's no way we're getting in that house without someone seeing us.

[Travis Willingham]

Right. Which is why we don't go into the house. We wait until she shows up at least. If it's anytime soon, and if it starts getting too hairy, we run.

[Liam O'Brien]

There's only so much time before my family gets home.

[Matthew Mercer]

Thimble, go ahead and give me an investigation check.

[Sam Riegel]

No.

[Marisha Ray]

How can I make this higher?

[Matthew Mercer]

It's not a 10.

[Sam Riegel]

It's not a 10.

[Matthew Mercer]

It's a 9. It's a 9.

[Sam Riegel]

It'S a 9.

[Marisha Ray]

But do I have any. Did I didn't wait.

[Sam Riegel]

I had, like, a hero dice or

[Marisha Ray]

something that somebody gave me.

[Sam Riegel]

I feel like there was something.

[Matthew Mercer]

Did Hal give you a Bardic inspiration at some point? Several episodes ago.

[Sam Riegel]

Liam?

[Matthew Mercer]

Liam?

[Marisha Ray]

No, I can't remember.

[Matthew Mercer]

I'll throw it to Lore. If Lore feels like there was a die, you guys can let me know if Bardic for thimble question mark. But for you guys on the wall. We'll cut to you for a minute. What are you doing in this moment?

[Liam O'Brien]

Can't stay perched on the wall. It's obvious.

[Travis Willingham]

Do you want to go to the window if she's about to come back? Would that be the point of exit?

[Liam O'Brien]

I think so. At least it'll put us somewhere people won't be immediately looking for us.

[Travis Willingham]

Then let's get there.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay.

[Travis Willingham]

Wait.

[Matthew Mercer]

Where are you headed to?

[Liam O'Brien]

Over the edge of the wall. Up the side of the building to be perched outside of the window that we came out of.

[Matthew Mercer]

Okay. Got it.

[Liam O'Brien]

With both And I can be spidered up there.

[Travis Willingham]

I'm going to go slightly into that window to just look. Just in case there's a dead thimble in there that got caught by something on our exit.

[Matthew Mercer]

Give me a stealth check as you guys get back up to the window of that aviary.

[Travis Willingham]

1817.

[Matthew Mercer]

1817.

[Sam Riegel]

Great.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Cool.

[Matthew Mercer]

You guys waiting for the lightning to crash and then that return to darkness to get up. Bam. You guys get up back toward hiding into the corner of the aviary. There Mara like slung over your shoulders.

[Liam O'Brien]

Mara is. There's a million pockets in the inside of my code for spell components. And Mara has been tucked inside.

[Marisha Ray]

She's nuts.

[Sam Riegel]

She's that little. She could be in a pocket.

[Liam O'Brien]

She's like yay big. But I've got a bunch of things in there. I'm giving a reason. I've got one hand to climb.

[Marisha Ray]

I don't think I do. I think it was a nine. I think it was a nine.

[Travis Willingham]

I think it's a nine.

[Ashley Johnson]

I think it's a nine.

[Liam O'Brien]

I think it's a nine.

[Matthew Mercer]

Thimble darting through the house as fast as you can. That's your investigation. Give me a stealth check for that travel through. You may get out of the door. But I want another stealth check as you move to the glass.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay. That's really great. That's a 26.

[Matthew Mercer]

You are taking advantage of the lack of tenebral gloom. You pop your way out and see you are looking out a window in the back of a kitchens gazing at a garden. And you can see the garden in this place has three statues of beautiful gnomish warriors.

[Marisha Ray]

Where's he supposed to be?

[Matthew Mercer]

That's where Teyr was supposed to be. And you can tell he didn't make it here. The door never opened. Tear did not make it to this location. You look out and consider see several ghouls moving out and taking those crates filled with straw. They pick up the statues, put them in the crates, and begin to hammer the boxes. And you see that one of the ghouls doubles over and pulls out of a rotting wound. Just pulls some thorny vines out and shows it to another ghoul.

[Sam Riegel]

Look at this shit.

[Matthew Mercer]

This is so bad.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay, so I know he's not there, so maybe he never made it out of the crypts.

[Matthew Mercer]

At the end of this, if you want to take another, you can go back in the direction, back to the crypts to keep trying to look for him, if you can. I'm gonna need rolls on the D6 for the three of you.

[Marisha Ray]

Oh, jeebies. Three.

[Travis Willingham]

Three.

[Matthew Mercer]

Three. I'm gonna roll one. Come on, Hannon. Come on, dude. That's a one for Hannon.

[Travis Willingham]

Bite him.

[Matthew Mercer]

He's by himself. Gonna roll on a D4. But the next roll will be on D4s.

[Sam Riegel]

God.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yeah, it's a one.

[Marisha Ray]

That's it then. They're here because of Hanon.

[Matthew Mercer]

Well, he's very bigger.

[Sam Riegel]

A little bit of a ruckus.

[Marisha Ray]

He is, but he's there.

[Matthew Mercer]

Okay, you know what? I will rule that this resolves in the middle of this next scene.

[Travis Willingham]

Okay?

[Matthew Mercer]

So fimble, go ahead. Give me investigation difficulties. 10.

[Marisha Ray]

This is great. This is a 20.

[Matthew Mercer]

Incredible. Fimble, give me stealth.

[Liam O'Brien]

We've only got a few more minutes.

[Marisha Ray]

This is a 15.

[Sam Riegel]

15. Um.

[Matthew Mercer]

Ch, ch, ch, ch. One second.

[Marisha Ray]

So I got too happy with my light working. I turned it on a little too high, didn't I?

[Matthew Mercer]

I think so.

[Travis Willingham]

How does your family travel in moments

[Liam O'Brien]

of duress with Han in here, they will have sent a messenger or some way to communicate to them.

[Matthew Mercer]

And I.

[Liam O'Brien]

Do you remember when my sisters were flying?

[Travis Willingham]

I immediately looked to the horizon.

[Matthew Mercer]

Give me potion

[Liam O'Brien]

8.

[Matthew Mercer]

You look to the horizon. Stormy weather, hard to see.

[Liam O'Brien]

Say I will also be looking because I also perched up here. That is a 17.

[Matthew Mercer]

17. Got it. Okay, Seventeen. Perception.

[Liam O'Brien]

Yes.

[Matthew Mercer]

There are forms streaking through the storm clouds.

[Liam O'Brien]

Straight here. They're coming. I can see them.

[Travis Willingham]

We have to go.

[Liam O'Brien]

We have to go.

[Matthew Mercer]

Thimble racing down the temporal gloom. Gone, flitting down on that 17. Or, sorry, the 15. You move through a room and alighting into the rafters, staying hidden in the shadows. Swaying zombies, dead members of Houses Divinos and Royce. You recognize some of these faces. And you see the monstrosity of Raymond Davinos missing an arm, tattered to threads by the mighty blows of the Pridesire brothers. You literally flit in through the bars of a door into this crypt. And see these undead figures unaware that there is anything living to kill here. Just swaying, facing the door. Past them, an open door. And you see the fading motes of light from the bodies of Teor and Cid.

[Marisha Ray]

You

[Matthew Mercer]

give me an insight check and give me a perception check.

[Sam Riegel]

Insight is 15.

[Marisha Ray]

Perception is 25

[Matthew Mercer]

thimble. Outside, you hear thudding on the ground. Something has just changed. The level of risk here was already so great that Teor is dead on the ground. You can see his body in the dim flickering light of whatever sputtering arcane symbols still glow with green necromantic light. That level of risk that killed Teor is but a fraction in the face of the risk that now just landed in the courtyard outside. However, on a 25 perception, the scroll of the torn banner has been shoved into Raymond Davinos un undead chest. He is a monstrosity that destroyed Teor and Cid, and they're not even done building him. And right now he is in tatters, but still animated. In that room, Daren. Cid's dead bodies are there, but you also can feel a powerful magical pulse. It's impossible to say what it could be, but there is something of fairy left in that room. There are no friends lives to save here. And every second counts. You might die here in the dark, like your friend did, but also there is chance here in this space. Raymond is almost destroyed. And there is something of Teors within that room that calls to you of your lost homeland.

[Marisha Ray]

How big is the room?

[Matthew Mercer]

This antechamber is Probably, I would say 50ft long and about 30ft wide. And the smaller chamber that currently only has Raymond's hulking mass standing within it. So the zombies have returned to that antechamber, and Raymond is standing there near the dead bodies of Teor and Cid in that other space. And that is a smaller chamber. You saw that chamber in front of Teor.

[Marisha Ray]

I want to try to attack him. I want to fly in and attack him. If I can stop it from coming to fruition, I'm going to do it.

[Matthew Mercer]

I'm going to need you to roll Initiative.

[Travis Willingham]

It's okay. Unless you're just looking for him and coming straight back.

[Sam Riegel]

Right.

[Liam O'Brien]

I absolutely believe that.

[Matthew Mercer]

Unbelievable. I keep renaming this encounter. It started as Obramass, and then when it got worse, I changed it to Obra Most. And this one is called Obra Mess.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay, Can I have snuck in close enough that I can get the drop on him?

[Matthew Mercer]

You're still in hiding. So even as we roll Initiative, it doesn't mean that you're spotted.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

Right. So these zombies are in the outer chamber.

[Sam Riegel]

Come on. Come on.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

What the fuck am I talking about?

[Marisha Ray]

What?

[Matthew Mercer]

There's no zombies in the outer chamber. They have collapsed into heaps of corpses.

[Marisha Ray]

Amazing.

[Sam Riegel]

Wow.

[Matthew Mercer]

This is very different.

[Marisha Ray]

Is he hurt as well from that spell?

[Matthew Mercer]

No, he. He's a. He's far too powerful. But the zombies are. Let me make sure. Yeah, zombies. I was gonna say, if zombies were challenge rating one half, they would not be destroyed yet. But they are identical to skeletons. They're challenge rating one quarter. They're toast. Okay. So it's good to know I'm not a zombie.

[Marisha Ray]

Yeah.

[Matthew Mercer]

So. Oh, brother. Okay, Thimble, what'd you roll for? Initiative?

[Marisha Ray]

I rolled a 17.

[Matthew Mercer]

17. I am gonna roll for General Raymond Divinos.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

17.

[Matthew Mercer]

He adds just plus two to this. So you want to see a 15

[Sam Riegel]

or lower, but I'm hiding.

[Matthew Mercer]

10.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay, great, great, great.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Okay,

[Matthew Mercer]

Fimble, it is your turn. You are outside this area here.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

So it's your turn. You can give me a tell me. If you want to make a stealth check, you can do that. As a bonus action, you let me know what you're doing.

[Marisha Ray]

How close am I to. So I wouldn't be able to get to him with my move, right? Would I? If I'm hiding and trying to get close enough to attack him before he sees him.

[Matthew Mercer]

I think you're probably 40ft out here.

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

So you might have to take a round to move, but it's just you and him acting right now.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay.

[Marisha Ray]

I'm sneakily moving until I get close enough.

[Matthew Mercer]

Give me a stealth check.

[Marisha Ray]

29.

[Matthew Mercer]

29 gets you into the room in the shadows right here. You're 4 inches tall, and you can see that his eyes are currently sloughing into his ribcage from this sort of. Again, fleshy head. You two on the wall.

[Liam O'Brien]

You got to start moving out.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yeah. Are you moving out at this point?

[Liam O'Brien]

Yeah, we have to. We have to. We can't be here when they arrive. She's going to have to find her way out, and I fucking hate this.

[Matthew Mercer]

I'm going to need a dc. I'm going to need a strength saving throw from Julian.

[Travis Willingham]

That's a five.

[Matthew Mercer]

As you go to leave Octus, Julian goes to leave, passing out lightning flashes. And Julian's shadow extends behind him into the manor. And your shadow grabs your chest and begins to pull you down the stairs into Obramis Manor.

[Sam Riegel]

What is happening

[Matthew Mercer]

down the stairs?

[Liam O'Brien]

Turn around, come back up to the window.

[Matthew Mercer]

Okay, you go Back up to the window. I need both to roll initiative for me.

[Marisha Ray]

Oh, my God.

[Liam O'Brien]

God.

[Marisha Ray]

Oh, my God.

[Liam O'Brien]

Natural 20.

[Sam Riegel]

Yes.

[Matthew Mercer]

Great.

[Travis Willingham]

Nice. Seven. Which makes sense for being dragged down the stairs.

[Matthew Mercer]

Okay, I am 29. I'm going to roll a perception check on Raymond Divinos. Turn the. The sort of necrotic hulk of him. Doesn't know he's in combat. And I'll let you know right now. He's got to hit a nat20 to see you, but we still have to roll. 12 does not see you. Thimble, that is. Or. Sorry, Octis, that's your turn.

[Liam O'Brien]

Okay, Coming back in through the window. And I see him. Do I just see him going down the stairs? Am I catching the tail? Like his feet going down?

[Matthew Mercer]

Yes.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay.

[Liam O'Brien]

What the fuck is going on? And I just use my full movement to go towards to see what's happening because I don't know what's happening. He's just being dragged in. Following him down, you begin to.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yeah, you follow him down as fast as you can. You can see Julian's shadow is wrestling him down the stairs as fast as it can.

[Liam O'Brien]

Okay. If I can still have my action.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yeah, go for it.

[Liam O'Brien]

Okay. Just think, think, think, think, think. Are you. No, no, no, I'm just. I see a shadow holding onto Julian. Then I would assume it is one of the shades in the house in this moment. Just for a brief moment. So I will fire bolt at the shadow.

[Matthew Mercer]

Give me.

[Liam O'Brien]

That is a 14.

[Sam Riegel]

15.

[Liam O'Brien]

16. 20.

[Ashley Johnson]

22.

[Matthew Mercer]

22 hits. Go ahead and roll. Damage two D10.

[Liam O'Brien]

That is going to be. Oh, my God. That is 16 points of fire damage.

[Matthew Mercer]

Jesus, Julian. The grapple is broken. You see that? Octis hurls fire out just like you did in Tanasar. And the shadow, the illum. It's more than the heat. It's the illumination. Just vroom. And the shadow is dispelled. Get back up here to this fucking house. You stand up, Thimble. That is your turn.

[Marisha Ray]

Have I away from him, am I?

[Matthew Mercer]

You are 20ft away from him.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay,

[Liam O'Brien]

got this.

[Matthew Mercer]

You got this, you got this, you got this.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay. How much movement do I have? I want to be close. Okay, listen, I'm going to get like. I'm going to attack him.

[Sam Riegel]

Great.

[Marisha Ray]

I'm going to attack him.

[Matthew Mercer]

He is. As I said, he has not had a chance to rest since his fight with Teor. Hit points are hit points. He can do enough damage to kill you in one hit. And that's the stakes here.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay, look. And what's his reach? Can I tell what his reach looks like.

[Matthew Mercer]

Reaches? Melee.

[Marisha Ray]

Like a ten foot, A five foot.

[Matthew Mercer]

Well, he also has movement.

[Sam Riegel]

No, I know.

[Marisha Ray]

How high are the ceilings?

[Matthew Mercer]

About. Oh. The ceilings in this room are not high enough for you to be able

[Marisha Ray]

to fly up and away from him.

[Matthew Mercer]

Fly up and away from him. So when you take a swing at him, you have to be. You'll be somewhere near enough to ground level for him to hit. Attacking from hiding does confer advantage.

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah, and sneak attack.

[Matthew Mercer]

And sneak attack.

[Sam Riegel]

Doesn't.

[Liam O'Brien]

Correct me if I'm wrong. Your fancy footwork allows you to disengage after an attack.

[Marisha Ray]

Sure.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yeah.

[Marisha Ray]

But he's still gonna chase me.

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah,

[Marisha Ray]

all right. All right. I'm gonna attack him with advantage because I'm coming from Thimble.

[Matthew Mercer]

This is very brave,

[Sam Riegel]

very dumb.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay, that's a 26 to hit.

[Matthew Mercer]

26 is a hit. You will roll. Sneak attack damage.

[Travis Willingham]

Okay.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay.

[Travis Willingham]

Got any of them desperate measures you want to spend there?

[Matthew Mercer]

I don't think you're wounded enough to have any.

[Sam Riegel]

Yeah, right.

[Marisha Ray]

Oh, yeah. You have to be half right in order.

[Matthew Mercer]

Half.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay.

[Travis Willingham]

Bet. That's nice.

[Matthew Mercer]

Both of us are just looking wrecked.

[Marisha Ray]

Three.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay.

[Marisha Ray]

19. No, 19 points of damage on the first hit,

[Matthew Mercer]

you surge forward. You said 19 points of damage. With 13 hit points left. How do you want it to. Holy shit. Holy shit.

[Marisha Ray]

Um. I'm gonna see the scroll sticking out from his chest, and I'm gonna fly into the chest cavity and up the head.

[Matthew Mercer]

Through the rotting flesh and brittle skull.

[Marisha Ray]

And as I. I'm going to just touch the banner as I go up. As I.

[Matthew Mercer]

The torn banner is not all gone. The banner flies and the general who opposed Teor in undeath, but who in life permanently altered and ruined his relationship to his son because the honor of the House to Venos was divided. Those opposed to the Falconer's Rebellion and a general who would be horrified to know that he had killed Teor Pridesire. You do not destroy Raymond da Vinos. You free him. Blood sprays. The chamber fills with light. You have risked certain death if he had gotten a single turn. And as he collapses to the ground, the terrible work of House Tuconis is ruined. This figure will not become stronger as they complete him and will not seek to destroy his son. In undead abomination of his life,

[Sam Riegel]

the

[Matthew Mercer]

banner flies, the sword of House Divinos Sprezatura clatters to the ground. No longer held by this abominable thrall of House Taconis. You look and see the bodies of Teor and Cid. You feel in your heart that it's awful. You're four inches tall. They can't be left here in the dark like this. And there's nothing you can do. You've just defeated this undead monstrosity. There's nothing you can do here in this moment. Except that part of the death boon structure that we didn't go into last time because I didn't think anyone was going to come find Teor's body. Is that in addition to granting another character one of your abilities, you can also choose an ally to instant, instantaneously attune to a magical item of yours. Teor chose Thimble to instantly attune to that fairy presence you felt, which are the bracers of oak and birch, which means your strength is now 19.

[Marisha Ray]

I don't have a negative four anymore.

[Matthew Mercer]

Symbol. Light yoked thimble. Light fills. Light fills the room. And I would like you to describe, if you'd be so kind, in this moment of triumph here in the dark bowels of Obramis Manor, your fifth level ability that we have not gotten to see yet. Here in this moment. Because the bracers have to. They can't fit on you at the size that you are.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh, my God.

[Matthew Mercer]

So somewhere else. The stone of Nightsong has broken. And as Hanon's ritual eases the tenebral gloom, that distant cave at the shore of Lake Nahami, you are filled with fairy light. You feel an anchor to the world of Faerie quite close nearby. And with most of light like you always saw coming off of Teor's body, the bracers begin to float off his form towards you. Full narrative reigns. Tell me what happens next.

[Marisha Ray]

As I see them floating and the light gathers around them, I remember stories from the orchard. They would talk about fairies who could be part of the human world. Once they got strong enough, they would be able to protect their gardens in ways that you couldn't even dream of. And they had the ability to make themselves big. And it was always a myth. But with all this light and these bracers, I think to myself, what if? And I'm gonna reach forward. And as the bracers float towards me, my body grows to human size, stepping

[Matthew Mercer]

forward, your wings fold and close. And a true vision of something like an archfey, tall and mighty and powerful, strides forward. The bracers float. These were Callowen. These were Erinassus brothers. Tapestries of stags in a wild forest. And all the lost might of House Royce clasps to one arm and then the other. Your strength sets to 19. The effects of a barkskin spell give you hardened skin. And quite importantly for this moment, your carrying capacity increases to being that of a creature one size larger than yourself. Which now that you are human sized, means you have the strength of a giant.

[Marisha Ray]

I don't even know. I just kind of run into something. I'm gonna walk over to Teor. Mm, this is so fucking weird. I'm gonna put him over my shoulder as I pick up Sid on the other one.

[Matthew Mercer]

It's easy work. Doesn't even. You don't feel even remotely encumbered. You could grab Raymond as well. You can grab this, you can grab Ingrid's greataxe. All of it.

[Marisha Ray]

I'm gonna just put it in my

[Sam Riegel]

inventory, put the sword on my belt.

[Marisha Ray]

I'm gonna take the banner out, put

[Sam Riegel]

it in my waistband.

[Travis Willingham]

Most tears of the kingdom shit ever.

[Marisha Ray]

And yeah, I'm not gonna take the body of

[Mary Elizabeth McGlynn]

Raymond.

[Sam Riegel]

Sorry, Raymond.

[Matthew Mercer]

Gonna leave that here.

[Sam Riegel]

I'm gonna leave that here. But I got the.

[Matthew Mercer]

Got the sword. It would be a hideous sight for. Yeah, this is a little too fucked

[Marisha Ray]

up to carry it around. But I got the sword and I'm going to find the banner out of his chest and I'm just going to put my hand on his. Put my hand on his forehead and say thank you, friend.

[Sam Riegel]

Be at rest now.

[Matthew Mercer]

Finds maybe part of Hanon's ritual outside but called here by your fairy man. Rose blossoms and thorns and vines vines of the house divinos break through the cracked stone and begin to inter and put at peace this body.

[Marisha Ray]

Yeah, yeah. I'm going to instantly cast plant growth and help that spread.

[Matthew Mercer]

Having Cid and Tewa with. What do you do now?

[Marisha Ray]

I gotta get out of here. I don't even know.

[Matthew Mercer]

Give me investigation and stealth to get the fuck out of here now. Without the terrible gloom. It's just a difficulty. 10 to retrace your steps from here back out through.

[Marisha Ray]

Okay. Investigation is a 16.

[Matthew Mercer]

Great.

[Marisha Ray]

Stealth is a 1919 human size.

[Matthew Mercer]

Is there anything with your wings gone? Is there any mark of the fae on you? Or I'll also ask is there any mark of Teor on you in this moment? Of the fact that a part of his soul that was attuned to these bracers is passed to you in this moment.

[Marisha Ray]

Man, I still look like me. Pointed ears, pointed ears still. But details that you couldn't see when I was little. Like how intricate the embroidery is on my clothes. It all is showing now. And my freckles that I normally have are actually sparkly. And I'LL do. Yeah. Teor had those braids. I have a Padawan braid.

[Matthew Mercer]

A single Padawan braid.

[Marisha Ray]

A single Padawan braid coming from my little cat.

[Matthew Mercer]

Beautiful.

[Travis Willingham]

The rat tail is strong.

[Marisha Ray]

The rat tail of strength.

[Matthew Mercer]

Hoisting your companions over your shoulder, you sprint forward from here on that investigation. Are you heading back up to the. You came to God.

[Sam Riegel]

How do I get out of here?

[Matthew Mercer]

Are you heading back up to the tower?

[Marisha Ray]

I'm gonna. I don't think that would be very safe to go through God. How do I get out of here with these bodies? I know Hannon is in the courtyard, right?

[Matthew Mercer]

Yeah, Hannah's in the courtyard.

[Marisha Ray]

But I know that people have landed.

[Sam Riegel]

Fuck.

[Matthew Mercer]

There was that underwater river.

[Marisha Ray]

There was. Thank you. I'm going to go for that.

[Matthew Mercer]

You head to the underwater.

[Marisha Ray]

The rushing water.

[Matthew Mercer]

The rushing water. You head to the rushing water. Seeing it out. Obviously, Taeor and Sid would not have been able to make this voyage alive. But as disrespectful as it is, they will be able to traverse it otherwise. And most medium sized people would have drowned. But there is a space of about 6 inches at the top of the top that you could return to your size and fly over with.

[Brian W. Foster]

All right.

[Marisha Ray]

Do I still get to keep the bracers? Do they shrink?

[Matthew Mercer]

If I want to get little, I will say.

[Taliesin Jaffe]

Let me.

[Matthew Mercer]

Actually, I'm going to do a whisper real quick, but then we'll cut back to you guys.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay, I'm going to whisper.

[Ashley Johnson]

Matt, sell some shit.

[Travis Willingham]

I'm not Sam Riegel. I stay in the moment.

[Sam Riegel]

Hey,

[Matthew Mercer]

Thimble. You get to the underground river. You have all this gear and stuff on you. You tie threads to the bodies to be able to traverse with them as you go small size, wondering about the bracers. You go and are 4 inches tall again. And as you go to that size, the bracers shift like a fairy glamour. And you are wearing almost armor made of tapestry. It's a fairy full plate of green pressed fabric studded with gems and gold embroidery.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh, shit.

[Matthew Mercer]

So you are in a fabric full plate.

[Sam Riegel]

It is fancy as fuck.

[Matthew Mercer]

And I will say, though your carrying capacity is lessened because you're tiny, you still have a 19 strength.

[Sam Riegel]

Oh my gosh.

[Matthew Mercer]

So you're. It's like Superman. You're a tiny little Superman.

[Marisha Ray]

This is amazing.

[Matthew Mercer]

You fly the fuck out of there.

[Marisha Ray]

Yeah, I fly the fuck out.

[Matthew Mercer]

Holy octys. And Julian up above.

[Liam O'Brien]

Can you get down? What was that? I had so many questions.

[Travis Willingham]

This whole house is filled with undead bullshit.

[Liam O'Brien]

Yes, it does.

[Matthew Mercer]

Yes, yes, I do.

[Travis Willingham]

Not see her. It is not like she's present.

[Liam O'Brien]

We just have to go. She's got to find her own way out.

[Travis Willingham]

Narrating reason look, if she's as strong and as willful as you seem to believe she is, she'll find her way. Otherwise, she'll be remembered. We have to leave now. Yeah.

[Matthew Mercer]

As you turn to go, the last thing you see as you leap over the side back into safety is the landing figures. Petra and Raya. Primus. Ethernd you see, they turn. Hanon is fulfilling this ritual. Primus turns to look, seeing. Hanon says, who in the devil are you? What are you doing in this courtyard? Hannon turns. Trimus comes out of the front gate and says, brother, this honorable member of the Circle of the Hunt is here to recover you see? She turns to Primus and Hannah says, a figure that has just since actually escaped. You are actually welcome to come in. You can see that she must have broken her bonds, but she is no longer here. Hanon turns and scowls. You see, he says, I that is quite too much of a coincidence. I will need some assurances. My order. The Circle of the Hunt stands to oppose. Primus raises a finger and casts power word kill. Hanon drops to the ground, dead. Trimus drops a goblet she's holding in her hand. Primus, you fool. What have you just done? Primus turns telekinesis on Trimus, lifts her into the air as she begins to choke and scream and he goes. It doesn't matter. We will either rule this world before the year is out or we will all be dead. Do you understand? The Druids can choke in blood. We will either defeat them or we won't be around long enough to see their reprisal. Is that clear, you pig?

[Travis Willingham]

You see?

[Matthew Mercer]

She drops to the ground. Petra and Rye are staring. Etherin looks nauseous. Primus says, fill the wagons. Gather our treasures. We leave tonight. Dolmaktar is finished.

[Travis Willingham]

I think Julian has his hand on his rapier hilt this entire time and is fighting every impulse. But while he's hearing all this and glancing here, he's glancing back at you. Come on.

[Marisha Ray]

Come on.

[Travis Willingham]

We do what we did, and we did all we could. Let's find the rest.

[Liam O'Brien]

Yeah.

[Sam Riegel]

Okay.

[Matthew Mercer]

The tenebral gloom returns to Opramus Manor. And that's where we'll take our break. Oh, my God. And that's where we'll leave our story for now. Part two of this episode of Campaign 4 drops this Tuesday. Thanks for listening and we'll see you soon. For more critical role. Sometimes life will get you stressed out. Lucky you can always count on text. Now Free Talk, free text, free 5G and they'll never shut you off. Cause like I said, it's free. TextNow's got your back. Nationwide, no long term contracts turn out. They're nervous about losing service. TextNow's got your back. That's their sense of purpose. No matter what comes next, you've got free talk and Text. With the TextNow app, wireless plans require the purchase of a sim card. Visit textnow.com for terms and conditions.