Tuesday 13 August 2024

Session 381 - Between a Frog and a Dark Place

Date: 6 August

Moon: New Moon
Zenith: Minerva


New Backstory:
- Grog Greedy caused his whole caveman commune to flee when they saw the changes that demonic mutations had wrought - his humungous forehead. Once per session, cause someone you've met to flee from you for a round.


Events:

--- The Mushroom Demon Cometh
- The party is within Dwimmermount, still hunting for the God Parts they previously manufactured and sent up to the Teleport Maze. The built-in terrariums in the walls flicker with a low light.
- Aximander is currently filled with the dark of the New Moon and looks like the Devil, red skin and goat legs and all - maximum mana, maximum power! Grog Greedy has returned, his skin was replaced by a demon recently so it's red too! They've got a cart with a bunch of God Parts on it, but there's a bit of an issue...
- Before them, for reasons as yet unknown, the Teleport Maze flickers with the shadow of an enormous mushroom! Sometimes it's just a man-sized mushroom surrounded by spores, sometimes it's huge and shrouded in darkness!
- They sprint past anyway, trusting their silver suits to protect them from spores. The suits work, but as they run past the smaller mushroom is replaced by the big one and its dark aura!
- They make it past regardless, taking the direct line, and reach the door! They careen in, finding themselves face to face with a very shocked skeleton!

--- Back to the Future
- A long time ago, somewhere relatively close, Sydney is looking out from the top of Dwimmermount across beautiful golden fields. It's the past! Sydney got transported here after accidentally being indirectly involved in the summoning of a giant mushroom demon.
- Nevertheless he gets a call from the Old Miner on his slime familiar phone. The slime familiar, oddly, has a pupil now like it's a big eye. The Old Miner chats a bit, and informs Sydney that according to the call records they are indeed in the past!
- Sydney suddenly warps back to the present day, now pupil-less slime slopping on one shoulder. Of course, they're back where they left, in the Teleport Maze... so they instantly warp away!
- Unbelievably Sydney appears in the teleport maze node closest to the other two, which is on balance much more convenient for me!

--- Prison Guard
- Aximander and Grog are face to face with a skeleton in a prison warden hat! He's actually quite polite, and he's guarding the prison cell in this room.



- They persuade him to let them stash the God Parts in the cell, and he lends them the cursed keys he protects.
- Aximander tries them out and opens the cell door... but an olive slime drops on his head! Luckily his Elf senses let him see it coming and he sidesteps, then blasts it with fire! The slime collapses into olive oil, which they duly collect.
- They lock away the god pieces in the now-empty cell, and discover that the other keys can be used to shift the cell between three different spaces! It's three cells in one! They shift it to a new visible one (with no god parts) and hand back the keys. Simple!

--- Title Drop
- They leave the prison guard and return to the corridor to find... Sydney! Hurrah!
- Unfortunately there is an issue.  The gigantic mushroom demon has returned... and with it the frog demoness Melissia! She's been taken over by the spores and has broken a wall terrarium to let the demonic mycellium spread! There are also a bunch of mushroom-infected frog men!
- Aximander lambasts her for breaching their deal... then blasts her with a fireball.
- The mushroom demon exudes its darkness aura and Melissia turns into her seductive form. Sydney and Aximander briefly consider themselves rivals for her love... but not so much.
- To make things worse, non-infected frog men appear from behind the party! It's a two-front battle! They're trapped between a frog and a dark place!
- Grog uses the powers he stole from a dragon to create a projector out of his massive forehead. He transforms the area around the frogs into a fly-filled swamp, distracting them!



- Aximander is at full Elf power, so spreads his hands and dims the magic around him. The darkness is now not quite so dark, the seductive Lust Demon powers not quite so compelling.
- Sydney follows up with Sudden Siege Engine, spearing the huge mushroom with a ballista bolt. It doesn't quite reach Melissia on the other side though.
- Aximander is going ham, flinging fireball after fireball at Melissia, frying her completely!
- The giant Mushroom Demon isn't looking so hot either, harr harr.
- With that, the Mushroom Demon warps away, leaving behind its man-sized spore version without the darkness aura. It does however begin infesting the fried corpse of Melissia with mycelium-filled mud... and she begins to arise...

--- Roy Mustang Mode
- Sydney doesn't want this demon to spread. Good thing they have Blight! It will kill all the plants within a mile, but that feels like a fair price for wiping out the mushroom demon!
- The blight bursts out. The glowing spores of the Mushroom Demon turn to ash. The flowing mycelium dies. There is a sound like a thousand Goblins crying out in pain and being suddenly silenced.




- The earth homunculus doesn't stop... but it also doesn't attack. It's trying to stop the fighting. Sydney and Grog team up to kill the smaller mushroom but trigger the Teleport Maze! Sydney is briefly blurred as he warps back to where he is, but Grog appears in a room filled with darkness.
- With Grog's illusion gone, there's nothing to stop the frogs from attacking. Aximander strolls forward, lighting his flaming sword, and blasts them with fire again and again! Soon there is nothing left but frog-shaped piles of ash.

--- Roy Mustang Mode 2: The Mustanening
- Grog is face to face with big floating pregnant seahorses, their eyes filled with the sparkling lights of the demon mushroom infection!



- He flees! Good thing Grog is good at fleeing via a backstory bonus! He gets a massive headstart, but runs randomly through the level in his attempt to escape!
- To my utter shock, he chooses the exact right left-right-left sequence that gets him back to the party!
- Sydney summons up the extradimensional apartment while Grog falls onto the Lust Demon's body and digests her. Yum. He steals the power to form a Love Triangle!
- Alas, that took some time. Trailing him are a bunch of infected floating psychic seahorses and infected croaking frog monsters! Grog bundles into the front door of the flat, while Sydney holds it open. Aximander stands in the doorway and snaps his fingers over and over as he turns the pursuing monsters to dust!


- Any survivors hop, crawl, or drag their burned bodies away from the scene of the massacre. Aximander smiles and goes back into the flat.

--- A Lively Post-Massacre Meal
- Sydney uses their last scraps of Mana to cast a cleaning spell on everyone. It goes slightly awry and swaps their ambiguous sex somehow, but everyone is otherwise clean!
- They cook up a nice meal, "Frog's Famous", with the frog legs and the olive oil and some of the seemingly endless millet and stale beer. You know what? It's pretty good!

Total: 8000 exp



Enemies Defeated:
- An Olive Slime (50 exp)
- Melissia the Succubus (750 exp)
- Mushroom Spore (250 exp)
- Loads of frog monsters (850 exp)
- A bunch of seahorses (900 exp)
Total: 2800 exp



Exp Totals:
- Carter / Sydney, Level 8 Magic-User: 211815 (Level up at 288000)
- Kitty / Julian & Aximander, Level 7 Languid Wastrel: 126191 (Level up at 144000)
- Charles / Grog Greedy, Level 6 Inheritor: 46500 (Level up at 72000)



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