Session 359 - Down Where It's Wetter

Date: 7 November

Moon: Waning Crescent
Zenith: Minerva

New Backstory:

- Deletion Snels remembers back to his former incarnation. He was meant to be watching over his wife when she was murdered, and he took the blame. He left Chavsby in chains. If a henchman dies, +2 to Saves.
- Odo Grumblebelch is a member of a secret society in Mt Grumblebelch - the Followers of the Yawning Eye. Once per session, find a trustworthy society contact in any city.

Events:

--- Globoblin Mind Jelly

- We open outside the Globoblin room in the depths of Dwimmermount. The walls are smooth, the doors have submarine-hatch wheels. There is a smell of ozone and, from within the Globoblin room, fresh vegetation.
- The Globoblin itself is a big mass of green goblin bodies, jammed together and overgrown. Floating jellyfish-like mushrooms float about on vines, feeding from the leaking pipes.
- Deletion Snels deploys his own goblin from his digital flesh and sends it into the room, where its head is immediately glommed onto by a mushroom. From its goblin throat, a voice speaks...
- The Globoblins' name is Few. It is guarding this place from the deep sea, which has filled the chambers and corridors beyond. Beyond are the frogmen and they hate Globoblin blood.
- After some conversation about getting rid of the frogmen, it allows them to continue on! Odo grooms her beard into a Stowing Beard that keeps in oxygen, like a hairy helmet, and she opens the door...

--- Frogman!

- Cold ocean water blasts into the room, throwing Odo back! She struggles through the deluge and pulls the door shut, twisting the wheel closed. Beyond... in the flooded corridor... she sees a frogman swimming towards her...
- Odo thrusts her sword forward, warning it, then tosses it an apple. The apple spins through the water and a long tongue flicks out. It went for her instead!
- It sticks to the wall and starts to reel her in, so she charges instead with reckless Barbarian strength! It's an instant kill, sword scything through the water and cutting the frog in twain!
- Before the blood can reach her beard, a sphere shooms up around her head! The silver suit provides air!

- She swims back, dragging the frogman corpse behind. Weird white globules have attached to her suit.

--- Mindspeaker

- Before Deletion Snels can devour the corpse, the Globoblin gets there first! The mushroom-jellyfish descend, flensing and dissecting its flesh, feelers groping into its brain...
- One of the mushrooms keeps floating around the partys' various heads, poking a feeler towards the backs of the necks. After some arguing, Sydney takes the hit. A mushroom plops onto their head, and their mouth talks on its own...
- The Globoblin tells them what it gleaned from the frog man. It considered this dungeon to be an old forgotten outpost, it missed its family, and the portal to the deep sea cannot be sealed.

- Forward!

- They open the door once more and as the water is about to reach their necks the bubble-helm slides back over! There's an oxygen bar and mysterious text is superimposed against the walls. Sydney's slime familiar bobs along beside them, reading the ripples in the water. The water itself is cold and clear.
- They head left, having no map, and come to a larger chamber. The door to the left is inscribed with strange green symbols. Through the porthole window in the door, goes through to a huge cavern full of black liquid like a starry sky. Azoth! However, not their goal.
- Elsewhere in the room are lockers. They open one and a silvery shape swoops out!!!
- Oh, it's just more of these silver suits. Good to have though. Deletion Snels grabs a drowned goblin corpse he finds. There's also a cool locket which looks bland in real life, but projects an image of a lady in AR.

--- Mysterious Generator

- After experimenting with the doors to see if they can drain the rooms (they can't), Odo scouts ahead. She finds a map mosaic on the wall! Very nice. They fill up some more map.
- In another drowned room is a big cylindrical machine, whirring despite being underwater. Deletion and Sydney swim in. They throw the goblin into the grinding gears and... splat! It's torn to pieces!
- In another room, Odo dives through some sort of office. Papers float in the water, ink long smeared. Under a pile of these waterlogged books, she finds a mysterious rod with a knob on the end and an I/O button. Mysterious code streams across her vision, then minimises.
- She finds some more bits in here - a Holy Symbol of Eris and a vial of holy water. Not bad!

--- Thralls of the Frogmen

- Sydney's slime familiar whispers in their mind... something is coming through the water.
- They scatter about the generator room ready to ambush. They are all confused to see several people in silver suits swimming in! Odo pops out and fires a crossbow bolt, missing! A Dwarf at the front mimes something while one of the people at the rear starts casting a spell!
- There are a frantic few moments before our heroes decide to stand down and let the spell finish. A shockwave goes through the water. The bubble-helms slide open. They're still underwater... but they can breathe!

- The Dwarf is called Gromli and he's from Ur-Barakh. He tells the party that his arcology was doomed by the blood tide at the end of the world, until they were saved by the Deep Ones. Now he is thralled to S-3 Neurocentre X and does their bidding in exchange for life.
- They chat for a while. Gromli tells them that the silver suits only have enough air for an hour - they were built for emergencies only - before needing to be refilled. That's why he keeps this witch around to cast the breathing spell.
- Leaving in peace, for now, the party head back to the Globoblin room. Their air is running low.
- When they get back and close the door, the water starts draining down the pipes. It's a little airlock! Sydney carves Make-Air runes on coins for next time, and Odo checks them very thoroughly. She's heard the famous tale of Bohemund the Barbarian who carved a Make Magma rune instead of a Make Air rune and ended up melting his own head off.

- We leave it here for now, ready for the next excursion into the watery depths...

Total: 7000 exp

Enemies Defeated:

- A frogman (50 exp)

Total: 50 exp

Treasures Attained:

- Holy Symbol of Eris (704 ob)
- AR Locket (500 ob)
- Vial of holy water
- Mysterious I/O Rod

Total: 1204 exp

OOC:
- Carter the Chronicler and Paymaster (200 exp)
- Tom the Expedition Leader and Chef (200 exp)
- George the Cartographer and Vanguard (200 exp)

Exp Totals:

- Carter / Sydney, Level 7 Magic-User: 94764 (Level up at 144000)

- Tom / Grumblebelch, Level 6 Dwarf: 35024 (Level up at 64000)

- George / Deletion Snels, Level 4 Cyber-Inheritor: 9755 (Level up at 18000)
Level Up! +1d6 HP! +1 to Saves! +1 MP! +1 Mutation Cap! +Backstory!

Session 358 - Lair of the Globoblins

Date: 17 October

Moon: Waxing Crescent
Zenith: Dispater

New Backstory:

- Deletion Snels remembers the time before he entered the digital world and emerged reborn as a sentient virus, the time he adventured into the cliffside caves of a race of flying elves, the time he... fucked a giant bat then ate it. +1 Charisma

- Grogg Greedy is in love with Odo Grumblebelch. His enormous neanderthal forehead throbs when he thinks of her. He is not very subtle. When Odo would be harmed, dive in the way and take double the damage instead.

Events:

--- Silver Suits

- They have made it down a dungeon level. The walls here are smooth and angular. This is not Dwarven architecture, to Odo's judging eye. More like whole areas of the mountain just vanished. The doors, such as they are, are circular submarine-style hatches.
- As they watch, a strange heat haze rises in the room. All magical effects are paused! The Inheritors are trapped in their current forms, and Aximander is banished to the recesses of Julian's mind!
- Odo has also just had a short fight with a tall statue, so gratefully wolfs down some leftovers from Julian's Tupper's Ware.

- Grogg Greedy looks upon Odo with open fascination. Julian notices a giant spider on the ceiling!... but it's just a moult. Odo identifies it with her Folio of Unusualle Craetures - it was a giant rhagodessa.
- Grogg, Julian, and Deletion Snels explore further as Odo chows down on a second helping, and find a whole shelf of silvery bodysuits. They've got a big ring that goes around the neck, but no helmet. Julian, Odo and Deletion put them on, but Sydney and Grogg just grab a couple for the road.
- As they all change into the new suits... they are literally caught with their pants down! More giant maggots have returned, with their flailing pain-poison tendrils!

--- Maggots Once More

- Julian clips on the neck piece just in time to turn and see the huge maggot flailing at him! He intentionally retreats into his consciousness, allowing Aximander to appear just in time to go "what the fuck is going on?!" and get flailed at! Thankfully the body suit is largely maggot-resistant, so he's barely poisoned.
- Meanwhile Grogg eats a crit, slapping his weapon out of his hands and burdening him with a whole bunch of paralysing venom! Sydney, regretting not putting on a suit, eats even more!
- Deletion,  who consumed one of these recently with his digital Inheritor powers, returns fire with the maggots' own attack! Unfortunately he's not well-versed in the art of wiggly venom tendrils and crits himself. Alas.

- Odo uses her also recently acquired power - Lay on Hands - to heal Sydney's poison. Sydney blesses everyone with Blessings of the Nine in recompense. Grogg uses his last strength to crit a maggot, slicing off its tendrils... then faints.
- Aximander slashes the remaining grub but faints from the stun poison, falling onto it. Odo flies into a rage and demolishes the maggot, making it deflate like a sad balloon. When Aximander's eyes open, he sees Odo scarfing down yet more leftovers. It makes her less angry at least!

- They discover that one of the grubs, the one that Grogg sliced the tendrils off, is actually still alive! He plops it into the wicker jar containing a bone-snake, hoping that they get along or something.

- There are two maggot corpses left behind, so Grogg and Deletion immediately set to work eating them. Grogg does this in the traditional way as a pool of mutating clay and blood and demonic organs, Deletion is more of a big wall of code. Grogg gains the poison venom attack and dangly fingers, Deletion gains their wall-climbing ability and a segmented body like a maggot.

--- Back into the Flat!
- With everyone a little worse for wear, Sydney opens up their Safe Space apartment and chivvies everyone inside to safety.

- Grogg, a cavemen, begins being rude and crude and trashing the place. Sydney is stressed once again.
- Sydney goes to shower while the others hang out in the kitchen. Deletion is cooking a meal!

- He uses a bunch of extremely dubious techniques to acquire olives and calls it "The Most Delicious Meal Ever Cooked". It's made of Olive oil, boar bacon, salt, olive, and fried banana.
- Alarmingly... it's good! Potentially due to the various superlative adjectives, or maybe just because it actually sounds nice.

- The cleanup results in a lot of oil going straight down the drain, vigorous cleaning resulting in deep stains to the upholstery, and various other equity-reducing impacts. Also, Odo uses the kitchen to fix everyone's gear - reforging in the oven, quenching in the sink, testing the edge on the wallpaper, etc.
- Sydney emerges from the shower and is, as always, absolutely horrified. They turn on their heel and go read in their bedroom. Turns out the book on Sky Tyrants isn't about Gods, but various creatures of the upper air that live in, on, and around clouds.

--- Disturbed Entrance
- After a long sleep in the Safe Space, our heroes peek out of the door to find that a circle has been drawn around the front door. When Grogg steps over it, he hears a ringing in his ears. Rubbing out the circle stops that happening. Hmmm...
- Someone hails them from the doorway - it's a ratman! He was waiting to see if the mysterious door was full of friends or enemies.
- It transpires that the Ratmen help the "Globoblins" defend this area from the evil frogmen that lurk elsewhere on this level. Globoblin blood repels the frogmen, he says. The Ratman himself, called Sniksnak, also offers his services as a naturist cleaner to Sydney who would quite like a live-in cleaner.
- The "naturism" is too much. Grogg hires Sniksnak to follow Sydney around and make them uncomfortable though.

--- Hired Guide
- Pleased by the cash, Sniksnak gives the party a tour. Over there is a magic wall that blocks the way to a library. Over here is the weird machine that makes poison. And this way is the way to the frogmen!
- They defeat the magic wall and enter a "library" that is basically cool stuff on the walls and a record player. No records to see, unfortunately. Sydney is saddened, but tries Bookspeak anyway. No dice - it needs a disk.
- They mess with the "poison machine" and don't get much from depositing various stuff into it. The troubleshooting head has the solution - "needs Azoth".
- Another ratman shows up and berates his compatriot for hanging out with invaders. It also turns out that the "oil" that Grogg was licking off of wooden shards last session was... rat piss.

--- Licking the Azoth

- They poke their heads into the last room that leads to the frogmen and see a big mass of vegetation, vague shapes of goblins beneath the greenery. Feathery strings lead to floating jellyfish-like plants that have latched onto leaking pipes.
- Grogg thinks he knows what the black liquid in the pipes is... Azoth! He runs in and licks some of the fluid from an unjellyfished pipe... drawing the wrath of those creatures! He dodges back out before they can sting him!

- The Azoth courses through his system, pulsing through his demonic veins! Black goop begins to leak from his ears... but his head fills with spells! 

- He collapses against the wall outside, colours flashing through his vision, and we end for the night...

Total: 7000 exp

Enemies Defeated:
- Several corpse maggots (300 exp)

Total: 300 exp

Treasures Obtained:
- Several silvery suits
- 3 scrolls: Confusion, Shocking Grasp, Earth Cake.

OOC:
- Carter the Chronicler (+ bonus for noticing exp discrepancies...)
- Tom the Cartographer & Expedition Leader
- Kitty the Vanguard

- George the Chef

Exp Totals:

- Carter / Sydney, Level 7 Magic-User: 91812 (Level up at 144000)

- Kitty / Julian & Aximander, Level 6 Languid Wastrel: 43768 (Level up at 72000)

- Tom / Grumblebelch, Level 6 Dwarf: 32072 (Level up at 64000)
Level Up! +1d10 HP! +1 to Saves! +Lorebond! +Backstory!

- George / Deletion Snels, Level 3 Cyber-Inheritor: 6803 (Level up at 9000)

- Charles / Grogg Greedy, Level 3 Inheritor: 4744 (Level up at 9000)

Level Up! +1d6 HP! +1 to Saves! +1 MP! +1 Mutation! +Backstory!

Session 355 - Balloon Ride to Dwimmermount

Date: 26 September

Moon: Waxing Gibbous
Zenith: The Lady

New Backstory:
- When Odo Grumblebelch left her dwarven hold in the Metal North it was the hottest summer anyone could remember. Not knowing any different she wandered unprotected under the raging sun, and even briefly caught on fire strolling through the Canyon of Liquid Death where the heat builds enough to melt rock. +1 to Con score.

Events:

--- Fresh Air
- We begin with the party heading up the inside of the reactivated Pylon, borne up from the central control room on a lift that takes them to the very top.
- Atop the pylon it's a clear night. The clean gibbous face of the moon shines brightly above, an ominous red star glowing behind it. The air crackles with static. Towards the sea, the great pit of rats has an ominous orange glow.
- In the distance is the glow of the town of Grasp, little torchlights glimmering. Jojo takes out her spyglass and looks closer. It's Dwarves from the town, looking around at the ground in amazement. With the reactivation of the Pylon, the polluted grime of the Drudge Wastes is turning back to good earth.
- They discuss their next moves. De-polluting the Drudge Wastes is a great and heroic plan, but they're worried about what the god Alaunus just told them about the missing God in the heavens. Without a ninth god there is a hole in the planetary defence grid, and the Red Elves easily slip through.
- Luckily they know the tales of where the Ninth God is - deep inside Dwimmermount. They exchange half-forgotten truths - the seraphim factory, the man-turned-god Terms Termax, a portal to a city of demon frogs.

--- Base Jump
- They decide to return to Dwimmermount and awaken the slumbering god. But how?
- Oh yea, they have an airship!

- Odo is stymied from creating a Beam-Light beacon by Warm-Heart, in whose Dwarven culture it is taboo to carve a rune without due respect.
- Jojo instead casts Speak With Dad, punching Warm-Heart in the face and turning him into a living telephone to Iskander, who is currently back on the ship!
- He tells them that coming to pick them up is no problem, but they should wait until the incoming storm passes. The storm is called The Soft, and it makes your skin crinkly. It's not great for a living airship.
- They discuss how to get down to the town so that they can carouse to pass the time. Sydney mentions that they've got Feather Fall.
- Odo jumps off the Pylon.
- Sydney yells "in my spellbook! I meant in my spellbook!" and dives off the edge after her!
- Jojo looks at the camera, shrugs, and jumps too, Warm-Heart under one arm and the dancing grandfather clock under the other!
- Sydney burns mana, wild-casts Feather Fall... and it works! Odo starts drifting gently downwards, while the others' momentum keeps them going a fair distance towards Grasp. Odo cludges together a Repel Air rune (out of sight of Warm-Heart) and creates her own little engine to follow along.

--- Caroose

- Several hours later they're back in Grasp, although the walk from where they landed was much nicer over the part-healed earth than the former sludge.
- The Dwarves at the entrance are grateful and amazed! The land is healing! Even better, the slow drain of the sludge has revealed an unopened wine cellar!
- Odo is down to party! The others... not so much. Sydney and Jojo get a couple of bottles of rosé and head off to study magic together. Jojo's manservant Barry and the dancing clock join Odo, at least, and they head off to the bar. It's a lock-in!
- Behind the bar are several copies of Julgoor! They grin behind their gold masks. Out the back in an ominous shopfront, a huge many-armed Julgoor squats in the darkness and supplies keg after keg of ale.
- Elsewhere in town, Jojo and Sydney have scoured the dead houses for books! They have found many! They settle down to research spells, and overhead the electric sky gives way to the dull heavy blocked-ear feeling of the Soft...

--- Aftermath

- Days later, Odo emerges from the lock-in to find herself in a thin and pervasive mist. She remembers a bar brawl, or at least most of one. Did the clock have sex with a pig or something? She's 2000 obols down, so it must have been good.
- In the skies above is a horrible throbbing pulsating balloon of flesh. It's Jonathon Toast! Iskander shouts "ahoy there!" from above!
- Sydney and Jojo are looking far more fresh than Odo. Their magickal research was a success! Sydney has created Sydney's Sudden Siege Engine, an extradimensional garage that can fit a ballista, which they have also purchased three of. Jojo has created Barbarian Mage, which is barbarian rage but for wizards. They're very pleased.
- The clock stumbles out, bashfully avoiding eye contact with a pig. Barry follows, and tries to enact his professional duties despite his massive hangover.

--- All Aboard!

- They trudge up to the dangling intestines that now constitute Jonathon Toast's B.E.A.M. system. Slightly better than the bucket, and perversely cleans you quite well during transit. Just hold your breath!

- Inside, Jonathon Toast has changed somewhat. He's got a longer face, more rat-like, and the walls tend to be fuzzier than before. He says that reconstituting dead redshirts in his demon vats allows him to mix and match genetic material.
- He still has no sense of direction so they send him north following the river. Sydney uses Recolour to make him a calming shade of teal, which he enjoys.
- They pass over the pyramid and distantly see the Marlingspike sending big soap bubbles into space. Must be the magic they're mining out of the Earth.
- They turn him towards the black shadow wall of the Typhlotic Lands many miles upriver.

--- Bubblecraft Inbound

- There is a cry of "incoming!" and the crew look out the sphincter windows to see a large soap bubble coming alongside! Within are Red Elves, and one of them hails them!
- Odo lobs some rations at them as a peace offering, but misses. The lead Red Elf sends one of his underlings to go get it, and the underling dives out of the bubble to his probable death. He'll be back soon, no doubt.
- They trade for some red dust, and leave in peace. The leader Red Elf tells the party a pass-phrase to show they're peaceful in case they meet more of them - "May you gain this world and all upon it".

--- Just Popping Into Dwarrow
- Rain comes as they get to the edge of the Typhlotic Lands, a wall of darkness that shivers like a curtain in the light of the sun. Jonathon Toast reveals that he's got bioluminescence now!
- In here, light forms bubbles. Everything at the edge of the light is a black featureless wall. Jonathon Toast is scared.
- Nevertheless, they make it through to the great bubble of light within. The Twinned Cities of Edge & Dwarrow are below, shining great wide-beam searchlights into the sky to keep the dark away!
- Jonathon Toast refuses to go further. He is scared and wants a break. There is no rain in here either.
- Sydney berates Jonathon for cowardice.
- They land, and find themselves ignored by everyone. The old separation between Edge and Dwarrow remains. The mortal population stick to Dwarrow, favouring yellows and oranges, walking with a hunched manner like Dwarves. Demons live in Edge, a city of purples and blues. These are two cities overlaid and as long as you ignore the demons in Edge they can't see you in Dwarrow.
- Conveniently the encounter roll comes up with an antique shops selling maps to Dwimmermount! They buy the map there, and a map of Dwarrow too for good measure.
- As they leave, Odo looks up and sees a crow-beaked figure peering down at them. She waves hello, and the head darts back. A kindly old lady runs over in panic and says "oh dear, you were looking at that gargoyle weren't you! Weren't you dear? Weren't you waving it hello?"
- She draws Odo away and admonishes her - the crow-beaked people are from Breach. They police the boundary between the cities. Never look at them, or risk death. A thin crossbow bolt clatters down from above, a warning.

--- To Dwimmermount!
- They scurry on out of the city, not wanting to cause any more problems. At the exit, a bunch of dwarves from Ur-Kalladh are selling Make Light runes to travellers. This upsets Warm-Heart's cultural sensibilities, who goes to tell them off.
- They're simply made anyway, so the party sets off without them. They have their own lights.
- After some hours of walking through the dense black, feeling like they're going nowhere, they finally come to Muntberg! The sun near blinds the party after all that time in blackness!
- Muntberg is half inside the Typhlotic Zone, and has been in ruins for many years. Several houses are still good enough to camp in at least!

- Dwimmermount looms above, the well-trodden path to the top wide enough for carts to pass side by side. The huge Seraphim that once topped the mountain is no longer there, but the scars from its wings still remain.

- They loot the ruins, finding old money, a suspiciously fresh bushel of apples (one black and smoking poisonously), some specialty crossbow bolts, and a hammer that can exorcise ghosts. They decide to settle for the evening, and see what tomorrow brings...

Total: 9000 exp

Loot:

- 715 obolsworth of pre-apocalypse money (715 exp)

- Basket of Mysterious Apples
- 2 speciality Crossbow Bolts

- Hammer of Exorcism

Total: 715 exp

OOC:

- Carter the Chronicler and Cartergrapher (200 exp)
- Tom the Expedition Leader and Chef (200 exp)
- Ollie the Quartermaster and Vanguard (200 exp)

Exp Totals:

- Carter / Sydney, Level 7 Magic-User: 84819 (Level up at 144000)

- Ollie / Jojo Fullbeard, Level 6 Muscle Wizard: 59251 (Level up at 72000)

- Tom / Grumblebelch, Level 5 Dwarf: 23979 (Level up at 32000)

Session 354 - A Pylon in the Wastes

Date: 19 September

Moon: Waxing Crescent
Zenith: Alaunus

New Backstory:
- Hagan was having a riveting, energetic, and vastly heretical discussion about the Old Miner, aka Dwarf Satan, and how he was actually a good god. Then the Loremasters arrived, and everything went to shit! Once per session, cause everything to go to shit in an unexpected way. Roll 1d6: 1-2 Good for Enemies, 3-4 Bad for Everyone, 5-6 Good for You.

Events:

--- Bonding over Lore
- Hagan the Heretic has reached inside his Dwarven soul and unlocked a Lorebond - the Lore of the Elders that grants deep knowledge at a price.
- He reads the party's book about Ur-Rajzesk, the City of Rails, to find out more about the Underways below the Drudge Wastes.
- He discovers that the best way to access the pyramid network is via the Magma Pyramid, that the Hollow Nexus of the Underways is not broken, and that fixing the Underways will require destroying said Hollow Nexus.

--- Hanging in Grasp
- Meanwhile, Sydney has hired a force of Dwarven labourers to clean out their magical flat. After the rest of the party stayed there overnight it's a tip. For 400 obols the dwarves will refill the liquor cabinet with Clunge Honey Mead too!

- Odo hires a Dwarven retainer, whose take-cold forehead glyph means Warm-Heart.
- Hagar chats to a few of the other Dwarves, who tell him that they're from Ur-Jeizhek the City of Sigils. The hated Goblins destroyed Ur-Jeizhek in an earlier age, creating their capital city in the ruins. Their numbers have been dwindling ever since, especially since their culture breeds the old-fashioned way.

--- Deals within Deals
- Odo wants to invest into the Grumblebelch business, so asks around to see if anyone's seen a gold-masked demon around. Luckily the Dwarves are very much capitalists, despite the destruction of their capital, and so they've managed to attract the Greed Demon into town recently.
- Making her way to the darkened crumbling shop front, Odo rings the bell at the front. There is a strange noise from the dark... a flash of a gold mask... and... hey it's Gifflewim! This time on business for Julgoor, who is currently conducting business elsewhere. Business!

- Aximander reveals his red right hand, and Gifflewim shakes it with his own. They're fellow Languid Wastrels - Magic Aura Elves!

- Gifflewim tells them all about his actions when he was under the influence of the Idea of Thorns, travelling the world, propagating Thorns, seeding the world with living trees that would tear down civilisation and plant seeds in the ashes, that sort of thing. Turns out that spreading the Idea of Thorns spreads out its power, so it's widespread but weaker these days.
- On the other hand, he has NOT been informed of the Red Elves and their magic-draining plan to mine the world for realities. This cannot stand!
- They trade items with him.

Aximander trades eldritch shackles for a Potion of Nightmares that brings prophecy.

Sydney trades Vantablack Paint for a Runeba that will clean the apartment. 

Odo trades a dot-matrix printer for a Folio of Monsters that lets you identify foes. 

Jojo trades a direction-swapping playing card for a Null-Magic Shield that can be broken to stop a spell. 

--- To the Spire
- It's a much nicer day as they set off to the Pylon to the north of Grasp. If they can switch it on, they'll link it to the pyramid at Splug and hopefully start de-poisoning the Wastes!

- When I say "a nicer day" I actually mean a long sustained drizzle that saps the spirit. Bulging tubers sprout from the muck and mire, swollen and soaked by the rain. Deflated aubergines are trivially gathered.
- Roiling winds come in during the afternoon, but luckily this slows them long enough to spot some Frazzlejack growing on the shells of dead angels!
- They reach the Pylon as the sun starts to set, and briefly consider hunkering down in a mysterious hole surrounded by scrabbling claw marks. Odo checks the book of beasts and discovers it's a trapdoor monster's vacated hole! Good to know.
- However the Pylon is close, so they decide to check it out first.

--- Inside the Pylon
- Within they discover a short hanger entrance, then a whole hollow interior space within the pylon. There is the distorted mechanical singing of tortured angels. Inside, inset into the pylon, is a squat pyramid.
- The walls are circuitboard channels with the occasional trickle of mercury running through them. Odo touches it and it gives her a static shock.
- Also, looking through the front door, the pyramid itself is more of a stepped open-topped maze! Climbing the walls is fairly trivial.
- Odo passes Warm-Heart a crossbow and idly asks what he knows of Ur-Jeizhek history. Turns out, a lot!

--- Historical Intermission
- Humans were freed from Halfling rule by the Dwarves in the late 1440s and lived in peace with the various races. Centuries later, in the 1980s, the Goblins rebelled against the Dwarves who had so kindly allowed them to live in their cities. Ur-Jeizhek was sacked, and the Dwarves driven out.
- The other Dwarves locked themselves into their cities, and a last hero from Ur-Jeizhek inverted the pyramids' poison pumps. The Drudge Wastes were formed, and the central control pyramid of Ur-Jeizhek was destroyed. It is now Dwarf Year 4482.
- Hagan the Heretic's main question is... in what Dwarf year was Jesus alive??

--- Eat the Good Mushroom

- Aximander, half-listening to this rambling, peeps into the next room and sees a dead Dwarf surrounded by dead Goblins. He picks a glowing mushroom from a dead goblins' neck and eats it! It's great, but he barely feels attached to his body, like another person is controlling it... woaoooohhh.
- Warm-Heart finishes his history lesson and tries a mushroom too. Wooaoahhhahahooohhhh
- Ahead there is an angel screaming, but the beat is sick. Aximander and Warm-Heart can't help but follow...
- There is, indeed, an angel! But it's barely holding together, metal pieces fizz with electrical energies, its huge central eye flickering like a plasma ball.
- Odo grabs the troubleshooting Dwarven head, which informs that this angel needs an update! No time for that now, it's time to battle!

--- Defeat the Angel
- Odo attacks with a sword, but the static burst from its armour makes him drop it! Hargen lobs a broom to immobilise it, but trips himself too!
- Aximander blasts it with fire, miscasts... and doesn't expend the mana! The angel is veeeery messed up.
- Jojo punches with a bare fist, gets stunned, then Sydney follows up with their spear. Electricity runs up the weapon but... they're wearing blacksmith gloves! No effect!

- The angel detonates, leaving behind a glowing AI core... which is immediately snatched.

--- Mushroomised Goblins
- There's a door ahead, but without power it remains closed. Over the wall it is! The only trouble is Sydney's singing clock, which takes a bit of getting over the wall.
- While they're sweating and struggling with the clock (which can't stop singing), they hear deeper-voiced goblins??
- Approaching are 11 goblins, glowing mushrooms on their necks. They are surprisingly chill.
- Aximander casts Guiding Lights, trying to bring about the emotional concept of "the way I will feel when I reach the goal of this dungeon". It miscasts, and does the opposite, guiding back to the dead angel which is, even now, starting to get reformed in the middle of the room.
- Aximander squints, squeezes his eyes shut, and tried again. It works! He thinks!
- The goblins, while permanently high on alterket-adjacent mushrooms, are no longer surprisingly chill. Warm-Heart harbours no warm feelings towards the species that killed his city, and is saying some extremely rarefied racial slurs.
- Odo distracts Warm-Heart while Aximander talks to the goblins. It sounds like these mushrooms are an anti-goblin bioweapon created by Dwarves!
- The goblins are now peaceful, but still very much in the way. Sydney picks them up and moves them out of the way one by one, with a little "wahoooo!" each time.

--- Alaunus 3.1
- They head round a corner, following the Guiding Lights, and very much avoid a room with white-eyed goblins crawling in a suppurating pit of fungus.

- The Lights lead them up a ramp towards a locked shut mechanical door. However, on the approach of several Dwarfs, it opens!

- Inside is another ancient god-plate attached to a large old-computer-green screen. They turn it on.
- A pixelated image of a mailed fist comes onto the screen! It's a young, brash Alaunus!
- The modern Alaunus makes the connection, but the party dismiss him for now and get this one to activate the terraforming engines... which it does!
- Then, seeing as an updated version is coming in... it deletes itself.
- Modern Alaunus arrives again, despite attempts to block him. He spouts propaganda about how he can't use this old hardware, and anyway it's foolish because he's defending the Earth from the Red Elves invading above! They're attempting to crash their Red Moon into Luna!
- He can send angels down to repair the pylon, which the party is cagey about. It's working ok already isn't it?

- At the mention of a gap in the Gods' defence network, they all suddenly realise the stakes. Eris, the Ninth God, was supposed to be under Dwimmermount right? Maybe they should take their airship over that way to sort out the Heavens before they think about resurrecting the Earth!

Total: 11000 exp

Treasures Acquired:
- A bunch of "depression potatoes"
- 4 frazzlejack (4 exp)
- 5 alterket mushrooms (5 exp)
- Fried angel core (250 ob)
Total: 259 exp

Enemies Defeated:
- A broken angel, destroyed. (500 exp)
- A crowd of goblins, moved aside. (55 exp)
Total: 555 exp

OOC:
- Carter the Chronicler & Paymaster
- Kitty the Expedition Leader
- Ollie the Quartermaster
- George the Vanguard
- Tom the Chef

Exp Totals:

- Carter / Sydney, Level 7 Magic-User: 81580 (Level up at 144000)

- Ollie / Jojo Fullbeard, Level 6 Muscle Wizard: 56012 (Level up at 72000)

- Kitty / Julian & Aximander, Level 6 Languid Wastrel: 36965 (Level up at 72000)
Level Up! +1d6 HP! +1 to Saves! +1 Mana! +Backstory!

- Tom / Grumblebelch, Level 5 Dwarf: 20740 (Level up at 32000)

- George / Hagen the Heretic, Level 3 Dwarf: 6687 (Level up at 8000)

Session 338 - The Session Before Shub-Wizardwrath Killed Everyone (TBD)

Date: 28 February, 22 p.p.

Moon: Clean Gibbous

Zenith: Eris

New Backstory:

- Jojo was born under an omen of hope - namely her father's death! Once ever, save someone from something that would have killed them.

- Sydney learnt the horrible falsity of reality from a dying cultist. +1 Wisdom

Events:

--- Aliens?!

- The party, rather large today, enter the final zone before the big boss they know as Shub-Wizardwrath. The machinery in the walls and floor is stopped and gunked up. A river of the Cruor flows through a channel splitting the room in two.
- There are bodies. Two huge gorilla-like beings with alien faces, and one creature that looks like a childhood pet was melded with Shub-Niggurath and given a load of tentacles and chainsaw limbs. All of them are dead. Footprints lead off from the far side of the channel and down a corridor...

- Celebus tears the chainsaw limbs from the body and reanimates them as biomechanical weapons! Sick!
- Grumblebelch pokes the stepping stones across the channel. It looks like they'll bounce you into the air if you step on them!
- Yea nah, not messing with those things OR the thing that killed all these dead monsters. The party sets off in the other direction, smelling dry ice and hearing some sort of loud electronic music...

--- Chewmeister69

- They come to a room filled with fog and tall mechanical pillars like trees! There's a desk with a spotty teenager behind it, but he's got no arms. He asks the party if they're here to challenge Chewmeister69 - a legendary hunter who got to top rank in a shooter and then was reborn from the Cruor into the real world.

- Attempts are made to appeal to Chewmeister's humanity and/or greed, but to no avail.

- Nobody wants to fight this pro gamer so they abandon the attempt and decide to go hunt some aliens.

- Given that the stepping stones seem sketchy, Jojo instead punches a wall open with a Passwall Punch and the party go through!

--- Bottles and Teeth

- The room beyond is full of bottles, some containing paint. Somebody has painted a big mural of a skull encrusted with gems and many figures praising it. That somebody is still there, but very dead.

- Jojo, to quote, "blacks up" with some vantablack paint. Celebus grabs some more paint of various colours.

- Dorian extendo-arms the body over, and they see that the painter clawed away at their face to paint directly on their skull. Very grim.

- The next area is full of teeth! Like a zen garden raked into spiral patterns, and an altar in the very centre of the space...

- Celebus sends a skeleton to grab the thing on the altar, and brings back a cloak of teeth! Weird.
- Sydney puts it on and all his teeth become molars. He feels that if he eats a tooth, he can gain some short term protection for the price of some tooth decay.

--- Chainsaw Cuddles

- They move on, and see a corridor speckled with autumn leaves and another with the humid air of a jungle. They choose jungle!
- There are real trees here, and lots of thick ground cover.
- Grumblebelch climbs a tree and sees something through the mist... a living one of those chainsaw-limbed monsters!

- He swings towards it from a vine, flailing frantically, and it nearly swipes him with its chainsaw arm! He swings back, tossing his own zombie chainsaw limb at it! It misses the monster, but the living chainsaw does manage to cut down a tree!

- Sydney considers Agent Orange'ing the jungle with Blight, but once again decides against it. Grumblebelch, up the tree again, acts as a spotter for Celebus who fires his crossbow in the general direction of the monster!
- Jojo slips into the shadows and sneaks towards it... and nearly runs into a second monster! It's quietly climbing the tree towards Grumblebelch, waiting to pounce...

- Celebus nearly gets killed by a piston-based alien-style inner mouth while the others rush to defend him! He drags himself back behind his rearguard of zombies.

- Sydney gets the kill on one of them, draining its soul into his atrametal blade and making it crumble to charcoal. Cool!
- The other monster, who is currently on fire and poisoned due to a bunch of flaming swords and a jagermeister-based poison concoction, flees for its life.

--- PC Borbly Worbly

- A post-battle scrounge reveals some bananas, 3000 obols-worth of gems, an effigy of Space Jesus who looks concerningly similar to Galaxy Johnson, and a glowing blue gem that flashes red from within.

- Grumblebelch grabs the glowing gem... and a voice echoes in his mind! It's a space cop who was hunting down Galaxy Johnson, but was defeated and now he's here!
- Grumblebelch puts the soul gem on his head where it fuses to his skull, creating a classic police flasher. They're buddy cops now! Two pigs together at last!

- Everyone's in pretty bad shape, so they rest up in a dead end. They use their chainsaws to create a tree barricade and stay very quiet...
- A huge skull encrusted with gems floats by, but other than that they're ok!

- Celebus cooks "Celebus' Nut Surprise Delight Flambe", containing nuts and berries and banana and salted butter. It's good!

- Dorian puts the leftovers in Tupper's Ware for later.

--- Stained Glass

- They head out after a long sleep, going through the now much less jungley jungle and into the next area, which is a cathedral??? With stained glass windows??? - Sydney rightly points out that it's weird that light is coming in through the windows, seeing as they're inside Fortress-City Fate and all.

- It transpires that the light from the windows stains whatever it touches. PC Borbly Worbly gets a colourful makeover! - Celebus wants to see what's behind the windows, so shatters a pane with a crossbow bolt. Behind, it's space! The air starts rushing out of the room! - They run, but first offer the copper a free ride back into space. He replies that he's going to help them for this one last job... - They choose between the sound of kids playing and a smell like death. Death it is!

- It's a whole ceiling of bodies hanging from nooses, absolutely writhing with rot grubs. The bodies start to lower! - Everybody sprints through, which is the right thing to do because behind them the bodies hit the ground and burst open! Rot grubs everywhere! Yea fuck that, say the party, and keep going. --- Wizard Despair

- They come to a large space with a ziggurat on one side! There's a wizard up there, seemingly half-tentacle! He cackles and begins to cast a spell, while the buglike monsters on either side of him open their pearlescent wings!

- Grumblebelch nuts him with a cursed gold bar.

- The wizard rubs his head, having been cursed into a bout of magical depression. Fellgorp the Worshipper is his name, and you might as well have his spellbook because fuck it.

- The party leave in the direction of Shub-Wizardwrath, leaving Fellgorp to be comforted by his insectoid friends...

Total: 8000 exp

Treasures Liberated:

- A bag of gems (3000 exp) - Tooth Robe

- Bananas, berries, and nuts (20 exp)

- Various paints - Space Jesus effigy (5000 exp) - The Soul Gem of PC Borbly Worbly

Total: 8020 exp

Foes Overcome:

- 2 chainsaw monsters (3000 exp)
- A wizard (1000 exp)
Total: 4000 exp

OOC:

Carter the Chronicler (100 exp)
George the Expedition leader (100 exp)

Charles the Chef & Cartographer (200 exp)
Ollie the Quartermaster (100 exp)

Tom the Vanguard (100 exp)

Exp Totals:

- George / Swan the Swift, Level 7 Barbarian: 125493 (Level up at 128000)

- Kitty / Dorian "Ditto" DeMone, Level 7 Inheritor: 103227 (Level up at 144000)

- Charles / Celebus Uppytus, Level 7 Necromancer: 83471 (Level up at 144000)

- Carter / Sydney, Level 6 Magic-User: 47015 (Level up at 72000)

- Ollie / Jojo Fullbeard, Level 5 Muscle Wizard: 23759 (Level up at 36000)

- Tom / Grumblebelch, Level 5 Dwarf: 17610 (Level up at 32000)

Level up! +1d10 HP! +Lorebond! +Backstory!

Session 335 - The Case of the Greedy Pig

Date: 31 January, 23 p.p.

Moon: Waxing Gibbous - Clean Face
Zenith: The Dead God

New Backstory:

- Grumblebelch was a drummer in a Dwarven band! +1 Music

- Sydney swore never to bring life into the world... but broke that promise when he summoned forth his Familiar! +2 to your first Attack, Save and/or Skill Check each session.

Events:

--- Cancer Defeated
- The party are on the lowest level of the Brasshell deep inside Fortress-City Fate. The machinery here is twisted, pulsing, slimy. Very much broken and unmoving. In the room itself, moving around and through the pulsing slimy pillars, prowls the Cancer Monster that the Unravelled priest pointed out before leaving our intrepid adventurers here.
- Celebus greases up a skeleton with possibly-rancid butter and send it slipping out towards the creature. It attacks!
- With the monster distracted for just a moment, the party runs into the room which Iskander had previously scried into via potion and see the very gold that he saw!
- Grumblebelch sees the slimy altar, piles of gold bars stamped with twisting runes, horrible statue of a bloated tentacular entity with a man's face... and immediately grabs a gold bar.
- His body morphs and wobbles and collapses and reforms until... he has turned into a pig!

- The pig desultorily wanders out of the room, thoughts of suicide playing through his mind.

- Celebus orders a skeleton to grab another... and it's kind of fine! The gold bar is glued to its hands by magical force! Celebus realises that oh yes... he now has a skeleton with a curse attack!

- He sends the skeleton out to attack the cancer beast and it swallows the skeleton whole! Its eyes go black as it hallucinates vividly! They proceed to kill it slowly and carefully while it's too high to move.
- A replacement character turns up, an unnamed Magic-User. He picks up a gold bar, gets very depressed, and shoots himself in the head with a disintegration ray. RIP.

--- Tasty?

- Dorian devours the cancer monster and steals its cancerous regeneration.
- While he digests the horrible monster, the others decide to cook something!
- There is much discussion as Sydney refuses to eat anything containing a human bone, people trying to tell him that it's a skeleton troll bone so that's different plus it will make a good stock, and so on.
- They realise they don't have any water... until someone remembers about runes! Water is here!

- After all that it's bon appetit! Minestrolle Soup! All that careful talk around who's allowed to eat what has granted a boost to Tinkering!

--- Twisting Linearity
- After the fairly tasty meal, they head off. Luckily they've been joined by Roger's Loyal Lads, a band of Extras who found their way down here! Almost out of sight, a pig follows sulkily.
- The Lads delve further in, stealthily moving past a room with big purple shapes slithering around and heading through a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
- It's quiet going. They avoid a door like a cosmic sphincter and a cold room with gems frozen under ice, following a trumpeting noise.
- It's some big woolly mammoths! In a grassy room with entrances way too small for them! The mammoths are scared, protecting a baby mammoth in the corner of the room.
- The Lads scoot through, head round a wiggly corridor that turns and turns until it... secret doors back into the room? Odd. They all leave the mammoths alone.
- The next room has some howling holes that suck you into the void between voids! The extras run through, hundreds, even millions, of them falling into the infinite void until they clog up the holes and let everyone else through!

--- Dinosaurs?
- A loud roar, investigated, reveals a huge mechanical T-Rex! The Extras charge and are immediately consumed.

- The last survivor, the eponymous Roger, is swiftly pulled to safety by Swan the Swift.

- Jojo uses a magic punch to blind the T-Rex! The party rush through as its laser eyes flicker!

- Yeehaw

- They come to a fork. In one direction, the smell of gunpowder. In the other direction, an ominous ticking noise.
- They choose the gunpowder and come to bodies dressed as cowboys, all dead. There is a big gaping hole out the bottom of Fate, looking down at the jungles of the Dino Dome miles below!
- They spend some time talking to the spirits of the dead men and discovering their reasons for the fatal shootout. It's very silly. Then they grab the cowboys' six-shooters and head towards the mysterious ticking noise.

- Tick Tock on the Rewind Clock
- The ticking is revealed to be a big coffin-shaped grandfather clock! There's a human-shaped moulded into the back behind the pendulum.
- With a little experimentation, they discover it can reverse time for whoever's in the clock if someone else turns the hands! Why is this only worth 5000 obols anyway?
- The pig leaps in, hoping to reverse itself into a piglet and die. The hands turn back and...

- Grumblebelch appears! The clock reversed the curse!

- Roger recently of Roger's Lucky Lads runs to the big hole in the floor and plummets to his death. RIP. Tom has Grumblebelch back!

- With more of this menacing deepest level of the Brasshell to explore, the party continues on...

Total: 7000 exp

Foes Defeated:
- A Cancer Monster, killed while it was high. (500 exp)
- A mechanical T-Rex, blinded then avoided. (1500 exp)

Total: 2000 exp

Valuables Liberated:

- Time-Travel Clock (5000 exp)
- Cursed gold bars (20000 exp)

- Gold traces (2000 exp)
- 3 Wild West Pistols

- Blacksmith Tools & Gloves
Total: 27000 exp

Exp Totals:

- George / Swan the Swift, Level 7 Barbarian: 108302 (Level up at 128000)

- Kitty / Dorian "Ditto" DeMone, Level 7 Inheritor: 86036 (Level up at 144000)

- Charles / Celebus Uppytus, Level 7 Necromancer: 80134 (Level up at 144000)

- Carter / Sydney, Level 5 Magic-User: 29724 (Level up at 36000)

- Ollie / Jojo Fullbeard, Level 5 Muscle Wizard: 20422 (Level up at 36000)
Level Up! +1d4 HP! +1 Spell! +1 Mana! +Backstory!

- Tom / Grumblebelch, Level 4 Dwarf: 14273 (Level up at 16000)