Perrinor

Session 14: The one where Elias gets magic and Rormir gets an octopus (March 15, 2023)

Last session, our heroes fought against the monstrous Carrion Crawler and Jude, the former teammate and friend of Joshy. Jude knocked Joshy out, but the party managed to subdue Jude as well. Joshy, just before slipping into unconsciousness, requested that they not let Jude die. With Jude at 2 failed death saves, Rormir finished off the last of their opponents rather than attempt to stabilize him. Subsequently Heph healed Jude and then blasted him with Fire Breath, causing him to surrender.

The battle won and a brunch with Bloody Mary scheduled for the next day, the party retired to below stage to recuperate and plan their next moves, hoping Mary will be able to shed light on who was behind the burglary at Potion Pitstop.

• Rormir approaches Joshy to say goodbye
• Rormir apologizes for finishing off the last of the Helions rather than trying to stabilize Jude
  • Joshy says it’s okay, it turned out alright in the end and he’s glad Rormir recognizes it might not have turned out alright
• Joshy says he’s probably going to keep fighting and trying to improve the conditions for gladiators, but he’ll be doing it solo for a bit at least
• Elias asks whether he’s considered retiring and taking up carpentry, and he says “Oh, like my dad, Joe”
  • He says he’s not quite ready for that career change yet
• When asked where the party could find him when he’s not at the Circle, he says he lives with his dad in a house off Joe’s Furniture Repair in the Heights
  • “We’ll bring your furniture back to life in three days or your money back!”
• On the way out of the Circle, a large minotaur gestures for them to stop
  • They remember this must be Otto, the person who designs the Labyrinth of Death
• Otto is saying in Minotaur “Wait!” and doesn’t seem to know Common
  • Luckily Rormir speaks Minotaur
  • Heph and Elias just hear bovine mooing
• Otto leads the party to a room that seems to be his workshop, explaining that the octopus they encountered in the Labyrinth of Death had been acting differently since Rormir charmed him
  • In the workshop are various tools and components of the Labyrinth, including the riddle door the Helions faced leaning against the wall with its hinges broken off (clearly they didn’t want to answer the riddles either)
  • Against another wall is a tank with a normal-sized octopus in it
    • Otto explains the enlargement spell has worn off
• When Rormir enters the room Karrl excitedly presses a tentacle up against the glass
• Otto was planning to release Karrl into the wild, but figured that the party might want him
• Heph tries to ritual cast Identify on Karrl, but he squirms back in his tank and Heph being short can’t quite reach him
• Otto gives Rormir a small tank with a strap that can be used to carry Karrl around
  • He also shows how the large tank can be folded when empty for easy transportation
• Rormir gently takes Karrl and places him in the backpack tank, folds up the other tank, and thanks Otto
• The party heads to Aqua Vita
• When out front, Elias exclaims, pulls out the small brass object he had received from Captain Nanda del Becco, and runs around to the back of the inn
  • Heph and Rormir exchange glances and follow
• Heph asks Elias where he’s going and Elias deflects
  • He pulls out the object again and Heph sees it’s an about 2.5″ diameter disk which opens up, and that the top half seems to have some scratches on the inside
  • Heph can’t really tell more than that
• Elias Misty Steps to the roof
  • Rormir climbs up after him and sees Elias sitting on the roof looking at the object
• Elias sees him and says he’s just meditating and needs some space, and Rormir and Heph decide to head inside the inn and leave Elias be
• Elias sits on the roof and stares at the object for a bit
  • After a while he sighs, closes it, sets it on the ground, and crosses to the other side of the roof
  • He then pulls out a book titled “The Absolute Complete Moron’s Guide to Magic, Part I” and opens to a tabbed page
• He practices for a bit, then gets angry thinking back to what Joshy said about forgiving someone who betrayed him, and in this anger casts Mage Hand
  • Having accomplished this, he look off in the distance towards Euxine Wares and flips his cloak to black
• Meanwhile, Rormir takes the suite in the inn overlooking the street and starts setting things up for Karrl
  • He goes downstairs and gets the late-night staff to bring him lots of water and salt and fills up the bathtub with salt water
  • He also fills a series of buckets throughout the room so Karrl can leap from bucket to bucket
• Heph takes the other room overlooking the mountains and starts banging away on his armor
• Elias heads towards Euxine Wares, which Rormir doesn’t notice out his window
• Elias arrives at the shop and doesn’t see the bouncer from before, but does see a single light inside the main room
• As Henry Randall, the artisan owner, opens the front door to leave for the night, Elias tries to tackle him
  • He pushes Henry back inside, but doesn’t fully gain control of the situation
• Henry looks panicked back at his desk and tries to run towards it
  • On an opportunity attack, however, Elias hits him with a dagger and with Booming Blade, and Henry immediately falls to the ground, close to unconsciousness
• Elias dramatically kneels over him with the dagger, and asks “L.D.? Who is L.D.?”
  • He gets an 18 on intimidation
• Henry is clearly frantically trying to wrack his brain for who or what this acronym refers to, and finally bleats out “L.D.? From Fleetwood?”
• He fails a death save and starts to slip closer to unconsciousness
• Elias continues to press him, and he says that the L stands for “Lucien”
  • He’s struggling to remember, and clearly this acronym isn’t at the front of his mind
  • It seems like he maybe doesn’t deal with L.D. very frequently or hasn’t very recently
• Elias checks the desk Henry was moving towards, but on a nat 1 nothing stands out
• Elias asks specifically about the NSI government
  • Henry seems to remember a bit more and says they approached him looking for magic items that he didn’t supply, and so he directed them to Fleetwood
• Henry rolls a third death save success and falls unconscious, and Elias heads back to Aqua Vita
• Rormir sees Elias returning through the window
• Elias walks into Rormir’s room and clumsily steps in a bunch of the buckets of water
• Heph runs into the room and excitedly shows off how his armor now has a retractable helmet
  • Elias, having none of it, reaches into the nightstand and pulls out an ACE magazine whose cover reads “Labyrinth of Death, starring Jesus Christ and the Apostles”
  • He throws it at Heph but it bounces off the helmet
  • Heph tries to punch Elias with his Thunder Gauntlets, but misses badly
  • Rormir throws a bucket of water, which misses Heph but drenches Elias
  • Elias throws the magazine at Rormir to retaliate and it bonks him on the head
• Someone downstairs starts banging on the ceiling with the end of a broom, and Heph suggests they all go to sleep
• Elias casts Sleep and instantly knocks Rormir out
• Heph stays awake even after Elias tries again
  • He then yawns, goes to the other suite, and passes out
• Rormir awakes in the clearing he was in before leaving for the material plane
  • He’s wearing the clothes he fell asleep in, and while he can transform into different animals this seems to be because it’s a normal dream, not because he’s actually physically back home
• Winding among the trees at the edge of the clearing, seemingly without end, is the snake spirit Urobor
• Rormir asks Urobor how long it’s been, to which it responds “For you, only a few days, but for me, well, you know how time is here”
• Urobor says he wants to check in and see how Rormir is fairing in the material plane
  • Rormir has learned about eating, and knows which is the correct hole to put food into
  • Urobor says he passed the first test
• Rormir continues that he’s learned that killing isn’t always the best way of resolving imbalance, and Urobor looks very pleased
  • “You can bring balance by changing people, not just erasing them”
• Urobor asks about Joshy
  • Rormir thinks Joshy is very wise for a physical creature
• Urobor asks what might have happened to the balance if Jude had died
  • Rormir says maybe in the short term it would have been better, since he wouldn’t be able to harm anyone, but long term Jude could change and himself work to improve balance
  • Urobor, pleased again, says Rormir will have a chance to set Jude down a better path if they meet again
• Urobor then turns serious and looks Rormir right in the eyes

There is a great imbalance in the material world. You are on its trail. It is not yet aware you are tracking it. But this is no ordinary prey. What you are chasing is but a wing or a paw. Just a small piece of the creature. When you find it, when you follow the last of its footprints and remnants and spoor and arrive at its den, it will matter less whether you have the strength to cut off this single limb, and more whether you are wise enough to strike at the beast itself.

• As Urobor recedes back into the darkness of the trees, Rormir asks whether the evil they are fighting can be removed or whether it can be changed
  • Urobor responds that more will become clear with time, but that simply putting down the evil will be insufficient, and a more complex solution will be needed to fully bring things back into balance
• Urobor disappears into the trees and Rormir wakes up in the morning
• The party gets up after a long rest
• Rormir says he needs to go off to the market to find a weapon of blue sapphire
  • Elias and Heph also want to go shopping
• Rormir asks whether Karrl wants to come with or stay, and Karrl excitedly hops into the portable tank, ready to go for a walk
• When the party arrives at the bar area downstairs they see a very disheveled Thom sitting at a table with his head in his hands
  • He looks surprised to see them
• Elias grabs a mug of water, uses Prestidigitation to flavor it like ale, and gives it to Thom, saying he could use a drink
• Thom gratefully takes the drink, but says he’s surprised to see the party here, since he thought they were staying at the Ruby Inn
  • He calls Elias “Lord Jeremias”
• Elias corrects him that he is in fact Elias, Jeremias’s brother, and that he and the servants are staying at a cheaper inn
  • He’s “hanging out with the pack mules”
• Thom says that he slept terribly the previous night and woke up fully clothed, not really remembering falling asleep
  • Elias and Rormir notice that the cuffs of his pants and his shoes are caked with dirt and mud, and there are tears in his shirt as if it snagged on something
  • These weren’t there the previous day
  • It does seem like Thom was out and about at night
• Rormir asks if Thom was in a fight, and he says he feels like he was
• He says what’s worse, his reason for being in Arkos in the first place is maybe ruined
  • He takes out the shiny cylinder from earlier, but it’s clearly now showing wear and tear
  • The reflections indicate the perfectly smooth surface has been warped, and spots of tarnish and rough, powdery texture are all over it
• Thom says he was hoping to sell it at the auction for at least 500gp, but he’s not sure what it will go for now
• Remembering the auction, Thom hands the party three tickets, apologizing that they’re meant for Jeremias, Heph, and Rormir, and he doesn’t have one for Elias
• Heph inspects the cylinder
  • He determines it’s magic, but doesn’t fit any of the school of magic he’s familiar with
  • It’s something deep and primordial
  • The object itself isn’t something Heph recognizes from modern times, and he can only assume it to be ancient
• He also sees that Thom has the same sort of magic about him
  • There’s a harmony between the magic in the cylinder and the magic in Thom

Referenced in

• Calendar