Session 107: A much needed rest (May 21, 2026)
Last session, our heroes resolved the rest of the predicament with Central Command that they had found themselves in. Maho returned to her Goliath form, and she and Eden invisibly followed Heph on Governor Literi’s horse out of sight of the Imperial Conjurer Ginevra and towards the Governor’s twins Paula and Paulo at the Grotto. When they arrived, they found the twins talking to a group of five individuals, speaking in unison, attempting to make diplomatic contact with “the great king of Ivalgo”. They said they were Sarnann, and Heph jumped in, offering to let Literi get back to deal with the invasion and not leave Mort alone with his city for too long.
Literi teleported away with Paula and Paulo, and Maho and Eden caught up. Sarnann was glad to see a Goliath, and generally was unsure what the current state of the world was and how long she had been asleep. She didn’t even seem to know of Cryptop or the Goliath presence there, last remembering the formation of Zora’s Furrow and a battle against human invaders, and was unsure why there were so many small people in the Haden Desert. It also turned out Jörnann had wandered off and found her sister, and at this moment Thom was napping on Sarnann’s tomb.
The party headed back to the safe house with Sarnann and her accompanying Pumice Fist monks and there met back up with Izume, Suzuki, the other goliaths, and Mindprison. They were surprised to see Eden awake, and Izume a little frightened, considering she was never under the influence of a Blind while Eden was. Suzuki, having been in a similar predicament himself, felt comradery with Eden. Heph set out to collect the Mansion, kicking Ana out when he dispelled his Arcane Lock. During the journey, he discovered through Karrl that Ginevra and other Central Command soldiers were keeping a fairly consistent distance from him several blocks away. He methodically went through all his items until he found that a Locate Object-like spell was connected to his Wand of Whispers, which he had acquired from Henry Randall at Hexicon. He painted up a lead box to put it in, then continued his trip back to the safe house.
Back at the safe house, Eden worked on a system for the Pumice Fist monks to take turns hosting Jörnann. However, she did not seem to be able to flow freely between bodies in the way her sister could. Sarnann, eager to claim the party’s mission of defeating Sentin for her own, also seemed keen on destroying the Bismarck Empire and reconquering it for the giants and Goliaths once she had her body back. Maho, trying to figure out how to resolve this situation, continued being the most religiously-competent member of the party and received a vision from Yura on the nature of the gods of this world, the many pantheons they belong to, and their relationship to each other. She said she had an idea, and that she would speed dial Yura to ask what to do.
Meanwhile we see a scene of Ivalgo. Mort brought down Meteor Swarm on the NSI invasion fleet while Bloody Mary, arriving from the other side, reflecting the morning sunlight like a mirror to burn the ships in front of her.
- Maho casts Commune to reach out to Yura, wandering
around the safehouse looking for moonlight without explaining what she is
doing
- She finds a book with a picture of the moon, and uses that to reach out to Yura
- It’s a comic of Moon Man and there’s a crescent moon in the sky on the cover
- She first asks if Yura would intervene if other gods tried to destroy all mankind?
- Yura’s face appears in the moon and looks rather sad, and shakes her head slowly and gently, and Maho can sense that the no is rather regretful
- We discuss what to ask next, and Maho eventually asks Yura if Sarnann is expected to return to her body within a month if we don’t help them
- In response, the moon shakes her head, indicating we have some time
- We decide that we shouldn’t try to use Jörnann or Sarnann to help, and Maho asks a third question, which is if we know anyone that can help with Thom, and she nods, giving Maho that answer for free
- Maho asks her real final question, asking if Central Command is still actively attacking Hojo, and she nods emphatically
- We discuss the new information, and Eden and Heph defer to Maho, given her people are actively being attacked
- She decides that a rest in Ivalgo will be beneficial to get ready for dealing with Central Command in Hojo
- We decide to head back to Ivalgo with our crew, leaving the giants to handle their own affairs, and get ourselves ready to deal with Hojo
- We head back into the main room, and Heph explains to Sarnann and
Jörnann that we will leave them to figure out their bodies and
will connect with them later
- Upon re-entering the room, Sarnann is trying to make diplomatic connections with Izume
- Heph explains the plan to the group, and pulls Thom aside to tell him that we are leaving him with Sarnann, and to keep and eye on what they are up to
- Sarnann reiterates her plan to first defeat Sentin and then conquer the world
- Eden tells Sarnann we look forward to her conquering the Bismarck Empire while curtsying stiffly, and then turns to Maho to ask if we can leave
- With everyone ready to leave, Maho uses the bivalve to open a door to her dad’s house, and we rush through the door, ending up in Joerg’s foyer as Sarnann waves bye and tells us she looks forward to meeting back up with us
- Maho and Eden hear clattering cutlery from the kitchen
as we fully startle Joerg, but Heph additionally hears the sound of
small, possibly gnomish, feet upstairs, and the faint sound of music and
celebration in the distance
- Joerg comes out holding a mustard-covered knife, which Heph takes from him with Mage Hand, and when he sees it is us, he runs up and gives Maho a hug
- He asks if we helped with the ships, and we explained that we brought Mort back
- We continue to explain that we confronted Sentin and it didn’t go great, so we are back to lick our wounds before we try again
- Maho points out Izume, asking Joerg if he remembers her, and he bows a bit and is happy to see her again
- Maho asks him who is upstairs, and he says a room just opened up, and Spraus walks down the stairs with his bag packed
- Seeing Heph he runs up and gives him a hug, and explains he is moving back into Potion Pitstop
- Heph explains that we are resting up before our next thing, and Spraus is just happy that he is home for a bit
- Maho asks Spraus to help Heph with what he needs, and Heph asks him to replicate the Potion of Hill Giant Strength
- Eden heads to the town’s spa to finally get her spa day that she
has been craving
- It was damaged, but not structurally, and there is a woman in charge that seems to be slightly stressed and giving orders to get the place back up and running
- Eden walks up to the lady in charge, introduces herself with a curtsy, and offers to be of service with the repair efforts
- She looks at Eden and isn’t sure how she will be helpful, and Eden casts Bigby’s Hand in response to that
- She lifts up the heaviest rock with a shimmering giant bunny paw, and it lifts up easily, and the woman looks at Eden and says “Umm… yes, yes, yes yes please help yes please”
- The woman is really taken aback by Eden and thinks she must be a student, and Eden clarifies she’s from out of town and isn’t currently a student
- The woman asks if Eden has any way to fix the wall, and Eden puts the stone back in place and uses a bit of Elementalism to stitch the stone back together
- The current owner is extremely pleased at how the slightly haphazard effect makes it her own and branches out from the perfect design her mother had
- After all the help Eden gave to help repair the place, the owner offers her free care, and Eden takes her up on that
- She orders a hot stone massage, a sauna, and then hot yoga, which includes goats
- Filippa Biagini offers Eden a job, saying she can fire someone, and Eden instead uses Suggestion to suggest that she give all her employees a raise
- Eden realizes the woman is horribly mismanaging the place, and ends up buying the place from her and not letting her stay on
- She buys a new dog every week, and just kinda hands them off to people to feed them
- The employees are rather grateful as she was a terrible boss, and Eden begins to ponder how she is going to manage this place and solve the debt problem
- Maho asks Heph to borrow Jarles’ scabbard,
and Heph ends up letting her borrow Jarles entirely,
and she puts the Servitude Choker on Jarles’ scabbard
- The scabbard springs to life and starts talking, and it freaks Jarles out and he starts screaming
- After some adjustment though, Jarles gets very excited by this, and pastes a bunch more eyes on himself and effectively now has arms and legs
- He is able to draw himself from the scabbard, and wants to go to Potion Pitstop to scare Heph’s parents
- He experiments a bit with his new capabilities and thanks Maho profusely
- She also gives Jarles the Catnip Amulet, and then it runs out of Maho’s house, followed by a pride of tabbies that came out of nowhere
- Heph spends the evening with his parents, spending some time at the
party
- There is music going on, and people are releasing a lot of pent up tension now that the ships have retreated
- Mort is being carried around celebratorily on a chair, but Heph is just fully in vacation mode and doesn’t notice at all what it is doing to Morty’s ego
- Constable Haxa and Bartolomeo Burton are holding hands and watching the fireworks
- There are several Pegs-Leg Steve and Pegs-Leg Stephanie dancing an energetic jig and playing music
- Karrl, meanwhile, is spending some time as an octopus in the sea
- The next morning, he heads to the University first thing, looking to use the lead room to figure out what is going on with the Wand of Whispers, not really registering that everyone is letting him proceed without any issue
- Once in the room, Heph hears someone say hi, and Morty is sitting in the corner, still draped in necklaces, and looks like he hasn’t slept and is hung over
- Heph strokes his ego a bit, telling him he knew he was the right wizard for the job, and then explains what he is doing with the wand
- Heph asks Morty what he is doing there, and Morty responds that he knew Heph would be there, and he tells Heph he put in a good word for him
- Heph investigates the wand and finds there is no specific spell on it tracking it, there is an item linked specifically to the wand that allows permanent tracking of the wand
- Heph suspects he can break the effect by significantly changing the wand, or otherwise by getting his hands on the tracking item itself
- Heph fully repairs the wand, but doesn’t change the nature of it, meaning it can still be tracked
- He then creates a schematic, which doesn’t have the full capability of the wand, removing the ability to suppress a verbal component and adding a damage to the wielder when using sending
- Heph sends the schematic off, and a few moments later gets back the contract marked as completed
- We spend several more days hanging out, Eden and Heph
having a shared nightmare about a Gelatinous Cube in the basement of the high
school
- They head to the basement of the school and actually find and defeat a gelatinous cube weirdly
- Eden sets up a therapy clinic in the spa, which is a service that the town now desperately needs
- Eden finally convinces everyone to check out the spa, and the group convenes after about a week of downtime and getting stuff done in the spa which is now named “The Bunny Burrow (Luxury Spa, Salon and Therapy Services)”
- Mort is actively getting a massage, as are some other members of the group, and the goats are wandering around
- Leah is keeping the books and winces a bit every time Eden gives out a free service, but as she is being paid a normal amount she lets it happen
- Eden’s business is really taking off since she nailed the ideal spot on the supply and demand curve, and she has paid the debt down to only 5,000gp
- Jarles runs up to Heph, covered in googly eyes, and says “Hey Heph, I’m sorry I’m late, I’ve never been late before unless someone made me late. It’s liberating that I can be individually inconsiderate in this way.”
- Mort stretches a bit from his massage and says he needs a vacation from the vacation, and turns to Maho asking what she wants to scry on
- Maho says she wants to know what her mom is up to, and Morty takes her mom’s cape and leads us to the hot tub to do some scrying