Session 82: Princesses at a Party (May 15, 2025)
Last session, our heroes stood across the room from Sentin Thornwillow, the second time they had seen him in person since fighting him by the Tischberg cliff face, setting his wagon on fire, and kidnapping his assistant. Sentin took the opportunity to calmly address the attendees, explaining his background growing up in Fleetwood, living comfortably in an unchanging elvish society which he desired to bring into the future. Heph, when asked how he plans to “challenge the world”, spun a tale of a would-be dictator “Kevin” coming to power in Homeburr, and what he hopes to do about him.
Sentin pulled out a Lucien Blind and described his proudest invention to the crowd of intrigued artificers. He posed it as a solution to the hypothetical “Kevin”, a tool whereby a peaceable people could defend themselves against the sudden incursions of much more powerful forces. And, he said, something that could reduce the cost of war by requiring far fewer combatants, and making them immune to exhaustion or fear or pain. Sentin even seemed interested in working with Heph to continue advancing this obvious boon for the world.
Meanwhile, Elias peeked behind the red curtain on the small stage in the room and discovered two masked goliaths and two Central Command soldiers hiding there, seemingly on bodyguard duty. Mindprison checked in with Maho, who told her to pay attention to how Sentin was being very careful with what details he said about the masks, which impressed the metallic woman. Maho then stepped forward and said she had a question to ask. She asked Sentin what brought him into this business, to which he responded that to grow elven society, he needed to impact the outside world, and the large amount of war and strife seemed like a great opportunity for influence. Maho said that Sentin doesn’t really understand the world, he just wants to be entertained by it, it’s a game to him. She, on the other hand, wanted to protect people without disrespecting life. Sentin said that war would exist with or without him, but he had the vision and will to exercise control over it. Wouldn’t Maho, after all, want to control things to her own ends? Maho said that she doesn’t want control, she wants to actually make things better for everyone. Sentin was simply speaking as someone who does not carry out violence himself.
While Maho’s speech did not move the room, it did touch mindprison, and with a distraction provided by Elias Mage Handing the curtain open the party exited, Heph sending Sentin a parting “call me”. They then returned to the safehouse. On the way, mindprison explained her background. She was what was known as an Obcy, a creature which arrived over the sea to Bolszcz, newborn but fully grown, with a desire to help and form connections with the fleshlings there. She said that this desire to connect meant that when a dear fleshling died, a new Obcy would arrive from the sea with the deceased’s personality. She, along with other Obcy, was put to work building settlements in the Weideland, but an encounter with a mysterious artifact opened her mind to the cruelty of her task and set her on a journey here to Bad Zamdorf.
The party arrived back at the safe house to compatriots glad to have a break from putting out the unconscious Harengon’s fires. Heph manifested some arcane smelling salts to wake the Harengon, after which she stirred, mentioning a notebook. Heph pulled out the papers he had pilfered from the Hopeful Ermine and laid them out, finding Sentin’s notes on this Fey individual.
- Continuing to pore over the documents we stole from
Sentin, finding that the blueprints are schematics
for how to carve runes into a seed in such a way that it grows into a tree
that can be manipulated by the person who carved the runes
- Ash chimes in that her dad should definitely not get his hands on the schematics as it might grant him more control over where Dalin appears
- We debate a bit but decide it makes more sense to kill Kogar first, as he seems to be the more imminent threat
- Turning our attention to the Harengon, Heph pours a health potion down her throat
- She is still for a second, then hiccups, and the health potion refills and Heph grows one foot taller
- The Harengon seems to be more full of energy but does not wake up fully
- Elias, jealous of the positive effects Heph experienced, pours another health potion down her throat, and he receives a couple of small items from Heph and Maho’s pockets, and his health potion also refills, slightly purple like Heph’s
- A magical barrier also appears in front of Elias, providing him a shield
- Elias gives Heph back the sending stone to Sylvia which is the item that Elias got with the magical effect, and then casts Identify on the health potions
- They are health potions, but a wild magic surge will go off when drunk
- Maho asks Ash to stun the Harengon, and she happily obliges, which seems to calm her down a bit
- Maho attempts to calm down the magic of the Harengon by putting a bucket from the fey wild on her head, which remarkably actually helps a bit
- Elias’ and Maho’s disguises are starting to fade, so they take them off, as Heph uses the Sending Stone to call Sylvia
- He says “Looking forward to the party, let me know when and where!”, and receives back a response saying “With cousin now, she is in town, meet at von Insel Dress House 8pm, I will be finishing fitting with my cousin, we shall party”
- Elias flips his cloak around to have a spider-web texture, prepping for the tomb party
- Heph spends some downtime while waiting for the party studying the
Sending Stones and the beacon, and realizes he might be able to combine some
of the runecraft Izume and Maho know to create additional effects
- Maho independently tries, with Izume’s help, to create a rune that can emulate the Message spell, after seeing how useful it has been for Heph and Elias
- She seems to figure some stuff out, and points her dagger at Elias across the room saying “hey does this work?” and Elias, surprised, looks up and out loud says “what the fuck??”
- While this is all happening, Elias is ensuring that things don’t get too calm by periodically taking the bucket off of the Harengon’s head
- Ana meanwhile asks Elias about Ash, she hasn’t been formally introduced and wants to know more about her
- Elias doesn’t really answer a lot of questions, but does invite Ash to the party
- Maho thinks most of the goliaths won’t want to go without there being alcohol, but Suzuki speaks up and says he’ll go along and do drugs
- Ana also speaks up and says she wishes to come along
- The group heads out to the von Insel Dress House, and Elias buys a
pink tux, Heph buys a dark red cloak, and Maho buys some
decorations for her new plate armor and a hat
- Suzuki is wearing a sheer top that his pecs are bulging out of, Ash is wearing a well fitted ball gown, and Ana is standing next to Suzuki looking exactly like Suzuki (“one of us is going to have to change”), and Woahdoe Boedough is wearing a tophat
- Sylvia walks up wearing a ball gown, not as nice as Ash’s, but a very practical one for a tomb party, very high fashion
- She sees the group and says “oh we’ve got a party here” and she continues to say that her cousin is getting fitted for an appearance at Hexicon
- Heph asks if Sylvia’s cousin is coming, and she responds that she is very busy, but Heph and Elias try to convince her that everyone needs a party
- Sylvia goes inside to try to convince her cousin to go to the party, and on a nat 20 a few minutes later is followed by a woman taller than her with a tiara set with intricate gems, wearing a much less practical dress than Sylvia’s, and on her shoulder is Tuki the ferret, wearing a full tuxedo with a top hat
- Elias asks Ash if she should be wearing a tiara, and Ash says she feels underdressed so Elias uses minor illusion to make a 5ft tall “tiara” for Ash to wear
- As she steps out, everyone bows to her, Maho the only one doing the “correct” bow, the rest doing the bow they know from their own places
- She walks out and sees this, saying “oh good, let’s fucking go”
- It is established that the princess was previously a big partier, and she says she will be fashionably late and acquire some drugs on her way
- Woahdoe Boedough casts expeditious retreat and with the aid of the horseshoes travels at approximately 30mph out of the city, arriving at a large ish tomb a short time later
- Sylvia informs us it is the Klippel family tomb, and there is an above ground
and below ground section, and we will be partying in there
- Feeding Woahdoe Boedough a bit of the wine that was in the bottle that the hourglass turned into, and he turns into a man again, and saying “Woahdoe Boedough!” enthusiastically joins us for the party
- Sylvia is a bit taken aback at first, but ultimately just goes along with it
- She unlocks the tomb, and with Maho’s help opens the doors, pushes back the coffin, and reveals a staircase heading down, which opens into a hallway that leads to large spaces where there are stone coffins, and an altar to Wyrdein
- Sylvia sets up the party and people start to show up, and the party begins
- The Princess shows up a bit later with two burlap sacks full of drugs, declaring that the party is really starting now, and after everyone is stunned for a moment, the crowd cheers and everyone gets really excited
- Heph pretends to do drugs but doesn’t really do any, instead working the room and trying to befriend Sylvia and convince her that the Blinds are really bad
- Maho is off in a corner with a group fighting shadow monsters, not completely out of control but definitely under the influence of some drugs
- Elias and Ash are on the dancefloor, doing an extremely dirty version of the mambo, and at one point Ash tries to awkwardly kiss Elias but misses
- Woahdoe Boedough is somewhere on the dance floor, awkwardly dancing and repeating his name over and over with a crowd of admirers
- At some point the princess joins Heph and Sylvia, and they have a brief discussion, Heph getting crowned the “Tomb Party King” and getting her tiara, and she invites Heph to come visit her castle in Eken next time he’s in town
- Heph points her towards Maho, telling her that Maho is pretty cool, and she heads over to talk to Maho, who gets Knighted by the princess as “Lady, Chief Protector of the Crown” for defending her from a shadow creature
- The princess’ servants are seeming a little uptight, so Heph returns the tiara to one of them and convinces them to take some Spooky Poof
- Maho tells the princess she is incredibly skilled, and throws a candelabra up in the air to slice it with her sword, and Heph makes the flames grow a bit bigger to be more visually impressive
- Maho’s first swing slices a bit of the princess’ lace off, but the next 3 strikes land true and she cuts the candelabra into multiple pieces, doing it all so fast that the candelabra doesn’t fall apart until after her sword is back in its sheath
- The princess appoints Maho her chief protector, which the guards protest, and then notes that Cryptop is a fairly uninhabited area, and Maho replies that yes most people seem to think that
- There is a brief glance exchanged between the two guards, but the princess seems genuinely surprised by this fact, and says she wants to learn more
- Elias and Ash are dancing, and Elias does a
big finishing move where he throws Ash up and spins her and dips
her, and as everyone cheers he tells her he is getting tired and asks if they
should get something to drink
- Ash is feeling distinctly unintoxicated, and Elias grabs the punch bowl from the top of a coffin
- Elias leads Ash over to the princess, thinking that Ash is also a princess and that might be good, and the princess asks who she is meeting
- Elias bows deeply while tossing the punch bowl up, catching the punch bowl after he stands up, and introduces himself as Elias and introduces Ash as a princess from a small island kingdom far away
- Ash says she would like to establish a connection with the Bismarck Empire and says she’d like to be the first to meet the princess
- Maho pipes up and says Ash is the princess of the land at the bottom of the chimney, and then everyone says that Ash’s dad is the worst and Ash agrees
- The princess asks if Elias is a prince, Elias stumbles over his words, but Ash says he is, leaning in to Elias to tell him it’s a good cover, and Heph notices there seems to be some hidden meaning to this
- Elias pulls out his Deck of Illusions and throws down a card, a troll appears and everyone is momentarily scared, then Elias has it yell out “PARTY!” and start dancing
- Heph hears one of his Sending Stones go off, and it is the one from Isabella, and Sentin’s voice, slightly exasperated and frustrated, but trying to maintain a steady tone, says “Trespassing is a crime. One more chance. Work for me, all four of you. Come to my booth tomorrow, I’ll have paperwork. An exceptional offer.” to which Heph does not respond
- Elias is drinking directly from the punch bowl, somehow managing not to spill, and Ana is hanging from the roof disguised as a bat doing the chicken dance
- Woahdoe Boedough ends up eating some drugs and casts Jump, starting to jump around the room doing flips and yelling his name