Session 87: The Wedding Gets Real (July 10, 2025)
Last session, our heroes pursued Lord Emperor Kogar Mistwall, determined to end his reign then and there. Fighting off and subsequently consuming some fey-transformed river fish, they arrived at a tide-level cave carved into the cliff face. They chased Kogar into this seemingly-ancient “natural” formation and fought him among mysterious statues holding empty bowls.
The fight was hard, and Maho, despite dealing much damage, went down. Heph fed her a potion of Wild Healing and she was immediately transported to the Astral Plane. There, under a strange cloth-like sky rippling in an unfelt breeze, she met Yura, the moon goddess. Maho kept her track record of bemusing gods going, offering up the Widow’s Blade to Yura, who accepted, pending some boon at a future time. She was then sent back to the Prime Material Plane, healed and with an extra Action Surge attacked Kogar.
Kogar, hurt and desperate, rushed Elias and accused him of taking his daughter, but was unable to finish the job. Elias responded that he wasn’t taking Ash, she was leaving Kogar, as Ash’s trident flew in from the River Sarn straight to Elias’s hand. With a mighty strike, he killed Kogar, hoisting him on the trident and shushing him before he could give any last words. He then tossed Jarles to Heph to make sure he was really gone, exploding his head.
With that, the party looted Kogar for 11,200 gold and divvied it up. Maho picked up Kogar’s axe and pulled the others in for a hug, relieved that the fight was finally over, although she saw out of the corner of her eye Kogar’s blood seeping into the trident and a dark shadow passing over it. She glanced at the sandstone altar in the room, and with some effort attempted to translate it, reading out “Blood nourishes and blood destroys. Offer blood, and choose.”.
- Heph takes the bowl that Elias knocked over and fills
it with Maho’s blood and puts it back on the table, attempting to
offer blood as the writing instructs
- The other bowls around the room start to fill with blood and starts overflowing, and 3 of the statues rumble to life
- As the statues come to life, Maho realizes the actual translation is more like “Her blood nourishes and her blood destroys. Offer her blood and choose.”
- The statues begin to close in, seeming aggressive
- Elias jumps up onto the table, grabs the bowl, and runs out of the room, using Heph’s head as a step down from the table, dumping the blood as he goes, and getting to the river rinses it out and fills it with river water, and then dashes back
- The statues seem to get less aggressive at this move, and the draining water
mixes with the blood and forms an image on the ground of a sword and a piece
of wheat
- Maho and Elias start drifting towards the sword, but Heph gets a sense that the choice we are making here is a choice not for us, but for something else
- Heph says “we’ve done enough destroying, let’s try something new!” and runs over to the wheat, kneels down and scoops some up in his hand and drinks it
- The sword seems to disperse into the walls, but the wheat flows back to the river and joins back into the river
- Elias seems very sad about not getting a cool sword, and Heph points out that Elias keeps trying to get rid of Jarles, and Jarles pipes up and asks Elias to promise to not leave him, and Elias responds by dropping Jarles and walking away
- Heph picks up Jarles and takes him, and Jarles seems sad, and Heph tries to reassure him that Elias will take him back eventually
- Looking around at the cave, it seems it has not seen worship or even people for ages, and realize this cave is a super weird thing to come across, and wonder what effect this ancient ritual had
- Realizing the trident was not originally recovered with Ash, it’s a
bit odd that it flew all the way here
- Elias mounts it trying to fly with it, and does an impressive jump, but it doesn’t do anything
- Elias, at Heph’s suggestion, dunks the trident in the river, and it shrinks down to about an inch
- He shakes it back to full size, and we head back to the original cliff
- Arriving there, Heph flies up with one end of rope, the other end tied off to Kogar, Elias and Maho
- There seem to be more guests now, the Princess and Silvia, as well as Claudia
- There is also strangely what appears to be a covered rickshaw parked on the south end of the river, and holding up the end of the rickshaw is Darryl, and coming out of the rickshaw clown-car style are Elias’ parents and some other people Heph doesn’t recognize
- Meanwhile, Elias is climbing up the cliff using his climbing rope and immovable rod
- The goliaths help pull up the rope, bringing Maho and Kogar to the top, and Elias joining shortly after
- The Dagger has also arrived and is looking around thoughtfully, and the various visitors appear to be coming with invitations, except the rickshaw folks, who seem very confused
- Heph spots Darryl, and uses message to say “Hi Darryl, nice to see you!” and he responds “I heard you were dealing with the issue we discussed, and I got a nice invite and thought I’d come”
- Ash hugs Elias, and seeing her dad come up, she steps back, and Heph says “we dealt with the objection, so now this thing can continue”
- Elias starts to propose, and Heph kicks him in the back of the leg so he drops to one knee, but she stands him back up and suggests they date first, but they should finish the ceremony first since everyone is here
- Elias uses rope trick to create an extra dimensional space and shoves Kogar’s body into it for now
- Maho asks Ash how her trident got there, she doesn’t know, and Heph also mentions that the trident got briefly dark for a moment when it killed Kogar
- There is some discussion about Ash’s pact with Beth and how it isn’t quite resolved, but she doesn’t want to talk about it
- Thad approaches, saying “sup brahs, I’m here on behalf of your sister and the
others on the Nor’Southern Isles, they were too busy
to come”
- Delilas sends her love and the rest send their best wishes, and Thad explains they were busy reconstructing the political structure, they didn’t know about the whole Kogar thing
- Elias gives Thad a really critical job of immediately going back to deliver the news and gives him a beer to go, and Thad goes to sit in the rickshaw excitedly
- Heph calls everyone over, explaining how the wedding was a ruse, but Kogar is dead and we’re all here to party
- Otto from the maze in Arkos is there, but while trying to talk to him Karrl seems a bit distracted, and Heph follows him off after what he is looking at
- Maho’s dad also shows up from the rickshaw
- As Karrl flies off towards the tree, we see shimmering light
through the leaves, and Rormir seems to materialize, although he
is maybe not fully corporeal, as branches move through him
- He says “this wasn’t supposed to happen, I wasn’t supposed to be incorporeal”
- Elias runs over and says “Rormir!” and running to give him a hug passes right through him
- Heph asks him what’s up, and he explains that after he died from this plane, he went off and visited Jesus Christ in a dream and got an idea to come back in 3 days, but he is a bit early and maybe missed his chance
- Rormir feels like something important has happened, and Heph explains that Kogar is dead and this party was a wedding for Elias and Ash
- Rormir explains he got an astral invite, and he brought a gift, and he grows a giant peach from a branch of the tree, which falls on Elias
- Heph tries to hand back Jarles, but Elias pulls out Jarles 3 which is giant, and it falls on the peach, revealing an Amazon box
- Elias pulls out a dagger to open that, and inside there is a note, a branch that looks like a wand, and some shiny underpants made of some organic fruit peel sort of fabric
- Rormir continues to explain that while he was away he learned a lot of things now that he is not bound by his physical body, and one of the things he learned is he can think properly when not bound by a body, and he can think before he speaks
- Rormir wrote the note to Elias, and it basically explains that Ash now owns Elias and this rod is essentially magical birth control that controls the banana peel chastity belt
- Ash takes the stick from Elias and waves it at the underwear, and it jumps and tries to attach itself to Elias, but Elias is able to barely manage to wiggle free before it locks into place, and Elias shoves it back into the Amazon box and ties a rope around it trying to contain it
- Ash is smiling from ear to ear, and says “Thank you Elias’ ghost friend, this is far better than any wedding gift I could have imagined receiving.”
- Rormir says “you’re welcome” and reminds Ash she can use a chip of the wand to duplicate to make another if she acquires another “seeder”
- She produces more belts, and in the background the banana peel pounces on a squirrel and a loud crunch can be heard
- Rormir seems to be fading a bit, but he will try to stay as long as possible, and it seems Darryl is also seeming to try to send Rormir away
- Izume comes over and wants to finish up the ceremony, and as
Rormir fades away, we gather everyone up and continue the
ceremony
- As we are setting back up to finish the ceremony, Elias mentions that he sent invites as paper airplanes, and Ana smiles at him and gives him a knowing look
- In attendance we also see Jimmy, arriving a bit late and looking harried Governor Literi with his kids, Silvia and the Princess who look very hungover, Otto the minotaur, Bloody Mary and Joshy and Jude and some other gladiators are huddled in some dark space and reflected in Heph’s shield, bloodied but she seems to be very much enjoying herself, and we also see Tertel, Darryl, Gerald the duck with his plus one the riddle door seal, Elias’ parents, several Pegs Legs Steve and one Peg Leg Stephanie, Amble, Joerg, a cloaked figure that is Loper, Barth, the proprietor of the Widow Seer, the Dagger
- Ash pulls Elias to the archway, and Izume starts frantically coaching Heph through the remainder of the ceremony, and Heph starts to lead the rest of the ceremony, after some jokes around objections we get to vows
- Ash is flustered and Elias pokes fun at her, so Heph makes Elias go first, and he says “I vow now to betray you and get a significant portion of your countrymen killed and get you exiled to a different plane of existence.”
- She finally says back “Elias, I met you in a situation which was not ideal for either of us, where we were trying to get something different out of it. I was looking to assuage my conscience and guilt and you honestly were looking for someone who trusted you and would confide in you, and we both got what we wanted but also what the other wanted as well. You were able to contribute to the resistance in a very tangible way, and I, despite the fact I didn’t know I was looking for it, I found a companion. Things happened, and you know, you want to focus on that, but I missed you when you left and I was trapped in the castle and had to make a pact with an Archfey, but when I was told by my Father to come here, I jumped at the opportunity because you had not been seen in the Nor’Southern Isles for a while and hoped you had found your way here. Lucky me, you had, and you rescued me from a situation that I appreciated the help getting out of, and we haven’t spent much time together since then but we had a really long day. We’re going to see how this goes, I’m very ready for you to be my --- nevermind, happy wedding day!”
- Heph leads them through the process of the rings, both of them nervous and having issues with it
- A voice cries out saying “wait, wait, wait I don’t want to miss this, I don’t want to miss this”, and flying in from the south east direction is a very tattered hat with silver stars which belonged to Morty flying with tatters serving as wings, and perches on the back of a chair
- It says “sorry I couldn’t be here in person, I am indisposed, the specific nature of my indisposition is not programmed into this, so it’s not clear where I am, thank you for the invite/death threat that caused me to come out here, lovely to see you, hope I’m not late!”
- Elias welcomes it and the hat explains he is a brief collection of Morty’s memories and then says “fuck you”
- The rings, made of woven sticks, finally make it onto the fingers, and the ring seems to get sturdier as it forms a bit more solidly around their fingers
- With that Heph pronounces them “Divine Bearer and seeder”, and Ash dips Elias and kisses him, and everyone cheers
- To get everyone across the water, Maho uses Kogar’s axe to bridge together what has been destroyed and chops down a tree to make a bridge across the river, which is braced by the immovable rod
- During the after party, Heph grabs the
Governor, his mom, and other folks who are
involved in the invasion, and checks in with them
- The governor fills Heph in that forces have landed in Arkos and are marching through the city, they have landed in Homeburr and are trying to enter, and the ships approached Ivalgo yesterday and are trying to gather their forces preparing to land
- Heph brings in Thad and asks him to see if the council can do anything to recall the ships, and Elias asks him to bring back Kogar’s body; Thad asks Heph to write him a note so that he doesn’t forget anything
- After Thad leaves, Heph goes back to discussing the situation, and the governor explains most of the ships seem to be at Arkos, but there are still 50 ships at Ivalgo
- Heph lets the governor know that Kogar’s forces are starved for resources and they should try to prevent them from getting resources, and they aren’t prepared to deal with magic
- Heph approaches Darryl, and asks him for help dealing with
Kogar’s forces in the Shivered Sea
- With some good persuasion, Heph manages to convince Darryl to help out in the Shivered Sea in any way he can, to give the people of Perrinor a fighting chance
- Maho approaches her Dad, who is eating a giant sandwich, and he tells her he is very confused about what is happening right now
- Maho is confused how he got there as well, but she is confused about a lot of what has been happening but it seems okay
- Maho explains he is just north of Bad Zamdorf now, and he seems to know where that is, and Maho notes that he seems a lot braver than she thought
- Maho asks if he has heard from her Mom, and he reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out a stack of letters that he has meant to go through, and he eventually gets to a parcel of some kind that has handwriting that Maho recognizes as her Mom’s
- It’s dated from a couple of months ago, and Maho explains that Hojo has been attacked in the last week or so, and Maho explains that Sentin has been attacking villages in Cryptop to take prisoners to turn into slave warriors
- Joerg decides to finally read the letter, and asks Maho to sit down and read it with him after the party, but before he heads off
- He goes on to tell Maho that she takes after her Mom a lot, she has become quite the warrior herself
- Maho is happy to hear that, although she has been a bit confused recently as she’s had to kill people, unlike working with TK which was just roughing people up, but recently she’s been having to deal fatal blows
- Joerg tells her it is part of what separates her from him, Maho has the strength to do that and he most certainly does not, but it’s not an easy path that she walks
- Maho’s main priority is making sure her Dad is safe, and TK doesn’t have any eyes in the Shivered Sea which is where he has been, so he should be safe
- Maho tells Joerg they will figure out what happened to her Mom after dealing with Sentin, and Joerg reminds her to protect herself and not to get so distracted by the mission that she forgets to do so
- They conclude their conversation with Joerg making Maho a sandwich and they spend some time together