Session 53: What Goes Around Comes Around

Or, Cichlids Coming Home to Roost
"V: "What the fuck have you been telling Mavadtorop?!"
 * We're in the mysterious underwater dream fight! (Mogen is not in her full chair… we're dressed like we were months ago)
 * SarienNPC shoots an arrow at one of the kopru but misses; VanNPCesse moves up to the other and attacks with her sword. Mogen blasts one of the kopru hiding behind coral and crits. One of the kopru stabs Vanesse hard. Vesun dimension doors to the rift and feels like he's being pulled toward it. Vikrit's shark (Tigger) flanks the kopru Vanesse was attacking and bites it; Vikrit casts Entangle, affecting only the shark (save failed) and the kopru. Tork blasts a kopru and Sarienne stabs the other. Vanesse manages to miss both her attacks. One of the kopru destroys the fiendish octopus. Vesun dives into the rift. Vikrit swims with all his might forward and the shark attacks again; the seaweed wraps around both kopru. Sarienne moves toward the remaining kopru after destroying the other. Vanesse finishes it off.
 * We hear Mavadtorop say, "GOOD! SHOW ME WHAT YOU'VE GOT!" and two ichthyosaurs, with a kopru holding a staff with a gem, appear. Vesun finds that he's lying face-down in sand on a beach; picking himself up, he feels warmth and the sound of the breeze, and can see a giant dead sea monster's corpse lying on the shore. The water is all red. He makes a Fort save and resists vomiting a ton of seawater. He looks around and sees that he's on an island surrounded by blue water (except for the water close-by). He notices that the tentacles lying on the shore are attached to the creature, and they're moving slightly. He calls, "Mavadtorop?" and eventually he hears a guttural noise from the creature.
 * Meanwhile, the rest of us are still fighting. Vikrit tries to get everyone with the seaweed trap between them and the new enemies, then directs the shark to distract the ichthyosaurs. He casts Speak with Animals and tells them we mean them no harm, but they charge forward and one hits the shark. The kopru sorceress magic missiles Tigger. Tork teleports him and Mogen onto the other side of the map; they notice the sorceress is wearing what look like a magical headband and amulet; Mogen recognizes the headband as potentially one of the "horns of the trident" - blowing into it does cool ocean stuff. Sarienne picks up her bow.
 * Back to Vesun: he thinks the sound came from something inside the fish; then he hears Mavadtorop's voice in his head say, "Where are the rest of you?" He says we've always been slow on the uptake; he says, "Congratulations, you have survived my challenge. If you are powerful enough to survive, why are you not worshiping my herald?:" Vesun says that wasn't part of our arrangement, and he says his herald is full of impatience and asks why we are doing nothing. He says he's given his herald many of his gifts but is he using them? Mavadtorop is confused as to why the rest of us aren't there. Vesun asks what the creature is, and he says it's 'Nebuchadnezzar' and that he's not on the best terms with other of his species, this is one of their minions he's defeated and has left there as a message.
 * Vanesse (now Georgiy) moves up to one of the ichthyosaurs to stab it. Mogen pulls off the sorceress's headband. Tigger gets killed by the ichthyosaurs. The sorceress moves way from the horn to Vanesse. Tork grabs the horn. Mavadtorop's voice yells, "Enough! Show me that you deserve to be here!" and a horrible gigantic creature appears. Vanesse misses first, but then slashes the sorceress with a huge raking blow. Mogen moves up to the horn and grabs it, then blows it, noticing that it's been made with metal to a conch shell. With a 1d3 roll, it functions as a dismissal spell--and the Deep Nightmare disappears! Vikrit summons 3 more sharks, dismisses the entangle spell, and starts swimming toward the first. The sorceress casts mage armor, getting bitten by one of the sharks. Tork casts Lightning Bolt and cooks one of the ichthyosaurs. Sarienne shoots the sorceress; Vanesse misses with her first hit but then crits and slices her sword straight through the sorceress, then her shadow sword hits the final ichthyosaur.
 * Mogen dives into the rift. Vikrit calls a shark over to him to pull him over to the dead sorceress and yells at the ichthyosaur to leave; he grabs her amulet and coral ring, and directs all the sharks to bring us over to the rift.
 * On the beach, Mogen gets expelled from the monster clutching the horn (Shimmer is with her). The rest of us soon follow. Vikrit and Mogen vomit seawater everywhere. Mavadtorop says, "Finally you have passed my trial!" We ask him to tell Cornerio to cut the shit because we're working on what Mavadtorop asked us to do, and that he hasn't even built a new shrine (untrue). He says perhaps his herald needs "more support". Vikrit and Tork have questions: Tork wants to interview him about his magic, and Vikrit asks if he can sense everything different re: Godara and he waffles about it… Mogen asks if he can just teleport us to the Mror Holds, and he it's not quite that but it's 'too complicated for our minds to comprehend', or… just an illusion.
 * We all wake up and make a beeline to Cornerio's room. Mogen opens his door and we push our way in. Cornerio tries to get away but Vikrit and Mogen trap him.

M: "What the fuck have you been telling my brother?!"

C: "I can't discuss that, it's attorney-client privilege.""


 * Tork is in the doorway; he came to see if Cornerio was okay. Vikrit yells at Cornerio that you don't fuck with your friends' family and chomps on him. Cornerio slips out of Mogen's grasp. Vanesse and Vesun hear the commotion and comes over; Mogen yells that she can't wait to tell the vampire who burned the records. Vanesse grabs Cornerio and he slips out of his shirt, then gets to the locked front door… and punches it, splintering some of the wood. Sam asks, "What are you doing? I just reinforced the doors!" Vikrit screams, "You can't run away from all the problems you cause every time, Cornerio!" and launches onto him from the stairs.
 * Vesun says, "You know, Mavadtorop did seem to indicate that he wouldn't mind if we killed him…" Tork tries casting Dim Door and reappears exactly where he was. Cornerio squirms away from Vikrit. Cornerio punches the door off its hinges and runs to the next door… which is also locked. Vikrit, Sarienne, and Mogen grab him. Cornerio says we clearly don't want him to be part of the party and he's gonna leave, and Vesun suggests the Dark Lanterns might be upset about him disappearing. After further argument, Mogen says, "You know what? I'm done with this guy" and Cornerio agrees and storms off to go pack his things.
 * Sam asks if we can calm him down, because the Dark Lanterns just won't let people go… and brings us some 'sleepytime tea' that is very potent. Mogen puts all of the tea into Shimmer's plunger and directs it to put it in Cornerio's mouth. Cornerio hears something but doesn't notice it until it's right at eye level on the bed, and it jumps on him. Cornerio rolls a 33 to avoid it, getting the powder everywhere, and skitters away sadly. Cornerio doesn't know what it is, but scoops a bunch of it up.
 * Cornerio asks Sarienne if he can have his stuff back from the portable hole, and she shakes her head slowly while holding his hooked hammer. Sam asks where he's going to go while unlocking the door, and he says, "I don't know!" and leaves. Sam tells us the Dark Lanterns are probably going to ask us to kill him. We talk about how to tell Mavadtorop that Cornerio's abandoning the cause., but Vesun can't cast Sending to contact him until tomorrow. Mogen gets Sam to promise that he won't notify Central Control for 24 hours; Sam also says he's not planning to tell von Pappen that Cornerio was the one who destroyed the records.
 * Meanwhile, Cornerio's looking for a hotel.
 * As he makes his way down the boulevard, an elf in a well-tailored suit stops him in the street and introduces himself as Ardyll Venetables. He says Cornerio looks like he could stand to earn a lot of coin today, and Cornerio lies that he took a vow of poverty. He asks if Cornerio knows the artist Damien Roberts, and Cornerio says "yes and no". He tells the elf there are people who would be very interested in this opportunity in the supposedly-abandoned Reichministry and leaves.
 * He finds a woman renting her spare room out in the Aundarian quarter and gives his name as Roland. He then sets up his shrine to try to contact Mavadtorop but nothing happens, so he goes to take a nap. In his dream, he gets swallowed by a giant shark. Then he hears Mavadtorop's address him in the dream. Cornerio complains that the party has turned against him, and suggests he find new followers. Mavadtorop says that he challenged his 'subordinates' (us) and we passed his trial. He says Cornerio has to demonstrate his power to us to earn our respect and devotion. Cornerio complains about his 'gifts' and asks for more boons. Mavadtorop agrees to grant him a final boon and says he must spur us on to the next gate.
 * Cornerio wakes up and throws up a seawater-covered conch shell. It looks like it has a mouthpiece on one end and the other formed into a brass horn, much like the one in our dream.
 * Back at the base, Mogen fills Tork in on what happened with her brother and we discuss the plan for tonight.
 * We also briefly discuss the thing with Lord Darro; Vikrit points out that even if we are able to get the Brelish prince to have an audience with Darro, that will almost definitely ensure everyone ganging up on Thrane accelerate the start of the potential war. Mogen mentions how much of a pain in the ass traveling is (to the Mror Holds specifically, even) during wartime. Vesun seems to be somewhat inclined toward working with Darro, but is very clear that he does not trust him.
 * Ideas:
 * Vesun & Tork going in pretending to be Thraneans, then putting the hat of disguise on the target and invisibility on Tork
 * Mogen will send in Shimmer with Vikrit up the back to try to get in that way during the distraction.
 * We send Sarienne to get von Pappen's family rowboat to borrow, and she hides it near the bridge close by to the officers' club.
 * For escaping, Vikrit has prepared Mass Camouflage and Lamb Womb.
 * Vesun has a spell to put people to sleep that he can put on a scroll, and Vikrit has Dawn. Shimmer can watch to see when people fall asleep.
 * Perhaps Vanesse can go light the Exarch's house on fire. Uhhh as a distraction; for some reason only Tork and Vikrit are advocating for this.
 * We need to decide what we're going to tell Lenore about who we are/why we're there and how we're going to do the interrogation.