In our last session, the stalwart PCs were just about to start making their way down from Tijuana, into the depths of the massive canyon known as "the Sphincter".
Now:
-The PCs start to try to climb down the canyon side.
"Now that I think about it, we should have brought some rope or something."
"No, you guys I think it's fine--yaaaaaaaaahhhhhh!!"
-Muu and Heidi, whose players couldn't come this day, slip and fall into the depths of the canyon. A large number of screams are heard as they fall against the canyon slope, followed by the sound of some kind of explosion, and then silence.
-"Morris, throw a rock down there."
They hear a lot of clanging noises, and some cthulu-type inhuman warbling, and then more clanging.
"...throw another one!"
-"Hey wait, I do have a rope!"
"Huh. So do I! And it's a rope of climbing."
"I guess Muu and Heidi died for nothing."
-"What does this green poison I have do?"
"Well, you are a thief, so you could use your poison skill to identify it."
"Nah, it's alright, I'm good."
-At this point Bill remembers that besides his Rope of Climbing, he also has the Levitation spell. He gives Morris the Rope of Climbing, and starts to levitate his way down.
-After their initial descent, Bill suggests that he make a larger platform of levitation, and for Morris to come with him. But it turns out that Morris is scared of levitating.
"what the hell, are you Mr.T now?"
-"Can I save myself with the rope of climbing if you break concentration and fall to your doom?"
"Yeah, I guess."
"Ok, I'm in."
-When they just start heading down, they run into Yarr and Bazooka Arnok, lying on an outcropping, half-starved and semi-conscious. Apparently they'd reached the Sphincter on their own, met each other at the fenced area around it, and crossed over, only to fall a considerable distance and end up trapped.
"You guys are lucky we came along!"
"Actually we were fine until some asshole started throwing rocks down the canyon."
-"Do you have any food?"
"I have this bag of mushrooms..."
-"As you proceed downward, it gets darker and darker"
"...much like this whole campaign!"
-They get to the bottom of the Sphincter, where they see there is this great crystal shard, placed as if to seal the hole where the dark ones came out of. Just as they are approaching, the earth shifts as a massive 30ft Shoggoth emerges and rushes toward the party, shouting an alien roar. Everyone in the party except Bill fail their saving throw and are scared shitless, possibly literally.
-"Wait, Yarr and Arnok haven't eaten anything in two days."
"Ok, so only Morris literally soils himself."
-Bill casts Control Fire, and his mercurial effect is activated! A rift into the Void Beyond appears and this terrifying raggedy-man entity comes through, some kind of dark Elder God.
"Why hast thou summoned me?"
"It was just a mercurial effect!"
-"What dost thou wish?"
"Revenge against Nikos!"
"I can grant thee this, at a price."
"what price?"
"The souls of your 3 companions."
"...could it be just one?"
-Just as the Shoggoth is breaking past Bill's sequester and the Elder God is threatening to eat souls, Arnok overcomes his magical Fear.
"I jump at the fucking Shoggoth with all my atomic missiles!"
-Arnok does 303 points of damage to himself and the Shoggoth; Arnok is utterly disintegrated, the Shoggoth is destroyed, the Elder God is dispersed, and everyone else in the party is potentially dead.
-As it happens, everyone except Arnok survives their Luck check.
"Goddamn it, seriously? I didn't take even one of them with me??"
-Their survival does come at a cost, however. They each get mutations and now have 40 kinds of cancer.
-"Yarr now has huge eyes."
"So, like an anime character? Cool."
-"Bill is permanently weakened, he only heals half as fast from now on."
"Only in this body though, right?"
-"Morris' hair now has a life of its own and wiggles around like worms."
"I'm even creepier now!"
-"Arnok died as he lived... blowing stuff up!"
-The survivors get to the crystal shard, and find it has an entrance. Inside they find a kind of waiting room (complete with bossa nova muzak playing in the background, and a snack dispenser giving out bags of peanuts). There's also four guys in there. Three of them are clearly 0-level newbies to replace Arnok. The fourth is a guy with multicolored wavy skin who looks like a wizard.
-"Hello my friends. My name is Rainbow Deva. I am a mighty wizard!
-"I hope you are not here to try to kill us, and also perhaps that you know how to use the machine here to get us to the city of the Wizard Council!"
-The three newbs are a human corn farmer (with a pet cow), a yellow-mutant boat-arsonist with extremely low INT, and a human blacksmith.
"Why the hell do I always get at least one 0-level dude with an animal?"
-"We have no clerics in our party. None of them wished to come along with us for some reason."
-Morris uses his skill in reading languages to figure out the controls of the Crystal Shard. Apparently, they are written in Techno-Walrus.
"Techno Walrus?"
"Yeah, we met them before you joined the campaign, on Mt.Parnassus."
"What the hell are they?"
"There's two things you have to know about Techno-walruses..."
-The controls manage a kind of transmat beam. The party activates it and they find themselves in ethereal form, being flown up into the sky, higher than they'd ever been before, beyond the atmospheric cover, into vacuum, toward the highest of the floating islands.
-The PCs arrive at one of the larger asteroids, featuring an astounding domed city with a strange mix of architecture, and a kind of space-port built into the rock. It has a variety of high-tech flying ships, magical flying galleons, and strange creatures that look like Ki-Rin with butterfly wings that seem to be used as mounts. They have arrived in the great sky-city of Lol, home of the Lolri (the Techno-walruses) and also the headquarters of the High Council of Wizards.
-in the spaceport, they meet an apprentice wizard named Beson, who will serve as their guide in the city.
-As they head up to the domed city they notice some strange robots; they look oddly-shaped. Beson explains that they have been in the city since even before the Techno-Walruses (the city was apparently originally built by the ancient), and that they are called the Guardians, and enforce the very strict laws in the city.
-After quickly checking in at the hotel-esque Guest Tower, and having some time before Bill and Rainbow Deva will be presented to the Council, they quickly decide to head toward the market.
-"the corn farmer wants to try to trade his cow for some magic beans. I've heard that's a thing."
-Yar tries to buy the cow with some of the peanuts the snack dispensers from the shard transmat were giving out.
"They might be magic peanuts!"
-Bill, Yarr and Morris' next stop is the clinic and being immersed in full healing tanks to help them recover from their injuries incurred trying to reach the city of Lol.
-the others go into the markets. They learn along the way that the Guardian robots don't kill you if you commit a crime, they encapsulate you into a crystal sphere. Those spheres are then auctioned off, either to family members or friends, enemies or victims, or just real weirdos.
-At the market, the farmer is disappointed to learn that there's been a general shortage of magic beans since the death of the great wizard Frijole.
He settles for selling his cow for 45gp.
-Rainbow Deva is a sucker for cheap tourist souvenirs. He got himself a baseball cap that says "Lol". He paid an obscene amount of money for it, and later discovers the label on it saying "made in the bharata kingdoms", where he's from.
-When the others are healed up and they all meet back at the Guest Tower, they are impressed by the luxuriant conditions. Also, Morris calls room service repeatedly, once he finds out the Council is paying for everything.
"I want more cakes... oh, and some conditioner for my hair."
-"Tomorrow I want to check out this slave market of yours."
"They have slaves here? Awesome!"
"Wee do not have slaves. Wee have indentured convicts."
"Indentured? So like servants but you don't pay them."
"Hey, that's like us!"
-Bill and Morris both purchase indentured convict crystal-balls. In Bill's case, he outbid someone trying to beat him at it, and agrees to sell it to them for 100gp more than he paid, in a few hours when they get the money.
-The really stupid ship-arsonist is wandering around the market, having separated from all the others, trying to buy a boat.
-Yarr buys some huge novelty-sunglasses.
-Morris takes a few gems he had to a jeweler to sell, to his surprise what he's got is worth 27000gp!
-"You could buy a ship with that kind of money!"
"Yes, but the arsonist would just burn it."
-the money being too much to easily carry around, he gets himself a Credit Card (they have those here). Then he goes to the market, buys a pulse rifle, and the most expensive purple Pimp Outfit he can find.
-"Hey everyone, why are you looking at me like that? Are you jealous of my wealth?"
"No, you look weird."
-"Morris is not taking his newfound wealth with quiet dignity, is he?"
"He's nouveau riche!"
-The farmer tells the other PCs the truth: that Rainbow Deva is actually just an apprentice to the real wizard who got the invitation from the Council. When they got to the Sphincter, the Shoggoth destroyed their master while Deva and the three newbs hid inside the shard.
"well don't tell Beson.. you'll queer the deal!"
"Yes, you must not reveal my secret or you will pay sir... in rainbows!"
"what?"
"Don't question the mighty power of the rainbow sir!!"
-The High Council meets. The wizards of the High Council are a mix of super-powered freaks. Their leader is Belmunster, the super-archetypal Gandalf/Elminster/Merlin style old-dude with long grey hair pointy hat and a pipe. But there's also a frogman wizard, a fat kitty-wizard named Fluffy, a grey-realm alien wizard, a cyclops wizard, a hippie witch named Princess Fairywinkle, and more.
-There's also Sir John De La Pole, the mysterious wizard who Bill had been told was in possession of his Primo Staff. It turns out, John De La Pole is a magic staff himself, who has attained consciousness somehow.
"How did we not see that one coming?"
-There's apparently also a wizard called the Hippomagus, that everyone was excited to get to see, but he's not there. It seems the Hippomagus has gone missing.
-The PCs are also surprised to see a Robot Wizard named "Bolt-1".
"WHAT?? Hey are you related to Bolt-0??"
"HE WAS MY FATHER/CREATOR. BUT HE WAS A FOOL. I HAVE REJECTED HIM."
"Wow. Bolt-0 has a son. And he's got daddy issues!"
-Among the crowd, the PCs also spot The Archemaster! It turns out he has come here to complain about Bill.
"It's ok, he can't do anything to us. This is neutral ground. Right?"
-While others petition for membership, the process for becoming part of the High Council of Wizards is explained: you need two council wizards to sponsor you, and you must defeat a third in a presumably non-fatal magical duel. They also abhor diabolism (having a Daemon patron), are forbidden to kill another wizard or apprentice of the council, and when you die, the council gets all your stuff. In exchange for this, you get your own tower, access to the biggest magical library in the world, apprentices and guards, contact with the spirits of dead former council-wizards, and the right to act all stuck up about how awesome you supposedly are.
-As soon as Bill steps on the petitioner's circle for his turn, the circle lights up and traps him magically!
"We all saw that one coming, right?"
-"Bill the Elf! You are a diabolist agent of Sezrekhan!"
"He's not really a bad guy..."
-"Sezrekhan schemes to take control of G.O.D.!"
"That's not my fault though. Well, I mean I did give him the Libram of the Ten Spheres, which let him do that.."
-"What have you done with the Hippomagus??"
"Hey! I seriously had nothing to do with that one!"
-The Archemaster is pleased, but knows Bill's talent for trickery.
"Be careful! He's less stupid than he looks!"
"It would be impossible for him to be more stupid than he looks."
"Hey! NOTHING is impossible for Bill the Elf!"
-"Send him to the Infinity Pit!"
"Wait! I did a lot of good! I tried to save Arkhome. I freed the Ribond. I fought the assassin king and the egg beyond. I slaughtered the eco ogres! I stopped G.O.D.! I genocided the cyber dragons! I freed the Eye Tyrants!"
"Half of those things are bad, or turned out terrible!"
-The other PCs aren't helping.
"Probe him!"
"I do not know this man."
-Without Bill, the other PCs are going to be left homeless, unless Rainbow Deva vouches for them all as his servants.
"Of course I can help you my good friends! Now, Morris, I understand that you have come into a little bit of money..."
-"You know, Yarr, you could just kill Rainbow Deva..."
"No I can't! He's a mighty wizard!"
"Seriously? His only offensive spell is Color Spray!"
-"I think I'm going to get a manicure while I'm here..."
"What the hell is wrong with you people? Your friend is facing a death sentence probably for diabolism!"
"..what friend?"
-Morris keeps taunting Rainbow Deva about being a shitty wizard until he becomes enraged, and color-sprays Morris in the middle of the street, knocking him flat unconscious!
Unfortunately his victory is short-lived, when the Guardian robots arrive in response to this violation of Lol's laws.
"ENCAPSULATE! ENCAPSULATE!!"
-Morris and Deva are both encapsulated, their judicial auction will be tomorrow. Now, being all out of wizards, the rest of the party really are homeless, down and out on the weird streets of Lol.
-They quickly split up. Yarr goes out looking for princess Fairywinkle, hoping to befriend her. And by 'befriend' I mean manipulate her like he's managed to manipulate several other slightly ditzy characters of high birth so far.
-"You have a pathological need to ingratiate yourself to ingratiate yourself to royalty, don't you?"
-She intercepts Princess Fairywinkle on the streets of Lol, being carried on a litter by four bare-chested hunks.
"Hi! Do you know if there's anywhere around here I could get a non-gluten peanut-free vegan smoothie?"
"...Get in."
-"The guy I came with killed someone, but he abused nature, and that was awful!"
"Tsk. Intolerant people have to die for the environment! I mean, there are billions and billions of people in the world.. and that's a problem!"
-Yarr gets an invite to stay with Princess Fairwinkle at her giant Tree-Tower.
"I don't know where you guys will be spending the night, but I'm sleeping in a magic tree."
"Yeah, but you had to act like a fucking sociopath to do it."
"Yarr's a halfling. It's not an act."
-Bill finds himself in the darkness of the Infinity Pit. To his surprise, he is not alone there. Pertinax, the wizard who had cursed Bill to be routinely attacked by Minotaurs, is there too.
"Oh yeah. Pertinax got his own invitation to the council, it's true."
-"So they got you too."
"Yeah. Apparently they don't approve of my serving the Lord of Blood and Fire, or sending minotaurs over to you to be slaughtered."
-Bill has a plan! Teleportation doesn't work here, but he still has two garbage bags full of weed.
"So... you're plan is to get really high, and that will somehow summon a Shoggoth?"
"Not just any shoggoth, Bob Shoggoth! He's cool."
-Meanwhile, Yarr has been working on convincing Princess Fairywinkle that Bill is actually a 'victim' in all this, and that he could be turned toward good. She gets Fairywinkle to agree to help her win over one other member of the council (probably Cylor the Cyclops-Wizard), and then the two will sponsor Bill for a place on the Council. Bellmunster is such a Neutral Freak when it comes to the club rules that he'll have no choice but to allow the challenge, at least, to take place. This is the plan, anyways.
-The Yellow Mutant boat-arsonist, having not been with the others when they became street people, went back to the Guest Tower. Having been confused at being denied entrance to the room, and too stupid to understand what he was being told, he just hung around, hiding from staff in the servant corridors. There, he runs into Jal'udin!
-Not realizing the Yellow Mutant is mentally disabled, Jal'udin talks to him and gets the impression that Bill had gotten his previous messages (Bill mostly did not) and agrees with his plan (Bill does not). Jal'udin tells the boat-arsonist to tell Bill that he's going to keep his part of the bargain, and steal Bill's Phylactery in exchange for Bill betraying Sezrekhan and enlisting the Wizard Council's help.
-"You realize Bill's never getting this message right?"
"Yup."
And that's where we leave off for this week. Bill and Pertinax are going try to toke their way to freedom (if they can manage to summon Bob Shoggoth), Yarr is going to try to use the technicalities of the Wizard Council to free Bill, Jal'udin incorrectly believes that the PCs are ready to play a crucial part in his plan to stop Sezrekhan, and Morris is just going to keep on pimping.
It seems utterly certain that everything is set up to go horribly wrong. But the really interesting part is going to be to find out just how.
RPGPundit
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