“I can’t be trusted.”
“I will always trust you!”

—Orkira and Penelope, Heroes of the Vale

Watch Heroes of the Vale – Chapter 2, Episode 12: Mind Blast

You can also listen to our show as a podcast! 

Dramatis Personae

Our heroes are 8th-level characters:

• Todd Kenreck as the Dungeon Master
• Keen, Eladrin Eldritch Knight Fighter played by TJ Storm
• Briv, Half-Orc Cavalier Fighter/Barbarian played by Adam Bradford
• Penelope, Halfling Circle of Land Druid played by Hope LaVelle
• Alyndra Alexandria Garanahil Sarrbarand, Lorekeeper of Rime Spiro, Kinscribe of Clan Monkeymouse, High Elf Cleric/Wizard played by Jen Kretchmer
• Orkira, Dragonborn Light Domain Cleric played by Lauren Urban

Full Summary

Werewolves descend on Keen and Briv, clawing horrific wounds that drop the two heroes to the ground. Penelope instinctively casts healing spirit, summoning her giant glowing elk to offer healing to her two friends, and while the wounds start to knit closed both men start to convulse before all their muscles lock up in bone breaking tension. Alyndra can see they are poisoned, and calls out for Orkira to help as she sends a mind spike at one of the werewolves.

From around a corner a tall, hooded figure looks down the alleyway. Calling a warning he sends a psychic blast to stun the werewolves, causing them to scream in pain and fall unconscious. The figure uses telepathy to let Penelope know he is a friend as he fully appears in the alleyway, revealing himself to be a mind flayer! Everyone is wary and on edge as there is a brief pause in the fighting, which Orkira uses to quickly cast lesser restoration on Keen and Briv to cure the poisoning and ease them into a more relaxed state.

As Penelope introduces herself and asks to be friends with the mind flayer, he relays how he has lost his connection to the Elder Brain and thus is no longer under its control. In a mutual moment of distrust Alyndra and the mind flayer detect thoughts on each other. Alyndra senses the illithid is telling the truth and cannot sense the Elder Brain in his mind, is worried about being attacked, and is alone but hungry and hoping to eat one of the werewolves. The mind flayer senses Alyndra's terror, and gives in to its hunger, warning everyone to look away as it warps its tentacles around the back of the head of one of the werewolves and begins to eat it’s brain.

Since Penelope was bitten badly the group ask if she is ok, and the druid takes a moment to cast detect poison on herself. Discovering she is indeed infected she at first tries to hide it, claiming to be fine, but the mind flayer reads her upset surface thoughts and says “You said friends don’t lie.” Quickly admitting she was infected but will soon be better she casts protection from poison on herself as a cure. The group introduce themselves, though the mind flayer does not have a name that translates nor is used to being a singular being, and so decides to be called Friend. Everyone is worried about more creatures arriving to attack, so Friend shows them the way into the sewers where he has been hiding. Alyndra casts floating disk to carry Keen and Briv, and they enter the tunnels below the street. 

As they move through the sewers, Friend relays that he was sent with two others by the Elder Brain to find the apparatus. When they found it something happened that caused him to be cut off from the collective illithid mind. He wandered the streets of the city until he happened on the Heroes, and recognizing that they are also not from the Shadowfell decided to try and assist. Alyndra is fascinated and asks to know everything she can about illithid society, so Friend sends an image dump to the wizard without holding anything back. Even the most unpleasant parts are downloaded into Alyndra’s brain, including the attack on the kraken before it came ashore. It’s a startling experience but she is thankful to learn.

A familiar voice whispers into Orkira’s mind, claiming to be able to help Briv, Keen, and everyone if she would return the favor. Recognizing that it’s the Elder Brain, Orkira warns aloud about having the alien thoughts in her head. At first she believes this is because of Friend being nearby and asks him to stop, however the mind flayer is not responsible. As they all grapple with the choice of stopping to rest or continuing forward, Friend sends a telepathic message to Penelope and relays the details about where he remembers the apparatus to be located. He doesn’t think it is far away, so Penelope casts locate object and senses it is to their north.

As Penelope announces she knows what direction to go, Orkira is suddenly taken over by the Elder Brain. She casts spiritual weapon but instead of the usual form, it takes the shape of a writhing tentacle to strike out at the druid. Before it can connect Alyndra counterspells it and causing the tentacle to dissipate. In a sudden panic to get away from her friends before she can hurt them again Orkira takes off, shouting about how the Elder Brain is in her head. Everyone is quick to follow, but with her wings she’s able to flee far down the tunnels before coming to a sudden stop at the sight of figures. More than a dozen dragonborn in rags with horrible burns turn to face her, and she recognizes long dead members of her old clan who were killed by the Phoenix. “Orkira, join us and we can save all of them. You kill him and we will kill all of your enemies.” Terrified and devastated, Orkira pleads with the vision to go away before once again turning to flee.

Penelope can see her friend racing back in their direction and tries to grab ahold, but is knocked aside by the panicked cleric and tossed into the water. Realizing what she’s done, Orkira stops to make sure Penelope is alright before frantically warning about how she can’t get the Elder Brain out of her head. She’s distraught at attacking Penelope, and terrified she won’t be able to stop herself from attacking again. Orkira takes off the spider silk bag that Penelope gave her, now patched and worn after six years in another Bag World, and hands it over. Inside is her holy symbol, the Book of the Phoenix. Orkira warns not to touch the book as it is too hot for most to hold without being burnt, but without it she can’t cast many of her most dangerous spells.

Friend suggests that the apparatus can be used to remove the Elder Brain from Orkira’s mind, much like it did for him. However Orkira insists that she can’t accompany the group as it’s too dangerous for her to know anything, and even worse she might attack them again. Alyndra and Penelope refuse to abandon their friend, confident that she’ll be able to resist any further mental intrusions now that she is prepared. Penelope reaffirms her trust in Orkira and asks her to hold onto who she is, while Alyndra swears she’d trust the cleric with her life many times over. Both promise to be there for support regardless of what happens. Reaching into a pocket in her armor Orkira, takes hold of a broken bit of the accordion Harold gave her, and after thinking for a moment promises to try, but only if they are ready to do whatever they must if she loses control again. Alyndra asks her to tend to Briv and Keen, then quietly begins to hum a tune under her breath that was included in a letter she sent to Orkira many years ago. This brings a small smile back to the cleric, and she focuses on tending to their unconscious friends.

The group discuss if they want to rest in a tiny hut or keep heading for the apparatus. Friend encourages Penelope to lead on as she is worried they will lose track of it. Alyndra is concerned about the powerful items their unconscious friends have on them, and tries to sleight of hand them without anyone noticing. However her dexterity fails as Orkira can see her remove the Deck of Many Things from Briv’s pocket. Horrified that the Elder Brain is watching she quickly moves far enough down the hall so she can’t see or hear anything the rest are doing. Fumbling with the items Alyndra manages to keep hold of the rod, but the Deck of Many Things and the soul coin containing Saranthis falls to the ground. Alyndra manages to grab the Deck but the coin lands on the stone, and as it glows on the ground the whisper of the dead goddess can be heard by all, “I tried to save everyone, this is what I tried to save you all from!”

Alyndra snatches the coin in horror as Saranthis begins to make offers to Friend. She throws it into her bag of holding, telling Friend how Saranthis is a liar who just wants power and control. Penelope begins to question what happened all those years ago, asking where the coin came from, and when Alyndra admits it’s a difficult tale to tell and asks for trust the druid snaps back about how friends tell each other the truth. Alyndra pleads that she’s her friend and will tell her everything, but is worried that they are not a safe place to have that conversation. In anger Penelope calls out to Friend that they have a mission to complete and begins to walk away. Alyndra casts message and launches into the tale of events that happened after the druid died, how Saranthis pretended to be Penelope and fooled them all, and how despite everything they still went to Hell for her. The halfling insists that if they were really her friends they would have known it was a trick, and in righteous anger continues down the sewers towards their goal.

The group moves in tense silence; Penelope and Friend in the lead, Alyndra behind with their unconscious friends on a floating disk, and Orkira with her eyes on the ground avoiding watching where they are going. Eventually Penelope can feel the apparatus is close above them, and as she moves a sewer grate to look she can see a decrepit castle behind stone walls and an iron gate with a plaque reading “Griffon Hill”. Penelope casts find traps and can sense alarm spells and glyphs of warding on the gate, but the wall appears to be clear. Friend moves forward to take her hand and casts levitate to fly them safely over the wall and into the courtyard. Orkira insists she should stay behind with the still unconscious Briv and Keen while Alyndra goes ahead to help Penelope. It’s the only way to be sure she won’t broadcast to the Elder Brain what is going on inside. With a last blessing of Oghma to her friend, Alyndra heads to the surface and misty steps into the courtyard.

As the three meet up again, Friend exclaims how he remembers what the Elder Brain tasked them to do with the apparatus. They were to connect the minds of all the illithids across all the planes so they could be a unified force of annihilation. But he is no longer connected to the group mind and the Elder Brain does not control his desires. He takes both Penelope and Alyndra’s hands and levitates them both through a hole in the ceiling so they can descend into the crumbling structure. The once luxurious mansion is waterlogged and destroyed, with old paintings of a vampire holding a strange red gem. Ancient spirits wander the halls ignoring the floating trio who eventually land among the apparatus. The machine is gigantic, almost three stories tall, with complex mechanical components that include a series of mirrors as well as several humanoid sized glass spheres.

Alyndra is drawn to the mirrors, and when she approaches she sees several different reflections of herself; one holding a blue dragon egg, another whose appearance is more viking, and another deep in battle covered in blood. When Penelope gazes into the mirrors she also views different versions of herself; her rotten skeleton buried in the ground, her fighting next to Alyndra and Rarv, her having a screaming match with Vordrid, and an ancient version with long white hair. Friend explains that all the reflections of the same person, just different versions scattered across the planes. Penelope asks if they should destroy the machine but Alyndra is unsure, wondering if they should try and merge all the different versions of themselves.

As Friend steps forward to look into the mirrors there is only the reflection of a tiny halfling. With longing he reaches out for the mirror as the crystal rod inside Alyndra’s bag begins to hum and vibrate. Realizing she has the key to make the apparatus work, Friend begs to use it and volunteers to be the first test subject. As he climbs into one of the pods Alyndra takes out the Saranthis soul coin to see what appears in the mirrors; one is her surrounded in light in a white gown, another has horns and a crown of fire with black eyes and leathery wings, and a final one that looks exactly like Penelope Half-Pint. Realizing the truth of the tale she heard earlier and the mistakes she made in doubting her friends, Penelope apologizes to Alyndra. Alyndra promises she would never lie to her friend, then uses sending to tell Orkira to bring Briv and Keen into the mansion.

In the sewers Orkira is sitting near her unconscious friends trying to keep her mind empty. However she cannot help but respond to Alyndra’s summons, and figuring the wizard wouldn’t have called if it wasn’t important she does her best to carry both Briv and Keen into the castle. Her wings strain at the weight, and the landing is rough, but all three arrive at the apparatus. As she places her friends down Orkira also can see different versions of herself in the mirrors; a young one without wings, a wizened one with ancient horns, and a full golden dragon.

Alyndra inserts the rod into the machine and activates it, causing Friend to writhe and scream as he is split into two beings. One is an illithid that is teleported to a glass cage on the third floor, but the other is a young halfling with tan skin and bright red hair covered in green streaks. He begins to laugh in glee, feeling the tentacles missing from his face, and hops out of the pod. The glowing rod is humming, but there’s a single glowing crack, and with frantic speed Alyndra orders everyone to get into separate pods so she can unify their different selves. Initially Orkira is unwilling, only interested in getting the Elder Brain out of her mind, but agrees when convinced this is the way to achieve that goal.

Finally Alyndra hands the soul coin with Saranthis in it to the halfling Friend, instructing him to keep it safe, before they all take their places inside pods. Friend waves and throws the level to active the apparatus to unify!

Special thanks to B. Dave Walters for being our guest this episode! Find out what happens to everyone in the apparatus on September 18th at 2pm PT on twitch.tv/dndbeyond!

EPILOGUE: In Alyndra’s pocket a card begins to glow as the device activates. An old man filled with rage growls out, “I am Ruin, and I have returned!”

Lauren "OboeCrazy" Urban is the Community Manager for D&D Beyond, as well as a professional classical musician on oboe and English Horn. When she's not playing a Bard in real life she's a prolific Dungeon Master and player on a variety of livestreams and podcasts. She lives in Seattle, Washington with her husband Luke where they spend their free time playing video games and drinking tea. The best way to keep up with Lauren's busy schedule is to follow her on Twitter at @OboeCrazy.