Giles prepares another round of blows and kicks to the Betrayer God, but it doesn't seem necessary, as reality begins to warp around him.
He watches the God, battling to stay alive, to control his evil experiment, ready to strike if the God seems to regain his composure and fight. When he hears Ylis wish for a mountain of flowers, he says to no one in particular, "and birds..."and he activates his Staff of Birdcalls with a smile. He always did like the sounds of the Wood-Warbler.
There is a tired sigh of relief from the old dark-haired man, now leaning heavily on his staff, as the last pillar breaks and crumbles, releasing all those trapped souls within, not a moment too soon. He watches the mad god desperately grasp for the dissapating energy, the last effort to stop them from completing their life's quest. Jack uses his last strength to call upon the enchanting power of his patron, uttering a single but immensely powerful ancient word of the fey to stupefy the deranged deity, halting his efforts to hinder the reversal of effects of the withering wind.
(Power word Stun)
As the word has been spoken, the old man with the staff sighs again, on the last vestiges of his life, sinking back to sit on a massive throne of rock created under him by the earth elemental servant, the staff still in his feeble hand. There he watches, and for the first and last time in his life he prays that what the Fellowship of the Wind had done would have been enough to save this world from the mad gods insane scheme.
The onyx arrow arcs through the air, striking Otbium square in the forehead, snapping his head back. He holds the explosion of reality in his outstretched arms with intense desperation, but the destined arrow has fulfilled its prophecy, causing the god’s focus to slip just enough for Jack to strike him with a powerful stunning spell. Otbium seems like he is about to shake both effects off when Vazo’yn’s spell lands, and the light of intellect fades from Otbium’s eyes. The dull, vacant eyes look down at the group with passing interest and he looks to his outstretched hands with a hanging jaw and a questioning furrow of his brow, as if he has forgotten why he was holding what is left of reality together in the first place. His grip releases.
Joy’s restorative magic washes over Otbium and Joy can see that for the briefest of moments before the release of all this held power, the body was once again Sue’s. He mouths a thank you that can be seen, but not heard over the ruction of all the souls bursting free from their imprisonment.
Reality continues to race toward annihilation however, until Ylis’ spell seems to snap reality back into place, like a puzzle piece was had been misplaced was righted – the mountain reforms under the Fellowship’s feet as carrots spring up over the entirety of the mountain, peppered heavily with blooming flowers of every hue.
Then it all falls away like ash blown away by a light breeze.
You float alone in nothingness. You are nothing. There is no fear, no anticipation, no happiness or sorrow. There is only the quiet peace of nothingness. You could stay here forever. Perhaps you already did, for this timeless comfort feels familiar to you. You feel yourself drift away. You cease to think or feel. You cease to be and it is good.
Warmth.
You feel a spot of warmth on your face; a ray of light that pierces into your barely opened eyes. For some, a warm bed is beneath you, some a well-cared for though worn hardwood that feels delightfully soft to your touch.
Your eyes snap open. Otbium. You remember it all. You look around and can see the gaps in your shuttered window. The ray of light crept through in exactly the same way at the start of this insane adventure. The same scents of earth and wood, and the light breeze that carries in the morning fish market. You can hear people negotiating prices a short distance away from your window. You hear laughter. Genuine laughter as children run the streets playing. This is not the kind of celebratory laughter of a great threat having been defeated. This is the laughter of a normal day, offered without ever knowing the fear of the end times.
You rouse from your rest and pull someone aside asking after the date. It is months before you set out on your adventure. You are all relatively young again. Some of you had just arrived here in Trostenwald. As you make your way to the town square, you are greeted by six other familiar faces. Faces that you had spent a lifetime growing to know in just a few days. The Fellowship. You all made it. But why were you brought back months instead of days?
As if to answer that very question, a voice whispers in all your minds. “This was but a setback. You cannot kill a god. Though you ruined my plans, you did inadvertently free me from my prison… I think. As a thank you for this, I will deposit in your mind the knowledge of where Susan Tineye’s home is. He is off fighting for the Empire. Bandits will find his home three days from now. He was a convenient tool, but one I no longer need. Save his daughter, if you wish. However, once I find out where I am, it will only be a matter of time before I free myself. The next time we meet, I will not underestimate you so.”
You feel a location fill your minds. A map of sorts, along with the faces of Sue's daughter, and the faces of the bandits that fell upon the home. The images are crisp, like a photograph, and you will be able to recall these images with perfect clarity for a while after receiving them.
DM: If you wish, you may make a closing post to end this adventure. How did you wake that was specific to you? How did you find your way to the market? What do you do in response to this knowledge? What do you do with the realization that some of you can’t even buy a drink again. What do you do at any point from now to the next few months. Thank you all for your time and effort. I appreciate all that you put into this game to make it enjoyable for everyone at the table. You are all fantastic players and I feel blessed to have shared in this two month journey with you.
Ylis leaps out of bed, she doesn't even bother changing out of her sleeping shift. She sprints through the streets dodging passersby leaving a trail of amused or bewildered people.
"Aunt Kristin!....Aunt Kristin!...."
The bunny girl calls out until she reaches the bakery out of breath. Then with tears streaming down her face, she leaps up to hug her aunt with all the strength in her little arms.
Jacaranda woke within the woven sheets...of course she was used to that after decades of.....no....she had only recently left home...faces came to her...friends not yet met yet deeply loved and missed.
The God-thing spoke in her mind once more cementing reality, she listened but quickly tired of its deluded self importance....still, she now had someone else to save...
She made her way downstairs and out to the village square....she had vague memories....fore-memories?....of the devastation this place would no longer undergo but it wasn't something she dwelled on.
She headed for the bakery for something sweet to start her day and saw tiny Ylis run in in her nightdress.
Randa stopped in her tracks and regarded the little girl with a warm smile, even as she recalled the frighteningly powerful and fiercely protective Lagomore Woman she would become.
She took her pastries and sat out at a table in the sun, as she waited for the others she somehow knew would soon be present she stroked the wood of her bow.....neither Rainfall or Moonlight yet....
Soon they would be on the way to deliver Sues daughter from harm, then she would ask them to find those who killed her people and destroyed the grove and other deeds would be done.....deeds and....other.....she raised her fingers to her lips and brushed away the powdered sweetness...another memory awakened...one not acted upon in a possible future....the mission always driving them forward....this time they would take the slower path....take time to appreciate life, fleeting even for herself.
She touched a finger to her lips again and her thoughts dwelled on one of her companions in particular.....perhaps.......perhaps this time she would risk it......perhaps......
Riven stood at the edge of the square, arms crossed, watching the others emerge one by one.
The air in Trostenwald was just as he remembered, brimming with yeast and horses and the faint spice of brewing beer. The same sound of carts on cobble, of sellers shouting about carrots and salt-pork. It was the same, down to the dust accumulated on his boots. Months before any of it began. Before the name Otbium meant anything. Before his hands had blood and fire etched into their calluses.
He exhaled, closing his eyes, letting the noise of the market wash over him. The warmth. The scent of fresh bread and old memory. He recalled what the betrayer god said, about the child, about next time. There was still work to be done. There was always work to be done.
He could leave. He’d done it before. Answers waited. His mother’s past wasn’t going anywhere.
He looked up again. Randa brushing powder from her lips. Ylis wrapped in her aunt’s arms, a laugh bubbling through tears.
And Riven, stood still in the middle of it all.
Maybe he would stay. Just long enough to help with the girl. With Sue’s daughter. Just long enough to be certain.
Or maybe, come morning, he’d vanish again. Following a trail of clues that would lead to answers about his mother.
He turned from the square, boots quiet as the treaded on the stone, his eyes already scanning the horizon.
Joy bursts into the morning like the dawn itself—bright-eyed and half-laughing with a disbelief that feels more like joy than shock. Her moss-green skin practically glows in the morning light, and she doesn’t hide the fey crown that curves from her head like a tiara of tangled roots. She has never felt more alive. She doesn’t walk to the square. She runs.
Joy doesn’t wait for words. She throws her arms around each of them in turn—Riven, Randa, Jack, Vazo’yn, Ylis, Giles—whether they expect it or not. Tears prick her eyes as she whispers, “We did it. We did it.”
And then, the whisper.
Her body goes still, brow furrowing as Otbium’s voice curls into her thoughts like poison fog. But instead of fear, something else fills her: defiance. So what if he wasn’t truly gone? They had saved the world. More than that, they’d won it time. And now, it was time to use it; not just to endure—but to live.
Giles wakes, as if from a dream, but he knows it was no dream. A road taken. A path completed. He rises and leaves, knowing he'll find the others outside. He runs his head over his mouth, once again full of teeth. Catching his reflection, there is no jagged scar next to his eye.
He has gained the Wisdom of a life time, but the scars and pains are gone.
Also gone is his fear. His Pain. His tormentor, the Vampire Lord.
As he hears the voice of Obtium in his head, he can't help but smile. Look what he had accomplished along the previous road, one he lived full of guilt and fear. With those feelings gone, and life long friends standing before him, just think of what the young monk could accomplish. Yes, a smile...
"Oh wake up you big lug!"The tiny blonde says with a teasing giggle to the young dark-haired man who lies sprawled out in a bed below her. "Oh go away, I was just dreaming the strangest dream." The man in the bed mumbles back. Or had he? Suddenly the the young dark-haired man is hit by the realization this might not at all have been one of the vivid dreams sent by his queen, and he sits up in his bed at the Trostenwald inn, covering his eyes from the rays of the sun. He had been old, so old, and yet his hand was without wrinkles now, the hand of a young man once more.
It is only moments later that he is moving quickly through the streets, the memories of the withering wind and the fellowship coming back to him, almost overwhelming him, his mind trying to come to terms with all that had happened, and that it all somehow had been undone. The people in the streets were cheerfully going about their lives, oblivious to the cataclysmic event that had already happened and now was in the past and yet never had happened now. And then he sees them, the others, his companions, they were all there at the square, like when he first met them all. He hesitates. Were they really meant to meet again? Perhaps he didn't truly belong with them? "They will be fine, all will be fine." He heard the soft voice of the tiny blonde in his head followed by her playful giggle, and he smiled. And then, like he was never ever really there, he is gone...
The soft, welcoming light of morning streams in through Vazo'yn's window. Its warmth awakens him from his evening's trance. He must have fallen into it while consulting his cards, as a spread lies before him on the table. He is sitting in the simple room he rented from the inn, looking down at the familiar cards.
He has forgotten what he was trying to glean from this reading, so he starts to gather the cards. But one is missing. He knows this deck better than he knows most people, so he senses the missing card immediately: The Broken One.
The memories come flooding back to him in a disorienting rush. Riven. Joy. Randa. Giles. Ylis. Jack.
Otbium.
In the moment that he remembers their great destiny he realises it is fulfilled. The purple wave's destruction has been reversed and Otbium's self-serving plan thwarted.
The whisper of the Betrayer God worms its way into Vazo'yn's mind, but he does not give Otbium the satisfaction of his own worry or fear. They dealt with the God once, they will do it again. He pushes Otbium from his mind, focused instead on Susan and his daughter. Those two will be spared Otbium's meddling.
Vazo'yn leaves the inn and walks contentedly through the simple, joyful morning in Trostenwald. To each of the Fellowship he sees along the way, he offers a thankful, encouraging nod, hopeful that they will face their next challenge together, bonded as they have been by their world-shaking destiny.
When Joy hugs him, he basks in the warmth of her light and hugs her back, a rare smile adorning his pale features.
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Giles prepares another round of blows and kicks to the Betrayer God, but it doesn't seem necessary, as reality begins to warp around him.
He watches the God, battling to stay alive, to control his evil experiment, ready to strike if the God seems to regain his composure and fight. When he hears Ylis wish for a mountain of flowers, he says to no one in particular, "and birds..." and he activates his Staff of Birdcalls with a smile. He always did like the sounds of the Wood-Warbler.
There is a tired sigh of relief from the old dark-haired man, now leaning heavily on his staff, as the last pillar breaks and crumbles, releasing all those trapped souls within, not a moment too soon. He watches the mad god desperately grasp for the dissapating energy, the last effort to stop them from completing their life's quest. Jack uses his last strength to call upon the enchanting power of his patron, uttering a single but immensely powerful ancient word of the fey to stupefy the deranged deity, halting his efforts to hinder the reversal of effects of the withering wind.
(Power word Stun)
As the word has been spoken, the old man with the staff sighs again, on the last vestiges of his life, sinking back to sit on a massive throne of rock created under him by the earth elemental servant, the staff still in his feeble hand. There he watches, and for the first and last time in his life he prays that what the Fellowship of the Wind had done would have been enough to save this world from the mad gods insane scheme.
The onyx arrow arcs through the air, striking Otbium square in the forehead, snapping his head back. He holds the explosion of reality in his outstretched arms with intense desperation, but the destined arrow has fulfilled its prophecy, causing the god’s focus to slip just enough for Jack to strike him with a powerful stunning spell. Otbium seems like he is about to shake both effects off when Vazo’yn’s spell lands, and the light of intellect fades from Otbium’s eyes. The dull, vacant eyes look down at the group with passing interest and he looks to his outstretched hands with a hanging jaw and a questioning furrow of his brow, as if he has forgotten why he was holding what is left of reality together in the first place. His grip releases.
Joy’s restorative magic washes over Otbium and Joy can see that for the briefest of moments before the release of all this held power, the body was once again Sue’s. He mouths a thank you that can be seen, but not heard over the ruction of all the souls bursting free from their imprisonment.
Reality continues to race toward annihilation however, until Ylis’ spell seems to snap reality back into place, like a puzzle piece was had been misplaced was righted – the mountain reforms under the Fellowship’s feet as carrots spring up over the entirety of the mountain, peppered heavily with blooming flowers of every hue.
Then it all falls away like ash blown away by a light breeze.
You float alone in nothingness. You are nothing. There is no fear, no anticipation, no happiness or sorrow. There is only the quiet peace of nothingness. You could stay here forever. Perhaps you already did, for this timeless comfort feels familiar to you. You feel yourself drift away. You cease to think or feel. You cease to be and it is good.
Warmth.
You feel a spot of warmth on your face; a ray of light that pierces into your barely opened eyes. For some, a warm bed is beneath you, some a well-cared for though worn hardwood that feels delightfully soft to your touch.
Your eyes snap open. Otbium. You remember it all. You look around and can see the gaps in your shuttered window. The ray of light crept through in exactly the same way at the start of this insane adventure. The same scents of earth and wood, and the light breeze that carries in the morning fish market. You can hear people negotiating prices a short distance away from your window. You hear laughter. Genuine laughter as children run the streets playing. This is not the kind of celebratory laughter of a great threat having been defeated. This is the laughter of a normal day, offered without ever knowing the fear of the end times.
You rouse from your rest and pull someone aside asking after the date. It is months before you set out on your adventure. You are all relatively young again. Some of you had just arrived here in Trostenwald. As you make your way to the town square, you are greeted by six other familiar faces. Faces that you had spent a lifetime growing to know in just a few days. The Fellowship. You all made it. But why were you brought back months instead of days?
As if to answer that very question, a voice whispers in all your minds. “This was but a setback. You cannot kill a god. Though you ruined my plans, you did inadvertently free me from my prison… I think. As a thank you for this, I will deposit in your mind the knowledge of where Susan Tineye’s home is. He is off fighting for the Empire. Bandits will find his home three days from now. He was a convenient tool, but one I no longer need. Save his daughter, if you wish. However, once I find out where I am, it will only be a matter of time before I free myself. The next time we meet, I will not underestimate you so.”
You feel a location fill your minds. A map of sorts, along with the faces of Sue's daughter, and the faces of the bandits that fell upon the home. The images are crisp, like a photograph, and you will be able to recall these images with perfect clarity for a while after receiving them.
DM: If you wish, you may make a closing post to end this adventure. How did you wake that was specific to you? How did you find your way to the market? What do you do in response to this knowledge? What do you do with the realization that some of you can’t even buy a drink again. What do you do at any point from now to the next few months. Thank you all for your time and effort. I appreciate all that you put into this game to make it enjoyable for everyone at the table. You are all fantastic players and I feel blessed to have shared in this two month journey with you.
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Ylis leaps out of bed, she doesn't even bother changing out of her sleeping shift. She sprints through the streets dodging passersby leaving a trail of amused or bewildered people.
"Aunt Kristin!....Aunt Kristin!...."
The bunny girl calls out until she reaches the bakery out of breath. Then with tears streaming down her face, she leaps up to hug her aunt with all the strength in her little arms.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
Jacaranda woke within the woven sheets...of course she was used to that after decades of.....no....she had only recently left home...faces came to her...friends not yet met yet deeply loved and missed.
The God-thing spoke in her mind once more cementing reality, she listened but quickly tired of its deluded self importance....still, she now had someone else to save...
She made her way downstairs and out to the village square....she had vague memories....fore-memories?....of the devastation this place would no longer undergo but it wasn't something she dwelled on.
She headed for the bakery for something sweet to start her day and saw tiny Ylis run in in her nightdress.
Randa stopped in her tracks and regarded the little girl with a warm smile, even as she recalled the frighteningly powerful and fiercely protective Lagomore Woman she would become.
She took her pastries and sat out at a table in the sun, as she waited for the others she somehow knew would soon be present she stroked the wood of her bow.....neither Rainfall or Moonlight yet....
Soon they would be on the way to deliver Sues daughter from harm, then she would ask them to find those who killed her people and destroyed the grove and other deeds would be done.....deeds and....other.....she raised her fingers to her lips and brushed away the powdered sweetness...another memory awakened...one not acted upon in a possible future....the mission always driving them forward....this time they would take the slower path....take time to appreciate life, fleeting even for herself.
She touched a finger to her lips again and her thoughts dwelled on one of her companions in particular.....perhaps.......perhaps this time she would risk it......perhaps......
Riven stood at the edge of the square, arms crossed, watching the others emerge one by one.
The air in Trostenwald was just as he remembered, brimming with yeast and horses and the faint spice of brewing beer. The same sound of carts on cobble, of sellers shouting about carrots and salt-pork. It was the same, down to the dust accumulated on his boots. Months before any of it began. Before the name Otbium meant anything. Before his hands had blood and fire etched into their calluses.
He exhaled, closing his eyes, letting the noise of the market wash over him. The warmth. The scent of fresh bread and old memory. He recalled what the betrayer god said, about the child, about next time. There was still work to be done. There was always work to be done.
He could leave. He’d done it before. Answers waited. His mother’s past wasn’t going anywhere.
He looked up again. Randa brushing powder from her lips. Ylis wrapped in her aunt’s arms, a laugh bubbling through tears.
And Riven, stood still in the middle of it all.
Maybe he would stay. Just long enough to help with the girl. With Sue’s daughter. Just long enough to be certain.
Or maybe, come morning, he’d vanish again. Following a trail of clues that would lead to answers about his mother.
He turned from the square, boots quiet as the treaded on the stone, his eyes already scanning the horizon.
The story didn’t need an ending. Not yet.
Not for him.
Joy bursts into the morning like the dawn itself—bright-eyed and half-laughing with a disbelief that feels more like joy than shock. Her moss-green skin practically glows in the morning light, and she doesn’t hide the fey crown that curves from her head like a tiara of tangled roots. She has never felt more alive. She doesn’t walk to the square. She runs.
Joy doesn’t wait for words. She throws her arms around each of them in turn—Riven, Randa, Jack, Vazo’yn, Ylis, Giles—whether they expect it or not. Tears prick her eyes as she whispers, “We did it. We did it.”
And then, the whisper.
Her body goes still, brow furrowing as Otbium’s voice curls into her thoughts like poison fog. But instead of fear, something else fills her: defiance. So what if he wasn’t truly gone? They had saved the world. More than that, they’d won it time. And now, it was time to use it; not just to endure—but to live.
Giles wakes, as if from a dream, but he knows it was no dream. A road taken. A path completed. He rises and leaves, knowing he'll find the others outside. He runs his head over his mouth, once again full of teeth. Catching his reflection, there is no jagged scar next to his eye.
He has gained the Wisdom of a life time, but the scars and pains are gone.
Also gone is his fear. His Pain. His tormentor, the Vampire Lord.
As he hears the voice of Obtium in his head, he can't help but smile. Look what he had accomplished along the previous road, one he lived full of guilt and fear. With those feelings gone, and life long friends standing before him, just think of what the young monk could accomplish. Yes, a smile...
"Oh wake up you big lug!" The tiny blonde says with a teasing giggle to the young dark-haired man who lies sprawled out in a bed below her. "Oh go away, I was just dreaming the strangest dream." The man in the bed mumbles back. Or had he? Suddenly the the young dark-haired man is hit by the realization this might not at all have been one of the vivid dreams sent by his queen, and he sits up in his bed at the Trostenwald inn, covering his eyes from the rays of the sun. He had been old, so old, and yet his hand was without wrinkles now, the hand of a young man once more.
It is only moments later that he is moving quickly through the streets, the memories of the withering wind and the fellowship coming back to him, almost overwhelming him, his mind trying to come to terms with all that had happened, and that it all somehow had been undone. The people in the streets were cheerfully going about their lives, oblivious to the cataclysmic event that had already happened and now was in the past and yet never had happened now. And then he sees them, the others, his companions, they were all there at the square, like when he first met them all. He hesitates. Were they really meant to meet again? Perhaps he didn't truly belong with them? "They will be fine, all will be fine." He heard the soft voice of the tiny blonde in his head followed by her playful giggle, and he smiled. And then, like he was never ever really there, he is gone...
The soft, welcoming light of morning streams in through Vazo'yn's window. Its warmth awakens him from his evening's trance. He must have fallen into it while consulting his cards, as a spread lies before him on the table. He is sitting in the simple room he rented from the inn, looking down at the familiar cards.