November 11, 2023

Hook

From Long Slumber [Session 6] (Ruefang; Cayali)

Plot Synopsis

[Co-GM: Spencer]

A few members of the party purchase and trade with Bai Long to obtain some stronger armors and weapons from the master crafter.

Meanwhile the rest of the party is informed that they require a boat to use in the upcoming battle with the spirits on the train. The party splits up, with Rik and NPC going back into the metal temple, while the rest of the party conversed with Huangdi and Qing.

Rik, who recently got back from an excursion to Ley’ork, requests the help of NPC and Bai Long to attempt to get a strange Ice-ship out from the fire plane. Over the course of the long rest, NPC is able to find what is honestly too much feet of chain (~1500ft), to descend 300ft bast the bottom of the elevator, and Bai Long is able to upgrade the elevator such that it can descend another 100ft closer to the fire plane.


At the end of the rest, Ujyaku and Ouros return with their newly hatched dragons, and the group descends into the fire plane. Immediately things are weird. The small island that Rik had previously landed on was now smoldering, slightly room temperature, and lukewarm rain currently pattered on the ground around them. Other then that, a large obsidian pathway seemed to lead off into the lava lake, with the pathway very slowly spreading outwards. At the edges of the pathway, the lava appears to turn into black ice, before forming into obsidian. What was even stranger- was the fact that in the peripheral vision of everyone, there seemed to be a strange black goop oozing from the sides of obsidian.

Choosing to ignore these oddities, the party is able to stop the NVS Frostdriver about a mile or two out onto this obsidian pathway. Though the ship looks nothing as it once did when they saw it the previous day. The bow and stern of the ship are now made of glittering black ice, and the wood that should be burning away in the plane of fire holds fast (at least from a distance). The party hurries on, closing the mile or two gap in less than an hour.

Something is on the ship, no one knows what. But where the black ice and the wood meet black goop oozes, but it also doesn’t. The ship is there, but it isn’t- it seems to flicker out of existence if one looks too hard at it. Black veins crawl along the inside, or they appear to. But those also don’t seem to exist. Rik’s hands are covered in a goop that burns but also freezes but also doesn’t exist. The ship is fine. The ship is safe. The stars that reflect off the ice blink, but stars don’t blink, that’s stupid.

NPC tries to shoot the walls of the ship, first opening up a hole into the water plane, the second speeding up the replacement of wood into ice. The group, during this, feels their minds clawed and torn at. A splitting headache graces the lot of them the longer they stay there. Ujyaku casts chaos multiple times on the vessel, though in one casting of the spell- she gets a vision of an underwater city. The city is made of coral, in a place of never-ending water. This is before, a black speck appears before it, then a large mile-wide sphere of air, before both disappear leaving the water to crash inward like a concussive burst- leveling the city and bisecting Ujyaku’s vision. Leaving her reeling and panicked on the deck of the ship.

Rik eventually launches the ship, using a combination of a teleport spell and the ship’s own weirdness, and sails it back to below the portal. Bai Long is then able to teleport the group and the boat to the surface.

Meanwhile Oswald and Gilburt are out and about the streets of Chongbai adopting a child (for the sake of the child’s privacy, their name will not be shared in this public announcement.) Furthermore, they visit the ever-famous Snipreme store, selling their ever famous product line of one sniper. Oswald and Gilburt convince the store owner to let them see their special order section. They eventually purchase a Silent Steel Snipreme Rifle once ordered by popular heavy metal band “Hug.”

Bai Long and Qing Long have no idea what this ship is, they notify the party that they 1) Don’t know what is inside the ship, 2) Something is wrong with the ship, 3) They can’t do anything about the wrong-ness of the ship. The ship innocently starts to set a layer of frost over the clearing, and begins to freeze the hot springs it currently sits in.

At this point, Oswald, Gilburt, and Huangdi Long return from their city excursion. Queue an intense debate between the party on whether or not they should use the ship. Rik, to prove the ship is safe, sleeps in it with his unhatched egg. He has a completely normal night with completely normal dreams. He does not dream of black ooze or a black void, no, definitely not. Or if he did, it’s not like he can even remember such an experience. Rik sleeps fine on the ship. The next day his egg hatches into a strange corrupted(?) pygmy long.

Ujyaku casts chaos a few times on the boat, effectively killing Rik, Orous, and herself instantaneously, though they reform a few seconds later as if nothing had happened. The party gets into a long drawn out argument about if they should keep the ship. Through a series of oneshots, almost torching the forest, teleporting ships, and the party from a few days ago randomly appearing on the NVS Frostdriver, the party ultimately is forced (or chooses) to keep the strange cursed ship. For better or for worse.

Noteworthy Postgame Events