In our last episode, the citizens of Bell's Run engaged in a life or death battle to protect the edges of towns from swarms of giant spiders. Day, Ichabod and Waylan joined the fray and quickly realized that they were in over their heads. Although the enemy was successfully driven back, there were many casualties, and Waylan's family farm was all that destroyed. But, it's still mid-summer's day, and now it's time to party.
Welcome, fellow travelers, to the Legends of Shell. I am Kieran, I am playing Waylan Beer, the human barbarian. My name is David, I am playing Ichabod Pike, he's a human wizard. My name is Theron and I am playing Day, she is a human druid.
And I am Hazel, and I am a year DM. So, time for the mid-summer's day party? Yeah, probably will be as festive as usual. Oh, I'm the best.
No, no. So you guys get into town. Can we take the equivalent of a short rest? Super great.
We can take a short rest. So, there are probably also people who are available to do some minor healing. There are people who are stopping me. So, I get it.
Maybe you can hear. But enough to meet that, you can ask for that. Alright, I'm going to recover one of my snow slides. No, six.
Yeah, I've got five hit points again. I'm six. Hey, I'm doing the best, right? How you going?
Seven. Sitting pretty at seven. I roll a two, and I got to hit that. I roll a four.
What did you roll, Kieran? Also a two. Good job, everyone. So, Wail is just going to be a long.
Still busy with her. Nope, I'm fine. That's good. You guys get picked town.
And Cooper sees you coming in and immediately runs out to you. And gives you a big hug and says, Hey, how are you doing? Are you alright? How's the farm?
I'm fine. Yeah. Farm's not too much. It's not good shape.
It's not good shape. I'll pick up them and just put them on my shoulder. We can take care of it. Yeah.
We always get by. Yeah. So where's our, where's everybody? Oh, there.
I didn't pick up. Did you wander off again? No. There's more than where you are.
Nope. You got to stop doing this. You got to stop. Especially during a spider attack.
Come on in. Be smart. Alright, let's go. People have heard the crowd of people coming back.
And so they know that you're in return. So they're starting to come out of all the buildings. See, Nara just dashed around one of the buildings and she goes, Sound down. There you are.
You can't just, you can't just leave. What if the spiders had gotten into town? They've done it before. You have to stay inside.
I already told him. But I don't know how well he's going to listen. He's just kind of hanging his head. He takes what you did for me.
You had me out, out during the spider thing too. You put me in as much danger as you were in. You have to think about other people as well as yourself. I'm sorry.
So everybody's coming out and tends to be wounded and there's some crying when people are looking around and not finding people who are part of their family. And the governor comes out and looks around. I know everything is very somber right now, but we will do everything we can for those who have lost family or homes. And we welcome you all to the big barbecue tonight, where you can at least get some rest and some food in your stomachs.
A roasted spider. Is my mom around? She is. You can find her.
She's probably stayed in town. That's kind of a town. Basically, far as the town, she's not the big monster hunter. The druid's are the most dangerous.
So I'm going to have a fun time. I'll go up to her and give her a hug and say, there are a lot of people in a bad place right now. Somebody that out on the outskirts just lost their farm because this late is the tag. Is there any way we can set up a place for them to say?
Are there other people who have lost their homes as well? We'll find some place. I think there are some homes that have families that are smaller than really work the size of their home. And I think to the farms that are nearby are also a bit abandoned for a little while.
We'll find some place. Don't worry about it. Good. I killed this one.
You're dead? You were big once. You went out there? I was wondering where you were.
They needed help. I figured. I could help. I don't pay any attention to this.
That was very brave and foolish. I'm glad you made it back. She gives you that. They helped me out.
I appreciate that. I am going to talk to the police. Pierre, like what's his title? He fought up here.
Minister Pierre. Tast her Pierre. I like the narration. I think most of the time he just goes by Pierre.
Do you want him to have a pilot? No, Pierre is fine. I will talk to Pierre about making arrangements for people who need some place to stay the night, because he probably knows best who has space and there's probably space in the church. That's what I do.
Yes, I can certainly help you with that. There's plenty of room in the church. I'll be welcome there, of course. I do know of a few homes.
I could spare a room or two here and there. I'll see that everyone gets in space. Thank you. You're welcome.
I'm going to wait a while and pray. I'll have all these sisters and all their kids and it's his parents. I'll take a whole group hug. I'm sorry.
The bar is gone. I brought back the jug, but we're going to have to find someplace else to stay. Then the bigger bod over there offered his house, but it's small. Obviously, all couldn't stay there.
I totally figured something out. But I don't know what we're going to do, guys. Gosh, it's very good to kiss. And she's like, don't worry about it, Will.
No, I'll figure it out. Yeah. I'm just glad that you came back all right. But, you know, I'm thinking maybe I'll go join the Monster Hunter or something.
Just sitting here doing nothing since our farm is ruined. I don't know. I need to do something. Sounds a bit dangerous.
I killed a couple of them. So, there's that. Would everyone know about the various beliefs that the various people in power hold? Yeah.
Okay, you would find Monster Hunter. Okay. So, just to talk about what she's talking about a bit. So, there is the Church of the All Guys.
But in town, there are primarily two gods that are, I say, worships, but one's worshipped and the other one's kind of pay tribute to. So, they worship St. Michelle to ask for good harvests and things like that. And others and sometimes even the same people.
So, uh, Patri to the Bullet Bog. The god of season filth, I think. Something like that. Um, charming.
To basically ask him to not send so many monsters out please. Please don't send you so many monsters, sir. Oh, and the Monster Hunter is mostly lighter. Okay.
No, no, no. It's a cute prone to play. So, I'm not driven. I can't help there.
Well, I mean, you're also not a ranger. You'll probably be trained for either one. Yeah. The god is a plague filth and hunger.
Yes. It's okay. It's fine. It's the hunger you view.
I'm sorry. Yeah, we're there. That's why I was always so bad. Yeah.
Hello, this is Theron. I wanted to just break in quickly with a note about Bolabog, the god of plagues. Um, we used he, him pronouns for this god. And that was wrong.
Bolabog is typically referred to with she, her. Um, so Bolabog is the goddess of plague filth and hunger. Um, I just wanted to clarify that and I have no idea if we're going to remember, but we'll see. Okay.
Actually episode, sorry to break in awkwardly. Anything else that you guys want to do right now? I don't think so. I mean, I would hang with people, make sure everyone's okay.
I don't have any, uh, like magic to offer, but I can bandage people. I can help with cooking if we're still going through with barbecue. Okay. Nothing specific.
Yeah. So you can help bandage some people, um, or actually, um, they're having druids go around and help organize people and like, how are you doing, uh, any kind of healing and you need a place to stay and stuff like that. So you're probably going around helping with that. And somebody comes up to you and is like, hey, I heard you lost your farm.
Um, so we're going to see about getting a place to stay. You probably have to be split up in a couple of places. You're kind of used to be pretty big. Yeah, that, that'll probably work out fine.
I just, just make sure that they're all comfortable. I'll take whatever's left. Like, I don't need a conceptual. So they actually, um, find you guys a couple of houses.
Um, out near the edge of town. And, uh, one of them is a big house that has been abandoned for a while and this needs some, needs some work. But they've, yeah, found some bedding and stuff. Throw in there for you guys.
And the second one is somebody else's house, but they've got like a bed you and your wife can use. Okay. Sure. My dad would, my dad would use a carpenter so he'd sit there and just immediately start taking measurements to try to fix anything that's been deleted out.
You also have a sister who's a carpenter. Yeah, I do. Is that your carpenter? I don't know exactly what happened.
I don't have a work set. I'm on my computer. Uh, no, I've actually set a carpenter. Uh, I'm a leader.
Okay. So yeah, I'm sure, sure he and I would just start getting started and work. Alright, so that's going on. And there's also, um, I'll go return the, the great access tool.
No, you can, you can keep that if you need it. I guess not like, I have one. I have my own. It was just out of reach of time.
Alright. No problem. Sorry. It's covered in spider goes.
Okay. I would appreciate if you clean enough for a part of that. Because I can do it. Hold on.
I'll go find a part of it. Pull a rag out of somewhere. I don't know. Sit down.
Go to the net. So there's cooking going on in the center of town. Pretty close to, um, Bill's grave. Um, there is a grave in the center of town.
Um, and it is to somebody named Bill. And there is, and a script in there, which I don't think I've ever written. So please ask for it is right now. I'm going to tell you later if you want.
Okay. TV. But yeah, it's an important marker and it's been there for probably since the town was found since it does help. That was right.
I think I'm going to, uh, to let everyone know all the stuff I know about sweaters. Okay. Right. Most of it's accurate.
Some of it's made up, but it's, it's, there's a lot of it. Okay. You know, a lot of people think all sweaters have eight legs. It's not true.
Some have seven or six, but that's usually a result of an injury. But some have ten. Those are the dangerous ones. You're going to watch out for those.
So you're just like wandering around town talking to people and people are wandering around and you're like, you know, except for the cooks. Actually, what happens? Because it can't move anywhere. It's not something that I wind up.
So anyway, actually I wouldn't cook it like that. Right. So, uh, Dave's been wandering around helping out people. Yep.
Um, so what's she doing now for this rest is she's going to try to talk. I saw the sce-ex-a-wing and see what's happening. Yeah. So you've, um, looked around for Echewynne and you see her talking to probably the governor.
Okay. Whatever his name was. Jim Bo. Close enough.
It was Jimster. Like Jim Bob is pretty close. Yeah. Jimster.
I think he copies. You go up to Esther-Wen and Jimster and they're talking and I'm like, well, he's all hasn't shown up yet. I don't know what to do. This part has been really bad.
I really think that the rationing plan is our only safe bet. You can't trust the hags. We don't even know if they even exist. It's just a rumor.
Nobody's ever seen them to come back. No, they're out there. I'm sure they're there. What about my grandpa?
Mad Marley. He came back. Sure. He says he came back from there and he was crazy.
So who, who, who, who knows if what he was saying was true and if it was then it doesn't really sound like a good idea to go there, does it? It's like, uh, we can do it with some good spell. We're going to vote on it, I guess. But it doesn't seem like a good plan for me.
Did we lose any additional farms in this attack or did it mostly focus on this one? Uh, you want to ask? I just did. Okay.
It's true. Oh, uh, hello there, Dave. Uh, other farms, yes. There were other, the attack did spread out past Wayland's farm.
The other farms weren't hit as hard. We did lose basically all the animals that were left on this farm and a number of the crops there. It wasn't as bad as on Wayland's farm. There's still houses are fairly intact and there were some crops left.
But yeah, there's, it was really bad. Uh, is the governor still standing with us? Yeah. So I sort of like, excuse us and I grab her by the arm and I like stroll and I'm like, do you think that maybe we have to consider the governor's plan?
We might. It's a long shot. I'm not even sure the hags are there. They could be, but...
Well, we might be worse off if the hags are there, but desperate times call for desperate measures. But you're the one with the rationing plan. Why are you? I had a rationing plan this morning before we lost a bunch more stuff.
I do think it's our only other option. I mean, we could try to leave, but who knows what's out there. There's nothing for miles as far as anybody's explored. All the places on the maps that we have are gone.
The only contact we have is the merchant who never said anything. Yeah. And I guess he's forsaken this. So we're gonna vote?
Is that what's happening? The parlay will vote and... You don't think we should get the townsfolk involved in the decision? I assume that you and the governor and Pierre and Minaret are all gonna stay here because you're important.
We're gonna have to find somebody else to go. You can't make that decision for them. If we have to do the hags, we will, of course, ask people if they are willing to take on this task. And if they are not, which I expect they will not, we will have to do it as fairly as we can.
And how them draw lots, and those people will go. I don't really see any other way to do it. I'm just raising my eyebrows at her. I would go if I could, but the town needs me here.
Yeah, I see that. Maybe some of the lost renters are over there. I don't say it, but I don't trust them on my frontiers. And I sort of storm off.
I don't have a plan on where I go. I just head back to the center town. Okay. So you head back to the center town and you see Ichabod over there bothering the cooks, just talking constantly about spiders and cooking techniques.
Cool. Yeah, that sounds right. And she was going back. I do.
Thinking to do. So, like if I wanted something to distract me, don't talk to me about it. We'd probably be great. You can have lots of bed druids.
Okay. So I guess it makes it time for the barbecue. So it's later in the day, everyone's kind of glancing over to where the merchant should be. I'm hoping that he'll just like suddenly pop up and they can order something real quick before he scoots up.
Just run up too much out of seeds. Yes. And the air is filled with delicious scint of roasted meat, which some of you have not smelled in quite a while. And it is delicious.
Ha ha ha. They want to smell it. Hey. So everybody has gathered into the town center and they have tables set up and big spits of roasted meat and a few vegetables and breads and stuff, a few pies and things, cakes, using the last of the sugar that they've gotten from the merchant.
And it's the most somber, mixed on this day that you guys have ever seen. You understand that. Actually, unless there's something for me to do, I'll probably focus on entertaining the kids so they don't realize how upset all of the grown-ups are. I imagine there are also other people doing that.
Probably a lot of the parents are trying. I'm going to do that too. I'll do some magic tricks. Showers of sparks, producing the coins, turning their faces green and then back again.
Make a performance check. Ten. Oh. Yeah, they like that.
Okay. They're having a good time and laughing with you. Are you doing anything in particular or just? Sure.
We have this old you that we have just kept for like, she should be dead ten years ago kind of thing. And I bring her out and it gives me the little kids rides around like slapper and she runs. Cool. Make an animal handling check.
Sure. Seven children die. That's funny. Oh, 20 children?
So yeah, the kids are really enjoying that. And a lot of the older kids want to go and really have to... She's like a thousand years old guys. You really have to, yeah.
But yeah, they're having a good time. The kids' suspected parents are very thankful. And you guys have a nice meal. You do?
I'll make a present check. Yay. 23. 16.
Lesch. Okay. How much less? Sorry.
Okay. 24. I forgot about my lucky stone. Okay.
You see here, Wonder Off. You see the governor and internet wonder off and kind of go in the same direction. You see all of them wonder off. You figured they're going to meet about this issue.
Issues. Yeah. Yeah. A part of me wants to go follow, but I don't.
I just need to kind of speak things. Basically, what I was doing, giving you a chance to eat straw. Yeah. Anybody want to do?
I'm too hurt for that. It's been a time when my wife would enjoy full dough this first time in probably weeks. Yeah. How much do you guys eat?
Are you careful or do you overeat? Careful. Because I have to make sure everyone else has them too. I try to have less than that.
I need to tell them to satisfy and then jump the road. Whatever else I got to the rest of my family. All right. Anything else I could find?
Okay. The festival starts to die down as parents are... People are going their way. Parents will come by and say thank you very much to both of you before moving on their way.
You get a lot of people who come and do that. And it seems like the night is done for a little while. I was going to ask if the parlay had returned yet. Or if they were still talking.
Oh. Were you waiting? Up to see what's going on with him? Yeah.
If the party is winding down and I'm like, you know, done getting medieval Tupperware together for the people who need it with the leftovers, then if then they're not back, I will go looking for a second win and the rest. Okay. Yeah. Things are wrapping up and you still haven't seen any of them exit the town hall.
Okay. I go there then. Okay. You're just going to walk in or look in, have some windows or...
I'm not going to do anything sneaky. I think I'll knock. I know it's usually a public building but they're having an important meeting so I'll knock. All right.
You knock and you hear some shuffling inside and then the head drew it. She comes in the door and she's like, oh. Hello, day. Hi.
Did you want something? I wanted to know what you all were deciding. We were just wrapping up. There will be runners tomorrow morning.
But we are going to have a town meeting tomorrow where we are going to ask for volunteers. And if they are in draw lots, like I suggested that we do, to have people go to the HAGS and ask for assistance. I look at her probably for 30 whole seconds and then I say okay. And then I leave.
She lets you walk for a little while and then she also leaves and the rest of the parlay comes out as well and goes to their homes. So yes, the night is done unless anybody wants to do anything else. I'm going to talk to my dads. I can tell them that I am going to volunteer.
They look at you like they're crazy and say, you're going to volunteer. Yeah. But if you didn't, there's a chance you wouldn't have to. Yeah, but I'm one of the best suited to do the job.
I'll be able to get through the woods. I'll be able to track whatever we need. I'm decent with dealing with people and I don't trust the Monster Hunter to do it. Those are the people who are most likely to volunteer and they'll fuck up.
They'll do something horrible. We have to have a career representation. But nobody's ever come back from the HAGS. Anybody who goes out there, they just disappear.
It's better me than some farmer who doesn't know what you're doing. I don't like this at all. But you're a full grown woman and you can make your own decisions. But please, consider this.
I give him a hug and I say, we'll see how it goes. But if nothing changes, I'm going to volunteer. Okay. Have a good night.
And they say that I don't know if you go to bed, but they are not for a while anyway. I probably just go chill out outside for a while before going to bed. Look at the stars. It's a clear night.
The setup for a while talking eventually, you're dead. Oh, I should've known that's my hair. Oh, this goes back to bed. And Alex comes out to look at the stars and says, well, I'm proud of you.
You've been doing good work here and I'm glad that you're willing to continue doing that work. Then he starts to say something else and basically just breaks down and gives you a big hug. I'm going back and I guess it's cheek and I say, oh, I'll come back. It'll be fine.
So there's nothing else. You guys can take a long rest. I'm excited about the long rest. I didn't think I would be.
It's the wrong first day. I feel like it might be safer in the woods. So, safer in the woods where you have more spiders. So, you guys, wake up in the morning sometime.
I do not have bread and button pie and excited getting it all been planned. Well, it's not holiday in the morning. I just take last four tickets to the scraps. I'll just roll the Tupperware.
Shortly after you wake up or maybe before, there is a knock on your doors. Talent meeting today. Shortly after dawn. New.
New. New to you. Talent meeting? Hi.
Yeah. We're probably short. It's probably a good plan. We're already short.
I'm sure they have anything to spare for that really. Good berries. Good berries. Good berries.
Slaughter. Alright. So, you're used to notify the town meeting, which one of you already knew of. You can feel free to ask questions since first, if you want.
Or you can do something with your morning if you want. Or we can move to the town meeting. I'm ready to move to the town meeting. As my mother heads out to work, I tell her I'll see there.
We'll sit together. Alright. Sounds good. So, it's noon time.
You guys head out to the meeting. The town square where you ate last night around the grave. It's full of people milling around and talking. And most of you never covered their spirits decently.
A few somber people still, of course, because of dead family members and such. But most of the people who weren't directly involved have recovered because it's just what you do. That's another day in Bell's room. So, out on the square, you see a minute right here in Essarwin.
Each of them is just standing out there silently. And each has a bag that they're holding. Once the sun is directly overhead in the sky, the governor steps out of town hall. He's also carrying a bag.
And he comes out and he says, Thank you all for coming. As you know, mid-summer today did not go quite as planned yesterday. We, the merchants, did not arrive. And there was a giant attack up at Whelen's farm.
We're very sorry for your loss, Whelen. Thanks. We're all live. Yes, you are all alive.
All of you here. Because the merchant did not arrive, we are lacking in a number of resources that we simply cannot do without. So, the parley has decided that we are going to send out three people to go find the hags and ask for aid. And the crowd of people who does not know anything about this starts remembering and talking pretty easily.
The governor makes quieting motions until finally they do it. Mostly. And he continues. We ask if there are any volunteers to go to the hags.
I mean, who looks out at the crowd. I step forward. I love you, Mom. I step up.
I stand out. Oh, yeah. Squeeze. The guy who's out of his hand and takes that forward.
I think about having to do a post-track, Jacks. It's nice and twinkly. In your case, kind of grasp onto your hands as you leave, but let you. And the mayor looks out.
I'm not the mayor, the governor looks out surprised and says, oh, we have three volunteers. Thank you, Dave. Thank you, Ichabod. And thank you, Wailan.
Do you see the parlay holding their bags? We're going to do what these. I'm talking all the way. We have three volunteers.
We ask that you do for them what you can. They will leave tomorrow. And we ask that you thank them and pray for them. And you may go about your business, meeting a joint.
I owe up to them. And I ask, what do you want us to ask for from the nice? Whatever they are willing to grant us. If they could stop the monster attacks or make the crops more plentiful or send us some animals, then you would be very useful if they know anything of the merchant and why he did this.
What happened to him? That would be useful knowledge to have. Anything that would help get us back on our feet. Is there anything I know about Haggs in general or these Haggs in particular?
Would be a good knowledge skill for this. I mean, since he's a wizard and Haggs are a magic thing, I would say that are probably a bad option. I'm thinking that probably would be a good one. Of course, well, in our contact.
You've read about Haggs and you've heard of a few instances of people coming back from the Haggs, the most famous one being Mad Martly. And you know that people occasionally do try to go to the Haggs on their own. They feel very desperate for some reason and they go to the Haggs to see Kate based on what you've read. And what you've heard, you're pretty certain that there are actually Haggs out there.
The signs point to there being something out there. But no one's ever come back except for Mad Martly and what they said wasn't really very coherent. So you'll have much to go on with these Haggs. Mad Martly said that there were three of them.
So you're probably dealing with a coven. Would I have seen anywhere about what languages they speak? Probably. They probably speak common because what doesn't?
They probably speak Sylvan. They probably speak whatever the opposite of Sylvan is. Some kind of a person. They're strict elish thinkers.
Common draconic and Sylvan. They are fake creatures. They're just dark fake creatures. They're actually fiends I guess.
This one's a fiend. This one's a fake. It depends on where they derive I guess. Okay.
But based on this forest and how things seem to work, you think it's probably the Sylvan area. I have another question, but I don't want to steal the spotlight too much. So if you have something, no. Do we have anything that the Haggs might want in return for this thing we ask?
Can you object to the Haggs might want? I mean, it doesn't have to be objects I would guess. Or services. Yeah.
Is there anything that we can do? Like that the town can do as individuals might really do? I can roll a check on that if you want. Sure.
I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Two anyways.
Way to handle. So I don't know what you want. Nature? Sure.
Nature is great. So, yes. You're not sure you like my soul. I'm not giving my soul.
I don't want to get in that either. You think maybe you get there maybe they'll ask you something. Okay. And you do know that Haggs really like to bargain.
And that often what they're saying they provide could be a bit twisted from how you actually want it to be. Or that there are additional consequences that they don't really talk about. What do they do? They do really like that.
The part to Haggle. Haggle's a good thing. It's in the word. All of the name.
I want to, if Professor Withers came to the town meeting, I want to try to corral him and just ask if there's anything he might have in his stores that could help us. I'm angling for another role on that. Really a precision check. Okay.
13. I have a few books that you could borrow. I got a couple of copies that say one somewhere. Let me go look.
So he has a word to the college. Go with him. Go with him. He'll do nice stuff.
So he sorts two things and give you a book on baseball stats. He gives you a book titled 12 Ways to Kill a Vampire. And then he hands you that bundle with six sticks and it again. Yes.
I was hoping to get those. Oh, I got this book here. Four copies of it. You can have two more if you want.
The vampire one? Yeah. Definitely. I've been meaning to read this twice.
Not this, uh, Maga Stakes. Forget, forget they do. Good sticks. They look like good sticks.
Yeah. Thank you. Okay. I'll be home.
Just like curiosity. Why get home? I'm going to do the ritual. Identify.
I'm going to confirm that they're actually just sticks. Oh, they are. Great. Maybe.
Maybe. Okay. S for sticks. The con in that day.
Maybe. It's coals. Three, nine, five, almost go. The DM may not be the best at scaling.
Yeah. Seven dragons. Okay. That's only two and a 30.
That's only two and a 30. Just push that over and over and over and over and over. The right hook already out. Maybe.
Maybe. You'll eat all six sticks. You'll eat one hit point. Two wands or smiles?
One wanda scales. One wanda paratechnics. A stick. And something else that I'll come up with later.
Okay. Wands or smiles would have helped earlier today. Wanda said. So your wife comes up to you.
What are you doing? What are you thinking? I'm thinking that there's nothing left here right now. Like we're here.
Your family. Why are you? What if someone else walks it up? The other ones, the other key people that are going, they're smart, but they, what if something tasks them?
You know, I can help. And if I can help, I should, I should. It's a rough path to the heads that they think. I don't know.
So. She sighs and gives you a newbie. And you're always far too good for your own gut. Oh, well.
Okay. Well, we'll wait for you. Try to make headway in town. And then if they like it back, we can actually rebuild the farm.
No, it's nice. I'm just working on the farm, but we've got to do what needs to be done. Plus it may be fun if I'm not there. I don't know.
Maybe that will be less attacks. You might be safer if I'm not there. Right? I don't know.
Sometimes it feels like the forest wants me. Well, I guess it's getting down. Yeah, I guess. We'll see.