S1:E58 – Study Buddies

In our last episode, the party had a harrowing battle against rats, learning that in this realm, small things can be large challenges. Luckily, they found a bunch of amulets to help in future battles. Our adventurers today are Kieran who plays Wail in the Barbarian. Excuse me, a lot of teas in Angel.

Max, who plays Playster the Monk. It's nice to help people. Duh! Theron, who plays Day the Druid.

Nobody wants to cuddle with a big frog. Arizona, who plays Psyche, the Medusa. I look like I've petrified my shoulders. And our DM Hazel.

Playster is waiting for the magic. What are you two doing? Welcome, fellow travelers to Legends of Chill. Right now, as far as I remember, you're still standing in that room with all the amulets, having decided that Psyche's going with you.

So, what are you doing now? I have lots of thoughts because I'm sure that just killing the Queen of this place is going to not be a simple task. Or even getting an audience with her. So I would like to do research on the way this place is governed, ideally at a library or city hall.

I probably will think of some other things like that to figure out how we're going to do it. And I'd also like to see if we can go and check out the line and see if we can find Jackery's friends in there. Because maybe they're totally fine and have just been waiting to get back to Chell. Are you saying that's my character?

Half and half? Okay. If you mention the name Jackery, then Psyche goes, who's Jackery? So there's this old, old, old elf just on the other side of the portal.

And he used to be here with an adventuring party. And everybody else came through it to this side. And he doesn't know if they're dead or if they're over here living lives because they haven't made it back through. And so I take it.

He's been the only sort of line of defense against everyone here leaving. Basically, yes. Oh dear. He's killing all of your friends and loved ones.

I like the line. Well, I mean, the rats are killing anyone who doesn't escape. So sort of game adventures at this point between a rock and a hard place. Right in the forest.

A rat in the level 20 adventure probably. Pretty much. Actually, Hazel, I should probably be asking you this. Would Clio know like government stuff or is she more of the like spellcasting type?

I was picturing more spellcasting type, but if she could be of use, then maybe we don't have to go to a library. It's really up to you. She's your wife and your character. So whatever you want to do with her is fine by me.

Sorry. So to speak. Okay, then, Psyche says, would I know of a library, Hazel? Is there a library?

Is there somewhere? Could I roll for it? There's definitely a library. It might be little well known enough for you to roll for it.

Okay. Some form of knowledge. I think you can just do an intelligence check. Yeah.

For memory, basically. Yeah. Basically, I'm trying to do that. Now one.

Which in this case is good. Maybe? Is it? No.

No, that's just how just how combat and DC's work. Okay. So this is technically a DC, but it's yes. It doesn't apply to the stuff.

So yeah, you don't know of a library. I look at the party and I go, you know, I'm more like I hit stuff with my snakes type of person. I'm not much of a scholar, but my wife might know where to find that information. And I'm probably going to hit them anyway and hold up the ambulance and say, I got to give these to my kids because I mean, we're protected and that's good.

But if there's anybody else I want to protect. Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. I would love to meet your wife and hear what she has to say, though, like I would like more than one opinion on the situation, obviously.

Oh, of course. I'm going to head home for a bit. Maybe also rest because that was, I mean, not that we really took a whole lot of hits in that battle, but that was still, I'm going to be real with you. This is the first time that, you know, the whole party has made it back alive.

So I'm pretty impressed with y'all and I'm very, very happy. I'm also a little traumatized just thinking about the rest of it, but like I'm happy probably. Should we go? We can go.

We don't have to stay and get attacked by more rats. We're good. I don't know how super relevant it would be to cry, but I'm going to talk at the journal just in case like there's any like secret shit on it that either she or someone else might be able to pick up on or if there's something that it said that we, I don't know, maybe don't super get. We the party not to.

Okay. Okay. So you gather up the journal and the amulets if you haven't already done that and you trace your steps back and you float your way over to Psyche's home. Right.

We're floating. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Shawalen is just like, yeah.

Like trying to mind walking through the, through the street or act like he's walking. Okay. Like this doesn't make sense. Psyche looks like this.

They're kind of like giggles. Hey, rude. I'm, I'm sorry. I'm sure if I tried to move forward in your world and face planted, I'm sure you would laugh at me.

So I'm. You're right. That's why we're like accidentally does a fun flip. I clap.

Thanks. Alright. Let's go. I was really.

Just around the corner. You can keep doing tricks if you want though. I'm not trying to. It's been pretty, pretty sad.

So obviously this is the most entertainment I've had in a long time. So like don't be embarrassed at all. I forgot to write down any of the stuff we talked about your house apparently. So that's fun.

You can go search our DMS because we did throw back and forth about it. Okay. So you arrived at Psyche's house. It's a fairly nice home.

You come into a main living area and a living room. How's it decorated? You have any good decorations or is it kind of sparse? No, I think, I think it's with all the stuff going on.

Like if there is stuff that sort of stuff that hasn't been put away, some toys on the ground for the younger kids are maybe a burger too of Clio's. But overall it's like maybe just a couple of like places to set dining table. But yeah, pretty sparse. So you come in and Clio comes in from another room having heard you enter and she is more to the show.

And she just looks at all of you kind of confused and then looks at Psyche's like, Hello dear, welcome home. Who are these people? So you know how I've been sort of trying to take care of the rat problem and I've sort of come home by myself. So these three, they say they came through the portal and we just survived a confrontation with the rats.

So I think we might have stumbled upon a bunch of non monsters who might actually be able to help it. Where are the kids? Are my kids here? Or do I hear them or?

Yes, you hear them. It sounds like they're probably playing in one of their rooms. It's pretty loud from one of the corners of the house. I take one of the amulets out of my, I guess wherever the fuck I keep them.

I don't know. In your snakes? Just in between my snakes. One of the snakes is actually I like that I do.

I just make a caring one. I mean, none of them work because I can only do a couple, but they're sort of dormant. I take one of the snakes comes down and I take off one and I put the amulet around her neck and I say, given what has been happening with all the rat stuff and apparently in this guy, these people's dimension, it's sort of normal, I guess the bigger monsters are more ferocious and can kill you and small things like rats can't. And apparently I pull out the journal and I hand it to her.

Turns out someone might have might be responsible for switching that. But this amulet that I just gave you is the result of somebody's research to sort of counteract the effect. So you may feel a little weaker while using it, but the other three are for the kids. Okay.

Thank you. So are you going to be home for a while now? I look at the party and I go, well, we may need to do a little bit of research, but I do think I think we should probably rest for a bit and sort of regroup and try to figure out what the fuck we're going to do and research. Okay.

Yes. Well, if I can help you with anything, let me know. I'm a fair-handed research, as you know, and I'd be happy to help you get rid of those vicious rats, though. I wish that you could be a little less involved in it.

I know. I take your hands and I sort of look at her and I say, I love you. And I know things have been hard since Hector died, but there's hope. These three are, I think, are tickets of solving this.

I know this hasn't been easy and I'm very sorry that I've been out a lot. If I could stay home and just do research with you, I would. But, you know, we're different. You are good with the whole book thing and I'm good with the whole hitting things.

And I want to solve this and to me, the only way I could think of to solve it was to try and fight it, but you were right. We need to be more strategic. Things are going to get better. And I kiss for knuckles.

I know. I love you too. And I probably don't say it enough, but I'm proud of you. Thank you.

All my snakes are just like blushing and they're just like, I'm blushing too. I'm like hiding behind a wail in. The wail is just like, I miss my wife. Oh, sorry.

Allow me to rub it in. I rub my arms around her and I just like, not not enough to hurt her, but I do like squeeze her up. It's here enough a little bit. I'm like, I'm sorry.

I love you. Awkward. We're all looking in different corners of the room. Yeah.

Oh, right. I'm being a terrible hostess. I'm so sorry. I'm going to go.

I'm going to help my kids and I go to the other room to give my children their amulets. So Cleo looks at the three of you and says, so I'm Cleo. What are your names? I'm Polaystra.

I'm Whelan. And I'm Day. I'm still blushing a little, but I like walk forward to shake your hand. It's very nice to meet you.

We've heard a little bit about you. Yes, well, that's good. So you need some research done? Yeah, I don't remember if Seiki gave her the journal.

I did. Yeah. Okay. So I sort of point to the journal and I say, well, if you read that, you'll see that the sort of situation that you're in right now is because of Queen Markwin.

And we kind of want to do some research on her. We don't really know where to start because this place is very unfamiliar. So any help that you could provide would be great. I see.

I don't know about a lot about Queen Markwin. There are some rumors, but there's not really much there. Have you considered going to the library? Yes, I have, but Seiki didn't know where it was.

So we came here first. Shocker. It's very small. And the person who runs it is a little eccentric and well, who isn't really, but it's a library.

Yes, I could tell Seiki how to get there so that she could take you that way. Sure. That sounds great. I mean, you could tell us do.

Yes, but like you said, you've just gotten here. You don't know the landmark. So if I said it was four blocks down from the grocery store, you'd have no idea what that meant. That's very true.

Okay. So Cleo has said that they will help. I am at this moment waiting for Max or Kieran to say something, but I do have another question for Cleo. I don't know.

I don't think Place really has much to say. Place was like, when do I get to punch stuff again? Okay. So after a moment of like day waiting the same way that I did, she'll be like, you said that there were rumors?

I would love to hear the juicy rumors about the Queen, even if they're completely baseless. Well, she arrived several thousand years ago. This place was much different about back then. I think it was called Old Domingon.

It's still on the cards. I guess it's kind of still called that, but nobody... What is it called? No.

That's a good question. I was saying, I guess it's still called Old Domingon. Just nobody really refers to it much. Some call it Margwin's Realm, which is kind of boring, but Old Dominion is not great either.

She came a long time ago and the world began to change as she took over from the previous ruler of this realm, who no one really knows a lot about other than they were big and scary. Well, that makes sense. We, I look around at this point as though it's the first time I'm realizing it. I say, we expected that we were stepping into the Shadowfell.

That's not where we are, is it? Oh, no. This is not the Shadowfell. It's a small place.

And what do they call them? Kind of like a pocket dimension. If a pocket dimension was bigger or like a plane, if a plane was much smaller, Fanny Pack dimension. Fanny Pack dimension.

Exactly. If you like. If you like. Okay, so while y'all are talking about this.

I'm like right after I come back in and I got, well, I got one kid, I think like in a piggyback and the other two, I think are big enough that I probably can't lift them, but they kind of look like one of them is probably closer looking to a psyche and another might be looking more like, I almost said Elvira. Who would be the kid on my, who would be the second youngest? I'm trying to remember. Okay, we did actually figure out who is who.

Yeah, I have your family written down. I think I introduced the three kids to y'all. I point to the tallest oldest looking and I say, this is he be he be meet my adventuring party who have not died. I point to the second oldest who's probably looks a little more like me, probably has kind of little baby snakes.

This is next, next say hello. And next doesn't really say anything. I think he just sort of like waves very timidly. And then the one on my back is just like kicking their feet.

And it is just like, like, I think looks at police. Was first something that's like easier. It's like he goes, are you okay? I almost heard you earlier when I did that.

I'm sure you want a giant bowl to do that to you. And and pan nods like really excitedly. And and and so he's like, all right. I take pan off.

I don't know what is about to happen. I grab by the arms. I basically just want to like, you them. What is happening?

And I say, hey, play straight. I'm fast. I attempt to catch the baby. Okay.

Okay, make a roll. Okay. Yeah. Right.

Okay. God, if we roll in that one, I think I'm 19. Yes, you you catch the kid. Look at psyche.

I'm like, why did you throw a child at me? Also, hello child. You know, you know, I, I'm sorry. I kind of assumed that you were bigger than me.

And I just kind of do that normally somehow without injuring them. But I mean, listen, we've been having a hard time right now. If my kid asked to do something, like, I'm not going to do that. Unless it's going to actually harm them.

Like, I just go with it. You know what I mean? Yeah. Oh, wait.

I just remembered that like everyone floats here. So like the child was probably not really in danger. Anyway, I kind of look a little sheep. I said, I'm like, next time I'll clear it with you before I throw my child at you.

I mean, now I know to expect it. So we're cool now. So do I, do I hand this back to you or do I put them down? I'm like, I'm sure what to do with the child.

That's the whole thing. Okay. Go ahead. Please just, just put them down.

They'll go over. I set the child on the ground. And Pan runs back over. Like I think probably either goes to how Keeby or next.

Also, I was a little disappointed when one of them was named Hebe and there wasn't another one named Geeby. Same. I was expecting it. Hebe's nickname is hebe.

Yeah. Turn on my wife and I go, what's you talking about? Like, completely forgetting that this is very serious thing going on. I'm just actually happy to see my kids again.

It did not be dead. Yeah, I was talking to them about Margwin and I was talking to them about the library, which I'm not really surprised you don't know where it is. Don't roast me in front of my new friends. Come on.

I love you because I know I'm like, yeah, I know that is cool. She nods and didn't she'll reach out an arm and give you a squeeze around the waist. Like a one-armed hug. I don't think it's possible for a Medusa to go beat red, but I'm doing basically the Medusa cool.

I'm like, oh God. Okay. Should we go to the library? Yes.

Let's go. Are we all going here? We have to come, but it's where we're going to learn all the stuff that we need. I might as well come with.

I turn to Cleo and I go, I hate to do this to you, but I'll be back soon. I'll try and run back home before we actually set out for real. Well, would you like to come with us? I mean, you probably know your way around the library better than I do.

She's got to watch the kids. I do, but yeah. I have to stay with the kids and Pan gets really rowdy around books. I don't know what he's doing.

What? What does that mean? I feel like a distant look and I'm like, oh yeah, God damn it. That's why we, you know, we didn't hate to keep your little library locked out because I turn to the party and I go, so here's the thing.

The short version is last time Pan got their hands on a book, they kind of destroyed it. I don't know why. I don't pretend to know how children's brains work, but they thought it was hilarious and it's Cleo and I were both very upset and so like, yeah, no, it's a whole, it's a whole. Yeah, whenever you turned around to your kids, you saw that Pan was slowly creeping towards the book and Cleo's hands.

Pan. I picked them up. I sleep them up and I'm like, hey, hey, what do we talk about? What do we do when we see someone holding a book?

We ask them politely if I can have it. And? And then I ask if I can rip it to pieces first. I look at the party kind of a little embarrassed and I go, well, we're halfway there.

And I look at Pan and I say, okay, we should probably head out before Pan actually start things that should die, they should die along. Okay, great. I waved to Cleo and say it was great to meet you. Thank you for the directions.

Yes, thank you. Nice to meet you. It's a real cool, like, salute wave thing. I sort of lead the way.

Sounds good. Sounds good. The library. Yeah.

Sweet. Okay. So you wander on down to the library? I'm like half expecting the library to be just squint somehow he's here.

So there is this like deep red crystalline building that Psyche leads you to. And on the balcony is a sign that says library. It looks like it was handmade and it was looks like it was made with a wood burner. Nice.

It's all made? No. Not absolutely bad, but a little less than average maybe. Okay.

A little shoddy. So you enter and there are a number of books and magazines and things and there is a desk with an ice demon. Okay. As soon as we enter, I like walk behind the three of you and I very quietly go, this isn't really my scene.

One of you do the talking, please. I'm sort of frozen in the doorway because I don't think I've ever seen this many books. And magazines and stuff that aren't falling apart. We've been through a lot of rotten libraries, but never anything like this.

And then after a moment when Psyche was like, oh yeah, okay. I guess that that's me right now. And I'll walk up to the person at the desk and say, hi, we are looking for some information about this realm and its ruler. I was wondering what you had.

Ah, hello. Yes, I can help you with that. So you want to learn about Old Dominion, huh? We don't get very many interesting people around here.

And it's good to see you. Good to see you. And it's good to see you. And I'm not sure about Old Dominion and its ruler.

Ah, do you want to? Well, we don't really have much on Dominion themselves. So you probably want to know about Queen Margu in the new ruler. Oh, is Dominion the name of the old ruler?

It is, yes. That was the name. It's about all I know. Okay.

Yeah, the current ruler is what we're looking for. I'm sure there's some books right out there somewhere. So just follow behind me like a bunch of little ducklings and I'll open the books. Okay, yeah.

We'll definitely do that. They just walk up and down aisles looking left to right. I'm looking today and I go, I don't know what a duckling is. What's a duckling?

You know what a duckling is? A duckling is a baby duck. A duck is like a small bird that lives in the water. Okay.

In this realm, would they be comparable to like rats in terms of ferocity or anything? Well, I would say that probably a duck would be comfortable, but a duckling is a baby. So it's a lot smaller. Does that make it more powerful?

Like are your kids more powerful than you? I mean, the rats were way harder to hit and they were small. So are they smaller than a rat? Depends on the rat.

And on the duckling. I know. Now, I'd rather fight one horse sized duck or 10 duck sized horses. It's like, you know, it's just imagining if a duckling is in fact small or the rat she kind of flittled, like scared.

The librarians like, oh, you want to know about ducks? I think we got some books on ducks. I think there's one back here and he's like turns around and I'll do later. It's it's cool.

These three know what they're talking about. I'm not the smart one here. All right. So we're not looking for ducks.

Just. We're looking for again. Queen of Boy and Dominion. Yeah.

On Old Dominion and Queen Marklyn. Oh, okay. Yeah. Those are over here probably.

And he leaves you down. Can I do some sort of check to see if there's a categorization system that he's ignoring or something? You may. Dominion decibels.

Can I? What a librarian question. Yeah. To be honest, if at work I didn't have like my computer, I would basically be doing the same thing like I think I think it's in the 500s.

I don't know. But can I do a perception or would that be something intelligent based? You can do a perception. I only got a 10.

There seems to be some categorization system that you can't quite figure out exactly what it is. You see books of similar topics grouped together in places. You saw the duck books and those were all together, but they were also next to bean bags for some reason. Okay.

You're not sure exactly what's going on, but it looks like there's some kind of system or used to be some kind of system where part of it's still in place. All right. Don't just follow them then. He walks down the aisles and he eventually does stop and he pulls out a book and is like, I think this one will work and he hands it to Palaistra and take it and I hand it today.

Then he continues walking and then he stops in another section, a few shells down and is like, okay, and here should be the rest of what you want. We got some tables back there. If you want to sit and if you need anything else, let me know. I can get that book on ducks or bucks or whatever.

Thank you. I was in retrospect. It was a very silly question, but I appreciate you wanting to help. You know, more people should come to library.

People who are smart, which is not me, but other people should come to library. Yeah, I think so. I like my little library. Hey, folks, we've had a lot of fun here today.

It's Matt from Orks Zone and I'm here to tell you about the serious problem we have with the underfunding and underutilization of America's public library system. The library just like drops his legs and he looks at the camera and says that whole thing. I will sort of like awkwardly kind of walk over to day and peek over. Sorry, what was it to say, Usain?

She's a she-her. I go and peek over her shoulder. Okay, I'm going to actually lead everyone to those tables you pointed to and sort of like enter taskmaster mode. So I'm going to open the books in front of me, but I'm going to then point to Phyllastra and hand them a piece of scrap paper and say, draw a picture of a duck for Psyche, please.

Oh, thank God. No, like you're going to get some terrible notes. And then just I'll look through the books about Queen Markwin and I'll hand a stack of them to Whalen as well. I'll do my best.

Okay, I was going to say while Day is looking at her boring smart people stuff, Phyllastra is going to go find the librarian and start asking them about lots of different types of books to see what they have. So I don't know if we just want that to be a thing that happens or if we're going to roleplay that. So anybody doing research can give me an investigation check and can we do it like one person gets advantage? Yeah, I want to give Day advantage.

I have that nice, nice plus zero. So not because I don't want to be useful just because Phyllastra is bored right now. Oh geez. So I only got an 11 with advantage.

Okay. And is Phyllastra trying to learn something or are you just doing a thing? No, Phyllastra is I think trying to learn. Well, Phyllastra is going to try to learn something, but that's at the bottom of the list of things they ask about.

I feel like Whalen's trying to help going through the books is the head nod and he's starting to fall asleep. Nice. We're the best. Even though research is not Seki Strongsuit, can I still like, can I look specifically for like a weak point or like some way to like some kind of weakness that Queen Margaret has?

I mean, we could talk to her, but like on the off chance that she's not the diplomatic type, like Seki's probably thinking about how to like possibly kill this woman if she has to. Yeah, you can try to look for that specifically if you want. But that'd be an investigation check. Yes.

Okay. Cross my fingers. This is a lot of really confusing like fucking legal jargon, but like historical jargon, I'm just looking at it and like I got lost at nation state. What's going on?

I just look at pages completely like I have no idea what this is. I like very like push the book over. So while you all are doing research over there and Wayland's falling asleep, Phyllastra is just like asking the librarian. Putting together a list that police was going to write down and the librarian.

Nice. That's a good idea. Okay. So I don't know if you guys want me to read the list or someone else wants to read it, but police are right, police are right down and hands the librarian.

This did not format the way I was hoping when I put it into chat. Can I read it? Can I read it in the librarian twice maybe? Can I read it?

Yeah, you can read it. Okay. Seki like looks at it before I hand it over. And it's comic books, a long list of very specific erotica, mostly titles I don't recognize.

I recognize one and I go, oh, he has really good. Books about commercial art. You're a huge winner. Books about martial arts of this realm and gender studies specifically queer and trans related.

And she gets to that last one and she gives you a very like, she gives you a thumbs up. L the only ones they have here are all like, chick tracks about the evils of playing Dungeons and Dragons. Weirdly Christian in this one section. And they're just like, I'm like, who's Satan?

Yeah. And they definitely do not have all of the erotica books, but they have a funny. Fuck. Do they have the really weird one?

To be able to say, you recognize this. There's only one really weird one on it? No, but like there's like the weirdest weird one. Do they have the weirdest one?

How about that? They do not. Okay. I'm looking at this.

I was looking at this and it's like, oh, I don't have a lot of this. I can see if I can find it. The third one is probably the most important for the adventure purposes. He'll bleach you over to the comic books and pull out the erotica books that you asked for.

And I'm going to say all the gender stuffs in one section. So that's in this section. He finds two books on martial arts of this realm. Nice.

Hopefully there are languages that I read. Fuck. So I think I'm going to sit down. I'm going to put the comic books and the erotica off to one side and then Polaister is going to page through the martial arts books and a couple of the gender studies books like using like the index or the table of contents to find specific topics.

And for the martial arts thing, do I learn anything that maybe helps me fight? Okay. Why don't you go ahead and give me an investigation check and then we'll move back over today for a little bit. Let's look at the library.

Eleven on that investigation. Okay. Day also got an 11 to learn about Queen Marguind in this realm. Thank you for listening.

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