OttL Session 28: Faren and Dreamonskii in Hobbs' House

General Summary

Plane Shifting

The party plane shifts to Feywild. Ignacio Icarsus makes three whispered arcana checks in absentee:
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Pos: 20, planar pos: 19, time: 20

Izar is the only one who fails the save. His head is stuck in the ceiling again.

Entering the House

Entering Hobbs' house proves somewhat troublesome, with people being redirected, teleported, and dropped into bushes. Dreamonskii later says this is normally even harder, but he "switched off most of the security"

Dreamonskii and Faren

When the party enters, they find Dreamonskii inside. He has Faren bound to a chair. Dreamonskii claims to have been here investigating Hobbs' past, while Faren claims to be investigating Hobbs himself. Dreamonskii found a room that was warded against non-fey creatures and was unable to enter. On his way out, he caught Faren poisoning booze in the kitchen. A fight ensued, and Faren was quickly charmed and "voluntarily" bound himself to a chair.
Faren claims the poisons were non-lethal sedatives, chosen to ease interrogation. He admitted that he expected whatever answers he got from Hobbs or others would result in him stabbing someone, but insists that his actual intentnion was not murder but information gathering. This last point is repeated several times during ensuing conversations.
Dreamonskii and Faren both confirm there is a simple shrine to Vecna in the basement. It is surprisingly modest compared to the rest of the house, but does appear to be functional.

Faren Talks About the Music Box

Faren is ungagged, and talks about Istus' Music Box. He says that Tsukiko used it to come back to the current time. In Tsukiko's future, Natsu was actually an ally of Vecna. Supposedly, Tsukiko had come back on time on orders of Natsu herself in order to change the future. However, some people still remember the old timeline, including all of the gods.

Faren Insists he is Protecting Natsu

Faren once again insists that he and his father Arrius were working to protect Natsu. Faren does not seem to completely agree with his father's orders, but stands firm in the position that he was only ever acting in Natsu's best interests. He claims he wanted to get answers from Hobbs in order to protect her from what he now perceives as a threat. Faren claims that Vecna must still have some hold over Hobbs, and will one day restore his memories in order to force him to do her bidding. This argument goes on at length.

Hobbs Drinks the Poisoned Booze

Hobbs drinks the poisoned booze, and is promptly put to sleep. Faren begrudgingly offers an antidote that was in his bag.

Combat with Faren

Faren is continuing to be a creep, and eventually provokes Thaiva Phenol to punch him. This breaks the charm, and he immediately invokes a warlock class feature to teleport himself free of the bonds. A brief combat ensues, and is then snuffed out when Hobbs restrains him and conversation resumes. The argument over whether Hobbs is dangerous is eventually resolved when Faren convinces Natsu to invoke her conduit power. Natsu does, and receives the following in DMs
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You see your crew standing inside a vast, damp, cavern. In the center is a certain well-known spider bitch. It looks like you've been fighting. She does... something. Hobbs falls to the ground, hands on his head. Then the moon plague goes off. He turns. ...and proceeds to dive straight for Lolth's throat anyway

When Natsu tells Faren that Hobbs is still safe, he is shocked and does not know how to respond. He eventually backs down and even apologizes for the accusations, though he still seems somewhat distrustful.

Dreamonskii in Distress

Dreamonskii is very upset by his findings. And crits a religion check to analyze them. He poses a new theory: Hobbs served Vecna in a previous life, and when he "got out", perhaps Vecna took his memories in order to protect her secrets. However, this would still be unusual, because he lost his memories twice. It is unknown if he was working for Vecna at any point, however he did participating in stealing Vecna's Orb alongside three others who admitted at least a minor relationship with her at the time of the crime: Tsukiko, Lenora, and Hinfyire Soriel.
Dreamonskii later expounds on this some more; what if their relationship never meant anything? What if Hobbs was using him the entire time?

Arrius and Shippo

Natsu asks Faren about Elder Arrius. Apparently Faren's father is now an Archfey on the Unseelie Court. He literally owns Shippo now, too, but still finds himself in a territorial dispute with The Prince of Fools, who claims the village is still considered part of his "De Jure territory".

Exploring the House

The party then proceeds to explore the rest of the house. Dreamonskii was not originally expecting to meet Hobbs here, so he had left a gift for him on the bed. It is an enchanted whip (which Natsu keeps), and has the following note:

Thank you lad for all you are, and all you've been to me Thank you for the laughter and for all the memories Thank you, for being there, through the good times and the bad And Thank you for being the best mate I've ever had

They also locate a broom of flying, two spell scrolls (clairvoyance and glyph of warding), some interesting reading material, a pumpkin that makes funny faces at Memento Vitae and then promptly goes inert, and some fancy foodstuffs. The house also has a teleportation circle inscribed on the top floor.

Report Date

14 Nov 2020