Session 78: Between Themselves and a Prisoner

General Summary

Depression

The session began with you all finding yourselves at the bottom of the deep 'well' you jumped down at the end of the previous session. Bobcat's staff was still on the ground, looked to be in fine shape, but trying to pick it up proved difficult. It seemed as though whatever it was gravitating towards was somewhere deeper below where you currently stood. ALT and Bobcat worked to pry it off the ground and the journey resumed with some trepidation.
Beyond the bottom of the pit were two possible paths. One led to your left and seemed to veer off in another direction thanks to a natural turn to the left. In the opposite direction were several dead trees and some spiderwebs just barely visible at the edge of your vision and light sources. Debate was had about which direction would be less dangerous: The obviously menacing or the potentially pretending to not be menacing. Were they both fake outs? Was one fake and the other not? This discussion also led to theories that this place was 'designed' by someone to invoke these confusions. The better direction was indeterminate, but you eventually decided to move towards the 'obvious danger' instead of the more unknown turn.
Moving closer towards the dead trees and spiderwebs, Hysteria decided to "test the waters" by flicking a ball bearing into a newly-discovered feature of this room. A yellow-green, sickly, goopy slime filled a hole near the center of the room. Some of the slime would occasionally spill from the top and coat a small section of the floor as well. The ball bearing did not react with the slime, and so ALT elected to send another test in. They wound up a small toy, and you all watched as it moved towards the slime and began to sink in. No sizzling or other signs of acidic reactions were present, but the toy was a bit rusty when it was eventually removed.

---

Things looked safe! So, after a bit more hesitation, you all started to move into the room en masse. Bobcat, however, stopped near the entrance as he discovered that his prosthetic was growing to cover his entire arm. He left the room and the growth stopped, but the progress did not revert. His arm had become wood up to a little bit below his elbow.

While trying to figure all this out, you took a look around the room for some clues and discovered a wall which was slightly different than the rest. At its center was as painting of a large, sickly yellow-green face with a large red eye. Tears streamed down this face, pouring freely from the eye. Hysteria flicked another ball bearing at it, and it rippled on the wall as the room slowly began to fill with life. Leaf buds grew on the trees, the air seemed to become less stagnant, but it quickly returned to normal as the painting stopped rippling. Thoughts of passing through were briefly had, but attentions quickly shifted to exploring the pit of slime.
ALT started by testing one of the nearby trees before wrapping rope around it. He explained its plan before refusing any pitons or other supports and having Frode and Hysteria keep an eye on things on the surface. The voyage down the pit was slow and seemed to go on forever despite there only being around 250 feet of rope. Those of you on the surface were able to see that some amount of slack remained, but ALT found themselves unable to move any further. His attention was drawn immediately to a pair of shadow eyes moving quickly through the slime beyond where the walls of the pit should've been, and they watched as these eyes quickly moved down to where ALT was unable to go.
At the 'bottom' of this slime pit, ALT was able to see a copy of the painting seen on one of the walls back in the room. They attempted to grab it with their psychic arm projections, but they seemed to just phase right through it. His attention shifted at this time to perhaps identifying the painting with magic, but their hands were unable to touch the image. Instead, they seemed to magically discern the properties of the slime surrounding it, and he then learned that this slime is a conscious being magically influenced by...something.

---

ALT relayed this information by claiming that the slime is a person and that they might have been cursed or something to look this way. ALT decided to try and communicate with the being and started looking for the weird eyes they saw earlier. He was able to find them and asked these eyes if they needed help. The eyes seemed to desire help as they responded with a single blink. ALT tried to offer some solutions such as the painting, but the eyes just seemed confused by it. ALT then brought up Agave/Bobcat's arm and the slime squinted again with some confusion before those of you on the surface saw some of the slime pull itself free of the pit and crawl onto the floor.
ALT, unaware of the detached slime, managed to convey that the pit of slime might know something, and Frode and Hysteria seemed to understand that they should hold off on attacking it for now. The slime began to approach Bobcat, and Bobcat put his hands up at the barrier of the room just before where he would start turning into wood. The slime similarly found itself stuck at the border of this room, but it looked at Bobcat's hand for a good while before returning to the pit.
The eyes that ALT was communicating with never left, but they widened after the piece of itself returned. It tried to convey what it knew, but all it could do was cause ALT to feel complete despair and apathy. A sense that ALT should just let go, sink into the good, give in and give up, but this feeling came after the slime saw Bobcat's arm. The sense that 'joining with the slime' is a good idea seemed to almost be instructions or an answer as to how to move forward or help the slime out. Bobcat might need to somehow interact with the pit.

---

ALT also understood this slime, expression some sentiment and familiarity with the provided emotions. The slime was grateful, as far as could be conveyed, but it also gave off the sense that this isn't what it was after. It didn't want ALT to join it, it wanted something to do with a hand as it stared intensely at ALT's hands. ALT then offered the slime its body, and the slime thought for a moment before eagerly blinking once. ALT understood and let the surface-dwellers know that his possessed body would be coming back up shortly.
Hysteria and Frode were on board with it, but they prepared in case something terrible happened. The possessed body of ALT immediately moved towards Bobcat, inspected the hand again, and, without any words, began to pull Bobcat into the room. Bobcat went along with it, but briefly resisted as the slime-ALT tried to shove his hand into the pit. The puppet was unable to communicate in the normal way, but it confirmed that Bobcat would get his body back and that the process would "open the way".
Frode immediately understood this to be a demonic gate of some kind, and the slime-ALT eagerly agreed and repeated the word "gate" with some enthusiasm. Bobcat tried to discern if it would hurt, and the puppet thought for a moment before shaking its head no. Bobcat's hand was plunged into the slime. True to its word, the slime didn't hurt Bobcat, but the wood grew much faster to eventually cover his arm, his shoulder and one side of his ribs leading down to his thigh. It stopped there, however, and the slime began to bubble erratically.
Several slime creature crawled out of the pit until it was completely empty. Each one waited around the well until the last one emerged and at last the painting on the wall vanished. It was replaced with a way forward and a spirit matching what was once on the wall. It was motionless, but its arrival also caused ALT's body to fall limp to the ground before slowly rising again as itself rather than the possessed puppet it had been for some time. He was still quite slimy though, and requested someone perhaps use magic to clean their body. Meanwhile, this spirit seemed to be emitting an aura around it that caused all of you to experience that same level of despair, depression, apathy and a desire to just give up. The feelings persisted despite Frode and Hysteria's demands for it to knock it off, but it did eventually move after ALT requested it.
Though, its movements were not quite expected. Instead of just moving aside, the spirit quickly moved towards Bobcat before vanishing most of the way across the room. His wooden arm glowed a bit, and you all started to move forward into the next hallway.

---

Paranoia

The hallways leading up to the next room were rather unusual. A door blocked your path leading into a room full of foods, some potions and so forth, and another door on the other side of this room was locked. The locked door was easily picked by Hysteria, and it led to another hallway with another door. This door was tested with some hesitation, and Hysteria found it to be already unlocked. It led to another hallway with another door at the end of it which was locked. Hysteria was able to pick it open, but it led to another incredibly short hallway with another locked door about 5 feet in front of the most recently picked door.
This lock, despite Hysteria's best efforts, just didn't seem to unlock no matter what they tried. After some failed attempts, you all resorted to identifying the door to see what was causing the issue, and it was discovered that, rather than a magical lock, this door had observational type magic which suggested that something was watching you. The lock was attempted again, still didn't open, but then ALT tried going into the small space and closing the door behind itself. With the first door shut, the second one opened, and he was able to move into the next area. The information was relayed back to the rest of you and you were able to repeat the trick to move forward.

In the next area, you found yourselves in a room full of statues. No matter where you went in this area, you found yourselves being watched by these statues. Curiously enough, some of the statues were standing on different colored carpets, some of the statues were in different poses, some were made of different materials, but most of them were soldiers wearing armor and holding a sword with the point directed towards the ground. Your attentions were drawn towards the differences in the statues to try and solve a puzzle, but Frode was also concerned with the possibility that the statues would come to life if you did something wrong. With this in mind, you chose to carefully investigate before interacting with anything.

---

You all tried to find any sort of mechanism or anything to do with these statues, but you were all unsuccessful in your endeavors, unfortunately. Frode began to perform a ritual to be able to see magic with hopes that it would help solve this room, and the rest of you continued to look around for any clues. More statues that were slightly off were found, but a reasonable solution was not found. Though, they did find that no matter where you were, there would always be at least one statue looking at you, and a certain feeling of paranoia began to creep up into the hearts and minds of all the not-Frode's in the room. The doors and the observation magic leading up to the room didn't really help with things.
Hysteria pushed this feeling down, and Hysteria and ALT discussed their feelings on the matter for a minute. ALT brought up the tight spaces, the architecture and everything else that also lent to this mental state, and it was mentioned again that somebody must have designed this place to intentionally be like this. Frode's ritual finally concluded, and he was able to see what was magically significant about these statues. It was hard to notice at first, a very small bit of magic in each and every statue, but he was able to see that the only parts of the statues that were magical were their eyes.
Particularly, each pair of eyes in these statues were imbued with some level of necromancy. The color and texture of the magic that was seen seemed to give off a shade that Frode would recognize more on the side of life-preserving magic than anything else. Based on the spell and the thickness of each statue...it seemed that it was only their eyes that were being preserved, kept alive, constantly watching from these statue prisons for an indeterminate amount of time. The senses of paranoia were only amplified by this discovery, and Frode found the simple way out at the end of the statue-watched path.

The way out was an ordinary door, but it quickly changed as Hysteria approached. Their armor burned their flesh and something was forcibly removed from deep within them, almost pulling at their bones. A painting appeared on the wall, reduced Hysteria health and then opened to reveal the way forward.

---

Torment

The shortest of rooms was then encountered. A room dedicated to Torment and to your time spent in Drimures. Jade, ash, burnt wood and smoke were the primary decor of this place, and a single wolf rug was positioned in front of yet another painting. This one was of a familiar wolf made of smoke and shadow. The puzzle of this room was simple as the way forward was revealed as Frode stepped in front of the painting, but memories of your time spent in Drimures were hard to come by, unfortunately, which caused more confusion.
This Torment spirit, much like Paranoia, had already been defeated in the past, already taken in as a part of yourselves during your journey, and the challenge it presented was non-existent at this time. Instead, much like what happened to Hysteria, Frode suffered for a moment before the painting vanished and another hallway appeared.

---

Delusion

The final area to be completed this session was approached and it was a bit different than the other places you'd been so far. This room was a proper tavern, something you might encounter on the material plane, but things were a bit off about it. For one, it was quite large compared to most taverns, but it also had two altars: One was in poor condition and found at the northern wall, the other was in fine condition and found on the western wall. ALT approached these altars after trying to sit in a chair and finding that their seat had turned to smoke beneath them. Similarly, each altar that was touched and inspected shimmered like a mirage before becoming smoke itself.
Patrons were also revealed to be nothing more than smoke, even the bartender and the bar vanished when ALT climbed on top of it, but there was one real thing in this place: a Halfling. He was seen crying over a sheet of paper and drinking heavily, and, as he was poked, it was discovered that he was definitely real unlike the rest of what the group had seen. He introduced himself as Steve, and your introductions quickly shifted to involve his three brothers and his lost love. Particularly, Steve was shocked to hear that DAN had died and was unable to be revived.
"Goddammit, another fucked up thing about this place. It's making me live my nightmares over and over again. Having me try to communicate with my own brothers. That never works out, they don't believe me. Given how long I've been in here, I don't know if I believe me if I'm real or not. I think I am! Things are just weird, different. I'm so lost."
ALT provided him with a calliope, a painting of Lady Ivory and the comfort of real food, drink, rest and so forth, and Steve offered to help you get through to the next area. Though, thinking about the "center of it all" seemed to cause him great pain, and thinking of Lady Ivory and the calliope forced tears to his eyes. As he stood and began to approach a painting on the wall, ALT also started to solve this wacky puzzle and tried removing the spiral that covered the floor of this 'establishment'. He was mostly successful, but, as it reached the center, something else happened...

Steve approached a painting on the wall. Much like the other rooms it appeared to be the only part of the walls that were different or that lent any sort of potential as a clue. This one was of some distorted, brain-like gyrification which had been pulled and pinched to a center with two lobes above and below. Eye stalks led up to barely visible eyes on a pink, hazy background, and a pair of arms which wrapped through the singularity-like center could be seen in almost meditative poses.

---

He touched the painting and it shimmered much like the painting of Depression in the other room. He touched it again, and the shimmers split into hundreds of different paintings reflecting his brothers, Lady Ivory and his life in general. He touched it again and the shimmering facets of this image joined together to become a reflection of himself before the floor started to give out starting with the tile at the center of the spiral. ALT fell through without much resistance and the rest of you jumped in after it.
You found yourselves falling from a great height. A world could be seen below and you could feel air whooshing past your faces as if you were falling at an immense speed. However, the surface of where you were falling seemed to be approaching must slower than the wind would've suggested, and the question of just how fast you would hit the ground came to mind. Thankfully, the collision with the ground was at a livable rate, and you found yourselves looking over a cliff at the City of Spirals.

The Center of It All as it had been called by Steve when speaking to DAN and again when he described it to the rest of you just now appeared to be the City of Spirals. Like the city of rot, Me'kiah'brem'or, this likely resided somewhere in a different layer of the Spirit World, and you were able to quickly find another Steve sitting chained on a throne at the base of a tower. Getting the chains off seemed like a simple enough task, though Steve was also held in place by several Stability spirits.
The "Steve" that you had met did not seem shocked and announced, "It's me." before the eyes of the Steve on the throne opened and the Steve you had first met laughs. Throne Steve explained that this person you had met is just a fragment, something he had developed during his time in this place. He called it an echo, and claimed he was able to live through his echo and that it gave him a sense of freedom, but he lost himself along the way. He desired freedom, and ALT asked why exactly he was on the throne in the first place. Steve didn't know...but he did reveal that The Oni had chained him to "this spot where The Oni used to be."
ALT laughed much to the confusion of Hysteria, and it explained that The Oni seems to have a "Good plan, but he has to convolute it." He went on to claim that The Oni could've completed his plans if he wasn't compelled to be so ...convoluted. Frode agreed and said that it was definitely to your own benefit, and that there should also be a monologue at some point. He called it a "metaphor for someone falling into the same patterns. Literally madness. Standing here now, I understand the metaphor, and its pretty funny. I wonder who this person was before they became...this."

---

ALT, having examined the chains and stability after Frode inquired about Steve prisoner-status came up with a plan. He pulled out a metal, manufactured acorn and explained. "This acorn that you told me never to use. The one that turns everything to metal? Well, I think it'll draw their attention."
It planted the acorn in the ground after having all of you help him pull an old treestump free from the ground to reveal some dirt, and then several horrible things happened in quick succession.
First, a giant metal tree did indeed grow, and it did successfully catch the attention of Stability, but the ones holding Steve in place were not drawn to the concern. No, several more of the spirits spawned and began addressing what ALT had done instead. Not only that, but after the tree had become fully formed, a massive mechanical dragon began to crawl out of the canopy. Riding on top of it was what appeared to be a L'huine with a cybernetic eye, mechanical arms and a staff. The person's identity was requested, and he responded:
"WHO AM I!? WHO ARE YOU!? WHY AM I HERE?!"
Requests were made for this man to kill the spirits of Stability, but he seemed confused as to why he would do that. Though, his mind was quickly changed as Hysteria signed, "Why wouldn't you?" and ALT explained "We need them to get away from that guy!" He became excited, exclaiming "GOOD ANSWERS, GOOD REASONS, BOTH OF THEM!" before stealing all of your metal, including ALT, and turning your possessions into a massive sword. This included Steve's chains, and, for a moment, the halfling was free. This L'huine cleaved through a Stability with ease, laughed, but was cut off as the dismantled ALT asked him to stop that and put everything back.
He was confused, but did so as long as you allowed him to go about his business in this place without getting in his way. ALT returned, the rest of your gear returned, and Steve was chained back to the throne.

---

Complaints and demands arose for the chains to be removed again, but this person was already flying off towards the center of this town. As you turned your attention back to freeing Steve, more and more creatures from what could only be assumed to be some sort of Manufactured layer of the Spirit World continue to emerge from the metal tree.
Frode had a new idea: He interviewed the chained-up Throne Steve for things that he hates, and then banished him back to the material plane. The chains were moved, and the banishment ended. Steve briefly got to enjoy life back in his home, but he returned to the hellscape freed from his chains. He tried to stand, but he spirits of Stability tried to hold him in place. Thankfully, Steve managed to prevent any atrophication and pushed past the spirits without issue.
Steve, now free to move, found himself near his fractured self, and it began to reach out to touch him. Steve avoided it and asked what its deal is. It revealed that one of his friends has to take his place on the throne, and ALT reacted to this with a blast of eldritch-oriented energy. The echo burst into a puff of smoke and the rest of you were lifted into the air at an incredible speed. The army of mechanical creatures were left below, and you could see the light of the spire at the center of town slowly dimming. You arrived back at the tavern with the painting on the wall still shimmering, and there was someone new at the center of the room: A Spiral Hag, and it seemed keen on hugging Steve.
Hysteria attacked immediately upon seeing this person, and combat began. The threat was dealt with easily enough, but you were able teo see that ranged threats against it spiraled out from her after making contact. So, any ranged approach was quickly met with one of your allies being hit as well. Steve struck the killing blow against this creature, and his sword was transformed by its blood. The painting dissipated and another room was revealed.

---

Anxiety

Reaching the next area involved passing through a room with three Dragon Skulls. It was immediately discovered by Steve that walking too close to them causes them to awaken and bite, and ALT also learned that they can still breathe their powerful breath attacks. Most of you flew across and avoided them, but ALT was able to maneuver through.

The room you found after this was circular with spiderwebs growing over most of the floor and walls. Random pits and chasms dotted the ground and led to some unknown place, and the entire floor was also covered in broken glass and pottery. A painting on one of the walls seemed to depict another spirit.
The painting was of several hands extending from a blurred section of the environment interlaced with nothingness. Its body is a pair of rhombuses with largely greyscale and heavily contrasting blacks and whites making up its Palette.
As Frode entered the room, he happened to almost fall down one of the pits. He failed to grasp the ledge, nearly falling to the unknown, but another arm grew from his back where one was once severed back in The Night City of Dorchar. It was able to grab onto the floor, and Frode was able to get back into the horrible place.

In-game Date:
Daulok 32, 308

Report Date

07 Aug 2023

Primary Location

Vsevolodrik's Prison

Related Plots

• A Broken Cycle
• Of a Patron, a King and a Lost Child

Related Characters

• DAN Wildcloak
• Vsevolodrik