01/13/2024 -- Operation Trigon Hope

Date: 37 Lionnir 715AR. Starring Koilos (commander), Andreas (marshal), Bee (spymaster), Angel/Bloom (lorekeeper), and Guy (no role). We’re told this mission is assault, recon, and cultural – we don’t know at first that this is Trigon Hope, we’re just trying to track down Varuz.
We begin right after Varuz has departed with Bee’s pyramid, debating on what to do to catch him; we decide to climb up one of the mountains and from there, use the gravity-altering power Ki, Bee, and Hester possess to slingshot ourselves to the lab back west, where we’ve figured he’s heading. Ki finds Hester to bring her along with us. Bloom has until midnight to punish Varuz for his deal, so we plan on trying to move quickly; because the trek up the mountain will allegedly take 10 hours, we decide that if it takes longer than 12 hours, we might ring up Bob to get us the rest of the way.
- Andreas was not in on what the theft from Bee was, or Bloom’s deal and time limit; he was just told Varuz stole something of Bee’s, and came because he wanted to talk to Varuz anyway.
Bloom attempts to use 2 recovery to heal his corruption before we leave, but it does not work. :(
The spies come back with 1 intel, so the marshal asks what item(s) would be useful on this mission, and is told whistlers. We spend 2 scrap to get 2 of them. The spymaster asks what the best way to get up the mountain is, and we’re told to take the roads. The marshal makes the engagement roll, and gets an extra die, because he’s the birthday boy. We start with an excellent position [rolled: 1 2 6 5].
We pick up with Guy in the Roost, making his way to breakfast. Varuz is already eating a large platter of breakfast foods. He invites Guy to eat, and says they’re going on a bit of a field trip – they might have a break in the case of the Xeroxixia, which Guy says he remembers Varuz talking about. Varuz says this field trip may be slightly dangerous, and asks if Guy would lend him his ax, to which Guy agrees.
He says they’re heading back to the lab to the west, and while they ideally won’t run into any foes, he suggests they enter quickly, and do not linger. The landscape below is incredibly twisted, and they should be wary of the ground itself – Guy’s had some experience with this, when he was in the woods during the battle. Varuz asks what his opinion is of the Brigade and its leadership.
Guy says he likes building houses for the Archfey, and that he hasn’t had any problems; they rescued him. They’ve been good to him. Varuz says they’re good, but he doesn’t see them as generals, just nobility playing at war; even now, they don’t know what war is. His own master fought a great war, and he wishes Caerwyn were here now. He then asks what Guy makes of his own chances of survival.
Guy just says he hopes he lives, and doesn’t plan on dying; he’s more of a stay in the moment guy. Varuz says no one plans on dying, and perhaps Guy won’t; perhaps they’ll continue to be amongst the lucky ones. He then says they’ll be touching down at the lab shortly, and encourages Guy to eat his fill, which Guy does. Guy loses 18 sp.
Back with the larger group, we’re making good time as we go through the increasing storm, though we lose 10 sp by the time we get to the top. We see many crows, blossomed, and spitters below, and decide we need to distract them before we try the slingshot – Ki attaches a whistler to an arrow and launches it away from us, off into the distance. 3-4 dozen crows swarm off to follow the noise, and the peaks come to life with the creatures moving. The storm intensifies.
We decide Ki will hold onto Andreas, Hester will hold onto Bloom, and Bee will “hold” onto Ki and Hester (she’ll be tied to them, since she only has one arm). Ki and Hester will use their wings to alter our direction a little better. The gravity-bending people work out what directions they’ll set their own gravities to. Ki makes a physical save, and gets 2 successes, meaning she only loses an additional 10 sp with this flight.
Before we take off, Hester talks to Bloom as she holds him, saying they haven’t had a chance to chat, since they’ve been running the entire time. She enthusiastically and entirely genuinely thanks Bloom for murdering her, loud enough for the rest of the group to hear. Bloom apologizes for the murder, but she just smiles at him, saying she’s so much happier now, that she was so lonely on that mountain, and that now she has a family.
We then use the gravity slingshot and take off, shooting through the air like a cannon. Andreas looks below, and it seems like all color has been drained from the land. Even the sky is grey, and it’s like our skin itself is fighting off the corruption.
We land close to the lab, and ascend the mountains it lies on. By the time we’re arriving, it’s about 6 at night – we’ve made very good time, but the storm’s conditions have turned to whiteout, and we have to hold onto each other as we climb. It’s maybe 10 degrees, which is highly unusual for the summer.
Bee smells something like cooked chicken ahead, and says she’s so hungry she thinks she’s starting to hallucinate. The doors of the lab are open, and we see 9 dead crows, many singed and burning. We cut to Guy, who stands in the doorway, and sees another series of humanoid figures approaching. He holds his ground, ready for any Impure walking up, and recognizes us – he and Andreas greet each other, and he recognizes Bee.
Bee is clenching her fist around the fake pyramid, until Ki asks if she can hang onto it. Bee reluctantly hands it over, and continues to clench her fist around nothing.
We tell Guy we want to talk to Varuz, and he lets us go inside, though he stays near the door in case any more Impure arrive. We see the interior chamber lined with lead, lit by blue torches. Glass vials still line the oak shelves, and there are crystals humming with latent power. In the center of the room is an ornate astrolabe, currently turning and spinning on a rune-etched table – Varuz stands at the astrolabe, books open around him as he works on the onyx pyramid, symbols floating in the air. He’s very focused on his work.
Ki asks Andreas to make a forcefield around Varuz, to separate him from the pyramid – Andreas doesn’t want to do that, he’s just here to talk. Bee is still very distraught about Varuz stealing from her, and Andreas ends up making a small translucent forcefield between Varuz and the pyramid, not fully blocking him. Varuz finally looks up, saying he didn’t expect us to come this far.
Ki and Hester move in sync, circling around him to prepare to grab the black pyramid. He doesn’t like how hostile we’re getting, and neither does Andreas, who just wants to talk. Varuz says he took off with the black pyramid to study it, but that he intended to come back to the camp; he implies Bee’s a child, and he didn’t want her to hurt herself on a hot stove.
Bloom is pissed about being left to deal with their “mutual friend” on his own, and Varuz basically says it’s his own fault for making a deal with a devil – this is news to Andreas, and Varuz tells him Bloom has made multiple deals with Bob. It’s pointed out that Varuz also made a deal, but he says his was out of necessity, and that he broke his deal because he didn’t want to help someone who’d prey on the innocent. Ki, Andreas, and Bee make spirit checks on this; Ki fails hers and gets no read, but Andreas Bee get the sense he’s being genuine about this.
Bee asks if Varuz knows whose lab this was, and he says he has suspicions, but doesn’t know for sure. He declines to share his suspicions, saying he won’t show his cards. He says he came here to use the power of the pyramid to find the Xeroxixia and other pieces of the exalted nine, as well as to aid a particular book within our camp. With the increased devilish activity, he felt it was a good time to leave camp for his own safety.
He says the pyramid provides power he wants to utilize, and he doesn’t want to go further with his work until he knows how the latent magic works, or until he can get the other parts of the pyramid, so he can use it to his fullest extent. The pyramid is meant to rest on a focus, and he’s attempting to find more information on that, as well as the location of the focus.
Bee says she could share information back at camp, but doesn’t have the “stuff” with her – she collected some papers from Mr. Raymas. Ki offers to let him work on the pyramid if she can be in the room during, and that she’ll only take it for missions requiring it. He refuses, and says we’ll get the pyramid back when he’s done with it. Telepathically, he calls Guy back, telling him to come back with his ax, because a fight might break out; when Guy’s a little shocked by this, he tells Guy to just come back and help diffuse.
Bee says she just wants to get the pyramid to who it belongs to, and Varuz asks if she means the storm witch, before asking if this seems like a good plan – Ki says we’ll need to answer that before actually handing it over it over to the storm witch, but it is an avenue we need to explore further. He asks what we’ve done in this exploration thus far, if we’ve made any progress.
Bee says Varuz was her research, as well as Mr. Raymas and his papers – Varuz points out that Raymas is dead, we’ve said we can’t understand the papers, and that he’s trying to conduct the research now. He talks more about the divider as an ancient piece of arcane technology, and Bloom asks if he recognizes the term “divider”; he makes a mental check, with 2 successes [rolled: 6, 6]. Pain shoots through his head as “divider” rings in his mind, and he’s falling to his feet, then falling further, further, further, into the labyrinthian depths of a dungeon.
Angel has begun to maneuver through this oppressive gloom, the Alabactus Scepter clasped in their hands, a scepter that glows and illuminates their path. Grotesque murals seem to writhe and pulse with a life of their own, eldritch energy distorting reality itself. The dungeon’s architecture is warped, defying the laws of physics – doors appear where there were none, and the shifting of passages confounds navigation. Angel presses forward, the scepter cutting through the eldritch miasma, “For Ilia, For Ilia,” repeating in his head as the scepter’s weight grows heavier with every step.
They venture further, the dungeon itself continuing to twist and distort everything around. As they approach a junction, the very fabric of space ripples, and the scepter’s glow falters, giving them glimpses of the nightmarish landscapes existing parallel. The thought of Ilia acts as a shield against the approaching madness, and they see a massive gate glowing ahead, golden doors in eldritch splendor.
Their steps become more deliberate, and they look upon the door, seeing shifting patterns of pyramids. The scepter’s glow intensifies as they approach, the air seeming to shimmer with unseen energies and distorting their perception, “For Ilia, For Ilia,” growing ever-louder in their mind. As they reach the doors, the scepter erupts into brilliance, but as Angel tries to make their way to the door, they collapse at the threshold – there’s a thunderous voice, and they see the Titan Niorax, eyes ablaze. Niorax lifts them off of the ground, and they feel power coursing from the Titan at their touch, but also from the object they hold; the black pyramid, the divider.
These sources fight against the warping reality, and the golden doors creak open, the Titan’s hand pushing in, revealing a new expanse beyond. Angel enters, “For Ilia. For Ilia. For Ilia,” in their mind. They come back to consciousness, and to everyone else, it looks like Bloom just had a violent seizure. Andreas moves to help him, and sees a strange tattoo forming across Bloom’s head, fading as he gains consciousness. To Andreas, it looks like a mess of complex geometric symbols.
Bloom’s shaken, and asks Bee where she got the divider – he says it’s from Niorax (Varuz doesn’t react to this). Bee reaffirms that she got it from Raymas, and that Raymas’s papers hadn’t mentioned anything about this, from what she’d seen. Guy asks if that was an example of touching the stove, and Varuz says yes, that it looks like someone’s been touching the stove a lot – Bloom says Varuz helped him touch the stove, and Varuz says that he was guiding him, and that that’s called cooking.
The conversation moves to Andreas, and Varuz says Andreas’s blood shows high torvian potential, though he doesn’t know which torvian. It also appears that the magic he’s channeling is from himself – his blood is magical, and he seems to be a sponge for his own power, though Varuz doesn’t know what the fuel source is. He asks about Andreas’s lineage, since he couldn’t find it in the books, but Andreas doesn’t know who his birth parents were. Andreas thanks him for helping.
Varuz warns Andreas not to try to build great structures from the forcefield, or go far beyond what he believes is possible. He says these methods are slow, but they’ll take time to explore this avenue, if he lives that long. Bee suggests maybe he has a weird organ that stores the magic, and mentions they could do an autopsy, before remembering someone has to be dead for an autopsy. Varuz says a living autopsy would be an exploratory surgery, but that that’s not a measure he wants to resort to.
Bee asks what makes her – she says she’s unraveling, and Varuz says he could fix her. He says there’s an artform at her core, and that the dead can be stitched together and reanimated with magic. She could be falling apart if the magic is waning or broken. He refers to her as a flesh golem.
Ki once again tries to convince Varuz to let her keep the pyramid in sight at all times, and makes a spirit check with 6 successes. He says that at times he’ll be doing things upon his own countenance, but he won’t leave camp again with the pyramid. He’ll also put a marker on her, so that he can tell where she’s going, and what she’s attempting to do with the divider. Bee confirms that they can come check it out from him like a book. Ki gets a spirit save at detriment ii to see if she can agree to this, and gets 3 successes – it’s acceptable to her.
He knows where the focus might be, so we may be able to go north and use the divider for our protection. He says the location is on Hanner Nos Peak.
Bloom asks if the focus is the Alabactus Scepter, and Varuz is very shocked – he didn’t know there was a scepter. Bloom says the last time he saw the scepter, he was the one holding onto it. Varuz is still intrigued by this, but says we have to get moving, to protect both himself and Bloom from Bob.
Bee asks if Varuz is having fun with the pyramid. He says he wouldn’t say that, and asks if she was. She says she was just holding it, and never did nothin’ with it – he raises an eyebrow at this.
We go into Varuz’s ship and get ready to take off. Bee is very enthused about seeing Kuno working. Guy is told he’s exempt from chores for another hour and 4 minutes. We start traveling, and get to 30 minutes to midnight, with the sphere slowing a bit; he says he’ll drop us off at the top of the mountain, and that there’s a quite large unfriendly pegasus following us through the storm. He’s gonna try to lead it away, giving us exactly 30 minutes to find the scepter and leave.
Bloom asks if the pegasus is a friend of Hester’s, and she says no – the others point out that it’s probably Belatrosh. Varuz was unable to see if Belatrosh had a rider.
There’s a temple on top of the mountain, and we’re told to approach stealthily, because there are creatures about. We need to make it to the staircase. He tells us to jump. Ki carries Bee, since Bee’s balance isn’t great with only one arm, and Hester grabs Bloom. Andreas and Guy are left to jump on their own, but we all land safely in snowdrifts, though it’s cold as shit (-20 degrees now). The sphere flies off, and we see a pair of massive black wings 40-50ft across, cresting out of the snow to fly off after the sphere.
We make physical checks to start sneaking up to the temple, at benefit ii. Ki, Bee, and Hester get 4 successes, Bloom, Andreas, and Guy get 3. We all lose 5 sp, but make it closer to the crumbling temple. We see a bronze circle on the ground, with a set of stairs that go up to the back of the temple – there’s no roof, so we’re not sure where they’re going. Also outside the temple are about 5-6 women in black robes, constructing piles of bone and sinew. We hear their dark chanting even over the howling winds, and see bits of dark energy like smoke flowing out of their hands and up into the air. Magic-users are given the ability to make mental checks – only Andreas can, and he gets 0 successes.
Ki ties another whistler to an arrow and fires it off. The gloomweavers stop working, and a few venture off to investigate. We make another physical check to sneak in – Ki, Bee, and Hester get 5 successes, Andreas and Bloom get 2 successes, and Guy gets 1. The 5 gang slips through to the temple without incident. Andreas ends up bumping into Bloom, and they crash into the snow, with one gloomweaver looking near them. Guy then slips on some ice, and crashes into one of the piles and bones and sinew, and it tumbles. The gloomweavers start to make their way over, and while he hasn’t been spotted, he’s clearly in trouble.
Bloom attempts to huck an object at another pile of bone, but it makes no noise in the storm. Guy tries to hide in another snowdrift, and gets to roll a d6 – he needs to roll higher than a 3. He rolls a 6, and the gloomweavers spot our older footprints, and hustle off that way. We make it to the temple, and climb about two stories in the closed stairwell, until we make it up to a small room (~100sqft). The room seems to be made of diamond, with some walls chipped and broken, giving off a strange glow – but to most people, it just seems like a flat, scratched-up diamond room.
Bloom sees a riddle on the wall – “In trust's attire, I dance with deceit, / A friend's facade, a subtle spark. / In shadows deep, my whispers play, / Trust shattered, I lead astray. / What am I?” He reads it out to the rest, and Andreas gets a hero point for saying “betrayal”. A staircase appears, and we go up it to find a massive room (10k sqft), with hundreds of statues, mostly of huge humanoids. They’re 9-11ft tall, battling against statues of deformed eldritch monstrosities, and fight side-by-side with others – humans, gnolls, goblins, genasi, minotaurs… there’s beautiful detail on the faces, shouting and screaming, with even tears subtly etched into the stone. On the opposite side of the room is another staircase leading further up. Bee guesses that this is “The Great Betrayal”, after Andreas suggests the room is depicting a betrayal, and says she got some information on her pyramid. There’s a bunch of other pyramids, ones that were created during the Great Betrayal.
Bloom looks for any figures he recognizes, and sees a proud-looking warrior with two massive greatswords, chopping through a 17-limbed beast made of looping entrails and teeth. The person’s face is yelling, might be a war cry – he recognizes Xix. Bee echolocates, and doesn’t find anything abnormal. She gets 1 success on a mental check identifying the room’s material as slate, with some other inclusion, maybe feldspar. The group heads up the staircase, and Bee thanks no one in particular for letting her see this.
The next room is similarly huge, pockmarked with explosions and bone. The humanoid races are all running toward the door, with the massive humanoids being left behind, and there are more eldritch creatures. A stone door is in the process of dropping from the ceiling, about 5ft from the ground (we have to stoop to get past). Guy thinks none of the large humanoids depicted will make it. Another staircase leads upward. Bloom suggests this might be the sacrifice of the Ring of Quelling, and Andreas has no idea what he’s talking about.
Bee echolocates, and finds something else in the room, shifting constantly on the ceiling – she points it out to us, but we only see darkness. We tentatively make our way back up the stairs, and make it to the next room with 6 minutes to midnight. We find a smaller room, but still large (~5k sqft). We see a slaughter of the larger humanoids, and the stone seems so real, as those eldritch beasts pull flesh from the corpses. Parts are strewn about the room, and both the young and old are massacred.
Ki sees the center of the room – 9 of the greater humanoid beings on their knees, reaching up. Suspended about 15ft up in the air is a scepter made of a bone-white material. We feel a tightness in our chests like we’re falling, and Guy stumbles a bit, beginning to feel nauseous. Bee suggests Bloom should get the scepter, and Ki has to make a mental save as she flies Bloom up, and gets 2 successes. She’s hit with vertigo, and the rest of us watch as parts of her body begin to float away. Hair, feathers, and more; she sees herself out of one eye in the 3rd person.
Bloom grabs the scepter at 3 minutes to midnight, and feels the power within grow. The statues’ hands lift higher, and the “statues” of the eldritch beasts are eating. Ki makes a physical save to fly down, and gets 3 successes – she wobbles as she makes it to the ground, her right leg hitting, then her second right leg hitting. Bits of herself start to overlay on each other. Guy scoops her up, though his vision is still swimming with nausea.
There’s energy building here, and the entirety of the space is losing all color. Andreas had lingered at the top of the stairs, and as we leave, he sees a swirling force coming from the back of the room, colorless tendrils extending toward us. He shouts for everyone to run, and throws up a forcefield to buy us time – there’s a pained shriek that comes from deep within the walls, and there’s silence and darkness, and then we’re stumbling out of the staircase into the cold. Eyeless gloomweaver bodies hang suspended near the top of the temple.
Ki hears a voice in her head. “Now is your chance, you have one part of the key, you must travel to find the other, but it’s time to reward you for your hard work. What do you desire? What do you need?” – Mechanically, she gets +5 of anything, and +3 of anything. She asks for +5 intel and +3 morale.
We feel a surge as the bronze circle begins to glow, and papers and maps appear in a burst of light. We scoop them up, Bee grabbing as many as she can with her one arm… One arm? Two arms, the one she lost already regrowing, each muscle fiber slowly and deliberately being placed upon her flesh. She’s being remade.
The sphere lands, and we see a sweat-drenched Varuz. He asks if we have it, and holds his hand out for the scepter – Bloom very reluctantly relinquishes it after Varuz promises to give it back (though he has no idea if Varuz is being honest). The session ends here.
Everyone gets a level-up!