#and he wanted to be extortionary and found the life they wanted for him dull and essentially beneath him

[parasite-core]

This week in Pathfinder we had the most stressful cooldown episode ever :)

@scarlet-the-girl

The party arrived back to the Clocktower after fighting Kostchtchie. It was still early in the day, so after getting some healing done and getting Greta so that Cesseer could rest, we decided to get a plan together to clear out the Water Palace where the final known Crone Queen was located. We came to the conclusion that trying to infiltrate the place like we did with the library and the winter wolves’ palace would be our best course of action.

Unfortunately, this would mean going in unarmed and unarmored, since it was a bathhouse.

We stored all of our equipment in Calio’s bag of holding to place in the Water Palace’s locker room, then we made our way to the bathhouse. The trip there was uneventful—we’d thinned out the patrols so thoroughly at this point that we easily made our way halfway across the city without being noticed. Calio took the lead entering the water palace, talking to the receptionist and playing the part of a regular customer. Greta, Nestian, and Edeya joined him, while Aenland, Nevra, and Talsune waited for Calio’s signal on a nearby rooftop, and Roscoe was safely stashed in the Bag of Holding.

The group scouting out the Water Palace entered the changing room, and everyone but Edeya stripped down with no second thoughts—Greta and Nestian being a wolf and a bear respectively in their true forms, and Calio just being Calio, Edeya was the only one who considered that being flustered was even a normal reaction to this particular situation.

Once everyone had gotten changed, they entered the bathhouse proper. There were 3 tubs, with a waterfall between each, and stairs leading up to whichever you wished to enter (the hot, lukewarm, or cold tub). In the middle of the uppermost tub was what appeared to be a magical statue made entirely of water, shaped like a dragon, with water spilling forth from its open maw. To the side of each of the other tubs were two enormous ice yai onis, which stood statue still—pretending to be inanimate.

Greta and Edeya walked around one end of the tubs, while Calio and Nestian walked around the other way. Unbeknownst to them, their disguise was almost seen through by the ‘water dragon’, but it got distracted at the last moment when Edeya swung around and accidentally went face first into Greta’s chest.

While shenanigans were happening on the girls’ side of the tub, Nestian spotted something written in the pool in Skald—which he couldn’t read, but he knew Calio could. So he pointed it out to his companion, who translated it as ‘the VIP room’. They determined this must be where the secret entrance to the room the Crone Queen was hidden in was. Nestian and Calio got into the pool, catching Edeya and Greta’s eyes to get them to follow suit.

They moved away from the onis and other patrons as much as possible, and discussed what Nestian and Calio had spotted. They came up with a plan: Nestian would return to the locker room and get the Bag of Holding. Calio and Edeya would open the hidden door and stealthily slip inside, and Calio would signal to Aenland. Then when they were inside, Edeya would use her Bracelet of Friends to transport Nestian inside, and Greta would just have to burst in on her own once shit hit the ceiling.

We got into positions, giving Nestian enough time to get down to the locker room and gather our things before Edeya and Calio carefully slid open the door.

And they heard a strange unnatural sounding voice announce to the Crone Queen and the elven man with her that they had uninvited guests. The voice came from one of four enormous spiders that took up the corners of the room. And in the pool was a writhing mass of tentacles and wolf heads—a Scylla.

Edeya immediately shut the door, but it was too late as a booming noise echoed through the complex, alerting everyone within. Calio understood the noise to be speech due to Tongues—it was a foreign speech from something far far too massive, coming from somewhere deep below them.

A staff member ran into the locker room and asked Nestian—in Skald—if he knew where the intruders were. Nestian shrugged noncommittally, with no idea what she was saying or precisely what was going on, except that clearly the alarm had been raised. Despite Nestian now being in his bear form, and therefore very clearly not belonging here, the dragon-blooded sorcerer ran off to find said intruders.

Immediately the onis, the water dragon, and the various other staff members went on the offensive. The Onis moved from their pedestals, one taking a swing at Calio, and the other managing to get a swing at all three—Calio, Greta, and Edeya. Beneath the Onis, one of the monks swung around and tried to Quivering Palm Greta.

Calio tried to get revenge on the monk for his attempt to instant kill Greta, casting a Fire Storm on every inch of the bathhouse he could see—including kicking open the door to the secret room and tossing fire in to burn the Crone Queen and her spidery friends. Unfortunately the monks dodged—but everyone else in both rooms burned. The water of the baths kept most of them from being lit on fire for any extended amount of time—except for the dragon-blooded sorcerer, who ran in at just the wrong moment and got caught up in the blast. Without his components, Calio was limited in what spells he could Quicken, so he attempted to Banish one of the Onis, but it resisted his attempt, refusing to be sent home by a puny human.

After the sorcerer ran out of the room, Nestian activated his Boots of Speed and dashed out of the room himself, using his ursine strength to climb straight up the sides of each of the tubs as he reached them and then propel himself forward, until the reached the rest of the party, holding out the Bag of Holding.

The water elemental dragon breathed boiling hot steam at us, Calio took the brunt of it, with Nestian and Edeya dodging entirely and Greta resisting a good portion due to her ring. Without his Bone Armor or his belt boosting his endurance, Calio was already on his last legs.

Aenland, Nevra, and Talsune were Dimension Doored into the metaphorical belly of the beast. Aenland began having back and forth shit talk with the elven wizard, who was also named Aenland, but it was pronounced Eenlend, which infuriated Aenland worse, and he was all high and mighty that he was a proper elf wizard and only elves who can’t handle the rigorousness of magical study become lowly *archers*.

However Aenland held himself in check enough to aim for the Crone Queen instead of the mage, shooting her to death with a flurry of arrows before turning his attention back to the elven wizard, who was quite offput that Aenland had ruined a deal that was going to make him very rich.

While he did that, Talsune tore into the enormous Scylla, and rended it apart before it or its summoned Charybdis could act. However it wasn’t the only thing in those dark waters. Unnoticed by the bathing elven wizard, something big and ancient and hungry swam deep below the surface of this dark pool. And with the Scylla out of the way, it rose to the surface.

It was immense, too immense to even see the entire beast as it surfaced. What could be made out appeared to be a whale-like beast with a shell of ice down its back and frost tapering down its sides. It was like a Leviathan, but changed to better fit with the icy waters of Irrisen.

Outside, things weren’t looking too good. Calio had his equipment back, had tossed Roscoe through the doorway to help Talsune and Aenland, and he managed to patch himself up with a Harm spell. Then he Boneshakered the monk who’d tried to kill Greta, and dragged him under the water. He never resurfaced. However right after, the two Onis continued laying into everyone in the party—with Nestian helping to block what he could, but doing so was leaving him battered and bloody as well. And two more monks ran in and attempted to Quivering Palm members of the party, to no effect thankfully. But now we were well and truly surrounded.

And then Aenland got eaten.

Talsune had charged the Leviathan and gotten a respectable slash across the monstrous whale, but it didn’t even acknowledge the essentially papercut sized gash when compared to its massive girth. Instead, it propelled itself out of the water just enough to grab Aenland and then dive. Deep, deep, back into the darkest depths of the pool where no one would reach them.

Talsune immediately told Calio what happened, and Calio told the others. Nestian told him not to worry, he had an idea to save Aenland. Calio trusted in Nestian, and kept trying to deal with their own problem. Especially when the water dragon flew down, flanking with one of the Onis. Calio took advantage of its new positioning to cast Horrid Wilting, which did some massive damage to it and respectable damage to everything else around it.

Nestian pulled off the bow and arrow charm on his bracelet of friends, teleporting Aenland from the much more literal belly of the beast and back out to the middle of battle instead. Frying pans and fire and all that.

After Aenland appeared we saw that the dragon-blooded sorcerer, who we’d mostly forgotten about, had been making her way around the tub and was now here—a bit singed for her trouble. She spoke a word, and tried to kill Aenland instantly, identifying him as the most injured member of the party. Nestian threw the protection of the Black Rider around Aenland, strengthening his resistance and saving him from an instant end to his story (or at least from needing to be resurrected).

Aenland repaid the trouble by killing both the water dragon and the draconic sorcerer with a flurry of arrows.

The nearest Oni tried to reposition herself so she and the other Oni would be flanking us in place of the now-dead dragon, earning her an attack from both Aenland and Nestian, but it did not down her and she was able to get in position. Not for long as Greta tore into her, slaying her with a brutal bite.

The other Oni threw her attacks on the party, which again left us battered, but Calio stepped out of her range to cast Oracle’s Vessel and then Harm on Aenland to heal him, while Talsune finished off the last Oni—having been teleported out of the Leviathan’s chamber by Nevra before the enormous beast resurfaced to find a new target. Roscoe was left behind, taking pot shots at the spiders from the ceiling of the chamber, much as he’d been doing to Daemons during his solo week in Abbadon.

The party regrouped and entered the chamber with the dark pool. Roscoe had paralyzed the spider nearest the door, leaving it unable to take swipes at anyone entering and making it an easy target for Nevra to finish off, while Aenland took shots at the spider in the back corner. Nestian charged in at the spider in the opposite corner, despite being on his last legs with more blood in his fur than in his body. Edeya followed behind and avoided an attack of opportunity to heal him.

Then the Leviathan rose to the surface, and once again grabbed Aenland off Nevra’s back. With his Stone of Farspeech he told Calio not to let Edeya teleport him out with her other Bracelet of Friends until they’d killed this thing. Calio complied, flying in on Talsune’s back and unleashing a Slay Living empowered by his pocket watch, followed by an attempt at Boneshatter that was resisted. Before the Leviathan could dive back under the waves with their friend in tow, Nestian finished it off with a final swing of his axe. Aenland escaped its now limply open mouth, and its body fell back into the darkness of the depths below.

The party investigated the room further, trying to discern where the portal into the Dancing Hut was hidden. Aenland gave Nestian his Goggles of Trueseeing so he could explore the magical darkness at the bottom of the pool. Nestian dove under and found a rune carved into the side of the pool, which could send them to the hut, dispel the darkness, and turn the pool into a magical bath that would empower them if they bathed in it for an hour.

Forebodingly, however, he did not find the body of the beast they’d just slain at the bottom of the pool.

The party was exhausted by this point, and decided to head back to the Clocktower.

Calio had a talk with Nestian about a conversation he’d had with Aenland. He hoped that Nestian could get through to Aenland, because Calio wasn’t good at dealing with him when he got stubborn. Calio had talked to Aenland about how *obviously* he and the others were going to help him to fight Treerazor when this was all over, it was a given. Aenland had disagreed vehemently. After some back and forth it come around to Aenland telling Calio that he didn’t want them to go because they would die if they went. Calio tried to reason with him that *he* had a better chance of survival if they all went, but he was having none of it, he didn’t want to see people he cared about killed by Treerazor a second time. So Calio was hoping that Nestian could talk some sense into Aenland, because Calio didn’t know how to get through to him when he was running on his emotions.

Nestian suggested approaching this from a different angle: instead of trying to convince Aenland that he logically should let them come along, Calio should try convincing Aenland that him going off on his own and getting himself killed would hurt them in the same way Aenland losing his family had hurt him. Calio agreed that this was a good argument—and one he never would have thought of on his own.

As Calio was making to leave to rest for the evening, Nestian mentioned that they would be going to the Dancing Hut to get Anastasia the next day. Calio was surprised this was his friend’s priority, and he said so, pointing out that Nestian’s mother and her Eidolon were still trapped in the Nonagon. It hit Nestian for the first time that his mother was likely still in danger, and he agreed that going to deal with Keisuke—one way or another—should be their first priority tomorrow.

Before Calio left, Nestian asked him why he cared so much about Keisuke. It struck him that there was more to it than just Calio feeling he owed the kitsune his life. Calio was quiet for a time before admitting to Nestian that, the way he saw it, if he’d met the party at any point other than when they did—whether he was still without his memories or the Grimm Rider in this scenario—the others would have tried to kill him on meeting him, just like they had Keisuke. They only liked him now because they knew him.

Nestian disagreed with Calio’s assessment. He agreed that Calio and Keisuke had some things in common, but they differed in a vital way: Calio couldn’t bring himself to be pointlessly cruel. Sure, he could be cruel to people who slighted him first, but he never just went around hurting innocent people. Calio pointed out that just hurting innocent people without cause was pointless and a waste of energy, it gained him nothing. Nestian said that’s the point: plenty of people they’d met and defeated DID hurt and kill innocent people just because they found it fun. Calio argued that the fact they had killed all the people who did that proved that it was an ineffective means of getting and keeping power. Nestian told Calio that he was better than he gave himself credit for—he’d never hidden the sort of person he was from Greta, and she loved him all the same, just like he loved her, and that said something about who he really was. Calio had no argument for that.

Elsewhere, Aenland had gone looking for the Night Monarch, to give her the gift meant for Desna to get the goddess of dreams’ blessing in saving Xanthadon from her demonic patron.

He and Nevra flew to the top of the opera house, in hopes that the Night Monarch might pass by one of the highest buildings in the city—or at least it would give them a good lookout spot.

While they waited they talked. Much like Calio and Nestian, they talked about Aenland’s plans for when this was over, and his desire not to have his new family join him in battle and get themselves killed. Unfortunately, he knew they were stubborn as hell and weren’t going to just take no for an answer. And if he tried to go on his own there was a good chance they were going to use everything at their disposal to try to track him down to help.

Nevra tried to bounce some ideas off him on how to either convince them to not come, but they both knew that in the end the others wouldn’t be dissuaded. Aenland bemoaned that as ‘his family’ they were incredibly frustrating, to which Nevra added that that’s what made them good friends, though.

As they talked, The Night Monarch appeared on the rooftop alongside them. She said it was pure luck that she happened to land here on this night—but luck had a deeper meaning to her and her lady than it might to others. She noted that she knew Aenland had something to give to her.

Aenland offered the acorn he’d taken from Earth—the progenitor of Vigliv’s tree, which had also taken in power from the herald of a god of another universe that had slipped between the cracks in reality into this world. He explained that he’d taken this acorn with the intention of it being his anchor back to ‘that sad planet’—he’d intended to go back to do something to help that world that Baba Yaga hailed from, where magic was dead. But now it had become something more, after absorbing whatever power the herald of that alternate Gozreh held. He believed it was something that Desna should safeguard.

The Night Monarch took the seed and examined it. Then she told him that what this told her was that he was thinking about the future. This wasn’t the offering of a man who was throwing himself into a fungal cave to die. This was the offering of a man who was looking ahead. She accepted his gift, and granted her blessing.

Aenland returned to the Clocktower, where Nestian had waited up for him with some dinner he’d saved. Aenland confirmed that he’d successfully done what he’d gone out to do, and he had the last piece of the puzzle for freeing Xanthadon. Nestian told Aenland their plan to go to the Nonagon in the morning. He and Aenland agreed that they had promised Calio not to attack Keisuke immediately—but Nestian told Aenland he believed that Calio was beginning to have his doubts about Keisuke, and the two agreed that this was probably going to come down to a fight.

The next day, the party teleported back to Artrosa, and returned to the Eon Pit. Calio asked the others to remain outside until he gave a signal. He wanted to try to talk to Keisuke first, and see if he could simply get him to release Nestian’s mother and eidolon—and he didn’t want to go in looking like he’d come with hostile intent, dragging the entire party along.

Calio went through the nine-sided door and walked down a long hallway. Up some stairs, he found himself at the same entry to the Nonagon that he usually Plane Shifted into. Keisuke had his back to the entrance, facing the final of the nine doors around the room. His ears perked up as he heard someone behind him, and he asked if it was Calio. As he was turning around, he was beginning to cast a spell—but he dropped the spell when Calio confirmed that it was him. If it l had been anyone else, apparently his first instinct on being snuck up on was to Death Clutch a bitch. As you do.

Keisuke expressed excitement that Calio had made it just in time. ‘The time and the place’, he kept telling Calio that’s all he’d needed, and now with the deal he’d struck with the King in Yellow he’d gotten it. Calio noted dryly that Keisuke could have warned him about the Demon Lord that was going to jump them in the Eon Pit, but Keisuke told him he’d honestly had no idea that was going to happen. All he’d known was that his bargain had been for him to help a Demon Lord with one task, and then he’d get the information he was seeking. And he did. And then he got right out of there, and slipped Calio the means to undo his handiwork while he was at it.

Keisuke asked Calio if he was just here to talk, or if he was here to see the end result of Keisuke’s work. Calio admitted he did want to see what Keisuke had to show, but also told him he *needed* to talk to him. Keisuke told him they could talk, but first he would show Calio the fruit of his labor—he opened the door he was standing before, revealing a chamber that was much more decorated than the plain chambers all the other simulacrums were kept in. This one looked like it was a room pulled right out of Cheliax—although Calio failed to identify the foreign nation’s style and only knew it looked more stylized than the other plain rooms. Keisuke told him that he’d been looking for a long time for the hidden cache of one of the greatest spymasters in the world, Eirtein Obeirago.

And now he had what he’d been seeking. And the means of mythic ascension were finally within his grasp.