Due to some violent content, Barntal discretion is advised. In the year two
forty seven, in the Age of Judges, Vartan was summoned home by a
letter stating that his father had died under mysterious circumstances. Upon returning home,
Vartan opened his mind at the possibility that his father's death and his hometown of
Eterno was not everything that had appeared to be welcome to itherial embrace, not
all servants of the Many Faced God or tieflings, but all the death guides
like myself are I think it has something to do with our infernal bloodlines,
or it's just because we look cool. Day four morning, Emery's Archanist's shop.
There are notes around an incantation, footnotes in tell Mika's handwriting that bitch
and anybody else. Yeah, you flip through it, and there are a
couple other exerts would tell Mika in there. There's some from Kirian in there,
and then the majority of the notes that are throughout the book though as
you flip through, are actually in Susan's handwriting the mother. Yeah, which
I would I would know that. Yep, you would recognize Susan's handwriting for
sure, anything in there matching the summoning circle for Colin Zill or that way,
you think that are Colin Zill rolling investigation for that to specifically flip through
the book and look for and extra planer summoning circle. Oh better than again?
Oh okay, okay, still not twenty It's awesome, all right.
Yeah. You do find one page toward the back of the book. The
page itself, it's not the same symbol that is in the cave that you
saw, but it talks about how to how to take a more elaborate symbol
and be able to tie it with magic, to be able to get to
another plane, to be able to access another anybody's notes in particular around that
one, Susan's okay, um, what was Tellmica's Uh? What was that
incantation that Tellmica had her notes on earlier on in the book? Was that
anything that stood out? Her notes were about more about where to find different
elements of the spell, for components, and there were like footnotes saying this
component can be extracted from this plant, or these shavings from this stone can
be found at this portion of the mountain. So they're more along the lines
of where to find the components, not anything about alterations to the spell or
tweaks or changes or attempts. She was gathering materials to make her own poor.
Yeah, or at least she put in the research as to where to
find those components. Emery was there when you were born. She would know
your mother. Yeah. And if she's saying that I'm the first person to
borrow this book, then why are there notes from other people in it?
Memory wipe? So yeah, we do know. Either she's really good at
lying about her memory being wiped, or her memory is wiped and she doesn't
have any memory of that, but she remembers you being born. Yeah,
but it was all fuzzy, Okay, I don't Yeah. I mean we
could continue to drill information about about people out of the town, out of
her, or we could move on and go I mean, I don't know.
We can move on and go to see tell Miga or Cody or whatever
y'all want to do. I guess we could ask about Susan real quick,
and then I guess move on. So how close were you and uh my
mom? Oh, sweetie, Susan and I were so close. We were
the best of friends. I imagine y'all were y'all did a lot of the
same magic together. Yes, she was very very apt in the yacanuts.
I learned a lot of things from her. Oh so you learned from her?
Did you happen to get the book from her? Oh? Yeah,
she had the book first. I think I think it came from her library.
Oh, her library? Okay, do I know the library? Oh?
No, it's just your father's library. Oh okay, okay, there's
a library in your house. That was the first room on the left when
you walked in. That's that was Susan's library. Okay, that's where you
found the fur bogs Justice. Do you know if she was doing anything with
the the sewers stuff for the ruins around the town before she left? No,
your father and I we put in the Suwa's after your mother's passing.
It was something we worked on just recently. But I do think your mother
did know about the ruins. I think she's the one who found them in
the caves back when Did you ever go down there with her? Oh?
Lord? No, Now, your mother was very secretive when when it came
to those things. Once she had to figure it out, she wouldn't stop
talking about it, but until she masked at something, she was locked tight
like a safe all right, Well, I appreciate your help, Emory.
Yeah. Is there anything else I can help you with? Vatan? It's
so good to see you. Mind if we grabbed those three uh wizard fires
you got, we've been helping down at the at the with the zill I
actually took a couple of them out myself. Oh well with my friends,
of course. But is that right now? Yeah, So if you're gonna
go down and you're gonna work with brass Cane, then yeah, for shot
Hun, you can have these, all right. I'm gonna grab him and
I'm gonna hold him out for the other two. Huh yeah, sure,
I'll take one. Are you feeling all right, Haun? Oh yeah,
I've never been better. Maybe a little hungry, all right? I mean
I think I got an apple here? You want it? Oh? Yeah?
Sure? She grabs an apple and hands it to you. All right,
sweetie, you take care of yourself now, Okay, all right,
thank you you too. Susan's alive. She's in town somewhere. Yep,
She's totally alive. Kirian is still alive. Oh, Emory, can you
you know that digging spell that you did for the Sewers? Yeah, what
about it? You don't. You don't happen to have like just a scroll
or something where I could cast it, do you? Oh? Man?
Ah, let me think it's gonna be one of my books. It's probably
in my big book, to be honest. I can cast it so easily
now, you know. I've been doing it Alva and Alva and Alva.
But I can try and dig it out of the book if you want to
take a peeksy. Yeah, as long as I could take it somewhere else
and use it. Oh, sweetie, I'm sorry, but this is kind
of like my you know, my book. I kind of need to hang
on to no one. No, I'm talking about like, can you put
it on a parchment and I can use it just a one use kind of
thing. Oh yeah, I could probably draw something up. It's gonna take
me a little while, though. All right, when do you need it?
By? How fast can you do it? Working on these, I'll
beat you. Oh. I could probably have it done by Dana. Okay,
that works. Um Baya takes the map of the Sewers out of her
bag. Obviously, Emery worked on the north part that isn't on the map,
so she could help fill in the rest of the map if there's any
other places missing for the sewers, good idea. Yeah, and she shows
it and I'll pay you up front for that scroll too or the so.
Yeah, so you want to ask her to do to fill in the rest
of the map. Yeah, I'm gonna show her the map. I would
have drawn in the north part of the cave system the sewer system, and
ask her if there were any other parts that she knew of that she made
that aren't on this map. Yeah. She takes a piece of charcoal out
something that can you know, easily be marked over the lines of the map
already and marks out the rest of the tunnels around the city and fills it
out. But there aren't any new access points. The access points that we're
on your map are still the access points. Okay, it's just an updated
path of all the tunnels that she put together. It was this just an
older map, Yeah, this is the older one. This is probably something
wasn't updated. You know how these things go. Yeah, sure, you
do notice that the southern paths and the eastern paths that go out of the
city take it all the way out to where she marked that circle around the
town too. Okay, so they all are access points to the bigger the
bigger circle. Yeah. Oh, and seeing that you guys didn't want to
know about it before, that path that you guys didn't take last night is
one that leads straight back into town and runs under both the temple and the
last stop tavern. And did the tavern have an uh a spot where it
went down? No, it didn't, okay, just the just the temple
did. But the storehouse does. Yeah, yeah, yeah, temple,
storehouse, then a couple empty houses. She did she say that she stopped
working on the sewage system. It was completed before Kirian died. I don't
know if I did say it, but she stopped working on it when Kirian
died. Okay, okay, all right, So how much for the how
much for the spell? How sweetie, I'll work on it. Don't you
worry about it, all right. We'll just say it's a my my gift
to you for coming back home, all right, I appreciate it. Yeah,
she will. She'll finish up the potion that she's working on right now,
just to just to finish it and then she'll get to work on that
scroll. Okay, tell Meca seems really suspect. Yeah, she was looking
up information on teleportation circles. She has access to the barrier spell under the
town through the sewer access in the temple. She bought some of the powder
as by a leave. She puts both of her hands on Emery shoulders and
says, kisses, thank you, and she kisses one side of each cheek.
Why why it's so good to have you home. Thank you? It
was nice to meet you, all right, and you guys walk out,
Yeah, and then we can kind of discuss where we're going next. Yeah,
I guess to the temple. I'm also going to point out now,
I know bass Steel was helping us, but maybe that was to get on
our good side. Um, I'm not sure I trust brass or bass Steel.
After the message went out, and if tell Mica had made the maybe
made a portal that goes from the temple. Bastel has access to that too,
Yeah, but he might not know it exists. He seems to stick
his nose in a lot of places. Though. I hope she put the
her end of the portal in her bedroom. I think that would be a
good place to hide it. Yeah, I don't know if I don't know
if he would just go poking around in her room. Yeah, so I
trust Bastel. I don't think he's in on it. I don't think he
has anything more to do with it than what we know of. Yeah,
but tell me tell Meca seems suspect right now. Well, I trust tell
Meca and I don't trust Bastel. Man. This is well, one of
us is gonna get to say, told you, So I have to say
I don't trust either one of them. So I'm torn between which one to
trust. Um, I mean those those religious types, I'm not I'm not
too fond of them. I'm a religious type. Yeah, but I don't
know we you haven't tried to push it on me. Uh, Well,
the many faced God will come for everybody. I don't have to push it.
Well everyone except the people that live here apparently. Yeah. So you
guys are walking towards the temples, the temple? Yeah, is that what
we decide? Go there? Next? Yeah? Eating your apple? Yep,
I'll split it in half, break it in half again, be like
yeah y'all want to pace? I thank you? All right? So,
yeah, you guys, the streets are starting to have more people out and
about and doing some things. You can hear some of the guards in the
courtyard doing some practicing. You do have the three wizard fire bombs on your
persons now, and each one of those does two D six plus three fire
damage and it's just a thrown weapon or a thrown item. Yeah, like
how I talk talk to us them together? So you guys do anything on
the way, or just straight to the temple walking on in. Our other
option is to stop at the tavern, have breakfast and talk to Cody,
or we can go there after we talk to Tomica. Do we have any
gold for that for food? Yeah? Didn't you spend your last fifteen?
Oh? No, I have. I have plenty of gold, okay,
and there's I think it's only like five gold. If food hasn't been costing
a whole lot, even though we get one of everything up to y'all.
If we want to just go straight in confront Talmica, or if we want
to scope out Cody, because I know that we were worried about him before,
because he was one of the for people we were questioning that would have
known that brass Cane was in the cave all night or all day with us.
Mh. But we do have brass cane tailing Cody and and Magno and
Magno. But if brass cane's in on it, well then we can give
some time for that to play that to show itself. Yeah, um okay,
So temple first, temple and be like like I've got to snack him.
I'm good for now. All right, head to the temple. So
as you make your way too. As you make your way towards the temple,
you see Bastile with a handful of books in hand, running down the
main street in your direction, and he sees you as he's I mean when
I say running, it's like what you'd imagine a bookworm with a giant stack
of books trying to run down a busy road running right. So he's like
watching the ground trying not to trip, but can't really see over the books.
And he barely glances up in time to see Vartan giant fur bag and
he shouts, oh, Vartan, just the person I wanted to see.
Do you have a moment, Vartan, Yeah, have a moment? Yeah,
yeah, we have a moment. Kind of stumbles for a second while
he's looking at you talking and drops a handful of the books, and then
stops and kneels down on the ground to start picking up the books and stacking
them back in a stack, just as you walk up on him, finishing
the last bite of your apple. Fatan, I found it. I found
the thing that you were asking me about with the the Morezi. He whispers
it so the people in the street can't hear. Oh yeah, yes,
come come here off to the side of the road with me and let me
show you what I've found. He motions to the side, away from the
general public, still outside, like you know, maybe maybe ten steps from
where he spilled the books. He sets the rest of books down on the
ground and pulls one out. I found in here an ancient, ancient message.
It's a poem that talks about the more Z. It actually the poem
is a little weird to read, but some of these things just work that
way. If you know what you're looking for, you can still find the
information that you want. Well, I've found in here where it talks about
how the more Z is one of the one of the creators of the ghouls,
so there are different demons from the under realm, that when they come
up and they are free and hour realm, they can plague villages. And
these are in the ancient tales obviously children's stories, ghost stories, but many
times I find of hint of truth in them. Anyways, the book talks
here in this poem about how the morrisey can be told to come up here
and command its own pack of demons or evil creatures. That would make sense
for what the zill was telling you or the chasms. I'm sorry, I
can't recall what you said before, but it makes sense for them to be
giving orders to these underling creatures. It's also said that when a morse feeds
on an individual, that the more z can assume the appearance of that individual.
Then it can stay in that form for no more than a ten day,
but typically much less. It must continue to feed on that individual to
keep that form, But during that ten day it eventually starts to decay and
the body looks more like a ghoul if you will, back to the normal
moraze shape and form. It also says that eventually the person that the more
z is feeding on turns into a ghoul, and they send that ghoul out
and they create havoc throughout the towns. And he shows you a picture of
the more Z and it's it's a blurry like chalked up picture in a book.
So it's you know, just aided and you know, really dark.
It's not very descript at all, but kind of looks like, uh,
kind of looks like a tall goblin with long clawed hands instead of goblin fingers,
and but very humanoid looking, you know, with the exception of the
face. The face looks like the face of an elf if it was beat
with a undead stick. So this is pretty much all I could find on
it. But I did want to bring it to your attention. I told
you that I would. Yeah, Now, the the Morsey pretending to be
somebody? Is there? Is there any like kind of like ticks or any
any signs that would give them away. Well, according to this, you
look for the person who begins to while they are walking around the town.
There's skin sluffing off. Have you seen anyone like that just falling to bits?
Can't say I have you, No, I haven't, but I barely
look up from my books. We all know that. Now, Well,
anything about tell Meca, maybe tell Mika. Yeah, well, I couldn't
imagine her to be a powerful, undead demon. She barely remembers to eat
breakfast in the morning. So I'm guessing they put off a kind of smell
right well, And there's nothing in the poem that says anything about a smell,
but I guess that would make sense that there would be one. I
mean, a rotting ghoul would smell pretty poorly. Oh, the person that's
getting fed on? Does it say anything about them? Obviously they end up
turning into a ghoul? But can they would they know they're being fed on
like well? According to the poem, the bite of a Moorsey can drain
its victim's sense of self. If this affliction goes on for long enough,
that can turn them into the gul. I don't know how much that relates
to their soul, to their total sense of awareness. For example, if
you're missing a chunk out of your leg, losing a little sense of self
would probably still tell you that it hurts to walk on that leg, would
it not? Yeah, I reckon, So thank you for this information.
Bastill. I'm sorry that I ever questioned you or doubted you. You're lovely
and wonderful and baya gives him a hug. Oh my, thank you for
the hug. But you doubted me. I told you from the get go
that something was fishy around here. I'll hug you back. Come here.
You know you're new to town, so you always got to keep a keen
eye out. I'm sure you understand. Ah, yes, with all the
strangeness, the new person in town is probably ideally the one I would blame
as well. But look at my legs. And he pulls up his pant
leg to show his uh skinny leg and he says, no bites missing out
of me today. Oh, he's adorable. You're adorable. Um, okay,
have you seen brass Cane. I want to share this information with him
as well? Have not? Oh? All right, well, I guess
I'll head on down to the barracks. Then be safe now that we know
as well, all right, and don't don't share this information with with others
just yet. We asked brass Cane not to tell anyone about the portal,
and he did, Oh my, yeah, just just you, since you
have plenty of that, right. Well, yes, is there anyone that
I mean, I feel like telling either Graystone or brass Cane about this looming
threat to their town is probably going to be helpful. Keeping it secret from
them might incriminate me, wouldn't you think? Yeah? I do. Oh
oh, well, then just give give me until after dinner. Okay,
Well, I guess I can take my time getting down there. Maybe I'll
make a stop down at the bakery and see what kind of breads they're working
on. Sounds good. Um, I'm gonna be around the around Emories a
little after dinner. If you want to meet up there, I can tell
you what I find and we can discuss what we need to do. Very
good. Sounds like a plan to me. I'll see you at Emories right
after dinner. I hope that's okay with you. You too, Yeah,
no, that's that's great. The less people that know about this, I'm
gonna flip them a gold and be like, hey, here, here,
this this will help you get some get some nice bread. He robs three
books while trying to catch the piece of gold by it goes oh goodness,
vartand and helps helps um best you'll pick up the books. Thanks, thank
you? Are you all right? Vartan? Yeah? I had a snack,
but I'm still kind of hungry. Ah. Bread down the mind.
I see, make sure to get some get some food in that belly of
yours. I can hear it rumbling from over here. Yeah, and then
he turns around a scurry off. Thank you for listening to this episode of
Ethereal Embrace and a Fool's Quest production. Vartan the fur bag Fighter is voiced
and played by Adam Culbertson. Bay A Rustin, the Half Elf Sorcerer is
voiced and played by Tisha Ovic. The tie Fling Cleric is voiced and played
by Chris Johnson and I am Nico your GM. Please remember to drop us
a five star rating and review on your favorite podcatcher. Music provided in part
by Midnight Syndicate, makers of the original Dudgeons and Dragon's soundtrack. If you
would like to follow us on social media or say hello to the cast,
details on where to find us will be in this episode's notes. Remember,
be safe, we love you all, and stay foolish.