C01 - Ep. 30 - Wight Winter - A Spectril Analysis
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This is a Rooster Teeth production. Good day to my congenial genies and affable ifrity. Hurl your burning buns on into the stinky dragon for our latest gulp, Gin of the Lamp. It's a ruthless concoction of smoky gin, citrus liqueur, fresh lemon and lime, and topped with a flame and twisted orange. This blazing beverage will burn your throat faster than you can whip up a wall of fire.

So you all are in the

slash hut of Spectral, a.k.a. Leonard Lank, who has been found out by your good friend Sleek, a.k.a. Austin Tash. So many a.k.a.'s. Everyone's got an a.k.a. Kyborg, a.k.a. number one party member. Am I right? Of the lame party. Gum Gum, a.k.a. number 47 party member.

What is that? It's a gun, I think, from Goldeneye. Mutt has just left the building. Mutt has just walked away and he is just thinking about what has brought him here in life and just really questioning all these choices. So before you stands a new friend, Leonard Lank. He's kind of a scrawny half-orc. He's got pierced ears and cropped black hair and a boyish face.

Seems like to you he's a little soft-spoken. Maybe you're not sure if he's embarrassed that he got his actual name outed in front of the villagers or not. And I think Gum-Gum and Kyborg encountered his bust way back when at the Boulderay School. So they might be the only ones who readily recognize him having seen the bust of him in the past. Did the bust say his name?

Yeah. Yes. Yeah, it did. I remember it like it was yesterday. It was so clear. Right, Gum Gum? Yeah. Tell us everything you know about him. Go ahead. He is half orc, which means we are at least half related. Maybe more. Or a quarter.

Would that encounter at the library have been the same time you guys encountered the Kenkus, which got turned into an animated short that you can watch right now on the Rooster Teeth YouTube channel? Why, yes, Sean. The very same. I hope we never run into Kenkus again. I love that animated short. I thought that turned out really well. It's very good. It was maybe one of my favorite encounters y'all have had so far in Tales from the Stinky Dragon. So Sleek steps up and addresses Leonard. Leonard, I'd like you to meet

No, go for it.

My name is Bartholomew Finn. You could just call me Bart, though. And he kind of tips over, and he's not wearing a hat, but he motions like he's taking off his hat. Oh, a pleasure, Bart. Someone just rolled something. How many times do I have to tell you? You can't just make rolls and then tell me after the fact. That's a 20 on acrobatics. I do a backflip. I do a backflip, and I say, I'm fat. You do a backflip. Roll now. Roll an acrobatics check. One. Wow.

Even better. I do a 25. I do a double backflip in the air. 25. Oh, Kyborg does an amazing backflip. But I land with my arms crossed and I go and I tilt my head up and I say, sup, I'm a Kyborg. That takes a step away from Kyborg because he can feel a lightning bolt from God himself coming down to get Kyborg at any moment. Ooh, that's quite a feat. He likes your feet.

Ew, gross bro. Hey, don't yuck anybody's yum. Uh, who's turn is it? Are you next? Go for it, go for it. Gum gum. Okay. I am Gum Gum, the great flower wizard. And then I make a flower appear below him. But you can also call me by my elvish name, Gelindor. Gelindor?

And I'm Mud.

And this is my badger, Gumbo. I was wondering if you might have anything I could feed Gumbo. It's been a bit since he's had food here in the spectral realm. What realm are we in? You're spectral. You're in the ethereal realm. He is powerful, but he does not own the entire ethereal realm. His name is Spectral, right? Right. Yes, lovely to meet you all, I'm sure. But how in the blazes did you find me here? And furthermore, were you followed?

Yes. That's a great question. We found ourselves here due to a little bit of a mistake. We got sucked in. We didn't really have a choice, so you can't be mad at us for that. I want to approach Spectral, and I want to put my hands on his shoulders. Like both hands on both shoulders? Yes. And then I want to stare him in the eye and say, the last two Infinites that we've encountered...

We're under the spell of, what was her name? Paralite. Paralite. I even just reminded you of it. It's fine. They're under the spell of Paralite. I will slap the Paralite out of you. Are you who you say you are, Spectral? You will slap it? I guess make an intimidation check. Okay. All right. Not my strongest, but we're going to do it anyways. Mud walks up to Spectral and just goes, Possessed, Infinite, say what?

What? He said it. He said it. He's possessed. Slap him. Slap him. Oh, no, no. I have nothing to do with Paralite. It's an 11. So your intimidation roll's not the best. So he doesn't seem really scared by your attempts to intimidate him. But don't forget, as he's talking, you can always roll an insight check to see whether or not you believe him or you sense ulterior motives in what he's telling you. I also have an inspiration dial.

I'll let it pass. There is no need for threats. I can get you up to speed on how I ended up here.

It's actually quite the story as to how I arrived here in the Ethereal Plane. I remember every detail like it was yesterday. But I'm afraid I'm not much of a storyteller, as I'm sure Sleek will tell you. He walks over to a nearby table, scratching his boyish chin. He glances down at a map with his grey eyes. Still, there is another way to catch you all up. As I'm sure you've no doubt guessed, this plane is teeming with memories. Sometimes they can manifest themselves in a very surreal way.

Do you know what I mean? Quadrant. We also just experienced something when we were in that weird floaty space where there was a shadowy figure that seemed to be controlling many of us and making us see things. Ah, no doubt taking advantage of the unique properties of this realm.

Here, I'll show you a much safer way to utilize those memories. So we didn't drop acid? Follow me. I know a place not far from here. Spectral starts walking to leave the hut. Can I try to surmise a way to draw out

worst, most anxiety-ridden memory from his childhood in the same way that the smoke monster did? Because I didn't get pulled into that little debacle? Oh, no, just because I just feel like you probably had some pretty traumatic stuff happen in your childhood, so I'm just seeing... I'm staring at you while we're walking and...

behind spectral to see if I can like summon a you peeing your pants in front of your friends or something. You're like concentrating, focusing, trying to unlock some kind of psychic power to like inception him. Yeah. For some reason, it just goes back to the memory inside of the pet shop where you back flipped onto the floor and couldn't help it a single way because you were prone. That was a strategic move. I shot my bow and arrow from the ground. I was multitasking. I was taking a nap and killing.

I killed many a small creature that day. Yeah. Kill in your sleep. That's been a recurring theme for Kyborg, killing small furry creatures. Yeah. So Spectral leads you all out the back of the hut. Once again, you know, you find yourself in the snowy village ruins, but everything around you is still veiled with a tinge of turquoise. The details are all muted and indistinct, like two worlds overlapping. We are at the edge of this plane, the border ethereal.

It is something of an echo of the material plane. On this side, we can see into the physical world, but can scarcely interact with it, and vice versa. Come, our destination is not far from here. Spectral heads to the edge of the village through blurry trees and past murky stones.

until you spot another vaporous curtain like the one in the grotto. But this one, however, is purple. And without hesitation, Spectral walks through the curtain and vanishes. Where'd he go? So, turquoise good, purple bad. Say turquoise again, Barb. Turquoise. Okay. I used to say turquoise, so... You're halfway between turquoise and turquoise. You're halfway in there. Well, you were wise beyond your years, Barbara. Turquoise. Turquoise.

And your Turk, Bah, beyond your years. Nailed it. That's it. Wrap the episode. We're done. That's good. That's good. Just trying to get jokes in before other people make jokes. It's difficult to find any time for my tiny little woman voice. Well, Barb, what you have to do is you have to roll the dice before you say anything. And then that gets everybody's attention on you. So then you get to do whatever you want once you do that. I made the backstory!

I'm getting a lot of passive aggression directed toward me right now. Then if it's a good roll, you do something good, and if it's a bad roll, you say it was something inconsequential. So... All right. Well, I go in through the veil, the purple thing. Ooh, the brave cyborg follows Spectral through the purple vaporous curtain. Or does the team not approve? Fuck.

Mud follows as well. Bard as well. Okay, I guess I'll follow you.

You have no choice. You all pass through the curtain of vapor and your surroundings swirl. Shades of violet and magenta wash over you until the haze settles. You arrive in an indigo field. Purple clouds swirl overhead and gnarly roots poke out of the ground as far as the eye can see. But there doesn't seem to be any trees. Spectral addresses you and says, These are the roots of Reminisce. These will tell my story far better than I ever could. Take

Take a seat and let's begin. Spectral sits down cross-legged, closes his eyes and places his hands on the roots. He takes a deep breath and his eyelids begin to flutter. I see you're also a flower wizard. Mud sits down and really starts to play with the dirt.

Kyborg searches around for Jimi Hendrix amongst this purple haze. And then I sit down. Nice. You already have an inspiration. Do we have two people sitting? Well, I'll sit down. Bart is so short that he stands, but it looks like he's sitting. I guess you're still low enough where you're able to touch the roots. He goes to sit, but doesn't actually change his height at all. His head stays. It's like when you have those chickens and you can just move them around. Their head stays in the same spot. That's Bart. Yeah.

Okay, Kyborg, you hear a voice in your head. It's the voice of Spectral, and you hear him saying... It all started the fateful night when Perilite infiltrated our home and was looking for vengeance.

And you open your eyes, Kyborg, and you wake up in a bed to the sounds of blood-curdling screams echoing outside your room. You know you're in the Infinite Headquarters. I should really get that alarm clock fixed. The torches are doused, but so are the purple gems that normally glow throughout the facility, which seems odd. Go ahead and make a perception check, Kyborg.

That is a 14. You look around your bedroom and you spot one of your boots on the floor next to your bed, but one of them seems to be missing. You think back and remember you kicked off your shoes last night and the other one must have fallen under the bed. Oh, I was playing Kung Shu. There's a monster under there. Okay, I tactically check under the bed.

How? How do you tactically check under the bed? By drawing my bow and arrow as I look underneath. You don't have a bow and arrow. You look around and none of the possessions seem to be yours. Okay. What is around me? Any weapons? You're in a bedroom. It's about a 20 foot by 20 foot room. It's made of stone walls. There's a door and no windows. Obviously, you're in a bed with a pillow. There's a dresser nearby and some dirty laundry spread about on the ground.

And you see a nightstand with some dirty dishes and cutlery on top. Okay. I take one of the knives from the cutlery, and then I check under my bed tactically. All right. You take a look under the bed slowly, not touching the floor to avoid monsters. You lift up the blankets that are blocking it, and you see a left shoe underneath the bed. Well, that was uneventful. I reached for the shoe.

You reach for the shoe and you grab it. The right shoe is where you saw it out near the dirty laundry that's on the floor of the bedroom. You roll to take a breath and then you roll again. Sorry. We're getting into the minutiae here. All right, I put on my boots, nothing else, and I walk out. I walk out into where the hallway is, I'm assuming. He's boot scooting. That's right. You're boot scooting. You feel comforted wearing the boots like it's familiar to you.

As you're putting on the boots and lacing them up, you hear the sounds of fighting and footsteps approaching the door. Okay. I double-checked. There's no weapons around here? Just the cutlery from the dirty dish? Make a perception check. Perception check. All right.

Ooh. Ooh, very perceptive. You rummage around through the drawers in the nightstand, and you find some thieves' tools in there. Okay. No, that's not a weapon. Oh, and you seem to remember, before you fell asleep, you placed your pair of daggers beneath the pillow for safekeeping. That's just dangerous. Okay, then I go under the pillow to bring back the daggers, to get the daggers. Okay, you, uh...

toss the pillow aside, exposing your daggers, and as you grab them, the door opens, and standing in the door is Dr. Ahem. Okay. Spectral, there you are. Oh, thank Daya. You're okay. We need your help.

I reply and I say, Doctor Ahem, it's me, Spectral. You wouldn't believe it, I pooped the bed last night. It is dirty, it's messy, we're gonna need to get a cleanup in here. Stat. Doctor Ahem seems a little confused and looks at the bed and doesn't see any soiling. Spectral, now isn't the time for your hijinks. Quick, hand me your daggers. Paralite is attacking us and she needs to be stopped.

Ew, no. I do an insight check. I don't think that you're Doctor at Home at all. I think you're Paralite. You're shape-shifting. Did you say Doctor Paralite? You're Doctor Paralite. That's what I thought you said. Indeed. Yeah, you can make an insight check. Alright. 20. Oh, I see all. Nat 20.

Oh, that is a net 20. You have not have any modifiers on your insight? No, plus zero. Oh, wow. Wisdom stuff or intellect stuff. Yeah, you're positive that whoever this is, they have without a doubt ulterior motives. And furthermore, the person standing before you is not Dr. He reaches out a gloved hand, you know, palm side up asking you to put the daggers into his hand. Okay, I high five him.

You high five him. You bring your hand down and high five him. And the second your hand touches his gloved hand, you are unable to move.

Good job. Called it. You're frozen in place. Doctor pulls back his hood on his robe, and as he does so, his face magically changes from Doctor to Paralyte. A sly grin comes across her bewitching pale face as she reaches out to confiscate your pair of daggers. Oh. Thank you for these, Spectral. They will come in most handy.

I knew it was you. She made a pun. Isn't that nice? The scene slowly fades away back into the mist. What does it mean? Should have thrown the blanket on her. Oh, that's a good call. You should have been there. You should have been there. It should have been you. It should have been me. It should have been you. Sorry, are we seeing any of this or is this just Kyborg? Yeah, everyone sees it. Just Kyborg is the one driving the POV. Yeah. Yeah.

We're all in John Malkovich, but Kyborg is controlling John Malkovich right now. Yes. Perfect. Mud, inspiration die.

I never get inspiration died. That's great. I like that. His first inspiration died. I'm going to make a note. More John Malkovich jokes. More Spike Jonze, the movie's references. Yeah. You hear Spectral speaking in all of your minds. She single-handedly captured all four of us Infinites that night and took us to her lair. That's when the brainwashing began. She used some form of enchantment on each of us and sent us out to do her bidding.

Gum-Gum, you open your eyes and a full moon glows overhead, shining onto the outside of the Glocken Tower. Paralite's words are branded into your mind. You have one mission to complete by any means necessary. Assassinate Guild Head Kendrick Ken Senses.

Okay. Make a perception check, Gum-Gum. Okay. Okay. That's a 10. So you look around your body, Gum-Gum, and you realize quickly it's not your body. And you look at your surroundings and you see you're standing outside the top of the Glocken Tower on a catwalk. You vaguely remember this catwalk from your previous encounter. You look up to see firelight flickering behind the frame of the door at the end of the catwalk.

This must be where your target, the guild head, is located. Okay. And he goes towards it. Okay. You walk towards the door, and it's closed, but you feel like you can hear voices speaking loudly on the other side. Am I getting closer to listen? Yeah, yeah. We'll say you're at the door. Oh, wait, do you mean like you're going to put your ear to it or something? Yeah, yeah, put my ear to it.

Okay, yeah, make a perception check. Even in your dreams, you must be perceptive. That'd be a two. That'd be a two. A two.

You hear voices, but you're not quite sure how many or none of them sound familiar to you. You get a splint in your ear from the door. I knock loudly. Hello, it's me, Gum-Gum. I'm here to kill you. You knock loudly and the voices stop and you hear some shuffling. And then you hear a voice from the other side of the door say, Wait, who is it? I'm Gum-Gum.

Gum-Gum. I'm a flower wizard. I'm here to save you. The door creaks open and behind it you see someone you don't recognize. It's kind of like a half bird, half person creature standing there. Gum-Gum. I don't know any Gum-Gum. I've never heard of a flower wizard. Well, that's because they were very rare and powerful. I am the last of the flower wizards that I know of. Ha ha!

What can I help you with? What business do you have with the Guild Head, Gum-Gum? Uh, I can't remember. In your voice, you hear again, like it's imprinted, like branded in your mind. You have one mission to complete by any means necessary. Assassinate Guild Head Kendrick Ken Senses. Okay, wait, I remember. I have one mission, and it's to assassinate the Guild Leader, uh, Senses.

bird figure in front of you seems to go pale. Do one of you know where he is? Well, he introduced himself as the guild head. Okay. He goes to try to close the door. Like, close the door behind me, or... Say, on you. Yeah, you never said you stepped in. Okay. I assumed you were still outside. Well, here, come on. Let's go in here where it's safe. And then I step in and shut the door. There it is.

You step into the room and it's a square room that's about 40 feet tall. It's made of stone walls and wood floors. There's four doors, one in each corner of the room and a ladder at the north end of the room that leads up to a loft. As you look around the room, you see there's another person sitting in here as well. There's a human. Hello, I'm Gum-Gum.

What's your name? I'm here to kill you. The human gives you a mischievous smile and says, Hello, I'm Hugh Manor. A pleasure to meet you, Gum Gum. Well, I don't like you. You try to eat me. He gives you a really confused look. Yeah, I'm confused about it too. I don't know why you would eat me. Hey, you might want to be careful. This guy likes to eat people.

Anyways, I'm here to kill you. Oh, yes. So wait, are you the leader of the guilds? Because apparently I'm supposed to kill you. Hugh Manor seems kind of helpful. He chimes in and says, Oh, yes. Guild Head Ken. That's him right in front of you. Okay. Well, apparently I'm supposed to kill you. I don't want to. How do you want this to go down?

Is there a reason why I'm supposed to kill you? Are you asking Ken? Yeah. Make a wisdom saving throw. That's not going to end well. Oh, God. Zero. You rolled a one and it just modifies to negative one. Uh...

What's that get him, Gus? What's that get him? It seems like without you being able to stop it, your hand reaches under your cloak and you pull out two daggers. And you plunge both of them into Guild Headcan while Hugh Manor watches. Gum gum. I'm so sorry.

Really? I think it slipped. Hugh Manor stands up, dusts off his top hat, puts it back on and says, Oh, and with that, I'll be leaving. Wait, get the ambulance, call the doctor. Do you have any magic healing berries? Magic healing berries? Magic healing berries. What?

Come on, it's emergency. Someone just stabbed him and I think it was me. The scene begins dissolving back into vapor and mist yet again. That sounded so much like those 911 calls that are just like incoherent and just like the operators trying to just figure what the hell is going on. I ate all the weed brownies. Someone killed them and I think it might have been me.

All of you here, in your minds, you hear Spectral's voice once again. Once I killed the guild head, my mind started to clear up, but the damage was done. The city went into chaos. Everyone was looking for me. I could barely live with myself. I had killed an innocent person. So, I did the only thing I've ever been good at. I went into hiding.

I don't know how long I was on the run, but eventually I ended up in this frostbitten land. Kohlberg.

Wait, so Spectral's the one who killed the guild leader? Yes. No, I killed him, I think. I'm not saying this. This is not in character. Sorry. It's Spectral under the control of Paralyte. Right, but it wasn't Sleek. Correct. Gotcha. Oh, interesting. No, Sleek's worthless. We figured that out. Sleek had to have another Infinite come and do the dirty deed and then just go and play a bunch of music. That's all Sleek had to do. Yeah.

That's a 16.

You open your eyes and you see there's a polar bear inches from your face, sniffing you. Seems to be holding something in its mouth. And you look around, you see your campfire has all but gone out, only embers remain inside. Your pack and your shoes are just out of reach, right by the fire, about ten feet away. You do, however, remember you kept your pair of daggers tucked underneath your bedroll, just in case. I turn to...

The polar bear who's above me? Yes. Like you're laying down. Yeah, he's kind of above you with his face down sniffing you. Oh, I thought it was behind him and they were like spooning or something. That'd be nice. Can you imagine being spooned by a polar bear?

It would be interesting. I think that would be a very unique experience. I don't know if many people have experienced that. The warmest sleep ever. Yeah. The warmest, grossest smelling sleep ever. Most dangerous. Yeah. Risky Naps. Risky Naps is a great drag name. It's kind of like a Tauntaun. Yeah. I smell that on the outside. I turn to the polar bear. Hello. Hello.

What you got there in your mouth? It opens its mouth and drops a fish right in front of you. Oh, that's very kind of you. I think Mud would instinctively try to turn into a bear right now.

Okay, yeah, you go through the motions and try to turn into a bear, but for some reason it just, it doesn't happen. Which sucks. It's okay, we all have performance anxiety once in a while. Happens to everyone. I normally have my pills for this. The bear, uh, sits down in front of you, just looking at you, and then looking down at the fish. Oh, right. I go reach to take the fish. Yeah, you grab it. It's yours, it's in your hands. Oh, okay.

Eat the eyes. Eat the eyes. I very, very ever so carefully reach for a dagger and slice the fish open and then take a little bit of fishy meat and put it in my mouth. Omega-3 fatty acids. Got that fish oil pill. There you go.

You don't realize how hungry you are until you take a bite of the fish and you realize you can't remember the last time you've eaten. And the fish tastes extra delicious. You look around and you see you're camped just inside the mouth of a cave and there's icy stalactites and stalagmites all around inside the cave. I like this dream.

You like it? Yeah. You want this one? You want to swap? It's very Christmassy. I offer a little bit of the fish to the polar bear because I'm a gentleman. No, the polar bear just kind of nudges at you with its muzzle. Aw. I try to pet it. Yeah, you're able to pet it.

The polar bear, you know, on all four legs begins walking towards the back of the cave. I take another big bite of fish and then follow it. Okay. Yeah. Delicious, delicious fish. Sushi. Yeah. Where are we going? You walk back towards the back of the cave and it seems like it narrows down, you know, kind of starts winding a little bit. And as you're walking through the cave, you start to see cave paintings along the way.

The first one you find depicts a group of bears surrounding a blue and white bear holding a blue gem. Cool. You keep walking further, and the next painting depicts the bears all standing on their feet like humanoids and protecting other smaller creatures. That's fun. You keep going, and the paintings depict walrus folk in ships attacking the bear folk. No! No!

Not the bear. And then as you keep walking further, a curtain of turquoise mist that leads you on, and then everything dissolves back into mist. Which Balrazians were the walrus people, yeah? Yes. I like, I like so far, Qyborg had to confront Paralite. Gum-Gum did a murder. I ate a fish. We've all faced our trials. We all have our crosses to bear. You also patted a polar bear. I did. You witnessed...

Sometimes being a witness to a crime is more, you know, emotionally stressful than actually doing the crime yourself. Chris has committed a murder, I'm pretty sure. He just confessed to it. No, he watched a murder, I think. Mm-hmm. From behind his own cold, dead eyes. You hear Spectral's voice in your head yet again. Once I went through that curtain, I was introduced to the tribe of the Ishbyon and to the love of my life, Yumi.

The spirit in the polar bear I met that day. She told me all about how her ancestors were bears, and how the goddess of this land, Andi, granted them the ability to stand and speak to steward the land on her behalf. But they were few in number and not a violent people. So when the barbaric Valrosians showed up with their fleet of ships, they slaughtered the Isbjorn.

A cursed winter spread over the land for 100 years, but their spirits remained in sacred places like the cave, waiting for opportunities to take back what they had lost.

Did Spectral just admit to falling in love with the bear? A spirit that was in the bear. Oh, got it. Yeah. Holy dia. It's totally different. The mist begins reforming and reshaping. And this time, Bart, you feel yourself waking up inside the ethereal plane. You turn to your side to see if Yumi is awake yet, but her spirit is nowhere to be found.

Where could she have gone? The sun's almost up. Surely she wouldn't have gone outside with it being almost morning. You make your way through the misty curtain back to the material plane, and you find yourself back in the cave, the place you've come to call home, but there's still no sign of Yumi. Go ahead and make a perception check, Bart. Who's Yumi? The spirit in the polar bear. Sorry, I thought it was called something else.

16. Bart, with a 16, you do notice a few things. First, you spot polar bear tracks leading out of the cave. Could they be Yumi's? Second, you also recall you hid your magical shoes and daggers behind some stalagmites near the cave entrance. And third, in the distance, you hear a bestial groan like something or someone is in pain. Oh, no. Someone's making out with a bear somewhere over there. What kind of groan are we hearing? I'm just kidding.

Uh, the kind of groan is like something or someone is in pain. Not a pleasurable groan. Not a delight groan. Sometimes it's hard to tell. Yeah, it's true. Don't yuck your yum. It's almost dawn. It's the pre-dawn hours. The sky's just beginning to become a little lighter. It's clear conditions. There's no cloud coverage, just snow on the ground. Just outside the cave, you see a small grove of evergreen trees and some stones. Mmm.

Okay. Interesting. Could I go take a look at them? At what? The stones. The stones? Yeah. Make another perception check for me.

Fourteen. Fourteen. You see that there's different prints all mixed up together walking in this direction. Okay. And you follow them and they lead over to where the stones and the trees are. Nothing seems out of the ordinary about them. They're just big, natural stones. You know, you're close to a mountain. It's part of the rocky terrain. Can I tell what type of prints there are? Yeah, they seem to be different kinds of polar bear tracks. Different kinds of polar bear?

Different sizes. I should have said sizes. I was trying to emphasize that it was different. Different bears. Prints from multiple bears. Multiple bears, okay. You hear another groan coming from a little further up inside the grove of trees. Gus, can you give us a demonstration of what this groan sounds like? Yeah, I would like that as well. That's a pleasure groan. That's a pleasure groan if I ever heard one. Hey, Gus, you get an inspiration die. Thank you.

You're DMing. I'm going to be upset if that groans down in the final cut, Micah. No, I mean, you're doing his job for him. You're adding some foliage in there. He normally has to go. He normally has to Google that. You gave it to him on a platter. Yeah. Well, there are trees nearby, so I had to give him some foliage. Hey.

All right, getting back that inspiration dog. Hand it back over. Okay, could I try to go investigate the groan? Yeah, you walk a little further up into the grove of trees. You see a Valrasian hunter engaged in combat with Yumi. Oh, God.

And the hunter has a couple of small polar bear cubs in cages. Oh, no. That he seems to be trying to take away. But Yumi looks in really bad shape. She seems to be in grave peril. You and me both. And you know that if her polar bear body perishes, her spirit might be exposed to the sun, which would be terrible. Oh, good. Interesting fact. It's a good thing you know that. Yumi cannot be exposed to the sun. Is Yumi a vampire? It's her spirit.

Her spirit. Is Yumi's spirit a vampire? Okay. The Balrossian hunter hasn't seemed to notice you yet. Get back, you brainless beast! Osman the hunter will not be deprived of his freshly caught game today! And he seems to be cursing at Yumi, trying to frighten her off as he's attacking her with a big axe. Oh no! Could I intervene to get him to stop? Like, how much effect do I have in this dream?

Yeah, well, what do you want to try to do? Do you have your daggers? Yeah, do I have any equipment on me? You didn't grab them. You remembered you hid your shoes and daggers by some stalagmites near the cave entrance, but in your rush to investigate the groaning sounds, you did not grab them. Okay, could I try to cast a spell on him? Yeah, what do you want to try to cast? Sleep. Sleep. Go ahead and make a wisdom saving throw for me.

I rolled a five. You try to conjure up the mystic energies inside of you to cast sleep, but for some reason, they're just not focusing on you. It seems foreign to your body to try to bend the eldritch energies in any way, and nothing comes out. It's because you're not you. And right as the spell fizzles in front of you, you look up in time to see the Valrasian hunter bring down his axe and finish you.

You did not, Gusrola. You, me. Me, you. It shouldn't have been you. It should have been me. There it is. We found it. The hunter approaches the body and begins pulling it over to the area where the cage is with the small polar bear cubs are. You son of a... Everything fades back into mist.

Hey, everyone. As always, please do not forget to give us a follow at StinkyDragonPod on Twitter and Instagram. We're always looking for fantasy or D&D-inspired tavern drinks for the intros for the episodes. Maybe some magic items that the party could use. Maybe they'll come across it in their travels. If you have any idea for either of those, go ahead and post it using hashtag StinkyDragonPod and you might end up in the show

As an NPC, like Yumi the Ishbjorn Spirit, who is named after at Yumi Ferrari, or Osman the Valrasian Hunter, named after at Oswme2. And don't forget, we got brand new Stinky Dragon merch at store.roosterteeth.com. We got a Roll for Backflip shirt and a drawing of the party t-shirt of everyone all together with a menacing dungeon master in the background. Both shirts are awesome. Go check them out at store.roosterteeth.com.

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Oh, goodness. Well, that was sad. You all arrive back in the field with the roots. Spectral's eyes are closed, but you can see tears start to stream down his face. He quietly stands up and heads for the rippling curtain. Uh, can I, can I intercept and give a hug and

Very aggressive way of saying that. We just went through a lot. We just mind melded with this poor person and we just watched Yumi die and I just overcome with emotion. That's hugs. That's a gum gum move. I learned it from you, gum gum. I'd bring an in group hug. Gum gum sees you give him a hug and is so overwhelmed with happiness that he goes and gives you a hug.

So Kyborg gives Spectral a hug and then Gum-Gum gets so excited he jumps up and gives Kyborg a hug. Yeah. And then I like hand gesture for Mud and Bart. Bart comes in, but he's like at waist level.

So it's awkward. Yeah. He just kind of like puts his face to the side and like does like one of those like sideways hugs. He's just in the crotch. Just in Spectral's crotch, yeah. Like when your kids are that age and they just come in for a hug and just headbutt your crotch. Yep. Very gentle though. That's not much of a hugger.

Fair enough. No pressure. Gus is not much of a hugger either, so I can respect that. That's not true. We hug all the time. That's how we start every day of work. A 20-second hug.

Bart, Gum-Gum, and Kyborg all engage in a group hug with Spectral, who seems to lean in and enjoy the embrace for a few seconds. And then he exits the area, walking back to his hut. Mutt starts touching the roots to see if there's any other shows. What else they got? You're picking up some shows about a forest fire. What about Witcher Season 2? Is that out yet? The mountains growing. You see flashbacks to young Mutt.

Oh, I love this one. It's like Young Sheldon, but better. Oh, God. The bar is very low for that. Yeah, you see flashbacks, quick flashes of key moments in your life when you were just a young firbolg. Can I do the same? I want to see what cyborg flashbacks I see. Now we're all just playing with the roots. Yeah.

Yeah, sure. Go ahead. And yeah, I mean, I guess Kyborg somehow knows that the roots are giving mud flashbacks. So Kyborg goes over and touches them and sees visions of flames and four armed quadrant, quadrant squadron. Quadrant. Bart is still hugging Spectral's crotch. Roll an insight check, Bart.

Insight into Spectral's crotch. Okay, I got a 21. 21. You know, after a little while, you feel Spectral just kind of like tense up, like become really rigid. And then he kind of escapes and pulls himself away very quickly. Oh, sorry. I got a little carried away there. I was just so, you know, I needed some comfort after that vision really messed me up a little bit.

How do you think he feels? How is his vision? Nah, things are all about Bart, baby. Yeah, he has left and gone back into his hut. Oh, okay. Well, I guess I won't ever try to hug anyone ever again. Bart learned his lesson. Bart makes us all about Bart.

Mud drifts through a memory of this one time that he was running along holding a cup of coffee and then tripped and fell and dirt fell into the coffee. And that's how he learned to love dirt coffee after he tasted it. The dirt coffee origin story. We all wondered. Now we know. He tripped. He fell. It's like peanut butter truck and the chocolate truck hitting each other. And it just became perfect.

Could Gum-Gum go and, like, hug the roots or do whatever they're doing? Yeah. I like that it's a hug for Gum-Gum. Yeah, Gum-Gum, everyone else is just touching the roots. He's sitting down touching the roots. Gum-Gum lays down and hugs the roots. In your mind, you see, like, a calm serenity. No solid memories seem to pop into your mind. I like these roots. Ha ha ha ha ha.

So are we still in the purple zone, or did we go back to the turquoise space? We're in Jimi Hendrix land still. Yeah, only Spectral has left and gone back to his hut. You all are still hanging out with the Roots and Questlove. Mud addresses the group and says, that gave us a story of how it brought him to the Velorossian place, but he still hasn't told us how he got here in the ethereal plane or into that village and why the villagers talked to him that way.

He seems like he wants to be alone. How should we approach this?

Just for a point of clarification, it was kind of hinted at just like from a metagame perspective, like the cloud of vapor in the cave he walked through was kind of his gateway. And that's when he kind of walked back out to the material plane to look for Yumi in Bart's vision there at the end. Okay. I couldn't tell. It seemed like that was just us. I couldn't tell if that was us like entering and exiting the dream of the moment. Yeah, that's why. Still won't know why he's here in the village and why they're chanting about him being, what'd they call him? Wraith. Wraith. Called him Wraith.

Wait, so is he stuck in this? Is he like dead? You don't think he's stuck necessarily because in the vision Bart had, he was able to transfer back to the material plane and walk out of the cave. And everyone saw that. Right. Everyone did see that. We could probably do the same thing if we find a portal. Yeah. Well, let's exit the purple haze. Mud does that. We exit the purple and we go back to the other place. Or I do. Bart takes one more whiff in the purple haze and then also leaves.

Gum-Gum pats the roots and says, "Thank you," and then follows. Okay, you all make your way back in the same direction Spectral went. I assume you all are heading back into his hut as well. Yeah. Okay, you all enter the hut, and you find Spectral standing inside facing away from the entrance. He hears you all enter, and he says, "All my life, I've been looking for my soulmate. So when I met you, me,

I counted myself the luckiest half-orc in the world. She opens my eyes to worlds beyond this one. Our love truly transcended space and time. He turns to face you all, his grey half-orc eyes narrowed and his jaw clenched. The Valrossians took that away from me.

They took that and more from all of the Ispion. They have ravaged this sacred land like ruthless raiders for a century, and it's time they paid the price. And soon, nothing will be able to stop us from making that happen. Bart goes, yeah, and you could see, like, tears coming from his eyes because Bart is a hopeless romantic. He's like, we gotta get your soulmate back. Bart's on board. Us, like, as in...

All of us or us as in you? Us as in all of us who stand for what is good. They must be stopped. I want to chime in and say that was a particularly bad Valrazian, but we met nice Valrazians. They weren't terrible. Valrazians murdered all the Ishbyon, took everything from them.

and soon we will have what we need to take our revenge on them. As the polar eclipse nears, the Ishbyon spirits gain more presence in the Material Plane. Once the polar eclipse is in full effect, during Hundra Fest, the 100th anniversary of the Valrosian invasion, for an entire night, the Ethereal Plane and the Material Plane will converge completely.

That's when we will stage our attack on New Valros and exact revenge on the Valrosian. No one will be left standing, starting with their leader, the King Yorn. Gonna have to spell that one out for us. I don't know how to make the symbol, but it's like a slash through the O. Ah, Yorn. You say they killed all the Ishborn. Is that what this village is? Is this village the spirits of the Ishborn?

Yes, these are all the Ishbiorn that remain. So they're not all dead. These are just their spirits. Their bodies perished ages ago at the hands of the Valrosians. Oh my god. Sleek seems to be pretty shocked by all of this. But spectral revenge won't bring back Yumi.

Can we not reason with this V-King? Find a peaceful way to make amends? But Spectral seems to ignore him. I talk to Spectral. Spectral, uh, I hate Sleek. I cannot think of anything that I hate more than Sleek outside of maybe Claudrin and his squadron. But I agree with him. I don't think that this is the right...

Path to take I think you hated Brink tussler a little more okay so in the in the in this in the tears of hatred a hierarchy it goes in the hate hierarchy it goes Brink tussler then sleek then quadrant in the quadrants quadrant Brink less

Brink did something heroic, and he actually also did things, but Sleek's just, he just twiddles his thumbs. Sleek, you suck. But I agree with him. Sleek brought you the wagon to escape Bruma Fume. And he's pleading with Spectral here. Wait, wait, Bruma Fume was the Valrazian one, right? Yeah. Yeah, no, I was fighting those guys naked, and I was totally, like, dealing with it. It was fine. The wagon was whatever. But...

We, I don't think we should get revenge.

I think that they should pay for what they've done, but I don't think that death is the right payment. How much money? I'm not saying I know how they should pay for it. Oh, I was wondering what he was talking about. Yeah, Sleek listens and says, Yes, calm down, Spectral. Listen to my good friend, Kaiba. We're not friends. We're not friends. Good friend. Very good friend. Continuing down this path will lead you to what you hate the most. What we tried to fight.

A bully to those weaker than you. Bart and Mud, you feel like you hear something, like a deep hum coming from somewhere you can't quite place. Mud starts like putting his fingers in your ear like, everybody else hearing that? Bart puts his hands on the ground to see if it's like an earthquake or something. Make a perception check, Bart. Perceiving...

You can't really feel anything on the ground, but on the bright side, that might mean it's not an earthquake because the earth isn't shaking. Okay. I guess Mud would turn his head around trying to get like a reading of where this is coming from. You don't...

see anything yet. You just noticed maybe the flap on the entrance to the hut just seems to be rustling a little bit, as if it's windy. Spectral, any chance you're causing that sound in the flap to do that? Spectral says, Our cause is righteous. The ethereal plane itself comes to our aid to take down the Varossians and get revenge for the Ishbyon.

So sometimes whenever I would get into fights with other kids at the orphanage, I would think that they would be taking my snacks or picking on me and I would get upset. But then I found out that the people I was upset at, they weren't the ones who were picking on me at all. It was the older kids and they were the ones who were doing it. And I got all mad at the little kids. So maybe...

Maybe the ones you're mad at aren't the little kids, but the big kids. Bart is just going like, all right, good for the point. Let's go, yeah. No, that was perfect. Make a persuasion check, Gum-Gum. With advantage. Does that make sense in Gum-Gum language? I think I know what you're getting at, yeah. Impressive.

Fifteen. Fifteen. Bart and Mud, you feel like the hum begins to subside a bit. Mud, you notice that the flaps on the hut don't seem to be moving quite as much as they were before. Spectral seems to calm down a little bit. Fine. Have it your way. You have until midnight to convince V King Bjorn to surrender. You are free to leave through the ethereal plane through the vortex archway you came through.

I mean, there's two sides to every story. I am conflicted because as someone who is seeking revenge on Quadrant and the Quadrant Squadron, I don't want to kill all of Quadrant's people. I just want to kill Quadrant. So I think maybe we just hunt down the guy that killed Yumi.

Yeah, would that suffice? And then we put him in a trial. Trial! No, this isn't just for you, me. This is for all the Ishbyon that have perished.

Well, if we take their leader, then it's kind of like payback. So you will only be happy if we manage to get the entire people in Bruma Fume to leave. And the people in New Valros. All of the Valrosian. Right. That's the big place. So our little task here is to get an entire people group to migrate to a different place based off of

the word of strangers. But if we're punishing people for the crimes they committed, should you and I not both go to jail for murdering that guild guy? Oh, look at you with, uh, Gum-Gum with the, the, dropping the logic over here. I'm sorry, what was in those roots that gave Gum-Gum so much, uh, insight here? I'm ready to answer for my crimes.

Once the Ishbyon have been given their vengeance, I will gladly turn myself in. What is... just so I know, what is the answer? I'm not very good at tests. What is the answer? Yeah, to your crimes. 'Cause it's my crime too, I... It's the answer to your crimes. Yeah, Spectral looks at you really confused and says... No, not like that. Just... go! Convince them to surrender. You have until midnight when the Ishbyon are at their strongest.

If you haven't returned, then we march. Okay, so we'll get them to surrender. Is there anything else you want? Uh, no. Do you want a muffin? I'm making a Starbucks run. I kind of do now. All right, then that sounds like a totally doable task for us four very capable interns. We'll be right back with a nice little migration.

Okay. And you remember the archway you came through before isn't far. It's at the edge of the village. It's right before where you all saw those children playing. Okay. Let's go through. I look back and see what Sleek is doing. Not inviting him, just to kind of see what he's doing. Is he following along? Is he like the little brother? Sleek's going along with you guys. Did you get your loot, Sleek? Oh, the instrument. Kyborg, you know this. Paralite has my loot.

Do you want to borrow mine just so you feel, like, more complete? No. I appreciate it again, Bart, but I need my loot. I could write your name on it. Do you want to sit this one out? Bart pulls out a Sharpie. It's important that I come with you. I hate to see what's happening to Leonard. I want to help stop this. That's a first. All right. Okay, let's... I guess we'll all go be diplomats. Okay.

Uh, okay. Do you all go back through the vortex archway? I guess so. Should we have a powwow to talk through our plan? I guess we don't know what's on the other side of that vortex, so maybe we should kind of do a little scrum. So we have to find our way to New Velros. We need to convince people to let us have an audience with the Viking. Mm-hmm.

And then within there, we need to convince him to take his entire kingdom to another place. What if we suggested different places that they could go to that are far more luxurious and vast in their offerings of resources, like Kanada? Maybe if we hang billboards around New Valros and say things like...

go to Ohio. Yeah, that's an inside baseball joke because there's Ohio billboards all over Austin. There's Ohio and Northwest Arkansas billboards all over Austin. It was strange.

Well, I'm glad he didn't find out that we killed a bunch of polar bears. Did we? Yeah. Did we figure out what happened with the Valrazians that attacked us? They seemed like they were possessed. Was that like the Ishborn? Oh, yeah. It was the blue thingy. Yeah. Maybe they did it because they were possessed and they're not actually bad people like that. No, I think that they were actually just jerks and they actually killed the Valrazians. Ishborn.

I don't think you all ever got to the bottom of that. Uh, should we ask Spectral what's up with your little, like, amulet? Oh, I still have that, don't I? Yes, you do. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's a good thing. Ask him about it. We go back into Spectral's house. I have a few questions. Hi! Us again. What are you doing? You realize you don't have a lot of time. Good news!

Two little follow-up questions. One, by any chance, are the Ishborn, are they in their spirit form only able to possess the bears? The bears. The bears. The Ishborn can possess any creature that has been weakened on the material plane. Could that include...

Hmm. In theory, I guess. Although no self-respecting Ishbyon would want to possess a Valrosian. Hmm. Has there ever been an Ishbyon that turned against the rest of the people? Was there like a bad Ishbyon? Not that I know of. So that's a yes. Should we show him the amulet? Yeah. Second question. What do you think of my necklace? Is this too much? Ha ha ha.

Just casual opinion, you know. It goes with your outfit? I don't know. Okay. You don't glean anything else? This isn't some sort of Ish Bjorn? Bart and Mud, you feel the deep hum returning. Oh, no. Oh, no. You know in video games when it's like a video game where you have to keep going forward or else the video game catches up to a wall of lava? I feel like Gus is doing that right now. It's the wall of lava, yeah.

We're in that level of Aladdin on Nintendo. Yeah, we touched the lamp. We touched it. Do we want to take a short rest or maybe a long rest? We have till midnight, my homes. All right. All right, let's...

We need to... What do we... What should we do? We should talk to the leader, right? We should probably go. We should probably get going. Alright, bye! Nice talking with you. And killing people together. Alright. We... We... We go... Do we all go through the portal now? Yes. I make one more plea with Spectral. Can you please babysit Slick? We don't know him. We might need him. It's true. Good one. Alright, I'll...

I'll eat my foot when we do. All right. Put that down in the ledger. Bart goes to shake Kyborg's hand. Let's go. Yeah. Shake on it. I guess Sleek asks, do you really not want me to go? No, we need you. You heard that. We are on a diplomatic mission, but if we could really use any help we have.

I don't want to be a bother. You're not a bother. Don't listen to Qyborg. He's got some problems with I don't know what, but just anyone who's here along for the mission is trying to help us. He somehow doesn't want them with us. It's happened before. I think it's mostly because we're really bad at keeping track of NPCs. It's just easier to know that none are around.

I feel that. Okay, so do you all go through the portal or the vortex archway? Yes. You don't want to front flip through it? Hold on really quick. You're so close. Why'd you even? He rolled a 13. See, this is what I'm talking about. He's rolling. He doesn't say it. He rolls, and then how it turns out, then he reacts. You can't be doing that.

Hey, everybody, catch our front flip T-shirt available now at the Rooster Teeth store. Yeah, Gus, this is all a way of promoting our shirt. Roll for backflip. That was a backflip. If you'd let me talk, I would have told you. I rolled a 13 on backflip.

Roll for backflip. All right. You all step through or flip through the vortex archway. And as you come back to the material plane, an overcast sun dips below the hazy horizon. A bank of fog settles onto the surrounding snow-capped hills. Something large in the distance catches your eye, but the thick mist is obscuring it just down the road before you.

You press forward cautiously and squint your eyes to try to make out the towering silhouette and you're met with a sheer drop in the ground. You jolt backwards to catch your balance and your feet kick a few rocks into the void below. You hear a few small splashes. Is there water down there?

Suddenly, a voice high above you calls out, Halt! Who dares approach the gates of New Valros at this ghastly hour? Oh, is that my best good-looking buddy over there? He's the other town, wasn't he? Maybe the same thing happens. He's like his brother. Oh, we're in New Valros. Yeah. Oh, this isn't... It's not the guy who likes compliments. Please, can it be? All guys like compliments. Keep going, keep going. Keep going, yeah, you got it, you got it.

Wow. What a heavenly, beautiful voice that calls out to us from above. Who could that be? You see torches moving around on the walls above you and voices talking. And then one of them yells, Who are you? Who approaches? We are the Infinite Interns, if that's not going to cause any problems. If it does, then we are the Infinite Interns.

Traveling band!

Carnival. You hear someone yell, "They're invaders! Seize them at once!" No, no, no! No air in our sentence did we say invaders! You hear a "ka-cheek" and a large "woosh" as something wide and sprawling hurls into the air and falls rapidly towards you. Whack! A giant net lands on all of you and plows you into the ground. Eight misty shadows quickly close in on your position, holding crossbows aimed at you. You hear one of them say, "Your orders, Captain? What shall we do with these invaders?"

A massive Alrassian with tree trunk sized arms steps forward wearing white furs holding a pick shaped like a ship's anchor. He narrows his deep brown eyes and lets out a low growl. To the dungeons. But we're just infinite interns.

I like your arms. Let's start up the music, Bart. You start. And a one and a two. The loot is crushed. All right. Thanks, everyone, for listening to this episode of Tales from the Stinky Dragon. We'll find out what happens to the Infinite Interns next episode. Can they retrieve coffee for the Valrasian guards from the dungeon? We'll see.

Can we talk about our new shirt? We do have some new shirts. This would be the perfect time to talk about it. We have two new shirts, both of which I think are great. One of them is like drawings of all the different characters. Yeah, we got a cast drawing. Yeah, that one's available on a yellow shirt. And what's the other option on that one? Is it a blue? Blue. They're very pretty. Sky blue.

Amazing artwork, I want to say. It's amazing. It's great artwork. It's even got Gus the DM on it. Yeah. Yeah. And listener, you know what? I imagine you wearing it and you look great in it. Oh, my goodness. Look at you go. I'm rolling for insight on that. And yep, that's a...

Nat 20 on that. Actually, that was a 12. Anyways, Insight says you look good, and you can get that in the roll for backflip as well. Those are both available at the Rooster Teeth store at store.roosterteeth.com. I think everyone had a lot of input in how their characters look in that character shirt, so I think it's really the most true way to see what the characters look like, how everyone envisions themselves. It's even got gumbo on it. It does have gumbo. And gum gum.

Like John said, check it out at store.roosterteeth.com. We'll also post some pictures of it in our social media. Yeah, at StinkyDragonPod. Thanks, everyone.