Transcribed by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)

 

## Intro

Rhi: Welcome back to Whitehollow. I’m so excited to share this bonus episode with you. Today we’re playing Descent into Midnight, a game about community, corruption, and psionic sea creatures. We adapted the game with a Blades in the Dark twist, and so instead of sea creatures we’re playing members of the Delvers’ Guild on an expedition into the depths of the Void Sea.

Richard Kreutz-Landry, one of the creators of Descent into Midnight, was the GM for this game, and we had an absolutely amazing time playing.

I’d also like to take a moment to thank the folks who donated to the Black Voters Matter Fund and Southerners on New Ground. Minna, Lauren, Bob, Gondwonaland, Eric, Kyle, Michelle, Antoine and Tanner collectively donated $1,000 to these excellent organizations. Thank you all so very, very much for your generosity and support.

Now then, let’s get started. Shall we?

 

## Story Begins [0:01:04]

Richard: So as we enter this episode of The Magpies, we see not Duskwall but Whitehollow. We see the city itself, and we follow the camera as it moves out over the waves past the rocks that jut out from the sea into the water beyond, and we see a boat. It floats there on the water, empty of people, and we just see some boots disappearing over the side, and we hear the splash.

We move under the water to reveal Cass. Cass, tell us a little bit about yourself and what you look like.

Josie: Cass is a small and sleight girl from the Dagger Isles with short close-cropped black hair, or at least that’s what she normally looks like, because right now from the neck down she’s just kinda got a shifting mass of black goop and tentacles going on.

Richard: Mm, like you do.

Josie: Yeah.

Richard: Nearby is Orla who has also gone down into the water. What do they look like?

Minna: Orla is… She kinda just looks like a normal Akorosian woman. Kind of tanned skin, crow’s feet, dark eyes. Keeps her salt and pepper hair cut very short. She looks like a stubborn kind of person.

Richard: Mm. All right. The two of you are diving down, down, and down. We recognize the attire and maybe a tattoo or a symbol of the Delvers, the society of people who go down into the… I don’t want to say leviathan-infested waters, because…

Minna: [squirms]

Richard: …that’s where they live. It’s their home.

[laughter]

Richard: But it’s not normally a place that people tend to go and stay for very long. The two of you are making your way down through the sort of, almost like twilight lit water, and there are sort of weak shadows that play along the sand underneath you. We get to a drop off, and we see darkness as the light quickly fades away into just blackness.

We see the two of you there, and we see you stop and look out. Cass looks over sort of in Orla’s direction, but not exactly, and says “what do you see?” With that, the sort of visual effect that we’re used to seeing when characters look into the ghost field activates and this sort of dim space that was all sort of grays and light blues that faded into deep darkness forms into the colors that we usually see in the ghost field. So, what do we see of Thaddeus in the ghost field?

Rhi: Thaddeus is a young man, also from the Dagger Isles. I think he’s got thick curly dark hair. He has kind of an iridescent shimmer to his form, and I think he is hovering in the open space just between Cass and Orla. It seems like the two of them have spaced out enough that with him in the middle they’re all three evenly spaced out.

Richard: Okay. With your vision in the ghost field, you can see past where the light dims and below you, somewhere beyond the drop off, is some ancient thing that people have not explored yet. What is it?

Rhi: Oh…

Josie: Leviathan skeleton.

Richard: [amused hardy chuckle]

Rhi: Ooh, that’s cool!

Richard: Okay.

Josie: [laughs] Just this maybe mile long thing.

Rhi: Yeah, yeah. I wanna go—Yeah. Well, because of the nature of leviathans it may not be necessarily a skeleton, so a leviathan… remains, we’ll say. [laughs] Because leviathans don’t usually die.

Richard: So what we see then is a… If you were looking at this with just your eyes, you might notice a long hill with a scoop out of it, almost like you had taken a piece of piping and cut it in half lengthwise and then just set it down, like a really long, long, long halfpipe in the sand, but this thing is huge. There’s bits of pointy chitinous things covered in barnacles and other bivalves and coral and all these other marine plants and animals that just sort of jut up along the length of each of the sides that sort of sticks up.

What you’re able to see, Thaddeus, as you’re looking into the ghost field, is this sort of—it’s almost like someone took a pill bug or a roly-poly or whatever you happen to call them regionally…

Rhi: Oh!

Richard: …and stretched it out to about three or four times its normal length, if its normal length was a couple hundred meters.

Rhi: Oh…

Josie: [laughs]

Richard: You’re looking at it, and you can actually recognize what it is, and where someone else would just see this weird almost natural fault or something that’s just sticking up with all these things that have grown up around it, you’re actually able to see the outlines of it. You can see these giant segments of armor plating that are upside-down. It’s literally like someone took this giant pill bug, turned it on its back, stretched it out, sunk it into the sand, and then let things grow on it for a couple of centuries.

In the center of it there is something that lights up in a way that tells you that there is something conscious in the middle of it.

Rhi: Ooh!

Richard: You’re not sure what it is, but you haven’t seen something like this before.

Rhi: So I think Thaddeus will, through our telepathic link, will tell both of you:

Rhi (as Thaddeus): It’s definitely down there, all right, but I don’t know if it’s quite as dead as we thought. There’s something… something alive. Well, maybe not alive, something with a spirit down there.

Josie (as Cass): Well we can change that if we need to.

Rhi (as Thaddeus): If we need to.

Richard: So when Thaddeus is, um… Is Thaddeus showing these things to the others through a visual impression or is he just telling the two of them about it?

Rhi: No, I think because anybody can look into the ghost field, I think that Thaddeus, now being a ghost, can probably see through it better. So yeah, I think that it’s just kind of like pulling you both into the ghost field a little bit to be like “look, see.”

[laughter]

Richard: As you’re looking down, and you see how far down you need to go to get down there, it’s further than a free dive will let you. So, what does Orla’s diving equipment look like?

Minna: I don’t think it’s diving equipment. I think that Thaddeus and Cass know some kind of magic that helps you take an air bubble with you underwater.

Richard: Ohh!

Rhi: Ooh!

Minna: Which is usually used for these people who are on ships, you know, to stop yourself drowning if something happens.

Richard: Okay. So what is—either from Thaddeus or from Cass—what is the incantation from the Dagger Isles tradition of magic to create this bubble?

Josie: I kinda like the idea of essentially making a heavily bubbly and carbonated potion.

Richard: Ooh, okay.

Rhi: Yeah~

Josie: Just out of, like, local folk ingredients and just boil it or have just a little device that you inject air into it, so it’s like you’re keeping the air in you, and as long as you’re in there air travels with you.

Richard: Ooh, okay. Awesome.

Minna: I like it.

Rhi: Yeah, I like that. I think it’s something that, because it’s made of ingredients that are mostly only found in the jungles of the Dagger Isles, it’s not something we can make very often. We had to scrounge through the markets for weeks to get enough stuff to make one dose of it for this dive.

[chuckling]

Richard: Perfect. Okay, so what does it look like? Is that something that Orla activated before they hopped out of the boat, or is this something that she’s doing right here at the precipice?

Minna: I think if it’s something precious she would do it at the precipice, if that’s something that she’s able to do.

Richard: I mean, I imagine just like a little fish bladder. You know how they have those old gunpowder flasks or like the little leather pouches that would have gunpowder in them, or they make the old-timey water skins, right?

Rhi: Yeah.

Richard: But it’s made from a dead leathery fish, so it’s this little fish that’s got some sort of liquid in it and you have to put it to your lips and then squeeze the fish and squeeze it into your mouth.

[laughter]

Minna: Mm-hmm!

Richard: You just start getting these little bubbles that start erupting from your mouth and then it slowly forms a big one around your head or something.

Minna: [smiling] Yes.

Richard: Okay. [laughs]

Josie: Cool.

Richard: All right, so we see Orla do that, and you are there looking down on this precious treasure. So, what does Orla know about this? Part of the playbook that you’re using lets you seek out information about obscure topics, so how did you find out that it was here or have an inkling that it might be here?

Minna: Hmm. I think there’s old writings about… I think there are old stories in the town of Whitehollow about the time a leviathan attacked the coast directly, and you know, a whole bunch of people went out and drove it away and slew it.

Richard: Mm-hmm. So we know that we found it here because we want to have an adventure today, but if you want to roll your investigation move you can roll +Drive and we’ll find out what other things you may or may not have happen as a consequence of actually making your way to it.

Minna: Okay. Roll +Drive, which is +2… 6. [laughs]

Richard: Excellent. So, with that, you can mark a Harmony, because failing is fun. We know that you did in fact find out where this thing is, because you are here, but that actually gives me an opportunity to do all sorts of fun things, because the options that you could have chosen from generally prevent bad things from happening.

We know that there is something alive down there, or “something,” which you weren’t expecting. There’s going to be two other things that happen. So, the first thing is, as the three of you are there, something or someone approaches from behind you.

Rhi: [gasps] Oh no.

Richard: Now, I have a question. The Delvers are the most well-known group of people who go down into the water to seek things that others cannot find. So my question is, is the rival or person coming up behind you, are they a different group of people or are they someone who has followed you from the Delvers group who either wants to poach your find or maybe they just don’t like you? Let’s find out a little bit more about them. So, let’s go to Cass.

You’ve been getting a little into some things maybe you shouldn’t have lately, hence all the weird tentacle things. It’s not that you’re injecting yourself with leviathan blood or anything. Who would do that?

Josie: Right! I’m totally not doing that.

Richard: Yeah! So you’ve probably, you know, not pissed anyone off or had to go some shady routes to get things like that. So who is it that you totally have no knowledge of why they would be after you in particular or would have a grudge or anything like that?

Josie: [laughs]

Richard: Tell us a little bit more about this person that you know nothing about.

Josie: Right. I think… yeah. I think I just straight up stole their shit to get my dose. [laughs]

Richard: Ohh! Okay.

Josie: Yeah. I think we probably didn’t get along anyway, but I think they are another Delver who came up from their last mission with some leviathan blood in toe.

Richard: Oh, okay.

Josie: And I think I just broke into their room and jacked it when I thought they didn’t know, because I ran out.

Richard: [laughs] Oh no. Okay. So they absolutely manage to find you, and because we’re dealing with the consequences of a 6-minus, y’all don’t see them coming. So, how do they attack you?

Rhi: Harpoon, or like fishing spear. Harpoons are big. Fishing spear.

Richard: Okay.

Josie: Yeah, that makes sense.

Richard: So, the first thing that Cass gets to do here…

Rhi: [laughs]

Richard: …you get to…

Josie: [laughs]

Richard: …emphasize I said “get to,” make a roll. Let me go and grab the appropriate thing here.

Rhi: [amused] Descent into Midnight is a game about avoiding violence.

[laughter]

Richard: It really is, and y’all just…

Rhi: And… and building community. Blades in the Dark is not.

Josie: I think you’ll find that I tend to make games that—characters that are contrary to the games they’re in.

Richard: So, as the first thing that Cass gets to roll here, you get to do an Endure. When you endure physical, emotional or psychic trauma, roll plus the number of conditions marked. Now, we didn’t specify if you had any conditions marked, but I do recall during character creation that the conditions you described as more just general states of being for Cass than negative condition modifiers. [laughs]

Josie: [laughs] Given this conflict, I feel like Selfish would be a good thing to have marked.

Richard: Perfect. Okay. Go ahead and mark Selfish for yourself, which is the opposite of Altruism. You are going to roll at a +1 on this and try to roll low.

Josie: Total, 6.

Richard: Okay. Hey, you’re doing well for yourself. So this is one of those where a 6-minus is actually a good thing. On a 6-minus you avoid consequence. You can mark a Harmony as normal as you gain some insight into your character, and maybe the rest of the group is gaining a little insight too of what you’ve been up to, as they see someone they recognize try and spear you. So, how does this go for them?

Josie: Honestly, I think she doesn’t notice until the tip of the spear is just poking through a tentacle.

Richard: [laughs] Okay.

Josie: But she’s made of black goop, so it just goes on through.

Richard: Oh no.

Josie: And she’s like, you hear in the link:

Josie (as Cass): Ah shit.

[laughter]

Richard: I like to imagine, too, that if we’re watching this as a show or something we have the shot of this person coming up on you with their spear, and then we get the shot of the three of them just looking down into the thing, and then we just see this spear just sort of shoot out of a tentacle, and she just looks down and says that. And then we start the thing, yeah.

[laughter]

Rhi: Yeah, super dramatic and then… [disappointed] “oh.”

[laughter]

Richard: All right. So, what are y’all doing?

Rhi: I need to look at what the basic moves are.

Minna: Same~

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Rhi: So, Thaddeus, being a good big brother…

Minna: [emotional hum]

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Rhi: …is going to defend Cass.

Richard: Okay.

Rhi: So I’m actually—Do I wanna use…? Okay, so I have a question about Empathic Shield.

Richard: Sure.

Rhi: Do I have to decide to use it before I roll?

Richard: Um…

Rhi: Or can I roll and if I roll badly be like ‘you know what, let me just throw some…’

Richard: Let’s see. What is that? You may choose to resist… [mumbles, reading]. Oh yeah, you can do that after.

Rhi: Okay. So, what do I roll with…? +Altruism. Oh, I have very good Altruism, so I might not need it. … I need it.

[laughter]

Rhi: For the third time today. I feel like all of us have rolled once so far and we’ve all gotten 6s. I also got a 6, so I’ll mark Harmony here, but I am gonna use my Empathic Shield which means I can choose to resist Corruption to treat my roll as a 10+.

Richard: Okay.

Rhi: So, resisting Corruption…

Richard: I’d say let’s actually resolve the Defend Another first.

Rhi: Okay.

Richard: And then… So it is a 10+, and so… when you risk your own safety to protect another, on a 10+ they are safe for now. You get to choose one from the list, so either you take the hit, you end up in a bad spot, or you lash out at a friend.

Rhi: I think this person attacking is somebody that I was friends with now probably, right?

Richard: Mm, okay.

Josie: Oh… [laughs]

Richard: It’s like, “yeah, they’re cool—wait what?” [laughs] Okay.

Rhi: So I want to ask, before we get into this any deeper, just in terms of the other Delvers.

Richard: Mm-hmm?

Rhi: For Cass and Orla, does anybody else know about me?

Josie: That’s a good question.

Rhi: [laughs]

Richard: I mean, they know you’re dead.

Rhi: Right, but do they know that I’m back, as a ghost, hanging out in y’all’s heads sometimes?

Josie: I was thinking probably not.

Minna: Yeah, like that’s really taboo.

Richard: I think that’s more fun.

Rhi: Because I think we had established that the Delvers are a lot more onboard with the occult, but I think that they still, like… there’s some people who are gonna be like, “I’m sorry, you’re letting a ghost do WHAT in your heads now?”

Josie: [laughs]

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Rhi: “Hell no. You’re gonna get possessed and then try to kill the rest of us. No.” Or it’s just having a ghost floating around is too much of a risk from the Spirit Wardens, no, we can’t do it.

Richard: Mm-hmm. Well, Spirit Wardens aren’t a problem, are they, Cass? I mean, it’s not like you’ve had to deal with any at any point in your backstory.

Rhi: [laughs and whines]

Richard: No~

Rhi: So yeah, I think that this person that Cass stole leviathan blood from is somebody that I was friends with in life.

Richard: Okay.

Rhi: So I am going to… I’m gonna use my… So I have, one of my powers is telekinesis. I think that I use the telekinesis to just yank the spear out of this Delver’s hands and kinda out of Cass.

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Rhi: I’m not gonna whip it around and stab them, but I am gonna bop them over the head with the blunt end of it. [laughs] Just kind of, whack!

Richard: Yeah. I think from a narrative perspective, if you leave them here and they’re, like—Do you think that you knock them unconscious, or…?

Rhi: I don’t think so.

Richard: Okay, so the spear just, of its own volition, according to them, just whips around and smacks them in the face?

Rhi: [laughs] Basically.

Josie: “No! Stop it!”

Richard: I love that. Okay, so now let’s go over to the Resist Corruption. That’ sunder the special moves.

Rhi: Yep, and I roll +Corruption marked?

Richard: Yep, which again, we didn’t specify how much people are rolling in, but if you wanted to mark a couple just to, you know, give it a little bit of a feel for what we’re doing here today.

Rhi: Yeah. Since I have a Corruption move, I have to have at least one marked. I feel like 2, probably.

Richard: Okay, 2 out of 5.

Josie: Okay, well if you have 2 Corruption marked I will also have at least 2 marked, because this is Cass.

Richard: Yes.

Rhi: Yeah. Well, for me it’s 2 out of 6, because the Empath has a slightly bigger Corruption bar.

Richard: Oh, that’s right.

Josie: Oh~

Rhi: [pinched] Ooh boy…

Richard: Oh no.

Rhi: I got an 11.

Richard: Ooh! We love 11s.

Rhi: Hmm, let’s see. What happens on a 10+?

Richard: So on a 10+ the corruption works its way deeper into your mind—well, you don’t have a body anymore—and soul, so you get to mark Corruption and a Condition.

Rhi: Oh, and a Condition?! Okay.

Richard: Uh-huh. So how is this making you feel?

Rhi: Oh, let me look at my Conditions here. Um… I think I’m Angry.

Richard: Okay.

Rhi: Because I don’t know what Cass did, I just see this person, who was our friend, has come down here and is trying to stab us with a spear. What the hell, dude? That’s rude! Stop it.

Josie: [laughs]

Richard: Okay.

Rhi: So yeah, I think I’m—Yeah, I’m gonna mark Angry.

Richard: Okay. So as that happens, you manage to swing it around and hit him with the blunt end. The spear comes out of Cass, and they are immediately trying to backpedal and are going for basically a boot knife and swinging their arm around, trying to figure out what’s going on, because that’s not supposed to happen. So what’s Orla doing as this is going down?

Minna: Oh boy. I’m trying to think. What is the best way to react to this? [giggling] I think I’m gonna do a Been There Done That.

Richard: Okay.

Minna: This looks like somebody Cass pissed off.

[laughter]

Josie: Valid.

Minna: The thing I’ve experienced before is people Cass pissed off.

[laughter]

Minna: God damn it, I rolled a 5. I’m rolling like garbage.

Richard: Oh my goodness. Okay.

Rhi: [recovering sigh]

Josie: I’m sorry.

Richard: That’s fantastic. So, uh… on a hit you tell the Guide something you understand, and etcetera. I think, actually… so you’re gonna mark Harmony, because you got a 6-minus.

Minna: Mm-hmm. Really gonna level up during this session.

Richard: But how does this situation… Right?!

Rhi: Yeah.

Richard: So how does this situation get worse? Um. You have dealt with people who Cass has pissed off before but never at the level of them actually coming after you like this, and so I think the thing that occurs to you is Cass must have done something big. I think you recognize sort of who they are. Everyone at this point knows that Cass is injecting themself with leviathan blood, right?

Josie: Uh-huh.

Richard: Okay. So I think maybe—we were talking about how maybe it was a recent thing before we started the recording. I think you’re starting to figure out that something has crossed a line, and how valuable leviathan blood is. You know that it was very, very important to this person that they had that money available for something, so what I will ask is what did they need that money for that you think probably should have gone to them and would have been a better use of it than what Cass is doing?

Josie: [grinning] Jesus Christ, Cass is a horrible person.

[laughter]

Richard: I mean… And maybe Cass doesn’t know about whatever it is, but you know.

Josie: Right, probably not.

Minna: They’re like getting ready to lose their house.

Richard: Okay.

Rhi: Oof.

Richard: Is it an older Delver who has a family and everything or is it like an orphan kid or something who’s…?

Minna: Yeah no, totally.

Richard: Okay.

Minna: Either that or like… I think they live with a large family. I don’t know if they’re the head of the family or if they’re just part of it.

Richard: Okay. I think that kinda hits you. You’re realizing that what Cass is doing is benefitting you instead of them, so I will ask you to mark a Condition as that realization hits you.

Minna: The Condition I’m going to mark is Selfish.

Richard: Okay. Interesting. So how is that, like… how does Orla feel about it? Is it that like, it sucks for them but we need it and that’s where the selfishness is coming from, or is it more that you feel guilty about that feeling? What’s going on there?

Minna: It’s that I know they need it and I do feel bad that my friend stole it, but also you cannot just attack my friend and I’m going to stand by them no matter what, because these are the only people that… these are my people.

Richard: So you’re having that sort of… that feeling, and getting ready to defend Cass. Cass, you’ve been injecting yourself with leviathan blood as we’ve now discussed a bit at length. How are you reacting now that you’ve realized what has happened and you see Orla putting things together in her head and you’re starting to feel like maybe she’s already figured out that this is 100% your fault and it’s very bad?

Josie: [chuckling] Uh-huh.

Richard: How you doing? Whatcha up to?

Josie: Um… shoot, I wasn’t expecting to reap consequences before I’ve even done anything.

[laughter]

Josie: I think the thing that Cass does is just try to pin this person with their tentacles.

Richard: Okay.

Josie: To just get them to stop attacking.

Richard: That 100% sounds like the playbook move Grapple. Sorry, the playbook move One to One, in which you grapple an opponent.

Josie: Well, do I need to roll to grapple first, or can I just do it?

Richard: Nope. You’re doing the thing. You are going to grapple them, and you’ve got all sorts of weird tentacles and stuff, so that’s probably gonna work, but let’s find out how that ends up by rolling a move.

Josie: Yeah. Let me roll real quick. It’s a +Calm.

Rhi: Well first you ask if they yield, right?

Josie: Right. So Cass just, I think from the front, just reaches her tentacles out and they are goopy and leave trails and mush into each other very much like a symbiont sort of thing.

Richard: Ooh… [grossed out noises] Mm-hmm! This is fine.

Rhi: [laughs]

Josie: And just wraps one around each limb and then gives them a look in the eyes, like “really? Are you gonna keep doing this?” And that’s kind of me asking if they yield.

Richard: Like, you’ve got them wrapped up in no time flat, and you can see them gripping the boot knife, or the dive knife, in their right hand, and there’s a moment, like there’s a beat. You’re not sure what they’re going to do, and you see their eyes flick over to Orla, and Orla, you just get this accusatory glance like “I can’t believe that you protect this person and that you are friends with this horrible person,” and then the eyes shift back to Cass and they drop the knife. It sort of spirals down and we get this shot of it slowly floating down and it hits point-down on the edge of the precipice and then rotates a little so that it goes off and it just starts falling down into the distance, and you see the fight go out of them.

Josie: Uh-huh. Okay. So they yield which means I need to do a roll, 2d6+2. I got a 12.

Richard: Okay!

Josie: So on 10+ I choose two.

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Josie: I think my options are “you speak your peace and they hear you” and “you create an opportunity for your allies.”

Richard: Okay.

Josie: I think it’s… I have a feeling the other two are gonna actually speak to him first, then they probably need to link them up into the telepathic link.

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Josie: Yeah. I think… Really, this just amounts to Cass doesn’t go further than this.

Richard: I wonder if like, honestly, for something like the Delvers, they would probably already have a language of dive signals.

Josie: That’s true.

Richard: You know, if it’s like… Is that part of—Is that in Akoros, right?

Rhi: Akoros, yeah, um… Yeah. I mean, I could see where they would learn Akorosi—or what did I… Imperial Sign Language, where they would learn that.

Richard: Yeah, I was just gonna say, so it’s based on Imperial Sign Language then, these sort of dive signals. So if you release them and sort of push them back, you can let them speak, but you can also hold them while the others actually speak, so if Orla wants to say anything she can.

Josie: Right.

Minna: Okay. So I think Orla kind of moves forward.

Minna (as Orla): We can settle this back home. This is not how we settle this kind of thing.

Richard: So you see, like, as they’re… with their hand that they had the knife in—first off they flip you the bird.

[laughter]

Richard: And then you see them actually, because they can’t have their whole, um, they don’t have full range of movement, you see them actually fingerspell out:

Richard (as ???): Fine, but we aren’t done here.

Minna (as Orla): Down here? You wanna be included in this?

Richard: You’re offering to let them be a part of the score, essentially?

Minna: Yeah? Like…

Richard: Interesting… Okay.

Rhi: [laughs]

Minna: Like, you wanna be treated like family, fine, we’ll do it. You gotta treat us like that back.

Josie: I think Cass shoots Orla a look, like “what?!”

[laughter]

Rhi: Yeah. You also hear Thaddeus in the back of your head.

Rhi (as Thaddeus): Orla, what are you doing?

Richard: I love that. Okay so, hey, this is the opportunity that was created. So… what do you all want to do?

Rhi: I think Thaddeus basically just says:

Rhi (as Thaddeus): Just send him back to the surface, we can figure this out later, but I don’t want either of you to get stabbed.

Josie (as Cass): Yeah. I mean, Orla, if you tell me to let him go, I’ll do it, but…

Minna (as Orla): Listen. They need a payout, we took that payout. The way to make this good is help them get one of their own to make up for what was taken.

Josie: I think Cass squeezes a little tighter for just a second and then lets go.

Richard: Okay.

Josie: Just a little fuck you on the way there.

[laughter]

Richard: Perfect. So yeah, you let them go and sort of move back, and you see the confusion on their face. We need a name for this person.

Rhi: Yeah, I was just gonna say. Now that they’re coming with us they need a name. [giggles]

Richard: And I think the pronouns are kind of like ambiguous between he/them, maybe? So they use both.

Josie: What about like… Corin?

Richard: Okay, yeah, let’s do that. So Corin, they/them. They look at you all in sort of confusion and then sort of glance down at the spear, questioning-like, and then looks at the two of—well, looks at the three of you…-ish.

Rhi: Yeah, but only knows about two.

Josie: I think Cass is pouting by the edge of the cliff.

Richard: Fantastic. So Corin actually signs to Orla:

Richard (as Corin): Are you serious?

Minna (as Orla): Yes.

Richard: You see the moment of indecision, and they go and they sort of cautiously pick up the spear and transfer it to a little sleeve that they have, or a little clip that they have, on their back. Then they sign to you.

Richard (as Corin): You still owe me… but fine. What the hell are you all doing down here?

Rhi: I imagine, you know, a leviathan corpse… if you can bring back—as we covered and the Leviathan Song episodes, any pieces of a leviathan’s body are valuable, so if we can get down there and get some bone or some of that chitinous armor… I feel like that was our plan. We heard this story about a dead leviathan, did some digging, found the location, and then were like okay, let’s grab a bit and we’ll just occasionally come out here and grab a bit more.

Richard: Okay. So now at this point, Corin… I don’t think that Corin realizes what it is down there yet, so is someone pointing that out to them and being like, look.

Rhi: I mean, I can’t tell him anything, because I can’t let him know I’m here.

[laughter]

Richard: And Cass is pouting, so I think it really is actually down to Orla what they wanna say.

Minna: It is up to Orla.

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Minna (as Orla): All right, if you’re gonna come with us, here’s the deal. We’re hoping there’s a leviathan down there. Well, we’re pretty sure there’s a leviathan down there. We think they’re dead, but they’re also not “not alive,” or something down there is alive. So it’s gonna be a bit of a risk, but if you’re up for the risk, then…

Richard: You see a very slow hand sign of just:

Richard (as Corin): Fuuuck.

[laughter]

Richard (as Corin): Okay. Okay…

Richard: Then they sort of… They have signs for their siblings, because they’re not actually going to spell out their names, but they have signs that you recognize for some of their siblings.

Richard (as Corin): They are gonna be so happy if we can get this.

Richard: Then they look at you and go:

Richard (as Corin): Three way split?

Minna (as Orla): Seems fair.

Richard (as Corin): Fine.

Richard: So Corin nods and looks over at Cass. What’s Cass up to?

Josie: I think Cass has looked back at this point and two of her tentacles have split human arms made of goop out of them just in case she needs to sign.

Richard: Oh God…

Josie (as Cass): Are we going or what?

Richard: You see Corin sign back.

Richard (as Corin): You know that’s super fucking creepy, right?

[laughter]

Richard: And just shakes their head.

Josie: Cass is like… Cass actually smirks and says:

Josie (as Cass): Yeah, I know. It’s great, right?

Richard: So, Corin shoots a look over at Orla and sort of rolls their eyes, and the three of you, well the four of you, begin making your way down toward the depths. So, as you go, what are some of the things that you see during your swim down the side of the cliff? What sort of sea creatures do you encounter on your way down?

Rhi: Ooh…

Josie: I feel like none of this is enough to see from a distance, and I don’t know, maybe our passing causes them to dim, but as we pass by things bioluminescent stuff lights up behind us.

Richard: Ohh, interesting.

Rhi: Ooh, that’s cool.

Josie: Because like, they go dark when they’re like “a thing is coming,” but then they light up again.

Richard: So we see that, and I think as you pass through there are a couple of shots of these large eels that pop out of holes in the cliff and sort of look around. There’s a couple of them that you see that start to look at you and then realize that y’all are a bit bigger than them and head back into their holes and just sort of hang out. You can tell that they’re sort of drawn by the lights turning off, because that means that something is moving through that area.

And you make your way down to the edges of this leviathan corpse. Some of the other, you know… you see lots of regular fish, right, so little silvery guys schooling and everything. I don’t know if you actually saw any of the eels that were popping out, but you get to the bottom and there’s sea stars all over the place and there’s like a small kelp and seagrass area right at the foot of the cliff and there’s some currents that sort of upwell and go up the face of the cliff that bring lots of nutrients and everything, so there’s actually a lot more life here than in some of the places up-top.

You come to the first jutting spire, that’s probably I wanna say maybe twice as tall as a person, that is sticking out of this and is clearly one of these legs. As you get closer to it we get a shot of this long almost like hallway between the center of the rows of legs that looks like just this almost tree-lined boulevard but super creepy and full of oceanic life. So what do you do as you approach this first leg?

Josie: I think Cass wants to try to camouflage herself like the carapace of the creature.

Richard: Ooh, okay.

Josie: So she can kinda move along it and get the drop on things.

Richard: Okay. You absolutely do that. You almost disappear. Right? So we get a shot of Corin and Orla and you, and you just disappear, and then the view switches over to Thaddeus and we’re watching your silhouette through the ghost field over Thaddeus’s shoulder as you start to make your way up towards the leg. As you get closer, you’re starting to notice something weird about the crabs that are just sort of hanging out in this area. So what strange feature do these crabs have that you haven’t seen before in the crabs up-top?

Josie: I think they’re two-sided crabs. Like, they have the crab face and claws on one side and also the other side.

Rhi: Oh!

Josie: Yes.

Richard: Ohh, okay.

Rhi: [delighted] Oh-ho-ho! That’s so weird!

Richard: And you approach this thing. So what do you do when you get there? Like, when you actually make your way up to the leg.

Josie: Well, since we already made the tree comparison, I think I just wanna wrap my tentacles around the leg and try and see farther down the crevasse.

Richard: Okay. So, the moment that you reach out and touch it you can sense that, like… There’s all this stuff sort of crusted onto it, right? That’s just what happens to things that are underwater for a couple centuries. As you do that, you can feel some of it just sloughs away. There’s just, like… below the stuff that was sort of encrusted onto it is this very slick, very non-stick shiny iridescent carapace.

Josie: Huh.

Richard: At first it doesn’t make sense. It’s like wait, how could that, like… everything should have just fallen directly off of it. What you realize is that it’s all just sort of crusted onto itself but nothing is actually holding onto the limb itself, and as you look at it you can see this purply neon yellowy sort of shine to it, so almost like how when you’re looking at a corvid’s feathers in sunlight, it has those other colors that are in it.

Josie: Uh-huh.

Richard: But it’s got this weird thing that just doesn’t feel right to look at. It just doesn’t feel good.

Josie: [squirms]

Richard: So you’re exposing little bits of that as you’re working your way up toward the top. You get there, and you look down, and the sort of bright spot that Thaddeus showed you is there, sort of glowing, a couple hundred feet away. You can see it in the ghost field, but just looking at it normally you don’t really see anything. It’s just sort of all seafloor and sand and rocks and coral and seashells and things like that.

Josie: But in the ghost field it’s just like a glowing dot?

Richard: Yeah. It’s pulsating a little bit.

Rhi: I feel like Thaddeus is kind of angel on your shoulder–ing it.

Josie: [laughs]

Richard: Okay.

Rhi: And so has just been kind of drifting along with you. He’s gonna say:

Rhi (as Thaddeus): I can go check it out if you three wanna start pulling stuff off here.

Josie (as Cass): If you’re okay with that. It seems like it might be a ghost thing.

Rhi (as Thaddeus): Well, I’m uniquely equipped to deal with ghost things.

Josie (as Cass): Okay.

Rhi (as Thaddeus): I’ll be okay, promise.

Josie (as Cass): All right. Call me if you need anything, bro.

Richard: Corin signs at Cass.

Richard (as Corin): You okay?

Josie: I think Cass isn’t going to explain.

Josie (as Cass): Yeah. Start harvesting. Don’t move further yet.

Richard (as Corin): Okay.

Richard: So yeah, so Corin’s actually gonna go to the base of the leg and start trying to dig into it. They pretty quickly find that it’s really, really, really tough to pierce whatever this shell is, which is why it’s lasted so long. So they’re just trying to find a chink essentially in the armor where they can start prying, essentially. You see them go for their dive knife and then realize that it’s somewhere back at the bottom of the cliff probably, and sort of just, like… “damn it.” So they’re using the spear tip to try and do that. What is Orla doing?

Minna: I almost want to investigate and see if I can figure out if the chitin is the most important part or if there’s something else, some other opportunity here.

Richard: Mmm. Okay. Perfect, go for it.

Minna: I think that’s gonna be a Truth Seeker, so I’m gonna roll +Hope.

Richard: Yeah. When you can instinctually read the flow of the Echo around creatures and objects, you examine an important object or creature.

Minna: Hey! I got a 10.

Rhi: [gasps] yay~

Richard: All right, this is definitely that. So on a hit—sorry, on a 10+, you get to ask me a question about the past, present, or potential future of the target. You’re also gonna get +1 ongoing with regard to information revealed about that. So, what would you like to know?

Minna: I would like to know what our best opportunity for gain is here.

Richard: Okay. All of the leviathans are different, but you have heard that this chitinous armor is extremely valuable for manufactured items and of course like armor and stuff too. This weird property of it being hard to look at you’re thinking could actually be really good for alchemical reagents. It feels like that’s stuff that might be useful. You’re not 100% sure, but you have the sense that would be really valuable. What I will also give you is you have Danger Sense as one of your gifts.

Minna: Yes.

Richard: So you’re sort of examining this and you’re looking at the overall structure of this thing and going “okay, the leg joints are probably gonna be the best thing to attack to try and get something out of here that we can actually carry, and will be transportable, and is gonna be relatively valuable without us spending a week down here trying to chop away at it,” but you’re sort of looking around and you’re following Thaddeus, and looking back over toward that center, that slightly pulsating thing, when something happens.

Minna: Oh.

Richard: So, Thaddeus.

Rhi: [laughing] Oh no! I’m in danger!

[laughter]

Richard: What I’m going to ask you is, because you are the ghost in this situation, you are the one who is most tuned in to the ghost field.

Rhi: Mm-hmm.

Richard: What do you find when you get closer to this thing? What shape is this pulsating thing in that alarms you?

Rhi: Oh boy… What would be most upsetting to find down here right now? Hmm. So, I’m looking at it through the ghost field which means that I’m seeing ghostly spiritual soul energy as brighter and anything that doesn’t really have that in it is a lot duller, so it kinda takes me a little bit. I don’t really have to swim, I drift over there and find this… I think it’s kind of a larger heap in the center, in the center of the leviathan, that is also covered in barnacles and stuff.

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Rhi: I am trying to get a good look at what it actually is in the real world, but it’s kind of hard for me to tell. I think that what alarms me is that the pulsing starts to speed up as I get closer and then that light, which I belatedly realize is electroplasm, shoots out through all of the tubing in this ancient rusted but somehow still functional hull that’s down here.

Richard: Yesss. Okay.

Josie: Cool.

Rhi: And I think that it’s starting to power up.

Richard: Okay then! So, we see the remains of this hull incrusted with all sorts of lovely sea life burst with this energy, and from where you’re at, Orla, you sense it just before it happens. So, it almost sounds like y’all have, oh I don’t know, stumbled on something and maybe been drawn to this thing that maybe shouldn’t have been uncovered. Does that sound familiar to anything in your playbook?

Rhi: Hmm, A Buried Secret, Touched by Violence.

Minna: Hmm!

Rhi: Uh-oh.

[laughter]

Minna: Bloodhound time, is that what we’re saying?

Rhi: Uh-oh, Orla.

Richard: I mean, the corruption drives you to uncover a buried secret about an object, creature, or site that was touched by violence, and when you find it, I mean… it sounds like maybe you found a thing like that. Do you wanna fire off that Corruption move and do a thing?

Minna: I do. We are all going to mark Corruption.

Josie: Oh great.

Rhi: Oh yay.

Richard: [laughs] So, what I think happens is… Thaddeus’s connection with Cass and with Orla is something that has been kept secret, we’ve talked about that a little bit already, but they have the ability to communicate telepathically. So I think what happens is in this moment this blast of energy reaches out and latches onto Thaddeus, and in that moment your consciousness reaches out to everyone around you to brace for impact, and that includes Corin.

Rhi: Oopsie~

Josie: Oh boy.

Richard: So, all of a sudden all the things that you’re experiencing shoot out, and Orla and Cass, you can both feel this as Corin’s mind is going “what is happening?” Right? That sense of shock. You’re feeling everything that Thaddeus is putting out, and…

Josie: [squirms]

Richard: …there’s a feeling there. So what does it feel like when Cass injects herself with leviathan blood?

Josie: It’s something you get used to, but the first few times it’s very uncomfortable. I imagine it’s not a thin liquid. It’s viscous and laded with magic stuff.

Rhi: [disgusted noise]

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Josie: So it’s just profoundly uncomfortable for that first bit, and as it spreads it just kind of makes everything feel really distant, like it just kind of changes your experience of the world.

Richard: So, the four of you all feel something like that, of not necessarily a physical thing entering your body but the sensation of the blood in your veins, or for Thaddeus that sense of self that you have that binds your ghostly form to what it used to be, you can feel something moving throughout it that just is wrong, and it’s just the worst feeling. There’s this energy flowing out, and you actually, in the physical world, can see this arching out from Thaddeus to each of the three of you and to a bunch of these crabs in the area.

Rhi: [laughing] Poor crabs.

Richard: Yeah. They’re living in the shadow of something real messed up. So the thing that happens is, what form does this hull have? Like, what shape is it?

Rhi: What I was thinking is that, you know, this leviathan has been down here for centuries, there are stories about it, we’re not the first ones to try this. I think somebody came down here with like a mining hull basically.

Richard: Ooh.

Rhi: So I think it has like a drill arm and maybe the spinning saw… I know there’s a name for it, but you know, on each—

Richard: Yeah, the circular saw.

Rhi: That’s it, circular saw, on the other arm. So like, yeah, somebody came down here trying to do the same thing we’re doing, but they brought much heavier equipment.

Richard: Okay.

Rhi: So I think it’s, you know, vaguely humanoid. It has two legs and two arms but is I think probably a lot bigger than your average human.

Richard: Okay. So, what happens then is it stands up. It’s probably two or three times as tall as you, and it starts clearing the area around it. What you can actually see is it’s digging down and moving all of this sand out of the way, and there’s this cloud of debris that’s coming up in the water and making it difficult to see you, but as it clears it away you can see more of the shell, right, of that purplish neon yellow iridescent shell below where it was, and you see a scratch in it.

It’s clearing things out of the way, it’s like shuffling with its feet to get the area clear until it can see it, and it starts to reach down with the drill arm, and you see just the tiniest scuff. The moment that it hits the drill that has begun to spin again to the shell there’s what feels like an earthquake.

Rhi: Oh no…

Josie: [chuckles nervously]

Richard: The ground beneath you begins to shake as bits of the shell are starting to move again, and the tips of the legs start to curl inwards and form a cage, and within moments, what you see, Orla, from where you are, is you see them twitch and then in like a half a second flat you see as this cage of them goes shooting down into the area where the hull is, and if Thaddeus had a corporeal body they’d be a shish kebab at this point.

Rhi: [laughs]

Richard: They would be super dead. You see as the legs go and start scraping against this hull and it begins to fight them. You specifically, because you have this ability to sort of do that psychometry type thing with the Truth Seeker, I’d actually like you to roll that as you are seeing all this happen to get a little bit more information about what the heck is going on here.

Minna: Mm-hmm!

Rhi: I think I just want to add that most of what you’re getting from Thaddeus is the spectral equivalent of incoherent screaming.

[laughter]

Minna: Oh buddy…

Rhi: But somewhere in there is:

Rhi (as Thaddeus): Demons don’t have souls. Demons aren’t in the ghost field. I didn’t know. I didn’t know! I swear I didn’t know!

[laughter]

Rhi: Just panicking.

Minna: So that’s a 7?

Richard: Okay, that is a 7. When you examine an important object? Or creature? Or thing?

Minna: Can I just ask “what the fuck?”

[laughter]

Richard: Yes. Absolutely. Your question can be. You’re actually right next to Corin who has a spear, like… they’ve managed to get it into one of the joints and they’re prying away at it, and you’re like “what the hell. That should. If poking the shell did anything, that should be a thing, right?”

What you quickly figure out is, you’re watching, you’re seeing, you’re hearing this scream from Thaddeus, and you sort of tap into that bit of that feeling in the ghost field that lets you find this information and sort of sense these things beyond what someone could normally tell, and you follow it back, and you feel that there’s actually a connection somehow between Thaddeus and whatever is still left inside of this hull.

And you feel it as almost a part of yourself, like you’ve grown a new arm that happens to be your dead friend and this 200 year old hull and whatever ghost is powering it, and you can feel the thread as it goes through the drill. You sense that the ghost in the hull is not just sort of making it move but that its aura is inhabiting the entire machine, and that’s why the drill was able to actually make progress against the fully formed main part of the shell rather than having to go and try and find a place or a chink in the armor. That’s the reason that it was able to actually attack the main part of the chitin and the armor.

As these arms come in, and they’re going, and they would have gone through Thaddeus, and this machine, this hull is sort of pulled away from it, the moment that the machine is not trying to dig into the shell, you can feel as the… the legs are spasming, but they have a little bit less purpose.

There’s a ripple effect from where Thaddeus and the hull are. You can tell that it’s more of a kneejerk reaction at this point, and there’s that moment of “oh, okay, I understand what’s going on,” and then you remember that Cass is on top of one of the legs.

[laughter]

Richard: So… Cass, what would you like to do about that?

Josie: Honestly? As soon as Thaddeus is in pain and starts screaming she’s just gonna give one look to Orla. Like, this is me offering her a chance to stop me, but if she doesn’t she’s just gonna fucking charge that hole.

Richard: [laughs]

Josie: Because it’s hurting Thaddeus and it needs to stop.

Rhi: [laughs]

Minna: Are you asking me to hold you back?

Josie: I’m giving you the opportunity to.

[laughter]

Minna: She will. I think what happens is that Orla goes up and tries to pull you off of the leg and also away from the hull and Thaddeus.

Josie (as Cass): Orla, we have to stop it!

Minna (as Orla): I don’t think you can stop it without hurting Thaddeus.

Josie (as Cass): But… [stammers] He’s hurting a lot.

Minna (as Orla): I know.

Josie (as Cass): [frantic] I promised.

Minna: Is there a way… Like, Thaddeus is still connected to us, yes? But just unresponsive?

Rhi: Yeah.

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Rhi: No, I think that the screaming was just kind of initial “oh God, what the fuck, what the fuck, what the—AHH!”

Minna: Oh, okay.

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Minna: So I think you get a:

Minna (as Orla): Thaddeus?

Rhi: Yeah. I think the screaming has stopped. You’re probably still picking up some lingering confusion panic from Thaddeus, but he’s starting to chill out a little bit.

Josie: Okay.

Rhi: Yeah. I think maybe you get that at the same time as Orla. Like, “it’s okay.” [laughs]

Josie: [laughs nervously]

Richard: So, with that move then, you can soothe your violent nature and clear a Corruption if you choose to.

Josie: Sure, I’ll do that.

Richard: So the hull has sort of taken its drill away from the shell and you’re all still sort of, like, the feeling of being connected to, through the whole chain of Thaddeus to the hull, is dying down quickly, except for Thaddeus. You actually feel like you are somehow… whatever spirit is in this thing has sort of latched onto you.

Rhi: Uh-huh…

Richard: And you’re not quite sure if you’re gonna be able to pull away from it or not.

Rhi: So here’s the thing. I don’t know if I want to, because now that I’ve stopped panicking I’m recognizing that this is another ghost that has been trapped down here alone for who knows how long.

Richard: Mm-hmm?

Rhi: And I could help it. I’m a helper.

Josie & Minna: [emotional noises]

Richard: Okay.

Rhi: So… um?

Richard: I mean…

Josie (as Cass): Thaddeus.

Rhi: [grinning] See, I got this Corruption move here.

Josie: Oh.

Minna: [gasps]

Richard: You do.

Rhi: I know it does say from an ally—It says to take Corruption from an ally’s track and add it to your own.

Richard: I mean, you’ve already made one friend already today. Why not another?

Rhi: Yeah, you know! Yeah! [laughs] Is that cool for me to just pull that?

Richard: Yeah.

Rhi: How much Corruption is this thing? Because I feel like this is gonna go real bad for my boy.

Richard: Oh boy, um… I believe the technical term for it is all the Corruption.

Rhi: Okay.

[laughter]

Richard: So, it’ll be enough to fill up your track, essentially.

Rhi: Yeah.

Richard: So, you… Good lord.

[laughter]

Richard: So you immediately mark 2 Conditions.

Rhi: I kinda want to… Okay, so definitely Isolated.

Richard: Mm.

Rhi: I think Despair, honestly. I think that’s just sort of what I take on from this spirit.

Richard: I have a question for you.

Rhi: Yes.

Richard: Do you merge with the spirit and become part of the hull, and have control over it, or is this just sort of pulling out and purifying what was already there?

Rhi: I don’t think that I merge with it, and I don’t think that I’m able to pull this spirit out of the hull. I think that I just kind of recognize that I had formed this involuntary link with it and I’m sensing its suffering and its anguish, so I deliberately open up that channel wider and just take those feelings away so it’s not feeling that suffering anymore. But now I’m carrying that.

Richard: Okay.

Rhi: Which is where those Conditions come from. So I think the hull feels great. [laughs] The hull feels a lot better. The hull I think for the first time in two centuries has hope that maybe it can get out of here or succeed at its mission or whatever. Whatever it wants, it has that ability to feel like it can do it again.

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Rhi: Thaddeus ain’t doing so hot. [chuckles]

Richard: Okay. So as part of that Corruption move, you are energized by that Corruption.

Rhi: Oh God! Yeah, that’s right. Fuck. [laughs]

Richard: So you are, you have—So here’s the fun thing about it. You pulled enough corruption off of it to fill your Corruption track which means you unlock another Corruption move and you clear the track, which means you now have a completely open Corruption track, and the ability that you get for this scene is you can mark a Corruption to just treat a roll as a 10+ and your ally can, which I think in this case, because the hull is… we’re gonna treat it as a quasi-character sort of, it’s going to be successful at the things that it does.

Rhi: Yeah. I think that what also gets pulled over is this thing’s mission, so both Thaddeus and this thing are equally driven to collect as much of this leviathan as we can. So that’s what we’re gonna be working on. [laughs]

Richard: Okay. So right about then, Orla and Cass, you hear a…

Richard (as Corin): What the fuck is going on?

Richard: …from Corin.

[laughter]

Richard: Who is now like:

Richard (as Corin): Wait, I’m not… Talk… What? I can hear all—What is…? Thaddeus?!

[laughter]

Rhi: Thaddeus is a little busy right now and can’t respond.

Minna (as Orla): Corin, buddy…

Richard (as Corin): What did you do to me?!

Josie (as Cass): Technically nothing.

Richard (as Corin): I hate you. You are all assholes! I, I, I… [strains and stammers]

Minna (as Orla): You know how, if you want to, you can look into the ghost field whenever you want?

Richard (as Corin): [uneasy] yeah?

Minna (as Orla): Let’s just call this hearing into the ghost field.

Richard (as Corin): We had better make so much money.

Rhi: [laughs]

Minna (as Orla): Buddy, we will.

Richard (as Corin): Okay…

Rhi: [laughing] I think in the background you just see that the hull is starting to drill in and Thaddeus is like telekinetically lifting up big chunks.

Richard: Yes. Okay.

Rhi: I’m just gonna straight-up to Do Something Wondrous of using your gifts in a spectacular way.

Richard: You gonna mark a Corruption to roll 10+? Okay.

Rhi: Yeah! I’m just gonna mark a Corruption of a 10+ so that I can just use my telekinesis more powerfully than I ever have before to just rip a hunk of this thing off.

Richard: Okay. So, as you’re doing this, we’re gonna circle back to Orla’s Corruption move where the thing that you get is you describe how you immediately begin to repeat the horrors of the past. I think in this case the horrors of the past are delving and carving apart this leviathan corpse without necessarily regard to the safety of others.

I think part of the corruption that you pulled in, like you said, was that mission, so there’s almost a block or an empty space, Thaddeus, for you right now of like your worry for the safety of anyone else.

So from Orla and Cass’s and Corin’s perspective, this digging that you’re doing is starting to reactivate those legs and it’s spasming and there is all sorts of bits of, like, all the stuff that was encrusted onto the legs is coming off, and you’re just seeing as there are flashes of shiny purple and neon yellow, almost like it’s trying to walk or like it’s trying to scratch itself, except these are huge razor-sharp blades that are however long.

So with that, how are Orla and Cass and Corin avoiding all of this?

Josie: I think avoiding is a strong word…

Richard: [laughs]

Josie: …considering that, as soon as she has the opportunity, Cass is gonna try and get over to Thaddeus as quick as possible.

Richard: Okay. So yeah, what are you specifically trying to do?

Josie: I think Cass just gives up the ghost of having human from the shoulders up and just shifts into this big long eel thing so she can slip between things better.

Richard: Ooh.

Josie: Like a slime eel.

Rhi & Richard: [disgusted and delighted sounds]

Richard: Yeah.

Rhi: I love it.

Josie: To try and get over there.

Richard: I will also point out that you have Sense Weakness, right? So you can identify weak points in everyone, friend or foe.

Josie: Right. Yeah, I guess for the leviathan would be… how do we stop it from moving?

Richard: Hmm…

Josie: And for the hull would be… how do I get it to stop hurting Thaddeus?

Richard: Interesting. Okay. For the leviathan itself: You have injected yourself with leviathan blood. Literally, you have a portion of a leviathan’s power running through you. You’ve touched the shell. As you were climbing up you exposed bits and pieces of it and you’ve now sort of come into contact with it.

I think there’s almost like a boiling feeling as you’re changing into the eel-like shape, and you can actually feel almost like a sympathetic vibration almost as the power that is left within this massive corpse is the same kind of power that is running through you, and you activating it in such a blatant active way is allowing you to feel the network of that power that is running still throughout the corpse.

You can feel concentrations of it in places like the bottom of the legs and in the joints and things like that. You get the sense that if you could reach out, either through the ghost field or maybe with physical contact, if you could get access to those and channel some of your power into them that you could stop them at least temporarily from communicating with the rest of the corpse.

Josie: Ah.

Richard: So that’s what you learn about the leviathan. The hull, you’re not actually certain that it is hurting Thaddeus. You can see that what Thaddeus has pulled into himself is the emotions and the feelings and the way he’s done that before. It’s literally the same mechanism that connects you to him and connects him to Orla. It’s not like there’s some weird nasty thing going on, it’s just that they pulled too much.

Josie: Mm-hmm.

Richard: So you’re not sure exactly how to help with that other than helping them deal with maybe those, in game terms, dealing with those Conditions to help them calm it and deal with those things.

Rhi: If I can just add one thing that I think Cass probably realizes.

Richard: Sure.

Rhi: I think this level of sort of impulsive recklessness is something that Cass usually sees in herself more than Thaddeus.

Josie: [laughs]

Richard: Hmm!

Rhi: But it’s a very familiar thing of like, “oh, oh no… oh, I know what you’re doing, because I do it all the time. Shit.”

[laughter]

Josie: Oh no. “I’m supposed to be the one doing that!”

Richard: “I learned it from watching you~!”

Rhi: “I’m not supposed to be the responsible one!”

Richard: All right. So, if you’re rushing in, then you are picking all of this up as you get closer to the scene. Hey, the hull has actually managed with Thaddeus’s help to actually pull up a chunk of this chitinous plate, so you actually have access to the interior of this thing, if that was a thing you wanted to do.

Josie: Well, I think her priority number one right now is Thaddeus.

Richard: Okay.

Josie: But I think as she feels that sympathetic vibration, maybe it’s not even a fully conscious thing she does, but rather than being like an eel she ends up kind looking like a smaller goopy version of it.

Richard: Ohh, I love that. That’s awful and I love it.

[laughter]

Rhi: That’s so good.

Richard: So you become this long millipede isopod-looking thing just sort of crawling along the bottom as you head towards them?

Josie: Yeah.

Richard: Okay.

Josie: I don’t know, maybe it’ll feel more comfortable with me being there.

[laughter]

Richard: So you’re headed that way. I think let’s actually cut over really quick to Orla. So, Cass has jumped in head… tentacles… weird isopod legs first, to go in and help, but like we were saying before the legs have started to really just go ham on trying to rip up anything that is on what is essentially its upturned underbelly which right now includes you and Corin.

Minna: [uneasy hum]

Richard: So what are you doing about that?

Minna: I think the first thing I have to do is get Corin out of there safely, because they don’t seem to be reacting terribly well. [laughs]

Richard: Okay. Yeah. They are sort of stunned with the whole mental connection thing and everything that’s going on.

Minna: Yeah.

Richard: That sounds like you might be putting yourself in harm’s way to defend someone else.

Minna: Okie-doke, I can do that. Oh, Altruism is not my best thing right now.

Richard: [chuckles]

Minna: I’ll be rolling at a -1 here.

Richard: Could be worse.

Minna: Seven, that’s not bad.

Richard: Okay, so on a 7 you get to choose two from that list, but Corin is safe. So, either you take the hit, you end up in a bad spot, or you lash out at a friend, any two of those three.

Minna: I take the hit and end up in a bad spot.

Richard: Okay. What does it look like as you get Corin out of the way?

Minna: I think that Corin is legitimately about to get hit by one of the legs, and I grab them and, as well as I can at least, I push them off the side of our pill bug friend.

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Minna: But in the process I do get hit by one of the legs and then get tossed into the middle of this double row of legs that are currently trying to kill me.

Richard: Ohh, okay. Yeah, so I’d say go ahead and roll to Endure as your danger sense is pinging like mad and you’re able to shove them out of the way, but you are in a really, really bad spot.

Minna: Plus Conditions marked, so that’s a 9.

Richard: So you definitely take a hit, and you are in the middle of shish kebab leg city. It’s like something from one of those spy movies where you’re having to acrobat your way through the whole thing except that’s not where you’re at. You’re just in the point where you’re huddled and trying not to be stabbed by all these things coming through.

Josie: [laughs]

Minna: [giggling] Do you wanna know what scene I’m picturing? Attack of the Clones, the droid factory.

[laughter]

Richard: So I think we see you trying to move through it, and you take that first hit, and you’re struggling, and then we cut back over to Thaddeus and the hull. You have managed to get a good square chunk of this thing that is probably going to take two of you to effectively move, because Thaddeus, probably, I mean you’ve got telekinesis so you could probably actually help with that.

Rhi: Yeah.

Richard: But you’ve got a big, big hunk of this thing that any more than that might really strain you to try and take with you.

Rhi: Yeah.

Richard: So you’ve kind of gotten a big chunk. You have checked off that item on the itemized quest list that shows up in your HUD of extract a giant chunk of chitinous armor from the leviathan corpse. So, given that, what do you think the next instruction that the hull would have would be, and are you still tied to it enough that you’re still following them?

Rhi: That’s kind of what I was thinking. I think that Thaddeus is, because we’re all still psychically linked, is going to pick up that Orla just got badly hurt.

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Rhi: And I think that is what kind of shakes them out of this, you know, machine-like focus on completing a task. I think he looks over towards Orla and also will see bug form Cass—

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Josie: [laughs]

Rhi: —skittering over. I like to think also that since Thaddeus only ever sees Cass in the ghost field, like, he can still see whatever physical form she’s taken, but primarily—and I think this is probably also part of why Thaddeus makes excuses for her and covers for her—is because he sees spirit primarily, which I think to him just looks like who she was before all of this.

Richard: Right.

Josie: [laughs]

Rhi: You know, just small baby sister.

Josie: Aw.

Rhi: So yeah, I think at this point he kinda shakes out of it a little bit and will ask Cass:

Rhi (as Thaddeus): What’s happening? What happened to Orla? What are you doing? What’s going on?

Josie (as Cass): A-Are you okay?

Rhi (as Thaddeus): Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.

Josie (as Cass): You were screaming. I can tear it apart if you want.

Rhi (as Thaddeus): No, no, no. We just, we need to help Orla.

Josie (as Cass): O-Okay. You’re good?

Rhi (as Thaddeus): I’m good. I’m good.

Josie (as Cass): Okay… um, okay. Good. He’s okay, all right…

Josie: Yeah, I think—You did mention that hull that got torn up.

Richard: Mm-hmm. There are like leg blades scraping the hull and continuously, you know, running across it and creating gouges and moving through where Thaddeus would be as this is happening, because there’s still all these legs just shooting in and everything.

Josie: Yeah. I think Cass wants to reach a part of her into that hull and see if she can like, I don’t know, communicate with it I guess?

Richard: Mm.

Josie: It’s probably a more Cass thing to try and be angry at it and tell it to stop.

[laughter]

Richard: Interesting. Okay. So, what is the actual goal that you are trying to do here? Are you trying to specifically defend Orla? Are you trying to deaden the whole thing and use your powers to just be like “hey, stop, don’t do this,” like as a general thing so that you can all sort of do what you need to do or move around freely or whatever?

Josie: Yeah, the second thing there.

Richard: Okay. It sounds like that’s more of a Do Something Wondrous.

Josie: Okay.

Richard: And we will see how that goes.

Josie: Also, I want to point out, how have I not filled up my Corruption track yet?

Rhi: [laughs]

Josie: I got a 7.

Richard: All right. On a 7 you get what you want, but something bad happens. Either you’re gonna suffer a backlash, you’re gonna lose control at the worst time, or you put others in danger.

Josie: Uh, hmm…

Rhi: Ooh.

Josie: One of those first two.

Richard: Okay, so a backlash yourself or losing control. So my thought is you’re going in there and Cass is going in there with an angry mindset of “hey, fuck you, stop hurting my friend.” Right? Is that kind of what I’m getting?

Josie: Right. Exactly.

Richard: Okay. You’re doing this by actively putting part of your goopy leviathan nastiness into the actual dead corpse of leviathan and finding one of its weird nerve leviathan nerve cluster things and using that to communicate with it. That’s what I’m getting.

Josie: Mm-hmm. Yep.

Richard: Okay. You have a move. You in fact have a Corruption move called Slaughter.

Rhi: Oh no. [laughs]

Josie: Oh!

Minna: Oh…

Richard: I don’t know if that’s something you’d be interested in using in this case, because it really is something that, again, is 100% up to you.

Josie: I mean, does dead or alive really apply to this thing, though?

Richard: That’s the thing.

Josie: Can it be slaughtered? [laughs]

Richard: Yes, absolutely. You reach out and you get to this thing and you make a connection with it. You have been injecting yourself with leviathan blood for a relatively short time.

Josie: Mm-hmm.

Richard: This is something that is relatively new to you, and it has given you immense power.

Josie: Right.

Richard: But, this is the centuries-dead corpse of a leviathan that has been around probably since… I mean, how long ago was the Cataclysm? This is a being who is ancient and is a force of unimaginable power, and even though it is dead, the fact that it has the reflexes and the instinct to shred anything that even remotely touches it with an intent of harming it…

And that is in fact a ghost, because that’s the thing that you figured out is that it was the ghost energy that actually activated that response, which is why when you poked it with a stick it was like eh, whatever, fine.

The amount of power flowing through it, you’re starting to realize, is enough that you could probably, if you calmed yourself down and really, really focused, you could stop it for just long enough to get everyone out.

Josie: Right. There’s a couple ways to go about this. Yeah, she could just be really angry at it. I mean, she’s angry either way, but she could use Slaughter and give into that and then lose control or something. But also, given what she has done to herself, a wounded leviathan being one of the few things she’s sympathetic with? [laughs]

Richard: Yeah.

Josie: I don’t think I’m gonna give into Slaughter, as much as I want to use the move before the session is out, but I do think I will choose Lose Control at a Crucial Time, because if I’m tapping into this thing, like, who knows what’s gonna happen.

Richard: So, I think I know what that looks like if you’re okay with this.

Josie: Sure.

Richard: So you reach out. You’re fighting. You are fighting that urge to just destroy, and there’s a moment where you decide that that’s not what you’re going to do. Right? You’re feeling this connection with this thing, and I don’t think maybe that Cass is aware of what’s happening as it happens, but Thaddeus especially, because they’re not busy dodging blades, is able to see as some of that power and that energy that lies within this thing begins to seep into Cass.

There’s a moment where you, Cass, get a glimpse of a ship, and there’s flashes of steel and bits of lightning energy that you feel singeing your skin. You feel, as you are stung over and over and over again, you feel something being shredded by your legs. You feel soft things being pierced by each of them. You feel as you rip something hard and metal apart. You feel wood crunching and splintering beneath your legs.

Then you find yourself calm, with that feeling of your own anger sort of being bottled up and shoved aside, as you feel this strange sense of waiting, almost like taking a bonfire and letting it burn down to coals and just feeling that low heat, waiting. You get the sensation of floating on your back…

Josie: [emotional hum]

Richard: …and then just falling. This is all happening in an instant. You sort of pull back from it and all of this motion around you, this chaos of these sharp legs that are going and scraping up the sand and the soil and creating this dust cloud that makes it harder to see from all the debris floating through the water, you know, the smell of bits of blood that you’re now picking up on from where Orla is from that wound that they took… you can smell that. You can feel it.

All of this is happening, and then all of a sudden it just stops, and Thaddeus and Orla and Corin are there, and everything just becomes still, and there’s a moment where all of this, just like these particles… It’s dark down here, right? But the little bit of light from the bioluminescent creatures and everything shows as these bits of sand and everything that are floating in the water slowly start to settle.

We see revealed, Cass, sort of stepped away from the opening… and what form is Cass in physically when we see them, when they are revealed?

Josie: Well see, that’s the thing, I was kind of already in the form that I would have chosen here. [laughs]

Richard: Yeah. Okay.

Rhi: Maybe bigger?

Josie: Yeah. Maybe bigger than I should normally be able to be.

Rhi: Ooh, yeah! Like you normally have as much mass as your human body had to work with.

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Josie: Yeah. More than that, but like… there’s a limit here.

Rhi: Yeah.

Richard: Right.

Josie: I can’t just turn into a whale.

[laughter]

Rhi: Except…

Richard: Well…?

Josie: [laughs]

Richard: So okay. You are larger, noticeably larger, than you were then, in still that same form as the leviathan?

Josie: Yes.

Richard: Okay. So Thaddeus, you see that, and everything has suddenly become calm, and the hull sort of just turns to you and appears to be waiting. You see an electric lantern essentially light up as it’s got this singular eye, and off in the distance Orla is mid-contortion trying to not get stabbed by these things.

Minna: [tightly] Mm-hmm!

Richard: They slowly just sort of retract, and you’re bleeding a little bit.

Minna: Yep. It’s doing the thing that it does in water.

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Rhi: Ugh… ah, and it’s salt water. It hurts like a motherfucker.

Minna: Yup!

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Rhi: I think I’m gonna start by rolling Channel. [laughs]

Richard: Mm! Okay.

Rhi: Because I feel like I’m gonna possibly need some extra boosts here. We’re all gonna need it. So I’m gonna draw on the corruption to power my abilities to see how much Blight I can hold.

Richard: Okay.

Rhi: Ooh! Good roll. I got an 11.

Richard: Excellent.

Rhi: So, I’m holding 3 Blight and marking Corruption.

Richard: You know, like you do.

Rhi: So, I think after doing that I’m gonna tell the hull to grab the big chunk of shell that we have and start heading towards the cliff, because I know that’s gonna be slow-going, so like let’s just get you moving.

Richard: Mm-hmm.

Rhi: And then I think I’m gonna look up at Cass. Let me know if you’re cool with this, Josie. I don’t think that I see regular Cass spirit form anymore.

Josie: Yeah~! [laughs]

Richard: Ooh~!

Rhi: I think that you look like the shape that you are.

Josie: Nice.

Rhi: And Thaddeus is just like:

Rhi (as Thaddeus): [apprehensively] Cass…?

Josie: I think the thoughts are sluggish to return, kinda, almost like the feeling like you would feel them coming in the water first before they get to you.

Rhi: Ooh, that’s cool.

Josie (as Cass): Uh… yeah, Thaddy?

Rhi (as Thaddeus): Do you wanna go home?

Josie (as Cass): Uh… if we can.

Rhi (as Thaddeus): Okay. Let’s get Orla and Corin and let’s go home.

Richard: Okay. Is there anything that you want to see Orla do before we close things out, Minna?

Minna: I would like a leg.

[laughter]

Richard: Okay, so you actually want to take a leg with you, just because.

Minna: I do. [giggles]

Richard: Okay.

Minna: I can roll something if you want. I just…

Josie: Aren’t the legs like two stories high?

Richard: Yeah.

Rhi: Maybe—It sounded like they had razor claws on the end of the legs. Maybe one of those? Because that’s what actually got you.

Minna: There was like a portion of the leg that would be accessible, right?

Richard: Okay. Like a transportable portion of it?

Minna: Yeah.

Richard: Okay. You are… in the middle of a bunch of legs that were trying to stab you, and they start to slowly retract. You are safe, and as you look over to where Thaddeus and the hull and… oh dear lord, is that Cass, are…

[laughter]

Richard: What do you say?

Minna: I think Orla looks at Cass, shakes her head because this is not something she can deal with right now, and then she just gets this really determined look on her face and says:

Minna (as Orla): You are coming with me to the leg.

Richard: Interesting. Okay.

Minna: [laughing] She’s literally, if she has to, going to climb a leg to cut off a piece of it.

Richard: Okay. You get up there and you’re trying to cut through it and you’re having a ton of trouble with it. You just… you’ve got, you know, a good dive knife and everything. Cass…

Josie: Uh-huh?

Richard: You kinda get the sense that you could be like, “hey, can I have that?”

Josie: [laughs] Yeah. I think that’s Cass’s exact thought process.

Richard: [laughs] Okay, so literally the moment you have that thought of like, “it would be really cool if, you know, we could just—“”

Josie: I would like to request that the tip of it just pops off anticlimactically.

[laughter]

Richard: Yes.

Josie: Just, pop!

Richard: Do we get the whole scene of like, we see Orla trying to pick at it, doing the whole thing? If this were a manga we would have the full page thing of all the different angles that she’s trying to pop it off and is just like “URGH” and has the frustration thing. Then the next panel is just you being like “eh,” and then it goes “donk.”

Minna: I feel like Orla is literally halfway up the leg with a knife by the time that happens.

[laughter]

Richard: All right. So, we see that, and yeah, you collect these things. What does underwater first aid look like for the Delvers? Because you all know that a cut untreated underwater is going to attract predators.

Josie: I think it’s either really heavy leather wrappings around the bandages or more like pastes and stuff that you kind of rub over and maybe even fill in some wounds with.

Richard: Oh, interesting. I actually kind of love the idea that Corin actually swims over to Orla and is like still doing the thing where they’re trying to figure out if the voice in their head will work and so isn’t signing, and they’re just kind of saying this to themself in that sort of:

Richard (as Corin): Can you hear this? Like, okay, uh…?

Rhi (as Thaddeus): [flatly] Hey. Corin.

Richard (as Corin): Yeah?

Rhi (as Thaddeus): Hi.

Richard (as Corin): Hi. This is—

Rhi (as Thaddeus): It’s me.

Richard (as Corin): Okay. This is weird.

Rhi (as Thaddeus): Yeah.

Richard (as Corin): You’re bleeding, Orla. That, you know… As much as I went to stab… We are gonna be so god damn rich! Here.”

Rhi: [laughs]

Richard: They pull out a bit of that heavy-duty, like, it’s this weird purple-green mossy stuff out of a pouch that they have and just start smearing it into the wound. Then they pull a little leather strap that is obviously meant to be a bandage to help keep that in, and they’re tying it.

Richard (as Corin): This is… This is…

Minna (as Orla): That’s the spirit.

Richard (as Corin): Is… Is that a hull?! Like, that’s actually—

Rhi: Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

Richard (as Corin): Uh… Are we all gonna get murdered because someone finds out that we have this stuff?

Minna (as Orla): Not if nobody finds out.

Josie (as Cass): Well no one needs to find out.

Minna: [laughs]

Rhi: I feel like at that point Corin turns and looks at Cass and has to deal with that now.

Richard: It’s just like the:

Richard (as Corin): I hate you all so much…

Richard: And then we cut to everyone moving out and heading up the cliff. I think we actually get a shot similar to the way that we saw coming down, right, that trail of bioluminescence switching off, so there’s like a dead circle that’s moving through it. We see something similar on the way back up except in the center of it you can actually see bits of the bioluminescent light of the creatures around that’s reflecting off of the purple neon yellow iridescent shell of this creature as you’re moving up.

As we cut back up to the boat… So there’s just the water, and it’s just this peaceful boat hanging out there, and we’re just watching it and it’s super peaceful and there’s of course a seagull that’s just hanging out on it. Then this giant piece of iridescent purple neon yellow leviathan shell shoots up out of the water and the bird just takes off like “WHAT the fuck is happening?”

[laughter]

Richard: It lays itself down on the… over the top of the boat, leaving just a little bit of space for y’all to come up, and we see the four of you pop up into the boat.

Josie: So Cass is able to turn back?

Richard: That’s a question.

Rhi: Ooh. Yeah.

[laughter]

Richard: So first we see Corin, and then we see Orla. We see Thaddeus just sort of float up, I guess?

Rhi: Yeah. I think Thaddeus is focusing very hard on using telekinesis to pull the leg and the hull with him. I think that’s the upper limit of what he’s able to move.

Richard: Yep.

Josie: I think Cass’s process is she floats up just as this big thing and honestly puts two of her front legs onto the boat like she’s about to get in.

Richard: Mm-hmm. Uh-huh.

Rhi: [giggles]

Josie: Like she hasn’t thought to turn back yet, and then is like, wait a minute.

Richard: Does Corin go:

Richard (as Corin): Um, are you gonna…?

Josie (as Cass): Oh, um… yeah. I should probably. I’mma real quick…

Josie: I think it’s slower and more arduous than it normally is…

Richard: Yeah.

Josie: …but she slowly pulls back in on herself until she’s in her “normal” barely human mode.

Richard: I was gonna say. What is the one thing that remains of the isopod, arthropod thingy form? What about her is different?

Josie: From the neck down she still looks like sleek black goo, kind of, but on land she maintains a human-ish shape, but below her arms there’s two pairs of the sort of bladed arthropod arms.

Richard: Ooh.

Josie: Yeah.

Rhi: Yeah! Oh, that’s so cool.

Richard: Okay. So, this has been a very special Blades in the Dark tone game of Descent into Midnight.

Rhi: [giggles]

Minna: Uh-huh!

Richard: Thank you all so much. This was a ton of fun.

Minna: [breathless] It was!

Rhi: Yeah… Yeah. Thank you so much for running this. This is awesome.

Josie: Yeah. [laughs] I loved it.

 

 

## Outro [1:37:53]

Rhi: Thanks for listening. The Magpies will be back soon.

This game of Descent into Midnight was GMed by Richard Kreutz-Landry. Follow him on Twitter at @rkreutzlandry.

Cass, the Redeemed, was played by Josie. Follow her on Twitter at @DragonGirlJosie.

Orla, the Traveler, was played by Minna. Follow her on Twitter at @mynaminnarr.

Thaddeus, the Empath, was played by Rhi. Follow me on Twitter at @rhiannon42.

The opening and closing theme music is from ‘Trio for Piano, Violin, and Viola’ by Kevin MacLeod, and is used under a Creative Commons license.

The Blades in the Dark setting is the creation of John Harper.

Descent into Midnight can be found at DescentintoMidnight.com, and follow @DiMRPG on Twitter for updates about the game’s development.

 

 

## Blooper [1:38:44]

Josie: It’s funny because we said sync and it’s in the ocean.

Minna: [squirms]

Richard: [makes a drum crash sound]

Rhi: Ugh…

Josie: [laughs]

Richard: [dramatically] It has begun.

Rhi: Yeah. [laughs] There’s one.