Live session 23 — 1 July 2026
They make their way onto the carpet, up the stairs, and finally into the last room. A hooded figure kneels, slumped over a massive statue at one side of the chamber. Smoke curls around its head.
Daiki stares. He offers the figure a hesitant, “Hi.”
The figure remains motionless.
“I think it’s alive,” Ruben says.
“We can fly around it and suck his face,” Daiki suggests.
“I can poke maybe with a mage hand.”
“No, don’t poke. Do not disturb the dead.” Daiki carefully flies around the figure and tries to peer beneath its hood. From between the statue and the crouched shape, he catches only darkness: blackness where a face ought to be. He feels watched.
“I don’t like it here. I feel like something is watching us.”
Ruben remains calm. “Well, I think all will be well,” he says, blessing Daiki, Lana, and Kroak.
Daiki gestures toward the statue. “Yeah, I think we should investigate the statue, but maybe you should poke it with not your own hand. Don’t you think so?”
Ruben sends forth a spectral hand.
Lana considers herself. “I will also save some of my healing pool. I want to be able to restore some of you.” She heals herself a little, keeping the rest in reserve.
Daiki still bears a shimmer of magical protection. Daiki turns to Lana. “You have this special thing to see if there are evil things around, right?”
“Yes,” Lana says. “But I’m afraid that, for now, that behind my eyes is gone. But I have a great feeling that there are undead here.”
Kroak remembers the driftglobe and its use. Ruben suggests trying daylight. Kroak activates the driftglobe and casts Daylight. Kroak explains that sunlight fills a great sphere around the globe, flooding the room with bright light and reaching further with dim light. They recall earlier portents and a banshee, then wait as the spectral hand reaches the seated figure.
The spectral hand touches the figure between the shoulders. Dust rises. The body has been sitting there for years, perhaps as long as the other remains they have found. It crumbles in slow motion, collapsing flat against the floor.
As the body falls across the runic circle the hooded figure was kneeling in, its light begins to drain. The room grows darker and darker. Shadows pour from the statue, swelling beyond the statue’s own shape. A massive shadowy figure steps down from the pedestal, axe in hand.
Daiki stares. “Oh.”
The sunlight remains bright, but this darkness is deeply magical. The statue no longer wears its cloak of shadows; the runes remain, but no longer emit light. Whatever was bound there has been unleashed.
Ruben prepares himself. “Fata Morgana,” he says, and three duplicates of him appear. Four Rubens now stand together.
Daiki approves. “Oh, that’s smart.”
Ruben rises into the air, trying to stay above the reach of the shadow’s axe. Lana watches him go. “Ah, you guys all can fly.”
“Fuck me,” Lana says.
“Fuck you,” Ruben replies.
The room is high enough for them to take to the air.
Daiki flutters hard with his wings. A gust of glittering magic blows toward the shadow, and the statue begins to glow, but the glitter does not cling to the shadow.
“He doesn’t seem to like glitters,” Daiki says. “Good luck, everyone.”
Lana declares herself the shield. “I’m the only one that cannot fly, but I will be the bug shield and you guys can—”
“It will be the flies in his way,” Ruben finishes.
Sszethik steps forward from behind the others. He lashes out with Thorn whip, catching the shadow with it. The magic bites into the creature but cannot pull its enormous mass toward him. He retreats again.
The shadow advances, swinging its axe back and forth. Its voice rolls across the chamber: “For freeing me, I’ll repay you in-kind.”
The shadow charges the airborne group. Ruben’s duplicates make him a confusing target, but the huge shadowy axe still finds him. It tears through him so brutally that his wing is nearly severed. Ruben is left barely standing. The shadow turns toward Daiki next, refusing to leave him out. It lunges like a cloud made solid, trying to bite him. Daiki is swallowed for a moment by darkness, then pulls himself free.
“Holy cracker moly.”
The shadow’s bite strips away Daiki’s temporary protection, but he remains upright. “I’m fine.”
Lana draws her sword and shield, and moves to flank the shadow. She nearly slips in Ruben’s blood on the floor.
She swings her longsword, but it passes straight through the shadow without affecting it.
She decides to drink a potion of flying as well. With sword and shield held in a steady stance, she rises straight upward. Her braid drifts as though in a wind that may not be there.
Kroak follows by drinking a yellow potion from a flask. Their pendant begins to spark with electricity. A bolt of lightning lashes out toward the shadow. At first it seems wasted. Then Kroak remembers the potion’s effect and corrects the attack. Lightning strikes the shadow’s lower body.
“Ooh, it’s electrifying,” Ruben says.
The lightning hurts the creature, though it bears the pain with frightening endurance.
Ruben, still badly injured, drinks a healing potion. Daiki spends the last of his magical reserves to heal him further, then sends a shimmer of temporary protection to Lana.
Ruben considers flying away without disengaging, trusting his mirror images. He rises farther into the chamber, moving diagonally upward. The shadow follows him with its gaze, its head turning unnaturally to keep track of him.
The shadow’s presence suddenly changes the room. Shadows burst outward from it and streak toward several points along the walls. Shapes detach from the stone: smaller shadow-servants, each roughly human-sized, clawing their way free.
“That’s not okay,” Daiki says.
One shadow-servant comes for Daiki, still partly anchored to the wall. It claws him, then remains clinging to the stone. Another breaks free completely and rushes Kroak, clawing them twice and leaving them frightened of the towering shadow.
“I can’t move toward it,” Daiki says. “I think I can only move away.”
A servant climbs toward Lana and attacks her near the wall. Her temporary protection absorbs the worst of it, and she keeps herself composed.
Sszethik uses Poison spray against the great shadow. A green cloud billows toward it, and unexpectedly, it has an effect.
“Spray the poison,” Ruben says approvingly.
Lana brings her weapon down and finally cuts into the shadow. The blow leaves it vulnerable to another attack.
The great shadow retaliates with a wide swing toward Sszethik, but Sszethik’s scales and a sudden shimmering shield keep him safe. The shadow tries to bite him as well, but the barrier protects him.
“Back from the ssshadow henccce you came,” he tells the creature.
Lana sees an opening and flies after the enemy. She rises farther into the air, flanking with Sszethik. She considers Sacred flame, then chooses her weapon instead.
The chamber remains crowded with drifting shadows, the great axe-bearing darkness, servants clinging to walls, and the party suspended at different heights above blood-streaked stone.
Kroak begins a small incantation, drawing a shard of mirror from their component pouch. For a moment, a vision of a swamp spreads through the room: water in the distance, a little cottage, and the suggestion of Kroak’s home. Then it vanishes as they ward themself with Sanctuary.
They cast Chill Touch as well. However, the black roots are not corporeal enough for what they had considered before, but the spectral touch reaches the creature. Necrotic energy tears into it and prevents it from regaining health for a short while.
Kroak moves nearer to Lana while remaining in range of the creature. One of the enemies tries to strike through Kroak’s Sanctuary but cannot land a blow.
Ruben says, “Dreams shape your world,” and directs his sleeping magic at both of them. One of them becomes incapacitated, and Ruben warns everyone not to attack it. If left alone, it may fall fully unconscious.
Ruben flies a little farther away and studies the statue, wondering whether it and the ghost are linked—whether damage to one might harm the other. He finds no clear connection.
“The red eyes are really gone,” Ruben notes dryly.
Daiki watches Lana’s magical shield, Kroak’s swamp-like sanctuary, Ruben’s magic, and Sszethik protecting himself. Thinking back to the basic aura classes and foundational magic, he decides he needs protection too. He draws on the weave, and shimmering purple scales project from his body as he casts Mage Armor.
One of the creatures attacks Daiki from the wall, but misses. The other creature studies the room and sees Lana floating in the air. It climbs the wall in a rage, then leaps toward her.
The creature catches Lana in an iron grip. For a moment, she hangs in the air, grappled and embraced by the thing as it tries to drag her down. Lana resists at the last moment, shoving the creature away. It tumbles across the room, falls, and lies prone below her rather than shattering.
Sszethik focuses intensely. He directs magic into the space between Bakasura and the stone servant, taking care not to target the sleeping one. Thunder erupts around the enemies. The stone servants are visibly breaking apart, and Bakasura is hurt, though still standing.
The wounded shadowy creature backs away slowly.
Sszethik tries to withdraw, but the creature lashes out with a heavy axe. The blade cuts him badly, tearing part of his robe and arm. The creature turns toward Kroak. Sanctuary forces it to struggle against the ward before it can attack, but it pushes through and swings its axe. One blow lands. A second misses as Kroak pulls their feet away.
Lana descends as far as her flying potion allows and strikes the creature with her longsword, driving the blade into its nose. The blow leaves it difficult finding focus for its next attack.
Lana considers feeding Kroak a potion, but Kroak assures her they have potions of their own. She does what she can to slow their bleeding and keep them alive. Kroak reaches into the bag of holding, takes out a greater healing potion, and drinks it. Colour returns to them as the worst of their injuries ease.
“Feels much better,” Kroak says.
Then Kroak turns to Bakasura, grips a rune, and says, “Don’t.” They cast Inflict Wounds. The necrotic spell strikes hard, leaving Bakasura heavily bloodied.
“Why would it not explode?” Kroak asks amid the excitement.
Ruben plucks three feathers and sends magical force into the enemy. Ruben then flies down toward Bakasura’s stone statue’s horn, trying to crash into it. He catches part of his robe on the horn instead and has to pull himself free.
Daiki disengages from the creature on the wall and flies toward a safer position. As he travels, he calls down magical fire like a little comet. The magic does not affect the enemy, but Daiki still makes his escape look dramatic and plays a heroic sound on his kazoo.
The sleeping creature remains unconscious. The other creature climbs the wall and prepares to leap again, this time toward Kroak. The creature overcomes the sanctuary’s resistance and lunges for Kroak, but its attempt to grapple them fails. It falls to the floor, wounded and frustrated.
“Oh, so we have two bloody statues and a sleepy one,” Daiki says. “But we’re all flying, so that’s great.”
Another creature stands and climbs the wall, preparing to jump at someone else.
Sszethik lashes out with Thorn Whip, wrapping it around an enemy’s leg without pulling it closer.
The shadow turns once more toward Kroak. It breaks through the sanctuary’s protection and lands a brutal strike, dropping Kroak unconscious.
Lana immediately reaches for them. With her shield still attached to her arm, she extends her free hand and catches Kroak in the air. She begins sinking under their weight but refuses to let them fall.
The shadow tries to bite Kroak, but Lana’s hold interferes. It bites into Kroak nonetheless, trying to pull them down and devour them. Lana struggles to maintain her magic and keep both herself and Kroak afloat. She heals Kroak enough to wake them, then lowers them safely toward the ground.
Lana uses the last of her innate magic. She unleashes Dissonant Whispers at the shadow, describing the sound as “a violin that is not tuned”. The awful discord rips through the creature’s mind, leaving shadow leaking from all sides of its form.
Lana keeps hold of Kroak until they can stand on their own. She sends a quick message through her mind link: “Go get ‘em.”
Kroak coughs blood into a potion, draws on what little power they have left, and casts Chill Touch again. Then they somersault over the creature’s head, touch the back of its head, and land on the other side to place Lana in a better position.
“I forgot about the guys,” Kroak admits when the prone creature takes a swing at them. “I was like, ‘Oh, just move to the other side.’ Then it’s like, ‘Oh yeah, this guy takes a swing.’”
“We’re getting the upper hand now,” Ruben says.
Ruben sends another spell at the large shadowy beast, then tries to kick its horn from close range. The horn proves solid and unbreakable.
Daiki rises into the air, opens his mouth, and releases a flash of silvery magical fire. Radiant energy bursts across the shadow. The radiant attack destroys the shadow creature. It evaporates, and the stone servants stagger before collapsing into lifeless rubble. The room falls quiet. Sszethik steps in from the edge of the fight as the last enemy disappears.
Lana, exhausted and bloodied, drops to her knees. Sweat and blood drip from her face onto the floor. For a moment, she looks as though she is swearing herself to some cult, kneeling amid the aftermath. She gathers herself, looks up, and sees Daiki shining against the light.
The fallen stone servant leaves behind an opening in the wall. Near the magical circle and the dust where a body had withered away, Lana notices something beneath the ashes. She turns, stands, and searches through them.
She finds a small metallic item: a golden ring with a purple top shaped almost like a brain.
Ruben warns that it might be cursed. Lana hands it over for the party stash.
“Please get out of here,” Lana says.
Kroak suggests taking a breather first. Daiki sees what looks like light at the end of a tunnel and offers to investigate.
“I’m going to scout,” Daiki says.
The others agree. Daiki enters the tunnel, which runs straight for a while before descending. At its far end, light appears. Water runs along the ceiling like a creek, gathering from the sides. As Daiki nears it, he feels himself being pulled toward the water.
He turns back. “I found the exit.”
Ruben says he would rather take a short rest outside. “We don’t know if it regenerates,” he says.
“And we don’t know if the wall closes,” Daiki adds. “Let’s go.”
“Ruben’s got a point, Kroak,” Lana says. “I have not so much life left in me, but I have a will to live.”
“Be strong, Lana,” Daiki says. “We survived this.”
“It’s a shadowy creature,” Lana says. “I’ve never seen that.”
“I think it was quite some good teamwork,” Ruben says.
“I think we did really, really well,” Daiki replies.
The group follows Daiki through the tunnel. It opens behind a waterfall. From outside, they can see the temple and the surrounding area; they had seen the waterfall before, but never guessed that a secret tunnel lay behind it.
“Oh, daylight,” Lana says.
“We did it,” Daiki says.
Kroak collects their driftglobe and puts it away so it does not trail behind them.
They leave the temple and make it safely back, ready to rest.