Ep. 34: The Crystal Kingdom - Chapter Six

"Hey gang, I've got to keep my voice down because I just put the... spooky kids to bed. Anyway, enjoy the episode! It's the Adventure Zone!"

Synopsis
''Can our heroes achieve a competent victory against three relatively unkillable foes? More importantly: Can they do any sick stunts while doing so? Taako conjures up the ultimate terror. Magnus has a public service announcement. Merle faces a crystal conundrum.''

Taako and Merle have been grabbed by the tardigrades’ probisci, and Merle manages to wriggle free. Taako, Merle, and Magnus have all rolled sixes for their initiative rolls, which does not bode well for them.

Merle, who rolled again, goes first and casts Spirit Guardians. A slightly different spell than the one that summoned Della Reese, this one creates a bunch of little spirits that flutter around him in a sphere of about 15 feet. They all look like Roma Downey. The tardigrade that had grabbed Merle gets blasted with radiant damage by these Romas, after failing a wisdom check. Nonetheless, the tardigrade bites Merle for 12 points of damage. Taako’s tardigrade has grabbed him with its tongue, and it also bites him for 15 points of damage. Meanwhile, the third tardigrade shoots a hunk of black tar-like spit at Magnus, hitting him with 19 points of poison damage.

The Flip Wizard goes next. Before casting a spell, Justin educates the other members of the party on the resilience of tardigrades: they can survive a few minutes at 151 degrees Celsius, thirty years at -20 degrees Celsius, and a few minutes at 1 Kelvin. He then taps into the tardigrade’s nightmares and casts Phantasmal Killer, which projects a manifestation of a creature’s deepest fears.

Taako yells, “Enjoy your taste of Taako!” while the tardigrade pushes away from him in terror. The second tardigrade is also haunted by Johann, and its head explodes.

Magnus grabs a fire extinguisher by him and uses it to propel himself through the air, and cannonballs into the tardigrade attacking him. He then throws the fire extinguisher at the two tardigrades and shoots it with his crossbow, blinding them with fire cream. He then chastises Lucas for failing to remove the door from his discarded fridge, citing an episode of Punky Brewster.

Merle throws Boyland's hand axe into a tardigrade’s mouth, but it flies too slowly in zero gravity to do any damage.

Merle dodges the tardigrade’s tongue, which shoots past him and sticks to the fridge door. The other tardigrade spits acid at Taako, wounding him for 14 points of damage. Taako casts Thunderwave, and the tardigrade near Merle’s Roma Zone hits the wall and dies. Magnus grabs the one remaining tardigrade and throws it in Merle’s direction. However, it passes its wisdom saving roll, and is not wounded by the Romas'. Travis calls it a “Smart Water bear”, which everyone acknowledges as a very clever play on words. Magnus uses Commander’s Strike to direct Merle to make a weapon attack. They all argue for a moment over whether or not Merle has an axe (Spoiler: he does.), and Merle ultimately hits the tardigrade with his warhammer, finally killing it.

The four leave this Fizzy Lifting Room into what looks like the main lobby of the lab, which is not yet crystallized. There are several airlocks leading into other parts of the lab, and some appear to be powered down. They can hear banging and chopping coming from behind a hatch leading to the Thermal Regulation Chamber, which is iced over on this side as well. Killian and Carey yell to them that they’ve been unable to get through, so Magnus begins chopping the ice from the door with his axe and Taako casts Fireball to melt it.

Merle hears a voice behind him. It sounds like Pan, calling his name, and no one else seems to hear him. Merle looks behind him to see a rift open in the air, with a crystal slowly passing through it. Pan urges him to grab the crystal before it hits the ground, and he does. Just as Merle grabs it, he hears a different voice go, “Well this is gonna be a lot easier than I thought!”. There is a sound like a light bulb shattering, and the crystal explodes into tiny splinters. Merle feels a sharp pain in his hand, replaced by a strange numbness, and sees that a few slivers of crystal are sticking out of his palm. His hand, and then his lower arm, is slowly turning into crystal. Merle turns around and calmly asks NO-3113 to “check this shit out”. Travis immediately wants Magnus to chop off Merle’s arm.

Griffin gives Travis advantage on this roll, given Magnus’s history of arm-removal. Merle, not seeing a better option, agrees. He screams, “Why did Pan lie to me!” as Magnus brings “Merle-Splitter” down on his arm, then immediately passes out. Killian and Carey make it through the door at this unfortunate moment.

Lucas, through the Stone of Farspeech, yells at them to bring Merle to the medbay, which is nearby. They pick him up and dash to the airlock, as the room turns to crystal. Chunks of crystal come together to form a golem, with Merle’s arm becoming part of this monstrosity. Taako consoles an unconscious Merle that he has plenty of arms to choose from.

They pass through a decontamination chamber into the medbay and meet Lucas, who has a bloody bandage on his head.

Killian, who has lost all patience with this dude, picks up Lucas and yells at him that his lab sucks. The others convince her to put him down and not destroy him immediately so he can help Merle. They set Merle down and Lucas gives him a shot of something which slows the bleeding. Merle wakes up somewhat as Magnus explains what has happened, defending his reaction in chopping off his arm. He then admits that he went into Lucas’s room and saw the magical compact, and demands answers.

Before answering, Lucas gives a note to Carey, and directs her to find Jamie Green and tell her to get the listed supplies. He puts a bandage on Merle, and begins mixing some concoction in a petri dish. He explains that he was working in the lower levels of his lab when one of his robots attacked him. He fled to the medbay, and became trapped there by the crystal monster.

Money Zone
Message from Evan Jones, who wants you to start your your family adventures together at Together Tales: This is a story about a dungeonmaster dad who decided story time could use a little more adventure and created Together Tales. Together Tales is a collection of interactive books that parents bring to life for kids age 7-12. Each Adventure Kit includes a book split into chapters, along with treasure hunts, digital games, cute coincidences and clues that put your child at the center of each story. togethertales.com

Personal message for Kathleena Kruck Esquire, from Mario: Thanks for being an amazing friend and DM. I wish I could keep you in Chicago, but wherever you go this year I know you'll be a zealous advocate for those in need and have fun doing it. Thanks for making me listen to The Adventure Zone and MBMBAM. Happy birthday! McElroys: Would Magic Brian and/or Garyl please wish her a happy birthday?

For Fergus, from Glen: Happy Eternal Candlenights, baby brother! You've already got the D&D sourcebook, so the next best gift is well-wishes from Griffin on one of our favorite McElroy podcasts, plus the chance of your name possibly being used in-game. Our shared brotherly nerdiness brings me joy and is now stitched into the fabric of podcast history. Garyl lives!

Featured NPCs

 * Killian
 * Carey Fangbattle
 * Lucas Miller
 * NO-3113
 * Kravitz

Featured Music

 * Competent Battle Fanfare
 * Pan

Featured Locations

 * Lucas's Lab