Episode 3 - Gimme that Flumph

Recap
The team face the Broodoyles on the airship with Zippy taking the wheel and attempted to fly straight up in the sky. Dariun was able to help get the Broodoyles off the ship using a gust of wind however, the airship stalled and ship had a smooth crash landing in a wasteland area. They found one of the balloons that allowed the airship to fly had busted open and Caine, one of the two air elementals, told them his brother, Hurri, had run away due to Norman using dissonant whispers on them. The team went off to chase the missing air elemental down a magic cave where they met a little pink fish named Dracken Gragast who claimed to be the most powerful sorcerer who destroyed the country that used to live in this area a millennia ago. They drained the pool of water Dracken was in, put him in a bottle and tossed him into Dariun's bag of holding. Now the team are entering a dungeon to find Hurri so they can leave the wasteland.

Episode Summary
Norman, Dariun and Zippy stand at the open doors of a large old house that lies on its side. Before they head in, Norman asks for some healing so Dariun uses cure wounds on him. They venture in and see they are in a run down, caved in house. There are no remains but there is decayed wood and rubble. Norman and Dariun don't find anything else in the house so they all exit out a door on the other end that leads to a long hallway. The team notice they are feeling energized and are thinking very straight. After walking for a couple minutes, they reach a dead end and when they turn around and see the end they came from has also become a rock wall dead end.

Zippy casts meld into stone but feels something is off, his hand sparks when he touches the wall and a phantom donkey appears in the small space they are in. Norman draws his wand of magic detection and its senses are go off. He can tell there is magic everywhere which is extremely potent. Zippy casts dispel magic and the donkey, Zippy would have called Danny, vanishes. They feel the gap in the magic fills in quickly and the room is once again filled with intense magic. Dariun believes it would be best for him to step in to the Ethereal Plane and find out what is happening. After a little back and forth, Norman gives Dariun a bardic inspiration and casts dispel magic, creating a pocket for Dariun to use his spell.

Dariun takes the opportunity and casts etherealness and hops into the ethereal plane. He can see the outlines of Zippy and Norman and when he looks around, he can see a wave of magic coming towards him like a tsunami. After the wave hits, he sees he is in a vast desert with dunes all around him. Dariun floats around and spots an oasis with a house. There does not appear to be anyone around and he can't seem to find any identifiable features but it does look a little like the house they just entered through in the prime plane. Off in the distance, there is a watch tower with tiny houses surrounding it. At the top, Dariun can see a large telescope that comes out of the dome like structure. He heads up to the opening to find a room filled with maps of stars and other astrology items. He has a look through the telescope and it is pointing to the moon. He looks around the room to see a banner that he recognizes as the same symbol that Norman had tattooed after they returned from the first grand treasure, the symbol of the Calm Cloud Monastery. This peaks Dariun's interest so he descends into the tower.

Norman and Zippy are in the closed off hallway just hanging out. Norman asks about going back to the Bramble Patch but Zippy questions his desire to go there. They discuss Norman's claims to being the demon kings son. Zippy tells Norman he is a dangerous man and is lucky he and Dariun trust him. Norman agree and believes he is lucky to have them. As they talk, Norman notices a message on the wall above Zippy's head that reads 'Keep your eyes on the wall'. Zippy is trying to look at two walls at once by pressing his face into the corner while Norman looks at the wall with the writing. They keep staring and trying different ways to figure out the puzzle but nothing is working. They try to pose but nothing happens, as they come out of the pose, Zippy bumps into Norman and he takes some steps backwards into the wall. They figure out that they need to look at the wall and walk backwards into the rocks of the hallway.

Dariun jumps into the trap door where he finds a spiral staircase. He sees a mural drawn in the walls seeming to depict the history of this place. It shows large animals, people working fields, sun and moons with people bringing sacrifices to them including swords, gold and boxes. The bottom floor expands to a house that appears to be a storage area with bags and boxes. Dariun dispels etherealness and pops back into the room but Norman and Zippy aren't there.

Norman yells out to Dariun and uses mage hand to explain the riddle but, due to the wild magic in the area, Norman is petrified as he tries to tell Dariun what to do. Dariun figures out what to do and walks back, knocking over the stone form of Norman. As Dariun and Zippy try to figure out how to help Norman, he comes back to normal. They continue to walk back as Dariun explains he believes he was in this area they are in but long ago. He tells them about the banner of the Calm Cloud Monastery which confuses them all as from what Norman has told them, the Calm Cloud Monastery was on islands in the ocean, not in a desert. Norman reflects and recalls that the Calm Cloud Monastery was very old and used to have many members but when Norman was there, it was only Master Matsumora and his siblings.

They continue to walk backwards and they end up in a room to see giant balls of water floating in the space like there is no gravity. It is a circular room with a column of water pouring down from the ceiling. Next to the water, there is another hole in the ceiling. As Norman gets into the room, his tattoos light up and he can feel the weight of the magic in the room. His Mir's blood tattoo is starting to react and he feels a jolt in his arm and feels power surge through him.

Zippy has a plan to get to the hole in the roof. He pulls out his bucket and goes to the edge of the room and slowly pour out the water from the bucket as he walks in a circle, making his way to the center of the room. He plans to use control water to redirect the flow allowing the team to get up to the roof like a reverse water slide. Zippy casts control water and when he does, his backpack starts to expand and potatoes start to fall out as the 100 gold he has turns to potatoes. The water has been controlled but it is much faster than expected.

Norman suggests Zippy goes first so he hesitates for a second then dives into slide. He goes shooting upwards but makes it there safely. Dariun follows him, cannon balling into the stream. Before Norman hops up, he grabs a vial of water from a floating ball of water before belly flopping into the slide. Norman feels perfectly fine when he reaches the top but when Zippy looks over to Dariun, and he is frightened of him and scurries away. As Dariun looks over to Zippy, confused as to why he is so scared, his hand pops off and a body forms out of it and a naked Dariun grows out of the hand. Dariun gives the naked Dariun his cloak and they cover just the front half. Norman casts calm emotions on Zippy and as he does, a beard of white feathers grows from his face. Zippy feels the effect of Norman's spells and calms down.

Zippy questions which of the Dariun's is the real one but even the fake Dariun knows what the real one does. The fake Dariun makes some compelling arguments and Zippy and Norman seem to be buying his stories. However, when they tell the real Dariun to give his switch blade to the fake, Dariun gets angry and his skin goes to the golden summer tone. They continue to deliberate and Dariun asks Norman to cast dispel magic to settle what is happening here and as he does, the fake Dariun fades away and Dariun's hand pops back on.

They decide to keep walking and come to a large chasm with white smoke coming from below. They see some empty shoes in the corner tapping to some kind of beat. Norman snaps his fingers to his beat and the shoes react and jump into the chasm and lands on a square that lights up. The shoes hop square to square making a little tune. They spin and point to the team. Dariun goes first and lands with the shoes. Zippy tries to use his magic carpet but can't get past a magic barrier so he also sings the tune and makes it to Dariun. Norman follows suit and hops his way over. The shoe goes another round and the team follow. The shoes make one final step to follow and Norman gets across to the other side. Dariun joins him and Zippy does the same, almost falling through with a flat last note.

The team continue through the cave and it begins to open up to some kind of street with a bunch of houses lining it. At the end of the street embedded into the rock wall is a tower that appears to the leaning. Dariun recognizes this as the tower he saw in the ethereal plane. Dariun explains this is the tower he saw and Norman looks at his Mir tattoo, which is still glowing. Dariun pulls out Dracken from his bag of holding and asks if this is the same place he destroyed. When Dracken isn't answering, Dariun shakes the bottle and Dracken complies, saying it is but he obviously didn't do a good enough job. Norman shows Dracken his tattoo and asks if he recognizes it which he does as the symbol of Wesnia. Dariun asks what happened after he destroyed Wesnia and Dracken was pretty sure he killed everyone but some may have survived. Norman asks if he knew Master Matsumora but Dracken does not believe he does. Dariun puts Dracken on his hip so long and they continue to explore.

Zippy goes to a house, opens the door and closes it behind him, locking himself in a room with two flumphs, floating jellyfish like beings. They speak to Zippy telepathically greeting him, he asks if they have seen the air elemental. The flumphs speak is a strange in-sync way and tell Zippy the air elemental is in the tower. He asks if the flumphs can take him to their leader so the flumphs lead Zippy, Dariun and Norman onto the street. A flumph that looks the same as the others greets the team. Norman asks how long they have been here and they say a very long time and when asked if they have seen people, they tell them they will sometimes see guests and one was here recently. Dariun recalls he has seen flumphs in the Feywild but normally they are very intelligent. They ask about the recent guest and the flumph explains the most recent guest was an armour man now dead in front of the tower.

They are guided to the tower by the flumph chieftain and find the body of a woman with commoner's clothes on and a gauntlet that looks to be from heavy armour wrapped around her throat. She looks to be dead for about a month. Zippy takes off the gauntlet and Norman kneels down in front of the body and puts one hand on his amulet and the other on the bodies face. He sings a tune and casts speak with dead.

Norman feels the space around him fade and finds himself on a fishing boat in the middle of a silver sea. Across from him is a living version of the dead body he just touched. She asks him where they are and he introduces himself. She tells him she was being tortured and burning a moment ago. Norman asks what brought her here and she tells him it was to find treasure. She did not know what the treasure was but it would help her find someone she needed to find. He asks what killed her and she tells Norman it was her suit of armour when it became animated. Norman's final question is if she wanted him to do anything for her which she asks if he can get her out of the Deep. She explains it hurts so much down there and Norman tells her he will do what he can. Norman snaps back to reality and asks Royce to spare her.

Norman explains the tower may be dangerous but Dariun feels her death may be attributed to the wild magic they have been experiencing. As they discuss, Pepper sniffs at the door to the tower and two eyes open up on the door along with a mouth. The door says 'door' and when it does, they see there is the door knob in the mouth. Dariun suggests they use Zippy's door knob to get in which he does. They get through and the door inverts and their face and looks a little sad.

The inside of the tower looks run down and they can hear and feel wind rushing from the top. The mural is on the walls like what Dariun saw but it looks cracked and old. Norman looks a little closer and sees a signature from the person who made it and it reads The Baron. Norman's excitement shines through as they realise a link between Wesnia and now as The Baron made this mural and their statue in Aurum. When they get to the top, they find Hurri, the air elemental scared. Hurri knocks the team against a wall with wind out of fear so Norman pulls out the chalice and burns the incense but he is too far away for it to work. Zippy casts gust of wind to propel Norman forwards, but party streamers come out of his hands. When they stop for a moment in confusion, the spell kicks in and Norman is shot forwards as more party streamers come out and fly around. Dariun jumps in the wind stream and uses misty step on Norman to get him the rest of the way. When he casts it, all of his hair falls out and he is now bald. Norman gets to Hurri and holds up the incense and Hurri calms down.

Norman is excited but Dariun shifts to the blue colour of winter as he is very sad about losing his hair. The team very poorly try to cheer him up and when Dracken jokes about it, Dariun shoves him back into the bag of holding. They look around and see that the telescope was removed and Dariun suspects that the telescope was the treasure. They also find some gold and after some arguing if they should split the gold, Norman looks around the room and finds one book that was left behind. He picks it up and when he opens it, he feels a rush of knowledge rush into him. Dariun does one final scan around the room to find a shattered lens in a box but the ring around the lens is rusted. He also notes that there is no banner of the Calm Cloud Monastery like he saw in the ethereal plane.

They decide to leave, going past the puzzle of the door and through the various rooms they travelled through. They finally leave and make their way to the airship.

Quotations

 * Zippy "You're a dangerous fellow there Norman D, you know, you're lucky the two of us trust you as much as we do."
 * Norman "I am lucky, that I have you two who trust me."
 * Zippy "For someone who has so many ties to the Deep, we're rolling the dice with you really! You should be thanking is constantly."
 * Jacob "We are going to have to edit like tonnes of this to make it seem like we're smart."


 * Zippy "Does any of you side characters in my story here wanna say anything cool?"
 * Norman "Surf's up!"


 * Zippy "No problem, this may seem like a whacky idea that I just came up with on the fly in hopes you would praise me."


 * Seth "He looks like the scariest, most intimidating thing you’ve ever seen."
 * Jacob "So it's just Dariun?"
 * Seth "Yes."


 * Dariun "I'm literally staring at a clone of myself that grew out of my hand that popped off my body I don't understand how calm you want me to be in this moment."
 * Dracken "It's kind of nice to be hated, fuels me."
 * Dracken "I'm like the hand soap of wizards."
 * Zippy "I have married one of these jellyfish, carry on."


 * Flumph "World? World is flumph. Flumph is here. We all flumph together"
 * Zippy "I'll flumph with you!"


 * Norman "By the power of Royce, may the dead, lend their voice."
 * Seth "Maybe the treasure was the friends we made along the way eh!?"

Main Cast

 * Norman D
 * Dariun Branch
 * Zippy Westborrough

Returning Characters

 * Dracken
 * Pepper
 * The Baron (mentioned)

New Characters

 * Phantom donkey (Danny)
 * Dead treasure hunter
 * Hurri (air elemental)
 * Flumph Chiefton
 * Flumphs

Locations

 * Wesnian Cave

Episode Tidbits

 * Norman's Mir's blood tattoo has activated and allows him to cast a second spell during his turn as a free action once per day
 * Dariun knows how to play the flute