Game-Summaries:7/27/2018 Recollections

Recollections by Cassio

TLDR: Cassio Amon Ember Ci Zanna ventured to the Pardor Range and killed a Neothelid. A legendary creature that would become an Elder Brain if given enough time.

Introduction: The Champion is born.

I wasn't always the handsome bastion of truth honor and justice you see before you. Oh no I was once a young but slightly less handsome, sexually masterful soldier in the greater service of Solace's army. Tasked with keeping the peasantry safe from bandits goblins and ne'er-do-wells my troupe was efficient and well known.

After a routine patrol, having set up camp for the night, my men and i were beset by a large beast. During the conflict I went down, and it was at that point I thought the great Cassio was done for. I awoke some time later the only one alive, but not without my scars. Clearly the world still had need of Cassio. But I could not save my men, nor would I rest till their deaths were avenged. Regretfully I had not heard tale nor whisper of that beast again.

That was until today.

Thanks to my very good friend and professional tiny person Callie Tealeaf, I've had a break in the case. I can now exact righteous justice to the beast.

Chapter 1: No Rest for the Wicked.

Cassio awoke that morning full of determination and purpose. His armor gleaming, his sword sharp, and his stomach full of a questionable meal of elven slaw and mead he set off to exact fiery vengeance and put the memory of his fallen comrades to rest. After a short conversation with the local stable master, Cassio took off eastward to his destination. For three weeks Cassio braved what could be described as a hellish landscape of sun dappled grassy fields and a terrifying onslaught of gentle winds and pretty flowers. He made way to the Pardor Range, where tale of a creature bearing the beasts description was terrorizing the villagers. Solidifying his resolve, not only will this holy quest help himself, but it will let the citizens rest easy. Their praise and adoration will be a small reward for the service he will perform this day.

Unfortunately.....

Cassio arrived to find the town abandoned. Not a soul. His senses keen like a winter fox Cassio searched the town for any signs of struggle or attack. Was he too late? Naught but a few bear tracks it was as if the peasants simply evaporated. How many towns like this must exist, peaceful one moment and then forgotten the next. Finding the abandoned stable, Cassio lets his trusty steed rest. He would be no help to where he was going. With his uncanny Owlbear-like sense of direction, Cassio takes off towards the mountain range, vengeance would be his.

Chapter 2: The Splinter Twin

The Cave beckoned. A large carved hole on the mountains side told every fiber in Cassio's steely and handsome nerves not to go. But he pressed forward. Tell tale signs of his quarry littered the cave floor. Our hero descends into darkness. With sword in one hand, shield in another, torch in another traverses the sprawling and branching caverns until he came upon the unthinkable. Laying on the floor of the cavern in a pool of his own blood was Cassio's old squad mate beckoning for him, but how could this be? His companions were slain years ago, how could he possibly still be alive!?!? Rushing to his side to render aid Cassio watches in horror as the familiar face of his old face transforms into a horrid visage. Sharp teeth and dagger in hand, Cassio's old man-at-arms lunges at our hero. And while the dagger found purchase, the physical wound was nothing compared to the emotional trauma of having to kill his old friends with his bare hands. With one slash of his mighty sword, Cassio turns his friend into a memory again. This was not the time for tears though, where his friend once stood was now a mass of purple tentacles streaming from a hole in the ground. Cassio 's mind was beset by a formless creatures vile voice screaming in his mind taunting and attempting to torture our hero with empty threats and falsehoods. And while the creature sought to terrify and intimidate our beloved hero Cassio Lista it had showed it's weakness. For if it could talk....it could bleed! Much like those trolls come to think about it. Cleaning the blood from his blade, Cassio ran deeper into the cavern. Waves upon waves of friends and foes threw themselves and the unmovable and undefeated Cassio. The beast was sending the visions of his own friends and companions in a feeble attempt dissuade Cassio from his goal, but each a shadow and pale imitation of the real thing was just fueling his rage and his resolve. regardless he said a silent prayer to each of his friends he slew that day.

Ci - I will always remember your full head of hair

Ember - If only i could tell you the finer points of changing to a dolphin

Amon - Why is your staff called J something....a name perhaps?

Zanna - I will need to tell your parents about this

Bridgette - You were a female version of me. Perfect!

Fallon - Always wiped back to front

Petry - Showered once a month

Lilianna - Never knew the meaning of the word Hornswaggle

Some old couple - I'm not actually sure who you are, but your heads came off far to easily.

The work was bloody, the work was long, but it was done. And with the image of his final companion falling under his sword, the floor the cavern shook and his true foe finally showed itself.

Chapter 3: No Items, Fox Only, Final Destination

The floor erupted in a shower of stone, bile, and screams. Towering 20 foot tall and immeasurably long sat Cassio's true foe. A worm of innumerable teeth and tentacles and malice, It's twisted form spending years terrorizing and devouring innocent people for it's own sick pleasure. But for all it's power, for all it's years of survival, for all it's carefully laid plans laid to hide it's true existence it had made a fatal mistake. That mistake was he crossed paths with Cassio Lista, self proclaimed adventurer and overall amazing friend to everyone with two and sometimes one eyes. For now he had the beast cornered. With sword and shield in hand Cassio charged.

The cavern rang out with sounds of battle. Cassio's muscles rippling as he tore chunks out of the beasts chitinous hide. The monsters tentacles trying to find purchase on our hero's resplendent armor and filling the cavern with miasma's of poison. Our hero fought long into the night and with a final blow the beast let out it's death knell

"Curse you Cassio Lista! I would have taken over all of Solace if it was not for your undisputed handsomeness and talent!"

The Monstrosity collapsed with a thundering crash. It was done.

Exhausted, Cassio slumped down to the cavern floor. Despite his Adonis like strength he could not carry the beasts body back as a trophy. a scale would suffice for now as a reminder that he did well by his old squad.

Chapter 4: Glittering Prizes

Fetching his trusty steed, Cassio returned to Solace to a shower of cheers and congratulations. After meeting with Pythia with tale of his success, he found the creature to be a Neothallids. The tadpole or infant form of a Elder Brain. The leaders of the Mind Flayer creatures we are constantly vexed by. The world now safer with it's death, Cassio can now devote himself fully to the Eternal order and their cause.

Written and dictated by non other CASSIO LISTA.

Also Amon Ember Ci Zanna were there.

THE END.

Recollections by Ci

I am sure, my dear friend will have, by now, regaled us all with the tale of the defeat of his nemesis, but I find myself quite unbalanced by my experience on this quest. I find I must get my own thoughts down on parchment to try to regain some harmony. I had answered our Paladin's call for assistance (though he would never admit needing it) without hesitation. Indeed I had not bothered to inquire about our final destination. As the days wore on, I was surprised to find us on much the same way that I had traveled on my road from the Temple of Shan Sua to Solace. I could hear my friend's florid descriptions of the bitter loss of the rest his squad so many years ago, but I found it hard to concentrate on his words. I was lost in my own reveries of my first trip down from the mountains so many months ago, and then of the even more distant memories of my first trip into those same mountains in the arms of a kindly Monk.... with such meditations, some pleasant and some less so, the trip passed quite quickly, and before I knew it we found ourselves at the very lair of the beast my friend had sought for so long. The sheer scale of the signs we could find of the creature, sobered us all. This creature was obviously vast and powerful.

With blind confidence as our example, however, we steeled our will for what was sure to be a desperate fight. We were not disappointed. The beast first chose to show us its talent for cunning and deceit, however. As we moved through it's lair we found we must face simulacrum, not only of my friend's long dead squad, but also of our very selves. And these copies were not mere empty shells, however. They had the memories, and the seeming emotions of the originals. None of us were completely unaffected by these shadows, but we managed to persevere. We also began to hear the voice of the beast in our heads... taunting us with knowledge it could not have, and promises it could not possibly keep. It alluded to recognizing not only my friend and survivor, but also another member of our party. Not for one moment, even with my mind so recently pondering the vague memories of my own terrible night, did I imagine it could mean me. And yet, as we neared what must be the location of the beast's deep lair, I was beset with a sight out both my wildest dreams, and my darkest nightmares... My parents. Of the night I lost my parents, I had not yet spoken to any of my companions. Indeed even faced with the abomination of their living forms before me, I found it difficult to do so. I must have some memory of Tomas and Annika Aarden in this life, for I recognized them immediately. The forms before me, however, are not the ones that visit me in my dreams and meditations. What I remember as clearly as the day I experienced it almost 20 years ago, is the sight my parents bodies, broken and lifeless, torn asunder and cast aside almost as if by casual afterthought. Yet here before me were the very image of my mother and father, hale and healthy and speaking a name I had not heard in many many years... Jan.

I knew it to be my name, though it felt strange and foreign to my ear. I had chosen the name Ci when I was finally accepted to monastery as an Apprentice, after 7 years a Novice. I had chosen the name they had jeered me with - Ci means "Angry" in the tongue of Yanji - but for its other meaning. A meaning I had earned by defeating all those who had once jeered me. A meaning earned by the long practice, and the stings and cuts I brought my tormentors. A meaning bought with dedication and pain that led to superior mastery of fist, and spear, and bow. You see, in the words of The Study, Ci also means "Sharp Thorn." And so I had become a dangerous protector of beauty and good... a thing to strike at anyone who would seek to mar that beauty... a weapon of nature, and at one with it... a thing of pain for those who would do harm.

And so on that day... at the young age of 12, Jan was dead, and Ci was born. And so I have been on every day since. And yet... to hear my old name... in the voice of my mother... from the very image of her own mouth. I must admit that my soul was not "the calm still lake" of The Study, but a seething tempest of emotions. In that maelstrom however one thought crystallized - my brother. If this beast knew my parents forms, their being, indeed seemingly even their thoughts - it might know my brother's fate. He was not there on that morning I awoke to find my parents slaughtered. I have no memory of the night before, and no idea what befell him. Though my memories of him are even dimmer than those of my parents, I have always felt the loss of him as I imagine the loss of a limb - sometimes I can almost feel him near me, and others I feel the absence of him so keenly it brings me to weep. If this thing could help me find him...

But it was not so. These shadows were meant only to deceive and to torture, not to enlighten. I was forced by this thing to witness my parents broken bodies a second time... only now, by a fate too cruel to be fiction, they lay broken by my own hand. This beast would pay for this violation... for the sacrilege of both my friend's memories and mine. In truth, I remember little of the fight with the thing itself. I have a memory of white hot fury burning at my center... of a sense of the enormity of the beast... a memory of falling and rising again... and finally a memory of the slain thing, now pitiful and impotent despite its bulk.

In fact it is that memory on which I now ponder. Yanji teaches us that all life has meaning. That all life has value. The fact that I feel more satisfaction at its death than in its life, would shock my masters. Master Fēng perhaps would understand... I will have to speak to him of this to understand what this might mean. I spent the rest of our journey pondering this question. Indeed I may spend a great deal more time trying to answer it.

Recollections by Zanna

We had to hunt down a giant worm (Gross).

Found the worm's home (tunnels and tight corridors ie my JAM!!!)

There were a bunch of undead versions of Cassio's old co-workers. When we killed them we saw that some tentacle thing was attached to their heads.

It was noticeable that something was wrong with them because they were happy to see Cassio.

Finally found the worm thing and MURDERED IT!

Everyone almost died except yours truly

YOU ARE WELCOME CASSIO!

But most importantly I made two new best friends :)

I would like everyone to meet Peanut Butter and Jelly!!! (In case you were wondering, Peanut Butter is the more playful one, Jelly can be pretty serious most of the time)

Peanut Butter and Jelly