Session 7 - Are You Willing?
General Summary
In the time between searches, the rest of the group manages to reform in the guest bedrooms. With the information they found: Edelweiss’s letter, the History of Draconian Presence, the illusion of the man known as “Dustin the Drunken,” and Lady Bumbleford’s journal—the puzzle is finally beginning to take its shape. The question is, how are these pieces connected?
This is the question the Partycule ponders as they hide away and repair their wounds. They start debating a few options: go back to the duels and interrogate Dustin or stay in the castle and search the remaining castle grounds for anything of use? In the end, they decide it is smarter to investigate the rest of the castle as there will likely be no greater opportunity to do so when the entire estate is at the dueling grounds.
The group decides to stay together this time, as door after door is unlocked:
The Garden
The indoor garden is beautiful, floors covered with varieties of natural flora grown by Bumbleford’s own hand. It’s more of a decoration piece than anything, but in it are some valuable resources which Violet and Celeste eagerly take for themselves. In the process, Celeste manages to kill one of the rarer plants on the right-hand side of the garden. Violet takes the pieces of dead plant for herself, for better or for worse.The Apiary
Inside the apiary are some of Bumbleford’s Vespon, they are slightly more magical than the other versions the group had previously seen. However, they are more fearful than any Vespon the group had previously encountered. As Violet enters the room, the terrified creatures return to their hives and buzz defensively. Violet spends the next handful of minutes continuing to scare the small creatures while Celeste takes a sample of the Vespon’s honey for herself.The Sitting Room
A peaceful place likely for Bumbleford to sit down, relax in front of the fire, and enjoy a nice bottle of wine. There’s not much inside, but when examining the books Celeste and Calum manage to find a hidden tome, it’s old, ancient even. It’s a tome from a time before Corondor’s divergence into a demiplane, probably even when Queen Vy’shera I, the first Queen of Corondor, was alive. It details the former Aspect of the Sea turned God of Death, Touarch. The previous global event in Corondor, the Long Winter, was fought to defeat the heretical worshippers of the Aspects. The Aspects had formerly been defeated during the Heaven’s War, where the mortal defeated their heavenly counterparts and out of its corpse rose the New Pantheon, or the Faith of the Nine. With the end of the Long Winter, and the demonization of any Aspectian faith, this tome is highly heretical, and brings into question why Bumbleford even has it.The Astrolabe Room
Hidden behind a locked door was a spooky room filled with bottled organs and magical supplies. In the center sat a large “astrolabe,” a magical device holding what appeared to be a crackling orb. When Asha tries to use Awakened Mind on it, she finds herself put into the hivemind of the Vespon, but quickly shoved out due to the overwhelming strain on the mind. Celeste and Asha try together, and while Asha is shoved out once more, her mind damaged after prolonged exposure into the hivemind, Celeste manages to push through and is able to focus on a few different Vespon. In one, she manages to watch a duel between Dustin and Bond, where Dustin is clearly fighting aggressively once more—just as Calum had described. She’s also able to overhear a conversation between Lady Bumbleford and Ser Brass Loreflower:“It’s a joust, no one will question a snapped neck. Who is he facing?” “Kettlewyck. The boy barely knows how to mount a horse. Are you sure?” “Positive. It won’t cause too much attention for him to get personal treatment in my laboratory. With the right spells, nothing will be amiss. It will be like every other jousting injury. Just make sure to cripple his horse, I’ll handle the rest.”
