Goblin Forge Presents
Goblin Forge is a varietal ttrpg production group with a wide range of projects and GENERAL MAYHEM IN THE FICTIONAL FANTASY WORLDS OF OUR MINDSSSS!!!! Our first campaign, Shadows of Prophecy, uses DnD 5e mechanics and our current running show is Vaesen: Slovene Lands.
LGBTQIA Mafia!
Goblin Forge Presents
Vaesen, Slovene Lands: Tall Tales
Joseph, Luka, and Akka follow their first lead on the drownings in Ukanc, a tall tale told by a local, Nico Gucek. Eyes of red, glowing embers, a haunting melody, and the blackest soul. Seemingly flourishes to scare children, but what ACTUALLY lurks beneath the surface of Lake Bohinj?
The opening number, Zrejlo je žito / An Dro is performed by the wonderfully talented Noreia
A Special thanks to our fabulous patrons, JayCeeAitch (JCH), Maggie Z., and Chris B.
Transcripts available at: https://goblinforge.buzzsprout.com/
The ¶¶ ¶¶.
Timothy (DM):Thank you, thank you, thank you, I'm going to go Welcome fellow travelers and seekers of the unknown to the shattered realm of Vossen, slavian lands. Here, the whispers of ancient legends weave through mist-shrouded forests and babbling brooks, bringing to life the eerie and the enigmatic. I am Kitchi, your guide and game facilitator, leading you through this dark and mesmerizing journey In the year 1848, within the rugged and mysterious Slavine lands. We traverse a world where the boundary between the mundane and the mystical is perilously thin.
Timothy (DM):As we step into this unsettling realm, we'll explore the shadows cast by industrialization and enlightenment upon a land steeped in folklore and arcane rituals, quarters surrounded by the daunting majesty of the Julian Alps, the placid mysteries of countless lakes and the haunting depths of vast forests. We shall uncover the secrets of the Vossen trolls, silkies, fae and other mythical beings that defy human understanding. With the sight our investigators pierce through the veil of reality, confronting ancient spirits that have lingered since time immemorial, hidden yet ever-present alongside humanity, yet ever-present alongside humanity, join us as we rekindle ancient magics and face the uncanny reconnecting with a world of mystery driven by primordial laws. Brace yourself, for in the land of the Vossen, the familiar and the fearsome dance an eternal haunting waltz With me. Today we have.
Chris (Joseph):Stravo. My name is Chris and I'm playing Joseph Fuchs. He is a man of the hunt.
Dan (Luka):Oh yeah, Hello.
Musical Interlude:Hi, I'm Tan, I'm fine and I am playing Luca Koss the indifferent, indifferent.
Dan (Luka):No, that's not the word I'm looking. I'm fine. And I am playing Luca Koss the indifferent, indifferent. No, that's not the word I'm looking for, never mind.
Ellie (Akka):Is he indifferent?
Dan (Luka):I don't think so no, no I wouldn't, characterize him as indifferent, unnoticeable, yeah, discreet.
Chris (Joseph):Discreet yeah, that's good.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, and I'm Ellie. I'm playing Akha Korlev, the stalwart nurse.
Timothy (DM):H, the stalwart nurse Havala Havala. Oh, you can thank me too yeah.
Timothy (DM):And now for a few disclaimers. All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental. This actual play contains themes of violence, death, religion, sexual and potentially explicit scenes, depictions or discussions of traumatic events and other adult topics that may or may not be suitable for all audiences. Listener discretion is advised. Please take care while listening and if you find any of the content distressing, consider pausing or skipping ahead. Your well-being is important, so let us step forward into the shadows and begin Veliko Sreće. Previously, on Shadows, Nope.
Musical Interlude:Nope.
Timothy (DM):My body kicked in.
Ellie (Akka):Previously voss and sloven lands all right tim just like blacks out and when they come back they've narrated an entire episode of shadows of prophecy.
Timothy (DM):It's like what all right previously on voss Slavian Lands. Our brave investigators Joseph Wolfram Fuchs, luka Kos and Aka Korolev were drawn into the fog-shrouded town of Ukans, their mission To uncover the dark truth behind the mysterious drownings that had plagued Lake Bohemia Lake Bohemia. Assisted by their enigmatic butler, elgert Frisk, they settled into life at Pradyama Castle and prepared for their first mission, studying advanced research on the effects of drowning, preparing an arsenal, training and stocking up on supplies. After all, how does one prepare for facing a lake monster, especially when one's resume says investigator one month?
Ellie (Akka):and not professional monster hunter.
Timothy (DM):Nonetheless, they steeled themselves for the unsettling journey ahead, ever aware that Vossen can be quite dangerous. Once in Ukans, the team found themselves caught between the village's picturesque charm and an undercurrent of dread and fish smell and fish, lots of fish, which had begun two months ago, philip, the brothers, dominic and Chris, tristan and, most recently, tio Dolinar.
Timothy (DM):While recounting the stories and imploring the party to resolve the issue so that the fishing company may return back to business as usual, luca noticed signs of violence on Jakob's hands. As usual, luca noticed signs of violence on Jakob's hands, indicating that he had recently punched something or someone quite hard. The party paid a visit to Stella Doolenar, still raw from the loss of her son, and, after some internal and external struggles, she allowed the investigators to examine his waterlogged remains. It was an emotionally delicate moment and, despite the gravity, fuchs, kos and Korolev somehow managed to tread the thin line between somber investigators and outsiders, trying not to spook the already already traumatized community. Aka's autopsy was a grotesque experience, if not more. The body was swollen, pale and bruised, the skin stretched hot over waterlogged limbs, but it was the small, unusual bite marks that made everyone shiver. Fairies bounced around. Was it a selkie, a vengeful water spirit or, as Joseph joked, an extremely hungry fish? While the autopsy took place, luca pressed Father Matej for slander on Jakob, who resisted all the while but eventually gave in to revealing the man's proclivity to aggression, before retreating into the confessionals, plagued by the hopelessness he was made to grapple with.
Timothy (DM):The episode wrapped up, with the team tracking down Niko Gusik in the local tavern, befriending him and coaxing him into telling them the tale of the monster at the bottom of Lake Bohemia. Long ago, when the village of Ukans was nothing more than a few humble homes by the water's edge, the villagers whispered of a creature that dwelled in the lake's blackest depths, a creature that had lived in the lake from before its first settlers. No one knew its name, but they all knew its eyes Red glowing embers that pierced through the night, burning straight into the hearts of anyone who dared come too close. They said the monster only came up from the bottom when the lake was quiet, after the sun sank behind the mountains and the mist curled across the water like bony fingers Reaching out to snatch careless souls. It waited for children, children who didn't listen to their parents, who wandered too close to the lake's edge at night.
Timothy (DM):The first sign of the creature's approach was always a song, soft, haunting, like a lullaby, sung by someone who is neither alive nor dead. It lured you closer, beckoning with each sweet, eerie note drip, drip, drip, like water falling from the hair of something that had been waiting beneath the surface for far too long. If you heard both, it was already too late. You'd see them, those red eyes glowing in the distance, eyes as deep as the blackest soul, pulling you in, filling your chest with a cold fear that froze your heart. And then, in a moment, the monster would rise, its long, wet arms reaching out, dragging you down to the depths where the light could never reach, and there you would stay forever, lost, forgotten, with only the sound of dripping water to keep you company.
Timothy (DM):This was many years ago, yet to this day nobody knows why the monster song went silent. That was until recently. Someone must have disturbed its slumber. So remember children, stay away from the lake at night, ignore its song and run at the first drip drip, drip calling out behind the audience oh no, it can't be.
Timothy (DM):Not now, not here in someone's ear ROAR, not now, not here In someone's ear Roar. And with that Mikko Gushik wraps up his tale as he frightens one of the younger boys sitting at the table by screaming into their ear. And as he finishes his story, he raises a glass um towards you all and shouts oh my gosh, I butchered the fuck out of that. Uh, which means cheers in slovenian.
Ellie (Akka):Uh, and that's the story we say that wow, I think you were over like carousing with the boys yeah and akka was sitting over a little bit away reading your book yeah, but I could probably hear the story from where I was sitting because it sounds like it got loud at the end yeah, well he's.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, I imagine he's got a.
Timothy (DM):Oh, yeah, he's very like energetic theatric about it. He's like really into this story he's been. He's been telling the story for for a little while.
Dan (Luka):He's gotten more practice, gotcha yeah, intercomt luca, will um wrap up his conversations with the the menzes um finish off his drink and then come back over to uh um, aka and joseph I was hanging out I think you were hanging out with us.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, you guys were having a little boy's night yeah but yeah, after uh getting some ring into my ears and yeah, I'll head back with you did you hear all that?
Ellie (Akka):I did sounds like, uh, some good pieces of information in there angry, angry, like person yeah, red eyes singing big bony fingers doesn't all add up, though, what do you?
Dan (Luka):mean the. He said well, the story says that it goes after children.
Chris (Joseph):It has not been going after children, it's been after adults I imagine there's a there's an amount of folklore we have to parse away to sort of I'm sure this is embellished over time, as like any of those uh fairy tales will be. But, um, I mean clutching. If they got sharp fingers, that'd match up with what we'd seen on the body, where it's like if they grab you, like grab your arm you remember those indentations we saw. Or it could be a big fish. I'm still not ruling out big fish.
Ellie (Akka):All right, I won't cross it out of my notebook just yet.
Chris (Joseph):Singing fish.
Musical Interlude:Now there's an idea.
Ellie (Akka):What I thought was intriguing is the idea that this used to be a problem then wasn't a problem for a long time and has recently started becoming a problem again. So we know that there previously was something that stopped this from happening and now something has started it happening again.
Ellie (Akka):So, in terms of resolving the problem, if we can figure out what stopped it the first time, it seems like a good lead for figuring out how to stop it this time because I don't know about you, but I don't feel confident in my ability to defeat a water-based creature no idea if I get in the water with that thing, I'm I'm simply drowning yeah, we're out of our our home field.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, so should we try to find the oldest person in town? They probably have the best history of the start of the town.
Dan (Luka):Well, well, when was zuccon's founded? Do we know? Have we seen any buildings?
Chris (Joseph):Like a church.
Timothy (DM):Established, yeah, the church maybe From what you have seen so far, the structures are stone foundation and wood to thatch walls, so the church is probably the most stone, but it's not like a. This is not like a very stately church, so it's not like established in this time period.
Dan (Luka):Yeah, but there's the old cathedral. Right, there is an old cathedral, yeah, didn't we pass by? That.
Dan (Luka):Which makes me think that if they've gone through an entire cathedral worth of time, it's an old cathedral, which makes me think that if they've gone through an entire cathedral worth of time, people might be dead. It might be too old the problem the water problem the problem began when Ukans was just a couple of buildings and it's going to be a long time since then. Yeah, If anything we can still see if we can talk to somebody who's old. Maybe their grandparents told them something.
Ellie (Akka):I imagine it's too much to hope that there's any kind of written history. That seems deeply unlikely.
Chris (Joseph):Unless it was painted on a tapestry or something.
Timothy (DM):We're talking about town hall tomorrow, hall pass yeah, oh, that's true out to you, yeah, there is a building that is potentially carries records.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, they're also. You know, fishermen are very superstitious sort and I wonder if you know this is sort of the most coherent telling that we've managed to acquire. But if we go to the fishermen with these tidbits, I wonder if we can collect any additional information, like here and there, about you know specific things that they do to like ward it off or like, oh my, like grandfather's grandfather, you know, escaped it actually also wondering if we should get something to block our ears with like wax yeah, to avoid lullaby effects possibly anyway these are my thoughts based on the story, but maybe it's time for bed to go to bed because it is pretty late, right j?
Dan (Luka):Jacob's house, yeah.
Ellie (Akka):Don't get hit, don't start any fights, luca.
Dan (Luka):I would never.
Ellie (Akka):We were also maybe going to probe his wife, I think, if I recall correctly.
Dan (Luka):Oh yeah.
Ellie (Akka):Because she was the one who originally recommended he contact us. She's quite superstitious as well.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, so she might have a pulse yeah.
Ellie (Akka):Might also have more information about his behavior. So go to bed. Yep.
Chris (Joseph):Wave. Goodbye to the boys.
Ellie (Akka):The boys.
Dan (Luka):Question for the GM Is that what your?
Musical Interlude:official title is for this.
Dan (Luka):In our research, not just necessarily about this particular investigation, but like of past investigations that the society has um done. Has there been like inklings that like human behavior can cause like? Is that a general understanding that we have? That human behavior can cause a vassan to act out or to become violent.
Timothy (DM):Give me a learning, oh or observation.
Dan (Luka):I could do observation okay, because my thought is that, like I don't want to chase Jakob down just because he's a dick, unless we think that if we go chasing every dick down, yeah, two successes too many dicks we'll be here all day.
Timothy (DM):Two successes, was it for observation yes, so two successes. Um, yes, so you can piece together that, like, while a lot of the society has, like, spent their time at least this location and everything you've read through has spent their time chasing down monsters as, like, monster hunters to rid them. Um, you do piece together that, through some of the stories, they do seem to be like aggravated by human behavior or um activity, like human activity tends to aggravate them.
Timothy (DM):Um similar to how, like, people have established settlements where, like a wolf pack would live and therefore, the wolves are then gonna attack the people and then the people are gonna kill the wolves. It's the same type of relationship, gotcha um, but then extra success. Uh is going to do a thing. Feel good about myself oh, no, no observation is the one where you can use that information somewhere.
Ellie (Akka):Great, you get a plus one if you use that information. Cool, great.
Timothy (DM):You get a plus one if you use that information.
Dan (Luka):Cool, I'll keep that in mind.
Ellie (Akka):I'm also thinking in terms of talking to the fishermen. These attacks started about two months ago, so I'm wondering if we can probe out anything that changed two months ago. I think Jakob said that he couldn't think of anything, but maybe the people on the ground have a different opinion.
Chris (Joseph):In my research of this lake to learn about geography, I know there are a lot of bottom dwelling fish, uh, so I you're really still stuck on the big fish thing. I, I, I'm a man of animals. I, I see, I see a problem and I think I need to. Uh, there's an animal resource to it, but I I would. I have a hunch.
Ellie (Akka):It might be related to trying to increase yield by fishing deeper yeah yeah, something about the way that the fishing yeah, fishing deeper or maybe fishing at like too often or where the animal usually eats yeah, we're about to catch ourselves a catfish boys all right, so the plan is to go back to the legec estate.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, um, you will be greeted by evelyn legec, so yakub's wife, um, basically she'll greet you. Is there anything that you want to like? Do you want to have like a conversation with her, or would you like to just settle in for the evening?
Chris (Joseph):kind of want to get her backstory. So nice of you to call us. We're just curious how you learned about the little group.
Timothy (DM):Oh well, thank you for coming. I hope that your room has been settled in nicely. I brought your bags in when Jakob went to take you on tour. But yes, of course I can tell you a little bit about um myself and how I came across you. Um, it actually is. It's quite a funny story. There's a woman that I met long ago, uh, during one of our trips to paris. Um, she, she lives in, I believe, the Netherlands now, but she had told me of this society that existed in her hometown. Actually, I honestly had originally written to them, but they had pointed me in your direction, stating that you were of closer proximity, which thank goodness because you were able to arrive so quickly.
Chris (Joseph):Always happy to help out a local friend.
Timothy (DM):Of course, have you been enjoying your time here at UConn so far? It's very quaint.
Ellie (Akka):Yes, excellent food, lovely local sites.
Chris (Joseph):Great architecture.
Ellie (Akka):Of course, with our focus on our investigation, we haven't gotten to partake in as much leisure as we might otherwise.
Timothy (DM):Understandable. I hope my husband gave you a nice tour, pointed out most of the important things.
Ellie (Akka):Yes, yes, he was able to share with us quite a bit of useful information about the town. I was curious if we could hear a little bit more about the troubles the town has been experiencing from your perspective.
Timothy (DM):Ah, yes, well, it's hit the town rather hard and it's a small community, if you haven't gathered as of yet. And so one death, let alone four, is quite a number.
Chris (Joseph):Five, five, I count the brothers as two, because they're basically always together.
Timothy (DM):That's right. Four instances, five deaths, is quite a lot for a community like this. Quite a large portion of the village is grieving. Then there's the matter of our entire economy being centered around fishing off of Lake Bohemia, and while grieving has its place, it's definitely been, new problems present themselves on the horizon, and that's going to just create more hardship for everyone here, I'm afraid.
Ellie (Akka):I see. And what inclined you to reach out to the society as opposed to a different body of investigators? Your husband's letter seemed to suggest that you think there's a supernatural element at play, or I guess supernatural is probably not how Akka would actually word it. A mysterious unnatural element at play.
Timothy (DM):Well, at first I didn't think too much of it. But um, one person drowning is unfortunate but it's not unnatural. It's hard to explain how five fully grown men, fishermen, who've all lived on the lake their entire lives, learned to swim in these very waters, could be drowned, with only glimpses and stories to come of it. It would take, I suppose at least it would take quite a bit of force to drown a human.
Chris (Joseph):Especially given some of the wounds that we've seen on some of the bodies for aggressiveness, rather than just accidental drowning in nature, but for them to happen while other people were present and go unnoticed, that would be quite a feat. Yeah, that's what they had said, where they have these night fishing parties. But the claim is that these bodies went missing Like people in the same boat, and then the body's just gone.
Timothy (DM):That's the stories that the fishers have told. Okay, so I, if I recall correctly, four of the bodies washed ashore, while one of them was in a separate location craggy cove. Craggy cove, yeah, um, there's occasionally a bit of a current here, but, um, it's possible that it was taken there intentionally. The other reason and I have spoken to Jakob about this once before and he thinks me crazy, but I swear I've heard the singing at night If you listen very closely sound travels across these waters.
Chris (Joseph):And you've heard them from here Atop the hill, atop the hill.
Timothy (DM):Not atop the hill, but I've occasionally gone for a walk around the Inn and Tavern. The coastline there is quite beautiful. There's a nice little beach. You can see Craggy Cove from it, mm-hmm, and when the moon is full it's quite a pleasant experience. Jakob has forbidden me, of course, from going to the shore at night.
Chris (Joseph):I imagine he values your protection of you.
Timothy (DM):But early on, when it was just philip, we didn't know that there was any reason to be concerned my last question is that we understand the attacks started about two months ago.
Ellie (Akka):Can you think of anything that might have changed or influenced these attacks that happened two months ago?
Timothy (DM):Can you give me an observation check?
Ellie (Akka):yeah, I can can I?
Dan (Luka):how can I?
Timothy (DM):help. You can each give your separate observation. Oh perfect, one success, one success and one success. What's over there with the observation master?
Dan (Luka):what's over there?
Ellie (Akka):with the observation master. No success.
Timothy (DM):Tired of looking, all looked out I rolled a full house, though as you ask that question, you notice that her eyes trail up to a side table that you had passed earlier um, where there is a photograph of herself and yakub um on their wedding day. Oh, oh. Oh and Chico, but her response is no. I don't know anything that would have changed that would affect the lake.
Chris (Joseph):Understandable.
Ellie (Akka):Do they in the photograph? Do they look approximately? Do they look younger than they are? Look approximately? Do they look younger than they are now? Do they look like kind of the same age as they are right now?
Timothy (DM):about the same age okay is she wearing a ring?
Chris (Joseph):she is wearing a ring. Does it look like it's been worn for a long time? What, yeah?
Dan (Luka):how old are her like? How old do they appear?
Chris (Joseph):They're in their late 30s and Jakob is also late 30s. Yes.
Ellie (Akka):That seems pretty old for to get married and no children.
Timothy (DM):No children, right, and you haven't noticed any photos of children in the house Any toys in the house.
Dan (Luka):No, nothing we've noticed.
Ellie (Akka):And neither of them have mentioned Seems like it would have come up.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, interesting. Hmm.
Ellie (Akka):Okay, noted, I won't pry further for right now, but interesting how much you want to bet.
Ellie (Akka):They got married about two months ago are you having this conversation with your eyeballs?
Chris (Joseph):I'm just thinking out loud no, I'm just thinking in my head yeah, well, I noticed nothing so that's true, yeah, but we're, we're older, so we know like we got the old people, sense the old people uh, young love yeah relationship.
Ellie (Akka):They're still, you know, rowdy and vivacious I'm, I'm over the hill I I probably don't have too much left in me.
Chris (Joseph):What does that?
Dan (Luka):mean.
Chris (Joseph):But yet I invented the first Fitbit so, um, that's from.
Timothy (DM):Oh, we established that like two episodes.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, that's from from last episode where I ran out of the castle um it was, oh, it was, oh yeah, I remember that bit yeah, yeah, um, but yeah anyway, thank you so much for welcoming us into your home, um, we'll see you tomorrow morning, unless you go no, I'm ready to hit the hay.
Ellie (Akka):It's been quite a day.
Chris (Joseph):What day is it? It's not Sunday because the priest has. He didn't say it was.
Timothy (DM):I don't think we established what day it was. That's a great question If you don't have it written down in your notes. We're just going to say that it is Tuesday yay. Tuesday because if you don't have it written in your notes, then I haven't said it. I don't think we did so. It's Tuesday. That's established now, so tomorrow will be Wednesday great.
Ellie (Akka):As good a day as any, as good a day as any Wednesday Great.
Timothy (DM):As good a day as any. As good a day as any.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, let's go to bed. I think I get my own room we established because I'm a girl.
Musical Interlude:Yeah, yeah.
Dan (Luka):Do we want to take a walk?
Ellie (Akka):around the lake Seems like a good way to get drowned, I pull out the life vests.
Dan (Luka):Maybe just with an earshot, but not with a grabbing distance.
Ellie (Akka):Okay, I mean we could go check out that little beach that she mentioned, where that has the view of Krakiko.
Chris (Joseph):That sounds like a good.
Dan (Luka):A good point. And if Nico's tale is to be believed, it seems like this creature jumps out of the water at you. So if we stay far enough away from the water, we should be able to see it coming it also sounded like the singing kind of lures you in.
Chris (Joseph):Like a siren.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, so we should maybe grab like camel wax and have it plug our ears. Or at least one person have their ears plugged so they can wrangle all the other people.
Dan (Luka):Evelyn wasn't dragged in.
Ellie (Akka):That's true. She says she's heard the singing, is it?
Musical Interlude:a gender thing.
Chris (Joseph):Oh, I don't know, because it's all been male victims. Interesting, maybe Evelyn's the monster.
Timothy (DM):Sorry, are there any?
Dan (Luka):non-binary people in there.
Timothy (DM):I need to test the theory we have yet to ask a single person their pronouns.
Ellie (Akka):So well, if it is a gender thing, you guys should block your ears, because I'm not like, if you start trying to get in the water, I'm not going to be able to keep you out of it.
Chris (Joseph):I'm not strong enough okay, yeah, I'll get some. I'll try to bum a candle or wax or something yeah.
Ellie (Akka):I mean, you can just have it handy you don't have to put it in now. I'm just trying to keep you guys safe well, much appreciated and we can pick you up if you start walking to the like. Yeah, yeah, yeah, not such a fan of singing though. You know it's never really been my thing. So listening to singing yeah, I prefer acoustic, like like instrumentals. Oh gotcha. A little flute of some sort, perhaps a strum on a string instrument. Anyway, let's go to the beach, to the beach. Night beach.
Timothy (DM):Night beach. Alright, so you make your way back down the hill towards the Inn and Tavern and the Town Hall and, sure enough, when you arrive, you do notice a small little footpath leading down towards a stone beach. The sounds of crickets are starting to swell as the sun has set behind the tree line to the west.
Ellie (Akka):This is exactly when the attacks happen.
Dan (Luka):Yes, Can we hear the water lapping on the rocky shore?
Timothy (DM):Yes, the water is lapping on the shore. The water is lapping on the shore. You hear the sound when water comes through the stones, it's almost like a rain stick.
Ellie (Akka):Just kind of like that's nice. Or it would be nice if I wasn't worried about getting got what, what, what.
Timothy (DM):And it's probably about a half moon night, so it's relatively dark. It's not a well-lit night. The only light that you really get right now is the little bit from the moon, the inn and tavern which is hidden by a few trees, um, and then a small light on the lake, maybe northeast of the docks, if you had to place it. It's hard to make out where the docks are off this unfamiliar coastline. They themselves are dark. The whole coast is dark. Besides this one little light in the middle of the lake, what color is the light?
Timothy (DM):It's kind of like an orange hue is it moving or stable? It seems to be somewhat stable, but if you continue to watch it it does seem to move slightly, very slowly like it's bobbing or something like that yeah so maybe like a light on a lantern on a boat is what I'm thinking Nightfish.
Ellie (Akka):So somebody's, out there.
Dan (Luka):Is it generally quiet? Otherwise Like can we hear people in the Inn and Tavern?
Timothy (DM):It's relatively quiet. The Inn and Tavern the lights are still on, but even as you were passing it it was starting to quiet. There's no reason to stay up late.
Ellie (Akka):Especially when you gotta wake up early for your fisherman job Although I guess nobody's doing their fisherman jobs right now. That's the whole problem. Yeah.
Dan (Luka):So do we just sit and listen?
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, keep an eye on that light yeah.
Timothy (DM):Does everybody want to give me an observation? Hell yeah, or I think, is it vigilant?
Chris (Joseph):yeah, because observation is more for like detecting people's tells yeah, let me look up what vigilance is real quick does seem like we would be being vigilant.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, notice someone sneaking up or interpret situations you are monitoring.
Ellie (Akka):That's not right.
Dan (Luka):Yeah, come on, two dice Ha, ha ha.
Timothy (DM):Yeah because, observation is more empathy, so it's social.
Ellie (Akka):Luca's sleepy.
Dan (Luka):Luca probably has ADHD.
Chris (Joseph):No successes I got one success and that's a four on the ground.
Timothy (DM):Alright, have you plugged your ears?
Ellie (Akka):I got one success.
Chris (Joseph):No, that was a joke. Oh okay, aka had said not to do it yet.
Ellie (Akka):Okay, Maybe, if you like, start as soon as you hear saying yeah then, you stop it so you do listen for for a while.
Timothy (DM):You probably stay out there for maybe 20 minutes, 30 minutes, um, watching the light kind of just slowly at. At this point you notice that it's slowly drifting almost across the lake, like its position has shifted since you started watching, um, and it still does continue to kind of look like it's bobbing.
Timothy (DM):The light seems to like ebb and flow a little bit and that's when, across the waters you hear a very faint high pitched song block those ears, boys not particularly high pitched, that it's like unnatural, but it is a, it's like a soprano voice okay, you can't make out much of what's being sung. The melody seems simple. I'm not going to sing it, because you all can be saved from that. But it's a simple melody. It kind of just repeats over and over, almost like a nursery rhyme or like a lullaby.
Chris (Joseph):So I just hear the tune, I don't hear words. Yeah, okay.
Timothy (DM):And it's very faint. You can tell it's being carried across the lake for quite some distance. You can tell it's being carried across the lake for quite some distance and that's kind of why you can hear it, because it's just reverbing off the surface of the still lake, but again it is reverbing, so it kind of gets muddled by the time it reaches you.
Chris (Joseph):You hear that I'd probably cover your ears.
Ellie (Akka):Are you feeling the urge to walk into the lake?
Dan (Luka):Luca's gotten bored and is lying on his back throwing a rock up and down.
Chris (Joseph):I cover the ears of Broody and. I start to plug my ears with wax. What happened? Do we hear something? I hear a song.
Dan (Luka):Do I hear it if I focus on it?
Timothy (DM):Now that it's been pointed out, if you focus, you start to tune into the frequency a little bit and you start to hear a muffled melody.
Chris (Joseph):Are there any female fisher people here in town? We didn't see any.
Ellie (Akka):It'd be real embarrassing if this was just a night fisher lady, but anyway if this was just a night fisher lady, but anyway, so I have not yet blocked my ears to test our gender theory no do I have any?
Timothy (DM):nothing compels you to move okay do we feel? Compelled from your ears and the tune returns to your ears, and nothing compelled you to move anywhere.
Dan (Luka):Okay, so does it sound like a human voice?
Timothy (DM):it's yeah, probably human okay, like it's.
Ellie (Akka):It doesn't sound like like a bird or some sort of animal it's in the human range.
Timothy (DM):The melody is being sung in the human range. Um, it doesn't seem to have any like tonality that suggests like roaring or monstrous maws that would obstruct the way the sound was coming from the vocal cords in a particular way.
Ellie (Akka):I wonder if it's coming from craggy cove is the melody fairly um musical.
Dan (Luka):Does that make sense? Like does it make sense from a musical theory? Okay, cool.
Timothy (DM):It sounds like a nursery rhyme or a lullaby, something one of your parents might have sung to you as a child.
Chris (Joseph):But yeah, I'd probably agree with Akka. We could try to walk towards Krakiko to see if there's anything, if we get closer to the source or if it truly is coming directly across the lake from us.
Ellie (Akka):Can we grab a lantern to bring with us or something? I'm not trying to just walk out into the night.
Dan (Luka):Yeah, I can run back to the inn tavern and see if I can borrow one.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, thank you. I mean that's easy enough to go grab from either the inn tavern or to have brought from yakov's house.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, yeah, yeah, this isn't far yeah, I'm also curious if this boat that we've seen drifting like, if that's drifting to or away from craggy cove or maybe unrelated, but do we know where craggy cove is?
Timothy (DM):yeah, oh, we do okay, I think yeah it would be east from the inn and tavern along the coastline all right nighttime walk that was good got our lantern all right just try and be aware of any watery urges some splashing, yeah, watery urges, if you feel like you want to be in the water, let somebody know.
Timothy (DM):No, tell a friend. Yeah, yeah, tell a friend. So you begin to walk along the coast towards Craggy Cove and you can hear the shifting of the stones beneath your feet. The waves continue to lap up across the shoreline and back into the water and as you do, you start to notice some rocks jutting out from the surface of the lake and you start to realize why it's called craggy cove. Um, the rocks are sharp, um, and the water is shallow in this area, um, it's just kind of jutting. Crashed into one of the rocks, a hole punctured in its side. Um, from the age that you can see through the rotting wood as you shine your lantern light over it, um, is relatively old. It's probably 40, 50 years years old at this point, that this crashed long ago. So the rot has taken its toll on the wood of the boat. But as you're continuing down this way, you do start to notice that the sound of the singing is falling off.
Timothy (DM):It's becoming softer and quieter, suggesting that it is indeed coming from the other side of the lake, potentially towards the docks.
Dan (Luka):Do we want to turn around?
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, I guess so.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, we can always check out this boat later. I don't think there's anything hiding in the boat, but yeah, from your tour you know.
Ellie (Akka):It's about a 20 minute walk to the docks from here yeah probably 25, having gone down towards craggy cove about what time of night is it at this point?
Timothy (DM):uh, so you would have come around sunset, so we're really only like 7 30 pm okay, oh wow, that's a lot earlier than I thought it was yeah, it's really just. Night has just set in as you were, because it was after dinner and hanging out.
Ellie (Akka):Oh okay, great then. Yeah, let's go check out the docs. I'm just trying, not I'm not trying to do this sleep deprived, you know I need my beauty rest how else do you think I keep my complexion.
Chris (Joseph):So you're looking well, you're a doctor, so I imagine you know, yeah, your your critical, your ability to think critically diminishes severely when you're a doctor.
Ellie (Akka):so I imagine you know, yeah, your ability to think critically diminishes severely when you're sleep deprived.
Timothy (DM):It does. There are two routes that you can take. You can either go back down the main road up towards the docks, or you can try to keep to the shoreline. It does go through a heavily forested area between you and the docks. There's probably footpaths along the way, but you're not familiar with this area, you can't be too sure of that. But it's a heavily forested area.
Chris (Joseph):I can send Broody out in terms of like way finding.
Dan (Luka):If you guys want to do that, we can always go the the civilian route I'd like to keep an eye on the boat, yeah, or the light, yeah, assuming it's about yeah, if you are confident in your ability to find our way, then I'm certainly willing to follow.
Chris (Joseph):I'll take the lantern and I take the lead with Broody Alright.
Ellie (Akka):What a woodsman.
Chris (Joseph):I'm in my element.
Ellie (Akka):Out of my element. I'm glad one of us knows what they're doing.
Timothy (DM):Alright, I believe this would be an investigation to wayfinding through the forest.
Chris (Joseph):Does that?
Timothy (DM):make sense to you.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, it's fine, I got nine, dice Wow.
Ellie (Akka):Do you want a dice tray?
Musical Interlude:No, that's okay.
Chris (Joseph):I got one, two successes.
Timothy (DM):Nice, wow, okay, cool, so you're gonna be successful. Not, this is not particularly hard, um, and then I said investigation, right, yep, okay, so investigation, extra successes. I think that's the one where you just, uh, you get extra clues I mean, we're not. We're not looking for clues in this one, but yeah but, um, it allows you to do this more easily, which means that you could probably be a little bit more observant of things that you're trying to track in the meantime yeah, more attention to the boat, more clues or
Timothy (DM):understand context yeah, so, as you are making your way through the various footpaths that exist through this forested area, along the shoreline um, you're able to do so very easily um, make sure that you stay, uh, on path, on the right course. Uh, well, maintaining line of sight with the light on the lake. And you notice, as you are going towards the docks, you have your lantern and you notice that that light starts to shift a little bit more quickly across the lake towards the west. It never comes down to the docks, however, oh, and just disappears into the tree line west of where you originally saw it?
Ellie (Akka):Why are you saying oh, like you understood something.
Chris (Joseph):It means that somebody lives out that way.
Musical Interlude:Oh, does it Okay.
Ellie (Akka):I imagine if they don't park at the dock, they must have their own dock, or they pull ashore wherever they store their boat, or they might just be fishing west side of the lake but we are on the west side of the lake so there's not too much lake to the west of us yeah, and I guess the fact that it started really quickly means that they started paddling okay and after about 25 minutes you do reach the first set of docks, and throughout this process you've also been listening for the song and it has grown.
Timothy (DM):But as you're just about to get to the docks, it goes silent.
Dan (Luka):Hmm, it's about the same time as the light disappears into the tree line to the northwest of you Would we be able to keep watching it if we were out on the?
Timothy (DM):dock the light. The light, yeah, it like disappears behind trees, gotcha like it disappears into the forest along the northwest edge of the lake okay, so way farther out than if they're parking next to the dock. Yeah, and the light just dims until you lose it.
Ellie (Akka):Are we able to get a sense of where, along the shoreline, the light went into the forest?
Timothy (DM):With that extra success you can Ooh good job oh, good job. So, yeah, because you were able to like watch it so closely and actually like keep track of it so well because of your wayfinding, um, you have a pretty good sense of where, within that tree line, it they disappeared. You don't know how far into the forest they went. You can at least get your latitude.
Chris (Joseph):I know trajectory.
Ellie (Akka):Maybe we go to that point in the daylight and you can see if you can track anything.
Chris (Joseph):Like footprints yeah. That'd probably be easier than or I mean Broody can track a scent, but I imagine with all this fish around it maybe muddled. But yeah, I'm open to either If we want to at least try to see if we can find it right now and see the person or whoever in the act.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, I just don't know how tracking works.
Chris (Joseph):But if we have the light with us, they'll probably notice us as we notice them.
Dan (Luka):How far away do we think that point is?
Timothy (DM):anyways, Probably another 15 minutes oh. Okay.
Ellie (Akka):Worth a shot.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, I'll see if we can get by the light of the moon rather than having the. I mean, there's no harm in saying that. We were just walking the forest. So yeah, do you want to go now?
Ellie (Akka):Sure, yeah, maybe we can use the lantern until we get a little closer. Yeah. And then like shudder it or just so we don't get lost or trip and fall. The last thing we need is one of us breaking our leg out in the woods in the night.
Chris (Joseph):Be no good.
Ellie (Akka):Bless you Great.
Chris (Joseph):We'll skirt around the fisherman's village and keep heading west.
Ellie (Akka):Lead the way, broody.
Timothy (DM):Alright. So you cross past the second set of docks and the Fisherman Village. The Fisherman Village is relatively quiet. You do hear a couple voices and you do pass some men sitting around a fireplace outside. They look your direction but eventually pay you no mind and continue with their chatter.
Dan (Luka):Anybody I recognize from the tavern.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, you probably saw all three of them in the tavern at one point.
Dan (Luka):Yeah, boys, between lunch and dinner I'm gonna wave and then yell out are any of you out on the lake right now?
Timothy (DM):they shake their heads and no all right, I wave keep.
Ellie (Akka):Good evening to you.
Timothy (DM):They give you a little nod and go back to their chatter and you begin to trudge into the forest. It begins to get thicker, more densely underbrushed. This is basically the edge of town Gotcha, so this has been less walked and there are fewer footpaths that traverse through this region of the forest. Um, would you like to? Oh yeah, you're just continuing up along the lake, and so you continue up the lake for 15 minutes or so until you reach about the point where you think that the light disappeared into the tree line and you look around the light flickering from your lantern, dancing along the dark leaves of the trees and give me, I think it's just going to continue to be observation.
Musical Interlude:Observation or maybe vigilance.
Timothy (DM):Vigilance is the stealth.
Ellie (Akka):It's the anti-stealth.
Dan (Luka):Okay, not investigation either Investigation. Yeah, okay, oh, investigation, either Investigation yeah. Oh, you said observation.
Timothy (DM):Oh, I meant investigation. I apologize. I look at one thing and I say another thing.
Dan (Luka):I got a success.
Ellie (Akka):Me too One success.
Chris (Joseph):I got two, I got three. Wow, you are looking.
Timothy (DM):I did place this as a two.
Musical Interlude:Oh nice.
Dan (Luka):Oh, good, great, I see now.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah we're both just like dark, trying not to trip.
Timothy (DM):It's dark and you're looking for a footpath in a general area Like there's, only so precise you can be with where you ended up on the shore, with where you ended up on the shore, and so you're doing a looking. You're looking, well, going up the shoreline, trying to make sure, like you know, I'm at about the right spot. I need to start looking now, and it's dark. There's long shadows being cast.
Chris (Joseph):Did you have a question? Oh no, I was doing. You lick your finger and you hold it to the wind. You're like oh yeah, wind.
Timothy (DM):He's probably pushed a little bit by a two mile per hour wind going by northwest her hair's being like push and as you squint in the light, you notice a parting between two of the large shrubs along the tree line on the shore, and so you peek around it, and you do notice a couple signs of a very patchy footpath here, not one that's particularly well traveled, but that has definite signs of being stomped down. So it's not a natural forest floor. Some of the roots have the groove marks of a foot being rubbed up against it on occasion. It's a weird way to have said that.
Chris (Joseph):Gotcha A little bit.
Timothy (DM):But like the marks of people traveling the same path.
Chris (Joseph):A habitual path that doesn't seem to be an animal pathway, yeah, so yeah, this seems more human.
Timothy (DM):The signs are a little bit. The way that the roots are like worn down is more of a smooth Like the heel of a foot or a shoe.
Timothy (DM):And so, yeah, there is a very patchy pathway leading to the west and you can follow it. Um, it is one that, in night, takes you quite a bit of effort to follow. Well, um, you veer off of it a little bit and realize that you've lost the path. So you have to backtrack a little bit, and so the process tends to be a little bit slower than you would normally do in the day, but you are able to maintain that pathway. You do notice that it winds a bit through the woods.
Timothy (DM):Um, it goes on probably nearing 20 minutes, uh, before it starts to curve more to the south. Okay, and then continue on until you hit a clearing, and in the center of the clearing you do notice a dim light emanating from a small cottage. It's tucked into the trees at the edge of the clearing, into the trees at the edge of the clearing, and there is the faint smell of tobacco smoke and just the little light coming from between the shutters of the windows and beneath the door, the cracks around the frame of the door, just a small little light flickering. If you had to size it from here, you'd probably say somebody has a candle lit.
Chris (Joseph):This person enjoys their solitude to fish or be on the lake and then travel a backwoods path to a little house in the middle of nowhere I know we haven't heard anybody talk about sort of like a weirdo who lives out on their own probably probably not on the on yakov's uh guiding tour, not on his payroll either. Oh, that's that's true. He's probably like a competition, slight competition, but should we come back later?
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, I mean, on the one hand I'm tempted because it's like, well, we're here now, but on the other hand, I can't imagine knocking on somebody's door this late at night.
Chris (Joseph):In a remote place.
Ellie (Akka):Might not lead to a warm reception. Probably not.
Chris (Joseph):But maybe we can go back to the fisherman and ask like, oh, you know about anybody that else fishes other than you guys at night.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, seems like they might know about this person.
Dan (Luka):Yeah, unless you want me to sneak up there.
Chris (Joseph):That works too.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, why don't you go sneak?
Chris (Joseph):and have a look. Just have a little look, I just want a peek.
Dan (Luka):Ooh, I'm gonna regret this. I feel like oh don't fuck it up.
Chris (Joseph):Luca, he just, he pulls out of his mask. Give me a stealth.
Dan (Luka):Yeah, that's my thought that's not the right number to ask.
Ellie (Akka):Come on.
Musical Interlude:Luca.
Timothy (DM):Oh, those are no successes. You step on a branch a lot of ones, yeah, wow, um. So it's very quiet in this section of the woods. Um, besides the sounds of birds, night birds and the crickets, there's only a faint breeze, which is why the water was so still tonight you're taking care to step softly, to mind where you place your feet.
Timothy (DM):Unfortunately for you, the ground is rather uneven and you come to a section where the grass is taller and you struggle to find clear footing. And sure enough, you do step on a rather large branch and that crack of the wood doesn't echo, but the sound is deafening in the silence of the wood. Um doesn't echo, but it is. The sound is deafening in the silence of the forest. Um, it punctuates the night sounds and you hear from within the cottage at that point, the clinking of metal and then the dragging of furniture across a wooden floor, and then you hear the door rattle in its hinges as something is pushed up against it with a thump.
Dan (Luka):How tall are these?
Timothy (DM):grasses Maybe a couple inches, okay, not that tall, got it. A wild Pokemon jumps out. Yeah.
Chris (Joseph):I was going to lie down really quick.
Dan (Luka):I'm the wild Pokemon.
Ellie (Akka):Sounds like they're just trying to keep us out.
Dan (Luka):Yeah, I I'm gonna scuttle back to the tree line maybe we come back tomorrow yeah, I wonder if they think we're hooligans. Yeah, did you all hear that, though they blocked up the door interesting I mean, is that not a normal reaction?
Ellie (Akka):if you're alone in the woods in your house at night and you hear somebody skulking around outside, that's what I would do I guess.
Chris (Joseph):Well, there's a lot of animals that live outside, so but I it's a rational response, I think come back tomorrow sounds good to me and we know the way here now.
Ellie (Akka):So yeah, yeah, it'll be easier in the light but the challenge oh sorry, we'll make you do it I want to do the role again come on, let me do the role again I.
Timothy (DM):I rely on broody, so broody's doing all the hard work I have not died all right, and so you turn in for the evening. You make your way back to yakub's house and probably enter a little bit quieter, um, because both yakub and evelyn are asleep at this time. Um, so you tiptoe your way back to your rooms in which you are lodging, and, if there's nothing else that you would like to do before we hit the lights out, snuff out those candles.
Chris (Joseph):Are there any other photos other than the wedding photo in their house that I can peruse?
Timothy (DM):Yeah, as you now are starting to come in and out of the house a little bit a couple more times, you do notice that there are a couple other photos from their wedding. No other photos of the two of them in the house.
Chris (Joseph):Like individually. No Gotcha Photos.
Dan (Luka):I imagine are pretty rare, though right, they're special, they're like pretty luxury. They're really rare yeah.
Timothy (DM):Um, so there's only like three Gotcha Um, but no children. There's no signs of children at all. Um, at this point, you've gotten a better sense of the house and what rooms exist, and you are indeed taking up the last two spare rooms. There's like a little study, the kitchen, dining room, the master bedroom, um, a water closet, um all the standard rooms, and then the two spare rooms that you are in, um, you do also actually, no, do you give me, uh, an observation or investigation? Sorry no not observation.
Timothy (DM):I have to keep remembering that observation is social uh investigation yeah I mean, unless you don't care, like if you don't care, I'll be peeking around the house two successes two successes, no successes okay we snoop in, you know if there's one thing.
Ellie (Akka):Middle-aged people know how to do it's snoop around somebody else's house.
Chris (Joseph):We've got the perceiving eye. You go in the bathroom.
Ellie (Akka):I'm opening the drawer. Being, like the silverware's, not polished, go in the medicine cabinet.
Timothy (DM):Look at all the drugs that they're taking. Try to parse together their mental health history.
Dan (Luka):It's like I get distracted by Pika.
Musical Interlude:You've never had a house before no you don't know.
Timothy (DM):I don't know where to look for things, uh. So there's gonna be a couple things that you find um one. You are gonna find um that there is almost like an altar um, not quite an altar, but it feels like an altered situation. Uh, in the study that there is this like end table, um, there's another photo from the wedding and then there's also a dried bouquet of flowers and a rope, a like decorative rope okay, um one that
Timothy (DM):um yes hand fasting, um type of looking rope. Um, and the flowers still have their color. So they are dry, but they still have quite a bit of color to them. Um, the other thing that you run across is that there is a? Um a big gash in the wall in one of the side hallways leading towards the study. Um, it is a like a solid wood wall um so it's not like a hole through it, but it is smashed in a bit like someone punched it.
Dan (Luka):Like someone punched okay.
Timothy (DM):You said gash and I was like like claws, yeah, or like a nice, someone punched it, okay, okay um, they're not punching clear through a two by four right um, but it's like paneling but yeah, it is paneling, so it's like cracked and crunched in a little bit, but it's not like a hole through into the wall. This isn't drywall yeah, we're not punching through the walls here how old does this rope seem?
Dan (Luka):like you know when, like rope, it like it looks nice.
Timothy (DM):Okay, it looks nice, okay, he's not just like decorative rope.
Chris (Joseph):They're not doing anything with it but what if he's gotten married multiple times and it shows the age?
Dan (Luka):of. I'm mostly thinking if it had like dust collected in between like the gotcha, or if it's starting to fray in the middle like no, it doesn't seem to have any dust.
Timothy (DM):The flowers still are. They're right new color.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, I sniffed them a little bit. Do they have any scent?
Timothy (DM):yeah, they have a slight scent to them still, oh, I thought they were magical flowers, lol. There's like white roses it's the boss they have like the rose scent is still there. There's a couple other like flowers woven in and yeah, they do still have not a strong scent, but something.
Chris (Joseph):I wonder what Jakob is so mad about in this house.
Ellie (Akka):I know. I wonder if they.
Dan (Luka):Probably his workers Not doing their job.
Ellie (Akka):Do we remember how long Jakob has been here? Because he inherited the business from his father, yeah, does that mean like he was raised here. Do we remember? Have we discovered this information?
Timothy (DM):I think that was the case he said he's, he's lived here through and through.
Ellie (Akka):Okay, um, that was the vibe you got so he's been here the whole time, but he only got married probably about two months ago.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, and that's when the lake started taking people men yeah, okay be curious to know if Evelyn moved here yeah, or if she was a local girl yeah we could ask her tomorrow over breakfast cool sleep time.
Musical Interlude:Yeah, you're like already in bed, we're just gonna look around a little bit. You're like.
Timothy (DM):I found this ham sandwich that was set aside from where it came from. Um is elga here, oh my god she's like creeping through the walls um what? No, he would never do that, he's busy.
Ellie (Akka):He's trying to keep that castle from fucking collapsing.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, he's bound to that castle. He can't go outside of the town, that's true.
Timothy (DM):Alright, and so you snuff out the candles and you turn in for the night as the world fades away, the last sounds that you are left with is the sounds of crickets fading into the night. And then it is morning. You wake up. How early I'm. Assuming the doctor and the hunter are fairly early people.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, with the sun.
Timothy (DM):So okay. You are waking up as the first rays of sunshine are hitting your face, you can already hear the sounds of somebody in the kitchen preparing breakfast. No scents have arrived yet, just just the noises. Um, and you can hear uh, luca, uh snoring.
Chris (Joseph):Does pika snore yeah and pika snores.
Timothy (DM):Yes, oh my gosh, with that squashed face, yeah, the tongue always hanging out.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, the two of you.
Chris (Joseph):It's like a duet.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, as one rises, the other falls. Yeah.
Chris (Joseph):Go in for some, I imagine fish breakfast.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, I guess I'll probably run into you in the kitchen.
Timothy (DM):So, as the floorboards creak beneath your feet, you make your way down the hallway towards the kitchen, where you find Evelyn beginning to prep breakfast. It looks like breakfast is relatively simple. It looks like breakfast is relatively simple. She does have a pot of water beginning to boil on the stove, some sort of porridge grain and then some add-ins, so some nuts, some berries, potentially a couple light sweeteners, so maybe a honey and maybe a maple syrup. That's been imported and she greets you. Good morning, I hope you've slept well.
Chris (Joseph):Very comfortable.
Ellie (Akka):Indeed. Yes, thank you for the hospitality.
Timothy (DM):Did you happen to head out last night? I could have sworn. I heard the door late in the night, late in the night.
Ellie (Akka):Yes, yes. We had a couple of lingering leads from the investigation that we wanted to follow up on, and we ended up staying out later than we expected.
Timothy (DM):Oh really Leads already so quickly.
Chris (Joseph):We're the best.
Ellie (Akka):The best at what we do within this area.
Musical Interlude:This localized region.
Ellie (Akka):Wow you know nothing concrete, but when it comes to things like these, no lead is too small.
Timothy (DM):Well, anything of note.
Chris (Joseph):There's a peculiar song that we heard over the water.
Ellie (Akka):We heard the same thing we were talking about yes at the small beach.
Timothy (DM):And she begins to hum it, this one.
Ellie (Akka):Is it that?
Timothy (DM):one.
Ellie (Akka):It's the same one sounds familiar yeah, it's the same always yes, I mean I've only heard it two or three times, but it was always the same and then we encountered this when we were trying to follow the source of the singing, we stumbled upon this little cottage way out in the woods on the northwest coast of the lake. Are you familiar with who it might be that lives out there? Yes or perhaps forgive me? Are you a local or did you come here for?
Timothy (DM):Jakob. I am from a neighboring town, but I am familiar with him. That's Mr Kozier. He's lived out there for years. At this point, ever since I came into Ukans Keeps to himself. Apparently there's some history between him and Jakob.
Chris (Joseph):Like competition in terms of the lake.
Timothy (DM):Oh, nothing of the sort. The man is really only fishes enough to feed himself. From what I've noticed More of the social engagement, although I never pride much, of course. Jakob seemed a little sensitive on the subject. I didn't want to push him naturally very tactful of you well, I'm preparing some cereal. Would you like any?
Ellie (Akka):that sounds delightful, thank you can't say no to a good grain perfect would it be possible to prepare a bowl for our young companion, although he does like to sleep in? I know how the kids are these days we all share a middle-aged laugh, although I guess 30 isn't really middle-aged.
Dan (Luka):But late 30, late 30s she's getting up there.
Ellie (Akka):Especially in this time period.
Timothy (DM):My cousin is the same way Can't say that's something that I will be blessed with, but oh, I'm sorry to hear. I've made peace with it, but of course I'll set some aside.
Ellie (Akka):Thank you, I'm sure he'll be very appreciative.
Timothy (DM):Anything else I can help you with today.
Chris (Joseph):I noticed that there is a shipwreck down at Craggy Cove. Is there any story behind that?
Timothy (DM):None that I've been told, other than the fact that it's there and it's been there for generations. Maybe I don't, really I'm not much of a good sense of that, Gotcha.
Ellie (Akka):Thank you. This has been very helpful. Like I mentioned, we have a couple of good leads that we're looking forward to exploring further today it's been a pleasure.
Timothy (DM):Um, if you do need anything, please stop by. I'll be working around the house today excellent.
Ellie (Akka):Likewise, if there's anything we can do to help, you've been such a kind and gracious hostess. If there's anything we can do to help, you've been such a kind and gracious hostess. So if there's, you know, anything you need while we're out, we can pick up for you. Just let us know.
Timothy (DM):I appreciate the offer and Jakob will be down at the office should you need anything from him, gotcha.
Ellie (Akka):Excellent, thank you, I'm not, I'm not, I'm nom, nom, nom, nom nom.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, and as you eat your breakfast, she joins you for a little while before then turning to cleaning washing dishes, setting aside a bowl for Luca and then she begins to mill about the house doing some chores that she had for the day planned out for the day.
Ellie (Akka):How long do you think we should let him sleep for?
Chris (Joseph):He's 18 years old-ish 19 19-ish.
Ellie (Akka):Do we know from hanging out with Luca in the castle? Do we know what time he naturally wakes up.
Chris (Joseph):Don't you wake up at like 2? I feel like when we first.
Timothy (DM):It was afternoon when we first encountered him. Yeah, but I was taking a nap.
Dan (Luka):Yeah, that's true.
Ellie (Akka):That wasn't part of your. That wasn't part of my routine.
Dan (Luka):Your- 8 hours Right in front of my 8, 10 hours.
Chris (Joseph):Look at him like 10 more minutes All 10 hours.
Ellie (Akka):I'm looking for like 10 more minutes. All right, we just are, you know.
Chris (Joseph):We got daylight, dilly, dally, yeah. So in terms of suspects, we can talk about this when Luca wakes up.
Dan (Luka):But yeah, I'll eventually wake up. Do you wake up naturally in the next 10 minutes, or do we have to?
Ellie (Akka):come get you. I think you probably have to wake me up, yeah.
Chris (Joseph):I tap you with my foot.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, I'm holding the bowl of cereal, oh bless you.
Chris (Joseph):I make you get out of bed.
Dan (Luka):Yeah, it's like hold it outside of arm's reach. Get up, fine, fine, okay, there you go.
Chris (Joseph):So the list of suspects, or at least suspicious folks, the list of suspects. So we have old man.
Ellie (Akka):We have Jakob. Well, just like are these not really suspects, but just people we want?
Chris (Joseph):more information about yeah, yeah, so, mr Kosher yeah, mr Kosher.
Ellie (Akka):Jakob. Um, I guess I had on my list check with fishermen about two months, but I feel like we're pretty sure it's the marriage thing that happened two months ago that triggered this yeah, we could probably check a town hall to see if they have records about marriage certificate yeah, town hall, okay.
Dan (Luka):So I think maybe start with town hall, since that's closest and then go check out, mr kosher yeah, and see if they have any records about other drownings in the past in the history of the town far back the historical records go yeah see if there were any other marriages that correlated to other periods of drowning or something like that you know that's a good point look for patterns data crunch pull out the spreadsheet.
Ellie (Akka):Maybe there's a good point Look for patterns Data crunch Pull out the spreadsheet.
Dan (Luka):Maybe there's a big question. She doesn't like marriages. Was the picture of their marriage on the docs? You said, right, yeah, it was on the docs, oh, wow.
Timothy (DM):I hadn't said that, but it was you just have a sense.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, you're a sixth sense. You just know he's like this man. He's a man of business and that business is fish You're. Espn.
Musical Interlude:It's hard at work, it's tingling.
Ellie (Akka):All right, let's start with the town hall.
Timothy (DM):Yeah.
Dan (Luka):Once you're ready to begin your day, I put on my shirt Ready.
Timothy (DM):So as you finish breakfast, a bird chirps in the window on a bow and you are greeted into the day with the rising of the sun. It is another lovely day in probably the high 70s, low 80s. Throughout the day it's summer. It's Wednesday because we've established a day of awakening. Nice, nice.
Timothy (DM):And you make your way down to Town Hall the bottom of the hill, past the Inn and Tavern, and you are greeted by a woman called Katarina Novak. She is the town bookkeeper. She works at Town Hall. She's basically the only employee outside of the town elder, her father, elder Novak, and her brother, oscar, um, so she can freely give you this information. You can run into multiples of them throughout the day, um, but you are looking for specific information on marriage certificates, correct?
Ellie (Akka):yes and drownings marriage certificates and drownings in particular the marriage certificate of jacob and evelyn, but also other marriage certificates yeah, so katarina can assist you.
Timothy (DM):Uh, looking up the marriage certificates and sure enough, you were correct about two months ago. Yes, oh, two and maybe a week or so. Um, make that two weeks, two and two weeks ago, because I realized a week has progressed since the letter was sent to you. Um, two and two weeks ago, uh, was their wedding, so that was back in june june yeah, because we're august.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, um. So in june um they had their wedding. It was held at the docks. They like decorated the, the dock area um the dock houses, had the reception there. Um, just the whole town shows up all of that does katarina seem like a chatty kathy? Um chatty she's free with information um, but she's not particularly like rambly gotcha, okay, okay yeah she's.
Timothy (DM):She's got kind of got like a reserved um vibe, so she doesn't like engage you with a ton of conversation.
Timothy (DM):She doesn't really like get super into the weeds, but she does seem to give information quite freely, um. So she helps you find the marriage records. Um, she shows you where all the marriage records for the town would be, um, if you needed to like go back. Um, but she doesn't really have like any direction in terms of when to look, where, to look who, but does know like let you know that you can come back if something comes up and you have like more to go off of in terms of what you're looking for, um for other marriage records. Um. And then the drownings there are like reports about the recent drownings, so those are really easy for her to um find um. And then she does point you to a section of like other news of note, like papers that the town has held on to, where like important events have happened or other sorts of things like that, where they would have actually hit the local news like uh, lubwana, um, and it would have held on to those papers do they have death records?
Timothy (DM):they do have death records. Yes, okay.
Ellie (Akka):Do the death records contain information about like cause of?
Timothy (DM):Yeah, they do. They're a little difficult to parse through because you have to go through each individual record and read all about it.
Ellie (Akka):Not a problem, I'm extremely good at learning.
Dan (Luka):Yeah. I can read. Yeah, technically.
Ellie (Akka):So what I'm hoping to do, if it's not too much of a pain, is I would like to and you tell me how feasible this is based on the quantity of information, but I would like to go through the death records, finding ones that seem attributed to drowning, yeah, and basically like plot them out to see if there are any concentrated periods where, like, more than three drownings happened within like a three month span. You know, like any sort of like, yeah, concentrated areas.
Ellie (Akka):Um, perfect that's possible, um all right so and then maybe cross check that against the marriage records.
Timothy (DM):But we'll see when we get there yeah, okay, so you had asked for a learning I think maybe because I'm very good at learning. But you tell me, I think there's two ways that we could swing this. So investigation is usually just to find a thing that exists. Learning is going to be more of piecing together the information to understand it.
Ellie (Akka):I feel like learning is applicable, because I'm not just finding the information about the drownings, I'm cataloging them and trying to understand a pattern, or if there is any kind of I will, that will work for me.
Timothy (DM):So give me a learning role yay, can I borrow another dice?
Dan (Luka):oh yeah, what does helping do again?
Timothy (DM):uh, it's a bonus die.
Dan (Luka):You have to narratively explain how you're doing it I feel like I could absolutely be akka's, like little assistant who is like you can also do your own role.
Chris (Joseph):No, no, no, no, no, no no I don't need to do that statistically more, yeah, unless you only only buy one dice.
Dan (Luka):No, that's fine. I like to think that I am akka, yeah I, I show you, I'm like.
Ellie (Akka):You know that this word here like drowning or drown. Yeah, yeah, I know drowned, look through all of these and sort out any that say drowning or drowned.
Dan (Luka):Or water lake or anything like that.
Ellie (Akka):Put them in a stack over here, then I'm going to sort them chronologically and find any patterns.
Dan (Luka):That I can do.
Ellie (Akka):Thank you. Okay, oh my fucking. God, no successes. Oh my gosh. Seven dice no successes.
Timothy (DM):You're still using the same dice, aren't you? Yeah?
Ellie (Akka):I guess After the break we are switching those out. That's awful.
Timothy (DM):Every single learning roll that you've done has been a failure.
Ellie (Akka):Flirting is the thing I'm best at.
Chris (Joseph):I think that's statistically with seven. You have a 60% chance of you have a 72 chance that's atrocious I did roll one success you roll.
Ellie (Akka):Oh great, you're fucking better at learning than I am I, just I.
Chris (Joseph):I followed your advice to look for the words that say drowning okay, so it's surprisingly easy, um, because there's only one record.
Timothy (DM):Oh, oh outside of the five recent ones, there's only one record of a drowning and there's also an associated news article yeah, this was paper clip to this news article. I thought yeah, so here you go, oh hand out.
Chris (Joseph):I see a lady. We have a handout. I'm reading it. Do you want to read it?
Ellie (Akka):No, All you? Okay, you found it.
Chris (Joseph):It's interesting. It is with heavy hearts that we announce the presumed passing of Zoya Herzog, who went missing near the shores of Lake Bohinj. Zoya, beloved fiancée of local fishmonger Jakub Leszek, was last seen walking along the lakeside before her sudden disappearance. Despite an extensive search, only remnants of her clothing were found, leading to the heartbreaking conclusion that she has been lost to the lake's mysterious steps. Zoya was a beacon of kindness and warmth in our community. Known for her gentle spirit and soft-spoken nature, she brought comfort and joy to those around her. Her presence was a light to all who knew her, and her loss leaves a profound void in our hearts. As we mourn the loss of Zoya, we remember her as a loving fiancé, a cherished friend and a kind soul who touched the lives of many. Her memory will remain with us, carried in the whispers of the wind over the lake she loves so dearly. Zoya herzog will be deeply missed and her legacy of kindness and love will continue to inspire all who were fortunate enough to know her. May she rest at peace. And there are some illustrations of a woman gazing at a mirror. It's hard to tell. They're a little bit blurry, but there's.
Timothy (DM):There are, like, other news articles. Oh okay, gotcha, I didn't know they were related.
Chris (Joseph):There's no picture of Zoya, there there's like Mount Triglav there and there's a winged angel, but yeah, so it seems. Was there a date on this article that I found?
Dan (Luka):There was article that I found there was Presumably within the last 10, 20 years, so the date on the article yeah. If she was marrying Jakob.
Chris (Joseph):Unless the father's name is Jakob. Fair yeah.
Timothy (DM):So it is dated.
Ellie (Akka):Oh gosh, it's dated six years ago, okay so she drowned and turned into a vengeful spirit. Right, maybe, or maybe she was drowned and turned into a vengeful spirit.
Timothy (DM):With that, we shall take a brief intermission to allow the shadows to deepen and the mysteries to simmer for the next 15 minutes, immerse yourself in the atmospheric embrace of our interlude, whether you are watching our video, where enchanting fog scenes will drift across the screen, or listening along to the haunting strains of Slovenian folk tunes. Take this time to refresh yourself. Sip a glass of water, stretch your limbs and perhaps indulge in a small treat. Let the whispers of the land call to you. As we prepare to delve back into the enigmatic world of Vossen's Slavian lands, A timer will count us down, guiding us back into the heart of our adventure. Return soon as the shadows await and the veil beckons.
Musical Interlude:My dear Lord, why would you let it bloom? Why would you let it bloom? Come with me, tell us, tell us how you have Asked, answered and grieved. Thank you, the. Potim pa zvenile so zhalo snev se. Klonine molci so rušce glavi. Potim pa zvenilo jev se. Oh, the little girl is playing, she's playing, she's playing. The little girl is playing, she's playing, she's playing. Oh, thank you, I have covered all my wounds, I have covered all my dear wounds. Oh, oh, my dear dear, come to me, my dear, come to me, my dear, come to me, my dear, come to me, me. I will wait for you, my dear, I will wait for you, my dear. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Thank you, thank you, thank you, the the. I love you. ©. Bf-watch TV 2021. The End. I'm alone in the world.
Dan (Luka):The world is cold far away is my home ¶¶. Thank you. Thank you is In a new cathedral and a new cathedral, chris, just talking through the transition back into oh, I'm on the wrong image.
Timothy (DM):We're back, okay, we're actually back to the right setup, the right scene with the right people and the right sounds. Hi, we're back from our 15-minute break. I hope you all enjoyed that break and had some nice treats. I don't know why I'm talking like a lizard person.
Dan (Luka):I think we all know why.
Timothy (DM):What, I don't know why, what. Anyways, we had just left off on a little bit of a cliffhanger. We had just uncovered a very tantalizing handout that Chris has not been able to resist reading and discussing during break. He's going to have to recount all of those revelations for the audience now.
Chris (Joseph):They've all fled from my mind, other than that Zoya and Jacob had not been married, she's only referred to as a fiancé. So they were engaged and I forgot the other one.
Ellie (Akka):It's interesting they have an old inn and a new inn.
Chris (Joseph):Oh yeah.
Ellie (Akka):An old church and a new church.
Chris (Joseph):I'm guessing that is less supernatural and more just, oh, this one fell down.
Ellie (Akka):Infrastructure-related I mean. But it does suggest a certain history to the town. It's been here a long time. There have been many iterations of it it seems like they're moving east.
Dan (Luka):Oh, away from the singing in the cottage I would like to ask katrina a question um katarina katarina so sorry um. What do the hercogs do in town, have you? We've yet to meet them uh, okay wait. Sorry, can I see this is? It yakub hercog no, it's zoya hercog oh, zoya hercog, okay so she was okay, okay, yes yes.
Ellie (Akka):And Yakub Leschak, who we know. Okay, great.
Timothy (DM):The Herkogs are a local investor. Their family's been around since the founding of Ukans.
Dan (Luka):Investors like where did they get their money from before? Do you know?
Timothy (DM):investors like where do they get their money from? Before, do you know? Uh, they've been investing in the the well, really, jacob's business for a while. Okay, the two families have been quite entwined for most of our town's history.
Chris (Joseph):And still they're still connected.
Ellie (Akka):now they are Honestly it was probably the unfortunate tragedy that brought them even closer.
Ellie (Akka):Do we think he killed her?
Timothy (DM):Excuse me, I beg your pardon.
Ellie (Akka):Sorry. I'm talking about this fascinating novel that I've been reading. Quite a statement Do you keep up with the periodicals.
Timothy (DM):Oh, no, sorry, I thought you were talking about this current conversation.
Dan (Luka):Oh no, no, she drifts sometimes.
Chris (Joseph):We were talking about whenever we were walking here. It's actually a fascinating plot.
Dan (Luka):There are seven dogs one of which can talk.
Timothy (DM):The mind does wander while you're spending your time indoors alone days on end.
Ellie (Akka):I recommend the periodicals.
Timothy (DM):Anything that you'd like to recommend in particular.
Ellie (Akka):I'm not sure what you can get out here. We're not local.
Timothy (DM):That's fair Not much.
Ellie (Akka):That was close. Sorry, I'll keep my mouth shut.
Dan (Luka):Well, we appreciate your time.
Timothy (DM):Of course, and if you need anything else else, I'd be happy to help should we go talk to the hercogs?
Chris (Joseph):shall we?
Ellie (Akka):yeah sure, so we leave we remember where their estate is right, yeah we walked past.
Dan (Luka):I think it's on the main road yeah, it is yeah, so we think he killed her it seems oddly coincidental I guess I'm on the fence, because if he killed her, it seems like she would become wrathful immediately.
Ellie (Akka):But she didn't become wrathful immediately. She only became wrathful when he remarried. So maybe he didn't, maybe she just drowned tragically.
Dan (Luka):But it's still a wrathful spirit.
Ellie (Akka):She's like a ghost tied to a spot and that seeing new bride, especially if they were married on the docks where, if she's bound to the lake, she's going to be like oh, I didn't get invited. It's interesting that I mean historically. There have been stories about this spirit.
Dan (Luka):Yeah.
Ellie (Akka):But it seems like maybe that spirit from the historical one doesn't exist anymore. And now there's this new. We're pretty sure it's Zoya right.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, I wonder, can we confirm, like Katrina's been in, she's a native? Does she confirm that this sort of local legend of a lake monster, or is this something that's popped up because young hotshot 18-year-old?
Timothy (DM):goose egg. If you ask Katarina about it, she just is like no, he made that story up.
Ellie (Akka):Oh, okay great.
Timothy (DM):She's like no, he's just been scaring children. Liar pants, liar pants. There is supposedly. He did tell people he um heard splashing the night that tristan died. He was out there um, so tristan was the second drowning gotcha no you yeah because matthew, or third because the philip was first, second drowning
Timothy (DM):yeah so tristan was the third drowning and he was present that night and he heard the splashing. But then, by the time he got to the edge of the boat, tristan was gone and I believe we also established Tristan was the one that washed up in Craggy Cove, believe.
Ellie (Akka):Do we yeah?
Timothy (DM):The rest of the story. It seems to be all made up, yeah.
Ellie (Akka):Is there a chance Neku is killing these guys and coming up with this as a cover story?
Chris (Joseph):I wonder what the motive would be.
Ellie (Akka):I don't know, but I'm just saying do we feel confident in ruling out foul play?
Dan (Luka):You know him best. He didn't seem the type. Okay, did he seem the type?
Timothy (DM):Did we do any observation checks? I don't think thank you do an observation check and I can give you a vibe.
Ellie (Akka):Vibe check on nico like the auto, the cause of death for the autopsy, the one that we did was consistent with drowning. Yes, what did you get I?
Dan (Luka):rolled a full house, none of which are sixes.
Timothy (DM):Oh, okay, mark it off on the.
Dan (Luka):Yahtzee sheet.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, we're really moving down the Yahtzees. Yeah, yeah, nothing that gave you murderous intent vibes Cool, you know all those murderous intent vibes you get when talking to random strangers for the first time, you know.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, Well, maybe if we get Jakob and Evil into divorce that'll solve the problem.
Ellie (Akka):I'm just spitballing, I'm brainstorming, there are no bad ideas in brainstorming.
Chris (Joseph):We'll put it on the board.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, thank you.
Ellie (Akka):Okay, yeah, let's talk to the hertz gogs. What information are we interested in getting from them?
Dan (Luka):their relationship with jacob yeah and his relationship with their daughter or yeah with um zoya zoya. I'm assuming that the parents will be there still, yeah. In six years.
Ellie (Akka):Great To the estate. All right Time to interrogate another set of grieving parents about their dead child.
Timothy (DM):They've had a little bit of.
Ellie (Akka):Luckily this one was six years ago and not four days ago.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, fingers crossed four days ago.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, fingers crossed um. So the herzog estate is hercog.
Timothy (DM):Sorry there's no z in there. Well as the, the slovenian c is made like it's oh okay, herzog. Herzog Got it. I had to look at what I wrote down. All right, the Herzog estate is a little lively during the day. They seem to actually have a couple staff on hand. This is aside from.
Timothy (DM):Jakob's house um actually no, this is more stately than jacob's house um, I'm astounded that a small town like this can support a fucking venture capitalist so, um, this is the hersog villa, so this is actually a collection of multiple family homes, so there are three main structures in total, as well as a kind of a servant's quarter's house I think there's a different name for that but, um, there is a separate help house, uh, that is just like a small little cottage on the estate. There's also like a little shed, um, and then the road actually goes out into a roundabout. Around these, these three structures, um, there's people that uh are able to greet you, um, that are like the butler type of the, the like not butler, but the? Um groundskeeper and the maid um, and then they can introduce you to the herzog, matron and patron um, whose names are. The names are verner um what did you say, verner?
Timothy (DM):like verner herzog oh, I was gonna say victor oh yeah, that was just a joke victor and nia herzog mia or nia? Nia n as in nice, which is a bad example. Oh no, is he gonna be mean nuance?
Ellie (Akka):no, because nice and mice are oh the same oh, I see, yeah, it's not a very good differentiator yes, correct, um so nuance nia n as in nice, which she's not um, so they would be able to introduce you, but, like, how would you like to approach this?
Timothy (DM):uh is there like a particular, would you rather talk to nia or victor? Would you try to talk with the um groundskeeper or the maid, or are there other things that you would like to try to do as you're navigating the social situation?
Ellie (Akka):you're a little schmoozer. Do you want to take the lead on this one? I?
Dan (Luka):can, trying to decide my approach.
Timothy (DM):I want to talk to the maid yeah, yeah, because, like so, do you want to like arrive and just talk to the first person you meet, or are you just trying to like get to the parents?
Dan (Luka):I would like to get to the parents house and then talk to somebody who is not the parents in the house, like if the groundskeeper could lead us to the house where I talk to the maid who answers the door. Excellent, that sort of thing okay, yeah, so yeah, we'll.
Timothy (DM):We'll do that. The groundskeeper greets you because he's like the one out and about flags you down. You go over and talk to him. He takes you to the house. Um, the maid opens the door.
Dan (Luka):Uh, hello uh, why hello there um oh um are you looking for a name tag? Iris. Hello, iris, lovely to meet you. I don't know if you heard, but we are investigators from Ljubljana here to see about the poor, unfortunate tragedies of the drowning fishermen and we were surveying the. We have been surveying the different. Introduce yourself oh yes of course.
Timothy (DM):Thank you, um, I am luca. Nice to meet you, luca, all the way from ljubljana yes wonderful quick trip.
Dan (Luka):Have you been before?
Timothy (DM):I have not myself, um, but the father and mother of the house have a wonderful plenty of times oh, I'm sure they, I'm sure they had a wonderful time in our little city.
Dan (Luka):Well, we were surveying people in the community about what they might know or think about the happenings in the lake and so we were here to discuss that with you and the, the patrons of the home, and also we bring our condolences. I know it happened a while ago, but we were looking through some old records at the town hall and saw about their past I imagine daughter. Is that correct?
Timothy (DM):Oh yes, poor girl, such a wonderful spirit. Did you know her well? Actually, I was her tutor growing up.
Dan (Luka):You don't say what was she like. They rarely talk about her in the papers, but she seemed like a lovely young woman.
Timothy (DM):She truly was. I really enjoyed my experience rearing her, always such a gentle woman, always such a gentle woman from childhood until she matured and, unfortunately, her life was cut short.
Dan (Luka):And shortly before her wedding. Nonetheless, yes. I'd like to get a read on that response. Thanks, observation yeah, give me an observation.
Timothy (DM):oh my gosh, I'm rolling like garbage tonight nothing nothing nothing for me um, yes, um, sorry, uh, uh, talking about her is bringing up some old feelings. She really was a lovely woman. It's so sad that she had to part so early. Is there anything that you wanted to know in particular?
Dan (Luka):I apologize. I don't mean to bring up any or drag up any bad feelings or memories of her.
Timothy (DM):Don't worry about it. I understand. You're doing your job.
Dan (Luka):Was she close with Jakob when they were to get married? I expect so. Well, I know that in some places some marriages are more for love and some are more for business, to say it bluntly. Give me manipulation.
Timothy (DM):That.
Ellie (Akka):I'm good at oh, manipulate.
Dan (Luka):I have all seven dice for this one.
Ellie (Akka):Wow, best luck.
Timothy (DM):Four successes Two successes Two successes.
Dan (Luka):I make her, I break her.
Ellie (Akka):Why is that the only manipulation you can do?
Dan (Luka):I do not want to do that to her, just so we're clear. Yeah, just a joke. I will treat it as a singular success if I have to, if that's the only benefit I manipulate her, and then you know what?
Ellie (Akka):I fuck her up a little bit so as you press further on that.
Timothy (DM):You see that she, she takes a beat to respond to you and she looks behind her, um, and like, you see that because you're at like the front door so she like looks behind her and you can see that there's like a sitting room and a um kitchen off to the two sides, um, and you see that she like peeks over in either direction before she then ushers you inside. She doesn't respond right away, but she actually takes you down through the back of the house where there is a small side room with a writing desk inside it, with a writing desk inside it, and after ushering you all in, she quietly closes the door behind you. Honestly, I'm still angry at them for pushing her into it. What did I say? She was such a sweet girl, she didn't deserve him. Least of all him deserved her. I guess it's the silver lining in the whole tragedy. She didn't have to be shut inside with that monster of a man, and you can tell at this point she's kind of hushing her voice a little bit, although there is a fervor behind it.
Ellie (Akka):Like there's still some like anger that she is holding back Did.
Timothy (DM):Zoya feel this way. That poor girl, all she could ever express was the sadness that it brought her Did she kill herself, but she did her best. To cover it up, she played her role as her parents asked her to, as I asked her. To. It's my biggest regret in life. I should have been there for her.
Ellie (Akka):It can be hard not to linger on what we could have done differently.
Timothy (DM):But I should have known better.
Ellie (Akka):It's no help to her or you to break yourself over the coals for the past. She would have wanted you Do you think she would have wanted you like this To feel sad, to blame yourself? No.
Musical Interlude:Just from what little we know about her Any of us.
Ellie (Akka):So live the way she would have wanted you to.
Timothy (DM):You see a grimaced smile stretch across her face and she clasps her hands and lets out a sigh.
Ellie (Akka):Thank you for sharing this with us. Of course it's more helpful than you can possibly know. Thank you for sharing this with us.
Timothy (DM):Of course it's more helpful than you can possibly know. I do hope so. If you don't mind, I should get back to work now. Of course I can introduce you to Nia and Victor if you're still interested in talking with him. If you don't mind, alright. She brushes herself up, wipes away some tears, kind of dries her eyes a little bit.
Ellie (Akka):I'm just going around making people cry.
Timothy (DM):And then she will take you out back to introduce you to Nia Herzog, who is sitting at a little bistro table on the back patio.
Ellie (Akka):I can't see A little lemonade. Big sun hat a little lemonade.
Timothy (DM):She has like a glass of some sort of like fruit drink, fruit tea um fruit treat teas are actually really uh popular in Slovenia. Um herbal teas and fruit teas are very popular. Not a lot of green or black or like like actual caffeinated tea. Um uh so honestly, like an elderberry tea would be like something.
Ellie (Akka):What a classy lady. Now, this is a lady who seems like she goes to into town.
Chris (Joseph):She goes to lubiana, maybe once or twice this is a lady who's been to paris.
Ellie (Akka):well, I guess it's evillyn who's been to Paris, that's crazy.
Timothy (DM):So as she sees you, she actually gets up from the bistro table and she like glides on over and she goes. Oh, you must be the people in from Pradyama. Was that Delighted? To meet you. Gosh darn it Leah. Herzog. What's your pleasure.
Dan (Luka):We, as you know, are investigators looking into the tragic drownings that have happened as of late, and we are here to talk to the locals to see if they have any information or if you have any speculations as to why these sudden drownings occurred. I'm Luca. It's a delight to meet you.
Timothy (DM):She leans over towards you and she holds out her hand. I give a kiss. He goes.
Dan (Luka):Nice to meet you too um, please return to your seat.
Timothy (DM):We will come to you if you insist and she sits back down. Uh, would you like a glass of tea? I'll send Iris to make you some If that's not too much to ask for. Of course, join me, iris, please. Thank you. Well, tell me about yourselves. You're here from Pradyama. That's a quaint little city, are you? Do you travel a lot?
Ellie (Akka):yes, more and more, as of late it seems yeah we get around wonderful.
Timothy (DM):I think traveling feeds the soul.
Chris (Joseph):It's such a liberating experience just to become worldly opens your mind to a whole new world of precisely people places things.
Ellie (Akka):You're quite a traveler, aren't you?
Chris (Joseph):I've seen my fair amount of towns I thought I sensed that on you he has a restless spirit yeah, I'm a wandering soul
Timothy (DM):so, uh, what brings you in? I mean, I know you you're investigating, but how does that bring you about here? Um, what ties you to this town?
Dan (Luka):um, I mean yakub sent for us yakub. Oh interesting, never would have thought he'd reach out to external folk, but it seemed at the behest of his wife Evelyn.
Timothy (DM):Hmm, desperation does not look great on that man, but I think we're all there.
Ellie (Akka):Can I do an observation check?
Timothy (DM):on that statement.
Dan (Luka):It's so shady.
Timothy (DM):It's really catty. Um one success, one success. Um, yeah, you can tell that there is um a rivalry between them I imagine sorry, between who? Uh between the herzogs and uh jac the Lezhigs.
Dan (Luka):Oh, okay.
Timothy (DM):So that's like a family rivalry.
Dan (Luka):It's a family rivalry.
Timothy (DM):These are the two wealthy folk in town. They've done business deals throughout the generations and some of those have been wonderful, but there's always a who gets to give and take a little bit more, yeah.
Ellie (Akka):Did I pick up on anything about um like her feelings on evelyn? Um because I thought. Well, what I thought was when she said desperation doesn't look good on that man she's like oh, the wedding yeah, like his new wife he's so desperate for like that's what I thought she was alluding to is like my beautiful daughter. And now he's desperate and so he's married this whore or whatever.
Timothy (DM):Um, that's sort of what I was, but maybe I don't know like what the like tone is from and alluding to um, but like throughout the rest of the conversation, um, because we can kind of fast forward through a couple pieces of information from that um. So throughout the the conversation you do get a sense that, like um, she is wary of evelyn being an outsider coming from another family of money in a neighboring town. Um, but at the end of the day, there's no ill will towards evelyn because, like, her own daughter died, yeah, like yeah there's.
Timothy (DM):It's not like a competition yeah um, so, so, like it's not like she can change anything about that for the time being. Um, in all honesty, in the next generation, those two families will probably marry off again, like that's the likelihood in this situation um she just yeah, there's. There's always like competitiveness okay, it's like a competitive rivalry. Okay so, and the Herzogs are heavily invested in the Lezik's company. Yeah.
Timothy (DM):Their business, as well as some other businesses in the area. So they truly are investors. They don't own anything, they are just Shareholders. Investors they don't own anything, they are just putting their shareholders into multiple fishing companies in the region.
Ellie (Akka):So what are her thoughts on, like the work slow down or the work shutdown that's been happening as a result of the drownings?
Timothy (DM):um it's impacted their income slightly. Um fortunately, their family has been relatively sheltered from it, just because they have other contracts set up a diverse portfolio.
Dan (Luka):They have a diverse portfolio of fish have you found that similar occurrences are happening to other of the fishing companies that you have stock in?
Timothy (DM):Well, no, it seems to be very localized here in UConn.
Ellie (Akka):Are any of the other companies you have stock in based out of the same lake or do they fish out of different lakes?
Timothy (DM):Most of them are here in Lake Bohemia. We also have some investments in some local logging companies. Yes, I see.
Chris (Joseph):We ran into some information around a Mr Kosher who had a tussle with Jakob Lezik. Do you know anything about that?
Timothy (DM):Oh, you can pay Mr Kosher. No mind he's really a drunk, is all. Mind he's really a drunk, is all Just kind of wallowed in his own filth and sorrow.
Chris (Joseph):Ever since I've known him, Is there a reason to cause that sort of downward spiral that you know of? Was he married at one time?
Timothy (DM):Honestly, he was always just a bit of an eccentric.
Musical Interlude:Such a strange man.
Timothy (DM):I don't know what Zoya ever saw in him. Well, glad that's over.
Ellie (Akka):What do you mean? Did he and Zoya have a friendship?
Timothy (DM):If you could call it that. It's like when you pity the runt in the pack.
Ellie (Akka):Ah well it sounds like she had a very kind heart, so it's no wonder she was drawn towards a charity case such as that.
Timothy (DM):Yes, very much so. She was a very sweet girl. Everyone always said so. Her father and I raised her well.
Ellie (Akka):Her memory is a credit to you.
Dan (Luka):Well, this has been lovely.
Ellie (Akka):I finished my tea.
Dan (Luka):We appreciate your time.
Ellie (Akka):Yes, and we will stop by again if we have any other questions. Thank you, so much, it's been enormously helpful.
Timothy (DM):It has been a pleasure. Please do stop by and tell me some stories of your travels. I'd love to hear about them?
Dan (Luka):oh yes, of course, another time over over tea. Oh, quick question. Um, yes, did zoya sing from time to time why do you ask? Just wondering, we've heard that. Um, we heard that she had a uh, a lovely voice to talk to, and I am fascinated by singers, and so I was just a thought that passed my mind.
Ellie (Akka):A voice as lovely as everything else about her.
Dan (Luka):She probably gets it from you. I see a singer somewhere down there deep I did have my heyday. I can tell Such fucking karma Wow.
Timothy (DM):I did travel with a group of girls.
Dan (Luka):We were part of a quartet Did you sing to her when she was young?
Timothy (DM):Why, of course, what mother wouldn't sing to her child?
Dan (Luka):Any favorite lullabies of hers.
Timothy (DM):There was this particular one. There was one I sung about. What was it about again? Ah, a fox. A fox that ran through the forest but took the visage of a woman. How does that tune go again? And she begins to like vocalize a little bit as she tries to find the pitches.
Dan (Luka):Can I try and this feels stupid, but can I try and recall what the song was that we heard last night? Yeah, and hum it lightly with her to like. Get her on, yeah.
Timothy (DM):So you do. You draw her to that melody and she begins to hum it with you yes, that's the one.
Dan (Luka):Yes, I heard that one as a kid as well Must be popular in this region.
Timothy (DM):Oh interesting. I've never met anyone else who knew it. It was taught to me by my mother.
Dan (Luka):Well, anyways this has been lovely.
Timothy (DM):It has been See you tomorrow for tea. Lunch I'll have iris.
Dan (Luka):Uh, make us some sandwiches if we can find the time, we will absolutely swing by.
Ellie (Akka):See you then, goodbye, bye-bye and with that can I share my working theory before we sign off? Okay, sure, I think Zoya killed herself and now she's trying to save Evelyn from her, like Zoya killed herself, instead of marrying. Jakob, and now that Evelyn has fallen into his clutches. She's trying to like get to Jakob to try and help Evelyn or save Evelyn.
Dan (Luka):That's my theory and I think with the lullaby we're confirmed. It's her, yeah for sure. But that also means that the person on the lake with the lamp is we were trying to follow, is her friend and knows her and talks to her and survives.
Ellie (Akka):Wow yeah, so it's so. The killings didn't start because she was angry that jacob on the killing started because she feels pity or sympathy for evil.
Dan (Luka):Edmund. Yeah, I could see that. Who was the guy that she Kosher Was that the guy who was out in the woods.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, that's the weirdo in the woods, so we'll talk to him next, next time.
Dan (Luka):Mystery unravels.
Musical Interlude:Shadows of D&D.
Timothy (DM):With that, the curtain closes on this installment of Vossen Slavimans. The calls of the wild linger for next time. A heartfelt thanks to Free League Publishing for their steadfast support of independent TTRPG creators through their open gaming license rules and for crafting the rich tapestry of Vossen, especially to the talented writers Niels Hintz, niels Carlin and Rickard Antoia for their exceptional setting and guidelines. Our gratitude also extends to Thomas Herrenstrom for the Year Zero game engine and to Niklas Lundmark for his crucial role in making this game accessible through translation. We also owe our thanks to Nerea, whose haunting renditions of Jrejo, jijito and Andro have beautifully enhanced our intro sequence, and to our incredible players Ellie, chris and Dan, whose performances breathe life into their characters and craft the tales that captivate us. Finally, thank you, russell, for helping me prep for these sessions and for moderating on our channel.
Timothy (DM):This project has been a profound journey, reconnecting with my heritage, a heritage disrupted by historical and personal trials, from the destruction of historical records during centuries of crusades and colonizations, enforced language barriers due to assimilation theory in the 60s and the loss of my grandfather during the COVID-19 pandemic, my last direct connection to my homeland. For all of those like myself striving to reclaim and redefine their cultural roots. I stand with you. May you find grace, empathy and kindness in your journey, as David Mitchell eloquently wrote in Cloud Atlas journey. As David Mitchell eloquently wrote in Cloud Atlas, our lives are not our own. We are bound to others, past and present, and by each crime and every kindness we birth our future. Thank you for joining us. Farewell for now, and may the echoes of the past guide you until we meet again. This is actually next week.
Musical Interlude:Next week. Bye, until we meet again.
Timothy (DM):This is actually next week. Yes, next week.
Musical Interlude:Bye, bye, ¶¶ ¶¶, thank you ¶¶, thank you ¶¶. © transcript Emily Beynon.
