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: Into the Depths
Join Joseph, Luka, and Akka in the Calm Waters Epilogue!
This is our very first Vaesen mystery: Calm Waters. Handouts and a mystery synopsis will be posted to our Patreon and Instagram accounts. Be sure to check them out!
TW: Discussion of domestic abuse
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/
¶¶, ¶¶ no-transcript 25 minutes away, and welcome to this special Eve of All Hallows Eve episode of Vossen, slavinlands. Here, the whispers of ancient legends weave through mist-shrouded forests and babbling brooks, bringing to life the eerie and the enigmatic. I am Kitchy, 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. With the sight, our investigators pierce through the veil of reality, confronting ancient spirits, spirits that have lingered since time immemorial, hidden 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 in eternal haunting. Waltz With me. Today we have Hello.
Chris (Joseph):I'm Chris and I'm playing Joseph Wolfram Fox, a hunter of the mundane and supernatural. Ooh.
Dan (Luka):And I am Dan and I am playing the manipulative vagabond Luca Koss.
Ellie (Akka):And I'm Ellie. I'm playing the vengeful nurse. Surprisingly vengeful, ooh Havala. Surprisingly vengeful ooh, ooh.
Timothy (DM):Havala. 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 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. Da Da, Da. So let us step forward into the shadows and begin. Veliko Sreća. Previously on Vossen. Yes, Only took me five tries.
Timothy (DM):Hand in hand, Aka escorted her newfound friend Evelyn to Gasper's cottage with the company of Luca and Joseph. The now sobered hermit was evidently more cooperative, sharing with them his nightly routine to set out on a boat into the stillness of Lake Bohin and listen to the melody sung by the Lady of the Lake. As the sun set and the darkness of the night stretched across the waters, the lullaby returned and the party set out. Their boat slowly slid into the lake. As the party joined in with the haunting tune, inviting the chanteuse closer, the dulcet soprano encircled their vessel in a moment of unease before two hazel eyes glinted in the light of the lantern and Gaspar dove in frantically chasing her visage. The moment was lost as the Rissolca disappeared into the depths, so the party was forced to concede back to the cottage to dry and warm the hermit.
Timothy (DM):And to formulate a plan, the party decided to perform a ritual dug up in the society headquarters library, one to summon and calm a water spirit. Luckily, the ingredients were easy enough to gather. Luckily, the ingredients were easy enough to gather O Vodni dush vizhviam vas odpus nam nasi privineni khshem upikoviyet toya hnev proshim ta hovar esnami and Zoya was summoned. The Rasulca joined them along the coast of Lake Bohinj and shared with them her grief, and shared as well in the grief of Evelyn, before their connection was shattered by none other than wrath incarnate Jakob Lezik. A fight ensued rage, pain, betrayal, vengeance. Jakob now lies unconscious. The remaining encounter participants stuck in a limbo of emotions and resolutions. What will happen next? Whoa, whoa, wow, all right, so you are all standing on the lake.
Dan (Luka):The shore of the lake Of Lake.
Timothy (DM):Bohemia, and Jakob is unconscious, having been knocked out by none other than me, luca Luca.
Dan (Luka):With an oar.
Ellie (Akka):With an oar. I forgot.
Crosstalk:Double-taped yeah.
Timothy (DM):Zoya has turned to you all. Her composure softened A somber sadness across her face. Evelyn still stands behind the boat where Akka had escorted her to safety, and she has fallen silent. She looks to the three of you and then back at Zoya as the light of the moon glints in the Rissoka's eyes.
Dan (Luka):I feel like this is Gpar's moment.
Ellie (Akka):Oh yeah, Where's Gaspar? What's Gaspar doing?
Timothy (DM):Gaspar is near Joseph and Luca, having participated in the fight with Jakob. He is also standing silently facing Zoya, his eyes wide and locked on her.
Ellie (Akka):I'm just gonna step out of his way yeah, we'll see how it plays out, I guess. I mean I'm tempted to just chuck Jakob in the lake, but I know.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah.
Ellie (Akka):We have some dissenting opinions.
Chris (Joseph):Oh, no.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, I'm going to walk over to where Evelyn and Anak are standing and give the other two some space, yeah, Can I wrap like an arm around Evelyn if she seems receptive to it and kind of like arm around Evelyn and sort of if she seems receptive to it and kind of like give her some emotional support.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, she doesn't react much as you place your arm around her. Oh, you can see that she's a bit in her head, that she's kind of like she's a bit in her head, that she's kind of like, lost in thought, trying to assess the situation. As Gaspar begins to slowly walk towards Zoya, you see that she reaches a hand out towards him. Met by his hand, they clasp each other's fingers and they move close together, and then you start to hear a muffled sob as they press their foreheads together. And then, under his breath, gaspar begins to speak to Zoya In hushed tones. Can you make an observation? Check Right Observation.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, empathy, observation, empathy.
Timothy (DM):Yeah.
Ellie (Akka):One success.
Dan (Luka):Two successes.
Chris (Joseph):I'm old, I don't hear anything, it's okay.
Ellie (Akka):You're listening to, like the waves? Yeah, I'm listening to. I don't hear anything. It's okay, You're listening to the waves yeah, I'm listening to.
Chris (Joseph):It's a nice rhythmic. I'm still thinking about the song. Yeah.
Timothy (DM):The Between between moments of indiscernible mumbling, you do make out some of what is being exchanged between the pair. They are having a rather intimate moment. They're not intentionally at least you don't get the sense that they're intentionally trying to like be quiet. They're just having a very intimate conversation and from the distance you're not making out a ton of what they're saying, but you do catch enough of it to understand that Gaspar is saying goodbye.
Chris (Joseph):Aww.
Timothy (DM):This was something he was robbed of six years ago the chance to say goodbye to Zoya. Say goodbye to Zoya and he's come around to the realization that he's the reason she's been held here in this state.
Crosstalk:Wow.
Ellie (Akka):Oh, I thought it was her anger holding her back, but I guess not, it was love.
Timothy (DM):It could be a combination of the two, but he truly is taking accountability for his portion. Accountability for his portion and letting her go, but also being truthful and transparent with her was a big piece of the puzzle. That he had never expressed his feelings for her out loud. It had always been an unspoken portion of their relationship, and knowing how each other felt answered a lot of questions and cleared up a lot of ambiguity that had existed, that had muddled the emotional landscape of the Rizulka. As they conclude their moment, gasper begins to pull away, holding onto her hand just a little bit longer before he fully turns to the four of you and walks towards you at each of you, and he begins to walk away from the shore into the forest. Evelyn looks at you, aka, and then she has a grimaced smile, but then a slow nod as she blinks, takes a deep breath and tugs at your arm a little bit.
Ellie (Akka):Is there an outcome that you're hoping for here, Evelyn? I've got my own ideas, but I'm not the one who has to live this life.
Timothy (DM):She doesn't say anything, but begins to walk towards the forest.
Ellie (Akka):Clasping your hand as she walks. Oh, then I'll follow her into the forest. I guess Is she pulling me along.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, lightly, she's not forcing it, but there's a gentle like nudge and if you don't follow her she will let go of your hand and continue on her way.
Ellie (Akka):I guess I'll follow her. Go with her.
Timothy (DM):You hear a faint murmur of a sob as a stream of tears runs down her right cheek.
Ellie (Akka):Oh, oh, no. Okay, yeah, is she still walking, or can?
Crosstalk:we stop and hug it out. Yeah, she's walking.
Ellie (Akka):Okay, Is she still walking or can we stop?
Timothy (DM):and hug it out. Yeah, she's walking, okay. Once she gets into the forest and the canopy blocks view of the moonlight. You are both standing in darkness and she stops walking. The crunch of the leaves stop with a snap of a twig, and then she wraps an arm around you, oh, and then buries her face in your shoulder.
Ellie (Akka):Oh, okay, yeah, they're there. I give her a big motherly hug using all my good bedside manner and rub her back while she cries. They're there, let it all out.
Timothy (DM):You can hear Gasper continuing further into the forest towards his cottage. Luca and Joseph, what are you doing?
Chris (Joseph):I feel like I should go to Gasper. So he's not just. This is a very intense experience for him as well that Joseph knows a little bit about loss of a loved one, so he'll try to fast walk back to catch up with Gasper yeah, so you do a little John Doff after him.
Dan (Luka):Luca, luca's gonna go put the oar back.
Timothy (DM):He just like, placed the oar very quietly yeah, is Zoya doing anything?
Dan (Luka):is she just standing there?
Timothy (DM):she's just standing near the body of yakub, just at the edge of the lake, all right I'll walk to the um.
Dan (Luka):I'll walk up the shoreline, not up the shoreline like up into the woods, but I'm gonna try and make eye contact with her and just give her a nod and then proceed into the woods as you were the last one to exit into the forest.
Timothy (DM):as you turn around and give her a nod, you see as she begins to slowly descend on Jakob's body and you hear the sound of stones dragging towards the lake. You turn away, left only with the bubbling of water as she drags him into the depths of Lake Bohemia.
Dan (Luka):Keep strolling and so good riddance.
Timothy (DM):Joseph, you follow Gasper back to his cottage. He slowly pushes open the door and makes his way inside you. You can hear the creaking of the wooden floorboards beneath your feet as he shuffles across the dining room into the hallway, making his way towards the bedroom.
Chris (Joseph):Gaspar, I know that was a very how are you feeling, feeling?
Timothy (DM):Better than I have in many years. It's not my ideal, but we did what had to be done. Yeah, there are never easy choices.
Chris (Joseph):We did what had to be done. Yeah, there are never easy choices, but I'm glad that you were able to have one sort of final moment.
Timothy (DM):Her soul can be at peace. Now he puts a hand on your shoulder and just kind of pats you a little bit. His cheeks are wet with tears. He pulls her dress from his pocket and wipes away the tears from beneath his eyes and then he motions towards the front door and then turns around and lumbers off to his bedroom. You hear the creak of his bed as he sits down on it.
Chris (Joseph):I'll see you tomorrow and I pull out. I pull out the flask from my pocket and I leave it on the table, but, unbeknownst to him, joseph had emptied it out and it just has water in it.
Crosstalk:All right.
Dan (Luka):Surprise hydration.
Ellie (Akka):Idiot. You thought you were drinking to cope and instead you're getting hydrated.
Timothy (DM):Hydration after a night of crying is one of the best things you could do. It feels so freaking good.
Ellie (Akka):Not even water. That shit got petealite in it.
Chris (Joseph):All the electrolytes you need.
Timothy (DM):Oh, my goodness, yes, that hits the spot. Anyways, speaking of crying back with Akka and Evelyn oh yeah, um, back with akka and evelyn, oh yeah. So you share several minutes of um embrace before she's cried most of it out and she is ready to return back home. You can see that there's a mix of emotions welling up inside her, but she's kind of at capacity for the day.
Ellie (Akka):Fair. You know, everything seems worse at night seems worse at night.
Timothy (DM):You can tell there will be a a long period of grieving that follows this in the weeks to come. Um, but for tonight she seems relieved great well, I can escort her home.
Ellie (Akka):I mean, we're staying at her house, so I expect we'll all end up there but, yeah, that's fair uh, escort her back to the house if she seems ready to go. Yeah, and I remember the way because, to be honest, every other time we've done this I've just followed one of you guys.
Chris (Joseph):There's a path. There's a trod path now.
Timothy (DM):She can also make her way back home from here, oh great, so she escorts me back home. She's very familiar with this town.
Ellie (Akka):I'm like let's go home, Let me take you back home.
Timothy (DM):And then we start walking and she's like uh, this way she's like a little gentleman to everyone for a while she just kind of like course corrects you.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, oh right, yeah, I thought that tree looked familiar.
Timothy (DM):And you make your way back to the Lezuka estate. As you enter, the familiar scent of lavender. You make your way through the entrance hall and she will walk with you down the hallway to the guest bedroom that you have been staying.
Ellie (Akka):Thank you. Is there anything else I can do for you tonight, or do you think just some sleep will do you good?
Timothy (DM):No, that will be all, thank you.
Ellie (Akka):Of course We'll see you in the morning.
Timothy (DM):I'll see you in the morning.
Ellie (Akka):Great, I take the hint, I go into my room that's not a heavy-handed hint to go to bed. I feel like she wants to be alone. She wants to be alone.
Timothy (DM):She does not want to have a conversation tonight she's not trying to process, she's trying to sleep. She's had a very long day.
Ellie (Akka):That's true. What time is it now?
Timothy (DM):We're probably like 10 pm, 11 pm at this point.
Ellie (Akka):Well, it's not even past midnight. I go out to the bar. Yeah, you go out to the bar.
Timothy (DM):You can do whatever you want no, no, I, I'm gonna go too, but she's, she wants to be alone for a little while, and, um, I don't want to role play somebody crying all night, so that's fair I you know, what I spend the whole night listening at her door, hearing her cry.
Ellie (Akka):So you have to do it.
Timothy (DM):no, no, I'll also go to bed.
Ellie (Akka):I'll get ready for bed. I'll wash my little face, brush my teeth, change into my pajama jams. I get my room to myself. I forgot that.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, you have a room to yourself.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, so I'll wait for the boys to get back too. I'll get ready for bed and then I'll go sit in the parlor.
Timothy (DM):Oh, ready for bed, and then I'll go sit in like the parlor.
Ellie (Akka):Oh yeah, they definitely have a parlor for sure. A little book or something.
Timothy (DM):Have a cup of tea um, is there anything else that luca was doing during this time? Are you kind of just like followed?
Dan (Luka):um. Are there any wild flowers um?
Timothy (DM):yes, uh. So there are these like little white flowers that bloom at night in the forest. I don't know what they're called, but they're like these really delicate little flowers and they kind of grow in the like carpet of the forest I'm looking for something a little taller that I could pick and make into like a little bouquet okay, yes if you want to do that like chamomile or something you can find some things um, they're a little harder to spot at night, but like, that's fine, you can.
Dan (Luka):You can have a several hours if you want to well, I don't want it to be several hours, just like a small bouquet, because one thing I realized leaving the scene is that we left everything on the altar, including the portrait, which should probably be out in the weather.
Chris (Joseph):I didn't know if you wanted to keep that or if that would be a hard memory for him or not.
Dan (Luka):I will bring it to his house and he gets to decide that, yeah. So I'm going to gather up some flowers as I walk back to the lakeside.
Timothy (DM):And he'll kneel. It is a clear night, so there's no chance of rain.
Dan (Luka):Okay, perfect, that's fine. I still don't want it to be out in the weather Next to the water, like moisture.
Ellie (Akka):It's not good for painters, yeah.
Dan (Luka):Luca will kneel down on the kind of the shoreline and place the little bundle of flowers in the water, and then I'm not a christian, but luca is and he'll say a little prayer just for her good passage into the next life. Um, and then he'll gather up all the stuff that we left at the altar and bring it back and quietly leave it inside gasper's home before heading home yeah, a bunch of it was also evil ones.
Ellie (Akka):so inside Gaspar's home before heading home, a bunch of it was also Evelyn's.
Dan (Luka):So maybe you can bring home this one. Oh, yes, I'll bring home Evelyn's, so you do the cleanup. The china, yeah, thanks.
Timothy (DM):Luca, the post-ritual cleanup? No problem, leave no trace, I'll leave the altar, you leave the rock here.
Dan (Luka):A memory, a little place for him to go back to. Yeah, oh that's gorgeous.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, because it will kind of mark the spot. That now kind of replaces her tombstone, because that's now, because she's not at her tomb.
Dan (Luka):That's where she left from.
Crosstalk:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Timothy (DM):It's also kind of where her body is. I guess that's true, if we wanted to be clear about what happened.
Ellie (Akka):We don't really understand the mechanics. Yeah, I don't know.
Dan (Luka):Does the dead body become the Rasalka? Is it just the spirit that becomes the Rasalka?
Ellie (Akka):Who knows, now that she's at rest, is her body just Inert If this?
Timothy (DM):was a movie, there would be like a during the epilogue there'd be like a pan into the water down to the bottom of lake bohemia where you would see, like the skeletal remains of this uh woman.
Dan (Luka):Okay, and the fresh remains of this man is like leaving the body and Parting.
Timothy (DM):Turning into beautiful little speckles of light that go off into the aether.
Ellie (Akka):She's at peace.
Timothy (DM):Mm-hmm, and so eventually, the three of you do end up back in the parlor at the Lezik estate.
Ellie (Akka):Howdy, boys Howdy.
Dan (Luka):I think that was a successful mystery solved. Yeah, check.
Ellie (Akka):Oh gosh Wow.
Chris (Joseph):That was a lot, that was not what I expected with a lake monster occurrence I feel like like paranormal investigators. It's more like we're like paranormal psychiatrists yeah, seriously, how do you feel about that?
Ellie (Akka):yeah, um is evil in still in bed?
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, Evelyn's gone.
Ellie (Akka):I think she wants to be alone.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, oh, is it still night or is it the next day? It's still night time. Okay, gotcha, sorry.
Timothy (DM):You're all convening post-ritual the night of.
Ellie (Akka):Thought maybe tomorrow we could wake up early and make her breakfast.
Dan (Luka):Exactly yeah, I don't know how to do that, but I will help in ways that I can.
Ellie (Akka):I'm not great at cooking, but how hard can it be? Truly.
Chris (Joseph):Part of it's cereal.
Ellie (Akka):So you cook a little bacon Bake like an egg. Yeah, a couple eggs, yeah, great. Well, I'm ready for bed. I don't know about you guys, I'm wrung out.
Chris (Joseph):Exhausted.
Ellie (Akka):Same Great Good night.
Chris (Joseph):Good night.
Timothy (DM):Sleep tight, and so the three of you go to bed. Yeah, After exchanging lots of goodbye, good nights, sleep tights. I had a cup of chamomile tea while I was waiting for that. Help me sleep. After exchanging lots of goodbyes goodnights, sleep tights.
Ellie (Akka):I had a cup of chamomile tea while I was waiting for that.
Timothy (DM):Lovely.
Ellie (Akka):Helped me sleep. Yeah, I'm feeling a little wired. You know when you're exhausted but you're also wired Aka's just like I have to go to bed, but I can't.
Chris (Joseph):I need to close my eyes manually. Yeah, exactly.
Ellie (Akka):Every time I take my fingers off they just go.
Timothy (DM):Oh, oh, I feel that too much. Oh, no, that's not good for you. No, it's not All right. So you all drift to sleep and you're greeted the next day by the light of the sun coming in through your windows great up early up early.
Ellie (Akka):I'll go downstairs and poke around and see if I can find any breakfast supplies Probably just like make the same breakfast that Evelyn's been making for us this whole time.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, there's like a ceramic jar filled with millet and you can find the pots and pans hanging above the stove, wooden spoons and a drawer to the right of the stove. Yeah, and you can kind of make your way around the kitchen and prepare breakfast.
Crosstalk:Perfect.
Dan (Luka):I didn't find any ham.
Crosstalk:Oh.
Dan (Luka):I did a clean sweep and nothing. No ham. It's unfortunate.
Chris (Joseph):I'm sure we could get some fish. I could probably pop down and find some and it's not the same but, I guess, if you want to maybe are there any like eggs.
Ellie (Akka):Are there chickens?
Timothy (DM):on the property. Yeah, they have eggs okay.
Chris (Joseph):I'll top each bowl of gruel with an egg delightful yum, I'll make breakfast for us and then gruel with an egg Delightful.
Ellie (Akka):Yum, I'll make breakfast for us and then some extra for Evelyn, and then clean up after myself and leave the kitchen exactly the way I found it Perfect.
Crosstalk:Because, I'm not an asshole.
Timothy (DM):So she doesn't sleep in very late, but it is definitely noticeably later than she normally is up. Based on the few days that you've been here, You've been here. This is the third morning.
Chris (Joseph):I think so. It's our lunch day with Nia oh my god yes.
Timothy (DM):I'm so glad you're here. So, yes, so she stays in bed a bit longer than what you've experienced the last two mornings, but eventually she does join you for breakfast. She's quieter but still exchanges quite a few niceties. Isn't like like tearful today, or at least not for for the time that you're with her this morning?
Ellie (Akka):with the relief of what's happened and kind of conflicted about it, understandable. Well, we can like banter back with her a little bit as she chats and I think also maybe I think I'd like to just extend the invitation and be like. You know, we were invited for lunch at the Hercog. Hercog estate with Nia this afternoon. I don't know if you're wanting to be alone or if some distraction would be a welcome activity, but you're welcome to join us. No pressure, though. I understand if not Just wanted to put it out there.
Timothy (DM):I'm actually going to make my way to Town Hall.
Ellie (Akka):Great. Do you want any company, or would you rather be alone?
Timothy (DM):There's a missing person to report oh indeed Missing indeed. She smiles slightly.
Chris (Joseph):Raise my teacup and take a sip. We all suddenly are looking somewhere else.
Timothy (DM):But have a lovely day and again, thank you so much. Please let me know whatever you need and when you think you'll be departing us that's a great question.
Dan (Luka):I imagine this evening after lunch after lunch in the afternoon yeah, yeah, maybe not evening, but afternoon, yeah, we've got it. We do have to get back yeah, I guess it'll be a few days for a day I forget how long it's gonna fire out a cart, yeah yeah, it was a couple days yeah, so probably we should, shouldn't linger, yeah I mean, your cart has just been here this whole time, yeah, just chilling.
Timothy (DM):You just hire a, a person to like drive you here and then stay here. Where are they going to go for an indeterminate amount of time before you hail them back?
Ellie (Akka):Now I know in meta we feel pretty confident we've solved the problem, but do you think there's any value in waiting to see if any more drownings happen? I guess we could just ask evelyn to like write us a letter if yeah, the drownings keep happening that's my thought. Yeah, that'll be fine wouldn't it be funny if we did all of that and then she was like I'm still here? Actually, there were two of them they were sisters.
Dan (Luka):My problems solved, but this shit is fun.
Crosstalk:Now I'm just drowning men for the hell of it, as a hobby. God forbid, women have hobbies, yeah.
Ellie (Akka):Okay, cool, yeah, I think we can leave this afternoon then.
Crosstalk:Alright, we'll stop by and say goodbye before we leave. Yeah.
Timothy (DM):Alright, I will see you later then.
Ellie (Akka):Thank you for your hospitality. You've been a wonderful hostess and a great friend.
Timothy (DM):Again she smiles and she waves as she leaves the front door and starts to make her way town to town hall. And the three of you have some time before lunch. Is there anything in particular that you want to do, or we can just fast forward to lunch with Nia?
Dan (Luka):I don't think so. Best not poke around and potentially blow anyone's cover.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, yeah, just stay in the house.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah.
Ellie (Akka):Lie in the sunshine.
Timothy (DM):All right, so you arrive at the Hercog estate, the Hercog Villa.
Ellie (Akka):We like take a bath yeah.
Dan (Luka):We should probably at least discuss what we'll tell people if we're asked, because they know we're here to investigate should we just say we're still investigating? Yeah, oh, but then we're leaving oh case ran cold or we performed a ritual at the lakeside and solved the problem.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, we saw.
Dan (Luka):Identified the drowner, not the drowning, and took care of it. That's simple enough, right.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, do you think it's going to be suspicious, the timing of us solving the problem and yakub's demise, like if we waited a day or two? Because if we wait a day or two we could say like, oh, yakub was like the last drowning victim and that was like the key for us to figure out what was going on.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, it could be odd that his body hasn't shown up like the other ones have.
Ellie (Akka):Okay, yeah, that's fine.
Chris (Joseph):We could also pin it on him saying he was the monster, because he really was a monster. That's true. Though, why would he self-sabotage? Yeah, I don't know.
Ellie (Akka):I think I'm thinking too much. Yeah, we could just say we did a ritual, we think the problem's solved. People who believe in the supernatural will be like, ooh, they did a ritual and the problem's solved. And people who just don't believe in the supernatural anyway will be like they were a bunch of hacks anyway.
Chris (Joseph):It just fixed itself. They didn't even need to come.
Dan (Luka):And that's fine.
Ellie (Akka):By me, we get paid either way, we get paid right.
Dan (Luka):Well, it was supposed to be. Jakob was supposed to pay us.
Chris (Joseph):Evelyn's in charge yeah.
Ellie (Akka):Maybe Evelyn can. That's going to be so awkward, so we're going About the money. You've been such a gracious hostess, we'll get it sorted out.
Timothy (DM):I mean this game. The way that the development points work is kind of your money growth. Yeah, oh, okay, so it's not actually related to numbers of coins, it's just that at the end of the mystery you get development points for answering a bunch of questions and that's just your general growth as a society. It's very ambiguous, but roleplay-wise there'll be stuff that happens to allow that Cool Mechanic. All right, so you do eventually make your way to the hercog villa what could she?
Chris (Joseph):what do we think?
Ellie (Akka):that she likes a bottle of wine flowers, that'd probably be, maybe both can we easily get a bottle of wine, or is that like an unimaginable luxury?
Timothy (DM):oh no, there's a wine, everybody has wine okay everybody makes alcohol a nice wine um, yeah, you can get a decent wine, okay, a lot of the like. So the hercogs and the like ledgerics probably have like stuff shipped to their house because, they're very fancy. But there's also a store in town that has at least mid-tier wines. This is a rustic vintage.
Chris (Joseph):Locally sourced Packy Okay.
Timothy (DM):It'll be nicer than what the tavern gives out normally.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, good enough, just to not show up empty-handed that's a good, that's good insight.
Timothy (DM):All right, so as you arrive at the hercog estate, uh, sure enough you do see nia hercog out at her little uh veranda veranda. She has little. You. You see that um, iris is carrying a tray of sandwiches out and then comes out with like a tray of drinks. Um, yeah, she said that she'd make sandwiches, but are they ham sandwiches? There's tea sandwiches, so there's probably a variety. Okay, yeah, yeah, this is like high tea style. She's like had little, cute little sandwiches made.
Dan (Luka):I give an excited wave from the gate.
Timothy (DM):She springs out of her chair and she like waves and she's like Luke darling. Oh, so good to see you again. Joseph Arca, hello, please do join me. I'm so glad you came. I've had Iris make sandwiches, you can see, and she's also prepared some lemonade, fresh. Ooh, I love lemonade. They were some lemonade fresh.
Dan (Luka):Ooh, I love lemonade.
Timothy (DM):They were imported this week, wow.
Ellie (Akka):Well, it's not quite the time for it, but we've brought this bottle of wine for you to enjoy at a later date.
Timothy (DM):Oh, we can absolutely open that up. That'd be lovely. Please sit down, sit down.
Ellie (Akka):Yay Sit down.
Timothy (DM):How are you all doing? Tell me, how is the mystery going?
Dan (Luka):Some interesting leads, yes, leads which led to yes, which led to a Wait just Aside, led to um a wait just aside. Did we? Does she know that we're like paranormal investigators?
Ellie (Akka):I don't quite remember if we or did we just say we were?
Chris (Joseph):detectives.
Ellie (Akka):I think I might have been more of the mundane detective route well, somebody like this, she's's going to love, she's going to eat it up.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, it's mystical, it's fresh.
Dan (Luka):Well, it is a little unorthodox of us, I love unorthodox, but we believe that there might have been an angry spirit in the lake. You do say, and we, through research and quick wit, um performed a ritual at the lakeshore last night and we believe that the we, we believe that we have set the spirit free from its mortal toils. This is fabulous.
Timothy (DM):Where's the reporters? Have you not had reporters come into town for this?
Ellie (Akka):that sounds like quite a story well, you know, for us it's just a regular day at work on an orthodox day, but a regular day.
Timothy (DM):You'd be surprised at how many unorthodox days we have, it's true that is honestly when, when you introduced yourselves the other day, you made it sound so mundane.
Dan (Luka):This is quite much more interesting well, we do have to keep a low profile in many cases as to not understandable and not to rile up up local. What is the word I'm looking for?
Chris (Joseph):Suspicion Sure.
Ellie (Akka):Agitate the locals Of course?
Timothy (DM):of course I wholeheartedly understand. Does that mean that you'll be leaving us so soon, so efficient?
Ellie (Akka):Well, we're very good at what we do.
Chris (Joseph):And there are so many little towns with problems like these.
Timothy (DM):Well, I am saddened by the mere fact that I hadn't get to know you all a little better, but I'm still so thankful that you're joining this lovely day with me.
Ellie (Akka):Is the day lovely? What's the weather like? It's another lovely day with me. Is the day lovely? What's the weather like?
Timothy (DM):It's another lovely day.
Ellie (Akka):Lemonade, lemonaded wine, wine shandy Tis the season Wine shandy.
Dan (Luka):Oh my gosh Jail. Somebody do a ritual on me, this one is possessed by an evil spirit.
Timothy (DM):It probably would be a very lovely thing. Oh, yeah, like in 1848, having like a decent wine and imported, freshly imported lemons.
Chris (Joseph):This is the highlight.
Timothy (DM):This is a fancy drink. This drink is so sour let's not get used to this. That's great.
Dan (Luka):Oh, my goodness, have you had this before it's lemonade Never in my wildest dreams.
Ellie (Akka):I don't think I have had it either. I have sucked on a lemon lemon before. This tastes kind of like that oh wow, fancy over here mr, imported lemons for sucking I found it.
Chris (Joseph):I thought it might have been something else. I was like this is a really weird looking potato do you normally suck on potatoes?
Dan (Luka):it can get pretty.
Chris (Joseph):It can get pretty desperate out in the woods. Oh, I think I found it on it. I was crossing a trail, somewhere like a, a road yeah, I'll go to it.
Crosstalk:Fell off a cart, it fell it fell off a cart somewhere.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, wow, well, this is great. And the tea sandwiches.
Dan (Luka):Oh yeah, are there ham sandwiches?
Timothy (DM):Yes, yam and cheese.
Dan (Luka):Luca does the thing where, instead of taking bites of the small sandwiches, he puts the entire small sandwich in his mouth.
Timothy (DM):Actually probably a provolone, Provolone's probably more common, not cheddar.
Timothy (DM):So, yeah, provolone ham sandwiches, there's some roast beef there's it's like a, it's a good spread, um and uh, she just keeps pressing you to tell more and more about your, your story, and then she kind of like pushes you to embellish it and she's like she, she even gives you a contact in ljubljana of like somebody that you should reach out to that runs a local paper, to be like you should talk to them because they'll be able to like print your story. Um, it'll bring a lot of clout to the town, um, especially since we just uh got our. We're experiencing some hard times.
Dan (Luka):The like attention yeah exactly I definitely give a embellished rendition beautiful of the story probably with me jumping up on chairs and stuff. Yeah, um, it definitely involves me fighting away the ghost with an oar on the shore side. Just to give some truth to it.
Ellie (Akka):Don't mention evil in.
Dan (Luka):No, no names, no names, just us, just us, just us and the evil spirit.
Chris (Joseph):The spirit and just us four yeah. Three Well and the spirit I was counting.
Timothy (DM):And our dogs, and the dogs, and the dogs oh yeah, us five, give me an inspiration.
Ellie (Akka):And the dogs? Us five.
Timothy (DM):I just want to know how good your story is. Oh, one success, alright, it's a pretty good story.
Crosstalk:It's definitely like paper worthy good job even I'm getting like hyped up you're all getting a little toasty you're listening to the story.
Timothy (DM):It's like getting really all getting a little toasty. Yeah, you're listening to this story. It's like getting really hype. You're having a wonderful afternoon. It's quite a nice change of pace at this point. And that continues on until like the mid-afternoon before you part your ways and she professes she's like stay a little later, have another drink.
Ellie (Akka):Oh, we really should be going.
Chris (Joseph):You should come see us sometime, we'll have cocktails this evening, oh yes, lubiana or no, just kidding, predyama is much closer than Paris.
Timothy (DM):That's true. That is true, and I actually have never visited. I heard that there's this really bizarre castle.
Chris (Joseph):You know what? We live there.
Dan (Luka):Shut up, get VIP access.
Ellie (Akka):You do not, we do.
Timothy (DM):It's sort of our headquarters, bizarre.
Dan (Luka):I will note it is a work in progress, A fixer-upper.
Ellie (Akka):It's charmingly rustic.
Timothy (DM):But you own a castle. Oh my gosh, make sure to have them print that in the paper as well.
Chris (Joseph):They must know about you all, most fascinating residence since Erasmus Luger.
Timothy (DM):Wonderful. Well, I will definitely make plans to visit. It has been a lovely time. Please do travel safely. We will.
Ellie (Akka):We will Thank you for the lovely afternoon. Quite a much needed change of pace after fighting evil spirits all night.
Timothy (DM):Alright, we'll head back to say bye to evilman. Yes, so uh, you depart from the the gusik nope uh, hercog hercog. Oh gosh, you uh depart from the Hercog Villa and make your way back to the Lezik Estate, um, where uh Evelyn has taken the opportunity to pack your bags, oh, as well, as prepare you a little travel gift bag of sorts Of some bread, some small treats, a packet of tea Stuff, like that for your trip, that you'll be able to tide yourself over with some little goodies.
Ellie (Akka):She's the best yeah. Thank you. We're so sorry to have to go, but I hope you'll come visit us in Pradyama sometime.
Timothy (DM):That would actually be very lovely. I've been very impressed with your abilities and Well, nothing is tying me down here anymore.
Ellie (Akka):I suppose that's true, although I wonder who will be responsible for the business in Jakob's absence.
Timothy (DM):I think it falls to me but, to be completely honest, business was never my interests in life then sell it yeah, true, travel the world go see paris you say sell it, and she's like you. She's like immediately her urge is to like respond, but she just like is hung up. She's like she cocks her head and she's thinking she's that's not a bad idea.
Ellie (Akka):Well, sell it to the her cogs? Yeah, they.
Timothy (DM):Basically I'm sure they'll take regardless, I will write and I will stay in touch. Thank you again. So much.
Ellie (Akka):This has been an interesting week, that's for sure.
Chris (Joseph):New chapters for everyone. If I could make a request. Of course, we probably won't be back in this town soon and I'm not sure how much what your plans will be in the future, but if you could keep an eye out on Gasper as he readjusts, of course, unless, no, if you need anything from us or anything, just yeah.
Ellie (Akka):Do you think we should? Oh, you did say you would see him tomorrow. Should somebody said see him tomorrow? Yeah?
Timothy (DM):we go and check on him before we leave too, yeah okay, yeah all right, sorry we gotta make a rest.
Chris (Joseph):I forgot about gas.
Timothy (DM):We made so many friends here, so many friends and who where's nico?
Dan (Luka):just kidding, one last round of drinks, oh my gosh.
Timothy (DM):Yes, you did actually buddy up with nico I did sorry, yeah um.
Timothy (DM):So yeah, make out later, do that. Um. You go make your way to gasper. Um, gasper is definitely in a much more somber state when you meet him, um, but he does seem to be like stable. Just I mean, he's grieving, he's actually grieving, yeah. Um, he did like experience some niceties with you, but he actually does kind of not push you away, but kind of like make the exchange pretty short before just wishing you safe travels, um and like whatever you kind of like nudge him to do, he just kind of agrees. So like if you're like you should go hang out with evelyn or something, he like agrees and kind of like just kind of brushes it off a little bit yes um, before just wishing you safe travel um, and like excusing himself yeah, give him a firm handshake
Chris (Joseph):yeah, yeah as a uh, it is a tough.
Timothy (DM):It's a tough go, but it gets less tough over time he does that like grimaced kind of smile and then and just nods a little bit, and then he wraps his arms around you, gives you like a nice squeeze, gives you a hug, shakes luka's hands, shakes akka's hands, gives you like a nice squeeze, gives you a hug, shakes Luca's hand, shakes Aka's hand and then fully excuses himself from the conversation. Nico Gusick, on the other hand, just kidding no, no, no, no, no, we're not actually going to go say hi to Nico Gusick.
Chris (Joseph):Nico spots you across the crowd.
Dan (Luka):There is no reason. Yeah, nico spots you, as is no reason.
Timothy (DM):Oh my god yeah as Nico spots you as you all are like you're like packing up the cart. He's like oh my gosh, wow, it was so nice to meet you. If you're ever in town again like let's hang out.
Dan (Luka):Come visit us in Pregnama it's gonna be a bash.
Ellie (Akka):Don't invite your 12 teenage friends to come visit.
Dan (Luka):They're like 1920 okay, oh, they are okay. Yeah, I thought they were like 12 for some no, no, they're all just drinking beer in the bar late teens early 20s okay yeah, yeah, they were.
Timothy (DM):They were like my peers uh, oh, okay, yeah, interesting, except not in college, not in college because they are fishers.
Ellie (Akka):The school of life, yeah, school of hard knocks.
Timothy (DM):But I mean just like any other, like if you made friends with somebody and you ran into them out and about, they'd just give you like that fun little exchange we should hang out sometime. Both of you are like sitting there in the back of your head Like we're never going to see each other again. Um, but you do that, and then that is not what Luca thinks.
Dan (Luka):Luca's like yeah, I'll see you in Prejama like a couple of months, right.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah.
Chris (Joseph):See there.
Crosstalk:We have a castle.
Ellie (Akka):Come stay at our castle For the next several months at Perdiama. You're like I wonder when Nico and his friends are going to come visit.
Timothy (DM):And then for weeks after that, the rest of you are like I wonder when they're going to leave, Generally overstaying their welcome.
Dan (Luka):We've run out of ham months ago.
Crosstalk:Oh God, they're eating us out of house and ham solo cups everywhere the floor is sticky we
Timothy (DM):will not take out the trash, there is a tower of pizza boxes. What is going on this morning?
Ellie (Akka):and there was a man sleeping on the floor of the hallway and he had idiot written on his naked butt cheeks that's the vibe.
Crosstalk:What are you doing?
Timothy (DM):oh my gosh, all right, um, but with that, and is there anything else that you would like to incorporate into this final bit of the mystery before you part ways and we transition back to the headquarters.
Dan (Luka):Assuming we got some kind of payment, I'm ready to go yeah.
Timothy (DM):You will get payment from Evelyn. From Evelyn she it's like she honestly because of how well you did and the fact that now she's in control of the business and she honestly doesn't care. If it succeeds, you probably get more than you were supposed to. Nice At least more than what Jakob was intending to pay you.
Ellie (Akka):Hell yeah, we should always drown the employer yeah, Especially if he's evil yeah.
Timothy (DM):Oh my gosh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so cool, you are going to make your way back to the headquarters. So, after several days of travel through the countryside of Slovenialovene lands um, you make your way back to pradyama castle um, and you're greeted by algut um, who has been tending to the place in your absence any ham sandwiches yes, he greets you with ham sandwiches.
Timothy (DM):He's like because you had like written him in advance of your departure from ucons. It arrives ahead of you so he like knows that you're arriving. It's like a really cool thing that mail can do um hell yeah, sends away on a horse versus a cart. Yeah, half the time, exactly. So what we're going to do right now is we are going to do our end of mystery house keeping.
Ellie (Akka):Yay, our points yes.
Timothy (DM):Good points. So we get experience points, and then there will be development points. Okay, so we will start with the experience points. So I'm going to ask a series of eight questions, hmm, and if you answer yes for any of the, questions.
Ellie (Akka):You get one XP. Oh cool. And is it like if you answer yes to two of them, you get two?
Dan (Luka):xp correct yeah, so for every, yes, each.
Timothy (DM):So number one didp everyone gets one xp always did you confront any vasin yes did you identify a previously unknown vasin I?
Ellie (Akka):don't, yeah, no, because we had like papers describing her. So, uh, for the purposes of the game, oh for us to you is new to us, oh yeah um?
Timothy (DM):were you affected by your dark secret? No, I don't believe any of you did deploy that. No um, did you take risks to protect other people?
Dan (Luka):Yes, I stepped in front of Evelyn, between Evelyn and Jakob at one point.
Ellie (Akka):Oh, that's true, yeah, you did. So you get to say, yes, I don't think I did.
Chris (Joseph):I don't think so.
Timothy (DM):I don't think I did. Okay, this one's a two-parter. Have you learned anything and what? So each of you go around and if you want to answer yes, you tell me what you learned.
Ellie (Akka):Is it you the?
Timothy (DM):character or you, the player? That's a great question. The character, okay, and it can't just be the Vossen.
Dan (Luka):I learned, what a salt guy is yeah, I learned about lemonade that's fair, that's true.
Ellie (Akka):I never had it before. This is great you learned about lemonade.
Timothy (DM):It is something that's going to come up again, for sure.
Chris (Joseph):I don't know, maybe I'll accept that I learned that you can spend 20 years in the woods and still get lost in the daytime, but you're perfect at night you learned humility, I learned humility what is this?
Dan (Luka):I'm not good at everything I've got 51 years on me, I learned that I can potentially cause someone to break by just talking to them.
Timothy (DM):That's meta.
Dan (Luka):We all learned to do lullaby.
Timothy (DM):I did learn a lullaby. You did learn a lullaby. Can you sing it for us? No, I don't remember it.
Dan (Luka):Luca probably remembers it, but I don't Okay, luca remembers it, does, don't okay, luca remembers?
Timothy (DM):it is. Does that count? Yes, yes, yes, yes, um, all right, um, did you develop something in your headquarters? Um, this is going to be no, because we haven't had development points yet, but the next mystery will get whatever we end up developing, um, and then did you perform an extraordinary action. What does that mean?
Ellie (Akka):is there a definition for that?
Dan (Luka):something that was extraordinary I mean I did cause psychological damage to a priest by talking, by asking him a question I don't know if that's extraordinary. What did I get like three successes on?
Ellie (Akka):So many things.
Chris (Joseph):I convinced.
Dan (Luka):DeVos into Sparrowman for a couple minutes.
Timothy (DM):I'm going to say that that's still tied up in the XP related to questions two and three. Okay, fine, y'all have already gotten a lot of XP, okay.
Chris (Joseph):What you really want to aim for is five points.
Ellie (Akka):Oh really.
Chris (Joseph):That's when you can upgrade one of your skills.
Ellie (Akka):Ugh, I should have done something extraordinary.
Timothy (DM):Oh, you only got four yeah.
Chris (Joseph):I think we I got five oh yeah, because I protected. Evelyn.
Dan (Luka):I tried to protect.
Ellie (Akka):Evelyn, you took a risk, so you get to upgrade.
Dan (Luka):I do. I do get to upgrade a skill.
Timothy (DM):Alright, so that will be something before the next mystery. You have 5 XP that you'll be able to expend to improve your character, and now I have to go to the development points, which are more questions. So now these are points that are shared, so you all will collectively get one point for each question, because it's for the headquarters, um, and then these are development points that can be spent for people and rooms, and I think there's also some like non-people or room things, like resources. You can get um for the headquarters itself Running water.
Ellie (Akka):Fix the roof.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, alright.
Chris (Joseph):Did you play at least one scene at the headquarters? We did.
Timothy (DM):Gorgeous. Did you encounter a new type of Vossen?
Crosstalk:Yes.
Timothy (DM):Did you visit a place of magic?
Dan (Luka):Yes.
Crosstalk:Does the lakeside count?
Timothy (DM):We went out in the lake too yeah I will say that the you created a place of magic yeah, with our ritual, that's true, yeah so that counts the point. Yeah, were you subjected to magic?
Dan (Luka):Yes, the song. But it didn't really affect us? No, it was not.
Timothy (DM):Did you bring occult books or other important items back to the headquarters?
Ellie (Akka):No, didn't even think about it. We didn't really have anything.
Timothy (DM):Did you make important contacts you?
Ellie (Akka):bet we did. Networking Did you make important contacts. You bet, we did.
Dan (Luka):Networking. We've got a gang of 19 to 20 year olds at our disposal Sugar ma, that's the most important contact you made no it's really Nia is the most important.
Crosstalk:That's fair. Well, Nia and Evelyn probably.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Timothy (DM):Because now they are potential patrons. Alright Was the mystery particularly difficult and epic, I would say so. That was a hard mystery and it was your first one, so we're just going to say it's the hardest thing you've done.
Ellie (Akka):It's the hardest and most epic one we've done yet.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, it's true, did you've done? It's the hardest and most epic one we've done yet yeah, it's true, um, did you solve it? We did, yeah, yes, you did. All right, how many development?
Ellie (Akka):points. Did you get six? Oh, it's a good amount.
Timothy (DM):I think that's like a enough to buy a good amount of things yeah, I'd like to buy a roof.
Ellie (Akka):One roof, please.
Chris (Joseph):One roof, please I mean probably luckily that's more just for role play anyway, yeah although there's some research things like you can get a butterfly garden.
Ellie (Akka):I saw whoa, I give me six of those every room is a butterfly garden aka, where are all? Where's all our?
Timothy (DM):money why are there so many butterflies?
Ellie (Akka):this is. I've never seen this before. I had to get it. It's a study that I'm doing.
Crosstalk:Yeah, money. Why are there so many butterflies? I've never seen this kind before.
Chris (Joseph):I had to get it.
Timothy (DM):It's a study that I'm doing, yeah, technically, so an infirmary is one. So you can buy an infirmary for six development points, and then it makes it possible to push all physical recovery rolls. So, you all didn't really take any physical damage, did you?
Timothy (DM):we were pretty short on abuse, gorgeous yeah um jacob did though this was definitely a more social, emotional, yeah, not quite as physical thing. Some of the other vasan are, yeah, very physical, where you can like break your leg and yeah, lose a limb and stuff like that. Fight off cultists in a logging town, yeah, yeah yeah, yeah, that was the one shot that we did like a year ago.
Timothy (DM):A year ago oh my god, it was around halloween, right was? It was, yeah, because it was a crypt, something I mean we just do a lot of horror themed one shot so it could have july. I can find it because it was in our group, yeah um, so yeah, so that is the end of the mystery and that's all the wrap-up activities you do, so you get to answer a lot of questions and feel good about what you accomplished so we don't spend the development points now um, we don't have to do that now.
Timothy (DM):It's a lot of decision making, so it's like better to just to think about that. Talk about it outside of sessions. Um, if we weren't live streaming, I'd say, yeah, let's just talk about it, um, but but the audience? The audience doesn't want us to sit here reading a book in silence before we start having some weird debilitate not deliberations.
Timothy (DM):Thank you um some weird deliberations it's not but yes, so that is the end of the mystery. Um, we have two more things that we're gonna do with this session. Um, so I did want to have a little scene in the study, um, and then I also just was like y'all can chat and talk about the mystery itself. I can give you all of the handouts you never saw.
Crosstalk:Yeah, mystery handouts.
Timothy (DM):Which is exciting. So which would you like to do? First Scene with Elgort, or.
Ellie (Akka):Let's do scene with Elgort. Yeah, let's do scene If you're out of character, or let's just see. Yeah, let's do this one's for out of character, it's hard to get back.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, that's fair, that's fair, that's fair and yes I really have to get into the akka's mindset.
Ellie (Akka):Uh okay, I just literally look in the mirror and I'm like there you are.
Timothy (DM):I'm mentally wearing an apron yeah, gorgeous me in an apron all right, uh, so weeks later you've, uh, kind of decompressed from your previous mystery, uh, taken some time to catalog the events that took place, add them to the ledger and do all of that type of stuff, as you are now tending to the castle and trying to plan renovations and other potential purchases that you might make in order to further expand the society. So one afternoon you are all sitting about in the study. It is just a regular day that you're doing your regular activities. So, whatever it is that you do while sitting around the study, so um Aka, what are? What are you doing right now?
Ellie (Akka):Uh, let's see.
Chris (Joseph):Probably having a cup of tea or coffee, depending on the time of day, and maybe writing in my little notebook about whatever I saw on my walk that morning lovely uh, luca, luca, I think would still be reading, like the grimoire-esque books that are in the library or in the study, um, and occasionally going over to aka to ask what where it is where it is gorgeous, joseph uh, I think joseph found a book of local tales, so he's reading one about zlatarag, the, the golden horn chamois that lives on top of the mountain near where, like boheme was hell yeah it's a, really it's a really fascinating story about a hunter that is trying his his uh.
Chris (Joseph):So he has a girlfriend, but his girlfriend is wooed by a merchant from Italy, so he's like, oh. I'm gonna go find this magical treasure of this golden horned goat, and he tries to track down this goat and he stabs it, but its blood can sprout these flowers that heal so gorgeous.
Ellie (Akka):I feel like every once in a while you're just like oh hell, yeah, yeah, that dude, that dude, he's doing the coolest work of mystery hunter what did you say?
Timothy (DM):I was reading about epicness here uh, so as you are each doing those things, you're sitting around the room. Is there any conversations that you're having with each other?
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, I'm helping you figure out words every once in a while.
Dan (Luka):Thank you.
Chris (Joseph):How's everything coming with the work in your little infirmary?
Ellie (Akka):the work in your uh little infirmary. Oh, you know it's, it's good for what it is, but, uh, you know, it's still just a pantry. Basically, it's not anywhere near the kind of facilities I'd be used to. I feel like we could really, you know, get something nice set up, but I'm not sure if it's our top priority right now yeah, still trying to patch all these holes. Yeah, what about you? Have you gotten a chance to go out into the woods surrounding the mountain recently?
Chris (Joseph):You know, there are some curious footpaths around here.
Ellie (Akka):I've found some too.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah, but yeah just herds of red heart and a few wolf tracks. Oh I think now is the rutting season, so it is a little bit uh wild in the woods right now we'll have to go on a walk at some time so you can show me all your little hunting secrets.
Ellie (Akka):I usually stick to the the paths well traveled, but I've seen all kinds of wildlife around here that I never saw back where I was from.
Chris (Joseph):And there's even more that are in caves, so we can maybe take a trip to Pistoina.
Ellie (Akka):Oh, I don't know how I feel about caves, but if I'm with you I guess I'll feel okay. You seem pretty experienced, although you did get us lost in the woods that one time.
Chris (Joseph):I only get lost once.
Timothy (DM):The door creaks open as Elgit the butler pushes open the door and begins to make his way into the room with the tray. The tray. Upon it sits a crumpled up, rather tattered looking letter.
Ellie (Akka):Oh, Not ham sandwiches.
Timothy (DM):Masters, if you please. We have received another letter, although this one appears to have well.
Chris (Joseph):It's been through the ringer.
Ellie (Akka):Oh God it looks like it came out of a lake.
Chris (Joseph):Oh goodness.
Dan (Luka):Is it wet? I found it.
Chris (Joseph):It's from Zoia. Is it from Zoia? Is it made out of fish?
Timothy (DM):Stuck beneath a rock at the bottom of the hill near our mailbox.
Chris (Joseph):Wow. Oh, it's shredded, it's got a big hole right in the middle it's hanging on by a thread. It's from Patouille, which is a city in the east. So it's dated January. I'm guessing we're in the winter, because our adventure was in summertime.
Timothy (DM):Oh yes, let's say it's been months.
Chris (Joseph):Okay yeah. We're, we're bunkered, we're in the one warm spot, which is a lot.
Ellie (Akka):I forgot. Oh, it's so cozy, yes.
Chris (Joseph):Um uh, joseph does his best as he tries to realign the pieces of torn letter and he says to the esteemed society I write to you with a heart burdened by fear and desperation. My name is Azja Subic and I live with my family in the town of Petui. I humbly beg for your aid, for I believe a terrible curse has taken hold of my family, and our very lives are at stake. Several weeks ago, my eldest brother, leo, suffered a grave injury while walking, while working at the sawmill. It was a horrible accident, one I cannot shake from my mind. I fear it was more than mere misfortune that befell him, for, as of late, miseries have followed us like a dark cloud.
Chris (Joseph):Accidents have plagued the sawmill for several months now, most notably the death Does that say oh sorry, I was misreading two lines the death of poor Iori Kaleva, a dear friend of Leo's, who was crushed beneath a tree in a manner too grim to be coincidence. He was shortly after Leo's accident that my younger brother, sven, began to suffer. At first it was only bad dreams, but soon the nightmares grew more terrible. He speaks of monsters hiding in the shadows watching him, waiting. He refuses to sleep now, for he swears that they will come for him if he does. His face is pale, his body weak. He is ill in both mind and spirit, bedridden with sickness no doctor can cure. Each day grows thinner, his eyes hollowed with dread.
Chris (Joseph):I believe Sven's suffering began the day Leo was injured. There is something unnatural at work here, something beyond our understanding. I fear the curse will consume us all unless we act swiftly. Please, I beg you, if there are any powers that you possess, any knowledge of strange and terrible forces that haunt us, I implore you to come to our aid. My family is unraveling before my eyes and I do not know how much longer we can endure. I fear for Sven's life and for what may happen if this curse is not dispelled. May God guide this letter to you and may you have mercy on us. We await your response with all the hope. We have left yours in desperation.
Chris (Joseph):azia subich my goodness, the condition of that letter does not bode well for no the condition of the family I'm really surprised it and there was no envelope algit, for this letter is just under a.
Ellie (Akka):And it wasn't delivered with the rest of the mail.
Timothy (DM):It was not. I almost overlooked it before I noticed it waving in the wind.
Chris (Joseph):Well, it sounds like we have another case.
Dan (Luka):How many days ago is that letter? What's the date? On that letter again.
Ellie (Akka):It's January 26th.
Timothy (DM):What's today's date? Let's say that it is February 12th.
Dan (Luka):Oh, okay, so it's been a couple weeks. We gotta get on it.
Ellie (Akka):All right, Back at it again.
Timothy (DM):Alright back at it again. There is one two more matters to attend to. I have been thinking over your proposal and I do believe that would be quite a necessary addition for the society. Linnea agrees agrees For the two of you. There is somebody Linnea would like you to meet. They will be at the tavern at the bottom of the hill tomorrow around 2pm.
Chris (Joseph):What do they look like, or what should we look out for?
Timothy (DM):Linnea will be there to introduce you.
Chris (Joseph):Gotcha.
Timothy (DM):Okay, that would be all.
Chris (Joseph):Thank you as ever, Alget.
Timothy (DM):He does his little bow and he exits the room.
Chris (Joseph):You know he's growing on me.
Ellie (Akka):You didn't like him.
Chris (Joseph):He has an interesting vibe.
Ellie (Akka):That's certainly true, so what was this proposal?
Ellie (Akka):well, you know, I was thinking about how you know when we're away on our missions or leaving the castle behind. It feels like there's a lot of progress that needs to be made here to help reinstate the organization, and so my proposal was that I could remain here, kind of be your home team to help with anything needed around the castle help Alligate with his activities, maybe get things cleaned up or, you know, help implement whatever changes that we want made. Keep an eye on things while you guys go out and explore and solve mysteries, and I'll be here. You can always come back and tell me about them.
Dan (Luka):Well, okay, could you still help me read when I'm back?
Ellie (Akka):of course. Okay, that's, I'll be here all the time to help you read, and great I'll prepare some trails that we can explore for whenever we come back perfect and I'll keep an eye on the local wildlife and report back.
Chris (Joseph):Make sure they're not doing, there's not going to to be a Vossen in our neck of the woods.
Ellie (Akka):Exactly, yeah, and I'll make sure you know the wolf and the deer populations are staying in balance, these types of things and besides, this is a very small town and they actually don't have any sort of a medical, particularly proficient medical practitioner here, so I think they could really use my help with even less supernatural ailments.
Chris (Joseph):Oh yeah, I'm sure there's all sorts of things that they just overlook. They're like oh, just, my arm feels off. I guess it's just how arms are, so I think you'll be a very valuable resource here.
Ellie (Akka):Yes, thank you. Thank you for understanding. I'll miss you guys.
Dan (Luka):I'll miss you out there, but you'll be here, I'll miss you guys.
Ellie (Akka):I'll miss you out there.
Dan (Luka):But you'll be here, I'll be here.
Ellie (Akka):I'll help you look at books and stuff.
Chris (Joseph):Yes, we need the help researching if that first endeavor was an indicator.
Ellie (Akka):Yeah, gosh, we didn't find anything in that life. No, we didn't. I looked at the fish books.
Chris (Joseph):I was like oh I learned about the lake, but yeah, yeah.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, and with that we are going to close the curtain on this mystery of Vossen Slavine Lands, the calls of the wild linga. For next time, before we do our outro, though, I did promise to show off some of the uh handouts that we did. Um, yes, exactly. So we kind of did that thing where you, in retrospective, did your learning uh roles and, like recalled things from the library. There were quite a few red herrings that I had also prepared well, even some of the ones that you got were a little bit of red herrings um, and additional research. So we did do a lot of prep of various tales of water spirits. So there was like a journal entry on the Mavka. We had like a protection spell, some poems that were talking about various water spirits.
Timothy (DM):We even had some stuff about a leshy that like could have come up and like worked its way in, depending on what types of clues you uncovered um gosh, what is this one? Um conjuration, magic and just general spells. Um, which was always fun information, and so I'm going to release a lot of this content on our Instagram as well as our Patreon. We've got the Uzernitsa and the Vodyanoi. There were, like some journal entries and I actually like, went and like made covers that we could open the journals.
Timothy (DM):It was like a little physical reaction, something about offering for Boginka to be left at an altar constructed at the water's edge. So there's a lot of water spirits in slovenian folklore, um, and so that is part of, or could have potentially been part of, the mystery of like just being able to like identify what it was. Because of how you all navigated it, you kind of came across the social aspects very early on, and so you didn't have to find all of the physical clues that would have led you down like various folklore um, you kind of like narrowed in on the result pretty quickly, or at least the the nature of the spirit pretty quickly, and so that's why I didn't pull out a lot of these, because they were just like no longer relevant for the the mystery. Um, there was also a letter that you could have found at the ledrick estate, um, for zoya. So who wants to open a wax seal, ellie?
Timothy (DM):yeah, okay um, so there's a wax seal letter that you could have found, because I wanted to create lots of different ways for you all to understand the history that was happening or that had happened between yakub and zoya gasper and like, really piece together that history so.
Chris (Joseph):So zoya was in the lake for six years, but she had only started attacking in the last two weeks.
Timothy (DM):Yes and gasper has months because of the wedding.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah and gasper hasn't has, had he known that she was on the lake, or only in these last two months?
Timothy (DM):He had suspected it was her that he was hearing singing the lullaby. It was familiar, but when you had asked him he said that he had never seen her.
Chris (Joseph):No, but for how long had he been hearing that song? Just as long as the attacks. For six years. Oh wow, that's wild.
Timothy (DM):Yes, so for six years Zoya was haunting the lake, but her rage did not build until the wedding because that's the first time that she sees Jakob. She's like ah, Since her murder.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, yeah yeah, so because Jakob never goes down to the water at night because it's his business, so he had never a reason to go there until the wedding night. Interesting, so that was that. That was the real, like history, like peeling back the curtain. Um, it was the wedding night that they had the reception at the boathouse and him and evelyn um were there and zoya saw them and saw that that yakub was marrying somebody and that like initiated her rage. Um, before that it was just a, she was just a sad spirit of the lake that didn't really have any motivation to do anything more than just be stuck there, gotcha.
Ellie (Akka):Big mood yeah.
Timothy (DM):She was just a spirit that couldn't move on, that rage built into protecting the lake, and she took it out on the fishermen, um, particularly those that she thought were, um, either like aggressive towards other people like she, like people who weren't not very nice, or they were disrespecting the lake, gotcha, um, so like we didn't really dive into that as much. There was a lot of stuff that if you pushed into the social aspect of the fishermen, you would have started to understand who was being targeted a little bit more. Um, so yeah, there was that. And then, and what does that letter say?
Ellie (Akka):This it looks like it was maybe Jakob drafting wedding vows to Zoya.
Ellie (Akka):It's quite it's very sweet actually, but he it's like a work in progress, he like had crossed out and rewritten some stuff. So I don't know if it was the final letter, if he was just like drafting. But he says Zoya, my dearest love. From the moment I first saw you, I knew my heart had found its home in your eyes. I saw kindness, in your smile I found warmth and in your laughter I and then it says, saw a joy. And then he crossed that out and wrote discovered joy that I never knew I was missing.
Ellie (Akka):You have brought light into my life in ways I never imagined and every day with you has been a blessing beyond words. I vow to love you with all that I have crossed out am to stand by your side through every hardship, crossed out, trial, and to celebrate every joy that comes our way. I promise to cherish you, to honor the gentle soul that you are and to protect you with everything I have. I will be your rock, your shelter and your greatest supporter in all that you do. I promise to listen to you, to learn from you uh, and then crossed out and to dedicate myself to you but that's crossed out, and it says and to grow with you as we build our life together. I will treasure every moment, whether it be in the quiet stillness of the morning or in the laughter of shared adventures.
Ellie (Akka):My love for you is steadfast, unwavering and forever crossed out. Eternal. Zoya, I gave you my heart, my soul and all that I am. Together, we will create a life filled with love, kindness, crossed out, compassion and endless joy. I am honored to walk this path with you, to share in every dream and to face every challenge hand in hand with you. Zoya, I am complete. I love you now and forever. So he was into her, even though she wasn't into him they were also wedding vows Wedding vows tend to be expected and exaggerated.
Ellie (Akka):Well, because you're saying them in public right, it can be.
Timothy (DM):It's very Sometimes people are able to put on a face really easily.
Chris (Joseph):Yeah.
Timothy (DM):And Jakob was definitely one of those people he put on a face.
Ellie (Akka):He was good at it.
Timothy (DM):He was good at it, not anymore.
Crosstalk:Now he's got no face. Yeah, he doesn't have a face anymore Fish ate it.
Timothy (DM):The last handout that I created was just a letter to a Kovac Sons Maritime Provisions requesting a bunch of supplies, including dredgenets, so they were actually about to start dredging the lake, that's not good for them. That's crazy. Which was kind of a red herring because it was going to point you to the vadianoi, which are a lot more lake protectors. But yeah, just one of the things that they were going to be doing.
Chris (Joseph):Oh fun.
Timothy (DM):It's on fun little like engineering paper yeah the green square grid. Um, I had to do so.
Chris (Joseph):I did my bachelor's in engineering and I had to do a lot of homework on this paper for some reason, and it's very expensive it's, it's from the 80s, when they're like oh well, you're an engineer, you have to use a special paper because you might draw diagrams and they have to be to scale, even though you're just doing math equations.
Timothy (DM):So yeah, that's the mystery. I will post all of that to our Instagram and our Patreon so you can see all those fun little handouts. The reason we put it on Patreon is we put it under the free category so you can download it, and then you can use this mystery if you would like, because I'll probably even just post my bullet points of what was happening, because it's not. I don't, I didn't write out a ton. It's a lot of just bullet points and then improv-ing from there.
Crosstalk:Once you know the histories and the background of the people.
Timothy (DM):the rest is just responding to what you all look at or try to explore, because I think that you should find clues wherever you go. I think it's important that even if you take a path I wasn't expecting, you should still find something. So I think it's the DM's job to figure out how that history translates into findings. So yeah, before we wrap up, anything else you wanted to talk about in the mystery, anything that still lingers in your mind, pressing questions, things that didn't make sense.
Dan (Luka):No.
Crosstalk:I think it was really clear yeah.
Dan (Luka):All the pieces came together Gorgeous.
Timothy (DM):Yeah, In the end everything fit Awesome Well.
Ellie (Akka):Thank you for a great mystery, Dina.
Timothy (DM):Yay Snaps all around. And, on that note, a heartfelt thanks to Free League Publishing for their steadfast support of independent TTRPG creators through the open gaming license rules and for crafting the rich tapestry of Vossen, especially to the talented writers Niels Hintz, niels Carlin and Richard Antoia for their exceptional setting guidelines. Our gratitude also extends to Thomas Herrenstam 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, yijito and Andro have beautifully enhanced our intro sequence, and to our incredible players Ellie, chris and Dan, whose performances breathe life into our characters and craft the tales that captivate us. Finally, thank you, russell, for helping me prep for these sessions and for moderating 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 colonization, enforced language barriers due to assimilation theory in the 60s and to the loss of my grandfather during the COVID-19 pandemic, my last direct connection to my homeland. For all those like myself striving to reclaim and redefine their cultural roots, I stand with you. May you find grace, empathy and kindness on your journey. And as David Mitchell once eloquently wrote in Cloud Atlas, our lives are not our own. We are bound to others, past and present. And as David Mitchell once eloquently wrote in Cloud Atlas, thank you for joining us and we will be taking a short hiatus as we prepare for our next mystery and deal with some personal affairs.
Crosstalk:Farewell for now, and may the echoes of the past guide you until we meet again. Keep an eye on our social media and discord nas vidanya. Thank you ¶¶, ¶¶ © transcript Emily Beynon. Thank you ¶¶ © transcript Emily Beynon.
