Session Date: 10/05/2025
After The Cops
We are all about as safe as we can be once the cops leave. We discuss next steps:
- We can go to the fire embassy to see if Taraaq can help
- We can talk to the Bleak Cabal to see if they are able to help us
- We can go to the embassy for The Nether and see what they can do
- Nymnar has previously suggested this and his verbiage was such that he would not be able to accompany the party with that
Zimri approaches the Bleak Cabal and apologizes for ruining poetry night. He explains we need to go to the Netherworld, and asks where we could go to get there. The gentleman that Zimri is speaking to explains there are definitely portals, and there is one guy that we can go to. He explains that we’ll need to go to the Undersigil. The gentleman is rather wishywashy on it, ultimately commenting that he’s fine, but he’s in a depression cycle so he went to Undersigil. He explains that he’s V!kgri (Vikgri) and then shows us roughly where we need to go to get there. He explains that V!kgri is a big guy.
Zimri asks how bad this Undersigil will be, and Silver explains that it’s less of a criminal underworld type situation and more just another layer of the city. Silver says that they’re going into the sewers and Zimri is far less excited about that.
Undersigil
We go and it’s more like we’re in the catacombs rather than the sewers. Zimri goes around asking if anyone knows where V!kgri is. We eventually see a rat with part of the brain exposed, and suddenly there’s a swarm of rats that nearly surround us. A voice enters our mind: You’re not from around here. Silver compliments the spookiness and the voice thanks her. Zimri explains that we are simply looking for someone named V!kgri. The rats explain that they can help us find V!kgri in exchange of cheese. We give them cheese.
The rats explain we have to move a bit - the third catacomb on the left, but there might be some other creatures on the way there.
We begin walking and Silver walks into a catacomb with some corridors and sees a spot that is flooded. Before she can react, an enormous four-legged reptile creature that’s grey-green emerges from the water. It starts coming at us. She pulls her dagger and asks if he’s V!kgri and he corrects her pronunciation, saying that nobody pronounces the ! correctly. He stands up like an ape and asks what we want.
Zimri says that we were told he can help us get to the Netherworld, and he asks what we need to go there for. Silver says it’s a long story, and V!kgri says he has time. Nymnar speaks up and says that we are looking for someone. V!kgri calls it vague, and then Silver gives the cliffsnotes edition: we are sent by a friend to rescue another friend who got kidnapped into the Nether. Silver hesitates and eventually name drops Soldos, and it’s clear that’s a good thing with V!kgri.
V!kgri comments that he wonders if this is enough to end a good brood, and Achille understands what he means. There’s some back and forth about what constitutes as brooding and what constitutes as contemplation. He ultimately explains that he needs something in return and he asks to know more about us so that he has something to think about.
Damaris explains that she’s Soldos’s adopted daughter.
He then comments that there’s chaos that clings to us, not that he has much room to speak: he’s a gormeel, the lawful variant of slaad. He comments that he was from Limbo and that he was something of an outlier, the kind where all of his kind wants to kill us. He’s always being hunted down.
He knows a place where we can go to the Netherworld, and he asks for more information: who are we going to go save, for example. Achille offers the name Shadowbutt, and there’s some awkward back and forth and then Achille recalls his name is Shadowbane. V!kgri does know that name, but doesn’t have much to say about it.
As we continue, V!kgri explains that this is not a good, nice, or fast portal, but it will get us there. The area that we will appear is - as far as he knows - less observed, so we should be able to emerge and not be immediately detained. At Silver’s prompting, he explains that the portal is more metaphysical: we will need to walk for a period of time through a very narrow corridor, and we will eventually emerge. We may hear things, but do not crack.
Silver asks - unrelated, of course - if bodies from above wind up down here, and V!kgri says sometimes. V!kgri says he comes down here only sometimes, just when he broods. Silver asks if he’s ever seen a body that looks like her, and he says she would need to speak to the Dustmen if she has interest in the bodies - he doesn’t look at the graves that often.
This opens up the conversation about Silver getting her memories back. She ultimately asks Achille to tell her what to do, and Achille says that there will be pain with the memories: probably a lot of it, actually, but there is important information in the memories as well. There’s a lot of knowledge stored there. There’s some more back and forth and Nymnar eventually chimes in to say that it’s clear that she is curious and interested in this, so perhaps she should just go ahead and get her memories back. There’s far more back and forth, with Zimri suggesting she not get her memories back before we go to the portal because she can’t regret what she doesn’t remember.
There’s even more back and forth and Achille ultimately offers to see the memories first to warn her of what there might be. This triggers a lot of conversation where Damaris tries to convince Achille not to do this. There’s a very long argument back and forth between Damaris and Achille about whether he should, and Damaris ultimately explains that she can do this instead (eliciting a scoff and near laughter from Nymnar). Zimri ultimately chimes in to say that he doesn’t think it’s a good idea for anyone but Silver to do this because they are Silver’s memories, and probably Silver is the only one that will retain the memories while everyone else will likely just suffer and then forget the details while they are still hurt.
Achille thinks that’s a good point, then grabs the crystal anyway. Damaris attempts to try to stop him. Achille stops and looks at her, saying that he needs this. He explains he needs to see it from the other side. She allows him.
He takes the crystal and is shown memories:
They meet and they are enemies. Silver thinks that he can be good. They meet again, and a slow relationship forms: first slowly as friends, and then eventually like a brother, and then as a lifeline: a connection in a sea of chaos. She admires him and his struggle a lot: for trying to be better, and still falling to his demons; also how strong and powerful he is, and how much he protects those he cares for and slaying those that are against him. Then there is death of her next to him (not because of him), and then she finds him again and she falls into that sibling platonic love with him again. There’s pain, and love, and desperate begging for him to be better when he fails to listen to his better half - the deep melancholia (not disappointment) of knowing he can do better. And then the last time: the same brotherly love, the living this life together, and the last life where she is glad that he’s killing her and not someone innocent as he slaughters her.
For everyone it’s not even a minute as he focuses and the crystal lights up. As he comes back, he puts the crystal down and the memories do not stay, but the emotions do. He slowly closes the box. He’s crying as he looks at Silver. She hugs him and he hugs her back. She takes advantage of this moment and flips open the box to take the crystal to remember.
Achille scoops Silver up so that he can carry her through the catacombs so we can continue to the portal. As each of her deaths passes, the corresponding death mark lights up. She sweats as she gets her memories back.
She experiences each memory very, very viscerally, feeling much of it. She discovers that the person who cursed silver is Atratus the Bitter - he was still human at that time. She finally comes back and the wound over her heart is the last one to pulse. She’s crying a she comes back and she leans into Achile, slipping the gem back into the box. V!kgri asks if any more people want to go on a trip.
Zimri says that nobody else should, and the two definitely should not have done that here. He says that this is going to be so much more difficult to get to the Netherworld now, and both Achille and Silver double down saying that they will be fine. Zimri says he can only shield one persona mentally at a time, and the two of them now need it, and both of them reassure that this is not the case - Achille says he does not need Zimri to protect him, and Silver explains that she does not have any regrets that can harm her in this portal: she has little regrets from life to life, sure - things left unsaid, things unfinished - but she would not change the course of her lives.
Zimri finally says that he will be shielding her brain, and she will not argue. She agrees.
The Portal
We make it to the portal. There’s some back forth and Nymnar finally stops putting up with everything and just walks through the portal. Silver tries to grab him but is too fast and makes it through the portal before she can grab him.
Achille goes up to Damaris and takes her hand and asks if she wants to be next or last. She wants to be last, and he says okay, then kisses her.
Silver takes off her ring and hands it to Zimri. She says if she dies to give it to her in her next life. She tries to go through the portal. Achille grabs her and picks her up, giving her a hug, and then tells her to wait, setting her down. Silver comments that Nymnar is getting away, and Achille says it’s fine. Silver says that he’ll cause some shit, and Achille says that’s fine, he will anyway.
Achille turns and offers a hand to Zimri, shaking it and calling him a good man. Zimri asks why they’re acting like he’s about to die, and Silver says that Silver and Achille might, but Zimri won’t. Achille says that they are about to do something dangerous and he want to get these things off his chest. Zimri thanks him for keeping him safe.
Marching order:
- Nymnar (long before the others)
- Achille
- Silver
- Zimri
- Damaris
For Nymnar, he’s just going here. He hears voices around him and they whisper things such as he will not be welcomed. He will have spent so much time in another place just to get here and die alone. The voices say that the party will abandon him. He doesn’t care: he only focuses on the fact that he’s going home.
Achille hears screaming, and screaming, and screaming - it grows as he continues. He hears clashes of blade on blade, buildings on fire collapsing: he’s in a mood for memories, so he’s getting memories. There’s a voice no louder than a whisper he hears: she can’t love you because of who you are. she simply does not understand you yet. the more she knows, the less she will love you because you are not lovable: you are a monster. you are a killer. you are an open wound in the face of the world, and the worst thing is that you are not even going to die. Achille growls saying that it doesn’t know him, and it doesn’t know her.
Silver hears her own voice saying things about how this does not matter, she will die, and she will forget. Silver retorts with she always dies, she always forgets, she will remember. She won’t break the curse this time around (no), she’s going to die (yes). She reassures herself she will come back. They’ll know. He’ll know she has a curse, and he’ll help her. Plus, what’s another death under the belt? It’s just character growth! (laughter)
Zimri hears his father’s voice. The voice calls Zimri mediocre, that he has a legacy to uphold. It says that Zimri is his son and all that is happening is other people carrying him on their backs. The voice says Zimri will die, and he will be embarrassed. Zimri just plays louder to drown the voice out.
Damaris hears a deep voice that says that the party will die, and that she will do this for it (the curse). The voice says that she has this all wrong: it’s not a curse, it’s the only way she can be free. Soldos kept her in a cage, Achille is playing with her: he can always come back regardless. The only thing that Damaris can do is kill him before he gets bored, and then kill the girl (she already did it once, it’ll be easier this time), then that pompous asshole Nymnar because he deserves it (she knows he does), and the kid will die anyway. He might as well get the last semblance of a motherly embrace before he goes. There is water where she is going: find it!
The Netherworld
We emerge and there’s a voice that cries out, “Get them!”