Hi, this is sc Albin, author of the Strega series, and you're listening to Tale of the Manticor.

The following podcast is intended for a mature audience.

Listener discretion is advised.

Welcome back to Tale of the Manticor Season three.

Like the creature from which it takes its name, Tale of the Manticor is a mashup, a cross breeding between two different species of storytelling.

Here you will find the unpredictability of old school paper and dice games with the story craft of a dark fantasy novel.

No character is sacred and none will be spared if the dice decide their fate is at hand.

According to Lare, the Tale of a Manticre is barbed with cruel iron spikes.

There will be much pain in the days ahead.

Last time on Tail of the Mantigor, the last episode concerns the exploration of the newly discovered cottage.

To Achilles's disappointment and frustration, it appears to have been abandoned long ago.

The only thing in the place that attracts any attention is a boot mat, which for some reason agitates Flicker.

Fairwind inspects it and at first finds nothing out of the ordinary, But then he remembers a lesson talked to him long ago by one of the priestesses at the Church of the Sacred Flame until moral.

The lesson was about seeing beyond the apparent to the true nature of things, and the sister used an optical illusion to demonstrate her point.

Thinking of this, Fairwind now notices there's something wrong with the mat and soon recognizes it for the illusion that it is.

Once he sees it, the spell is broken and everyone can see it is not a man at all, but a door.

When Achille opens it, the party is astounded to find themselves looking down into what seems like an underground complex that is being turned on its side.

Chapter forty one, Part one, day thirty six, late afternoon.

Twenty minutes remain in Achilies detect evil spell, mythic event meaning harm, rumor party status Achillee thirteen out of thirteen eight points, Court twenty four of twenty four, de Renni sixteen of sixteen, ten Tier nineteen of nineteen, Fairwind twenty seven of thirty three, Flicker sixteen of sixteen.

Supplies the companions have no food, remaining spells available.

Achillie can cast enlarge message and glitter, dust, cord can cast entangle slow poison and old animal.

Fair Wind can cast cure light, wounds and protection from evil.

Every hidden thing revealed uttered fair wind in a whisper at what they saw.

But even this paled beside the bizarre event that transpired when Achilie put out her foot and stepped into the pit.

The half elf was willing to risk everything to blind trust, well not quite blind.

She had asked that tenttire to take hold of her by her backpack, and so if things did not transpire the way she expected, she was not likely to fall to her death.

She put out her foot and shifted her way forward, and she did not fall.

Instead, all of reality seemed to rotate on its action.

The walls rolled up to either side of her, and when her foot came down, it came down on the carpet.

She breathed out an excited gasp.

Her instinct had been right ahead.

The hallway stretched out before her completely solid.

Gravity was working properly, and her feet felt firm on the ground.

She took a tentative look back over her shoulder and immediately regretted it.

Tenttyr was standing as though stuck by the bottoms of his feet to a wall, except that this wall was actually the floor of the cottage.

The young elf still had his hand out, fingers bladed, as though he had just let go of her pack.

His mouth was an open oh of astonishment.

Achillie's brain lurched, and she felt her equilibrium tilt for a moment, but the feeling passed, and then she was herself again.

She flashed tantyr a hesitant smile.

It's safe, she.

Said, mostly believing it.

I hope my modest skillet writing is enough to have described what has taken place here.

Have you ever seen the movie Labyrinth?

In it, the Goblin King, played by David Bowie navigates a kind of mc escher jumble of staircases, and no matter which way he walks, he is always right side up.

That's the idea I was going for to roll back the tape a little.

It was fair Wind that noticed the initials carved into the front door and suspected right away that the cottage was decoy.

When he dispelled the illusion of the boot mat, his suspicion was proved correct.

But there's much more going on here this place.

I'm going to call it Odoke's Seclusium is built into the ground sideways and by some powerful magic gravity works, so that down is ninety degrees from where it normally would be.

Whether this whole complex is actually dug into the earth, or if the door is a portal to a pocket dimension, well, I haven't actually worked that out yet, and it might not make any difference.

Suffice it to say that the Seclusium is very weird and much, if not everything about it is powered by magic.

Before I return to the narrative, there are a quick pair of roles I need to make because the current event meaning harm rumor has been used.

Actually, the whole idea of a decoy cottage meant to throw off people looking for the owner came from that mythic pair.

Thanks Mythic.

I'm not sure I would have come up with that without you.

Anyway, we need a new event meaning using deep percentile.

I've got ten in ninety six that gives me communicate and the public communicate with the public.

Oh, of course, the way to apply this one is obvious.

Chapter forty one, Part two, Day thirty six, late afternoon, fifteen minutes remain in Achilles Detect Evil Spell.

Mythic event, meaning communicate the public party status.

The party's status is unchanged.

Flicker had bounded in right after Achillia.

To the others, it was as though a magnet had taken hold of the animal and pulled it to the wall as soon as it moved past the threshold.

De Rennie came next, but he had insisted on making everyone wait while he got the rope out of his pack and tied one end to his belt, then with ten tier holding onto the other, he came through with his eyes shut.

When he opened them, he was standing beside a Chillia and the blank dog, and the remainder of the party seemed to fasten to the wall beyond the door by the soles of their boots.

He wiped a bead of sweat from his temple and swallowed hard looking pale Achilia.

He said in a quivering voice that was brave.

She had expected a different word, reckless, stupid, even I.

It was the only thing that made any sense, was her reply, because well, look over there.

She pointed down the core or at the pair of torches attached to the wall, opposite to each other and burning brightly.

The flames were going up in the right direction, when we were outside.

So I just thought she trailed off as ten Tire passed the threshold.

Next, still holding the other end of the rope.

After came Chord with Robin on his head.

Finally, a terrified looking Fairwood stepped through, and the others watched as his whole body pivoted smoothly so that without faltering, he was properly aligned with the rest of them in their new surroundings.

Ah, let's never do that again, the clerk equipped, refusing to look behind him before proceeding.

The companions assumed the following march.

Mortard Renni sword drawn, went first.

Tent Heir also drew his blade and walked behind his brother.

Then came Achillia, who yet maintained her spell of detection with Flicker at her side.

Fairwind was next, and Cord brought up the rear.

The party walked the length of the the corridor, slowly, trying to be alert for any more tricks, illusory or otherwise.

At the midpoint, they passed the pair of torches and now could see the end of the hall and the wooden door at its terminus.

The place was very well maintained.

The carpet was as though new, and the stone work was precise and smooth.

In fact, everything was so perfect looking that Achilia wondered to herself, yet the whole place had not been built by magic.

When they reached the door at the end of the hall, Dranni held up his free hand and pointed first to his ear and then the door, indicating that he intended to listen at it.

He did so, placing his head against the wooden surface beside the handle and closing his eyes in concentration.

Suddenly he jerked away from it with a gasp.

It took a second to see past him to what had been so alarming, but when they did, all the companions fell back in surprise.

The wood of the door had bulged and puckered in the middle.

It continued to morph until it had formed a pair of full wooden lips.

Then the door addressed them in the common tongue, you.

Were trespassing in the home of the great and powerful wizard Odoak Sygog.

Remove yourselves at once, or be repelled.

Though kaw completely off guard, Achilie had dissents to direct her spell of detection at the door.

She was relieved to perceive no evil emanating from it.

To any intent here who did not understand the language of men looked at her questioningly, but she ignored them for now and instead cleared her throat and replied, we.

Seek an audience with Odoak Zygog.

Tell him that Achillea and Muwok word of an apprentice to all day Muog has come to speak with him on a subject of importance.

By the time she had gotten half way through her reply, the wooden lips that sunk back into the surface of the door and were gone.

It was once again just a plain door.

Despite this, the entire party waited to see if there would be a reply.

There was none.

Achilia explained what the door had said to them and how she had responded, adding, I can't go back.

I won't if anyone wants to wait here while I go on ahead, I understand I will not leave your side.

Said Dorenni, And you open the door.

I need to pump the brakes a bit here, because as a DM, I have no idea what is behind that door.

When creating a place for exploration, I'll often use one of several approaches.

There's the pure randomness of rolling on open ended tables.

But I don't often go this route because I feel a dungeon crawl can get stale if it goes on too long, and so a potentially limitless expanse is not ideal.

This kind of thing might work well in a live solo game, but for the audio format, I just feel modules are better when they're fairly brief.

A second option would be to use a limited random table like One Shot in the Dark.

These have plenty of chaos, but it's controlled chaos that gets funneled down to a definite ending and it doesn't take too long to get there.

That system seems to work really well in the audio media, but One Shot in the Dark is not a great choice for Odoke's Seclusium.

It's better suited for caves and crips and dungeons, not for a wizard's home, which will need some specific contents and features.

I think for this place, I need to go dmfat and just generate it as I go.

Still, I want to have some kind of random element, so I'm going to try to use a new event meaning for each room as to when the pieces will find the heart of the Seclusium or reach some kind of goal or end.

I'm going to leave that up to feel I'm hoping I'll just know it when the time is right.

But getting back to the mythic event meaning, I've already used to communicate the public by putting that magic mouth on the door, so I need a new one here.

Come to the rolls fifteen and forty six, give me gratify food.

Okay, I guess I know what kind of room the piecs are going to find.

Next chapter forty one, Part two, Day thirty six, late afternoon, fifteen minutes remain in Achillea's detect evil spell.

Mythic event meaning gratify food party status.

The party status is unchanged.

The door opened into a vestibule some thirty feet wide and twenty across.

Each wall of this room had a door and a pair of torches burned ensconces to either side.

The carpet from the hallway had ended at the door, but a finely made circular mat of brown and green covered most of the floor.

Here.

A pair of framed paintings flanked the door.

Opposite to them, the left painting showed a natural vista very much like those represented in the sketch book Achilie carried, But while those were mere drawings, roughly done in charcoal pencil.

This was made with vibrant oil paints.

The artist, presumably Odok, had a flare for communicating the magist of nature through an economy of bold strokes.

This particular scene showed a shimmering lake cradled at the base of a tree covered mountain.

It is very beautiful.

The painting on the right was not a natural scene but a portrait, presumably a self portrait if that were true, It gave the companions their first look at the famous historian.

In contrast to the other the colors in this painting were muted, as though the artist did not find the subject of his own face as exciting or important as a scene from the natural world.

The face itself was a dignified one and quite old, maybe twenty or thirty years older than fair Wind.

It showed a man with a nearly bald head.

There were tufts of white over each ear, and a beard that was unique in that the must ashes were longer than the hair of the chin.

Zygog's nose was large, and his eyes, surrounded by deep wrinkles, seemed to smile even though the mouth did not, While the portrait only showed him from the shoulders up.

Zygog's rich garment, a robe of red with accents of gold, was visible too.

Achilia found herself troubled by Zygog's face.

In her mind, thus far, she had imagined him to have an imperious and menacing countenance, one she would have to stand up to with courage.

But this face was mild.

It was at odds with the outrage she carried.

She didn't have a plan to deal with a face like this.

It left her feeling confused, even a little cheated.

Conflicted in her heart.

She directed her spell of evil detection at the painting and sensed nothing.

Her face was screwed up in consternation when she turned a court.

Apart from the shorter beard and a lack of hair on top of his head, don't you think he looks a little bit like Voppy?

The construct twisted back and forth to say he did not, and Achilia shrugged, no, I guess not.

Still, that does not look like a cruel face.

Every hidden thing revealed, said Ferwood for the second time in the past five minutes.

We cannot always trust our eyes, Achilie.

And before you ask, I have never seen odok zaigou likeness before and cannot say whether this is he or no.

Achillie did not reply to that, but instead turned to Durani.

Intent here, which door should we try?

She asked in Elvish.

Now was Dourani's turn to shrug.

He indicated the door right in front of them, between the two paintings.

Akilie had noticed that it had a keyhole, whereas the doors to either side did not, but she agreed nonetheless.

Unfortunately, when they tried the handle, the door indeed proved to be locked.

Let's try that way.

Then suggested the off, pointing to the door on their left with the tip of his sword.

This door opened easily when they off tried the handle, and the companions passed into a short connecting hallway before entering a small dining room.

This place was slightly larger in dimension than the vestibule, though not by much.

Its appointments were modest.

There was a table of dark wood set for five torches burned on the walls.

Here too, there was one on the side wall and one on the north.

If cardinal directions were meaningful in a place set into the world sideways, the companion spread out and began to examine the room Tantyer went to listen at a small door set in the west wall.

Cord stood guard at a second, larger door set in the one adjacent.

Achilia, Dornni, and Ferwind inspected the table.

It was set with several types of cutlery at each place.

Notably, one of the chairs was different from the others.

The seat was higher.

Is that to accommodate for a child or a person of short stature.

We can learn much about who lives here by this, commented Dornni, assuming that it is not all part of some elaborate trick.

I'll wait sure that the door by Tentier leads to a panty, replied Achilia, which might also provide some clues.

Flicker wagged her tail as though she understood the word pantry.

When Tanier said he had heard nothing through the door, it was decided that Cord would maintain his post while the rest of them investigated.

It opened into a pantry, just as Achillie had expected for all the magical wonder of the place they were in.

The contents of this small room were mundane salted fish, smoked meat, and an assortment of fresh herbs and vegetables, organized neatly on shelves.

On the floor was a trio of barrels containing a quantity of dried mushrooms, roots, and flour, respectively.

Despite the fact that they had run out of food, the companions took nothing.

After all, they had not come here as thieves.

It doesn't appear that very many people live here.

Achilius remised, as they returned to the dining room.

God, let's see where your door leads.

Well, this has been a fairly innocuous star to the exploration of the Seclusium, considering the warning of the magic mouth, which threatened them if they didn't leave now.

While I do have some ideas about the Seclusium in general, I do not have any granular ones, including for defenses and terrens.

So I'm going to rely on mythic more heavily than usual here.

I know, I said i'd try to use an event meaning for each room, and I've already stretched the last run over three.

But going forward I will try to stick to my word a little better.

And speaking of words, I need a new pair of them.

Rolling twice on the mythic table gives me eighty two and fifty five activity.

Suffering a quick scan of the entire chart shows that there's no separate entry for activate, So I'm going to go with activate suffering.

That's pretty straightforward.

Sounds like the pieces are about to spring some kind of trap just for fun.

How A, but another pair of rolls to determine the nature of this trap, I've got thirty six imitate and seventy five military.

Oh right, that makes total sense.

Chapter forty one, Part three, Day thirty six, late afternoon.

Ten minutes remain in Achilles Detect evil spell mythic of end meaning activate suffering party status.

The party status is unchanged.

Although Achillie could feel that her spell of detection was beginning to wane, she did not object when Durrenny proposed that he listened at the door before opening it.

Frankly, she was surprised to his willing after what had happened last time.

A few moments later, the elf was shaking his dark locks and saying nothing.

Then he pushed on the door, which swung open with a faint creek.

Beyond was a rather large room, some fifty feet square.

The first impression it gave was one of symmetry.

A single door was set in the wall directly opposite to them a pair of torches burned in their sconces, one to either side, in the exact middle of the west and east walls.

In each corner stood a suit of plate and mail armor, posed upright and rigid as though at attention.

These displays had no helms, and so they reminded ten tier of the pair he had found became more crypt But unlike those suits, these were finally polished steel.

They had read ennimal designs worked into their breastplates and gleaming halberds gripped in their gauntleted fists.

Nothing stirred, and the chamber was silent but for the companion's footfalls on the bare stone floor.

This armor might fit fair winds.

Dorannie told a Chilia over his shoulder as he moved towards one of the displays.

Wait a minute, cautioned a Killia.

She closed her eyes and brought up her hands, concentrating on her spell.

Finding nothing, she doubted that it was safe for the oft to continue, and Urannie proceeded while she magically scanned the other three suits to be certain that none of them was more than it appeared.

When she was satisfied, she turned her attention to the pair of torches and began walking towards the one mounted on the east wall.

It occurred to her that where there were torches lit, there must be someone to light them.

Of course, in a place like this, there was also the possibility that the torches were magical in nature.

He had intended to take a closer look, but the moment she reached the midpoint of the room, something happened that drew everyone's attention to the door on the far side.

For the second time, they watched a door transform so that his wooden surface bulged out and assumed a new shape.

At first, it was an eyeball the size of a dinner plate.

The wooden pupil rolled around, taking in each member of the party.

Then its weirdly grained eyelids blinked once twice in a third time.

When they opened this final time, they no longer revealed a rolling eyeball, but a set of teeth, and the eyelids were no longer eyelids, but the lips of a mouth.

After a few more seconds of transformation, the wood had warped into a shape identical to the one that had addressed them before.

He did so again now, and his message this time was subtly different from the first.

You were trespassing in the home of the great and powerful wizard odok.

Zygog, it said, motionless voice.

Drop your weapons and surrender.

Achillie replied, in a voice she hoped sounded strong.

My name is Achillie Muag.

I have come to speak to me.

She didn't even get to finish the sentence.

With a clank, each of the four headless suits of armor animated and stepped off their stands, converging on the party members and corralling them into the center of the room with their leaving halberts.

They clanked forward, pulling back their weapons, ready to strike.

The purpose of this room is to catch any intruder foolish enough to proceed past the Seclusium's first warning.

Let's catch, not necessarily kill.

If the pieces threw down their weapons and surrendered, the animated suits of armour would escort them to some kind of holding cell deeper into complex.

However, if they resist, the armor will fight until destroyed.

It's surprising to me that the BX rules do not have any listing for animated armor in their respective bestiaries.

AD and D two E gives us the helmed horror.

But I'm just going to make up my own monster stats.

I mean, these are pretty straightforward enemies.

Let's see, I'm thinking four hit dice.

I'll just roll up their hit points now sixteen each, as that means the men out it stands.

Armor class will be for plate mail, no shield, probably somewhat slow.

I'll say AC sixteen.

Damage for the Halberg attack will be one to ten.

They are immune to any spells that affect the mind, and they never flee or surrender.

And that's probably all the detail we really need.

If something else comes up, I'll do a ruling on the spot.

The suits of Animated Hour closed in around them.

Drop your weapons and surrender.

Repeated the wooden mouth on the door.

There was no time to make a play.

Achille shot a look at Durni back stern faced, arranging themselves that they stood back to back.

The companions formed a ring.

Within the ring, raised their weapons and prepare to do battle.

Thanks for listening to Tale of the manticor if you'd like to join with other great folks who support the show, there are several different ways to do so.

You can recommend the show online and to friends.

You can like and repost episode announcements on social media.

You can purchase a Tale of the Manticore t shirt at Bareard's dat store or one of my offerings on drive through RPG.

Then, finally, you can rate and review the show on your favorite podcatcher.

All of these things helped us spread the word, yet I truly appreciate the support.

At this point, I'd love to share a listener review.

This one was left on Audible by the lovely guys who make the Pink faux Hawk podcast.

Pink Foe Hawk writes, Tale of the Manticore is an absolute must listen for anyone that loves dark D and D adventure.

The sound design is amazing and the host's incredible storytelling makes it an enthralling journey out of random dice rolls.

The characters are all perfectly written and performed, and the reactions to the fate of the dice are natural and believable, with a few amazing surprises thrown in for good measure.

This podcast single handedly convinced me to pick up old school essentials so that I could play through my own old school D and D stories.

Thanks very very much, Pink fo Hawk, you are my kind of people.

And your podcast is rad I'm excited to hear about your adventures using old school essentials and how it stacks up to Shadow Run.

Next, let's talk about this episode's great cast of voice actors.

Of the usual trio of regulars, this episode features just two Dornni and Faerwind are played by Kylin and Dave Cooper.

Providing the voice of the magic Mouth is the very talented artist Amanda t.

Check out her excellent work on Instagram at Wicked Underscore, Loving Underscore Lies.

That's at Wicked Loving Lies Connected by Underscores.

Thanks very much, Kylin, David, and Amanda.

For those curious to learn more about Tale of the Manticore, I keep a blog where I post all kinds of show on RPG related stuff like sketches, maps, tables, crafts, and show notes.

You can find it at Taleofthemanticore dot com.

To get in touch with me, you can find me at Solo Roleplayers Network dot com.

I'm at Tale of the Manticor dot Blue Sky dot Social, Tale of the Manticore podcast on Instagram, or if you prefer email, taleof Theemticor at gmail dot com.

The adventure will continue on the next episode of tale of the manticor it's the story were KOs roll Us